I've managed to avoid Essentials, until now...
- Thread starter Katana_Geldar
- Start date
Garthanos
Arcadian Knight
As part of a Mike Mearles led retograde surge in the D&D products who's feature new direction forward is exemplified by essentials... pretending it is separte ? nyeh it was created at the same time as essentials in the same vein... just easy to release ahead of them.
Prestidigitalis
First Post
Streamlining is a more accurate word. I like the new Essentials builds because it means that I can spend some of my time in combat watching what the other players are doing and enjoying the "story" aspects of it rather than flipping through papers thinking "Was that power an Immediate Interrupt or a Free Action?"
It's also nice to know that when the opportunity to use an Immediate action arises, I will be paying attention and jump in to use it, instead of having to tell the DM 30 seconds later "Oh yeah, I can stop that whole thing from happening", which pisses him off and grinds everything to a halt.
I've only seen this level of not being able to pay attention start to occur at low to mid Paragon where the number of individual player options (i.e. powers) starts climbing significantly.
One helpful solution to this with core 4E is to hand out very few items that have Powers associated with them. The Common, Uncommon, and Rare guidelines help out with this a little. If a player has 4 items at level 10 with powers instead of 7 items, that's 3 fewer Powers listed on his character sheet.
Another thing to do is to follow the guidelines on PC advancement. If the PC advances too quickly, some players might start getting overwhelmed with new options before they have had many chances to see the Powers gained from the previous level.
The theory that Essentials streamlines the system is mostly (but not completely) dependent on which Essentials class one plays and which powers one picks.
For example, the 10th level Mage has 3 of each type of power (At Will, Encounter, Utility, and Daily). A 10th level core Wizard only has 2 At Will powers, so he has one fewer power, but he has one additional encounter class feature. The Mage also gets bonus abilities at various levels that the Wizard does not get, but most of these are static that just add into the character sheet. With Mages being able to use any Wizard spell, nothing has really changed with respect to complexity and hence, streamlining.
The 10th level Thief has 9 Utility Powers (backstab can be used twice per encounter, but it is still just one power), and 0 At Will Attack, Encounter Attack or Daily Attack powers. 9 powers is fewer than the 11 of the 10th level Rogue but the player of the Thief doesn't have to worry about saving or using Daily powers. So although the Thief has fewer total powers, every single one of them can be used at least once in an encounter and often more than once.
In reality, the Thief (like the Mage) has more usable every encounter (and sometimes every round) power options (9) than his 4E counterpart the Rogue (who has 8).
The minor streamlining for the Thief is twofold. One, he doesn't have Daily powers to worry about. But encounter in and encounter out powers that he uses, he has one more of those than the Rogue. The player still has a lot of powers and hence options to be aware of.
Two, some Rogue encounter powers can Daze foes or give penalties to foes or whatever. Most Thief powers tend to give advantages to the Thief himself. The player keeps track of the bookkeeping for his PC, the DM and/or players do not have to keep track of the extra bookkeeping for multiple NPCs (which NPC was at -2 to the end of the Rogue's turn?). However, this is a choice. A player of a 4E Rogue can pick powers that do not put conditions on foes and hence can be about as streamlined to play as the Thief in this regard.
And, the Thief powers can have the same questions associated with them as you posed. Is the power an Immediate Interupt, or an Immediate Reaction? The same scenario that you posed of interrupting the DM 30 seconds after the fact can occur with Essentials.
So Thiefs can be slightly streamlined over Rogues in this regard, but do not have to be. Mages are not especially streamlined over Wizards. It depends on which Essentials class one plays and which powers and abilities one picks.
There are also some specific streamlining that can occur with Essentials like Fighters having an Aura instead of a Mark. In a one hour combat, that can save a minute or two of total bookkeeping time. But again, the streamlining gain is fairly minor.
Prestidigitalis
First Post
Most of my recent play (last six months) has been low Paragon tier -- levels 11 to 13 -- and my last character was a Swordmage with lots of Immediate actions. So the issue has been a big deal for me lately.
That is certainly true. My actual Essentials experience has been with the Thief and Knight -- the rest is theorycraft.
Your other comments are generally insightful. It's hard for me to define why the Essentials Thief seems so much easier to play, but it is, at least for me.
Normally, I'm not interested in simplifying and streamlining, but I think pre-Essentials 4e reached the point where any combat ran the very high risk of at least one of the following problems:
1. Players neglecting some of their options and opportunities because of difficulty tracking
2. Serious grind because of slow decision making
3. DM and player frustration (and sometimes hostility) because of excessive bumbling and out of sequence interruptions ("oops, I meant to...")
Now maybe the problem is that I've gotten too old and my brain doesn't work as well as it used to... I'm sorry, what was I saying? Oh, right... but I welcome the simplifications, limited though they may be.
Agreed. Interestingly enough, when 4E first came out, it was a bit slow. As players got more familiar with it, it sped up quite a bit. But as more and more splat books came out, it started slowing up again. Some of that is due to the plethora of additional powers that allow for conditions or other specific effects (zones, conjurations, etc.). Some of that is due to players playing new classes with different unique concepts (Shamans with Spirit Companions, Psions with psionic points, Wardens who can slide marked foes at range, Swordmages who can teleport right and left). The number of possibilities and hence a need for the group to be more familiar with more rules and more in game tactics has climbed quite a bit.
It used to be a simple matter. If the Rogue had flank, then he had Combat Advantage. Now, he might have Combat Advantage from one of five different ways in the party.
One thing that can help this is player PC familiarity. When a player is familiar with his or her PC, then it goes much smoother. When a player switches PCs every 6 weeks (we used to have a player like this who got bored with his PCs and often wanted to try out new builds/concepts) or when a PC advances too quickly or when a player misses out on a lot of game sessions, that familiarity decreases quite a bit and often slows up the game.
There is also team abilities and tactics familiarity. When the players are familiar with what the other PCs can and will do, it often makes decision making quicker and easier for their PCs as well.
Yup. It's amazing how much my old brain deteriorates.
I suspect that some of the simplifications will start disappearing as more Essential splat books come out, just like it did for 4E. When the Thief has 9 options for a given utility power level instead of 3 options, there will be more chances for him to pick something that slows up the game, one way or another. Ditto for feats, items, etc.
Just to clarify, that's why I made my comparisons to the numbers you had already used. My point there was mainly that the more optimized a character becomes, the less useful Magic Missile is for them. (And, partly tied to that, the same goes in general as a character goes up in level.)
Except, again, none of your examples actually show a situation in which Magic Missile is truly better than most other At-Wills.
I understand the logic you are offering - if an enemy is already bloodied and is close to death, the guarantee of finishing him off makes MM the best choice. But an enemy being exactly at or below 7 or 8 hp is a pretty small range, even at low levels. I'm not sure I'm sold on the suggestion that you have an enemy precisely at that point in one in every three rounds. You've claimed that is your experience, and that's fair enough; I'm nonetheless not ready to call that typical. Armchair aside, I've certainly played and run in tons of games - even without Magic Missile being present, it is usually noticeable when an enemy hovers in single digit hp, and it certainly hasn't been as common in my games as it has been in yours.
I think there will be times when that is the case, sure. But there will be plenty of other times when an enemy is at 11 hp, and another At-Will would be the better option.
It's that 'every time' that is really where my disagreement lies. Sure, there is a hypothetical example where your allies start of combat by dropping a foe to single digit hp, and MM is a great thing to have on hand, rather than casting a spell that misses and wastes your action. But there is also the hypothetical scenario where your MM then leaves him with a few hp left, and was also a wasted action. The idea that 1/3 of the times, you've got lingering enemies precisely in the right range - and that you always have an excellent sense for that, and can use something else if they are a few hp higher - just doesn't mesh with how I've usually seen things play out.
And, honestly? I'd rarely expect to see a wizard breaking out MM on round 1 - if you've got one injured enemy and several other foes, now is probably when you should be breaking out your multi-target powers.
My claim isn't that Magic Missile is bad, remember. My disagreement was with your claim that MM is so good that a wizard who isn't using it 1 out of every 3 rounds is playing badly. And I really haven't seen any examples thus far to back up that claim.
Again, Magic Missile is especially useful in the right scenarios. Just... not the ones you've really mentioned. For less optimized characters, it is on par with most other At-Wills. It is a useful tool to have on hand in the right situations.
But something that every good wizard should be casting 1/3 of the time? Not even remotely.
Katana_Geldar
First Post
Okay, I've asked some of my players and quite a few are against including Essentials in the game, saying it is a dumbing down. This is how I feel about it, but it's beside the point.
I'm beginning to think it's a bad idea bringing in Essentials if so many are opposed to it, the guy still wants to play a mage but I am starting to worry.
Final decision won't be until after he has played it, which won't be for a few weeks.
I'm beginning to think it's a bad idea bringing in Essentials if so many are opposed to it, the guy still wants to play a mage but I am starting to worry.
Final decision won't be until after he has played it, which won't be for a few weeks.
I didn't make that claim. I said that the spell is useful once every three rounds at low level, especially for a Wizard that focuses on other area effect powers, including other At Will area effect powers.
Single digit hit points are not the only issue. You are missing the big picture here and focusing on that. You are not focusing on foes that have other number of hit points. Even a fresh first level foe with 25 hit points can often (nearly 40% of the time) be taken out quicker by Magic Missile (assume no striker attacks for this example), attack #1 hitting, and attack #2 hitting; then with Phantom Bolt missing, attack #1 hitting, attack #2 hitting, and attack #3 hitting. The odds of Phantom Bolt hitting and attack #1 taking the foe out are extremely tiny when the foe has 25 hit points, so attack #2 hitting is almost always required. The difference is that if attack #1 and #2 hits along with Magic Missile, attack #3 is typically not required. That saves a Standard Action to be used on a different foe at least one attack in three for this scenario. Sure, the DPR is similar, but there are initial hit point ranges where MM works better, just like there are hit points ranges where the extra few points of Phantom Bolt works better.
Let's take your example. Let's take a first level Wizard with Magic Missile (7 points at level one) vs. a first level Wizard with a D8+5 single target At Will power, and both have a first level Cleric with a D8+4 single target At Will power as backup. Note: there are D6 single target At Will attacks for both Clerics and Wizards, but there are also feats that can add +1 damage, so I consider this a wash for this example, not all PCs take damage feats at level one, not all Controller or Leader PCs do D8 damage at level one.
The foe is bloodied and has 11 hit points.
Wizard #1 with Magic Missile hits him for 7. He has 4 hit points left. The Cleric has a 55% chance to hit and kill, so there is:
0%: 1 attack and dead
55%: 2 attacks and dead
45%: 2 attacks and seriously wounded
0%: 2 attacks and not additionally wounded at all
Wizard #2 hits 55% of the time and criticals 5% of the time (60% chance to hit total). The Wizard has to roll a 6 or higher on the damage die to kill the foe. So, there is a 3 in 8 chance * 55% chance + 5% chance of the foe being killed outright in 1 round. The Cleric has a 55% chance to kill if the foe took damage from the Wizard and a 0% chance to kill if the foe did not.
25.6%: 1 attack and dead
18.9%: 2 attacks and dead
37.5%: 2 attacks and seriously wounded
18.0%: 2 attacks and not additionally wounded at all (i.e. requires 1 or more additional attacks from the Wizard and possibly the Cleric to take this foe down)
This is a hit point scenario that favors your POV (because the Wizard with a D8+5 power can kill the foe with a single attack) and there is still only a 1 in 4 chance that he will do that.
The foe is dead in a single round 43.5% of the time (with 2 PCs attacking it) vs. the 55% of the time with Magic Missile.
The foe isn't even additionally wounded by the two attacks almost one round in five. The foe is always seriously wounded in the MM case.
And what if the foe has 14 hit points instead of 11? The D8+5 attack is a lot less useful then because it cannot kill the foe with a single attack. In that scenario, MM wins more because the Cleric attack will almost always kill if it hits.
And, it's even more in favor of Magic Missile for Minions and for tougher foes (higher level or elites) that are harder to hit.
The reason it works this way is that the ratio of damage vs. the ratio of to hit. As an example, the D8+5 damage does 9.8 average damage (including criticals) vs. 7 for MM, whereas the ratio to hit is 6 to 10. 7/9.8 > 6/10. Until the 9.8 increases above 12 (2+ more damage per hit), MM wins the DPR race and hence, wins the "how often does it help more than a D8+5 power" race.
MM typically has a better DPR at low level and hence, there are a lot of scenarios (most of the non-area effect ones) where it is better. Even when the player boosts other At Will powers above the DPR of Magic Missile with feats and items, there are still a lot of scenarios where the Wizard either automatically takes out a foe, or sets the foe up for another PC to kill.
For example, the DPR of the other attack is higher than MM for a standard foe, but it is lower for an elite harder to hit foe.
Except that it is NOT a wasted action. Here is where you are missing the point and mistaken. It actually does a LOT of good.
The Cleric with his D8+4 attack will automatically kill the 4 hp remaining foe if he hits.
The Thief or Rogue or Sorcerer can go after bigger game with their 15 to 20 point damage attacks.
Sure, one can play dumb and ignore the information and utility that MM gives the team when used appropriately. Or, one can play smart and use MM as a scalpel to either kill foes automatically, or set the foes up for a high chance of death by weaker allies like leaders.
I agree that it won't happen a lot in round one, but it does happen. If there are other foes that an area effect can target, an area effect is better.
But, if there is a heavily wounded foe in round one (and at low level, a foe hit by 2 PCs or hit heavily by a Striker PC is often heavily wounded, often 75% damaged or more), then it can sometime make sense. The intent of other PCs is to throw out Encounter powers and focus fire in round one. Encounter powers often do more damage. The odds of there not being multiple foes in a close enough area combined with the odds of a single foe being heavily damaged is actually not insignificant. This can easily happen 1 encounter in 4 or better, depending on whether the DM plays the NPCs smart (i.e. avoid being in area effects).
Every good Wizard who has it should cast it that often at low level.
And, Mages get it automatically. It really is the best choice for when it appears that it will kill a foe or when it leads to the death of a foe by a fellow PC when a different single target At Will Wizard power would not have killed the NPC. The rest of the time, it may or may not be the best choice.
My suggestion is this:
Let him play his Essentials Mage, regardless of whether you get around to reading the books or not.
After the session, decide whether or not you think it's okay to have that Essentials Mage in your game, given the experience.
If you decide against it, just let him retrain as a Wizard and be done with it. It's the same character but classic mechanics.
That said, I don't think that whether or not Essentials classes are 'dumbed down' should matter to the decision of whether to use them in your game or not (besides the fact that as DM you SHOULD have veto authority to disallow them). If a player wants to play a simpler, accessible iteration of a D&D character then that's entirely up to him. I'd say it's like letting everyone else play with the "Auto-Level Up" feature in CRPGs turned on.
I myself don't like the Essentials classes so much. In theory and mechanics they're fine by me, but I don't get the degree of pathological customization I can get from classic characters. Essentials classes aren't 'dumbed down' so much as they are 'idiot proof' and you can't have the min/maxing fun you'd get from them that you would from building an Halfling Warlord/Swordmage using some kind of Brash Assault combo.
So, in short, I think they're a perfectly valid choice for individual players and shouldn't be regarded with group distrust, so long as they function in a way that breaks the mechanical rhythm of the group and the DM (and as far as I can tell, they don't.)
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