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What's the reasoning behind the Lethal Shroud feat from Dragon 401 giving a +5 damage bonus per shroud (from level 11) as well as the usual "increase your striker damage die 1 size"? Just that the assassin is poo poo otherwise? e: I have completely overlooked that shroud damage gets a static bonus at level 11 anyway. e: also, discovered a neat, albeit very specific, rules interaction: a beholder's Death Ray can daze you, and failing the saving throw against that starts you on a track to death. But if you're a Kalashtar, you make saving throws against dazed at the start instead of the end of your turn, and since effects that get worse on a failed save only do so if you make the saving throw at the end of your turn, just by being a Kalashtar you're protected from instadeath by beholder forever. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 10:19 on Aug 5, 2016 |
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Aug 5, 2016 07:46
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Inherent bonus question. Specifically, the Dark Sun crit variant. Does the 1d6 per + from the Dark Sun rules apply only to weapon and implement attacks, or should I give it to stuff like Dragon's Breath as well?
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Aug 5, 2016 08:20
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My Lovely Horse posted:What's the reasoning behind the Lethal Shroud feat from Dragon 401 giving a +5 damage bonus per shroud (from level 11) as well as the usual "increase your striker damage die 1 size"? Just that the assassin is poo poo otherwise? The shroud assassin is bad, because it's playing an effect-stacking minigame that almost never pays off and thereby has pretty terrible DPR, when it is a striker's #1 job to have the best DPR. I am pretty sure spaceinvader will name other reasons that the assassin is balls, too. The other assassin is pretty good and even better as a hybrid feature.
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Aug 5, 2016 11:25
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Basically, the biggest issue is that the shroud assassin is designed to build up damage over several turns, then unload all that damage. The problem is that a striker's is supposed to finish fights quickly by just straight up alpha-striking the targets into oblivion. The issue with assassin is that it does that, but it takes time to build up, which is counter-intuitive to the striker's role. They also have pretty terrible multi-striking capability, which is necessary to have as a good striker. It's serviceable in a low-op party, it's not at vampire levels of bad, but it's still not a good striker.
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Aug 5, 2016 11:40
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The Crotch posted:Inherent bonus question. Specifically, the Dark Sun crit variant. I would say that non-weapon/implement attacks should get the inherent bonuses too. If nothing else, the Character Builder adds them automatically and it'd be extra busy work to go through and strip them out. Hwurmp fucked around with this message at 12:11 on Aug 5, 2016 |
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Aug 5, 2016 12:08
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berenzen posted:Basically, the biggest issue is that the shroud assassin is designed to build up damage over several turns, then unload all that damage. The problem is that a striker's is supposed to finish fights quickly by just straight up alpha-striking the targets into oblivion. The issue with assassin is that it does that, but it takes time to build up, which is counter-intuitive to the striker's role. They also have pretty terrible multi-striking capability, which is necessary to have as a good striker. It's serviceable in a low-op party, it's not at vampire levels of bad, but it's still not a good striker. I think shroud assassin also has one of the worst, if not the actual worst, defenses and hit points of any melee striker. They're really squishy.
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Aug 5, 2016 21:42
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Dick Burglar posted:I think shroud assassin also has one of the worst, if not the actual worst, defenses and hit points of any melee striker. They're really squishy. They have controller-grade hp, but access to strong Resist All or Insubstantial via Black Flame Form and Shade Form, respectively.
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Aug 5, 2016 21:48
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The assassin's mechanic was essentially geared around the idea of waiting and watching a target for a bunch, and then suddenly springing out and murdering them. Hypothetically. The problem is, this assumes the assassin ALWAYS gets the jump on their target, which, well, doesn't actually play out much. Of course, even if you DO get the jump on a target after lurking and collecting your shrouds, you very quickly discover that the shrouds don't actually do super fantastic damage, so their whole design is more or less hosed. Now, you can have strikers that aren't 100% murdertown, but they normally have something else to boost them up. The warlock is known for this - unless very specifically built, they will not be super damaging to the max, but they have a pretty good side order of control they can apply. The assassin lacks a side-role. Their powers are just all damage all the time...but they're real bad at it. Add in that all their paragon choices are likewise rubbish, and you have a class that simply doesn't work. The assassin is, to my recollection, the only class to come out of Dragon, and there's probably a real good reason for that. It feels half-baked if that. It definitely needed more design overlook and time.
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Aug 5, 2016 22:29
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ProfessorCirno posted:The assassin's mechanic was essentially geared around the idea of waiting and watching a target for a bunch, and then suddenly springing out and murdering them. They tried again with Executioner, and while it's slightly better, it's not fantastic either, aside from its gimmick of making bad damage rolls matter less.
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Aug 5, 2016 22:36
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Executioner actually does do what the assassin was originally meant to do. It just does it by hybriding itself to the warlock. Boom, you have a dark sneaky evil striker with strange and murderous shadow powers and a real good "catch you off guard and murder the gently caress out of you" striker mechanic. You just activate it by charging. The assassin should've been - and, I think, at one point, was going to be - similar to the swordmage. The swordmage is what you get when you stop faffing around with fighter/wizard multiclass shittery and make a class that actually does both together. The assassin, if you look at it's 3.x roots, would combine Rogue with Evil Wizard - or, in this case, warlock. It's why there's actually a decent amount of overlap between poo poo assassins do and poo poo warlocks do; they both have a lot of traction in the whole "evil shadow magics" territory. The assassin ideally would give up some of the rogue trickery and some of the warlock weirdness to make a class that meshes them together. Just as the swordmage gives up some of the fighter's offense and some of the wizard's control to overlap them and make a sort of "controlling defender." The problem you hit is that both the rogue and the warlock are, well, already strikers. So you really quickly run out of unique things to do by adding them together. So yeah. The assassin's concept needed a lot more work to begin with. I don't think the assassin's mechanical woes are why there were never any other "Shadow" power source classes, I think it's because they realized there just wasn't enough thematic material there to work with that would make the classes thematically unique. Like, yes, on a broad level, the rogue, the fighter, the ranger, and the warlord all operate the same way as the Martial power source, but there's plenty of thematic differences between them - even just between the rogue and ranger, who are both martial strikers. But at a certain point, "I move the shadows to do a thing, but not in the same way arcane classes do it" runs out of material.
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Aug 5, 2016 23:05
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Warlocks were actually really good at off-roles in general. They were never top-tier strikers, but their control was quite good and they could also off-tank pretty well since infernal pacts can pump out good, steady THP as well as being CON-focused so having lots of hit points in general. I don't know if any pacts dabbled in leader-like stuff but I wouldn't be surprised. Fake edit: I wonder if a valor bard/warlock hybrid would be any good.
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Aug 6, 2016 01:54
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Would it help at all if Shrouds were something that the Assassin accumulated on themselves, rather than per target? I'm just going off of Rogue Combo Point theory.
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Aug 6, 2016 01:59
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It's an idea that has been considered. It makes shroud assassins better but they're still crappy. The next idea was poring over the wording of assassin powers and trying to convince your DM that "no this damage is TOTALLY a separate instance and I should be able to add my ability score modifier damage again" bullshit.
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Aug 6, 2016 02:03
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gradenko_2000 posted:Would it help at all if Shrouds were something that the Assassin accumulated on themselves, rather than per target? I'm just going off of Rogue Combo Point theory. It helps the problem of "what if my shroud target dies before I invoke," but not the really bad part of the class which is "it takes too long to apply my damage". The Inexorable Shroud feat is how they approached fixing the targeting issue. Dick Burglar posted:The next idea was poring over the wording of assassin powers and trying to convince your DM that "no this damage is TOTALLY a separate instance and I should be able to add my ability score modifier damage again" bullshit. I mean even if you argue it's bullshit, those rulings still don't help it much compared to other damage-focused strikers.
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Aug 6, 2016 02:10
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Dick Burglar posted:Warlocks were actually really good at off-roles in general. They were never top-tier strikers, but their control was quite good and they could also off-tank pretty well since infernal pacts can pump out good, steady THP as well as being CON-focused so having lots of hit points in general. I don't know if any pacts dabbled in leader-like stuff but I wouldn't be surprised. gradenko_2000 posted:Would it help at all if Shrouds were something that the Assassin accumulated on themselves, rather than per target? I'm just going off of Rogue Combo Point theory.
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Aug 6, 2016 02:11
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The shroud mechanic no matter how it works kinda suffers from how much of 4e's metagame is built around a single round nova. Which, in all fairness, isn't an Assassin problem, because I personally hate the super nova-centric design the game ended up rambling towards. There are ways to make Shrouds interesting, but pretty much all those ways would run into the problem where every other character is always at Max Killzone, and thus has every reason to unload as much as possible in round 1.Dick Burglar posted:Warlocks were actually really good at off-roles in general. They were never top-tier strikers, but their control was quite good and they could also off-tank pretty well since infernal pacts can pump out good, steady THP as well as being CON-focused so having lots of hit points in general. I don't know if any pacts dabbled in leader-like stuff but I wouldn't be surprised. I don't think it'd be that great. You'd have pretty abysmal AC unless you use your hybrid talent on shoring that up...but if you do that, you're no longer a valor bard. And, to be frank, a valor bard who doesn't take Warchanter is losing out on literally the best thing they could ever have. Bard|warlock in general isn't that strong. You could go Cunning bard|Warlock...or, you go Cunning Bard, MC warlock (and wizard and sorcerer and swordmage and) then take Resourceful Magician. Now you're a Bard|Warlock|Wizard|Sorcerer|Swordmage|etc. The question with every hybrid is "what am I gaining?" I just don't see warlock adding much if anything to the bard. If you want a warlock that's half-leader, you're better off just grabbing Star and maybe Sorcerer-King as pacts and then joining the illustrious ranks of Caiphon's Star Bros at paragon. Passin' out MBAs so much people will think you're an online college.
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Aug 6, 2016 06:52
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I think the biggest way to make Shrouds work would have been to start combat with all shrouds active, then you either build (using at-wills/utilities) or expend (using encounters or Dailies) them as needed. So you get that big nova at the start, then get to play sort of a mini-game within to maximize your damage. Of course, doing it that way can make the game even more fiddly than it already is.
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Aug 6, 2016 07:39
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berenzen posted:I think the biggest way to make Shrouds work would have been to start combat with all shrouds active, then you either build (using at-wills/utilities) or expend (using encounters or Dailies) them as needed. So you get that big nova at the start, then get to play sort of a mini-game within to maximize your damage. This is what I was thinking but you still run into the problem of having to give up your striker mechanic in order to do other cool things. It's similar to the problem 5e battlehwatever fighters have - they could use a maneuver to push you, or they could just do a lot more damage; guess which one is almost always better? To put it another way, I've never seen a rogue take any of those feats that let you give up sneak attack damage to hamper enemies. It also sadly wouldn't fix the problem of assassin powers being garbage unless you use specific (and kinda dumb) word lawyer interpretations, and the fact that shroud damage is actually really low in comparison to other strikers. Honestly, it'd be neat, but what 4e really needs is some means to reduce nova potency. And that can't really happen without a full rewrite of the system.
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Aug 6, 2016 08:49
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Conversely though the Ranger feat to give up a die of quarry to slow the target is well worth it - but that's because the Ranger gets so much of its damage from its powers that Quarry is utterly insignificant.
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Aug 6, 2016 14:29
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thespaceinvader posted:Conversely though the Ranger feat to give up a die of quarry to slow the target is well worth it - but that's because the Ranger gets so much of its damage from its powers that Quarry is utterly insignificant. Not to mention you could very easily turn into an interesting Fake Defender by proning folks via World Serpent's Grasp and, due to slow/prone, generally force something into 1v1ing you. Except instead of minuses to hit others, (with Blade Dancer's Regalia) they've got a minus to hit you which means unless they have a minor shift or something they're in a terrible situation. Plus Rangers can very easily jack up their AC/REF/FORT to Defender levels. They don't quite have the HP of a proper defense or the status-shaking abilities, but that's why I said fake Defender.
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Aug 6, 2016 14:55
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Okay, guys, I'm officially into my first fully epic-tier game in 8 years of running 4e. It's the Zeitgest path, and we're just starting Adventure 10: Godmind I'm a bit weirded out - really, Epic characters are crazy resourceful - but nobody is super tweaked out, and I've kept magic gear to a bare minimum (using inherent bonuses + occasional rares/artifacts/miscellaneous items) instead. There's also no pure Controllers in the party, so I'm at least avoiding that specific trainwreck. I have switched to the Level 1 Damage Forever calculations, but is there any other advice from anyone out there who's had experience with Epic parties?
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Aug 17, 2016 19:07
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I've had the strange urge to run a 4E sandbox game in full simulationist mode, as far as the system will provide. All like, walk into the wrong area and you may meet enemies many levels higher, rituals are tangible things in actual use in the world, classes are professions, the whole works. I'm sure it will pass, but I do wonder how far you'd get before throwing your arms up in frustration, and if nothing else I'm pretty sure my group would actually go for it.
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Aug 17, 2016 21:21
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My Lovely Horse posted:I've had the strange urge to run a 4E sandbox game in full simulationist mode, as far as the system will provide. All like, walk into the wrong area and you may meet enemies many levels higher, rituals are tangible things in actual use in the world, classes are professions, the whole works. To what end? There are systems that are vastly better equipped to run as simulationist sandboxes. GURPS is my favorite in that regard.
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Aug 17, 2016 23:54
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kaynorr posted:To what end? There are systems that are vastly better equipped to run as simulationist sandboxes. GURPS is my favorite in that regard.
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Aug 18, 2016 00:00
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dwarf74 posted:Okay, guys, I'm officially into my first fully epic-tier game in 8 years of running 4e. It's the Zeitgest path, and we're just starting Adventure 10: Godmind My group is only just breaking into Paragon, but my experience so far is that besides using the Level 1 Damage Forever rules, I've also stopped reducing HP counts to MM3 standards and just running the HP straight off the book because the players are just that well optimized. My Lovely Horse posted:I've had the strange urge to run a 4E sandbox game in full simulationist mode, as far as the system will provide. All like, walk into the wrong area and you may meet enemies many levels higher, rituals are tangible things in actual use in the world, classes are professions, the whole works. 4e has the rules for it, but going full simulationist sandbox is almost guaranteed to run into the problem of having too many encounters that "don't mean anything"
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Aug 18, 2016 01:47
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My Lovely Horse posted:I've had the strange urge to run a 4E sandbox game in full simulationist mode, as far as the system will provide. All like, walk into the wrong area and you may meet enemies many levels higher, rituals are tangible things in actual use in the world, classes are professions, the whole works. So I'm running Keep on the Borderlands, and I can say that this leads parties to kinda meander a bit. You need to really make the encounter characters talk a bit. Also, just straight up tell players not to bash their heads against the same encounter for 3 sessions in a row...
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Aug 18, 2016 02:05
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I've been snooping around Roll20's 4e LFG without much success for a week or two, and I've just now stumbled on the most bizarre thing.Some Guy's Houserule posted:You get your third encounter power at level 7. Once you pick which one you want, you combine it in some manner with your level 1 or level 3 encounter power to make a single more powerful power. For example if your level 1 power lets you do 1[W]+mod acid damage and push 3 squares, and your level 7 power lets you do 2[W]+mod fire damage and knock prone, the combined new power becomes 3[W]+mod acid and fire damage, push 3 and knock prone. For some reason, it's way easier to find this sort of poo poo or people who like to roll d100s on every natural 1 to see what muscle you pull than it is to find people who know what feat taxes and inherent bonuses are. But I'm curious exactly what kind of hosed up, disgusting bullshit you could make out of that. A druid could trivially get a close blast 5 dominate at level 7, and obviously everyone would eventually end up with all of their powers being minor actions that target NADs. I'm kind of tempted to PM the guy and ask how he would handle warden dailies.
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Aug 18, 2016 04:46
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I would be unoriginal and combine a ranger's double tap encounter power with the Distracting Strike power from level 3, for an interrupt doubletap that inflicts a scaling to hit penalty.
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Aug 18, 2016 05:05
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Every charopped sorcerer past level 7 has Flame Spiral and Lightning Cuts, but one brave man says, why choose?
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Aug 18, 2016 05:20
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The Crotch posted:I've been snooping around Roll20's 4e LFG without much success for a week or two, and I've just now stumbled on the most bizarre thing. I am so confused about what this rule is even trying to accomplish.
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Aug 18, 2016 05:30
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The dude explained further on that 1: he thinks that you just get too many powers by Epic, period (I don't entirely disagree, but I place the blame primarily on item powers), and 2: merging powers can cut down on analysis paralysis in combat.
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Aug 18, 2016 05:39
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The Crotch posted:2: merging powers can cut down on analysis paralysis in combat. He's not wrong - if you can just combine two encounter powers into one super-power then it's not going to be a tough call which one to use 
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Aug 18, 2016 05:42
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The Crotch posted:For some reason, it's way easier to find this sort of poo poo or people who like to roll d100s on every natural 1 to see what muscle you pull than it is to find people who know what feat taxes and inherent bonuses are. To understand feat taxes and inherent bonuses, you need to understand the math behind the game and how it works under the hood. And to really understand why it matters you have to have DMs who throw challenging fights at you, because you won't really run into the problem if the DM is lobbing softballs at you. It's something that's not immediately noticeable, and if the DM isn't pushing you or is generous with the treasure it's something you may well never notice. The critical failure/power-combining stuff don't require any sort of knowledge or analysis at all.
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Aug 18, 2016 07:23
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Just to follow up my own question, found out how to get a new subscription to DDI, so I did that and now have parsed everything for VTT using a parse tool. If anyone doesn't know (if its been in thread already I apologise) but here is a link to get a new sub to DDI
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Aug 18, 2016 09:42
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kaynorr posted:To what end? There are systems that are vastly better equipped to run as simulationist sandboxes. GURPS is my favorite in that regard. I'm going to take back my earlier skepticism - it occurred to me that you actually could use 4E as the basis for a sandbox game, but you have to think about it in the same way that the XCOM games are a sandbox. It's a procedural means of generating the conditions for a series of tactical encounters. There are unusually strong (for a tabletop RPG) underpinnings in terms of what constitutes an average enemy/encounter/reward/progression, which means you could meaningfully push on those parameters based on the choices you make at the strategic level. Even if the strategic level consists of picking a barfight.
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Aug 18, 2016 15:52
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kaynorr posted:I'm going to take back my earlier skepticism - it occurred to me that you actually could use 4E as the basis for a sandbox game, but you have to think about it in the same way that the XCOM games are a sandbox. It's a procedural means of generating the conditions for a series of tactical encounters. There are unusually strong (for a tabletop RPG) underpinnings in terms of what constitutes an average enemy/encounter/reward/progression, which means you could meaningfully push on those parameters based on the choices you make at the strategic level. Even if the strategic level consists of picking a barfight. The entire game could take place in Bartown, WI, and if you go into the wrong bar before you're ready, look out.
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Aug 18, 2016 15:54
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homullus posted:The entire game could take place in Bartown, WI, and if you go into the wrong bar before you're ready, look out. "I think you boys might want to think twice and turn around. We drink at the paragon tier here, and I don't see a one of you with Bourbon Expertise."
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Aug 18, 2016 16:20
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Hey, newbie to 4th edition here (I played it once back when it first came out, but never a full campaign) with a few questions: I've been reading a lot into hexcrawls and other open-world exploration focused games, and have been considering how best to run it. Since it seems 4th edition has the best balance and tactical combat of all the editions, I've been looking a bit into how 4th edition would handle such a campaign, but I've gotten a bit lost in all of the content. Specifically, 1) Are there good wilderness exploration and survival rules anywhere? 2) How well does 4e handle wandering monsters/random encounters? I've heard that it works best with carefully designed setpieces, so would it bog down horribly if there were also occasional less important fights? 3) I love the idea of inherent bonuses, since I don't like the magic item treadmill and prefer to have unique magic items not easily available. What do you do with gold in games with inherent bonuses applied? 4) I'm an experienced DM in general, having run games for about a decade now, but am very new to 4e. I've heard very bad things about Essentials, but the OP seems to like it? Where should I start and what should I avoid? Is the advice in the first post still accurate? 5) Is there a good guide somewhere about teaching players 4e when they're mostly used to other systems? (Not just other D&D editions, our group doesn't play much D&D as a whole) 6) Do you have any advice in general for a hexcrawling exploration take on 4e? Thanks for any help you can give. If these are common questions or answered already, a point in the right direction would also be appreciated!
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Aug 18, 2016 18:44
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Strategic-level play in D&D 4E is about attrition and managing the resources you have between each extended rest. There's no reason this doesn't work in a hexcrawl/survival context, you just need to think about it in those terms. I think the general rule about "encounters should be crafted setpieces" steps partially from what a big deal terrain can and should be, and partially from the fact that resolving combat can take a while so you should make it count. The math is built around 4-5 at-level (EL equal to party level) encounters between each extended rest. Tension & challenge comes from winning the early battles with as few resources as possible, and/or winning the late battles with whatever you have left in the tank. So for survival rules, it's all about conserving those healing surges. Survival skill challenges could sap them, along with random encounters. I don't see why the random encounters couldn't work so long as you have an assortment of interesting terrains ready in advance - the main question asked by the encounter isn't "do they win" but "how many healing surge & daily powers did they need to win". The fail state is that you have to take an extended rest earlier then planned, which means you don't arrive at your destination when you wanted to, which needs to have narrative or mechanical consequences or you're back to one-rest nova fights. It requires a slightly different mindset, but it's eminently doable.
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Aug 18, 2016 19:17
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Yo, Kaza42! I have not done any hexcrawling with 4e, but would agree that it really shines with big, set-piece encounters rather than random, brief ones. You can still hexcrawl with it - but you shouldn't expect to just roll on a few tables and put 2d4 orcs in front of them on an open field or what have you. Instead, you can populate your hexes with interesting ruins, adventure sites, etc. Look to Dungeon Delve for ideas on those counts. e: And yes, you WILL need to tweak extended rests if there's long travel interspersed with encounters. No worries, there - you should in pretty much every edition of D&D since B/X. dwarf74 fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Aug 18, 2016 |
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Aug 18, 2016 19:20
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