D&D 4E Flowery power names vs pragmatically descriptive.

[Garthanos]

I recommend against impronouncable old/middle/early-modern english spellings (ie. chirurgeon, gaol, draught) just for the sake of ease of understanding.

I take this to heart but you just tempted me to design one name Gaol of blade and bone and another Draught of fluid reversal.

 

[Arnwolf666]

I take this to heart but you just tempted me to design one name Gaol of blade and bone and another Draught of fluid reversal.

Not me. I want those Middle English and ancient sounding names and words. And as this is a game that primarily draws from and celebrated European folklore and heritage it is a great chance to use the words they would use for flavor and aesthetics.

 

[Bohandas]

Not me. I want those Middle English and ancient sounding names and words

I think they're all pronounced like their modern equivalents. They just date to a time before sensible spellings were invented.

 

[Arnwolf666]

I think they're all pronounced like their modern equivalents. They just date to a time before sensible spellings were invented.

Yeah the welsh and Celtic can be quite difficult to read. But there are certain flavors that can be kept. That’s one reason I liked birthright setting so well.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don’t really remember, it’s been so long since I played 4e. Honestly, my first instinct was to go with Stunned, but I remembered Stunned being really powerful, so I looked up a list of 4e Conditions and went with Surprised based on the name. Seemed like the most appropriate reaction to having a sword pommel thrown at you

No, there aren't other powers which produce surprise mid-encounter AFAIK. It is just a condition though, so there's nothing mechanically preventing it from working. I think Dazed is the most common "this guy is not quite functioning at full power" state. It allows the target to still attack/move and possibly even both if they charge, but disables OAs and gives some penalties. I always liked Dazed TBH, but I never thought of using Surprised, interesting!

 

[Garthanos]

No, there aren't other powers which produce surprise mid-encounter AFAIK. It is just a condition though, so there's nothing mechanically preventing it from working. I think Dazed is the most common "this guy is not quite functioning at full power" state. It allows the target to still attack/move and possibly even both if they charge, but disables OAs and gives some penalties. I always liked Dazed TBH, but I never thought of using Surprised, interesting!

surprised is an extremely powerful suppressive condition though.

 

[Garthanos]

Gaol of blade and bone and another Draught of fluid reversal.

Gaol of Blade and Bone ... fighter encounter power - trigger enemy shifts and you can shift so long as you end adjacent to the enemy, wondering what level?

 

[Charlaquin]

surprised is an extremely powerful suppressive condition though.

It is, although the way I wrote the Power (where the condition lasts until the end of your turn), it effectively just makes the target grant combat advantage. Which is still pretty decent, but not nearly as powerful if it would be if it lasted until the end of their turn.

 

[Garthanos]

It is, although the way I wrote the Power (where the condition lasts until the end of your turn), it effectively just makes the target grant combat advantage. Which is still pretty decent, but not nearly as powerful if it would be if it lasted until the end of their turn.

Sure you narrowed the time frame so far that they weren't going to be doing standard actions etc, seems less clear than saying no opportunity actions and grants combat advantage in some sense. It could last till their turn and enable your allies to exploit the condition too.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Sure you narrowed the time frame so far that they weren't going to be doing standard actions etc, seems less clear than saying no opportunity actions and grants combat advantage in some sense. It could last till their turn and enable your allies to exploit the condition too.

Honestly I much prefer the use of the standardized conditions instead of random assortments of effectively just about the same thing, which results in 900 different ways to depict 'confused' or 'poisoned' or whatever. I want to just get on with the game, not fiddle with trying to remember 42 different individual effects. This is a real beef I have with 4e, that it got away from that FAR too much. I mean, there might be a very specific flavor reason now and then to want something different, but then what happens when people REFLAVOR? Its really just an impediment to good easy clean design and should have been used MUCH MUCH MUCH more sparingly, if at all.

I'd point out that one could criticize flowery power names in a similar way, they could inhibit reflavoring the narrative explanation, but I think most players are capable of sorting that out, and it isn't like generic names are lacking in flaws either. Mostly I think the notion that you should have generic at-wills and more specific encounter/daily power names/flavors makes some sense.