Utility Recharge Bias

[Leatherhead]

When picking out your characters utility powers, do you have any preference for daily, encounter, or at-will powers?

I find myself drawn to encounter utilities. I like being able to use my powers whenever rather than save them for the boss or when things go pair-shaped, and at-wills tend to be minor bonuses without the dramatic effect that an encounter power can have.

 

[EroGaki]

I don't actually play 4E anymore, but I liked utility powers above all, mainly because they were more useful and/or interesting than at wills, and usable more often than dallies.

 

[Iron Sky]

Encounter powers hit the sweet spot between power and usability. In our group, half of the days we have combat, we don't even end up using our dallies since we're saving them for "something harder than this."

In my experience, unless an At-will is power to the point of nearly unbalanced(the rogue jump-delimiter at-will comes to mind), they tend to be about the power level of feats, you just have to pay a power "slot" for them.

Rarely is a daily utility so powerful that I say "I just need that" rather than a decent encounter.

 

[Stalker0]

Definately encounter.

To me far too often the daily utilities do not have enough bang for their buck to really be elevated from an encounter power.

There are some good ones. Bless/Shield of Faith - Those are awesome utility dailies.

Feather fall? Not so much.

 

[Scholar & Brutalman]

I chose "None of them in general." Sure, an encounter can be used more often than a daily, but an awesome daily is better than a weak encounter. Awesomeness wins!

 

[Cadfan]

I don't tend towards anything in particular. I emotionally lean to encounter or at will, but then I actually read the powers and frequently find a daily that's just too good to pass by. A lot of daily encounter powers sort of define the encounter for you, and its hard to give that up.

 

[mach1.9pants]

100% encounter, and at wills if they are any good (like aforementioned Rge one). We normally do 8 to 10 encounters a day so dailies are no where near enough. The players don't mind cos I introduced this house rule: 'After you have rolled all relevant dice for your daily power (first round used) you can decide to no apply those effects. Your daily is not expended but you loose that action. The daily power cannot be attempted again in this encounter"

 

[wedgeski]

Encounter powers, but I do enjoy front-loading the hit bonuses from my fellow PC's for a round or two before unloading a Daily. As a DM I also enjoy watching that strategy at the table.

 

[Baron Opal]

'After you have rolled all relevant dice for your daily power (first round used) you can decide to no apply those effects. Your daily is not expended but you loose that action. The daily power cannot be attempted again in this encounter"

Interesting rule. I was kicking around an idea where you could use encounter or dailes as often as you wanted, but you had to roll an 15+ first for an encounter or a 20 for a daily. That represented the chance to "make an opening" and use the ability for free. Otherwise, you could just use the ability at least once per encounter or day as you wished. Haven't gotten to trying that yet, however. We play too infrequently for that kind of mechanical overhaul.

To respond to the OP, I definately lean towards encounter abilities. I usually see them as more applicable to uses outside of combat and can rationalize their use easier that way.

 

[Minigiant]

Daily & Encounter powers.
A good daily can save you or really boost effeciency.
But encounters are generally most best.