D&D: Five Surprisingly Useful Feats
You’ve seen the best, you’ve seen the worst. But don’t sleep on these five surprisingly useful feats. That would be uncomfortable.
Feats are one of the most popular sets of optional rules in D&D. The right ones can make or break a character. But you might not have noticed these ones, or given them their due. These underrated feats might not shine like Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter, but they’re five surprisingly useful feats you won’t want to miss.
Ritual Caster
First off, Ritual Caster is one of those feats that when you read it, you might think “oh okay that’s for spellcasters.” And yes, most spellcasters can get a lot out of the Ritual Caster feat. But look carefully at what it does.
When you pick the feat, you pick a spellcasting class: bard, cleric, druid, sorcerer, warlock, or wizard, and then get a spellbook with two 1st-level spells from their lists. The spells must have the ritual tag, sure.
But that means you can cast the spells without having to spend spell slots. And you can acquire more from scrolls or other spellbooks that have the spells written down. Which is huge for characters who aren’t mages. To start with, this gets you access to spells like:
- Find familiar
- Comprehend languages
- Detect magic
And that’s just the start. Higher-level rituals include spells like water breathing and telepathic bond. They can change the game and you don’t expend any resources (outside of gold pieces) to do it.
And you don’t even have to be a spellcaster. You could be a Fighter, take the feat, and be good to go. You do have to have an Intelligence or Wisdom of 13 or higher, but that’s not a problem for you, right?
Moderately Armored
Moderately armored is a unique stand out among the armor proficiency feats. Again, at first glance, it seems pretty straightforward. You get proficiency with Medium Armor. And you get to increase your strength or dex by one, which is always handy.
But you also get proficiency with Shields. This means there’s a much bigger potential jump in AC than from no armor to Light Armor, or from Medium Armor to Heavy.
Going from no armor to the best light armor is a jump of +2 AC.
Going from the best light armor to the best medium armor is a jump of +3 AC, + another 2 to your AC because you can wield a shield. For a potential +5 to your AC all for a single feat.
In contrast, going from the best medium armor to the best heavy armor only nets you an extra +1 potential AC (assuming your Dex bonus was a +2 for Half Plate). It’s not the kind of feat you’d take every time, but it packs a surprising amount of value into one package.
Magic Initiate
Magic Initiate is another great fight. It’s a lot like Ritual Caster and you probably wouldn’t take both, unless you really wanted to spend extra feats.
But Magic Initiate gets you access to two cantrips, expanding your repertoire in and out of combat. And you get a 1st level spell from the same list you picked your cantrips from. This means you can pick up something like mage hand and fire bolt and magic missile and turn a stalwart Fighter into an apprentice mage. Or you could pick up a spell like disguise self and round out your nonmagical rogue with cantrips like minor illusion and light.
Inspiring Leader
Inspiring Leader is a surprisingly useful feat. At first glance, it seems weird. It takes 10 minutes to activate, you can only do it once per rest, and it gives you just a few extra hit points.
But when you get right down to it, those extra hit points add up real quick. At 1st level, the earliest you could possibly have this, you can potentially give out 4 or 5 extra hit points to up to six friendly creatures including yourself. And you get to make a cool inspiring speech.
That’s giving out 24-30 hit points effectively for free every rest. It doesn’t take any spell slots, so healers might love it. It’s something any character can do.
And as you level up, the hit points scale along with you and can mean the difference between winning and losing that critical fight.
Fey Touched
Fey touched is also just fantastic. It is a much more specific kind of magic initiate. You get to increase one of your mental stats by one, and then you get the misty step spell and one 1st level spell of your choice from Divination of Enchantment.
One feat can get you a 2nd level spell, a 1st level spell, and is available as early as you can take it. Even at 1st level, you could have this. It’s a free teleport and a free divination or enchantment once per long rest. But if you have spell slots, you can keep them going, they’re basically added to your spells known/prepared lists for free as well.
Happy adventuring!
