Battlerager....Overpowered?

[Blizzardb]

Just a clarification - battlerager's temporary HP are gained every time he is hit by an enemy with a melee or close attack, after the attack resolves. So he will not gain temporary HP if he is hit with a ranged or area attack (and yes, along with the other benefits the ability does seem very powerful to me).

 

[mlund]

A Fighter who can't hit his opponents is a lousy Defender. At that point all he's doing is wasting his Standard Action to give an enemy -2 to hit his allies - and any other character could pretty much generate the same effect with Aid Another. If you can't hit reliably your OA and Immediate Interrupt Fu is worthless. You're not going to stop anyone from closing in on and attacking the other characters in your party that are actual threats.

Giving up the ability to hit for the added potential of "not dying" requires a very steep ratio in favor of "not dying." I haven't come up with any Fighter powers where CON helps you hit, only capitalize on hits with more damage. Yes, you could min/max a fighter who accumulates large amounts of Temp HP to act as continual Damage Reduction. However, if he's sacrificed his threat value by 3 or 4 points on his attack roles he won't provide the Defender's proper incentive to monsters to draw their fire in the first place.

Consider if you will what a Battlerager who isn't throwing away his good armor is going to give up:
+1 to hit from the standard Fighter Bonus
+1 to hit from Strength each extra +1 Con Modifier for Temp HP (roughly)
+1 to hit from using a +3 proficiency weapon for a +2 proficiency weapon that adds Con to Damage

Trying to maximize your use of Constitution as a Rager leads the Fighter away from being a Defender and towards becoming a "Brute" monster, IMO.

Just taking the -1 to hit and otherwise employing the Battlerager without any real modifications seems pretty decent - something like DR2 or 3 in exchange for hitting about 10% less of the time vs. Monsters you'd otherwise hit on 11s. That's probably worthwhile, but not game-breaking. Yeah, it scales up with leveling and feats nicely, but I figure that's necessary in the first place. As powers start to do more damage temp HP need to scale to keep relevant.

Frankly, the Dwarf Fighter needed a little extra love, and the Battlerager gives it to him. The Dragonborn fighter might get more love than is good for him, but he was wasting one of his Stat bumps in the class to begin with (CHA). The Warforged is probably the most troublesome example, but we don't play Ebberon locally or use too many MM races anyway. We understand those races may not make ideally-balanced PCs every time.

- Marty Lund

 

[Kraydak]

A Fighter who can't hit his opponents is a lousy Defender. At that point all he's doing is wasting his Standard Action to give an enemy -2 to hit his allies - and any other character could pretty much generate the same effect with Aid Another. If you can't hit reliably your OA and Immediate Interrupt Fu is worthless. You're not going to stop anyone from closing in on and attacking the other characters in your party that are actual threats.

Giving up the ability to hit for the added potential of "not dying" requires a very steep ratio in favor of "not dying." I haven't come up with any Fighter powers where CON helps you hit, only capitalize on hits with more damage. Yes, you could min/max a fighter who accumulates large amounts of Temp HP to act as continual Damage Reduction. However, if he's sacrificed his threat value by 3 or 4 points on his attack roles he won't provide the Defender's proper incentive to monsters to draw their fire in the first place.

Consider if you will what a Battlerager who isn't throwing away his good armor is going to give up:
+1 to hit from the standard Fighter Bonus
+1 to hit from Strength each extra +1 Con Modifier for Temp HP (roughly)
+1 to hit from using a +3 proficiency weapon for a +2 proficiency weapon that adds Con to Damage

Trying to maximize your use of Constitution as a Rager leads the Fighter away from being a Defender and towards becoming a "Brute" monster, IMO.

Just taking the -1 to hit and otherwise employing the Battlerager without any real modifications seems pretty decent - something like DR2 or 3 in exchange for hitting about 10% less of the time vs. Monsters you'd otherwise hit on 11s. That's probably worthwhile, but not game-breaking. Yeah, it scales up with leveling and feats nicely, but I figure that's necessary in the first place. As powers start to do more damage temp HP need to scale to keep relevant.

Frankly, the Dwarf Fighter needed a little extra love, and the Battlerager gives it to him. The Dragonborn fighter might get more love than is good for him, but he was wasting one of his Stat bumps in the class to begin with (CHA). The Warforged is probably the most troublesome example, but we don't play Ebberon locally or use too many MM races anyway. We understand those races may not make ideally-balanced PCs every time.

- Marty Lund

Hammer Rhythm. Hammer Rhythm. Hammer Rhythm.

In the Heroic Tier, the damage dice multiples are small enough that +2 damage is roughly equal to +1 to hit, which is the trade off in question.

Past the Heroic Tier, Hammer Rhythm makes hammers+con always a good idea in terms of inflicting damage.

Add in the fighter's suite of auto-damage stances, and you aren't giving up any offense for your massively boosted defense.

 

[James McMurray]

Past the Heroic Tier, Hammer Rhythm makes hammers+con always a good idea in terms of inflicting damage.

Personally, I prefer swords and strength. A hit practically always deals more damage than a miss, unless it's a power with a good effect on a hit, in which case you still don't want to miss.

Hammer Rhythm is nice insurance, but a lousy strategy.

 

[Kraydak]

Personally, I prefer swords and strength. A hit practically always deals more damage than a miss, unless it's a power with a good effect on a hit, in which case you still don't want to miss.

Hammer Rhythm is nice insurance, but a lousy strategy.

Early paragon tier, longsword vs hammer, +5 con modifier.
Say the hammer battle-rager needs a 13 to hit, while sword-boy w/weapon talent and an additional point of Str needs a 10.

Over 20 attack rolls, the hammer guy gets +(12*5 from misses)+(8*2 from battlerager)=76 extra damage from sources the sword guy doesn't get (+1 str cancels hammer's higher base damage).
Over those same 20 attack rolls, the sword-guy gets 3 bonus hits.
So if the sword-guy's hits do more than 26 damage, he pulls ahead (+1 str has already been counted, so needs to be discounted here). At +10 to damage (+5 str, +3 weapon, +2 feat), he needs 16 on the dice. The breakeven point is between 3 and 4 W. Good luck on that, and you aren't getting the defensive benefits.

But wait, it gets better for hammer-boy: his numbers get better as the opponent's AC gets worse. He pulls through in a pinch, while the sword guy does better in cases where victory is already assured. Further, hammer-guy gets noticeably more benefit out of the various auto-damage stances.

The better ability to land the debuffs with swords is nice, but don't pretend the battle-rager is giving up much offense. He is of course, especially compared to a weapon-talent+hammer rhythm build, but it isn't debilitating. In not-that-special circumstances, he'll actually do more damage (those pesky stances, again, where the +2 to damage applies but the +1 to hit is irrelevant)!

(N.B. I do not own MP. I could easily be getting details, like +2 damage on the stances, wrong)

 

[nerdytenor]

Something to consider: it seems to me that battlerager gets less powerful over time, as the amount of tmp hps granted by the feature gradually shrinks as a percentage of total hps.

I'm not yet convinced it is overpowered - some of the analysis I've seen seems to forget that, yes, the players occasionally MISS, and aren't actually granted the tmp hps. Also, as a melee combatant, you are likely upping str, and if you up con with str, you are likely giving up a lot in terms of REF and WILL defense.

fwiw,
- nt

 

[James McMurray]

Are we comparing hits vs. misses, or exact builds? If we're looking at builds I guarantee we can one-up each other for a long time. If we're looking at specific instance, then 1[W] (or more) + Strength mod is going to be higher than Con Mod fairly consistently. Hammer Rhythm + Battlerager may eek out a ffew more points of damage over the course of 20 attack rolls, but when you're in an actual fight, if it takes you 5 misses to kill someone that others are killing in two hits, you're going to get laughed at.

 

[Mengu]

Something to consider: it seems to me that battlerager gets less powerful over time, as the amount of tmp hps granted by the feature gradually shrinks as a percentage of total hps.

Not quite what we want to hear in 4e. Generally, well designed class features are equally useful throughout a character's career. If battlerager temporary hit points don't fit this design, there would be something wrong with them. But I don't think temporary hitpoints lose their value at higher levels.

I agree at low levels it seems the temporary hit points are more powerful, but you have to realize it doesn't take that many actual hits to take down a fighter, 4 or 5 solid hits will typically do the job. Temporary hit points can extend that to 6 or 7 hits. At high levels it takes a lot more than 4 hits to take down a fighter, so the temporary hit point buffer will essentially keep playing its same role of extending the fighter's durability by 1 or 2 hits.

I'm not yet convinced it is overpowered - some of the analysis I've seen seems to forget that, yes, the players occasionally MISS, and aren't actually granted the tmp hps.

Maybe you are misreading the power? It triggers when you are hit, not when you hit.

 

[Kraydak]

Are we comparing hits vs. misses, or exact builds? If we're looking at builds I guarantee we can one-up each other for a long time. If we're looking at specific instance, then 1[W] (or more) + Strength mod is going to be higher than Con Mod fairly consistently. Hammer Rhythm + Battlerager may eek out a ffew more points of damage over the course of 20 attack rolls, but when you're in an actual fight, if it takes you 5 misses to kill someone that others are killing in two hits, you're going to get laughed at.

16 str/18 con vs 18 str/16 con (or whatever) starting stats, warhammer vs. longsword (same enchantment level), weapon focus (or equivalent).

Average damage calculations will almost invariably come out in favor of the hammer guy (weapon talent OR battle-rager), and so the hammer guy will kill his foes faster. On the same sequence of attack rolls, the sword guy benefits if they fall in the narrow (3 number) range where he hits and the battle-rager hammer guy misses. Otherwise, the hammerer does better. The sword-guy's extra hits do hit harder, but they still have a hard (read: impossible) time making up for the 17 numbers on the d20 where the battle-rager hammer guy does better (+2 damage when both hit, +con modifier when they both miss).

 

[Kraydak]

Something to consider: it seems to me that battlerager gets less powerful over time, as the amount of tmp hps granted by the feature gradually shrinks as a percentage of total hps.
...
fwiw,
- nt

The basic +con after getting hit does get a bit weaker over time, but it starts at absurd and merely drops to "way, way better than 1 point of AC against anything you have any business fighting (or chance at beating)."

You can match it up against the damage/level tables in the DMG if you like. They aren't perfectly matched by the MM, but it comes close enough to get the scaling.

That doesn't count the improved value of invigorating powers, either.