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Message: <blockquote data-quote="FabioMilitoPagliara" data-source="post: 4124617" data-attributes="member: 10313">in this thread on Livejournal<a href="http://jediwiker.livejournal.com/41107.html" target="_blank">http://jediwiker.livejournal.com/41107.html</a>Rodney Thompson (gamescribe) and Mike Mearls (mearls) make a lot of clarification on the rules we are using in the lite 4e and the enworld made adventuresit's a long thread, the more useful answers are the following: In case you guys decide to give it another stab... (gamescribe) Just in case you guys decide to give it another go, here are some responses to comments/questions:  I'm curious--is this a complaint about encounter powers, or just lamenting the bad dice? If it's the former, do you feel any different than you did in 3.5 when a monster made its saving throw against a spell, or you failed to penetrate SR, or when you miss with that paladin smite?  I believe this is part of the adventure design, as it's not anything hard-coded into the rules of 4E.  Well, it does add some granularity to the roll, and allows you to have monsters that have "+4 to saves" or allow an ally to let you make another save at +2, for example. If it was a simple coin toss, it's so binary you can't do anything with it. Also, it may help you to think of saves not as "I avoid taking damage" so much as this edition's version of duration rolls.  Stealth still has to be rolled; there's no "Passive Stealth." Likewise, Passive Perception is only used when you're not actively looking for someone, as you probably already figured out. It's a way for the DM to determine whether you notice something without usingthe metagame-inspiring "OK, everyone give me a Perception check."  The dragon fight is in there to showcase exactly how the higher-level solo monster interacts with a party of 4. Also, I believe the defenses are all 2 points too high on the stats that are floating around the interwebs.  Because the importance of movement as a whole has been altered in 4E.  That seems like an awful lot of actions for the dragon to take as a result of you going to heal someone. It may be that your GM misplayed it...but then again, that dragon is way too tough for most 1st-level parties.  I'm curious, were you at WotC when 3E debuted? If not...how did your first experiences with 3E stack up to this? 3E is a much more radical departure from 2E than 4E is from 3E in my opinion, so I'd be interested to know why you felt this wasn't D&D.  The sample characters and cheat sheets are available on the WotC website. The adventures are not, because all of the DMs who ran the adventures at D&D XP had access to the 4th Edition PHB, and so the adventures do not include the necessary information to run the game. Now, should those adventures be posted? Maybe so. But the Raiders of Oakhurst adventure is NOT one of the D&D Experience modules; it's fan-made using secondhand knowledge of 4E. ++++++++++++++++Re: Examples (mearls)  Because the change to the paladin's ability was my personal Helm's Deep! I do not kid - it was me, sitting at my desk, surrounding by five or so people, all telling me that I was wrong to change the paladin's ability. The really, really funny thing is that all the playtesters were abusing the rule, but they *liked* abusing it, so they never reported it as a bug. All we received were non-specific complaints from people that the paladin was clearly better than the fighter.  Anyway, we made the change, and then D&D XP served up a big old salad bar of Mike was right. I love it when that happens! Anyway, it's always interesting to read actual play reports. Thanks for posting this, JD. ++++++++++++++++Re: Examples (mearls) The change requires the paladin to "paladin up" and actually fight the guy. The paladin's mark is generally better if you fight one big, tough guy. He can force that one opponent to focus on him or take damage. The fighter's mark is a little less reliable in that it keys off making attacks. However, the fighter is much better at handling groups of enemies. The fighter puts the risk of extra attacks on foes, and while he might miss he might also crit, or he might carry a big axe and do more damage on average than the paladin. BTW, both the fighter's and the paladin's abilities are different in the final game. I don't think a week went by in the past 6 months where they didn't change, or we had to spend time talking about a potential change. Both classes figure prominently in Mike's anxiety nightmares about 4e's utter failure. =) ++++++++++++++++Re: Examples (mearls) Yeah, the ranger suffered from a math error in PC correction. I think someone added a bonus twice and then added a slice of bonus damage to Accurate Attack that wasn't supposed to be there. Yup, that's us, putting our best foot forward, right into our mouths. Anyway, glad you enjoyed the game. ++++++++++++++++++++Re: Examples (gamescribe)  Kerri was playing the warlock, right? IIRC, she has eldritch blast which is the big damage-dealer, but she also has eyebite which does less damage, it's true, but also makes you invisible to the target for a round. That's pretty good, as it's a great way for the less-than-hearty warlock to avoid taking damage from a bad guy. Likewise, her ray of frost was a wizard multiclass power, and it also has a slowing effect on it. The damage may be different, but a difference in damage usually comes with other effects.  As Merric pointed out, that was actually a result of Organized Play using an old draft of the rules. Similarly, you're jumping to a lot of conclusions about the duration of the paladin's challenge, since those D&D XP character sheets had a limited amount of space on them.  Also keep in mind that you're playing a first-level character, which is going to have more limited options. And I completely disagree about the cleric healing sucking. A cleric with a good relevant ability score can more than double your healing surge value on a good roll. Our 5th level cleric in my Wednesday night campaign regularly adds 11 points onto my healing surges...and I only get back 11 hp per surge. That's as good as using 2 uses of lay on hands right there, and it doesn't even take into account the cleric's other powers, like his daily that increases the amount he heals someone by even more. +++++++++++++++++++Re: Examples (gamescribe)  From a pure damage perspective? Sure. It's an average of 2 points of damage per attack.  No. Sometimes you get to make a basic attack as a result of a situation or power (opportunity attacks and charges use basic melee attacks, for example). The warlord, for example, has some abilities that let him do X, and then let an ally within Y squares make a basic attack. That's one case where you'd be able to use that particular aspect of eldritch blast, but otherwise it doesn't come into play.  Against a solo monster? Probably so. But remember that the typical 4E encounter is going to have at least one monster per hero, sometimes more if there are minions involved, so being invisible to someone close to you on their turn is big. It's basically "you can't attack me" insurance. Similarly, if you spend an action point to take another action, you could use that action to move and gain the benefits of that invisibility. Is eyebite more situational? Sure. But...it's an option you wouldn't even HAVE under the previous versions of the game. Also, it's important to note that the warlock is much squishier than the ranger, who gets the benefit of tougher armors, so he needs the occasional attack avoidance/deterrence ability to compensate for lower AC.Note: I pute in quote the question to which Gamescribe-Rodney Thompson or Mike Mearls are answering, the unquoted test is Gamescribe or Mearlshope it's clearer</blockquote>

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