Excerpt: Paragon paths (merged)

[DeusExMachina]

Yes, OA's are exclusively melee attacks...

 

[Voss]

you, sir, should never, ever, get to play eXalted.

Eh. Like most white wolf games, I find the setting interesting, at least until you get to the point of entropy rape demons and 'wild (wyld) = crazy, because we've added a y!', but ultimately the system is pretty terrible.

But while it does the boy's fighting manga pretty well, it doesn't do much for the magical girl genre. This does. Now, I'm a bit crazy and kind of like it, but I'd rather avoid that particular flavor in some campaigns- at least my own dark age-ish setting.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Having trouble parsing this:
"Warpriest’s Challenge (16th level): When you hit an enemy with an at-will melee attack, you can choose to mark that enemy for the rest of the encounter. The next time that enemy shifts or attacks a creature other than you, you can make an opportunity attack against that enemy. If you mark a new enemy with this feature, any previous marks you have made with this feature end."

How does "the rest of the encounter" fit with "the next time"? Does the mark go away once it's been triggered once, but lasts until then? Also, are opportunity attacks explicitly melee? 'Cause if you can make them ranged, and it does last the whole encounter, the warpriest just became the ultimate sniper.

(Mark, run, then shoot every time the poor thing shifts...)

I assume I'm misreading this.

Generally, (barring any exception ability) you make only melee opportunity attacks.
Warlords seem generally more melee focused, which means it is unlikely anyway that they would be good enough at ranged combat to this being a good tactic. (Especially since you still have to make at least one succesful melee attack). It would perhaps be more interesting for a Ranger/Warlord multiclass character.

But I am also not whether "the next time" means that the effect ends or not. I believe the benefit could end, otherwise it should probably be phrased "each time..." But the mark seems to stay.
But I still haven't seen enough abilities to get a feeling for the precise details of the language used for 4E.

It certainly looks more like a class feature that transforms the Warlord a little bit towards Defender instead of Leader.

 

[Lacyon]

Having trouble parsing this:
"Warpriest’s Challenge (16th level): When you hit an enemy with an at-will melee attack, you can choose to mark that enemy for the rest of the encounter. The next time that enemy shifts or attacks a creature other than you, you can make an opportunity attack against that enemy. If you mark a new enemy with this feature, any previous marks you have made with this feature end."

How does "the rest of the encounter" fit with "the next time"? Does the mark go away once it's been triggered once, but lasts until then? Also, are opportunity attacks explicitly melee? 'Cause if you can make them ranged, and it does last the whole encounter, the warpriest just became the ultimate sniper.

The target is marked for the rest of the encounter, getting -2 to hit on his attacks if he doesn't include you as a target.

The next time he shifts or attacks someone other than you, you can make an OA on him.

Does that help?

(Mark, run, then shoot every time the poor thing shifts...)

I assume I'm misreading this.

I'm pretty sure you can't make OAs with a ranged weapon.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Eh. Like most white wolf games, I find the setting interesting, at least until you get to the point of entropy rape demons and 'wild (wyld) = crazy, because we've added a y!', but ultimately the system is pretty terrible.

But while it does the boy's fighting manga pretty well, it doesn't do much for the magical girl genre. This does. Now, I'm a bit crazy and kind of like it, but I'd rather avoid that particular flavor in some campaigns- at least my own dark age-ish setting.

I am not really much into anime - not because I don't like it, it's just I never found the time for it. But I remember seeing a little bit of Sailor Moon (my sisters, many years ago, seemed to enjoy it, even though the German version was strongly changed due to the translation, I suppose because it was treated like a "kids show".) and Cowboy Bebop (liked that one a lot). So, I didn't really get that vibe. I suppose it's possible to create it, if you want, and ignore it, if you don't care for it. But it might be a tiny hint that, just maybe, 4E might have some elements that are suitable for attracting female gamers.

 

[vagabundo]

I hope there's an answer. I'd be disappointed if you were forced to make a paragon path choice or even if your fighter had to take ranger or warlord abilities in the paragon tier because there was no other way to do it.

Pinotage

You could multiclass with your own class...

 

[Voss]

You could multiclass with your own class...

Thats an odd assumption. What would it give you? You already have the class features...

 

[small pumpkin man]

Having trouble parsing this:
"Warpriest’s Challenge (16th level): When you hit an enemy with an at-will melee attack, you can choose to mark that enemy for the rest of the encounter. The next time that enemy shifts or attacks a creature other than you, you can make an opportunity attack against that enemy. If you mark a new enemy with this feature, any previous marks you have made with this feature end."

How does "the rest of the encounter" fit with "the next time"? Does the mark go away once it's been triggered once, but lasts until then?

It lasts untill the encounter ends, or you mark someone else, whichever comes first. Just like the Paladin's mark.

Also, are opportunity attacks explicitly melee? 'Cause if you can make them ranged, and it does last the whole encounter, the warpriest just became the ultimate sniper.

(Mark, run, then shoot every time the poor thing shifts...)

I assume I'm misreading this.

Why would you even think that? Of course you have to threaten them or whatever the 4e equivelent term is when they do it, that should be obvious, in fact threatening beyond adjacent is specifically harder to do in 4e, which you should know since you follow the announcements as much as anyone else on the board.

 

[WyzardWhately]

I wouldn't worry too much about a paragon path shoehorning your character into a concept. It looks to me like it's just a small collection of combat stuff under the umbrella of some pretty generic flavor text.

Also: I have hated like every little in-character quote they've included in these previews. Good lord, maybe it's the effects of growing up in a point of light or something, but nobody in D&D-land ever seems to have much interesting to say. Ugh.

 

[Lackhand]

You could multiclass with your own class...

Ew no.

But I fail to see how a fighter at 10th level multiclassing with marsha-- I mean, warlord -- is a problem. Indeed, it strikes me as very 1st edition.

This free multiclass is completely reasonable for a raft of classes -- fighter, paladin, cleric, wizard, and warlock can all supply some quite reasonable multiclassing -- but I'm not sure what the rogue or ranger would get forcibly multiclassed into.


My guess for how this works, by the way: The class-training feat grants access to a few of the 1st level class features of the class you're after, and maybe a skill or a power.
This grants the rest of the features and regular access to the power list.