How good is the new MM? (Thread split)

[KarinsDad]

It certainly hasn't proven overpowered like KD suggests in my campaign. KarinsDad- have you seen it in actual play or are you judging on theory?

I've played it myself. Granted, I was making a mistake when playing it (I foobared and allowed Arcane Reserves and Gauntlets of Blood to work when they should not have which probably average 3 extra points of damage). This mistake increased the frequency of MM being even better.

But even without that, I am the type of player who is extremely tactical. I pretty much have a rough idea of how much damage each NPC has taken (I don't write it down, but I do have a rough ballpark). It's pretty easy to know when a foe is on the cusp or not especially since "bloodied" (and rough idea of level) can give one a good idea of total hit points. For a more laid back player who is not a DM or player in 5 games, it would be harder to guess correctly when the situation calls for it.

And note: I have not stated that it is overpowered. I have stated that it is now a solid choice of At Will for low levels. It has great range. It has higher utility than it had before, not higher power.

But when MM first came out, everyone was ragging on it and almost nobody took it. Now, it is viable. Then, not so much.

If "death" was considered "control," wouldn't strikers be better controllers than controllers?

In many respects, yes.

Why do you think that the PHB suggests that a 5th PC be a Striker? Because the faster the PCs take out individual foes, the faster the action economy leans in the direction of the PCs and the fewer resources the PCs use.

The main way in which Controllers are better controllers than Strikers is when they can a) more or less totally take away actions from foes (i.e. stun, or possibly blind or immobilize), and b) when their area effect attacks do more overall damage spread over many foes than a Striker does against a single target.

 

[KarinsDad]

This is badwrongmath.

The chance of a -2 (assuming you're looking at to-hits of 3+ to 18+) turning a hit into a miss isn't "60% of 10%". It's 10% -- period.

This is badwrongmath.

If you have a 60% chance to hit, you have a 60% chance to put the 10% penalty on the foe.

You do not have a 100% chance to put the 10% penalty on the foe.

So, 6 times in 10 you hit and 1 time in 10, that hit results in a changed result.

6% of the time, Illusory Ambush stops the foe's attack from working (note: the percentage is slightly higher than this because there is also a chance that the damage of Illusory Ambush will kill the foe outright or set up the foe for a kill by some other PC).


Note: This is also why some leader powers are bad. If I have to hit the foe for no damage in order to give an ally a chance to hit the foe, then I'm probably decreasing the overall damage compared to if I just went up and smacked him myself.

 

[Saeviomagy]

What is the most important type of control? The answer is death. If a foe is dead, then he cannot attack back (as a general rule shy of some monsters bringing NPC allies back from the grave). So, damage is the ultimate form of control.

No, death is the control. A damaged but not dead monster is no different to a healthy monster, and a seriously damaged but not dead monster may be more dangerous. You're talking about margins of damage of 2 points between powers, which is (on the 25 hitpoint monster you cited) only 8% difference in deadness.

With regard to single target At Will Attack powers, let's look at the control that you are talking about:

Cloud of Daggers, Erupting Flare, Nightmare Eruption. 95% damage, 5% control. These are almost never used as a control spells. They are all about damage.

Cloud and erupting both are "obey my control or else I'll do more damage than MM does". Nightmare eruption just flat out does more damage unless you're fighting individuals.

Ray of Frost. The first of the hard control powers. It is good for preventing a foe from escaping, but in the scenario that you were discussing (i.e. the first attack on a foe), it rarely helps as control. An NPC that is slowed can still shift and attack, or charge up to 4 squares and attack, or use a ranged attack. The control aspect of Ray of Frost (and the chance to hit) is fairly limited.

Most combats contain melee foes, and most combats start with one or more of them outside 4 squares of range. Additionally even melee foes that are blessed with ranged attacks are typically built with significantly weaker ranged attacks than melee attacks.

Storm Pillar. Also a control power that uses damage to control, but it's use too is extremely limited.

More limited than 8% faster death? Any time that your party has a defensive line, and there are spaces for more foes to join that line, storm pillar can either stop melee from joining the line (causing effective round-by-round death of about 25% per foe) or cause faster death than MM can. And especially at low levels, melee monsters have significantly weaker ranged attacks than melee.

At higher level, Magic Missile loses its luster due to the plethora of extra Encounter and Daily Attack powers and the damage boosts to the other Single Target At Will powers. But at low level when a PC typically only has one or two Encounter Attack powers and has a greater need to save his only Daily attack power, Magic Missile is a solid choice over most of the other single target At Will Attack powers (build depending).

Is it worth using sometimes? Yes. Would it be worth choosing as a power if you had other options? Not usually. Is it really, really nice to not be forced to waste a pick on a damaging non-situational fallback at-will? Hell yeah.

 

[Aegeri]

For someone who claims they are a "tactical" player, your ability to actually make a good argument on sound tactics isn't very good. Admin here. Your point becomes much weaker when you have to insult someone to make it. Don't do this again, please. ~ Piratecat

Firstly, let's look at the DPR of a power before and after the penalty is applied.

Edit: I changed the maths below because I realize an illusionist mage proves my argument so hard it isn't funny.

A creature with a 60% chance to hit dealing 4d6+6 damage, +6 vs AC attack against a PC with AC 14 (which is pretty bad I must admit):

Avg damage: 4d6+6 = 20 points of damage (ouch).

Actual DPR of the power (including accuracy) is,

Damage = ((0.6*20)+(0.05*20)) = 13 DPR.

With -2 penalty from illusory ambush. -4 penalty if we're talking about an illusionist mage who is being attacked by that creature.

Damage = ((0.5*20)+(0.05*20)) = 11 DPR.

Damage = ((0.4*20)+(0.05*20)) = 9 DPR (against yourself).

So even though your argument seems correct, the actual effect is immediate. Dropping the monsters damage quite a bit. Especially the illusionist mage.

Now hitting the AC 18 defender (not even the best for a defender, but solid IMO).

Damage = ((0.4*20)+(0.05*20)) = 9 DPR.

With -2 penalty.

Damage = ((0.3*20)+(0.05*20)) = 7 DPR.

Now we'll put on apprentice illusionist and a mark, hitting the previously squishy character - who is the mage in this case - of AC 14 (to get your 60%). The mark imposes a -2 penalty and illusionist wizard apprentice feature imposes a -2 penalty, for a grand total of -6 penalty on illusory ambush.

With -2 penalty for the mark alone.

Damage = ((0.5*20)+(0.05*20)) = 11 DPR.

With a -6 penalty from Illusory Ambush + Apprentice Illusionist + mark.

Damage = ((0.3*20)+(0.05*20)) = 7 DPR (less than half without the mark)

Without the mark and a mere "-4" penalty. This would be illusory ambush + apprentice mage.

Damage = ((0.4*20)+(0.05*20)) = 9 DPR (Still a considerable reduction).

So we immediately see where your argument falls over flat. When we combine that -2 penalty with the easily available feature for the illusionist mage, plus a mark that penalty suddenly becomes an insurmountable problem for the creature. Where before he could do a very solid amount of damage, the penalties ensure that the creatures DPR against the non-defender (especially the wizard who imposed it to begin with) is plain awful. When attacking the defender the accumulated penalties negates combat advantage and makes their life very difficult. So here we see where a control power like illusory ambush is flat out superior to MM - unarguably.

The penalty to hit impacts a creatures DPR negatively the higher its damage actually is as well. When you combine illusory ambush with the penalty for mark you increase the defenders resilience again (now the defender is effectively in full plate + heavy shield), but you also vastly reduce the creatures ability to hurt anyone else if it somehow escapes the defender. The wizard with 14 AC looks a lot better when the monster is attacking it at equal AC to the defender effectively (due to -2 penalty mark, -2 penalty psychic bolt). In addition to this, the above is an encounter power and the monster either lands it or waffs it. The more chance of the monster waffing the power the better for you. This is why MM is inferior to PB control wise. MM doesn't stop that creature slamming a poor defense character with that power anywhere near as effectively. In fact, it doesn't do absolutely anything whatsoever except inflict a poor amount of damage.

Edit: My arguments above are even more valid than I realized. An illusion mage gets psychic lock as an apprentice feature! Only when you are attacked, but none the less when we combine that with psychic lock at level 11 we end up with a monstrous attack penalty. That wizard will be quite able to secure his life against pesky enemies.

 

[KarinsDad]

Magic missile is very poor at this you realize. Very poor. It gets poorer and poorer the higher level you are as well. This is a really unconvincing argument. Especially because a minor amount of damage is not "control" by any definition. Neither will anyone in the party agree when the "controlled" monster freely moves and punches the rogue unconscious - instead of being slid into difficult terrain or adjacent to the fighter.

Nightmare Eruption has the psychic keyword, so qualifies for psychic lock. This boosts it to a control power easily and is a fantastic choice for an illusionist. Not to mention wipes out clustered minions and deals solid damage to other adjacent creatures.

Erupting Flare isn't so good.

Cloud of Daggers is not bad and inflicts extra wisdom damage at the start of the creatures turn. This can finish off enemies just as effectively as MM can at low levels. Without costing an additional action. Plus it can present a barrier in narrow areas for monsters to cross.

Illusionary Ambush + Psychic lock = -4 penalty to attacks. So that's damn good. Especially combined with a mark. Also you severely underestimate the importance of a -2 penalty if you think it isn't important, especially when you've thrown that -2 penalty onto a marked creature. There is a reason getting combat advantage for the +2 bonus makes a huge difference in 4E. With a mark and illusionary ambush and psychic lock, that's a whopping -6 penalty for that creature attacking anyone other than your defender. That is pure control, no questions asked.

Ray of Frost has frost cheese associated with it, so can get constant CA and deal more damage as well. It also slows an enemy for a delightful side benefit, that allows another PC to easily keep distance from that creature. Or prevents artillery from running and similar.

Storm Pillar is not great post-errata, but it works brilliantly in its niche.

Charm of Misplaced Wrath is an encounter power, that gives an attack against an enemies ally as an effect, plus on a hit slides and dazes. Magic missile is not better than this power and I am stunned you could claim it is. Are you claiming that Magic Missile is seriously better than this encounter power? I have to assume this is a mistake and you meant hypnotism.

Hypnotism (which may have been what you meant) is a great control power. It lets you use monsters very strong MBAs against their own allies, with a +4 (+6 with right school) to the attack roll. That's incredible. It's secondary effect isn't bad either, sliding the creature for setting it up for allies, marks or similar. It also targets will and has a solid range. Overall this can be really niche or absolutely terrific. Given how many monsters do great things with their MBAs, this is more than worth having.

Let's continue though to other spells.

Arc Lightning is two attacks that deal pure damage, but targets two creatures. This is a very good deal and lightning damage has good synergy with Mark of Storm from Eberron (slide 1 when you hit with a lightning/thunder keyword power).

Phantom Bolt has a slide and again, psychic lock.

Winged Horde (that you ignored) is an ally friendly burst 2, has the psychic keyword and the enemy cannot make OAs. That's a very strong control power.

Beguiling Stands is a close burst 5 entirely ally friendly power that can push a ridiculous amount of squares with the right set up. Even so, int damage and push 3 ally friendly is terrific.

Your arguments here just don't make any sense whatsoever, because all of these have control effects while MM does a very small and often insignificant amount of damage. PCs with good tactics can easily make use of powers that slide, for example, by keeping a creature adjacent to the defender of the party. Forcing a creature to waste actions and not move as it wants is by definition control.

Psychic Lock is 11th level at the earliest. It is non-sequitor to this discussion about low level At Will Single Target attacks.

And, I don't know how many times that I have to say it. Area powers are often better. So you claiming that area Wizard powers are better does not disagree with what I said.

The control you mention is extremely limited for the At Will Single Target powers. A slide might do something. It usually doesn't. The foes typically can just shift back. If you can slide a foe into a pit, great. But, that's not typical. To take advantage of a one square slide often requires that the initiative order be something that helps (some DMs play all of the NPCs on the same initiative, so it would be more useful there).


I do agree with you. The Essentials Single Target At Wills can be better than the 4E At Wills.

Arc Lightning is pretty much superior to Magic Missile unless you know that a foe is on the cusp and MM will take him out. Then again, Arc Lightning is superior to practically every single target At Will attack power (and one of the reasons that Essentials is avoided by some people).

Hypnotism, not so much. 60% chance to hit in order for an 80% chance to hit is a 48% chance to hit. The target of the MBA has to be adjacent to the original target (or the original target has to have reach), so it has limited utility. Yes, some enemy At Wills are potent, but the enemies that are potent are typically also higher level.

So, if the Wizard has a 50% chance to hit an n+2 foe with Hypnotism, then it becomes 50% * 70% chance or 35% chance to hit. That's basically a 1 in 3 chance of doing something that round.

Hypnotism also doesn't have a secondary effect. It's either the MBA, or the slide.

 

[Destil]

Cloud of daggers auto-kills minions better, other wizard powers do anything else better. The only thing it's good for is being a ranged basic attack.

 

[mneme]

Ah, a DPRish calculation. Sorry, I misread what you meant. The only problem I have with that in this case is that it's not really a great comparison -- to really compare IA to other spells, you have to get a heuristic of the average amount of damage prevented by IA vs the average amount of damage prevented by a pure damage spell (in terms of its chance of killing) If anything, if your hit chance is 60%, its chance of reducing damage is lower than 6% more than a bigger damage non-control spell--as if this spell kills them, it doesn't get to reduce damage, and if it doesn't, there are places where the bigger damage would- have killed them and reduced damage. Really, though, I think IA is subpar unless (maybe) you're building an illusion specialist (but in that case, it can be quite strong, as Phantasmal Assault is a lot weaker when you're duplicating its effects with feats, and most of the rest are pretty weak sauce). -2 to hit and d6 damage isn't that great, but all that plus chance to use an Deception reroll, combat advantage for you and a friend, crit on 19-20 most of the time, and daze on a crit is starting to talk business for an at will even in epic levels.

The nice thing about Ray of Frost is that you actually -know- when it's providing a significant control option. This makes its power much, much higher when the opportunity cost of having it available is lower (like, say, having a wand of cold, being a PH human, or being a mage).

 

[KarinsDad]

For someone who claims they are a "tactical" player, your ability to actually make a good argument on sound tactics isn't very good.

If you are going to continue to insult me, I'll just ignore your posts.

...

Now we'll put on psychic lock and a mark, hitting the previously squishy character of AC 14 (to get your 60%). The mark imposes a -2 penalty and psychic lock imposes a -2 penalty, for a grand total of -6 penalty with psychic lock.

Psychic Lock is Paragon. This entire discussion is low level heroic.

I'll ignore your posts until you are civil and you actually stay within the topic of low level MM vs. other low level At Will Single Target Wizard powers.

 

[DaMidWestNinja]

The new MM is annoying when you combine it with a Warlord and their ability to grant basic attacks(coming from a DM's POV).

 

[Aegeri]

Psychic Lock is 11th level at the earliest. It is non-sequitor to this discussion about low level At Will Single Target attacks.

But an illusion school mage's level 1 apprentice feature isn't

The control you mention is extremely limited for the At Will Single Target powers.

Wrong and especially wrong in light of the DPR calculations I did above. Especially when combining different penalties together.

So, if the Wizard has a 50% chance to hit an n+2 foe with Hypnotism

This is an awful assumption, because the power targets will and that's a weak defense for many monsters. Combined with the fact that a wizard can boost accuracy quite easily, they will not be riding a 50% chance to hit against will -it will be much higher (I apologize for the pun). That's just wrong and doesn't match my experience (all the way into two epic games at all. One even pre-expertise feats). Especially because a huge chunk of monsters dump stat will (much like some PCs), so they actually have much weaker will defenses than the game would assume. I don't think you'll see anyone who has crunched the maths for accuracy against monster NADs agree that targeting will is poor (or that you'll just get 50% to hit). Fortitude is not as good because a lot of monsters are strength/con primary, couldn't agree more there. Reflex would be in the middle, but will definitely lags behind.

Hypnotism also doesn't have a secondary effect. It's either the MBA, or the slide.

Which are still both great, especially when the marked enemy who pushed the fighter/knight away now needs to be back adjacent to them.