Proud Nails?

[Plane Sailing]

using the terminology which WotC devs introduced a while ago, are there any 'proud nails' for you in 4e yet?

By which I don't mean whole rule subsystems which you don't like - this isn't the thread for that - but just odd little things that you worry don't fit.

Here are my first ones:

Ranger archer vs two weapon fighting - one weapon vs two

It seems that the archer ranger is strictly better off than the two weapon fighting ranger for most of his career. Not only does he spend most of his time shooting from out of immediate melee reach of his foes, he can have one enchanted weapon and get full benefit of it on all attacks he makes with, for instance, Twin Strike.

The two weapon fighting ranger would have to spend double the money on enchanting two separate weapons.

Does the higher number of ranger exploits which are for melee and give two attacks offset this? Enough?

Orbs vs other implements

At the moment the Orb seems a strictly better implement than the other choices - its' power seems much more encounter defining than the others. If the wand mastery gave its bonus to all attack rolls made by a spell (e.g. add it to all attacks against something in a burst) then wand might be more of a match, but the poor staff user seems like a much poorer option.

In an early 'design and development' article they said that staffs were going to be connected to close blast and burst powers, but they seem to have changed their mind on that, which is a shame.

 

[Starbuck_II]

using the terminology which WotC devs introduced a while ago, are there any 'proud nails' for you in 4e yet?

By which I don't mean whole rule subsystems which you don't like - this isn't the thread for that - but just odd little things that you worry don't fit.

Here are my first ones:

Ranger archer vs two weapon fighting - one weapon vs two

It seems that the archer ranger is strictly better off than the two weapon fighting ranger for most of his career. Not only does he spend most of his time shooting from out of immediate melee reach of his foes, he can have one enchanted weapon and get full benefit of it on all attacks he makes with, for instance, Twin Strike.

The two weapon fighting ranger would have to spend double the money on enchanting two separate weapons.

Does the higher number of ranger exploits which are for melee and give two attacks offset this? Enough?

The style feat of 2 weapon fighter is better than the Style feat of Archer. Toughness beats that Mobile AC feat any day.

The Archer must waste money on arrows and thus more carrying capacity (Strength needed even if not a Str build). I mean getting starting gear at 1st (backpack, etc), is quite a bit of weight if add if arrows.

Orbs vs other implements

At the moment the Orb seems a strictly better implement than the other choices - its' power seems much more encounter defining than the others. If the wand mastery gave its bonus to all attack rolls made by a spell (e.g. add it to all attacks against something in a burst) then wand might be more of a match, but the poor staff user seems like a much poorer option.

In an early 'design and development' article they said that staffs were going to be connected to close blast and burst powers, but they seem to have changed their mind on that, which is a shame.

They mean magic staves?
Staffs:
70% of staffs have a conection to clode blast and burst: Staff of storms, Staff of warmage,Staff of Winter, and Thunderwave staff.

It feels like you totally didn't even read the staffs.

 

[A. Smith]

Wands are also very useful, as you can give all your powers the keyword of the power contained in a wand - see here.

 

[Plane Sailing]

They mean magic staves?
Staffs:
70% of staffs have a conection to clode blast and burst: Staff of storms, Staff of warmage,Staff of Winter, and Thunderwave staff.

It feels like you totally didn't even read the staffs.

I was talking about staff implements, I would have thought that would be obvious from my comments.

It feels like you totally didn't even read my post

 

[Shabe]

Regarding two weapon fighting vs archer rangers, twf rangers get the opportunity to get combat advantage via flanking, archers don't.

 

[darkdragoon]

Part of it does come down to style preference, but the TWF Ranger just feels like it has more good stuff.

 

[generalhenry]

TWF rangers are the top damage dealers in the game.

Archers have the advantage of range, it balances out fine.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Wands are also very useful, as you can give all your powers the keyword of the power contained in a wand - see here.

That's very useful information, thanks!

 

[Plane Sailing]

That's very useful information, thanks!

Then again, having read through it I disagree with the original posters premise.

I don't think that wand keywords are supposed to be applied to all spells cast using that wand as an implement.

I seem to remember a long thread about that on ENworld, I'll just go and have a look for that.

Cheers

 

[Cirex]

Wands are also very useful, as you can give all your powers the keyword of the power contained in a wand - see here.

I thought this was proved to be false.
The wand keyword only works for the wand powers, when activated. A wand with cold keyword (because it has a cold related power) doesn't let you add the keyword "cold" to all your powers.

EDIT : Ninja'ed by a ship