Recent content by Victoly

Magic items are an iconic aspect of the D&D experience, but their implementation has changed drastically over the years. The randomized generation of magic items was emphasized in earlier editions of the game, and magic items - being hidden away in the DMG - had a sense of rarity and wonder to...

I do group XP. In addition to XP for adventurous success (I normally work out XP based on overcoming a challenge rather than just for killing monsters, so that players are encouraged to sneak past monsters or parley their way past troubles if that suits the character and/or the moment), I'll...

When did "they remain a challenge for longer" become "epic-level characters will still deal with Orcs!"? Last time I checked the dictionary "longer" didn't mean "forever". Blatant exaggerations make your complaints seem silly, not stronger. FitzTheRuke hit the nail on the head with his...

I've had a lot of luck using Apocalyptica's originals for battle music. The vast majority of it is instrumental (as a general rule, it's wise to ignore the tracks they do with guest vocalists, though I did like the cover of Bowie's Heroes that they did with Till from Rammstein) and the...

Our group just finished the DMG adventure too, and we found it to be terribly, terribly easy. Our party: Dragonborn Fighter Half-Elf Warlord (Tactical) Eladrin Rogue Elf Ranger (Melee) Human Wizard Most of our party beat the dragon on initiative, thanks to the Warlord's +2. The Rogue and...

Kzach's Premise 1: All of 4e is cheese. Kzach's Premise 2: Fighters marking with Dragon Breath is cheese. Therefore, Fighters marking with Dragon Breath is consistent with what we should expect from 4E rules. Sorry Kzach, I'm only poking fun, but when your retort amounts to saying that the...

Personally I like to think of minions - from a design perspective - as a single monster that takes four hits to kill, gets four attacks per round, and occupies four different squares on the board. Just my two cents worth.

That's a pretty big "if". Suffering damage in fourth edition doesn't necessarily mean that you have been physically harmed in any way, so Reaping Strike could very easily be an attack that comes so close or is so fierce that it shakes up its target whether or not it hits.

I think that a DM who makes his monsters think: "This character has more total hp so his surges are worth more, therefore if he is healed it will negate more of our actions" is meta-gaming for his monsters and should cut it out.

Premise A is faulty. Cloud of Daggers is not an attack. Cloud of Daggers is an arcane power or "spell" which, when activated, has two consequences: -An attack -A persistent effect The persistent effect has no attack roll and thus its damage would automatically kill a minion beginning its...

Spending a minor action to cancel out a monster's standard action? Not a bad trade-off if you ask me.

I'm not sure I agree with you there. Technically, the Fighter just applies the standard "marked" condition to an enemy, but their own reflexes and training allow them to take extra advantage of this. I'm not sure that will amount to a big difference in decision-making on the DM's part, but...

DracoSuave, your math doesn't account for the Wizard's Orb mastery. The chance to hit would be 95%. The chance to fail the save would be 70%, due to the -10 (or so) from Orb mastery. Overall you're looking at about a 2/3 chance of having this work, which is far better than the 19% you forecast...

If the OP thinks Cleave is such a problem, I'd hate to see what he thinks of Reaping Strike...

Needs more plot.