Non-optimized character

Okay I've ran some 4e, but never really played it. and we were all new enough to the system powergaming was limited. I know when it was coming out they were talking about they didn't want you to need system mastery. And while I never saw objectively bad characters being built in previous editions I did see many relative to the rest of the party bad characters being built, or more usually a character relative to the rest of the party being too good.

Anyways I was looking at the charops board on the wizards site(bad idea I think) and wow I would do everything wrong. If I were going to play a game in the near future with people who powergame more than me, um how bad will I be? Is the disparity of power between a non-powergamed character and a more haphazard take the feat that is cool character huge, small, or somewhere in between?

For example here is a level 10 wizard I'd normally build use the ddi char builder. Just as a note I took a high dex because I think arcane reach is really cool.

level 10
Human, Wizard
Arcane Implement Mastery: Tome of Readiness

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 8, Con 11, Dex 15, Int 22, Wis 10, Cha 12.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 8, Con 11, Dex 13, Int 18, Wis 10, Cha 12.


AC: 23 Fort: 16 Reflex: 22 Will: 19
HP: 57 Surges: 6 Surge Value: 14

TRAINED SKILLS
Religion +16, Arcana +16, Nature +10, History +16, Dungeoneering +10

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Acrobatics +9, Bluff +8, Diplomacy +8, Endurance +7, Heal +7, Insight +7, Intimidate +8, Perception +7, Stealth +9, Streetwise +8, Thievery +9, Athletics +6

FEATS
Wizard: Ritual Caster
Human: Enlarge Spell
Level 1: Expanded Spellbook
Level 2: Jack of All Trades
Level 4: Unarmored Agility
Level 6: Expert Ritualist
Level 8: Arcane Reserves
Level 10: White Lotus Hindrance

POWERS
Bonus At-Will Power: Winged Horde
Tome of Readiness: Charm of Misplaced Wrath
Wizard at-will 1: Storm Pillar
Wizard at-will 1: Thunderwave
Wizard encounter 1: Grasping Shadows
Wizard daily 1: Flaming Sphere
Wizard daily 1 Spellbook: Arcane Whirlwind
Wizard daily 1 Spellbook: Sleep
Wizard utility 2: Mystical Debris
Wizard utility 2 Spellbook: Shield
Wizard encounter 3: Maze of Mirrors
Wizard daily 5: Stinking Cloud
Wizard daily 5 Spellbook: Fireball
Wizard daily 5 Spellbook: Web
Wizard utility 6: Emerald Eye
Wizard utility 6 Spellbook: Refocus
Wizard encounter 7: Corrosive Mist
Wizard daily 9: Ice Storm
Wizard daily 9 Spellbook: Visions of Ruin
Wizard daily 9 Spellbook: Wall of Fire
Wizard utility 10: Arcane Gate
Wizard utility 10 Spellbook: Circle of Protection

you should do fine. also keep in mind that charop boards generally look at a PC in a vacuum, but PC synergy says a lot for PC effectiveness.

However, you may -feel- like you are doing worse because of either
1) the power gamers (using your own words) might start dictating to you how you built your pc 'wrong' which may make you feel more selfconcious about it
2) if the dm is compensating /expecting a 'tough' group of pcs, the monsters may be more difficult
3) you might have a 33% chance to hit while your allies might tweak out as much as a 50% chance to hit, or you have a 33% chance not to get hit while your allies might tweak out as much as a 50% chance not to get hit (yes, i'm making up numbers).. but my point is there may be some difference between your to hit and theirs, as well as your defenses and theres, but, really, it won't be the end of the world but (see #1) you might feel like you're contributing a lot less, but it's not the end of the world.

build it in such a way that you think you'll have fun (and not stomp on other people's fun) and you should be fine. if anyone gives you any trouble over it, just tell them thank you, and that you don't get to play much so you were just trying it out, but you'll know what types of things to consider retraining for next time.

>also keep in mind that charop boards generally look at a PC in a vacuum, but PC synergy says a lot for PC effectiveness.

This.

On internet board like here or in Wizards community, you will see people trying to make an individual, mathematically-maximized characters. There is nothing wrong to do that. It is fun to argue on such build (at least for some people), and in most cases, people can only do that on BBS, as they cannot show people all the other PCs in their party.

But actually, mathematically-maximized character, in it's own, does not make a strong adventuring party. In 4e, effectiveness of an adventurer party is achieved by synergy of PCs, and more importantly, co-operative strategy of the entire party.

On the other hand, even a PC which seems really strong oh the math, customized by a talented power gamer, may work poorly if he does not co-work effectively with the others.

So, the strong party is not a party composed of individually strong characters, but a party in which each players know what other PCs can do and cannot, and act accordingly.

This can be done by playing in the same party for several times and co-develop party tactics.

So, basically, just make a PC which you want to make. Then, try to find out how he/she can contribute to the entire party, through actually playing adventures. Then, retrain or gain new powers and feats if necessary.

Yeah, charop is a kind of game using D&D, but is in no way actual D&D.

Luckily in 4E, unless you gimp your main combat stat, do not use magical items, or totally ignore your role, and you did/hopefully will not, it is very hard to make a very ineffective character.

Iti s very true that op people make characters in a vacuum, and their only goal is damage. It is a good measurment, but I'd rather have a cleric with a few more powers to help outthe party, and magical items to boost healing, thna one who can eke out 20 mroe damage per round. Teh first is more fun for me, and better for the party's survivability as a whole.

It soulds like hte OP has a good grasp of non-poweergaming, so go with it.

Ok, cool. I kept reading things like expanded spell book is a waste of a feat. Everything was focused on making a X wizard, like summoner wizard, fire blaster wizard etc. While I am more of a generalist what spell seems cool at that level wizard. I probably should drop my int to nat 16 before my race bonus it gives a crap ton of points to to spend on the other stats, and it would let me put points in wisdom so thunderwave actually did the push thing. Or I could just ditch thunderwave and probably arcane reach because really how many close bursts do I have. The problem remains it is just so darn cool.

Ahglock said:

Ok, cool. I kept reading things like expanded spell book is a waste of a feat.

Click to expand...

The way I look at it, when CharOp says that, the full context is "Expanded Spellbook will not help to optimize your character (in a vacuum, in a hypothetical "typical" 4e game, and for specific result X)."

I find CharOp very useful in that if I want to accomplish X with my character, I can find an X build on CharOp and I have a good idea of what the hypothetical "best" character at X can do, and why. But that character is hypothetical (at least in terms of characters I would actually run) because it probably doesn't do anything else... But it gives me some good ideas on what kinds of things I should be looking for, and even a character that doesn't go as far as the CharOp build twords maximizing X should be pretty good at it, in a normal game.

Ahglock said:

Ok, cool. I kept reading things like expanded spell book is a waste of a feat.

Click to expand...

It's one of those feats that will really depend on your personal play style. Unless I had a good idea what I was going to face during a particular adventuring day, I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable picking between even two dailies, let alone three, at the beginning of each day. I'd be afraid that I'll smack myself in the head during combat, thinking I'd chosen the wrong one.

But, seeing that you trained in all the "knowledge" skills, I'd imagine you're going for the "scholar" approach to a wizard, so it makes sense that he'd have a lot in his spell book. I'm a little surprised to not see "Linguist" on your list of feats; being a polyglot has great RP potential.

Everything was focused on making a X wizard, like summoner wizard, fire blaster wizard etc. While I am more of a generalist what spell seems cool at that level wizard.

Click to expand...

I would say your biggest concern here will be to make sure that you like the powers that you do choose. Controllers can sometimes find themselves needing to work a bit to get their powers to go off successfully without stepping on their own party. Just make sure you're comfortable with what it will take to get your choices to pay off.

I probably should drop my int to nat 16 before my race bonus it gives a crap ton of points to to spend on the other stats, and it would let me put points in wisdom so thunderwave actually did the push thing. Or I could just ditch thunderwave and probably arcane reach because really how many close bursts do I have. The problem remains it is just so darn cool.

Click to expand...

I did kind of wonder why you favored Cha over Wis in your build. With the skill training on Dungeoneering and Nature, and with Thunderwave, I'm thinking you'll get more out of switching the two?

Overall, though, it looks like a fun character to have in a game; not just another cookie-cutter char-op.

-Dan'L

The main reason that expanded spellbook is seen as a waste of a feat is for the following reasons:

The really important fights tend to have some sort of schtick, and those fights will be all the more memorable if the PCs don't know the schtick up front, which makes it sort of the DM's job to stop you from finding those schticks out before time. So it's unlikely that you'll be able to pick niche spells to suit any hard fight.

AND

There aren't any niche spells that are much good anyway.

Most of the time the average wizard doesn't use his regular spellbook class feature for those precise reasons. Improving a feature that doesn't see much use isn't great.

HOWEVER

Taking the feat means that you're missing out on a few points of damage, or 5% chance to hit, or whatever. So if you think that your DM will give you opportunities to size up your foes before fighting, or even if you just want to be able to switcheroo your spells about for variety, knock yourself out. Those 2 points of damage per hit WILL have an impact on combat, but the impact is pretty minimal.

Expanded Spell Book usefulness is dependant on your groups playstyle. If you do a lot of recon/research about what lies ahead before you set out to face it or how much you can use your spells outside of combat. Personally, to make you feel better about your feat choice, I'd probably tag on something like: 'you can swap unexpended powers with a power of equivalent level with a short rest.' That way adventuring could flow slightly better without the mage always insisting on returning back to town to read his books somewhere warm and safe for 8 hours.

As for you other choices, well placing an 18 in INT is maybe not the best option. Even a 17 would give you 4 more points to distribute. And at level 4 you already have a 20 (after racial bonus +2). Placing points in CHA is fairly majorly unoptimal. Is that to achieve psychic lock at paragon level? Difficult if you have chosen to already place 13 in DEX. Pumping 2 non-secondary stats is... maybe not a great idea, whether you are a powergamer or not.

If you place those points you put in CHA into WIS and distributed the 4 extra points between WIS and CON you can have a 14 in WIS and 12 in CON: +1 WILL, +2 NAture, +2 Dungeoneering, PUSH 2 with Thunderwave, +1 HP, +1 FORT, +1 Healing surge.

Otherwise, your character seems fine. You certainly have some of the top echelon powergamer optimiser wizard powers amongst your repertoire:
Winged Horde (wow!)
Flaming Sphere (godly)
Shield + Magic Debris (the two best lvl 2 utilities)
Grasping Shadows (pure win)
Stinking Cloud, maze of mirrors... the list goes on! Admitedly you have a few feat choices which have little or no relevance in combat, but I'm sure you'll be glad to have them out of combat. And that is where half of the game takes place (at least at my table).

Certainly your character would not be unplayable, far from it. With such spell versatility, I'm sure you'd be a valued member of the group.

Yeah, where you run into the bad suboptimal characters is where you have bad/mediocre power choices, poor stat allocation, and unhelpful feats all rolled into one. The example character's stat allocation is maybe marginally suboptimal but at least his primary attack stat is quite respectable. The power choice is fairly optimal, and while the feats don't generally serve to tweak out to-hit or damage the high INT gives you a respectable to-hit already and damage just isn't a focus for wizards.

If you were feeling like you were lagging you could easily improve your combat ability a bit just by swapping in Versatile Expertise and starting with more WIS and less CON. I would NOT sacrifice the INT though. Starting 20 is obviously high, but when you don't have much in the way of combat feats AND you start dragging your primary attack stat down is when you'll start to look bad vs the really optimized PCs. As it is the character will definitely hold its own and is at least as good as the average casual player build I typically see in play.