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5 years ago ::
Aug 16, 2008 - 8:11PM
#1
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Ok, This thread is about the Char ops board general attitude on broken powers, feats, builds, effects.
I am not stateing there are no broken powers (cascade was indeed broken as just getting lucky could screw the epic last battle) I want to get that off the ground.
These things are in no way bad, but instead the top of thier catagory.
My issue is with the boards general attitude. If something is REALLY good at something (say top of the job) its automaticaly broken. This was said about the following things
30th Demigod Ulti (Assuming that you use the limited rolls from Pray/Elf)
Blood pulse
Sleep
Orb
Rain of blows
Bolstering blood
Seal of binding + devine regeneration (this is the only one thats on the fence)
Things I will agree were definately broken
Cascade.
Stuns, not the locks, the mechanic in general.
Seriously I have seen way too many people go "ZOMG crap my pants needs errata" When it just doesnt. This thread is about trying to stop that mentality. Alot of it sounds broken when you say it but just isnt when you do it.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 16, 2008 - 9:15PM
#2
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Date Joined:
Jun 28, 2005
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Good points. I agree mostly.
I think Blood Pulse is only borkd because of RAI vs RAW. A dumb ability anyway, but arguing 3D damage is clearly an auto DM-veto.
Rain of Blows though. Different story. No ambiguous wording. No interpretations required. Simply overpowered. WotC tried, foolishly, to balance this power by imposing strict requirements, but...epic fail. It simply opens up the door for too much abuse of buff powers to drastically increase DPR.
IMHO.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 16, 2008 - 9:19PM
#3
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Ok, This thread is about the Char ops board general attitude on broken powers, feats, builds, effects.
I am not stateing there are no broken powers (cascade was indeed broken as just getting lucky could screw the epic last battle) I want to get that off the ground.
These things are in no way bad, but instead the top of thier catagory.
My issue is with the boards general attitude. If something is REALLY good at something (say top of the job) its automaticaly broken. This was said about the following things
30th Demigod Ulti (Assuming that you use the limited rolls from Pray/Elf)
Blood pulse
Sleep
Orb
Rain of blows
Bolstering blood
Seal of binding + devine regeneration (this is the only one thats on the fence)
Things I will agree were definately broken
Cascade.
Stuns, not the locks, the mechanic in general.
Seriously I have seen way too many people go "ZOMG crap my pants needs errata" When it just doesnt. This thread is about trying to stop that mentality. Alot of it sounds broken when you say it but just isnt when you do it.
This "broke" thing come from the sense of a general balance among the characters in 4th edition.
Not to get to much on the subject... cause it will be hard to explain. But this sense of brokeness is directly related to the emphasys on balance of the 4th edition.
I am not saying this balance emphasys is good or bad. It is diferent... somehow interesting and disgusting(for me, IMO).
The balance make you able to compare everything. When you compare, you see what is broke.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 16, 2008 - 9:46PM
#4
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Date Joined:
Aug 31, 2007
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I'm so freakin' glad someone made this thread. Everytime I step into a forum and scan the list to see "Wizards are Broken!" "Righteous Brand is Broken!" "Mage Hand is Broken!" "Shadow Step is Broken!" I want to post an angry, profanity-ridden response.
Thank you for opening up the discussion.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 16, 2008 - 10:08PM
#5
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I'm not sure what this has to do with the thread title, but all right.
My issue is with the boards general attitude. If something is REALLY good at something (say top of the job) its automaticaly broken.
Strange. The attitude I've seen has been that a thing is broken if it is too good. If it trivializes challenges, bypasses entire portions of the system, or enables results that are wildly out of proportion to the incurred costs (incl. opportunity costs), then it might be called broken. Powers can be very strong and very attractive without creating instabilities in the balance of the game system. When powers do that, they are problematic and need to be fixed.
This was said about the following things
30th Demigod Ulti (Assuming that you use the limited rolls from Pray/Elf)
Blood pulse
Sleep
Orb
Rain of blows
Bolstering blood
Seal of binding + devine regeneration (this is the only one thats on the fence
And for good reason. Each of those has been demonstrated to fall outside the normal expected parameters for what a power of similar level is capable of doing. What's more, many of them take advantage of imprecise or nonintuitive wording to achieve results that are 1) not apparent from an initial reading of the power, and 2) extreme in comparison to other powers that are supposed to be competitive with them.
Example: Sleep wouldn't be broken if damage woke the target up like every other example of unconsciousness in the game. But since that's not the case, a failed save against Sleep means that the whole party can Coup de Grace the target in the next turn, likely killing it outright. That makes it tantamount to a save-or-die, which the designers explicitly said they wanted to do away with in this edition. It is accurate to call such a thing broken.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 16, 2008 - 10:13PM
#6
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Date Joined:
Sep 18, 2007
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I'm so freakin' glad someone made this thread. Everytime I step into a forum and scan the list to see "Wizards are Broken!" "Righteous Brand is Broken!" "Mage Hand is Broken!" "Shadow Step is Broken!" I want to post an angry, profanity-ridden response.
Thank you for opening up the discussion.
That's not 'general consensus of the Char Op boards'. That's called idiocy. Easiest way to tell if someone is an idiot about what they're declaring broken is if they use an anecdote. I'm sure many of those did. People find one particular power/combination and start yelling about how said combo is broken, because it's good. It's only broken if it literally breaks very important restrictions on the game.
Ok, This thread is about the Char ops board general attitude on broken powers, feats, builds, effects.
I am not stateing there are no broken powers (cascade was indeed broken as just getting lucky could screw the epic last battle) I want to get that off the ground.
These things are in no way bad, but instead the top of thier catagory.
My issue is with the boards general attitude. If something is REALLY good at something (say top of the job) its automaticaly broken. This was said about the following things
30th Demigod Ulti (Assuming that you use the limited rolls from Pray/Elf)
Blood pulse
Sleep
Orb
Rain of blows
Bolstering blood
Seal of binding + devine regeneration (this is the only one thats on the fence)
Things I will agree were definately broken
Cascade.
Stuns, not the locks, the mechanic in general.
Seriously I have seen way too many people go "ZOMG crap my pants needs errata" When it just doesnt. This thread is about trying to stop that mentality. Alot of it sounds broken when you say it but just isnt when you do it.
Things that I believe are so powerful as to be considered 'broken':
- pre-errata Blade Cascade (by the way, the 'getting lucky' thing you mentioned is ignorable and not a reason for it being broken, as it is extremely unlikely. It's the ability to make your hit chance extremely high that made it broken as it was written.)
- Stun-locking (I have no idea what you were saying, since stun-locking is clearly broken, but stunning as a mechanic is debatable. I think it isn't)
- SoB (Divine Regeneration just enables it, but any sufficiently good regen and/or damage reduction would do)
- Demigod Capstone
- Orb at high levels (this sort of fits under stun-locking, actually. it's only good because of the amazing effects you can make very hard to save against)
Bolstering Blood is just way too good with powers that do damage many times, (not broken) I think Blood Pulse is fair without Bolstering Blood shenanigans, (not saying it's not awesomely powerful, but I don't think it's overpowered, especially as it's a team-based effort that makes it so good) Sleep is just awesome, (not overpowered, but awesome) and Rain of Blows is very overpowered.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 17, 2008 - 1:25AM
#7
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I'm curious as to under which conditions stun locking becomes broken.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 17, 2008 - 1:30AM
#8
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Date Joined:
Sep 26, 2005
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*sigh* People need to learn something. There's no such thing as purely theoretical optimization. If you can do it, people WILL do it. In any event: 30th Demigod Ulti (Assuming that you use the limited rolls from Pray/Elf)
Blood pulse
Sleep
Orb
Rain of blows
Bolstering blood
Seal of binding + devine regeneration (this is the only one thats on the fence)
In order:
Level 30 Demigod epic feature: BROKEN. It is broken simply by someone doing the most obvious thing with it, using the same encounter power over and over again. Be it a stunning power, a power which grants extra actions, a power which heals without healing surge expenditures, it doesn't really matter. These obvious uses are broken, even without doing something weird.
Blood Pulse: BROKEN. It deals far too much damage to large and larger creatures, and even against medium creatures it deals too much damage for a power of its level. It should be fixed.
Sleep: Not broken. The problem is the Orb, and really, Sleep is hard to abuse compared to other stuff. Save ends one effect powers are far more abusable with it, as with Sleep, they've got to fail that initial save to lock them down without actions.
Orb: BROKEN. The problem is that it applies for multiple rounds. If it applied for only one round, it'd be fine. It doesn't, so it is broken. And again, the obivous thing to do with it (in fact, really the only thing to do with it) is what is broken about it. There's no non-broken purpose; permanently inflicting temporary status ailments is simply broken. It also is pretty unfun in actual play, pretty much for exactly that reason - locking stuff down under status ailments forever isn't particularly fun, even if it is powerful.
Rain of Blows: Overpowered. It does way too much damage, and should be fixed. Again, the obvious thing to do with it is the problem; there's really nothing secret about why it is too good.
Seal of Binding: BROKEN. This power doesn't require divine regeneration to be broken. It doesn't require anything to be broken. It is inherently broken, in and of itself. People talk about it in conjunction with Divine Regeneration, but the reality is that Divine Regeneration is pretty much irrelevant to it. Its inherently broken, and there's no non-broken usage. It single-handedly locks down a foe indefinitely. Its just plain old bad design.
So in short, you're wrong. Most of them are broken, and most of them are obviously so or even have no non-broken usage (orb of imposition, Seal of Binding).
I'm curious as to under which conditions stun locking becomes broken.
All. Action advantage is the real currency here, and as such, stun locking is inherently broken as it allows you to gain action advantage at a rate of .6 (or more) actions per round per character.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 17, 2008 - 1:49AM
#9
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Date Joined:
Jul 30, 2008
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Wow, great argument TD. You've certainly convinced me.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 17, 2008 - 7:55AM
#10
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1) I dont totaly agree with TD. Because I am talking about practical uses for them in actual games.
2) BB + BP Does not deal an excessive amount of damage if just you are pushing them(Due to spending a surge), and as such if the team in a way "Agrees" to break it then its not broken unless the table wants it to be.
3) Orb is not broken but instead just the top choice, The damage at epic for spending a daily using the orb to lock a regular 1/encounter is not broken but instead is changeing the mechanics of dailys.
4) Demigods capstone, Excluding infinate rerolls this is not broken because spaming stuns still 1, has to hit 2, you spend all you actions doing that.
5) Seal of binding does not deal too much damage, it is yet another case of simply being the best solo remover.
6) People scream broken at the best power for doing a specific job, Well the next power down will eventualy be ok but how many powers will you go before that happens?
Examples
Cascade was the best solo killer, now its SoB + demigod.
BP + BB is the best AOE damage, trying to balance itself by self damage.
Sleep is a low level 2 save to unconcious (effectivly) Essentialy a low level stun
Rain of blows allows you to hit with an amazing encounter power in exchange for using an otherwise subpar whepon
Orb is simply the best of the 3 choices, even though its not the only 1 that applies to multiple rolls (Staff)
In short, this is about people like TD going "ZOMG THIS DOES SOMETHING ABOVE POWERLEVEL ZOMGS BROKED!" Which is essentialy the problem at really high levels its like before the game yes degenerates into high power mush, but thats all DND, which is why DMs simply have to be smarter and build actual groups based on the party.
The problem is the definition of broken by some is just not broken in actual play. Examples
1) I orb a Normal in a 5 normal epic encounter. Ok, so I spent a daily on an encounter of normals, thats fine, not broken just really good.
2) I Seal of binding the BBEG and regen, well his aura + the random minions that (insert DMs plot hook) popup next to me with different damage auras
3) BB + BP wow, ok lets spend a healing surge to deal about 100 damage to 25% of the monsters, over damaged yah but also self damage.
4) Rain of blows, Really good, but the next most damaging power is not as good but just because its the best doesnt mean it needs errata.
Simply put
The best =/= Broken every time.
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