D&D 4e General. Thread starter questions: What are your thoughts on pixies' mechanics in 4e? Are they too cheesy, being Tiny yet having reach 1 and the ability to ignore most terrain and opportunity attacks? Do you consider draconians, who can also ignore most terrain and opportunity attacks, just as egregious?
If you are GMing, remember...
1. To strongly consider giving out at least one free "tax feat," like Expertise and pre-errata Melee Training.
2. To use Monster Manual 3/Monster Vault/Monster Vault: Nentir Vale/Dark Sun Creature Catalog math. Avoid or manually update anything with Monster Manual 1 or 2 math.
3. That skill challenges have always been scene-framing devices for the GM, that players should never be overtly told that they are in a skill challenge, and that the Rules Compendium has the most up-to-date skill DCs and skill challenge rules.
If you would like assistance with character optimization, remember to tell us what the what the rest of the players are playing, what books are allowed, your starting level, the highest level you expect to reach, what free feats you receive, if anything is banned, whether or not themes are allowed, your starting equipment, and how much you dislike item-dependent builds.
If you wish to talk about settings, 4e's settings are Points of Light (the planes and the natural world's past empires are heavily detailed in various sourcebooks and magazines), 4e Forgotten Realms, 4e Eberron, 4e Dark Sun, and whatever setting you would like to bring into 4e.
Nentir Vale locations: http://web.archive.org/web/20130520012550/http://community.wizards.com/nentir_vale/wiki/Nentir_Vale_Locations
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PDFs for 4e books: Search thepiratebay for "Dungeons_and_Dragons_4th_Edition_books_update__1_[Nov_2012]"
Does 4e do Eberron well?
A couple of my players want me to run an Eberron game, but I've only done Eberron in 3.5 before and don't know how the setting works under the different ruleset
>>45812408
4e was partially built with Eberron's scale in mind where heroic is local heroes, paragon is national scale heroics, and epic is global or planar heroics.
>>45812418
>>45812408
4e does eberron better than 3.5.
The only iffy thing is that magic item creation in 4e is not allowed to go as bonkers as 3.5, tho artificiers get to bend the rules considerably either way.
>>45812408
Eberron received its own "Campaign Setting" book, "Player's Guide" book, and premade adventure, not to mention somewhere around three to four dozen articles and adventures in Dragon and Dungeon Magazines. (Really, those two publications have a *trove* of 4e Eberron material, and much of those articles were written by Keith Baker himself.)
Eberron works perfectly well under 4e and has a great amount of support for it.
>>45812462
Eberron got a premade adventure for 4e?
First I've heard of that
So if making a campaign with less than 4 players which role is more redundant?
I was thinking controller.
>>45812469
I think he means Khyber's harvest; it's free to download if you look around a bit.
It's a very linear and not too great intro adventure for low level characters, but it has some nice weirdness to it.
>>45812534
Definitely controller
Although depending on party composition it might be striker.
It won't be defender or leader though
>>45811819
Other than assisting in jumping, I don't think flight with a limited height is such a game-breaker for Pixies and Draconians.
I do agree that there should've been more ways to get a flight speed as a player - Hengeyokai and Kenku come to mind, but the Druid class is another good example. Storm Sorcerors get some 'you gain a flight speed until the end of your next turn'-powers, but those are of very limited use, for obvious reasons. Constant but limited flight is much more fun than temporary flight, imo.
In conclusion, I don't think limited flight is overpowered, but I would've liked to see it being available more.
>>45812577
Flight with limited height isn't overpowered, but not having to land at the end of your movement kind of is
>>45812597
It's kinda solved by just giving everyone ranged attacks. It definitely has a warping effect on combat, but then, that's what makes abilities interesting.
>>45812642
The main problem with not having to land is that it effectively means that pixies need to be knocked prone twice to actually be knocked prone
>>45812557
Well one of the players is determined to play a Paladin so Defender is in.
The rest are pretty new and don't seem to mind either way.
I think warlord and warlock seem like a nice compliment.
>>45811819
>D&D 4e General
BAD OP!
>>45812577
Speaking of the former.
There is a Hengeyokai player in my game who asked to refluff it as a Tengu.
As a result, I'm looking at helping him with a couple of feats at they got no feat support.
How does this seem?
Animalistic Speed:
Prereqs: Hengeyokai
Benefit: You gain the movement speeds of your Animal Form in Hybrid Form. If you would gain a flight speed it has an altitude limit of 1 while in Hybrid Form.
Any ideas would be good for feat ideas to fit his theme/general use (He's an Avenger)
>>45812749
*yawn*
4e is a great system
...for me to poop on!
Srsly tho, 4e combat lasts longer than my grandparents marriage
>>45812749
There already is a tengu race
They're called kenku though, and make pretty shitty avengers
>>45812749
Flight speed as an Avenger is really nice, but the feat seems rather plain.
How about making the Flight Speed available only when hands are free? Since Hengeyokai don't have seperate wings and actually use their arms as wings, it wouldn't make sense for him to fly while wielding a big two-handed axe.
It wouldn't be that much of a hassle to store/draw a weapon (and Quick Draw solves that issue) and would make a lot more sense, thematically.
>>45812669
The most experienced person in a party should pretty much always be playing a leader.
Warlock and paladin work nicely together if you're going radiant mafia. Star Pact Warlock + Chaladin + Warlord = lots of radiant vulnerability abuse
I want to build a radiant blaster, preferrably better at multitarget than single target damage, how would I go about doing that? Which class does it best?
>>45814989
Cosmic sorcerer?
There's also some way to make their fire damage radiant I think.
Our group of 4 is interested in getting into some D&D. Would it be better to get 4e or 5e? Which is more beginner friendly?
>>45815539
5e is more beginner friendly I think, especially since there isn't much material, so just using the core book is the "best" way to play it.
Meanwhile the best way to play 4e is using the builder, which could be overwhelming for new players.
If none of you played 4e before, I'd recommend going with 5e, though I absolutely prefer 4e to it.
>>45815572
Cool, thanks for the response. One of the people in our group found a good deal on some used 4e books (Player Manual 1-3, DM Manual, Monster Manual) and they arrived in basically flawless condition. We hadn't discussed editions yet; one of the guys is old hat but hasn't played a game since 2011 or so, so all the rules have probably changed a lot.
>>45812986
>How about making the Flight Speed available only when hands are free? Since Hengeyokai don't have seperate wings and actually use their arms as wings, it wouldn't make sense for him to fly while wielding a big two-handed axe.
Would alternate between horribly weak (Weapon users) and horribly power (Impliment users). Anyone with access to a Ki Focus would snap that in half.
>>45815539
5e is more beginner friendly in general, but 4e is specifically more beginner friendly for DMs
>>45815595
4e is really best played using the builder. Books are good to get the basic handle of the rules and stuff, but the builder has all material and errata in an organized format.
So yeah, having books are cool, but not that useful for 4e.
>>45815694
This is something I forgot, but also true. However, if you started with 5e you could just run Lost Mines of Phandelver which takes the load off your shoulders for a while at least.
>>45815600
Then rule that both hands need to be free and keep the height limit in place. This prevents ranged casters from abusing the skill even when they have a Holy Symbol or Ki Focus, and also allows for Monks to be absolute flying badasses with their flying Unarmed Strike.
>>45811819
Pixies make some pretty badass Fighters. Being able to stand inside your opponent's space because of Tiny size is huge.
Plus a Luchador-style Pixie FIghter is one of the more ridiculous PCs I've played. Wrestled a Black Bear to death.
