Holiday Present - The Elf PHB entry

[Spatula]

That's assuming they're copy-and-pasting the SWSE skill rules and feats straight out of the Saga book, which are horribly flawed at low levels (as the example indicates). SWSE allows for big giant numbers up front and then the skill bonuses flatten out over 20 levels. I doubt we'll see the exact same thing in 4e.

 

[Stalker0]

Lets put it this way.

Elf guy, as above. +16 (or someone else trained, focuses and a pile of bonuses)
Rogue, trained, slight wisdom. call it +7
untrained, wisdom-less fellow. +0. Or +1 if the elf is close by.

this is all first level, by the way.

We are making a couple of assumptions that have to be looked at:

1) Skill Focus provides a +5. Lets remember that feats are downgraded in 4e from what we've heard. They may provide a +4 or +3 bonus. Further, that skill training provides the +5 bonus.

2) That skill focus will often be taken. I mean, in this example we are talking the paragon of perception, a man who is wholly dedicated to seeing stuff. Now if we are talking a guy with just an amazing wisdom (+4) an elf (+2), and trained (+5), we have a +9 bonus. This is only 2 points higher than our 3e equivalent (16 wis, elf, 4 ranks in spot).

How often will characters take skill focus?

3) Will skill focus even be in the game? Perhaps their will only be reroll feats, and not straight bonuses like in SAGA, we just don't know yet.

 

[FireLance]

So how do you appropriately challenge this party with spot or search scenario? Oh, the perception specialist found it and the rest of you shouldn't even bother isn't a very good option.

I do recognize that this can be a problem, but it just seemed strange to me to criticize the elf bonuses when the +5 bonuses from Trained and Focus seem to be much larger contributing factors.

Perhaps to even things a bit more at 1st level, +5 to each may only be the bonus at the Epic tier. At Heroic and Paragon tiers, perhaps the bonuses from Trained and Focus could be +3 and +4 - still a significant edge over untrained/unfocused characters, but not nearly as overwhelming.

A tweaked out elf could thus have +12 at 1st level, a rogue could have +5, and the untrained guy could have +0.

 

[Voss]

We are making a couple of assumptions that have to be looked at:

Yes we are. We're assuming that Saga is the big preview of 4e that we've been repeatedly told that it is.

But really, perception is a big, big skill. (Like init is, if that is for some reason made a skill, like Saga). That surprise round can literally kill you. Throwing a feat into that is very worthwhile, since it comes up in some many encounters, particularly the potentially fatal ones.


@Firelance- that doesn't really help. The variance is still too big. Going beyond about a +5 variance within a single level is too much, mathematically speaking. Thats 25% on a die roll. Thats *huge*. Reasonable differences are ideally +2 to +4.

 

[Kintara]

Everyone but the other Elves in the party.

And again, how exactly is it that the Elves "force" the other party members to behave or react in certain ways?

Why force? I don't think it would be out of line to decline the bonus. It's like offered advice. You don't need to follow it, but in this case it's good advice.

 

[small pumpkin man]

Yes we are. We're assuming that Saga is the big preview of 4e that we've been repeatedly told that it is.

No, it shows where their heads were at at the time, we've been specifically told that 4e skill system will be similar, but different to the Saga System, the reasons the trained/skill focus bonuses were so big in Saga is because they were the only ones it was possible to get. The fact that there are bonuses besides these implies that the bonuses from trained and the feat will be smaller.

But really, perception is a big, big skill. (Like init is, if that is for some reason made a skill, like Saga). That surprise round can literally kill you. Throwing a feat into that is very worthwhile, since it comes up in some many encounters, particularly the potentially fatal ones.


@Firelance- that doesn't really help. The variance is still too big. Going beyond about a +5 variance within a single level is too much, mathematically speaking. Thats 25% on a die roll. Thats *huge*. Reasonable differences are ideally +2 to +4.

There's one very large difference you're forgetting, everyone scales almost equally (except for the people who put points into the appropriate stat). What this means is while the nutcase perception character has +16 over the mook or Wizard at first level, which is a lot more than 3e, that difference remains essentially the same all the way to level 30. (or at least will scale less), which is a much smaller difference than it was at level 20 between the crazy perception guy and the mook (which was closer to 30 or 50).

In fact I would argue about +15 is exactly the sweet spot between the crazy skilled guy and the mook that you want, and that extending that sweet spot from 1st to 30th is a Good Thing.

 

[Voss]

+15 is way too high. Its literally 75% of the possible results on a d20, almost to the point that the die roll doesn't even matter.

Its better than 3e, true, but really, next you're going to tell me that a mansion is better than a shack.

OK, on the Saga thing, you are correct. There are assumptions built in. But lets take a look at what we actually do know. 100% verifiable facts.
An elf, at first level can take the negate combat advantage feat, which gives a +2 perception (feat) bonus.
Between that and his +2 perception bonus and his +2 to wisdom, a first level elf can be at an extra +5 over the 'normal' maximum for a perception roll (whatever that is).

He an extra 25% bonus on perception checks. He is hitting a static DC an extra one quarter of the time. Thats a rather large stack of bonuses he can sit on at first level.
Thats really stretching the limit of the statistical curve. And you can *start* that way with one feat.

If perception is a passive skill, he is 25% less likely to be surprised be stealthy enemies. Thats a very significant game effect.

(And it should be pointed out that we've been told that most things advance a 1/2 level. I do believe skills were included in this list. He's competing equally with a significant number of 10th level characters).


(back to speculation for a minute. if you add this +5 to the +15 you say is the sweet spot, you've got a 100% win rate. The perception junky always wins. Thats... bad.)

 

[JohnSnow]

Sounds to me like the Drow get Dex and Charisma bonus - "Although they are no taller than eladrins, they have a presence that often makes members of other races feel smaller and on edge"

Sounds like Cha to me.

Cheers

And since "Eladrin share the grace and agility of their elf cousins but place more value on the developed intellect than on intuition and emotion," I'm betting they get:

+2 Dex, +2 Int

Cheers!

 

[Mr. Wilson]

I don't understand why people take such issue with the height/weight of elves. When I finished high school I was 6 foot tall and weighed 128 pounds. I was fit enough to run at least a mile every day, do farm work, play basketball fairly well, etc, etc. Yeah, I was skinny, but not OMG YOU'RE GONNA DIE skinny.

When I graduated college in 2003 I was up to 145 pounds, and honestly didn't look much different. I now weight 160 pounds but I blame that on lack of excerise and bad diet.

 

[Will]

You know, it occurs to me that I may have misunderstood what they meant when the devs said 'we want to reduce the number of stacking bonuses.'

I assumed they meant 'we want fewer bonuses to worry about.' Maybe they were rather specifically saying 'now most bonuses don't add together.'


...

Sigh.