Why the Warlord is SO Flippin Frustratin
There's a very simple method to fix silly players.
If they do dumb things, they shouldn't expect support from the support class.
Except none of them NEED your support. Not for their at-wills to operate at 100% effectiveness and power. Sure you can give em that boost to 120%, but they don't need you to work with them to be reasonably or even exceptionally good at their job. Although there are a few poor at-wills among the other classes, no other class will have a harder time finding a chance to use it's at-wills and make em work to full strength than the Warlord. None. If you're playing a Warlord, you NEED at least one other PC to be very actively positioning themselves in regard to your powers. Probably more than one if you want your encounter and daily powers to have their full, mathematically expected benefit on the encounter.
The problem with the Warlord is he NEEDS the party's cooperation, not the other way around. Or his powers are operating at 70%.
In order for Wolf Pack Tactics to be worth anything there HAS to be an ally who wants to shift one square (and I don't have the books with me but don't they have to be adjacent to you or the target enemy as well?) Through 4 encounters with a Warlord I think this happened... well... NEVER. I would say, "Does anyone need to shift one?", the response was always,"No, stop wasting time trying to find the slim chance that we need your power and make a basic attack".
The same is true for Commander's Strike, Viper's Strike, and Furious Smash. Another character HAS to be ADJACENT to the Warlord and/or his target. Not even nearby, not previously next to the Warlord 3 spaces behind him because the Warlord had a higher initiative and needed to put the moster down before it kills the ranger, but ADJACENT. The cleric needs an ally somewhere in the battle for his powers to get their full effect, a reasonable condition for a leader. The Warlord needs an ally somewhere they won't be most the time. Where they can't be much of the time even if they are trying to work with him.
I would say the Cleric power Priest's Shield suffers from this a bit as well, but at least that power gives a +1 bonus to AC to the Cleric as well as an adjacent ally so even if there is no buddy adjacent the power is still always better than a basic attack. Priest's Shield also has the benefit of the +1 to AC being against any subsequent attack, not just from the enemy just hit. This makes it actually fun to use against minions. Just try using Viper's Strike against a minion and tell me you had fun.
There may even be a friendly helpful player who knows how all your powers work but there just isn't any good the power could in that situation. There are some powers other classes have like the Rogue's Deft Strike that may not be useful every turn. If the Rogue is adjacent to the target he want's to attack then it is as little use as Wolf Pack Tactics. But imagine if the Rogue needed an ally next to the target he wants to make a Deft Strike towards! Obviously there are times when this is possible, but it would be a severe limitation on the power, reducing it's utility as an at-will and causing frustrations in the Rogue player when he wants to move 2 squares and attack a target but can't, because none of his allies had positioned themselves where the co-dependant rogueneeded em.
Heck, Viper's Strike feels like a Riposte Strike that has had this exact limitation put on it. Only the triggering condition is even less likely to happen in the first place.
And I'd like to point out that this dissatisfaction with the Warlord and his at-will powers has nothing to with him being a "support" class. I don't want to play a stirker, defender, or controller. I understand that their has to be some separation between the Warlord's attack and the benefit it grants going to an ally. Otherwise his powers would have to be weaker because they're more versatile. Or his powers would just be better than everyone else's cause not only can he use them, but so can somebody else.
For example, the way to improve Commander's Strike would not be for the Warlord to be able to use it on himself, because that would make it flat out better than several other classes' powers like the Paladin's Holy Strike or the Rogue's Sly Flourish; which are essentially a basic attack with another ability modifier bonus to damage. The way to make Commander's Strike a better power would be to give it a range of 5. This wouldn't increase Commander's Strike's mathematical effect on the battle, but it would greatly increase it's ease of use.
Like the Cleric's amazing Rightous Brand, the Warlord's at-will powers should have a range of 5 or better as a general rule. This wouldn't make them more powerful when they go off, it would just increase the meager chances the Warlord currently has of being able to do anything other than a basic attack. I feel like the designers just hated the Warlord since a Cleric has two at-wills that can give a bonust to any ally the Cleric can see, one at-will that gives a bonuse to the Cleric AND an adjacent ally at once, and one at-will that despite being a melee attack, still gives an AMAZING BONUS USING THE PRIMARY ABILITY SCORE to an ally within 5 squares. Furious Smash might attack Fortitude and give its bonus to non-melee attacks, but it does half as much or less damage initially, uses a non-primary ability score, and works on only one attack as well as being much harder to set up.
So in short, it's not so much that the Warlords powers are mathematically weaker than the Cleric's or other classes' powers, but that they are SO much harder to find a chance to use. Mostly because of their limited range and awkward requirements that an ally be positioned just right. Which is assuming the power didn't have a somewhat limited usefulness to begin with. Useful sometimes sure, but I'd bet the math behind the game assumes Viper's Strike will provoke an opportunity attack a LOT more often than actually happens.
Heck, I bet the game assumes that a succesful Furious Smash will always be followed up by an attack from an ally. Or that it is just as easy to set up a Commander's Strike as a Reaping Strike. I think it was James Wyatt who said the game assumes the Rogue has Combat Advantage every turn for him to keep up in damage dealing with the Ranger. The Warlord has a similar problem compared to the Cleric, only much, much worse. The Warlord just can't possibly use his powers well as often as the Game Balance God's assume he can.
) and I never intend to make that mistake again.
