Hand me my crossbow.

As Crwth mentioned earlier I equated being down to nothing but At-will powers and a handful of healing surges to "grabbing the crossbow". It was an off the cuff remark and I'll readily concede that it's not very accurate.

For starters, the At-wills are better than the old 3.5 crossbow-shot-and-a-prayer fallback. If not "better" at least they're arguably more interesting/engaging.

Our rogue trotted out two of his at-wills before finally falling. The paladin likewise. The warlord made good use of his Wolfpack Tactics and the ranger steadily used Twin Fanged Strike (or whatever it's called). Of course that was pretty much the only power the ranger ever used. Still, it's effective.

My fighter/wizard should have been even more versatile with the at-wills, and to be honest I felt like I had more options. I got off a couple of Thunderwaves to try to get some breathing room (one time it actually hit!) and otherwise relied on Reaping Strikes (damage on a miss! Love it!). So, all in all, no real feeling of "let down" when left with nothing else in the tank, so to speak.

Instead, the downside comes in the lack of options beyond powers.

At several points in the battle I wished that I could counter-spell those damn controllers. Or use a resist fire potion. Or a neutralize poison. Something to alleviate the feeling of being powerless under those enemy's whims. It was incredibly frustrating being completely helpless to resist being blinded or knocked down.

Simply spread out so that the controller's area of effect powers can't hit everyone at once? Good idea. In theory.

In reality, we were hemmed into a dead end room (admittedly a bad tactical blunder and probably the biggest reason for our TPK) with at least one enlarged Duegar taking up even more room. Frankly, once we allowed ourselves to become trapped in that room we were at the mercy of the controllers. As they thoroughly kicked our asses all player ingenuity was effectively nullified. We needed to get incredibly lucky just to push our way back out into the hallway. As impressed as I was by the enemy controllers, I was ultimately just frustrated by them, and that took away from an otherwise fine fight.

Sure the at-wills kept the fight interesting, but no more so than 3.5's relatively banal "pot shots with the crossbow". Boiled down, the at-wills are still strike me as basic attacks with some flavor text attached.

So, does this mean that 4E sucks compared to 3.5?

I love 3.5 for a variety of reasons, but I can't say that it's hands down better; regardless of how one defines "better". It's all so subjective.

I will say that 4E has alleviated many of my earlier knocks. The variety of classes has opened up numerous options, so multi-classing isn't missed as much. The upcoming Skill Powers looks like it's gonna be all kinds of awesome. The encounters are a lot of fun, and even dying is exciting.

On the downside, I'm still not liking the concept of Reflex, Fortitude, and Will as defensive scores versus saving throws. I know the math and all works out more or less the same. I just miss the empowerment of making a saving throw versus simply being blinded or knocked down.

I'm also hating the dearth of magic items. There's a decent variety of them, but their usefulness is minimal at best. I miss the days of having that one trinket/potion/scroll that can be pulled out to use in some inventive way, or simply to save one's ass. I also miss the facet of planning that magic items used to bring. Knowing that we were facing fiery and poisoning Duergar we would have stocked up on fire resists and anti-poison potions/scrolls/spells in 3.5. In 4E we had nothing but our powers and luck to rely upon. When the former dwindled and the latter ran out, the results were fairly predictable.

Where's the magic?

I just don't feel it any more. Maybe that "new car smell" has worn off of 4th ed, but I'm becoming increasingly disenchanted (pun intended) with the magic system. This past level up has been the most boring level up ever. It was just one ho-hum after another.

Now, I'm hoping that later levels will get better. The addition of the big hitter spells, err, sorry "powers" should help. But so far at least I've got very little to look forward to.

Sure, it’s nice that my wizard never runs out of his at-will powers, so he can reliably drop Scorching Bursts on bunched up enemies. Or Thunderwave them away if they get too close.

Next round? More of the same. Yadda, yadda, yadda.

I understand that their game design called for giving the melee classes something “cool” to do each round. As opposed to simply picking your target and rolling a couple of dice. Maybe, once in a while, a feat would come into play. Or some special ability from a magic item. I guess that the designers felt this was boring, for some reason.

Well, congratulations WoTC. Fourth edition has given the melee classes a bunch of powers to use every round. Now instead of just “attacking orc ‘A’ with my sword” you “attack the orc skulker ‘a’ with my at-will ‘Powerful Strike’”.

But seriously, is this really any different?

Worse yet, they’ve reduced spellcasting to the same wash-rinse-repeat cycle. Instead of carefully planning my spells and choosing just the right moment to use them, I now blast away with the same one over and over. Someone wake me when combat is over.

Oh! We leveled up? Woot. I guess. I get what? A utility power? Woopdeedoo.

The magic is gone.

PHB - Combat

Because we were playing this weekend, I skipped a bunch of chapters to read Chapter 9 - Combat.

For those who have played 3rd edition, the round/turn idea is still present and familiar, as are surprise rounds and the limited actions available there. The biggest addition is that the standard and move actions (and free actions) have been joined by the minor action. This was a sorely needed piece of a character's turn, but one that I probably couldn't have put my finger on if asked.

No longer are characters using move actions to draw a weapon (or feeling like they ought to move just to take advantage of drawing for free); drinking potions is more reasonable; and opening a door doesn't seem to take forever. It's such a minor thing (ha. ha.), but this was a much-needed addition.

The terms "interrupt" and "reaction" have been added into the immediate action section. These are obvious carry-overs from Magic: The Gathering and Jyhad/Vampire: The Eternal Struggle, both WOTC properties. But they fit here, if only because the idea they represent was around in 3rd edition Ready actions anyway; we now have formal terminology for such actions.

Also seemed to be carried over from the Collectable Card Game universe are the explicit Start of Your Turn and End of Your Turn "phases". These phases will be useful to help remember all of the ongoing effects that need to be handled; I know that regeneration and fast healing were often forgotten in 3rd edition.


The actual act of attacking is a little more involved now. Third edition kept the idea of a melee/ranged attack separate from casting a spell; now they're all the same thing. The close attack blurs the two, including both an arcing swing with a blade along with a pulsing magical aura. With the change to the saving throws, spell casting and other effects is now considered an attack (we voiced our opinions about this in previous posts), which I think we've warmed to. While playing on Saturday, I kept thinking, "they automatically take this damage?? Where's the save?", but of course the save was in the Defense score that the attacker beat. Saving throws are now relegated to the removal of ongoing effects. As mentioned here before, this does simplify the flow of combat (attackers roll, not defenders), but I think it will take a bit of time to get used to one of six ability scores versus one of four defense scores, though I suppose there are some combinations that don't make sense (Strength vs. Will?)

The part that most complicates combat is the fact that, unless you're doing some fancy charge or other combination move, you are unlikely to use the Melee Basic Attack or Ranged Basic Attack -- one of your character's at-will powers will almost certainly have a better effect. This might be harder for seasoned D&D players to get used to than newcomers, but it took effort to NOT "just swing my mace" at the kobolds. The character sheet isn't quite designed for laying out your various attacks, showing the X vs Y roll, the damage and the typical extra effect, so I found myself flipping back to the cleric level 1 at-will powers page all the time. I'm sure I'll get used to what I have, and it will become quicker, but for now, it slows down combat having these choices available.

The page on Conditions was nice to see, better laid out than in older versions, and helpfully spelling out all of the effects of the condition. No more do I have to flip back and forth trying to figure out which of stunned or dazed is worse, which stops you from taking an action, which leaves you vulnerable for a sneak attack, etc.
Now, we see that Dying implies Unconscious, which implies Helpless, which has its list of penalties. Much simpler.

I'm torn about the critical hits. Max damage - yay! No extra dice - boo. I rolled my criticals in my role as DM than the party did, so it really comes down to the players whether they prefer getting beaten consistently or with that sense of randomness. *:^)

I'm also confused with the ongoing damage. One of the tenets mentioned early on about 4e was reducing bookkeeping, yet many of the powers have ongoing damage and effects, which means you need to keep track of them. Interestingly, we didn't seem to have much of a problem there - one PC was on fire and immobilized, and we never forgot to roll the saves. I suppose players are more likely to remember to shake off effects than they are to remember to remind the DM to ascribe more damage from that ongoing acid arrow... Also confusing this issue is that some powers are removed with a saving throw, some are Until the Start of Your Next Turn, some Until the End, and some Until the End of the Encounter.

With the move of the traditional saving throw into an attack roll, it's nice that what's left of saving throws is a static value, rolling 10 or higher to succeed. As the PHB says, "[w]hat makes a giant snake's poison worse than a normal snake's is not how hard it is to shake off the poison's effects, but how easily it affects you in the first place (it's attack bonus) and what it does to you while it remains in your system (its ongoing damage or other effect)."

Cover and concealment have been simplified a bit, so there are only two types of penalties, -2 and -5, that apply to attacks. No more percentage miss chances, and no more defense bonus - just an attack penalty. This is nice, and I agree that this was needlessly complicated in 3rd edition.


Diminutive and Colossal have been lost as sizes. That's too bad, but I suppose there's no reason to keep them, especially since it seems that size no longer affects your armor class. The new Squeeze action is interesting, allowing a creature to suck in its gut to squeeze into tight spaces, with listed effects. Most of the movement rules are similar to the older version, with a few exceptions.

Run is now just +10', instead of triple- or quadruple-speed. This is good to prevent long over-ground chases, of which we've had a few. The terrain has taken on Miniatures terminology and effects, costing an extra 5' to move through difficult terrain, and taking a certain amount of movement to move atop obstacles. The Push/Pull/Slide idea seems to be quite prevalent; sliding nee five-foot-adjustment is needed for the feel of fancy footwork in combat, but the pushing and pulling ideas are more than just bull rushing being put into concrete terms. Many powers have these effects, which lends to a more strategic feel to combat in general. And having kobolds that can slide in response to the characters' movements is great.

As for the other miscellaneous actions that are available, Crawling now lets you go at half-speed instead of just 5'. Grappling (Grab, now) and escaping are simplified, which is nice. They were always good mechanics to use in combat (monsters crushing PCs, or PCs grappling NPCs when they couldn't do anything else effective), but always required going to the books to find out the order of the checks, who-could-do-what, etc.

We've yet to try out the new death and dying rules, but they definitely seem designed to help the PCs live to see another day, provided their companions can finish the battle without them, or heal them quickly. The dynamic lower-limit for death is definitely an improvement, using the bloodied number as a negative instead of the static -10. No mention of massive damage that I could see, though. I don't think it'll be missed.