-
NOW LIVE! -- Into the Feywild: Fey Critters For D&D 5E! on Kickstarter! A book of fey-themed critters and a fantasy adventure in the feywild for D&D 5E!
Dragon 405 - Class Acts: Swordmage - The Winterguard of Cendriane
- Thread starter Shroomy
- Start date
Shroomy
Adventurer
I love it! Between this and the Knights of Rethmil, it is a good week for Swordmages!
Can't wait for these powers to hit the CB so I can stat up an Ensnaring Swordmage. It was my least favorite Aegis type, but you make me want to try it! So Kudos!
Thanks! While I don't think they're a top tier defender or that I "fixed" them in any way, I think that I met my goal of giving them a bunch of new, cool options that would be a lot of fun to play around with.
Klaus
First Post
A Swordmage may not be the most effective defender, but it allows for some great tricks. For instance, mark the foe, retreat to the middle of your allies and send someone else to attack the foe. Then enforce the aegia by teleporting the foe to the middle of the party. Hilarity ensues!
chitzk0i
Explorer
The Special line give it a second trigger so it would read "when you teleport an enemy on your turn or when you use Aegis of Ensnarement". The real question is when will it ever trigger if you aren't Ensnaring, and suffice it to say you shouldn't be.
Klaus
First Post
There are Swordmage powers that teleport an enemy adjacent to you:
Blade of Judgement (Daily 1)
Dimensional Vortex (Encounter 3)
Transposing Lunge (Encounter 3)
Evoker's Summoning (Encounter 7)
Hellspike Assault (Daily 9)
Dimensional Echoes (Daily 9)
Be Gone (Daily 9)
etc...
EDIT: to be clear: some of the powers I listed explicitly teleport an enemy to a space adjacent to you. Others simply let you teleport an enemy (such as Be Gone), and you can simply choose the destination to be an adjacent square.
Last edited:
They have triggers, but note that they are free actions, not immediate actions, so can indeed be used on your turn.
Yeah. Pretty much all of that. Ensnarement Swordmages do need a fix of some kind, but it didn't look like you were trying to force that. You added some cool powers to a class/build that needs to love. Kudos.
Nemesis Destiny
Adventurer
Always nice to see support for under-serviced classes. Two articles for swordmages in recent weeks - they might be on the cusp of no longer desperately needing help, and be ready for just kind of needing it.
Klaus
First Post
I'd change a simple thing with the Ensnaremage: change the aegis trigger from "hits with an attack" to "hits or misses with an attack". That way you can prevent it from going after your allies, instead of punishing it when it does that successfully.
It needs some sort of more severe punishment. Dragging someone adjacent to you is cool in a thematic sense, but the worst thing that happens is they grant CA.
As much as people don't love band-aid fix feats (due to feat taxes already being high) but they could release some that would help the mark punishment. Maybe also use the "ensnare" element: immobilize or restrained (at epic, maybe) could be added as a save ends effect (seeing as you're not doing any damage).
Shroomy
Adventurer
There's already a series of feats from Arcane Power that do this. The heroic tier feat slows, the paragon feat gives a damage boost, and the epic tier feat immobilizes.
Incenjucar
Adventurer
Isn't this also true with the assault build?
Klaus
First Post
The trigger for the Assault build is "makes an attack", so you teleport to the enemy's side as it completes its attack. If you write the ensnaring trigger to be "hits or misses", you specify that you don't negate the attack, teleporting the enemy after the attack is completed.
I think it's not overpowered to give ensnaring a basic attack on the foe he teleports, instead of the granting of CA.
Incenjucar
Adventurer
At the very least, the game could use a "cold iron" weapon that grants OAs against teleportation.
