Walking Death

[Lordhawkins9]

This item was released through DDI within the Article "Boss Laughter":

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Official Home Page

Pretty much a textbook examle of what I've truely come to hate about 4th edition items, and how they've lost anything special about them.

Walking Death has several different levels it can be used for, as with many alchemical items WotC has come up with...this has Epic Fail written all over it.

If your character is so inclined to poison a high level opponent, you can spend 125,000 gold pieces, trick your opponent into drinking/eating this and after 1-6 HOURS they get an upset stomach.

A 30th level opponent would have several hundred hit points. IF the poison "hits", (not that great of a chance) they start taking 20 ongoing. So if you hit and if they blow their next 10+ saving throws...you're good!

Am I missing some hidden use for this item, or does WotC really have no idea on how their own rules work? Seems like a complete waste to me.

 

[renau1g]

The only time I can see it being useful is if the BBEG is a Palpatine type foe, operating in plain sight and the party needs to take him down outside of the scene. Perhaps they can use this poison on his food at a state dinner and then time it perfectly so that they follow for 1d6 hours (unseen of course) and then launch their Alpha strike at him at the precise moment he is dazed... yeah it's pretty useless.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Yea, hitting that likely 6 second window is tricky.

 

[frankthedm]

Am I missing some hidden use for this item, or does WotC really have no idea on how their own rules work?

Seems inline with their design choices on items like Alchemist fire.

Do I add half my level to attack rolls when using Alchemical items?

No, page 274 of the Player's Handbook discusses how to determine the base attack bonus for a power. If it is a power that you know you add half your level to the attack roll, with a attack roll from an item like alchemist fire you would not add half your level because it is not a power you know.

Seems like a complete waste to me.

Agree

 

[Mapache]

Wow, that is terrible. Also, they did a writeup for The Joker? WTF?

 

[catastrophic]

As for the main article, I don't mind them taking risks on concepts, you need to do that if you're going to get more interesting content. If you end up with the joker or that wierd one about crippling people occasinally. . . .so be it.

However, the poison itself resides in a pretty dodgy quasi-system space. Clearly this should be a plot event either way- done by an npc, or done by PCs as part of the plot.

Thing is, they could have a system for plot events like poisons and major curses- even if it was more of a tickbox or organised summary of the idea pre-packaged with tropes and advice, just a way of organising them so the GM could look over such options.

And of course, this is a consumable item, and like most of them, it's just wierd to be dropping all that permanent cash in a game where most of yourr cash stays with you. They really need to fix rituals/items/consumables.

 

[Trebor62]

I think the poison is designed as a roleplaying item acting outside of an encounter. That is the PC's need to kill someone but cant just attack them, so the resort to poison.

It could also be used against the PC's. there host the Baron etc. invites them to the banquet. But he has been order to eliminate them. The PC are too strong to face straight up so they are slipped the poison then that evening when the effects kick in the Baron and his henchmen attack.

In short I think this is more of plot item not intended for frequent use in combat. Especially since the Assasin has deadly poisons that will work in combat, and that is there stchick

 

[Klaus]

This item was released through DDI within the Article "Boss Laughter":

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Official Home Page

Pretty much a textbook examle of what I've truely come to hate about 4th edition items, and how they've lost anything special about them.

Walking Death has several different levels it can be used for, as with many alchemical items WotC has come up with...this has Epic Fail written all over it.

If your character is so inclined to poison a high level opponent, you can spend 125,000 gold pieces, trick your opponent into drinking/eating this and after 1-6 HOURS they get an upset stomach.

A 30th level opponent would have several hundred hit points. IF the poison "hits", (not that great of a chance) they start taking 20 ongoing. So if you hit and if they blow their next 10+ saving throws...you're good!

Am I missing some hidden use for this item, or does WotC really have no idea on how their own rules work? Seems like a complete waste to me.

Well, not every poisonable NPC needs to have hundreds of hit points. If you want to take down an (non-combatant) enemy king that hides behind thousands of soldiers without getting killed in the process, you slip Walking Death into his food and go away. A few hours later, he's dead.

This poison serves more of a storytelling device than an actual weapon for the PCs.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Still 20 damage save ends is absurdly useless...

either it needs to reed: 20 ongoing. Heal xxx ends.

Save ends absolutely makes no sense here...

 

[Piratecat]

Does anyone know of an alternative alchemical system for 4e? My players who want to use alchemical items and poisons are both annoyed and disillusioned. They're pretty much never worth the money and action economy, and that just seems like a shame.