Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

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Morgy
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Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Morgy » Fri Aug 19, 2022 7:10 pm

Hello!

Currently Favored souls only get one martial epic bonus feat to choose from - armour skin. Most FS PCs are played at melee'rs, which given the massive amount of attack boosting spells, makes sense. However, the bonus feats don't really reflect this, as they are almost entirely casting bonus feats - great/epic foci, epic spells, greater cha.

Would it be possible to add more martial options? Like epic weapon focus or prowess? I think this would fit the theme of the class as it is currently designed.

With the domain and path changes to cleric, War Priest is just so much better than Favored Soul for melee. This might help bring things a little more into line between the classes, by adding some more flexibility to FS.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Stop. Ninja Time » Fri Aug 19, 2022 7:19 pm

While at it, it'd be a nice QoL to port some of the path bonuses over to FS.

I don't play an FS myself, but it has to be pretty disappointing that warpriests get free caster level boosts, refunds on most of their combat spells, massive temp hit points, and auto extended main buffs, domain spells and powers. Of course, they do give up summons/epic spell foci for it.

While the FS gets... A couple of elemental resistances.

At the least FS should get better proficiencies and the CL bonus (like spellsword/warpriest) given they basically are required to dip since they lack discipline.

It'd be nice to see FS get:

- Better bonus feats as the OP says
- Their deity's favoured weapon (or martial, at least)
- CL bonus at 21+
- Longer lasting buffs - an extended divine power is going to last an entire PVP fight anyways, so it'd be mostly QoL for dungeons

It'd be nice if they also got weapon focus in their deity's weapon and maaaaybe weapon spec, but I imagine due to weapon grouping that's very hard to do.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Ork » Fri Aug 19, 2022 7:38 pm

FS gets the same bonus feats list as clerics. I'd also like to see their list expanded as it is sad to be forced to pick great wisdom at L26.

Overall, these classes cance a fine line between good and overpowered. Adding anything should be carefully considered, especially for favored soul - very powerful class already.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Purplemyst » Fri Aug 19, 2022 8:04 pm

Ork wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 7:38 pm
FS gets the same bonus feats list as clerics. I'd also like to see their list expanded as it is sad to be forced to pick great wisdom at L26.

Overall, these classes cance a fine line between good and overpowered. Adding anything should be carefully considered, especially for favored soul - very powerful class already.
I haven't played a favoured soul but would be interested to know what makes them powerful. The only thing I can think of is a dip BG/Hex/pally dip and even then you can only get the cha saves.

I've recently been looking into creating a new divine character and I was personally put off playing a FS after reading about the cleric paths and synergies. To me cleric is in a lot better spot rn and it felt like I'd hinder my character by choosing FS.

Now I'm wondering if there is something that brings it into line with cleric that I missed.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Eyeliner » Fri Aug 19, 2022 8:15 pm

Most of the power is WoF spam, I think. I played a caster FS once... It was okay. Both melee and casters were more enticing before the cleric overhaul.

I admit I have no idea what the options are with battlecleric/FS synergy since I'd just rather play a cleric anyway.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Aug 19, 2022 8:45 pm

Purplemyst wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 8:04 pm
Now I'm wondering if there is something that brings it into line with cleric that I missed.
Spontaneous casting is a pretty big deal. It also has more spells per day, and makes an excellent battle-fs with a lot of heals and harms and likely strong dispels. It also has a good spell selection. Cleric has more limited spell selection and depending on their domain choice they might have more important spells but will almost always give up something very useful FS will have. I think Warpriest is arguably stronger but they are quite different. Warpriest has higher uptime on some spells and epic spec, but wont have access to summoning like Gate et cetra so they are different enough that it's hard to compare. Warpriest also has longer wind up because of divine might/shield.

Now regarding the bonus feats. I've brought this matter to the devs before (aka I can only pick great wisdom/charisma here if I dont use it for epic spell focus, and it sucks) and I understand that it's intentional for balance reasons.

I think the solution is to take Armor skin and ESF (or just gsf if it's too tight on feats) abjuration on the bonus feats.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Morgy » Fri Aug 19, 2022 9:28 pm

FS is good at spontaneous pvp, I’d say that’s all it has that brings it close to War Priest.. which doesn’t need as many casts anyway because of doubled spell durations.

FS is okay, buts it’s by no means top tier and is very limited in diversity.

Even being able to take arcane defensive feats would be nice for useful, non casting feats.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Stop. Ninja Time » Fri Aug 19, 2022 10:02 pm

FS/Sorc are mostly only good at PVP, and even then they're outshone pretty easily by book casters in most situations. Sure a favoured soul/sorc might be able to out buff and win a fight from sheer spell slots against many enemies, but once they get scrolls the book casters make up for that lack.

Other than epic spell focus (which why does Shaman get a free one, but FS gets none?), and summons, FS is really a lot weaker than Warpriest.

Not to say FS is bad, at all; but it's certainly far from the best buff-and-bash (warpriest and spellsword knock them out of the water), and far from the best caster (invoker/cleric/wizard will far outshine). Even as a hybrid class, spellsword/warpriest will outdo them.

But it's really the diversity that is the issue here, a FS that dips for anything less than 30FS effectively is required to spend 2 feats on Arcane Defense Abjuration to compete, otherwise lose 25-40% of their buffs on a dispel. They don't get discipline so they're basically required to dip. Given all your main buffs are rounds/level and divine favor is 1 minute long, you're basically required to take extend.

So you have a class that has 3 feats chosen for them, a lousy epic bonus feat pool to choose from, and their main benefit is a few extra spellcastings? Clerics can just refund instead and match them in spellcastings/day with more versatility and diversity.

Also contrary to popular belief, WoF spam from FS doesn't make them any more powerful than a cleric. A cleric can already spam it more than enough for any PVP fight, and worst case can just use scrolls. You can only cast it every 3 rounds, and most fights are over within 12 rounds (four castings).

Would just be nice overall for favoured souls to be more interesting to play outside of PVP!

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Morgy » Sat Aug 20, 2022 3:59 am

Stop. Ninja Time wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 10:02 pm
FS/Sorc are mostly only good at PVP, and even then they're outshone pretty easily by book casters in most situations. Sure a favoured soul/sorc might be able to out buff and win a fight from sheer spell slots against many enemies, but once they get scrolls the book casters make up for that lack.

Other than epic spell focus (which why does Shaman get a free one, but FS gets none?), and summons, FS is really a lot weaker than Warpriest.

Not to say FS is bad, at all; but it's certainly far from the best buff-and-bash (warpriest and spellsword knock them out of the water), and far from the best caster (invoker/cleric/wizard will far outshine). Even as a hybrid class, spellsword/warpriest will outdo them.

But it's really the diversity that is the issue here, a FS that dips for anything less than 30FS effectively is required to spend 2 feats on Arcane Defense Abjuration to compete, otherwise lose 25-40% of their buffs on a dispel. They don't get discipline so they're basically required to dip. Given all your main buffs are rounds/level and divine favor is 1 minute long, you're basically required to take extend.

So you have a class that has 3 feats chosen for them, a lousy epic bonus feat pool to choose from, and their main benefit is a few extra spellcastings? Clerics can just refund instead and match them in spellcastings/day with more versatility and diversity.

Also contrary to popular belief, WoF spam from FS doesn't make them any more powerful than a cleric. A cleric can already spam it more than enough for any PVP fight, and worst case can just use scrolls. You can only cast it every 3 rounds, and most fights are over within 12 rounds (four castings).

Would just be nice overall for favoured souls to be more interesting to play outside of PVP!
These are basically my thoughts, but written out articulately. 😬

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Yvesza » Sat Aug 20, 2022 5:45 am

The argument regarding discipline and AD: Abjuration sort of rings true for every class that casts, it's not uniquely a problem for FS. Very few classes can avoid feat tax and it's worth noting that the spell list for FS is very, very good. They can cast a significant number of spontaneous harms, gates, WoF's and even the lower DC on the low charisma SoV will still be high enough to challenge the saves of a lot of enemies.
I think that's maybe getting a bit away from the subject of the thread though, I don't really think opening up the options for FS really changes much for them? They're still taking very similar if not the same feats, just the ordering can be moved around a bit? I think the issue really stems from the fact that the class really doesn't do anything other than be a spontaneous divine class.
The class has sort of fallen behind compared to clerics and shamans though, at least so far as being somewhat forced into one particular build without much wiggle room to do much outside of that.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Stop. Ninja Time » Sat Aug 20, 2022 6:25 am

The argument regarding discipline and AD: Abjuration sort of rings true for every class that casts, it's not uniquely a problem for FS. Very few classes can avoid feat tax and it's worth noting that the spell list for FS is very, very good.
To my point though, the other two buff and bash classes (warpriest and spellsword) get bonus +3 bonus caster levels versus dispels, acknowledging their reliance on their buffs. Even paladin does. Oddly spellsword and paladin both get discipline too.

The other caster classes are not as reliant on buffs. Druids go 30 almost exclusively anyways, melee non-warpriest clerics are rare, and shaman is more designed for summon spam and buffing than it is for fighting in melee itself.

So yes, other caster classes have to go through this, but the favoured soul is the only one that is directly buff and bash and becomes useless from a decent dispel, so is far more reliant.
They can cast a significant number of spontaneous harms, gates, WoF's and even the lower DC on the low charisma SoV will still be high enough to challenge the saves of a lot of enemies.
Sure, but gate scrolls are just as good as gate castings, and how many SoVs do you need in a fight? Harm is easy to counter (though in PvE at least it is uncommon), and you're rarely going to need more than 4-5 WoF in a fight, which a cleric can easily get 7 which is what 2-3 less than a FS?

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by AstralUniverse » Sat Aug 20, 2022 8:03 am

Well, forgive me for being too lazy to provide links to previous threads but before cleric had the juicy domains and paths they have right now FS really cast big shadow on cleric in both pvp and pve. I reiterate that spontaneous casting is a pretty big deal. I think we're in a pretty good spot right now. A battle cleric/fs should likely want ad-abjure very badly so they can use that semi-useless bonus feat on 26th for gsf abjuration or esf abjuration. So over all I dont think it's a big deal.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Morgy » Sat Aug 20, 2022 8:15 am

AstralUniverse wrote:
Sat Aug 20, 2022 8:03 am
Well, forgive me for being too lazy to provide links to previous threads but before cleric had the juicy domains and paths they have right now FS really cast big shadow on cleric in both pvp and pve. I reiterate that spontaneous casting is a pretty big deal. I think we're in a pretty good spot right now. A battle cleric/fs should likely want ad-abjure very badly so they can use that semi-useless bonus feat on 26th for gsf abjuration or esf abjuration. So over all I dont think it's a big deal.
As pointed out before, the War Priest (battle cleric), already gets +3 dispel resistance in epic levels, thus meaning it can get a 3 level dip without needing to take arcane Defense. Whilst spontaneous casting is decent, this doesn’t really detract from the point that the bonus epic feats could use some more variety. Clerics already have far superior variety and the war priest currently overtakes FS in combat potential.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by AstralUniverse » Sat Aug 20, 2022 9:45 am

If you warpriest isnt 23 wp, 4 fighter, 3 tumble+umd dip (or 21, 5 zhent/harper, 4 fighter) I dont know what you're doing and I dont personally see much point discussing niche suboptimal builds in regards to balance. FS is fine. It can summon, it has more spell slots and they're spontaneous. It may be slightly weaker than warpriest straight melee but it is also not just limited to melee and can also be a caster and it has summons so it's really not as one dimensional as people make it to be in this thread in my opinion. I also think that if the epic bonus feat selection being too narrow is decided to be a problem, then it should be considered equally a problem for both classes anyway.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Stop. Ninja Time » Sat Aug 20, 2022 2:49 pm

AstralUniverse wrote:
Sat Aug 20, 2022 9:45 am
If you warpriest isnt 23 wp, 4 fighter, 3 tumble+umd dip (or 21, 5 zhent/harper, 4 fighter) I dont know what you're doing and I dont personally see much point discussing niche suboptimal builds in regards to balance. FS is fine. It can summon, it has more spell slots and they're spontaneous. It may be slightly weaker than warpriest straight melee but it is also not just limited to melee and can also be a caster and it has summons so it's really not as one dimensional as people make it to be in this thread in my opinion. I also think that if the epic bonus feat selection being too narrow is decided to be a problem, then it should be considered equally a problem for both classes anyway.
I also agree on not discussing niche suboptimal builds like 23wp/4fighter/3 tumble/umd dip.

I'm not sure how anything you've said here is contrary to the points above though, other than throwing out a random suboptimal build.

Clerics already have a better epic bonus feat selection, not that they couldn't get more. I'd have to disagree about it not being one dimensional. As stated by a few people - FS might have more spellslots, but warpriest has both refund and less need for those spellslots by auto extended (and can double extend) the spellslots that matter. Warpriest have more HP, more AC, more damage, better bonus feat selection, better CL, better diversity.

While filling the same buff and bash role.

Summoning doesn't make up for that, especially when WoF exists. Especially when, as you point out, warpriests have easier access to UMD, discipline and tumble.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Ork » Sat Aug 20, 2022 3:10 pm

Cleric bonus feats and favored soul bonus feats are identical.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Xerah » Sat Aug 20, 2022 3:41 pm

Stop. Ninja Time wrote:
Sat Aug 20, 2022 2:49 pm
I also agree on not discussing niche suboptimal builds like 23wp/4fighter/3 tumble/umd dip.
Uh, what? How is this a niche suboptimal build?

What do you think is the optimal war priest build then? Even if you have an answer, the above is not a "niche" build.
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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by Morgy » Sat Aug 20, 2022 4:58 pm

I think we are dwelling a bit to heavily on this comparison. I’m not opposed to some more feat variety for clerics either, even if both were to have some extra options like meta magic feats instead.

Currently playing less than 27 FS is really dispel bait, and given this, it would be nice to have other options for the two epic bonus feats in this range. Small change that would improve life a little for FS and doesn’t turn it into anything much more powerful than it is.

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Re: Favored Soul - Bonus Feats

Post by AstralUniverse » Sat Aug 20, 2022 6:35 pm

Stop. Ninja Time wrote:
Sat Aug 20, 2022 2:49 pm
I also agree on not discussing niche suboptimal builds like 23wp/4fighter/3 tumble/umd dip.

I'm not sure how anything you've said here is contrary to the points above though, other than throwing out a random suboptimal build.
LOL

So what is the optimal warpriest then?

I also addressed everything you said already in the post you literally quoted. FS is fine.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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