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9 months ago ::
Sep 22, 2012 - 11:13PM
#11
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Spoiler:
Show
SvenDJ, many thanks for DMing this module and for making it great for us 
That said, the Maroon Prince can shed any effect on the beginning of each of his turns? Wouldn't that include marks and stuff like my Symbol of the Champion's Code as well? That sounds like way too much. How can you get an effect on him at all if it's like that?
However, if you do use it at full effect at the beginning of each turn, maybe some kind of debilitating effect for shrugging off the effect would be good too.
For example, since he's going into a frenzy, he might ignore his defenses in favor of being able to eat people more effectively. -1 stackable penalty to all defenses until the end of the head's next turn, if he uses Feeding Frenzy.
Like you said, it's a far too powerful and unfun ability. However, if it has to be used as written, I think something more appropriate would be him taking the AL or AL x 2 in damage every time he does, since the fight is basically a race to kill him before he kills you. That would give controllers (and non-damage based defenders) something meaningful to contribue as well. Flavorwise, he might shrug off the effects in his frenzy, but it does tire him out. And he already gives up when his hp drops to 20%.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 23, 2012 - 6:17AM
#12
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Date Joined:
Mar 17, 2005
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Not speaking to how WOTC balanced this particular paragon creature when they designed it, I will not that it only effects a single condition, so a controller isn't completely useless. It's fairly likely that at any given time the dragon has 3+ conditions on him. Between standards, action points, minors, and moves for 4-6 PCs, you can stack a number of conditions on him; something that is normally the death knell of a solo.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 23, 2012 - 7:18AM
#13
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Date Joined:
Mar 15, 2001
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Not speaking to how WOTC balanced this particular paragon creature when they designed it, I will not that it only effects a single condition, so a controller isn't completely useless. It's fairly likely that at any given time the dragon has 3+ conditions on him. Between standards, action points, minors, and moves for 4-6 PCs, you can stack a number of conditions on him; something that is normally the death knell of a solo.
Doesnt matter if its only one condition when he can use it 3-4 times a round.
In play it equates to :
Wizard Stuns
Fighter Marks
Dragon shakes Stun
Dragon shakes Mark
Rogue Attacks
Dragon gets full action
Cleric give Vulnerability
Dragon shakes Vuln.....
....or other "worse for the party" scenarios.
As written, he's almost never under the effect of any condition that would hinder his action. Thats bad design when each of those actions he gets off are designed to have the effect of 5 standard creatures turns.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 23, 2012 - 8:02AM
#14
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Not speaking to how WOTC balanced this particular paragon creature when they designed it, I will not that it only effects a single condition, so a controller isn't completely useless. It's fairly likely that at any given time the dragon has 3+ conditions on him. Between standards, action points, minors, and moves for 4-6 PCs, you can stack a number of conditions on him; something that is normally the death knell of a solo.
If we assume for a moment that the monster doesn't care about being marked (he can almost effortlessly attack at least 3 to 4 pc's with each attack, especially if they try to save the children), and with marked being the only 'condition' that could hinder him in any way which can be reapplied every turn, it would fall down to the controller and any debuffs the other party members have on their limited-use power to stack it up. Now, he can remove the most threatening 3 to 4 of those automatically each turn, before he even takes his turn.
As such, I can't see a controller contributing anything useful, since his effects are likely the first to go on each opportunity. Even if the party has so many conditions (that somehow all land?) that he isn't able to remove all of them, the controller will never see his spells do anything. Acting like a 'anti-debuff buffer' for the other party members doesn't seem fun at all, if it would even work.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 23, 2012 - 10:58AM
#15
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Date Joined:
Mar 17, 2005
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Placing conditions on a target is not the only thing controllers do. (zones, walls, forced movement, etc...)
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9 months ago ::
Sep 23, 2012 - 12:01PM
#16
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Date Joined:
Apr 11, 2008
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Unless those zones and walls are only doing damage, then the creature can shake them off as easily as everything else. Similarly, forced movement and prone are only good against an enemy when they keep it from being able to do what it wants anyway. Given that this is a solo and that the group is unlikely to be ranged-only, someone's going to have to get up close to it. Enemies which auto-shed conditions tend to make fights degenerate into piling damage onto those enemies. That's especially true when the enemies can shed more than one condition per round. Whenever I hear about a module like that, I try to bring my archer ranger or an enabling leader so that I don't feel useless. I've played controllers and defenders in modules like that. It's not fun when the effect of my cool daily ends before it has taken effect once.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 24, 2012 - 2:18AM
#17
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It was out first playtest Lunattic that got the monster changed in the first place for it having a big potential of being boring and too easy to defeat (especially the AL you played)  Also note that your played with 4 PCs. In my experience that in itself can up the challenge significantly more than the rules assume it is, especially with solos or elites or when facing hard control. Anyway, I have not seen the new monster, but Imany solo's tend to have the described effects. I know that in my home campaign the controllers and defenders simply do not use those "cool" dailies against solos. Those are for use against elites (or standard monsters when the situation takes a turn for the worse). They switch to their somewhat less effective powers, but the controller also does a lot of forced movement and those tend to work as well... Mind you, in my home campaign solo encounters tend to be part of 5 to 7 encounters (it works surprisingly well if your players are used to it and have build characters accordingly ) and they don't dominate an adventure nearly as much as in a typical 4 hour LFR adventure. The reality is that in my exerience 4e is not that well suited for the 4 hours slot at upper paragon levels. If you allow the controllers and defenders to work without constraint you might as well not use the solo (although I probably would have ruled the same as your DM: do it at the end of the turn) which is a shame as well.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 24, 2012 - 3:27AM
#18
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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About controllers versus big solo's: forced movement is extremely effective against flying enemies like dragons, so they aren't useless at all. I know for a fact that if you guys would've had more forced movement, the Sorcerer's Flame Spiral action sequence would've shortened the Maroon Prince's lifespan considerably Not to mention it would've brought him into the dragon-hating Paladin's weapon range. The way it went, the creature could just fly 5 squares above the ground and always remain out of reach of those nasty close burst powers.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 24, 2012 - 5:19AM
#19
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It was out first playtest Lunattic that got the monster changed in the first place for it having a big potential of being boring and too easy to defeat (especially the AL you played) Also note that your played with 4 PCs. In my experience that in itself can up the challenge significantly more than the rules assume it is, especially with solos or elites or when facing hard control.
Anyway, I have not seen the new monster, but Imany solo's tend to have the described effects. I know that in my home campaign the controllers and defenders simply do not use those "cool" dailies against solos. Those are for use against elites (or standard monsters when the situation takes a turn for the worse). They switch to their somewhat less effective powers, but the controller also does a lot of forced movement and those tend to work as well... Mind you, in my home campaign solo encounters tend to be part of 5 to 7 encounters (it works surprisingly well if your players are used to it and have build characters accordingly ) and they don't dominate an adventure nearly as much as in a typical 4 hour LFR adventure.
The reality is that in my exerience 4e is not that well suited for the 4 hours slot at upper paragon levels. If you allow the controllers and defenders to work without constraint you might as well not use the solo (although I probably would have ruled the same as your DM: do it at the end of the turn) which is a shame as well.
Oh, I personally think that 5 to 7 encounters per day is very reasonable for high paragon; most of the home campaigns at that level I've played in now include similar ways around recharging powers too quickly And I do agree that status effects can wreck solo's if allowed to stack up. But the ability as described on the monster is just overkill, or perhaps it just scales extremely well with fewer players; he can remove 4 effects each turn, with the maximum amount of effects (barring action points to specifically apply more) that four players can land on him also being four. At six pc's, they can apply six while he can remove four, so those effects actually have a chance of sticking around.
About controllers versus big solo's: forced movement is extremely effective against flying enemies like dragons, so they aren't useless at all. I know for a fact that if you guys would've had more forced movement, the Sorcerer's Flame Spiral action sequence would've shortened the Maroon Prince's lifespan considerably Not to mention it would've brought him into the dragon-hating Paladin's weapon range.
The way it went, the creature could just fly 5 squares above the ground and always remain out of reach of those nasty close burst powers.
Not entirely sure why you see it that way; if any party member in the group had been replaced with a random controller, it would have been a guaranteed TPK barring major interference or further toning down from your part. We applied less than four effects to him each turn, meaning the controller's debuffs wouldn't have stuck. In addition, I think both the paladin and the leader used all of their healing powers and the strikers both went all out. In the end, everyone was either bloodied or slightly above bloodied, and I (foolishly) gave the paladin the last resistance potion, not considering that the dragon would have removed the target restriction effect from the item daily from himself, meaning he would have eaten me in that round if he hadn't given up right then.
If we lacked either of the healers, we'd have died. If we lacked either of the strikers, we'd have died. In both cases because the dragon did so much more damage than us. Given that the dragon had 660 hp, that the leader did only healing and that the paladin only hit him once, the average DPR of both strikers was around 100. With that and using every single healing ability available, we barely won.
Now, even if the controller had some sort of daily zone that somehow continuous pulled the dragon towards us and that circumvented the dragon's effect shield, I don't see that compensating for the lost healing or damage. If I used flame spiral, it'd be a double hit on him if he had been next to me, but since he was right after me in the initiative order, he could have used his shift away power or just fly away instantly. If we were lucky, maybe we'd have gotten 1 to two more triggers out of flame spiral. And on the thing about the defender being able to hit him... um... I remember his standard action attack hitting the dragon for 12 points of damage. While our tank's self-healing and defenses were invaluable, I don't think the added damage from him would have offset losing a healer or dps for a controller.
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9 months ago ::
Sep 24, 2012 - 7:43AM
#20
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Date Joined:
Apr 14, 2010
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I disagree with the assertion that the fight would've ended badly if you guys had a controller instead of, say, the defender or the second striker. See, your character's power is in his multi-attacks, but those require enemies to be adjacent to you. Over the course of 3.5 rounds, I remember you getting off one Demonsoul Bolts. No thunder jumps, no Flame Spirals, no Cyclone Pulls, no other doubletaps at all. If I recall correctly, you were mostly spamming Chaos Bolts and saving children. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just that your character didn't get to do what he does best because the dragon was at least 20 feet in the air at all times. I think that if a controller had kept the dragon on the ground until it was your turn (delaying to make that happen), the fight would've ended a lot quicker because you would've dealt 150-200 damage in a single turn.
That means of course that you either had to compensate for the damage the other striker brought to bear, or that you guys would've faced the full fury of the dragon because you didn't have the defender. I don't know what would've happened in that case. But this is definitely a creature that gets much, much harder to fight if you have fewer party members.
About the flying thing, by the way: maybe you should invest in a Broom of Flying, Elixir of Flying, an Ebony Fly or a Greatwing Tattoo?
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