Essentials Cleric

[fanboy2000]

Today's Ampersand is doubling as a preview of the Cleric from Heroes of the Fallen Lands. Well, sort of. Mearls and Slavicsek took the time to re-address the compatibility issue.

The Essentials products aren’t a new version of the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game, though they do give us a chance to clean up and clarify a few things that have been causing issues the past two years. In the end, current players had to endure as few changes as possible. The only changes we embraced were ones that we would have implemented even if we were not producing the Essentials products. That’s why things like the new approach to racial stat modifiers appeared in Player’s Handbook 3 and the higher monster damage appeared in Monster Manual 3. Regardless of the directions the Essentials products took, we wanted to implement these new approaches in the game.

Here are the differences I noticed immediately:

+1 to Fort
Only lists Wis and Con as key abilities
Prof with shields
At-wills and encounters seem to be chosen via choosing a domain.

If I'm reading this correctly, this seems to be the "sub class" Warpriest, thus only Warpriests would get the +1 to Fort and Proficiency with shields.

 

[thecasualoblivion]

Initial impression: god damn!

 

[Otterscrubber]

Well i'm a little confused, what exactly are the D&D essentials. There seem to have been a lot of things trying to explain it but those explanations on wizards.com have only served to confuse me a bit more. Are they actual rules changes? Or just "practice" version of D&D for beginners to get them into the game?

 

[thecasualoblivion]

Well i'm a little confused, what exactly are the D&D essentials. There seem to have been a lot of things trying to explain it but those explanations on wizards.com have only served to confuse me a bit more. Are they actual rules changes? Or just "practice" version of D&D for beginners to get them into the game?

Both. They are new rules to play which can be combined with the standard rules, and a version specifically geared to beginners.

 

[samursus]

Wow..big changes...but I can see how they can exist alongside the previous incarnations. Starting to wonder if anyone will stick with the old builds. Actually I am kind of excited...wondering if these changes will address many of the minor issues I have had with my group of new players.

 

[thecasualoblivion]

Wow..big changes...but I can see how they can exist alongside the previous incarnations. Starting to wonder if anyone will stick with the old builds.

Old builds will be more flexible. The listed Warpriest seems to have all Encounter powers pre-chosen, determined by Domain

 

[hbarsquared]

So, it's definitely not 4.5....

It actually looks more like 3.9E.

 

[fanboy2000]

Beyond mechanics, there seems to be a conscious effort to weave more fluff from the default setting into the class. The class entry previewed starts off with how the class fits into the mythology of the default campaign setting.

I like that.

 

[Ahrimon]

Anyone else notice the lvl 8 ability of Resurection? I wonder if that's a built in ritual ability?

It's pretty interesting to see them drop strength for a warpriest build. Maybe they'll errata all of the PHB classes to the one primary attribute style of PHB II and III.

 

[Markn]

I'm looking forward to the Essentials. I've long felt that there just wasn't enough variation within a given class. Taking the cleric for instance, your build type may affect some of your encounter powers but ultimately you were still a standard stock cleric. Now the subtypes are the answer I have been looking for - that is much greater variation. Playing a warpriest will be a vastly different experience from the standard cleric. I love this!

One thing I wonder though, is, are they reintroducing classes gaining levels at different experience thresholds? With 3e (and up), the standardization of class XP was nice and it allowed our group to do away with it. We just level as appropriate for the story. That won't work so well if classes gain levels at different rates now. Of course, I'm jsut speculation as the Warpriest is gaining levels at the same rate as every other class in 4e, but still...

In regards to the cleric I REALLY like that some of the powers are tied to the domains now. This should further differentiate a sun warpriest from the storm warpriest giving a much greater variety in play!

All in all, I can't wait for it!!!!