D&D 4E Rich Baker on his 4e Warlord

[Lonely Tylenol]

The problem is being used to higher stats. Random rolls usually give you something better than 25-pt.

They give you about 30, on average. I don't know what the variation is.

 

[Driddle]

If you read the descriptions verrrrrrry closely and fill in the blanks, it becomes aparent that Karhun is actually another character's familiar.

Intriguing, no? That means the primary PCs that haven't been revealed yet must be mega-awesome.

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Well, considering that:

1) Star Wars Saga edition is considered a "public beta" of 4th edition concepts

2) In Star Wars Saga edition you raise 1 point in two different ability scores every 4 levels

3) Rich Baker's character has really good ability scores


I think its safe to say that you can upgrade your ability scores more than in 3rd ed. (and even more than Saga, apparently), without having to resort to the amulet/periapt/headband/belt/etc. twinkle thing.

Which is a huge step forward towards solving MAD issues.

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Edit: Sorry, I posted before reading the entire thread and didnt notice other people had already pointed out Saga Edition.

 

[Irda Ranger]

Which is a huge step forward towards solving MAD issues.

And softening the blow of removing stat increasing items.

 

[FireLance]

Paladin is one on which I definitely disagree with you. I'd play a Paladin in a 25 point buy build in a heartbeat. I'd put together a fighter with 25 point buy as 16, 11, 14, 10, 10, 10. I'd put together the Paladin as 14, 10, 14, 10, 13, 12.

Actually, I'd say that Charisma is more important than Constitution for a paladin, so I'd go with 14, 10, 12, 10, 13, 14. Constitution basically adds to Fortitude saves, hit points, and Concentration checks. From 2nd level onwards, Divine Grace and Lay on Hands allow you to offset almost all the advantages you get from putting the higher score in Constitution instead of Charisma, and you get +1 to Reflex and Will saves and attack rolls when you smite evil.

 

[LEHaskell]

OoT//

What bugs me with the warlord is its healing ability. Seems really NOT logical. And I fail to see which kind of fantasy archertype it fills. Aragorn the healer ?

Well, Aragorn WAS a healer -- following the Battle of Pelenor Fields, he is the only one who can heal Faramir and Eowyn from the wounds inflicted by the Nazgul. Aragorn goes to the Houses of Healing and asks the wise woman there for an herb, Kingsfoil. In fact, she recounts an old wives tale saying that "...the hands of the King are the hands of a healer -- and thus the rightful King may always be known."

The warlord is the archetype of the martial leader: the veteran sergeant who shows troops how to bind their wounds, shouts encouragement to keep fighting and directs his platoon to press advantages they may not have seen. Where the fighter is unequaled in handling a weapon, the warlord is master of handling a team in combat. He may not be the best fighter on the team, but he knows which end of a sword is pointy and everyone benefits from his direction.

Now, D&D healing has been dominated by divine magic, but as the rumor mill has it, 4ed will likely introduce some sort of "Second Wind" mechanic, the ability to tap into your own physical/mental reserves to heal yourself -- but only so many times per day. Perhaps the warlords healing ability will be to permit you to tap into this Second Wind more times per day -- to push yourself further than you could with out his encouragement.

 

[Baby Samurai]

Come on now - that was totally me being aggressive. There's no passiveness involved.

Oh, okay, well that's cool – bad cop/bad cop?

 

[Stalker0]

Worst MAD still has to be a Monk.

QFT, here's the difference to me.

A monk needs wisdom to boost his AC, not because its a cool class feature, but to make up for the PENALTY of not being able to wear armor. This is why the wisdom is needed, and why it leads to the dependence part of multiple ability dependence.

For a warblade, its a different story. He gets his int to reflex saves (but only in combat, not while flatfooted). Sure, normally his reflex save is poor. But he has a d12 hitdice, its not like he's really sweating those fireballs. He gets his int to crit confirmations. Handy, but certainly not the end all be all, especially if he picks up an axe and isn't likely to crit often.

For the warblade, int is a nice stat, and its a viable build to sacrifice strength for more int and still play an effective class. But you could play a warblade with a 6 int and still play a fine character (afterall, you still get all of those manuevers). That is why I like the warblade so much, that elegance in game design is appealing to me.

If all 4e classes take the warblade's approach to multiple abilities I will be a happy, happy man

 

[Remathilis]

Never underestimate the power of DMs to be stingy and limit character options.

So? I've seen DMs who don't give out wealth by level appropriate magic, ban clerics, and use no races but human. Does that mean 4e should take those DMs into account too?

 

[Ahglock]

Which is a huge step forward towards solving MAD issues.

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Depends on what your MAD issues are. One of my biggest problems with MAD is that your weaknesses define a character as much as your strengths. With MAd it sometimes makes it too penalizing to have a weakness so you build characters with no weaknesses, or only stereotypical weaknesses with the one ability that doesn't matter to your class.

Lets say power selection is from wisdom, Intelligence lets Wizard know a wider list of spells,. and charisma increases is spell attack power. All of a sudden the absent minded professor(low wis) characters are virtually off the list. Shy book worm(low charisma) off the list. Con probably still gives HP so you aren't making that a dump stat, so all of a sudden at most you have two options for defining a weakness for story development reasons, Dex, and Strength, strength probably hurts the wizard the least, but you can probably get by being a clumsy wizard.

I don't want all wizards to be charming, insightful and smart because all of those attributes are tied closely to there class. I want people to be able to decide to gimp wisdom a bit and not feel like they just screwed there character.

Having enough points in stats so I can have all good attributes isn't a solution to me because I may want some bad attributes I just don't want to be crippled because of it.