New Epic Destinies

[AbdulAlhazred]

But if you use an area of effect blast to chunky salsa my original body (or deliberately go up to it and do so) I am dead, even though my dragon will stick around a while.

That is a downside. Depends on the enemies willingness to capitalise on it, but I know my dragon-spirit would not be leaving the body behind.

Sure, but by the same token the character just got back ALL their hit points and gained 2 EXCEEDINGLY powerful attributes, one of which effectively doubles their hit points again and the other of which is likely to be of huge tactical value in a wide variety of situations. Sure, its possible to be perma-killed, but all Demigod gets back is half his hit points, which in a situation where high epic PCs are going down is likely to mean he just gets capped again next round. There is another slight disadvantage in that the dragon spirit goes away and leaves you with 1 hit point at the end of the encounter, but usually at that point its not an issue. The only time an epic PC is going to be getting wasted is usually in capstone type encounter, what happens after that is likely to be irrelevant.

I think all these EDs have really awesome fluff and I love the open ended stuff they did with the Thief of Destiny. Hopefully the finalized versions will be a bit more in line with the other EDs because I'd REALLY much rather people were picking an ED because of the fluff and not because its just 3x better than any other ED mechanically.

 

[Zaran]

I don't like that the Impossible Theft power has no Keywords besides Teleportation. The power source isn't even listed. I guess the thief can Martially teleport an item 300 miles away. It's so impossible that even the power doesn't explain it.

 

[Black Knight Irios]

I don't like that the Impossible Theft power has no Keywords besides Teleportation. The power source isn't even listed. I guess the thief can Martially teleport an item 300 miles away. It's so impossible that even the power doesn't explain it.

The thief knocked out the power and stole the keywords.


Not that there would be any gain if it had more keywords.

 

[Lord Ernie]

I don't see the reasoning behind the cries of 'overpowered'. The de facto most powerful ED in the game has always been Demigod, because it has the complete package: it has +2 to two stats of your choice (the most important factor, really), an amazing daily utility (regeneration 26 or so? Yes, please), a daily free revive, and a great capstone (although that one has been severely nerfed). It's also very bland for most characters, offers little in the sense of flavour, and has been done to death by characters on all heights of the optimization ladder.

Most of these ED's are simply near or on the level of Demigod. Let's summarize and compare:

• Draconic Incarnation has more restricted stat bumps (albeit ideal for arcane characters), a revive, a decent daily utility (it's only really good for swordmages and sorcerers, honestly), and a great capstone (which might, actually, be too powerful, but hey, it's a L30 capstone).
• Thief of Legend has more restricted stat bumps, a great revive and incredibly flavorful L24 and L26 ability (of which the actual power is debatable), and a very powerful capstone (again, too powerful, but yeah).
• The Sentinel has more restricted stat bumps, no revive (strange for a defender ED, TBH, although most defender classes have their own 'get out of death for free' utility powers), very good defensive utilities, and a capstone that sounds great in theory, but isn't all that hot in practice (defenders aren't strikers).

Are these powerful, flavorful, ED's? Definitely. Are they stronger than Demigod? Debatable; if anything, if you argue these are overpowered, then Demigod is overpowered and needs nerfing.

Using Demigod as a baseline for comparison, the only thing that really needs nerfing, IMO, are the Incarnation's and Thief's capstones, but then again, there are existing ED's with capstones that are just as powerful. Seriously, they publish the first ED's that don't make you feel bad for not choosing Demigod, give them great flavour, and you'd want them to power them down?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't see the reasoning behind the cries of 'overpowered'. The de facto most powerful ED in the game has always been Demigod, because it has the complete package: it has +2 to two stats of your choice (the most important factor, really), an amazing daily utility (regeneration 26 or so? Yes, please), a daily free revive, and a great capstone (although that one has been severely nerfed). It's also very bland for most characters, offers little in the sense of flavour, and has been done to death by characters on all heights of the optimization ladder.

Most of these ED's are simply near or on the level of Demigod. Let's summarize and compare:

• Draconic Incarnation has more restricted stat bumps (albeit ideal for arcane characters), a revive, a decent daily utility (it's only really good for swordmages and sorcerers, honestly), and a great capstone (which might, actually, be too powerful, but hey, it's a L30 capstone).
• Thief of Legend has more restricted stat bumps, a great revive and incredibly flavorful L24 and L26 ability (of which the actual power is debatable), and a very powerful capstone (again, too powerful, but yeah).
• The Sentinel has more restricted stat bumps, no revive (strange for a defender ED, TBH, although most defender classes have their own 'get out of death for free' utility powers), very good defensive utilities, and a capstone that sounds great in theory, but isn't all that hot in practice (defenders aren't strikers).

Are these powerful, flavorful, ED's? Definitely. Are they stronger than Demigod? Debatable; if anything, if you argue these are overpowered, then Demigod is overpowered and needs nerfing.

Using Demigod as a baseline for comparison, the only thing that really needs nerfing, IMO, are the Incarnation's and Thief's capstones, but then again, there are existing ED's with capstones that are just as powerful. Seriously, they publish the first ED's that don't make you feel bad for not choosing Demigod, give them great flavour, and you'd want them to power them down?

I don't care if they are at any specific power level, the issue is that if you have a game feature that is transparently superior in every mechanical way to all other choices then it renders those other choices rather moot. Now, obviously ED choices SHOULD be largely about fluff and RP. Players shouldn't have to feel punished because the ED that fits their character concept so well is mechanically trash and this other ED lets the other players ignore flavor and just tromp all over you.

When analyzing Draconic Incarnate specifically what I see is that the stat bump is effectively identical to Demigod. The fact that some other class might not find that stat bump ideal is irrelevant to my character that can take advantage of it. Basically at a simplistic level of analysis roughly 1/3 of all PCs should have INT as a primary or secondary, so that aspect is widely applicable anyway. Even if its 20 or 25% its still MECHANICALLY identical to the Demigod bump for a lot of PCs.

The DI utility power is nothing earth shattering, but its not exactly BAD. No, it isn't as good as 26-30 regeneration but how huge is that regen really? Its very nice but healing at those levels is something you should have in abundance anyway. At least the DI polymorph is a UNIQUE type of power that has plenty of RP potential and even a modest amount of tactical combat utility (sometimes being HUGE is an advantage for example, and flight is never a bad thing). Honestly I would rate them as not much different.

The recovery ability of Demigod is just flat out inferior to that of DI. The DI one has a couple of minor strings attached to it that may or may not even be relevant in a given situation but it gives you effectively 4x more than you get from the Demigod one, so sign me up!

And as you said, Divine Miracle is pretty clearly inferior to having 2 level 25 daily powers for free. Even pre-nerf it was arguable (how often do you REALLY need more than 4 encounter powers) and post-nerf its not really arguable.

So CLEARLY Draconic Incarnate is stronger than Demigod mechanically. Given that Demigod was strong enough WotC felt the need to nerf it because it was overshadowing other EDs its kind of hard to argue that DI isn't in the same category. Its just, relative to ALL other EDs superior for a pretty decent percentage of characters (maybe between 1/3 and 1/2 of them depending). It just seem to me rather sloppy of them to publish something that is OP out of the gate and sure to get the old sponge bat. Better to design it with the right power level in mind from day one instead of having to saw a leg off the thing the day after it sees print.

 

[Kingreaper]

I don't like that the Impossible Theft power has no Keywords besides Teleportation. The power source isn't even listed. I guess the thief can Martially teleport an item 300 miles away. It's so impossible that even the power doesn't explain it.

Martial is NOT the default

Seriously, if it doesn't say a power source that means it doesn't necessarily use any one of the standard power sources. It's a natural power (like breathing fire, or creating a cloud of darkness) not one gained through:

Intense practice and skill (martial)
A connection to the weave of the universe (arcane)
A connection to the gods (Divine)
Some kind of association with the spirits of nature (primal)
Joining with the realm of the dead (shadow)
Or a far realm influenced mind (psychic)