Rule of Three and THEMES! FINALLY THEMES!!!!

[Peraion Graufalke]

They are of the "friendly" kind of power creep:

They don´t make anything obsoleteand are just a little thing to make combats shorter... so no harm done.

I've got no problem with the additional encounter power at level 1. Balance-wise, it's the stuff on top of it that concerns me.

(Btw, they're also good for making skill challenges shorter. Let's boost my Arcana skill even higher! Hooray for Arcane Mutterings! )

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I meant attack powers like the Athasian Minstrel's Fever Poison; it's level 3 and has "upgrades" at levels 13 and 23 that improve its damage. Sorry for my poor wording there.

Now that I look at the new themes again I do notice that there is scaling damage on some of the powers. The thing I'm really missing is the option to swap attack powers of higher levels with theme powers, AKA the Dark Sun style. So my complaint is basically that they're mechanically different to the original themes, with an additional dose of power creep and a decrease of options.

Order Adept really stands out as being too good compared to the other themes. I find this lack of balance disturbing. How could the editor(s) not catch that before publication? It's not as bad as the original battlerager, but still...

Ah, right. I think the upgrading damage options do a pretty good job. Swappable higher level options would be OK too. I get the impression the main goal with the newer content is to keep things simple, less powers, less feats, more fixed options and just generally less crunch.

My ratings would be-

Alchemist - This seems like a nice target for a theme. Doesn't do a LOT for you in terms of combat encounters, but certainly handy. I like the 'thematicness' of it. Power-wise this does seem like about the weakest theme mechanically. I really like the way it reinforces a cool character concept.

Animal Master- I like a lot of the same things flavor-wise about this theme as the Alchemist, it is a decent way to add a nice facet to a character. OTOH I'm not really too convinced mechanically. The animals have the same issue that old AD&D style familiars did, they're going to be toast real fast. The fluff tries to downplay the problem "Oh, the DM should pretty much ignore the animal, it's just an animal" but of course there is at least one power which encourages the animal to be adjacent to the character. The first stray blast is going to crisp Fido up good. That aside the mechanics are OK. Like the Alchemist they don't add a lot of oomph to the character, but a little bit of this and that is OK and fits with the theme.

Order Adept- This theme is on a whole different power level than the previous 2. Argent Rain is a quite nice encounter power, vastly more mechanically significant than what the other themes get. Both features are excellent, again distinctly better than the other themes get. A total +4 to Arcana and +2 WILL!!!??? is pretty impressive. Heck, some PPs barely get better features than this theme. The utility powers are nothing earth shaking, but any of them could be quite useful to some builds. The main thing though is this seems more like a boost to wizards than a theme you'd take to add a new dimension to your character. It just makes you better at what you already do, and it is hard to see a non-arcane character taking the theme (though it could be useful for some divine PCs).

Apprentice Wizard- This one at least is toned down compared to the Order Adept. The features are nice, but not as flat-out hot as Order Adept's. The same is true of the powers. Disappear and Winged Step honestly seem pretty useless as you can get equivalent effects with existing wizard utilities. Minor Polymorph is really the mechanical gem of the whole theme. There's no problem with this theme, except that it simply pales by comparison with Order Adept. I'm not really sure what about it says "apprentice" either. Seems like a cantrip would have worked well here....

RP-wise these themes all work. All I can say about Order Adept is that if I were to have a player using it I'd feel a bit compelled to rake them over the coals some via their order membership. Like most WotC 4e offerings this is a bit of a mixed bag. There's a chunk of good, some meh, and a dab of the not so good.

I'd just note I don't know that the people playing in my current game would really even bother with themes. I can definitely see the attraction, got nothing against them, just not sure 4e really NEEDED them. There such a vast number of customization options already. But ah well... I'm sure we'll do something with them.

 

[TerraDave]

Read it, and agree nice overall, but with some real wizard loven. And wondered, why not also have attack powers?

In the DSCS, all themes offer encounter (level 3 and 7) and daily (level 5 and 9) attack powers that can be selected in lieu of normal class powers, just like optional utility powers in this article.

What the DSCS did not have are the level 5 and 10 features of the theme. Clearly these themes were designed to play nice with classes that do not receive standard encounter or daily powers.

Then I read the above, and the mentat is almost certainly right (it is a mentat, afterall).

Now my feeling is:


GODINGDAMMIT! Get your essentials classes off my game!

 

[Obryn]

Read it, and agree nice overall, but with some real wizard loven.

Given that this was Heroes of Something and Lore, I'm unsurprised on that count!

And wondered, why not also have attack powers?

Then I read the above, and the mentat is almost certainly right (it is a mentat, afterall).

Now my feeling is:

GODINGDAMMIT! Get your essentials classes off my game!

I don't love the new themes, but in fairness to WotC, these are maximally compatible and useful for both E-style and PHB-style classes. I understand that this was done for that compatiblity, when I would have been just fine without it, but credit where credit's due... It's not like they're more useful for E-style classes than they are for PHB-style ones.

-O

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Given that this was Heroes of Something and Lore, I'm unsurprised on that count!


I don't love the new themes, but in fairness to WotC, these are maximally compatible and useful for both E-style and PHB-style classes. I understand that this was done for that compatiblity, when I would have been just fine without it, but credit where credit's due... It's not like they're more useful for E-style classes than they are for PHB-style ones.

-O

I think it has to be a pretty rough job to be sitting over there in WotC HQ and deciding which way to go with stuff. Obviously their market research has told them that fewer better options is the way to go (else why would Essentials exist in the form it has taken, they aren't dumb). OTOH there's the die-hard 4e fanbase, a lot of which seems utterly determined to have another 150 new options every month or else they're on the warpath and threatening to take their toys elsewhere to play.

On the complexity of themes and the number of options I have to admit I don't know that I have a strong opinion. The people that I DM for will probably appreciate the fact that they can pick a theme and just run with it and never need to actually even think about it again if they don't want to. I doubt they'd be too excited by attack power swaps, extra PPs, or extra feat choices. As it is they're dealing with 3 more utility power choices and another encounter power. That isn't going to break the camel's back, but I do sense a gathering doubt at the table about the sheer size and complexity of the game and the amount of book keeping involved at this point.

OTOH I personally am fine with lots of new toys to play with and like all the knobs and buttons you can fiddle with. Taking a middle view I think the approach they've taken with themes will turn out one of two ways. Either it will satisfy neither camp, or it will manage to satisfy each one enough not to turn either one off. Sadly the world usually works the former way and not the later, but we can always hope...