Polearm Feats and Polearm Ranger Style

Hello, dear readers.  Long time, no see.  I'm pretty well settled back on my home continent now, sadly very far away from any castles but very close to all my RPG books.  I'm sorry for the lack of updates recently, but that changes now.  I'm getting back on schedule and bringing you more content every Monday.

Today, as I promised long ago, I've written up a selection of feats centered on making polearms a more appealing weapon choice for adventurers.  While all of these feats are great for people that use polearms, a number of them will also be of interest to adventurers who don't keep their weapons on the end of a ten-foot pole.

And, now that polearms have more feat support, I've also made a polearm fighting style for rangers.  I know at least two of my players have expressed a desire to play a polearm ranger and been frustrated by the lack of options available to them.  Rangers seem like they would be well-suited to polearms; they tend to seek out and fight a lot of scary stuff, and in my experience it's often best to have ten feet of weapon between you and scary things.

Before I start, I'd like to give a shout-out to Kobold Quarterly for the Reflexive Brace feat they published in The Cavalier's Creed.  The feat lets you ready a brace weapon against a charge as an immediate action, making the brace weapon quality a lot more useful.  It's exactly the sort of polearm-centric feat I wanted to see.

The following text in gold is available as Open Game Content under the OGL. Open Game Content is (C)2014 Jonah Bomgaars.

Powerful Brace (Combat)

You deal more damage when bracing against a charge.

   Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +6

   Benefit: When you make a successful attack of opportunity against a charging opponent by setting a weapon with the brace quality against the charge, your weapon deals triple damage.

   Normal: A charging enemy struck by your brace weapon takes double damage.

Stopping Power (Combat)

Your braced weapon can stop a charging opponent.

   Prerequisite: Str 15, base attack bonus +1

   Benefit: When you successfully strike a charging opponent with a braced weapon, the opponent must overcome your CMD or be unable to continue the charge.  The opponent must be no larger than one size category larger than you.  The opponent takes damage from your attack of opportunity as normal.  If you are within the charging creature’s threatened area at the point where it is stopped, its charge attack can still be made against you as normal.  Otherwise, the attack is wasted and the opponent’s turn ends. 

Greater Stopping Power (Combat)

Your braced weapon can stop even larger opponents in their tracks.

   Prerequisite: Stopping Power, Str 17, base attack bonus +4

   Benefit: You gain the benefits of the Stopping Power feat against creatures of any size category.

Stand Back (Combat)

You can make opponents stand still with your reach weapon.

   Prerequisite: Stand Still

   Benefit: You gain the benefits of the Stand Still feat against opponents in all squares which you threaten while wielding a reach weapon. 

   Normal: Stand Still only applies to opponents moving through adjacent squares. 

   Special: This feat does not grant you the ability to make Stand Still attacks with non-reach weapons if it is gained without having the Stand Still feat (e.g., via the ranger’s fighting style special ability).

Forced Dismount (Combat)

Your reach weapon can knock an opponent off their mount.

   Prerequisite: Str 13, base attack bonus +2

   Benefit: When you strike a mounted opponent with a reach weapon, they must make a Ride check (DC 5 + damage dealt) or be knocked from the saddle and land prone behind their mount. 

   Normal: Staying in the saddle after taking damage is only a DC 5 Ride check. 

Pole-Weapon Defense (Combat)

You are skilled at defending yourself with the haft of your polearm.

   Prerequisite: Dex 15

   Benefit: While wielding any two-handed polearm (awl pike, bardiche, bec de corbin, bill, fauchard, fauchard-fork, glaive, glaive-guisarme, great morningstar, guisarme, halberd, longspear, lucerne hammer, mancatcher, military fork, partisan, pike, pollaxe, ranseur, spear, spetum, voulge, voulge-guisarme), you gain a +1 shield bonus to your AC.

   When you are fighting defensively or using the total defense action, this shield bonus increases to +2. 

Backswing Maneuver (Combat)

When you miss an attack with your polearm, you can make a combat maneuver attempt at a penalty.

   Prerequisite: Combat Reflexes, base attack bonus +6

   Benefit: When you miss with a polearm that you are proficient in which has the disarm or trip special qualities (bill, glaive-guisarme, guisarme, halberd, partisan, pollaxe, ranseur, spetum, voulge-guisarme), you can expend one attack of opportunity to make a disarm or trip attempt against that same opponent at a -4 penalty. 

Improved Backswing Maneuver (Combat)

You are skilled at tripping or disarming your opponents on the backswing.

   Prerequisite: Backswing Maneuver, base attack bonus +10

   Benefit: The penalty for making a disarm or trip attack on the backswing is reduced to -2.

Whirlwind Trip (Combat)

You can attempt to trip every foe within reach.

   Prerequisite: Dex 13, Combat Expertise, Dodge, Mobility, Spring Attack, base attack bonus +4

   Benefit: When wielding a weapon that has the trip weapon quality, as a full-attack action, you can make one trip attempt against each opponent within reach.  You must make a separate roll against each opponent. 

   When you use Whirlwind Trip, you also forfeit any bonus or extra attacks granted by other feats, spells, or abilities. 

   Special: If you also have Whirlwind Attack and Improved Trip, you can make a Whirlwind Trip with any weapon, not just one with the trip special quality. 

Polearm Combat Style

If the Ranger selects polearm style, he can choose from the following list whenever he gains a Combat Style feat:

Forced Dismount, Pole-Weapon Defense, Reflexive Brace, Stand Back, and Stopping Power

• At 6th level, he adds: Backswing Maneuver, Greater Stopping Power, Lunge, and Powerful Brace.
• At 10th level, he adds: Disarming Strike, Improved Backswing Maneuver, Tripping Strike, and Whirlwind Trip. 

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As always, I can only playtest so much.  Please use these in your game and leave a comment telling me how they worked out for you.  Now get out there and play some polearm rangers!

-your 10-foot d20 despot