Broken things errata'ed, July 2009

[Dr_Sage]

Thanks for the heads up!

Battlerager Vigor now triggers on YOU hitting with melee and close, rather than being hit. Invigorating powers no longer stack for you, instead they give THP if you miss.

Thanks.

So if I underestand correctly what now prevents HP stacking using.. say... sweeping blow and hitting oponents is the very basic rule that temporary HP does not stack right?

So now the invigorating powers just double the HP granted? (you receive con HP for the invigorating + con HP for being Battle Rager if I got that right).

On the bright side my dwarf will get some Temp HP for hitting with his shield bash.

Curious nerf, I can't wait until I get home to read the full text + errata.

 

[Elric]

LFR players can retrain a class feature (along with up to 2 powers and 2 feats) at any one point during their character's career. So they should be just fine.

Just saw this elsewhere. It looks like it has to be a time when they could already retrain, which might limit them to when gaining a level, and since you can only do it once in your career, this could be a problem if you switched into BRV in the first place and now want to switch out. In general, characters should be fine, though.

If you're limited to retraining on a level up, BRV characters with Improved Vigor + Dwarven Stoneblood will have a wasted feat for a level (even if they have invigorating powers). Without the immediate retrain option, a Tempest Fighter with Cleave and Dual Strike would pretty much be wasting an at-will for a level as well.

 

[Flipguarder]

Im still upset as all get out that they didn't clarify the damage for rain of blows.

All the ranger powers that do multiple attacks say "1 [W] per attack". Is it that freaking hard to add those two words at the end?

A really uptight and literal DM could read that and say "it does two or three attacks, but only does 1[W] total"

 

[Dr_Sage]

Well, I honestly appreciate anything which scales back the BRV Fighter who's built as a normal Weapon + Shield fighter.

If I had any in my game, I would be extremely forgiving and allow a total rebuild of these characters. I hadn't given much thought to LFR games, but then again, I also don't care.

-O

LOL

My char was developed pre-Martial Power and I kept his personality, manneirisms and gear unchanged.

Here we go again!

 

[Dannager]

Just saw this elsewhere. It looks like it has to be a time when they could already retrain, which might limit them to when gaining a level, and since you can only do it once in your career, this could be a problem if you switched into BRV in the first place and now want to switch out. In general, characters should be fine, though.

You know, not that I'm necessarily advocating this, but the LFR campaign doesn't track character data anyway. As long as the people you play with don't object, I don't think you're going to be penalized in any way for just rebuilding your character a bit when errata hits.

 

[FireLance]

Im still upset as all get out that they didn't clarify the damage for rain of blows.

All the ranger powers that do multiple attacks say "1 [W] per attack". Is it that freaking hard to add those two words at the end?

A really uptight and literal DM could read that and say "it does two or three attacks, but only does 1[W] total"

I'd call it extra utility for some players: they can use it as a litmus test to identify DMs they should avoid.

I really like the way that WotC has included a bit of boxed text to explain the reason for the change in the text of the individual book updates (even though most of the explanations given are rather obvious) and has collected all the changes in a single document.

 

[Elric]

I really like the way that WotC has included a bit of boxed text to explain the reason for the change in the text of the individual book updates (even though most of the explanations given are rather obvious) and has collected all the changes in a single document.

They got the explanation wrong on Dual Strike, though.

Dual Strike [Revision]
Martial Power, page 7
Replace the powerʼs Target, Attack, and Hit lines with the following:
Primary Target: One creature
Primary Attack: Strength vs. AC (main weapon)
Hit: 1[W] damage.
Effect: Make a secondary attack.
Secondary Target: One creature other than the primary target
Secondary Attack: Strength vs. AC (off-hand weapon)
Hit: 1[W] damage.
Explanation: This revision updates the power’s format for clarity, and it revises the Hit line to exclude “Strength modifier” in damage so that the fighter is not achieving striker level damage with this attack.

The person who did the update seemingly doesn't remember what the pre-update version was. Dual Strike was 2 attacks on one target without Str modifier and that was the problem! It didn't need clarification on the targeting.

There's a similar problem with Rain of Blows:

Explanation: This revision updates damage to bring this power in line with other fighter powers and it
improves formatting to clarify that the power allows three attacks at most.

Rain of Blows didn't need clarification to clarify that it gives a max of 3 attacks, it needed revision because it used to give a max of 4 attacks. See here or the "Reading a power" rules on page 219 of PH-II.

 

[Kordeth]

Rain of Blows didn't need clarification to only give a max of 3 attacks, it needed revision because it gave a max of 4 attacks. See here or the "Reading a power" rules on page 219 of PH-II.

Erm--plainly they're clarifying that the intent was to give 3 attacks, not 4, regardless of what the pre-errata version appeared to say. What's the problem?

 

[Elric]

Erm--plainly they're clarifying that the intent was to give 3 attacks, not 4, regardless of what the pre-errata version appeared to say. What's the problem?

It depends how you read it. I read it as "we are clarifying that the power allows 3 attacks, and it really did allow 3 attacks from the get-go, that was just hard to interpret." That's wrong. Clarification would be if you write something that's hard to underestand and then you go back and revise it so it's easier to understand.

What they're doing here clarifies how the power works in general, but it's not clarifying that the power is 3 attacks. The power was up to 4 attacks. It didn't "appear to say that", it did say that. Changing it to 3 attacks is revision. The pre-errata version said up to 4 attacks.

If you read it as "we've made the wording on this new, changed version of Rain of Blows very clear so everyone will know the new version only grants 3 attacks", then it's fine. I don't think that's a tenable reading, though. The errata claims that they're only updating damage. If that were true, then the original Rain of Blows would have been 2 attacks, or 3 attacks with the conditions met, without having to hit on a primary attack. That's simply not a credible reading of the initial power, my link to a designer saying it was intended as 2-4 attacks aside.

Edit: It's not a big deal, but the explanation given minimizes how overpowered pre-errata Rain of Blows was. That's why I'm pointing this out.

 

[Ryujin]

I really pity the guys who built their characters around battleraging now.