New Essentials Builds!

[AngryMojo]

Except for your allies who want to walk over there and attack something. To add insult to injury, you ignore their resistance too. Your melee buddies probably will not like this zone.

I'm not sure about the fire resistance thing. The zone isn't technically an attack, and the fire resistance thing specifically states that your attacks ignore fire resistance.

 

[nookiemonster]

Except for your allies who want to walk over there and attack something.

Disagree!!!

Firstly, it's for creatures that end their turn in the zone. As long as the melee PC does not end his turn in the zone, he's fine. He can move through it. Also, if you drop Scorching Burst so that it hits the monster who is in melee with your fighter but not your fighter, the monster must move out of the zone or take damage, possibly triggering Combat Superiority attacks. And if your fighter is a Brawling type, and has grabbed the monster with his free hand, immobilising him... well, you get the picture. I can see this being used to "cover a flank" in an open area, making it harder to get around your melee tanks.

Edited to add:

I like the new staff feats. There's quite a few staff-wielding heroes, especially in Asian literature (Monkey from Wu Ch'eng-En's famous Buddhist fable for example). This will be good for players who want to play such characters.

 

[samursus]

Yeah, I don't know if its me, but these are two great articles. They manage to put in some quality (not overpowered I think) options for a lot of builds, essentials and otherwise. Colour me a bit more optimistic for future Dragon articles.

 

[Aegeri]

Yeah this months dragon/dungeon hasn't entirely sucked. A good direction for once.

 

[FabioMilitoPagliara]

...and the staff knight make an interesting choice for a DEX Knight (light armor and all....) with melee training obviously

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I also like the pyromancer...

note that the 10d10 fire spell is not much better than the war wizards 8d10 spell... so not out of line...

 

[erf_beto]

I'm impressed with how easy it seems to add new builds and schools for the essentials. I thought they would be hell, with all the different class features spread at different levels. Guess I was wrong.

And those new category of feats (ordained weapons, thief weapon, etc) seem like a good way to give characters the properties of magic items without depending on gear. With the new treasure distribution (not to mention Dark Sun), they are welcome, IMO.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

It actually seems easier, as you don´t need to write thousands of powers for each build!

just exchange one or two features and you are done... as i hoped, essential and unearthed arcana approach will make designing classes much more fun, as you are less restricted...

still the base foundation is retained. Well done Mike Mearls.

 

[Walking Dad]

I'm impressed with how easy it seems to add new builds and schools for the essentials. I thought they would be hell, with all the different class features spread at different levels. Guess I was wrong.

And those new category of feats (ordained weapons, thief weapon, etc) seem like a good way to give characters the properties of magic items without depending on gear. With the new treasure distribution (not to mention Dark Sun), they are welcome, IMO.

I hope for a totemic weapon. My dwarf shaman and druid builds depend on the Alfsair item. Would be nice to dodge this issue, with the new item rarity.

 

[Mengu]

Firstly, it's for creatures that end their turn in the zone. As long as the melee PC does not end his turn in the zone, he's fine. He can move through it. Also, if you drop Scorching Burst so that it hits the monster who is in melee with your fighter but not your fighter, the monster must move out of the zone or take damage, possibly triggering Combat Superiority attacks. And if your fighter is a Brawling type, and has grabbed the monster with his free hand, immobilising him... well, you get the picture. I can see this being used to "cover a flank" in an open area, making it harder to get around your melee tanks.

People are talking about tossing fireballs. There really won't be much space for your barbarian/monk/fighter to go and attack stuff without ending their movement in the zone. It restricts where your rogue can go to flank things. It restricts where your warlord can wolfpack tactics an ally to get a flank. The occasional zone is good to have, but throwing around zones all the time, that are not ally friendly can be a big pain. I know I used to want to kill our own wizard nearly every time he used Icy Terrain.

I'd really like to hear what people are liking about these articles. I'm probably being thick, but I'm not seeing it. I think the fire dragon sorcerer covered the pyro archetype quite well. The staff fighter options are a little more interesting though I'm not fond of the image of a plate wearing knight with a staff. A lightly armored slayer with a staff seems a better image, though the mechanical options for the former look better to me.