|
One of my players on my use of Masterplan: "This is hilarious, we do the most complex poo poo here and no matter what it is, I just hear 'clickclick' from you and it's done." Also I discovered after the session that you can link tokens to represent curses, marks, shrouds etc. and that's just staggeringly useful. News from my STR/CHA 12, WIS/CON 18 paladin player: he noted how he wasn't sure which ability scores to increase because "a lot of good stuff for paladins seems to hinge on Charisma." Think he's catching on. Also there was a turn where he left an enemy standing with 2 HP and I couldn't help but remark "you know, if you had higher strength..." He actually explained his idea a little further, noting that he'd gone for the "stay-in-the-fight attributes rather than the kill-things attributes" and I think for all the "let the guy play like he wants to" I'm doing I'm gonna give him a few pointers about how by writing down "dwarf paladin" he's already done about 100 times more for his staying power compared to other characters than by picking CON 18 even if you project it over 30 levels. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 18:15 on Feb 17, 2015 |
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 21:32
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 8, 2024 23:58 |
|
|
Dumb question: when you crit with a High Crit weapon, are the extra [W]s maxed or rolled?
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 22:14
|
|
|
P.d0t posted:Dumb question: when you crit with a High Crit weapon, are the extra [W]s maxed or rolled? Rolled, just like anything else that only happens on a crit.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 22:16
|
|
|
P.d0t posted:Dumb question: when you crit with a High Crit weapon, are the extra [W]s maxed or rolled? I'm 90% they are meant to be rolled, but my DM let's us maximise them, and I'm fine with that, since it makes my Fullblade weilding Paladin samurai a crit monster.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 22:21
|
|
|
They are indeed meant to be rolled. You max everything you would or could have rolled if you hadn't crit (i.e. stuff like Quarry, Curse, Sneak Attack, the Slayer's Power Strike, Half-Orc Furious Assault, etc etc, even if you only chose to trigger it on that attack BECAUSE you crit, as you can with Quarry for instance) and roll anything you ONLY roll because you crit, High Crit included. thespaceinvader fucked around with this message at 22:51 on Apr 6, 2014 |
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 22:35
|
|
|
Sneak Attack gets maxed on a crit? I'm the worst DM.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 22:49
|
|
|
Yep. Anything that you could roll if you didn't crit, is maxed when you do. It's one of the main reasons why Daggermaster is so good.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2014 22:51
|
|
|
The Samurai theme isn't quite as good, but it is also fun on a rogue since the encounter power gives you an 18-20 threat range if you beat everyone else in terms of initiative. Rogues have the Unerring Ambush feat in Paragon, which lets you roll twice on all your attacks in the first round of combat if you're attacking someone who hasn't acted yet. Fire up all your minor action attacks and alpha away. Similar results can be had with an Avenger if you can get a good initiative build.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2014 04:46
|
|
|
Samurai is insane on an avenger. Coincidentally, avengers also get a power that does maximise all of their dice on a crit. It's a beautiful combo, really.
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2014 06:27
|
|
|
My Lawbot can't get RRoT because of the Tempus requirement. 
|
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2014 06:40
|
|
|
Does anyone have any alternate maps for Reavers of Harkenwold? I don't mind how they recycle maps (it's a nice thing if you are using the actual physical maps, but we are using Masterplan so it doesn't matter), but I feel that those who are not outdoors locations are too cramped, and even with the outdoors maps they usually end up having a very tight melee in the edge because the group is very ranged-heavy and the monsters have to move towards them usually. The first and last battle in Toadwallow Caverns were a slog, because the cave mouth was a narrow location. It's an otherwise awesome adventure, and at the start of each session we are having a sort scene (a "vingette" from DMG2) inside the Iron Keep were Nazin is being a cartoon villain and talks about poo poo going on in the valley. On the other hand, we didn't enjoy The Slaying Stone that much. The macguffin works in way too specific ways to give a gently caress about, the structure of the adventure is too open-ended for a newbie group to handle with their characters still warm out of character creation, and between all this confusion it's difficult for the players to give a gently caress about the various factions of the town. If I were to run these two adventures together again for a new group, I would do the following (per group level):
Rexides fucked around with this message at 15:04 on Apr 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2014 10:30
|
|
|
Trying to start making a list of races between "normal" and "weird/sci-fi" for D&D 4. Some basic background: Campaign world being played in is effectively a Dyson Sphere, with the whole "Hollow World" (backwards ancient fantasy) style setting on the inside, and a bit more "science fantasy" stuff on the outside. Though originally separated and unaware of each other, a giant gaping hole is created that allows the two sides to interact. I'm trying to determine where the various PC races should fall between the two sides. So far, what I've come up with is this: Both Humans Eladrin Hollow World Dwraves Elves Halfings Half-Orcs Minotaur Half-Elves Dragonborn Gnomes Outer World Warforged Tieflings Deva Bladelings Changleings Genasi Githzerai Shardmind Shifter Thri-kreen Wilden Can you think of any major races I missed (except Drow, I dropped the whole conventional underdark thing like a cliched bad habit) or any minor races that would just fit too well into this paradigm?
|
|
#
?
Apr 8, 2014 20:23
|
|
|
rkajdi posted:Trying to start making a list of races between "normal" and "weird/sci-fi" for D&D 4. Some basic background: You probably thought of this, but you could also just use the more recent Gamma World mutations for your sci-fi world. It's roughly compatible with -- if a little deadly for -- 4e.
|
|
#
?
Apr 8, 2014 22:03
|
|
|
homullus posted:You probably thought of this, but you could also just use the more recent Gamma World mutations for your sci-fi world. It's roughly compatible with -- if a little deadly for -- 4e. Don't have access to Gamma World, so I didn't even think of it. Also, that stuff seems pretty random-- do you think they'd fit as PC races in D&D mechanically? Right now, it's totally cool in that all the PCs are "Hollow World" races and have been playing on the inside, so I'm not stepping on anyone's toes saying all these random races they haven't encountered are actually not part of their local area.
|
|
#
?
Apr 8, 2014 23:33
|
|
|
rkajdi posted:Don't have access to Gamma World, so I didn't even think of it. Also, that stuff seems pretty random-- do you think they'd fit as PC races in D&D mechanically? Right now, it's totally cool in that all the PCs are "Hollow World" races and have been playing on the inside, so I'm not stepping on anyone's toes saying all these random races they haven't encountered are actually not part of their local area. They do fit mechanically as combinations, but not individually as races. In Gamma World, your character is (usually) a combination of two of those mutations, inheriting at-will and encounter powers of each piece. There are no dailies, and the powers are a bit stronger to compensate. So you wouldn't choose "Swarm" as a race and then make NPCs from that, you'd choose "Swarm" and "Rat" to make an individual or a whole species of sentient rat swarms that walk around as a whole entity. The "Rat Swarm" individual/species then has mechanical characteristics that are compatible with 4e, and you would add whatever other flavor you desired. I am not secretly telling you that your idea is bad to make githzerai (for example) the spacemans, they are the spacemans of 4e anyway with all the Astral Sea stuff. Gamma World just has some of the conversion to sci-fi already done for you, with different damage keywords and a slightly different "feel" to the system. It could be interesting for the damage types alone, because suddenly people do damage types to which the other world has ZERO resistance.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 14:42
|
|
|
Since there is probably no concept of "day" in a dyson-sphere world anyway, maybe the mechanical difference between the inner and outer worlds would be how daily abilities work. How is "magic" (in the broad, supernatural sense) work in that world? Is it just sufficiently advanced technology, or just magic? Maybe the inner world features a revolving half-shell around the sun that provides a day-night cycle but also recharges "daily" abilities for those individuals who possess them, while on the outer world you can recharge your "daily" abilities at power outlets or something.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 15:19
|
|
|
Dailies recharge after an extended rest, they work just the same in 4E locations without day/night cycles (e.g. elemental chaos, pandemonium). I don't think I as a GM could find a good reason why, say, a fighter's daily would be tied to celestial movements.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 17:15
|
|
|
Yeah, I know. I am just saying that in that world it could be ~~~different~~~ e: I was actually expecting someone to say that my idea is stupid because it will completely mess up encounter creation rules, not because fighters.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 17:59
|
|
|
The pull of the moon makes your sword arm stronger
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 18:00
|
|
|
Rexides posted:Since there is probably no concept of "day" in a dyson-sphere world anyway, maybe the mechanical difference between the inner and outer worlds would be how daily abilities work. I had day and night work with "moons" (small bodies in orbit of the central sun) eclipsing the sun. Also gave the ability to create areas that never or rarely ever had sun due to permanent eclipse, which created a pretty spooky area that was just Not Right for the PC to explore. Magic is going to be broadly supernatural, though some of the more advanced races have magic/technology/alchemy hybrids, and the Eldarin are straight up Craftworld Eldar from 40K. Science-Fantasy on the outer world I had ideas of being more like He-Man or Thundarr than Star Wars, with no space travel available and most people still crushing poo poo with swords and bows, plus the occasional giant robot because why not? Realistic no, but D&D is a poo poo simulation of anything resembling reality so I'm going more for a Grant Morrison/Rick Remender comic book feel. So crazy high concept stuff that's internally consistent but doesn't hold up if you try to carefully examine it. One idea I was tossing around was no "normal" humans existing in the outer world. Muls, Kalashtar, and Revenants/Vrykola take their place as altered humans. Would give an interesting and different feel to what's going on there. I get this isn't running D&D "properly", in that I'd probably be better using a different game system, but it's the system I can get players for and everyone at the table is cool with it.The fact that it makes my very genre strict (i.e. no technology more advanced than an X-Bow, game is literally ye olde renn faire) ex-DM's eye tweak every time he hears about it probably is some positive reinforcement for me. I'm a little worried I'm writing myself into a corner about doing future campaigns in the same world, but for this campaign everything is golden.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 18:39
|
|
|
killstealing posted:The pull of the moon makes your sword arm stronger "I am the moon" now becomes a game-breaking use of Bluff.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 18:40
|
|
|
Rexides posted:Yeah, I know. I am just saying that in that world it could be ~~~different~~~ It's a cool idea, but the campaign has been going for over a year, so the boat for changing how you get powers back sailed awhile ago. I just thought of the idea of making the outer world inhabited too, and am just trying to spitball it into something interesting instead of just an odd plot point that doesn't get touched on too much.
|
|
#
?
Apr 9, 2014 18:44
|
|
|
For those of you who've done so, how well does "eliminate the 'day,' everything recharges after each combat" work out? I was considering making dailies encounter powers and regular encounter powers reliable, then halving everyone's number of healing surges (if that's even necessary...), but while I remember people here loving their games without the adventure-day concept, I haven't played in a game like that and I don't remember what everyone was doing.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 21:14
|
|
|
tzirean posted:For those of you who've done so, how well does "eliminate the 'day,' everything recharges after each combat" work out? I was considering making dailies encounter powers and regular encounter powers reliable, then halving everyone's number of healing surges (if that's even necessary...), but while I remember people here loving their games without the adventure-day concept, I haven't played in a game like that and I don't remember what everyone was doing. The current "adventuring day" Gygaxian sacred cow holdover mechanic is very ingrained in the system. If I have all my dailies on every fight, I am pretty much going to open every fight in the exact same way. Encounter-long dailies and dailies that completely cripple monsters become way better, and they are already more or less the best. In order for this to balance out, enemies need to get significantly beefier and/or have more ways to invalidate shutdown/stunlock tactics. Solos have to find ways to ignore even more effects (and they are already considered underwhelming without help, especially if they don't have a "ignore stun/daze" free action). Party DPR is going to go way up because you are going to get a super-saiyan-level party nova on every fight, especially with a strong leader. So, it can be done, but you are looking at making "hard" level encounters or harder in every battle.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 21:21
|
|
|
Formulaic. Even with the current structure, fights can get a bit formulaic at Epic when you all have amazing encounter powers that pretty much go in a specific sequence, especially for leaders and strikers. Plus, if everyone opens with dailies every fight, you just wind up playing initiative-tag with the Wizard.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 21:54
|
|
|
I think the easier fix would either be to have narrative "days" where the DM controls the pacing or extend long rests to something like "a long weekend of downtime at a safe place".
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 22:00
|
|
|
Much. DOn't feel hamstrung that a long rest should happen every time the party sleeps, or indeed that the party should have to sleep to have the benefits of a long rest. Have it happen at narrative-pace-appropriate points.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 22:47
|
|
|
I find it paces out nicely if you run a good variety of adventure types. Sometimes, the party will be fully rested for every fight and other times, they will have to stretch their resources through a tough slog. Dailies work fine in that context.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 23:02
|
|
|
I've thought about just having one daily per fight (call them something else). They'd be like an emergency power, or Uber power. It could use some tweaking, but that is how I would go about it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 23:12
|
|
|
Days = Sessions for my group, and we pace things around that expectation.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2014 23:44
|
|
|
Dailies should be really cool things that have a big impact imo, not things you just pop every fight.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 02:41
|
|
|
killstealing posted:Dailies should be really cool things that have a big impact imo, not things you just pop every fight. ImpactVector posted:I think the easier fix would either be to have narrative "days" where the DM controls the pacing or extend long rests to something like "a long weekend of downtime at a safe place".
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 03:46
|
|
|
The Leper Colon V posted:This also works. It depends how fun "downtime" is.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 03:57
|
|
|
P.d0t posted:It depends how fun "downtime" is.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 04:18
|
|
|
So, I have basically no experience with spellcasting classes. Are there any sort of class-independent builds for them, in the vein of Frostcheese or Charge-Kits for melee classes? I assume there is Dilettante bullshit for casters too, right? Like, poach an at-will that counts as RBA and such.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 04:54
|
|
|
P.d0t posted:So, I have basically no experience with spellcasting classes. If you're a striker, think about a damage type you like, and focus on it with feats and gear. If you're a controller, think about a condition or conditions (or damage type) you like, and focus on them with feats and gear. There's definitely more ways to do it than just that, but those are the "still learning, I want something simple" ways.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 05:08
|
|
|
The Leper Colon V posted:Spellcasting isn't as complicated as you'd think, since it's really just power selection like everyone else. Are there particular damage types or conditions that are better "supported" than others? I've heard about degenerate bullshit like Radiant Dragonbreath spamming, but I don't know much about any Radiant Mafia builds. e: I'm actually playing a Psychic Lock bard right now and it's hilarious because our DM thinks making us fight solos is the way to challenge the party. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 05:34 on Apr 12, 2014 |
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 05:32
|
|
|
Cold, of course, with frostbite, is very well supported. Thunder is best for AoE.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 05:41
|
|
|
Cold is good for controllers. Thunder is great for AoE. Lightning is also fun, and often goes hand-in-hand with thunder. Fire is great for ongoing damage. Acid is rubbish, too much resists it. e:f;b
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 05:46
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 8, 2024 23:58 |
|
|
The Leper Colon V posted:Cold is good for controllers. Why is cold good for controllers? Frostcheese is good, but additional piles of damage is more of a striker thing than a controller thing.
|
|
#
?
Apr 12, 2014 06:32
|
|