I hope its not just me...

[Sadrik]

A bunch of excellent points have been made. I will attempt to address a few without going quote crazy here.

Use the enter key it is your friend then...

First yes I am aware with the penchant for balance that 4e professes I would be unnecessarily handicapping casters if I tinker only with them.

Yes I think you need a global effect not a wizard only fix.

I may decide to go for balance and nerf everybody’s at wills en masse in the end to restore balance and also get away from the "warcrafty" feel. I think that having to use your noggin to enhance the effects of a basic attack helps put role-play back into the game a bit more anyhow. It also promotes creativity that the spamming or the overuse of at wills cannot.

This is the sentiment of a huge thread I began in the general section a month back. The resolution was this: convert all at-will powers into encounter powers at their 21st level damage bonus (Magic missile does 4d4+INT 1/enc). Twin strike ranger at-will is deleted (the only one that is needed).

Example: 1st level wizard gets 3 encounter powers instead of 2 at-wills and 1 encounter power. It was shown that the damage was comparable if not higher in some cases and lower in others. It also gave the feel that I think you are looking for.

 

[Sadrik]

Moniker, Your suggestion on the healing surge mechanics for a MP system is exactly what I have in mind for a daily MP and power use system

I would not dove tail an out of combat healing system (surges) into an in combat resource tracking system. If you do like that make sure you will be forcing players to have to decide between healing themselves and firing off that at-will power.

 

[Belaugured DM]

Sadrik, not trying to be a wise guy but are you saying I am not using enough paragraphs? If I am not sufficiently clear in that way I will attempt to fix that for sure. My question to you is, are 3 separate postings necessary to reply to 3 quoted items in a row? Again not trying to be funny but apparently we have radically different posting styles.

I digress however, what I really wanted to clarify is that I wouldn’t be making the players choose between healing surges and use of powers per se, I would simply be using a similar mechanic to the healing surge system.

Also can you link the thread you refered to? I would like to have a look at that.

Thanks!

 

[Sadrik]

Sadrik, not trying to be a wise guy but are you saying I am not using enough paragraphs?

Yeah, just in that one post.

I digress however, what I really wanted to clarify is that I wouldn’t be making the players choose between healing surges and use of powers per se, I would simply be using a similar mechanic to the healing surge system.

Also can you link the thread you refered to? I would like to have a look at that.

Thanks!

Good ideas abound and I am pleased to see others are having the same issues and coming to similar conclusion that I in fact have. Here is that thread.

 

[Alex319]

Alex, Regarding Stunting or "improvised At-Wills" The answer to your question whether I am looking for either or in some way by limiting the use of at wills is yes to both. Yes, I have had a fair amount of stunting performed, a few called shots here and there, and yes I am looking for players to create their own improvised at wills I suppose. This brings combat to life in a way that the simple "I swing my sword at monster x ...." basic attack grind cannot, but also it gets away from the "Twin strike, Twin strike, Twin strike...." (might as well be playing Warcraft and hitting your 3 key) feel as well. I am trying for a mix and balance of these things I suppose.

Will definitely be interesting to see how well this system works. This answer certainly clears up a lot of confusion - I was wondering why "twin strike ... twin strike ... twin strike" is boring but "basic attack ... basic attack ... basic attack" is not. What you're saying is that what you actually want is "improvised attack ... called shot ... a different kind of improvised attack ... maybe a basic attack for a change..." and so on.

The only potential problem I see is that one of the following two things is likely to occur:

1. Players will eventually figure out what kind of "improvised at-wills" work the best, and will attempt to use them repeatedly whenever possible - thus effectively recreating the original at-will system. For example, suppose a player says "When I attack, I'm going to aim at his weapon arm to try to cripple it" and you say "Okay, if you hit then he gets -2 to attack rolls for his next round." Then if this ability turns out to be useful he can keep repeating it - and you've basically given him the equivalent of an at-will.

2. In order to prevent (1) above, you'll end up having to constantly re-adjudicate the effects of the improvised actions - like in the example above, say "okay, the monster you're fighting now has particularly sturdy arms, so you take -2 to attack if you do that." if he seems to be using those called shots too much. This has the potential to significantly slow down combat if players have to come up with new improvised actions every encounter.

On the other hand, it definitely seems to be a new twist on combat. And I'm just speculating here - your actual experience could be very different. I would be very interested to see how it actually turns out.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Thanks for signing up, welcome!

I can understand where you are coming from, and I've often made some quite large tweaks to rule systems to suit particular campaign setting 'visions'. I've found this harder to do with 4e, to my annoyance

Some possibilities which you might want to consider:

a) double the strength of all wizard dailies
b) Move encounter power to dailies (these are the 'weaker' dailies)
c) move at-wills to per encounter and double their strength

d) ensure that there are a lot of things going on in the environment that allows smart wizards to get good use out of his at-will cantrips. Ghost Sound to distract opponents (arcane check to bluff someone with a sound effect?), mage hand to scatter burning coals / move sheets / do other stuff, prestidigitation to hide small things (the rogues dagger) - essentially ensure that there is a way for a wizard to use his 'non-combat' at-wills to attempt 'limited damage expression' attacks using his magic indirectly.

I offer no guarantees for this combination of changes, but it would make magic more vancian and powerful in the 'attack spells' form, but also means that the wizard isn't reduced to using his dagger alone or a crossbow every combat if he can use his cantrips to fun and useful effect during the fights.

Cheers

 

[Belaugured DM]

Thanks for the welcome and suggestions.

A few odd things are happening in my game. I don’t know what to make of it all now. It’s as if my players know what’s coming, I guess they do in fact, since I ask their opinions and mention any changes I have in mind or am working on in advance anyhow.

The weird thing is they are playing in a fashion that may totally eliminate the necessity of any of the tweaks I have in mind these last few sessions. My wizard player used 3 of his cantrips to great effect (light ghost sound and prestidigitation) this week both in and out of combat. My fighter player routinely uses improvised stunts and called shots. The other players are also exhibiting a good mix of by the book ability use and improvisation, the only real problem is the ranger player of the group. He definitely needs encouragement to get away from the constant at will power spam. I am still going to develop these rules regarding magic and overall at will use but it may not really be as big of a deal as I had once worried about. Or conversely as I said they may have already started modifying play-style to compensate for anticipated changes.

I will let you all know once I have it worked out.

 

[Rel]

I think you'll discover that, as the PC's rise in level, the available Encounter Powers will mean that you seldom need to worry about constant At Wills. That certainly seems to be the case for my group and they are only 3rd level.

 

[Alex319]

Thanks for the welcome and suggestions.

A few odd things are happening in my game. I don’t know what to make of it all now. It’s as if my players know what’s coming, I guess they do in fact, since I ask their opinions and mention any changes I have in mind or am working on in advance anyhow.

The weird thing is they are playing in a fashion that may totally eliminate the necessity of any of the tweaks I have in mind these last few sessions. My wizard player used 3 of his cantrips to great effect (light ghost sound and prestidigitation) this week both in and out of combat. My fighter player routinely uses improvised stunts and called shots. The other players are also exhibiting a good mix of by the book ability use and improvisation, the only real problem is the ranger player of the group. He definitely needs encouragement to get away from the constant at will power spam. I am still going to develop these rules regarding magic and overall at will use but it may not really be as big of a deal as I had once worried about. Or conversely as I said they may have already started modifying play-style to compensate for anticipated changes.

I will let you all know once I have it worked out.

One possibility is that the Ranger class is the one class that has an at-will power - Twin Strike - that is so good that he doesn't feel the need to use anything else. Maybe nerfing Twin Strike a bit (maybe a -2 penalty to both attacks or something) might help solve the problem.

 

[Garthanos]

The weird thing is they are playing in a fashion that may totally eliminate the necessity of any of the tweaks I have in mind these last few sessions.

Your players or most of them are interested in the game feeling closer to how you want it and you are probably rewarding that suitably (ie giving them more attention adjucating the action in interesting ways that allows them to be highlighted etc)...

I have seen an idea where multiple usage of the same strategy was penalized with a simple penalty... the second time in a row -1, third -2, fourth gives combat advantage etc, admittedly I keep finding reasons for characters to have more at-wills so the players even ones such as your spamming ranger will have enough options to capture his imagination even if the elements are pre-planned. The in game world rationale is the character has become predictable and the enemy is exploiting it.