Zex's page

I've read a few posts about 4e and one of the things that keeps cropping up as an "issue" is that of minions.

Then I watched Fellowship of the Ring with my daughter for the first time (hers not mine - she loved it). I realised that the end fight (after Boromir tries to take the ring) is an awesome minion fight, and totally the way I envision it happening in game.

I heartily recommend watching it if you are having difficulty with the concept of minions.

Are there any other scenes from films that represent awesome fights vs hordes of minions that people would recommend?

Back on track with the point of the OP, instead of some epic debate over the mechanics.

Kill Bill vol.1, like the whole second half of the movie. So many minions. I also saw Monster vs. Aliens the other night and

MP is cover to cover crunch for martial characters. If you play any of the martial classes I would say it is completely worth its price. Outside all the new power and new build options presented there are a good variety of feats and paragon paths. MP has made me look forward to the other power books for months. Arcane Powers 4/21 btw ;-)

Interesting mix of the two current flavors of the sorcerer. You have the more in the monsters face style of the Dragon Sorcerer with some of the unpredictable feel of the Wild Mage Sorcerer. I wonder what their at-wills will be.

A reply to the concern over psionic, it has its own power source and is widely speculated to be in the PHB3 (along with Dark Sun being in the 2010 setting.) A power with a keyword doesn't mean it gets its power from that.

Speculating on the book industry is just a silly thing to do. I remember like 10 years ago when the internet was catching on, people were out on the street proclaiming the end to the bookstore and the book as a whole. I mean why would anybody buy a book when they can get text online?

Book stores are still going though. I am not debating if there is a growth but its not like they all closing up shop, boarded over their windows and leaving nothing but cliché tumbleweed behind them.

Remember the days before Harry Potter were child didn't want to read books? Or the days before Twilight (oh how I miss those days.) Books sales definitely are spiky from time to time. Sometimes something hits the shelves that sends the world into a flutter. At the same time there are periods were people grab their signs and head back to the streets for their prophecies of doom and gloom.

Any industry that makes such jumps in demand are going to have erratic growth rates. Speculate all you want but the fact remains that it is nothing more than speculation. Even looking at sales data is false in that it looks back at some past time. What past sales are, while it does relate some, is not the sole function of current sales.

Scott,
Thanks for the compiled pdf. I have read through about half it now and I must say you put a lot of work into this, and the community as a whole owes you for it. Your introductions and explanation to the planning where great. I look forward to the Skinsaw Murders which other then the almost TPK on the top of the clock tower, is one of my favorite mods.

I personally ran this AP in 3.5 and had a blast but reading this compiled file makes me want to re-run the whole thing again in 4th. I hope more AP get a full treatment like this. I never played the Crimson Throne, and haven't even looked at Second Darkness.

Thanks again.

PS. OOC, Why isn't Lone Wolf +1 Fort instead of the Reflex?

Regarding how common Dragonborn and Teifling are I would also say it would be up to your DM. I find these races have a built-in backstory. Even in the real world there exists communities or area where certain races aren't particular liked. While these two races may be "common" it definitely allows the DM to flavor an area to dislike or distrust them. This can go for any of the races as mentioned. Lets face the truth. Racism does exist.

In the game I play in myself, I am a teifling. Not just a teifling, but from a union of a human and teifling. There is no half-teifling and the PHB says that teiflings always breed true. That line stuck out to me as a interesting way to make a character. I roleplay this being an issue and my DM has taken the stance that most "common" people (as in people who spend the majorities of their lives within the area they were born.) have a general mistrust towards tielfings. Oral traditions would speak of their pacts with devils for power.

Overall, the core books seem to run under the assumption that race shouldn't really be a limiting factor but it does play a "role" (get it?) Many of the races in their "Play a {race} if you want..." section will mention something about their history or heritage. That implies to me that the races' background is considered. But as the same time PC are above the average. It really comes down to a roleplaying function.

One of the things that stood out about Eberron was how "monstrous races" were almost common in large cities. If you read the fiction there is mentions of parts of Sharn were medusas live and operate business. To some of the traditional ideals of the fantasy genre its an odd notion, but the setting makes it work.

The game is explicitly designed for a party of 5.

This edition scales so much easier then previous. I would say, they designed it with flexibility in mind, not some hard rule "You must have 5 players in order to ride." Yes, the published adventures assume that, but the DMG is packed with how you can scale the game with the number of PC. Regardless of what WotC wants, the simple fact is sometimes you don't have the golden 5 players. This thread definitely exhibits that. I even recall a thread here before about somebody playing with a "group" of one.

The game I run we only have three players. I would really like to have another one but I can't seem to find one :-/
Eldarin Wild Magic Sorceress (soon to be written out and replaced with a deva avenger)
Half-Elf Bravua Warlord
Human defending fighter.

I play in another game it has what feels like a million players but from reading this post I guess not:

Earth Gensei Warlord
Dragonborn Cleric
Half-Elf Paladin
Teifling Swordmage
Dopplerganger Bard
Elven Ranger
Elven Rogue

I am learning from play experience that the sweet spot seems to be like 5 players for 4th edition. Too many and combat tends to drag and too few makes encounter construction more of a task. Of course that is my own opinion.

This is one I have been wondering for a while. It hasn't come up in my game too much but there is only 3 PCs.

1)Can you ignore allies when drawing Line of sight? What about line of effect?
2)Can you use a pole arm to attack through an allies space to a creature?

Here is something that just dawned on me. One of the perks to a defender is how the marking effects helps combat by:

1)forcing opponents to hit you or
2)Making it harder to hit others.

If you are the only person then your mark basically has no effect. Seems like that mechanic might need to be tweaked a little.

I would say have a mark target just take a -2 to attacks but then a Swordmage who manages to mark everything on the field might be a little too powerful. Perhaps a +1 to your defense against a marked creature since you are "watching and anticipating their action." Just a concern that you might want to think about. Still interested in this idea though. :-)

The little block on page 4 (iirc) about Delves being DM testing grounds is about all I can really see the book being good for. Of course this is an opinion but in general forcing something into a long running campaign that might run against the theme, doesn't seem worth it. If you have been fighting drow for like most of a level as they are the enemy in the store, suddenly fighting ogres for the 7th level adventure seems a little out of place.

I guess you could always change the name of the monster but keep the role and stats though. Overall I think this would have been a better testing ground for micro-transactions and sell the delves alone. Like $1 for a delve or something. Just a thought.

Its quiet possible I am just not impressed since its also two weeks before PHB2 and that will beat the snot out of Delve. :)

I definitely think this is a good idea, especially since minions can help a lot with this. A "standard" encounter for a single PC would be 4 minions which feels like it could be a good amount. Of course any class that gets an at-will burst or some chaining spell (see Chaos Bolt from the Sorcerer) can make that combat trivial.

Either way if you write one you should post it here or at least a link to a site you are posting them on. I would like to try some of them since they can fall into that elusive "fun but cheap" entertainment that my wife and me always seem to pursue.

To lift something off the WotC boards, you could think about using the Brutal property too. I would think like a Power Weapon would have it, or perhaps instead Mastercrafted weapons. Granted it has been years since I have played any 40k so my game terms might be mixed up some.
Chainsword definitely should be high-crit though. Just picture what a chainsword does to somebody when they are hit with it. ouch...

Librarian - Sorcerer/wizard

Just wondering why you wouldn't consider a warlock for that role. The warlock's options for psychic attacks seems to be in line with some of the fluff to the 40k world. Granted, you could reserved that class for Chaos psychers.

For my particular group there is no controller though, so there is no class that I am "crimping." I can see the point though but if the controller hits 5 minions, that is a -5 to all the minions saving throws. Hit enough and they will function like normal regardless of number of minions. It also still is based on dice luck. I have seen a minion hang on for 5 hits itself while all its buddies died in the first hit. So far it seems to be working out. I might drop the "saving throw" later though depending if things get too rough or annoying.

I am an Eberron fan so I have been trying to keep tabs on what they are planning on doing with it in 4E. First I can assume that the dragonmarks are going to work something similar to the bloodline from the Damyhr (sp) article from DDI a few weeks back. There has been some mention of how the new races will fit into the setting too such as Teiflings have some origin in the Demon Wastes and the Dragonborn being some races from Argonesson (sp, no book on hand.) I'd suggest reading Keith Baker's LJ for some more information Particular post on 4E and Eberron

As Scott said I wouldn't add the cost of the Dragon shards to the rituals, rather have the PC find shards in their adventures like Siberyis, or Eberron shards and use them in enchanting as part of the cost. You could assign the shard a value when used in enchanting, even make them worth more for the Enchant Magic Item ritual then if they were sold.

Also a party with no leader and no defenders isn't going to live long. Even if you tailor the encounters to them it will get boring quick as you will have to use lots of minions and limit the number of monsters that deal real (read as non-minion) damage. Or you can make them all multi-class or give them a mutli-class feat for free and try it out. Honestly though you are facing an up-hill battle there. That's my opinion though

2. Players do not keep track of their own HP - the DM tracks the HP of all the characters. Players know when they are at full, and when they are bloodied, and that's it. Cuts down on metagaming (hopefully.)

I have played with the rule that players are not allowed to say their HP totals or remaining HP to any other player at the table. The "blooded" mechanic in 4E is nice for that and of course if a player is at like 4 HP left they can tell another player they are "really staggering" or something like that but no numeric values given. For the players that do mention it you can remind them of the rule or take some sort of "punishment" but I really hate doing the later. This is dnd, not babysitting.

This really seems like a good idea and great way to give minions a "fighting chance" against controllers or other classes with area damage. I understand that minion are meant to die but it seems silly that if somebody with an area wins initiative the minions are effective punch bags of XP. I am going to try the saving throw method and see how it goes. Another though would be like have them take a collective -1 to their save per minion "death" so despite how your rolls might rock they are bound to die soon or later.

I printed off the Alpha rules and got it bound so it is easier to have at a table instead of having a computer (especially since I don't own a laptop.)

Is is possible that future releases for the Alpha can be released as appendixes instead of a new file entirely, or at least give players that options?

This way I don't have to reprint the whole file but rather just the change log in essence.

They charge nothing until they ship it.

Thanks for the quick reply!

Pre-ordered everything.

This is a stupid question and I will admit to it, but when you pre-order with Amazon do they charge your credit card at that time or when they mail it?

Thanks for the reply. Glad to see that it at least on the list of things to do. I am sure you guys are back-up.

PS Amazing work

I meant the player handouts. I bought the hard copy book at my FLGS but I would like handouts to give to my players without just reading the text. People like visual ads.

Like I mentioned I scanned in the pages with the handouts and then I cropped them so it just had the handout box but the quality isn't the best in the world.

I know for Shackled City they would post most of the handouts on the website for download. Just wondering if they planned to do this with Pathfinder too.

I am not sure if I am missing their location but are the player handouts posted on the website somewhere for download. I scanned them in and printed them but of course the quality isn't the same since they are so close to the binding.
Thanks.