4e Rules Fixes

[Nox_Noctis]

Will be added to be fixed soon:
*Clarification/Errata of what it means to grant free action attacks on an "attack" from an AP: it needs to be limited to granting 1 attack or else it becomes all too easy to launch 18-attack Storms of Blades, recover them via Epic Resurgence and a Violet Solitaire, and run it again for 18 more attacks (or Battlelord of Kord's Path of the Storm, or Barbarian's Hurricane of Blades for a bit less). The idea is the same: it becomes too easy to grab far more attacks than are reasonable.

[PhoenixInferno]

Big ass errata coming in this month's Compendium update.  Bloodclaw/Reckless and Storm/Hurricane of Blades are known to be on the list.

[awaken DM golem]

Perhaps Bard could be limited to 1 Power feat (or so) per Multiclass feat.
This way, a Bard would have to choose between Power versatility combos, and having a limited feat stack.

**

Personally, I'm not sold on some of the problems at Epic levels.
I feel like the word "Retreat" is too Not acceptable.
Additionally, the limited use of Rituals, specifically Divinations, makes Epic that much harder.

I may be way off base, but my caveats here are : personally , and I feel.

Consider the Boons option box, in DMG2; kinda a low magic variant.
The Boons replace the 2 Mid magic item slots, and ditch the Hi and Lo slots.
In return the players don't get much, just the attack damage and defense bonuses.
What do you do with all that excess moolah?
Spend it on rituals.

Yer still gonna hafta "Retreat" with a capital R.

[Nox_Noctis]

Big ass errata coming in this month's Compendium update.  Bloodclaw/Reckless and Storm/Hurricane of Blades are known to be on the list.

Yup, I saw the update a few hours ago... It will take some sifting. I hope to have this (my fixes/lists) all sorted by the end of the week. There are still some things they have not touched that I have here, but they definitely restored a lot of game balance (although a lot of their nerfs were a bit over-the-top).

Golem, your comments after the Bard bit make little sense in context of this thread. No one has mentioned retreating, nor Boons in DMG2. Please clarify what you were saying or move it to a more appropriate thread (the Bard stuff is fine and makes sense).

[awaken DM golem]

Epic Monsters "should" or "ought" to be tough enough, to cause a Retreat every now and then.

A random distribution of dice rolls + enough powers/abilities to nova at the start of combat = the dreaded tpk possibility 
... possibility can be neutered away via enough curve fitting.
I don't want that, but that's just me. I want dangerous opponents at high levels.

Boons?
Yes I know no one else mentioned. Boons in DMG2 have a somewhat comparable power curve. But then you have a small pile of moolah left over. What do you do with it? There aren't any magic items to play golf bag hero with. There's one option: Rituals ... lots of them. That's PCs using a lot more rituals than normal. But this is officially an alternative.

Guess What?
Officially not an alternative: high level monsters can use rituals ahead of time. Like Orcus. He's hanging around blowing money left and right, on all those Liches he's creating. That's a ritual. So, he's popping out some more rituals on unsuspecting PCs.

Now, why go about messing with high level play, when the Monsters can zip out a few rituals ahead of time ?!
And what's the limit? There is none. You tell me what Orcus's limit is on the number of Liches he can make.
How'd that Balor get here, from the Abyss ... maybe a ritual or two.

So it's unexplored, as to what is the true power level of Epic Monsters.

imho

[Nox_Noctis]

I'm not sure that belongs in rules fixes. In all honesty, the whole ritual bit seems best to fall under rule 0 in conjunction with encounter design (also DM territory).

I'll look at Boons when I get a chance.

As for Epic level monsters, I guess what you're proposing is altering their rules to make them more challenging. If you want to look at that and maybe propose some things, I'll look at that, but I'm pretty busy, so I'm not going to go through the MMs until other things (on the PC side of things) are taken care of.

[awaken DM golem]

Eh, right, dang.

It's monsters related.
There is a possible loophole, as in the DM can only "allow" the PCs to beat high enough level monsters.
But it doesn't matter, no one is playing the game that way just yet.
I'll give it time ... 

[Nox_Noctis]

Now I need to incorporate the December updates and then evaluate what still needs fixing. Good job, Wizards, for stepping it up. It took an awfully long time but it's looking like the edition is coming back together.

[Nox_Noctis]

I added a change to Follow-up Blow, redacted the change to Radiant Sigil as a stance on healing powers. As long as Ferocity has its fix it shouldn't be too problematic.
I noted a few other things with strike-throughs.

I realized I don't have DMG2 access.

Where does it say monsters cannot prepare rituals ahead of time?

[awaken DM golem]

happy new year 


"Where does it say monsters cannot prepare rituals ahead of time?"
Nowhere.

Orcus obviously kicks out a Lich Ritual over and over again. And where'd he get all that money? And where'd all that money go?
Doesn't matter.

Some of the Monsters in the MM have a backstory Ritual as either part of their creation, or part of their improvement.
The trick seems to be any Ritual has to be up and running before the PCs show up.

Zero Rituals = most monsters
One Ritual = some monsters
Lots of Rituals = Orcus, and the NPC of ?? level example in the DMG NPC section (the town priest).
A.H. Rituals = a t.o. possibility; problem here is how much time, and how many could be running before a real encounter.

This is most likely the only way to really soup up a Monster in 4e.
(my opinion)

[Nox_Noctis]

This thread temporarily shut down until 2 March 2010 errata is reconciled with my posts.

[Nox_Noctis]

This just in: **** it. This isn't worth it after the latest nuclear nerfing. If I can find a way to close the thread, I will. Otherwise I'll shoot a PM for it to be locked.

[X-Codes]

The neutering of Tieflings has caused me to spontaneously forsake 4e for the rest of my life.

It seems that this is the business model that WotC is going to follow, though.  They're going to use the newest supplements to introduce cool new abilities and allow for a little power creep, and then stamp it all out with errata a few months after the release, forcing people who stay up to date on such things to play the new and cool classes in the PHB 83!

[Ferret]

The neutering of Tieflings has caused me to spontaneously forsake 4e for the rest of my life.

It seems that this is the business model that WotC is going to follow, though.  They're going to use the newest supplements to introduce cool new abilities and allow for a little power creep, and then stamp it all out with errata a few months after the release, forcing people who stay up to date on such things to play the new and cool classes in the PHB 83!

Just like Magic!