D&D 4E New gamemaster to 4e

[AbdulAlhazred]

after the fiasco with the pathfinder synthesist/paladin multiclass a few years back, multiclassing is banned. Forever. Anyone who brings it up at my table will be exiled and shamed and then mailed to australia. I managed to find a workaround for the missing pages/corrupted files that may not be against ENworlds rules so I won't share, but the final houserule is anything from the essentials line is banned unless I approve it. Simply because essentials is a goddamn trainwreck waiting to happen. Ranger/warden/artificer is the current party lineup.

4e MCing is a whole entirely different beast. It is usually considered a bit weak, but actually if you know what sort of stuff you want, then it can be VERY much worth the cost of a feat to get access to a specific highly valued power! And of course the 'base' MC feats are almost all well worth taking simply on their own, so overall its a pretty good deal and there's no brokenness or whatnot involved.

The hybrids presented in PHB3 actually also work pretty well. I think they add more complexity than they are really worth, in general, and only a small subset of all the permutations are really worthwhile, but they certainly don't hurt the game overall. Nor are they 'broken' in any real sense. A few classes, swordmage most famously, seem to add a rather large amount of value as hybrids, but the results aren't crazy or beyond what you could achieve with single classed characters. Its just another path for optimization. Personally I let players use them if they want, but I don't really encourage it actively.

Most of my players figured that MCing was a pretty good deal, but only a couple of them every went beyond the base MC feat. 4e classes are so flexible already, particularly with themes and whatnot in play, that it doesn't seem like the big deal it was in 3.x or AD&D.

 

[Garthanos]

and there's no brokenness or whatnot involved.

This right there.

And hybriding can open some sweet character design space I won't claim it doesnt take some system savvy... but following the guides can get you pretty far.

I do find themes actually contribute to hybriding

 

[tuxedoraptor]

we don't use themes or backgrounds and magic items are pretty limited just to prevent the game from relying completely on magic items. They exist and are a thing you can get, but you won't need them to be good at adventuring. We have a tiefling bard, a goliath warden and a half orc rogue trying to take down a local necromancer who has managed to hide pretty well from everyone. I must say that the bard was probably the most entertaining character I have had at my group in ages. We had a few moments where I had to pause the game and try to catch my breath from laughing so hard. The reason? Vicious mockery. He wins fights by insulting his opponents to death. With a hand puppet.

 

[tuxedoraptor]

Before we got too far in our campaign, our bard player dropped a few bucks on me and got me admant entertainments warlock pacts. Does anyone know how balanced they are? Some of them look really neat and I would be interested in seeing them in play. The pacts are: Ghost,blood,dragon,vermin and divine. Some of them even give an extra class feature that sort of replaces warlocks curse. The pact of angelic choirs has the most, so I will post its added features here:

True Name
Warlock (Angelic) Feature
You call upon your patrons to reveal the True Name of
your foe. With it, your adversary is more vulnerable to
your attacks.
At-Will*Arcane
Minor Action
Range Special: the closest enemy to you that you can see
Target: One creature
Effect: Against your attacks, the target takes a penalty
to AC, Fortitude, Reflex and Will defense equal to 1 +
one-half your Intelligence modifier. This penalty lasts
until the end of the encounter or until the target drops
to 0 hit points or fewer.
Special: If you have placed your Warlock’s Curse
on a creature, the curse is immediately lifted when
you use the True Name power. You can not curse an
enemy while the True Name power is in effect, unless
otherwise indicated in a warlock power’s description

they also get this:

Instead of the standard class feature Shadow Walk,
a warlock with the Pact of the Angelic Choirs gains
Menacing Transport. Your passage creates an aura of
awe and dread. Whenever you move 3 or more squares
opponents suffer a -2 penalty to melee or ranged
attacks (but not area attacks) against you until the start
of your next turn.

They DO get a pact boon related to warlocks curse, it causes enemies within five squares of you to lose concealment and total concealment but not invisiblity. Should I let them use these or no?

 

[MoutonRustique]

From what is written, I can say this :

The "new curse" that is the [True Name] power essentially trades dmg for accuracy. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of 1+ 1/2 stat as a definition (but that's a nitpick really).

Trading -1d6 damage for +2 to hit seems like a pretty fair trade to me.

But I might be biased - the warlock my friend plays rolls abysmally! To the point where I've engineering things so he gets a hidden +2 to all attack rolls - and still he misses most attacks!

The second part is both better and worse than the regular power:
It's better because it can stack with concealment and it works against foes which ignore concealment.

It's worse because he looses out on some excellent support for that feature in terms of items and feats.

If you were playing with system mastery experts hell-bent on breaking the system by over-optimizing every last little shred, I'd be leery of this kind of change. But since you're playing with a bunch of friends who are looking to have cool characters, I see no real reason to disallow it.

 

[tuxedoraptor]

Well, we also are looking at the forgotten heroes books. Mostly scythe and shroud. The reason being is that they have a more classic 4E assassin and a non psionic monk. Plus a class called the spiritsworn, a paladin that is powered by the spirits of the dead.

 

[MwaO]

Target: One creature
Effect: Against your attacks, the target takes a penalty
to AC, Fortitude, Reflex and Will defense equal to 1 +
one-half your Intelligence modifier. This penalty lasts
until the end of the encounter

So Warlock(Angelic) essentially, assuming they have an 18 Int/Cha(or Con), essentially get a +3 to hit at will that stacks with everything. They have an improved Shadow Walk because being able to see through concealment does not negate the penalty. In fact, they can combine with concealment if they get it elsewhere.

Um, no.

 

[tuxedoraptor]

Anyone know how balanced the forgotten heroes from goodman games are? The spiritsworn looks interesting. I also redid the clerics healing lore, divine fortune and battle clerics lore.

Healing lore:
You gain a +2/4/6 shield bonus to AC and standard healers lore ability

Divine fortune:
encounter,divine
range:5
Trigger: An ally fails a death saving throw, saving throw or is reduced to zero hit points.

Effect: reroll the failed death saving throw, saving throw or attack, taking the second one even if it's worse

Special: You may additionally expend this power to reroll any hitpoints regained by a power with the healing keyword.

Battle clerics lore does not grant the +2 shield bonus to AC.

I also made ardent vow scale with level, going 5/10/15 per tier. I haven't tested it yet but the cleric should be tested soon.

 

[Garthanos]

a non psionic monk.

OK you got me curious??? I have been considering making a Martial Artist class for 4e.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

OK you got me curious??? I have been considering making a Martial Artist class for 4e.

Just re-cast the monk as Martial and fiddle a bit with the 'weapon instead of Ki Focus' implication of that (hint: getting rid of ki focus is a LOT simpler, though you need inherent bonus to then make unarmed combat really competitive).