Hooray for clarification and answers. 
It all makes more sense now. Like I said, I'm 'learning' through just the CB and the Compendium, the latter of which doesn't appear to actually have 'all previously published content,' or that content isn't anywhere I expect it to be; sadly, the holes seem to be in the most basic elements. Like: weapons having their own proficiency bonus. I see it now in the item descripitions in CB, but nothing in compendium seems to come up explaining that you are both proficient in weapons and that the weapons themselves have a proficiency bonus (as an aside: slightly confusing, that terminology overlap. 
).
Ah, and how do powers that have 'until the end of the encounter' in their description work outside of combat? In fiddling, I discovered the Dark Harbinger druid utility (a daily power), and I can see a fair number of uses for being able to fly for a short time, but how do you determine how long that is when there aren't monsters about?
Actually, for that matter, wild shape used to confer disguise bonuses (i.e. folk would mistake you for whatever critter you'd turned into). The new editions doesn't seem to make mention of that. Is it gone, or restricted to some power?
Thanks again for everyone being patient with my learning curve. A second run at Shai should be up in the near future.
jason
It all makes more sense now. Like I said, I'm 'learning' through just the CB and the Compendium, the latter of which doesn't appear to actually have 'all previously published content,' or that content isn't anywhere I expect it to be; sadly, the holes seem to be in the most basic elements. Like: weapons having their own proficiency bonus. I see it now in the item descripitions in CB, but nothing in compendium seems to come up explaining that you are both proficient in weapons and that the weapons themselves have a proficiency bonus (as an aside: slightly confusing, that terminology overlap. ). Ah, and how do powers that have 'until the end of the encounter' in their description work outside of combat? In fiddling, I discovered the Dark Harbinger druid utility (a daily power), and I can see a fair number of uses for being able to fly for a short time, but how do you determine how long that is when there aren't monsters about?
Actually, for that matter, wild shape used to confer disguise bonuses (i.e. folk would mistake you for whatever critter you'd turned into). The new editions doesn't seem to make mention of that. Is it gone, or restricted to some power?
Thanks again for everyone being patient with my learning curve. A second run at Shai should be up in the near future.
jason
