The Essentials articles are atrocious.

[Crothian]

That's fine. But people who don't have the time or knowledge to optimize are getting poor advice from an optimization stand point from this article. People who don't "have the time" should instead be directed to CharOp forums, which take an equal amount of time to read and give better advice. See his point now?

Is the purpose of the articles specifically to help people/newbies min max? If that is not the point of the articles then his point is off point.

 

[fuzzlewump]

Besides, "atrocious"? Really? Why the melodrama? Can't you just say, "Hey, I disliked the article, someone please explain to me why you might have liked it?" And then to criticize those who did find the article useful and/or entertaining . . . it's just crass, really.

Atrocious is certainly a strong word, given that I love about half of the articles. But I'm not seeing anywhere where he is criticizing anything but the articles themselves.

I certainly see the "atrocious" word has made his point far more blunt than it needs to be, but it still remains. I mean, why give poor advice to players when better advice takes the same amount of time and effort? I mean, it's not like he's advocating to have a damage analysis on every power, but to say sure-strike is a good choice for anyone is poor advice.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

Optimize is to min/max as ethnic cleansing is genocide

 

[fuzzlewump]

Is the purpose of the articles specifically to help people/newbies min max? If that is not the point of the articles then his point is off point.

Yeah, definitely. I don't really know what the intent is, but if you're going to give a new player a stat array, you might as well make it a good one. When in D&D history has WotC just flat out given a stat array rather than advice on building one? It comes down to this issue where D&D has, by design, put in poor choices so that experts would have an advantage since they would know how to avoid them. Assuming that design is gone, the articles should have the best, or close to them, stat arrays available.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

Sure strike is a wizards favorite. There is a very internally focussed gaming culture at WIzards. They overvalue accuracy, for one quirk.

 

[Klaus]

Sure Strike + Exotic Weapon Fighting = Awesome power.

Sure Strike is a great power to fall back on when facing, say, solo soldiers or hobgoblins with Phalanx Fighter up the wazoo. +2 to hit in exchange for not adding Str to damage? Specially with low-accuracy, high damage weapons (including a few brutal ones)? Not a bad trade!

 

[dontmazemebro]

I have to agree with the sentiment of the original poster. While the powers of the Essentials articles have been much to my liking, the discussion of class features and ability score placement in these articles are borderline useless even for the greenest of players.

For example, the "Wizard Essentials: Secrets of the Spiral Tower" contains several pages of useless information. The discussion of the different implement mastery features is basically a rewording of the respective power's text. Furthermore, the discussion of ability score placement is quite elementary and non-informative.

 

[Nightson]

Sure Strike is overly maligned. The power is roughly two to three points less dpr then a melee basic at decent to high chance of hitting and it is up to two points more dpr then a melee basic at very low chance of hitting. But of course, the problem is generally the lack of riders since the other at-wills are what's being compared too.

Sure Strike offers very situational benefits which doesn't make it worth the at-will power slot you have to choose next to the other great fighter at-wills. But it's not a worthless power.

 

[Tallifer]

Whenever I read one of these articles about a class which I have actually played, I groan at the horrendous advice or shrug at the obvious tautologies.

However, whenever I read one of these articles which is about a class (eg. the barbarian or the warden) which neither I nor my friends have ever played or about which I have never taken the time to read, then I read with great interest: it is certainly quicker to read the article than to experiment on my own with a class.

Furthermore, while there are a few excellent amateur class guides out there (for example, for paladins, fighters, rangers and warlords), many are incomplete, out of date, badly organized, narrow in focus or sometimes even worse than one of these much maligned Essentials articles. (And, no, I could not do any better.)

 

[avin]

Have to agree with OP, is that information useful for people?