Visions of Avarice trivializes melee encounters?

[keterys]

Nah, it's cool. Just compare to Web, which is the same level and does almost the same thing and...

Wait, why are you laughing?

 

[shmoo2]

Effect: The power's area becomes a zone of illusory
treasure that lasts until the end of your next turn. Once
per turn, you can make the following attack, using the
zone as the origin square.
    Minor Action           Close burst 5
    Target: Each enemy in burst
    Attack: Intelligence vs. Will
    Hit: The zone pulls the target 3 squares. A target that ends
         this movement within the zone or adjacent to the zone is
          immobilized (save ends).
Sustain Minor: The zone persists. When you sustain the
power, you can repeat the attack as a minor action.

See how the indents work? Look at the effect: what is the "following attack" you get to make? What action does it take to make that attack?

How would you work out the actions for Mordenkainen’s Sword?
It seems like that power actually does include the attack in the sustain minor action, though it will probably require a move action to move adjacent to the target as well.

 

[KarinsDad]

Smells a bit fishy, eh?

Smells like a horse.

Wait, I already said that. Nevermind.

 

[Mistwell]

So are you trying to say that only actual experiences count? We cannot have a rational and informed discussion without actual experiences?

No.

I am trying to bring the thread back to the questions the OP asked. Since he reemphasized recently that he wants to hear from folks who have experienced this spell in actual play, I thought I would encourage people to report any actual experiences.

We all know that theory and practice sometimes differ on these boards. We've all seen people miscalculate the actual impact certain classes, feats, and powers have once the theory meets the gaming table. So, when the OP says he is just interested in actual experience with a power, and then says it again, I think it's fair to back him up and try to encourage folks to report actual experiences.

Since I presume you have a regular game, and since you are interested in this topic, I was hoping you (and others) would try to throw this spell into one of your sessions, and report back. That's all.

 

[keterys]

Remember... you can always throw it on an NPC, too.

 

[cdrcjsn]

Immobilizing foes is great against certain foes.

But even the eidolon/spider/minion encounter mentioned, a stinking cloud would've destroyed all minions without the need for an attack roll and done significant damage to the other two.

The problem with this spell in the Ediolon and the spider encounter is that they are melee only creatures.

What's the percentage of combats where you only have creatures with only one style of attack?

Locking down foes who can teleport, or have both ranged/melee attacks, or can pull creatures to them are not bothered by the spell at all.

It's a powerful spell, I agree. An immobilize effect is worth quite a bit in terms of the math for calculating powers. Does it trivialize encounters? Yes, against encounters with only melee types, but not all encounters are like that.

 

[keterys]

We were looking at the effects of immobilize in another thread at one point, and it's actually quite bothersome how effective immobilize is at heroic tier. At paragon less so, and at epic much less so.

But it's almost as bad as stunned (no combat advantage, and +2 to all defenses from total defense) for a startling number of creatures.

 

[Wolfwood2]

I've used it twice in actual play. There's no doubt it changes the terms of an encounter (as arguably a Daily should). However, all foes so far have had either a ranged back-up attack or been paired with a leader-type who could move them out of the effect.

 

[OchreJelly]

I don't know. I've seen the wall spells used to great effect (WoF and Blade Barrier) and they are only a few levels higher.

Wall spells tend to divide the battlefield by position. This spell seems to divide the battlefield by role. That is to say, artillery, controllers, and even skirmishers are less likely to be impacted by this spell (because they tend to be ranged attackers) than soldiers, brutes and lurkers.

Arguably a controller daily should really shake-up the flow of the battlefield.

 

[kerbarian]

Some data of my own:

It's been used twice in my campaign now. The first time it was used late in the encounter, and the effect was mostly that it immobilized a nearly-full-health melee elite for the rest of the fight. It never escaped and was unable to do anything useful for the rest of the encounter.

The second time it hit four melee enemies. Two of them ended up adjacent to each other and one freed the other with a heal check, so one got away. A ranged elite who wasn't in the area voluntarily went in to free another melee guy with a heal check. The other two melee enemies never escaped.

So the first time it single-handedly took an elite out of the battle, and the second time it took out two creatures plus cost many more actions (probably two full rounds of the entire enemy force) in time spent immobilized or attempting heal checks to free the other two.

So far, no creature has ever escaped Visions of Avarice without the help of a heal check from an ally.