Feats & Fighters

[Aegeri]

First, you created not just an unoptimized knight, but an ANTI-optimized knight that specifically did not have the right tools for the encounter.

Or any encounter with those things. It's actually not that easy to be very resistant to forced movement at around level 8. There is a particular reason I keep mentioning that the only Knights that I've ever seen that are worth anything are Dwarf, Defend the Line and World Serpents Grasp: EG heavily optimized. No fighter in my experience falls apart if it doesn't have one particular race, one particular power and one particular feat.

Second, you based your experiment on a capstone encounter. Your players have been together for a while, know each others abilities, and work well as a team. Then you remove a central character and replace it with a different one that has substantially different strengths and weaknesses, requiring substantially different tactics.

This ignores that the PCs having just played the encounter, now know everything about it and have *better* information than they did starting off. In addition the Knight is a very "simple" class to play, it doesn't take a degree from Harvard University to figure out how it works. If you mean "Substantially different tactics" as "Figure out how to work around its completely crippling weaknesses" then I would agree. Except "Completely crippling weaknesses" should be put at character creation: Not on the table. That is in fact my point.

Also, crushing your complaint entirely I can remove that fighter and put in a swordmage: No huge disaster. I can take away that fighter and put in a Warden: Once again, no huge disaster. I can take away that fighter and put in a battlemind. Once again, no huge disaster. Actually by using Loadstone Lure the Battlemind actually did the best and he had lightning rush so he was amazing in that encounter. I did not try a paladin, but given I am running the same campaign again in future we will have to see what the defender there is (I suspect it will be a weaponmaster). So I can do precisely what you say I can't and the party doesn't fall apart. Some defenders did plain better!

In fact due to the fact I don't always know what my parties are for these things, I use my collection of characters (Some from real players that I have kept and some I made) to test these encounters. So we could try different combinations. At the time my PCs knew everything about the encounter as well, so trying other things is relatively normal and thus far, no other defender struggled anywhere near as much. Of all the defenders we tried only the knight did poorly - I might try that encounter with my friends again later with a paladin (though by this point they are pretty sick of it ). Compared with every other defender in the same situation, some of whom did better than the weaponmaster (in fairness, the Shielding Swordmage and Battlemind were overachievers in that situation. The Shielding Swordmages ranged mark and the Battleminds lightning rush were key to that). So I don't buy your argument here whatsoever.

Edit: In fairness, I also think that comparing optimized characters here is missing the point. The Wizard in that game was a Goliath (Staff Implement) with Scorching Burst and Thunderwave. Despite being TERRIBLY optimized I could *not* kill him no matter what I tried (Staff of Defense, Shield, Wizards Escape... so defensive.... Got him eventually though!). Point is that the party was not heavily optimized itself except 1 or 2 characters (of which the original weaponmaster was not one of them). So knowing at the time that I would need a completely optimized Knight just to perform its role as a defender is not something I was aware of. Then again my player built the character and not me. If I had a PC who wanted to play a Knight now, I would immediately set them on being Dwarf (resistance to forced movement right from level 1!), Defend the Line (Slow enemies), World Serpents Grasp (knock slowed enemies prone on a hit, making the OAs bite in particular), Feyslaughter/Aurakiller weapons as treasure for the most part. Of course I know this *now* and when we first did that experiment above I actually did not know any of that. So if you're expecting me to be psychic in the examples I use, I'm afraid that is not possible and again, it merely proves my point.

Edit2: I also enjoy the irony of the "simple" essentials martial defender requiring a great deal of system mastery to actually make it function well.

 

[Tony Vargas]

A defender's mark-punishment (whatever it may be, part of the mark or a power that's based on it) is primarily a deterent, it discourages a monster from moving away from the defender or attacking his allies. Deterents, of course, as Dr. Strangelove teaches us, /don't work if you keep them a secret/.


On a slightly different tangent, the defender role is one that changes a bit with the style of the DM. Some DMs respect marks, and defenders seem a bit like controllers, limiting enemy options, while others disregard marks, and defenders seem a bit like strikers as they dish out mark-punishment frequently. Some DMs do try to 'RP' each monster's reaction to being marked and facing mark-punishment and factor that into its decisions, so sometimes the monster makes a 'tactically sound' decision for his side of the battle, and others it makes a more 'selfish' decision. Other DMs take marking as part of the tactical meta-game and have monsters work around them if they can, and respect, ignore or circumvent them on a cost/benefit basis: it's a given that any PC marking is the one you'd be wasting your limited time attacking, so only attack it if there's no way to attack anyone else, or the mark-punishment is so steep and unavoidable that taking it would substantially degrade the attacker's overall effectiveness (ie, by killing it rounds sooner than otherwise).

The first sorts are predictable, and a defender can be very effective in their campaigns, if not always that engaging. The other two make the defender's life more 'interesting.'

 

[Frankie1969]

In addition the Knight is a very "simple" class to play, {...}

Also, crushing your complaint entirely I can remove that fighter and put in a swordmage: No huge disaster. I can take away that fighter and put in a Warden: Once again, no huge disaster. I can take away that fighter and put in a battlemind. Once again, no huge disaster. Actually by using Loadstone Lure the Battlemind actually did the best and he had lightning rush so he was amazing in that encounter. {...}

Then again my player built the character and not me.

The "easy mode" fighter is the Slayer.

Aura defenders may have simpler mechanics than most marking defenders, but their tactical usage is non-trivial, and importantly different. Weaponmaster has more in common tactically with any of the other marking defenders than with a Knight. It sounds like neither you nor your players understood this. They would need to keep a knight in the party for an adventure or two before seeing full value from it. And yes, a dwarf knight has some advantages.

In general, marking defenders do well when challenging 1 or 2 key baddies. OTOH, aura defenders are better standing amidst 3 or more standard foes. Locking down a big elite or solo is not easy for a knight, and I agree that this is a weakness of the build. But they are not as bad as you think, if your players know how to use them correctly.

 

[Aegeri]

Aura defenders may have simpler mechanics than most marking defenders, but their tactical usage is non-trivial, and importantly different.

I am in fact quite aware of this. It is why I point out that their weaknesses mean their advantages, like the ability to enforce a mark 1/turn do not automatically make them better than standard fighters. I just feel their weaknesses far outweigh their benefits when it actually matters.

It sounds like neither you nor your players understood this.

I knew, the point of the whole exercise was to show the players that as the argument started about mark enforcement. I believe it was even identical to Tony and my discussion just above: About how the Knight was viewed to be better due to 1/turn mark enforcement against the Weaponmasters 1/round. We soon saw how that worked out (it didn't).

They would need to keep a knight in the party for an adventure or two before seeing full value from it.

Done this already actually. Player changed the Knight into a Weaponmaster (it still feels so odd to call the original PHB fighter that) after the first adventure. Let's just say it worked a lot better - it's a shame my move to Australia curtailed that game (as it was just getting interesting!).

OTOH, aura defenders are better standing amidst 3 or more standard foes.

If they feel the need to pay attention to the Knight in the first place - that's the real trick.

But they are not as bad as you think, if your players know how to use them correctly.

You've missed the problem: Can I use my monsters with simple forced movement powers/effects correctly? If I can, then the Knight is in serious trouble. I know there are various ways of "forcing" a monster to deal with the aura (such as using a wall), but they have their own particular unique flaws as well (most notably exposing the character you are trying to defend to blast attacks - like the Inix tail swipe, which can normally be hard with a standard defender to incorporate into the area without moving them around first).

 

[Tony Vargas]

The "easy mode" fighter is the Slayer.

Aura defenders may have simpler mechanics than most marking defenders, but their tactical usage is non-trivial, and importantly different.

I'm sure there was at least an intent to make the Knight (and Cavalier, for that matter), an 'easy mode' defender. The defender aura is simply easier for both the player and DM to track than any other marking mechanism. That's easy. It also means it's easier for tha aura-based defender to establish a mark, and easier for the DM to escape it. If neither the DM or player are feeling terribly tactical -if they're both new, for instance - that doesn't matter, and the Knight plays out much like any other defender (in the hands of a tactically savvy player), with it's mark or mark-punishment having a real impact depending upon the style of the DM. If there's a stark difference between the tactical inclination of player & DM, the Knight could suffer even more miserably (or shine even brighter) than other defenders under the same dynamic. That potential swinginess (like other balance issues with the sub-class) is a price of the way it was made simpler.

 

[WalterKovacs]

If they feel the need to pay attention to the Knight in the first place - that's the real trick.

Admitedly though, in the specific '3 on 1' type of situation, while the knight may not be able to get their attention, he is more likely to get to hurt those enemies than a weaponmaster would. Assuming the weaponmaster had them all marked (not hard with close bursts), and that the enemy at this point knows about the movement stopping OA, they would probably each shift away or, make normal melee attacks against other enemies if possible. In which case one suffers the interupt, the rest suffer the penalty to the attack, and the inconvenience of avoiding an OA. In the case of the knight, he'd get OAs against each one of them unless they attacked him (or one of them happened to use a forced movement effect ... then again, that enemy at the very least used his attack on the knight, so at least one of them paid attention). The enemies, again assuming they know the knights capabilities, would be able to move away instead of shifting, and not suffer the -2 penalty to attack, true, but the knight would have gotten many more OAs as a result. So, he would have been less controlling and more striking.

The knight, in this regard, does have a benefit. OA boosting effects are more likely to benefit the knight because the fighter's OA is, in general, so devastating with it's literal stopping power, that the fighter rarely gets to use it. A knight on the other hand, will probably end up using his OA often enough to warrant feats or items to improve it.

Stickiness is an important defender quality, but it isn't the only one. Just like a striker isn't ONLY about the ammount of damage it can dish out (it also needs to be able to get access to the enemies it wants to deal that damage to). So to does the defender's ability to punish enemies make it worthwhile. Stickiness is most important for stopping opponent's from attacking your allies ... but then, killing them also works. A defender that enemies repeatedly allow to beat them up has a whole other set of strenghs, with any dpr improvements being much more valuable for a knight. Depending on the group, the knight could be a very striker leaning defender, getting many attacks per round do to his "weaker" defending skills.

Not every monster has forced movement, and unless the forced movement is basically free (aura/OA/interupt/minor), it's still wasting it's action on the knight, which DOES seem to be the idea. One enemy is able to waste the knights actions ... and one enemy can absorb the only interupt coming from the weaponmaster and the rest can shift or attack someone else in melee with less effort. True, they lack the ability to just walk away afterwards ... but then again the forced movement on the weaponmaster would have resulted in nearly the same thing. The -2 will matter ... once in every ten rolls.

So if the scenario is: 3 enemies adjacent to fighter, fighter has all three marked (or in aura), gets pushed away by 1, the other two do what they want ... this needs to happen 5 times before the mark matters on one of the attacks (not actually the case, but over a long enough period of time, there would be an average of one miss caused by the mark continuing to apply when they are out of the aura for every 5 instances of this scenario playing out). Now, this also supposes that the fighter has enough burst attacks or other tricks to repeatedly create the scenario ... since, presumably, the enemies with forced movement aren't showing up in every fight.

 

[Aegeri]

Admitedly though, in the specific '3 on 1' type of situation, while the knight may not be able to get their attention, he is more likely to get to hurt those enemies than a weaponmaster would.

This was only kind of true and isn't so true now - because of the powerswap feats the Knight can get. For one thing, what a weaponmaster does is move into difficult terrain (or an ally that can generate it) and uses come and get it. Without the ability to shift, that's pretty much the end of those monsters going anywhere unless they are skirmishers. The Knight can in fact do this as well - one of the reasons the weapon swap feat is so damn good for them - but due to their inability to really make OAs count like the weaponmaster it's not as inherently effective (but still pretty damn effective). The fighter is really only susceptible to forced movement at that point, but at least he can still count on having some kind of effect on the monsters - the Knight can't and that's the real flaw.

Assuming the weaponmaster had them all marked (not hard with close bursts), and that the enemy at this point knows about the movement stopping OA, they would probably each shift away or, make normal melee attacks against other enemies if possible.

This is something I mentioned earlier, but you've entirely missed the real advantage: An enemy cannot maneuver properly to use its best powers optimally. If I have a close blast 3 and am stuck where I can't get a good chunk of the party, as the fighter has me stuck too far away shifting + charge is a humongous loss. On the other hand if I can walk away, freely choose my position and then attack (with no penalty to boot), then that is a net win and there is a huge incentive to do so. Getting 4 party members with no -2 penalty for 1 OA, is a damn fine deal to being forced to shift and charge, taking an attack for the effort and attacking the other PC at a -2 penalty.

1 OA is a damn fine deal to optimally use your powers. Unless the Knight can somehow enforce it not to be, such as with Defend the Line (pretty much mandatory for a Knight IMO), then he's in major trouble. Most monsters have very powerful attacks off their standard actions (albeit not all!), but aren't always melee basic attacks. So a shift and charge reduces what they could do considerably (or forces them to use it on the Fighter).

Not every monster has forced movement, and unless the forced movement is basically free (aura/OA/interupt/minor), it's still wasting it's action on the knight, which DOES seem to be the idea.

Welcome to monster manual 3 design, where plenty of monsters have these mechanics and many controllers slide/pull/push even on a missed attack. Not to mention how skirmishers have changed the wording of many movement powers to move X squares (ignoring slow basically) and don't provoke OAs. Knights are, as mentioned utterly unable to deal with these creatures at all pretty much.

The -2 will matter ... once in every ten rolls.

Stacked with illusory ambush, now it's once in every 5 rolls. Stacked with a wizards shield, that -8 penalty (essentially) now means an attack that could have outright crippled (or killed) the wizard now misses entirely. Stacked with disruptive strike, the monster may as well have not bothered using the power in the first place. There are so many example powers I could use here, that are commonly available to a wide array of different builds, classes and similar. Penalties that hang around and aren't easy to get rid of - marks are actually one of the harder penalties to get rid of in many cases - can be freely stacked with others (or against bonuses). I've mentioned this before, but a -2 penalty looks unimpressive until it gets a bunch of other things thrown on it. Then it puts a creature over into "I am never hitting anything" territory.

I've even had an incredibly rare event where a PC couldn't be critically hit due to penalties. The critical hit would have outright killed them. Good thing my players don't think like you that a -2 penalty isn't worth it! Also I mention this repeatedly but it gets ignored, but a weaponmaster by paragon can get a -3 penalty to marks. Nothing to sneeze at whatsoever. Minding in fairness, a Knight by paragon should multiclass Cleric and get Warpriest. Because god damn Warpriest is amazing for a Knight (I have mentioned this before I think).

 

[Tony Vargas]

This is something I mentioned earlier, but you've entirely missed the real advantage: An enemy cannot maneuver properly to use its best powers optimally. If I have a close blast 3 and am stuck where I can't get a good chunk of the party, as the fighter has me stuck too far away shifting + charge is a humongous loss. On the other hand if I can walk away, freely choose my position and then attack (with no penalty to boot), then that is a net win and there is a huge incentive to do so.

Nod. With the monsters played that way, the Knight ends up strikerish, doing more damage as monsters constantly eat OAs to move away from from him, while the Fighter ends up more controllerish, by degrading the effectiveness of their actions rather than doing much damage to them. (actually, since the Knight will probably be doing damage to several monsters - any he can end up next to - that's also a tad controllerish... hmmm....)

That style really de-emphasizes the Defender role, though, since monsters will rarely attack the defender, himself, they'll concentrate on bringing down the squishies, and all the defender can do is try to bring them down faster with mark punishment (might as well be another striker), and/or make them a little less effective at bringing down the squishies (might as well be another controller).

The point of the Defender role, the MMO 'tank, and the iconic Fighter that they're both based on is to be a frontliner who sucks up some damage for the party and is generally the tough guy. In the olden days, if a DM didn't go along with that, there was little to support it. Now, there are consequences, but they still don't keep the defender a defender, rather they make it into a striker or controller when the enemy declines to cooperate with the defender paradigm.

Maybe at some point we will have defenders so coercive that they aren't so subject to DM style or whim.

 

[IanB]

Minding in fairness, a Knight by paragon should multiclass Cleric and get Warpriest. Because god damn Warpriest is amazing for a Knight (I have mentioned this before I think).

You mention it a lot, but I suspect there are tons of knight concepts being played out there that don't actually want to enter the priesthood for flavor reasons. To me more than anything that's the issue with the knight, that you can't mitigate the problems without going in a fluff direction that is pretty specific. There needs to be a more generic way to deal with it.

 

[Aegeri]

That style really de-emphasizes the Defender role, though, since monsters will rarely attack the defender, himself, they'll concentrate on bringing down the squishies, and all the defender can do is try to bring them down faster with mark punishment (might as well be another striker), and/or make them a little less effective at bringing down the squishies (might as well be another controller).

Actually I will regularly respect marks due to the penalty and the damage together. I only really routinely ignore the knight because it also removes the penalty to the attack - if the penalty stuck around then I wouldn't be anywhere near as inclined to just walk away. Monsters have boatloads of HP, but only a few uses of important powers. Missing with an important power you can't get back hurts FAR more than a few HP.

So in this way I am more concerned about the penalty making the attack irrelevant than the damage inflicted by the mark punishment. This is most present when penalties from marks make the defenders AC roughly near or worse than the actual defender. Especially when combined with other penalties or even bonuses on top of that. For example a Wizard looks like a good target, but with a -2 penalty and a shield/staff of defense it's actually not that worth it. So actually I don't defy marks that often, because I try to maximize my ability to hit first - especially with any power I regard as important. In many ways, a penalty will dissuade me far more than an attack and especially so if it can't be easily gotten rid of.

This is ironically what kept the Goliath Wizard alive in that game. Mark penalties + enfeebling strike (defender was a paladin) + shield = don't bother. Effectively -8 to the attack, giving him AC roughly equivalent to that of the paladin so I would miss anyway. He also had Staff of Defense. Ever seen a 20 con wizard with that? Yeah, it's amusing at first but surprisingly effective.