Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
How is the 4e essentials Slayer??
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6902791" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>From a long-time player PoV, they're fun - moderately tough, high-DPR beatsticks, evocative of the 1e fighter - for as long as that can be fun for you. For me the nostalgia wore off in about an hour. </p><p></p><p>I also played a Slayer as an Archer, which was clearly an off-label use (Power Strike only works in melee, so it's throwing away even encounter powers in return for doubling up on DEX bonus to damage, still quite effective). It was fun because it was a reprise of a 3.5 Barbarian/Thief character, a primary archer who would rage to kick it when forced into melee, this worked out similarly, when 'forced' into melee he'd throw down Power Attack. Not quite as cool, but I'd developed a whole personality for the character that made it fun. </p><p></p><p>From a system perspective, like much of Essentials, The Slayer (like other martial E-classes) is more problematic. Really, Essentials and the mass of errata that accompanied it could be seen as ill-advised complication (ironically in the name of simplification) or even the intentional sabotage of an otherwise pretty decent game. In the case of the Slayer, specifically, it deviates from AEDU (adding to the overall complexity of the game, including making day length matter to class balance), deviates from Role support (being a striker with defender AC, hps & surges), can abuse the many minor options that let you buff basic attacks (it's at-wills & encounters all augment basic attacks), and, though it is presented as a fighter build or sub-class, introduces at-will and encounter powers that cannot be used by previous fighter builds (a first) and, similarly, cannot avail itself of a lot of extant fighter material (contrast that to the Mage, which can take any extant wizard power and provides a bunch of new & improved wizard powers other wizard types can use). </p><p></p><p>They are a solid enough striker in Heroic (it's hard to do striker too badly, it seems, even the Vampire is a pretty good striker - all 4 possible Vampire characters you can play), also 'solid' in the sense of being tougher than typical for non-primal strikers. But they lack options, resources and tactical flexibility compared to 4e classes, and even most other E-classes, limiting their long-term appeal. But they do peter out pretty quickly - Essentials, in general, like 3e-and-earlier & 5e today, seems to have been designed without an expectation of higher level (11+) seeing a lot of use.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 6902791, member: 996"] From a long-time player PoV, they're fun - moderately tough, high-DPR beatsticks, evocative of the 1e fighter - for as long as that can be fun for you. For me the nostalgia wore off in about an hour. I also played a Slayer as an Archer, which was clearly an off-label use (Power Strike only works in melee, so it's throwing away even encounter powers in return for doubling up on DEX bonus to damage, still quite effective). It was fun because it was a reprise of a 3.5 Barbarian/Thief character, a primary archer who would rage to kick it when forced into melee, this worked out similarly, when 'forced' into melee he'd throw down Power Attack. Not quite as cool, but I'd developed a whole personality for the character that made it fun. From a system perspective, like much of Essentials, The Slayer (like other martial E-classes) is more problematic. Really, Essentials and the mass of errata that accompanied it could be seen as ill-advised complication (ironically in the name of simplification) or even the intentional sabotage of an otherwise pretty decent game. In the case of the Slayer, specifically, it deviates from AEDU (adding to the overall complexity of the game, including making day length matter to class balance), deviates from Role support (being a striker with defender AC, hps & surges), can abuse the many minor options that let you buff basic attacks (it's at-wills & encounters all augment basic attacks), and, though it is presented as a fighter build or sub-class, introduces at-will and encounter powers that cannot be used by previous fighter builds (a first) and, similarly, cannot avail itself of a lot of extant fighter material (contrast that to the Mage, which can take any extant wizard power and provides a bunch of new & improved wizard powers other wizard types can use). They are a solid enough striker in Heroic (it's hard to do striker too badly, it seems, even the Vampire is a pretty good striker - all 4 possible Vampire characters you can play), also 'solid' in the sense of being tougher than typical for non-primal strikers. But they lack options, resources and tactical flexibility compared to 4e classes, and even most other E-classes, limiting their long-term appeal. But they do peter out pretty quickly - Essentials, in general, like 3e-and-earlier & 5e today, seems to have been designed without an expectation of higher level (11+) seeing a lot of use. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
How is the 4e essentials Slayer??
Top