The new, shiny "Stuff I Have/Would Ban" thread!

[brassbaboon]

Heh.

Moving right along, what do other people think of the dragonshard augments that got added? +1/+3/+5 damage to lightning or radiant or implement powers with a weapon.

Or the warlock armor that gives them combat advantage whenever shadow walking.

Or anything other than armbands, really.

Heh, yeah, let's talk about other items that break the "secondary slot" rules or otherwise unbalance things.

Just a quick question. With more and more splat books coming out, do you think this problem is going to get better or worse?

 

[keterys]

Heh, yeah, let's talk about other items that break the "secondary slot" rules or otherwise unbalance things.

Absolutely. That is the entire point of the thread.

Just a quick question. With more and more splat books coming out, do you think this problem is going to get better or worse?

To be honest, so far it seems like it's amazingly good. I'm shocked how few 'this is broken' threads I see so far. Sure, each book has a small handful of things that rock the boat, but it's trivial to allow them or not.

One of my games I give extra* random treasure out and I like how I can keep adding on sheet after sheet of random treasure as it's released. It's pretty darn cool.

* As in, literally just extra - they get it for doing cool things and for playing quickly

 

[Ryujin]

Heh.

Moving right along, what do other people think of the dragonshard augments that got added? +1/+3/+5 damage to lightning or radiant or implement powers with a weapon.

Or the warlock armor that gives them combat advantage whenever shadow walking.

Or anything other than armbands, really.

As a player, I like them. Throw something on my Longsword of Summer that will do +3 stackable damage every time that I use a fire attack, which is EVERY attack? Perfect.

As a DM I'll feel free to disallow them as my campaign is running in The Realms, not Eberron.

 

[brassbaboon]

Absolutely. That is the entire point of the thread.

To be honest, so far it seems like it's amazingly good. I'm shocked how few 'this is broken' threads I see so far. Sure, each book has a small handful of things that rock the boat, but it's trivial to allow them or not.

One of my games I give extra* random treasure out and I like how I can keep adding on sheet after sheet of random treasure as it's released. It's pretty darn cool.

* As in, literally just extra - they get it for doing cool things and for playing quickly

OK, I'll stop beating on the limitations of the game mechanics. I do think the pressure to put out money making splat books is a tremendous pressure on the design team and that will inevitably lead to more unbalanced items as they find it more and more difficult to come up with "flavor" items that have the right balance but still offer something different than what already exists. Banned lists may be small now, but I suspect they will grow rapidly.

 

[Obryn]

OK, so the problem isn't that they provide a +2, but that they are "secondary slot items" and therefore should not provide damage bonuses that stack with weapons or feats. That's the sum total of your argument then.

I. simply. disagree.

Alright. Conversation over, then. We've reached an impasse. Fortunately, since I neither play in your game, nor you in mine, we don't need to go further than that.

In fact, this is a primary example of what I mean when I say the game is fundamentally unsound. Everything about the game mechanic is arbitrarily twisted around this goal of maintaining some artificial balance to the point that the rules no longer make any SENSE. They're just rules for the sake of rules. And they are so obviously absurd that the GAME'S OWN DESIGNERS don't even understand or adhere to them.

No, you DON'T "get it." It's not about ME. It's about a game system that is so arbitrary and unsound that THE GAME'S OWN DESIGNERS can't stick to the "rules" you think exist. I say again. I. Didn't. Create. The. Iron. Armbands. Of. Power. I really didn't. It wasn't me. It was WIZARDS OF THE COAST. You know, the guys who MADE the rules.

All I'm doing is pointing out the REASON for this is because the game mechanic is fundamentally unsound. If it was fundamentally sound THEY WOULDN'T HAVE MADE THESE ITEMS. Or the other items that are being discussed. The problem isn't that someone created some item, the problem is that the rules are so arbitrary and unreasonable that the game designers themselves are obviously not sticking to them. If your analysis of this is so obviously correct, why hasn't Wizards simply errata'd the items out of existence? (Along with everything else that breaks the same rules?)

I'll tell you why. BECAUSE IT CONFLICTS WITH THEIR MARKETING STRATEGY.

...ookay.

I think you might find more mileage out of this argument either on another board, or in another subforum of this board. Or, follow the handy Edition War Flowchart linked on the front page!

I'll just say that I disagree with your premise that any and every item that WotC makes improves the 4e game experience for every table. Frankly, while I think WotC has an outstanding track record this edition, they're not perfect. If you want to talk about false marketing-strategy-related ideas, I'd add "DMs should use everything WotC wrote, without hesitation, because they wrote it" right in! If they're selling that line, you seem to have bought it!

-O

 

[Obryn]

Heh, yeah, let's talk about other items that break the "secondary slot" rules or otherwise unbalance things.

Yes, please!

Just a quick question. With more and more splat books coming out, do you think this problem is going to get better or worse?

Hmm... Both?

I think that, as the design team gets more proficient, they are going to have fewer major missteps. You can already see a narrowing of focus in Arcane and Divine power - whereas in the PHB1 and in Martial Power, most of the feats applied to anything you did; in AP and DP, the feats are limited to, say, your Wizard powers. Or your Invoker powers.

So I think they've better learned to firewall options. Whether or not that's good, I have no idea.

I also see a general trend towards less outlandish stuff. Note that most of the stuff I listed was all released within the first few months of 4e, and was probably in production before or shortly after release.

With that said, option creep is inevitable in any continually-supported game line. It was a huge issue in 3.5 by the middle of its production run, and I'm sure it will be an issue with 4e as well.

Personally, I'm thrilled that my list only needed to be as long as it is. I call that a net win for WotC.

-O

 

[Umbran]

Need I mention that bashing 4e is not acceptable behavior in the 4e forums? Well, apparently I must. But don't expect another warning, folks.

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

The warlock armor is in AV2 - I believe it's 10/15/20/25/30 for levels, and yeah... it's very powerful indeed. It's also put on warlocks who could arguably use a boost. Not sure if it's viable to do things like have a rogue/warlock use it to always have combat advantage, or if that's even a real problem.

Yeah, Warlocks could use the boost, though giving them an item that basically becomes a "must have" leads to the whole IAoP argument - so I don't think an item fix is the way to deal with the warlock unless there are other armours that are as appealing.

That said, I don't see it as a big problem for multiclassing between rogue/warlock, as rogue->warlock doesn't get the shadow walk ability, and for warlock->rogue it basically just gets him sneak attack twice per encounter, which isn't horrible. It is a big deal for a hybrid, though, which is something to consider if you have such a hybrid in your campaign.