Do you know how many powers there are currently out there?

[Herremann the Wise]

Hello Everyone,

I was just playing with the DDI D&D Compendium and noticed a very surprising figure (at least to me). There are currently 4203 powers out there. That's four thousand two hundred and three "things" to do in combat. I don't know about you but my goodness that seems a lot and I'm sure it will steadily increase with every WotC release. Is it too many? Do many of them do "roughly" the same thing and so should this 4203 number be revised down for an "effective" power count?

I think the "power" concept as a formalization of an action is perhaps the greatest advance in terms of combat made from 3E to 4E. By referencing a heavily streamlined gamespace of terms/resources (hit points, position, conditions and keywords), it has become possible for the players (through power cards / sheets) to take much of the burden of adjusication away from the DM. As such, I suppose having 4203 powers out there is not that big an issue because of how easily they are adjudicated by a group rather than everything being pushed through the DM's brainspace.

Do you have any further thoughts on Powers and how many of the darn things there are from a design perspective?

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[Umbran]

Well, a major thing to note is that most characters have access to only a fraction of them. How many there are overall is not so much an issue as how much a player must absorb for any particular character.

 

[Inyssius]

Hello Everyone,

I was just playing with the DDI D&D Compendium and noticed a very surprising figure (at least to me). There are currently 4203 powers out there. That's four thousand two hundred and three "things" to do in combat. I don't know about you but my goodness that seems a lot and I'm sure it will steadily increase with every WotC release. Is it too many?

That's a rather silly question, isn't it? Try this one instead:

With the release of Primal Power, almost every class has approximately eight different options to choose from at each level where it gains a power. Is this too many choices to expect a player to choose from (once, as part of the level-up process)? If not, how many might be too many?



EDIT: Herremann, I've got a question for you specifically: given that a normal sixth-level character can only do nine of those four thousand things, what exactly do you mean by "too many"?

 

[ppaladin123]

A large subset of those powers are the paragon or epic tier upgrades to a heroic power. If you understand that particular mechanic then it is easy to evaluate other members of the family against powers of the same level.

In general, all of the powers within a class have certain thematic elements in common (focus on teleports, or slides, or stuns, or interupts, etc.). Beyond that there are, as I said, families of powers that have further mechanical similarity. There are no more than five or six such families for each class.

As a result, players quickly get a good sense of what their character can do and what s/he will eventually be able to do (stun instead of merely daze, long teleports instead of short ones, interupts instead of reactions, and so forth). The DM (in my experience) also figures this out after a couple of sessions with a new class. There shouldn't be too many, "You can do that?!" moments after that.

 

[Herremann the Wise]

I was just playing with the DDI D&D Compendium and noticed a very surprising figure (at least to me). There are currently 4203 powers out there. That's four thousand two hundred and three "things" to do in combat. I don't know about you but my goodness that seems a lot and I'm sure it will steadily increase with every WotC release. Is it too many?

That's a rather silly question, isn't it?

I'd like to think not! If you look at the number of abilities/spells/actions available over the lifetime of 3.x, I'm not too sure it would even approach this number. As such, I wonder how redundant many of the powers are? In terms of scope for further development I think there is quite a bit but has the current ground been trampled upon too much instead of forging into new areas and mechanics (something that would seem to be definitely arriving in PHB3)? In addition, I know the DM does not need to have read all the powers that his or her players can throw into the mix, but at the same time in terms of description and tactics, does this allow the DM to bring his or her "best game" to the table? I suppose this is more related to RPGA DMs dealing with many various groups and characters rather than regular campaign DMs.

Try this one instead:

With the release of Primal Power, almost every class has approximately eight different options to choose from at each level where it gains a power. Is this too many choices to expect a player to choose from (once, as part of the level-up process)?

This would be good if they were all meaningful options but in practice, I have found character development to tend towards far fewer meaningful options to the point where one's build pre-determines more choices than not.

If not, how many might be too many?

As I said, I think it is more a case of meaningful options (my tactical build warlord is mainly going to focus on intelligence/tactical related options rather than charisma/bravura based ones) rather than total number. Having eight meaningful options would be pretty cool. I think this could be achieved with generic powers (available to all classes) and at the same time, the ever-increasing number of psuedo-similar powers could be curtailed. Just a thought.

EDIT: Herremann, I've got a question for you specifically: given that a normal sixth-level character can only do nine of those four thousand things, what exactly do you mean by "too many"?

Only partially on a DM campaign/tactical level (although as I mentioned in the original post the beauty of the power system is that individual players were adjudicating their powers rather than the DM), but more so on a design philosophy level. The elegance thread by MerricB got me thinking about such things. Are there a lot of powers that don't really need to be there... power filler as it were?

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[Inyssius]

Are there a lot of powers that don't really need to be there... power filler as it were?

Mm. As you said, I think it is more a case of meaningful options rather than total number. You suggest that a DM's burden is increased by the total number of powers in the game. I don't see how that could be possible, since any one party cannot throw more than a tiny fraction of those powers "into the mix", and--as you said--very likely will not use many of the powers that they theoretically could choose from.

Even if the DM in this case is planning encounters ten or fifteen levels ahead of time, he could still tailor those encounters to his party without significant trouble, because--as you conceded--a character's likely power choices are much easier to predict than one might infer from the total number of powers available to them. A character's earliest path choices will curtail their total selection drastically. Warlocks may have abnormally large power lists, but few warlock players would actually choose from that whole list; instead, they choose from the two or three options available to their pact--and importantly a character with a predefined concept may well see fewer options still, like a starlock who doesn't think radiant damage fits her concept, or an ice-based AoE wizard.

And that last effect is paradoxically becoming more pronounced with the increased power selection; if a wizard power slot didn't have an ice-based AoE power, and a new supplement adds one, it becomes much easier to predict which power our ice-based AoE wizard will take.



As for RPGA DMs, a very small percentage of a much larger hobby... it is my experience that it generally takes one encounter to identify how an unknown character works. This would be the case even if players were limited to the PHB1 -- even in core, most classes can be built in a number of very different ways. If you don't actively gather information about him from the player, you really don't know what he's like in combat (and, therefore, how to deal with him in combat) until the fight starts--and after that you will quickly figure it out literally regardless of how many supplements he was built with.



I'll reply to the simplicity/generics argument when I have time, but I'd like to hear your response to these points.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think one of the beauties of 4E power system is that I, as the DM, don't really have to know what powers the PC have at all. Just keep them coming and react. Of course, after the first or second encounter, I also gain a good impression on their strengths and weaknesses.

The beauty for the player is that when playing, he only needs to know a small amount of powers.

Before the game, the player can spend a lot of time analyzing his power options, but
once in the game, he only has to care for the one he actually knows.

Of course, for the tactically savvy party, it also doesn't hurt to know your allies powers, but you mostly just need the basics, like "can he daze someone" or "can he heal me?" or "can he use forced movement to get the enemy into a better position for us?".

 

[Jhaelen]

I'd like to think not! If you look at the number of abilities/spells/actions available over the lifetime of 3.x, I'm not too sure it would even approach this number.

Well, I'm pretty sure 3E had a larger number of them. You just don't have a convenient way of adding them all up. Remember, that the Compendium lists every official source, including Dragon, Dungeon, RPGA and other adventure modules.

If you took all of these sources in 3E you'll easily surpass those numbers. There's probably about a thousand different prestige classes alone (or maybe even more).

You'll also have to keep in mind that in 4E powers often serve a similar purpose as feats and skill options did in 3E. And there's definitely thousands of feats in 3E.

I once started compiling this stuff in Excel Sheets and the total numbers are truly intimidating. Did you know there have been about 100 base classes in 3E?

 

[Belen]

Well, I'm pretty sure 3E had a larger number of them. You just don't have a convenient way of adding them all up. Remember, that the Compendium lists every official source, including Dragon, Dungeon, RPGA and other adventure modules.

Yes you do. There is a handy index:

175 base classes
782 prestige classes
3304 Feats
2800 spells

Total: 7061

Of course, this was over the life of the entire edition with 7 years of material and Herremann is not counting feats and rituals in his list, or at least, I do not think that he is.

That is a lot of bloat for so early in an edition.

Also, the DDI gives you the ability to use all the 4e stuff whereas 3e was restricted to the books you owned. I imagine most players had access to far fewer options.

 

[Phaezen]

A handy Breakdown by Class:

[Sblock=Breakdown]
Artificer: 86
Assassin: 82
Avenger: 182
Barbarian: 93
Bard: 180
Cleric: 190
Druid: 107
Fighter: 207
Invoker: 174
Monk: 41
Paladin: 173
Psion: 41
Ranger: 191
Rogue: 191
Seeker: 43
SHaman: 91
Sorcerer: 179
Swordmage: 179
Warden: 82
Warlock: 235
Warlord: 189
Wizard: 192
[/sblock]

Or an average of 6.3618 Per class Per Level, which does not seem as bloaty as all that.