D&D 4E Late to the D&D 4E Bandwagon - First Impressions

[Storminator]

The poisons can be used to have bonus damage on every attack in an encounter, and after a while you should be able to do so every combat. The once per encounter assassin strike is signifigent damage, and assassins are doing [w]+stat+1d8 every turn, at the least. You seem to have forgotten Attack Finesse, which is 1d8 extra damage on all attacks with assassin weapons. So, use a rapier and break the game with light blade OP, and the class works just fine.

It does indeed look like the player forgot the Attack Finesse ability. None of the poisons he chose allowed every turn damage. It looks like he could have been doing 2d8+12 per turn (another +4 if he had the other poison). Now he does 3d8 + 11 per turn, +2d6 twice a fight.

PS

 

[doctorbadwolf]

That's a lot more reasonable. How many d10's was his Assassin's Strike, btw?

Of course, only a small handful of strikers can compete with the Thief for DPR, so there's not much he could have done to make the executioner look good next to a Thief.

 

[Neonchameleon]

It does indeed look like the player forgot the Attack Finesse ability. None of the poisons he chose allowed every turn damage. It looks like he could have been doing 2d8+12 per turn (another +4 if he had the other poison). Now he does 3d8 + 11 per turn, +2d6 twice a fight.

PS

At 9th level an assassin should be doing a minimum of d8 (rapier) + d8 (finesse) +5 (Stat) +2 (weapon) + 2 (Bracers) = 2d8+9 on a melee basic attack. (Note the missing things like Weapon Focus - that's a baseline). Not quite in thief territory but certainly in nasty high damage territory.

Forgetting Attack Finesse is pretty huge

But assassins only really shine in urban campaigns in my experience. In campaigns where the ability to walk right up to the enemy and keep stealth until the end of turn is useful as is the poison; with an assassin you can literally walk out across a crowded floor, spend your minor action to drop poison into someone's drink or to douse something they are about to put on, and walk out unnoticed past a double line of guards - all while remaining hidden. And then jump out of the tower window, fall to the ground, and leap a 20ft gap to race away across the rooftops. The thief can't even come close to matching this kind of shenanigans although they are better than the assassin at actual combat.

 

[Storminator]

That's a lot more reasonable. How many d10's was his Assassin's Strike, btw?

Of course, only a small handful of strikers can compete with the Thief for DPR, so there's not much he could have done to make the executioner look good next to a Thief.

He was 9th level, so I think that's 3d10, right?

The player is the least proficient with the rules in the group (obviously, forgetting 1d8 every attack is . . . suboptimal? ), and the assassin takes a lot more work than the Thief.

We actually have a whole party worth of characters that someone in the group decided was useless, so someone else made one just to prove a point. Maybe one day we'll play all of those.

PS

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yeah, theif, ranger, a few others, definitely better for someone with low system mastery.

 

[Shades of Green]

I think that a very strong point in 4E is the fact that spellcasters get to shine a lot more - sure, the Fireball might be a Daily, but they'll have At-Will and Encounter spells to cast in each and every encounter. This strongly mitigfates the 15-minute adventuring day syndrome.

Also, from what I understand, Clerics can attack and heal at the same time with some of their powers, which makes them more fun to play.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I think that a very strong point in 4E is the fact that spellcasters get to shine a lot more - sure, the Fireball might be a Daily, but they'll have At-Will and Encounter spells to cast in each and every encounter. This strongly mitigfates the 15-minute adventuring day syndrome.

Very definitely. There is some incentive for 15 minute adventuring days - but it's not the zero to ultra power.

Also, from what I understand, Clerics can attack and heal at the same time with some of their powers, which makes them more fun to play.

Two ways The first is that the basic hit point recovery (Healing Word/Inspiring Word/Majestic Word) that can be granted by any leader is a minor action so it can be used in addition to a standard action attack. From a fluff perspective this is inspiration as much as healing - the healing surges being spent are from the character being healed rather than the "healer". The second is there are quite a lot of standard attack powers for the cleric that provide both an attack and either some healing or allowing an ally to spend a healing surge. And yes, most people find this more fun. (If they want to play the healbot they can take healbot powers). Me, I find the Bravura Warlord more fun than the cleric anyway.

Note that although the effect of Spending a Healing Surge is equivalent to that of healing the fluff is different; spending a healing surge is the person being healed drawing on their own resources and spending one of their chits. One of the orthodox cleric's benefits is that whenever a cleric allows an ally to spend a surge they add their wisdom modifier (i.e. some actual external healing) to the hit points recovered - and what little surgeles healing there is (e.g. Cure Light Wounds) is almost the exclusive property of the cleric and warlords can't do this. One of the many bits of fluff buried in the mechanical fluff of 4e and never made explicit.

 

[MoonSong]

Very definitely. There is some incentive for 15 minute adventuring days - but it's not the zero to ultra power.



Two ways The first is that the basic hit point recovery (Healing Word/Inspiring Word/Majestic Word) that can be granted by any leader is a minor action so it can be used in addition to a standard action attack. From a fluff perspective this is inspiration as much as healing - the healing surges being spent are from the character being healed rather than the "healer". The second is there are quite a lot of standard attack powers for the cleric that provide both an attack and either some healing or allowing an ally to spend a healing surge. And yes, most people find this more fun. (If they want to play the healbot they can take healbot powers). Me, I find the Bravura Warlord more fun than the cleric anyway.

Note that although the effect of Spending a Healing Surge is equivalent to that of healing the fluff is different; spending a healing surge is the person being healed drawing on their own resources and spending one of their chits. One of the orthodox cleric's benefits is that whenever a cleric allows an ally to spend a surge they add their wisdom modifier (i.e. some actual external healing) to the hit points recovered - and what little surgeles healing there is (e.g. Cure Light Wounds) is almost the exclusive property of the cleric and warlords can't do this. One of the many bits of fluff buried in the mechanical fluff of 4e and never made explicit.

YMMV on this one, personally I found 4e took away all of the fun from being a healer, no doubt it was better for people who didn't like it, but all of the changes stripped away all of the heroism from healbots:

*No longer running and shielding a fallen comrade, you heal from distance, no need to get yourself into danger for the sake of an ally. In other words the times you used to shine as a healer are long gone.
*Healing is no longer enough to be useful, if you aren't contributing to the hp ablation game you are not helping the party.
*You aren't a healer anymore, you are a killer who sometimes heals as an afterthought
*Out of combat you are useless as a healer, the party doesn't needs you, they heal by themselves as long as they have surges, and their hp reset every day. You can contribute on a extremely limited fashion only, and if you want to do more, you have to burn valuable cash that would go to improve the party's gear instead.
*If you still went out of the way to be a superhealer, congratulations, you just made the already slow fights even slower.

In short words you went from being a valuable party member to be a disruptive character.

 

[Neonchameleon]

YMMV on this one, personally I found 4e took away all of the fun from being a healer, no doubt it was better for people who didn't like it, but all of the changes stripped away all of the heroism from healbots:

Let's look at this supposed heroism a second.

*No longer running and shielding a fallen comrade, you heal from distance, no need to get yourself into danger for the sake of an ally. In other words the times you used to shine as a healer are long gone.

Perversely this is now done by non-healers to trigger peoples second winds. (Normally the party healer's). In other words the times to shine are still there - and IME it's far more common in 4e than previous editions.

*Healing is no longer enough to be useful, if you aren't contributing to the hp ablation game you are not helping the party.

Hint: You never were. In 1e, there was no Cure Moderate Wounds and Cure Serious Wounds was a 4th level spell. In 3.X the Healer was a Tier 5 class. And being a dedicated healer as a cleric was taking the class and cripling it. In oD&D, of course, Clerics needed to wait until level 2 before getting any spells.

*You aren't a healer anymore, you are a killer who sometimes heals as an afterthought

No. You're a leader and coordinator who helps the party kill stuff - while possibly keeping your hands clean - but not very if you are healing them in the middle of combat.

And the 4e healer can actually healbot - he never runs out of Astral Seal.

*Out of combat you are useless as a healer, the party doesn't needs you, they heal by themselves as long as they have surges, and their hp reset every day.

You mean that out of combat the party heals through a Wand of Cure Light Wounds or Wand of Lesser Vigor (often backed by a Healer's Belt) and your job is to wave the healing stick? Out of combat healing only needs a class to do it in AD&D where the Cleric was mostly a fighter who could heal and definitely couldn't healbot.

And all I can say about the change is that it is hugely positive to the group dynamic - no one is forced to play the healer in order to keep going. If someone wants to play a healer they can - but that is their personal choice.

You can contribute on a extremely limited fashion only, and if you want to do more, you have to burn valuable cash that would go to improve the party's gear instead.

I'm sorry. Are we talking about the AD&D battle line fighter who could heal a bit, the 3.X healbot that was doing the out of combat job of some fairly cheap items (Wand of Lesser Vigor, Healer's Belt - 750Gp each). Or are we talking about the actually useful healer with an unlimited reserve of Astral Seal, some pretty useful debuffs to use that don't get in the way of healing by taking spell slots.

*If you still went out of the way to be a superhealer, congratulations, you just made the already slow fights even slower.

That's precisely what healbots have always done. If you can heal fast enough to mitigate the incoming damage you are seriously slowing the fight down. If you can't and would be better off doing damage and then healing the pieces most of the time, you're not a healbot.

In short words you went from being a valuable party member to be a disruptive character.

The Pacifist Healer/Healbot has always been a disruptive character in a game that started as a game about killing things and taking their stuff. No less so in 3.X than 4e.

The combat-medic on the other hand (which is what the AD&D cleric was when it came to healing) is alive and kicking in 4e.