/4eg/ - D&D 4e and 4e-like General: Hot-Blooded Wuxia Action Edition

Also trying my hand at the Surge of Yang power.

Surge of Yang
Shugenja Utility

Encounter
Minor Action
Close Burst 6 (12 at 11th level, 18 at 21st level)
Special: You can use this power three times per encounter, but only once per round. At 16th level, you can use this power four times per encounter.
Target: You or one ally in the burst.
Effect: You gain a +1 bonus to your next attack roll or saving throw before the end of your next turn, and you may mark an adjacent enemy as a free action.
Special: Gain 1 point added to your Yang pool. (2 points at 11th level, 3 points at 21st level)

Using the cleric as my reference as far as leaders go.

Is there a point in splitting the effect and special lines? It's not like this power can miss.

probably not. just posting it as I had come up with it.

I loved 4e's consistant stance on taking monstrous races and giving them some attention as sympathetic potential players. I've always loved Gnolls, Orcs, Kobolds, Goblins and the like but too often it feels like they're given the bare minimum of a stat block and then treated as a monster in every other mention. Gnolls really stand out in 4e for me. I liked the Vryloka, Revenant and Shade as playable takes on traditional undead, even if they seem pretty divisive. I love that the hundred or so elven subraces all fit under the split brackets of Elf and Eladrin, and each has a more defined theme as a result. Also big fan of the Genasi getting lots of love and a bunch more variants.

>HW power

What?

Healing Word.

Since Shugenja is a leader, it needs a healing power.

oh derp, I see where said

>the Shugenja's Healing Word equivalent

now

I'm not actually that into manga and anime and all that. Can someone explain to me what ki is, because I looked it up and I don't really get how we got from "qì or ch'i...an vital force forming part of any living thing...'material energy', 'life force', or 'energy flow'" to punching people in the face and healing people. Also apparently you can get "stronger" ki by training, and especially by spiritual growth. So how do I go from "I should be a good person" to "I will punch them with my goodness"

>The practice of qigong is an important component in both internal and external style Chinese martial arts. Focus on qi is considered to be a source of power as well as the foundation of the internal style of martial arts (Neijia). T'ai Chi Ch'uan, Xing Yi, and Baguazhang are representative of the types of Chinese martial arts that rely on the concept of qi as the foundation. Extraordinary feats of martial arts prowess, such as the ability to withstand heavy strikes (Iron Shirt, 鐵衫) and the ability to break hard objects (Iron Palm, 铁掌) are abilities attributed to qigong training.
>Demonstrations of qi or ki are popular in some martial arts and may include the immovable body, the unraisable body, the unbendable arm, and other feats of power.

Uhm... Probably the typical excuse - self-defense, which is really the point of martial arts. Naturally, in a world like PoL, a whole load of things could attack you.

No, I mean, like...

Right, fire magic for example, lets you create fire.

Divine magic is power granted to you by the gods.

Ki is...what? Can I use "earth ki" and "fire ki"? Is there "demon" ki? Can I attack others ki directly, can I make a ki field to protect my allies?

It's just not something I'm familiar with. The most exposure I have is a half dozen random episodes of DBZ.

Putting aside the fact that Ki is about as related to Anime and Manga as Norse Mythology is to American comic books, the problem here is that the real world's concept of Ki does not work in the context of D&D 4e.

If Ki is defined as a vital force inherent to every living being, it could be said that pretty much everyone uses Ki by default. As far as this definition of Ki as a Power Source goes, it is basically synonymous with the Martial Power Source and the "world's antibody against the Far Realm" interpretation of Psionics.

Afaict, the current definition of "Ki" this general is basing its ideas on is "Asian stuff".

Martial - Physical
Psionic - Mental
Ki - Spiritual
Primal - borrowing from natural spirits
Divine - borrowing from higher powers
Shadow - tapping into decay and darkness
Arcane - reality hacks

So to me, Ki is *necessary* to complete the body-mind-spirit triangle.

>Ki - Spiritual
Right, and where do you get "spiritual" from?

There is nothing inherently spiritual about Ki. Ki is natural. You can improve your Ki by just plain training your bollocks off.
Ki is usually only spiritual when viewed through the lens of a culture not familiar with the idea. And even then there's the problem that "spiritual" as a term is ill-defined, as it can be synonymous with "psychological", "mystical" and "religious". And can the body-mind-spirit triangle even be taken as a base assumption in 4e? What even is "spirit" in 4e, or more specifically, PoL?

What I'm saying is, we need some sort of definition that makes sense in the context of 4e's default assumptions and that most people can interpret similarly.

I really liked the idea one user had about ki classes being mechanically defined by having powers with after effects. Like the five point palm exploding heart technique and Kenshiro's pressure point attacks, martial arts is full of opening and finishing moves.

A leader could give a buff that grants a heal when an ally makes a save against it.
A striker could inflict a debuff that grants extra damage on their next attack.
A controller could grant a worse condition after their target saves from the first.

Their powers would all be an at-will strength set-up for a much more powerful attack on their next turn.

It has it's glaring weaknesses, like being unable to control when your big effect happens and often requiring two attack rolls to land a daily or encounter, but that just means you can make their powers more interesting to compensate.

>Vrylokas: Because "living vampire" is an awesome race idea for a dark fantasy setting.
I used to think this was a silly, redundant race, but then I played a vryloka thaneborn barbarian and never looked back

Beyond that, Dragonborn and Tiefling getting all that love in the fluff really raised them to favorite races status

It's a mystical energy analogous to magic. Pretty much anything you can think of involving magic can be plausibly reflavored to be accomplished using ki, down to blasting fire from your hands or flying through the air.

You get a lot of 'punching dudes in the face' because that's part of the Oriental flavor, but the general idea is that it's magic drawn from the self rather than from external sources.

Almost like psionics even

Shhh, nobody likes psionics.

But reall,y if you want to say that, then every power source might as well be "magic"

It is
The difference of each magic was already explained. It is just a matter of not thinking "magic = arcane".

Well then Ki makes just as much sense as the others

Of ardents, skalds and charisma clerics, which have the best striking potential? Had my heart set on barbarian but the party needs a front-line leader and a face.

Lazylord.

How do I encourage 5e babby's to play a 4e campaign?

They've never researched / seen / played it, yet they fell for the "Everyone hates so it must be bad." meme.

That's a lost cause.
Even if you do somehow get them to play, they'll insist on playing it as if it were 5e and then cry how it's bad.

Maybe have them play Strike first? You can even go "fuck the non-combat section" and literally use 4e's skills and whatnot (not that "whatnot" is much more...), hand them the skill list and say "pick any 4-5 skills, I don't give a shit." and then go with it.

If they like the core mechanics and want more, they can play 4e. Switching systems is a bit of work, but, meh.

Even if you do convince them to play 4e, they'll go in thinking it'll probably be bad, which can influence their view and the actual game. Strike can avoid that because it isn't labeled "DnD 4e". Or maybe you can just tell them "guys pls 4e is kind of cool, try it out? Y'all trust me, right? We can stop after a few sessions if y'all really hate it" and if they're all reasonable they can maybe at least try it out.
I do know people can get absurdly attached to systems, though.

I really like forward thinking cut with Ardent.

You could even do a Barbarian|Ardent hybrid with it and be pretty damn good IIRC.

Make some premade simple essentials characters, print out all the power cards and explain it to them as trying out a new system. The 4e and 5e out of combat experience is so similar it's not worth worrying about, you want to sell them on the combat, if they like it enough you can then graduate them to full classes. 4e as it is right now is very overwhelming to just new players, let alone players who have a stigma against it. Your best chance is to ease them in with essentials, as much as they're criticised on these threads, they're still good introductory classes.

I don't think essentials classes are necessary, just premade characters. I'm currently playing in a party with two players who are not mechanics-oriented at all, so I pretty much built their characters and on level up present them with the 2 or 3 most optimal options for them to take and only let them choose from those. It works pretty well.

Rogue|Bard, wielding a dagger. You can really balance it out.

You could do half elf thief (or other Basic Attack striker), grab the skald multiclass to have the aura, and then equip yourself with a skald at-will stance using the half-elf. Most likely the temp HP one.

Actually pretty fun with Hunter, now that I think about it.

Yeah, you theoretically can, but Rogue|Bard's a lot better.

You're right that you can do a lot of cool stuff with the Half-Elf Skald at-will trick - I like doing it on a Warlock|Warlord.

I really liked psionic monks. I never really liked psionics until it was bundled with them, then I realized the whole thing was just eastern mysticism an not just psychic mutants

A risk of premades is that it doesn't invest them into the characters, which makes them care even less.

You can, however, easily avoid that by asking for their intents and goals and what they want, and then you just build that as close as possible for them.

It would definitely help.
Also, as a basic GM tip in 4e and it was mentioned in another thread, but the way 4e exposes so much mechanics so plainly towards the players CAN "erase" the idea that it's still an RPG and fluff & description & whatnot are fun parts of the game (and can very easily still exist in 4e) and then as such they might revert solely to mechanics-based play...so just be at least slightly aware of that with new, hesitant 5e players

I guess I should have been more specific, but I agree with this. I found out what the other players wanted for their characters in broad strokes before building them.

Theme it up as a one-shot blast from the past time warp games night, and take a premade adventure and some premade characters. Treat it like you're teaching the game for the first time, try not to reference 5e or other editions. They'll be slow in the first encounter, but will be 'what, wow!' when they see their HP and that they all have tons of powers. Get them hooked with a cool short story, and they'll be faster for the second encounter and start looking at combos they can do. If you don't have them hooked on the gameplay in addition to the usual D&D roleplaying stuff by the third encounter, they're probably not interested in general with tactical games.

Gammaword was republished when 4e was still the current shit. It uses 4e mechanics, but simplifies it down to be easier to understand, and there's very little to choose as you level.
This isn't a bad thing, as it's meant to be a short, zany adventure with crazy combinations of mutants.
After a night of that, ask if they want something with a bit more depth, and then show them real 4e.
They'll be sad they can't play a telepathic yeti or a sentient school of fish but they'll adapt.

>you can't play a telepathic yeti or a sentient school of fish in 4e
Bugbear battleminds and swarm druids would like a word

Why are Defenders the best role?

Roll up your characters fellas
2d48 - I've never found a pdf for any of the books but I have them here to photo if people want to know what their character would play as.

1. Android
2. Cockroach
3. Doppelganger
4. Electrokinetic
5. Empath
6. Felinoid
7. Giant
8. Gravity Controller
9. Hawkoid
10. Hypercognitive
11. Mind Breaker
12. Mind Coercer
13. Plant
14. Pyrokinetic
15. Radioactive
16. Rat Swarm
17. Seismic
18. Speedster
19. Telekinetic
20. Yeti
21. A.I.
22. Alien
23. Arachnoid
24. Cryokinetic
25. Ectoplasmic
26. Entropic
27. Exploding
28. Fungoid
29. Gelatinous
30. Magnetic
31. Mythic
32. Nightmare
33. Plaguebearer
34. Plastic
35. Prescient
36. Reanimated
37. Shapeshifter
38. Simian
39. Temporal
40. Wheeled
41. Antimatter Blaster
42. Demon
43. Octopoid
44. Photonic
45. Reanimator
46. Regenerator
47. Saurian
48. Vampiric

Rolled 38, 45 = 83 (2d48)

Lets see~

Rolled 14, 15 = 29 (2d48)

>Radioactive Pyrokinetic
"Some Like It Hot"

Rolled 17, 46 = 63 (2d48)

Rollan for Dolan

>Seismic Regenerator

No idea what that actually means, but it sounds like Kaiju levels of cool.

Question about the Offline Monster Editor

base package and the first update install ok, but the second and third ones pop up with an error message that says "7-zip: Internal error, code 105."

Any idea how to get them to install?

You're made of rocks, cause earthquakes, and resist 5 physical damage, while also regenerating health. You're unkillable. A tiny terrasque.

Because 4e actually has viable mechanics for drawing the attention of foes and keeping it on them.

Because after years of playing tabletop RPG's and going "I wanna be the tanky one and help everyone survive by soaking hits" I finally got a mechanic to introduce threat to the game and several classes defined for this role

hey guys, i'm gonna play 13th age next week, never played that or 4e. what are the class tiers? light searching suggests barbarian is very weak.

I remember barbarian and druid being very weak. Classes are generally balanced for the first few levels, then things start to go a bit haywire.

Linear Martials, Quadratic Casters, as usual.

Take the Bullet and that 5 Physical Resist is a hell of a combo

Man, making a new defender is fucking hard.

what have you got?

Nothing so far. First of all I'm struggling to figure out how you defend someone else with kinda, thematically, and then I'm struggling to figure out a marking mechanic and a punishment mechanic that aren't copies of existing stuff.

Use something like Strike's Shieldbearer?

It can mark enemies with one of its powers, but it's mostly about selecting a dude to protect, instead of selecting an enemy to stop.

Defender that conjures minions that block movement and are generally annoying.

Isn't that a controller?

I mean, I know defenders are sorta controllers but...

There's classes that can conjure/summon things, but none of them attempt the defender role with them. Just like how there's many classes that hit things, but not all of them are defenders.

Pick an ally, all people attacking them are at -2 (Doesn't stack with marking)?

Not great at protecting the entire team but can protect from basically as many dudes as you want if you do it right.

I could see a defender who lays down a and it gives a small aura of difficult terraign/makes opportunity attacks.

Have them work differently to normal with summoning rules, so damage taken by the goes right out of your HP (That way they can be an every battle thing) BUT you have a small bit of resistance to attacks transmitted that way.

Combine that with REALLY low defences for a defender (Like cloth or something) but a bonus to the defence of your . You get a defender who's very tough and can be in a few places...but if you can actually get up in his (real) face he is made of glass.

Are there any implement-based defenders? Swordmage sometimes uses an implement.

Well maybe something like the necromancer idea then?

Has a Mark of Death. Does the usual mark things, but instead of punishment, it makes your summons target the guy with the mark.

One of your first level encounters summons 3 skeletons, if all 3 die you lose a surge. They always surround the target of your mark.

I understand that you don't get the runic stances if you create a hybrid runepriest without the rune master hybrid talent, but are still able to get the runic effects of your powers?

What if it were a summoner who places conjurations.summons on the field, which then mark adjacent foes, or have an aura, or something. Some sort of inbuilt punishment mechanism like "if a marked opponent adjacent to your (summoned whatever) attacks a (not you or your summons), inflict (some sort of punishment)."

Shit, now I'm thinking of the Diablo 2 Necromancer, full skeleton-army mode. Maybe some not-explicitly-defender summons as encounters or dailies, like druids or artificers.

Sounds interesting, though I'd be very concerned about the possibility for effective HP bloat if they don't lose much by having the summons destroyed. Most summons are dailies to prevent that.

How about maybe having at-will summons that are minions (die in one hit) and you can only have 1 out at a time, encounters that take surges to use, and dailies that require a dead enemy to use?

Right click > Run as Administrator

Then make sure you direct them to the correct folder

I'd give them HP more like the Shaman's companion. So minions won't pop it but a Real Hit will.

Or just make it so that they all count as the Defender (Just in multiple places at once/a few bonuses). Using your own lifeforce to sustain them.

Not the original user, but following my necromancer theory here, yeah, I'd be looking at ways to mitigate the 'free hp buffer' effect.

Minion summon-markers for sure, and something, anything finding ways to cost surges or HP. I'd love the ability to bring out multiple skeletons though, just for that D2 feel. Maybe one per tier? I found Epic battlefields tended to get a bit bigger, as the enemies became larger, flying was less of a big deal, and the nature of battlefields was less about basement cellars and more about astral planes.

I think one power summoning 2 skeletons that DON'T mark/have aura works; they can flank someone so he can't shift+attack without punishment.

This could be addressed in terms of some paragon path options, focusing on different aspects of the class. One that focuses on a single powerful pet minion, another that allows regular summoning of smaller temporary ones. One based around blood draining, or enhancing battlefield control with bone manipulation

I'm just throwing ideas out because holy shit I love necromancers and we need a cool one in 4e!

I lean towards the 'Hitting the summon damages you' effect myself.

So you might have:

Skeleton Warrior: +3 to all defences, Resist All 1/3/5 (Based on tier).

A guy swinging at your skeleton body will be much less effective than stabbing you personally. Likely with 'For effects that would affect one or more summons, they are treated as a single creature. If a necromancer would generate an effect you instead nominate a single part of your group to be the origin of that effect'. That way a fireball hitting a few summons won't evaporate you as it can't double-tap.

It's not like arcane makes sense, anyway

Nice catch on the double-tap; I like the 'shared life force' thing, but I'm also interested on a reminder of how Shamans played with their spirit, since we only had one of them, once, in any campaign I've been in. AFAIK they didn't share HP with the PC themself, but I don't remember it being a huge 5e-onion-druid level shitfest.

Yeah, maybe the multi-summon is better expressed through PPs, unique summons from powers (clay/blood/iron/etc golem, skeleton mages, etc).

Shaman summon didn't have HP. If it took more than X (Scaled with level) damage in a single hit, it popped. Made it so minions couldn't really kill it but non-minions could flatten it.

Ah yep, I remember now. Still feel like sharing HP or surges in some way better fits a Defender (mechanically, thematically too I guess).

I have no idea where this user is but I wanna thank them for sparking a cool discussion and reminding me how much I miss Diablo 2.

Thanks, that did it.

Where is it? I don't see it in the Strike! pdf I have

It's playtest stuff.

Anyone else think it's weird that the Avenger isn't a Defender?

Yeah that always seemed a little odd to me

Just thinking about Defenders - OAs are one of my favourite things. Is there anything that can be done with them without being a Fighter?

Any martial class or multiclass has access to the weapon specific MBA boosting feats, you don't even need that for heavy blade opportunity, which is the prominent one.

Well, you got a lot of ways to get an OA mark punish (Berserker, PPs like Tactical Warpriest and Champion of Order).
And everyone Martial has access to Heavy Blade opportunity, for some extra fun.
Then you got... I think seeker has that power that lets you basically OA at range if the target moves, which is again, a pretty cool thing.

You don't need a Martial MC for HBO, dude.

Shadar Kai with Reaper's Touch, use Magic Missile as your MBA.

Don't do this

Top kek

>Magic Missile

good night sweet prince

Can someone shed some light into this?

I have been thinking of a build using that, that PP (or was it ED) that lets you count as two races (Genasi/Shadar-kai) and Elemental empowerment on a bladesinger. Use Arcane Admixture to add Thunder to the magic missile, use Promise of Storm to add a damage roll to both your MBA and your melee attack (and hence, your strength), use Lotus Master Riposte to be really annoying.