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wallawallawingwang posted:The 13th age bestiary has gelatinous tetrahedrons, hexahedrons, octahedrons, and dodecahedrons. Each round they make one of 4, 6, 8, or 12 random attacks. Dice Battle is a good thing is what I'm saying. e: for very obvious reasons I feel extremely silly asking it, but "what else are good ways to determine the outcome of an action by a dice roll" My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Aug 26, 2016 |
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Aug 26, 2016 05:47
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fatherdog posted:I can't even tell what they were trying to do with the bladesinger. Striker wizard? Controller melee wizard? It's a bad class.
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Aug 26, 2016 06:16
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fatherdog posted:I can't even tell what they were trying to do with the bladesinger. The bladesinger owns because it looks exactly like the sort of thing you get from UA these days. It's a perfect window into what was to come in the next edition. What were they trying to do? Nothing. There's no actual concept there. Not mechanically, not thematically, not in the fluff - nothing. They took a super basic non-defender shell, gave it some generic bonuses when using a one handed weapon, and then went "we want it to cast spells but not as strong as a wizard, let's just give wizard encounters as dailies." None of it's abilities actually work together, and, poo poo, it even uses two attributes that aren't meant to stack together. At no point in time did anyone pay attention to how any of the 4e mechanics worked. And again, it's not like there's even some cool fluff to back it up that made it unique from other classes like the swordmage. It's the perfect 3e/5e class - barely thought up, stuck together with duct tape, and obviously made in under an hour so they could take a longer mid-afternoon nap. It's pure filler.
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Aug 26, 2016 08:44
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Okay, how about this for the dice modron encounter: as long as a modron is in the fight, you can't benefit from abilities that allow you to reroll the corresponding dice. No Brutal weapon property, no d20 rerolls. You can still benefit from bonuses, including those you give yourself after a roll, but the die roll itself is what it is. I feel it corresponds nicely with the idea that these guys are the ultimate foundation of law and won't abide manipulation. And it's also not too bad a penalty. (Kurieg, modrons were a fantastic idea. In this context, they're the rules by which even chaos works, basically. Such a shame there's no Wild Mage in the party.) In the meantime, I'm also planning a fight where the party encounters mirror versions of themselves, because what RPG is complete without that, and I'm trying to figure out a way to work the mirror theme into it mechanically. Idea A: A mirror bisects the battlefield. The PCs' counterparts are visible on the other side of the mirror, and they always take up corresponding positions. When a PC moves, their counterpart moves, and vice versa. They don't precisely mimic each other's movements; each creature still takes their own turn, makes their own attacks etc.; i.e. when the wizard casts Magic Missile, the mirror wizard does not also cast Magic Missile. You can target creatures through the mirror as usual - arrows don't bounce off, rays don't reflect, and so on. However, if you place a zone, conjuration or similar, it also appears in a corresponding position on the other side of the mirror. [This may or may not actually do anything, to be honest.] You can't cross over by walking - your counterpart will block the way. You can teleport into (or out of) the mirror, and your counterpart will do the same. Once your counterpart is gone, you're free to move wherever you want, into and out of the mirror as you please. idea B: The surface the party stands on is the mirror. They are the only creatures visible on the battlefield, but their counterparts are understood to occupy the space directly below them. Again, PCs and counterparts move simultaneously, but take their own turns. A PC is always adjacent to their counterpart. Bad for ranged characters, who will be drawing Opportunity Attacks from their counterpart all the time (unless they can fly). Good for melee characters, who will always have someone to attack - but maybe the defenders would rather concentrate on someone other than their equally well armored counterpart. You never draw OAs from your counterpart when you move. You become free to move once your counterpart is gone. Zones affect both sides of the mirror, you can freely target the counterparts, and you don't need to cross over because you can always get adjacent to someone. I'm not sure which of the two is better, or if they're even any good at all.
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Aug 26, 2016 09:04
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fatherdog posted:I can't even tell what they were trying to do with the bladesinger. It was boring and awful from the start.
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Aug 26, 2016 13:00
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I just did a read-through of that Bladesinger in the Neverwinter Campaign Setting, and you guys weren't kidding. It's so awful. Like, they explicitly wrote down "actually, your encounter powers are daily powers now" and thought that was a totally reasonable thing to print.
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Aug 26, 2016 16:56
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4E's early stuff was not great. To be fair, it was a huge departure from previous editions' rulesets so they were working in uncharted territory but it's hard not to see the problems with the earlier books in hindsight. While bladesingers are clearly on the accidentally-awful end of the spectrum, you also have the accidentally-too-good stuff from early books like melee rangers. Twin strike and minor action attack powers out the wazoo really broke the expected DPR over their knee right out of the gate. Also it took them seemingly forever to realize that doubling up on the same NAD ability scores was a bad idea.
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Aug 26, 2016 17:20
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My Lovely Horse posted:Okay, how about this for the dice modron encounter: as long as a modron is in the fight, you can't benefit from abilities that allow you to reroll the corresponding dice. No Brutal weapon property, no d20 rerolls. You can still benefit from bonuses, including those you give yourself after a roll, but the die roll itself is what it is. I feel it corresponds nicely with the idea that these guys are the ultimate foundation of law and won't abide manipulation. And it's also not too bad a penalty. (Kurieg, modrons were a fantastic idea. In this context, they're the rules by which even chaos works, basically. Such a shame there's no Wild Mage in the party.) Another idea: while fighting in an area of Modron influence skip all damage rolls and make every attack do average damage. It's not exactly a bonus or penalty just something weird that fits with the enforced order theme. For the mirror thing, I think I like the first idea a little better. You'd get a fun game of trying to move yourself to move the enemy, and that's pretty novel.
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Aug 26, 2016 17:38
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gradenko_2000 posted:I just did a read-through of that Bladesinger in the Neverwinter Campaign Setting, and you guys weren't kidding. It's so awful. Like, they explicitly wrote down "actually, your encounter powers are daily powers now" and thought that was a totally reasonable thing to print. It's one of those things where it's designed to nova and nothing else (blade dance lasts two rounds, squeeze as many MBAs into those two rounds as you can) and it's so poorly written that the most optimized bladesinger in the game dumps int entirely, picks "encounters" that don't require attack rolls, and is one of the str/dex races with easy access to more powerful 1h heavy blades. It can be optimized but the way you optimize it is by ignoring everything they want you to do with it and instead exploiting the fact that whoever wrote it has no idea how 4e's rules are supposed to work.
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Aug 26, 2016 17:43
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fatherdog posted:I can't even tell what they were trying to do with the bladesinger. Nor could the 'designer' who made it.
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Aug 26, 2016 18:01
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gradenko_2000 posted:I just did a read-through of that Bladesinger in the Neverwinter Campaign Setting, and you guys weren't kidding. It's so awful. Like, they explicitly wrote down "actually, your encounter powers are daily powers now" and thought that was a totally reasonable thing to print. I really, really didn't think they'd be that bad in play. But, well...
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Aug 26, 2016 18:01
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With, say, Vampire and Assassin, you can at least see what they were going for, even if it didn't work very well. Bladesinger I can't even divine what the intent was.
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Aug 26, 2016 18:08
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fatherdog posted:With, say, Vampire and Assassin, you can at least see what they were going for, even if it didn't work very well. Bladesinger I can't even divine what the intent was.
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Aug 26, 2016 18:14
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dwarf74 posted:Yeah, there was a six-round combat and he did nothing in rounds three through six. wallawallawingwang posted:Another idea: while fighting in an area of Modron influence skip all damage rolls and make every attack do average damage. It's not exactly a bonus or penalty just something weird that fits with the enforced order theme.  What I could do that's similar is that every Modron rolls itself on its turn, and whatever number comes up is automatically the result for any instance of that die for the next round. Once a Modron is defeated, that die becomes "free". But it's not really gonna work with a d20 Modron in the mix, is it. "Okay, natural 1, everything goes wrong this round  " Would need some sort of justification or a different special rule...e: "As a free action once per round, you can reroll a d20 roll you just made. However, the d20 Modron [icosamodron?] can use the result of the reroll as its own attack roll on its turn." e2: that or it could just straight keep any d20 roll that's made as its own. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 18:31 on Aug 26, 2016 |
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Aug 26, 2016 18:18
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If you want to make that more powerful, you could say that each modron can choose from any result of its die type during the previous round. No results, it has to roll itself. e: I see you've already come up with this
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Aug 26, 2016 18:35
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ProfessorCirno posted:The bladesinger owns because it looks exactly like the sort of thing you get from UA these days. It's a perfect window into what was to come in the next edition. Fluff-wise I'm pretty sure the concept was "Elf Fighter/Wizard" from early editions. So mechanically it's a bit conflicted because it's "swings a sword and casts spells" and they're trying to fit that into 4e's tactical framework.
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Aug 26, 2016 18:46
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Assuming you did some houseruling to make the stats work and not be MAD, how much more or less stupid would it be to just say "you can choose powers from both the Fighter and the Wizard classes"?
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Aug 26, 2016 18:48
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gradenko_2000 posted:Assuming you did some houseruling to make the stats work and not be MAD, how much more or less stupid would it be to just say "you can choose powers from both the Fighter and the Wizard classes"? It's sort of a lost cause because this is not a role that needs filling thematically or mechanically. Like, play a swordmage, a hybrid, or a loving bard already.
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Aug 26, 2016 18:51
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Whenever I imagine "swings swords and casts spells" my mind goes to the Mystic Knight from Final Fantasy V, who casts spells to improve his sword attacks. And, y'know, that could be a cool niche for 4E, the guy who has a reliable way to deal every kind of elemental damage under the sun if he puts his mind to it. (Or it would be a viable niche if enemies were more reliably vulnerable to specific elements.) You know what was great for that in the old days? Duskblades. If only for the ludicrous Power Attack/two-handed weapon/True Strike combo. 
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Aug 26, 2016 18:57
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gradenko_2000 posted:Assuming you did some houseruling to make the stats work and not be MAD, how much more or less stupid would it be to just say "you can choose powers from both the Fighter and the Wizard classes"? You can already do that via Hybrid Fighter|Wizard. If you gave Bladesinger regular encounter powers or regular dailies, it'd help. If you want it to be the controller it claims to be, you'd probably have to rethink the bladesong power (or whatever it's called, away from CB), because right now the entire chassis is geared toward Striker + light control (in which case it functions better with a build like Kurieg described).
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Aug 26, 2016 18:58
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OneThousandMonkeys posted:It's sort of a lost cause because this is not a role that needs filling thematically or mechanically. Like, play a swordmage, a hybrid, or a loving bard already. Well, except for the swordmage none of those fill the same setting place as the bladesinger does. Considering Neverwinter was released after Essentials and wasn't supposed to mandate using the FRPG/FRCG, it makes sense to have an essentials swordmage in there for all the Iliyanbruen stuff. They didn't do a good job of it, but it was something that needed to be done thematically and mechanically for that product.
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Aug 26, 2016 18:59
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Arivia posted:Well, except for the swordmage none of those fill the same setting place as the bladesinger does. Considering Neverwinter was released after Essentials and wasn't supposed to mandate using the FRPG/FRCG, it makes sense to have an essentials swordmage in there for all the Iliyanbruen stuff. They didn't do a good job of it, but it was something that needed to be done thematically and mechanically for that product. If you need setting-related stuff, it would've been better served as a Theme or Paragon Path than a class.
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Aug 26, 2016 19:01
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Generic Octopus posted:If you need setting-related stuff, it would've been better served as a Theme or Paragon Path than a class. There were a couple related themes in the Neverwinter book as well. But no, Essentials 4e didn't have a fighter-mage hybrid which the focus of Neverwinter basically demanded. It was a natural fit for that product.
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Aug 26, 2016 19:03
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Arivia posted:There were a couple related themes in the Neverwinter book as well. But no, Essentials 4e didn't have a fighter-mage hybrid which the focus of Neverwinter basically demanded. It was a natural fit for that product. I think they could've easily done a wizard-specific theme that stapled some armor/weapon proficiency + Intelligent Blademaster as a starting feature, which then gradually gained the ability to mix spells with basic attack strikes.
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Aug 26, 2016 19:11
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Generic Octopus posted:I think they could've easily done a wizard-specific theme that stapled some armor/weapon proficiency + Intelligent Blademaster as a starting feature, which then gradually gained the ability to mix spells with basic attack strikes. No, because that wouldn't fit the identity of fighter/mages as their own end to end class setup since 2e in the Realms. Again, I'm not saying it was a well-designed class, but I'm saying it makes sense in the scope of Neverwinter as a product.
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Aug 26, 2016 19:13
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Isn't that getting into 3rd Edition-style "this specific narrative description of a knight of this county needs its own prestige class" design, though?
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Aug 26, 2016 19:16
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Arivia posted:Well, except for the swordmage none of those fill the same setting place as the bladesinger does. Considering Neverwinter was released after Essentials and wasn't supposed to mandate using the FRPG/FRCG, it makes sense to have an essentials swordmage in there for all the Iliyanbruen stuff. They didn't do a good job of it, but it was something that needed to be done thematically and mechanically for that product.
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Aug 26, 2016 19:24
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OneThousandMonkeys posted:It's sort of a lost cause because this is not a role that needs filling thematically or mechanically. Like, play a swordmage, a hybrid, or a loving bard already. Or hell, can't Sorcerors take dagger implements and use their powers as melee attacks? I thought I remember that being a thing. Rolling as a dragon sorc with a dagger, and shield and pull together enough constitution for hide armor would make for an interesting tough guy sword mage.
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Aug 26, 2016 19:58
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"it existed before and needs to exist now" is rarely ever a good reason to do anything. Particularly in 4e which is the edition of reflavoring to taste.DeathSandwich posted:Or hell, can't Sorcerors take dagger implements and use their powers as melee attacks? I thought I remember that being a thing. Rolling as a dragon sorc with a dagger, and shield and pull together enough constitution for hide armor would make for an interesting tough guy sword mage. It's a feat, Sorcerous Blade Channeling.
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Aug 26, 2016 20:02
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Kurieg posted:"it existed before and needs to exist now" is rarely ever a good reason to do anything. Particularly in 4e which is the edition of reflavoring to taste. I'm curious? Can the elementalist use that? I've never actually looked into them, I just know they're the essentials sorcerer.
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Aug 26, 2016 21:12
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Yes but they don't get any of the secondary riders. Also most elementalists should have a pretty good PBAOE in their kit since unless your DM rules differently elemental blast+sorcerous blade channeling still doesn't count as an Melee Basic Attack. It's a Ranged Basic Attack being made at Melee Range.
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Aug 26, 2016 21:17
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My Lovely Horse posted:Whenever I imagine "swings swords and casts spells" my mind goes to the Mystic Knight from Final Fantasy V, who casts spells to improve his sword attacks. And, y'know, that could be a cool niche for 4E, the guy who has a reliable way to deal every kind of elemental damage under the sun if he puts his mind to it. (Or it would be a viable niche if enemies were more reliably vulnerable to specific elements.) There are like, 18 different ways of doing that concept in 4e, not least the Elemental Pact Warlock.
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Aug 26, 2016 21:20
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gradenko_2000 posted:Isn't that getting into 3rd Edition-style "this specific narrative description of a knight of this county needs its own prestige class" design, though? That's not really a problem, since that's what prestige classes were for in the first place? Now that doesn't fit the scope of a class in 4e, but that's not what the blademaster is doing either. The fighter-wizard archetype spans the entire Realms, from Neverwinter on the Sword Coast North to the Yuirwood in the Unapproachable East, with plenty of places in between. The swordmage materials expanded that, especially to genasi. It worked pretty well! So the bladesinger had wide applicability across all of the 4e Realms. It was particularly relevant to a group in the Neverwinter Campaign Setting (as I previously pointed out, the Iliyanbruen elves) and that's likely why they chose to update it in the Neverwinter Campaign Setting. (Part of the reason also being that it was updating something from a previous FR book in the new one.) dwarf74 posted:The line had stopped pretending that Essentials was standalone well before then, though. Heck, even Heroes of Shadow recommended some stuff from pre-Essentials books. Neverwinter was supposed to be standalone though. It does have some suggestions for other products, but it was designed to be a one-book setting in the larger Forgotten Realms. Standalone was a very big part of that product. DeathSandwich posted:Or hell, can't Sorcerors take dagger implements and use their powers as melee attacks? I thought I remember that being a thing. Rolling as a dragon sorc with a dagger, and shield and pull together enough constitution for hide armor would make for an interesting tough guy sword mage. Sure, but that doesn't fit the same narrative position as the bladesinger did for the Neverwinter book. The Iliyanbruen elves are coming back from the Feywild, not the Dragon Lands. Kurieg posted:"it existed before and needs to exist now" is rarely ever a good reason to do anything. Particularly in 4e which is the edition of reflavoring to taste. Come on, don't be an idiot. That the bladesinger/swordmage archetype existed before in the campaign setting, in this edition already, and is useful in this current product, is a very good reason to update something. Additionally, reskinning or whatever is a popular idea around here - but it's not a suitable design direction for a game setting trying to flesh out a world, and isn't how Wizards designed things. You know that.
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Aug 26, 2016 21:31
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Arivia posted:Sure, but that doesn't fit the same narrative position as the bladesinger did for the Neverwinter book. The Iliyanbruen elves are coming back from the Feywild, not the Dragon Lands. There are wild sorcerers, and thunder sorcerers, both of which are cha/dex and would fit that kind of thing. Arivia posted:Come on, don't be an idiot. That the bladesinger/swordmage archetype existed before in the campaign setting, in this edition already, and is useful in this current product, is a very good reason to update something. Additionally, reskinning or whatever is a popular idea around here - but it's not a suitable design direction for a game setting trying to flesh out a world, and isn't how Wizards designed things. You know that. Yes it existed before, which means they could have re-printed it, or designed a different Swordmage. But as it stands the bladesinger is really bad both at being a controller and pretending to be a striker. It's addition to the setting even if it is for narrative reasons detracts from the game as a whole because it's yet another trap option to avoid during character creation just because the Iliyanbruen elves need "wizard what uses a sword". Make it a Theme that lets wizards use swords as implements and maybe gives them a bonus to avoiding AoOs. Their level 10 feature can be something about attacking and using a spell in the same turn, hell they can even provide additional encounter powers like they did with the Dark Sun Themes. There are ways to do this that isn't "Make another wizard archetype".
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Aug 26, 2016 21:38
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Kurieg posted:There are wild sorcerers, and thunder sorcerers, both of which are cha/dex and would fit that kind of thing. quote:Yes it existed before, which means they could have re-printed it, or designed a different Swordmage. quote:It's addition to the setting even if it is for narrative reasons detracts from the game as a whole because it's yet another trap option to avoid during character creation just because the Iliyanbruen elves need "wizard what uses a sword". quote:Make it a Theme that lets wizards use swords as implements and maybe gives them a bonus to avoiding AoOs. Their level 10 feature can be something about attacking and using a spell in the same turn, hell they can even provide additional encounter powers like they did with the Dark Sun Themes. There are ways to do this that isn't "Make another wizard archetype". You don't make it a theme because you're using the design space of themes for specific organizational uses in the Neverwinter Campaign Setting. Making another wizard archetype makes sense for what is system and setting wise another wizard archetype. Don't muddy things up and confuse the design spaces. There's no problem with printing another wizard archetype; the bladesinger just didn't work well in comparison to other options.
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Aug 26, 2016 21:45
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Arivia posted:There's no problem with printing another wizard archetype. I think you are wrong about this. Even though it releases "stand-alone" products, D&D as a brand has always been indiscriminately syncretic. They should have been creating these things knowing that the majority of the player base will draw everything from every product they have access to. The emphasis on wizard sub-classes was an increasingly unsubtle backsliding to D&D's true self. Like, you can sell "stand-alone" ice cream that somehow doesn't require toppings and swear up and down that it's meant to be eaten as-is, but you should probably still have an eye on what happens to your product when people dump chocolate sauce on it.
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Aug 26, 2016 22:00
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My Lovely Horse posted:Whenever I imagine "swings swords and casts spells" my mind goes to the Mystic Knight from Final Fantasy V, who casts spells to improve his sword attacks. And, y'know, that could be a cool niche for 4E, the guy who has a reliable way to deal every kind of elemental damage under the sun if he puts his mind to it. (Or it would be a viable niche if enemies were more reliably vulnerable to specific elements.) That exists, and it's the Swordmage. In fact, one of the more popular paragon paths is a swordmage one that lets you choose elemental types between fights that you can add to your attacks, so your sword attack is now ALWAYS ON FIRE. The swordmage essentially has two schticks. First, it stabs magic into people. Second, it magics it's way into stabbing people. The former involves doing stuff like "you shank a dude and then lightning strikes him," or "you shank a dude and then kick him backwards and he explodes." The latter involves stuff like "you teleport a baddie who was about to attack an ally right next to a different baddie who he attacks instead!" Or both, where you get stuff like "you teleport around to three different enemies and slash through all three with lightning speed, also literal lightning." So in other words, a lot of elemental sword attacks, and a lot of teleportation shenanigans. Maxwell Lord posted:Fluff-wise I'm pretty sure the concept was "Elf Fighter/Wizard" from early editions. So mechanically it's a bit conflicted because it's "swings a sword and casts spells" and they're trying to fit that into 4e's tactical framework. Right, but it already existed. I guess it was trying to fit in a mechanical niche that didn't actually exist - it couldn't just be a warrior / spellcaster, it had to explicitly cast WIZARD spells. It's exactly the sort of dumb metagaming I'd expect from 3e/5e to be frank - the sort of argument that fits alongside "No I can't just call my ranger a fighter, I have to play the FIGHTER class, but be all about using a BOW!"
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Aug 26, 2016 22:30
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Ok we've had our first full session since character creation and I can happily report my in person group is in complete agreement that we should now play 4e instead of 5e. Having options and things to do for everyone (two of our players love martials) is the biggest selling point. That and keywords Holy crap keyword system is good.
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Aug 27, 2016 11:51
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They could have just killed off every single bladesinger, like they did the assassins going into 2E. No need to cater for the archetype then!
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Aug 27, 2016 13:49
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Spiteski posted:Ok we've had our first full session since character creation and I can happily report my in person group is in complete agreement that we should now play 4e instead of 5e. ONE OF US ONE OF US
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Aug 27, 2016 14:13
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