The Peanut Gallery

Speaking of Censures... since you're running pretty much the exact same build that my LEB character, Lanharath is, I wanted to ask your opinion on the Pursuit build. I'm not really liking it much and I am thinking about switching over to the Censure of Unity as soon as I can. It seems (to me) that enemies who are going to fight you... are going to fight you. Avengers NEED their censure damage bonus to get anywhere NEAR real striker damage rates, and enemies don't seem to run away much. Granted, I'm making my opinion after only playing with him a handfull of times, but I've also been reading through the "Can Dextyr..." thread and have noticed that you haven't gotten that bonus much either. Though I will say that Blade and Tristan make a WICKED combo against a single enemy! Anyways, it just seems to me that it's too difficult to get that Censure bonus for Pursuit Avengers and that the bonus rests FULLY in the DMs hands and it's relying on the purposeful retreat of an enemy doesn't seem to leave them with a damage bonus often. And it's not like it even stacks for every square they move away from you like the damage bonus does for the other Avenger build when they get hit multiple times. Okay, 'nuff ranting from me... now it's your turn Lord S. =)

Just as an FYI, I'm not a fan of relying on another person (DM or player) in order for your PC's schtick to work, well except for my warlord...but that's a horse of a different colour.

Well, I figure that the pursuit avenger shines better vs. certain kind of enemies. Lurkers, skirmishers, and artillery type monsters are what they should focus on, in my opinion, since those monsters either don't want to be in melee or want to move around. If you keep the artillery in melee or keep skirmishers and lurkers from moving around you're already putting a serious cramp in their tactics, even if it means you're not doing fantastic damage.

I think you're probably right that avengers often don't get high damage numbers (remember that retributive avengers have to take a beating to get bonus damage, unless they get lucky with resistances or somesuch), but I don't think that they should have as high damage as other strikers - they already have about 20-30% higher hit chance. Having the same numbers for damage would be terribly unbalanced, in my opinion. I think avengers are supposed to have lower average damage, but be more consistent in landing it. But of course as a pursuing avenger your bonus damage really does depend on how DMs play monsters and which monsters you pick as your oath target. I mean, if you have your choice, a pursuing avenger probably shouldn't oath a brute or soldier or melee controller (Do as I say and not as I do - I realize I just went straight for the one soldier on the field in the Dextyr game, haha.) And that leads me to my next point.

I think that DMs should keep in mind that the monsters don't know that attacking/moving affects the avenger's censure, since it's not an effect applied to the monster. 4e is of the philosophy that a creature under an effect knows exactly what that entails mechanics-wise, but the censure effect is one that applies to the avenger, not the monster. After they see it a couple times, fine, but until then avoiding triggering your censure is like avoiding clumping to counter a wizard.

Lastly, part of why I like the pursuing avenger is the mobility, especially as an elf. I mean, I moved 11 squares, including a lot of difficult terrain, and made two attacks in the same round. The only way something is going to get away from Tristan is if it's flying or swimming under water That mobility also helps them get to those targets I mentioned that I think should be their prime focus, since they tend to hang out on the back lines.

In any case, I won't change Tristan unless I get really disillusioned with the pursuing avenger (which I don't see happening, to be honest). I don't mind playing a sub-optimal build, and I don't think Tristan is really all that sub-optimal.

Those are some excellent points, LS. I think I will still be doing an overhaul once LEB has approved DP so I can go with Censure of Unity. Not because I don't really like the mobility of the pursuit build (which it has definitely proven it has in spades), but because of how I'm playing the character as more of a leader-y type of striker.

Lord Sessadore said:

I think that DMs should keep in mind that the monsters don't know that attacking/moving affects the avenger's censure, since it's not an effect applied to the monster. 4e is of the philosophy that a creature under an effect knows exactly what that entails mechanics-wise, but the censure effect is one that applies to the avenger, not the monster. After they see it a couple times, fine, but until then avoiding triggering your censure is like avoiding clumping to counter a wizard.

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I figure that in a fantasy world, wizards are common enough that intelligent creatures avoid clumping together as a matter of course. It's just a standard part of small group tactics in the D&D world. If Avengers in your campaign world are common enough, most monsters should know what they do and how to avoid it (although obviously they shouldn't know that someone's an avenger just by looking at them). I'd say in this world they're NOT that common, but I do expect monsters to know the basic abilities of, say, Paladins (and thus expect a Divine Challenge when they confront an armoured guy with a holy symbol) or Fighters (armoured guy WITHOUT a holy symbol? Be careful when you shift, it might not be all that safe).

Players often undervalue the benefits of monsters behaving counterproductively in order to avoid an effect.

In the case of the censor of pursuit, if a skirmisher no longer darts around on the battlefield and stays to slug it out with the Avenger, life is great. The skirmisher is usually not much of a slugger and it is probably a better outcome to see him behave like a brute than it would be to gain a bit of extra damage against him if he kept doing what he does best.

Same with monsters spreading around needlessly to avoid a wizard's AOE attacks. Fine, do a Spartacus* on them and focus on the now isolated weaker members of the opposition. If you are dealing with a typical mix of soldier/Brute in fronts of controller/artillery, then being able to rush the squishier monsters because the tougher monsters are too moronic to hold a line isn't half bad a result.

*When a roman army sent to crush the insurection chose to split in two in order to take the slaves in a pincer, Spartacus simply rushed his entire army against one of the half of the roman army. He crushed them before the other half could rejoin and then crushed those too. Split at your own risk, people!

Very true Mal. Avengers are a bit more able to control/lock down a specific enemy on the battlefield. Like LS said they're the PC class that's meant to take down the highly mobile/back line baddies. Retributive avengers are encouraged to rush right past the opposition to get to the back line (although it's certainly risky, unless you happen to be resistant to their damage).

Yeah, good points Mal. I was thinking about that when I wrote up my little spiel too.

JoeNotCharles said:

I figure that in a fantasy world, wizards are common enough that intelligent creatures avoid clumping together as a matter of course. It's just a standard part of small group tactics in the D&D world. If Avengers in your campaign world are common enough, most monsters should know what they do and how to avoid it (although obviously they shouldn't know that someone's an avenger just by looking at them). I'd say in this world they're NOT that common, but I do expect monsters to know the basic abilities of, say, Paladins (and thus expect a Divine Challenge when they confront an armoured guy with a holy symbol) or Fighters (armoured guy WITHOUT a holy symbol? Be careful when you shift, it might not be all that safe).

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Yeah, I agree that intelligent monsters should use intelligent tactics. And maybe wizard was a bad example, because they're pretty easy to spot. Invokers would've been better, but that's moot.

Basically what I'm trying to get at is that DMs shouldn't game too much with their monsters. The DM has the advantage over the players of knowing exactly what each PC can do, so he should keep in mind that his monsters probably don't know that.

I think you're doing a good job on that front, Joe. If you were doing what I just said I don't like DMs doing, then none of the dogs would've attacked Blade ever

Lord Sessadore said:

Yeah, good points Mal. I was thinking about that when I wrote up my little spiel too.
Yeah, I agree that intelligent monsters should use intelligent tactics. And maybe wizard was a bad example, because they're pretty easy to spot. Invokers would've been better, but that's moot.

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What I was getting at with the wizard is that you pretty much expect a wizard to show up at some point. I rarely have monsters bunch up and then get hit by a fireball and yell, "Wizard! Scatter!" unless I want to play that bit up. I figure most of the time if they're standing in a bunch and they're on any sort of alert somebody would say, "Uh, we're really vulnerable to wizards right now," same way if they were on a hill outlined against the sky somebody would say, "You know, we're a really good target for archers, we should get our heads down," even if they have no reason to specifically expect wizards or archers.

Lord Sessadore said:

I think you're doing a good job on that front, Joe. If you were doing what I just said I don't like DMs doing, then none of the dogs would've attacked Blade ever

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Either that or I'm not reading character abilities and resistances carefully enough...

WOW...whats with all the Dextyr bashing on this thread!???

But serously, you ask what is the connection between HBO's Dexter Morgan (my favorite serial killer) and the L4W Dextyr M'rgan? Right now.. not much.

I had multiple character ideas jumbled up in my head at the time of creation and I was in such a hurry to get a character in and start playing that what I put out was not entierly what I had wanted.

As for the background, it was a modification of an existing character background that I had written up years ago that I had mostly cut and paste and made fit the L4W setting. In hindsight I should have spent more time on it.

As for the class - I like bards, and at the time there was a serious lack of leaders in the game and an abundance of strikers, so I comprimised with the character concept a bit to make him fit better

I will most likely take advantage of the ability to modify the character after level 1.

That, or I could just RP any changes I want to Dex. Hmm I guess hanging around a bunch of bloodthirsty killers and lunitics could have an effect of the naive young half elf.......

As well, my intent was never to recreate HBOs Dexter Morgan in L4W, but there are many aspects of that character that I did intend to have in / develop in this character that has not really happened yet...