Action Points

[Mouseferatu]

Say what? That's not what the primer said about AP...

I'm not claiming that's all they do, or it's their only reason for existing. But the slow accumulation of APs does, indeed, provide at least some benefit for parties continuing on to longer adventuring days.

 

[Darth Cyric]

The question is:

"Which is more valuable: pressing onward and receiving one action point, or camping and getting back all of our HPs, healing surges, and Daily powers (as well as one action point)?"

Or pressing onward, using action points instead of our Daily powers in most of our mundane encounters, and saving our Daily powers for when we're REALLY in deep?

 

[FadedC]

There may eventually be other uses for action points as well. We know for example that there is (or was) a feat that allows you spend an action point to not be surprised. It's unclear if this will count against the limit of one per encounter or not.

 

[Scholar & Brutalman]

One of the things I like about the 4e implementation of Action Points is that the name is literal. Action Points give you actions.

As for how powerful they are, I remember 3.0 Haste...

DM: "You see Villian Von Nasty"
Player: "I hit him with my per-day Shatter the Kneecaps attack, and then spend an AP to use my per-day Exploding Spleen Surprise as well. Oh look! Both of them hit. How does Villian feel now?"

 

[Shieldhaven]

I take Action Points to be a whole lot like Drama Dice in 7th Sea, actually. Unless other details of the rules persuade me otherwise, I'll experiment with houseruling them so you can go through several encounters to build up a pool of them, and then unload everything you've earned while fighting the boss.

Haven

 

[Darth Cyric]

As for how powerful they are, I remember 3.0 Haste...

DM: "You see Villian Von Nasty"
Player: "I hit him with my per-day Shatter the Kneecaps attack, and then spend an AP to use my per-day Exploding Spleen Surprise as well. Oh look! Both of them hit. How does Villian feel now?"

Thus why it's a good thing they're usable only once per encounter and gained only every two encounters.