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Aug 14, 2012 -- 9:03AM, lokiare wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 9:01AM, SleepsInTraffic wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 8:08AM, lokiare wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 7:49AM, Seerow wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 7:43AM, lokiare wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 7:37AM, Seerow wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 7:36AM, Maxperson wrote:

Aug 14, 2012 -- 7:30AM, lokiare wrote:

Ok, go with grease then. With bounded accuracy its going to basically have the same effect it had in 3.xE which was to take anything without a high dex out of the fight and combined with stinking cloud makes it easy to trap up to 25 creatures in a damage zone... By level 5 the Wizard gets grease like 4 times if they want it. The round before it wears off the Wizard just pops another one. So thats up to 4 minutes worth of stinking cloud damage which is 220-440 still enough to take out anything in the packet...

also by the end of it, if they are bored they can light a torch and throw it into the mix...

First, the ONLY thing that made grease the terror it was in 3e was the armor check penalties.  Second, grease never took anything out of an entire fight.  You simply crawled out of the area.  In 5e, if you have an 18 int, you are looking at a DC 14 dex save.  Not terribly hard even with a 0 dex modifier. 

It's still going to get you stuck there for 3 rounds on average if you keep trying to get up and walk out. But yeah, crawling out still looks like it's a viable option.

Nope, go read crawl in the "How to Play", then go back and read grease again. You can try to crawl, but it won't matter as soon as you start moving you still have to make the save and lose all movement if you fail. So its even worse than 3.xE because if you keep failing your saves you ain't going nowhere...

This one is more open to interpretation. By my reading Grease makes you "fall prone and lose the rest of your move" if you move within the area. The 'and' there being the key word, where one is contingent on the other. If you don't fall prone (because you are already prone), you aren't losing your movement.

Of course I could easily see it interpreted the other way as well. But unlike with Hold Person, I don't see this one as clear-cut. 

Crawling clearly is a form of move (its in the move section of the chapter). If you move you have to make the save if you fail you are knocked prone and lose all of your move. Proning doesn't stack with prone because its from the same spell, but the losing all the move part does come into play.

It seems pretty clear cut to me...

You cannot be knocked prone if you already are prone.  It is a yes no variable.  You already have prone set to yes. It can't be set to yes again.  Can't fall prone can't lose your movement.

You can lose your movement. Its pretty clear if you try to move you must make a save, if you fail the save you are knocked prone and lose the rest of your move.

If the two were separate how would they word it? exactly how they worded it now...

"If it fails it falls prone and loses the rest of its move"

"Falls prone and loses the rest of its move", can't fall prone means you can't "fall prone and..." anything, you are already prone.  Any additional effects of the effect of being knocked prone, like losing the rest of your move, can't take place.  Basically the way it is written it takes the effect, "falls prone and loses the rest of its move", and puts it in parens if you can't satisfy part of it, falling prone, you can't have any of it happen.  If it said "on a failed save it loses the rest of its move and then is knocked prone if not already prone", Then there would be a problem. 

if they needed to make a change to clarify things it would be this simple
 
"If it fails it falls prone and then loses the rest of its move" can't do step one (falling prone) then step two (losing your movement) can't follow it.

Aug 13, 2012 -- 8:27PM, bone_naga wrote:

You're still treating roles as more strict than they really are. You're also thinking too narrowly to realize that sometimes there's another way to do what you are trying to accomplish. I can't think of any character concepts I've seen that weren't possible under 4e rules. For example, the striker "fighter" you described could be done rather easily as a ranger, but you're too focused on class names rather than concepts.

 



Yes, You could, But it defeats the purpose of Playing a Fighter, as for not marking the target, Abandoning a class feature is rarely a good thing.  I simply say break Role away from class Let there be a choice, For every class what role you want to fill, And it would be a long stride back to where it needs to be. 

Your definition of Concept and mine are very different here.  I define concept Perhaps more tightly A fighter is a disciplined trained warrior WHo dedicated his life to becoming a weapon.  A ranger is a Woodsman, WHo has no formal training but has rather picked up a series of tricks and manuvers that work for him, SO in those lights it very much violates concept.



Simply Put a class represents to me a concept, Woodsman, Highly trained combatant, Holy knight, etc.  Role dictates function, If you split them up then at least you can play to the concept you want and fill the role you want.  So With out trading the COncept the class represents, It is impossible to escape your Role.  Simply put this is the single most limiting thing in 4e and conversly the strongest part of 3.x in my experience.  Even prior to that this was a lot more flexible.  Since the "Striker" classes Either didn't exist, Got 2 weapon fighting and a handful of Semi useless spells which sure could be optimised or Backstab x2-5 Sure these bumps were helpful, but not hard fast rigid rules imposed by the designer to hold a class in it's place. 


Another example, I like the concept of the white robe Mage in Krynn, But I HATE the controller role.  (Don't get me started on how big a nerf 4E wizard has over a 3.5 Solid control build mage. THat would be edition waring)  My only Choice?  A warlock, Slinging curses, Making pacts with beings beyond, and COmpletely shredding the concept I want to play.  I did look into Both the hybrid and Multi classing but to the complete discredit of the system the classes are largely incompatible due to the wording of the Warlock's striker bump making it only work on That class's powers.  Effectively ruining any possible chance of creating the concept in the role I want to play. Ultimately the lack of choice of role in the class ruins a Concept Because the game designers do not want it.


Ultimately I would like a solution I would like to see to this is Class determines Base abilities, Then Feat trees (requiring Prerequisites to progress to the next rank as opposed to being openly available to any one with attribute X at rank y)  Refine these abilities into one of several possible roles. 


Also All forms of flexibility have been lost Even with Essentials.  I remember games where the Cleric Died from a save or Suck early and The druid had to pick up the Healer/leader role despite being entirely statted and feat chosen to be a shifting striker, Using his forms and abilities to deal huge amounts of damage.  Of course after the mage dropped a limited wish and brought back the Cleric after a rest, and the game went on from there, with much teasing of the player for having a seven con and failing his save against Finger of death.  You really can't do that in 4e ANd Honestly I feel it takes a layer of depth from every class.