DnD One Lucky Feat Guide

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I was really surprised to see the Lucky Feat as a 1st-Level feat…and in fact I was kind of surprised to see Lucky appear at all. The most broken feat in 5E, the Lucky feat has frequently been banned at many gaming tables including multiple ones that I’ve played at. It’s a cool concept, but it is ridiculously overpowered…and DnD One might have actually made it worse.

Lucky is the most overpowered 1st-Level Feat in DnD One as it gives luck points equal to your proficiency bonus and those points can be used to give yourself advantage after rolling a d20 test or imposing disadvantage on a creature

I’m not sure why the design team decided to buff the Lucky Feat when it’s already an assumed ban at most tables, but let’s dive into it further and see what changes have been made.

Lucky 4-leaf clover
Lucky – still here, but is it still broken?

Let’s dive in!

Lucky Feat DnD One Review

The best way to break down a feat is to check out the exact wording.

From Unearthed Arcana:

1st-Level Feat

Prerequisite: None

Repeatable: No

You have inexplicable luck that can kick in at just the right moment, granting you the following benefits:

Luck Points. You have a number of Luck Points equal to your Proficiency Bonus. You can spend the points on the benefits below, and you regain your expended Luck Points when you finish a Long Rest.

Advantage. Immediately after you roll a d20 for a d20 Test, you can spend 1 Luck Point to give yourself Advantage on the roll.

Disadvantage. When a creature rolls a d20 for an attack roll against you, you can spend 1 Luck Point to impose Disadvantage on that roll.

Unearthed Arcana, Character Origins

Let’s break down these benefits in more detail.

Benefit #1: You get a number of Luck Points equal to your proficiency bonus.

This benefit made my jaw drop to the floor. In the original you always had 3 luck dice that were then recharged with long rests. You still get your Luck Points back with a long rest, but the old way meant at Level 1 you had 3 luck dice and at Level 20 you had 3 luck dice. In this system you start with 2, get back up to 3 by 5th level, and then become overpowered as you get more and more luck dice.

Having 6 luck dice at level 17 and up is just insane. Having more than one person with Luck at the table makes it brutal for a DM trying to provide a true challenge.

Powerful, super powerful, and a crazy boost to a feat that frankly didn’t need it.

Benefit #2: You may spend a Luck Point after rolling a d20 to give yourself advantage.

While this doesn’t guarantee success, the fact that you can look at what you roll first to decide whether to take the extra die roll is crucial. What many people overlook is that you can roll for a crit because you don’t have to take a new die roll – advantage means take the best one.

This will also erase most crit fails. If you roll a Natural 1 and then use the Lucky feat to reroll, even if the reroll is a fail, that’s usually better than a critical failure.

What’s really interesting is the removal of wording from 5th edition saying that you had to make the decision to add advantage before you knew the outcome of the roll (whether it was a success or failure). I assume most DMs who allow this feat are going to impose this restriction regardless, but it’s no longer in the text.

Benefit #3: You may spend a Luck Point to impose disadvantage on a creature that rolls a d20 attack roll against you.

Imagine being a DM with a multi-attack boss, and every single player uses luck on all of your melee attacks, and then the Bard hits you with the Bane Spell. Game over, man. Game over.

I often found this as powerful to keep my character alive as the ability to give myself advantage.

How Does Lucky Feat Measure Up?

The lucky feat was the strongest feat in all of DnD in 5th Edition, and based on what we’ve seen from DnD One so far, that hasn’t changed. In fact, this strong, to the point of being broken, feat was buffed in this version, making it even stronger overall.

This means that the Lucky Feat is the most likely to be banned from play at your DM’s table, however if it is allowed you would be foolish not to consider taking it. This overpowered versatile feat is good for every class and every build.

No matter what the build, taking this feat is never a mistake.

Lucky Feat: DnD One Vs 5E

There aren’t huge changes from the actual mechanics of how the feat works. The biggest difference is that with this you have one less die until level 5 when the proficiency bonus improves. One problem: unless you had the Human Variant build starting with a feat, you were never going to get the Lucky Feat until Level 4 anyway, meaning those 2 Luck Dice were still 2 more than most 5E builds would have had to begin with!

Since the feat then gives even more luck dice as the player’s proficiency bonus increases, that makes this feat even stronger and more powerful than before.

Related Article: Take a look at the old version of this feat in our complete 5E Lucky Feat Guide

The fact the words “You must declare your roll before knowing the result of the dice (whether it’s a success or failure)” has been removed means that this feat is even stronger than before.

I suspect most tables will force the player to make the decision first, but by Rules Lawyer letter of the law, that is how it works in its current DnD One iteration.

So Lucky in DnD One is stronger and even more powerful than the 5E version.

Who Should Take the Lucky Feat in DnD One?

Any build can take this feat, and most should. The only reason not to would be very specific builds like an uber tank barbarian taking the Tough Feat for the extra HP or an armored spellcaster build that should take Lightly Armored because it opens up an incredible number of options.

So unless you have a very long-term build that requires another 1st-Level feat early to set the foundation, going with Lucky is always a good decision especially since many of the other previous “always good” feat picks like Alert have been nerfed.

If you don’t have a specific build-needed feat from level one, you should pick Lucky in your next DnD One game.

DnD One Lucky Feat Final Grade

This is an S-Tier A+ grade from the overpowered standpoint for the Lucky Feat, but it is worth noting that you can argue this feat might deserve an F grade. If the feat is so broken, so overpowered that it is regularly being banned at the gaming table, then is it really a well-designed feat?

But that also means taking into account individual tables and DMs, which is impossible to do on a large scale.

If your game allows the Lucky Feat, take it. Before the DM realizes their mistake and tries to backtrack on it 🙂

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