Unhappy Pally - Righteous Rage + Vicious Weapon

[SamusekTDS]

Ok, so I have an unhappy player pissed off with the 4th ed paladin... he's up to 4th level now as a dragonborn serving pelor STR 19, WIS 14, CHA 14.

Since we were obviously new to 4th when he made the PC, he now believes the class to be fundamentally broken for those stats (power selection etc) and doesn't like Pelor's radiance (as its WIS based), and wants me to now allow him to use the FR god Tempus feat Righteous Rage (encounter, auto crit on hit) with the power combo of having a vicious waraxe (extra d12 on crit).

I drew the line here.

He says he is so unhappy with me disallowing this he either wants me to allow this, to scrap the PC and make a whole new character in a new class, or quit the campaign.

My reasons against it:
- I'm playing only with Core, not FR, so I want him to stay as Pelor and not switch to Tempus
- If I "houseruled" it as a Pelor power I still find it unbalanced compared to most feats/powers
- I have to make so many allowances and "retro-fits" for him to do this it seems slightly unfair to other players

In his defense:
- He hasn't seemed to be terribly combat effective at times (misses alot, does not do heavy damage overall), and he sees the rogues (we have 2) always flanking and doing crazy damage, and the warlock hits more often since he's against reflex not AC.
- He got a magic holy symbol at one point, but all the powers it is used with are wis/cha based and he takes mostly str based powers since he feels he would miss all the time with them

Are we exposing real flaws about the paladin? Am I beiong unreasonable? Is there a better way to handle/houserule this? How powerful a fighter should a Paladin be allowed to get? Is he fundamentally unbalanced (I mean as a class, not the player himself, LOL)?
---
Sam.

 

[keterys]

RroT is almost guaranteed to get errata-ed at some point... and yeah, if there's no Tempus then there's no Tempus.

That said, quite seriously, if he's not having fun then let him remake a character.

 

[CubeKnight]

If he wants to do crazy damage, then he gotta go with a Striker. If a Paladin (a Defender) could do as much damage as a Rogue but with full armor/shield proficiency, tons more HP, and lots more HS... what would be the point of Rogues?

 

[deleteme123456]

Encourage him to take STR-based powers and let him retrain any of his CHA-based powers to WIS-based ones. Then give him a magic sword instead of a magic holy symbol. He may want to take a superior weapon proficiency like bastard sword or waraxe (he'll hit more with the sword but do more damage with the axe) if he has a feat available. Remember that you don't get your deity's channel divinity feat for free, so if he's unhappy with the Pelor feat he should retrain it for the weapon proficiency. A Str-based paladin is a little harder to play than a CHA-based one, and at some levels there are just no good choices (they're all CHA-based) but divine power should help, and that's out in a few months.

 

[Kinneus]

He says he is so unhappy with me disallowing this he either wants me to allow this, to scrap the PC and make a whole new character in a new class, or quit the campaign.

This seems like your solution right there.
Righteous Rage of Tempus is generally considered to be a little overpowered... or, at least, to be the most powerful Channel Divinity feat out there. It's perfectly legitimate of you to not allow it in your campaign because you believe it would be overpowered, or believe it would break the setting.
However, it is also perfectly legitimate for a player to be bored or annoyed with his role, and I don't think it's fair that you force him to continue playing a paladin if the role really doesn't appeal to him. Allow him to make a new character with his new rules-saviness; everybody wins.
Just be sure to impress upon him that a Defender will never do the same amount of damage as a flanking Rogue. Nobody does more damage than a flanking Rogue. Damage simply isn't what being a Defender is about.

 

[fba827]

I would not allow the FR Channel Divinity Feat because it was an upfront statement about what gods were being used. And, the FR Channel Divinity feats are not at the same level as the PHB ones (in my opinion).

Toss my voice in with those saying to let him remake his PC in a new class.

Obviously, I can't read his mind to know what he's thinking. But based on the info available here, I think it might be a good idea to step back and explain the 4 basic PC roles and then ask which sounds most appealing to him -- try not to let personal prejudice come in when describing them, each role has some good and some bad (low/high defenses low/high hp low/high attack power low/high damage power and so on).

You may also want to mention that, in addition to their main role, they have a secondary role... so a paladin is mainly a defender with a little leader capability, and so on.

 

[RangerWickett]

I think letting him retool the character could be the best solution. I'm not really a fan of the paladin until paragon levels, because so far there aren't many options (if you're high-Str, you only really have 2 powers to choose from at each level, instead of the 4+ other classes get). That might change with divine power.

Assuming he wants to keep the same "character" (personality, backstory, etc.) just with different powers and such, I'd suggest a fighter multiclassed to cleric. He gets about the same amount of healing per day, and he can have a high STR and moderate WIS (since wisdom helps with opportunity attacks). Or possibly a fighter/paladin, if he still wants his Charisma bump to matter.

I'd say let him retool to Str 20, Con 15, Dex 8, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 12 (base stats 17, 14, 14, 10, 10, 8, +2 Str/Cha, and +1 to Str and Con at 4th level). He might change those stats depending on the type of weapon he uses.

 

[Obryn]

Pretty much everyone in my game has a different character than they started with... I've found that people like playing classes in 4e that they never really liked before; and that they hate classes they used to love.

Now that you've had some 4e time under your belts, opening up the floor to allow everyone a new character, should they choose (or the option to rebuild an old character) might not hurt.

-O

 

[boolean]

Ok, so I have an unhappy player pissed off with the 4th ed paladin... he's up to 4th level now...

He's unhappy now? Wait until he reaches 9th level, and see what his options are for his daily power selection...

 

[Stalker0]

Go with allowing a new character, I've seen RROT in action, it is broken

I think this is common with any new edition. People are getting a feel for how and what they want to play, no harm in needing a few tries to get the swing of things.