Is it possible to acquire new Distinctive Features? What about new Specialties?

Traits are very nice to have - they don't give any direct benefit, but a clever player can use them to generate lots of extra advancement points, so I understand why there is a limit.

I know its possible to change a distinctive feature as a character's undertaking during the fellowship phase, but is there any way to add new ones?

If there isn't, does anyone have any suggestions for a house rule on adding new ones? Would spending one XP to gain a new Distinctive Feature from your background be fair?

Personally, I think Distinctive Features (all Traits actually) are way too valuable to allow more than the number allotted at character creation. Couple this wth the fact that you can change them during a Fellowship phase, and this should allow any player the freedom to try out as many Distinctive Features as they should wish.

However, if you do wish for a house rule, my preference would be to treat it like Valour and Wisdom. So, if you wanted to increase to 3 traits, you could do so for the same XP cost as moving your Valour or Wisdom from 2 to 3. It's been our experience that they are far too valuable to allow the addition of a Distinctive Feature with only a single XP.

Anyone else have an opinion?

Personally, its precisely BECAUSE they are so important that I think there should be a way to get more of them; as it currently stands you have to know what skills you care about / are likely to use and prioritize - in other words, horribly game the system - instead of just picking whatever fits your character.

I mean, you can of course pick whatever you like, but if you do something like make a Dwarf with Smoking, Tunneling, Dour, and Grumpy, and you like having those traits on your character, you are going to miss out on a fair number of successful skill checks and advancement points, because you can't add any more.

Personally, I feel constrained by the inability to pick up more traits. If I want to be Tall, for instance, I have to pass on being either true-hearted or energetic. I think the current implementation discourages role-playing when its supposed to be encouraging it.

I'm on board with bob here. Some of the traits seem objectively better than others.
For example, the Hobbit background "Restless Farmer" Give you the choices Bold, Eager, Generous, Merciful, Merry, Patient, True-Hearted, Trusty.
Of those, I would be inclined to choose Bold and True-Hearted, since they look like I could use those on active skills as opposed to being passive, or even a drawback or something I don't see a use for. Merciful is essentially abstaining from an action, as is Patient. Eager, Generous and Trusty seem like things that would get me in trouble. And I can't figure out how to use Merry.
RPGs generally should avoid the trap of forcing a player to choose between a character he wants and a character that's mechanically good.

Deathfork,
you make a good point there on the trap of a thematic character over a mechanically Robocop character. Perhaps extra advance points for playing your character well using his traits for the good or ill of your character?

That's a good idea, but how?

Theoretically, the simplest way would be "whenever it comes up", but that's basically what we have now, and it doesn't work. Changing it slightly to "whenever the player mentions the trait" is a whole other can of worms - does that mean a player could mention "bold" whenever they attack in forward stance? If so, where does the advancement point "queue"?

Trying to apply a "weighted value" of some sort to the traits is far too much work to be practical, and will always be arbitrary.

Regarding "merry", only thing I can think of is song rolls, which is actually not bad - can mention it every round during combat if you are trying to "heal", plus can invoke it when getting rid of shadow to get an advancement point and drop more shadow. Unfortunately hobbits don't earn shadow the way the tall folk (and especially dwarves) do, so it's less useful than smith-craft (which is also a specialty, not a feature, and thus doesn't have the same opportunity cost).

I will be very generous with player choosing "useless traits" by awarding advancement points for just roleplaying.

If someone has gardening as trait and is telling about his garden at home and how he misses it he will get an advancement point in any skill group he hasn't gotten a point yet.

If a grumpy character replies to him to shut up about food because it makes him hungry and they get into an argument, he will also get an advancment point.

If the one with leech craft keeps silent and prepares a healing salve while laughing at the arguing dwarf and hobbit, he will get one point too.

Basically i want actual roleplay and living out the character you want to be more rewarding than passing an appropriate skill check.

If you stick strict to the rules players will chose the most useful one.

So as long as there is still one skill group that hasn't gotten at least 1 advancement point, roleplaying you character without having to pass checks will grant advancement points.

Second and third points are harder to get anyway. That's where dramatic rolls will come in.