LEB Discussion Thread '10 Pt 2

[Velmont]

Today is my last day at my actual work. That mean I will lose my PC as it was given to me by my job. For this long week-end, here in Canada, I won't have any PC. Tuesday, I don't know yet what to expect for the computer I will work with. So I might be inactive for while. To my DMs, don't hesitate to to NPC my characters. I'll give you guideline if I can. I'll give you a status next week.

 

[KarinsDad]

Rules question about warlock: [MENTION=36973]stonegod[/MENTION], you play Incarnation, maybe you know for sure...

Item 1: Bloodied boon feat: You can choose to gain pact boon when cursed enemy is first bloodied. The curse is removed from the enemy.

Item2: Bloodcurse rod: Your pact boon triggers when you bloody the enemy with the attack through this rod.

The question: If attack through Bloodcurse rod bloodies the enemy for the first time, do I get 2 pact boons?

Order of things :
attack hits, damage bloodies the enemy
Rod property gives pact boon
Feat gives pact boon
Feat removes the curse

I believe this order is correct since the attack is fully resolved after item properties are taken into account and only then other things trigger.

What the rest of you think?

[MENTION=87106]MetaVoid[/MENTION]

I don't think that anyone replied to this.

This is a bit of a tricky question, but I'll try to get it right. First off, I'm not convinced that the item trigger happens first and then the feat trigger happens second. That sounds more like wishful thinking. Do you have a rules source for that?

Assuming that this order does happen this way (and not simultaneously and not in the opposite order), they sometimes stack unless they are an effect. However, it is rare that using both of them will actually be beneficial.

Looking at most of the pact boons:

1) Darkspiral Aura: one of the few with a gain. You would get a +2 gain to the aura instead of +1.

2) Accursed Affinity: no gain. This is an immediate reaction for the trigger. It cannot occur on your turn. Even if an ally gave you a ranged basic with the rod, the next enemy is the next enemy, not the next two enemies.

3) Misty Step: no gain (I don't think). It is not two teleports. As per the free action interrupt clause, both free actions are handled like an immediate reaction kind of after the fact of the total action resolution because the trigger is not based on the free action happening. So, the free actions do not happen one after the other, but at the same time immediately after the action is resolved. There is no arrival at teleport location and then another trigger teleport. Not positive on this one though.

4) Dark One's Blessing: no gain. Temporary hit points do not stack.

5) Fate of the Void: a small gain. A single die roll is not two die rolls, so only one die roll. However, this effect stacks with itself for damage, so +2 to damage.

6) King Elidyr Pact Boon: no gain. One ally before the end of your next turn is one ally. If this was done on two foes, it would stack, but it is only done on one foe.

7) Zutwa Pact Boon: no gain. The bonus to Prime Shot is increased to +3 for the same duration. Increasing it to +3 when it already is +3 doesn't change it.

8) Other vestige pact boons from Dailies. I won't go into the details of each one, but some will stack and others will not depending on what they do and how they are written.

 

[MetaVoid]

[MENTION=87106]MetaVoid[/MENTION]

I don't think that anyone replied to this.

This is a bit of a tricky question, but I'll try to get it right. First off, I'm not convinced that the item trigger happens first and then the feat trigger happens second. That sounds more like wishful thinking. Do you have a rules source for that?

Thank you for answering, I was wondering about getting no response.

It's for darkpact warlock, exactly the one that gets the benefit

As for wishful thinking, they are properties of the item and the feat. Both trigger of bloodying the opponent. Do you have rule citation that says I cannot determine the order of things happening simultaneously?

In my thinking, if I have two effects that both are free actions or trigger on the same thing as free actions, I can choose which of them to use when.
[MENTION=36973]stonegod[/MENTION], [MENTION=54810]renau1g[/MENTION], [MENTION=69684]WEContact[/MENTION], [MENTION=78756]Son of Meepo[/MENTION], [MENTION=44459]Luinnar[/MENTION], help?

 

[WEContact]

If you have two powers/actions that occur simultaneously, you can choose the order in which you resolve them. Not sure where that's written down bit I'll try to find it.

 

[Luinnar]

I never played a warlock, so I can't be of much help. But I don't remember any rules on the order of free actions, so I would say the player chooses.

Remember you only get 1 free attack action per turn.

 

[KarinsDad]

Thank you for answering, I was wondering about getting no response.

Well, I didn't reply earlier since I never saw your post until yesterday.

In my thinking, if I have two effects that both are free actions or trigger on the same thing as free actions, I can choose which of them to use when.

Well, that's a different rule than the one you mentioned.

You indicated that item properties worked before feat triggers in your earlier post.

If you have two powers/actions that occur simultaneously, you can choose the order in which you resolve them. Not sure where that's written down bit I'll try to find it.

It's in the Rules Compendium and is a new rule (since the PHB).

But, it is only on your own turn (AFAICT). There is no such rule for during anyone else's turn (e.g. the warlock gets a handed a free ranged basic attack, bloodies a foe, etc.).


Here's the tricky part though.

The Dark Pack boon is listed as an Immediate Interrupt action, not as a free action.

So, the RAW interpretation of it is that the Effect is an Immediate Interrupt that cannot occur on the PC's turn. Just because other pact boon triggers are free actions does not mean that this one is. It's an II to get an aura point and it's a different II (for the trigger) to use them. Given this more RAW interpretation, the item wouldn't stack with the feat because one cannot do two IIs in a round.


Now, someone could claim that the Trigger is the II and that the Effect is a free action (because of how other pact boons work). For other pact boons, the knocking to zero hit points is a trigger which happens to be a free action. Here, the knocking to zero hit points is an effect. It might be RAI (every time a foe drops to zero, the aura gets a point, even if it's on the warlock's turn) and I agree that this is a reasonable interpretation, and this is how I would interpret it.

Given that, though, the trigger of Darkspiral is doing the damage, not adding the aura points. So the rod wouldn't give an extra point to the spiral because the rod only allows the trigger to fire off. The trigger for Darkspiral is NOT the effect.

The trigger for Darkspiral allows for a hit. So combining the rod with darkspiral aura and the feat would technically mean that the PC on his own turn could bloody a foe and wound that same foe with the aura with the same attack.


Now, it gets better. Since these are free actions, they get resolved like Immediate Reactions.

1) If the rod occurs before the feat, then the damage is done with one fewer point in the pool. The Special (which could lower the pool to zero) occurs, and then the feat would raise the pool by one.

2) If the feat occurs before the rod, then the pool is raised by one and the curse is removed. The rod then does not trigger because the target must be cursed.

So, choose your poison.


But my earlier interpretation of 2 points from the warlock bloodying the foe wouldn't be correct. The rod explicitly states that it only affects the trigger of the pact. This also means that none of the vestige pact boons would work with it because most (if not all) of them do not have triggers.

Your pact boon triggers when an attack you make with this rod makes a target affected by your Warlock’s Curse bloodied. (It still triggers when you reduce a target to 0 or fewer hit points.)

It's apparent the that designers of this item were thinking of the other pact boons where knocking below zero IS the trigger and is a free action (which means it can be done on your turn).

 

[MetaVoid]

I think it's just wrong wording.

If you decide that "pact boon triggers" means when pact boon effect is used (+1 for starpact etc...) then feat means you get boon "point" (aura, +1 to rolls, whatever) and that rod effect is actually gaining the benefit of said boon...except there are those who cannot use it as such and in effect it is useless to all (or most) since using the benefit on your turn is something you can do anyhow

If "pact boon triggers" means when pact boon "point" would normally be gained (dropping or bloodying the enemy) then EVERY warlock can use it. True, they cannot gain additional Fell Might point or extra thp (since they don't stack), but they could still slide the enemies since the boon triggered, they just don't gain anything extra out of it.

I believe Dark pact aura attack is immediate interrupt. But points of the aura are not. They are gained as any other pact boon on killing cursed things. If it is II then at no point darkpact warlock could gain more then 1 in any given round

 

[KarinsDad]

I think it's just wrong wording.

If you decide that "pact boon triggers" means when pact boon effect is used (+1 for starpact etc...) then feat means you get boon "point" (aura, +1 to rolls, whatever) and that rod effect is actually gaining the benefit of said boon...except there are those who cannot use it as such and in effect it is useless to all (or most) since using the benefit on your turn is something you can do anyhow

If "pact boon triggers" means when pact boon "point" would normally be gained (dropping or bloodying the enemy) then EVERY warlock can use it. True, they cannot gain additional Fell Might point or extra thp (since they don't stack), but they could still slide the enemies since the boon triggered, they just don't gain anything extra out of it.

I believe Dark pact aura attack is immediate interrupt. But points of the aura are not. They are gained as any other pact boon on killing cursed things. If it is II then at no point darkpact warlock could gain more then 1 in any given round

I don't disagree with you per se. The wording of the feat is clearer than the rod, possibly because the rod came out in AV and that book was one of the earliest books after the core three (the feat came out almost a year and a half later). In fact, the Dark Pact boon came out about the same time as AV and it too has ambiguous wording in the power (the II portion). The wording of the pact boon is pretty bad, but I think it's easy to determine designer intent there.

Given this though, I would say that the feat and the item really don't do anything for the vast majority of the pact boons, so should they do anything for the dark pact where the wording of the pact combined with the wording of the rod is ambigous?

If one assumes that the wording is unclear at best, and that the intent of both the feat and the item is to result in the exact same effect, and that the vast majority of the other warlock pact boons cannot really stack the effect, then the simpliest solution is to not allow the dark pact to do it either. It's the same effect, so it shouldn't stack. It is attempting to allow the PC to use the same "trigger" twice for the same effect.

The designers did at least attempt to prevent the same effects from the same source from applying in most cases. I don't really see how this is any different. Dark Pact is effectively designed to allow a Warlock up to 5 aura points per encounter (assuming 5 foes) and one of those points is wasted if the Warlock takes a short rest. It's typically a max of about 18 more points of damage per encounter if the Warlock gets attacked, and the power is really intended as a protective aura for the warlock by being an incentive for the DM to attack someone other than the Warlock and/or by the Warlock using it to weakening attacks against him. It's not really meant to be a major damage dealer.

The feat or the rod (assuming your interpretation) takes that up to a max of 10 aura points per encounter (average max 40 damage, the last point typically will be lost) and allowing both moves it up to a max of 15 (average max 63 damage). Granted, the warlock will not be the only one bloodying foes, so the average max for both is probably closer to 12 aura points per encounter (average max 50 damage).

If the Warlock decides to not take a short rest (which technically, he could do and with certain types of adventures, would be forced to do), he could literally quickly collect several dozen aura points from multiple encounters (especially if he is tricked out to get 2 or more cursed foes per round) and could possibly kill an undamaged elite or even bloody an undamaged solo every time the warlock gets attacked. It goes from being a mild protective power to a major (beyond what other strikers can manage) offensive nova striker power. Nothing forces the warlock to actually use the interrupt earlier in the day or to use the weakening aspect of it.

Do you really think that is balanced (course, the fact that here Defenders can do 60 plus points of damage in a nova round here these days isn't really balanced either )? Given the ambiguousness of the wording of this, I would think that allowing this amount of nova strike power multiple rounds per encounter would be problematic and I do not think that this is designer intent. I think designer intent was to allow warlocks to double their pact effectiveness with either the feat or the rod (1.5 times at best with the rod), not to make it 2.5 times as effective with both. And I think that there is enough RAW ambiguity in both the wording of the pact boon and the wording of the rod that it would require a rules clarification here to get your interpretation accepted. JMO.

Remember. As long as the interrupt does 12 or more points of damage and as long as the Warlock does not weaken his foe's attack, he does not lose aura points. This already gives a warlock heavy striker damage every encounter starting with the second encounter as long as he does not take a short rest. A warlock could ignore his encounter powers and this would give him a really big boom stick. The II could kill most standard foes (one per round if he hits) for merely attacking the warlock (even if they do not actually hit him) and the warlock wouldn't take any damage or effects from their attacks.

Note: bloodying or killing a foe with the aura would also give the Warlock an additional aura point. It would become madness.

 

[MetaVoid]

Except no DM in his right mind would attack such warlock or even let the aura accumulate enough to do that.

I'm sure at least starpact would benefit greatly from such combination with cumulative pact boon of +1 (or +2 with some feat) - other then that, there are things that do wonders (radiant mafia, cold cheese and similar strategies) IF the character focuses on such - no different then what you have here, the cost being having rod and feat to get part-time benefit (you have to actually attack with rod AND bloody the enemy to get it)

Should we put this to vote for judges or I can use it (pending clarification from WoTC support if somethree or somefour would put the question to them)?

It doesn't seem people find this terribly important, there isn't much commenting and you KD is only one commenting and looking for rules.

WEContact and Luinnar are in general agreement that order of the actions is determined by the user (and I believe you agree too)...it's just this particular combo that is suspect, right?

 

[KarinsDad]

Except no DM in his right mind would attack such warlock or even let the aura accumulate enough to do that.

Well, the DM could decide to not attack the Warlock. And the other players might consider that a bit unfair (i.e. the NPCs using knowledge that they do not have).

How does the DM prevent the aura from accumulating that many points though? He cannot force the player to have the Warlock take a short rest, can he?