New Powers in Player Handbook Heroes

[Lazaro]

So I was bored an crusing the interwebs when I found this out. The new PHB Heroes Miniatures come with usable power cards for your 4e games.

So I decided to post the powers for us to look over

Hunter's Teamwork (Ranger, At-Will) - You gain combat advantage if two or more of your allies are adjacent to the target. It's okay I guess.

Walk Among the Wounded (Cleric, Utility) - You move up to your speed. If any of you allies are adajcent to you during the move they gain a +1 power bonus to AC until the of your next turn. The bonus becomes +2 if you're bloodied. Not to sure about this. I haven't played a Cleric, but I'm sure there are better Utilities out there.

Eldritch Strike (Warlock, At-Will) - Melee Basic Attack that let's you slide your target one sqaure, plus deals 1[W] damage, 2[W] at 21st. It's a tough choice between this or using Reaper's Touch to turn Eldritch Blast into a Melee Basic Attack. Of coure you save a feat and you can slide the target

For to For (Barbarian At-Will) - If you reduce a non-minion to 0 hit points during the encounter, the attack deals 1d8 extra damage. If you're raging it instead deal 1d10 extra damage.

Hidden Blade (Rogue, Utility) - You have to trained in Thievery. You gain Combat Advantage on your next attack roll you make with a weapon that has the off-hand property before the end of your next turn.

[AlexBlake]

Hunter's Teamwork is Bow only. Seems tailor made for a group with either a lot of melee power, or an archer ranger with a pet (send your bear in to flank with the fighter, you get CA for your shots.

Walk Among the Wounded, boring as beige. If you gave some temp HP, or even some healing too, it could be fun. as it stands now, it'd be a flavor thing to take.

Eldritch Strike, seems great until you realize there's almost no way to get it. As a warlock you get Eldritch Blast and the one from your pact. Only a Human Warlock (or a non warlock Half-elf taking it with Dilettant) can pick this up as a third at will. If you paragon multiclassed into Warlock you could take it as well. Hopefully, TPTB will give us some sort of "you can take Eldritch Blast or Eldritch Strike and the one from your pact."

Foe to Foe, seems a less useful choice than any at will the Barb already has. It's too situational. I need a foe that's not a minion, that I can drop quickly so I can make this better than Devastating Strike.

Hidden Blade, dagger has the Off-hand property, and that's pretty much what I've got to say about that. More rogue awesomeness.

My current favorite is Warlock 10, Etheral Sidestep. it's an At Will, Move Action, Personal, 1 square teleport. No need to shift, can't be blocked by difficult terrain or immobilization. Great for escaping grabs. Makes me want to play a warlock just so I can Nightcrawler around.

Our Cleric player likes Gaze of Defiance. Level 1 at will, range 5, wis vs will, 1d8 + wiz and allies get +1 power to hit target. If target attacks you, the bonus increases to +3. Since he likes to cast spells from melee, provoking opportunity attacks is actually advantageous for him.

[Lazaro]

AlexBlake wrote:

Eldritch Strike, seems great until you realize there's almost no way to get it. As a warlock you get Eldritch Blast and the one from your pact. Only a Human Warlock (or a non warlock Half-elf taking it with Dilettant) can pick this up as a third at will. If you paragon multiclassed into Warlock you could take it as well. Hopefully, TPTB will give us some sort of "you can take Eldritch Blast or Eldritch Strike and the one from your pact."

As a DM I'd rule the character could take Eldritch Strike or Eldritch Blast.

AlexBlake wrote:

My current favorite is Warlock 10, Etheral Sidestep. it's an At Will, Move Action, Personal, 1 square teleport. No need to shift, can't be blocked by difficult terrain or immobilization. Great for escaping grabs. Makes me want to play a warlock just so I can Nightcrawler around.

Our Cleric player likes Gaze of Defiance. Level 1 at will, range 5, wis vs will, 1d8 + wiz and allies get +1 power to hit target. If target attacks you, the bonus increases to +3. Since he likes to cast spells from melee, provoking opportunity attacks is actually advantageous for him.

Didn't have links or scans to the other powers so I held off on posting on them. Etheral Sidestep sounds awesome! My melee warlock would love teleporting around the map. Even if it only was 1 square at a time.

[Matthew Koelbl]

Ethereal Stride is definitely strong, as is Gaze of Defiance. The other big winner is the Druid, who gets Grasping Tide: Burst 1, for 1d6+Wis, and if an enemy you hit leaves the initial area, you get an attack to knock them prone. Only downside is it targets Fort, often seen as the hardest defense to hit... but still very strong.

Most of the rest are pretty much average, with a few that will be weak for many but possibly handy for very specific builds.

[Stedd Grimwold]

RE: Warlock Powers

Any warlock can take any warlock power. A Fey Pact Warlock can take Hellish Rebuke and the new Eldritch Strike if they so choose at 1st level.

[Matthew Koelbl]

Stedd Grimwold wrote:

RE: Warlock Powers

Any warlock can take any warlock power. A Fey Pact Warlock can take Hellish Rebuke and the new Eldritch Strike if they so choose at 1st level.

That is incorrect. Warlocks have 100% free reign when choosing Encounter and Daily Powers, even when those powers are associated with specific Pacts, but all Warlocks must take Eldritch Blast plus another At-Will determined by their Pact. (Eyebite for Fey, Hellish Rebuke for Infernal, Dire Radiance for Star, Spiteful Glamor for Dark, Eyes of the Vestige for Vestige.)

You can only get access to another pact's At Will if you have the option for a third At-Will (such as if you are human), or if you take the Double Pact feat at Paragon, or through any other similar options.

I do agree that letting player's have their choice of Eldritch Blast and Eldritch Strike is a good way to handle it. It shouldn't be an issue in any reasonable home-game, certainly, so should only be a problem in an RPGA game - and no idea if these powers will even be available there.

[Blazej]

My first thought when thinking of Ethereal Stride was combining it with the Eladrin Boots. Mmm, wonderful teleporting.

[Matthew Koelbl]

Yeah, that kicks you up to the important amount for Shadow Walk.

Eladrin Chain and a Mithrendain Steel Weapon will get you there earlier, if you are willing to invest in them. More likely for certain (melee-centric) Warlock builds than others, though those are more viable than ever these days.

[Blazej]

Does Shadow Walk work off of teleporting? I thought that it might would off only actual movement.

Why choose when you can get them all? With teleport 5 as a at-will power for a move action, it practically makes walking obsolete.

[Matthew Koelbl]

Blazej wrote:

Does Shadow Walk work off of teleporting? I thought that it might would off only actual movement.

I think it works - the wording usually implies teleporting is a form of movement, just one that bypasses intervening squares. But I could certainly see someone ruling either way.

Blazej wrote:

Why choose when you can get them all? With teleport 5 as a at-will power for a move action, it practically makes walking obsolete.

And actually, the Eladrin armor distance scales at higher levels.

In fact, at level 23, with it, Eladrin Boots, a Mithrendain Steel Weapon, an Eladrin Ring of Passage and a Ring of Dimensional Escape, you are looking at Teleport 9 at-will, or 10 if you are an Eladrin.

Though a DM could probably rule that these are untyped bonuses that wouldn't stack - but still, Teleport 3 at-will in early Paragon is certainly doable, and extremely strong.

[Blazej]

Matthew Koelbl wrote:

And actually, the Eladrin armor distance scales at higher levels.

In fact, at level 23, with it, Eladrin Boots, a Mithrendain Steel Weapon, an Eladrin Ring of Passage and a Ring of Dimensional Escape, you are looking at Teleport 9 at-will, or 10 if you are an Eladrin.

Though a DM could probably rule that these are untyped bonuses that wouldn't stack - but still, Teleport 3 at-will in early Paragon is certainly doable, and extremely strong.

Woo. Apparently I just skipped the scaling of Eladrin armor.

I'm thinking that several of these likely should have fallen under typed bonuses rather than untyped increases in range. It would seem that this number would only get bigger and bigger and more teleport items appear. Although, I'm not sure how unbalanced being able to teleport anywhere on the field at-will is when you are using all your magic items choices to focus on that.

[Matthew Koelbl]

Blazej wrote:

Woo. Apparently I just skipped the scaling of Eladrin armor.

Yeah, same here, until I went back to check exact level. >_>

Blazej wrote:

I'm thinking that several of these likely should have fallen under typed bonuses rather than untyped increases in range. It would seem that this number would only get bigger and bigger and more teleport items appear. Although, I'm not sure how unbalanced being able to teleport anywhere on the field at-will is when you are using all your magic items choices to focus on that.

Well, the real issue is the 'At-Will' part. I suspect most of those items, they didn't see a problem, since letting your Encounter power bounce you 10 squares instead of 5 isn't that big a deal - cool, but not game-breaking.

Being able to bounce around as freely as you want, without any great sacrifice of resources? (Especially since you don't need to go all out on the items - Eladrin Boots + Chain is only two items, and kicks the teleport up to 4-6 squares.) This lets you largely ignore tons of terrain problems, various status effects, opportunity attacks, etc.

There are some boots that let you do so at level 28, and even that most people feel is pretty powerful - but by that point, every character has some trick up their sleeve to get around the standard limitations. Getting the same capability by mid-Paragon is much more significant.

Changing the wording on this power from "teleport 1 square" to "teleport to an adjacent square" would remove most of the issues, while still keeping the flavor.

[AlexBlake]

Matthew Koelbl wrote:

And actually, the Eladrin armor distance scales at higher levels.

In fact, at level 23, with it, Eladrin Boots, a Mithrendain Steel Weapon, an Eladrin Ring of Passage and a Ring of Dimensional Escape, you are looking at Teleport 9 at-will, or 10 if you are an Eladrin.

Though a DM could probably rule that these are untyped bonuses that wouldn't stack - but still, Teleport 3 at-will in early Paragon is certainly doable, and extremely strong.

I had thought they were all Item bonuses, but the compendium doesn't list them that way.

Heh. Seems like an oversight on their part. Probably should all be item bonuses and therefore not stackable. Maybe make the rings untyped and the others item bonuses if you want some stacking but not others.

FWIW: the Arcane Wayfarer Paragon path's Level 16 feature is "gain teleport 2 as an additional movement mode", so you can get the same stacking problem with that.

Good catch guys. Something to be aware of for me when suggesting this to our Warlock.