Assassinate needs clarification: it should read that you may only use the ability when a target is not aware of your attack instead of presence.
Sneak Attack needs to be reworked from the ground up; it should be something like this: you gain advantage when you attack a foe that is adjecent to one of your allies. (In other words, make assassinate the sneak up and kill them like a lurker power, and make sneak attack the power that makes you attack in sneaky ways so that you can get advantage more often.)
Magic missile is a little overpowered: the spell should note that cover stops a creature from being a valid target to this spell (so that creatures without a shield spell can try and defend themselves from it as well).
Trap the Soul needs to be rewritten: it is both horribly overpowered, and too expensive to ever use unless you can use it in a situation where it is overpowered. This spell needs to be rewritten from scratch.
Wish should not be able to make uncommon or rare magical items without a magical McGuffin: I am fine with the spell making such magical items if the player has also undergone some quest/story related experience during which the DM gives the player a magical McGuffin that allows the caster to use the spell to make such an item. But, no player should ever be able to make such an item without DM approval, let alone make such an item once per day.
Polymorph still seems overpowered: I am not sure what else to say about this one.
Glancing Blow is underpowered: I would really like glancing blow to let you add the combination of any ED you roll, not just the best number rolled. Right now it sucks. This power, however, has the potential to be both very cool and not overpowered. One of the ways in which a fighter shines in combat should be that, unlike the other classes, he will be dealing his ED as damage whether he hits or misses.
Flurry of Blows might be overpowered: though, if they make the change to Glancing Blow that I just suggested, everything will be fine. So really, I think Flurry of Blows is fine. I just think it is overpowered compared to Glancing Blow.
Feint is underpowered: either let it grant advantage to all attacks until the end of your next turn (not just the next attack), or make it a move action.
Two-Weapon fighting needs to have its wording clarified, and the -2 to attack with your main hand removed (at least if you use two light weapons). It should be clarified that when you are Two-Weapon fighting with two light weapons you must choose which weapon is your main-handed weapon before you attack.
Two-Handed weapons need some support.
Meteor Swarm needs to specify that the areas of effect of the meteors cannot overlap, or else the spell becomes broken in terms of power.
Earthquake kills people if they are caught in a fissure. The fissure closes when your concentration ends. You can end your concentration at will. This spell can be used to auto-kill targets. That needs to be fixed.
The spell "Command" needs a self-preservation clause, or else you can "command" someone to commit suicide.
That is what I got for now (I need to go keep working on PhD related matters)...
Sneak Attack needs to be reworked from the ground up; it should be something like this: you gain advantage when you attack a foe that is adjecent to one of your allies. (In other words, make assassinate the sneak up and kill them like a lurker power, and make sneak attack the power that makes you attack in sneaky ways so that you can get advantage more often.)
Sneak attack is fine. Doubling expertise dice is a pretty large amount of damage and often worth giving up advantage for. It's high risk, high reward. But that isn't a bad thing.
I would say it is reasonable to just remove one advantage. In other words, if you have advantage from 2 sources (like dual-wield and stealth) then you should still get it.
Magic missile is a little overpowered: the spell should note that cover stops a creature from being a valid target to this spell (so that creatures without a shield spell can try and defend themselves from it as well).
It's not. Compare it to fighter damage at an equivalant level.
Trap the Soul needs to be rewritten: it is both horribly overpowered, and too expensive to ever use unless you can use it in a situation where it is overpowered. This spell needs to be rewritten from scratch.
It reminds me of a deck of many things where either the party gets screwed horibly or gets way too much, either way its too disruptive to the game. That being said more options is never bad as a DM can more easily ban a spell from his game than add new ones.
I would like a sentence that says if the target willingly take ownership of the gem (whether or not he knows its cursed) gets no saving throw.
Wish should not be able to make uncommon or rare magical items without a magical McGuffin: I am fine with the spell making such magical items if the player has also undergone some quest/story related experience during which the DM gives the player a magical McGuffin that allows the caster to use the spell to make such an item. But, no player should ever be able to make such an item without DM approval, let alone make such an item once per day.
You should not be able to cast a new Wish until you physically recover from the old one. A 17th level wizard making items once every couple days of downtime seems fine.
Polymorph still seems overpowered: I am not sure what else to say about this one.
It needs an additional restriction that the creature must be native to the environment. Turning a high level for into a sea kraken would instantly kill it outside of water.
As for beneficial forms breaking some adventures, that seems fine. D&D is often about solving problems in clever ways, not always number crunching and dice rolls. If the players devise a creature that trivialises my adventure, I am fine with that. That behavior should be rewarded.
Glancing Blow is underpowered: I would really like glancing blow to let you add the combination of any ED you roll, not just the best number rolled. Right now it sucks. This power, however, has the potential to be both very cool and not overpowered. One of the ways in which a fighter shines in combat should be that, unlike the other classes, he will be dealing his ED as damage whether he hits or misses.
The problem isn't that, the problem is its a trap. Any fighter worth anything will hit almost everything with a 10. People have been pointing that out since the 1st packet and it continues to be ignored. Maybe they know something about monster ACs that we don't but it seems useless. It should work on 9s and less.
Flurry of Blows might be overpowered: though, if they make the change to Glancing Blow that I just suggested, everything will be fine. So really, I think Flurry of Blows is fine. I just think it is overpowered compared to Glancing Blow.
No, its clearly overpowered. Multiple attacks has always been overpowered unless static modifiers are mitigated and not simply doubled (or trippled in this case). After several years of rangers completely humiliating every other striker in 4th edition without using anything but Twin Strike, they still don't get it aparently.
Feint is underpowered: either let it grant advantage to all attacks until the end of your next turn (not just the next attack), or make it a move action.
Feint is fine. Advantage is very powerful. Sure you are giving up an action, but next round you get to roll twice so big deal. There are situations where its better to wait a round.
Two-Weapon fighting needs to have its wording clarified, and the -2 to attack with your main hand removed (at least if you use two light weapons). It should be clarified that when you are Two-Weapon fighting with two light weapons you must choose which weapon is your main-handed weapon before you attack.
Yeah the packet is clearly not written by word-smiths. I would cut them some slack since we are dealing with rough drafts here and not finished products. Professional editing is expensive.
One of the smartest things in 4th edition is the introduction of multiple [W] attacks. It meant that your weapon dice continued to matter when static modifers surged into insane numbers. Who cares if my damage is 1d8+52 or 1d12+52?
The best and most obvious answer (and I don't understand why they didn't do this) is to remove the static Martial Damage Bonus and replace it with an extra [W] instead.
Earthquake kills people if they are caught in a fissure. The fissure closes when your concentration ends. You can end your concentration at will. This spell can be used to auto-kill targets. That needs to be fixed.
The spell "Command" needs a self-preservation clause, or else you can "command" someone to commit suicide.
They need a rulebook text for mind control effects. There are too many spells and monsters to include that text under every entry and every spell that functions in this way.
It's not. Compare it to fighter damage at an equivalant level.
Yeah, 81 uncontested damage once a day vs ~50 damage most rounds (with a successful attack) seems pretty alright to me.
After several years of rangers completely humiliating every other striker in 4th edition without using anything but Twin Strike, they still don't get it aparently.
Statics are way lower now though. The stat mod doesn't grow by much, magic weapons are not likely to provide much more than +2 typically, and random spells and abilities that give damage bonuses are nearly non-existent.
The best and most obvious answer (and I don't understand why they didn't do this) is to remove the static Martial Damage Bonus and replace it with an extra [W] instead.
They definitely ought to do something along these lines; it's weird that weapon choice barely matters at all (and that two-handed weapons trade a scaling +1 AC for a completely static +1 damage).
Sneak Attack needs to be reworked from the ground up; it should be something like this: you gain advantage when you attack a foe that is adjecent to one of your allies. (In other words, make assassinate the sneak up and kill them like a lurker power, and make sneak attack the power that makes you attack in sneaky ways so that you can get advantage more often.)
Sneak attack is fine. Doubling expertise dice is a pretty large amount of damage and often worth giving up advantage for. It's high risk, high reward. But that isn't a bad thing.
Sneak attack is not fine. It is garbage. The amount of DPR you lose from giving up advantage means that you need to hit around 70% of the time to break even, 75% or more of the time to start seeing damage gains. Making the power just make it easier to get advantage will always help the rogue, not just help the rogue when he can already hit the thing easily.
I would say it is reasonable to just remove one advantage. In other words, if you have advantage from 2 sources (like dual-wield and stealth) then you should still get it.
Magic missile is a little overpowered: the spell should note that cover stops a creature from being a valid target to this spell (so that creatures without a shield spell can try and defend themselves from it as well).
It's not. Compare it to fighter damage at an equivalant level.
I have. Magic missile is overpowered. Cast as a 9th level spell magic missile has a DPR of 81. A fighter, using his surge, has a DPR of between 64.74 and 78.36 damage. The only way to block magic missile is with the shield spell. Meanwhile, it deals more single target damage than a fighter using a surge (which should not really ever happen) and it can be split up to attack up to 18 weaker foes (which a fighter cannot do either). That is overpowered. If there were a few more ways to stop people from being targeted by the spell I would be fine with it. As it is now, it is too much. Which is why I said that any cover should block the missiles.
Trap the Soul needs to be rewritten: it is both horribly overpowered, and too expensive to ever use unless you can use it in a situation where it is overpowered. This spell needs to be rewritten from scratch.
It reminds me of a deck of many things where either the party gets screwed horibly or gets way too much, either way its too disruptive to the game. That being said more options is never bad as a DM can more easily ban a spell from his game than add new ones.
I would like a sentence that says if the target willingly take ownership of the gem (whether or not he knows its cursed) gets no saving throw.
Wow. So they should take an overpowered spell and make it even worse! No thanks. I don’t want overpowered spells in my game. I don’t want to have to fine comb spells (the way I am for this playtest) to avoid such trite. If they want my money they can fix it.
Wish should not be able to make uncommon or rare magical items without a magical McGuffin: I am fine with the spell making such magical items if the player has also undergone some quest/story related experience during which the DM gives the player a magical McGuffin that allows the caster to use the spell to make such an item. But, no player should ever be able to make such an item without DM approval, let alone make such an item once per day.
You should not be able to cast a new Wish until you physically recover from the old one. A 17th level wizard making items once every couple days of downtime seems fine.
Not to me. I am fine if it is common magic items, but uncommon and rare magic items should require DM permission (via a magical McGuffin which the DM has to give you).
Glancing Blow is underpowered: I would really like glancing blow to let you add the combination of any ED you roll, not just the best number rolled. Right now it sucks. This power, however, has the potential to be both very cool and not overpowered. One of the ways in which a fighter shines in combat should be that, unlike the other classes, he will be dealing his ED as damage whether he hits or misses.
The problem isn't that, the problem is its a trap. Any fighter worth anything will hit almost everything with a 10. People have been pointing that out since the 1st packet and it continues to be ignored. Maybe they know something about monster ACs that we don't but it seems useless. It should work on 9s and less.
It is not a trap, and has not been since the last playtest packet. You don’t have to roll a 10 anymore. Your attack result must be a 10. Since your attack bonuses count towards your attack result, by the end of the game the maneuver works even when you roll a 1. Its damage is crap right now though. It needs to be better.
Flurry of Blows might be overpowered: though, if they make the change to Glancing Blow that I just suggested, everything will be fine. So really, I think Flurry of Blows is fine. I just think it is overpowered compared to Glancing Blow.
No, its clearly overpowered. Multiple attacks has always been overpowered unless static modifiers are mitigated and not simply doubled (or trippled in this case). After several years of rangers completely humiliating every other striker in 4th edition without using anything but Twin Strike, they still don't get it aparently.
As most of your bonuses can only be used once a turn, and only your stat bonus can be applied multiple times a round, if they fix glancing blow the way I suggested it will not be that big a deal. The damage bonus from glancing blow and the damage bonus from flurry of blows (to your DPR) will pretty much even out. It is only so noticeably overpowered right now because the fighter doesn’t have any sort of maneuver that increases his DPR by a comparable amount.
Feint is underpowered: either let it grant advantage to all attacks until the end of your next turn (not just the next attack), or make it a move action.
Feint is fine. Advantage is very powerful. Sure you are giving up an action, but next round you get to roll twice so big deal. There are situations where its better to wait a round.
No it is not. Granting one person (not necessarily yourself, by the way) advantage does not increase the group’s DPR enough to make up for the DPR you will cost the group by not attacking the creature. The net result is a loss of DPR. That should not be the case. Right now it is worthless. It needs to be fixed. Either it needs to grant advantage until the end of your next turn (and the whole group can attack it to make use of that advantage), or it cannot cost an action (though it would be fine if it cost a move).
Two-Weapon fighting needs to have its wording clarified, and the -2 to attack with your main hand removed (at least if you use two light weapons). It should be clarified that when you are Two-Weapon fighting with two light weapons you must choose which weapon is your main-handed weapon before you attack.
Yeah the packet is clearly not written by word-smiths. I would cut them some slack since we are dealing with rough drafts here and not finished products. Professional editing is expensive.
I am cutting them slack. I am providing them with playtesting data so that they can fix the final product…
One of the smartest things in 4th edition is the introduction of multiple [W] attacks. It meant that your weapon dice continued to matter when static modifers surged into insane numbers. Who cares if my damage is 1d8+52 or 1d12+52?
The best and most obvious answer (and I don't understand why they didn't do this) is to remove the static Martial Damage Bonus and replace it with an extra [W] instead.
I would actually be fine with that… I think that sounds like a good idea.
Yeah, 81 uncontested damage once a day vs ~50 damage most rounds (with a successful attack) seems pretty alright to me.
81 damage once per day, when a fighter is doing upwards of 50 at will, might be reasonable. Then again the fighter is giving up versatility for doing one thing well for longer, so maybe a 9th level should be equal to what a fighter of that level can do, not more.
My point is there is a lot of debate about exactly how powerful dailys should be compared to at-wills. And the designers have no idea either.
Fortuneately for them number crunching like this is easy. Obviously the designers are not going to get secretly blindsided by Magic Missile. They know it does 81 damage. The question of whether or not that is the target for an end-game daily is the question, and that debate is still ongoing.
So be patient.
Statics are way lower now though. The stat mod doesn't grow by much, magic weapons are not likely to provide much more than +2 typically, and random spells and abilities that give damage bonuses are nearly non-existent.
They thought they had static modifiers under control in 4th edition. Twin Strike got no ability mod and querry dice were once per turn. But every new book that came out seemed to introduce some new feat, item, or paragon path that dumped on one more static bonus. It didn't take long before Twin Strike was not merely a problem, but flat-out broke the game.
New static modifiers will happen and Flurry of Blows will be the elephant in the room every time it does.
They thought they had static modifiers under control in 4th edition. Twin Strike got no ability mod and querry dice were once per turn. But every new book that came out seemed to introduce some new feat, item, or paragon path that dumped on one more static bonus. It didn't take long before Twin Strike was not merely a problem, but flat-out broke the game.
No argument that more static mods crept into the game as time went on, but a lot of the stuff that made multiple attacks an issue existed right from the start:
- Enhancement bonuses that scaled with level - Power bonuses to damage on rings and from warlord abilities - Vulnerability increasing damage by a flat amount per attack.
At any rate, looking at how explicit they are being that martial damage bonus only happens once per round, it seems like this might be a mistake they don't repeat.
I have. Magic missile is overpowered. Cast as a 9th level spell magic missile has a DPR of 81.
The wizard can only do 81 DPR once a day, and it comes at the opportunity cost of casting any other 9th level spell that day. That's fine.
No it is not. Being a fighter comes at the cost of not getting spells at all. Your surges are directly analogous to the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th level spells. To keep wizards balanced, a fighter should be doing more single target DPR when using a surge that a wizard will have when casting any 6th, 7th, 8th, or 9th level spell. A fighter, using his surge, has a DPR of between 64.74 and 78.36 damage (depending on monster AC). That means that even if the fighter will hit 95% of the time, magic missile is still superior. That is not fine. That is not fine at all. That is horribly overpowered, as the spell is not only better at single target DPR but is great at precision DPR against multiple weaker foes. Either they can majorly nerf its DPR, or they can add in more ways in which one can avoid becoming a target to that spell (cover/concealment makes you an invalid target).
In fact, magic missile currently deals almost double the DPR of ANY other high level spell. They should really halve the number of darts it gives you...
Sneak attack is not fine. It is garbage. The amount of DPR you lose from giving up advantage means that you need to hit around 70% of the time to break even, 75% or more of the time to start seeing damage gains. Making the power just make it easier to get advantage will always help the rogue, not just help the rogue when he can already hit the thing easily.
Not when you take into account other uses for expertise dice. Missing with your +1 d4 dagger is not that big a deal compared to the several d6 bonus damage you gain from sneak attack. It only becomes a serious problem when you assume you are giving up several d6 of Deadly Momentum damage.
But there are other uses for those dice, so they won't really be wasted on a miss. And the nova damage of a sneak attack hit on the first round of combat can potentially trivialise an encounter if you drop an important enemy before he acts.
Again, probably worth the risk. That being said I do think it should only remove one set of advantage, not all if you have multiple.
Wow. So they should take an overpowered spell and make it even worse! No thanks. I don’t want overpowered spells in my game. I don’t want to have to fine comb spells (the way I am for this playtest) to avoid such trite. If they want my money they can fix it.
A lot of high-end spells have the potential to be extremely disruptive. Have you read Clone?
I think your problem with Trap the Soul is that you don't like the mechanic of Save or Die. I can understand that, but it comes down to an issue of play style. Some players love them, and spells like this should exist for them.
Not to me. I am fine if it is common magic items, but uncommon and rare magic items should require DM permission (via a magical McGuffin which the DM has to give you).
At some point a DM needs to let the players take some control of the campaign. Mother May I works fine for low level item disbursement but by level 17 shouldn't the players be afforded some autonomy with regard to what items they get to make?
It is not a trap, and has not been since the last playtest packet. You don’t have to roll a 10 anymore. Your attack result must be a 10. Since your attack bonuses count towards your attack result, by the end of the game the maneuver works even when you roll a 1. Its damage is crap right now though. It needs to be better.
I read the manuever differently but you may be right.
That said, any damage on a miss is not crap. Most classes get nothing if they miss. If you don't like the "best roll" mechanic then just never spend more than one die on it. That way you get a free d6 damage when you miss, which is nice, and still have other dice for parry or whatever.
No {feint} is not. Granting one person (not necessarily yourself, by the way) advantage does not increase the group’s DPR enough to make up for the DPR you will cost the group by not attacking the creature. The net result is a loss of DPR. That should not be the case. Right now it is worthless. It needs to be fixed. Either it needs to grant advantage until the end of your next turn (and the whole group can attack it to make use of that advantage), or it cannot cost an action (though it would be fine if it cost a move).
Costing only a move is severely overpowered. Moves are nothing. Giving up a move to gain advantage is just giving rogues free advantage all day every day.
And you are right that it is a DPR loss, but that isn't the point. They didn't write up Feint as a DPR boost to be used every other turn. It is just an option. An almost free one. It does not need to be anything more than sometimes useful. And there are definately several situations where attacking now is not so great (because of some spell, or condition, or whatever) but next round will be fine. Or a situation where passing on your turn to give another player advantage on his attack is the best plan (like a powerful spell that requires an attack roll or a fighter using an arrow of slaying).
No it is not. Being a fighter comes at the cost of not getting spells at all. Your surges are directly analogous to the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th level spells. To keep wizards balanced, a fighter should be doing more single target DPR when using a surge that a wizard will have when casting any 6th, 7th, 8th, or 9th level spell. A fighter, using his surge, has a DPR of between 64.74 and 78.36 damage (depending on monster AC). That means that even if the fighter will hit 95% of the time, magic missile is still superior. That is not fine. That is not fine at all. That is horribly overpowered, as the spell is not only better at single target DPR but is great at precision DPR against multiple weaker foes. Either they can majorly nerf its DPR, or they can add in more ways in which one can avoid becoming a target to that spell (cover/concealment makes you an invalid target).
In fact, magic missile currently deals almost double the DPR of ANY other high level spell. They should really halve the number of darts it gives you...
Your math is a little off. Players will usually use surges when they miss so they can get their Deadly Momentum and Martial Damage Dice. So over the course of a day, surges will account for a more sizable increase in damage than what you get in your counting.
Obviously Power Word Kill is laughably bad compared to Magic Missile. But does that mean Magic Missile is overpowered or that Power Word Kill is underpowered?
Obviously the designers don't need us to crunch numbers for them, they can do that themselves. They need to see how the classes play. And I don't think either of us can say for certain if 81 damage is too high or not. Things like this really need to be played at a table in a full level 17 adventure, not number crunched without all the variables taken into account.
