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Message: <blockquote data-quote="KarinsDad" data-source="post: 5505351" data-attributes="member: 2011">I don't disagree. Some things were bonkers right out of the box and did need to be errated.BUT.The original rules had very little real Beta testing. It's only human nature for the original rules to have a lot of balance bugs in them.Having designed a game accessory, I know how easy it is to miss something.Terrifying Insight is the equivalent of +3 to hit. It's really potent right out of the box and has not been errated.But to say that these really potent elements like Terrifying Insight are not much stronger when the PCs can now add +2 to hit at level 16 for Expertise and +1 to hit for Superior Implement Training Accurate is a bit naive.A 60% chance to hit with a re-roll is an 84% chance to hit.A 75% chance to hit with a re-roll is a 93.75% chance to hit.In just this example (without other ways to boost to hit), this makes most Encounter and Daily vs. Will powers nearly automatic. Not 100%, but close enough. And the Daze penalty is hardly a hiccup.A lot of it was mistakenly built into the system. To assume that the designers knew 100% what they were doing pre-errata is incredulous.An obvious example is the difficulty table for Skill Challenges which was drastically changed practically day one (and they went overboard when fixing it).They had limited testing and had no clue to all of the possibilities of character optimization. It just became more obvious as more time went by, as a much greater number of players analyzed and played the game, and as more options were added to the game.As another example, they also drastically changed monster damage. Why? Because it was way too low. Their original testing didn't find this.I think that any PC that has 18-20 crits is imbalanced.I think that any PC that can re-roll D20s or roll two D20s for virtually every attack is imbalanced.I think that any PC that can add temporary hit points for getting hit is imbalanced. At least this one was errated.I think that any PC that can do surgeless healing while many other types of healers cannot is potentially imbalanced.The reason I think these are imbalanced is not because they are imbalanced on the surface. It's because they become imbalanced when combined with certain other feats, powers, items, and abilities.The best way to prevent balance issues is to prevent certain types of mechanics into the game system in the first place.WotC should have made certain metagame rules and stuck with them. I opine that the reason that the errata is 123 pages long, nearly the equivalent size of some of the books, is because a lot of cool sounding game mechanics were allowed in without taking into consideration a lot of other game mechanics.I find that anyone who ignores the increased amount of synergy due to the increased number of options (both at the PC level and the party level) and defends power creep as non-existent is not being objective.There are over 3000 feats, almost 9000 items, and over 7500 powers. The sheer volume of different combinations means that there is the potential for very strong synergies.And, this does not even take into account the sheer amount and power of synergies for a party designed to synergize together.A quick example. Spirit's Shield results in very little surgeless healing. Maybe Will * 2 extra healing per encounter in many circumstances if the PCs are lucky. It seems very balanced.Combined with Psychic Anomaly, it can suddenly becomes surgeless healing 2 to 4 times per round. It can easily be 10 or more * Will per encounter or maybe 2 or 3 free healing surges per encounter if the PCs work well together.This only works because surgeless healing exists. Stopping the mechanic from existing in the first place prevents the significantly greater synergy.Not that I am saying that surgeless healing shouldn't exist, I'm saying that the more different cool new mechanics that get added to the game increases the number of unexpected powerful synergies that can creep in.</blockquote>

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