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Here's my experience: Shadow Run is very sustainable. Our campaign lasted several years, and only ended because our DM went to medical school. The basic mechanics are quite robust, and it has perhaps the best group structure of any RPG (in terms of available player roles and group styles). You...

Mike Mearls: Works by the Word Mike Mearles is famous for completing the easy stuff (i.e. writing enough words to fill his contract), but avoiding the hard work (i.e. editing, revising, balancing, etc.). When you're paid by the word, there's little incentive to finish your work. Iron Heroes...

Let's see how it plays out... This is the future of D&D. More powers, more combinations, and hence more broken combinations, faster than the errata can be published. I predict that no later than the summer of 2011, a revised PHB/MM/DMG will be published that will not be very backward...

Expertise as Power Creep as Marketing, D&D as a Roleplaying Game Very good observation, but balance is difficult in practice. Even in a game like EverQuest, where after enough XP, characters of the same class and level have acquired all the same abilities, balance between classes is elusive. If...

Ranger yes, because Hunter's Prey can apply to any attack, but Sneak Attack only applies to light blades, crossbows, or slings. Is the bard really going to "nova" with those weapons? Ranger is one of the best M/C feats, as it gives you access to any Ranger skill, especially Perception, and...

I strong disagree. Combining Jack of All Trades with Skill Versatility yields +3 for every untrained skill. That's a lot of return for the investment of a single feat. Ah, but Bardic Knowledge can apply to trained skills, whereas Jack of All Trades only applies to untrained skills. Bardic...

The more I look at Bard Multi-Multi-Classing, the less impressed I am: All the arcane multiclasses train Arcana, which the bard already has, so those M/C feats gain the bard less. With Skill Versatility and Jack of All Trades, a bard has +3 in all untrained skills, so all other M/C feats gain...

Axam the Dwarf Ranger does axes: a Paired Waraxe for melee, and Distance Handaxe for heavy thrown. Twin Strike really helps make up the difference for starting 16 STR/DEX. When I created the character, I expected to be "flexible," switching between melee and ranged as needed. What I've found...

I've mostly been thinking about Cunning Bards, since they appeal to me. I think the answer is to look primarily at the initial M/C feats, and think of them as feats that yield encounter powers. Since typically feats modify powers rather than yield new ones, I think that is the value of bard...

Does the teir gap actually even exist? There are several disincentives against playtesting. Good playtesting requires adherence to a design methodology. This in turn requires skilled and disciplined management. Once a lax development culture is in place, it is in the participants' self...

Did Gregory Marks actually get paid!? Did his EDITOR? My experience was similar to the posts here. The characters were overly complex, poorly built, riddled with mistakes, and the players never really mastered more than a subset of their powers in the time allowed. There were over a dozen...

I think they'll wait until it's clearly a catastrophe I think that what will happen is that Hasbro will deny that there's any problem until the game is a complete mess and book sales plummet dramaticly. Then, when forced to act, they will take the opportunity to address some of the fundamental...

Spiral of Doom Countdown Personally, I am of the opinion that we are seeing signs of the coming apocalypse far sooner than anticipated. Let me explain. The very first time I read the 4E Player's Handbook, I predicted that Hasbro would eventually sell us "The Book of +2's," and this would be...

PHB+2 rewards specialists (20) over generalists (16) After looking over the new feats in PHB+2, my new concern is that these feats greatly favor specialists (characters with a starting score of 20 in their attack), and generalists (those with a starting 16). Prior to these new feats, one...

Actually, +10 is correct, as Roswyn has the Paragon Path Feature Queen's Grace (not listed on the character sheet), which adds her Charisma bonus to all Bardic healing powers. That's why her Stirring Shout heals 10, not 5, for example. But good catch there, thank you. Smeelbo

This brings up an interesting point. In Aragorn v. Grishnak (Edoras Superior Court), Aragorn, a human Warlord/Ranger multiclass argued first, that since his extra Hunter's Quarry damage applied to a successful attack, it not only applied to Furious Smash, but also, since damage dice were rolled...

The apparent consensus is that "extra damage" is intended only to apply to "damage rolls," and any damage bonus that does not specificly apply to "damage rolls," but "damage dealt" and so on, has been misworded. As currently written in the PHB Errata: “Once per round, when you hit your quarry...

Indeed, the character sheet lists several boxes where the PHB lists a racial bonus, but in the underlying text, the bonus is not explictly called out as racial. I suppose they go under misc, with the racial boxes reserved for future expansions. I am not terribly impressed by the attention to...

Collected all DM aids I've collected all the DM aids I wrote into the first post of the thread below: Tips for DMing PHB2 release day adventure! - Wizards Community Enjoy! Smeelbo

One of the pregen characters for the PHB2 Release Game Day Adventure is an 11th level drow Avenger. She is a divine melee striker that selects a single enemy within 10 as her oath enemy, has all kinds of bonuses against that enemy, and keeps that oath enemy until they are dead, or the end of the...