D&D 4E 4e Monster Manual excerpt

[Jack99]

mah - leh - BRAN - keh.

That's it's correct pronunciation in Italian, even if the official pronunciation given by the designers in an audio file I got from WotC site was quite different (and horribly wrong).

Malebranche is a French name, and should thus be pronounced as if in French ( mȧl bräns̸h′ )

 

[Yair]

I don't like the Charm thingie. You are charmed, so now you can interpose yourself to defend her... do I get to interpose myself before my ally, who haven't charmed me? Before my true love? And how precisely am I interposing myself without moving? Would be kinda hard to do if, say, my ally is Large, attacked by an invisible opponent, or so on. I don't like this exceptions-based design. Not these kind of extensions.

I also dislike that the effect is so well-defined. You interpose yourself, and don't attack her. You can, supposedly, do other things that don't count as Attack by the rules - perhaps Mark her, or set a trap that prevents her from moving, or so on... Yet you can't do something like charm her back, since that would (probably) be an Attack. And while you're interposing yourself to save her, you'll be of course constantly muttering how much you hate and despise her and are filled with rage and desire to destroy her utterly. Now, all of these might be nit-picks to be ignored by good roleplayers or adressed in the PHB's "Charm Effects" heading, I don't know; but a brief line of roleplaying-effect wouldn't have hurt either, methinks. Too much focus on mechanics - even a statblock needs to have a roleplaying effect listed when the spell's affect is roleplaying-related.

I also didn't really liked that all the Nine Hells are kinda layers of this ball floatying around in the Astral. Too geometrical-thinking IMO. They should have stayed with an impossible construction - each layer leads to other "Planes"/Layers, it need not make geographic sense, it's magic!


Otherwise - I liked it. The War Devil looked like a LOT of fun mayham-causing on the battlefield, and the description of Asmodeus and his host was neat, plus the layers weren't half-bad at all for such a succint piece. The succubus also looked fun for a one-time encounter (a bit too predicatable and mecahnic for multiple encounters, though).

 

[hong]

Malebranche is a French name, and should thus be pronounced as if in French ( mȧl bräns̸h′ )

BUt this is an Anglo-Saxon game, and it should thus be pronounced Male Branch.

Kinda sucks that its Male Branch only works 50% of the time, huh?

 

[Dausuul]

To use the defense most 4E supporters use: Its fantasy, it doesn't have to be realistic.
PS: And please do what Cirex suggested. As soon as you managed to douse a fire with another fire without burning up all oxygen in a enclosed space (fire elementals are self sustaining) you can come with "realism argument, not sooner.

I agree that beings made of pure flame should be immune to fire damage. However, that's an extreme example and it's pretty much the only one I can think of. Except in the case of beings that are literally made of the energy type in question, nothing really needs total immunity--for instance, there's no real reason why red dragons have to be immune to fire as opposed to just having sturdy fire resistance.

 

[Jack99]

BUt this is an Anglo-Saxon game, and it should thus be pronounced Male Branch.

Kinda sucks that its Male Branch only works 50% of the time, huh?

That's it, those devils will be called Male Branches in my campaigns from now on. Too funny.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I'm still stunned in awesomeness at the War Devil's sample encounter. This is what I'm talking about, a true army of Devils swarming the PCs... Throw in a Pit Fiend in a few levels and start summoning/exploding minions for more beautifully orchestrated chaos. The (apparent) fact that the gloriously iconic/'simplified' MM entries as depicted will actually allow a normal human being to run this encounter and maintain his sanity is just such an overwhelming Win for me.

Did anybody else notice the fact that only the War Devil's entry refers to the Legion Devils as specifically Minions (In the Pit Fiend's Infernal Summons they are referred to only as "8 legion devil legionnaires [level 21]"). We've already seen what the Elite template does, so I suppose this means that Minion is also a distinct template that can be applied as well.

Sick. I love it all. Bring on the rest.

I find it really interesting how the whole Pit Fiend encounter looks like now. When he summons his Legion Devils, they get a +4 bonus to attacks, which brings them 1 point below his own! They look really nasty now. No surprise that Dispel Magic is a daily power...

 

[Cadfan]

Random thoughts.

1. Apparently "dominate" is a defined keyword.

2. I assume that "charm" is also a defined keyword, because otherwise there's no reason for the charmed target to stay near the succubus. Instead, the player of that character would have it immediately leave to fight a different enemy, preferably by a path that leads right past the party fighter or paladin, where the succubus would fear to follow. I don't know how I'd fix this. I've never liked charm effects, because its always been tough for me to reason how the charmed character would see one enemy as his ally, but not the enemy's allies as his allies. This partially fixes the problem by making the effects of charm precisely defined, but I still need a little more precision. Maybe its off camera.

3. There must be a default flight maneuverability, because the war devil is defined as "clumsy" while the succubus has no defined maneuverability.

4. Part of the purpose of per encounter abilities, per day abilities, and for monsters, recharge abilities, is just to create variety. I have, for a long time, loathed the way that D&D encourages purely spamming attacks. I've wanted fighters who fight with a sword in one hand, and the occasional left hook, or something, anything, to create more variety. So... yeah, its not realistic that the war devil "can't" use his trident every round. But this is a "the rules are not physics" issue. The recharge effect allows two things. First, it allows the designers to give the war devil an above average power level trident attack, because they know he can't use it every round. So it satisfies a balance need. Second, it makes the war devil more cinematic. Instead of a 3e style monster that attacks with his trident every round, now he spears one character with a trident, claws another, swings his trident around to attack a third, etc. It keeps things active and dynamic. Its not that he CANNOT use his trident every round. Its that it was unrealistic that he USED to use his trident every round, and now, thanks to an unrealistic recharge mechanic, a more realistic outcome has been achieved.

5. The Level 21 Encounter may seem like it has a lot of monsters, but take a look. There's 12 level 21 minions (counts as 3 pcs), 1 level 22 leader (counts as ?? just over 1 pc?), 1 level 20 soldier (counts as ?? just below 1 pc), and 2 level 17 controllers. The level 17 monsters seem to be the only real surplus, and they are four levels behind the level of the encounter. That might make it a tough fight, but perhaps not. No way to tell at this level.

Maybe minions become less useful as the players go up in level, and gain more area of effect attacks?

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

War devil or Malebranche (pronounciation anyone)?

mah - leh - BRAN - keh.

That's it's correct pronunciation in Italian, even if the official pronunciation given by the designers in an audio file I got from WotC site was quite different (and horribly wrong).

I've always pronounced the French way, which would be mal-uh-bronsh. It never occurred to me that it might be pronounced differently...

 

[Tuft]

Random thoughts.
2. I assume that "charm" is also a defined keyword, because otherwise there's no reason for the charmed target to stay near the succubus. Instead, the player of that character would have it immediately leave to fight a different enemy, preferably by a path that leads right past the party fighter or paladin, where the succubus would fear to follow. I don't know how I'd fix this. I've never liked charm effects, because its always been tough for me to reason how the charmed character would see one enemy as his ally, but not the enemy's allies as his allies. This partially fixes the problem by making the effects of charm precisely defined, but I still need a little more precision. Maybe its off camera.

Anyone care to speculate what happens if forced movement powers are applied to the charmed one? Would the warlord's powers that moves allies be applicable? (Remember the discussion about whether that movement was voluntary or not?) Would the powers almost all classes have that moves an enemy be applicable? What would be the result of such moves?

 

[Steely Dan]

3. There must be a default flight maneuverability, because the war devil is defined as "clumsy" while the succubus has no defined maneuverability.

Yeah, I've been wondering about that – as long as they clean up manoeuvrability I'll be happy.

I think Hover is also a special form of flight.