Hardest to Visualize Power

[Cadfan]

I thought that blinding barrage was reasonable for shuriken wielders, or even sling wielders (put a bunch of rocks in the sling at one time, let fly), but yeah, its a little awkward for a crossbow wielder.

 

[Celebrim]

I thought that blinding barrage was reasonable for shuriken wielders, or even sling wielders (put a bunch of rocks in the sling at one time, let fly), but yeah, its a little awkward for a crossbow wielder.

Personally, I didn't think it was appropriate even for that.

I thought it was appropriate for a 'smoke grenade'. I can easily imagine it as a 'smoke grenade', and the whole 'ninja drops a smoke grenade and no one can see bit' is a trope of the genera.

The problem with that flavor - and I'm pretty sure that that flavor is where the power came from - is that it raises more problems than it solves. Where do the grenades come from? Why can't I use more than one per encounter? Why can't I use more than one at a time? And so forth.

So they kept the power and dropped the flavor. The hard to envision new flavor is just something that they whitewashed on to the old power. The key to playing 4e is to not ask questions. Trying to envision or narrate this power goes against the grain of 4e's design.

For example, even if we can narrate it as 'He takes 4 daggers' and flings them accurately into the eyes of his enemies', what's so freaking tiring about that that he can't try it again next round? Or why can't he fling 2 daggers this round, and then two daggers the next? Or why can't he make a single more accurate throw at the eyes of his opponent 20' away?

Magic.

 

[Marnak]

Blinding Barrage with Thrown Hammer

Here is my best shot at visualizing Blinding Barrage.

First level dwarven rogue named Thor takes hammer and throws it at his assembled enemies. The hammer ricochets off the face of each and every enemy before falling to the ground. The blinded foes and the merely bruised marvel at the rogue's prowess.

This is certainly cinematic, which I hear is a design goal of 4e. Doesn't work for me though.

 

[MarkChevallier]

By the way, why I am I actually trying to help someone "visualize" a power in this thread! It's devoted to write down the "hardest to visualize" power not the "help me visualize powers" thread, right?

Well, I appreciate the effort anyway! I think, to be honest with you, most of the explanations (apart from the "magic" ones) help explain what the power is trying to achieve - to recreate the genius of a tactical mind at work - but don't help me (at least) to visualise *how* the power actually works.

I honestly think that whenever it comes up in play I'm just going to laugh internally and shrug to myself. To me it remains the hardest to visualise power.

 

[Keenath]

The spell I mentioned is one of those H. P. Lovecraft things where words and images can drive people crazy.

I'm not saying it isn't based on that, but there's a lot of non-lovecraft examples of "dark speech" causing actual physical effects, including mental damage.

Do you recall Lord of the Rings when Gandalf quotes the inscription on the Ring in the original Mordor? The sun seems to fade and a pall of terror falls over everyone present.

Some things are just too evil or vile to hear. I don't see how that's hard to envision -- it sounds to me like you just don't like the flavor of it, which isn't the same thing.

 

[DSRilk]

There are so many it's hard to know where to start. Except, perhaps, writing a giant list of powers to replace or to which I'll attach new magical keywords - some power descriptions I just can't stomach. I really like 4e far better than previous versions, but there are just some things that are too far out there for my style of gaming - and this is coming from someone that can even tolerate everything turning square (though only because it helps my wife and kids play).

 

[Lackhand]

When the fighter swings his sword and damages the target even when he misses, how do you explain that? You could torture yourself with convoluted explanations that would require all sorts of situational exceptions, or you could do the obvious thing and take a page from Wuxia and say that the fighter has 'cut the wind' and that even when he misses the wind from his blow strikes the target.

Weeeeelll... There are a very large class of "my d20 plus my bonuses doesn't exceed the AC of my foe" misses for which it's quite easy to deal the damage anyway: foes using armor and shields.
Nobody ever claimed those made you the nimble dodging master, which means that there's no reason to reach so far for an explanation in those cases: what the armor would normally turn aside into a glancing blow, you are able to keep on course and buckle a few plates.
Even with dex bonus, this just means you never miss, you only fail to connect: glancing blows or jarring parries cause a modicum of damage to your target, still.

When the rogue unleashes a burst of metal shards or whatever so that he blasts a 15'x15' area, you could torture yourself trying to explain it realisticly or you could just describe it the way a japanese animator would animate it.

Yeah, okay, this one I got nothing for.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Blinding Barrage?

After having seen Kung Fu Panda (yeah . . . I know . . .), Jack Black (as Po) during his dream sequence at the start of the movie gave me all the inspiration needed for Blinding Barrage.

[paraphrased]

". . . and they were BLINDED by his AWESOMENESS!"
[everyone screams] "AI! I'm blinded by awesomeness!"​

Clearly, Kung Fu Panda's animators were playtesters for 4e.

 

[burntgerbil]

The Divine Oracle lvl 20 power (p73) has been the wildest I've seen. On a miss, it rewinds time back to right before you used the power and lets you choose another action instead.

 

[Celebrim]

The Divine Oracle lvl 20 power (p73) has been the wildest I've seen. On a miss, it rewinds time back to right before you used the power and lets you choose another action instead.

I think you are quite missing the point.

How do you narrate that? Easy.

"You look into the future and see yourself miss, time rewinds back to right before you use the power. Now you can try something different."

Ok, that's slightly tongue and cheek and I'm sure I could think of something more exciting if I tried, but the point is that if the power is explicitly magical then it simply does what it says it does with no extra explanation needed. Magic means, 'No realistic explanation is needed'.

A power is only difficult to narrate if you insist on seeing the 'martial' power source as meaning 'not magical'. If you insist on this, you end up with all sorts of twisted situations trying to explain what happens in ways that don't appeal to 'magic'. But, if you simply accept that 'martial' power sources are just different sorts of magic, all the problems of narration go away.

This is why I've had such a good chuckle at the expense of all those that praise 4e for allowing them to run 'low magic campaigns', because they could limit the available classes to those with 'martial' power sources. Well, sure, but on close inspection doing so doesn't in fact get the magic out. Heck, it doesn't even get the flashier magic out. It just limits you to the sorts of magic martial artists in Eastern martial arts fantasies tend to have. That is different, but hardly 'low magic'.