Robin Stacey's page

Fairy nuff :)

OK, but I'll keep it brief because we're starting to go round in circles. Either you'll see there's a problem, or not. If not, more power to you :)

Let's use....oh, I dunno.... Keep on Shadowfell 'cos that's where we've hit the in-game problems with Fey Step being per Encounter head-on with my gamer group. And apologies for any spoilers. After a brief one-session playtest with the pre-gens we created our own characters, restarted and sallied forth. Good phrase that. "Sallied forth".

Mark, one of my long-time players, wanted to run a classic arrogant warrior-wizard type , so Eldarin Wizard is a perfect fit. He's playing him as a Noldo nobleman from an long decaying Empire. Nice.

In combat his Fey Step is put to good use each battle, mainly to keep him away from foes who stray too close while be blasts them with Wizardly napalm-stuff. In other words, I reckon he's playing it exactly as the Designers intended, and we're happy.

In fact, everything is going just fine (barring the odd minor hiccoughs while we're learning the rules, a Rogue falling into a pit trap filled with a rat swarm - nice touch - and the like), up until they reach the Excavation Site (page 42). That's one heck of a battle. The Goblins have kicked the planks away, and the players are convinced that the ground where they've dug is unsafe, so won't go down there. They manage to clear the room, and they want to search the pile of stuff in the top corner (annoyingly, Shadowfell doesn't say //where// the Treasure is on the map, so I put it in the most hard to reach place :) ). The Eldarin Fey Steps to the mound just below the one containing the treasure (it's shown in the map as having a ladder on the West side and planks North and South), manages to snarf a plank, gets the treasure (rather nice Holy Symbol of Bahamut), gnaws on an apple while he and the others rest, then crosses a plank and Fey Steps back. More importantly than the Holy Symbol, here's when Mark realizes the non-combat uses for Fey Step.

Fast foward to Area 7: Skeletal Legion.

The party doesn't like the look of the sarcophagi against the walls, so the Eldarin suggests he Fey Steps past them to see what happens. I can already see Thom (another player) planning an Eldarin Rogue as a character too! As per the room description, nothing happens ('...until a character passes between the two middle sarcophagi.'). Telepot doesn't cross intervening space, so.....

Human Fighter decides to chance it, and the Mark shouts "No, wait till I've rested!" but it's too late. Combat commences!

I could go on, but if I've not made my point by now (Fey Step = Good in combat, but too free to abuse in non-combat situations and should be nerfed to Daily) you'll never get it - until you GM and you've an Eldarin PC in the party :)

I've also been going through my much-loved collection of Dungeon mags to see what low-level adventures will convert over to 4th Edition. Answer: pretty much all of them if I add more monsters to each combat encounter. That's a Good Thing. Did I mention that I DO like 4e? Good!

But each time we hit a trap I have to consider whether an Eldarin could just hop right over it, and most of the time that's a yes so I end up having to change it, just because of one darned too-frequent-to-use Power.

I'll say it again 'cos it's obviously not sinking in.

It's not the depth of the pit that matters - though sure, getting out would be much easier for them. Or whether it's a pit at all, for that matter. You could put anything that's supposed to slowdown the players (ie, make 'em think of a creative solution to the problem), and so long as the Eldarin can see beyond it and it's less than 25' end-to-end, they can just teleport right past. One short rest (roughly 5 minutes) later, and they can do it again, and again, and again.

It could be a 10' deep pit or a 10,000' deep pit. It could be jets of flame from the walls. It could be swinging axes. It could be a 20'x20' room with a door opposite. If they enter the room it triggers spikes from the floor. Anything. They can just teleport right across. Doing that once per Day is cool - the Eldarin's player has to make a choice to burn their Fey Step use to bypass that one trap/situation/whatever.

As it stands, I reckon a party of Eldarin could darned near traverse the even the Tomb of Horrors unscathed by just Fey Stepping around 90% of the traps.

Is that any clearer?

Geez, how often are you gonna throw your players into pits? I mean I can see if everyone in the party was an eladrin, but taking away Feystep as an encounter power seems a bit much, and unfairly penalizing players for playing a "cool" race.

Honestly, not that often. It's an example of the kind of thing an Eldarin could bypass each and every time. An example.

@agarrett, you're using round-by-round rules in a non-combat situation. Player. Pit. Trap. Don't need no battlemat, figures and 6 second turns to work that one out. You'll never hear me say "He's fallen in a pit trap. Roll initiative!" unless by "Pit Trap" I really meant to say "Sarlac" or there's some other problem like Kobold Archers at the opposite side. That's cool, but not the setup as given.

The point is that an Eldarin could Teleport out of the pit (10', 20', 30', whatever. I really don't care) then 5 minutes later use Teleport in another non-combat situation. And 5 minutes later. And again. And again - irrespective of the situation. So long as they can see a destination and it's less that 25' away (or 30' straight up) they can get there while the rest of their party can only look on. Over, and over, and over.

Game breaking? Nope. Will the world end because of it? Nope. But it sure is broken - but it's easily fixed. Changed to Daily, Fey Step is fine and much more in line with the abilities of other Races.

Your pit traps can stay 10' deep if you'd like. You can only teleport to a spot if you have line of sight (PHB p. 286). Unless you've got 10' tall eladrin running around, you're OK on this one. Sure, they can jump 5' up to see over it, but jumping is a move action - they can't start another action until that is finished (unless it's an interrupt, which fey step isn't.) By the time they can fey step, they've lost line of sight.

...

I'm going to stick with 'good power, not game breaking.'

They can see the edge of the pit, so they can teleport up to grab hold of the edge and heave themselves up. As another posted has already said, that means that it'll take at least a 30' deep pit (that's pretty much the height of a two storey house, including roof) to hold an Eldarin - 25' Fey Step, plus their height.

Game breaking? Probalby not, but it's far too open to abuse as a per Encounter ability out of combat.

Bag of Holding. The rest of the party rides around inside the bag.

You've been talking to my players, haven't you? I can tell.

:D

Banning Eladrin from your city on the basis that theft rates skyrocket when they are around.

Thanks for the feedback, ArchLich!

Y'know, I'm growing to love the vibe of Eldarin supplanting Halflings as thieving little buggers in the campaign world. I'm sooooo going to steal that!

Still think Fey Step is broken as a per encounter Power though........

What I haven't seen addressed is how Fey Step applies to Backstab...4E does still have backstab, right?

Yep. Fey Step is a Move Action so an Eldarin Rogue can Teleport to Flank an opponent (for example), get Combat Advantage to gain +2 to hit, and make a Sneak Attack doing (at least) an extra 2d6 damage. Heck, that attack could be a Power too, so they could use (for example) Tortuous Strike to do 2[W]+2d6+DEX damage. That's kinda cool!

As Fey Step is per Encounter (so is Tortuous Strike) though, they could only do that trick once in that combat. Just like any other Rogue, they could use Bluff once in the encounter (the next round, maybe!) to gain Combat Advantage again and use Sneak Attack once more against the same poor mook, even if they're no longer flanked.

Fey Step in combat (as, I reckon, the game designers thought it would only be used!) is pretty good. It's the out-of-combat once-per-5 minutes abuses I've a problem with.

Another question is does Fey Step allow you to take someone with you? I can't remember from the description.

Well, the Range is Personal so it's just you, but if you can carry another character within their encumbrance limit then it could be argued otherwise. In 3e I've had characters Polymorph their allies into small animals before to cheat spell descriptions before. I'd disallow it now though.

Sounds like your players are particularly tricksy though. ;)

Oh you have no idea........ :D :D :D :D :D

That Eldarin Wizard player has already tried to Fey Step across a floor of glass shards while holding one end of a rope so he could secure it at the other side so the other players could use it to slide across.

I ruled that the rope severed during the teleport - it doesn't cross intervening space, remember - so he was stuck holding a small nub of rope at the other side. It was sooooo tempting to toss a load of Kobold Minions at him then :)

Instead, I just rolled for a random encounter, he secured a thrown rope then the other players shimmied over. Good use of Fey Step - but he could do things like that every single time!!!! Daily, it's great - once per 5 minutes is just insane.

I guess the problem with pit traps and Eldarin isn't so much how deep they are, but how long/wide they are. It'll take a 26' long pit trap to make an Eldarin stop in his tracks. Of course, if they don't spot it they'll fall in just like anyone else - then if it's less than 25' deep they'll just teleport right out again!

One quick note - I've had an email from one of my players already asking if their Eldarin Wizard can buy a mirror (ALSO not in the PHB equipment list!!) so they can teleport 'round corners. I kid you not. And that's AFTER we've nerfed it to Daily.......

Actually (don't you just hate sentences that start with "actually"? I do!) I don't care about the Eldarin's world-changing potential. This is a game that contains dragons and Dead Who Walk fer goodness' sake :)

If the Eldarin was a monster who could teleport once per five minutes I wouldn't bat an eyelid, and consider it a fun challenge to fit into the worldview. But it's not. It's a Race played by a player who's going to wreak unholy havoc all over my carefully crafted scenarios because they can bypass anything that takes up less than 25' of space without breaking a sweat.

No other "standard" race has a power like this that's quite so problematic. When it comes to scenario design it doesn't matter whether the characters are dwarves, warforged (or even dwarforged!), elves, orcs or blue hicky men from Mars. But add Eldarin into the mix and all of your pit traps are suddenly at least 30' deep, all doors are airtight so the Eldarin can't peek underneath and teleport through and all darned corridor traps fill at least 6 squares. You're designing around a racial ability. I'll say it again - that's a Very Bad Thing! Make it Daily and that throws the choices back onto the player, not onto the unfortunate scenario designer.

So yeh, it's a problem.

.... continued. I hit the quote limit....

Take out the page-and-a-half double spread artwork at the beginning
Back to ye curmugdeonly artless world with ye--but don't be too bitter at those of us who appreciate nice art.

Lol! Yeh, I'm an artless curmudgeon. Who spends far too many hours each day makin' Fantasy artwork using Poser and other 3d tools :)

Seriously though - if the PHB could contain more Powers but that meant less artwork (not none!) at the same cost and pagecount, then I don't think that's a bad thing. When I see 15 whole pages of artwork and a p*ss-poor selection of Powers though, I just see spurious padding.

why not just make ‘em Powers that are usable per week, per month or whatever.
Because rituals can be used by any class, thus it would be inappropriate to either make them powers or to group them by class.

That's one reason I suggested there's a need for General Powers that are usable by any class provided they're the correct level.

Sure, I know that the limited number of Powers is designed to get us to buy more books from Wizards to fill in the gaps
And/or to not make the game overwhelming for new players.

Oh, I think new players are over-whelmed enough! If they wanted to cater for new players they'd include more examples. They'd provide pre-generated sample characters right in the book. The whole book would be far, far better structured to cater to the needs of a new player. Oh wait.... that's going to be another product, next year. Silly me for thinking that the first book of a whole new edition should somehow be new-player friendly AND contain enough Power to allow them to make unique, customized characters!

That Fey Step means you can’t put your Eldarin in jail.
Don't be ridiculous. There are any number of ways to restrain an eladrin even with fey step. A hood might be the easiest. Another would be a 30' pit.

True, but we're thinking PLAYERS here. I've run adventures where the characters start in prison. What am I going to do? Have the Eldarin the have a bag on their head? Lead-lined cells? Every darned room windowless? At that stage, I'm writing the situations around the abilities of one Race. That's Very Bad.

You can’t have them stuck at the bottom of a pit trap.
Whyever not?

It's a 20' pit :)

The equipment list is very limited too, lacking several of the core essentials for any dungeon adventure.
Untrue. At least, none of my players have noted a shocking loss of "several essentials."

Oil flask. Sack. Mule. Saddle & bridle. Bullseye Lantern.

That's just a fraction of what my players have looked for and lacked so far. Limited? I think so, yes.

Where’s the 10’ poles (personally, I prefer quarterstaves anyhow)
Seriously? A 10' pole is essential? I disagree, given that I haven't seen one used in over a decade. It was probably removed because no one used them--like you, who prefer quarterstaves.

Yeh. I know :) But c'mon - every equipment list should have a 10' pole :)

There should be a group of General Powers which are open to all
Like feats and rituals?

Yes, exactly like that.

The Star Wars RPG contains the entire system in one book
Apples and oranges. Star Wars is a very distinct and limited milleu. D&D has to satisfy a far wider range of experiences.

No, apples and apples. They're both role-playing games. Saying "D&D has to satisfy a far wider range of experiences." is just pretentious. Why can they write a single-book RPG for one, but not for another? More to the point though - how come they can't write a D&D PHB better when they can write a whole frickin' system in roughly the same pagecount???!!!?

d20 Modern is another one-book system that’s pure brilliance.
The wealth system is the single worst idea in the history of roleplaying games. No, not brilliant. But that's a different topic, really.

Oh I don't know. I reckon Dragonroar was the single worst idea in the history of roleplaying games. Either that or the Paris Hilton RPG. But thankfully, that doesn't exist (yet!) so doesn't count.

I hated the d20 Modern Wealth system at first and now love it - but there's no way it could translate to a non-credit-based economy like D&D. But as you say,that's a different point, for another day.

What is there is so poorly referenced, badly structured and just downright lacking that it’s beyond a joke.
Hyperbole.

Ain't nothing wrong with hyperbole to emphasize a point. That's what hyperbole is :) I plead guilty.

Except..... the PHB is poorly referenced (1 page index? No glossary?), badly structured and lacking. There's just not enough Powers. As I said before - Human Fighter gets 3 at-will Powers, out of a choice of 4. That's silly.

using sticky tabs to mark pages
I see people using tabs on every kind of reference book that exists, just as I see people not using them. This is an utter non-issue.

I agree - but people are using that non-issue as an excuse for the PHB's poor layout.

This game needs a Glossary, bad. It needs a bigger, better index.
Correct.

Thank you! :)

My impressions are that the PHB designers spent so long congratulating themselves for making such an awesome game, they forgot to actually write the damned thing.
Comments like that lend zero credibility to your argument.

Fair enough. Except I'm not arguing. It's my impression, not a statement of fact.

Also, the Powers are completely and utterly all over the place
Not true. They're grouped according to the classes that use them--which is very good organization, not bad. Instead of paging through the book during play--or heavens forfend using a tab--I can keep it open and be within a few pages of what I need to consult.

....and there's Powers in the Classes chapter too. Oh, and there's Powers detailed in the Feats chapter too. By my book, having Powers all over the place means I'm justified in saying that Powers are.... all over the place!

The number of times my players have played Hunt The Power in the PHB already is beyond a joke.
Beyond a joke, eh?

Go on, find the Moradin's Rescue Power using the Contents page and Index. Now imagine a new player doing that mid-game because they're playing a pre-generated Dwarven Cleric against an Ogre and they want to know if it applies. That was one of my players and he said he felt very flustered and at sea until we helped him out. Imagine a group of new players having to do things like that for their first session together.

The selfsame player had no problems at all looking up Feats, 'cos THEY'RE ALL TOGETHER IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER!

Beyond a joke? When other parts of the book (feats and skills) ARE organised that way, I'd say it has to be a joke :)

The Character Class chapter is a joke.
You must laugh a lot, but despite that, you don't sound like a happy person.

Oh I'm happy enough, thanks for asking :) But I also believe in saying what I think and being critical if things aren't right. I hope you don't have a problem with that.......

there’s so f~~!ing few of them to choose from it’s laughable.
....Having a few choices to start and then more choices later is exactly the right way to go.

I entirely agree - even with just the Core 3e the game could be overwhelming for new players. Add in all the supplements and there's enough Races, Classes, Feats and Spells that it's possible to glaze the eyes of even the most hardcore gamer.

I reckon the 4e PHB hasn't got the balance right though. We've 8 Races and 8 Classes but far too few Powers to be sufficiently able to create your OWN Dragonborn Paladin, Human Ranger or whatever. The PHB should have more, and more varied, Powers for each Class.

Thanks for your reply, and I'm loving the debate :)

The design of the PHB is actually one of the thing I like best about 4e. The character chapter should only be referenced during character generation and leveling.

I agree entirely. A chapter called "Making Characters" should contain just the rules needed to.... uhhhh.... make characters. That clue is in the title :) It's not a chapter you'd expect to find rules you're likely to need during play.

Here's a quick quiz though. In the 4e PHB, where are the rules for:

• Making skill checks
  
• Attack rolls
  
• Skill checks
  
• Ability checks
  

..... answer: Right there in the "Making Characters" chapter! They're placed conveniently and logically right under the list of languages too. That's the first place anyone would look, of course :)

This is stuff that new players will need to check time and again, and should have been in a "how to play the game" part of Chapter One (or a whole new Chapter Two, with Character Generation starting at Chapter Three. Whatever), not tucked incoherently half way through some chapter called "Making Characters".

Good structure and organization? I think not.

So tell me how do you balance adventures in 3.5 edition with the MYRIAD of spells that allow wizards and sorcerers to pretty much do ANYTHING they want. Invisibility, Teleport, Time Stop, Dispel Magic, Tongues, Tiny Hut, Water Breathing, Fly, Dimension Door, Scrying, Dominate, Passwall, Telekinesis, Transmute Rock/Mud, Anti-Magic Field, etc... It goes ON and On. And, that's just "core" spells.

I mean seriously, do you only play 3rd level and lower 3.5 edition games??

The difference is they don't get those powers at 1st level, and you build the expectation of those abilities (or rough equivalents) right into the adventure.

At low level you're expecting adventure within a horse-ride's distance of your home base. By 15th level (we're talking 3e here) it's not unreasonable to set adventures on Cloud Cities or other Planes as you're expect the PCs to be able to get around much easier.

4e uses that entire "different style gaming at different tiers" with it's Hero/Paragon/Epic concept too. What we've got with Fey Step is a Paragon-level ability ("You can Teleport! 288 times a day!") intruding on Hero-level play. Nerfed to Daily, it's MUCH less of a problem though.

Phil, we'd most likely get along very well - especially after a lot of beers :)

Honestly, 4e IS a great system.

I love the new DMG and can't find much fault with the MM (though would have liked more low-level critters, animals and a few dinosaurs). I reckon the PHB is the weakest book of the three, mainly due to it's poor layout and low number of Powers listed. I'd have liked to have seen more powers dealing with Ranged weapons, Unarmed combat and more Powers dealing with Terrain and traps rather than just hitting monsters with pointy things. Give me Powers that grant a change to a monster's behaviour (picture a Rogue with a Daily-use Fast Talk Utility Power that can convince a Monster to help you for a while - more powers like Master of Deceipt, that kinda thing).

Y'see, I'm excited by the 4e Powers system, and wish they'd given us more for the money. As it is, while there's good variety between the Classes you're limited (due to the lack of choice of Powers) with the variety within the Classes. That could so easily have been fixed.

Every Edition of D&D has faults - some more than others - and 4e has far fewer than some previous Editions I could mention. Fey Step is easily nerfed (just make it Daily) so it's not a huge biggie but it is there. The first time your resident powergamer elects to play an Eldarin Rogue you'll see what I mean :) Why roll to Open Lock (Thievery check, DC20) when you can look through the keyhole and teleport right in (and out again 5 minutes later) leaving no trace...........

> But the bottom line is, that the reviewer does not seem to have actually tried the game.

Right now I've 6 sessions of 4e under my belt - 4 as GM, 2 as player and I'm in the middle of organizing a fairly large 4e D&D Gladiatorial Fight Club involving almost 30 characters between 9 players.

So yeh, you could say I've tried it...... :D

There's no problem with detaining nefarious Edlarin types. Handcuffs and a blindfold will do that :)

I'm more thinking about the in-game situations where the GM drops a trap or puzzle that the players have to figure out how to bypass. This could be as simple as a chasm they have to cross, jets of flame across a corridor or a locked gate they need a key for that happens to be around an ogre's neck.

All of these are things I've used in adventures before at low-level, and in every case an Eldarin would sail right through. It's one thing when the characters are 7th-10th level and have access to some kind of teleport ability (but even then it's limited in number of uses), and entirely another when you're having to consider Teleport at 1st level over and over again. At least nerfing it to Daily means they have to choose when to use it. Per encounter means it's a permanent "bypass this obstacle free" card for the player. That's unfun for GM and the other players alike.

As Chatty says - you end up having to work around the Power to fix it. When you have to do that, it's a sure sign something is Very Broken!

Hi folks, and thanks to Pete Apple for picking up my blogpost. It's good to see the debate going on here :)

On to your comments.......

@Erik, I like full-page artwork as much as the next guy, but when it's at the expense of missing content and you've a pagecount to hit then it's got to be the first thing to go. Having 15 whole pages of the book taken up by art when there's only 4 or 5 at-will Powers per Class at 1st level is a crime. Play a Human Fighter and it's more a question of "which at-will Power don't you want?". You get three, and a choice of four. That's just stupid, and I'd happily sacrifice artwork to fix it.

@Panda-s1, I didn't forget that Fey Step can be used once every 5 minutes - check my math. Once per 5 minutes is 12 times per hour. 12*24 = 288 times per day. Even with an 8 hour extended rest that's 12*16 hours = 192 times per day. Fey Step being per Encounter is wrong and potentially campaign breaking. If the Eldarin player can see a location and it's within 25' they can teleport there, pretty much without restriction. You can't toss an Endarin in jail. Barred door? No problem if there's a crack underneath. 20' chasm? No problem! Make it Daily and it's much less of an issue as once they've used it for the day it's gone.

@Jeremy Mac Donald, honestly, I don't know if there is an easy fix to Rituals. I know I suggested extending the Powers list but, as you say, that doesn't feel right either as there should be a "cost" element. More thought needed.

Good points, all :)