|
My Lovely Horse posted:Why any society would invent and traditionalize such a cumbersome and befuddling instrument has baffled everyone but the minotaurs for ages, but we're talking about a people that consider it perfectly natural to live in labyrinths. I like all of this idea and I might suggest that to the player in question, but this last sentence reminded me of an extremely petty annoyance I have with minotaurs as often depicted in role-playing games - that they have a supernaturally good sense of direction, or can innately find their way through a maze, such as the Natural Cunning feat. It should be the opposite! The original minotaur was put in a maze to trap him and was stuck in there literally his entire life! They suck at mazes!!
|
#
?
Oct 3, 2021 22:36
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 14:03 |
|
|
Tuxedo Catfish posted:that's not a hot take Nah, that's just a good idea. Everyone should be a striker with a side order of defender, leader or controller.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2021 09:26
|
|
|
Aston posted:I like all of this idea and I might suggest that to the player in question, but this last sentence reminded me of an extremely petty annoyance I have with minotaurs as often depicted in role-playing games - that they have a supernaturally good sense of direction, or can innately find their way through a maze, such as the Natural Cunning feat. It should be the opposite! The original minotaur was put in a maze to trap him and was stuck in there literally his entire life! They suck at mazes!! Lore Idea: Player character minotaurs have a supernatural sense for mazes because they're the ones who escaped. Although the image of a minotaur with reading glasses on, frowning at an issue of The Puzzler or something is also very good.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2021 09:44
|
|
|
potatocubed posted:Lore Idea: Player character minotaurs have a supernatural sense for mazes because they're the ones who escaped.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2021 10:50
|
|
|
And in 5e, minotaurs automatically succeed on checks to escape the Maze spell.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2021 11:26
|
|
|
I really love the default lore for 4E minotaurs anyway, with their strange mental processes and involved way of thinking while also barely holding off violent demonic impulses, and inhabiting bodies that are much more suited for the latter.potatocubed posted:Although the image of a minotaur with reading glasses on, frowning at an issue of The Puzzler or something is also very good.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2021 11:38
|
|
|
Defender Wizard Elemental Battlefield Control Choose Frost Pillar, Flame Ring, or Shock Cage. You gain the corresponding power.   
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2021 16:11
|
|
|
Namagem posted:Defender Wizard There's a lot of sloppy phrasing there that isn't up to 4e's crunch but I'm not gonna nitpick that right now since that's easy to fix in a polish pass. I do question the wisdom of having control effects as an at-will minor action AoE though, especially on the class with some incredible synergy options - I can see a Beguiling Strands with Flame Ring combo locking down nearly every fight, for example.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2021 17:38
|
|
|
I think those were more proof-of-concept for a theoretical defender wizard in a 4e retroclone over something to straight-up slot onto a 4e wizard. That being said 10 times Int mod is busted as poo poo in heroic (50 hp pillar level 1!) and not particularly strong in epic, you probably want to do 5/10/15x INT per tier.
berenzen fucked around with this message at 18:33 on Oct 7, 2021 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2021 17:54
|
|
|
Namagem posted:Defender Wizard
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2021 21:24
|
|
|
As it is, closest to No Action. Should at least be Free. Actually as it is you get no choice at all whether to make the attack or not. When your target attacks your ally, you make the attack, whether it's a good time or not, and whether you're dazed or stunned or dead... or whether, which is the most interesting interaction I can think of right now, you're marked by someone yourself. Might in some cases also waste a bonus you have "to your next attack roll".
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2021 21:40
|
|
|
Can you overlap Flame Rings like the world's hottest Venn diagram? Is there a limit to the amount of Frost Pillars on the battlefield? Or can you use your move+minor to block off even a 10' wide corridor like an instant wall which radiates debuffs? HP seem a little high (basically anywhere from 30 to 100 HP) for such a casual conjuration. Summons tend to have your bloodied value or healing surge value as their HP. Given that you can just re-conjure it as a minor action, perhaps that's a better call?
|
|
#
?
Oct 10, 2021 11:10
|
|
|
Sage Genesis posted:Can you overlap Flame Rings like the world's hottest Venn diagram? I made sure to include "or until you use this power again" on each of these. Edit: Apparently missed it on frost pillar; that was an error
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2021 15:46
|
|
|
Namagem posted:I made sure to include "or until you use this power again" on each of these. Ah. I didn't see it on Frost Pillar and then just sort of scanned the others, apparently assuming they'd work the same. Ok then. Clears it up.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2021 17:04
|
|
|
Hey thread, I could use another monster statblock critique. This is a fight with an elite controller, the Avatar of Visage, which is a kind of pod-person spirit which fights primarily by summoning in minions to keep players occupied and tied down. Meanwhile its Vine Hulk minions smash the players around and can also sacrifice themselves to it to give it more hit points:   E: I just realised I worded Face-Stealing Aura kind of weird -- when I say "the doppelganger's target" I mean "the player who the doppelganger is turning into" (as per the Mirror Image power)
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2021 22:31
|
|
|
I'd just put it as "If the enemy is the target of the unformed doppelganger's Mirror Image power, [...]".
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2021 22:43
|
|
|
Well, I'm the only one who has to read it anyway, so I'm less concerned about wording and more concerned about being able to drop Vulnerable 4 onto a low-level PC in a minion-heavy encounter. Although they do have two dragonborn and a wizard, so minions shouldn't bother them too much.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2021 11:47
|
|
|
I might have the doppels put a persistent mark on their "double" to be slightly more disruptive, and maybe something like: Face-Stealing Aura (Aura 1): Enemies who start their turn in the aura are slowed until the start of their next turn. Enemies in the aura marked by the doppel grant combat advantage and gain vulnerable 2 to attacks by the doppel's allies. Slam slides the doppel's target 1 square or does some other minor vexation. The Avatar being immobile seems like it could cause trouble - the party wizard could drop a stationary damaging zone or conjuration there with a daily power and wrack up some no-effort consistent damage. Maybe it can swap positions with a doppelganger once, and recharge that power when first bloodied? Is popping the doppelganger minions supposed to be a primary way to damage the Avatar, or just a consolation prize for devoting attacks to the minions? I'd probably give the players a window to disrupt the healing and a prompt to telegraph that it's coming and that they should do something. Possibly give the brute: Rejoin the Roots (Move action): The brute is immobilized until the start of its next turn. If it starts its next turn within 2 squares of an Avatar of Visage, it loses blah hit points and the Avatar heals that many hit points. To give the party a chance to either KO or forced move the brute before the healing occurs.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2021 12:57
|
|
|
It's a cool concept but the thing to remember is that most fights don't last more than 3 rounds. Complicated fights with non-obvious mechanics are cool but they need to be HEAVILY telegraphed through description or players are just going to brute force everything. Depending on how many minions and how initiative shakes out, giving vulnerable 4 can just DROP a player before they get to interact with the mechanic at all. The boss draining the brutes for hp is actually a net benefit for the players. If it kills a brute, even if it regains the same amount of HP, you've just made the fight easier by taking out an opponent. Here's my hot take: Vine brutes are fine, but don't eat them as a minor action (see below). Remove the shared vitality from the minions, the boss is going to die in 3 turns anyway. 68 hp is like 5-6 good hits. Instead of the aura, the minions deal +4 damage to the person they are copying. Make their image-daddy get a -4 to hit them, or need to make a saving throw to hurt them, or if their image-daddy kills them they get an attack vs. will that dazes or weakens them. Something to force players to help each other and make it harder to kill their doppleganger. You could even give a +4 to hit someone ELSE's doppleganger because it's so focused on its image-daddy. No I will not apologize for using the term "image-daddy". Summon dopplegangers becomes a free action. Change the wording so that if there is one or fewer minion remaining it summons 3. Give it an initiative +10 action like a solo creature. I'm assuming this is a big boss fight but you can't use a solo because you have a smaller party. On Visage's init+10 give it an attack vs. reflex that immobilizes, so it loses this action if it's dazed and shrugs the daze (or deletes some other status like a damaging zone or conjuration). The Pre-initiative action is ESSENTIAL for allowing elites and solos to act against control heavy parties. If its DEAD and the vine brutes are alive, it uses consume ally and comes back to life. This would be an awesome cinematic moment where the players think they have the upper hand, but the boss comes back to life (and still gets its turn!). Oh! And Elites should always have some kind of immediate. Maybe when a player kills a doppleganger it does a shriek that does like, close burst 3 vs. will and just gives -2 attacks or grants CA for a turn. Granted, I DM for a group of VERY optimized players, so I tend to make things really brutal. This might also go differently if it's the 4th or 5th fight in a day, but action points and dailies tend to cut the legs out from under a really cool encounter.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2021 14:02
|
|
|
Thank you both, that's really useful! My players are quite well optimized, because I gave them a lot of chargen guidance, but not always the most efficient fighters. I especially like the idea of making the dopples' ability against aligned enemies a horrid counterattack instead of more damage, but it's all really good.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2021 17:50
|
|
|
I'm gonna do a Halloween session with 3/5 of my regular group, and their characters are 2x striker (Rogue and Barbarian) and a controller (Wizard, specializing in movement denial, i.e. slow, immobilize, prone). I'm thinking about what some good enemy types are to put a group like that up against. My thinking so far is: Artillery: good. They go down quickly and getting to them can make a good tactical challenge for the strikers with the right terrain. Brute: avoid, too dangerous without any damage mitigation. Maybe a single melee brute in one fight, where the challenge is for the wizard to lock it in place. Controller: depends. Not too dangerous, but don't lend themselves to an obvious setup either. One could supply the "right terrain" mentioned above. Lurker: probably okay, depends on the exact Lurker mechanics. Skirmisher: good, again a challenge for the lockdown wizard. Soldier: okay as support for other types, like the Controller, probably preferrable over it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 14:30
|
|
|
I'd probably go with a couple soldiers or a soldier elite to try to pull the strikers away from the backline with a couple artillery or controller units in the back to hassle the strikers from a distance and give a good target to the controller.
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2021 18:14
|
|
|
One of my players is playing a Warlord, currently at level 3, almost 4, and I'm having a really hard time finding fun and useful magic items for him to find. He's the type of Warlord who spends most of his turns allowing others to make extra attacks and doing a bit of healing. He's already got magical armour, and given how little he uses his weapon I'd prefer he buys one eventually and finds things that are a bit more impactful. I've asked him for a wishlist and it's basically just items which support his healing, which is what I also already found on my own as good candidates (and his armour already helps with this also) but I don't want to give him just healing stuff and turn him into a walking band-aid because boring. There's other generally useful items ofcourse, like a neck-slot item or a shield, but the issue there is that it is very likely that other party members would take priority on those items because they'd likely get more use out of them. He's already starting to get behind on number of items compared to the rest of the party and I don't want this to get out of hand. So long question short, what are some good lvl 5-10 magic item recommendations for a Warlord?
|
|
#
?
Nov 12, 2021 16:54
|
|
|
Give him an item for a slot he doesn't have yet, if he has an empty slot. It gives him a daily that allows him to spend 2 healing surges on a 0 hp ally, or he can spend 2 healing surges for an extra standard action that turn.
|
|
#
?
Nov 12, 2021 17:01
|
|
|
Orange Devil posted:One of my players is playing a Warlord, currently at level 3, almost 4, and I'm having a really hard time finding fun and useful magic items for him to find. He's the type of Warlord who spends most of his turns allowing others to make extra attacks and doing a bit of healing. He's already got magical armour, and given how little he uses his weapon I'd prefer he buys one eventually and finds things that are a bit more impactful. There are weapons you can give a warlord that will better enable their granted attacks. I believe Chieftain's Spear/Polearm is the type you're looking for? But there might be others available that provide a similar benefit.
|
|
#
?
Nov 12, 2021 17:14
|
|
|
Orange Devil posted:One of my players is playing a Warlord, currently at level 3, almost 4, and I'm having a really hard time finding fun and useful magic items for him to find. He's the type of Warlord who spends most of his turns allowing others to make extra attacks and doing a bit of healing. He's already got magical armour, and given how little he uses his weapon I'd prefer he buys one eventually and finds things that are a bit more impactful. Weapon: Chieftain's Weapon (3) Armor: Tactician's Armor Ringmail (5) Head: Casque of Tactics (4) Feet: Acrobat Boots (2) Neck: Healer's Brooch (4) Misc: Battle Standard of Healing (3) A good (though slightly outdated) CharOp guide for this kind of Tactical Warlord build, including powers that allow the Warlord to actually participate themselves while still buffing their allies: http://www.dyasdesigns.com/dragon_phoenix/Genasi%20Novalord%20_%20The%20Wizards%20Community.htm
|
|
#
?
Nov 12, 2021 17:25
|
|
|
It's been years since I played this game because my friends are boring, but was there room in 4e for weird items that aren't in the book? Ring - 1/- for all unintended damage to or from the user - extra fate point per session (no known use) Circlet of Hate - spend two consecutive full rounds focusing on how much you hate someone in LOS to instantly kill them or cast phantasmal killer on them, and then the item shatters from the sheer force of your hate. Or something less extreme than instant death, I don't know. Dog - good girl The Scripture of St. Borethius - A clever bit of notional/textual magitech that attunes the wearer to all the local nega-lines, causing them to align with the user at the center. This non-aggressively invokes any voidwraiths and naught-hounds in the area, allowing you to commune with the Empty Masters. Do not do this. A Chipping from The First Stone - can be thrown at voidwraiths and naught-hounds to kill them. Don't do this either. Cool Flower - Regular flower that does nothing, but it's all about how you pitch it. Just don't give it to them at the same time you're giving more practical things to other characters.
|
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 05:13
|
|
|
If you're looking for serious criticism on those magic items, they're all one of either; half-formed concepts that need fleshing out (ring, circlet of hate), very plot specific (scripture, chipping), or straight-up joke items (dog, cool flower). You'd need to be more specific about what "unintended damage" is, but a ring that provides resistance to damage dealt by allies has a niche in parties heavy with powers that deal damage to all creatures in an area, or that create harmful zones. You might want to bump the resistance up to resist 10 or even 15 considering it's a ring and they're largely for paragon and epic parties, though. And a ring that provides resistance to the "unintended damage" of zones and/or hazardous terrain has a niche, too. There may even already be items that have similar effects ont the game. I'd avoid an instant death power like the plague in 4e, but you could maybe get away with an item power that dealt increasing necrotic/psychic damage the longer you sustained it, made it Sustain Standard, and maybe had it daze or immobilize the user until they stopped sustaining it. It would have to deal a lot of damage to be worth using in that case, though. The scriptures item is probably better off as a campaign-specific ritual, and you need to flesh it out a bit more. What does "communing with the Empty Masters" allow the caster to accomplish? Do they answer questions? How comprehensive is their knowledge, and in what areas? Why would you not want to do this? Do the Empty Masters have their own agendas, that they may choose to lie to accomplish? Does the act of communing with them have some effect on the caster, or the world itself? The players don't necessarily need to know all this information, but the DM definitely should, and so do we in order to judge its suitability to the game. Otherwise, you could choose to make the scriptures themself an artifact item, and it has agendas of its own, personally related to the Empty Masters. Similarly, that Chipping from the First Stone needs a few more details. Is it a consumable? What are voidwraiths and naught-hounds, and why is the stone worth using to kill them? What are the consequences of killing something with it (again, the players don't need to know this right away, but we do)? The dog and the cool flower are plainly joke items, and could be rewards suitable for PCs, as long as they're alongside of the adventure's other rewards or the act of attaining them isn't too difficult, or you have a group that would appreciate slaying a dragon and finding stuff like a dog, a flower, the Necklace Of Fireballs (not what it sounds like; it's cinnamon candy), and the Sword of I'm Mortal (which makes you keenly aware of your own looming death and the harm you cause others on a daily basis). The latter two are part of a trove my own DM have us at the end of an adventure once, in a 3rd edition game. We laughed, then put them in the party inventory and kind of forgot about them after a while. Basically, there's plenty of room for homebrew magic items, yours are just kind of first draft and need more refinement before they'd stand on their own.
|
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 08:06
|
|
|
Should have clarified: none of those were meant to hold water as an actual idea, so much as offer some general ways a DM could reward players with items when they already have all the gear they need. Plot hooks for the warlord to get a first look at, powerful one-off items that spotlight the warlord for a round and give the players something to remember, evocative knick-knacks. You know, just stuff to have and feel good about earning even if not all of it is strictly, practically useful in combat. But now that I think of it, it's possible the item system in DnD doesn't really support this approach, since items are usually crucial to character progression and that's the headspace players are going to be in when it comes to items. I think I've gotten used to playing more rules-light systems, where if your reward for the mission is XP and a prose poem about the elegiac nature of grass (or whatever) then that's cool. Ragnar34 fucked around with this message at 08:35 on Nov 14, 2021 |
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 08:33
|
|
|
4e does support alternative rewards for players, but yeah, you need a lot more rules crunch than what you're giving if you're going to make something a viable reward.
|
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 08:36
|
|
|
TBF though, that bit with the Empty Masters, voidwraiths, and naught-hounds seems like it could be a cool campaign arc, and you could absolutely get away with poorly-defined "consequences" for using the Scriptures and the stone thing if you're good at seat-of-your-pants DMing. But yeah, sounds like you want more of a narrative system where a player's build isn't as important to their viability as a character.
|
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 08:52
|
|
|
For a "proper" 4E game I'd expect the concepts of nega-lines and voidwraiths to be known, defined quantities and the items' effects to be specific methods of interacting with them, just like it's established what, say, AC is and what a magic armor does to it. But that being said, the scripture and the chipping have extreme Dark Souls energy, and if I received them in a game and it was the first time I'd ever heard of nega-lines and voidwraiths, I'd be super excited about the cool stuff you're obviously running behind the scenes, even if it was all improvised and the descriptions just evocative story prompts. Very generally items like this probably fare better in more story-based games, or at most 13th Age or something, but you can definitely take your 4E game in that direction if you have a like-minded group.
|
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 10:13
|
|
|
Do... do you not get that the list was a shitpost I am genuinely not sure if these responses are a bit.
|
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 13:36
|
|
|
Well it genuinely makes a better RPG idea list than it makes a shitpost, to be honest. Good job I guess on conclusively proving that the Dungeons & Dragons thread is full of nerds though, I never would have suspected My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 13:47 on Nov 14, 2021 |
|
#
?
Nov 14, 2021 13:42
|
|
|
My 4E group is started to get a little burned out keeping track of all the powers, bonuses, feats, etc. every level. They're having a ton of fun, but the bookkeeping is getting to be a bit much and I can see it's only going to get worse in that regard. Is there a streamlined version of 4E that we could switch to? Some kind of patched up retro-clone? I'm looking at Shadow of The Demon Lord, but it's missing a few critical things like Dragonborn and a teleporting Swordmage-type class. We're going to stick with 4E for now, but if there's something easier on them I'd like to be prepared to transition to it.
|
|
#
?
Nov 29, 2021 06:24
|
|
|
I've found something that helps a lot is to prep your own character sheet in advance, and with each power list all the bonuses that may or may not apply. That way when you're rolling something you don't need to flip through a bunch of sourcebooks all the time, you already have all that information to hand.
|
|
#
?
Nov 29, 2021 08:39
|
|
|
Devorum posted:My 4E group is started to get a little burned out keeping track of all the powers, bonuses, feats, etc. every level. They're having a ton of fun, but the bookkeeping is getting to be a bit much and I can see it's only going to get worse in that regard. Strike! is the closest thing I've found. It isn't as fleshed out as 4e though, so it puts a lot on the DM in terms of monster generation. Loot is also basically gone which feels like a loss, even if the system is almost certainly better off for the change.
|
|
#
?
Nov 29, 2021 19:27
|
|
|
IMO, the best thing to do for something like that is to basically crib the idea of Epic 6, which plants a fairly low level cap, but gives smaller, more manageable rewards when you'd get a level-up. One more feat, for example. 5th or 6th level as a cap are both great for this, 5 because you get your second daily, 6 for one more feat and your second utility power. 6 is also just 1 level below when you're expected to get +2 weapons, so you can eventually drop those in in a way that makes them feel actually special, without breaking the math too much. And Level 6 characters are still pretty manageable, since you've got few enough powers that you could feasibly fit all their cards on one sheet, depending on your build. It's a better fit for games with themes of scrappy heroes and/or low-magic settings, rather than something like Eberron or Forgotten Realms, where high-level characters being all over the place is just a fact of life. girl dick energy fucked around with this message at 21:22 on Nov 29, 2021 |
|
#
?
Nov 29, 2021 21:19
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 14:03 |
|
|
I'll second Strike. The skill system is sublime, and I like how elegant attack/damage rolls are, being a single D6 roll which gives you both whether you hit and how much damage you did.
|
|
#
?
Nov 29, 2021 21:19
|
|