Lore Raithbone
First Post
While looking at the ranger, I noticed two powers right next to each other: Armor Splinter and Blade Cascade.
Armor Splinter is a TWF attack, if one hits the enemy takes a penalty to AC equal to your wisdom modifier until the end of your next turn, if both hit, target takes a penalty to AC equal to 2 + wisdom modifier.
A 15th level ranger could have a high or low wisdom, but lets look at the outlier; the high wisdom ranger. Assuming a wisdom of 20 by level 15 (14 base + 2 racial + 4 stat ups, or 16 base + 4 stat ups), the ranger has a very good chance of landing a -5 or -7 penalty to AC on the enemy; this is huge in 4e, and the penalty to AC only increases as the ranger gains levels. By level 30, the penalty to AC is -7 or -9; in terms of 4e, I believe that is very close to an auto-hit. The danger of this comes when you combine this power with Blade Cascade.
Blade Cascade is Strength vs AC, Alternate main and off-hand weapon attacks until you miss. As soon as an attack misses, this attack ends. Each hit does 2W + Str modifier.
There is no decrease per attack made; you keep going until you miss. Well, what if our ranger has enough favorable modifiers (for example, combat advantage + some other party buffs, maybe from the Warlord for example) to miss only on a 1? What if this Ranger has attack rerolls from paragon paths, items, and epic destinies?
You are looking at a huge damage output, even for a daily. This is a case where the normalized AC/to hit of 4e works against the system, because plusses and minuses mean so much more than they used to.
Armor Splinter is a TWF attack, if one hits the enemy takes a penalty to AC equal to your wisdom modifier until the end of your next turn, if both hit, target takes a penalty to AC equal to 2 + wisdom modifier.
A 15th level ranger could have a high or low wisdom, but lets look at the outlier; the high wisdom ranger. Assuming a wisdom of 20 by level 15 (14 base + 2 racial + 4 stat ups, or 16 base + 4 stat ups), the ranger has a very good chance of landing a -5 or -7 penalty to AC on the enemy; this is huge in 4e, and the penalty to AC only increases as the ranger gains levels. By level 30, the penalty to AC is -7 or -9; in terms of 4e, I believe that is very close to an auto-hit. The danger of this comes when you combine this power with Blade Cascade.
Blade Cascade is Strength vs AC, Alternate main and off-hand weapon attacks until you miss. As soon as an attack misses, this attack ends. Each hit does 2W + Str modifier.
There is no decrease per attack made; you keep going until you miss. Well, what if our ranger has enough favorable modifiers (for example, combat advantage + some other party buffs, maybe from the Warlord for example) to miss only on a 1? What if this Ranger has attack rerolls from paragon paths, items, and epic destinies?
You are looking at a huge damage output, even for a daily. This is a case where the normalized AC/to hit of 4e works against the system, because plusses and minuses mean so much more than they used to.
