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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6077534" data-attributes="member: 42582">I never said there's a specific meaning, and I don't think those others did either. They said "thematic support". That's quite different - as I posted in the other thread, from the fact that someone can reflavour Valiant Strike to fit their paladin based on one of the Three Stooges doesn't stop it given very direct and clear support for the more conventional approach of playing a valiant knight.What you seem to be missing, to my eyes at least, is that (i) reflavouring is confined by the mechancial parameters, including keywords and effects, of a power, and (ii) the thematic support that I and others are talking about is a direct result of those mechanical parameters.And as in the other thread, I have just shown that this is not so. You are foucing on the flavour text of a power (is my magical missile green or blue, screaming or chanting?) and disregarding its mechanical parameters (keywords and effects). But it is the latter that produces (in my view) such tight thematic play in 4e.Come and Get It is another example. Its flavour text is well-known, but in my game I don't think it's ever been narrated like that. Rather, the polearm fighter uses the forced movement in combination with his billion-and-one enhancing feats and items to completely own the battlefield around him. And we narrate it, typically, as deft work with his polearm. But that doesn't change the fact that Come and Get It - via its mechanics - plays a strong role in establishing and reinforcing the story of that fighter as a dogged, unflabbable, quintessentially dwarven devotee of Moradin, who is no good at ranged combat but who can hold off and defeat seemingly any number of foes in melee. (Which makes it all the more dramatic when, every now and then, he fails to control the battlefield and endure the onrushing hordes, and needs to be rescued as a result.)Yep, exactly this.And this.It's also possible to build a PC out in odd directions, but (at least in my experience) the rules can mostly be relied upon to make it clear what is going on.For instance, when the wizard PC in my game was reborn as an invoker, the player noted that his ranges had dropped from 10 and 20 squares to 5 and 10 squares, and so - in anticipation of finding himself in melee a bit more - he took Melee Training (WIS) so he could beat things up with his Sceptre of Erathis (Rod of 5 (of 7) Parts).That's certainly not part of any power build - in terms of sheer mechanical outpout, there must be dozens of better feats for an upper paragon invoker - but it comes up every now and then (mostly taking OAs) and he sometimes hits and does a token amount of damage. The player wanted a charcter who would - when melee broke out around him - play as competent, if not uber, rather than as hopeless, and the build rules showed a clear path to that effect.And even though his melee contributions are pretty minimal, they are noticeably better than either the ranger-cleric or the old wizard (though there was the one time that the wizard needed exactly 20 on an OA, rolled it and therefore critted, and the gnoll died in a burst of fire as the mage struck him with his Tome of Replenishing Flame).(And for the rules-conscious, yes, I am aware of the two house rules in the above: allowing the Rod to be used as a melee weapon (a regular mace) without having all 7 parts; and allowing a magic tome to do its crit damage even when used as an improvised melee weapon. My 4e game seems to have survived both tweaks!)</blockquote>

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