Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="MyISPHatesENWorld" data-source="post: 4201839" data-attributes="member: 65684">Rather than going post-by-post, I'll address points by facet of the build.The key to the character staying alive as long as it has is that it worked out of core in 1e and 3.x, with room to sharpen focus with new material or change capabilities a bit to fit a campaign or DM style.From a build standpoint:Race: Half-orcs traditionally had a backstory that won't exist in 4e (I guess they'll be magically created from flowers and honey by a race of anthropomorphic bears or something when they show up). Without that backstory, the way the character interacts with society (and is seen by society) loses a lot. It's easy to fit that same story into a character's past while having it relevant in commonly encountered civilized societies as a human. A pure orc is a too far removed to have the right effect. So, orc is out for sure and half-orc is pretty much certain to have a foo foo background that won't fit. Also, half-orcs looked a lot more human in 1e. In 3.x, the character was described as being exceptionally small and favoring his human side heavily in appearance.Class: The character is a striker. He moves around and does a lot of damage to one target. He isn't a defender, and I don't want to lock anything down. The only thing about the rogue I don't want is the little, jabby melee weapon. The only thing I want from the fighter is the greatsword. Grabbing some fighter powers through multiclassing seems like what I'll need to do if I want him to use a greatsword and have it feel like a greatsword or maybe to get any greatsword usable powers at all.Weapon (or ZOMG Sneak Attack with Greatsword!): It's not that unusual, it has come up in pretty much every Rogue preview article thread I've read on the half-dozen boards I lurk. I can't recall playing with anyone that had a multiclass fighter/thief or fighter/assassin that didn't use at least a longsword in 1e and in third, greataxes, greatswords and falchions were everywhere for any multiclass rogue that could use them. If your assassin wanders around court and kills nobles in their sleep, then yeah a greatsword seems out of place. If he kills dragons, giants and other stuff, often needing to fight things on the way that are either well armed or big, then using a greatsword or greataxe is a no-brainer. Even the assassin prereq in 3.5 is to kill "someone" - which is a very wide range in DND. It isn't limited to a guy in a castle somewhere. If your rogue wants to go kill a 60' dragon with a 10" knife, knock yourself out. I don't mind that the system supports that. But trying to somehow argue that you can't do more damage when you have a combat advantage with a greatsword than when you don't have combat advantage at the same time is kind of lame. Greatsword or 2-handed sword in DND to this point hasn't reflected any specific sword. As the weapon entries don't appear to reference weapon lengths, is there some bit of information leaked that greatsword is now a specific sword that has a length of 70 inches? That's longer than a sword needs to be to be balanced in a way that it works only in two hands and has enough mass to do a lot of damage.It makes sense for balance reasons to require feats to use a greatsword or other high base damage weapon with rogue powers and class abilities, particularly since it is expected or already revealed other feats boost sneak attack damage directly, add bonus damage to all attacks and increase the weapon damage you do with the default weapons. So a certain number of feats needed to use a higher base damage weapon with rogue abilities and powers means a certain number of fewer feats to boost damage in other ways, which balances out. The greatsword doesn't need to have all of the damage bonuses of sneak attack plus feats to boost sneak attack plus powers plus whatever, but it needs enough things to work together to have as many things to do and to be overall as effective as any other character. The feats could be written so as not to stack or powers could exist that are balanced for higher base damage weapons.Feats: Yeah, I'd be happy if this was all fixable with a balanced number of feats, though since I kind of like the Endurance skill and will likely have the prerequisites, I may take the first fighter multiclass feat anyway, though I'm not married to it and something else like Ranger may be a better option if I don't need or really want a fighter power or two for the greatsword. Toughness is looking really good though regardless. Improved toughness was a viable feat in 3.5 when everyone had more HP, to get the same benefit in 4e looks great. Add in that in a per encounter system you'll likely need the extra cushion more, and it might be the 4e power attack - don't melee without it. Paizo: I haven't bought a third party DND supplement since Grimtooth's Traps Ate, Citystate of the Invincible Overlord, and a Thieve's World thing that I think had 1e stats (Lythande was a half-elf Fighter/Magic-User but not really a half-elf or something). I did look at the Paizo PDF and it did work in the first alpha, which makes sense since it worked out of core. Dump the character and completely rebuild: I'd dump 4e with it, and realistically 3.x. Maybe come back in 5e or if it becomes possible down the road in 4e and I can find a DM using the supplements that make it work.</blockquote>

Verification