Essential preview: a striker fighter!

D&D Essentials class previews

Introduction
Cleric - Fighter (Knight) - Fighter (Slayer) - Rogue -Wizard
Druid - Paladin Ranger (Hunter) Ranger (Scout) - Warlock

Ever since the release of the first Player’s Handbook, Fighters have been one of the most damaging classes in 4E. Forget about roles and that stuff for a moment: these defenders have the right combination of class features, paragon paths and feats to give them a realistic shot at beating many strikers at their own game, when properly built. If you think that is frightening (and it is!), imagine a fighter build that was even more focused towards bringing pain, to the point of eschewing defender marks in favor of striker-like extra damage features. Heroes of the Fallen Lands brings us exactly that - it’s called the Slayer, and it looks brutally straightforward - and terribly effective.

More than any mechanical innovation (though there are a few), the most surprising thing about the Slayer is the Role line. It’s a Martial Striker, with a touch of defender - not the other way around. This marks (heh) a major shift in class design in D&D 4E, since there was precedent of builds of a class with different secondary roles, but never before had we seen a change in the main role. And there is no reason why it shouldn’t happen again, so the class lineup for the second D&D Essentials player book, Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms becomes more intriguing than ever: which classes will be given new roles? It’s easy to imagine Druids as defenders or leaders, Paladins as leaders, and Rangers or Warlocks as controllers. However, there will likely be at least one build for each of these classes that keeps the current role, so I doubt we’ll see more than a couple of these changes. Still, it’s an exciting prospect.

As for the rules details there’s little new about the Slayer - it shares the same basic core as the Knight, with basic attacks and stances replacing at-will attacks, Power Strike replacing encounter powers, no daily powers, and several new features at higher levels. The major differences lie in the defender features (which are missing: forget about Defender Aura and Battle Guardian), and the brand new striker feature. That one is called Heroic Slayer, and it lets you add your Dexterity bonus (Slayers use Strength as main ability, and Dexterity as secondary) to all weapon damage.

Apart from that, we get to know about the Weapon Talent feature which, as expected, grants a +1 to hit on all weapon attacks. Also, we can see a couple of the at-will stances, including Berserker’s Charge (which boosts movement and accuracy in charges, and would be the enfy of any Barbarian) and Unfettered Fury (which looks like a stronger version of Power Attack). It remains to be seen whether Knight and Slayer stances will be interchangeable or not, as they have no built-in requirement, like requiring a shield or a two-handed weapon. This is rounded up with the same HP, surges and proficiencies as ordinary fighters (though there is no shield proficiency), making for an extremely sturdy striker.

Conclusion

Unlike with other classes in D&D Essentials, we actually get to know every Slayer class feature available at level 1 so, apart from a couple missing at-will stances, we have everything that is needed to build a first level character. I haven’t experimented too much yet, but it’s safe to say that they will be very capable strikers. Not only that, but they are clearly the easiest class to play in the game. Just pointing at an enemy and attacking will work, with perhaps a change of stance every other turn. All martial characters in Essentials already had pretty straightforward mechanics, but the Slayer goes a step further, and also removes many of the strategic nuances. After all, rogues need some effort and finesse to keep Combat Advantage every turn (and are relatively fragile), whereas knights have to perform the more subtle defender role. A Slayer is very much like a barbarian without encounter powers or rages, which is to say, a well oiled killing machine with few concerns apart from getting close to an enemy and smashing it to a pulp. I can’t say I’m personally thrilled to play one, but it’s a great option to have in a product aimed at introducing new players.

As an aside, it’s interesting to note that the Slayer also presents yet another nod to old school D&D players, in that many primitive fighters were purely focused in damage, with little of what we currently associate with a defender, apart from the heavy armor and high HP pool. Not only that, but bow-wielding fighters (or, at least fighters capable of performing decently at range) are now possible, if not actively suported, since some class features (and crucially the striker damage) also work with such weapons - a controversial decision that is sure to bring some wacky builds.

Introduction
Cleric - Fighter (Knight) - Fighter (Slayer) - Rogue -Wizard
Druid - Paladin Ranger (Hunter) Ranger (Scout) - Warlock

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Essentials spoilers: At-Wills, racial powers and... a solution for Expertise?

As I mentioned yesterday, some bits of preview information about D&D Essentials have been leaked by the community manager at wizards’ site. We have a couple of at-will attacks (or rather, their equivalent for Essential fighters and rogues), a new racial power, and a humble feat that may be a sign of deep changes in design - not many things, but definitely solid stuff. Here’s my opinion on them.

To continue with yesterday’s topic, we’ll start with the Fighter material. There’s a new at-will stance called Defend the Line that is, perhaps, the strongest one revealed to date. It slows enemies hit in melee, providing some crucial movement denial to make up for the loss of Combat Superiority, as well as having amazing synergy with your opportunity attacks and Battle Guardian feature. In fact, I think this stance works better outside of your turn than for your regular attacks, so there should be some fun tension and stance switching games. I can’t imagine skipping this one while building a knight.

Moving on to the Essential Rogue, we have a very nice Rogue Trick called Unbalancing Trick. It features a useful movement effect, and a devastating attack modifier - a 2 square shift and knocking prone on melee hits, respectively. Both parts of the power turn it into an instant classic, even though it isn’t as absurdly strong as it might seem at first glance. This is because the most effective application of melee proning, shifting 1 square so that you are outside of enemy reach but just short of charge range, is not possible this way! As good as Rogue Tricks are, they require you to move before attacking, so your target will be able to stand up and attack you back unless you have reach - which is a possibility, with certain Spiked Chain feats, or perhaps a polearm, if you have the strength and the proficiency to attack with it, and don’t mind giving up on Sneak Attack. Finally, shifting 2 squares is very conveniently the exact distance required to charge an enemy, even if you start off adjacent to it, so this could enable some cool charging builds.

The new racial power shown is interesting in that it belong to humans - a race previously notorious for its lack of racial powers. Since Essential races will present alternate rules rather than replacing the Player’s Handbook versions, this probably means replacing a racial feature - such as the human’s third at-will attack. It wasn’t very clear how this extra at-will would interact with fighter stances or rogue tricks, and this might be our answer - it won’t. Anyway, the power in question is called Heroic Effort, and it provides a moderate bonus to an attack or save, once per encounter. It’s usually an improvement over Elven Accuracy, and that is to say a lot - for many classes, it’s hard to think of a reason for giving up on the extra at-will, but Heroic Effort could be that good. It also fits the existing mechanics for human characters, since one-shot attack bonuses and enhanced defenses were a recurring theme. I like this one, though I personally find the third at-will even cooler.

And finally, we have the feat that might change the game as we know it. Or maybe not, but I suspect that it is the sign that one of the most annoying (and houseruled) game elements in 4E is getting fixed, at last. Let me explain. This is the feat in question:

Bludgeon Expertise: +1 feat bonus to attack rolls with hammers and maces. In addition, any time you push with a weapon attack using a mace or hammer, you gain a +1 feat bonus to that push.

The cool, and potentially game-changing thing about Bludgeon Expertise is that it’s stronger than Weapon Expertise and similar feats, it has an interesting effect, and it provides a meaningful choice. I have explained in length why I think that current Expertise feats are bad for the game, in that they are boring, but virtually mandatory: you will spend a valuable feat slot to gain a +1 to hit (make it +2 or +3 at higher levels) sometime during your career, because it is so effective, even if it is utterly bland and involves no decision whatsoever.

Enter Bludgeon Expertise. I think it is safe to assume that this is just one among a series of feats that provide the bonuses to hit usually associated with Expertise (heck, it even shares the name!) in addition to some other kind of effect that would usually be worth a feat by itself - in this case, extra pushing. I bet there’s one to cover most (if not all) weapon categories, and probably implements too. Admittedly, we also have to imagine that this feat text is incomplete, so that it actually gains the additional bonuses at paragon and epic tier - otherwise it would all fall apart, as people would retrain to the generic feats at those levels. But take all those assumptions, and think about the result: Expertise could work.

Having a single feat that you need to take, no questions asked, is a terrible think. But make it into a full category of different feats that grant the required effect for free, on top of something unique and worth a feat by itself, and it all clicks. It may not be complete freedom, but it’s a kind of freedom I can live with. I think it would be better if the feats were not as strongly tied to your weapon or implement choice as they seem, and the game could actually afford some kind of overlap, with more general Expertise feats as well as weapon-specific ones - the really strong benefit is the bonus to hit, which doesn’t stack, so there would be no real harm in taking two such feats. We’ll have to see the whole range of feats to know how well this solution works in practice, but I must say, this looks great.

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Essentials Fighter spoiler: Battle Guardian revealed!

A couple of weeks ago we talked about the previews for the new fighter builds to be included in Heroes of the Fallen Lands. As could be expected, the preview teased us with a handful of class features and powers, from the many that the final text will have, which was all the more frustrating since there was one missing piece in the puzzle that was, well, essential. We had an innovative mark-like mechanic in Defender's Aura, but lacked the all-important class feature focused on punishing enemies for attacking your allies - the very core of any defender class. Thankfully, this feature (alongside other interesting information, which I may comment in a later post) was leaked in D&D Community Manager Trevor Kidd's site at wizards.com. Let's talk about it.

Battle Guardian is a class feature that takes the place of Combat Challenge. Though it shares many points in common with CC, it also introduces a few twists. In game terms, it:

• Works against all adjacent enemies not marked by your allies (i.e. enemies within your Defender Aura, see the Essential Fighter preview for details)
• Triggers whenever an adjacent enemy shifts or attacks an ally.
• Allows you to make a melee basic attack as an opportunity action.
• Deals Strength damage on a miss.

Rules-wise, there are a couple of interesting details about how the feature is implemented:

• It works properly with other marks or defender auras: you can’t trap an enemy between multiple defenders due to poor wording.
• It does nothing against enemies attacking other enemies, so it’s the first defender mark that doesn’t make the dominated condition even more brutal. I wonder if the marked condition will receive some errata to match this?
• It removes one of the most confusing rules issues for unexperienced players with the fighter: the fact that some enemy actions were punished as an interrupt, and other as opportunity actions, and that the Combat Superiority effects weren’t shared by Combat Challenge. Now everything uses the same type of action, and although the miss damage is specific to Battle Guardian attacks, it’s nowhere as critical as occasionally stopping movement.

So, what does this all mean towards the Knight's power level, and the way Essentials Fighters are likely to be built?

• Knights (and probably other Essentials Fighters) will be the best defenders in the game to lock multiple enemies. Not only does their mark (ok , defender aura) apply automatically on all adjacent foes, but they can make their punishment attack once to each one of them (since it is an opportunity action). Note that daily powers can boost other characters’ ability to punish groups beyond this level, though only temporarily. Also, awesome encounters such as Come and Get It are another advantage for traditional PCs.
• Knights are incredibly sticky, but less so than conventional fighters. Any kind of movement around them triggers a melee basic attack, which should be as good as other classes’ at-wills, thanks to their Stances. Known stance effects include extra damage, cleave, and even slowing (more on this in the following section!). Nevertheless, the almost assured lack of an equivalent to Combat Superiority (at least at level 1) means that their opportunity attacks, though still great, aren’t as awesome.
• It looks like it will be possible to have Knights with primary abilities other than Strength, thanks to the Melee Training feat. However, the strength-dependent rider in Battle guardian (damage on a miss) is good enough to keep that ability as a secondary at the very least and, along with the saved feat, a decent incentive to play as intended and have it as the primary ability.

Conclusion:

In my previous article about the Essentials Fighter, I commented the following:

“The not-quite-a-mark could be as good as Combat Challenge (which is to say, really good), or almost useless, for all we know (again, I doubt that will be the case)”

Amazingly enough, the combination of Defender Aura, Battle Guardian and stances has turned out to be downright better than Combat Challenge, which is no small feat. The original fighter will still have an edge when it comes to opportunity attacks thanks to Combat Superiority, but I’d say that Essential Fighters have better overall defender capabilities than their predecessors (and other pre-Essential defenders, for that matter), before accounting for encounter and daily effects. Other defenders will be stronger when such powers are available, though just how much will be hard to tell, before knowing everything about the knight.

Nevertheless, even if we still lack information on many class features, the Essential Fighter with just the previewed material is quite playable, and definitely competent at its role.

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D&D Essentials preview: The fighter

D&D Essentials class previews

Introduction
Cleric - Fighter (Knight) - Fighter (Slayer) - Rogue -Wizard
Druid - Paladin Ranger (Hunter) Ranger (Scout) - Warlock

So we finally get to see the class preview for the Essentials Fighter (for more info about Essentials, check out previous articles) and, man does it bring surprises! For all the forum uproar they caused, the essentialized Cleric and Wizard were little more (and little less) than your regular 4E class build with a few simplified decisions, and a higher level class feature or two, to throw us off-balance. Remember all the talk about classes with different levels of complexity, shaking up the Encounter/Daily power system, and the like? It all makes sense when you see this Fighter. Also, it’s a good thing we were shown the “normal” classes in Essentials first, as this one is nothing but shocking! Let’s see why...

This isn't actually from Essentials, but it needed to go here.

The Essentials Fighter is perhaps the most radical departure from the basic 4E class framework to date. Forget about psionics and powerpoints - these were bold, and cute, and slightly broken, but at the end of the day you still have conventional at-will and encounter powers, even if you got some added flexibility in using them, and a few restrictions in taking them. This Fighter is made of different stuff. Consider the following paragraph from the preview:

“Basic Attacks: As a fighter, you make most of your attacks using basic attacks. Some classes rely primarily on class-specific attack powers, whereas you typically make basic attacks enhanced by your fighter stances and other class features and powers.”

Anyone remember the older editions of the game, where a fighter’s shtick was to hit the monsters with his standard attack, turn after turn? I sure do,and it was kind of monotonous, and boring, and not that strong compared of what the fancier classes could get... but wasn’t D&D 4E suppossed to bring the end of this mindless spamming? I get that they wanted a straightforward experience, but how can “Basic Attack every turn” become a compelling strategy with a minimum of variety?

Stances instead of At-Will Attacks

From what we have seen, the new fighter gets no attack powers. At least, not attacks as we are used to, with Attack and Hit lines. Just the good old Basic Attack. But do get something to emulate the effect of other classes’ at-will attacks, in the form of at-will stances. Conveniently, a first level fighter gets 2 of these stances (but more on this later), which add modifiers and special riders to all melee basic attacks. This way, instead of, for example, an at-will that adds extra damage, there would be a stance that boosts the damage of all basic attacks.

So far, we have a full writeup of two of these stances in the preview, and the name and general effect of a third. Battle Wrath is your straightforward offensive power, providing a flat bonus to damage that is decent at low levels, though it doesn’t seem to scale properly for higher tiers, unless we are missing something (and we probably are). Cleaving Assault deals damage to other adjacent enemies, as could be expected - a well-known mechanic for fighter players. Finally, Measured Cut seems to provide free movement (likely shifts) with your attacks. Overall, it looks like a fighter using these stances would perform very much like the current ones.

Nevertheless, this system has serious implications. The most obvious is that it feels different, and probably easier to swallow for players of previous editions. I’m perfectly fine with martial characters getting a series of powers that might resemble a spell list, but I’m also aware that this was a shock for some D&D players when 4E was released - making the game less enjoyable for them. On the other hand, a fighter applying modifiers to the standard attack does have precedent in previous editions, and thus looks more familiar.

But this is not just directed to veteran players. This kind of at-wills also has subtle advantages compared to the 4E default, for someone completely new to the game, or who just wants a simpler game experience. Because a stance effect lasts until you turn it off or switch to a different stance, a fighter player would no longer need to choose and declare a specific power each turn. Just saying “I hit the monster with my sword” works just fine. Of course, sometimes it would be preferable to change stances, from a strategic point of view, but you now have a decent default in case you don’t want to think too hard about it.

And I know, from experience, that this kind of things can be useful. There’s a player in our campaign that has been in the party since the beginning (almost two years, now), but who nevertheless doesn’t care much for the mechanical details - she’s just there for the company and the laughs. So, more often than not, when her turn comes, she points to a monster and throws the dice, while shouting “Attaaack!”. Which, of course, isn’t of much help when nobody knows exactly what kind of attack she intended to make - and deciding after everything has been rolled is kind of awkward, so we end up asking her to specify the power and reroll. All of this has happened before, and it will happen again. Well, guess what? The Essential fighter works just fine for this kind of players. And not just because of the at-wills.

Power Strike instead of Encounters

Not content with overhauling the at-will attack mechanics, this version of the fighter also features a twist on encounter attacks. It’s clear that many details escape us at the moment, but one thing is for sure: there are no encounter attacks, only Power Strike.

Power Strike

Encounter

Free Action

Trigger: You hit an enemy with a melee basic attack using a weapon.

Effect: The target takes 1[W] extra damage from the triggering attack.

The At-Will stances described above didn’t bring that much simplification in character building or game strategy, as you still had a similar number of slots to fill, and of decisions to make each turn. Power Strike is a different beast, entirely replacing a whole category of powers with a straightforward effect. Your encounter power will always be a plain 2[W] attack, easy enough.

Except that it isn’t just that. To begin with, Power Strike is triggered when you hit, so you don’t have to declare it beforehand. Not only is this much more friendly for non-hardcore players, who no longer need to think much before taking an action, but it’s also deceivingly strong. Our simple 2[W] encounter now works as if it had the reliable keyword, becoming a much more potent choice. Moreover, you are still making a basic attack with whatever stance you had active, so any riders of your pseudo-at-will power will also apply. Add to this the fact that it can trigger on opportunity attacks or charges, and our easy-mode encounter replacement doesn’t look so harmless, anymore!

One of the greatest mysteries of Power Strike is how it will advance as you level up. From the Knight advancement table, we see that at level 3 there is a feature called Improved power strike, which likely grants an extra use of the power, or something like that. And, though we lack information on those levels, I’d bet that the extra [W] damage increases at paragon and epic. But the thing that throws me off guard is the fact that there’s nothing like “More Improved Power Strike” at level 7! So you don’t necessarily get up to 3 uses of this, as other classes gain 3 encounter attacks. I wonder how that will work out? Maybe the level 3 feature isn’t a straight second use, and grants you some kind of recharge mechanic instead.

Also, it remains to be seen if we will be able to customize Power Strike through feats or class features. It would be a cool way to emulate the choice of different encounter attacks, but it might also rise the complexity to unacceptable levels (and I’m not just talking about beginner players, here). Again, this preview leaves us with many, many questions.

No dailies, lots of mysterious features

Speaking of questions, the advancement table shows a huge number of class features we still know nothing about. And, unlike with wizards and clerics, we can expect these to be very juicy, strong features, because Essential Fighters do not get Daily Powers. This had been anticipated, but I somehow expected there would be some kind of daily-like mechanic to boost powers, in fact very much like Power Strike. However, none of the features in the table looks like a clear match for that mechanic, so we might end up with something completely different.

At level 1, there are a whopping 4 class features (apart from stances and Power Strike), of which only one appears in the preview. Called Defender Aura, it seems like an interesting twist on the marking mechanic, without all the hassle of inflicting a condition on the enemy. Basically, any enemy adjacent to a fighter takes penalties to attack as if he were marked by him. This is worded so that it doesn’t stack or interfere with marks, suggesting that Essential defenders will probably not mark enemies. It looks like a fine mechanic, but it’s hard to say how effective it will be without knowing about the punishment mechanics.

The remaining level 1 features are Weapon Talent (no idea if it will picking the features with the same name from previous books), Battle Guardian, and Shield Finesse. Battle Guardian looks like the defender punishment, and Shield Finesse seems to be a knight-specific defensive feature. Note that none of these sound like a pseudo-daily feature.

As with other Essentials classes, you gain more features at higher levels. Level 4 brings Combat Readiness, which sounds like something related to Opportunity Attacks, and level 9 has Improved Combat Readiness (again, not daily-like at all). Level 5 has Weapon Mastery, and Level 7 Weapon Specialization. These could all be predefined features, but I expect at least a few of them to offer some choices down the line, to make up for the loss of different encounter and daily powers. Finally, there’s something called Shield Block at level 8.

Something remarkable in this list of features is the one you get at level 7: Extra Fighter Stance. This means that fighters get a third at-will as they level up, and potentially even more at higher tiers.

Conclusion

This preview leaves us with a good impression of what the new fighter is not like (i.e, 4E classes as we know it). However, there are enough gaps to make it almost impossible to guess what it will be like in play. It certainly might end up with a ridiculously low number of options to build and fight, but there’s also potential for a class even more complex than psionic ones (even if I’m almost certain that they won’t go that route). The not-quite-a-mark could be as good as Combat Challenge (which is to say, really good), or almost useless, for all we know (again, I doubt that will be the case). And the balance against classes with encounters and dailies? Your guess is as good as mine - personally, I think there are a LOT of things that could go wrong, but have faith in the game developers, psionic classes notwithstanding.

There is one final point of concern, though. There is an impressive amount of feats and enchantments in the game that can improve a character’s basic attacks, to the point that it is possible to build PCs with basics that outperform their at-wills, or even their encounters. This is worrying by itself (and in fact I was thinking on writing about it some day), but could become disastrous in combination with a class like this warrior that is completely based on souped-up basic attacks. I don’t think it’s possible to implement a fighter that is balanced both with and without these items, so I wouldn’t be surprised to find a massive errata following the release of Essentials.

Introduction
Cleric - Fighter (Knight) - Fighter (Slayer) - Rogue -Wizard
Druid - Paladin Ranger (Hunter) Ranger (Scout) - Warlock

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All about Shields: A Fighter Class Acts article

Continuing with the ongoing trend of goodness in march DDI content, today's feature is a very niche article that happens to fit MY personal niche: that of Fighters with shields. The article, signed by Daniel Jones (who is getting D&D material published for the first, and hopefully not the last time), fills 5 pages with a wide assortment of options for the defensive-oriented warrior. This is good stuff, with many fresh ideas supported by solid mechanics. Here is an overview of what you'll find:

- Shield powers for each slot up to level 16, including a new at-will, so you can now realistically make a Paragon Fighter fully committed to shield attacks. And a moderately effective one at that, thanks to the next point...

- Proper attack bonus scaling on shield powers! Yep, these have +3 at heroic, +6 at paragon, and +9 at epic (rather than the +2/+4/+6 of previous iterations), to account for the loss of Weapon Expertise (since they lack the weapon keyword). Powers on the later half of a tier even have an extra point thrown in there to ease the progression. I may still miss the extra point from Fighter Weapon Talent, but this is a very positive progress, nonetheless. Now, if only shield powers from other sources could be updated to work like this...

- A strong, shield-based at-will attack that is even offensively oriented! I had been missing something like this for a while. I loved the original shield at-will, Tide of Iron, as much as anyone (aside from its mechanic usefulness, it still has one of the best power names in the game), but the more recent addition, Resolute Shield, had turned out to be a poor man's version of Crushing Surge. The one presented here, called Shield Feint, has the intriguing effect of Righteous Brand'ing (post-errata) yourself. Most useful in sustained assaults, this can also serve to set up potent encounter or daily powers. Interestingly, the attack bonus can be applied (and spent) if you make opportunity or combat challenge attacks, making you even more sticky, but also being a potential waste if you are already auto-hitting with Combat Superiority.

- A Paragon Path with an amazing concept. Called Snapping Testudo (in honor of the famous Roman defensive formation, and Latin turtles in general), it rewards players for wearing two shields at once! Needless to say, this turns you into a defensive powerhouse, apart from being downright cool.

- New magic shields that can be used as off-hand weapons, opening up many cool options. These make a very solid alternative to Spiked Shields because they don't take up a feat, tend to have better stats, and can be heavy shields. Apart from being very useful for those whishing to enter the Testudo path from the previous point, these open up Dual Strike for shield fighters. So now my character is retraining not one but two at-will attacks (goodbye, Cleave!). And, of course, adding shiny new loot to my wishlist!

- Finally, there are a few new feats to further customize your shield user, including one that I consider a must-have: Hindering Shield (for Paragon fighters) makes all your forced movement slow enemies! I wonder if this couldn't have been written in a more restricted way - as is, it allows a wizard multiclassing into fighter to turn Thunderwave into a real powerhouse. On the other hand, I'd like it to work with melee basic attacks, and fighter and paragon path powers with or without the weapon keyword - which is not easy to template.

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Martial Power 2 Preview: Brawler Fighter build!

With the most obvious fighter builds (weapon and shield, two-handed weapon, two weapons, berserker) already available from Player's Handbook and Martial Power, I wondered what new weapon style could Martial Power 2 bring. Single handed weapons without a shield is still open, but that might be hard to justify. What could you possibly want the free hand for?

To punch them in the face, of course! The Brawler Style Fighter has been previewed in a very sneaky way through the MP2 faq, which includes an awesome new at-will power specific for the build: Grappling Strike. It is a standard weapon attack that requires you to have a hand free, so that you can grab your foe after hitting. It looks like a very cool concept, since it introduces hand-to-hand combat in a very fightery way, giving a new meaning to the expression "Sword and Fist".

I had some doubts about Martial Power being able to surprise us, but this was quite unexpected.

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Broken Bits: Come and Get It

(Broken bits is a series of short articles that will focus on unbalanced or otherwise broken game elements, one at a time.)

Overpowered attacks in D&D 4E usually fall in one of three categories: those that dish out huge amounts of damage (usually of the single-target variety), those that negate enemy actions with conditions such as stuns and immobilizations, and those that grant massive bonuses to a party's attacks or defenses. These tend to be easy to identify, since damage, enemy actions, and stat enhancenments can be objectively measured and compared as numeric values. Today I will discuss a power that, though not stellar in any of these variables, is nonetheless extremely effective.

How do you quantify strategic advantage? How much is controlling character positions in a battle really worth? These aren't easy questions, but looking at the Fighter's level 7 encounter power Come and Get It, the answers seem to be "Highly" and "A lot".

In many ways, Come and Get It is a success. There are few powers in the game that make such a perfect fit with the class they belong to. Indeed, for most other classes (and even most defenders) it wouldn't be more than a good way of dealing damage to lots of enemies, with an interesting side-effect. In the hands of a Fighter, the ability to attract most nearby enemies and hit them is the ultimate trump card.

It works like this: for a marked enemy, moving away from a Fighter is an annoyingly difficult and dangerous proposition. Under normal conditions, only one or, at best, a few clumped together enemies are threatened this way. But with Come and Get It, this turns into the whole opposing team. Moreover, since the forced movement is guaranteed, and the covered area is considerable, the Fighter has a wide margin for moving before the attack so that a lot of monsters are moved to, and pinned in, a very disadvantageous position.

It's an extremely exciting and amusing maneuver that every Fighter should try at least once in their career. I recently reached Level 7 with my Human Battlerager, and the power has been every bit as good as I expected. Though it is useful in many situations, you will often want to blow it on the first round of combat in order to take your opponents out of cover, mark everybody before your allies get hurt, and set up a barrage of whatever area attacks the party has at its disposal.

What is not to like? Well, for a start, being so terribly effective turns it into an almost automatic choice for the level 7 slot of any Fighter character. And being so convenient at the start of the battle makes it an all-too-common first turn play. But I think that to fully grasp the strength of this power, one has to DM against it.

Regardless of their actual efectiveness, fighters tend to be annoying opponents. Your creatures can't move, they can't safely shift away, and if you choose to stay and fight them, they take forever to bring down. But Come and Get It upgrades that annoyance to downright frustration. Forget about any clever schemes, because as soon as the guy with the sword starts his turn, all your incompetent lackeys will go rushing exactly where he wants them to be. And they won't get away.

A possible solution.

The power's brutality comes from two main factors: the size of the affected area, and the inescapability of the forced movement. A reduced burst would probably be a safe fix, but I'd rather keep the power as a burst 3, and make the pull conditional on an attack roll instead:

Come and Get It, mk2 - Fighter Attack 7
Encounter - Martial, Weapon
Standard Action - Close burst 3
Target: Each non-adjacent enemy in burst you can see.
Attack: Strength vs. Will
Hit: You pull the target 2 squares to a square adjacent to you.
Effect: Make a secondary attack.
Secondary Target: Each adjacent enemy you can see.
Secondary Attack: Strength vs. AC
Hit: 1[W]+Strength modifier damage.

With this version, there is some tension between reaching the maximum number of potential targets within the pulling burst, and having as many adjacent enemies as possible to ensure you can attack someone. The pulling attack can be extremely accurate, but the chance of missing, small though it may be, will make most players think twice about the way they use this power, which is a good thing in my mind. But don't fool yourself: even with this patch, you are still looking at a devastating attack.

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Fighter Essentials: The Great Weapon

UPDATE: The article has finally been errataed in the Dragon magazine compilation. There are details below, but the most important error - the Warding Steel power - is fixed now.

The new Class Acts article devoted to Fighters (how many are there, already?) provides much needed reasons to make a Greatweapon Talent Fighter, by far the most overlooked of this class' builds. There's a lot to comment - to summarize, the article makes a great read, and is mostly safe to use in your campaign, with two notable exceptions I'll explain below.

New Feats

The new feats presented in the article are something the class has been missing greatly, ever since Martial Power was released: Fighter options that can't also be taken by Battleragers or Tempests. Most of them are decent and moderately interesting, but there's one that really sucks, a very strong one that will be very influential in future fighter builds, and one that is quite broken.

The crappiest new feat is, sadly, called Fighter Weapon Specialization. One would expect such a name to be used for something really cool, but this amounts to a mere +1 to damage with your chosen weapon type, which never increases. What a letdown.

The feat you will have to take into account whenever you make a Fighter PC from now on is Hewing Charge. It's the ultimate reward for going the 2H-weapon talent route, and grants a Con bonus to charge damage. This has the potential to embarrass Howling Strike Barbarians, and asks you to build the character around it. Nevertheless, I think it isn't really unbalanced, considering what you can get from other Fighter builds. I really, really like it.

The broken one is Pinning Challenge which, despite its name, doesn't have nothing to do with Combat Challenges or Opportunity attacks. It allows you to immobilize with basic attacks, and it's wrong at so many levels! Against melee enemies, this allows you to effectively stun them at-will, for the whole encounter. What's worse, nonbasic attack powers become really unappealing once you have this. A real blunder.

A version of Pinning Challenge that is both cool and balanced just requires you to add 'When making a Combat Challenge attack or an opportunity attack'. I strongly recommend you to use it, or something similar, at home.

By the way, the Mastered Technique feat, which is conceptually sound, won't work in practice because it grants a +1 feat bonus to AC, but every Fighter worth his salt won't be able to stack it with the +1 feat bonus granted by Armor Specialization. Since it absolutely needs to be a typed bonus, why not change it to +2?

New Powers

There is a neat selection of new powers, typicaly centered on 2-handed weapon wielders, but without actually requiring the Weapon Talent class feature. The core mechanic for attack powers seems to be granting -2 to hit for a bonus to damage (usually) Con. At first sight, this is terrible unless the bonus is huge (which it isn't), but some of the powers manage to be decent.

Brutal Advance (Daily 5)

A multiattack power, exclusive to 2-handed weapon wielders. Hit, push, then charge. This should amount to a great deal of damage.

Line in the Sand (Utility 6) (Update: changed to daily power in errata)

An amazing example of justifying Zone powers for martial characters.

Hurricane Strike (Daily 15)

This targets "any enemy in burst". This deviates from the usual "each enemy in burst", but judging from the powers, they mean the same. Weird. Maybe it's supposed to work like previous powers, but allowing you to skip enemies?

Warding Steel (Util 16) - Completely broken as an at-will. A permanent bonus to AC equal to Con, and you can activate more than once per turn (it stacks!). It really should be an encounter power. (Update: Finally changed to Encounter. The world is saved)

Toppling Finish (Daily 19)

This is a promising 2-hit power: the first attack knocks prone, and the second hurts a lot. The problem is, it has the reliable keyword, so you can 'spend' the reliability with a hit that deals no damage, then miss the important attack. Maybe they could add a line like "Hitting this attack doesn't count towards the Reliable keyword"?

Battle Furor (Utility 22)

Permanent Stance! It's an encounter power, so you can have it always up. It's effect is to turn excess healing into temp. HP, and then grant some extra damage. Very cool.

Paragon Paths

Two, exclusive to Great Weapon fighters. The Great Weapon Master specializes, oddly, in defensive maneuvers and counter attacks - the 16th level feature grants a Con bonus to damage against enemies that have missed you. It looks more fun to play than the average path, and isn't too bad at the power level department.

The Siegebreaker' Shtick is to weaken enemy defenses. It's damage enhancing feature is what the Pit Fighter's should have been all along: ability modifier damage (Con instead of Wis, here), limited to once per round, and only when you have combat advantage. This one also features a permanent (that is, once per encounter) Stance, called Brutal Momentum, which grants bonus to attack after hitting with at-wills.

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One errata to fix them all!

The rule updates for july have just come out, and I'm really, really impressed. Although the number of changes isn't huge, the accuracy and quality of the fixes is unprecedented. Seven changes affecting five of the most problematic rules elements in the game. You will no longer have to worry about banning/houseruling any of the following:

• Rain of Blows (broken Fighter encounter power)
• Righteous Rage of Tempus (obscene Channel Divinity feat)
• Battlerager Vigor (broken Fighter class feature)
• Dual Strike (broken Fighter at-will... do I see a pattern, here?)
• Guileful Switch (time warping Warlord utility)

So, what did they change?

Rain of Blows

Target: One creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC, two attacks
Hit: 1[W] damage.
Weapon: If you’re wielding a flail, a light blade, or a spear and have Dexterity 15 or higher, make the attack a third time against either the target or a different creature.

This power suffered from terrible, ambiguous templating, but under the most popular (and optimistic) interpretation of its text, it allowed for up to 4 attacks. That is, a 3rd level encounter power outdamaged most dailies, even at epic tier. The update tones it down significantly, clearly limiting the number of attacks to 3 and removing the strength bonus to damage.

I like this change, as the new text is elegant and clean, but don't be fooled into thinking that the power is no longer worth taking. Even for those without the required dexterity, the double attack without strength should overtake single attack encounter powers at mid-heroic levels, and improve from then on. As for making full use of it, it probably isn't worth it anymore to build characters specifically to use this power, but any fighter interested in polearms or with a racial bonus to dexterity will find enough reward if he invests to fill the requirements. It also makes a great multiclass power for Brutal Scoundrel rogues.

Channel Divinity: Righteous Rage of Tempus

Effect: If you hit with the next weapon attack that you make before the end of your next turn and it isn’t a critical hit, you roll the extra damage dice that you would roll if you scored a critical hit and deal the result as extra damage. If the attack is a critical hit, its extra damage is maximized.

No longer gives you an automatic critical hit, but the extra damage is nothing to sneeze at. It's clear that Tempus' favoured weapons are Vicious Executioner's axes or Fullblades, so you can expect to add 2d12 damage even at lower levels, and a rather impressive +9d12 at epic!

After losing half of its damage contribution and the combos with critical hit triggers (like Rending Weapons or Two-Weapon Opening) RRoT is still a fantastic feat, and flat out better than most Channel Divinity ones, at least until the coming of Divine Power. Tempus' legion of followers probably won't be diminished by this change, but their power has been brought down to almost reasonable levels.

Battlerager Vigor

Whenever you hit an enemy with a melee or a close attack, you gain temporary hit points equal to your Constitution modifier, plus any temporary hit points normally granted by the power.
If you use an invigorating fighter attack power and miss every target with it, you gain temporary hit points equal to your Constitution modifier.
(the extra damage using light armor and certain weapons is unchanged)

This is a bit stronger than what I would have liked, but I can live with that. They made the extra THP to trigger on your attacks instead of your enemies', taking away the immunity to melee minions and making Battleragers vulnerable to multiple enemies ganging up on them. THP gained against single enemies have been roughly halved, but they make up for it with a very cool bonus to invigorating powers: making them work on a miss. This is a nice twist, and introduces a synergy between Battlerager and Invigorating powers that the original rules failed to get.

Related to this fix are the changes to two feats:

Dwarf Stoneblood

Benefit: You gain a +2 feat bonus to the number of temporary hit points you gain from using an invigorating power. (+4/+6 at higher levels)

Improved Vigor

Benefit: You gain a +1 feat bonus to the number of temporary hit points you gain from using an invigorating power. (+2/+3 at higher levels)

Improved Vigor no longer provides additional benefits to Battleragers, and Dwarf Stoneblood has been overhauled - previously it gave a bonus to Battlerager Vigor equal to half your Constitution, and now it's just a better version of Improved Vigor. Also, the bonuses of both feats are now typed so that they no longer stack.

Overall, I like this new version of Battlerager Vigor, and the idea of respeccing my Fighter to be a Battlerager no longer ashames me. As for the feats, Improved Vigor will remain a good option for (non-dwarf) battleragers and a poor one for other fighter, whereas Dwarf Stoneblood is now open to dwarf fighters of any build (EDIT: it isn't - oddly, Battlerager Vigor is still a requirement), being a very strong incentive to pick Crushing Surge as an at-will.

Dual Strike

Primary Attack: Strength vs. AC (main weapon)
Hit: 1[W] damage.
Effect: Make a secondary attack.
Secondary Target: One creature other than the primary target
Secondary Attack: Strength vs. AC (off-hand weapon)
Hit: 1[W] damage.

Format aside, this is a functional equivalent of the fix I asked for, so I'm completely satisfied - fighters will no longer outdamage all but the best of strikers, and Tempest gameplay will be the group marking, minion slaying experience it should have been from the beginning. I can imagine some dual wielders actually not taking this power now, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Guileful Switch

Requirement: You must use this power during your turn before you take any other actions.
Effect: (switch initiative with an ally) You then act when your ally would have acted.

This gave you extra turns every encounter, which was obviously broken, as well as unintended. Another very well chosen fix.

To sum up, I love this update! I'd say about half of the things fixed here are still slightly overpowered, but in a tolerable way. Some players will be forced to retrain their characters, though: Battleragers, in particular, should no longer be able to ignore Crushing Surge, and dual wielding fighters built to be single-target damage machines will no longer work. Can't say I'll miss them.
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Reliably good

When you think of exciting, powerful Fighter mechanics, the reliable keyword is unlikely to jump to your mind. It's certainly solid, and it does its work, but its effect isn't what you would call flashy. To make things worse, it usually ends up in simple, mediocre powers like Brute Strike. While I don't doubt that this will eventually get solved, even if it means printing strictly superior stuff like Lasting Threat, I'd like reliable powers to be somewhat useful in the meantime. This is what I'll try to address today.

My approach is simple: take advantage of the fact that Reliable is a keyword, and design a few feats that reward you for using such powers. Hopefully, this will make Fighters feel a little less ashamed of using a non-stance daily.

Unerring Tactics
Heroic Tier
Prerequisite: Fighter
Benefit: Once per round, when you hit with a Fighter or Paragon Path daily power with the Reliable keyword, choose an Encounter power you know. That power gains the Reliable keyword until the end of the encounter.

Certain Recovery
Heroic Tier
Prerequisite: Fighter
Benefit: Once per round, when you hit with a Fighter or Paragon Path daily power with the Reliable keyword, you can spend a healing surge.

Infallible Shield
Heroic Tier
Prerequisite: Fighter
Benefit: Once per round, when you hit with a Fighter or Paragon Path daily power with the Reliable keyword, you gain a +1 bonus to AC until the end of the encounter.
Special: You must carry a shield to benefit from this feat.

Inescapable Assault
Epic Tier
Prerequisite: Fighter, 21st level.
Benefit: Once per round, when you hit with a Fighter or Paragon Path daily power with the Reliable keyword, you can reroll any number of dice in the damage roll. Until the end of the encounter, whenever you make a damage roll, you can reroll one die.
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Not at the beginning of turn: Fighter Stances

I have this thing with effects that work at the beginning of an enemy's turn. It's not just that I think they are overpowered -they usually are- but rather, that were several options to express the same game function, and they chose the worst possible one. Consider, for example, the difference with something that triggers at the end of your own turn. Outside of some corner cases of you or your target being slid or pushed by third parties between your initiative turns, both wordings are equivalent. Why, then, do I think one of them is wrong?



Let's use Rain of Steel, arguably the best Fighter daily attack power in its level, as an example. Its wording may lead to false assumptions. By having the damage take place during the enemy's turns, a reader can, as a first impression, think that that enemy is somehow responsible of that damage. That he is taking it as a consecuence of previous actions, or that he could have done something to prevent it. In short, the power is punishing opponents for being next to the fighter. But that is not true.

Imagine that the same power was written in the following way:



There are a few very minor functional changes here, but essentially this works just like the previous version. However, now it should be more clear to the reader that the power's only purpose is to deal extra damage to whoever you move next to. And, by the way, it's very good at what it does.

However, I'm not writing today's article merely to complain about unfortunate templating, or to suggest cosmetic changes. See, even if my perception of Rain of Steel (as a power that punished enemies for their choice of movement) was a lie, it was a lie that I liked. Maybe the game designers just wanted a power that dished inconditional damage all along, but I'm convinced that it would play better if the enemy was given a chance to avoid the damage. Not only would it be more balanced, but it would have far more strategic depth, and be more fun to play, both for players and DMs.

So, how would I (supposedly) improve this Fighter Stance? Just a simple fix - change the effect to trigger at the end of enemies' turns. It may not seem like much, but it makes the power much more interactive. Although your opponents now have a choice to avoid the automatic damage,
the alternatives aren't pretty - since taking opportunity attacks from a fighter is usually a losing rproposition, shifting and getting hit with Combat Challenge becomes the lesser evil. Even if the stance is weakened overall, this new version is now without its advantages, as enemies who charge you or otherwise engage you in melee will be punished. The limited playtesting I have made so far (you don't use daily powers that often, after all) has been very promising, as almost every turn I had a chance to make opportunity attacks or combat challenge attacks.

This is what it would look like:


There are several, higher level Fighter powers using the same mechanic. The revised versions are shown below:









About the power of Rain of Steel

(Warning: this paragraph contains some math. Feel free to skip it if you're not interested in the numbers) To justify the my balancing issues with RoS, let me explain just how much damage this kind of power amounts to. A non-optimized level 5 fighter with Strenth 18, a +1 Bastard sword and weapon focus should deal 1d10+6 damage on a basic attack hit, for an average of 11.5. If he can hit an enemy 60% of the time, this amounts to 6,6 average damage per attack. A single trigger of Rain of Steel, which needs no roll to hit, would deal 7,5 average damage - that is slightly higher than a basic attack, but a bit lower than some at-will powers. As contrast, a simple, pure damage daily power, like Brute Strike would make 3d10+6 (average 22) damage on a hit, or 13.2 per attack. That is less than what you'd make in the first turn you used Rain of Steel (with a minor action) and, say, a basic attack (with the standard action) against the same opponent (about 14 on average). And we're not even counting that RoS lasts for the whole encounter, and can hit several enemies at once.

Granted, Brute Strike is a pretty bad daily, and this is a particular scenario. Switching to a 2-handed weapon, like a Mordenkrad(and assuming, for simplicity, that hit rate doesn't change) would increase it's damage to an average of 30*0.6=18, whereas the basic attack+RoS trigger would be 14*0.6+10=18.4. Increasing the hit rate would benefit Brute Strike, but higher damage bonuses (which are more frequent) would favor RoS. Anyway, the point is: RoS deals a LOT of damage, turn after turn, to many targets.
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Fighting for balance

It's not too difficult to come up with really powerful Fighter builds. On top of excellent defending capabilities, you can get absurdly high damage potential, often rivalling even the mighty Ranger. I already addressed the Battlerager Vigor class feature, but there are still a few powers that I consider broken enough to push Fighters over the top. I will take a look at them today, among other things, such as the pitiful at-will Sure Strike.

At-will powers

Comment:This change was directly taken from the WoTC errata forums, and I love it. Dual strike is typically the most serious offender in fighter damaging builds, and this removes that option, while adding a unique, fun dimension to Tempest Fighters. Comparison with Cleave is inevitable, but being both able to mark twice and restricted to dual wielding whould differentiate it enough.


Comment: This has nothing to do with overpowered builds, but Sure Strike was abysmally bad, and could lead inexperienced players to play poor characters. If my numbers are right, now it should be on par with basic attacks without the conditional bonus, and be a serious rival for other at-wills with it. I like that it encourages using different single-target at-wills, depending on the situation, as you generally have one that is just better all the time.

The following fixed at-wills just have minor modifications on them, so I list the changes rather than showing the full power blocks:

Brash Strike - In the Attack line, change 'Strength+2 vs AC' to 'Strength+1 vs AC'.

Comment: This might not be needed, but Brash Strike was undeniably strong and pushing the limits allowed to a fair at-will. I also think that the drawback turned out not to be that harsh, since it will be quite easy for enemies in melee to gain combat advantage anyways. Although this tones down the power, I think it should still be more than good enough to remain competitive.

Footwork Lure- In the Hit line, change 'slide the target into the space you left' to 'slide the target 1 square into the space you left'.

Comment: This was needed to prevent polearm users to attack targets from reach and slide them 2 squares, and makes this power the same as the Avenger's Overwhelming Strike, which was published directly with this limitation. In combination with the Polearm Momentum feat (that knocks prone after moving an enemy 2 squares), this power allowed to knock enemies prone every turn, which is quite abusive.

Encounter powers


Comment- Rain of Blows is a good candidate for power with the worst format in the game, and it leads to (oficially confirmed) interpretations suggesting that it makes between 2 and 4 attacks. This is unacceptably good, as it deals more damage than many daily powers of higher level. My suggested fix differs a bit from the original idea, but it has the advantage of being playable without the right weapons, yet not broken with them. Read More......

A less Vigorous Battlerager

The Battlerager Fighter build is absurdly powerful. Here's a suggestion to bring it on par with other weapon talents, while preserving as much of the original mechanics as possible.

Replace the Battlerager Vigor Fighter talent with the following:

When you hit an enemy, if that enemy has hit you with a melee or close attack since your last turn, you gain temporary hit points equal to your Constitution modifier. If the attack is Invigorating, and you are wielding an axe, a hammer, a mace or a pick, you gain the sum of these temporary hit points and the amount granted by Invigorating.

When wearing light armor or chainmail, you gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls against enemies that have hit you with melee or close attacks since your last turn. Increase this bonus to +3 at 11th level and +4 at 21st level

This is a refinement of an idea I proposed a while back at the wizards.com forums. Essentially, by adding the requirement of hitting an enemy, the amount of THP gained is halved. Also, it no longer activates multiple times when several enemies attack at once, so Battleragers can now be overwhelmed by superior numbers. More importantly, the dreaded minion immunity is gone for good.

Given this sudden drop in power, you might think that this new version is now too weak. Far from it. Characters with good Constitution will still gain lots of THP, it's just that now they just mitigate enemy attacks rather than almost negating them. The combination with Invigorating can also be effective, as well as spectacular: it's not difficult to have Invigorating, Battleraging hits that heal for double digits. Of course, this isn't any more than what previous stacking rules allowed, but gaining the THP in single bursts should feel impressive, anyway.

Putting aside balance concerns, I like to think that the revised mechanics should be more fun in play, too. The need to hit makes character building more interesting,since the build with the best defenses is not necessarily the one with the highest Constitution. Also, there are now stronger reasons to go with the recommended weapons and armor, although other choices are definitely viable. Finally, the need to go for the guy that hit you provides the raging flavor that was sometimes missing in previous implementations.

But the best of all is that, no matter how good these battleragers turn out to be, their desperate need to hit means they will always miss the Weapon Talent they had to give up!
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D&D class overview (IV): The not-so-awesome

The second tier of classes, which I'll talk about today, are mostly fine except for a few significant issues. While they can certainly be played, and enjoyed, I believe they would vastly improve if these issues were addressed. Let's take a look at the Fighter and its balance problems, the featureless Wizard, and both Clerics and Paladins with their crippling multiple main ability scores.

I find identifying classes in pictures rather difficult, and not just because of resolutions as tiny as above.

I should start by admitting I'm a Fighter kind of guy. Shield Fighter, to be more specific. The first archetype I try in most games is the highly defensive melee guy. However, don't think that I'm blinded by favoritism when I state that the Player's Handbook Fighter is a brilliant design. I particularly like how it offers not just 2 different builds, but 2 x N: two fighter weapon talents and N different types of weapon (including three very viable choices in heavy blades, axes and hammers, as well as a smattering of lesser varieties). These multiple levels of choice are a great idea, and something that I'd really like to see generalized.

While the Player's Handbook material alone would have the fighter as an almost flawless class, this changes, for worse, with Martial Power. Don't get me wrong, I think MP is quite a decent supplement, and it adds lots of goodies for all martial classes, fighters included. It's just that it has a few important blunders regarding balance, and they are all fighter related.

The most obvious offender is the Battlerager Vigor class feature. For builds with low to average constitution it's merely a better choice than Weapon Talent. On more optimized characters, however, it is a powerhouse that grants near immunity to melee attacks. Slightly less problematic, but still dangerous, is the Tempest Fighter build. This build, coupled with double weapons from Adventurer's Vault and a careful feat selection, is capable of damage outputs that rival those of most strikers, being second only to optimized Rangers. I do believe that most of the blame lies in the double weapons, but the at-will power Dual Strike should also be closely examined.

Another Fighter 'gem' from MP is the paragon feat Marked Scourge, which is almost unreachable for other classes through multiclassing, boosts Fighter damage even more, and becomes just insane when dual wielding. Finally, no discussion on Fighter balance would be complete without mentioning the 3rd level encounter power from PHB, Rain of Blows. Official interpretations on this poorly formatted power (which I disagree with) state that it can deal between 2 and 4 attacks, which translates in an absurd amount of damage, rivalling most daily powers, even at Epic levels.

Wizards, more than any other class, are entirely defined by their powers. It's not just that they have an amazing selection of them, with excellent choices available both for the at-will, encounter and daily categories. Rather, it's because what they lack: class features.

Cantrips and Spellbooks, while cool and flavorful, are virtually useless in combat. Implement Mastery, on the other hand, is quite useful, and would make a great secondary feature. What is missing here is a core, combat related feature. Any other class would fill this spot with some role-related feature, but there is no such thing for controllers. As a result, the class feels slightly lacking in efficiency and uniqueness, even if the awesome powers sometimes make up for it. There are also worrying implications with multiclassing, as other classes with actual features can gain access to those wizard powers.

To make things worse, even the humble Implement Mastery isn't fully taken advantage of. No power in the wizard's repertoire references neither the wielded implement nor the chosen mastery, making this build choice largely irrelevant. Furthermore, secondary ability scores are worthless, with the exception of Wisdom being used for two at-will powers. Other than that, and the Implement Mastery power, we find that Wisdom, Constitution and Dexterity mean nothing to the Wizard.

Despite these problems, added to their blatant lack of feats, wizards work fairly well. But they definitely can be improved upon.

We are left with Clerics and Paladins, which to me present the same concern: they offer two options for a main ability score, and have that as the only variable to differentiate builds. As I explained previously, multiple main ability scores just don't work. But even if they did, the build options in these divine classes would still be very, very wrong.

It's bad enough that class features stay the same from one build to the other. What is completely un acceptable, though, is that one build's abilities affect these features while the other one's don't. Wisdom Clerics have Healer's Lore, but Strength Clerics get nothing. Likewise, Charisma Paladins gain a bonus to Divine Challenge, and Strength Paladins cry (though both have Wisdom-powered Lay on Hands). You could argue that Strength provides better basic attacks, or whatever. The fact is, in order to use one of your class builds, you have to give up features without getting anything in return!

Oh, and there is no 9nth level daily power for Strength Paladins. The designers must really dislike strong divine characters.

Next: The less-than-awesome!
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