The Devil's in the Details: Slavicsek reveals the Pit Fiend in all its glory

[catsclaw227]

I do not regard adding cleric powers to a Fire Giant to be "ultra-cheesy" in any way whatsoever. It is a hundred time more elegant and less cheesy than the tortured and contrived methods that had to be used in previous editions. I simply cannot forget the various Giant high priests I've seen in 3e adventures with 3-5 levels of cleric, because every time the designer added a cleric level, saving throws, BAB and hitpoints all increased. If you want to somehow feel balance is kept, you could always lower the melee attack bonus and any remove any special melee attacks from the Fire Giant description before you added the cleric levels.

I am thinking that we can take a cue from Bo9S about how powers are handled by "adding" levels of cleric (or wizard, etc). If you add a single cleric level, it's possible that 1/2 all other levels are added to the cleric to determine its power level. so a 26th level Pit Fiend with 1 cleric level might make it 14 level with regards to the kinds of powers it can use (and spells). I could be wrong though...

 

[FireLance]

You may be making an invalid assumption here though. The mace damage might be considered Fire AND weapon, and only if you are resistant to BOTH those things will you be ignoring the damage.

So Fred with fire resistance still takes the 1d12+11 damage (but doesn't catch fire). Ghosty mcGhost who doesn't take any weapon damage still takes 1d12+11 fire damage from a blow.

That seems a more likely assumption to me than your assumption that the damage is entirely Fire and can be entirely absorbed by fire resistance.

Interesting interpretation. I think you may be right.

 

[catsclaw227]

While it's true that the weapon does "1d12+11 fire damage", it's tagged as "Fire, Weapon". Whatever that means. Plane Sailing's theory was that it did both types of damage for purposes of resisting it, kinda like how a 3.5e morningstar works with its bludgeoning and piercing damage.

Bingo.

 

[Wolfspider]

Fair enough. But I do think that some of the opinions are unreasonable. For example, complaining that +X swords are still in the game. Of course they are still in the game. D&D would no longer be D&D without +X swords. Its like complaining that a new Star Wars movie still has Jedi in it.

So when I have to wade through complaints that I feel are unreasonable, it makes me less tolerant of other complaints that are reasonable.

Why is the +whatever sword a sacred cow that can't be slaughtered while other things that have been around for decades (gnomes, alignment) can freely be slaughtered?

I think that the unreasonable complaint you cite is quite reasonable in this light.

 

[Dausuul]

Why is the +whatever sword a sacred cow that can't be slaughtered while other things that have been around for decades (gnomes, alignment) can freely be slaughtered?

I think that the unreasonable complaint you cite is quite reasonable in this light.

I agree, frankly--I've wanted to see the +X item gone since the days of second edition. But I suppose the sacred beef processing plant can only handle so many carcasses at once. Maybe 5E will see the end of them.

 

[Shroomy]

If you could post a summary description of them when you get a chance, that would help; I've never even seen a copy of FC2, much less read it!

In 3.5e, Legion Devils are a type of low-level foot soldier (CR 3), but I can see that they have traits of 4e development because they are designed to work together as a group. For instance:

*All the legion devils within 100 feet of each other, combine and share hit points.
*All the legion devils use the highest saving throw if more than one is targeted by an effect.
*They essentially have a hive mind against mind-affecting effects (all fail or all succeed at the saving throw).
*For every legion devil within 60 feet, each legion devils gains a +4 bonus to their attack roll.
*A legion devil can teleport to a space next to another legion devil within 100 feet.

They also have big left arms that provide a shield bonus and bash attack, as well as the ability to summon more legion devils. This makes me wonder what a 4e level 21 version will be like!

 

[Voss]

They (legion devils) are badly written and way under-CRed. If there are more than 2 of them, they pretty much hit automatically (+4/devil) and unless you hit them with save or dies, they keep going and going and going.

Hopefully, they are completely re-written for 4e, because the 3e version is either 1 or 2 that are mere speedbumps, or large groups that are total TPKs.

 

[Shroomy]

I thought that the +4 to hit/devil thing was way wonky when I read it too.

 

[Peter LaCara]

It's cheesy because:
a)If you play a fire giant cleric, you won't be built that way. At all. Ditto any other monster race.

Yeah. So what?

b)Players might well want to know how they can get 'just the cool powers' like the faux-cleric they just fought.

You don't tell the players that. They never need to know. I guarantee they won't be able to tell the difference if you don't tell them.

c)It's hard to work out interactions between pseudo-caster powers and adding class levels, which we know WILL be possible in 4e.
d)It's a cheap, lazy, shortcut to design. It's saying, "Well, wizards do what...cast fireballs, right? So we'll give this hobgoblin a few extra hit dice and say he can cast a 5d6 fireball 3/day, and, uh, let's see, mage armor 1/day, on himself. Presto! Hobgoblin wizard!"

I honestly don't see anything wrong with that.

I mean, I can see the appeal as a freelancer.

I see the appeal as a friggin' DM.

I could fill a huge book with all sorts of pseudo-classed monsters while doing very little work besides thinking up the idea and some basic playtesting. (Based on my work on Mongoose's monster book, thinking up a cool (IMHO) monster takes about 1/4th as long as statting it out 3x style. Or is that the point?)

 

[Voss]

You don't tell the players that. They never need to know. I guarantee they won't be able to tell the difference if you don't tell them.
.

Maybe the newbies won't. The experienced players will blink in unison and tell you you're playing it wrong.

You don't really think that experienced gamers don't read the DMG and MM, do you?