Gencon: Any non-Essentials content coming up?

[Neonchameleon]

Yes, and the E-classes do next to nothing to stop it. All that changed was a shift from 'powers' to 'stances' and 'tricks' that simulate powers but use extra actions to make use of. IOW, E-classes are significantly MORE complex to actually play than the base 4e classes are.

Except that your armchair theorising has nothing to do with how it works in actual play. Analysis paralysis is caused by too many options at each given decision point. And made worse by having no default option. Stances and defender auras are fire and forget; your Defender Aura is either on or off. I've yet to see a stance-based class played without a default stance. Which means they don't need to think about it - just remain in it. The extra actions are only used when they spot an opportunity.

Uh, huh. Thats the same process that 4e classes go thru. Sorry, theres no improvement here. You want a simple, easy to use FTR? You pick the simple, easy to use powers.

You mean the almost indistinguishable ones? Because they make analysis paralysis so much better!

You dont bring in the "Use a minor action to change your stance, use a standard to attack, check back to see what your stance does, oh yeah, make sure you activate your defender aura".

No you don't. Your defender aura is almost always running. It's not something you activate except at the start of a fight. You then have one default stance (IME either Poised Assault (+1 to hit), Battle Guardian (+ damage), or Defend the Line (Slow - which combines with World Serpent's Grasp)). The question is "Is there a good reason not to stay in my default stance?" Sometimes there is - Cleave (or whatever the real name is) for minion-clearing and Hammer Hands for pushes have definite places. But the question "Should I stay in my default stance?" is much less likely to provoke analysis paralysis than "Which option should I use?"

Thats just oh so much simpler than choosing between Attack once with at-will or Attack twice with encounter, mark.

"Does my default stance work? Should I turn defender aura off?" vs "Which of these powers should I use? Should I mark?" Yes, it is simpler when you actually compare like with like.

But if that was a goal, they failed miserably. Theives are much more tactically intensive than Rogues.

Thieves who do not simply spam Tactical Trick are tactially intensive. Tactical and ambush trick are there to be the thief default powers. As normal you fail to understand the class. Acrobat's Trick and Unbalancing Trick (and the OA for escaping flanks) are gravy. If you aren't tactically minded you don't need to touch them. But although it isn't as screamingly obvious as the stance-based classes, Thieves have good defaults that you need a good reason to change.

It is obvious from what you have posted that you absolutely fail to get why and how the Essentials classes work.

I've seen this trotted out before, but who, seriously, has problem with "use these at-will powers, and these others are limited use, but better".

As far as I know there are few people who have a problem intellectually. But Analysis Paralysis, as I mentioned before, can be a real problem at the table. It's not "What's the difference?" but "What should I do? If I do that... or would that be better... that's better, but it uses my daily... what should I do?"

However, that also doesn't mean I have to game with them, and I have serious reservations about the wisdom of aiming towards that market for game sales.

I'm with The Little Raven here.

 

[FireLance]

You know, it seems like only last year that I was posting in threads where people seemed offended about the very existence of come and get it and martial healing. Plus ça change indeed.

 

[TwoSix]

You know, it seems like only last year that I was posting in threads where people seemed offended about the very existence of come and get it and martial healing. Plus ça change indeed.

Oh, those people are still there.

You ever notice that there's very few complaints about the 4e stuff not actually working? They always boil down to either "4e is too much like 4e instead of earlier editions" or "New 4e isn't 4e enough."

 

[Nullzone]

Fun fact: Defender's Aura and your choice of the at will stances are "always on". The only time they fail is if you fall unconscious.

Source: Greg Bilsland, Trevor Kidd, and the Encounters pregen cards.


I never understood the "everyone is a wizard" argument myself. The fact that you have things to do besides "I hit it with my axe" makes you a wizard? Did people forget that wizards used to be "I cast my biggest spell" and then they were done?

 

[FireLance]

I never understood the "everyone is a wizard" argument myself. The fact that you have things to do besides "I hit it with my axe" makes you a wizard? Did people forget that wizards used to be "I cast my biggest spell" and then they were done?

For some, it was the way that 4E stretched the limits of what could be done with martial abilities - the above-mentioned come and get it and martial healing being the usual subjects of complaint.

For others, it was the fact that all classes got daily attack powers, which reminded them too much of the daily spells prepared by wizards and other spellcasters in earlier editions.

For me, the solution to the former was obvious: don't play with abilities and classes that break your suspension of disbelief. With the release of Essentials, the solution to the second is equally obvious: don't play with martial characters that have daily attack powers.

 

[Caerin]

Exactly right, FireLance. I've played 4E regularly since it came out. I liked it well enough, but to me most classes played too similarly for my taste, especially at first. Not just the daily/encounter/at-will split, but the things you could actually do with your powers- the push/pull/slide, for example. To me, for many class powers it felt like a reskinning of basically doing the same things. I completely recognize that not everyone feels that way, but tastes vary. Essentials, and some of the newer books, have done a lot to ameliorate many of those in my mind.

 

[MrMyth]

Yes, and the E-classes do next to nothing to stop it. All that changed was a shift from 'powers' to 'stances' and 'tricks' that simulate powers but use extra actions to make use of. IOW, E-classes are significantly MORE complex to actually play than the base 4e classes are.

Not in my experience, honestly. I mean, I can see in theory how those extra actions to shift in stances and auras and such would be more complicated.

In practive, though? Not so much.

I've run for players who, when presented with a list of at-wills and encounter powers... always choose to basic attack. Even when using an at-will costs them nothing - they just don't want to bother with it. They don't get why they would have a basic attack if an at-will is supposed to be their default instead - the benefit of being able to make OAs, charge, etc, is lost on them.

When presented with an Essentials character, on the other hand? And the ability to just say, "Hey, you always have this defender aura on, so you automatically distract enemies near you. And just choose one of these stances to always be on, and just write down that benefit next to your basic attacks"?

It works. It is simple and easy, because they don't actually have to bother with shifting stances. That's the difference - they can just set it to default and go, rather than having to make those decisions every round about at-wills and encounters.

Similarly, Power Strike is so much easier for them to handle than Encounter powers, since they can decide it after they hit. Which means I can say, "Hey, did you want to use Power Strike?" And then can say, "Oh yeah, extra damage, woo!"

Whereas it is much harder to cut in before they attack and say, "Hey, did you want to use an encounter attack here instead of something else?" That's both more disruptive to them, forces them to look over options and make more choices, etc. And can't really be done after the attack, when they already know what they are rolling.

Look, I can totally get not preferring the Essentials format. And I do hope going forward they provide a mix of design.

But arguing that the Essentials fighter is more complex than the normal fighter... just really isn't true. At least, in my experience, and amongs the gamers I know whom are pretty much the ideal target audience for such things. Maybe you know others for whom it is different, I suppose.

 

[WalterKovacs]

The elimination of daily powers, and encounter powers like power strike, both solve something connected to analisys paralysis, something that is seen in some video games. The "too awesome to use" effect. Some PCs go the whole day without using their daily powers because they fear wasting it, and needing it later. What good is a daily power that never gets used? In the case of power strike, you don't have to decide to attack with it instead of your 'default' attack, instead you decide after you hit. This also fits into stuff like the encounters powers that Essential controllers and leaders get, that still do something on a miss. It eliminates 'wasted' encounter powers ... part of what made dailies good was that they still were decent on a miss ... doing that with encounters (or not having to use it until you know you've already hit) means that you don't have the feeling of having wasted it. And worrying about wasting an encounter power can be another source of analysis paralysis.

There are bad AEDU classes, and bad E classes. (Seeker and Binder, I'm looking at you two). The non-mage E classes that still follow a basic AEDU structure have sort of taken a short cut in terms of eliminating player choice for encounter powers (i.e. warpriests, binders, hexblades, etc) but this is partly a practical matter (not needing to develop about 2 to 4 times as many powers at each level, and have them all be compelling choices and balanced not only with each other but existing powers of the same level). It simplifies design and development, and character building, but in play the characters play pretty much the same as old classes would.

 

[Dice4Hire]

How is activating a stance and then MBAing every round different from using the same at-will every round? I am not seeing it.

It is easily possible to pare down a pre-essentials class to play easier. Maybe not as far as some E-classes, but it is not a total impossibility like some are stating here.

 

[FireLance]

How is activating a stance and then MBAing every round different from using the same at-will every round? I am not seeing it.

Agreed, it's not very different. However, one difference between a Slayer and a Weaponmaster figher, as WalterKovacs pointed out, is the decision point.

At 1st level, a Weaponmaster's "decision tree" might look like the following:
Choose between: AW1, AW2, E1, D1
The player needs to choose between one of four options.

On the other hand, a Slayer's "decision tree" might look like the following:
Change stance? (Y/N)
If attack hits, use encounter power? (Y/N)
This breaks up the decision-making process into two separate Y/N decisions.

A player who tends to default to using the same attack every round will be less likely to make use of his encounter and daily attacks in the first instance, because there is no additional "prompt". Hence, he would tend to be less effective when playing a Weaponmaster than when playing a Slayer.