A Player's Guide to Feats - Athlete
The Athlete Feat is one of the most maligned feats out there, which may or may not be deserved. This isn't to say that it's a feat worth taking. Still, it does have some redeeming qualities. It has the potential to be a usable feat. Hopefully, changes will be made to buff the feat to become something decent. However, we are stuck with this incarnation of the Athlete feat, so let's look at what it can do and how it may not be as bad as everyone thinks.
What is the Athlete Feat?
The Athlete feat is the best if your character goes to the Olympics. Unfortunately, they probably aren't.
You have undergone extensive physical training to gain the following benefits:
Increase your Strength or Dexterity score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
When you are prone, standing up uses only 5 feet of your movement.
Climbing doesn't cost you extra movement.
You can make a running long jump or a running high jump after moving only 5 feet on foot, rather than 10 feet.
Player's Handbook
Dissecting the Feat
The Athlete Feat has four main components, more than most of the feats for the 5th edition. It's probably because they know the feat only brings a little to the table. This feels true and is a crappy way to build a feat. The number of benefits per feat in One D&D may be similar to this feat, but we'll have to wait and see.
Increase your Strength or Dexterity. When this is the best part of the feat, you know there's a problem. Don't get me wrong, adding anything to an ability score is excellent, and this has benefits if either of your stats is an odd number. But do the other feat's traits make it with taking ASI and two points? This all depends on what else the feat brings to the table, and unfortunately, in this case, it's not very much.
Being Prone. More creatures can knock you prone than you may think. From the CR 1/4 boar with its charge attack to the most powerful creature in the game, the CR 30 tarrasque when it swallows you. Being prone means your only movement option is to crawl unless it stands up, have disadvantage on attack rolls, and attacks you at advantage if within 5 feet of the creature. To get up, you'll need to use half your movement speed to do so. For example, if you have 30 feet of movement, it will cost you 15 feet. It may not seem like a lot, but it severely limits your mobility for that round.
With the Athlete feat, getting up takes 5 feet of movement. Gaining an extra 10 feet of movement can be the difference between getting away from the froghemoth trying to eat you, who instead latches on to the rogue with its tentacles. Sure, it could be better, and alone isn't worth taking the feat, but don't discount its benefits.
Climbing. The problem with this trait is how often you are trying to climb. In our game, most climbing takes place out of combat and requires us to take an athletics check before we start climbing, and then we're just climbing faster than everyone else. Most combat takes place on the ground, so it's worth very little unless you're trying to climb a tree to get away or have a better vantage point for ranged attacks.
Jumping. Utterly useless. Jumping in combat is usually when you're trying to do something silly, but beyond that, when will you care about reducing your running start by 5 feet? It doesn't increase how far you can jump, which would be a significant improvement, but it wouldn't make any real impact on the game.
The Athlete Feat Useability by Class
I was tempted to say that there isn’t a single class where this feat is worth taking. Depending on your build, there may be one or two classes where you might consider it.
Artificer: Not worth taking.
Barbarian: Not worth taking.
Bard: Not worth taking.
Cleric: Not worth taking.
Druid: Not worth taking.
Fighter: Not worth taking.
Monk: This is the one class that may seriously consider taking the feat, but it all depends on the build.
Paladin: Not worth taking.
Ranger: Not worth taking.
Rogue: +1 to Dexterity is nice. I know I’m reaching here, but other than the monk, which class really needs to get up faster or jump quicker?
Sorcerer: Not worth taking.
Warlock: Not worth taking.
Wizard: Only if they need the Dexterity bump to help their AC and plan on trying melee attacking and need to get up faster to run away. Ok, it’s not worth taking.
Conclusion
The Athlete feat isn't the worse feat out there, but it is not one I can recommend. It could be fixed in One D&D with significant changes, so not all hope is lost. Remove the jumping and climbing parts. They do nothing for a character in or out of combat. Go big and give the feat advantage on Strength checks. If that's too powerful, make it so it's only a check when involving grappling or shoving. They need to make changes to the Athlete feat, and until then, there are too many worthwhile feats available to bother taking this one.
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