Too Many Powers

[kent_allard_jr]

4th edition D&D has always had a flavor problem, and this is never more clear then when reading the power descriptions. This is true even though each power has a colorful name and a short bit of flavor text. Quick: Can you name all of your PC's powers? I've been playing a rogue in kokoinai's campaign since 4th edition came out, and gotten to 16th level, but I could only name half of his exploits from memory, let alone say what each of them did.

Part of the problem, no doubt, is that rogue exploits -- unlike, say, wizard spells -- are all going to sound a bit alike. There are only so many ways to describe one guy stabbing someone else. So you get abilities like "Crimson Edge," whose name tells you nothing at all, so its no surprise I couldn't tell you what it does.

This may get to the core of the issue: There are just too many attack powers, all doing more or less the same things. In some future edition of D&D there should be far fewer of them, perhaps only one new power every 5 levels instead of every 2-3. If you want more variety for spellcasters you can expand the size of the spellbook (from 2-3 spells to 4-5), or give them powers from their pact, totem, guild or deity.

Alternatively characters can get powers as frequently as they do today, but only up to low Paragon tier. After that they can Enhance existing powers: Add extra dice of damage; push, pull or slide targets farther; add more conditions to the effects. After all, you can find many powers -- such as "Deep Cut" and "Biting Assault" for rogues -- that do more-or-less the same thing, only one is better than the other. Instead you could have a single power ("Deep Cut") and an Enhanced version at later levels ("Enhanced [Level 25]: Increase damage to 3[W], and target is weakened on hit (save ends)"). It would save space and make all of the powers easier to remember.

Comments

[kokoinai.livejournal.com]

Note psionic characters essentially work this way already, having a smaller power pool but the ability to enhance them on the fly.

[jlc.livejournal.com]

Indeed. And I think they almost work better. But at the very least they win for being the only power source that actually plays differently.

[mneme]

Well, kinda. They also lose, because "differently" is "they keep the same powers from first level (plus one extra) and just spam low level encounter powers at high level, because that's more effective than playing as designed".

The Essentials BA builds were much more workable as classes that actually played differently (even when they added in a daily-like option like the Assassin Executioner).

OTOH, this is mostly an execution problem (costing high level powers too high relatively to very powerful scaling lower level powers), and likely could have been handled with power level eratta.

[jlc.livejournal.com]

this is mostly an execution problem
Very few of the problems of D&D 4e are anything other than execution problems. 4e has plenty of well-intentioned ideas whose execution leaves a good deal to be desired. But that's kinda the point--execution is the hard part of game design.

[mneme]

Kind of. The thing is, if all (or most) of your problems are execution problems on individual elements, not design problems, then you can fix them by changing those elements (and, yes, get issues like 4E's books requiring marking up with erratta to be accurate, but that's what reprints are for). If your problems are fundamental design (or lack of design) problems, they are, in fact, harder to fix.

Now, of course, the issue with a pseudo-ccg like 3rd or 4th edition D&D is that they have much more of a constant stream of game elements to get wrong--so even if you basic design is sound, you can foul things up (and/or force houserules) when, not if, you print broken game elements.

[mneme]

I think this is -more- a martial problem than that for other power sources--I've never had a similar issue for a sorcerer or a wizard (where every power tends to have a very distinctive effect), or, for that matter, my 16th level Avenger (I do tend to use the checklist from CB--but mostly I can run without consulting anything except a list of what powers I've got unused and a list of damage expressions for odd powers like Fury's Advance--the specials are distinct enough that I can usually keep them straight, particularly as one only has 3 encounter powers (sorry, four, but the paragon power is easy) and two at-wills to remember (and for an avenger, all dailies are buffs, and all dailies I've taken are 3W wis vs AC buffs).

I think what would help a lot would be standardizing titles. I mean, if you look at their keywords, they're basically tossing darts onto a board to decide that, say, Fury's advance is the Avenger minor-action attack power (which also does a push, so ok, the Advance makes some sense), wheras Focused Fury and Desperate Fury are standard action attack powers, a bunch of furies (Wizard's, Battle Fury Stance, Fighting Fury, Spark of Fury) are stances or might as well be, and there's even a Fury that's a summon (Summon Stormstone Fury).

And if you look at the "crimson" powers (one of their favorite words), there's Crimson Edge (ongoing damage--a "bleed" power), Crimson Spear Strike (immobolization), Crimson Stride (the awesome Avenger teleport you/teleport enemy E13 power--which does have a special I always forget, but that's because it does negligable damage and I almost never fulfil its conditions anyway), Crimson Agony Tide (blinds and pushes) and Crimson Phoenix Rage (fire damage and auto-heal. I do see why they don't want to call every power by a directly descriptive name -- Thunderstaff sound a lot better than "Pushing Staff Strike" or some such--but by coding common elements into names and staying consistent; make "crimson" used for only bleed, or only teleport-other powers, and "fury" only used for attack stances, and, say, Edge or Flash used only for minor action attack powers, etc--they could have flavorful names that still gave you a clue to what the power actually did; maybe enough to remember the rest of what it did.

At least "blinding" powers almost always blind. Yes, almost--Blinding Glare from Dragon makes you invisible instead, Blinding Torrent (also Dragon) grants concealment, Blinding Clarity only blinds when maximally augmented, Blinding Assailiant makes you invisible (another Dragon one), and Blinding Sun Technique only blinds as a granted crit effect [awesome buff, though, at least until you get a better way to up your crit range]. But still, in comparison to most of the rest of their stuff, that's a great track record--every non-Dragon element with Blinding in the title involves Blind at some point, and out of the 23 elments with that in the title, all but 4 blind on a hit (in at least one mode).

They have, in fact, been producing more powers that auto-boost if taken at a higher tier. The problem is, they've mostly mis-designed these to provide the same benefit at each tier except for damage expression--and the standard is that instead each half-tier of power should provide a bit more in the way of a benefit beyond the damage expression. For a power to scale well and feel satisfying at a higher tier, damage boosts need to be higher, ranges and areas of effect larger, and status effects generally more potent (if only because of the increased fragility of status effects in higher tiers). Buffs and debuffs can also probably afford to be larger--but as is known, they currently tend to overdo Buff/debuff scaling now (with higher level powers it's -probably- ok, though).

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

I think this is -more- a martial problem than that for other power sources--I've never had a similar issue for a sorcerer or a wizard (where every power tends to have a very distinctive effect)

Well, yes. That's why I called out wizard spells explicitly. It's easy enough to distinguish a bolt of lightning from a ball of fire -- you call them "lightning bolt" and "fireball" respectively -- but harder to distinguish different ways of stabbing people. That's why I would enlarge wizard "spellbooks" and give other spell-casters additional spell choices, such as deity-based spells for divine casters (or deity-specific bonuses that can be exchanged for power usage, like Barbarian Rage), to make up for less frequent power collection.

I think what would help a lot would be standardizing titles.

I agree, or at least use more straightforward titles. Fewer superlatives, and more simple description, could help in the flavor text, too.

[peacewood.livejournal.com]

Of course, enlarging wizard spellbooks gives them more de facto choices and options, which was a frequent criticism of wizards in 3E (and indirectly led to the Power system being developed in the first place).

Not sure what a solution here would be -- but I agree that it would involve slimming down of some kind.

[mneme]

Re martial rather than non-martial. I'll note that I said martial, rather than weapon using. Non-martial weapon users have more variance in effect than martial characters, because Paladins have more buffs, debuffs, and heals; Avengers have teleports, buffs, and debuffs (and control effects, and moving people around); Swordmages have a lot of things (but mostly teleports, marks, and debuffs), etc.

For martial characters--and particularly martial strikers, though, the range of possibilities seems to be narrower; Rogues seem to go from A to B (damage, debuffs, shoves, more damage), and Rangers have a lot of flavorful but not very good powers (like the beast mastery chain; Beastmasters are still great, and they still don't want to take many/any beast powers), but most of their powers seem to be "I stab you X times" and "I shoot you X times" (although one can mitigate this somewhat by taking all your encounter powers as immediate/minor action powers).

[avram]

Crimson Agony Tide

If there are D&D 4e players at the University of Alabama, I'm certain that they have a joke involving this spell.

[negativeq.livejournal.com]

Crimson Agony Tide

This sounds like an especially nasty period. This could be its effect in DnD: bleed, plus slowed. You try moving with menstrual cramps!

[mneme]

lol. Hmm.

Curse of Crimson Agony Tide

You force your target to suffer exquisite, bloody, and embarassing agony.

Daily Arcane, Implement
Standard Action Ranged 10

Target: One creature

Attack: Con vs Fortitude

Hit: 1d8 + Con damage

Miss: Half damage.

Effect: The target is under your Curse of Crimson Agony (save ends). While it is under this curse, it takes ongoing (8) damage, and squares in an area burst 1 centered on it are difficult terrain. Additionally, if the target is not female, while it is under your Curse of Crimson Agony, it is dazed.

(not found at all; I just made it up)