A few nit-picks on powers

[BASHMAN]

Well, I have been looking through the pre-gen characters handed out at D&DXP, and also some of the spells posted to this website, and I have noticed a few nitpicky things that bother me. On the whole, I like the powers they've come up w/ for 4e (even if I don't like the marketing strategy of keeping half-orc barbarians & gnome druids hostages along with monks in other $40 books). That said, I have noticed a few things that I hope are some sort of errors, but likely will be used as some sort of loopholes by jerk DMs & munchkin players in the near future.

Fighter Power: Tide of Iron-- you shield bash a foe & knock him back. To use it, you hit the enemy's AC. But anything that works like this-- it is essentially a bullrush-- should target Fortitude Defense instead. Being quick & lithe should be less important than being strong/ bulky enough to resist being knocked back. Like I said-- these are nitpicks.

Mirror Image Wizard Utility 10
'Three duplicate images of you appear, imitating your actions perfectly and confusing your enemies.'
Daily * Arcane, Illusion
Minor Action Personal
Effect: Three duplicate images of yourself appear in your space, and you gain a +6 power bonus to AC. Each time an attack misses you, one of your duplicate images disap-
pears and the bonus granted by this power decreases by 2. When the bonus reaches 0, all your images are gone and the power ends. Otherwise, the effect lasts for 1 hour.

This seems pretty cool-- except that it only affects attacks that go for your AC. What if someone tries to grab you-- that is an attack against your Reflex Defense. They would not be fooled by the mirror image? I would reword it to any attack that depends on touching /shooting you has to get by the defense bonus.

Frostburn Wizard Attack 13
'You whisper a word of elemental power and hurl a flaming ball of ice. Waves of fire and ice explode outward from the point of impact.'
Encounter * Arcane, Cold, Fire, Implement
Standard Action Area burst 2 within 20 squares
Target: Each creature in burst
Attack: Intelligence vs. Fortitude
Hit: 3d6 + Intelligence modifier cold and fire damage.
Effect: This power's area is difficult terrain until the end of your next turn. Any creature that starts its turn in the area takes 5 cold and fire damage. You can dismiss the effect as a minor action.

The bolded section is a bit unclear if it is 5 damage total or from each source...

That's all I have so far, I am sure I will find more as I read, and if you see any, feel free to contribute...

 

[fnwc]

Mirror Image Wizard Utility 10
'Three duplicate images of you appear, imitating your actions perfectly and confusing your enemies.'
Daily * Arcane, Illusion
Minor Action Personal
Effect: Three duplicate images of yourself appear in your space, and you gain a +6 power bonus to AC. Each time an attack misses you, one of your duplicate images disap-
pears and the bonus granted by this power decreases by 2. When the bonus reaches 0, all your images are gone and the power ends. Otherwise, the effect lasts for 1 hour.

The way this is written, any time an attack misses you, an image disappears, regardless if the attack targets your AC or not.

 

[BASHMAN]

The way this is written, any time an attack misses you, an image disappears, regardless if the attack targets your AC or not.

Wow! that's even worse! So lets say you have AC, Ref, Will, & Fort all at 10. You use Mirror Image and get AC 16, and the rest all 10. A kobold tries to trip you-- an attack vs. your reflex-- and rolls a 5, so he misses anyway, even though you only have a 10 reflex. Now your AC is reduced to 14.

As I said-- the bonus should apply against any attack that must touch / shoot you....

 

[Incenjucar]

I think the idea is that the images really have zero ability to dodge or deflect.

Though you could house rule something like "if they miss on a 1, they don't even manage to hit the image."

 

[AZRogue]

I agree. Reflex should be included in the bonus. Or, if not, they should force some kind of choice between which image an enemy tries to touch.

 

[Khuxan]

The bolded section is a bit unclear if it is 5 damage total or from each source...

I don't see any ambiguity. The spell does "3d6 + Intelligence modifier cold and fire damage.", and later "5 cold and fire damage". The damage is both fire and cold. Otherwise it would say "5 cold and 5 fire damage".

 

[Someone]

I agree. Reflex should be included in the bonus.

The problem is, is Reflex defense just a defense against attacks that only need to touch you, or do you roll defense against things like rolling boulders, avoiding falling into pits, balancing on ice, etc? As it happens, the system looks less robust than the reviewers made s believe.

 

[VannATLC]

I'm kind of assuming it is either a misprint, and the +6 Power bonus is to Defenses

I don't like the fact they appear in your space, either.

There had better be a bigger version that lets you manipulate their location, later on.

 

[Khuxan]

The problem is, is Reflex defense just a defense against attacks that only need to touch you, or do you roll defense against things like rolling boulders, avoiding falling into pits, balancing on ice, etc? As it happens, the system looks less robust than the reviewers made s believe.

Instead of you rolling a Reflex save against a pit with a static DC, the pit rolls an attack against your static Reflex defence.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

The problem is, is Reflex defense just a defense against attacks that only need to touch you, or do you roll defense against things like rolling boulders, avoiding falling into pits, balancing on ice, etc? As it happens, the system looks less robust than the reviewers made s believe.

I am pretty sure those things you use skill-rolls for so Acrobatics to dive out of the way of the boulder, Athletics to stop the boulder in its tracks, etc.