I would also note, with regards to weapon. As it stands you can't poison Ammo in battle (presumably out of battle you can poison it as per normal. That said the rules are pretty vague on that... some poisons are 1 dose per 3 ammo, and some don't specify so i assume 1:1).
I would greatly prefer they just allow adding profiency bonus to all poison's already set DCs. that way it really represents your character's profiency with them. Whether you fluff that as refining the poison, or your character practicsing the best application sites. INT based 'spell dc' would hurt a lot of folks but would also at least provide reasons to want some INT for certain characters. Which is pretty much a non starter currently that I know of. But as I said. I would really prefer they just also let you add profiency bonus (base amount) to all poison's DCs. Since that would really make it your Niche. Just like the combat feats you mention making it a niche for them.
it is a good point about them never expiring. But that drops off really hard really fast when that DC is insufficent currently. At a certain point its just like the basic poisons you stock up with an alchemy jug. Sure you have a ton, but....they're not really going to work and start to clog up the game requiring an extra save roll every attack. if the DC stays 15 with no sort of bonus. Feels like it should be a short rest, degrade in a day sort of mechanic. though that can result in weirdness with things like elves or coffeelocks and alchemblades.. It basically is cost prohibitive during the points in gameplay where it would be useful. Or at least it feels as such.
buut. feats and multiclassing are optional rules so there should be a line where they dont' balance it in order to make the feat stand on its own. (And leave that balancing point to a gm)
I also freely admit I look at the game through the lens of an Alchemist ARtificer the most. Someone with one attack,, and unfortunately lacking stuff like GFB despite having short ranged abilities in many cases (and multiple reasons to use poison type). So I really want the poison feat for them combat and flavor wise.
....though if it the standard rule for poisons was/is 3ammo per 1 dose. That makes hilariously wonderful combo with the Magic Stone at some levels. Since you make 3 magic stones, which can be used as a weapon attack with a sling. So arguablly is ammo. Though i'd assume 1 dose pepr 1 stone anyway. which would be hard to set up due to bonus actions.
Does it make any damn sense? Not at all. But in every other instance the bow's magical effects somehow translate to its arrows with no loss, and the feat says "you can poison a weapon, and then do the thing when you hit with that weapon". Hitting something with an arrow has always also counted as hitting it with the bow. In point of fact, the arrow never enters into it - all the damage is wrapped up in the bow, the arrows are simply the consumable thing that allows you to make an attack using the bow's statistics. See: the same 'arrows' and 'boilts' working with every make, manner, and size of bow/crossbow despite that making NO GODDAMN SENSE.
If your DM gives you the side eye for poisoning the bow, bring up this exact weirdness and say "By RAW I can't poison the arrows but I can totally poison the bow. You want me to make sense? Work with me here."
An interesting breakdown, especially with the close damage comparison to the two big combat feats. It's worth pointing, though, that Sharpshooter especially is commonly held to be the most overpowered feat in the game. Distance weapon fighters often end up feeling that Sharpshooter is absolutely mandatory, especially those capable of making more than two attacks a turn. Judging Poisoner as lesser than Sharpshooter honestly strikes me as fair, as virtually all feats end up in the same bucket.
The comparison to Great Weapon Master seems more apt to me, especially since Sharpshooter applies to an entire classification of combat - "all ranged weapon attacks" - while Great Weapon Master specifically narrows it down to "Heavy Melee Weapons", which by definition also restricts the feat to two-handed weapons. GWM is specifically the 'Huge Weapon Guy' feat, which feels like a similar breadth of niche to the 'Likes Poisoning Folks' niche. Poisoner requires a bonus action to function at all in combat, and it can 'waste' its damage if you fail to apply it before the poison wears off. The Poisoned condition is very strong, but poison immunity is also nigh-omnipresent. Poisoner does feel like you're not getting much for your fifty gold, but something occurred to me that I just got done double-checking which changes the game, just a little bit.
The 'Potent Poison' you can craft with Poisoner does not expire. Once you make it, it's yours until you use it. This is entirely unlike most other 'Make on [X] rest' feats, where the thingus only lasts until your next long rest. If you want to spend a full eight-hour workday and four hundred gold making twenty or thirty doses of poison, you absolutely can.
This means you can give poison to your allies, and allow them to use their own attacks to deliver your damage provided they have a moment to apply poison prior to combat. It also means you'll never not have poison on your hands. Want to lace the meat you're using the bait guard dogs with poison? Done. Want to use Potent Poison to lace somebody's wine at a gala? Done. Yes, the feat treats Potent Poison as a wound poison, but it doesn't say so. Depending on the DM, you can use it as an ingested poison as well, or work with your artificer buddy (if you're not the party's artificer, which seems unlikely given the nature of the feat) to create aerosoling poison grenades. The feat gives you the ability to manufacture permanent poisons, which seems like something a clever player could use in a great many ways.
After all, neither Sharpshooter nor Great Weapon Master allow you to 'bank' your +10 damage to use when and how you see fit, no matter how long a stretch of time goes between Creation and Use.
So, I can appreciate that Sharpshooter is "so good it's mandatory" for some builds, mostly fighter that I've seen. But we don't have a large variety of damage boosting feats to compare against, so it and GWM are what I use here. It's not that sharpshooter in particular is *that* much better than GWM in a vacuum, it's that it offsets some key weaknesses that ranged attacks often run into (range and cover) and that the Archery fighting style has really great synergy for offsetting its downside.
Sure, "Potent Poison" doesn't expire, and you can make/store as much as you have gold and time for. That's still somewhat limited by your DM giving you the time and money to do the crafting, but definitely helpful in some games. But as has been pointed out, even infinite amounts of DC14 poison at high levels isn't going to do much other than slow down the game as you hope the enemy rolls a 1. And while SS and GWM don't let you "bank" the damage, that's because they don't have to--you have it on-demand whenever you want it with no prep or action cost or usage limit. For Poisoner to have a true "banking" advantage you'd need to be able to stack many doses on one attack, somehow.
Also, while it's true that you can give this poison to allies, that's not a realistic scenario. For anyone other than you, they have to spend an action applying it. And if they don't have poisoner kit proficiency, they take a risk of poisoning themselves in the process. In combat, you only have the bonus action to poison one weapon per round, so why wouldn't you poison your own? I will give you that there might be niche scenarios where the party is ambushing someone and could somehow make this work, but to say those are rare would be an understatement for most tables I've run, played at, or seen.
As an extra thing I just realized. Most things are poison damage immune.. but that does not mean poisoned condition immune. Does it? From a quick search I can't see anything tht specifies they're the same. But I did find things that imply they'r separate Take Yuan Ti race. they call out immunity to the damage and the condition. Where as stuff like the armour and belt only mention poison damage. Then we have stuff like some of the racial abilities that just give advantage to 'poisons' So it seems like there are very much distinctions going on.
I'm not sure about things that just say 'poison' but most of the time if it just says poison its talking a bout giving advantage--not talking about immunities. In fact I off hand don't know a case where it says Immunity but isn't talking about damage. Though I'm sure there is one.but.. that is a distinction point here. PLenty of things are immune to poison damage. But not neccecarily the condition itself. Which is weird...but also a thing that exists.
This also makes me wish my Alchemist got the Contagion spell... because thats pretty compelling debuff.
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As a random 'just me' note of info. I think I've only played 1 game so far (not that I have a huge amount of games in me. maybe 5 diff gm oneshots/games) where I actually got gold income. Sure all of them I had a hand ful, but most of the time we got items and such instead of golds. Unless I purposfully turned down items for them anyway. Same thing often happend to me in pathfidner though. So could be the circles I tend to end up in.
So i am totally biased in the 'cost gold for class features' detail. Excluging material component sort of things.
As an extra thing I just realized. Most things are poison damage immune.. but that does not mean poisoned condition immune. Does it?
[sic]
So i am totally biased in the 'cost gold for class features' detail. Excluging material component sort of things.
Condition Immunity and Damage Immunity are completely separate things. They are even listed under different sections of monsters stat blocks as two separate Immunities.
This is a feat, not a class feature. It is optional for players to take feats. Heck, it is optional for DMs to even allow them.
There appear to be ~24 pages of monsters with immunity to the Poisoned condition, as well. Note that you can find this in the Monsters section with Advanced Filters > Condition Immunity: Poisoned. From a brief browse, these appear to overlap heavily with creatures that have Damage Immunity to Poison
Also, while it's true that you can give this poison to allies, that's not a realistic scenario. For anyone other than you, they have to spend an action applying it. And if they don't have poisoner kit proficiency, they take a risk of poisoning themselves in the process. In combat, you only have the bonus action to poison one weapon per round, so why wouldn't you poison your own? I will give you that there might be niche scenarios where the party is ambushing someone and could somehow make this work, but to say those are rare would be an understatement for most tables I've run, played at, or seen.
Presumably you can still apply poison to your (or an ally's) weapon as an action. So theoretically you could apply poison to two weapons in one turn by using both an action and a bonus action.
Though I'd personally find it be rather dull to just be doing nothing but applying poisons every round.
Yep. But outside of undead, constructs, and deamon/devil sort of thing. Its a fairly okay list. If you exclude those subtypes most of the other ones are relatively okay amounts.
Most of the items I know of that provide poison stuff, usually is just poison resistence without the conditon. Or they provide advantage against poisons. Which will help them beat your DCs but still as a thing at least.
It is just a spice to the character though so I'm pretty alright with that. I'm still hoping for it to be straight up damage + save vs condition. Or the 1/2 damage that ohter poisons do. Doing that plus the resistence bypass, and maybe adding in some sort of boosts to most/all DCs would make me snag it first or fourth level on sevral characters i've got on a back burner. combat chemists based out of Adlet., as well as a build on Sango from Inuyasha.
We'll see~
There is an interesting idea for a low level NPC to just sit back poisoning arrows or weapons. Could be a low level npc with this feat and just random poisons. Would be an interesting spice to the 'protectee npc" situation.
Its interesting that people keep saying "alchemist" because my first thought was rogue, then warlock. I have a yuan-ti warlock with the obvious snake/poison theme who would benefit from this greatly.
I also really like the idea of poisoned darts being a viable substitute for something like a crossbow or a short bow.
I greatly enjoy playing nonstandard weapons, which is why I was so disappointed that the sling was always flatly inferior to even the weakest bow, and that throwing darts used to be 1 damage, (now. 1d4)
For a melee rogue, a rapier is always better that a shortsword.
Adding a little bit of poison to the mix stands to make these overlooked weapons a little bit more viable.
I considder it one of the most important feats in this UA because without bonus action application it is usually a no-go to use poisons. That said, it doesn't solve the other key problem - unscaling low DCs.
In my feedback i suggested removing the resistance-penetration and instead add that when wielding a weapon with poison, the DC can be replaced by the 8+proficiency+characters INT/WIS (characters choice). That would make all poisons somewhat viable lategame, much like low level spells are. It would also give ground for interesting martial builds that have a bit of INT/WIS. It happens to lead into rogue/ranger/artificer which also fit like a glove.
I considder it one of the most important feats in this UA because without bonus action application it is usually a no-go to use poisons. That said, it doesn't solve the other key problem - unscaling low DCs.
In my feedback i suggested removing the resistance-penetration and instead add that when wielding a weapon with poison, the DC can be replaced by the 8+proficiency+characters INT/WIS (characters choice). That would make all poisons somewhat viable lategame, much like low level spells are. It would also give ground for interesting martial builds that have a bit of INT/WIS. It happens to lead into rogue/ranger/artificer which also fit like a glove.
I know there's a rogue subclass (investigator or something?) that focuses on Int, but adding an int requirement to a martial class just feels like a punishment. Forcing another stat dependency just feels like a bad idea.
You're already spending a feat just to make poison usable at all. That's the equivalent of 2 attribute points. Why should it cost more than that? How is that supposed to be fair? Keep the base 14 and then add proficiency bonus to that. Or knock it down to base-10 if you think that's too high.
Also, I'd suggest a houserule where you can negate the 50gp cost to create a poison if you are proficient with a herbalist or alchemist tools and spend two or three hours working with them to gather/brew your own ingredients. Likewise, The Alchemist's Jug should allow you to create large amounts of poison per day for free. (or Mayonnaise, if you prefer)
... Honestly, a lot of this feat feels like it should be standard. The fact that without this trait there's no real way to use poison at all feels like a massive oversight. Being able to make poison should be an action listed in the basic description of the poisoner's kit, alongside the timecosts and gp cost to make it. Having the feat should just make it better. Like the bonus action to apply, or boosting the save DC, or boosting the damage or whatever.
Likewise the basic costs (in gp and time) to brew the different types of healing potions should be listed in the description of the herbalist's kit. (And nonhealing potions like bull's strength and feather-fall should be listed for the alchemist's tools) The blacksmith/woodworker tools should have a basic ruleset for crafting generic non-enchanted weapons or armour baked into them.
Otherwise what do these craftsman proficiency even exist for?
I mean, I'm proficient with a poisoner's kit. Does that not make me a poisoner by default? Does that not imply that I know what i'm doing when it comes to poisons? It says I can "apply my proficiency bonus" when using a poisoner's kit, but there isn't any way to use a poisoner's kit, unless you have this feat.
There don't seem to be any rules about creating poisons, and the list of poisons in the core game is... extremely limited, to say the least. Purple Worm is very powerful, and Wryven seems pretty decent, but Drow is mediocre (and mentions only being used by drow, so it's hard to justify being able to obtain a decent amount of it if you're not in the underdark) and 'basic poison' is... frankly a joke.
A full action to apply, 100gp a pop, DC 10 to just completely ignore it and a terrifying 1d4 damage if it they fail their check. Completely worthless. An absolute waste of a primary action.
Edit: Oh, and yeah. The official version of this feat needs to mention somewhere that poison can be applied to ammunition (it's safe to assume, but it should be written in text anyway) and that the existing rule about one dose of poison covering three pieces of ammunition still applies. 50GP for one swing is very costly. 50GP for three arrows (or darts) is a lot more reasonable.
I"m sure there are tons of issues with it. But I still have fondness ofadding "ability stat" or adding "poisoner's kit" profiencies. Which would result in Rogues, Artfiicers, and bards(?) with the expertise. As well as anyone who wants to invest in getting them. Then just adding that DC to the standard item's DCs.
Though, if I were to do it. I'd make it standardizing 8+profiency in poisoner tools + one of your class's stats. Basically end up making it similiar to standard Class DCs. Using poisoner's tools as the profiency of choice, and would allow the expertise to work on it.
I"m sure there are tons of issues with it. But I still have fondness ofadding "ability stat" or adding "poisoner's kit" profiencies. Which would result in Rogues, Artfiicers, and bards(?) with the expertise. As well as anyone who wants to invest in getting them. Then just adding that DC to the standard item's DCs.
Though, if I were to do it. I'd make it standardizing 8+profiency in poisoner tools + one of your class's stats. Basically end up making it similiar to standard Class DCs. Using poisoner's tools as the profiency of choice, and would allow the expertise to work on it.
but i'm weird.
Frankly, if you spend on of your limited Expertise slots on something as narrow in scope as the poisoner's kit, then you deserve to have a sky-high DC for it.
I mean, that could have been applied to Persuasion, or Sneak, or Thieves Tools so you can pick locks and disarm traps. Instead you spent it on poison. So using poison is probably an essential part of your build.
Uh, i have a vast arsenal of daggers, darts, arrows, javelins, and swords all tied with color coded ribbons to denote which poisons i have applied to them. Fantastic array and extremely versatile. Paired with diviner, i can force a fail, and with hexblades curse, increase odds for that 12d6 purple worm dosed javelin of lightning to go up to 24d6. 2 levels of grave cleric also assures i can put a foe down in short order. Good times. Are there more efficient ways? Certainly, but none as flavorful, to me, for this character.
Does riders like poison roll extra with crits too?
That sounds pretty fun. I've really wanted an Alchemist-Chainlock who combo'd with his spirte. Mind SLiver + Sprite chainlock's poisoned bow shot. The b ow having been infused,sprite poisoend and poisoner poisoned.
Far easier to pull off with a friend using mind sliver though or bane
Does riders like poison roll extra with crits too?
That sounds pretty fun. I've really wanted an Alchemist-Chainlock who combo'd with his spirte. Mind SLiver + Sprite chainlock's poisoned bow shot. The b ow having been infused,sprite poisoend and poisoner poisoned.
Far easier to pull off with a friend using mind sliver though or bane
Depends on what you mean, but generally speaking, no - the need to roll a separate save means the poison's damage isn't part of the attack's damage, for crit purposes. Poisoner poison is particularly weak and therefore easy to understand, as it deals no poison damage on a successful save. It's a more involved question if you use one of the many better poisons available, granted, but the answer is the same.
I'm not aware of any useful interactions with Alchemist, but note that a Sprite's bow with Poisoner poison on the arrow inflicts two Constitution saves, one for poisoned/unconscious and one for poisoned/damage. That might not interact with Mind Sliver the way you want, depending on what order the DM decides to have the saves be made in.
Also note that contrary to what this thread would have you believe, there are rules for using a poisoner's kit without the feat. DMG p258 has rules for harvesting poison from a downed creature, which uses the Nature skill, meaning by definition you can use Poisoner's Kit proficiency instead, or if you have both, roll the higher one with advantage. Xanathar's p128/PHB 187 has rules for using poisoner's kit proficiency to craft poisons - note that across the board, crafting makes the dubious design decision that the size of your proficiency bonus doesn't matter but you have to be actually proficient, so expertise and better stats and so on won't help, and jack of all trades won't qualify. Crafting poison costs more downtime than you probably have - e.g. 1 dose of Assassin's Blood takes 15 workdays. You're far better off in general using the far kinder rules for harvesting, which will let you generate a dose every 1d6 minutes (your GM may rule that corpses can't provide more than one dose, but you can use Find Familiar and Polymorph - and Wild Shape, if you have a Druid - to provide willing subjects to be milked for venom). In terms of a chainlock, I don't know if you can get the poison off a Sprite shortbow, but that poison is weaker than a pseudodragon's sting regardless, or if you want to do poison damage, an imp's sting, so those are the two I'd milk.
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I would also note, with regards to weapon. As it stands you can't poison Ammo in battle (presumably out of battle you can poison it as per normal. That said the rules are pretty vague on that... some poisons are 1 dose per 3 ammo, and some don't specify so i assume 1:1).
I would greatly prefer they just allow adding profiency bonus to all poison's already set DCs. that way it really represents your character's profiency with them. Whether you fluff that as refining the poison, or your character practicsing the best application sites. INT based 'spell dc' would hurt a lot of folks but would also at least provide reasons to want some INT for certain characters. Which is pretty much a non starter currently that I know of. But as I said. I would really prefer they just also let you add profiency bonus (base amount) to all poison's DCs. Since that would really make it your Niche. Just like the combat feats you mention making it a niche for them.
it is a good point about them never expiring. But that drops off really hard really fast when that DC is insufficent currently. At a certain point its just like the basic poisons you stock up with an alchemy jug. Sure you have a ton, but....they're not really going to work and start to clog up the game requiring an extra save roll every attack.
if the DC stays 15 with no sort of bonus. Feels like it should be a short rest, degrade in a day sort of mechanic. though that can result in weirdness with things like elves or coffeelocks and alchemblades.. It basically is cost prohibitive during the points in gameplay where it would be useful. Or at least it feels as such.
buut. feats and multiclassing are optional rules so there should be a line where they dont' balance it in order to make the feat stand on its own. (And leave that balancing point to a gm)
I also freely admit I look at the game through the lens of an Alchemist ARtificer the most. Someone with one attack,, and unfortunately lacking stuff like GFB despite having short ranged abilities in many cases (and multiple reasons to use poison type). So I really want the poison feat for them combat and flavor wise.
....though if it the standard rule for poisons was/is 3ammo per 1 dose. That makes hilariously wonderful combo with the Magic Stone at some levels. Since you make 3 magic stones, which can be used as a weapon attack with a sling. So arguablly is ammo. Though i'd assume 1 dose pepr 1 stone anyway. which would be hard to set up due to bonus actions.
Go along with 5e weirdness and poison the bow.
Does it make any damn sense? Not at all. But in every other instance the bow's magical effects somehow translate to its arrows with no loss, and the feat says "you can poison a weapon, and then do the thing when you hit with that weapon". Hitting something with an arrow has always also counted as hitting it with the bow. In point of fact, the arrow never enters into it - all the damage is wrapped up in the bow, the arrows are simply the consumable thing that allows you to make an attack using the bow's statistics. See: the same 'arrows' and 'boilts' working with every make, manner, and size of bow/crossbow despite that making NO GODDAMN SENSE.
If your DM gives you the side eye for poisoning the bow, bring up this exact weirdness and say "By RAW I can't poison the arrows but I can totally poison the bow. You want me to make sense? Work with me here."
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So, I can appreciate that Sharpshooter is "so good it's mandatory" for some builds, mostly fighter that I've seen. But we don't have a large variety of damage boosting feats to compare against, so it and GWM are what I use here. It's not that sharpshooter in particular is *that* much better than GWM in a vacuum, it's that it offsets some key weaknesses that ranged attacks often run into (range and cover) and that the Archery fighting style has really great synergy for offsetting its downside.
Sure, "Potent Poison" doesn't expire, and you can make/store as much as you have gold and time for. That's still somewhat limited by your DM giving you the time and money to do the crafting, but definitely helpful in some games. But as has been pointed out, even infinite amounts of DC14 poison at high levels isn't going to do much other than slow down the game as you hope the enemy rolls a 1. And while SS and GWM don't let you "bank" the damage, that's because they don't have to--you have it on-demand whenever you want it with no prep or action cost or usage limit. For Poisoner to have a true "banking" advantage you'd need to be able to stack many doses on one attack, somehow.
Also, while it's true that you can give this poison to allies, that's not a realistic scenario. For anyone other than you, they have to spend an action applying it. And if they don't have poisoner kit proficiency, they take a risk of poisoning themselves in the process. In combat, you only have the bonus action to poison one weapon per round, so why wouldn't you poison your own? I will give you that there might be niche scenarios where the party is ambushing someone and could somehow make this work, but to say those are rare would be an understatement for most tables I've run, played at, or seen.
As an extra thing I just realized. Most things are poison damage immune.. but that does not mean poisoned condition immune. Does it? From a quick search I can't see anything tht specifies they're the same. But I did find things that imply they'r separate Take Yuan Ti race. they call out immunity to the damage and the condition. Where as stuff like the armour and belt only mention poison damage. Then we have stuff like some of the racial abilities that just give advantage to 'poisons' So it seems like there are very much distinctions going on.
I'm not sure about things that just say 'poison' but most of the time if it just says poison its talking a bout giving advantage--not talking about immunities. In fact I off hand don't know a case where it says Immunity but isn't talking about damage. Though I'm sure there is one.but.. that is a distinction point here. PLenty of things are immune to poison damage. But not neccecarily the condition itself. Which is weird...but also a thing that exists.
This also makes me wish my Alchemist got the Contagion spell... because thats pretty compelling debuff.
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As a random 'just me' note of info. I think I've only played 1 game so far (not that I have a huge amount of games in me. maybe 5 diff gm oneshots/games) where I actually got gold income. Sure all of them I had a hand ful, but most of the time we got items and such instead of golds. Unless I purposfully turned down items for them anyway. Same thing often happend to me in pathfidner though. So could be the circles I tend to end up in.
So i am totally biased in the 'cost gold for class features' detail. Excluging material component sort of things.
Condition Immunity and Damage Immunity are completely separate things. They are even listed under different sections of monsters stat blocks as two separate Immunities.
This is a feat, not a class feature. It is optional for players to take feats. Heck, it is optional for DMs to even allow them.
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There appear to be ~24 pages of monsters with immunity to the Poisoned condition, as well. Note that you can find this in the Monsters section with Advanced Filters > Condition Immunity: Poisoned. From a brief browse, these appear to overlap heavily with creatures that have Damage Immunity to Poison
Presumably you can still apply poison to your (or an ally's) weapon as an action. So theoretically you could apply poison to two weapons in one turn by using both an action and a bonus action.
Though I'd personally find it be rather dull to just be doing nothing but applying poisons every round.
Yep. But outside of undead, constructs, and deamon/devil sort of thing. Its a fairly okay list. If you exclude those subtypes most of the other ones are relatively okay amounts.
Most of the items I know of that provide poison stuff, usually is just poison resistence without the conditon. Or they provide advantage against poisons. Which will help them beat your DCs but still as a thing at least.
It is just a spice to the character though so I'm pretty alright with that. I'm still hoping for it to be straight up damage + save vs condition. Or the 1/2 damage that ohter poisons do. Doing that plus the resistence bypass, and maybe adding in some sort of boosts to most/all DCs would make me snag it first or fourth level on sevral characters i've got on a back burner. combat chemists based out of Adlet., as well as a build on Sango from Inuyasha.
We'll see~
There is an interesting idea for a low level NPC to just sit back poisoning arrows or weapons. Could be a low level npc with this feat and just random poisons. Would be an interesting spice to the 'protectee npc" situation.
Its interesting that people keep saying "alchemist" because my first thought was rogue, then warlock. I have a yuan-ti warlock with the obvious snake/poison theme who would benefit from this greatly.
I also really like the idea of poisoned darts being a viable substitute for something like a crossbow or a short bow.
I greatly enjoy playing nonstandard weapons, which is why I was so disappointed that the sling was always flatly inferior to even the weakest bow, and that throwing darts used to be 1 damage, (now. 1d4)
For a melee rogue, a rapier is always better that a shortsword.
Adding a little bit of poison to the mix stands to make these overlooked weapons a little bit more viable.
I considder it one of the most important feats in this UA because without bonus action application it is usually a no-go to use poisons. That said, it doesn't solve the other key problem - unscaling low DCs.
In my feedback i suggested removing the resistance-penetration and instead add that when wielding a weapon with poison, the DC can be replaced by the 8+proficiency+characters INT/WIS (characters choice). That would make all poisons somewhat viable lategame, much like low level spells are. It would also give ground for interesting martial builds that have a bit of INT/WIS. It happens to lead into rogue/ranger/artificer which also fit like a glove.
I know there's a rogue subclass (investigator or something?) that focuses on Int, but adding an int requirement to a martial class just feels like a punishment.
Forcing another stat dependency just feels like a bad idea.
You're already spending a feat just to make poison usable at all. That's the equivalent of 2 attribute points. Why should it cost more than that? How is that supposed to be fair?
Keep the base 14 and then add proficiency bonus to that. Or knock it down to base-10 if you think that's too high.
Also, I'd suggest a houserule where you can negate the 50gp cost to create a poison if you are proficient with a herbalist or alchemist tools and spend two or three hours working with them to gather/brew your own ingredients. Likewise, The Alchemist's Jug should allow you to create large amounts of poison per day for free. (or Mayonnaise, if you prefer)
... Honestly, a lot of this feat feels like it should be standard. The fact that without this trait there's no real way to use poison at all feels like a massive oversight.
Being able to make poison should be an action listed in the basic description of the poisoner's kit, alongside the timecosts and gp cost to make it. Having the feat should just make it better. Like the bonus action to apply, or boosting the save DC, or boosting the damage or whatever.
Likewise the basic costs (in gp and time) to brew the different types of healing potions should be listed in the description of the herbalist's kit. (And nonhealing potions like bull's strength and feather-fall should be listed for the alchemist's tools)
The blacksmith/woodworker tools should have a basic ruleset for crafting generic non-enchanted weapons or armour baked into them.
Otherwise what do these craftsman proficiency even exist for?
I mean, I'm proficient with a poisoner's kit. Does that not make me a poisoner by default? Does that not imply that I know what i'm doing when it comes to poisons?
It says I can "apply my proficiency bonus" when using a poisoner's kit, but there isn't any way to use a poisoner's kit, unless you have this feat.
There don't seem to be any rules about creating poisons, and the list of poisons in the core game is... extremely limited, to say the least.
Purple Worm is very powerful, and Wryven seems pretty decent, but Drow is mediocre (and mentions only being used by drow, so it's hard to justify being able to obtain a decent amount of it if you're not in the underdark) and 'basic poison' is... frankly a joke.
A full action to apply, 100gp a pop, DC 10 to just completely ignore it and a terrifying 1d4 damage if it they fail their check.
Completely worthless. An absolute waste of a primary action.
Edit: Oh, and yeah. The official version of this feat needs to mention somewhere that poison can be applied to ammunition (it's safe to assume, but it should be written in text anyway) and that the existing rule about one dose of poison covering three pieces of ammunition still applies.
50GP for one swing is very costly. 50GP for three arrows (or darts) is a lot more reasonable.
I"m sure there are tons of issues with it. But I still have fondness ofadding "ability stat" or adding "poisoner's kit" profiencies. Which would result in Rogues, Artfiicers, and bards(?) with the expertise. As well as anyone who wants to invest in getting them. Then just adding that DC to the standard item's DCs.
Though, if I were to do it. I'd make it standardizing 8+profiency in poisoner tools + one of your class's stats. Basically end up making it similiar to standard Class DCs. Using poisoner's tools as the profiency of choice, and would allow the expertise to work on it.
but i'm weird.
Frankly, if you spend on of your limited Expertise slots on something as narrow in scope as the poisoner's kit, then you deserve to have a sky-high DC for it.
I mean, that could have been applied to Persuasion, or Sneak, or Thieves Tools so you can pick locks and disarm traps.
Instead you spent it on poison. So using poison is probably an essential part of your build.
I'm biased because I am an Alchemist.
so. level 6 I get auto tool expertises haha. I adore having them and love getting all those.
Uh, i have a vast arsenal of daggers, darts, arrows, javelins, and swords all tied with color coded ribbons to denote which poisons i have applied to them. Fantastic array and extremely versatile. Paired with diviner, i can force a fail, and with hexblades curse, increase odds for that 12d6 purple worm dosed javelin of lightning to go up to 24d6. 2 levels of grave cleric also assures i can put a foe down in short order. Good times. Are there more efficient ways? Certainly, but none as flavorful, to me, for this character.
Does riders like poison roll extra with crits too?
That sounds pretty fun. I've really wanted an Alchemist-Chainlock who combo'd with his spirte. Mind SLiver + Sprite chainlock's poisoned bow shot. The b ow having been infused,sprite poisoend and poisoner poisoned.
Far easier to pull off with a friend using mind sliver though or bane
Depends on what you mean, but generally speaking, no - the need to roll a separate save means the poison's damage isn't part of the attack's damage, for crit purposes. Poisoner poison is particularly weak and therefore easy to understand, as it deals no poison damage on a successful save. It's a more involved question if you use one of the many better poisons available, granted, but the answer is the same.
I'm not aware of any useful interactions with Alchemist, but note that a Sprite's bow with Poisoner poison on the arrow inflicts two Constitution saves, one for poisoned/unconscious and one for poisoned/damage. That might not interact with Mind Sliver the way you want, depending on what order the DM decides to have the saves be made in.
Also note that contrary to what this thread would have you believe, there are rules for using a poisoner's kit without the feat. DMG p258 has rules for harvesting poison from a downed creature, which uses the Nature skill, meaning by definition you can use Poisoner's Kit proficiency instead, or if you have both, roll the higher one with advantage. Xanathar's p128/PHB 187 has rules for using poisoner's kit proficiency to craft poisons - note that across the board, crafting makes the dubious design decision that the size of your proficiency bonus doesn't matter but you have to be actually proficient, so expertise and better stats and so on won't help, and jack of all trades won't qualify. Crafting poison costs more downtime than you probably have - e.g. 1 dose of Assassin's Blood takes 15 workdays. You're far better off in general using the far kinder rules for harvesting, which will let you generate a dose every 1d6 minutes (your GM may rule that corpses can't provide more than one dose, but you can use Find Familiar and Polymorph - and Wild Shape, if you have a Druid - to provide willing subjects to be milked for venom). In terms of a chainlock, I don't know if you can get the poison off a Sprite shortbow, but that poison is weaker than a pseudodragon's sting regardless, or if you want to do poison damage, an imp's sting, so those are the two I'd milk.