L4W Discussion Thread IV

On Puget Sound · Dec 30, 2009

re Guild and Tribe feats and such, I agree it would be really nice if there were a way to make them useable in a Living style setting. Perhaps one solution would be

new feat:
TEAMWORK
This feat duplicates any one of the Guild, Tribal or other cooperative feats listed below. [ List ] At the start of the adventure, all PCs with the Teamwork feat must agree (by vote or other means) on one feat from this list. For the duration of the adventure, the Teamwork feat is treated as that feat.

elecgraystone · Dec 30, 2009

Don't see that working. Lets say I take the one that boosts my initiative. the party picks one that boosts their thievery. I lose my bonus and in return get a buff to a skill I don't have and I'm not going to use. Seems like a good way to start an argument.

On Puget Sound · Dec 31, 2009

If your character would only benefit from a few of the teamwork choices, you probably wouldn't take the feat to begin with. In a party with several PCs with Teamwork,it's up to them to come up with a choice that works best for the party as a whole. Characters that are the archetypal emo misanthropic loner should not take this feat; characters with both range and melee potential or with a wide skill selection might consider it. Hybrids and multiclassers especially might like it (though multis don't have a lot of feats to spare). As is, no one in L4E will ever take any tribal type feat, so a change that makes them viable for even a few players may be an improvement.

elecgraystone · Dec 31, 2009

If you'd let people pick the feat that they use every adventure, that could work. Having the feat pick forced on you by vote is another thing all together.

The thing with the 'teamwork' feat is you get a small bonus that gets bigger the more people you have with the feat. Unless 100% of the people need the same bonus, someone is left out. What if 2 people want initiative and 3 want a skill buff? Why not let the two take the feat they want and the three take another? Why make two people have something they don't want/need?

You say 'characters with both range and melee potential or with a wide skill selection might consider it'. So the one with the wide skill base wants the same thing as the combat person? Not likely.

JoeNotCharles · Dec 31, 2009

KenHood said:
Hey Judges!

Any word on when Tonk's level-up approval?

Ken

I just went through my backlog of character requests I've been ignoring, and crossed off all the ones that are either approved or waiting for the requester to make changes. It went down from 159 to 36. Tonk's #8 on that list, so I should be able to get to him fairly soon.

BTW, everybody who's submitted a level-up request or a new character and hasn't had their character reviewed yet, please take a look at your character page and make sure the judge's aren't waiting on you to make corrections. There are a couple of characters who are active in adventures who had their approval denied ages ago because there were errors, I'd hate for these people to miss out on XP because they didn't notice the judges were waiting for them. (That happened to me with Ironheart.)

renau1g · Dec 31, 2009

Just an FYI as well, the tribal feats are pretty useless in LFR unless you know that you'll be adventuring with the same group every week and you all agree to be part of the tribe. L4W & LEB are like LFR in that you'll have different groups of players (most of the time) and so the "group" feats are not really beneficial.

As to character approvals, there's about 25-30 or so in my inbox between here and LEB and with the holidays I haven't been really able to look at any. Tonk is next on my L4W list, but I've been trying to look at LEB's first as we have less judges there to review.

Wynter · Dec 31, 2009

Hey there folks. I'm pretty much brand new but I had a question about a power and how it works. This seems to be the place to post such a question, but again I'm still really new to the boards and all.

Anyway, I have decent knowledge of the 4e system but there's one ability in particular that kind of baffles me, and I'm wondering if it's a typo or not. It's an At-Will Shaman ability from PP called Spirit of the Tempest and it mentions...

Spirit of the Tempest (At-Will Standard Melee 1 ✦ Implement, Primal, Thunder)

Considering powers are never just "Melee 1" (they're usually either 'Melee Weapon' or 'Ranged Weapon') and there's no "Weapon" indicator...did they mean to put "Melee Spirit 1"? Anyone have any ideas on this?

stonegod · Dec 31, 2009

The power means what it says: Any creature within 1 square of the shaman can be targeted. Its an implement power that targets adjacent enemies (as opposed to ranged ones).

RedBeardJim · Dec 31, 2009

"Melee 1" is actually defined in the Player's Handbook, page 56: "A melee power that has a range of 1 can be used only on an adjacent target." I don't know of any other specific examples of powers with that range, but that's what it means.

Now having said that, it does seem odd that this particular power has that as a range, considering all the other Shaman at-wills are either "Ranged 5" or "Melee spirit 1". I'd guess probably a typo, but I don't know.

Edit: On second thought, it's likely not a typo. It doesn't have the "Spirit" keyword either, and granting a saving throw as an at-will effect is *really nice*. More likely it's a balancing thing, to make the shaman put themselves a bit more at risk when using it.

Oni · Dec 31, 2009

I kind of thought it might be a typo as first, but then I noticed the flavor text stands out in comparison to all the melee spirit 1 powers as noting you the shaman make the attack rather than the spirit companion. While I realize that the flavor text doesn't have any bearing on the rules, it does tell me that the power had been looked at as is, at that it wasn't some accidental last minute word drop. That's my deduction anyway.