I think we're done with 4E

[Jack99]

That's true but it's better than my original house rule that required that they spend an Action Point + Daily Power to use the "DSA" power.

Actually, I am not so sure. While dailies can have a significant impact on a fight, most fights are not a problem without using dailies, there merely take a couple of rounds more. However, running out of surges will stop most players, unless you are absolutely nuts, like one of mine..

The above is just IMO and IME. Nothing more, ofc.

 

[timbannock]

Also, along the lines of a DSA card, is a suggestion fleshed out on another thread I saw a while back:

For any battles with some "set-piece effects" -- say, barrels you can knock down onto an enemy, stalactites you can break off the ceiling with a ranged attack to impale someone below them, or pools of water that flash-freeze when a Cold attack enters the square that the pool is in -- jot down said effects on an index card (with or without gamey rules info). Then, at the start of the battle, give the PCs a Skill Check (not Challenge) to see if they notice these things.

Anyone who succeeds gets a copy of the index card, so they know they have new, sweet maneuvers to try out.

My personal take on this is that only the Leader character or a character with an applicable skill (if it's foresty terrain, a Ranger with Nature, perhaps) gets to roll to receive the card. They then have to pass on this info IN CHARACTER to the other players in order for them to make use of the specified maneuvers.

No "Hey, do X and it'll give you a plus X to hit and do Xd6 damage!" It has to be "Hey, hit those barrels when the goblins get near it and we can crush the lot of 'em!"

Haven't playtested this yet, but it seems like it's got awesome written all over it. Swap out the "index card" for "checklist" or whatever you prefer, and you're good to go.

 

[Felon]

Sorry, but you do know that this is a gross exaggeration, untrue right?

I know that you conflate what you don't understand with what's untrue, and that you conflate snideness with wit. In general, your comments seem to exhibit a presumption of indisputable authority that you don't actually possess.

I've played and run lots of 4e at heroic and paragon tiers. The consensus of my group is that 20 points is pretty ample for a non-daily.

 

[Felon]

Okay, let me try and go through each round as well as I can remember:

Pre-combat: Fighter, Rogue, and Wizard head in from the north; Warlock and Warlord head in from the south.

Surprise Round: Elf Scout dumps boiling oil on Fighter, Rogue, and Wizard via murder holes; misses everyone except the Wizard, who takes (3d8+4 = ~21) damage.

Round 1: Wizard goes up on balcony, opens pit.
Elf Scout 1 opens door, stabs Wizard.
Elf Archer, Elf Scout 2, and goblin minion show up through another door. The Elf Archer might have dropped the Wizard, while the scout went after the warlord/warlock.
Cave Bear comes up and melees fighter (the only one he can reach).
Warlord blasts them all with a Fire Shroud, killing the minion and destroying the rickety balcony they are standing on. (Damage is 10 to all, 2 more to the elves, ongoing fire 5.)
Fighter Tide of Irons the Cave Bear back into the pit. (Damage is 21; the pit is 20' down.)
Rogue - ?? Hits the bear for 16 damage?
Warlock does something... might miss.

Round 2: The Wizard Thunderwaves the Elf Scout off the balcony. Damage is 17.
Elf Archer shoots Wizard, drops him.
Elf Scout 2 attacks the Warlord?
Elf Scout 1 attacks ??
Bear gets out of pit and attacks the warlord?
They all fail to save vs. Fire.

I can't remember what happened past this round, but the PCs are obviously able to deal enough damage to bring down monster HP quickly - all the elves had taken 17 damage after 1 round of PC attacks! I think only one Elf Scout survived to the next round.

The bear survived, not quite Bloodied yet, but it was on a chain and the PCs didn't want to fight it. That's when the goblins showed up.

edit: The bear didn't save against the fire, even with the save bonus, until late in the game. So it started off taking 10/20/31/40/56/60 damage, and then 65/70. I think I forgot to add the fire damage in one round and I am adding two rounds worth at that point. So in the first round the bear's taken 31 damage, in the next two it has taken a total of 70.

Plus all the elves are dead; their damage looks like this:
Scout 1: 17/22/29/dead
Scout 2: 10/12/17 - that damage is 10 from the fire shroud, 2 from falling, and 5 from ongoing 5 fire - 29/41 (obviously dead at that point)
Archer: 10/12/17 - that's fire damage, and I think it dies after that from a Sneak Attack.

The bear's damage: 82/87 - that's probably one more round - 97/101/113/118 - another round - 130/151/164/dead. It probably saved around the 118 mark and lasted about 2 rounds after that.

I was actual a little more interested in what damage output in general was like for the party, rather than an actual blow-by-blow description of a particular battle. I do notice, however, that we're looking at a lot of hits there--in particular, from an AoE (the fire shroud). And in 4e, a lot of damage rides on the encounter powers hitting their marks. When they miss, that's when the grinding starts to set in.

 

[Harlekin]

I know that you conflate what you don't understand with what's untrue, and that you conflate snideness with wit. In general, your comments seem to exhibit a presumption of indisputable authority that you don't actually possess.

I've played and run lots of 4e at heroic and paragon tiers. The consensus of my group is that 20 points is pretty ample for a non-daily.

So encounter powers generally deal below 20 damage, even though you roll multiple damage dice and by paragon levels should add at least +8 from feats, magic and attributes to damage?

You also don't seem to play with strikers as even a first level rogue can generally do >20 damage with a sneak attack and twin striking rangers are not far behind.

 

[MrMyth]

I know that you conflate what you don't understand with what's untrue, and that you conflate snideness with wit. In general, your comments seem to exhibit a presumption of indisputable authority that you don't actually possess.

I've played and run lots of 4e at heroic and paragon tiers. The consensus of my group is taht 20 points is pretty ample for a non-daily.

From who, though?

I mean, my rogue was doing ~20 damage with At-Wills at level one. Now, the character was pretty well designed for damage - but most Strikers should be easily doing more than 20 damage with Encounter powers from the start, and with At-Wills by Paragon level.

Even a character of a non-damage class, without a damage-oriented build, by Paragon level, is looking at ~15 damage from At-Wills - and a rogue or ranger is looking at ~25-30 damage At-Wills, and even higher from Encounters.

I mean, if you want to say that 20 damage is high from Heroic-level At-Will powers, I'll agree with that - it isn't impossible, but requires some pretty solid number-crunching. But by Paragon level it is par for the course - and Encounter powers are easily able to hit that mark in the Heroic tier.

 

[Felon]

So encounter powers generally deal below 20 damage, even though you roll multiple damage dice and by paragon levels should add at least +8 from feats, magic and attributes to damage?

You also don't seem to play with strikers as even a first level rogue can generally do >20 damage with a sneak attack and twin striking rangers are not far behind.

Let's see, the party warlock (that's a striker, btw) will roll 2d8 with one of his encounters. He'll add +8, throw in his curse...Hmm, seems like that comes to around 20. Some encounters do more than 2d8, some less, but 2d8 seems like pretty standard.

Yes, at the greatest extremes, an encounter power can top 20, but parties don't tend to be made up entirely of strikers. There's other guys dragging down the average.

 

[Harlekin]

Let's see, the party warlock (that's a striker, btw) will roll 2d8 with one of his encounters. He'll add +8, throw in his curse...Hmm, seems like that comes to around 20. Some encounters do more than 2d8, some less, but 2d8 seems like pretty standard.

Yes, at the greatest extremes, an encounter power can top 20, but portraying extremes as the norm is gross exaggeration false.

By your numbers, the expected damage is 20.5, so he will deal 21 or more damage with exactly half of his damage rolls. How is that an extreme?

 

[Shadowsong666]

I know that you conflate what you don't understand with what's untrue, and that you conflate snideness with wit. In general, your comments seem to exhibit a presumption of indisputable authority that you don't actually possess.

I've played and run lots of 4e at heroic and paragon tiers. The consensus of my group is that 20 points is pretty ample for a non-daily.

Thats just not true.

If you have a paragon fighter he should easily do around +26 damage per attack (+3 weapon). And thats not even considering marked scourge or the pit fighter ability you get at level 16. That would boost it with an additional ~+9 to +35 damage per hit. Sure, this build would not be defender heavy, but hey, in our group every player got a MC leader feat. Cleric going MC Warlord for the extra heal, ranger going cleric etc... so i really think it depends on your group and how well you read the rules and know how to setup a character for doing good damage.

 

[Harlekin]

Thats just not true.

If you have a paragon fighter he should easily do around +26 damage per attack (+3 weapon). And thats not even considering marked scourge or the pit fighter ability you get at level 16. That would boost it with an additional ~+9 to +35 damage per hit. Sure, this build would not be defender heavy, but hey, in our group every player got a MC leader feat. Cleric going MC Warlord for the extra heal, ranger going cleric etc... so i really think it depends on your group and how well you read the rules and know how to setup a character for doing good damage.

I hope you mean 26 including weapon base damage and not [w]+26. Still, I would be interested in that math.