*D&D 4ed*

[Username17]

The super moves are:

Confounding Arrows (Ranger 15)
Hurl Through Hell (Warlock 29)
Sleep (Wizard 1)
Prismatic Spray (Wizard 25)
Legion's Hold (Wizard 29)
Destructive Salutation (Bood Mage 20)


Quite simply, these are the powers that can potentially cause an enemy to lose actions for more than one turn.

Especially Hurl Through Hell. That causes people to lose all their actions forever, so expect that to get nerfed in errata even though it's a single target attack that you can use once a fucking day at 29th level.

In other news: I don't understand how a Wizard is supposed to contribute to anything without falling back on his Daily spells. A 12th level Wizard uses an Encounter power and does like 20 points of damage. I... I don't understand what that's supposed to accomplish in the face of 12th level opposition that has over 180 hit points for an elite or over 600 hit points for a solo. It's just... really sad all around.

-Username17

[Psychic Robot]

It's because they're not strikers, Frank! Don't try and make the wizard do something that he's not supposed to do--it's not in his class role! You're trying to break the game!

[virgil]

The skill system is even more stupid than I had realized. DCs generally auto-scale with the power of the character, even if the actual challenge in the game doesn't. That ice slick is just as hard to balance on at 1st level as it was at 10th level, possibly even the SAME ice slick if you backtrack to fight the new monsters that moved into the Temple of the Frozen Flame.

The non-scaling stuff barely matters, because your bonus advances soo slowly. Jump advances even more slowly, so your Level 30 fighter who is built to jump (+32) is primarily only jumping 40' (or 8 squares) with a running start.

They don't want you to truly improve at anything, except combat ability. It doesn't feel very epic, when the only thing you learn and improve at is killing, which is at a near glacial pace anyway.

[josephbt]

This game is a fvckin logistical nightmare.

I've only read through Clr, Ftr & Pal, and the ammount of miniscule bonuses that keep springing up is staggering.

That guy marked this guy with a Pally mark, that one is marked by a Ftr mark, we're in a zone of whatever and a zone of whateverelse and we have a bonus from a daily something power.

I seriously don't care who said what and who did what and who did who, i just wanna play a game and make it fast. 4e doesn't do anything fast.

[Aktariel]

I've read/skimmed my way through most of the first few chapters of the Players Handbook, up to about the Cleric or so, and what it makes me feel is condescended.

Seriously. It's like they thought that everybody was so stupid, the designers had to play the game for us, but they wanted us to feel useful and not realize how little we actually had to do, so they made us play "add bullshit numbers" all day long.

As much as 3.5 had problems, it was big, flexible, customizable, and fun.

This is not something I expect I'll be using any time soon.

[Voss]

They come remarkably close to endorsing that you force the players to do some Sudoku before you let them continue to play actual 4th edition.

I caught this line before the rest of your post... I thought you were talking about the point buy system, which is a little fucked.

Depending on the class and what you want to focus on, there seem to be few really good options for your ability scores:
18/14/11/10/10/8 or possibly 18/13/13/10/10/8 if you want the potential to have 3 good defenses.
or
17/14/14/10/10/8, maybe 17/14/13/12/10/8
You can pretty much ignore one of your classes secondary stats, you don't want to be a strength and wisdom cleric, for example.

And of course, you should always choose a race that gives you +2 to your attack stat, because actual attack bonuses are only given out by the cleric and warlord, combat advantage (and various powers that grant it) and a couple other class powers (usually in the form of defense penalties, the warlock has several)

So that means you should be
human
or match your race explicitly to your attack stat.

Half the races can be good fey warlocks or charisma paladins, because there are so many damn charisma focused races.

Fighters, paladins, warlords, and melee rangers and clerics are human or dragonborn, pretty much exclusively.
blaster clerics are dwarves and elves (or human)
archer rangers and rogues are human, elf or halfling
and so on.

And by no means should you ever punish the players by making them use the standard array. Buying off the '8' and putting an 11 in the 5th stat can never, ever be worthwhile, unless you really, really care about a minor bump to handful of skills your character shouldn't be using anyway. Hell even a fourth stat is questionable, given the way defenses and classes work. But if you want to optimize, clerics, paladins and wizards need to grasp the fact that the tertiary stat (wisdom or charisma, and dex) just needs to get dropped.

Or just play a class thats built around having 1 stat in each category, rather than doubling up in one.. because that hurts a great deal.

In other news: I don't understand how a Wizard is supposed to contribute to anything without falling back on his Daily spells. A 12th level Wizard uses an Encounter power and does like 20 points of damage. I... I don't understand what that's supposed to accomplish in the face of 12th level opposition that has over 180 hit points for an elite or over 600 hit points for a solo. It's just... really sad all around.

I think the mistake here is that the elite and solo monsters seriously kick the math in the nuts. Against normal monsters, the assumptions seem to work out- over the course of the fight you'll use all your encounter abilities, maybe a daily, and fill in with your at-wills, and the combat is 5-7 rounds, you're hitting on somewhere between 10+ and 14+, and its fairly functional.
Then these screw-ups come along and the combat is suddenly 8-10 rounds (or 12-15 rounds for solos), you're hitting on 15-16+ or 16-17+, you're real abilities probably get wasted, and you spend most of the fight spamming the best of your worst attacks and its purely an exercise in dice rolling.

[Username17]

Then these screw-ups come along and the combat is suddenly 8-10 rounds (or 12-15 rounds for solos), you're hitting on 15-16+ or 16-17+, you're real abilities probably get wasted, and you spend most of the fight spamming the best of your worst attacks and its purely an exercise in dice rolling.

Yeah pretty much.

Let's use the Fen Hydra, because it's incredibly simple and doesn't move you around or anything. You have a party of four Elven Rangers because that means that you seriously don't have to ever fight it in any capacity, you just run around like little bitches shooting arrows at it until it dies. It has an AC of 25 and 620 hit points.

Assuming for the moment that you never took any of your Dailies or Encounters as stuff like Disruptive Strike, and that you saved all your daily powers for the boss battle, you'll be flying high on special powers for 7 rounds. You're probably using Nimble Strike as your at-will power, and you probably have a +2 bow of something or other. Let's call them Fire Bows, because that's easy. Your basic attacks dish out d10 + 2d6 + 9 damage, near as makes no odds - and they hit on a 12+ (let's call it an 11+ because it makes the math super easy). Natural 20s jack damage up to crazy town (to about 40). So basically when you're in "Attack, attack, attack..." mode your entire 4 person party is going to be throwing out about 36 damage every turn. It would be more than that, but one of you has to scamper each round or the thing will tear you to actual shreds and in a hurry.

Your entire barage of burst damage, meanwhile, is really honestly not that impressive. A Shadow Wasp Strike does 5 extra damage on a hit, and you can cash in a daily on the bow to cause 5 ongoing damage from fire (average 10 points), your ultimate super strike is your Attacks on the Run that does... wait for it... ten extra damage and attacks twice! The first 7 rounds your team will be doing, what? 50 damage a turn? Maybe 75 (if you just accept some attacks from the enemy for the first few rounds)?

The all offense, all the time party that is perfectly suited for this painfully uninteresting monster is going to take 10-15 rounds to kill the damn thing. And heaven help you if you have a frickin Fighter in the group. The hydra will just kill him while the rest of you contemplate your options and try to heap on damage.

-Username17

[Koumei]

I took a brief look and whipped up a Dragonborn (for the Cha and Intimidate, not a dragon-fetish) fey-Warlock. +15 to Intimidate at first level, for the whole "Bloodied -> Surrender!" routine.

Actual powers... unimpressive. Some things that are cute tricks ("I hit you! You can't see me for a round!" like a weak "Colour Burst" spell from 3.5, and the free teleport when enemies die while under your curse), but mostly it's just utter balls.

[Voss]

Some of the higher level warlock powers do some crazy things. Tendrils of Thuban, I believe, tosses out an area immobilization effect, which can seriously break an encounter.

The star and infernal pacts strike me as a bit more effective. Star gets utterly screwed, however, by its paragon path. 75% of the star powers are Con (and you can take infernal powers when the star ones are less than good (or charisma based), but its paragon path powers are solely charisma based. Having 2 different attack stats is flat out bad. One will be good, the other will be at best, average. Its a shame really, because Star has the interesting flavor, and the best boon (gain an attack bonus when one of your curse victims dies? (And it doesn't matter who kills them) Its one of the few attack bonuses in the game that don't rely on a cleric or warlord hitting someone.

I'm going to have to sit down and seriously analyze the powers, and compare them between classes. Partly to see if multiclassing is worth it at all (in general, it only seems to be if you can optimize the hell out of the character), but partly to see what people can actually do.

A couple things I've noticed in passing is that everyone gets some area attacks, even if only close bursts or blasts, even the fighter and the rogue and I'm not even sure how some of that would even work. The rogue has a ranged-only burst power that seems to involve going full auto-with a fucking sling, hand crossbow, throwing daggers or handful of shuriken, and the last is the only one that even vaguely makes sense.

[Voss]

Also- weapons.
With the way damage works in this edition (x[damage die] + stat +enhancement + misc) and the way attacking works stat+1/2level+enhancement + almost nothing (unless the cleric or warlord hands you a bonus, the target has a defense penalty or combat advantage)...
are anything but swords actually worth taking?

weapons seem to work off a base formula-
standard is +2 prof bonus, d8 damage,
simple weapons all revolve around this, with different weapon groups being the only variation, apart from daggers, which take damage hit for an additional prof bonus

military weapons get one property:
reach, high crit, higher damage die, or an additional +1 prof bonus.
'superior' weapons get two properties.

So- is reach (which only works on your turn), an additional +1 or +1.5 average damage, or a 1 in 20 'explosive' effect of 3.5 damage (on top of normal crit effect) worth giving up an actual +5% chance to hit, all the time?

Reach almost definitely stands out as not worth while, particularly for fighters, or working in combination with the rest of the party. Combat advantage and general defender style monster control pretty much requires being adjacent. Standing back is a bad idea. It doesn't work with the warlord well (since being adjacent is also a requirement of his stuff), and if the cleric wants to stay out of the fight, he should be a blaster cleric. So pole arms are... not great.

Final note- the 'superior' weapons and weapon proficiency.
First, weapon proficiency doesn't have any restriction- pick any one weapon. Do not pause, do not pick a military weapon, go directly to superior, because they are, well, flatly better. A bastard sword is exactly the same as a greatsword (+3, d10), except you can use it in one hand, and if you do use it in two hands it gets +1 damage from the [versatile] tag (which is so pathetic, the system doesn't even treat it as a worthwhile trait).

Second, most of these get the +3 prof bonus, and additional things. Katars are oddly awesome, particularly for melee rangers. +3, d6, high crit and off hand (smaller damage die allows the third property, I guess). At the same time, the smaller damage die is, well, a problem with the X[damage die] model on powers. They don't explode as well on crits, and in fact are significantly worse when you're tossing a 4[w] and 5[w] power, because you cap a lot lot lower. a 4[w] crit is 24 rather than 14, but a 4[w] crit with a bastard sword is 40 rather than 22.

Which brings us to the rogue. daggers are nicely accurate weapons, and rogues get a +1 for using them. but they do d4 damage.
If the rogue blows a feat on weapon proficiency and takes rapier, his attacks look a lot more dangerous. Take a first level rogue, optimized 20 dex, because the player isn't an idiot.
So, dagger guy:
+9 to hit, d4+5 damage, average 7.5, 9 on a crit,
with 2[w] encounter powers: 10 average, 13 crit
4[w] power 15/21
rapier guy:
+8 to hit, d8+5 damage, average 9.5, 13 on a crit,
with 2[w] encounter powers, 14 average, 21 on a crit
4[w] power: 23/37

While I wouldn't give up +1 to hit for a +1/1.5 increase in damage, I think I might give up the +1 and the feat for doing more than a dagger wielders critical damage on an average hit.

Interesting note: enhancement bonuses (and other damage bonuses) are added after, so this is always the case. Die type is the only thing thats multiplied ever. Though magic weapons do extra damage of +d6 per plus on crits (base, some properties are better.)

So lets see. Longsword vs high damage one handed weapon (d10)
and greatsword vs high damage two handed weapon (2d6). At using first level abilities, assuming a 20 in the attack stat
longsword: +8, d8 +5
1[w] = +8, 9.5/13 on crit
2[w] = +8, 14/21
3[w] = +8, 18.5/29
4[w] = +8, 23/37 (for the sake of argument, not sure if there are any 1st level 4[w] powers.
high damage weapon [d10]
1[w] = +7, 10.5/15
2[w] = +7, 16/25
3[w] = +7, 21.5/35
4[w] = +7, 27/45

Not sure this is worthwhile. +5% for +x damage. the crits are nicer, but don't happen often enough

greatsword [1d10]
1[w] = +8, 10.5/15
2[w] = +8, 16/25
3[w] = +8, 21.5/35
4[w] = +8, 27/45
high damage 2h weapon [2d6]
1[w] = +7, 12/17
2[w] = +7, 19/29
3[w] = +7, 26/41
4[w] = +7, 33/53

This, on the other hand... still not sure, but I wouldn't call either option willfully stupid. I prefer the extra chance to hit, but 2d6 is a lot more consistent than a d10, which is another factor in favor of say, the maul. A d12 weapon on the other hand... Thats more like the longsword comparison and a simple +1 per x[w].

[RandomCasualty2]

Yeah, really it seems that they screwed up the monsters alot. Despite the potential for them to give monsters some interesting abilities, like the hobgoblins and kobolds in playtest that legitimately did cool shit, the most of the higher level monsters do crap.

The saddest example is the swordwing. An epic monster that literally is just a flying thing with a sword for an arm. That's all it does, just shank you with a blade, and it's a level 25 monster.

I mean it's one thing to down the complexity required for monsters. They really had to do that to some extent since 3.5, where you needed a big laundry list of shit a monster had to do to compete. But it' crazy that an epic monster is just a flying thing with a sword.

[Voss]

The phane is apparently worse. I'm not sure, because I didn't fuck around with epic shit in 3rd, but apparently it was capable of crazy shit.

Now? Now its just a weird, smokey cat-centaur thing that zaps people with rays. It can't even kill a 1st level human guard in one round without spending an action point Its a pain in the ass because it has a lot of HP and insubstanial = half damage, but this is an epic level threat that can't knock over a small town. Put 80 undertrained militia on rooftops with longbows and you'll kill it just based on the number of 20s that you roll on average. It will probably kill about half of them, and it will take a goddamn long time, but this is seriously an epic level predator that feeds on human suffering, and its net affect on a community is a few funerals and a boon to the arrow-making industry.

The epic levels really feel half-assed, half-finished and full of fail. Admittedly its better than 3rd editions epic atrocity, but it would have been nice if the first book was actually complete from 1-30 since thats what they were aiming for.

[Fwib]

What about a no-save, instant-death power?

In the feat section is Sehanine's Reversal, a feat that gives you the eponymous power for a cleric or paladin.

What it does is drop the condition on an enemy that you just saved against, with a nat. 20, no attack, no save.

[Dying] is a condition you make saves against.

Does it work? (although since you need rare conditions... is it even worth it?)

[RandomCasualty2]

The phane is apparently worse. I'm not sure, because I didn't fuck around with epic shit in 3rd, but apparently it was capable of crazy shit.

Now? Now its just a weird, smokey cat-centaur thing that zaps people with rays. It can't even kill a 1st level human guard in one round without spending an action point Its a pain in the ass because it has a lot of HP and insubstanial = half damage, but this is an epic level threat that can't knock over a small town. Put 80 undertrained militia on rooftops with longbows and you'll kill it just based on the number of 20s that you roll on average. It will probably kill about half of them, and it will take a goddamn long time, but this is seriously an epic level predator that feeds on human suffering, and its net affect on a community is a few funerals and a boon to the arrow-making industry.

I'm actually not too discouraged about that. It actually makes armies a bit more useful. In 3.5 it was ridiculous how armies just totally sucked. Really for a true epic beast that's designed to be a world killer, it should probably have resist weapons 10 or 15, so that it's immune to most of that shit.

But honestly I don't really have too much trouble with people driving off big shit like dragons with a bunch of bows and a lot of casualties. Because the dragon can always return to its lair, rest for a day and come back. And that's fine because it gives the heroes a town left to save. So the villagers can say that the bad dragon came yesterday and killed half of em, and they don't feel they can survive another attack.

Because in D&D, villagers seriously need some way to chase off threats, otherwise you wonder why their village didn't get wiped off the map long ago. The 4E system actually makes more sense from a world building viewpoint than 3.5 did.

And at the very least, the phane does some stuff that matters, like stun you and slow you and otherwise inflicts some meaningful and nasty conditions. The swordwing... well that thing is just pure damage. It stabs you and you take damage, and that's it. You can't get more basic than that.

The epic levels really feel half-assed, half-finished and full of fail. Admittedly its better than 3rd editions epic atrocity, but it would have been nice if the first book was actually complete from 1-30 since thats what they were aiming for.

It seems just rushed. Clearly with 4E, the monster system has great potential to create interesting encounters.

It's just that as usual the high levels got no attention or playtesting and they just hoped it worked out.

Seriously, why the fuck do they always do that? Would it kill them to split their playtesters into three groups for the three power levels?

[Voss]

True. It does make sense that somethings just can't kick over a town, but the way they presented it was... odd.

I think I understand why they half-ass the high level stuff. Two reasons- they figure most people won't actually get there. And they can sell more books, and fill it in later. But I don't like the coldly cynical profiteering angle of that.

It also just irks me. The feat tables:
Heroic- 1 3/4 pages of feats
Paragon- about 1 1/4 pages of feats
Epic- 2/3 of a page of feats, and almost a third are 'with this weapon group, you crit on a 19 or 20, which for someone starting to become *an actual demigod*, is kind of lame.

And even the paragon levels are kinda meh. The paths have some serious holes. You can really do a strength based cleric thats rather good, by 4e standards. (One of the at-will powers is frankly awesome, you hit: do damage, and hand out a bonus to hit equal to your strength bonus. In a game where almost nothing does that, thats pretty amazing. Especially since it can be +5 at level 1, to +10 at level 28, if you're take the demigod destiny). And you can do that every round, forever.

But the 4 paragon paths don't really support it. The angelic one, kind of does... but not really well.

[Jerry]

I have before me a copy of the 4ed rules.

Still reading over it; too soon to say about balance issues. Working on it; feel free to ask of specifics.

You said that it was a bootlegged version. Those are made by people trying to score a quick buck off of other people's work; they are not known for making quality pieces of game balance.

[Fwib]

Those are made by people trying to score a quick buck off of other people's work; they are not known for making quality pieces of game balance.

Sounds like D&D by WotC to me!

[Jerry]

Those are made by people trying to score a quick buck off of other people's work; they are not known for making quality pieces of game balance.

Sounds like D&D by WotC to me!

Sounds like every RPG ever made. Most JRPGs involve "young, angst-filled teenager sets off to defeat the evil empire!"

Fantasy RPGs are usually something involving destiny, a band of unlikely heroes, and/or a heroic quest that involves traveling great distances to a magical land which has the villain/treasure/artifact.

[Voss]

I have before me a copy of the 4ed rules.

Still reading over it; too soon to say about balance issues. Working on it; feel free to ask of specifics.

You said that it was a bootlegged version. Those are made by people trying to score a quick buck off of other people's work; they are not known for making quality pieces of game balance.

Scott Rouse of the WotC think police has publicly said that its a legit version, 'stolen from the printers'.

There is a small possibility thats its not the 100% final version, based on the date, but its definitely a legit copy.

[Jerry]

Scott Rouse of the WotC think police has publicly said that its a legit version, 'stolen from the printers'.

There is a small possibility thats its not the 100% final version, based on the date, but its definitely a legit copy.

And I thought that you guys took anything WotC says with a grain of salt! I had faith in you guys...

[Shatner]

Has anyone found item stats anywhere (for the purposes of sundering a weapon or hacking open a door)? If I'm reading this correctly, the only way to break something is to perform a strength check (PHB pg 262) and the circumstances surrounding the break attempt don't matter/aren't specified beyond any DM imposed bonuses or penalties to the check DC.

Furthermore, I can't find anything on special materials (adamantine, mithril, etc.). Has all of that been given the ax or am I just overlooking it?

[K]

Has anyone found item stats anywhere (for the purposes of sundering a weapon or hacking open a door)? If I'm reading this correctly, the only way to break something is to perform a strength check (PHB pg 262) and the circumstances surrounding the break attempt don't matter/aren't specified beyond any DM imposed bonuses or penalties to the check DC.

Furthermore, I can't find anything on special materials (adamantine, mithril, etc.). Has all of that been given the ax or am I just overlooking it?

Remember, this is a video game. You aren't allowed to attack doors or walls.

[SphereOfFeetMan]

Weeks ago in another thread I was harping pretty hard on the point that the 4e Fighter seemed like it was going to be less interesting than the 3e Fighter (at least at low levels). Let's look at the pinnacle of the 4e Fighter's abilities, their 3 level 29 daily powers:

Force the Battle: Extra damage, and you can use an at will power against adjacent foes as a free action.
No Mercy: 7[W] +Str mod damage
Storm of Destruction: 5[W] +Str mod damage to two creatures.

Ok. So two of the three "abilities" are nothing but bigger numbers. The third ability is a combination of bigger numbers, and using your most basic attack (an at will power) as a free action. These are the best, the most inspiring, the most magical and fantastic things that a 4e Fighter has to offer?
__________________

From what I can tell, it appears that many (possibly most) "abilities" in the game are merely formulaic bonuses that keep your character level-appropriate* damage wise. In other words, Its as though you took the 3e Rogue and made all the +1d6 sneak attack levels into "options" you could choose to upgradable your "powers."

*(Whatever that means considering how long the combats drag on)

I haven't examined the powers extensively, but it seriously seems like if you incorporated all of the math bonuses into the classes, the power abilities might cover less than a dozen pages. If there was some sort of rubric by which you could choose abilities like attacking two creatures, or sliding a creature X number of squares, then it might be possible to fit the abilities onto 2 or 3 pages.

Since it has been established that Rituals cost gp, and are therefore competing with equipment, they will either not be used, or rarely so.

So. This makes me ask myself, what is the fundamental purpose of rules in a cooperative story telling game? One possible answer: To adjudicate and decide the outcome of fantastic abilities and situations. By that standard, 4e's mass of slides, shifts, and other such abilities might be reducible to less than a dozen pages. Considering that the 3 core rulebooks of 4e are close to 1,000 pages, that is...stupefying. This is irrespective of the fact that those "good" dozen pages consist of abilities like bull rushing.

___________________

I haven't yet tested which is more interesting: a 20th level 3e Fighter, or a 30th level 4e Fighter. Subjectively (and I know that others disagree) I believe that different numbers on a sheet are not interesting abilities. By that standard I think it might be possible that a 20th level 3e Warrior could be more interesting than a 4e 30th level Fighter.

[K]

Lots of the powers deal with immobilizing, pushing, proning, and slowing people.

So, considering that monsters usually have short range powers, winning is a matter of Tekken juggling by using powers to keep them out of range of the PCs using your longer range powers. Since most powers do damage as well as their special status effect(and some even do so on a miss), then you shoot, move, then shoot again and monsters never get to attack.

My test battle was a 9th level Wizard Vs. a Succubus. Her only ranged power is range 5, while the Wizard has powers with Ranges of 10+ on most powers I picked.

My question is this: how many battlemaps would I have to buy to represent the running combats that are effective 4e combat?

[Voss]

Has anyone found item stats anywhere (for the purposes of sundering a weapon or hacking open a door)? If I'm reading this correctly, the only way to break something is to perform a strength check (PHB pg 262) and the circumstances surrounding the break attempt don't matter/aren't specified beyond any DM imposed bonuses or penalties to the check DC.

Furthermore, I can't find anything on special materials (adamantine, mithril, etc.). Has all of that been given the ax or am I just overlooking it?

Remember, this is a video game. You aren't allowed to attack doors or walls.

Well, you don't attack them, but the break things strength check he's talking about lets you burst through walls. Its pretty over the top.


So, here's a wacky interaction with magic items. The warlock's rod has an interesting magical property: Reaving- you automatically do damage = enhancement bonus to any creature you curse. So, you can autokill a minion every turn. Two if you have the Twofold curse feat at 11th level. And this of course, fuel your pact ability, which is pretty good for a star pact. The amusing part? A +1 reaving rod is 1K gold, and thats all you need. You can switch to a rod of first blood for your 'real' rod.

And why does the symbol of power have a constant effect? A -2 to all enemy saves for effects that use the symbol is a hell of a lot better than a single daily use. You've just switched their odds off recovery from 55% to 45%.

I find it amusing that they limited the daily effects on these items. Thats all well and good, but the constant properties are just better anyway.