# Grading Daily Powers



## keterys (Jul 8, 2008)

This exercise was primarily focused on establishing guidelines for power design. I'm mostly hoping for interesting debate and a vague guide for DMs and players alike for comparing powers. While this post deals with daily powers, you may find the encounter or at-will discussion interesting.

All powers are graded assuming they are used effectively - if a power requires a second person in melee to work, don't take it in a party with no other melee. In many cases you'll find that personal preference varies from these grades - while a power may be extraordinary in theory or combined with the right build or party, take the power that is most fun for you! 

Grades 
A - Excellent. This power brings something special to the table in terms of tactical ability or damage output. It may be too powerful, especially in the hands of the wrong class. 
B - Good. This is a solid power. Most powers should fall into this grade.
C - Okay. This power is certainly adequate but pales somewhat in comparison to other powers.
D - Poor. This power is certainly usable (and may even excel in certain rare situations), but is definitely lacking compared to other options. 
F - Compares extremely poorly to other powers and should likely be improved or ignored.

A+ powers in particular are at a dangerous balance level. If designing a new power and it is on par, or better, than an A+, most likely you should go back to the drawing board and tweak some things.

B- is what I considered the baseline for comparison of powers. A bit worse and it's in the C territory, but a fair amount of distance to get into the A range.

Basic Grading Guidelines:

Giving an ally a bonus to attack or giving penalties to defense is extremely powerful for setting up your ally's abilities that do high damage, stun, etc.

Raw damage is pretty good, but in general I'm going to value tactical bonuses such as stun, daze, blind, or large amounts of forced movement more highly. These set up combat advantage and deny effective action.

Penalties to attack can prevent bad status effects, like daze and stun, as well as damage, so that's probably next.

Knock Prone and Immobilize are pretty close. Prone is often no penalty at all, but it has some great niche use in taking down fliers and when an enemy can't do any good action and stand. Immobilize works great on melee only monsters and combined with zones and such.

Weaken is fine, but it's just less effective than that. Monsters don't do a ton of damage so weaken is only so good.

Slow and some similar effects are... even further after that. 

Area effects get scored well overall, since you often fight a lot of monsters in 4e and it's important to clear out minions before they can do significant damage. Big areas that target enemies only are pure gold since you can output a ton of damage that way.

Powers that use ability bonuses can often be much stronger for some characters than others. For low level powers, I'll assume a 2 to 6 range depending on the ability, but as levels progress that can climb into the 6-10 range for some builds so I'll need to take that into account. Under no circumstances will I consider a power that uses an ability score that it 'might be a 0 or 1' just to prove a power could be weaker, just as I won't assume that weapon powers use fists for poor damage and no proficiency bonus. 

Please feel free to disagree with any suggested grade I give at all, pointing out flaws in my logic, grading guidelines, etc. If a power is exceptional under extremely limited circumstances (Cause Fear on a large+ creature in a blood pulse area, for instance), please make note if that's why you're suggesting the change and otherwise it's some other grade.

If comparing powers of different levels - for example a level 5 power to a level 1 power, note that I am grading in relation to other powers of its level so the level 5 is expected to be better (much as you'd expect a 5th grader's Math to be better than a 1st grader's, at the same grade level or even worse). I can't be exact in how much of a drop you'll see, but don't be surprised by at least a full letter difference.

Daily Powers without a notable Effect or Miss result (or Reliable) will be marked down. 

Daily 1 Analysis
Daily 5 Analysis
Daily 9 Analysis
Daily 15 Analysis

*CLERIC*
[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
B- / Avenging Flame
A / Beacon of Hope
C+ / Cascade of Light
A- / Guardian of Faith

-= Daily 5 = -
A+ / Consecrated Ground
C+ / Rune of Peace
A / Spiritual Weapon
A / Weapon of the Gods

-= Daily 9 = -
C+ / Astral Defenders
B+ / Blade Barrier
A / Divine Power
B / Flame Strike

-= Daily 15 = -
B- / Holy Spark
B+ / Purifying Fire
B+ / Seal of Warding[/sblock]
*FIGHTER*
[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
C+ / Brute Strike
B- / Comeback Strike
B+ / Villain's Menace

-= Daily 5 = -
C+ / Crack the Shell
C+ / Dizzying Blow
A / Rain of Steel

-= Daily 9 = -
C+ / Shift the Battlefield
C+ / Thicket of Blades
C+ / Victorious Surge

-= Daily 15 = -
B- / Dragon's Fangs
B / Serpent Dance Strike
A+ / Unyielding Avalanche[/sblock]
*PALADIN*[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
C+ / On Pain of Death
B- / Paladin's Judgement
A- / Radiant Delirium

-= Daily 5 = -
B+ / Hallowed Circle
B- / Martyr's Retribution
B+ / Sign of Vulnerability

-= Daily 9 = -
B- / Crown of Glory
B- / One Stands Alone
C+ / Radiant Pulse

-= Daily 15 = -
C- / Bloodied Retribution
C / Break the Wall
B / True Nemesis[/sblock]
*RANGER*[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
C+ / Hunter's Bear Trap
B+ / Jaws of the Wolf
B- / Split the Tree
C+ / Sudden Strike

-= Daily 5 = -
C+ / Excruciating Shot
B+ / Frenzied Skirmish
B+ / Splintering Shot
B+ / Two-Wolf Pounce

-= Daily 9 = -
B+ / Attacks on the Run
C- / Close Quarters Shot
C / Spray of Arrows
C / Swirling Leaves of Steel

-= Daily 15 = -
A- / Blade Cascade
A- / Bleeding Wounds
A / Confounding Arrows
A / Stunning Steel
[/sblock]
*ROGUE*[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
A- / Blinding Barrage
C / Easy Target
B- / Trick Strike

-= Daily 5 = -
C+ / Clever Riposte
B- / Deep Cut
C+ / Walking Wounded

-= Daily 9 = -
B- / Crimson Edge
C+ / Deadly Positioning
A / Knockout

-= Daily 15 = -
C / Bloody Path
B+ / Garotte Grip
C / Slaying Strike[/sblock]
*WARLOCK*[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
A / Armor of Agathys
C / Curse of the Dark Dream
C / Dread Star
C / Flames of Phlegethos

-= Daily 5 = -
C+ / Avernian Eruption
D+ / Crown of Madness
D+ / Curse of the Bloody Fangs
B+ / Hunger of Hadar

-= Daily 9 = -
C+ or B+ / Curse of the Black Frost
C+ / Iron Spike of Dis
C / Summons of Khirad
C- / Thief of Five Fates

-= Daily 15 = -
NA / Curse of the Golden Mist
C- / Fireswarm
A / Tendrils of Thuban
C- / Thirsting Maw[/sblock]
*WARLORD*[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
B+ / Bastion of Defense
A+ / Lead the Attack
B / Pin the Foe
C+ / White Raven Onslaught

-= Daily 5 = -
B+ / Stand the Fallen
D- / Turning Point
C- / Villain's Nightmare

-= Daily 9 = -
C+ / Iron Dragon Charge
B- / Knock Them Down
C+ / White Raven Strike

-= Daily 15 = -
D+ / Make Them Bleed
B- / Renew the Troops
D- / Warlord's Gambit[/sblock]
*WIZARD*[sblock]-= Daily 1 =-
C / Acid Arrow 
A / Flaming Sphere
B- / Freezing Cloud
C / Sleep (Disclaimer: A+ for certain builds, particularly at Paragon+ Tier)
B+ / Phantom Chasm

-= Daily 5 = -
B- / Bigby's Icy Grasp
C+ / Fireball
A / Stinking Cloud
C- / Web

-= Daily 9 = -
B / Ice Storm
C+ / Lightning Serpent
C+ / Mordenkainen's Sword
A / Wall of Fire

-= Daily 15 = -
B+ / Bigby's Grasping Hands
C+ / Blast of Cold
B- / Otiluke's Resilient Sphere
A- / Prismatic Beams
A+ / Wall of Ice[/sblock]

Given the nature of daily powers, I expect the balance (and my own guesses) to be pretty all over the place, so your help is especially appreciated on these.


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## keterys (Jul 8, 2008)

Daily 1 Powers:
Quick note on damage - I'm assuming a baseline of 3W (or 3d8 - 3d10) damage for powers as I go through them, and I'm assuming some little bit added onto that 3 dice.

*CLERIC*
B- / Avenging Flame
A / Beacon of Hope
 C+ / Cascade of Light
A- / Guardian of Faith

*Cascade of Light* is short range and under most circumstances I don't expect that vulnerability to add up to that much extra before it's saved against. If it's trivial to 'game' the vulnerability for a ton of damage with conjurations, zones, and ongoing damage, let me know. 
*Avenging Flame*'s ongoing damage can really rack up or force a creature to take no action for a round or two, which is quite nice. Unfortunately it gets no ongoing damage on a miss.
*Beacon of Hope *hits a nice large area and can add a metric ton of healing over the course of an encounter, and even potentially does a healthy amount up front. The weaken can hit several enemies which is also a solid kicker.
*Guardian of Faith *is particularly good against undead. Its abilities as a blocker were updated away, but not requiring a sustain action and especially when working with a fighter or some other penalty or difficulty moving (Pin the Foe, what have you) it can really do very good damage over the course of an encounter.

*FIGHTER*
C+ / Brute Strike
 B- / Comeback Strike
 B+ / Villain's Menace

I may be slightly overvaluing Reliable, but it has a certain amount of 'Feel good' points I'll admit. I have a difficult time rating any of the fighter powers over each other, which I find interesting and cool.
*Brute Strike *is very solid damage that you know will eventually connect. 
*Comeback Strike *is a healing surge you can count on with decent damage. Compares well to Paladin's Judgement.
*Villain's Menace *is the best 'meta' power of the bunch and would almost assuredly rise higher in ranking if it wasn't pretty lackluster on a Miss and I didn't expect its relatively minor bonus to attack to sometimes not come up due to stacking.

*PALADIN*
C+ / On Pain of Death
 B- / Paladin's Judgement
A- / Radiant Delirium

*On Pain of Death *is very short range and likely saved against fairly quickly. The main advantage it has over, say, Avenging Flame is that it's a damage roll for the ongoing damage which means you can add on your enhancement bonus or potentially other things like feat and power bonuses, but I ultimately find it disappointing and would rather mark it lower. Unlike Avenging Flame you can also guarantee you won't take damage by not attacking (which is still a solid benefit if it prevents attacks for a round).
*Paladin's Judgement *is a guaranteed healing surge which is quite useful. No damage on a miss is disappointing however. 
*Radiant Delirium *is a guaranteed daze (potent) and deals radiant damage. It has short range, but the AC penalty can be quite nice even if it only lasts a round or so.

*RANGER*
C+ / Hunter's Bear Trap
 B+ / Jaws of the Wolf
B- / Split the Tree
C+ / Sudden Strike

*Hunter's Bear Trap *is tolerable I guess. Okay damage, side effect (slow) not that great, and probably saved against quickly. It has its uses (quick strike on a melee foe far away) and you can get lucky with it on failed saves.
*Split the Tree *is a neat resolution mechanic and all, but it's very possible to miss entirely with it and the requirement to have 2 enemies within 3 squares is a notable limitation.
*Sudden Strike *is okay, but it does no damage on a Miss and the off-hand strike only does 1W which is a bit lackluster.
*Jaws of the Wolf *is just damage, but its Miss damage is almost as much as most of the powers do on a hit, so it edges ahead on pure damage potential.

*ROGUE*
A- / Blinding Barrage
 C / Easy Target
 B- / Trick Strike

*Easy Target *could be pretty decent, if the target fails a bunch of saves, but the kind of target that can take multiple rounds of damage to make this Daily worthwhile is not the kind of target that fails saves that often, so I find it pretty disappointing. I do find it amusing that a Miss often results in a longer lasting Combat Advantage than a Hit.
*Trick Strike *I really like. A slide every single time you hit can really let you do some fun (and even powerful) things, but it suffers from the lack of any damage on a Miss and is pretty much just a gimmick for solos and some elites.
*Blinding Barrage *gets a little bit for doing solid damage assuming you're attacking at least two people and blind is a very powerful side effect, often crippling an enemy's turn in addition to setting up the bonuses to attack and sneak attack. 

*WARLOCK*
A / Armor of Agathys
 C / Curse of the Dark Dream
 C / Dread Star
 C / Flames of Phlegethos

I suspect I'll get some objections on the warlock powers from those who argue you can mostly avoid missing so I should rate the non-Armor ones better, but there you go.
*Armor of Agathys *I rated highest because it's a ton of temp hp at the level you get (well more than a surge's worth) and the guaranteed (auto minion killing, even) damage for a brave warlock really adds up to a ton over the course of an entire encounter.
*Curse of the Dark Dream *is a decent power with reasonable damage and a solid slide, but its sustain will be quickly saved against and it does so little on a Miss.
*Dread Star *does low damage, but it's radiant so that helps slightly. A hit immobilizes for a turn, and I like the auto-penalty to Will defense even if the penalty is pretty small and quickly saved against... but again I'm finding it pretty disappointing on a Miss.
*Flames of Phlegethos *does high damage on a Hit, negligible on a miss. 

 *WARLORD*
B+ / Bastion of Defense
 A+ / Lead the Attack
 B / Pin the Foe
 C+ / White Raven Onslaught

I personally am a little iffy on the Warlord's powers so would particularly appreciate feedback on these. They're very party dependent - I do appreciate that they have a lingering cool effect for the entire rest of the battle.
*Bastion of Defense *is definitely a bit disappointing on a Miss, but that's very respectable temp hp at low level and when it hits +1 to all defenses is always appreciated, and it's decent damage.
*Lead the Attack *is a gigantic bonus to attack for an entire encounter. If you can setup a hit with someone else, this power potentially halves the duration of a Solo encounter. On top of pretty solid damage at that.
*Pin the Foe *is neat. No damage on miss is disappointing, but being able to completely deny shifts for the duration of a battle can give you some great synergy with other powers (zones and conjurations) and make it much easier to flank, or give people free opportunity attacks, and all that without hitting.
*White Raven Onslaught *is certainly a cool special effect, but I think it's a little too specialized, especially on a miss where you have to pick a single person to key off of. This is the kind of effect I like, so I'll admit I'm disappointed that I find the power's implementation a bit lackluster.

*WIZARD* 
C / Acid Arrow 
 A / Flaming Sphere
 B- / Freezing Cloud
 A+ / Sleep (Disclaimer: Only for certain builds, particularly at Paragon+ Tier)
 B+ / Phantom Chasm

*Acid Arrow *can potentially do a fair amount of damage, but I think its damage is probably a little low and its 'area' less useful.
*Flaming Sphere *can do a ton of automatic damage and is nice and maneuverable. Also good for a wizard down to at-wills for a damage boost.
*Freezing Cloud *doesn't look like much, but it covers a reasonable area and anyone caught in the initial cloud is attacked twice with automatic Miss damage so it can be pretty respectable.
*Sleep *is a power that will probably be accused of being both broken and useless, depending on who you ask. For orb wizards, there are many who claim they would not give it up until 29th, if ever. That said, I suspect some of its power is purely based on errata-to-be in the form of making some way for the creature to wake up other than making its save. For now, however, it is the most powerful control effect (unconsciousness) short of death and is a guaranteed slow on a decent-sized group of enemies.
*Phantom Chasm *is a guaranteed immobilize to a small area, which is potentially very powerful. Knocking prone is nice, though enemies will likely just stand up while immobilized to no harm except for attacks made between the wizard's turn and theirs. Its damage is only okay.


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## brehobit (Jul 9, 2008)

I think you mostly nailed it, though at lower levels I think flaming sphere is better than sleep.  But I also assume a damaging effect will wake them...

Mark


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## WhatGravitas (Jul 9, 2008)

brehobit said:


> I think you mostly nailed it, though at lower levels I think flaming sphere is better than sleep.  But I also assume a damaging effect will wake them...



Agree here. Also, at lower levels, your penalty on saves isn't high enough to hit solos reliably with a "take a nap".

Flaming sphere, however, is good battlefield control (as in providing a strong disincentive to stay there) and minion muncher in one neat little package.

Cheers, LT.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 9, 2008)

I agree with the others that sleep should probably get knocked down to A instead of A+. I think the warlord's daily is the strongest by far.


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## Fedifensor (Jul 9, 2008)

keterys said:


> *Cascade of Light* is short range and under most circumstances I don't expect that vulnerability to add up to that much extra before it's saved against.



It really depends on party makeup.  A group with clerics, paladins, perhaps a wizard using Color Spray...it can be handy.  A group where only the cleric has radiant attacks...not so much.



> *Beacon of Hope *hits a nice large area and can add a metric ton of healing over the course of an encounter, and even potentially does a healthy amount up front. The weaken can hit several enemies which is also a solid kicker.



This is a definite 'A' power in my book, and essential for tough encounters.  It can completely change the course of a fight when the group is on their last legs.  Get a heal, dish out weaken to multiple targets, and significantly boost any other healing the group gets?  Sign me up!



> *Guardian of Faith *is particularly good against undead. Its abilities as a blocker were updated away, but not requiring a sustain action and especially when working with a fighter or some other penalty or difficulty moving (Pin the Foe, what have you) it can really do very good damage over the course of an encounter.



Since the conjuration doesn't take up space anymore, the cleric can put the GoF into his square to dish out damage to anyone engaging him in melee.  I still think Beacon of Hope is better, but not by much.




> *Brute Strike *is very solid damage that you know will eventually connect.



Decent, but quickly outclassed by later powers.  Both Dizzying Blow (5th) and Victorious Surge (9th) have the same damage and reliability, but also have an additional effect.  Since you can't trade out the power until at least 13th, you'd better be dedicated to damage above all else to take this...and most fighters act more like defenders than strikers.  In the long run, I think most fighters are better off with the additional utility of the other choices.



> *Villain's Menace *is the best 'meta' power of the bunch and would almost assuredly rise higher in ranking if it wasn't pretty lackluster on a Miss and I didn't expect its relatively minor bonus to attack to sometimes not come up due to stacking.



Fighters don't get many self-buffs, much less buffs that do damage.  Even if you miss, the +1 to hit and +2 damage makes you feel that your action wasn't wasted.  And if you can get a short-term boost to hit (perhaps a cleric using Righteous Brand), you're more likely to connect with this power and get a sizable boost for the entire encounter.  I would rate this higher than either of the other two choices.




> *Paladin's Judgement* is a guaranteed healing surge which is quite useful. No damage on a miss is disappointing however.



It's basically a Brute Strike that trades the reliable keyword for a guaranteed healing surge.



> *Radiant Delirium *is a guaranteed daze (potent) and deals radiant damage. It has short range, but the AC penalty can be quite nice even if it only lasts a round or so.



Guaranteed daze gives combat advantage for a +2 to hit the target, and the -2 AC is effectively another +2 to hit the target, for a total of +4.  It's a perfect way to set up a tough creature for a pounding.  I'd move this up to an A-.




> *Hunter's Bear Trap *is the clunker of the bunch I think. Subpar damage, side effect (slow) not that great, and probably saved against quickly. It has its uses and you can get lucky with it, but eh - this is a daily we're talking about.



More useful for a bowman than a TWF ranger.  The guaranteed slow lets you stay out of range, and the ongoing damage makes the attack as good as a [3W] attack if it hits.



> *Split the Tree *is a neat resolution mechanic and all, but it's very possible to miss entirely with it and the requirement to have 2 enemies within 3 squares is a notable limitation.



The two enemy requirement is minimal, because you use this daily when you're fighting multiple foes.  Yes, it doesn't help against a solo...but that's about the only time you're out of luck.  Taking the better of two attack rolls basically halves your chance of a miss, and the damage on _each_ arrow is as good as any of the other daily choices (with the exception of Hunter's Bear Trap).  It's definitely the top choice for a bow-using ranger.



> *Sudden Strike *is okay, but it does no damage on a Miss and the off-hand strike only does 1W which is a bit lackluster.



Well, you get two attacks (the secondary is under Effect, not Hit, so you always get the second roll).  While Jaws of the Wolf is superior for damage, the weakening effect is good when facing off against an elite or solo.



> *Jaws of the Wolf *is just damage, but its Miss damage is almost as much as most of the powers do on a hit, so it edges ahead on pure damage potential.



Less chance to hit twice than Split the Tree, but being able to hit the same target twice pushes it ahead on damage.  It effectively does [2W] if both attacks miss, [3W] if one hits, and [4W] (plus double your bonuses) if both hit.  Definitely the top choice for a melee ranger.




> *Trick Strike *I really like. A slide every single time you hit can really let you do some fun (and even powerful) things, but it suffers from the lack of any damage on a Miss.



Useful if you're lacking a Warlord, but about the only time it will matter is against an Elite or Solo.  As a striker, you should be dropping a single target of your level fairly quick if you have combat advantage.  Speaking of which...



> *Blinding Barrage *gets a little bit for doing solid damage assuming you're attacking at least two people and blind is a very powerful side effect, often crippling an enemy's turn in addition to setting up the bonuses to attack and sneak attack.



The opportunity to do [2W] damage plus a blind to several targets is a no-brainer, especially since blinded targets grants combat advantage and imposes a strong penalty to hit.  I'd up this to an A-.  Even a wizard's sleep spell only slows targets in the first turn of its effect.  AoE Blind is amazing control for a striker.




> I suspect I'll get some objections on the warlock powers from those who argue you can mostly avoid missing so I should rate the non-Armor ones better, but there you go.



I agree with you for the most part.  Armor of Agathys is even better if the warlock has Wintertouched...being able to gain combat advantage for an entire encounter in addition to bonus damage is quite nice.




> *Bastion of Defense *is definitely a bit disappointing on a Miss, but that's very respectable temp hp at low level and when it hits +1 to all defenses is always appreciated, and it's decent damage.



Like my comment on Paladin's Judgement, this is basically a Brute Strike that trades the reliable keyword for guaranteed temporary HP for your allies (but not you, unfortunately).



> *Lead the Attack *is a gigantic bonus to attack for an entire encounter. If you can setup a hit with someone else, this power potentially halves the duration of a Solo encounter. On top of pretty solid damage at that.



One of the best effects in the game, though it is vital to have someone else who can impose an AC penalty on the target and/or a hit bonus on you before using this power.  Any Tactical Warlord who skips this power is a fool.



> *Pin the Foe* is neat.



Again, Brute Strike that trades reliable for a different effect.  Useful, but against a solo I'm not too worried about shifts (as most solos have reach or other special abilities to help them attack without taking an OA), and I'm not keen on blowing a daily versus an ordinary foe.  Which pretty much relegates its usefulness to elites, and many elites are perfectly happy to stand still and beat you to death.



> *White Raven Onslaught *is certainly a cool special effect, but I think it's a little too specialized, especially on a miss where you have to pick a single person to key off of.




In general, I find that the ability to give a single ally a slide (without being near him) multiple times per combat trumps the ability to prevent a single foe from shifting.  It has many useful applications, from flanking tough creatures to moving away after unleashing a point-blank power (yes, the wizard can use this after using a close blast or burst, to move out of harm's way).  Should definitely be upgraded to a B...anyone with AoE attacks can trigger this easily due to multiple attack rolls.




> *Acid Arrow *can potentially do a fair amount of damage, but I think its damage is probably a little low and its 'area' less useful.



It's good damage if you can make the attack rolls, but harder to place it so it hits several enemies without hitting an ally.



> *Flaming Sphere *can do a ton of automatic damage and is nice and maneuverable. Also good for a wizard down to at-wills for a damage boost.



I consider this the best power of the bunch, as it can last for a full encounter and doesn't worry about an enemy rolling well on a save.  A solid A in my book.



> *Freezing Cloud *doesn't look like much, but it covers a reasonable area and anyone caught in the initial cloud is attacked twice with automatic Miss damage so it can be pretty respectable.



It functions mainly as area denial, but doesn't do automatic damage (which means minions who avoid getting hit can walk right through it).  It also targets Fortitude, which is generally the highest of the non-AC defenses.  Decent area, but Flaming Sphere is MUCH more useful.  I'd rate it a C+.



> *Sleep *  (some text deleted)...For now, however, it is the most powerful control effect (unconsciousness) short of death and is a guaranteed slow on a decent-sized group of enemies.



To be clear, the affected creatures will get an action before they make their first save, so it takes a bit of time to knock foes out.  It's wonderful for Orb specialists, less so for other types of wizards (55% chance for normal foes to avoid unconsciousness, more for elites and solos).  It's a power you want to use early in a fight, rather than when you're down to single-digit HP...you may be dead before they fall unconscious.  Because of that, I can't give it an A+...though it is definitely an A for the right build.



> *Phantom Chasm *is a guaranteed immobilize to a small area, which is potentially very powerful. Knocking prone is nice, though enemies will likely just stand up while immobilized to no harm except for attacks made between the wizard's turn and theirs. Its damage is only okay.



One interpretation is that you can't stand up until the end of the next turn if you're hit by the power...mainly due to bad wording in the power (could use a comma after prone).  More damage than Freezing Cloud, has two secondary effects (prone and immobilize), has a longer range, and targets Will.  What's not to like?


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## keterys (Jul 9, 2008)

Fedifensor said:


> It really depends on party makeup.  A group with clerics, paladins, perhaps a wizard using Color Spray...it can be handy.  A group where only the cleric has radiant attacks...not so much.




It's vulnerability 5 (the cleric who cast it), not radiant. Radiant would certainly make it cooler 



> This is a definite 'A' power in my book, and essential for tough encounters.  It can completely change the course of a fight when the group is on their last legs.  Get a heal, dish out weaken to multiple targets, and significantly boost any other healing the group gets?  Sign me up!




It's definitely great (and almost assuredly what I intend to take with any cleric unless we have an overabundance of healing), but I wouldn't expect the kicker to affect more than 4 or so other powers, so that's 20 healed and the initial spellcast depends on how early in the fight you cast it, but let's call that 3 * (5 + Wis) to be generous. So something like 50 healed. Amusingly, the amount it heals doesn't scale all that much with level but I suppose the amount weaken potentially blocks does. I'll upgrade it, though having run those numbers. My gut instinct was to do so, but I tried to avoid giving out too many A powers other than a couple obvious ones.



> Since the conjuration doesn't take up space anymore, the cleric can put the GoF into his square to dish out damage to anyone engaging him in melee.  I still think Beacon of Hope is better, but not by much.




Better in the paladin's square  Or the monster's square while threatened by the fighter.



> Decent, but quickly outclassed by later powers.  Both Dizzying Blow (5th) and Victorious Surge (9th) have the same damage and reliability, but also have an additional effect.  Since you can't trade out the power until at least 13th, you'd better be dedicated to damage above all else to take this...and most fighters act more like defenders than strikers.  In the long run, I think most fighters are better off with the additional utility of the other choices.




You can retrain at any level so it doesn't really matter what you get at 5th and 9th for this equation. It's more of a 'do you want to do a d10 or get a healing surge' and I suspect the answer depends on how much healing via team mates the fighter has available.



> Fighters don't get many self-buffs, much less buffs that do damage.  Even if you miss, the +1 to hit and +2 damage makes you feel that your action wasn't wasted.  And if you can get a short-term boost to hit (perhaps a cleric using Righteous Brand), you're more likely to connect with this power and get a sizable boost for the entire encounter.  I would rate this higher than either of the other two choices.




If you have a cleric using Righteous Brand, you probably won't get that hit bonus half the time  So, to compare against Brute Strike, cause it's convenient:
Lose 1W (so 5.5 damage) all the time and have a 40% chance to lose the entire hit (so call that, say, 2d10+8 or 19) vs 60% chance of (some handwaving extra hits in with autohitting, sorta) +24 dmg and 40% of +12 dmg... so yeah, I'll upgrade it. I still think you'll be pretty disappointed if you Miss, but it's just like Lead the Attack on stacking the deck to make it land.



> It's basically a Brute Strike that trades the reliable keyword for a guaranteed healing surge.




3W is the standard damage for Dailies... I don't think comparing it to Reliable helps that much 



> Guaranteed daze gives combat advantage for a +2 to hit the target, and the -2 AC is effectively another +2 to hit the target, for a total of +4.  It's a perfect way to set up a tough creature for a pounding.  I'd move this up to an A-.




Hmm, maybe. I think I'm going to take a step back and look at all of the possible A candidates tomorrow and make sure it's clear what might be eligible. 



> More useful for a bowman than a TWF ranger.  The guaranteed slow lets you stay out of range, and the ongoing damage makes the attack as good as a [3W] attack if it hits.




It's not a single player game. Slow rarely lets stops a foe from engaging _someone_. Agree on the 'if it hits', but it doesn't halve if it doesn't so it's no better than 3W I figured and I rate slow really low.



> The two enemy requirement is minimal, because you use this daily when you're fighting multiple foes.  Yes, it doesn't help against a solo...but that's about the only time you're out of luck.  Taking the better of two attack rolls basically halves your chance of a miss, and the damage on _each_ arrow is as good as any of the other daily choices (with the exception of Hunter's Bear Trap).  It's definitely the top choice for a bow-using ranger.




I've seen it not used at all 3 times, miss completely one time, and used wastefully (on guys that a daily was overkill on) once. Color me unimpressed. 

I do agree it's the best archer choice, but that doesn't make me think it's _good_ 



> Well, you get two attacks (the secondary is under Effect, not Hit, so you always get the second roll).  While Jaws of the Wolf is superior for damage, the weakening effect is good when facing off against an elite or solo.




Elites and Solos really don't do that much damage, Weaken is cool, but it's not powerful. If this had a Miss 'Half damage' line I would rate this decently though since a little over 3W + Weaken is definitely on par with the Baseline.



> Less chance to hit twice than Split the Tree, but being able to hit the same target twice pushes it ahead on damage.  It effectively does [2W] if both attacks miss, [3W] if one hits, and [4W] (plus double your bonuses) if both hit.  Definitely the top choice for a melee ranger.




Concentrating damage is also better than spreading it.



> Useful if you're lacking a Warlord, but about the only time it will matter is against an Elite or Solo.  As a striker, you should be dropping a single target of your level fairly quick if you have combat advantage.  Speaking of which...




Yeah, this is total Solo bait. 



> The opportunity to do [2W] damage plus a blind to several targets is a no-brainer, especially since blinded targets grants combat advantage and imposes a strong penalty to hit.  I'd up this to an A-.  Even a wizard's sleep spell only slows targets in the first turn of its effect.  AoE Blind is amazing control for a striker.




So, I had it A- and moved it down (along with some other powers like Beacon and Guardian). One reason is that it really is a pretty small area and the blind only lasts 1 round and blind isn't necessarily more powerful than, say, Daze (which makes this comparable to Color Spray)



> I agree with you for the most part.  Armor of Agathys is even better if the warlock has Wintertouched...being able to gain combat advantage for an entire encounter in addition to bonus damage is quite nice.




Yeah.



> Like my comment on Paladin's Judgement, this is basically a Brute Strike that trades the reliable keyword for guaranteed temporary HP for your allies (but not you, unfortunately).




And hey, +1 to all defenses is still cool 



> One of the best effects in the game, though it is vital to have someone else who can impose an AC penalty on the target and/or a hit bonus on you before using this power.  Any Tactical Warlord who skips this power is a fool.




Yeah - does this one even get dropped by level 30? I'm least familiar with the Warlord powers I'll admit.



> Again, Brute Strike that trades reliable for a different effect.  Useful, but against a solo I'm not too worried about shifts (as most solos have reach or other special abilities to help them attack without taking an OA), and I'm not keen on blowing a daily versus an ordinary foe.  Which pretty much relegates its usefulness to elites, and many elites are perfectly happy to stand still and beat you to death.




So, I was thinking explicitly of this being used against a Solo to maintain combat advantage, exposure to zones & conjurations, or trigger OAs. Why would it only be useful against elites?



> In general, I find that the ability to give a single ally a slide (without being near him) multiple times per combat trumps the ability to prevent a single foe from shifting.  It has many useful applications, from flanking tough creatures to moving away after unleashing a point-blank power (yes, the wizard can use this after using a close blast or burst, to move out of harm's way).  Should definitely be upgraded to a B...anyone with AoE attacks can trigger this easily due to multiple attack rolls.




Except anyone with AoE attacks is unlikely to be standing adjacent to an ally he wants to slide, honestly.



> It's good damage if you can make the attack rolls, but harder to place it so it hits several enemies without hitting an ally.




Agreed.



> I consider this the best power of the bunch, as it can last for a full encounter and doesn't worry about an enemy rolling well on a save.  A solid A in my book.




Yeah, Flaming Sphere is my favorite - that said it does eat up a bunch of actions and can hit allies potentially so it's not quite as convenient as Guardian of Faith. Better damage (except against undead) though.



> It functions mainly as area denial, but doesn't do automatic damage (which means minions who avoid getting hit can walk right through it).  It also targets Fortitude, which is generally the highest of the non-AC defenses.  Decent area, but Flaming Sphere is MUCH more useful.  I'd rate it a C+.




Two chances to hit minions at least  



> To be clear, the affected creatures will get an action before they make their first save, so it takes a bit of time to knock foes out.  It's wonderful for Orb specialists, less so for other types of wizards (55% chance for normal foes to avoid unconsciousness, more for elites and solos).  It's a power you want to use early in a fight, rather than when you're down to single-digit HP...you may be dead before they fall unconscious.  Because of that, I can't give it an A+...though it is definitely an A for the right build.




The problem roughly is that at the moment it's potentially broken good, but I wouldn't recommend it for people for a variety of reasons. That said, I can't discount the opinions of those who think it's the most effective wizard daily until 29. Which is automatic A+ treatment.



> One interpretation is that you can't stand up until the end of the next turn if you're hit by the power...mainly due to bad wording in the power (could use a comma after prone).  More damage than Freezing Cloud, has two secondary effects (prone and immobilize), has a longer range, and targets Will.  What's not to like?




I don't see any language to suggest that interpretation, though it's possible that might be intended. It would definitely be a stronger power if it had a 'and target cannot stand'. Much less damage than Freezing Cloud - (at least) 2 attacks vs 1, Half damage on miss vs none. I missed the range, though.

I do like it second best, though. My wizard will have Chasm and Sphere assuming Chasm is allowed.


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## Mengu (Jul 9, 2008)

Cleric:
Beacon of Hope is a clear A to me. Maybe not an A+ because it doesn't scale so well, but for its level, it's fantastic. Healer's Lore makes clerics slightly better healers than Warlords. Beacon of Hope makes them way better healers than Warlords.

Fighter:
I would put Come Back Strike up a knotch or two. Healing surges are useful at every level, B+.

Paladin:
I'm good with that line up.

Ranger:
Jaws of the Wolf is a little better than the rest, but not that much better than the rest. It misses a good bit more than say Split the Tree. I'd put Split the Tree up a knotch. I've played an elf ranger with this power, and using stealth (or party help) for CA and elven accuracy, I could nail anything with this power.

Rogue:
I would up Blinding Barrage to an A-. I'd carry around a stack of Shurikens just for this attack. I want to point out it only targets enemies, so the blast 3 is very handy, and you'll be very glad you have this as a rogue if you're facing swarms.

Warlock:
We have some disagreements on this one. I put Armor of Agathis at the bottom of the pile, with the caveat, it's only useful for Warlocks who don't have other means of gaining temporary hit points. The warlock's job is to be the Striker, a daily power that does a little bit of damage is not very impressive. While not as reliable, all the 3dx damage powers are more appealing to me, since they takes targets down fast.

I would rate Curse of the Dark Dream a B, because it's just about as good as Pin the Foe. I also like Flames of Phlegethos a bit better than Dread Star, because it does a lot more damage, and as a Warlock, I like damage, I'd give it a B-, or at worst a C+.

Warlord:
Bastion of Defense is the clear winner for me. It's another A power. I might overvalue temporary HP's but as a player, it just lets you take greater risks for greater gain when you have a nice buffer like that. Lead te attack is not an A+ for me. It's great against solos, but other than that, if everyone concentrates their attacks on one target, bonus plusses or not, that target is going down anyway. But because it's so good against a solo, I could understand keeping it an A-.

Wizard:
I would value Flaming Sphere above Sleep. The others are about the same. I don't think Acid Arrow is so bad, though when playing a wizard with both Acid Arrow and Sleep, I just about never memorized Acid Arrow.

Good news, there are no D's or F's among daily powers. Bad news, there are a couple A's that can overshadow other powers. We will see more of this when we look at level 5 Dailies.


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## Korror (Jul 9, 2008)

Mengu said:


> Rogue:
> I would up Blinding Barrage to an A-. I'd carry around a stack of Shurikens just for this attack. I want to point out it only targets enemies, so the blast 3 is very handy, and you'll be very glad you have this as a rogue if you're facing swarms.




One thing that might keep this down to a B+ is that you can't use your main weapon on the attack (unless you're a primarily ranged rogue). This means you don't get the magical enhancement bonus or damage from weapon focus or any other nifty bonuses that may be on your main weapon. This is more of a minor point than anything but I think it prevents BB from being a true A class power.


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## keterys (Jul 9, 2008)

Apparently if you use daggers it works out - supposedly a magic dagger can just hit everyone in the cloud.

If you don't have a magic weapon, though, you need Quickdraw to attack more than two targets, and that assumes you fling the weapons in both hands.


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## Mengu (Jul 9, 2008)

keterys said:


> If you don't have a magic weapon, though, you need Quickdraw to attack more than two targets, and that assumes you fling the weapons in both hands.




Why? Under light thrown weapon description it specifically says some powers let you hurl several of these weapons at once or in rapid succession.

I would certainly permit a rogue to draw a stack of throwing daggers and toss them in rapid succession, or draw a stack of shurikens and toss them all at once. Of course drawing the stack would be a minor action without quickdraw, but I don't see why quickdraw would be needed to use the power effectively.


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## Plane Sailing (Jul 10, 2008)

Not mentioned yet, but Armour of Agathos has excellent minion-killing abilities.

Cheers


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## Fedifensor (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> It's vulnerability 5 (the cleric who cast it), not radiant. Radiant would certainly make it cooler



Whoops!  That'll teach me to actually grab the book to double-check the power before I post...



> I'll upgrade it, though having run those numbers. My gut instinct was to do so, but I tried to avoid giving out too many A powers other than a couple obvious ones.



I understand the reluctance to have too many A powers, but this one really is that good.



> Better in the paladin's square  Or the monster's square while threatened by the fighter.



Depends on what god you worship... 



> You can retrain at any level so it doesn't really matter what you get at 5th and 9th for this equation. It's more of a 'do you want to do a d10 or get a healing surge' and I suspect the answer depends on how much healing via team mates the fighter has available.



It also depends on how you see your role.  A maul fighter trying to imitate a striker will love Brute Strike, while a sword-and-board defender will probably go for the healing instead.



> If you have a cleric using Righteous Brand, you probably won't get that hit bonus half the time



Righteous Brand helps one ally, and the cleric should be helping the strikers, not the defender (unless you're a maul fighter, in which case you'll probably take Brute Strike.



> 3W is the standard damage for Dailies... I don't think comparing it to Reliable helps that much



The first level daily powers actually are [2W] with a bonus effect - Brute Strike gets [3W] because there is no other effect.



> Hmm, maybe. I think I'm going to take a step back and look at all of the possible A candidates tomorrow and make sure it's clear what might be eligible.



Sounds good.  My take is that an +4 to hit by everyone for a turn, in addition to an effective [3W] damage, is absolutely amazing.



> It's not a single player game. Slow rarely lets stops a foe from engaging _someone_. Agree on the 'if it hits', but it doesn't halve if it doesn't so it's no better than 3W I figured and I rate slow really low.



Take a look at Prime Shot - the ranger gets the bonus if he's the closest to the target.  If you're the closest character to the target, and not in range for an OA, then chances are the slow effect _will_ keep that foe from engaging someone.



> I've seen it not used at all 3 times, miss completely one time, and used wastefully (on guys that a daily was overkill on) once. Color me unimpressed.  I do agree it's the best archer choice, but that doesn't make me think it's _good_



Then you've watched people with bad dice luck, or who waited too long to bring it out.  It can miss completely, but the odds aren't very high if you're optimized for ranged combat and taking advantage of Prime Shot.  And since you take the better roll, it either misses completely or hits perfectly.  The damage is strong enough to put a serious dent in normal monsters, but not enough to be overkill on a fresh monster (besides minions, of course).



> Elites and Solos really don't do that much damage, Weaken is cool, but it's not powerful. If this had a Miss 'Half damage' line I would rate this decently though since a little over 3W + Weaken is definitely on par with the Baseline.



A young white dragon (level 3 solo brute) can drop a 1st level character in one round with three successful (non-crit) attack rolls.  2 claws plus bite average out to 29 hp, which goes up with good damage rolls or a crit on one of the attacks.  I fail to see how solos "really don't do that much damage".



> So, I was thinking explicitly of this being used against a Solo to maintain combat advantage, exposure to zones & conjurations, or trigger OAs. Why would it only be useful against elites?



The majority of solos are dragons, who have reach and dragon breath.  They don't _need_ to shift.



> Except anyone with AoE attacks is unlikely to be standing adjacent to an ally he wants to slide, honestly.



Close blast and close burst.



> Yeah, Flaming Sphere is my favorite - that said it does eat up a bunch of actions and can hit allies potentially so it's not quite as convenient as Guardian of Faith. Better damage (except against undead) though.



While it can hit allies, you choose where you move it.  As long as the party is working well together, this shouldn't be an issue.



> I don't see any language to suggest that interpretation, though it's possible that might be intended.



It depends on whether you read it as "prone and immobilized, until its next turn" or "prone, and immobilized until its next turn".


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Fedifensor said:


> It also depends on how you see your role.  A maul fighter trying to imitate a striker will love Brute Strike, while a sword-and-board defender will probably go for the healing instead.




Oh, sure - but back to the assumption that the powers are being used by those they're intended for 



> Righteous Brand helps one ally, and the cleric should be helping the strikers, not the defender (unless you're a maul fighter, in which case you'll probably take Brute Strike.



If there's a melee striker, true 'nough. 



> The first level daily powers actually are [2W] with a bonus effect - Brute Strike gets [3W] because there is no other effect.



You might want to doublecheck - there are more 3Ws (or equivalent, or better) than 2Ws 



> Take a look at Prime Shot - the ranger gets the bonus if he's the closest to the target.  If you're the closest character to the target, and not in range for an OA, then chances are the slow effect _will_ keep that foe from engaging someone.



*shrug* Assumes the mob isn't able to do appreciable ranged and is more than 6 from a target. That's an underwhelming selection of events in my experience, and even if the Ranger kicks it off first round of the combat when folks are at max range it may excessively limit the melee PCs to avoid getting within range of the target. I'm willing to concede I might be underrating it, but slow gets pretty picked on (with good reason) as an effect type.



> Then you've watched people with bad dice luck, or who waited too long to bring it out.  It can miss completely, but the odds aren't very high if you're optimized for ranged combat and taking advantage of Prime Shot.  And since you take the better roll, it either misses completely or hits perfectly.  The damage is strong enough to put a serious dent in normal monsters, but not enough to be overkill on a fresh monster (besides minions, of course).



For example, in Scalegloom Hall, a good use for it never came up. It was never particularly needed in any of the early fights, the wyrmpriest was nowhere near enough to anyone else, and the dragon was alone. In a moathouse adventure it wasn't used on the relatively easy fight outside and the tough fight inside people were too spread out.

The person who missed I think rolled like a 7 and 8... it happens. 



> A young white dragon (level 3 solo brute) can drop a 1st level character in one round with three successful (non-crit) attack rolls.  2 claws plus bite average out to 29 hp, which goes up with good damage rolls or a crit on one of the attacks.  I fail to see how solos "really don't do that much damage".



Said white dragon has +6 to AC. If he's shooting for AC 17, he has a 50% chance of hitting. He has to hit with both attacks (25% chance) in order to trigger the bite, for its own 50% chance... so there is a 1 in 8 chance it'll do that much, yep. And he's one of the hardest hitting solos. On average, a weaken on him will prevent about 5 damage. Woo.



> The majority of solos are dragons, who have reach and dragon breath.  They don't _need_ to shift.



What do reach and dragon breath have to do with avoiding zones, conjurations, and flank? Or anything at all to do with shifting, for that matter?

It is true that dragon's breath is far less useful if you can't line it up on multiple targets and shifting is one of the easy ways to slowly line those up as you recharge... but I don't think it matters as much for this discussion.



> While it can hit allies, you choose where you move it.  As long as the party is working well together, this shouldn't be an issue.



Depends what you're fighting. If you're fighting non-Large opponents it often cuts off flank, which could matter quite a bit to the rogue.



> It depends on whether you read it as "prone and immobilized, until its next turn" or "prone, and immobilized until its next turn".



I don't believe it does. The default duration of prone is 'Forever'. It's "cured" by standing. Prone until next turn doesn't prevent standing anymore than being poisoned prevents using ointment to remove it.


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## small pumpkin man (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> *shrug* Assumes the mob isn't able to do appreciable ranged and is more than 6 from a target. That's an underwhelming selection of events in my experience, and even if the Ranger kicks it off first round of the combat when folks are at max range it may excessively limit the melee PCs to avoid getting within range of the target. I'm willing to concede I might be underrating it, but slow gets pretty picked on (with good reason) as an effect type.



You cannot run while slowed. (Well, you can, but you cannot increase your speed above two), so the limit is more than 4 from a target.


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## Mistwell (Jul 10, 2008)

I've seen split the tree be an encounter winner with a stealthy elven bow ranger.  It's far better than you are giving it credit for, if you just do the odds on an objective basis.  Heck, ANY two-attack powers are better than you seem to be grading them. 

Just because the folks you have seen use it had bad luck doesn't mean those times were representative of the power.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Mistwell said:


> I've seen split the tree be an encounter winner with a stealthy elven bow ranger.  It's far better than you are giving it credit for, if you just do the odds on an objective basis.  Heck, ANY two-attack powers are better than you seem to be grading them.
> 
> Just because the folks you have seen use it had bad luck doesn't mean those times were representative of the power.




I think two-attack powers are quite good. I mean, I like all forms of 'AoE' and it's just a very selective AoE (Burst 1, enemies only, max 2 targets) 

In fact, if Split the Tree could be used at all on a single target and did half damage on Miss I'd find it top notch. 

I just don't find it much of an improvement over, say, Two-Fanged Strike (Encounter 1). At 60% hit chance and (1 or 2)d10 + 8 damage (~6th level) with +1d8 hunter's mark,  TFS nets 19 damage to a single target and Split the Tree nets 21.5 to a single target and 17.8 to a second, which is totally respectable, but it's also a daily and you often just _can't use it_ (or shouldn't, minions) cause of target restrictions. It's no Blinding Barrage. I personally find it closer to Acid Arrow. But eh, I may be in the minority there 

Anyhow, I'll obviously increase it since I'm underscoring it but I'm having serious difficulty comparing it to any of the higher scored ones. 

Making another pass through all of them now with folks' recommendations.


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## Mengu (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> But eh, I may be in the minority there




I think you are.  

The main reason I like it is because it reduces miss chance from 
60% to 36%
50% to 25%
40% to 16%
So it's approximately a +5 to hit for the AC ranges that matter. There aren't very many daily powers that let you hit two targets with Stat+5 vs AC, doing 2[W]+Stat damage. It is totally in line with the Ranger's role of dealing fast and high damage. A hidden benefit is that this attack has a 9.75% crit chance on *two* targets.

Maybe it's not an A power due to a lack of effects, but it's definitely somewhere in the B range.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Yep, that's where I put it. I'm going to get started on daily 5s today, but if I don't get enough time to finish today I probably won't get it in for a couple days (I run D&D the next two nights and I'm busy during the day). Just a warning.


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## Cadfan (Jul 10, 2008)

Usual complaints, you can't compare easily between classes and roles, a controller-like power given to a defender is worth more than Yet Another Fireball given to a Wizard, etc.

Cascade of Light- gives single target damage to a class that mostly lacks it, and can add up to quite a lot of damage if the same is failed.  Worth at least a B.  You can get some extra damage with some damaging zone powers, but that doesn't really factor into my final decision that much because it usually requires multiple dailies to be fired off at once.

Brute Strike- Worth at least a B-.  Everyone laughs at it because its just 3[W]+Str with Reliable, and that seems like its half as much of a Daily as other classes which usually get 3[W]+Stat and an added effect.  But, consider who's using it.  Fighter's [W]s tend to be much bigger than everyone elses.  With a maul, this power does 6d6+str damage at level 1.

Split the Tree- this is where your "grade down if no Miss: Half or Reliable" rule starts to fall through.  Some powers haven't got a Miss: Half or a Reliable entry, but usually they have some other effect to help assure their accuracy.  In this case, Split the Tree gives you two attack rolls, and you pick the better of the two.  This is a very significant increase in accuracy.  Against a target that is hit on a 11+, you get the same overall expected damage as you would from a power which read, "4[W]+dex+dex, Miss: Half."  The damage is spread around a little, which lessens the knock out effects, but the overall damage is basically the highest available of any level 1 daily power in the game (except for wizards with tightly packed foes).  I'd give this an A.

Hunter's Bear Trap- not that great, but not bad for an archery Ranger.  Ongoing 5 is worth as much as an extra W, guaranteed, and sometimes is worth more.  Would you rate this as poorly if it read, "3[W]+Dex, target is slowed, save ends, Miss: Half damage?"  Because that's actually worse.

Easy Target- awkward power.  Its almost better to miss with it in order to guarantee yourself a second round of combat advantage, instead of relying on the target to save.  I'd rate it even more poorly just because of that annoyance.

Armor of Agathys- Good, but it requires you to go into melee reach of your foes with a class that isn't cut out for that.  And the Infernal warlock, the one most likely to not mind, already has enough non stacking temporary hit points not to get excited.  I'd just give it a B.

Dread Star- compatible with the Star pact paragon path (and very little is).  Probably worth a B.

Curse of the Dark Dream- sliding enemies is just so darn useful.  I'd give it a B.

Flames of Phlegethos- Total damage is very high on a hit.  On a miss, it does minor damage.  Worth at least a B.


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## Cadfan (Jul 10, 2008)

Mengu said:


> The main reason I like it is because it reduces miss chance from... ...50% to 25%...



In terms of expected damage per round, this is exactly as good as adding "Miss: Half damage" to a power.  If you hit on a number below an 11, its better.  Above is worse, but now that you know that, you'll choose targets wisely.


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## ZSutherland (Jul 10, 2008)

My player's named the party wizard's Flaming Sphere Bob.  They picked out a bright orange d20 to be Bob's mini, and he stays with their character's minis, never in a dice bag.  I expect he'll soon start getting a share of the loot from one encounter every day.  I think we know what their opinion is.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Cadfan, it appears that your scale is just slightly higher than mine, but if you decrease your recommendations by a partial grade they're a lot closer to mine. That said:



Cadfan said:


> Cascade of Light- gives single target damage to a class that mostly lacks it and can add up to quite a lot of damage if the same is failed.  Worth at least a B.  You can get some extra damage with some damaging zone powers, but that doesn't really factor into my final decision that much because it usually requires multiple dailies to be fired off at once.




Err, what? Since when do Clerics lack for single target lasers?  Normals will die too quickly to get much out of the vulnerability, while elites and solos are _really_ likely to make their save. It's best combined with other dailies and action point expenditure, definitely.



> Brute Strike- Worth at least a B-.  Everyone laughs at it because its just 3[W]+Str with Reliable, and that seems like its half as much of a Daily as other classes which usually get 3[W]+Stat and an added effect.  But, consider who's using it.  Fighter's [W]s tend to be much bigger than everyone elses.  With a maul, this power does 6d6+str damage at level 1.




The greatsword is no better than the bastard sword and the maul is no better than the greatsword. 



> Split the Tree- this is where your "grade down if no Miss: Half or Reliable" rule starts to fall through.  Some powers haven't got a Miss: Half or a Reliable entry, but usually they have some other effect to help assure their accuracy.  In this case, Split the Tree gives you two attack rolls, and you pick the better of the two.  This is a very significant increase in accuracy.  Against a target that is hit on a 11+, you get the same overall expected damage as you would from a power which read, "4[W]+dex+dex, Miss: Half."  The damage is spread around a little, which lessens the knock out effects, but the overall damage is basically the highest available of any level 1 daily power in the game (except for wizards with tightly packed foes).  I'd give this an A.




Split the Tree is not equivalent 4W+Dex+Dex, Miss: Half, anymore than Scorching Burst is 5d6+5xInt, Miss: Half  On the very same level and class, Jaws of the Wolf deals more expected useful damage than Split the Tree. Freezing Cloud on only two targets does almost equal damage on _all misses_. Nevermind the damage potential of Flaming Sphere, Guardian of Faith, or Villain's Menace. Dailies have a much higher spread of ability and Split the Tree isn't in the same ballpark with the As. I could probably up it to a B, as one notch below Jaws' B+, even if I'm protesting all the while. I won't do another round of updates for a day though.



> Hunter's Bear Trap- not that great, but not bad for an archery Ranger.  Ongoing 5 is worth as much as an extra W, guaranteed, and sometimes is worth more.  Would you rate this as poorly if it read, "3[W]+Dex, target is slowed, save ends, Miss: Half damage?"  Because that's actually worse.




I would rate it the same pretty much. 5.5 damage up front, 2.75 damage on Miss vs. ~7 via ongoing on Hit and 0 on Miss.



> Easy Target- awkward power.  Its almost better to miss with it in order to guarantee yourself a second round of combat advantage, instead of relying on the target to save.  I'd rate it even more poorly just because of that annoyance.




Heh, but guaranteed combat advantage on a Miss seemed like a nice consolation prize 



> Armor of Agathys- Good, but it requires you to go into melee reach of your foes with a class that isn't cut out for that.  And the Infernal warlock, the one most likely to not mind, already has enough non stacking temporary hit points not to get excited.  I'd just give it a B.




Auto kills minions and makes it extremely painful for foes to even try attacking. Weirdly even if your entire turn is just defensing and/or stealthing, the damage output can be quite solid. Nice synergy with Eyebite too.



> Dread Star- compatible with the Star pact paragon path (and very little is).  Probably worth a B.
> 
> Curse of the Dark Dream- sliding enemies is just so darn useful.  I'd give it a B.
> 
> Flames of Phlegethos- Total damage is very high on a hit.  On a miss, it does minor damage.  Worth at least a B.




I think all three of these are the same 'My scale is lower than yours' problem. Flames of Phlegethos for instance is basically a 3W and kicker spell with no Miss: Half... and 3W + kicker with Miss: ~Half is a B- or C+ depending on the kicker.


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## Mengu (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> I think all three of these are the same 'My scale is lower than yours' problem. Flames of Phlegethos for instance is basically a 3W and kicker spell with no Miss: Half... and 3W + kicker with Miss: ~Half is a B- or C+ depending on the kicker.




Your scale must be lower than mine too, when it comes to Warlock powers, except for Armor of Agathys, in which case your scale seems to be higher than mine. 

Curse of the Dark dream is no worse than Pin the Foe, and you have that one at a B. And I'm still not impressed with Armor of Agathys, based on the primary role of a Warlock. As a Fighter power, it would be pretty incredible, as a Warlock power it's a bit counter-intuitive.


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## Cadfan (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> Cadfan, it appears that your scale is just slightly higher than mine, but if you decrease your recommendations by a partial grade they're a lot closer to mine.



Except that I agree with you on a lot of powers.  I just think you devalue certain ones.


> Err, what? Since when do Clerics lack for single target lasers?  Normals will die too quickly to get much out of the vulnerability, while elites and solos are _really_ likely to make their save. It's best combined with other dailies and action point expenditure, definitely.



I should have been more clear.  Clerics lack GOOD single target damage, particularly at low levels, and they are extremely lacking in knockout power.


> The greatsword is no better than the bastard sword and the maul is no better than the greatsword.



Eh?  A maul user with Brute Strike and 18 strength clocks in at average damage on a hit of 22.  A greatsword user clocks in at 20.5.  In any case, that wasn't the point- the point was that 6d6+str is higher than the expected damage output on a hit of most other daily abilities of that level.  The only ones that compare are sneak attacking rogues using rapiers, rangers using Hunter's Quarry, and wizards who are hitting multiple foes with an area of effect attack.  A Fighter often gets more out of 3[W] than other classes because he often has a bigger [W].


> Split the Tree is not equivalent 4W+Dex+Dex, Miss: Half, anymore than Scorching Burst is 5d6+5xInt, Miss: Half



No, it is.  And while Scorching Burst isn't equivalent "Miss: Half" under any circumstances, its damage IS properly calculated based on how many foes you expect to fit inside the burst.  That's why Wizard damage is so much higher than some people think- the damage of an area spell is multiplied by the targets struck.

Lets say you hit on an 11+ with Split the Tree.  If you hit, you will deal 2[W]+dex to each target (and you'll get your hunter's quarry on one, probably, but we'll leave that aside).  Since its Split the Tree, you roll twice and keep the better one.  We'll ignore the increased chance of a critical hit.

Your possible rolls are, with equal odds for each,

Hit, Hit, choose to Hit
Hit, Miss, choose to Hit
Miss, Hit, choose to Hit
Miss, Miss, you have to Miss.

So you've got a 75% chance of hitting.  If you hit, your total damage is 2[W]+Dex per target, for a total of 4[W]+2[Dex].  Lets give you a 1d10 longbow, and +4 dex.  This makes your total expected damage .75*(4*5.5+2*4)= 22.5.

If you were using a Miss: Half power that also dealt 4[W]+2[Dex] and hit on an 11+, you'd have expected damage of .5*(4*5.5+2*4) + .5*.5*(4*5.5+2*4) = 22.5.

Its exactly the same.  Miss: Half increases your expected damage by one half times your chance of missing times your expected damage.  When you hit on an 11+, that's .25*expected damage.  When you roll twice and hit on an 11+, you increase your chance of hitting by 25%.  The outcome is the same.  If the number you hit on rises, Miss: Half improves.  If it falls, the double roll method improves.

The two options are easily compared to one another, and Miss: Half comes out about even.

For the record, you rated Jaws of the Wolf as a B+.

Its expected damage, if your strength 18 ranger hits on an 11+ with longswords, is 2d8+4 per hit, and half that on a miss.  You get a kicker of +1d6 either way, from Hunter's Quarry, since that occurs on damage dealt, not on a miss.  So overall, your expected damage per attack is

.5*(2*4.5+4) + .5*.5*(2*4.5+4) = 9.75

times 2 for two attacks, plus a guaranteed 3.5 from hunter's quarry, gives you 23 damage.  The longsword ranger gets +1 extra weapon proficiency, but the ranger can use Prime Shot, so that's about a wash with a slight edge to Jaws.  Also, the 22 I quoted above for Split the Tree did not include Hunter's Quarry, which increases overall damage by 3.5*.75 = 2.625, raising the overall result to 24.625.

These powers are almost exactly the same in terms of damage.  They have various minor benefits (prime shot takes effort, as does marking ranged quarries, but the ranged combatant can choose his foes more easily, etc etc), but the overall damage output is very, very similar, certainly enough so to justify about equal ratings.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

> your total damage is 2[W]+Dex per target, for a total of 4[W]+2[Dex]




Damage to multiple targets is not equivalent to damage to a single target. That was the point I was trying to make.

Hence.
Equivalent Damage _but_ must apply to two targets (minor penalty) and requires proper target selection (minor penalty)

Either the ranger using Jaws of the Wolf needs to have a higher hit bonus (proficiency) or do d10s... and I still find it interesting that you assume rangers won't take either bastard swords or TWF feats to improve their damage, since that's one of their strengths (other classes can't boost their damage as much in that way).

Prime Shot is no easier to acquire than flank and CA provides a larger bonus.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Mengu said:


> Your scale must be lower than mine too, when it comes to Warlock powers, except for Armor of Agathys, in which case your scale seems to be higher than mine.




That one's easy - 
1) The amount of temp hp at level 1 is enormous
2) the armor is extremely powerful if used in an atypical fashion

It doesn't change the fact that even if you use it for _1 round_ of attacks on adjacent enemies it can output more guaranteed damage than any of the other warlock daily 1s. Even just 1d6+Con+(Enh/Feat/etc) to 2 opponents compares favorably to the 3d10+5ongoing and a 40% miss chance from Phlegethos, and I rather assume that optimal use for it involves using it on more than 2 opponents or getting _at least some_ benefit from the temp hp, even if not the 2 surges worth that it gives you at level 1 



> Curse of the Dark dream is no worse than Pin the Foe, and you have that one at a B. And I'm still not impressed with Armor of Agathys, based on the primary role of a Warlock. As a Fighter power, it would be pretty incredible, as a Warlock power it's a bit counter-intuitive.



Curse of the Dark Dream doesn't last for a whole encounter. Pin the Foe is increased under the assumption that it gives you a notable tactical advantage.

Like so:

Fighter is flanking a red dragon with a Rogue+Warlord with a Guardian of Faith also beating on it.

If the Red Dragon does not move at least a square each round, it loses use of its tail slap ability, it gets attacked by the Guardian, and it can't line up breath weapons as effectively.

If it tries to move, the fighter gets an OA to prevent the movement entirely (plus the rogue + warlord get to do some damage). 

That's Pin the Foe really screwing someone up... screwed enough that I assumed an enemy would take at least OA hit or provide a lot more flank during the course of the battle, which made it worth more damage = a higher grade.

Disclaimer: I only assumed the one OA / extra flanks, though, not the extreme case I outlined.


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## Cadfan (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> Damage to multiple targets is not equivalent to damage to a single target. That was the point I was trying to make.



Its not identical, no.  Sometimes its worse, because you fail to drop your target.  Sometimes its better, because you drop two targets.  Sometimes its better because there's less "leftover" damage above and beyond what you needed to drop the target.


> Either the ranger using Jaws of the Wolf needs to have a higher hit bonus (proficiency) or do d10s... and I still find it interesting that you assume rangers won't take either bastard swords or TWF feats to improve their damage, since that's one of their strengths (other classes can't boost their damage as much in that way).



I left feats out because they multiply complexity.  Yes, a melee Ranger can take Proficiency: Bastard Swords, Two Weapon Fighting, and then Weapon Focus: Bastard Swords.  The archery Ranger can take feats as well.  Yes, there are more damage options for melee Ranger feats, but at this level of complexity, we're dealing with too much data, I think.  How are we to compare the archery Ranger's lackluster feat choices against the melee Ranger's poor stat distribution?  I've got no idea.  So I figure we just hold those things constant.


> Prime Shot is no easier to acquire than flank and CA provides a larger bonus.



Archery Rangers can snipe.

Also, I note that you consider target selection a negative.  Its not, its a positive.


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## Mengu (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> It doesn't change the fact that even if you use it for _1 round_ of attacks on adjacent enemies it can output more guaranteed damage than any of the other warlock daily 1s.




I'm not denying the potential damage over the course of several rounds, or the nice temp HP's. I'm just saying, that's not exactly what's expected of the Warlock. I expect him to do concentrated damage, per his role. And all other powers are more in line with this role. If I'm the Cleric giving him the Lance of Faith bonus, I expect him to put that to good use with a big attack, not some wussy minion killer that the Wizard already has covered in spades. I also don't want the Warlock to be running into the middle of three brutes (or skirmishers) just to do a bit of controller-like damage to all of them, only to get mauled. I have more important people to heal like the Defenders.




keterys said:


> Curse of the Dark Dream doesn't last for a whole encounter.



Sustain Minor, means it will typically last until the target you're focusing on is dead, which souldn't be long once you have them cornered like this. You don't have anything better to do with minor actions until you kill him anyway since you should have cursed him already.


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## FadedC (Jul 10, 2008)

Doesn't Guardian of the Faith still occupy a square, and thus somebody else can't share it's space? I know people can move through it now, but I didn't think people could stop in it's square.

Lead the attack may or may not be as good as advertised, depending on how often your DM uses solo monsters. I would expect many adventures not to contain a single solo and this power really is kind of lackluster if used on an equal sized group. Still potentially an amazing power, but not quite in the "anyone who doesn't take this is a fool" category some are claiming.

Edit: Curse of the dark dreams is sort of oddly worded. You definitely can't sustain it any more once your target makes his save. The question is when does your enemy get to make a save? After the first attack or after it's first sustained?


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Mengu said:


> I'm not denying the potential damage over the course of several rounds, or the nice temp HP's. I'm just saying, that's not exactly what's expected of the Warlock.




1 shot of Phlegethos = 19.9 expected damage. 2 hits of the Armor = 19 expected damage. The warlock doesn't need to run into melee to use it, but just use it when he's attacked to get solid value (really close damage plus 2 surge's worth of temp hp)



> Sustain Minor, means it will typically last until the target you're focusing on is dead



You may have missed the save ends. It's likely to last a round or two at most.



> Archery Rangers can snipe.



And they're often the _furthest_ from the target instead of the closest. Assuming Prime Shot all the time is just as valid as assuming the TWF Ranger always has flank, and it's probably best to just ignore both from the equation.

Which brings you down to the TWF ranger not having the same bonus for less damage, even ignoring the feats that let the TWF ranger inch ahead.



> Also, I note that you consider target selection a negative.  Its not, its a positive.



Requiring 2 targets within 3 to use it at all is a negative. Look at Eldritch Rain for a better option. Now Icy Rays. Or any number of powers that are 'one or two targets, one attack per target' or at _least_ don't require that the targets be so close.


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## Korror (Jul 10, 2008)

Quick thought on the cleric's Guardian of Faith. Without a fighter, this power is not going to do very much damage at all. Since the monsters take damage only if they END next to the guardian, they will always be able to avoid damage as long as they can shift away (assuming they're not caught in a dead end or something). This means that the cleric has to keep sacrificing his move action if he wants to keep forcing the mobs to shift which will not always be possible. What if the cleric needs to move into range to keep an ally up or needs to shift to avoid a dangerous flank? In these cases, the guardian will probably not deal damage or force the monsters to stay mobile.

I think these limiting factors bump the power down to B+/B as it requires unusual circumstances or another specific class to be used for full effect while the other daily powers are effective all the time. I know you have a disclaimer that the powers are always assumed to be used in their most useful circumstances but it seems within reason to downgrade a power that shines once in a while but is only average most of the time. You seem to follow this reasoning with the ranger dailies as well.

Pardon me if I'm off on any details of this power, I'm at work and working off memory right now.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

I did have it as a B+, but upgraded it last night (I think cause I upgraded Beacon of Hope and Flaming Sphere, the things I was comparing it to). I'm more than content to reduce it.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Oh, and I do hope that it's obvious I'm not personally attached to anything, but I do need to debate key points (or even devil's advocate in some circumstances) to get the bets results. Especially if the math I've done strictly disagrees (like the warlock dailies which I peg at sub-par but others peg at better than average).


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## Mengu (Jul 10, 2008)

keterys said:


> 1 shot of Phlegethos = 19.9 expected damage. 2 hits of the Armor = 19 expected damage. The warlock doesn't need to run into melee to use it, but just use it when he's attacked to get solid value (really close damage plus 2 surge's worth of temp hp)




How are you calculating those expected damage values? If you hit with Phlegethos, your average damage is 3d10+1d6(curse)+4+10(ongoing fire) = 34 points (ignoring crit). On a miss, the average damage is 10 points. Those 34 points are a lot of concentrated damage on a BBG.

Ranger's Jaws of the Wolf (a B+ power), if it hits twice, does 4d8+1d6(quarry)+8 = 29.5 damage. You need 2 feats (bastard sword, Leathal Hunter) to bring it up to the level of Phlegethos (34.5). On a miss it admittedly does more damage than Phlegethos.




keterys said:


> You may have missed the save ends. It's likely to last a round or two at most.




I didn't miss it. I just kind of forgot about it. 




keterys said:


> Oh, and I do hope that it's obvious <snip>



Yes it is. No worries. For me this is just a good exercise to grasp the expected potency for different class powers at different levels.


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## Cadfan (Jul 10, 2008)

> And they're often the _furthest_ from the target instead of the closest. Assuming Prime Shot all the time is just as valid as assuming the TWF Ranger always has flank, and it's probably best to just ignore both from the equation.



Fair enough, sort of.

The following ignores criticals, which are ever so slightly in favor of Split the Tree, but not by a lot.

TWF Ranger, 18 str, using 1d10 proficiency 2 weapons, hitting on a 11+:

Expected damage: .5*(5.5*2+4) + .5*(5.5*2+4) + .5*.5*(5.5*2+4) + .5*.5*(5.5*2+4) + 3.5 = 7.5 + 7.5 + 3.75 + 3.75 = 26

Archery Ranger, 18 dex, using a 1d10 proficiency 2 weapon, hitting on an 11+:

2*.75*(5.5*2+4) + .75*3.5 = 25.125.

That's it.  Meanwhile,

1. "Must be adjacent to target" is as much a targeting restriction as "targets two foes within 3 of one another, the former is arguably the more restrictive of the two, and it carries the most risk of personal harm.

2. If you change the axes to longswords and include the extra proficiency bonus, it actually makes things worse, because Miss: Half rewards high damage and low accuracy disproportionately in comparison to other power attributes.

Expected damage: .55*(4.5*2+4) + .55*(4.5*2+4) + .45*.5*(4.5*2+4) + .45*.5*(4.5*2+4) + 3.5 = 7.15 + 7.15 + 2.925 + 2.925 + 3.5 = 20.15.

3. If you give the TWF ranger proficiency in bastard swords and the archery ranger the boosted hunter's quarry, you get 25.845 for the archery ranger, and

Expected damage: .55*(5.5*2+4) + .55*(5.5*2+4) + .45*.5*(5.5*2+4) + .45*.5*(5.5*2+4) + 3.5 = 8.25 + 8.25 + 3.375 + 3.375 + 3.5 = 26.75.

which still fails to create a lead of an entire point of damage.

Eventually, as you add feats (or as you increase the AC of the target, the opposite being true as it decreases), the TWF ranger will pull ahead due to the availability of four damage boosting feats (bastard swords, weapon focus, two weapon fighting, lethal hunter), and the lack of damage boosting ranged feats.  The archery ranger still receives benefits from feats, of course, they just won't be damage boosts.


> Requiring 2 targets within 3 to use it at all is a negative. Look at Eldritch Rain for a better option. Now Icy Rays. Or any number of powers that are 'one or two targets, one attack per target' or at _least_ don't require that the targets be so close.



But 2 targets in 3 spaces of one another is a trivial thing to find in an encounter with multiple foes, and you get to pick the targets you most want dead.  So you can pick off bloodied foes, or foes with low AC.  Choosing to go after foes with low AC makes it even easier for you to beat the expected damage of the melee Ranger, as the lower the AC becomes, the more Split the Tree moves ahead.


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## keterys (Jul 10, 2008)

Mengu said:


> How are you calculating those expected damage values?




Unfortunately I don't have the Phlegethos math on me, but I tend to assume a 60% hit rate and fluctuate level for usage a little to see if it changes drastically (like the armor is better at low level when the temp hp are huge) - like fire resist impacts Phl. more (not a ton, but it comes up at all and resist weapon doesn't) and JoW scales better with stat upgrades and enhancement bonuses.

I can say that for ongoing damage I was getting 1.4 rounds of average duration for dailies with saves, which I think was based on using an elite as the average target of a single target aily. Chance to save is, needless to say, pretty high even on a Normal.

The number I gave for Phlegethos vs. Armor I did in the car earlier just as a quick thing to dash off, though, and it is actually slightly low (I made some type of error in the car) from what I can see, but 3d10 + 4  * .55 + 34 * .05 + 7 (ongoing) = 19.98 is probably what I did actually.

On that note, may be interesting for me to run the daily 1s through something a bit more rigorous to compare them more easily. I don't want to do that for each cause honestly it takes time and there's a lot of powers to go through


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## Mobius777 (Jul 16, 2008)

I've really enjoyed thes threads on Daily, Encounter, and At-Will Powers.  Great work!!!

I'm not a major power-gamer, but in 4th edition it is essential to have some idea of the effectiveness of each power.

If ever you have the time/interest to grade more powers (maybe Level 5 Daily Powers or Utility Powers), I'll be reading the ratings with great interest.


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## Mengu (Jul 16, 2008)

Mobius777 said:


> If ever you have the time/interest to grade more powers (maybe Level 5 Daily Powers or Utility Powers), I'll be reading the ratings with great interest.




Yeah, I think we need to do level 5 dailies and level 2 and 6 utilities, which will cover everything through level 7 for now. We ought to give keterys some time to do the hard work, and then bombard him with comments as usual.


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## keterys (Jul 16, 2008)

Sorry, I'm really busy - full time job of course, but it hit a spike of activity last week, DMing 4 games, playing online, etc. So I pretty much have to do things in chunks. I delayed the daily 5s slightly cause I wanted to be a bit more rigorous on the math for the lower level powers because I think I was letting high level math (that is, high stat mods, damage bonuses from items, powers, etc) influence my thinking excessively on the low level powers.

I think I'll just go with the gut feeling and finish the daily 5s ASAP (but not until after the maptool/online game tonight cause that's lots more data entry and such), and revisit things with the math redone later.

The math model I'd started was to identify archtypes and levels to run #s on to compare, where I'll have 2-3 types of each character at levels 3, 7, 11, 15, 19, 25, 29 for benchmarks, so I'll know that a level 7 power is replaced at 23 so gets 7,11,15,19 benchmarks (which is quite a spread!)


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## keterys (Jul 18, 2008)

*Daily 5 Analysis*

*CLERIC*
A+ / Consecrated Ground
C+ / Rune of Peace
A / Spiritual Weapon
A / Weapon of the Gods
*
Consecrated Ground: *Automatic damage to enemies only, surge-free healing to half health (useful after combat nothing else) - especially amusing on a high level PC getting dropped in the area and immediately waking up at the start of its turn. Every time. Oh, and it's movable. 
*Rune of Peace: *vs Will. Guaranteed that target cannot attack for one round, which is extremely nice, though it doesn't set up other attacks like daze or blind, and is obviously worse than stun. Damage really low.
*Spiritual Weapon: *Guaranteed combat advantage on one target (switchable) each round for an entire battle. And, hey, damage while you're at it.
*Weapon of the Gods:* An extra d6 per attack from someone on an entire battle is actually quite respectable damage, but it gets really gross when you factor in the -2 AC that can be shifted from target to target as you kill them.

Wow, clerics really set a strong initial act for this level.

*FIGHTER*
C+ / Crack the Shell
C+ / Dizzying Blow
A / Rain of Steel

*Crack the Shell: *A reliable -2 penalty to AC power is a real help for powerplays
*Dizzying Blow: *Immobilize is a decent option for defenders and I'll admit that immobilize (save ends) can set up some nice tactical options since it almost guarantees an enemy will start two turns in a zone. At a minimum, it seems like a solid improvement over Brute Strike.
*Rain of Steel:* Automatic minion killing and more average damage than any of the other fighter powers if it hits only two or so times? As a minor action to start? Nice. In theory a power being a stance should be a penalty, but there appear to be so few that I'm not going to mark them down for now.

*PALADIN*
B+ / Hallowed Circle
B- / Martyr's Retribution
B+ / Sign of Vulnerability

*Hallowed Circle: *Very large area that damages only enemies is nice, and then the entire area provides a bonus to all defenses for the encounter. 
*Martyr's Retribution: *Very good damage. While a healing surge is a cost, it's often enough a negligible cost to a paladin (or defender).
*Sign of Vulnerability:* If this hits, there is nothing to prevent you sustaining it until the target is dead. The target's allies may try to avoid being in a dangerous spot for sustain, but it's still a very solid effect on the first round with some nice possibilities in later rounds.

*RANGER*
C+ / Excruciating Shot
B+ / Frenzied Skirmish
B+ / Splintering Shot
B+ / Two-Wolf Pounce

*Excruciating Shot: *Decent, but pales compared to the other options. Same frustrating save problem where the creatures you most want to weaken are most likely to save very fast.
*Frenzied Skirmish:  *Decent damage, but 1 or 2 dazes and a big OA-free move make this a good option.
*Splintering Shot: *That's a solid attack penalty on an enemy for the entire encounter.
*Two-Wolf Pounce:* Versatile shifting options and 3 attacks. Comparison to Frenzied Skirmish is interesting here.

*ROGUE*
C+ / Clever Riposte
B- / Deep Cut
C+ / Walking Wounded

*Clever Riposte: *Pretty clever form of protection and amusing that it works on ranged and area attacks (making for odd tactical advantages by hanging out in the middle of where good areas should be situated), but it's not a ton of damage and it's fairly easy to just attack anyone else. The attack itself is lackluster.
*Deep Cut:  *vs. Fortitude. If it hits, that's a ton of ongoing damage potentially, but likely it won't last long. 
*Walking Wounded: *vs Fortitude, can also be done ranged. If it hits, it's potentially good for laughs at least even if it's pretty easy to avoid triggering it.

*WARLOCK*
C+ / Avernian Eruption
D+ / Crown of Madness
D+ / Curse of the Bloody Fangs
B+ / Hunger of Hadar

*Avernian Eruption: *Size of area kinda small. Ongoing damage autokills minions at least.
*Crown of Madness: *I really want to like this, but it's lackluster damage, not a big detriment even if not saved against and its primary effect requires a sustain with a save so might never trigger at all.
*Curse of the Bloody Fangs: *A spell targetting AC is a real disad. The sustain is potentially cool, but also might be saved against before ever triggering any effect and is easy for the target to minimize the effect of with positioning.
*Hunger of Hadar: *Automatic high damage effect with a nice sustain kicker. If you can force creatures into it and/or force them to remain in it, it can add up to a ton of damage, but it's a small area so easy to avoid after the initial effect most likely. Also, necrotic. Blocks line of sight, which might be useful though it complicates locking an opponent down into it potentially.

*WARLORD*
B+ / Stand the Fallen
D- / Turning Point
C- / Villain's Nightmare

*Stand the Fallen: *Primarily useful for its area heal, but that's a fantastic area heal.
*Turning Point: *Turn back one page to Inspiring War Cry. It's _better_ than this ability (though not by much). But it's a lower level encounter ability. 
*Villain's Nightmare: *Against Reflex, which helps. While there are a couple of cool tactical things you can do with this, it really feels too specialized / limited.

*WIZARD*
B- / Bigby's Icy Grasp
C+ / Fireball
A / Stinking Cloud
C- / Web

*Bigby's Icy Grasp: *This spell is quite effective for hindering one enemy at a time for a battle and provides a good alternative to using an at-will for increased damage. Potentially costly in actions.
*Fireball: *Quite large area. 
*Stinking Cloud: *Good sized area of solid damage, including automatic damage. The ability to move it is extremely powerful. The line of sight blocking can be useful or harmful, but I'll grudgingly call it a tactical plus.
*Web: *This spell _can_ be quite good if there is a very specific area you don't want people to go, such as for using it defensively to protect someone. That said, it's a bit too easy to avoid being immobilized or to escape the area.

The As are all fuzzy As. None violently leapt out as A+s, but some should probably be A-s and it may be that some should be A+. I have to admit, '3W and minor effect on hit, half damage and no effect on miss' are starting to look really bad compared to things like 'automatic damage every round for rest of combat'.


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## Wolfwood2 (Jul 18, 2008)

keterys said:


> *WIZARD*
> B- / Bigby's Icy Grasp
> C+ / Fireball
> A / Stinking Cloud
> ...




In picking out dailies for a wizard, I found that the action economy mattered a lot.  In an important battle, I might want to blow two or three daily powers.  That means that I don't want to be caught with multiple powers that require a sustain to be effective.  Obviously a wizard has it easier on that front since he can swap out which 'sustain' powers are memorized on any given day.

Web might be under-graded a little.  It can be positively brutal in combination with a zone or control power from another PC.  I watched an elite get chewed up by a cleric's guardian of the faith when he failed his save to escape for a couple of rounds running.


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## keterys (Jul 18, 2008)

Yep, immobilizing (save ends) is nice... but if the elite had been missed on the initial cast, it could have just walked out of the area, no harm.

I had it higher, but there's a lot of instances where it just doesn't do anything at all I felt, which is a cardinal sin for dailies for me  I'll be happy to upgrade it if others feel it should be.


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## Mengu (Jul 18, 2008)

Cleric:
I would drop Spiritual Weapon to an A-. I've seen this one in action, and all that the target has to do is delay his action until after the spell is sustained. Then he can simply step out of that square, and will not grant combat advantage. It's still a pretty good annoyance though, and combos well with an immobilize effect from another character.

Rogue:
I'd bump Walking Wounded up to a B-. It's a great tool against Skirmishers and Lurkers. And there is no save, unlike most immobilize and slow effects.

Warlord:
At this level, compared to all the other powers that do 3[W] damage, Stand the Fallen has a superb effect. Easily an A power.

Wizard:
I might drop Stinking Cloud down a knotch to an A-, because it can be challenging to use, and can hinder the actions of your allies.


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## keterys (Jul 18, 2008)

Mengu said:


> Cleric:
> I would drop Spiritual Weapon to an A-. I've seen this one in action, and all that the target has to do is delay his action until after the spell is sustained. Then he can simply step out of that square, and will not grant combat advantage. It's still a pretty good annoyance though, and combos well with an immobilize effect from another character.




Unless there is errata, that tactic does not work. There is no requirement for the target to be in the square nor for the spiritual weapon to hit, only that it attack the target (or be sustained) to provide it for another round.



> Rogue:
> I'd bump Walking Wounded up to a B-. It's a great tool against Skirmishers and Lurkers. And there is no save, unlike most immobilize and slow effects.




It's really quite easy to avoid triggering it, however, and it does subpar damage on its own. 



> Warlord:
> At this level, compared to all the other powers that do 3[W] damage, Stand the Fallen has a superb effect. Easily an A power.




Sure... and a 3W power on its own is starting to not look very good as a daily 5. The effect is superb, agreed... but A? How much would just the effect be worth (no damage at all), do you reckon? It's harder to rank healing on its own merit, especially something like this... that's like giving, say... 3 people surges. To compare to Consecrated Ground, another A, it does amazingly better at damaging enemies and doesn't cost surges for its healing. Unfortunately it requires bloodied - once bloodied, it can heal far more damage, especially on demand (over the next 5 minutes) or if people are actually falling down, but I'd consider its healing less innately useful if I had to pick.



> Wizard:
> I might drop Stinking Cloud down a knotch to an A-, because it can be challenging to use, and can hinder the actions of your allies.




Why is it challenging to use? I agree it can hinder the actions of your allies, but it similarly can force enemies to leave an area to see anyone, etc, so it also hinders enemies. Given you get to choose when to use it, I didn't treat this as a net disad.


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## Mengu (Jul 18, 2008)

keterys said:


> Unless there is errata, that tactic does not work. There is no requirement for the target to be in the square nor for the spiritual weapon to hit, only that it attack the target (or be sustained) to provide it for another round.



Chalk it up to another thing we've played wrong.




keterys said:


> and a 3W power on its own is starting to not look very good as a daily 5.



How many [W]'s does a power need, before it starts to look good? Damage is still important. Effects alone, don't kill opponents. A monster can be blinded, immobilized, and dazed, but you still have to do damage to kill it. I think 3[W] is respectable for a Warlord, who is expected to be in melee to do his schtick. Also there are many times instant healing via surges is better than slow HP gain while bloodied, so when comparing it to Consecrated Ground, I feel they both have similar effectiveness, just at different times.




keterys said:


> Why is it challenging to use? I agree it can hinder the actions of your allies, but it similarly can force enemies to leave an area to see anyone, etc, so it also hinders enemies. Given you get to choose when to use it, I didn't treat this as a net disad.



The initial use is probably not too difficult. But afterwords, it seems wherever you try to move it, you're blocking your Rogue's flanking options, or hindering something else. It's a big template. It still does a ton of auto damage, so I'm ok leaving it an A.


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## keterys (Jul 18, 2008)

Mengu said:


> How many [W]'s does a power need, before it starts to look good? Damage is still important.




Actually, that's sort of my point. You get more damage from multiple attacks or from automatic damage zones and auras and such. 3W on its own does not a good daily make - it really needs more oomph to compare to the other damaging effects. Everyone heals is definitely oomph.



> I think 3[W] is respectable for a Warlord, who is expected to be in melee to do his schtick.



I actually agree - I think the main thing about the warlord powers are the Effects.



> Also there are many times instant healing via surges is better than slow HP gain while bloodied, so when comparing it to Consecrated Ground, I feel they both have similar effectiveness, just at different times.



You might be surprised at how fast the healing from Consecrated Ground ends up being... but yeah, I'd rather have the healing from the Warlord power because it's easier to use (though consecrated ground could get ridiculous in a fight against many solos, effectively becoming an automatic win). Ignoring the healing, Consecrated Ground blows away Stand the Fallen for potential damage output and tactical usefulness though... which is why I figured Stand the Fallen would be lower than it. 



> The initial use is probably not too difficult. But afterwords, it seems wherever you try to move it, you're blocking your Rogue's flanking options, or hindering something else. It's a big template. It still does a ton of auto damage, so I'm ok leaving it an A.



Yeah, it's a lot less useful if you can't _also_ have people fighting some other stuff. Clearcutting through all the minions and neutralizing back row controllers and artillery while you deal with brutes up front, golden. Fighting a solo? Eh...


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## Korror (Jul 18, 2008)

Weapon of the Gods as an A power?! Again I'm hampered by not having the book with me right now but I remember looking at that one and thinking how useless it was compared to Spiritual Weapon. The extra damage and -2 AC depend on your ally hitting while Spiritual weapon always (I think) grants CA and does more damage.

Web seems like it deserves better than C-. It creates (I think) an area burst 2 section of difficult terrain which means that monsters can't cross it without being having a chance of being immobilized. This is especially useful if the monsters are primary melee and start out 10+ spaces away from the PCs. In this case, a web can block their path with difficult terrain and more importantly stagger their arrival so that the PCs can kill them 1 by 1 as they arrive. Of course, I may be slightly biased in favor of web as it was one of my favorite spells in 3rd edition and the tactic above saved the party many times.


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## Mengu (Jul 18, 2008)

Korror said:


> Weapon of the Gods as an A power?! Again I'm hampered by not having the book with me right now but I remember looking at that one and thinking how useless it was compared to Spiritual Weapon. The extra damage and -2 AC depend on your ally hitting while Spiritual weapon always (I think) grants CA and does more damage.




Spiritual weapon requires a standard action to cast, and every round, a move action to move and a minor action to sustain and attack. Weapon of the Gods is a minor action to cast, and lasts till the end of the encounter. Put it on a Rogue's weapon, and since the rogue will typically be maneuvering for CA, -2 penalty to AC can become more useful. And to add insult to injury, the damage is radiant. This makes undead uncounters considerably easier, since not only can the cleric be doing Radiant damage, but he can let someone else do it too.


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## keterys (Jul 18, 2008)

Korror said:


> Weapon of the Gods as an A power?! Again I'm hampered by not having the book with me right now but I remember looking at that one and thinking how useless it was compared to Spiritual Weapon. The extra damage and -2 AC depend on your ally hitting while Spiritual weapon always (I think) grants CA and does more damage.




Yeah, I was surprised myself, but it's a minor action, adds radiant damage, and that -2 is a big enabler. That'll increase the damage of many other powers, jetting it right ahead.



> Web seems like it deserves better than C-. It creates (I think) an area burst 2 section of difficult terrain which means that monsters can't cross it without being having a chance of being immobilized. This is especially useful if the monsters are primary melee and start out 10+ spaces away from the PCs. In this case, a web can block their path with difficult terrain and more importantly stagger their arrival so that the PCs can kill them 1 by 1 as they arrive. Of course, I may be slightly biased in favor of web as it was one of my favorite spells in 3rd edition and the tactic above saved the party many times.




Any creature can cross it without a chance of being immobilized, as long as they don't end their turn in it. It's a 5x5 area, so you need to be able to move at least 11 squares to get across it entirely, of course, so if your speed is 3 or less then you won't be able to cross it in one turn, even running... but otherwise it's potentially very easy to avoid the immobilize effect.

Anyone have much play experience with Web and can say how effective it is, as long as the initial immobilize hit doesn't land? That is, for targets initially outside the web or for targets moving through it?


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## Korror (Jul 19, 2008)

keterys said:


> Any creature can cross it without a chance of being immobilized, as long as they don't end their turn in it. It's a 5x5 area, so you need to be able to move at least 11 squares to get across it entirely, of course, so if your speed is 3 or less then you won't be able to cross it in one turn, even running... but otherwise it's potentially very easy to avoid the immobilize effect.
> 
> Anyone have much play experience with Web and can say how effective it is, as long as the initial immobilize hit doesn't land? That is, for targets initially outside the web or for targets moving through it?




I realized that I was forgetting about the ability to take a double move, doh. If monsters didn't have the ability to do that, then web would be an amazing power than it is as it would always immobilize anything slower than speed 10. Still at least it provides an barrier to speed 5 creatures who are unwilling to run or who are starting more than 2 squares away. It would be a lot more effective if there was a way to inflict mass slow or mass daze on a group which would render them unable to to safely move through the web.

On closer review of the wizard, I'm still wondering how effective he is in his role of a controller. Our party's wizard has been nothing more than an wimpy striker with above average minion killing capacity and rarely disrupts the monsters plan of battle.


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## Korror (Jul 19, 2008)

keterys said:


> *ROGUE*
> C+ / Clever Riposte
> B- / Deep Cut
> C+ / Walking Wounded
> ...




Looking at the math for Clever Riposte and Deep cut, it seems that the rogue would have to be the focus of 3 attacks before the two evened out. The ongoing damage (assuming 16 str) from Deep Cut will do an average of: 8 + 4 + 2 + 1 + .5 + .25 .... which sums up to ~16 damage. Assuming 20 dex, clever ripose will do 5 damage per attack which will quickly add up. The rogue could combine this with Riposte Strike if they ever were isololated and forced to fight alone. 

However it's always a bad idea to give your opponent (or your DM) choices as they will pick the one that harms them the least. The rogue was never the first target of monsters in my game who prefered to eat the wizard or the cleric hanging in the back. Walking Wounded has the same issue of giving your opponent choices as the creature won't trigger the effect if its not in its best interest to make a sudden dash. I'd lower the grade on both Clever Riposte and Walking Wounded for this reason.


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## Korror (Jul 19, 2008)

Mengu said:


> Spiritual weapon requires a standard action to cast, and every round, a move action to move and a minor action to sustain and attack. Weapon of the Gods is a minor action to cast, and lasts till the end of the encounter. Put it on a Rogue's weapon, and since the rogue will typically be maneuvering for CA, -2 penalty to AC can become more useful. And to add insult to injury, the damage is radiant. This makes undead uncounters considerably easier, since not only can the cleric be doing Radiant damage, but he can let someone else do it too.




I did the math to see how Weapon of the Gods compares with Spiritual Weapon. Assume that a given enemy grants CA half the time to a PC who is seeking to gain it. 

Expected damage of Weapons of the Gods: .65(3.5 + ally damage). 

I admit that the +3 to hit is only a crude estimation as we should really calculate the probability of the AC penalty + CA existing at the same time to find the average bonus to hit which is made tricky since a hit with weapon of the gods makes it more likely that the next attack will hit. In any case, I'm pretty sure that the true bonus lies between 2 and 3 so we'll assume the upper level for now.

Expected damage of Spiritual Weapon = .6(5.5 + ally Damage). 

A 2-handed maul fighter with 18 str, a +2 weapon and weapon focus is going to be doing 14 damage per hit which gives us 11.7 expected damage for Spiritual Weapon and 11.375 expected damage for Weapon of the Gods. If we adopt the pessimistic view of Weapon of the Gods' to hit bonus, the expected damage drops to 10.5. If we give Weapon of the Gods to a twin strike using archery ranger then it clearly out damages Spiritual Weapon. In addition, Weapon of the God is esentially a free action which gives it a head start on Spiritual Weapon.

I admit to being surprised to how good Weapon of the Gods appears to be. I suppose that I overlooked it before because it wasn't very flashy and enchanced a party member rather than being an awesome attack for the cleric. I would guess then that Weapon of the Gods is better  as long as you have a ranger or 2 handed fighter in the group while Spiritual weapon is better if you have a rogue or warlock.


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## keterys (Jul 19, 2008)

And weapon of the gods only gets better if you have multiple people targetting AC. If you've got a twin strike ranger, 2h warrior, and a rogue, then that -2 AC really starts to kick in 

Especially if it's used with something more serious, like another daily. Like Cascade of Blades.


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## Mengu (Jul 19, 2008)

keterys said:


> Especially if it's used with something more serious, like another daily. Like Cascade of Blades.




Blinding Barrage or Cloud of Steel with a Weapon of the Gods would be quite good too. Obviously the Ranger has the most multi-attack options though. Sweeping Whirlwind for instance would be pretty fantastic.


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## Korror (Jul 19, 2008)

Korror said:


> I admit that the +3 to hit is only a crude estimation as we should really calculate the probability of the AC penalty + CA existing at the same time to find the average bonus to hit which is made tricky since a hit with weapon of the gods makes it more likely that the next attack will hit. In any case, I'm pretty sure that the true bonus lies between 2 and 3 so we'll assume the upper level for now.





If we separate the bonus from CA and Weapon of the Gods, the math becomes a lot easier and it's pretty easy to show the AC penalty from Weapon of the Gods is around 1.5555 (repeating). Assume a 50% chance to hit or miss, the AC penalty has a %50 chance of being applied. On the second round, the chance to hit is .6(.5)+.5(.5) or .55. On the third round, the chance to hit is .6(.55) + .5(.45) or .555 and so on. A 50% chance of combat advantage evens out to +1 and thus we can assume an average bonus of 2.5555. If you combine the bonus then things get more complicated but I don't see the need to do so when we're already making wide assumptions about being able to attack every round and the 50% chance of combat advantage.


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## Branduil (Jul 26, 2008)

Any plans for analysis on the level 9 dailies any time soon?


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## keterys (Jul 26, 2008)

Plan is Monday. Yeah, I'm being slow.


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## Goumindong (Jul 27, 2008)

keterys said:


> I did have it as a B+, but upgraded it last night (I think cause I upgraded Beacon of Hope and Flaming Sphere, the things I was comparing it to). I'm more than content to reduce it.




But flaming sphere got an errata change that made it take up a square. The guardian requires an attack roll to do its per round damage, doesn't have AoO's or anything other than its square that its blocking.

Its good in that you can stick it right in front with your line while a flaming sphere will be dealing damage to friendlies, but in general, even with a fighter, flaming sphere is just plain better. Guardian is something you should only take if you don't have a controller in the group.

ed: About the only thing you can do with it is stick it near a squishy to get everything to scatter the next round. But since they can attack, then move, and since 1d8+wis is not exactly impressive(even after an attack roll) its not something that makes a strong deterrent.


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## keterys (Jul 27, 2008)

Fair enough. Looks like downgrade Guardian to B+... and upgrade Web to C. If no objections, I'll do that when I put in the Daily 9s.

 Also... the 2 warlock daily 5 powers that have a hit, no miss, and sustain (save ends)... may be a bit better than I thought. It's unclear if you need to hit to sustain and it's unclear if you can save against the effect before it's sustained (and thusly triggers) at least once. Which would make a big difference. I'll leave them as is, for now though.


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## FadedC (Jul 27, 2008)

One thing I will say in defence of walking wounded is that it's a power usable at range that knocks it's target prone. This can be rather important for a melee class to use against fliers.


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## keterys (Jul 29, 2008)

Hmm, that's a very interesting point about ranged knockdown against fliers. I wonder how often that will come up. Hmm.

Installs for work ran several hours late then my wife wanted us to play the Wii, so didn't get the daily 9s up. I do have to say that the disparities are getting to be a bit more startling for me. I really wish I'd been in on the playtesting for 4e to maybe see some of the evolution of these powers.


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## Goumindong (Jul 29, 2008)

Walking wounded is actually fantastic.

Against melee enemies that are at range, knockdown is as good as a daze.

Against a melee enemy, any decently reliably push powers also can become like a daze. E.G. take an enemy with a move of 6. He is 6 squares away and you walking wound him.

He falls, gets back up, charges you. At the end of its movement before its attack, if falls prone...

You do your thing and shift 1 square away, the wizard pushes him 3 squares away. He gets up moves 4 squares to re-engage and... falls prone.

Combine with difficult terrain and you only need to push 3

Combine with Slows and you only need a push 1 or a shifting power. The enemies speed gets set to two, shifting one means that it has to get up, then move 2 squares to you. Its movement ends it cant attack since its taken two move actions... its moved over half its move and so falls prone again.


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## keterys (Aug 1, 2008)

*Daily 9 Analysis*

*CLERIC* 
C+ / Astral Defenders
B+ / Blade Barrier
A / Divine Power
B / Flame Strike

*Astral Defenders *is not something that leaps forward as a good power and if not used well it might not result in anything, but it doesn't require an action to maintain to getting 4 OAs out of it (or completely denying a couple rounds of actions from targets) shouldn't be too hard, which makes it more than respectable damage.
*Blade Barrier *is quite a lot of automatic damage to targets in the wall area. The wall is pretty small, however, so after the initial placement you may not get much benefit out of it.
*Divine Power *is a weapon attack vs Fort in a close burst 2, which would already make it a very good pick, but you get to add on regeneration 5 for the rest of the encounter (fantastic) and +2 AC to your allies in the area and it's a possible contender for A+.
*Flame Strike *is a decent sized area that's enemies only and the ongoing damage can be a ton if it hits.

*FIGHTER*
C+ / Shift the Battlefield
C+ / Thicket of Blades
C+ / Victorious Surge

*Shift the Battlefield *is a solid close burst 1 for reasonable damage and a slide 1 kicker. 
*Thicket of Blades *used to be amazing before the reliable errata and now it's quite a bit less impressive since you're likely to hit at least once and you do no damage on a miss. 3W in a close burst is still respectable.
*Victorious Surge *is Comeback Strike plus 1W that doesn't cost a surge. Reliable self healing is still a good thing.

*PALADIN*
B- / Crown of Glory
B- / One Stands Alone
C+ / Radiant Pulse

*Crown of Glory *is pretty nifty, but autoslowing enemies already adjacent to you is more "cool" than "powerful". Decent damage and radiant and against Will are all high points. No half damage on miss and the required sustain action are low points.
*One Stands Alone *has a very nice 'Effect', especially if you luck out and multiple enemies fail the save. I think the prereq is an annoying limitation on a burst power to my mind and no damage on miss again, but vs Will, radiant damage, and it's good if the group has no other melee or the paladin can get ahead in the first round. 
*Radiant Pulse *has a neat sustain that you can't actually save against, but unfortunately it's tricky to work correctly and easy for enemies to avoid being hit by. It's also a letdown if you miss and vs Fortitude. Fun if you get it working, though.

*RANGER*
B+ / Attacks on the Run
C- / Close Quarters Shot
C / Spray of Arrows
C / Swirling Leaves of Steel

*Attacks on the Run *is an excellent power, giving you a move and two attacks at 3W miss for half at any point in the move. Which means that even on a complete miss you got a move out of it and dealt a full 3W + modifiers.
*Close Quarters Shot *is a bit deceptive. Being able to shoot without provoking is good, but the range 1 is a real limitation and close attacks are certainly a lot more versatile. The damage is high at least.
*Spray of Arrows *is I think a more versatile option than close quarters shot (nothing else because it ups to 3 range), but honestly it could have done something extra on top as 2W small area attacks are fairly common in this range. 
*Swirling Leaves of Steel *is just okay. It's the generic 2W close burst 1 that has come up multiple times at daily 9, but with no extra special effect.

*ROGUE*
B- / Crimson Edge
C+ / Deadly Positioning
A / Knockout

*Crimson Edge: *vs. Fort, quite good damage and maintains CA, but don't expect it to last long
*Deadly Positioning: *the pre-attack slide seems almost guaranteed to give you flank (and thusly CA) at least once and it's got some other nice benefits, especially against solos
*Knockout: *Possible A+ - vs Fort, daze even on miss, easy to land unconscious to lead into AP coup de grace or some other trick... but at least damage breaks it.

*WARLOCK*
C+ or B+ / Curse of the Black Frost
C+ / Iron Spike of Dis
C / Summons of Khirad
C- / Thief of Five Fates

*Curse of the Black Frost *gets two scores because I suspect there will be those who rule the effect damage triggers only once per turn and those who rule it triggers every single time the target moves. At any rate, it requires a willingness to bounce the target a bit, but if you can and they fail the save even once the damage can really ramp up since you can add weapon enhancement and feat bonus (and vulnerability) to every time the damage triggers.
*Iron Spike of Dis *does decent damage and immobilizes. Definitely a decent choice.
*Summons of Khirad *depends a lot on the environment. If you can place someone in a spot where they'll take significant damage or be otherwise screwed, it can be a real boon. If not, it's pretty subpar.
*Thief of Five Fates *is a pretty cool effect in rare circumstances, most likely briefly, though it's crippling for some corner cases (like a Tarrasque's silly low Will). It doesn't do any damage, it sometimes doesn't do anything at all even if you hit, has no effect on miss, and uses up your action to use up your enemies so it's only really useful against Solos. For some campaigns, perhaps this will see more use but I think it's just a bit too limited.

*WARLORD*
C+ / Iron Dragon Charge
B- / Knock Them Down
C+ / White Raven Strike

*Iron Dragon Charge *can sure net a lot of charges, but charging is often not the best use of your action, often invites OAs, or really can only happen a limited number of times. Assuming you can get a couple ally charges in and hit a bit with it, though, it still ends up decent. If there are a lot of 'can use this power as a charge' powers, maybe this is cooler?
*Knock Them Down *is yet another warlord power about knocking down all the enemies. It does give everyone the ability to move a few squares even if they don't want to knock people prone and even on a miss is an auto prone, which is pretty cool.
*White Raven Strike* is a pretty nice amount of temp hp at the level you get it, but doesn't scale at all. 

*WIZARD*
B / Ice Storm
C+ / Lightning Serpent
C+ / Mordenkainen's Sword
A / Wall of Fire

*Ice Storm *is a nice big area and it either slows or immobilizes in difficult terrain, which makes it very easy to force an enemy to not go anywhere (making it good for laying on top of another zone). Quite good.
*Lightning Serpent *is decent damage and is a guaranteed slow. 
*Mordenkainen's Sword *at least only takes a minor action to get another attack. It really needs to be able to get off several attacks in a battle to truly shine, which I'm sure it can do in some, but it's eating up some move actions and minors in the meantime. In an optimal situation you can really amp damage (like in a big fight where you can put it in a good spot and get off 10 attacks with it)
*Wall of Fire *is really a very large customizable area when you consider that it does automatic damage in its own squares and adjacent ones. It's also a ton of movement to cross - particularly amusing if you've got a slowed creature that needs to cross it, but even a speed 6 creature is either losing actions, running, or getting hit by the wall twice in one way or another.


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## avr (Aug 1, 2008)

I think the idea with Blade Barrier is that you've got a place for PCs with forced movement powers to send the enemies. I haven't seen it in action, but I'd have thought it better than Flame Strike.


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## keterys (Aug 1, 2008)

Absolutely agree - that appears to be a transcription error (I put down - instead of +). The wall spells do automatic damage to anyone starting in the area and you can start them on people, so... they're _really_ effective.

The real power of multiclassing feats are really showing for certain level ranges - for example I'm pretty sure a fighter/cleric might be a lot happier with Divine Power than any of the other level 9 fighter options. And the level 5 Rain of Steel is better than any of the level 9 fighter options for that matter.

Just interesting.


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## Gladius Legis (Aug 4, 2008)

> *Victorious Surge* is Comeback Strike plus 1W. Reliable self healing is still a good thing.



Comeback plus 1W that does NOT spend a healing surge (the text reads "_as if_ you spent a healing surge"). That vaults it solidly into B territory.

Thicket of Blades, even errataed, is definitely better than a C+. The battlefield control you can exert with that power is still second to none. Slowing is awesome for a defender, in general, since they can't escape you easily or attack the squishier party members as easily. The Paladin's Crown of Glory, similarly, is great, especially for keeping next to your DC target so you can maintain it easier.

For the Ranger, Attacks on the Run is an A+ simply because at Lv. 9 you're already doing more damage than most class' Lv. 29 powers. In fact, it is the Fighter's Lv. 15 Dragon's Fangs with a free move action attached.


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## keterys (Aug 12, 2008)

So, immobilize _often_ does a fairly weak effect (prevents a skirmisher/lurker/artillery/controller from moving away, keeps a brute/soldier on the defender, etc) _but_ in certain circumstances it's as good as a stun, such as when used on a melee only monster that you can avoid completely. I'm not sure on how often that happens - but it would likely increase how valuable immobilizes should be in a general sense, especially area ones since you can get the drop with them in the first round potentially.

Similarly, knockdown by itself is not that impressive but if you can shift 1 away after or push 1 and knock prone and there are no other target options (such as in a corridor) the target can neither stand and attack nor stand and charge, leaving it either losing a round of attacking or crawling and attacking. That makes it quite a bit more valuable that _exact_ 1 square distance.

Any powers that folks feel I slighted unfairly in those respects but didn't feel like arguing with me enough to raise up? (and for shame, if so - argue argue


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## apache (Sep 2, 2008)

*Web*

Hi, first post 

Just wanted to point something out concerning Web, Wizard Daily lvl 5. Now the way i read that it says any creature ending _a_ move in the zone is immobilized. So... a double move isn't gonna help you out, because they are 2 discreet move actions... or are they?!

... i'm not sure how to read the rules on this: PHB p. 284
*One Speed*: When you double move, add the speeds
of the two move actions together and then move.
*Occupied Squares: *When you double move, your
first move action can end in an ally’s space, because
you’re not stopping. Your second move action can’t
end in an ally’s space, as normal.

Now the first point seems to indicate that you take 1 move action, while the second point seems to make a distinction between the two move actions... i always figured the first point was simply to make sure that you can move 5 squares of difficult terrain with a double move off speed 5... but what do i know 

so... is there a distinction between the two move actions inside a double move? If there is, that should trigger Web. Also... with speed 5 you would get 2.5 squares before Web triggers (potentially), so in which square are you immobilized?


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## keterys (Sep 2, 2008)

Hmm, very interesting point. There is an important distinction between end of move and end of turn in that respect.


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## Plane Sailing (Sep 2, 2008)

keterys said:


> *Fireball: *Quite large area.




I think this is called "damning with faint praise" is it not?

I'd rate the fireball as a D.  3d6 against all targets in a blast 5 eh?

compare that with the Encounter 3 *Fire Shroud*, which does 1d8 + ongoing 5 against all _enemies _in a close burst 3.

Since the party wizard got fire shroud it has been a tide-turner in every battle that involved any minions at all. He can cast it without fear and it hurts enemies without hurting friends. Avg damage is 9.5 vs 10.5 and it has the potential to do more than that because of the ongoing 5 fire damage.

D for fireball (and if there is one spell they should have got *right*, it was fireball. Grrrr!)


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## keterys (Sep 2, 2008)

You are dead on with the faint praise, and I am disappointed that the iconic fireball spell is one of the more disappointing options... It is a 7x7 area within 20 squares of the caster, so that's quite a bit different from the close nature of fire shroud (which is indeed an awesome encounter ability)

Comparing fireball's damage and range to other powers it's still quite useful, just not impressive nor as desirable as the other wizard abilities. If you compare it to the abilities of other class's, it actually especially starts looking better - I graded it the same as Avernian Eruption which has half the range and is burst 1 instead of burst 3, for instance. Avernian just has the automatic ongoing damage to autokill minions and ramp up the damage to a slightly more respectable level to counterbalance.


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## burntgerbil (Sep 2, 2008)

did you skip or overlook rogue daily 9th's ?


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## Hypersmurf (Sep 3, 2008)

apache said:


> So... a double move isn't gonna help you out, because they are 2 discreet move actions... or are they?!




Two move actions, which together make up your move.

At the end of the first move action, you are still moving; your move has not finished.

-Hyp.


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## keterys (Sep 3, 2008)

burntgerbil said:


> did you skip or overlook rogue daily 9th's ?




Hrmm. Well, I don't have the full writeup, but my original grade and notes:

*ROGUE*
B- / Crimson Edge
C+ / Deadly Positioning
A / Knockout

*Crimson Edge: *vs. Fort, quite good damage and maintains CA, but don't expect it to last long
*Deadly Positioning: *the pre-attack slide seems almost guaranteed to give you flank (and thusly CA) at least once and it's got some other nice benefits, especially against solos
*Knockout: *Possible A+ - vs Fort, daze even on miss, easy to land unconscious to lead into AP coup de grace or some other trick... but at least damage breaks it.


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## keterys (Oct 6, 2008)

Considering that Consecrated Ground should maybe move into A+ for its level - with the lower damage output of creatures in 4e it can just make people pretty much unkillable.


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## Kinie (Oct 7, 2008)

Just curious if you are going to grade the Swordmage or Dark Pact Warlock powers as well, or if you are going to stick with the PHB classes for now.  Other than that, very nice list.  Personally I like damage and ongoing over effects, but that's mainly because I see them as "dirty" tactics.  I'm an honorable PC if nothing else.


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## Plane Sailing (Oct 7, 2008)

keterys said:


> Considering that Consecrated Ground should maybe move into A+ for its level - with the lower damage output of creatures in 4e it can just make people pretty much unkillable.




I agree here.


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## Plane Sailing (Oct 7, 2008)

Kinie said:


> Just curious if you are going to grade the Swordmage or Dark Pact Warlock powers as well, or if you are going to stick with the PHB classes for now.  Other than that, very nice list.  Personally I like damage and ongoing over effects, but that's mainly because I see them as "dirty" tactics.  I'm an honorable PC if nothing else.




I hope that keterys sticks with the PHB classes for now - best to get the core all thought through before dallying with those johnny-come-lately's


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## keterys (Oct 7, 2008)

The plan is to do the core first, yes. I suffered some temporary setbacks since the computer I had all my notes on died due to drive corruption and I added probably one too many games to my schedule (so good to be excited about gaming, though)

If anyone wants to take a stab at the others, go for it.


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## renau1g (Mar 3, 2009)

*bump* Any chance of updated Keterys?


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## keterys (Mar 4, 2009)

It's pretty low priority for me - I'll admit that losing the computer hard drive really beat a lot of the energy for this out of me. I'll take a look over where I left things on these and see what I think I can do, though. I hate unfinished projects


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## Korror (Mar 4, 2009)

I remember this thread and I think the discussion of the daily powers is too much fun to let die. I'll take a stab at the level 15 powers and Keterys can come in with a more detailed analysis later.

*Cleric*
B+ / Holy Spark
B / Purifying Fire
B- / Seal of Warding

*Holy Spark *is a rare STR vs. Will that has the weapon keyword. There is no other cleric melee power that has this property and this makes it quite accurate. The damage isn't too bad either, if you assume that there will usually be at least 1 NPC within 3 squares.

*Purifying Fire*is yet another effective cleric ranged AoE. The fact that it doesn't target allies makes it safe to drop on your defender. The problem is that the healing side effect is dependent on the turn order so if the NPC goes first and saves against the ongoing damage then your allies lose out on the healing.

*Seal of Warding* gets slightly downranked because I'm of the opinion that Close burst powers are harder to use as effectively as ranged burst powers for a wisdom based cleric. The zone effect is nice but at level 15 you will want all your actions and shouldn't tie up for minor action for such as small effect.

*Fighter*
Dragon's Fangs / C+
Serpent Dance Strike / B -
Unyielding Avalanche / A

*Dragon's Fangs* is almost exactly like a double brute strike. The damage is good but that's all there is there. At level 15, monsters have a TON of hps and I feel a daily attack should do something besides chip away at their HPs. On the other hand, it does do a lot of damage so I could see bumping this power up to B in some situtaions. 
*
Sepent Dance Strike* is another one of the shift and attack powers capping out at 4 targets. This power is unlikely to be able to be used to maximum effect in every battle but since it's a daily you can wait and save it for when it is most effective.
*
Unyielding Avalanche* is the best stance power the fighter has so far. Regeneration, an AC bonus and best of all, an auto hit attack against everyone next to you that slows makes this stance very very good.

*Paladin*

Bloodied Retribution / C -
Break the Wall / C +
True Nemesis / B +

*Bloodied Retribution *only works while bloodied and from what I've seen from our paladin, he doesn't spend that much time bloodied. This power also doesn't do a significient amount of damage to make up for its situtational use.

*Break the Wall* is at least useful for setting up other PC's powers but on the whole, there's nothing too special about this power which even targets a defence that is usually as high as AC.

*True Nemesis* is better than it looks at first glance. Notice that the secondary effect lasts the whole encounter and triggers even on a miss. The reaction attack also does damage on a miss so if the paladin can stay within 5 squares of his target, he's certain to do at least 1d10 + CHA/2 damage per round.

*Ranger*

Blade Cascade / A+
Bleeding Wounds / D
Confounding Arrows / B-

*Blade Cascade. *Do you even have to ask? Even in the errata'd version does more damage than pretty much any other ranger power. It does require some setup but nothing a ranger shouldn't be doing anyway.

*Bleeding Wounds*. Lackluster damage considering that 5 ongoing isn't very much around level 15. Level 9 Dailies do more damage.*

Confounding Arrows* is a stunning power which is very powerful. Stun is 2nd most useful status effect to inflict and can be quite effective on a dangerous NPC.

*Rogue*

Bloody Path / B
Garrote Grip / A+
Slaying Strike / C+

*Bloody Path *is one of the more amusing powers in the game and I'm tempted to rate it higher just for that reason alone. One thing to note is that many creatures do not have a basic melee attack but instead use their more powerful at will strike. You can get creatures to inflict status effects on themselves if you are facing the right opponents.

*Garrote Grip*'s power  depends on if you can relyable substain the grab. Most monsters don't have an acrobatics or althetics score listed so I assume that they'll be reduced to making STR vs fort tests to escape. I think this means you shouldn't have many difficulties holding the grab for 3 rounds.

*Slaying Strike* is not truely a bad power but it does rely on getting a foe to bloodied. From what I've seen in our games, the strikers generally wanted to unload their dailies as quickly as possible and I don't think they would have liked to wait until their dangerous target was bloodied.

I really don't know the warlock really enough to comment on their powers. No one in my group plays one and I've never really had any interest in them. Tendrils of Thuban looks like a nifty power but the other appear substandard.

I think I'll also leave off the Warlord and Wizard for now. Their powers are slightly harder to evaluate and I've not seen the wizard in action before.


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## Korror (Mar 5, 2009)

Ok, I have some more time so here goes the warlock, warlord, and wizard analysis.

*Warlock*

Curse of the Golden Mist / D
Fireswarm / C-
Tendrils of Thuban / B-
Thirsting Maw / C

*Curse of the Golden Mist* is simply a waste. You are using one of your precious dailies, not to do damage, but simply to trade your actions for the targets. This is most useful on solos, the very monsters where you are most likely to miss with this power. If you don't believe me, imagine that this power was "Hit: Target is stunned (save ends)" That is weak for a level 15 daily but better than this power.

*Fireswarm *is another sustain standard power which becomes worse the more powers you have and better options for your standard action become available. The damage is good but NPCs can easily avoid the splash damage on the later turns.

*Tendrils of Thuban* is only halfway decent because how difficult it is to get out of the zone once the NPC is stuck in it. Since the NPC saves at the end of its turn, it leaves itself open for being immobilized again by the power's continued effect.

*Thirsting Maw* does low damage coinciding it is a level 15 daily. There might be some use for it considering the new warlock feats that let you deal damage to yourself in exchange for benefits but I don't know those feats well enough to comment.

*Warlord*

Make Them Bleed / B (D if the ongoing damage doesn't stack)
Renew the Troops / B+
Warlord's Gambit / C


*Make Them Bleed* adds 5 ongoing untyped damage which I don't know if it stacks or not. I know ongoing damage from the same source does not stack, if a monster hits you for 5 ongoing fire damage and then hits you again the damage does not become 10 ongoing. I'm not sure if that applies to this power or not. Anyone have a good grasp on the ongoing damage rules?

*Renew the Troops* heals without using a healing surge which is quite handy in a pinch. You're rarely going to be able to use this to heal everyone because damage is usually concentrated on 1-2 PCs but every bit helps.

*Warlord's Gambit* has the nasty problem of giving your opponent choices. If it's beneficial to hit you, the NPC is going to enjoy the attack bonuses and if its not then the effect is wasted. The penalty of having an ally make a basic attack against it is not that prohibitive as its roughly the same as a fighter's mark which monsters ignore if the benefits are high enough.

*Wizard*

This is the level that wizards start to really play with the good spells. Up to now, their dailies have been not that interesting but from now on wizards get spells that really control the battlefield.

Bigby's Grasping Hands / B-
Blast of Cold / C
Otilukes Resilient Sphere / B
Prismatic Beams / B+
Wall of Ice / A

*Bigby's Grasping Hands *deserves extra points just for its humorous nature. Sadly the fact that it needs a minor action to sustain means that it competes with other cool wizard powers.

*Blast of Cold*. Remember buring hands, thunderwave, color spray, thunderlance? If you do, then you already know Blast of Cold, the latest and not the greatest in the series of close blast powers that do damage and a minor status effect.

*Otilukes Resilient Sphere* is excellent for isolating a dangerous foe for several rounds while the rest of the party cleans of the rest of the NPCs. The only problem is that you need to hit on that attack roll as the miss effect is nothing to write home about.

*Prismatic Beams* is amazing if you roll high. If all three beams hit which will happen more often the only some of them hitting, the target takes 4d6 + 2 INT, 10 ongoing and is dazed. Dazed is one of the nasty status effects to inflict and it is keyed off the lowest defense.

*Wall of Ice* is what you have all been waiting for. A wall 12 can completely surround two adjacent squares. It does 4d6 to each creature attempting to break the wall down and doesn't even require an attack roll. Aside from blade cascade, I'd say this is the most powerful level 15 daily.

Ok, that's it for the level 15 dailies. Now for the fun part where you the reader tell me where I'm wrong. It's pretty unlikely that I've managed to get everything rated accurately so don't be shy and tell me which powers I've underrated and which ones aren't quite as nifty as I thought they were.


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## keterys (Mar 5, 2009)

Very cool, thanks. I'd started to poke at them a little today but this should save me time. 

Fwiw, you're probably overvaluing Blade Cascade... for example, its expected damage output is actually not that far above Bleeding Wounds, which you ranked as a D  Ongoing 5 is roughly equivalent to 1W in damage, and it does half on miss, so 3 attacks at 2W almost half on miss, at ranged, or 1 to 5 melee attacks at 2W, nothing on miss and ending string on miss... even if you get up to 90% hit it's just not as amazing as you'd think.


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## mlangsdorf (Mar 5, 2009)

I'd say you're underestimating Confounding Arrows: it's really an A+ power.  It inflicts a Daze effect on up to 3 enemies even if all shots miss.  That's very potent!

Blade Cascade, on the other hand, does a maximum of 10W+5Static, so maybe 150 points of damage if all 5 attacks hit.  That's impressive, but there's plenty of foes who aren't going to be stopped by that.  If 2 of the 3 hits from Confounding Arrows hit, the foe is stopped.

My point is, at the top end, Blade Cascade is 10W+5Static, and Confounding Arrows is 5W+3Static *and* Stunned (Save ends).  Do you really think 5W+2Static damage - likely not much more than 90-100 points if all the dice come up maximum - is equivalent to Stunned (Save Ends)?


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## keterys (Mar 5, 2009)

100 points vs stunned (save ends)? At a certain point, you do have to concede that dead (no save) is a really good condition 

A lot of it will start to depend on the game's saturation of solos and elites - I have one character who in 20 game sessions has fought one solo. For him, certain powers are quite a lot less useful...


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## renau1g (Mar 5, 2009)

Save Ends if you're battling solos (or even elites) tend to be much lower valued.


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## Korror (Mar 5, 2009)

Hmm, I think you're right about Confounding Arrows. I usually rate stun powers higher than B- so I'm not quite sure why I gave it the low rating. One thing I think that prevents it from being an A level power is that you have to decide how many shots to allocate to each target before you see if they hit. Optimally, you'd want to have 2 hit and then the third directed at a secondary target but you have no guarantee that you'll hit with the first two which forces you to allocate all 3 shots at the target you want stunned. Still, I'd say it's a B+ on a secondary look.

As for Blade Cascade, I believe it's still the most damaging daily even after the errta. I'll run the math when I have time but I think with good preperation (getting CA and other party members to apply penalties to AC) it does enough damage to kill or get close to kill a normal level 15 target and, as Keterys has put it, dead is the ultimate status effect.


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## keterys (Mar 5, 2009)

Out of curiosity I did a quick and dirty spreadsheet for Blade Cascade vs. Bleeding Wounds...

If static damage is around +20, 
Blade Cascade vs. Bleeding Wounds (positive is BC more damage, negative is BW more damage)
When roll needed:
2: +47.2
3: +29.5
4: +14.4
5: +1.7
6: -8.8
7: -17.6
8: -24.7
9: -30.4
etc to -42.9 when a 19 is needed

That's a very notable difference in usability, and BW is more versatile in terms of range and target selection. Fwiw, the static bonus mostly just expands the difference from there. If you're +50 at epic, it's +88.4, +54.5, +25.7, +1.4, -18.9, -35.8... 

Rerolls to flush some of the misses from blade cascade certainly help, but it's not anywhere near as crazy as it was when unbound.


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## Herschel (Mar 5, 2009)

Some can be situational, but so good. I've found for Swordmage's Burning Blade is just rocking, but that's generally when it's used during big encounters and a +3 Strength bonus and a TacLord usually about. With low strength and/or a small number of baddies (or ones with controller abilities to freeze you) Frost Backlash is better.


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 5, 2009)

Came late to this party but it's an interesting read and I thought I would chime in:



Plane Sailing said:


> Not mentioned yet, but Armour of Agathos has excellent minion-killing abilities.
> 
> Cheers



Armor can kill minions like no other power except possibly sphere.  Coupled with the curse powers (especially fey) you can sometimes run into a clump of minions, cursing the one with the lowest initiative, each minion automatically dies when it's turn comes due and then when the lowest init minion dies you can use the curse power to teleport into another group.  It doesn't happen often, but in one minion heavy encounter my level 2 warlock killed 7 minions and delivered an additional d6+2 dmg to one non minion in a single round.  It also causes automatic curse damage once per round so one creature is taking 2d6+2 which is pretty signifcant automatic damage.  Coupled with eyebite and the temp hitpoints you can frequently hang in adjacent to even a BBEG for several rounds.  In a big battle armor can be a dominating outcome changing power.  Free d6+2-3 adds up.  In paragon levels you can combine armor with winter touched and lasting frost making every creature adjacent to you give up combat advantage and take 5 additional damage from the armor d6+8 and combat advantage against multiple targets is very powerful and other pc's in the party can take winter touched and also gain combat advantage.  If you have a wizard using cold powers or a rogue with wintertouched the benefits only multiply.  



keterys said:


> Depends what you're fighting. If you're fighting non-Large opponents it often cuts off flank, which could matter quite a bit to the rogue.



it only cuts off flank if your party fails to work in a coordinated manner.  Whenever possible pc's should approach monsters from the corners (this is good defensive and offensive strategy) and it always allows wizards to attack with bursts, blasts, zones and spheres without putting the party in the area of effect.  



ZSutherland said:


> My player's named the party wizard's Flaming Sphere Bob.  They picked out a bright orange d20 to be Bob's mini, and he stays with their character's minis, never in a dice bag.  I expect he'll soon start getting a share of the loot from one encounter every day.  I think we know what their opinion is.



Kind of sums it up in a nut shell.  No other level 1 power does as much damage as sphere.  It's nearly always the encounter defining power.  I've seen people argue that sleep is it's equal or superior but it's simple not the case, sleep sometimes has almost no impact on an encounter.  Any encounter that sphere appears in is greatly changed by sphere.  I would conservatively say sphere does a minimum of 100 damage in 90% of the encounters I have seen it in.  If you get a good placement with high init you can easily deliver 50dmg on round 1 (my wizard has astral fire and a +1 staff so it's putting out d4+6) but even without that +2 if you drop sphere in a clump of 4-5 critters you get 26-32.5 average automatic damage and an attack that hits for a very respectable 2d6+4. Admittedly after sphere is in play it's hard to get more than 1-2 creatures on any given round because our dm plays the monsters with a fair level of intelligence, but over 8-10 rounds of battle this is still a very impressive amount of damage.  



Mengu said:


> I'm not denying the potential damage over the course of several rounds, or the nice temp HP's. I'm just saying, that's not exactly what's expected of the Warlock. I expect him to do concentrated damage, per his role. And all other powers are more in line with this role. If I'm the Cleric giving him the Lance of Faith bonus, I expect him to put that to good use with a big attack, not some wussy minion killer that the Wizard already has covered in spades. I also don't want the Warlock to be running into the middle of three brutes (or skirmishers) just to do a bit of controller-like damage to all of them, only to get mauled. I have more important people to heal like the Defenders.



Even though minion removal is not what's expected from the warlock, it still helps achieve battlefield superiority for the party.  It seems unlikely he'll use armor if he's got +2 to hit (or maybe he'll use an action point and get two spells off).  The mistake is in thinking armor is not effective at killing bigger creatures.  Put a curse on a BBEG and move next to him with armor on and they invariably try to retreat from you.  How many creatures want to "hang in there" taking 9+ automatic damge per round.  If you hit him with eyebite before moving adjacent then he's got even more problems as getting rid of you is very hard and you have the bonus temp hit points to offset what ever damage he is dishing out.  You are in effect both doing the striker role (you're probably averaging 15 damage per round vs 1 creature) and also doing some defending in that you're now tying up a bbeg.  If along the way you happen to get next to a minion or two and fry them for free, that's just another bonus.  Saying you have more important targets to heal is just silly if the warlock is dominating a BBEG and killing minions at the same time, healing him is not a waste of resources. People undervalue armor because they feel the damage is minor but it's not only pretty significant it also guarantees curse dmg.  If you assume normally you hit about half the time, armor doubles the impact of curse.



Mengu said:


> How are you calculating those expected damage values? If you hit with Phlegethos, your average damage is 3d10+1d6(curse)+4+10(ongoing fire) = 34 points (ignoring crit). On a miss, the average damage is 10 points. Those 34 points are a lot of concentrated damage on a BBG.



 how did you come up with average damage of 10 on a miss?  In any event, this is 24 initially and then 5 and 5.  approximately half the time.  So the average expected damage from flames would be 17'ish.
In those same 3 rounds armor can pretty reliably do 6d6+6 to that same target (pretty much every time because of no to hit roll) which is 27 dmg almost every time. Armor also adds ~12 temp hit points AND could easily have delivered another 3d6+6 or more to other targets in the same 3 rounds.  Plus it's still active and can continue to deliver more damage.  I understand the reasoning for wanting to concentrate heavy damage on one target but armor actually out performs flames even at that.  Unless the initial att of 3d10+d6+4 kills the creature outright, there's very little benefit to flames compared to armor.  If the initial att does kill the bbeg I would say he's not much of a bbeg anyway.



Korror said:


> I realized that I was forgetting about the ability to take a double move, doh. If monsters didn't have the ability to do that, then web would be an amazing power than it is as it would always immobilize anything slower than speed 10. Still at least it provides an barrier to speed 5 creatures who are unwilling to run or who are starting more than 2 squares away. It would be a lot more effective if there was a way to inflict mass slow or mass daze on a group which would render them unable to to safely move through the web.



planting a fighter at the edge of the web can greatly enhance the spells effectiveness.  Thunderwave also works very handily in conjuction with web.  It's still pretty weak compared to other spells but it can be effective.  In 3.5 web could be used to cover an escape but 4e removes the web as soon as the caster is out of range so it's a lot less effective in that regard.



Korror said:


> On closer review of the wizard, I'm still wondering how effective he is in his role of a controller. Our party's wizard has been nothing more than an wimpy striker with above average minion killing capacity and rarely disrupts the monsters plan of battle.



If he was too effective the game would be ruined.  His role is not to score the heavy hitter damages like rogues and warlocks, but to grind down the enemy hit points and kill minions.  He's more of the set up man than the closer.  If a wizard gets off a burning hands into a clump of bad guys and kills a minion while putting 13 dmg on a pair of goblin warriors, then the rogue gets flanking on one of the goblins and dishes out a 20dmg attack the goblin is down, there's also a minion gone and the other goblin has been whittled down as well.  Wizards can't "dominate", they just help control.  Zones, AoE, minion removal are all part of control.  I think if you kept a spread sheet of who puts out more damge in the course of a campaign a wizard or any striker the odds are pretty good the wizard will come out on top.  The striker obviously will have done more concentrated damag which has it's benefits but minion removal is critical to parties surviving.  That wimpy minion goblin cutter can be the guy who gives the bugbear strangler flanking and kills a pc.  4e is a pretty tactical game.  The pc's are usually outnumbered and the monsters usually have 2-3 times the hit points of the party at the start of a major encounter.  One of the most important things the pc's must remember is to minimize the number of attacks that bad guys get, in any manner possible.  If a wizard could do 25 dmg to a bbeg or kill 4 minions with stinking cloud on round 1, the stinking cloud is vastly superior.  If you let the 4 minions all get an attack or two, they've added 10-20dmg to the party on average and the game is balanced enough that mistakes that let monsters deliver more damage are how parties get TPK'd.  



Korror said:


> I did the math to see how Weapon of the Gods compares with Spiritual Weapon. Assume that a given enemy grants CA half the time to a PC who is seeking to gain it.
> 
> Expected damage of Weapons of the Gods: .65(3.5 + ally damage).
> 
> ...



You're discounting the fact that if you miss with weapon of the gods, ALL the other pc's get no advantage.  Spiritual weapon grants combat advantage to the whole party regardless of the type of power they are using.  There are alot of powers that don't attack AC, for instance warlocks and wizards will get +2 to their ATT vs a SW target but no benefit from the creature hit by weapon of the gods.  SW also grants a pretty significant ATT as a minor.  d10+wis+implement is ~3 times as much damage as d6.  Weapon of the gods can only be used if the cleric moves or starts adjacent to the weilder.  If weapon of the gods is put on a melee weapon that person can be immobilized which would block it's effectiveness.  Weapon of the gods is also more limited by the layout of a battle.  If there's a bbeg in the back row he may have cover or if wotg is on a melee weapon he may be unreachable.  SW can fly unimpeded to the target (speed 10) and attack with no danger to the party + grant combat advantage to every party member.  Obviously the best use for wotg is probably a rangers bow.  What if your party has no ranger?  I saw someone suggest that SW could be avoided by delaying but the cleric could ready an action or delay as well so that's really no defense at all and would actually increase the power of SW since the target is now basically immobilized.  CA is about twice as valuable to a party as -2ac and the -2ac only happens if the weapon weilder hits.  Hard for me to understand how wotg can honestly be compared favorably to SW.



Korror said:


> I admit to being surprised to how good Weapon of the Gods appears to be. I suppose that I overlooked it before because it wasn't very flashy and enchanced a party member rather than being an awesome attack for the cleric. I would guess then that Weapon of the Gods is better  as long as you have a ranger or 2 handed fighter in the group while Spiritual weapon is better if you have a rogue or warlock.



This makes a lot of sense, but your party wizard zap cleric also benefit from SW.  It seems to me that only a ranger is truly benefiting from WotG more than from SW as putting the power on a melee weapon increases the chance that it will be ineffective.  Bottom line, everyone in the party benefits as much or more from SW and repeated d10+implement+wis for a minor is much better than d6 for free.  The chance of putting the -2 AC on mulitple targets is greatly offset by the fact that when you miss there is no penalty applied and even -2AC on multiple targets won't help half the party in most cases.



keterys said:


> And weapon of the gods only gets better if you have multiple people targetting AC. If you've got a twin strike ranger, 2h warrior, and a rogue, then that -2 AC really starts to kick in
> 
> Especially if it's used with something more serious, like another daily. Like Cascade of Blades.



I agree that it gets better if you have more people targetting AC, there's also a slight synergy bonus in that sometimes you'll get both the -2AC and CA (though there are other powers that grant -2AC to targets so it's possible to lose some synergy as well) but in the grand scheme of things most parties of 4-5 will have at least 2 characters who are not benefiting at all (wiz, cleric, warlock) from wotg or benefiting far less (rogue).  You're still discounting that frequently there will be no benefit granted because the ATT(s) missed, SW has a far greater chance of helping more attacks per round.


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## keterys (Mar 5, 2009)

Spiritual Weapon doesn't technically follow a target at all as written, so some of its effectiveness will depend on how the DM rules that one. In some games, it requires both a move action and minor action to give its combat advantage since an enemy can freely move away from it. In other games, it autofollows. Anyone seen anything official on that one?

That said, Combat advantage does not stack and melee combatants are easily able to get combat advantage. -2 to AC does (all penalties stack), so the only loss of synergy is once everyone hits on a 2... at which point no one really cares as much anyways. So SW helps certain parties more than wotg helps certain parties. One costs an action every round and a standard action up front, the other doesn't. That's pretty important too.

WotG can also affect multiple opponents when used with close and area attacks or multiple target melee and ranged attacks.


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## Korror (Mar 6, 2009)

Always good to have more people chime in with their opinions.



AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> Came late to this party but it's an interesting read and I thought I would chime in:
> 
> planting a fighter at the edge of the web can greatly enhance the spells effectiveness.  Thunderwave also works very handily in conjuction with web.  It's still pretty weak compared to other spells but it can be effective.  In 3.5 web could be used to cover an escape but 4e removes the web as soon as the caster is out of range so it's a lot less effective in that regard.




I've tried to get my party to use web by giving them a special trinket that let them cast web once per day but they are still reluctant to use it. The main problem is that the player who was playing a wizard decided that he really wanted to play a swordmage and abandoned the class. My group never really had problems with minions so I had to resort to lowering the minions XP cost in order to balance the encounter levels (shhh don't tell them). They had more an enough effect ways to remove minions (twin strike, cleave, sword burst) that he felt that he wasn't contributing. I'm not sure that the wizard has more ability to prevent the NPCs from attacking until he hits around level 15. But of course, I haven't gotten up to that level yet as my party is just now hitting the end of heroic tier.


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 6, 2009)

mlangsdorf said:


> I'd say you're underestimating Confounding Arrows: it's really an A+ power.  It inflicts a Daze effect on up to 3 enemies even if all shots miss.  That's very potent!



stun is potent, daze is moderate.  A melee creature can still charge and deliver a basic attack.  



mlangsdorf said:


> Blade Cascade, on the other hand, does a maximum of 10W+5Static, so maybe 150 points of damage if all 5 attacks hit.  That's impressive, but there's plenty of foes who aren't going to be stopped by that.  If 2 of the 3 hits from Confounding Arrows hit, the foe is stopped.



stopped is relative.  If a foe has 200-250HP, I'm not sure if stunning him for a round or two average is better than putting instantly into bloodied.  On the other hand I wouldn't count on hitting all 5 times very often.  



mlangsdorf said:


> My point is, at the top end, Blade Cascade is 10W+5Static, and Confounding Arrows is 5W+3Static *and* Stunned (Save ends).  Do you really think 5W+2Static damage - likely not much more than 90-100 points if all the dice come up maximum - is equivalent to Stunned (Save Ends)?



I honestly thinking bleeding wounds is the best of the three in a lot of cases.  With confounding being the second best.  Confounding would be a lot better if it said "a dazed target that is dazed again is stunned". Stunning steel which isn't covered seems like it might be better than any of the others, since any hit is stun.  really unsure what the benefit of adding immobilized to stun is since save ends both, this power is probably best if you can reach two creatures.  Do a lot of people play two weapon rangers compared to bow rangers?



Korror said:


> Hmm, I think you're right about Confounding Arrows. I usually rate stun powers higher than B- so I'm not quite sure why I gave it the low rating. One thing I think that prevents it from being an A level power is that you have to decide how many shots to allocate to each target before you see if they hit. Optimally, you'd want to have 2 hit and then the third directed at a secondary target but you have no guarantee that you'll hit with the first two which forces you to allocate all 3 shots at the target you want stunned. Still, I'd say it's a B+ on a secondary look.



does it say you have to define your targets before any attack rolls are made?



Korror said:


> As for Blade Cascade, I believe it's still the most damaging daily even after the errta. I'll run the math when I have time but I think with good preperation (getting CA and other party members to apply penalties to AC) it does enough damage to kill or get close to kill a normal level 15 target and, as Keterys has put it, dead is the ultimate status effect.



I think on average you'll get less than 3 hits.  I guess if you have elven accuracy this number might change (but you're adding another power to the mix). If your normal chance to hit is 50% and you have CA and some other bonus worth +2 you're looking at 70% hit.  You drop to roughly 50% chance of getting 2 or more hits right away.  Even if you bump this up to 80% you're below 50% by the 3rd hit.  With elven accuracy you can pump this up but there's a decent chance you'll fail on the very first roll... hardly the most damaging daily.  



keterys said:


> Spiritual Weapon doesn't technically follow a target at all as written, so some of its effectiveness will depend on how the DM rules that one. In some games, it requires both a move action and minor action to give its combat advantage since an enemy can freely move away from it. In other games, it autofollows. Anyone seen anything official on that one?



I would say it definitely doesn't follow the creature, you have to move it.  This definitely weakens it but it's still pretty powerful, and I would say more valuable on average than wotg but party composition is definitely a factor here.



keterys said:


> That said, Combat advantage does not stack and melee combatants are easily able to get combat advantage. -2 to AC does (all penalties stack), so the only loss of synergy is once everyone hits on a 2... at which point no one really cares as much anyways. So SW helps certain parties more than wotg helps certain parties. One costs an action every round and a standard action up front, the other doesn't. That's pretty important too.



I didn't realize all penalties stack.  I agree the action cost is significant especially as clerics need their minors for healing word but there are a lot of rounds where a zap cleric can fire off a ranged attack without moving and get a second attack off with this power.  Delaying or readying a move action to follow a creature with the SW defeats any planned escape a creature can plot other than a double move away from battle which has it's own utility.  Not many powers let a zap cleric get a second attack per round.  The added bonus of CA for the entire group is pretty strong, especially if you have a rogue.  getting CA is agreeably not very difficult but this power allows you to gain CA on the controller/leader in the back row from round one and for anyone who wants to pound him.  Suddenly your wizard, warlock, ranger and rogue can all reach out and touch the guy in the back with CA while his row of soldiers is still on it's feat, could change a battle quite a bit if you thrash the orc eye of gruumsh in the first two rounds before cutting your way through 5 raiders, a berzerker and 6 warriors for instance.



keterys said:


> WotG can also affect multiple opponents when used with close and area attacks or multiple target melee and ranged attacks.



agreed but how potent is this?  you're likely trying to concentrate damage onto one target anyway so having two or three to choose from has a diminished ROI.



Korror said:


> Always good to have more people chime in with their opinions.



thanks.



Korror said:


> I've tried to get my party to use web by giving them a special trinket that let them cast web once per day but they are still reluctant to use it. The main problem is that the player who was playing a wizard decided that he really wanted to play a swordmage and abandoned the class. My group never really had problems with minions so I had to resort to lowering the minions XP cost in order to balance the encounter levels (shhh don't tell them). They had more an enough effect ways to remove minions (twin strike, cleave, sword burst) that he felt that he wasn't contributing. I'm not sure that the wizard has more ability to prevent the NPCs from attacking until he hits around level 15. But of course, I haven't gotten up to that level yet as my party is just now hitting the end of heroic tier.



If you really want to focus on control you have to sort of commit to it.  Personally I think this opens the door to a vastly underpowered party because the damage wizard is exponentially more valuable to the party.  Sphere alone is one encounter per day that the wizard can semi dominate.  Our campaign is pretty dangerous.  I think we've played through about 9 levels (4 the first time and 5 the second) We've never lost a pc in a combat involving sphere and I think that says something.  Relative to other powers sphere is sort of a no brainer.  Pretty much the best level one power of any PHB1 class.


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## keterys (Mar 6, 2009)

I guess I don't quite understand the discussion over Spiritual Weapon vs. Weapon of the Gods. They're both A powers, which basically means they're amazingly good and both worth taking. Depending on your party one might be more worthwhile than another, but no matter what your party will be happy to have one of them. Even if no one in the party targets AC except a single ranger who only uses twin strike, WotG still just a bucket of added damage over the course of the combat. Rogues will hug any cleric who has spiritual weapon, and ranged folks will probably cheerfully high-five. It's all good.


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 6, 2009)

Korror said:


> Curse of the Golden Mist / D
> Fireswarm / C-
> Tendrils of Thuban / B-
> Thirsting Maw / C



Fireswarm is probably better than a C-, it's possible to combine it with some sort of immobilization power and inflict pretty solid damage but in any event it's nothing special.

If you drop tendrils on a group and hit 2 or more creatures, it's pretty much guaranteed to do more damage than blade cascade.  And it immobilizes them.  I'm not sure why you give daze a better rating than immobilize.  Personally I like immobilize better unless the creature is a "leader" with minor actions that pump it's followers or inflict penalties on the pc's.  Coupled with actions that push, pull, slide, shift bad guys tendrils can be devastating.  It doesn't even have to hit every round to keep creatures immobilized.  They need to make a save or else they're locked down and even if they have a huge bonus to saves like an elite or solo you get a chance to pin them down again before they escape.  You can couple this with wintertouched and lasting frost which makes it easier to sustain and a lot more painful for those that are in it, some might call this a brutal combo.   

Renew the troops also seems like at least an A- (I would say A or A+) as it deals 3W dmg and might easily heal 100hp's of dmg without using surge.  Pretty mighty.  Even a miss is likely worth 50-70HP's of healing without a surge.  I disagree that all the damage will be concentrated on 1-2 characters as usually by this level the monsters are delivering some blasts and bursts.  The melee types seem to use more surges than the ranged types in 4e but we rarely leave an encounter without everyone getting hit, saving this power until everyone has 15-20 dmg doesn't seem that difficult.  Even if it only heals 3 pc's a healing surge plus cha for a fighter is likely worth 26+ for a fighter by level 15+ throw in another 22 or so for the other two and you're looking at 70'ish healing at worst on a hit.  Character hit points are about twice as valuable as monster hit points so 70 healing is roughly equivalent to 140 dmg in terms of winning encounters.



Korror said:


> Bigby's Grasping Hands / B-
> Blast of Cold / C
> Otilukes Resilient Sphere / B
> Prismatic Beams / B+
> ...



Once a wizard has deployed a cool daily that persists, worrying about using another daily with a minor seems silly.  This is 2 attacks at 2d10+int every round and immobilize. If neither creature escapes it's 4d10+20ish automatic damage for the price of a std action.  If one creature escapes you can hit it with the hand with a move action (2d10+10) and then slam it against the other with a std on the same turn.  This gives the possibility of delivering 4d10+20 to one creature and 2d10 to another.  Plus immobilizing them both.  This is ongoing blade cascade like damage.  Even if both creatures escape you get to use move actions as ATT so you can take two attacks without burning up any powers.  The benefit of sustainable powers is that you get to keep doing "encounter or daily power" dmg without using up any of your resources.  trust me when you're delivering 6d10+30 dmg 3-4 rounds after the spell is cast, you're going to be thinking wow this is a nice spell.  Lets not forget you're "grabbing" two creatures who are forced to use their move action to try and escape or take the guaranteed damage.  I find it hard to believe you won't trade your std and a minor for two creature held and 4d10+20 per round.  (incidently the +10 is based upon me assuming you're working with a +6 or +7 stat and a +3 implement (there's also the possibility of other feats, increasing this but 10 static seemed reasonable at level 15).   No real use vs a solo.

Blast of cold should be tossed out compared to the others.  

Otilukes is ok if it hits but kind of weak when compared to the others at this level.  Anything worth putting inside can probably cut it's way out in a relatively short time though this is effectively fixed duration stun that removes a monster from the battle for a while while the party gets busy on other targets.  While this is a benefit, it has no real affect on a solo other than delaying the encounter a couple rounds.  Very surprising to see it compared favorably to the hands.  If you miss, you get almost no benefit, just one immobilized save ends, no damage, no residual.  If you hit you basically remove a level equivalent bad guy for 3-6 turns depending on it's att power.  I popped open the MM and looked at the table of monsters by level.  I looked at githyanki gish and salamanders to see how the sphere might hold up in terms of duration vs a 15th level monster.  The gish can break out in about 3-4 rounds depending on if it is willing to expend it's AP.  The salamander archer is likely to stay held 5 rounds though a little luck has it out in 4.  So roughly half the time the power removes one bad guy for 4 rounds, good not great. Slightly less than half the time vs a soldier because soldiers have high reflex and soldiers are really who you want to grab up a leader or a controller makes a nice second choice.  Meanwhile hands is probably putting out enough damage to more than bloody 2 creatures in the same time and once the shell is open hands are still working the bad guys over.  More importantly hands almost never fail to deliver.  Because they persist you keep getting grab after grab (immobilize after immobilize) which can brutalize a group of powerful melee creatures.  It's sort of a toss up which is better if sphere hits because removing a bad guy for a few rounds can help the party get control of the situation but roughly half the time sphere does nothing while hands keep filling the room with the sound of clapping ogre heads...

Prismatic beams... a tiny shadow of the damage of hands other than you might catch 2-4 targets initially.  Odds are pretty good only 1 target gets pounded.  Once again daze is not overwhelming for many creatures.  It does inhibit but immobilize can do far more since it cripple melee creatures while daze cripples neither ranged nor melee types.  



Korror said:


> *Wall of Ice* is what you have all been waiting for. A wall 12 can completely surround two adjacent squares. It does 4d6 to each creature attempting to break the wall down and doesn't even require an attack roll. Aside from blade cascade, I'd say this is the most powerful level 15 daily.



Wall is pretty solid, you can couple this with the winter touched and lasting frost combo to up it's power and Pain.  Using a physical wall you can even encircle a couple of large creatures.  In a 10' wide hallway you could completely crush a medium size group of monsters by running the wall down one side of a hall and closing off both ends with a double thickness, the amount of damage the group will take before they get out it very impressive. the W's represent the 12 squares of the wall of ice, the O's represent 4 monsters walking down a corridor.  

|WW|
|WW|
|WO|
|WO|
|WO|
|WO|
|WW|
|WW|

I'm unsure which is better wall or hands because in various situations either could be better.  In wide open geography wall has greatly decreased impact while hands seem to remain constant regardless of situation, but are ineffective against a solo where wall could trap a dragon with a stone wall as the 4th side.

my take on wizard powers.  
Bigby's Grasping Hands / A
Blast of Cold / C-
Otilukes Resilient Sphere / B
Prismatic Beams / B
Wall of Ice / A


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 6, 2009)

keterys said:


> I guess I don't quite understand the discussion over Spiritual Weapon vs. Weapon of the Gods. They're both A powers, which basically means they're amazingly good and both worth taking. Depending on your party one might be more worthwhile than another, but no matter what your party will be happy to have one of them. Even if no one in the party targets AC except a single ranger who only uses twin strike, WotG still just a bucket of added damage over the course of the combat. Rogues will hug any cleric who has spiritual weapon, and ranged folks will probably cheerfully high-five. It's all good.



Agreed.  I didn't look at the current ratings, I felt it was implied that WotG was rated higher, I honestly think that SW is better more often but clearly it's ambiguous and I can accept that it's situational enough to call it a wash.


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## Plane Sailing (Mar 6, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> Spiritual weapon grants combat advantage to the whole party regardless of the type of power they are using. There are alot of powers that don't attack AC, for instance warlocks and wizards will get +2 to their ATT vs a SW target but no benefit from the creature hit by weapon of the gods. SW also grants a pretty significant ATT as a minor. d10+wis+implement is ~3 times as much damage as d6.




Just wanted to say that Spiritual Weapon at 5th level makes Mordenkainens Sword for wizards at 9th look a little sad. granting CA to your mates as against attacking vs Ref instead of AC? Doesn't look like much of a contest


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## Plane Sailing (Mar 6, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> I'm not sure why you give daze a better rating than immobilize. Personally I like immobilize better unless the creature is a "leader" with minor actions that pump it's followers or inflict penalties on the pc's.




I can't speak for others, but the potential for charge attacks notwithstanding, the big benefits for daze to my mind are
a) grants CA
b) can't take immediate actions (no OA from him)
c) can't do one of his fancy attacks as charge only allows a basic attack 

(also, isn't there a rule about charge needing a minimum distance? If you are 1 sq away from him and he is dazed, he can neither attack you nor charge you, and if he moves/shifts closer he then doesn't have the attack available.

Immobilise, on the other hand, seems highly situational to me. Unless you've got one of the following situations:
a) it is flying
b) it is in a damaging area (e.g. wall of fire)
c) it is a melee only creature and you have a ranged-heavy party

it doesn't turn out to be much use - it doesn't hinder combat capability one iota if it is currently engaged in melee, and your fighter, paladin, warlord, rogue and 2wf ranger probably want to be engaging him in melee anyway.

Just my thoughts.
Cheers


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## keterys (Mar 6, 2009)

Plane Sailing covered it well, but daze is basically always useful (grants CA, limits actions) and immobilize is sometimes useful. Sometimes more useful than daze, absolutely (poor melee guy out of reach)... but even the +2 to attack to everyone often makes up for those moments, nevermind when you use it to avoid opportunity attacks, deny elites and solos their reactive or extra abilities, etc.


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## Korror (Mar 6, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> does it say you have to define your targets before any attack rolls are made?




Going off p.269 in the PHB, I think it works like this:

1) I announce I am making an attack
2) I announce the target(s) of my attack
3) Anyone who wishes to apply penalties or bonuses to my attack roll (such as disrupting strike) chimes in.
4) I make an attack roll for each target
5) I roll damage
6) I apply the damage to my targets

Going off this, you must select the targets for confounding arrows prior to making your attack roll.


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## keterys (Mar 6, 2009)

There is some argument on this point, with some DMs allowing you to select targets one at a time arguing that it's not handled like a close or area attack is, but rather a separate instance of an attack each time.

Fwiw, it's my overwhelming experience that you do need to pick targets in advance, so that's the assumption I'd likely operate under.


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 6, 2009)

Plane Sailing said:


> Just wanted to say that Spiritual Weapon at 5th level makes Mordenkainens Sword for wizards at 9th look a little sad. granting CA to your mates as against attacking vs Ref instead of AC? Doesn't look like much of a contest



My DM came up with a theory that different classes were created by different designers and the people who edited for "play balance" and put the stuff together weren't particularly good.  It appears as if the person who edited cleric was a lot more generous than other designers.  Compare shield of faith to sacred circle, or consecrated ground to pretty much any level 5 daily.  Clerics though slightly unglamorous from a damage and domination standpoint are arguably the most powerful class in PHB1.  



Plane Sailing said:


> I can't speak for others, but the potential for charge attacks notwithstanding, the big benefits for daze to my mind are
> a) grants CA
> b) can't take immediate actions (no OA from him)
> c) can't do one of his fancy attacks as charge only allows a basic attack
> ...



Thanks for this.  All good points though I disagree with a few of them at least partly.  Both powers are situational to a roughly equivalent amount.  Daze points In order:
A) CA is very good but a lot of characters can gain this is they need it especially vs an immobilized creature.  Keeping an attacker out of combat for a round has to be as good or better than this advantage 75% of the time.  

B) no OA can be important as can preventing him from participating in flanking, but both are also situational.  

C) preventing a fancy attack is an incremental gain in many cases.  Most monsters basic attack is their standard melee attack anyway so charging actually gives them a small benefit (+1 to hit). If they have an encounter power then dazing them for a round prevents them from discharging it this round but that just flip flops their actions from encounter/at-will to at-will/encounter.  Admittedly this can have a significant impact in certain situations (i.e. you prevent the creature from hitting as many pc's with it's burst because the pc's maneuver away from each other during the daze or several other possibilities)

Immobilize in order:
A) stopping flying is very situational agreed but still can be pretty powerful.

B) Obviously if the creature is in damaging terrain immobilize has a huge upside, agreeably situational but being in damaging terrain is not exactly a "rare occurrence" in 4e.  I would rate the chance to immobilize someone in damaging terrain as more valuable than preventing OA since as a rule I try to avoid giving up OA's as much as humanly possible.  

C) even if you have no ranged attacks at all, you've prevented a creature from participating in combat for a round.  There are a lot of creatures that are melee only or have vastly weaker ranged powers compared to their melee powers.  Since you get to control who is targeted you'll more often than not pick a creature(s) that suffers significantly from being immobilized.

Yes charge needs to move 2+ squares in a straight line.  If you're 1 square away he can't attack you (pretty situational that you'll be exactly one square away) but he can charge another member of the party.  Based upon my experiences with dazed creatures charging more often then not it's hard to make me believe this will frequently prevent the attacker from getting in an attack.  Most creatures move 6, so in order for there to be no targets he can charge there needs to be a 15 square box centered on the dazed guy that has no opponents in it other than those precisely at range 1.  Extremely situational.  Also, you're assuming that the dazed creature also is melee only.  If he has ranged attacks he still gets his normal attack.  You can just as easily shift 1 square away from an immobilized creature as you can from a dazed creature so I don't actually see any benefit to daze in this case.  

The real advantage of daze is almost exclusively centered in CA.  I think this is more than offset by the increased possibility of preventing him from attacking and the times you immobilize in unfavorable terrain.  

Clearly there's room for debate here but in my experience immobilize prevents a lot more attacks than daze.[/QUOTE]



keterys said:


> Plane Sailing covered it well, but daze is basically always useful (grants CA, limits actions) and immobilize is sometimes useful. Sometimes more useful than daze, absolutely (poor melee guy out of reach)... but even the +2 to attack to everyone often makes up for those moments, nevermind when you use it to avoid opportunity attacks, deny elites and solos their reactive or extra abilities, etc.



not sure I agree, though denying reactive powers to elites and solos is pretty powerful I also think this is pretty situational.(we haven't faced a lot of solo encounters in any of the campaigns I've played in. So my experience is limited to slaying two dragons in two different campaigns.) I went back at the email my dm sends out after every session with a recap and experience.  I would roughly estimate that 85-90% of encounters have targets that immobilize would prevent them from attacking.  Their are many monsters where this could be encounter changing in terms of the advantage of immobilize vs daze.  Ghouls are a good example. Possibly one of the most brutal 200 exp monsters in the game. Dazing a ghoul has almost no impact (CA) in comparison to preventing a ghoul from engaging with a player.



Korror said:


> Going off p.269 in the PHB, I think it works like this:
> 
> 1) I announce I am making an attack
> 2) I announce the target(s) of my attack
> ...



Thanks for this as well. Other than the argument that each attack is a separate attack (which I've seen made for other powers) this makes sense.  

I pondered this for a bit and I think actually that it would be 3 separate attacks given that if you were under the power of a +2 to next attack bonus, I wouldn't give you +2 all 3 times.  it's not critical to game play by any stretch but poses an interesting question.


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## Korror (Mar 7, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> Renew the troops also seems like at least an A- (I would say A or A+) as it deals 3W dmg and might easily heal 100hp's of dmg without using surge.  Pretty mighty.  Even a miss is likely worth 50-70HP's of healing without a surge.  I disagree that all the damage will be concentrated on 1-2 characters as usually by this level the monsters are delivering some blasts and bursts.  The melee types seem to use more surges than the ranged types in 4e but we rarely leave an encounter without everyone getting hit, saving this power until everyone has 15-20 dmg doesn't seem that difficult.  Even if it only heals 3 pc's a healing surge plus cha for a fighter is likely worth 26+ for a fighter by level 15+ throw in another 22 or so for the other two and you're looking at 70'ish healing at worst on a hit.  Character hit points are about twice as valuable as monster hit points so 70 healing is roughly equivalent to 140 dmg in terms of winning encounters.




An A+ power should be borderline broken (like twin strike) or solid overall and a major boost in every encounter (like beacon of hope). Renew the troops can potentially give everyone a healing surge back but I think the actually healing will rarely get up to the potential max. Think about it this way, does the warlord often have difficult decisions where two people need his inspiring word? Usually for our group there's just 1 person who is in danger. If you ever get to a case where everyone has taken significient damage, somebody is either being reckless or not defending the party properly.  Monsters with blast powers can change this but blasts  are usually encounter abilities and rarely do 1/4 of a PC's hps on their own.

That being said, there's not too much difference between a B+ and a A- so the power really could go either way. I don't think it has the flexibility to rate an unqualified A but it does have the raw power in certain situtations.




AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> Otilukes is ok if it hits but kind of weak when compared to the others at this level.  Anything worth putting inside can probably cut it's way out in a relatively short time though this is effectively fixed duration stun that removes a monster from the battle for a while while the party gets busy on other targets.  While this is a benefit, it has no real affect on a solo other than delaying the encounter a couple rounds.  Very surprising to see it compared favorably to the hands.  If you miss, you get almost no benefit, just one immobilized save ends, no damage, no residual.  If you hit you basically remove a level equivalent bad guy for 3-6 turns depending on it's att power.  I popped open the MM and looked at the table of monsters by level.  I looked at githyanki gish and salamanders to see how the sphere might hold up in terms of duration vs a 15th level monster.  The gish can break out in about 3-4 rounds depending on if it is willing to expend it's AP.  The salamander archer is likely to stay held 5 rounds though a little luck has it out in 4.  So roughly half the time the power removes one bad guy for 4 rounds, good not great. Slightly less than half the time vs a soldier because soldiers have high reflex and soldiers are really who you want to grab up a leader or a controller makes a nice second choice.  Meanwhile hands is probably putting out enough damage to more than bloody 2 creatures in the same time and once the shell is open hands are still working the bad guys over.  More importantly hands almost never fail to deliver.  Because they persist you keep getting grab after grab (immobilize after immobilize) which can brutalize a group of powerful melee creatures.  It's sort of a toss up which is better if sphere hits because removing a bad guy for a few rounds can help the party get control of the situation but roughly half the time sphere does nothing while hands keep filling the room with the sound of clapping ogre heads...




   One thing that you might be overlooking is that it an escape action only takes a move action and thus can be attempted twice and it targets the wizard's weakest defense (athletics vs fortitude) making it very likely that at least 1 creature will escape and move away. If both creatures escape and move then the wizard has to spend 2 movement actions and his minor to attempt to reacquire his targets. Giving up your move action is a big deal as you often have to shift to get away from an adjacent monster or move to get line of sight on another. I agree that the hands can do quite a bit of damage but you sacrifice too many of your own options for it be an A level power.

Otilukes on the other hand gives no option for escape if you hit. You know that the monster will be stuck there for 4-5 rounds or more if you target a leader or controller like the Drow Priestess who will be lucky to break out in 15-20 rounds. I don't rate it higher than a B power as it still needs to hit and doesn't do anything but hold a monster but it is still more "controlerish" than the hands.


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## Sitara (Mar 7, 2009)

On pain of Death is superior to Radiant Delirium. I mean, its 5 damage (save) is very powerful, especially at the level you get it. Great way to open up a battle with a boss.


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## keterys (Mar 7, 2009)

Radiant damage is an advantage on its own, due to its benefit against undead (extra damage, denying regeneration and other powers, etc)

Other than that, the +4 to hit equivalent plus action denial from radiant delirium is more valuable than a d8+modifiers damage. That said, I doubt I counted it as d8+modifiers and instead counted it as just a d8, so I should possibly bump up On Pain of Death as a result. Makes it more like 10 damage instead of 7 damage, equivalent.


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## keterys (Mar 8, 2009)

*Daily 15 Powers*

Okay, took a bit to do the spreadsheet to calc some expected damages over a range of targets so I could maybe compare some of these. I'm kinda assuming a midline of character optimization... damage dice are going to matter a lot than multiple attacks more to a character who is only +8 damage modifier at level 18, but more attacks kick butt for someone with +30, so different characters have some different needs in that respect.

*CLERIC*

B- / Holy Spark
B+ / Purifying Fire
B+ / Seal of Warding

*Holy Spark* Weapon attack vs. Will makes it very accurate - if you hit it's pretty decent, especially if you time it right to hit several enemies before your target even acts. On miss it's pretty lousy, and its damage effect is tempered a bit by enemies being able to avoid it after the first time.
*Purifying Fire* is a nice sized area of enemies only for considerable damage. The healing from it is pretty fiddly, but this is a dependable and solid performer.
*Seal of Warding* is a good sized close burst, enemies only, vs Will, for impressive damage. The zone's difficult terrain might be problematic or helpful and that's a little harder to control since you have to be stuck in the middle of it, but ranged cover and difficult terrain on demand might make the zone valuable. Even if not, it's a great damage close attack.

*FIGHTER*

B- / Dragon's Fangs
B / Serpent Dance Strike
A+ / Unyielding Avalanche

*Dragon's Fangs* is boring, but solid damage. 
*Serpent Dance Strike* is a little tricky to use well, but it's good for some shifts, attacks on a couple of enemies, and knocking prone is pretty helpful - especially for a fighter who can mark targets then be in a spot they can't attack/charge to easily.
*Unyielding Avalanche* is a little crazy really - standard 1W stance, but also with slow, which is fantastic for a defender... but with +1 AC and saves? Great! And... Con regeneration? Hard to say no.

*PALADIN*

C- / Bloodied Retribution
C / Break the Wall
B / True Nemesis

*Bloodied Retribution* is mostly a self-healing surge (with no bonus to it, and not even a free surge). 4W vs. AC isn't horrible, but it's definitely substandard damage compared to other level 15 dailies.
*Break the Wall* vs. Fort and short range with lackluster damage. The penalty to defenses is definitely good stuff, but it's a low penalty and save ends so unlikely to last long on enemies you need it for the most. I guess considering it +10% to your allies' damage for one round is not a bad way of thinking about it.
*True Nemesis* is vs Will, which is good... it is low damage and short range, but it puts a sorta 'Super Mark' on the target. This power will see its best effect when combined with a second defender who can actually mark the target, making the target screwed if they can't hit both.

*RANGER*

A- / Blade Cascade
A- / Bleeding Wounds
A / Confounding Arrows
A / Stunning Steel

*Blade Cascade* is actually outright rotten damage under most circumstances, but gamed properly (don't bother unless you hit on a 2 or 3, preferably with a reroll available, pretty much) its burst potential is extremely high and it's a power multiplier due to the number of attacks. A pet TacLord and a source of a reroll will definitely help here to optimize its damage and up its personal grading. I know this one will be surprising to some... it actually averages less than the Fighter's Dragon's Fangs under most circumstances, though, and that has to count for something.
*Bleeding Wounds* is deceptive - it's actually a bucket of potential damage once you do the math and very flexible about where you place it. Its expected damage and versatility is higher than Blade Cascade under normal circumstances, but it doesn't peak nearly as close.
*Confounding Arrows* is okay damage in a versatile package, though it's slightly tricky to use. Its main strengths are in Dazing even on a miss on up to three targets, and in extremely high chance to stun (save ends) a single target.
*Stunning Steel is a weapon attack vs Fort that stun (save ends) on each of two attacks, allowing two targets to be stunned or one to be almost certainly stunned. Its damage isn't amazing, but it's certainly respectable enough given the very powerful effect.

*ROGUE*

C / Bloody Path
B+ / Garotte Grip
C / Slaying Strike

Bloody Path is certainly fun and it is a way to move speed without provoking any OAs, which is okay... but it's immensely dependent on enemy positioning and damage output. Thankfully monster basic attacks are often very good damage and sometimes have special effects, but their chances to hit themselves are often unimpressive. 
Garotte Grip is autohit and minor if you can setup grab in some manner, so it may often be worth doing that instead of just using it as a standard attack. Its damage is not that special, but gaining cover and body shield is quite cool. Unfortunately, the chance of sustaining it three times for the coup de grace is extremely unlikely to be of great use.
Slaying Strike is deceptive. It looks like it must do a lot of damage and hey that's a big crit range, and certainly it's easy to find a bloodied enemy... but Ws aren't that great for rogues in general, a single attack is just worse than multiples, and a rogue crit on a bloodied target has significant chance of blow-through. Tack on that a character will likely have an expanded crit range for much of the time they possess the power and it's very disappointing output compared to other daily 15s.

*WARLOCK*

NA / Curse of the Golden Mist
C- / Fireswarm
A / Tendrils of Thuban
C- / Thirsting Maw

Curse of the Golden Mist is pretty awful in one sense - it's only really worth using on a creature that is flat out more useful than the caster, and ensures that the game is now going to be more boring for the caster and target... but it technically can have semi-broken results when used against solo creatures. For instance, the poor Tarrasque is completely screwed by a repeating Will attack to render it useless. I'm currently grading it Not Applicable with the suggestion that no one take it or base any power balance off it because powers shouldn't just be a more powerful version of it, either. They just should be designed completely differently.
Fireswarm can be high damage potential if you can position enemies well for it and/or get a nice string of hits, but it's slow and steady damage and replacing actions (sustain standard) you could otherwise eldritch blast (or whatever). At least fire and poison both will dodge a lot of resistances.
Tendrils of Thuban is an area immobilze that does good damage, and the sustain minor attacks again and immobilizes. With a little work you can keep a melee enemy locked down for a very long time with no way to get out (which is why I'm rating this as highly as I am, much to some folks' surprise I suspect). Solid damage, powerful control effect, nice sustain.
Thirsting Maw is a pretty cool concept, but it's short range, vs Fort, the target is likely to save pretty quickly, not much going on if it misses, and the amount you heal is quite low.

*WARLORD*

D+ / Make Them Bleed
B- / Renew the Troops
D- / Warlord's Gambit

Make Them Bleed is basically a very lackluster attack and 'ongoing 5 damage (until the enemy dies)'... and the ongoing damage is very cool in that way, but damage up front is just flat out better and since it doesn't stack in any way it's actually not even all that much damage over the course of the entire fight (barring a crazy 20 round fight, in which case it will catch up to the damage that some daily 15s do in one action.
Renew the Troops is basically Mass Cure Light Wounds (Utility 10) with slightly better range and healing a bunch less if you fail to hit. In truth, it would possibly be a better power if it did no damage and didn't make an attack at all. In the meantime, it is a big chunk of free healing which is still appreciated in the right circumstances. If you're not worried about surges, though, Stand the Fallen (level 5) is probably a better power so its rating can only be so good.
Warlord's Gambit is generally rubbish, since it's a lousy attack tied to giving the enemy a bonus if it attacks you. The bonus has a significant penalty, but the enemy gets to decide when to trigger it pretty often. That said, this power could see good use with multiclassing for a defender who wants to be attacked anyways. I'd like to see that an inspiring warlord with paladin multiclass could get good use out of it, but his Int would probably suck for how close the allies would have to be to get the free basic attack.

*WIZARD*

B+ / Bigby's Grasping Hands
C+ / Blast of Cold
B- / Otiluke's Resilient Sphere
A- / Prismatic Beams
A+ / Wall of Ice

Bigby's Grasping Hands is likely an action hog, potentially using up all of them in any particular turn, but grabbed is helpful, its damage is solid, and honestly clapping enemies together is a little hilarious. 
Blast of Cold is moderate AoE damage with an immobilize which can be good... but slow on a close attack is pretty dubious and it's just save ends so it doesn't have the persistence of many dailies at this level. It is enemies only, though, so this has nice synergy with putting it right on top of your defender.
Otiluke's Resilient Sphere is a peculiar spell that won't be for most people, but it removes most enemies from the fight for multiple rounds (effectively for the fight, in a lot of cases), immobilizes on a miss, and can be used defensively in rare circumstances. 
Prismatic Beams is a large close burst of enemies only that actually does solid damage and dazes. It's pretty unforgiving of low rolls, but its expected damage output can be quite high and dazed enemies are easy to disengage from.
Wall of Ice is absolutely brutal. You get automatic damage against any enemy you put next to it, can truly screw certain enemies if they're trapped inside it, etc.*


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## keterys (Mar 8, 2009)

APC, if you strongly feel that immobilized is better than dazed, then simply consider all immobilized powers to be an appropriate amount stronger in grading. 

If you were ranking conditions on a scale from 1 to 10, how would you rank the following?

Stunned
Dazed
Immobilized
Prone
Weakened


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## Korror (Mar 9, 2009)

You're right, I am surprised that you rate *Tendrils of Thuban *so highly. It's not a bad daily and it's probably better than the other options at level 15 but it still only inflicts immobilize which I say one of the weaker effects. Would you rate a power that did "immobilize (save ends) Saves against this power have a -5 to the roll" as a A grade power?

You rate the rogue and warlord dailies as all-subpar which strikes me as a bit odd. What are they lacking in comparison to? It's not like the warlord or rogue have the option of taking another classes dailies and none are all that bad in comparison to the other dailies rogues and warlords get.

I also think that Bloody Path and Garotte Grip are worth at least Bs. You can get a large number of attacks with *Bloody Path* and certain monsters are going to be very vulnerable to *Garotte Grip *becauseoftheir low STR scores. Consider the case of the poor Drow Priestess who is reduced to making +8 attacks against the rogue who should have a fort defense around 23 if he is an artful dodger and around 28 if he is a brutal scoundrel. The strongest monsters can count on a bonus anywhere from +13-15 which still gives the rogue good odds of maintaining the grab for 1-2 during which attacks directed against him have a good chance of hurting his poor target further. To sum up, *Garotte Grip *is very powerful assuming that you are a brutal scoundrel and your target is humanoid or does not have a large strength bonus.

(I'm not quite sure of the numbers for a rogue's fortitude defense, I pull them from a build posted online and did some quick conversions to get them at level 15. They also included a belt of vim which may not be an option in every game)


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## keterys (Mar 9, 2009)

Korror said:


> You're right, I am surprised that you rate *Tendrils of Thuban *so highly. It's not a bad daily and it's probably better than the other options at level 15 but it still only inflicts immobilize which I say one of the weaker effects. Would you rate a power that did "immobilize (save ends) Saves against this power have a -5 to the roll" as a A grade power?




Depends how easy it was to increase that save penalty since immobilize (no save) is completely incapacitating for a number of creatures. What would you rate a power that was 'ongoing 10 damage and immobilize (no save)'? 



> You rate the rogue and warlord dailies as all-subpar which strikes me as a bit odd. What are they lacking in comparison to?




They're largely victims of the fact that all of the other dailies are better than them. For example, if you might expect Bloody Path or Slaying Strike to do 30-40 damage on average, but that Dragon's Fangs might do 60, Bleeding Wounds 75, Unyielding Avalanche 150, etc... how could you not rate them lower?



> It's not like the warlord or rogue have the option of taking another classes dailies and none are all that bad in comparison to the other dailies rogues and warlords get.




They certainly can, with multiclassing and other features. They can also take their own lower level dailies. Or ones from other sources.



> I also think that Bloody Path and Garotte Grip are worth at least Bs. You can get a large number of attacks with *Bloody Path*




Sure, let's say you're level 22 and bloody path past a Death Giant, Hezrou, Rot Slinger, and Efreet Fireblade (pretty much the whole selection of normal level 22 monsters). On average:
Death Giant hits itself for ~10.8
Hezrou hits itself for ~12
Rot Slinger hits itself ~7.2 (and ongoing 10 necrotic that it ignores)
Efreet Fireblade hits itself ~11

For what it's worth, a Shock Sphere (level 3 encounter) would do more damage than that, by and large.

I think Bloody Path is one of the coolest powers, so I'm very sad that it's not more effective. If it were a move action, I think that'd probably do the trick. 



> Consider the case of the poor Drow Priestess




I'd actually contend that the Drow Priestess isn't worth using Garotte on in the first place, since she's a non-elite or solo threat of equal or lower level to the rogue who will die easily by just being attacked by the group for all of a round... but, that's a fair point that Brutal Scoundrels can actually get their Fort defense up quite a bit higher than I'd been factoring. So, it's very low damage no matter how you cut it, so effectively it's an immobilize attack and 'detaunt' combined. 



> To sum up, *Garotte Grip *is very powerful assuming that you are a brutal scoundrel and your target is humanoid or does not have a large strength bonus.




Sounds good, I'll up it. I actually like the power a lot, but I do think that between a push/pull/slide attack (which will break the grab, regardless of whether it hits the rogue or the target), "free" move action attempts to duck out, teleports, and just the target flat out dying, it's pretty unlikely that the 3 round-delayed unconscious will be that much use.


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## keterys (Mar 9, 2009)

Fwiw, I'm playing an Inspiring Warlord now... and Stand the Fallen (level 5) is actually a better power for the play that I've experienced so far than Renew the Troops (level 15). In a Wight heavy area, Renewing certainly has a lot going for it, but Stand the Fallen is exactly as much damage and reliably more healing and running out of surges has oh so rarely been an issue.

That said, other groups seem to have issues with people running out of surges so I'll bump it upwards a little so at least it counts as an above average level 15 rather than an average one


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## keterys (Mar 9, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> My DM came up with a theory that different classes were created by different designers and the people who edited for "play balance" and put the stuff together weren't particularly good.  It appears as if the person who edited cleric was a lot more generous than other designers.  Compare shield of faith to sacred circle, or consecrated ground to pretty much any level 5 daily.  Clerics though slightly unglamorous from a damage and domination standpoint are arguably the most powerful class in PHB1.




This kind of thing is part of what prompted me to start this project, yep.



> A) CA is very good but a lot of characters can gain this is they need it especially vs an immobilized creature.  Keeping an attacker out of combat for a round has to be as good or better than this advantage 75% of the time.



If melee are gaining CA against an immobilized target, then that highly limits the potential effect of the immobilize.



> A) stopping flying is very situational agreed but still can be pretty powerful.



I wish less fliers could hover. 



> Also, you're assuming that the dazed creature also is melee only.



Not really - but the immobilize trick is only useful on melee only monsters, so it was to show the effect of daze on a melee only monster. The defender can similarly shift back 1 square and the creature can't engage the defender so might have to charge someone other than the defender, possibly provoking, etc - I've actually done this with my fighter and stopped a monster's movement (and turn).

Similarly if you daze a ranged combatant, they have to choose whether to provoke OAs when they make a ranged attack or to fall back on a crappier melee option. 

Immobilize and Daze are both very good options, though worse than stunned. Immobilize is situationally useful. Daze is universally useful. I do think I'll make a pass through the powers at some point to make sure I didn't mark immobilize lower than I should have, though. If you see any in particular, feel free to call them out.



> Clearly there's room for debate here but in my experience immobilize prevents a lot more attacks than daze.



I'd imagine so - but that assumes you're all that worried about preventing attacks. Focused fire and killing things prevents attacks too, after all 



> Thanks for this as well. Other than the argument that each attack is a separate attack (which I've seen made for other powers) this makes sense.
> 
> I pondered this for a bit and I think actually that it would be 3 separate attacks given that if you were under the power of a +2 to next attack bonus, I wouldn't give you +2 all 3 times.  it's not critical to game play by any stretch but poses an interesting question.



There's a shaman power that does back up the argument that you have to declare targets, then resolve:

*Effect:* Make the attack one more time against the same target or a different one. 

That Effect is unnecessary if 'two attacks' allows you to resolve one attack then decide the next... so either the designer was misinformed on the rule, or the interpretation that you have to declare targets for all the attacks is RAW.


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## keterys (Mar 9, 2009)

Korror said:


> *Cleric*
> B+ / Holy Spark
> B / Purifying Fire
> B- / Seal of Warding
> ...




It can actually be pretty cool for clearing out minions and some other things - it's a very large area that it covers potentially.

*



			Purifying Fire
		
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*


> is yet another effective cleric ranged AoE. The fact that it doesn't target allies makes it safe to drop on your defender. The problem is that the healing side effect is dependent on the turn order so if the NPC goes first and saves against the ongoing damage then your allies lose out on the healing.




One nice thing is you can hit multiple enemies with it, and you can get the healing until they all save, so that does suggest you'll probably get at least a couple allies with the healing. I think you might be discounting how much raw damage Purifying Fire can do, at least when comparing the scores of Holy Spark and Purifying (since both just do damage). I'd actually expect Purifying Flames to do a good 50% more damage, and have the healing side effect.

*



			Seal of Warding
		
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*


> gets slightly downranked because I'm of the opinion that Close burst powers are harder to use as effectively as ranged burst powers for a wisdom based cleric. The zone effect is nice but at level 15 you will want all your actions and shouldn't tie up for minor action for such as small effect.




Clerics often hang out within 5 squares of their enemies, which makes them fairly easy to come into melee contact with enemies. Further, this power does not require Charisma in any way, so many battle clerics (who are right up in melee) would be able to take it and close attacks work quite well for melee types. Close burst 3 (7 x 7 area centered on the cleric, does not provoke) is not necessarily worse than Area burst 2 within 10 (5x5 area within not too many squares, provokes) - just different  I'd not be surprised if the zone isn't sustained, but slowing all the enemies around you then making everything difficult terrain does make it hard to shift or even move anywhere at all which can be pretty helpful. 



> *Fighter*
> Dragon's Fangs / C+
> Serpent Dance Strike / B -
> Unyielding Avalanche / A
> ...




Yeah, the damage range on level 15 dailies is a little wonky honestly. In the end I spreadsheeted an expected damage for all powers of that level and this one fell in a rough middle area, so I went with C+ for it (it's dreadfully boring and straightforward and really does seem like the textbook of an 'okay' but not exceptional daily) and based my damage comparisons around its. If I upped it to somewhere in the B range, then I would up  all the other ones based on damage.
*



			Sepent Dance Strike
		
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*


> is another one of the shift and attack powers capping out at 4 targets. This power is unlikely to be able to be used to maximum effect in every battle but since it's a daily you can wait and save it for when it is most effective.




Yeah, I wanted to mark it a B- like you did, but I really think its difficulty in using optimally is a real disad. After all, you can save it until it's most effective... but if that means you don't use it in a day, or you save it from when it's 'good' to the last fight when it's 'sorta awful' then that doesn't quite work out. 
*



			Unyielding Avalanche
		
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*


> is the best stance power the fighter has so far. Regeneration, an AC bonus and best of all, an auto hit attack against everyone next to you that slows makes this stance very very good.




I was tempted by A+ for this one, but held off... but still, wow. Especially in the hands of a fighter with a good Con this can heal a ton and slowed enemies are hard pressed to disengage, and hoo boy the damage potential. It's not bursted like Blade Cascade's, but it can do buckets more damage in most combats.



> *Paladin*
> 
> Bloodied Retribution / C -
> Break the Wall / C +
> ...




I really do think this would have been a pretty spot on level 5 daily.

*



			Break the Wall
		
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*


> is at least useful for setting up other PC's powers but on the whole, there's nothing too special about this power which even targets a defence that is usually as high as AC.




Curious, why did you set it so high? Range 5, against Fortitude, low penalty that doesn't persist long, low damage. The idea is certainly sound, it's not a horrible daily, but that's just a lot of negatives against it that I'd think would drag it it down below average (C+ being average)

*



			True Nemesis
		
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*


> is better than it looks at first glance. Notice that the secondary effect lasts the whole encounter and triggers even on a miss. The reaction attack also does damage on a miss so if the paladin can stay within 5 squares of his target, he's certain to do at least 1d10 + CHA/2 damage per round.




Yeah, True Nemesis is pretty darn cool - honestly combined with a different defender marking the target it'll really tear up a lot of Elites and Solos.



> *Ranger*
> 
> Blade Cascade / A+
> Bleeding Wounds / D
> ...




Because it does no damage on miss and the sequence stops when you miss, you _really_ have to set things up so that you need a 2 or 3 to hit before it's worth using at all. Even then, you probably want a reroll available to ensure you're really capitalizing on its damage output. The errata-ed version is still very powerful, but it's just damage and has a huge requirement - so if you don't end up meeting the appropriate attack conditions, fight a foe who doesn't have enough hp to make it really matter, etc its damage plummets horribly. I don't think this is broken powerful anymore.

*



			Bleeding Wounds
		
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*


> . Lackluster damage considering that 5 ongoing isn't very much around level 15. Level 9 Dailies do more damage.



*

*I hope the earlier charts disproved this enough for you - basically it's a better power than Blade Cascade unless you need a 2 or 3 to hit.
* 



			Confounding Arrows
		
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*


> is a stunning power which is very powerful. Stun is 2nd most useful status effect to inflict and can be quite effective on a dangerous NPC.




The damage is pretty darn good, too, even without damage on miss. More damage than Blade Cascade until like 7 or less to hit.



> *Rogue*
> 
> Bloody Path / B
> Garrote Grip / A+
> ...




Monsters need ~10 to hit themselves, so a lot of them miss, and it's hard to trigger from _that_ many critters at once... but it's damn fun, so I wish I could rate it higher.

*



			Garrote Grip
		
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*


> 's power depends on if you can relyable substain the grab. Most monsters don't have an acrobatics or althetics score listed so I assume that they'll be reduced to making STR vs fort tests to escape. I think this means you shouldn't have many difficulties holding the grab for 3 rounds.




Teleport, any type of forced movement, daze, stun, can all screw up these plans (and those kinds of things certainly appear at the level 15-30 range that this power will be used at), but it is potentially harder to get out than I was dismissing... but I don't see what part of it is actually broken or close to broken?

*



			Slaying Strike
		
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*


> is not truely a bad power but it does rely on getting a foe to bloodied. From what I've seen in our games, the strikers generally wanted to unload their dailies as quickly as possible and I don't think they would have liked to wait until their dangerous target was bloodied.




Bloodied is a restriction, but it's not a crippling one. The real problem is that multiple attacks just do crazy more damage than single attacks so a pure damage single attack starts to look worse and worse as you get higher level. Like the much laughed at 'No Mercy' or 'Godstrike' that do less damage than some level 1 dailies, level 3 encounters, etc.


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## keterys (Mar 9, 2009)

Korror said:


> Ok, I have some more time so here goes the warlock, warlord, and wizard analysis.




Pretty neat having stuff to reply to, right after looking at stuff  Thanks again.



> *Warlock*
> 
> Curse of the Golden Mist / D
> Fireswarm / C-
> ...




The thing that gets me the most is that it's just boring. It just slows the combat down and makes it less interesting for everyone.



> * Fireswarm *is another sustain standard power which becomes worse the more powers you have and better options for your standard action become available. The damage is good but NPCs can easily avoid the splash damage on the later turns.




Actually, I need to mark this down more than I did - I see that my calculation assumed it was a damage increase over eldritch blast if it hit, but Eldritch Blast actually goes to 2d10 in epic so then it's just the half miss. Oops.



> *Tendrils of Thuban* is only halfway decent because how difficult it is to get out of the zone once the NPC is stuck in it. Since the NPC saves at the end of its turn, it leaves itself open for being immobilized again by the power's continued effect.




Yep - in order to escape it needs to make a save, be missed by the attack, and be able to move out of the area then not get knocked back into it. And in the meantime allies can knock people into it and the sustain lets you attack new people. And each time it immobilizes for 1.5 turns and does another 20 damage or whatever. Most powers are save ends or attack ends, and this is both, on an effect that is effectively a stun for certain enemies - the real consolation is that most melee only enemies have a good Fortitude, which tempers this power considerably.



> *Thirsting Maw* does low damage coinciding it is a level 15 daily. There might be some use for it considering the new warlock feats that let you deal damage to yourself in exchange for benefits but I don't know those feats well enough to comment.




Yeah... which is a shame since it's actually a pretty cool idea, just really low output.



> *Warlord*
> 
> Make Them Bleed / B (D if the ongoing damage doesn't stack)
> Renew the Troops / B+
> ...




It doesn't stack, so yeah... that target will totally have ongoing damage 5 right up until the point it dies... but that's all.



> *Renew the Troops* heals without using a healing surge which is quite handy in a pinch. You're rarely going to be able to use this to heal everyone because damage is usually concentrated on 1-2 PCs but every bit helps.




So, you don't need surgeless healing _that_ often... maybe all the games I've seen are atypical, but once someone gets down to 1 or 0, you know you're about to rest or you start drawing on certain magic items or utility powers. So, then you're 1-2 targets has to come from someone who is having surge issues for this to be truly worthwhile. It's extraordinarily comparable to the level 5 Stand the Fallen... which, granted, is a very good power, but it's a little disturbing how little has changed in 10 levels. Do other people run into needing surge free healing a _lot_? I 'get' powers like Mass Cure Light Wounds (a level 10 utility which I'd consider at least as useful as this power) a lot more.



> *Warlord's Gambit* has the nasty problem of giving your opponent choices. If it's beneficial to hit you, the NPC is going to enjoy the attack bonuses and if its not then the effect is wasted. The penalty of having an ally make a basic attack against it is not that prohibitive as its roughly the same as a fighter's mark which monsters ignore if the benefits are high enough.




Yeah... I really don't get what was going on here. 



> *Wizard*
> 
> This is the level that wizards start to really play with the good spells. Up to now, their dailies have been not that interesting but from now on wizards get spells that really control the battlefield.




Flaming Sphere, Stinking Cloud, and Wall of Fire would beg to differ 



> Bigby's Grasping Hands / B-
> Blast of Cold / C
> Otilukes Resilient Sphere / B
> Prismatic Beams / B+
> ...




Sure, but those other options are dailies. Wizards can mostly pick a daily attack to use for a fight, then ride it to the end - they don't have much use for their minor actions otherwise (occasional mage hand to pick up something or swap an implement). The potential damage output on Bigby's is sizable and as you already pointed out it's not _that_ easy to break out of grabs - and a grab by a conjuration has the potential effective stun on certain combatants.



> *Blast of Cold*. Remember buring hands, thunderwave, color spray, thunderlance? If you do, then you already know Blast of Cold, the latest and not the greatest in the series of close blast powers that do damage and a minor status effect.




Heh, pretty much. If it immobilized even on miss, this would probably be a lot more popular.



> *Otilukes Resilient Sphere* is excellent for isolating a dangerous foe for several rounds while the rest of the party cleans of the rest of the NPCs. The only problem is that you need to hit on that attack roll as the miss effect is nothing to write home about.




While I don't think immobilize is as strong as APC does, I think you might be discounting its effect a bit too sharply. It's no stun, but it's also no Slow or Weaken 



> *Prismatic Beams* is amazing if you roll high. If all three beams hit which will happen more often the only some of them hitting, the target takes 4d6 + 2 INT, 10 ongoing and is dazed. Dazed is one of the nasty status effects to inflict and it is keyed off the lowest defense.




Pretty much agreed. Double modifiers (int, focus, enhancement, temporary bonuses like TacLord AP use, etc) really lets this do very good damage.



> *Wall of Ice* is what you have all been waiting for. A wall 12 can completely surround two adjacent squares. It does 4d6 to each creature attempting to break the wall down and doesn't even require an attack roll. Aside from blade cascade, I'd say this is the most powerful level 15 daily.




This is the other one I think might potentially be an A+ - it's a lot less clear than on some, like say Consecrated Ground or the original Blade Cascade, that any of the 15s are broken... With the right terrain, or even without it for a couple creatures you completely enclose, you _really_ screw some targets with the amount of automatic damage output.


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## Korror (Mar 9, 2009)

keterys said:


> Yeah, I wanted to mark it a B- like you did, but I really think its difficulty in using optimally is a real disad. After all, you can save it until it's most effective... but if that means you don't use it in a day, or you save it from when it's 'good' to the last fight when it's 'sorta awful' then that doesn't quite work out.




I think you can count on getting a cluster of 4 enemies near the fight at least once in an encounter. The fighter in our party used to love passing attack (he eventually switched out to a barbarian) and found a use for it in pretty much every encounter. Passing attack only needs 2 close together and not 4 like *                             Serpent Dance Strike *but since the monsters often get stuck in around the fighter, I think it's a decent power.

Of course it pales in comparison to *                             Unyielding Avalanche *but that's probably a sign that Unyielding Avalanche is too good rather than Serpent Dance Strike being bad.




keterys said:


> Curious, why did you set it so high? Range 5, against Fortitude, low penalty that doesn't persist long, low damage. The idea is certainly sound, it's not a horrible daily, but that's just a lot of negatives against it that I'd think would drag it it down below average (C+ being average)





C+ is not average, a power that was perfect balanced in every possible way would be a B based on the scale on page 1. C+ is for powers that are underpowered in general but may be alright in certain situations. Break the Wall is conceivable useful against targets being focused fired down as the defense penalty is nice in that situation. However, I agree with you that the other powers are certainly better.



keterys said:


> Because it does no damage on miss and the sequence stops when you miss, you _really_ have to set things up so that you need a 2 or 3 to hit before it's worth using at all. Even then, you probably want a reroll available to ensure you're really capitalizing on its damage output. The errata-ed version is still very powerful, but it's just damage and has a huge requirement - so if you don't end up meeting the appropriate attack conditions, fight a foe who doesn't have enough hp to make it really matter, etc its damage plummets horribly. I don't think this is broken powerful anymore.




My thought is that if it was broken before, it's still pretty powerful now. 5 attacks is still more than you're going to get with any other daily. If you rarely got >5 attacks on old version, then it wouldn't have needed an errata and the outcry over the power was unjustified. So either the new version is still powerful or people were making a lot of fuss over nothing before.



keterys said:


> Monsters need ~10 to hit themselves, so a lot of them miss, and it's hard to trigger from _that_ many critters at once... but it's damn fun, so I wish I could rate it higher.




Yea, I agree this power could use some help. I didn't account for how little damage monsters generally did when I first went over the power.



keterys said:


> Teleport, any type of forced movement, daze, stun, can all screw up these plans (and those kinds of things certainly appear at the level 15-30 range that this power will be used at), but it is potentially harder to get out than I was dismissing... but I don't see what part of it is actually broken or close to broken?




Anything that denies actions or causes the unconscious effect has the potential to be broken and while I won't say that Garrote Grip is broken ( I'd move it down to a A- or B+ since I forgot that monsters could make 2 actions to escape) I think that the combination of automatic grab/cover+redirection/chance of unconsciousness make it quite powerful. I also don't think push/teleport/daze/stun effects are that prevalent for monsters. PC have tons of those effects but for monsters those abilities are rare and often encounter powers.

Here's a list of all the level 15 monsters which should be a good sample of the kinds of targets a rogue might face.

Destrrachan Far Voice (High STR, Stun powers)
Rakshasa Archer (Low Str, ranged attacks)
Salamander Archer (Low Str, ranged attacks, push)
Salamander Noble (Low Str)
Yuan-ti Malison Incanter (Low Str, daze powers)
Azure Rager
Thunderfury Boar (high STR)
Chimera (high STR)
Drow Priestess (low STR, ranged attacks)
Immolish
Angel of Battle
Githyanki Gish (low STR, teleport)
Adult Red Dragon (high STR)
Rakshasa Warrior (low STR)
Red Slaad( low STR)

Judging from this list, there are just about as many good targets as there are bad ones. The bad targets are the Salamander Archer, Githyanki Gish, Destrrachan Far Voice, Adult Red Dragon and the Immolish who can either break out pretty easily or you don't want to be in meele range of them anyway. The targets where Garrote Grip is close to broken are the Drow Priestess, Rakshasa Archer, Salamander Noble and Red Slaad who have to dedicate all of their actions to escaping and only have a ~75% chance of succeeding or accept that they are going to be out in 3 rounds.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

Korror said:


> I think you can count on getting a cluster of 4 enemies near the fight at least once in an encounter.




I'd really think it would get more difficult with the number of large creatures at higher tier, but maybe I'm mistaken. I'm fine upping it a step anyways - it's been so long that I worked on these that I thought my baseline was C+, but it's actually B- so I need to make another pass through.



> I think it's a decent power.




Agreed.



> Of course it pales in comparison to *                             Unyielding Avalanche *but that's probably a sign that Unyielding Avalanche is too good rather than Serpent Dance Strike being bad.




Also agreed 



> C+ is not average, a power that was perfect balanced in every possible way would be a B based on the scale on page 1.




Eh, B- was the baseline, but I actually thought it was C+... oops. That said, I expect the powers people take to actually be higher than that, since balance is a tricky thing and people like more powerful stuff... hence Wall of Ice, Unyielding Avalanche, etc 



> My thought is that if it was broken before, it's still pretty powerful now. 5 attacks is still more than you're going to get with any other daily. If you rarely got >5 attacks on old version, then it wouldn't have needed an errata and the outcry over the power was unjustified. So either the new version is still powerful or people were making a lot of fuss over nothing before.




It was _theoretically_ broken before... if you've seen some of the explanations, it used things like multiple characters to setup a situation in which you hit on a 2 for all the attacks in the sequence, had +100 damage per attack, and had 3 or so rerolls to unroll 1s. At which point you were hitting 800 or so times so everything exploded. At 5 attacks, you can still setup that crazy stuff and it will do the 500 damage... so it's certainly powerful, but in the same situation Confounding would do the 300 damage and stun (save ends)... and Twin Strike does 200 damage... so, eh?



> Anything that denies actions or causes the unconscious effect has the potential to be broken and while I won't say that Garrote Grip is broken ( I'd move it down to a A- or B+ since I forgot that monsters could make 2 actions to escape) I think that the combination of automatic grab/cover+redirection/chance of unconsciousness make it quite powerful. I also don't think push/teleport/daze/stun effects are that prevalent for monsters. PC have tons of those effects but for monsters those abilities are rare and often encounter powers.




Do make sure when you look at a power that you look at it at more than just immediately when you get it, but also over the course of how long you have it... so level 15 through 28 you'll have this power. 

But, mostly I don't tend to think of 'this happens 3 rounds later' as being that worrisome, since any creature you're attacking other than a solo should be dead three rounds later. I'll probably bump it a notch, all the same.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

Adjusted scores due to my mistaken baseline, as well as a couple erroneous assumptions (Fireswarm, Garotte, Break the Wall)


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 10, 2009)

Korror said:


> Think about it this way, does the warlord often have difficult decisions where two people need his inspiring word? Usually for our group there's just 1 person who is in danger. If you ever get to a case where everyone has taken significient damage, somebody is either being reckless or not defending the party properly.  Monsters with blast powers can change this but blasts  are usually encounter abilities and rarely do 1/4 of a PC's hps on their own.
> 
> That being said, there's not too much difference between a B+ and a A- so the power really could go either way. I don't think it has the flexibility to rate an unqualified A but it does have the raw power in certain situtations.



Inspiring word and healing word are different in that you usually reserve them for people who are in the bottom 1/3 of their hit points.  I totally agree that there are few rounds when two people are both in danger of going down (though it happens fairly frequently over the course of a career) it's not really that important to this power.  We're talking about pc's all having taken some damage not all being bloodied.  My experience has been (admittedly we play in a dangerous campaign) that by the time someone is down to 25-35% of their hit points then everyone is damaged to some degree.  15th level pc's have roughly 80-130HP's if we wait until the defender has taken 90-95 damage (our fighter and rogue get targeted a lot in melee) the odds that the cleric and wizard have 20+dmg is very high. 5 x 24-34 = ~140 hp's of healing without a surge.  That's a pretty giant impact on a combat.  I agree stand the fallen is also very powerful but it does cost 5 surges AND if you miss there's no benefit.  Missing with renew the troops is still 70'ish healing.  That's a very very large benefit.  Both these powers scale well with levels.  At level 30 this power might heal 300HP's on a hit (the miss values don't scale as nicely so there is a decreasing ROI with advanced levels).

This poses an interesting question.  My personal belief is that PC hit points are approximately twice as valuable as monster hit points.  i.e. if your rogue is standing in the middle of a group of creatures doing 25-30 damage per round but taking 15-20 in return you're probably getting a negative net return in terms of projected victory int hat encounter.  I would be interested in hearing  other peoples perspective on this.  In fact i'm going to start a new thread. here



Korror said:


> One thing that you might be overlooking is that it an escape action only takes a move action and thus can be attempted twice and it targets the wizard's weakest defense (athletics vs fortitude) making it very likely that at least 1 creature will escape and move away. If both creatures escape and move then the wizard has to spend 2 movement actions and his minor to attempt to reacquire his targets. Giving up your move action is a big deal as you often have to shift to get away from an adjacent monster or move to get line of sight on another. I agree that the hands can do quite a bit of damage but you sacrifice too many of your own options for it be an A level power.



great point on the double move, but doesn't that effectively mean that a monster's turn is wasted by the hands?  Spending your move action to do damage hardly seems a waste.  In fact I think the spell is only enhanced by creatures escaping the grab.  If one creature escapes and one doesn't I have the option to use my move action to grab the escapee.  If that hits I get a free "clap" so I've scored for 6d10+30 dmg without using a power, I have at least one creature grabbed (burning up their actions) and admittedly I've spent all my actions they're very well spent.  If I miss with the grab (I might use an AP or force a reroll if I have that ability looking to score the 6d10 whammy) but I still have one creature held for my minor, I can move if I'm pressed by a bad guy or I can take a standard and unload an encounter power.  The perception that this power is using too many actions is faulty.  Wizards generally deploy a daily and then ride that daily through an encounter.  This lets them preserve their other dailies for the rest of the day.  I can sustain this with a minor and use my move and std elsewhere, but that's rarely going to the case as most times this spell gives me the option of making two attacks by trading my move for an attack.  2d10+10ish.  How many powers let you attack with your move action?  This doesn't even factor in the effect that the grabs are having on burning up two monsters actions.



Korror said:


> Otilukes on the other hand gives no option for escape if you hit. You know that the monster will be stuck there for 4-5 rounds or more if you target a leader or controller like the Drow Priestess who will be lucky to break out in 15-20 rounds. I don't rate it higher than a B power as it still needs to hit and doesn't do anything but hold a monster but it is still more "controlerish" than the hands.



more "controlerish" is fine but doesn't really speak to which is "better".  I did just realize that otilukes has another advantage over hands.  If you're an orb wizard you can lock in the immobilize on a miss.  Probably not as good as other affects you could lock in but still an advantage.  I agree otilukes might be devestating on some creatures in some situations.  Drow Priest is a great example but, hands can snatch her up on about an 8 attack roll and hands have range 10 while she has range 5 with everything but her darkfire power so if she's grabbed and held in the 6-10 range her powers are greatly crippled and the other hand can snatch up a drow blademaster and beat her to death with it.   My perception is there are a lot more situations where hands will have an advantage over otilukes.  Even in this example, if you miss the priestess how much benefit are you getting from otilukes?  My point being if you miss 45% of the time hands crush otilukes by a factor of 10.  In the other 55% I think the two powers are close to equivalent depending on the situation.  If otilukes had the reliable keyword how much better would it be?



keterys said:


> *RANGER*



Why does no one discuss stunning steel?  It appears to me that two attacks both with stun is pretty mighty.  Damage is low but the opportunity to stun two creatures or at least the high probability of stunning one seems pretty strong.  Comparable to confounding arrows in a most favorable way to my perception.  



keterys said:


> *WARLOCK*
> 
> NA / Curse of the Golden Mist
> C- / Fireswarm
> ...



totally agree.  This power is one of the best area damage powers because of the combination of immobilize and the mechanic for it to sustain itself through the new attack. Coupled with slide/push/shift/pull mechanics this power is potentially a lock in some encounters.  Lasting frost/winter touched combo makes it frighteningly powerful.  The flavor says the tentacles reach down from overhead (I know flavor has no game effect but...) how do you play this power or a power like it against flying creatures?  I guess my first instinct is the burst 1 means it can hit everything in a 15' cube.  



keterys said:


> *WARLORD*
> 
> D+ / Make Them Bleed
> B- / Renew the Troops
> ...



 I don't understand why stand the fallen is better.  Surgeless healing on a hit or miss at range line of sight means renew is much better.  Surges are like firearms.  You don't need one very often but when you need one you really need it.  The definitive "we must long rest" resource is the minimum number of surges left in the party.  



keterys said:


> *WIZARD*
> B+ / Bigby's Grasping Hands
> C+ / Blast of Cold
> B- / Otiluke's Resilient Sphere
> ...



I find the concept of "action hog" to be kind of questionable.  If you have some reason to not use the hands you can sustain them for the price of a minor and move/std as normal.  Wizards don't have a huge use for their minors (other than sustaining dailies) so unless you're planning on burning through many dailies in one encounter this is not a significant cost.  When considering the action usage you have to say what else would I do with my actions?  If you can unload a fireshroud on 7 targets and thereby get 3-4 ongoing 5's started by all means use your std to fire an encounter power but in a lot of rounds a wizard can stand still (if you're playing with sphere you frequently stand still to move the sphere, same with stinking cloud) and hands are super flexible in that you get to make numerous attacks on your move action over the course of an encounter.  Even if you never get to "clap" them heads together you're going to repeatedly get to make two attacks in a round on targets up to 21 squares apart and beyond a respectable damage they wind up grabbed and almost forced to use at least one action to escape.  Strength vs wizard reflex is not a great deal for a lot of creatures.  That drow priestess is gonna be in a world of hurt if your reflex/fort defense are ~25 which by 15th level is almost a given, take great fortitude and she's really in trouble.  If she does get lucky and escape, you simply scoop her up again.  The sound of clapping drows fills me with joy 



keterys said:


> *Otiluke's Resilient Sphere* is a peculiar spell that won't be for most people, but it removes most enemies from the fight for multiple rounds (effectively for the fight, in a lot of cases), immobilizes on a miss, and can be used defensively in rare circumstances.



 I also skipped the defensive use though it's hard for me to imagine many chances for this (restraining the dominated might be one).  I did however take another look at sphere because of this and it occurred to me that the drow priestess example might be flawed in that the priestess can have her minions cut her out in a round or two (the group in the proposed encounter level 15 can do about 90 damage in a round average more if you let the warriors flank) if you throw in some grimlock minions like the other encounter they can bust her out in a round which effectively would make sphere equivalent to giving the party a surprise round.  This also brought some interesting questions to mind.  Can drow warriors gain CA vs an otilukes sphere?  Does the drow priestess aura still work through a sphere? (I think so)



keterys said:


> *Prismatic Beams* is a large close burst of enemies only that actually does solid damage and dazes. It's pretty unforgiving of low rolls, but its expected damage output can be quite high and dazed enemies are easy to disengage from.



I agree this power can be pretty potent against a group, and it has the huge upside of only impacting enemies but if you don't get at least 4 targets what is your expected outcome? If you get 4 targets I would think on average you get about 1 creature hit by all 3, 1 creature hit by 2 powers, 1 creature dazed and one creature missed.  Something like 3 dazed, 2 with ongoing 5 one of which took 17 ish damage and the other which took 34 ish.  So assuming you get a clump you probably score about 75 damage and 3 dazes with this spell.  If the targets are more spread out you have a much smaller return offset by the rare cases you might get 6 targets and score 4 dazes, 100+ dmg.   Don't get me wrong, I like this spell, but bigby's seems equally as effective even in the best case where you score a pile of dazes (bigby's will score a pile of immobilizes over the course of the encounter) but this spell can strike out or have low impact on certain encounters (any encounter with less than 4-5 monsters will severely limit this power) where as bigby's will not have that limit and bigby's will almost always win out in damage production and since neither is likely to put a 15th level monster down right away I think the repeated application of 2d10+Int far out weighs the burst of 2-6 2d6+Int's that you'll likely gain from this.  Reviewing powers is obviously highly subjective and there's never going to be a 100% right answer when powers are close but I think bigby's gets a bum rap and the grabs are a lot more powerful than they get credit for.  The automatic damage to held creatures is giant, how many automatic damages are there that get 4d10+20'ish?  


keterys said:


> *Wall of Ice* is absolutely brutal. You get automatic damage against any enemy you put next to it, can truly screw certain enemies if they're trapped inside it, etc.



Totally agree.  This has everything a wizard can hope for, it can control by blocking or separating enemies into smaller groups and it can cause serious damage in the right terrain.  Can you drop wall in a square that's occupied?  What happens?



keterys said:


> APC, if you strongly feel that immobilized is better than dazed, then simply consider all immobilized powers to be an appropriate amount stronger in grading.



 I feel they both are strong.  Situationally better at times with a slight edge to immobilize as it's often more likely to lead to a no attack action turn for the monster.   



keterys said:


> If you were ranking conditions on a scale from 1 to 10, how would you rank the following?



 Great question!  I used decimals because I feel daze and immobilize are really close, my initial point was always that immobilize was being treated as less than daze by other posters when they're really pretty close and i think immobilize has a slight edge.

Stunned  - 9.0 -  short of dead or dominated this just rocks.  
Dazed - 5.8 - if they can charge it's a small benefit but CA is always nice and taking away an action is always good.  
Immobilized - 6.2 - it's more likely to limit a bad guy to no attacks than daze, and can lock someone in damaging terrain but also hurt by teleport and doesn't grant CA.   
Prone - 3 - takes away an action to get up, but the bad guy has options, can charge etc.  CA is limited to adjacent or else I would probably call it a 4.  There's also no chance of it being ongoing like daze/immobilize/stun.
Weakened - 3 - doesn't take away an action but it can cut down on average expected damage by a small amount and it can be ongoing.



Korror said:


> You're right, I am surprised that you rate *Tendrils of Thuban *so highly. It's not a bad daily and it's probably better than the other options at level 15 but it still only inflicts immobilize which I say one of the weaker effects. Would you rate a power that did "immobilize (save ends) Saves against this power have a -5 to the roll" as a A grade power?



No but this presents tendrils badly.  First tendrils does damage as well as immobilize.  Second your example with the -5 (equating -5 to the chance you'll hit after a save) negates the ability of tendrils to reacquire it's hold on you in numerous ways.  Someone knocks you prone or slows you in the area.  You get thunderwaved back in... etc.  save ends -5 to save is over as soon as you save and as such it's bound to end. Tendrils is vastly more likely to keep you held longer or get you again once you escape AND it's doing significant damage on top of it.  It's value in combination with other things can't be ignored either.  If you couple it with lasting frost and winter touched now the save would be effectively -6, everyone in the party is also gaining CA if they took winter touched (which is pretty likely if you have a wizard or warlock working this combo) and the damage is going up by about 30%.  Any class that isn't the wizard who can put down a zone of pain is a serious threat since the wizard has so many ways to move you into it or keep you there.  Pretty nice combo with positioning strike, and various fighter powers that push or slide you as well.  Only thing that's bad about it is that it target fort which is usually higher on the tough monsters.  The feat combo helps by making it 10% more likely to grab you again.



Korror said:


> Consider the case of the poor Drow Priestess who is reduced to making +8 attacks against the rogue who should have a fort defense around 23 if he is an artful dodger and around 28 if he is a brutal scoundrel.



Who decides what defense you get to target on a grab escape?  I've assumed it was the attacker.  The escapee allowed to choose to make an athletics check vs fort (basically a strength vs fort if you're untrained) or a dex vs reflex if you don't have acrobatics.



keterys said:


> They certainly can, with multiclassing and other features. They can also take their own lower level dailies. Or ones from other sources.



I should probably start a new thread but when it comes to multiclassing it's been my experience people take cleric or a striker class if they multiclass.  Be interesting to see a fighter/rogue/warlord who took wizard and then traded out a daily to gain an auto damage zone.  Pretty potent if your martial type is dropping stinking cloud on the battle field so the wizard can lock people down in the area.  Are all those creature marked?  Maybe someone should fork this to a new thread if we want to discuss it.



keterys said:


> I think Bloody Path is one of the coolest powers, so I'm very sad that it's not more effective. If it were a move action, I think that'd probably do the trick.



 anything that lets you do attacks with your move action is pretty powerful.



keterys said:


> Fwiw, I'm playing an Inspiring Warlord now... and Stand the Fallen (level 5) is actually a better power for the play that I've experienced so far than Renew the Troops (level 15). In a Wight heavy area, Renewing certainly has a lot going for it, but Stand the Fallen is exactly as much damage and reliably more healing and running out of surges has oh so rarely been an issue.



 how so? this confuses me in that stand can miss and do no healing where as renew does 10+cha even on a miss.  line of sight and not using surges are also both benefits to renew.  stand is clearly a nice power but so is renew and renew is clearly superior though you could possibly make an argument that level 15 vs level 5 it should be more superior.   

How superior is wall of ice to stinking cloud?  If you're in an outdoor adventure is wall vastly superior?  Wall's damage is going to be primarily concentrated in the first two rounds or concentrated on 1-2 creatures encircled.  The cloud can follow a moving enemy or enemies and keep doing damage far into the combat.  d10+int vs 2d6+int isn't a huge change for 10 levels.  granted wall can block movement in closed environments but as I pointed out sphere can follow the battle in open environments.  It's a lot more likely cloud will be doing damage 5 rounds after it's cast than wall will.  I think the upside of renew is similar to the upside of wall if not greater in that it can't miss.



keterys said:


> That said, other groups seem to have issues with people running out of surges so I'll bump it upwards a little so at least it counts as an above average level 15 rather than an average one



Single most important resource a party has.  We try to never get in an encounter when the rogue or fighter doesn't have 3 surges or more.  



keterys said:


> If melee are gaining CA against an immobilized target, then that highly limits the potential effect of the immobilize.



I agree, I was pointing this out as a counter point when someone pointed out that CA was so valuable.  I would always avoid moving adjacent to the immobilized creature and work on someone or something else while he was held.  My point being that immobilize preventing the creature from being in combat is way better than the advantage of CA.  End result, being charged and attacked by the dazed creature even though it's granting CA is inferior to the creature losing it's attack because it can't reach you.  



keterys said:


> Not really - but the immobilize trick is only useful on melee only monsters, so it was to show the effect of daze on a melee only monster. The defender can similarly shift back 1 square and the creature can't engage the defender so might have to charge someone other than the defender, possibly provoking, etc - I've actually done this with my fighter and stopped a monster's movement (and turn).



 you're comparing "might" not be able to attack to definitely can't attack.  



keterys said:


> Similarly if you daze a ranged combatant, they have to choose whether to provoke OAs when they make a ranged attack or to fall back on a crappier melee option.



how is this different from immobilize?  If you're adjacent to the archer he can't shift and fire he can just fire and therefore provoke an opportunity attack.  If you choose to move out of range, he can't pursue you if he's immobilized.  You do get +2 on the OA which is a small benefit but not as he'll likely choose the melee option. 



keterys said:


> Immobilize and Daze are both very good options, though worse than stunned. Immobilize is situationally useful. Daze is universally useful.



totally disagree. daze is equally situational. If a melee creature charges you he gets +1 ATT and you get +2 for CA.  this is a tiny benefit compared to the possibility that a melee create can't attack at all.  



keterys said:


> I'd imagine so - but that assumes you're all that worried about preventing attacks. Focused fire and killing things prevents attacks too, after all



from a purely math standpoint limiting enemy attacks while maximizing pc attacks is the key to winning encounters.  PC hit points being double the value of monster hit points taking away a monster attack is equal to granting two pc attacks of similar power.  I agree focused fire is a great tool, I just don't see that the +2 from CA even remotely makes up for a lost monster attack.  The extra damage accumulated from the CA is good for the party but over the course of a campaign I think you'll find that holding bad guys in adverse situations and/or preventing attacks from being delivered is equally valuable.  



keterys said:


> There's a shaman power that does back up the argument that you have to declare targets, then resolve:
> 
> *Effect:* Make the attack one more time against the same target or a different one.



I'm unsure of what is correct but resolving each attack seems logical and more fun.   



keterys said:


> That Effect is unnecessary if 'two attacks' allows you to resolve one attack then decide the next... so either the designer was misinformed on the rule, or the interpretation that you have to declare targets for all the attacks is RAW.



I don't think you can interpolate from a detail being added on the shaman power that it's purposely not added elsewhere because the editing is woefully inconsistent.  RAW is based upon what is written not what is implied by an omission.  Unless it says somewhere you must declare all targets of a power before resolving then the RAW is actually that you must declare all targets of an attack and some powers allow multiple attacks that are each resolved separately.  The uniform damage rule is a little troubling to me and I think it's simply a time saver simplification at the expense of game play/reality.  It certainly makes a lot more sense if one guy can be cooked by fireball but another standing just a few feet away can just be nicked.  There are a lot of guys who would be dead if grenades always did the same damage to everyone in the aoe.  



keterys said:


> It was _theoretically_ broken before... if you've seen some of the explanations, it used things like multiple characters to setup a situation in which you hit on a 2 for all the attacks in the sequence, had +100 damage per attack, and had 3 or so rerolls to unroll 1s. At which point you were hitting 800 or so times so everything exploded. At 5 attacks, you can still setup that crazy stuff and it will do the 500 damage... so it's certainly powerful, but in the same situation Confounding would do the 300 damage and stun (save ends)... and Twin Strike does 200 damage... so, eh?



I don't see how it could do 100 damage per attack but I guess I could google optimization threads and find out what was discussed.  in any event, if you burn up 3-4 other powers and actions to set up this situation how powerful is it really?  I've never once had an attack roll hit on a roll of 2.  We had a rogue put the serious hurt on someone with an attack roll of 6 and we thought that was pretty fantastic.  



keterys said:


> Do make sure when you look at a power that you look at it at more than just immediately when you get it, but also over the course of how long you have it... so level 15 through 28 you'll have this power.



great point, not all powers scale that well.  

This is a great thread, thanks keterys.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

> daze is equally situational.




No... it really isn't. It always helps some. Sometimes it helps a lot more than others, but it always improves the party's chance to hit, gives the rogue damage output, and denies certain actions.

Immobilized _sometimes_ either prevents a creature from attacking or makes it take opportunity attacks to do something good.

Both can end up with people stuck in a zone unable to move, though immobilize is slightly better at it.

Immobilize is better at bringing down non-hover fliers.

Daze is better at dealing with enemies who have minor or move actions of note.

Immobilize has best usefulness in the first round of combat when you can immobilize enemies before they engage (or are engaged, by your own melee), but after that its usefulness depends a lot on the combat setup. For example, looking at level 22 enemies for a second, of 10 options (not including the minion who already died), 

Rot Slinger (Rot Harbinger) Level 22 Artillery - has good melee and ranged, not impacted 
Bluespawn Godslayer Level 22 Elite Brute
(Dragonspawn) - has reach 3, only affected at start of combat, once engaged it will hit someone
Death Giant Level 22 Brute - has reach 2, mostly only affected near start of combat and with a pretty mobile party and/or multi round immobilize
Hezrou (Demon) Level 22 Brute - Reach 2
War Devil (Malebranche) Level 22 Brute (L) - Reach 2, ranged attacks, teleport, not affected
Marut Concordant Level 22 Elite Controller - Reach 2, ranged attacks, teleport, not affected
Astral Stalker (Abomination) Level 22 Elite Lurker - ranged attacks, invisibility action, only slightly affected
Efreet Fireblade Level 22 Soldier - has reach 2, ranged and melee attacks, not affected
Elder Red Dragon Level 22 Solo Soldier - reach 3, hover flight, ranged and melee attacks, not affected really
Thunderhawk (Roc) Level 22 Elite Soldier - reach 2, hover flight, most affected in first round then not too badly hurt

So... immobilize not so good against an entire level of enemies, there.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

> this confuses me in that stand can miss and do no healing where as renew does 10+cha even on a miss. line of sight and not using surges are also both benefits to renew.




Stand heals as an effect.

So, comparing the two:

Both do the exact same damage (despite a 10 level gap)
Stand the Fallen heals a surge + charisma, no matter what (call it 32 hp for our purposes)
Renew the Troops heals a surge + charisma on hit, 10 + charisma on miss (call it 32 and 16, or say 24 average)
Stand the Fallen affects all allies within 10 squares (which has always been 'all allies' for me when I've used it)
Renew the Troops affects all allies within line of sight (which means it doesn't work through zones of darkness or on blinded allies but has slightly more potential range)
Renew the Troops does not use a surge.

So, renew the troops _heals less_ but does not cost a surge. Everything else cancels out.

In situations in which you aren't worried about running out of surges (which is most, in my experience, since as you said you don't go into an encounter if someone is below 3 if you can arrange it), Stand the Fallen is _better_.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

I know less people are checking this out, but if anyone has any feedback on the daily 15s please try to get them in soon so I can factor things in easily. I'm actually going to start working on the daily 19s while I have momentum.

First reaction: Oh boy, some of these are pretty insane


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 10, 2009)

keterys said:


> No... it really isn't.



The problem here is semantical.  I fully understand that daze always grants CA and takes away an action even if there's no other benefit.  By equally situational I meant that given the weighted impact of each outcome and the probability of each situation they were equally situational.  In the event no one attacks the creature while it's dazed but it can charge another pc and manages to hit, what real benefit was daze?  Even if someone attacks CA only changes the outcome 10% of the time unless we're talking about a rogue which is again situational (the party might have no rogue).



keterys said:


> It always helps some.



Not true at all, if you take the perception that it only helps if it changes an outcome or prevents damage.   If it is true then it's equally true of immobilize.  Immobilize always prevents some actions.  I would say this is a tiny benefit if the creature still gets off an attack that hits.  Unless it can't move from damaging terrain then it's pretty huge either way. 

You seem to be undervaluing the ability of immobilize to prevent an attack and over valuing the ability of daze to do so.   



keterys said:


> Sometimes it helps a lot more than others, but it always improves the party's chance to hit, gives the rogue damage output, and denies certain actions.



improved to hit only matters 1 time in 10, if there's a rogue and he hits this is a benefit, denying actions is only important if those actions would have happened.  I understand it's clearly a benefit of daze that a wizard can fire off a big ranged attack and then move fully away from the powerful melee critter and not provoke an OA with either. 



keterys said:


> Immobilized _sometimes_ either prevents a creature from attacking or makes it take opportunity attacks to do something good.



 change sometimes to most of the time.  You pick the target of the power, you're not frequently going to dump an immobilize on the archer but you're very likely to drop it on the umberhulk.  



keterys said:


> Both can end up with people stuck in a zone unable to move, though immobilize is slightly better at it.



Immobilize is massively better at it.  Only teleport escapes.  Other than that it's 100% effective.  Daze only helps if the terrain is difficult and the creature doesn't have enough points of movement to reach an edge.  This means for most creatures they must be 4 squares from the edge of the terrain.  How often does that happen?   90% of zones are under 6 squares so unless you have another factor involved (i.e. the zone is in a corner of a room and the creature is in the corner of the zone that is the corner of the room) the creature can almost always escape.



keterys said:


> Daze is better at dealing with enemies who have minor or move actions of note.



define move actions of note.  Does this mean teleport?



keterys said:


> Immobilize has best usefulness in the first round of combat when you can immobilize enemies before they engage (or are engaged, by your own melee), but after that its usefulness depends a lot on the combat setup.



Highly subjective and can be equally applied to daze.  If you're adjacent to a creature that gets immobilized you can shift away and deny him his attack.  You're not going to attempt to immobilize a creature that is already adjacent to a pc and will act before that pc unless you have no better options.  you kep trying to make highly situational and anecdotal arguments against immobilize without considering the inverse.  



keterys said:


> For example, looking at level 22 enemies for a second, of 10 options



Massively stilted level selection. Really anecdotal when compared to all 30 levels.  By the epic tier most creatures have more options for attacking.  By level 22 a pc might have a host of debilitating effects in his arsenal and you'll likely deploy the ones that have more impact ont he target. I'll still play along because I'm a good sport but this was a ridiculously uneven level to choose.



keterys said:


> (not including the minion who already died)



 why is he dead if it's round one?

+Rot Slinger (Rot Harbinger) Level 22 Artillery - much better melee than ranged though both are good. CA probably is better than stopping this guy from reaching melee though it's closer than you think and I might call it a wash because ongoing 10 is a lot worse than weak.   

*Bluespawn Godslayer Level 22 Elite Brute - would you target this creature after he was engaged?  If I do hit him with immobilize, he's not in combat.  Daze also does not prevent him from attacking.  Suppose the effect lasts 3 rounds.  Immobilize has completely prevented him from engaging for 3 rounds where daze just forced him to charge and his speed is 8 so he can cover a lot of ground.  Granted CA might have caused him to take more dmg but I'll take immobilize especially as I'll be choosing when I use my powers it will never be after he's in combat with our fighter.

*Death Giant Level 22 Brute - same as above, advantage immobilize 
*Hezrou (Demon) Level 22 Brute - same as above advantage immobilize.
#War Devil (Malebranche) Level 22 Brute (L) - teleport, advantage dazed
#Marut Concordant Level 22 Elite Controller - teleport, advantage dazed
#Astral Stalker (Abomination) Level 22 Elite Lurker - ranged attacks, invisibility action, only slightly affected
#Efreet Fireblade Level 22 Soldier - only has 1 ranged attack and that needs a recharge.  Possible to immobilize him after he's used it and still gain great use of immobilize. still advantage dazed.
#Elder Red Dragon Level 22 Solo Soldier - reach 3, hover flight, ranged and melee attacks, immobilize makes flying creatures land, hover creatures do not need to spend a move action and thus remain aloft if dazed, this creature also has only one ranged attack out side of 5 and that has a recharge so immobilize could tie it up for several rounds and leave it powerless to act.  I'll still give this to daze but immobilize could definitely impact this situationally.
*Thunderhawk (Roc) Level 22 Elite Soldier - still affected better by immobilize than daze, it's primary attack is a charge and it has hover flight.  Incidentally when I looked up this creature I looked at roc's (level 14) a regular roc is devastated by immobilize and only moderately affected by daze.  It has a fly by attack so it will still function normally it just won't get the bit after it tosses you to the rocks.  Meanwhile immobilize makes it crash, no attacks unless it happens to fall next to you. Just one example that shows a huge bonus to immobilize.



keterys said:


> So... immobilize not so good against an entire level of enemies, there.



I question this logic quite a bit beyond the fact you picked a level designed to shaft immobilize I think it works better on the minion and 4 of the other 10 while being pretty close to even on 1 more.  I had thought that immobilize makes flying creatures land but in looking at the dmg for this post I realize that's not true as silly as that seems.  



keterys said:


> Stand heals as an effect.



Oops, missed that.  I totally get it now, thanks.  Surges are still valuable but the healing is still better for stand.  Really poorly designed change from 6th to 16th.  I still think this is a good power (possibly 300 hp's with no surge) but it's annoying to see the weakness when compared to stand.  One note on line of site. I agree with you on line of sight/blinded.  It totally makes sense and I would probably play it that way as well, but RAW fanatics might say LOS and actually seeing aren't the same.   I would agree that range ten will mostly always get all allies but I would also say that line of sight is more likely to benefit you than hurt you in this regard.  I've seen a lot more encounters where my pc's are more than 10 squares apart than I have where they couldn't find a line of sight to each other.  



keterys said:


> In situations in which you aren't worried about running out of surges (which is most, in my experience, since as you said you don't go into an encounter if someone is below 3 if you can arrange it), Stand the Fallen is _better_.



Yes we try to avoid encounter when the fighter or rogue is down to less than 3.  I agree stand is better most of the time but the non surge healing might mean we saved a surge in an earlier encounter and thus have an extra one each remaining so renew is better in that instance.


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## Korror (Mar 10, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> Why does no one discuss stunning steel? It appears to me that two attacks both with stun is pretty mighty. Damage is low but the opportunity to stun two creatures or at least the high probability of stunning one seems pretty strong. Comparable to confounding arrows in a most favorable way to my perception.




I seem to have overlooked that power when I was going through the PHB. On quick inspection *stunning steel *is not quite as effective as confounding arrows mainly because you have to be in melee range but it is still a stunning power which are always effective. I'd say it rates an A- based on the score confounding arrows received.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> In the event no one attacks the creature while it's dazed but it can charge another pc and manages to hit, what real benefit was daze?




You may want to note the disclaimer for these ratings:
"All powers are graded assuming they are used effectively - if a power requires a second person in melee to work, don't take it in a party with no other melee. In many cases you'll find that personal preference varies from these grades - while a power may be extraordinary in theory or combined with the right build or party, take the power that is most fun for you!"



> Not true at all, if you take the perception that it only helps if it changes an outcome or prevents damage.



It always means the rogue doesn't need flank. It always means that people can ignore opportunity attacks from the target. It always means that sustaining powers is painful and that some other abilities are denied. It always synergizes with other effects like grab or prone. It always provides an increase in average via combat advantage. It always means the target has limited ability to select targets if the party chooses to take appropriate steps. Etc.

Ignoring the benefits of daze so that it doesn't have an effect is not effectively using it. 



> You seem to be undervaluing the ability of immobilize to prevent an attack and over valuing the ability of daze to do so.



Immobilize is quite effective at preventing some attacks from some targets. 



> change sometimes to most of the time.  You pick the target of the power, you're not frequently going to dump an immobilize on the archer but you're very likely to drop it on the umberhulk.



And if you're not fighting any melee only creatures? If the Umber Hulk won initiative and is already adjacent to someone, so you need to double move to make it lose the ability to attack and it will _still_ be able to use its confusing gaze unless you're more than 5 squares away?



> Immobilize is massively better at it. Only teleport escapes.



Or any type of forced movement... not common but I've seen a Deathlock Wight push an ally out of a zone, for instance.



> Daze only helps if the terrain is difficult and the creature doesn't have enough points of movement to reach an edge.



Or if a fighter can OA to stop movement, or heavy blade opportunity can slow or push or slide the target. 

But, as I noted, immobilize is better at keeping creatures in a zone. Certainly agree.



> If you're adjacent to a creature that gets immobilized you can shift away and deny him his attack.



Only certain creatures, only if all allies shift - which makes it both initiative dependent and ally action dependent, and potentially limits your damage output (such as by negating flank for the rogue)



> You're not going to attempt to immobilize a creature that is already adjacent to a pc and will act before that pc unless you have no better options.



Correct. Making it not useful in those cases... which makes immobilize less effective.



> you kep trying to make highly situational and anecdotal arguments against immobilize without considering the inverse.



No, I am considering it. I'm giving it a different weight than you are. You seem to be assuming that you'll always have the right target selection and tactical situation. Immobilize is _fantastic_ in the first round of combat with the right enemies... with the wrong enemies less so, after the first round or if you lose initiative... even less.



> Massively stilted level selection. Really anecdotal when compared to all 30 levels.



I was looking at level 15 powers, so I'd had that level of creatures up to look at for the Bloody Path example. I can certainly bring up more examples, but I hardly think that an entire level of creatures, every single one of them, is 'anecdotal' to the discussion. If immobilize becomes significantly less useful at epic, that is a an impact.



> ridiculously uneven level to choose.



Eh, one I had up. I'll do another level later... but we are looking at level 15 powers, so it can only go so low 



> why is he dead if it's round one?



Because he's a minion and you just immobilized him. I sure hope you damaged him too 



> +Rot Slinger (Rot Harbinger) Level 22 Artillery - much better melee than ranged though both are good. CA probably is better than stopping this guy from reaching melee though it's closer than you think and I might call it a wash because ongoing 10 is a lot worse than weak.



Its ranged attack is as good as its melee... it's not only weaken, it's also vs Fort (more likely to hit), and -2 to saves which can be very helpful for maintaining other effects.



> *Bluespawn Godslayer Level 22 Elite Brute - would you target this creature after he was engaged?  If I do hit him with immobilize, he's not in combat.  Daze also does not prevent him from attacking.  Suppose the effect lasts 3 rounds.  Immobilize has completely prevented him from engaging for 3 rounds where daze just forced him to charge and his speed is 8 so he can cover a lot of ground.  Granted CA might have caused him to take more dmg but I'll take immobilize especially as I'll be choosing when I use my powers it will never be after he's in combat with our fighter.



Why would the effect last 3 rounds? It's got a save bonus, among other things. As noted, if you get initiative over it, in the first round of combat, you can immobilize it before it engages. If not, then it's likely already too late due to it having reach 3.



> *Death Giant Level 22 Brute - same as above, advantage immobilize



Indeed, same as above, no advantage immobilize.



> *Hezrou (Demon) Level 22 Brute - same as above advantage immobilize.



Ditto.



> #Elder Red Dragon Level 22 Solo Soldier - reach 3, hover flight, ranged and melee attacks, immobilize makes flying creatures land, hover creatures do not need to spend a move action and thus remain aloft if dazed, this creature also has only one ranged attack out side of 5 and that has a recharge so immobilize could tie it up for several rounds and leave it powerless to act.  I'll still give this to daze but immobilize could definitely impact this situationally.



Immobiize does not cause hover fliers to land... cool houserule though. (Ah, I see you realized this later on)



> *Thunderhawk (Roc) Level 22 Elite Soldier - still affected better by immobilize than daze, it's primary attack is a charge and it has hover flight.  Incidentally when I looked up this creature I looked at roc's (level 14) a regular roc is devastated by immobilize and only moderately affected by daze.  It has a fly by attack so it will still function normally it just won't get the bit after it tosses you to the rocks.  Meanwhile immobilize makes it crash, no attacks unless it happens to fall next to you. Just one example that shows a huge bonus to immobilize.



Hover flight still works, as you know. Immobilize is more effective on the level 14 Roc than daze under most situations, agreed.



> I question this logic quite a bit beyond the fact you picked a level designed to shaft immobilize I think it works better on the minion and 4 of the other 10 while being pretty close to even on 1 more.



I didn't pick a level to shaft immobilize - I picked a median level for the powers we're looking at pretty randomly  It doesn't matter to the minion at all and I'd show it as more effective than daze on one of the targets, about even on two of the targets, a solid effect on two more, a minor effect on one, and largely ineffective on the remaining four.



> Oops, missed that.  I totally get it now, thanks.  Surges are still valuable but the healing is still better for stand.  Really poorly designed change from 6th to 16th.  I still think this is a good power (possibly 300 hp's with no surge) but it's annoying to see the weakness when compared to stand.  One note on line of site. I agree with you on line of sight/blinded.  It totally makes sense and I would probably play it that way as well, but RAW fanatics might say LOS and actually seeing aren't the same.   I would agree that range ten will mostly always get all allies but I would also say that line of sight is more likely to benefit you than hurt you in this regard.  I've seen a lot more encounters where my pc's are more than 10 squares apart than I have where they couldn't find a line of sight to each other.



Yeah, I just figure that it's easy enough to all be in 10 on purpose, but it's hard for someone to get unblinded or not be in a zone of darkness sometimes. I'd totally take controllable disadvantage over uncontrollable disadvantage, so I figure they cancel out  



> Yes we try to avoid encounter when the fighter or rogue is down to less than 3.  I agree stand is better most of the time but the non surge healing might mean we saved a surge in an earlier encounter and thus have an extra one each remaining so renew is better in that instance.



When it gets down to it, I'm still marking Renew the Troops as a better power by the grade that I gave it... I just think it's a lot less impressive than others might. It doesn't affect the user, but puts him potentially in danger, while still assuming the rest of the party is hurt enough to need it, it requires a hit for optimal use by someone often less optimal at hitting, it's roughly comparable to existing powers - a level 10 utility or level 5 daily. Certainly enough marks to drop it out of high grade, on my book.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

So, backing up from 22, let's look at 13 and 4.

Adult Blue Dragon Level 13 Solo Artillery - hover flight, great melee and ranged options, no big deal
Beholder Eye of Flame Level 13 Elite Artillery - hover flight, ranged attacks that don't provoke, can help party avoid fire burst but... no big deal
Drow Arachnomancer Level 13 Artillery (L) - attacks of all types, might cause some OAs
Githyanki Mindslicer Level 13 Artillery - reasonable ranged and melee options both, no big deal
Yuan-ti Malison Sharp-eye Level 13 Artillery - ranged attack is superior, so similar to weaken or might provoke OAs
Grimlock Berserker Level 13 Brute - can be completely screwed by immobilized
Hill Giant Level 13 Brute - Reach 2 makes shift more difficult to pull off and solid ranged attack, minor impact
Magma Brute (Magma Beast) Level 13 Brute - Reach 2 makes shift away more difficult to pull off, but first round immobilize quite effective
Briar Witch Dryad Level 13 Elite Controller - ranged attack, teleport, ineffective
Eidolon Level 13 Controller (L) - stance makes immobilize almost always ineffective
Githzerai Zerth Level 13 Elite Controller - both melee and ranged attacks, teleport, ineffective
Minotaur Cabalist Level 13 Controller (L) - melee and ranged attacks, no big deal
Mummy Lord Level 13 Elite Controller - only one decent ranged option, plus second wind, and aura still effective... pretty effective but not crippling
Balhannoth Level 13 Elite Lurker - reach 3, teleport, ineffective
Horde Ghoul Level 13 Minion - Already dead
Displacer Beast Packlord Level 13 Elite Skirmisher - Reach 3 (Threatening, even) makes post-Round 1 immobilize a lot less useful but it helps turn off displacement and shifting so still quite good
Dragonborn Raider Level 13 Skirmisher - Pretty much screwed
Drow Blademaster Level 13 Elite Skirmisher - Pretty much screwed
Gray Slaad (Rift Slaad) Level 13 Skirmisher - condition transfer, teleport, largely ineffective
Nightmare Level 13 Skirmisher - teleport, ineffective
Vrock (Demon) Level 13 Skirmisher - Reach 2 and burst 3 make it tougher after round 1, but it always shuts down flyby attack, crashes its flight, and potentially lets you avoid spores of madness, so it's pretty darn good
Bearded Devil (Barbazu) Level 13 Soldier - Reach 2
Hellstinger Scorpion Level 13 Soldier - Pretty much screwed
Helmed Horror Level 13 Soldier - crashes its flight, pretty much screwed
Hook Horror Level 13 Soldier - Reach 2, pull, grab, after round 1 effectiveness down a lot
Medusa Warrior Level 13 Elite Soldier - good ranged and melee options, no big deal

In hindsight, this whole immobilize discussion might have been a good fork. Anyhow, I'll do level 4 next.


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## keterys (Mar 10, 2009)

Corruption Corpse (Zombie) Level 4 Artillery - good ranged and melee-range options, but being able to stay more than a square away from it is pretty useful so decent
Dwarf Bolter Level 4 Artillery - slightly worse melee attack, but not too bad
Human Mage Level 4 Artillery - crappy melee attack, either weakens it or provokes OAs
Magma Hurler (Magma Beast) Level 4 Artillery - slightly worse melee attack, but not too bad
Human Berserker Level 4 Brute - effectively weakened range attack
Kruthik Adult Level 4 Brute - good rechargeable range option, stops its aura, so pretty darn hindered
Magma Claw (Magma Beast) Level 4 Brute - screwed
Orc Berserker Level 4 Brute - screwed
Deathlock Wight Level 4 Controller - multiple good options, no big deal
Goblin Underboss Level 4 Controller (L) - screwed
Cavern Choker Level 4 Lurker - Reach 2, Grab, highly reduced effect after first round and it's good at stealthing so hard to nail down when it's not within grab range
Kobold Slyblade Level 4 Lurker - screwed
Specter Level 4 Lurker - Invisibility, burst 2... hampered certainly but not too bad.
Young Black Dragon Level 4 Solo Lurker - stops flying (but clumsy, so probably wasn't really anyways), reach 2, breath weapon and zone of darkness heavily mitigate effect 
Orc Drudge Level 4 Minion - Dead already
Dark Creeper (Dark One) Level 4 Skirmisher - Can throw daggers fine, but loses its combat advantage trick
Deathjump Spider Level 4 Skirmisher - screwed
Ettercap Fang Guard Level 4 Skirmisher - screwed
Fey Panther Level 4 Skirmisher - some teleport so often ineffective
Greenscale Hunter (Lizardfolk) Level 4 Skirmisher - screwed
Rotwing Zombie Level 4 Skirmisher - screwed
Phantom Warrior Level 4 Soldier - screwed
Visejaw Crocodile Level 4 Soldier - grabs so harder to pull off, but screwed if you do
Warforged Soldier Level 4 Soldier - screwed

So immobilize is far more effective in heroic, being extremely powerful when used effectively in heroic, reasonable but not earth shattering in paragon, and honestly not very good at all in epic.

As one caveat, it's been my experience that a lot of humanoid enemies do carry throwing weapons, even if not in their stat blocks. That is, that kobold slyblades may have throwing daggers, a warforged soldier some javelins, etc. I suspect that is not necessarily typical experience, but worth note.


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## Korror (Mar 11, 2009)

keterys said:


> I know less people are checking this out, but if anyone has any feedback on the daily 15s please try to get them in soon so I can factor things in easily. I'm actually going to start working on the daily 19s while I have momentum.
> 
> First reaction: Oh boy, some of these are pretty insane




The level 19 dailies are truly insane and it only gets more crazy into epic tier. I've got a feeling that they are going to hard to analyze as there are not too many people playing at that level (my group is still in heroic and we started close to when 4th edition came out) and each class is nearly the end of their paragon path and becoming even more hyper specialized. For example: Holy Wrath is an nice daily for a cleric but an excellent for the warpriest who can function as a defender and get the most out of that regeneration.


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## keterys (Mar 11, 2009)

Even better for the multiclassed fighter/cleric warpriest.


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## keterys (Mar 11, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> Why does no one discuss stunning steel?  It appears to me that two attacks both with stun is pretty mighty.  Damage is low but the opportunity to stun two creatures or at least the high probability of stunning one seems pretty strong.  Comparable to confounding arrows in a most favorable way to my perception.




Good question - it wasn't on my typed in list of powers, I'm guessing through failed flipping the pagitis... at any rate, A. Can almost guarantee a stunned (save ends) and can often do it two targets. Its damage isn't that great, but it's certainly not bad. More than the rogue, paladin, or warlord options certainly


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## MwaO (Mar 12, 2009)

keterys said:


> So immobilize is far more effective in heroic, being extremely powerful when used effectively in heroic, reasonable but not earth shattering in paragon, and honestly not very good at all in epic.




You don't seem to be factoring Cloak of Distortion in the mix - you immobilize an enemy with a mix of melee/ranged outside that 5 square range, and they're severely weakened.

(yes, broken, and most DMs should not let it into their games or take an axe to it, but it is LFR legal...)


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## keterys (Mar 12, 2009)

Nah, it assumes that everyone has it (as opposed to, say, healer's brooch or cloak of survival or...) and that it's trivial to get everyone more than 5 squares from an immobilized enemy, and that's way too big of an assumption.


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## Plane Sailing (Mar 12, 2009)

AngryPurpleCyclops said:


> The problem here is semantical.  I fully understand that daze always grants CA and takes away an action even if there's no other benefit.  By equally situational I meant that given the weighted impact of each outcome and the probability of each situation they were equally situational. (etc)




APC, I understand that you disagree on the relative benefits of daze and immobilise. I think we can drop the subject now as both sides understand where the other is coming from, and there is no need to attempt to persuade anyone to your point of view. I imagine that you will factor in such issues when you have a look at how other people grade things, and that is fine.

No more discussion on that issue in this thread though - start a separate thread if you really want to discuss it further.

Thanks


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## AngryPurpleCyclops (Mar 13, 2009)

last post Plane, I was halfway done when I saw your admonishment.  



keterys said:


> It always means the rogue doesn't need flank. It always means that people can ignore opportunity attacks from the target. It always means that sustaining powers is painful and that some other abilities are denied. It always synergizes with other effects like grab or prone. It always provides an increase in average via combat advantage. It always means the target has limited ability to select targets if the party chooses to take appropriate steps. Etc.



All of these are "sometimes valuable".  This is the same argument you use to degrade immobilize.  You apply _sometimes_ to it's benefit.  This simply works both ways.  I can see the logic of your side but you keep steam rolling mine.  That's annoying.  There are times when each is better.  I'm really unsure why you can't seem to admit this.  



keterys said:


> Ignoring the benefits of daze so that it doesn't have an effect is not effectively using it.



Can you not make the exact same argument about immobilize?



keterys said:


> And if you're not fighting any melee only creatures? If the Umber Hulk won initiative and is already adjacent to someone, so you need to double move to make it lose the ability to attack and it will _still_ be able to use its confusing gaze unless you're more than 5 squares away?



I can turn this around and point to many situations that daze won't impede the <insert various monsters> either.  Once again it's hard for me to understand why you can't accept it's pretty close to even each having their benefits in various situations.



keterys said:


> Only certain creatures, only if all allies shift - which makes it both initiative dependent and ally action dependent, and potentially limits your damage output (such as by negating flank for the rogue)



 the rogue can be busy attacking a different creature.  You keep pointing to situations that detract from the immobilize but there are equally as many that detract from daze.  By your own admission above you said it should be used affectively.  lets assume you're going to do that with both not just immobilize.  



keterys said:


> Correct. Making it not useful in those cases... which makes immobilize less effective.



I can change the word immobilize to daze and use this to counter many statements.  Please stop doing that.  For every use there is a situation that's bad for both.  d



keterys said:


> No, I am considering it. I'm giving it a different weight than you are. You seem to be assuming that you'll always have the right target selection and tactical situation. Immobilize is _fantastic_ in the first round of combat with the right enemies... with the wrong enemies less so, after the first round or if you lose initiative... even less.



 the first part of this is great!  I agree we weight things differently.  That's fine.  The rest is garbage.  I'm the one using the power, I pick when and where to deploy it.  I can hit a monster in melee with a pc with immobilize and then when the pc goes he can hit the monster and shift away. You keep focusing on the fact that at higher levels more monsters have reach.  This is offset by the number of powers that let you shift/teleport multiple squares. rogues, warlocks, eladrin, rangers, warlords, wizards, clerics all have ways to get away from reach creatures unharmed.  



keterys said:


> I was looking at level 15 powers, so I'd had that level of creatures up to look at for the Bloody Path example. I can certainly bring up more examples, but I hardly think that an entire level of creatures, every single one of them, is 'anecdotal' to the discussion. If immobilize becomes significantly less useful at epic, that is a an impact.



 I agree but i think you're still weighting this with no consideration for the fact that by your own admission we're going to use the powers effectively more often than not.



keterys said:


> but we are looking at level 15 powers, so it can only go so low



Not really accurate.  I commented on this phenomena before we moved to level 15 and the tangential discussion that arose is really about the relative worth of debilitating powers regardless of level or across all levels.  I fully agree that there are things that make immobilize less effective at epic.  Not to the degree you're trying to imply simply because we're controlling where and when we use our powers and by your own admission we're not apt to do ourselves the disservice of wasting it.



keterys said:


> Why would the effect last 3 rounds? It's got a save bonus, among other things. As noted, if you get initiative over it, in the first round of combat, you can immobilize it before it engages. If not, then it's likely already too late due to it having reach 3.



at high level a lot of creatures can easily get away from reach 3.  This is simply false and very misleading.  The effect could be orb'd to a -10 or more.  if you're a melee creature being immobilized and orbed is a kill where as daze is a major hindrance but not apt to take you out of the combat completely.  Orb and immobilize is therefor better than daze in most circumstances not involving teleport.  Orb/immobilize a dragon and stay outside his breath weapon and melee range... seems better than having him move in and action point the breath weapon.  



keterys said:


> Indeed, same as above, no advantage immobilize.
> 
> Ditto.



again wrong on both counts.  I'm using my powers effectively I promise you.  I have init roughly half the time on the BBEG... how about you?  I almost always have init on at last a few creatures in an encounter, how about you?



keterys said:


> I didn't pick a level to shaft immobilize - I picked a median level for the powers we're looking at pretty randomly



we've been looking at dailies from 1 to 15... I brought this up before we reached 15 i believe.  I certainly thought it right away if I didn't say it.  But I have a feeling in my posts about levels 1 or 5 I probably mentioned something about "why does everyone seem to think daze is so much better than immobilize"?



keterys said:


> So immobilize is far more effective in heroic, being extremely powerful when used effectively in heroic reasonable but not earth shattering in paragon, and honestly not very good at all in epic.



Finally we're at least finding some middle ground.  I agree with this assessment for the most part.  I think it's better than you imagine in epic because pc's can get away from reach 3 creatures a lot easier than you're giving then credit for and it can lock someone down in epic with orb.  immobilize can have another use entirely.  If you immobilize the ranged creature and the fighter moves adjacent he can't make any attacks without giving away OA.  The fighter doesn't even have to mark him.  

In retrospect the various effectiveness across tiers was probably a big part of why we couldn't find a middle ground sooner (does this mean you'll be going back and re-evaluating the heroic powers and upgrading immobilize?  .  I've only played in heroic so my experience/perspective is heavily weighted.  I admitted right away that teleport totally hoses immobilize and dazed has added benefits as you get more creatures with minor powers at higher levels.  I still find them comparable at worst in most encounters and immobilize far better in most encounters I'm familiar with.  The ghoul encounter for example.  Turn undead pushes them out of melee range and immobilizes them. what could be better short of disintegrating them 



Plane Sailing said:


> APC, I understand that you disagree on the relative benefits of daze and immobilise. I think we can drop the subject now as both sides understand where the other is coming from, and there is no need to attempt to persuade anyone to your point of view. I imagine that you will factor in such issues when you have a look at how other people grade things, and that is fine.
> 
> No more discussion on that issue in this thread though - start a separate thread if you really want to discuss it further.
> 
> Thanks



Dropped.  I wrote most of this post before I came back and saw you had posted this.


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## ChristopherA (Apr 2, 2009)

I thought your ratings were quite good. I thought I’d try to rank the powers in order according to my impressions, and see how it compares. Here is level 1, I was pretty close:

A Flaming Sphere
A Bastion of Defense
A Armor of Agathys, Beacon of Hope, Blinding Barrage
B+ Lead the Attack, Jaws of the Wolf, Freezing Cloud
B Radiant Delirium, Sleep
B Split the Tree
B Avenging Flame
B On Pain of Death
B- Flames of Phlegethos, Trick Strike, Pin the Foe
B- Guardian of Faith (I’m guessing, I’d have to see it in action)
C+ Brute Strike, Paladin’s Judgment 
C+ Comeback Strike, Cascade of Light, Curse of the Dark Dream
C Hunter’s Bear Trap, Dread Star, White Raven Onslaught
C- Villain’s Menace, Acid Arrow
C- Sudden Strike, Easy Target

The power ratings will depend in some ways on the style of the campaign. Perhaps you fight solo monsters more often than I do. I was surprised that you rate Villain’s Menace so highly, since in playing I’ve found it to be quite weak. If you factor in how bad it is to miss with the power, you really need to get in at least 4 attacks with the attack/damage bonus before Villain’s Menace is clearly superior to Brute Strike. But Brute Strike is just so much more convenient and easy to use. In order for Villain’s Menace to be really effective, the fighter has to attack the same monster every round for several rounds, and the rest of the party has to refrain from killing that monster. At least in my group’s style of play, daily powers are most valuable when used in tough fights that you couldn’t win without them, and a power that can help the party quickly kill a dangerous threat is what everyone really wants. Low-level fights only seem to last about 6 rounds. If you can afford to leave a monster alive for the entire fight in order to maximize the effect of your daily power, maybe the monster wasn’t really worth spending a single-target daily on anyway. And during this time, the fighter can’t react defend the party against different tactical threats. I guess this power would be a lot more effective if you fought a lot of solos and tough elites.

The usefulness of a power like Comeback Strike, which lets you spend a healing surge, would vary a lot based on how restricted you are by healing surges. If you can rest whenever you want, Comeback is clearly better than Brute Strike. If healing surges are precious, and you can get clerical healing after the fight, spending a healing surge is not so great (I explain this more on one of my blog entries).

I agree with an earlier poster that, at heroic level, Bastion of Defense seems generally more useful than Lead the Attack. But Lead the Attack is one of those weird powers that gets better and better as you gain levels.

I think Acid Arrow is overrated compared to the other wizard powers. Sleep seems better – if you target multiple monsters, there is a good chance one of them will fall asleep and die soon after. Acid Arrow is just a pedestrian attack with a weak and hard to use area effect. It seems more than two steps inferior to a potent area effect spell like Freezing Cloud.

__________________
Come read my game design/analysis blog at: http://gamedesignfanatic.blogspot.com


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## keterys (Apr 2, 2009)

Yeah, I'm not sure what to do/say on the solo/elite equation where certain powers completely thrash a single combatant, but require that enemy persist. When I started playing solos were actually fairly common, but since I started the game and fought about four in like four adventures, then I think I've only fought... two... since then. In like another thirty adventures.


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## Evilhalfling (Apr 6, 2009)

*Phb2*

B Echos of Guardian 
B+ Slayers Song 
A+ Stirring Shout  
B- Verse of Triumph 

B Aspect of Might 
B+ Oath of Final Duel 
B Renewing Strike 
B Temple  of Light 

B Bloodhunt Rage 
A+ Macetail Rage
A+ Rage Drake Rage
C+ Swift Panther Rage

A Faerie Fire 
A Fires of Life 
B+ Savage Fenzy 
B+ Wind Prison  

A Angelic Echelon
A Binding Chains 
B Purging Flame 
B Summon Angle of Fire 

A- Blessing of 7 Winds 
B Cleansing Wind of North 
A Spirit of Healing Flood 
A Wrath of Spirit World 

A- Chromatic Orb 
A Dazzling Ray 
B- Dragonfang Bolt 
B Lighting Breath 

B Form of Willow Sentinel 
A+ Form of Winter’s Herald
A- Form of Relentless Panther 
B+ Form of Fearsome Ram 

Standouts: Stirring Shout, Form of Winters Herald, Macetail Rage and Rage Drake Frenzy 
Discussion ?


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## Stalker0 (Apr 6, 2009)

keterys said:


> I know less people are checking this out, but if anyone has any feedback on the daily 15s please try to get them in soon so I can factor things in easily.




Keterys I think the thread has gotten so large that's its intimidating for new posters (I know I rarely join a page 5+ thread unless i've been involved in the discussion).

It might be time to post a new thread with all of the results you've collected, and then start hitting the 15+ level powers.


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## keterys (Apr 6, 2009)

Maybe each level gets its own analysis and feeds back to an original - that might be simpler to tackle.

EvilHalfling your grades seem... very high. I unfortunately haven't analyzed the powers to a great extent, but I can say that the invoker dailies, for instance, are not all that impressive. Not bad, certainly, but saying Binding Chains or Angelic Echelon is roughly equivalent to, say, Spirit of the Healing Flood seems a bit odd.


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## Stalker0 (Apr 6, 2009)

keterys said:


> Maybe each level gets its own analysis and feeds back to an original - that might be simpler to tackle.




I think the organization is fine, its just time to clean up the discussion, post the results, and then do more discussing. I wouldn't break up your threads more than you already have (daily, encounter, at will).

You have 7 pages worth of discussion that goes into your results, that's very good. If the next thread builds up another 7 pages of discussion, boil it down, and do it again. Having a big debate on all the powers of the game is a big job afterall!!


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 7, 2009)

Might be worth breaking it into PHB1 vs PHB2 for the encounters and dailies though


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## keterys (Apr 7, 2009)

Yeah, I definitely agree there. Looks like I'd gotten a decent chunk through the daily 19s before I got grabbed for a few other projects... hmm. I guess easier to hold onto those and redo what's in these threads with a more sane explanation for grading and some suggested changes as I go. I might start with at-wills though, since it's easier to get some sense of closure there


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## Ulthwithian (Apr 7, 2009)

I'd certainly be willing to assist you on the At-Wills for PHB2 (and presumably the Swordmage as well).


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## ChristopherA (Apr 10, 2009)

I wrote up my estimate of level 5:

A+: Consecrated Ground
A: Rain of Steel, Stinking Cloud
B+: Stand the Fallen
B+: Bigby’s Icy Grasp
B+: Spiritual Weapon, Weapon of the Gods
B: Fireball, Hallowed Circle, Hunger of Hadar
B-: Avernian Eruption
B-: Dizzying Blow, Frenzied Skirmish
C+: Sign of Vulnerability, Splintering Shot, Two-Wolf Pounce, Deep Cut, Villain’s Nightmare, Web
C: Excruciating Shot, Clever Riposte
C: Crack the Shell, Walking Wounded
C-: Rune of Peace, Martyr’s Retribution
D: Crown of Madness, Curse of the Bloody Fangs, Turning Point

I think your rating of Martyr’s Retribution is inconsistent with the rest of your rating system. Normally you don't rate too highly for powers with high damage, but this power has just a slightly high damage with a penalty and you are rating it in the B category. You ranked it higher than Excruciating Shot, which does only 1W less damage and has a useful advantage instead of a significant disadvantage. And it certainly isn't remotely close to Jaws of the Wolf, which does significantly more damage, doesn't have a disadvantage, and is lower level.

Although Spiritual Weapon and Weapon of the Gods are very good compared to most level 5 powers, I couldn't really put them in the A category, they just don't seem to totally unbalance the fight like Flaming Sphere or Rain of Steel.

Fireball is weak by the standard of Wizard spells (for the classes to be balanced, controllers have to have better powers than other classes to make up for the low hit points and limited class features). But by the standard of other classes, I think the incredible area would make it a very solid damage-dealing power.

The usefulness of a group healing power like Stand the Fallen depends on how your DM chooses to distribute the monsters’ attacks. In my campaign you can often find that at least 3 characters need healing, so Stand the Fallen rocks.


__________________
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## keterys (Apr 10, 2009)

ChristopherA said:


> I wrote up my estimate of level 5:
> 
> I think your rating of Martyr’s Retribution is inconsistent with the rest of your rating system. Normally you don't rate too highly for powers with high damage, but this power has just a slightly high damage with a penalty and you are rating it in the B category. You ranked it higher than Excruciating Shot, which does only 1W less damage and has a useful advantage instead of a significant disadvantage. And it certainly isn't remotely close to Jaws of the Wolf, which does significantly more damage, doesn't have a disadvantage, and is lower level.




I rated it a B-, because it does 4W radiant damage and I don't consider a defender spending a healing surge more than a tiny disadvantage. If it wasn't radiant, I would have rated it a C+. As is, I'm probably fine with it being bumped down to C+.



> Although Spiritual Weapon and Weapon of the Gods are very good compared to most level 5 powers, I couldn't really put them in the A category, they just don't seem to totally unbalance the fight like Flaming Sphere or Rain of Steel.




There was significant discussion of the effects of these two powers earlier in the thread, if it helps. Mostly it's a synergy question and they're, in their own way, just as useful. It's probably reasonable to drop SW to an A-, however, due to the action exhaustion it can set in. WotG's minor action and ability to put on someone else's weapon (such as the Tempest Fighter who has Rain of Steel going, while he wades through undead) still makes it a solid A.



> Fireball is weak by the standard of Wizard spells (for the classes to be balanced, controllers have to have better powers than other classes to make up for the low hit points and limited class features).




Which is a sad design decision in a system that allows power swapping, and especially once proven untrue by things like Firestorm 



> But by the standard of other classes, I think the incredible area would make it a very solid damage-dealing power.




I think it actually started higher but got campaigned down a grade by PlaneSailing. That said, its damage truly is uninspiring for daily powers - I do agree that it looks out of place at C+ on the list. I'll try and go back over the discussion of it later.



> The usefulness of a group healing power like Stand the Fallen depends on how your DM chooses to distribute the monsters’ attacks. In my campaign you can often find that at least 3 characters need healing, so Stand the Fallen rocks.




Yep - we agreed on the rating for that one  If anything it could be higher, but I think it's in a safe spot.



> A+: Consecrated Ground
> A: Rain of Steel, Stinking Cloud
> B+: Stand the Fallen
> B+: Bigby’s Icy Grasp
> ...




 Looking for ones we disagreed notably on... (your grade then mine listed)

Rune of Peace: C- vs. C+

You think it's really so bad? Weapon attack vs Will makes it very accurate, and it does neuter an elite or solo for a round. I mean, I agree that it's not _good_ 

Spiritual Weapon: B+ vs. A
Weapon of the Gods: B+ vs. A

Talked about above.

Crack the Shell: C vs. C+
Dizzying Blow: B- vs. C+

Damage is basically equivalent so it's -2 AC (save ends) vs. immobilized (save ends), and generally I consider melee immobilize much less powerful than ranged immobilized. Not sure I see as sharp a difference between the two as you did. 

Martyr's Retribution: C- vs. B-

I think the big difference is that you consider a healing surge a significant cost here.

Sign of Vulnerability: C+ vs. B+

Hmm, so effectively it's trying for +5 damage to all my attacks and all the attacks from a friend probably... but I think I rated this slightly too high due to the Solo factor. Still, I suspect you rated it too low.

Frenzied Skirmish: B- vs. B+

Two attacks that daze on hit with a better-than-shift of your speed in between seems stronger than baseline, no?

Splintering Shot: C+ vs. B+

Permanent attack roll penalties, even on a miss, are very serious business on an elite or solo, but I probably rated it slightly high based on a theory that solos are more likely than they apparently should be. Still, I think it should be higher than C+.

Two-Wolf Pounce: C+ vs. B+

This is very good damage output with two shift 2s thrown in for good measure... I take it you're not rating damage output well at all? 

Villain's Nightmare: C+ vs. C-

Y'know, I think you're right here. 3W vs. Reflex, no miss damage, but wacky interrupt thing is probably worth at least some combat advantage or an opportunity attack.

Bigby's Icy Grasp: B+ vs. B-

Hmm, this seems strong - Bigby's uses up an awful lot of actions and has never appeared all that strong except when it was ruled poorly such that you can deal both attack and sustain damage in the same round on the same target. And even then, eh. Maybe others have seen it be more impressive - its grab effect is at least limiting, if not as powerful as a true immobilize. That said, I might bump mine up to a B either way.

Fireball: B vs. C+

Yeah, I'm pretty sure this will get bumped back up... I think it mostly lost points on 'But, Fireball is supposed to be cooler'

Web: C+ vs. C-

As a heroic tier ranged immobilize I should probably bump this up to your rating. I haven't seen as many uses to immobi-stun melee-only monsters in my games as much as others seem to, but the monster manual certainly backs it up as more powerful.


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## Mengu (Apr 10, 2009)

I'll take a stab at PHB2 Daily 1's.

Avenger
B+ / Aspect of Might 
C- / Oath of Final Duel 
B- / Renewing Strike 
B / Temple of Light 

Barbarian
B+ / Bloodhunt Rage 
B / Macetail Rage
B- / Rage Drake Rage
C- / Swift Panther Rage

Bard
B / Echos of Guardian 
B+ / Slayers Song 
B / Stirring Shout 
C+ / Verse of Triumph 

Druid
B / Faerie Fire 
B / Fires of Life 
C / Savage Fenzy 
B / Wind Prison 

Invoker
B / Angelic Echelon
C / Binding Invocation of Chains 
C / Purging Flame 
B+ / Summon Angle of Fire 

Shaman
B+ / Blessing of 7 Winds 
B / Cleansing Wind of North 
A- / Spirit of Healing Flood 
B / Wrath of the Spirit World 

Sorcerer
B- / Chromatic Orb 
C+ / Dazzling Ray 
C / Dragonfang Bolt 
B+ / Lighting Breath 

Warden
B- / Form of Fearsome Ram 
B / Form of Relentless Panther 
C+ / Form of Willow Sentinel 
A- / Form of Winter’s Herald

Lots of B's, some C's, very few A's. Nothing at the level of Armor of Agathys. Some of these are difficult to judge because they require a certain composition of opponents (or group members, or terrain) to be effective. And some of them, eventhough I rated low, I felt were good powers for covering a weakness if needed for the character or for the group.


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## keterys (Apr 10, 2009)

Cool. One caught my eye as interesting - I actually just swapped out angel of fire from my invoker to angelic echelon after finding angel of fire extremely disappointing. Why did you rate it so highly?

Basically I found that it's not really all that useful for its standard action - its opportunity attacks are fine but not spectacular, and it's very easy to kill.


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## Mengu (Apr 10, 2009)

keterys said:


> Cool. One caught my eye as interesting - I actually just swapped out angel of fire from my invoker to angelic echelon after finding angel of fire extremely disappointing. Why did you rate it so highly?
> 
> Basically I found that it's not really all that useful for its standard action - its opportunity attacks are fine but not spectacular, and it's very easy to kill.




As I mentioned earlier, this is one of those highly group dependent ones. For instance, in the group I'm playing with, we have no trouble giving each other flanks, and controlling the battle field. So I would be tempted to rate it as a low priority power. But in the group I'm running for, they have lots of trouble with both, so this daily power would be almost better than Flaming Sphere. They also have 2.5 defenders who would be able to keep attackers off the angel fairly easily, while the angel provides them and the ranger with flanks where needed.

Group size also factors into the value of the power. In a group of 3 or 4, having another target for enemies to attack is awesome, in a group of 6 or 7, not so much.


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## keterys (Apr 10, 2009)

Fair enough - if I'd been in a group of 4 with a rogue without much support instead of in a group of 6 with no rogue... yeah, I can see that making a big difference.


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## ChristopherA (Apr 11, 2009)

In response to your questions about my ratings:

Rune of Peace: I don't have a strong opinion on this, but I figured that "cannot attack" is maybe three times as good as weaken. And weaken isn't that great. The power is accurate, but doesn't do half damage on a miss, so you are paying a lot of damage for the special effect. And the monster gets to take total defense for a round (annoying if he is a solo who already has great defenses).

Crack the Shell/Dizzying Blow: I rate ongoing damage 5 as only about 1W, because the delay in causing the damage is a significant nuisance, plus a few monsters have special saving throw powers. The -2 AC only helps weapon fighting allies and probably lasts a very short time, if the monsters saves you can't even take advantage of it yourself without an action point. Whereas Dizzying Blow gives at least one round of immobilization, maybe more, which seems like a strong control effect.

Sign of Vulnerability: There are just a number of little things I don't like too much. The implement attacks don't seem to great for a paladin - your implement is rarely used so it probably has a lower magic bonus than your sword, it only has range 5 but forces you to leave melee combat or face opportunity attacks, it goes against fortitude (the strongest monster defense) making it less accurate than your bastard sword, it rolls d8 instead of d10 for your bastard sword. It limits your tactical choices (you have to fixate on the monster, the party has to avoid killing it). Even if it works, you probably get no more than an average of 3 more hits (+15 damage) unless it is a solo. You have to use radiant attacks - many of the good paladin attacks are not radiant. The only radiant at-will is Holy Smite - and that is Str-based, while this power is Cha-based, so you probably aren't good at one or the other. Unless you are a balanced Str/Cha paladin, in which case your Wis is low and Holy Smite is a weak power. Now I'm starting to think I overrated this power.

Frenzied Skirmish: I actually like this power quite a bit, but it doesn't cause any effect on a miss, hence the mediocre rating.

Splintering Shot: I was rating based on the way I clustered my powers, and I didn't like it quite as much as the powers I put above it. You are right, looked at by itself it is pretty cool, maybe I should have put it B-.

Two-Wolf Pounce: I figure that the barbarian rage strike for this level - 4W, half damage on miss - is sort of the "average mediocre" C+ power. Mentally I add 1W for each attack, so this is 5W. For doing half damage on miss, make this 7W. Two wolf pounce does 5W over 3 attacks, so I think 8W. But some of the attacks are "off-hand" (which is -2 per die for your dwarven urgrosh), and the last attack doesn't add your stat bonus. So maybe 7W. I don't really count the in-between shift as a real bonus, since you are constrained to use it to find a secondary target. The first shift is quite nice. But the fact that you have to find a secondary target, and attacks against a secondary target aren't as good as attacks against you main target, is a penalty. So overall, I'm thinking this power is only average.

Bigby's Icy Grasp: This is much more accurate and damaging than spiritual weapon, and seriously harasses a foe with grabbing. And if you hit, the target loses a whole action escaping and moving, or doesn't move, in which case you don't have to spend a move action to make another attack! So this seems like a good quality (but not A-class) conjuration, one that can add up to a ton of damage and harassment over the course of a fight, and is thus superior to a single-shot power from a regular class.

Web: This is much too weird to get a good grasp on, so I don't have a strong opinion. It is sort of obscure, so perhaps I overrated it. But my observation is that if the opponents are hand-to-hand and they are on the other side of a corridor or narrow room, it can really cost the monsters a lot of actions to get past it.


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## hong (Apr 11, 2009)

Rune of Peace deserves an A just for comedy value.


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## keterys (Apr 11, 2009)

ChristopherA said:


> In response to your questions about my ratings




Thanks! I'll incorporate this feedback in when I redo the post in the hopefully not too distant future


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## Evilhalfling (Apr 12, 2009)

Mengu I think you have underrated several of the powers: 
Stirring Shout used against an elite or Solo is amazing.
An effect that generates healing for every party member that hits,  based on a primary stat? use dual strike get x2 hp, use an AP, get more hp.... 
This single handily turned a hard dragon fight at 1st level into a cakewalk. 

Macetail rage does much the same for the barbarian, its not a lot of damage up front, but makes the Barbarian much harder to kill.  

I did overrate some of the powers. fires of life, and angel of fire have tested out as less useful than expected. Ill revise some of my scores.


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## Evilhalfling (Apr 12, 2009)

my rankings, Mengus : 
_< revised my ranking down, > revised up _

B, B+ Aspect of Might 
B+,C- Oath of Final Duel 
B, B- Renewing Strike 
B, B Temple  of Light

B, B Echos of Guardian 
B, B+ Slayers Song 
A+,B- Stirring Shout  
B-,C+ Verse of Triumph  
_
B+, B+ Bloodhunt Rage : > the high initial damage and potential to shorten fights, is making this look better _
_A-, B Macetail Rage: < temp HP easy to get for barb, low initial damage_
A, B- Rage Drake Rage
C+, C- Swift Panther Rage

A, B Faerie Fire 
A-, B Fires of Life: < only a AB1, in most cases will hit 2 opponents, and rarely kill any.
B+, C Savage Fenzy 
B+, B  Wind Prison  

_B, B Angelic Echelon: < orginally overrated. _
_C+, C Binding Chains: < good area, but 0 damage for a daily? _
B, C Purging Flame 
_B, B+ Summon Angle of Fire: < dies easily, damage comparable to at-will. _

A-, B+ Blessing of 7 Winds 
B, B Cleansing Wind of North 
A, A-  Spirit of Healing Flood 
B, B Wrath of Spirit World 

A-,B- Chromatic Orb 
_B+,C+ Dazzling Ray , < lots of damage but just dull._ 
B-, C Dragonfang Bolt 
B, B Lighting Breath 

B,B Form of Willow Sentinel 
A+, A+ Form of Winter’s Herald
_B+, A-  Form of Relentless Panther : < not comparatively great _
B+,B+  Form of Fearsome Ram 

Standouts: Stirring Shout, Form of Winters Herald.


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## yesnomu (Apr 12, 2009)

I don't think Rage Drake's is really that great for the Barb. You're talking about maybe one or two extra attacks per encounter, unless you're being swarmed by minions (and then you're getting away from the striker's job). It could be handy for a Rageblood if your DM let you make the attack after Swift Charge, but that requires DM adjucation. And it's totally useless against solos, too.

I also think the mobility of Swift Panther's is being underrated, but if you have Pressing Strike you can normally get where you need to be anyway.


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## Mengu (Apr 12, 2009)

I'll try to comment on the grades that we had more than 1 click off (the difference between a B and a B+ I'll let Keterys decide, we're ballparking most of these powers any way, and the powers can easily become more or less powerful situationally).



Evilhalfling said:


> B+,C- Oath of Final Duel




I really don't see the attraction for this one. So whatever you're fighting won't move away and keep attacking you. As far as I'm concerned this power has no effect on melee monsters. For artillary and controllers, there are a few more applications, but you can usually move up to them, it's rare that you have to teleport to them. The damage isn't anything to write home about either.



Evilhalfling said:


> A+,B- Stirring Shout




There are so many powers that are fantastic against solos/elites, this one doesn't really rise above them. I can go up to a B but definitely not an A power. I like surgeless healing as much as anyone, but compared to spirit of healing flood, (which I think is an A power). In solo and elite fights, I like powers that kill them faster, and find them more valuable, healing powers are good when the PC's are outnumbered and everyone is getting attacked all the time. I just think this power is a little backwords.



Evilhalfling said:


> _A-, B Macetail Rage: < temp HP easy to get for barb, low initial damage_




I absolutely love this power for a Thaneborn barbarian, since they don't have many ways of gaining temporary hit points. And to top it off, it's Strength based and not Con based. But I don't think that makes it an A power. In 6 rounds of combat, if you hit 4 of those rounds, that's about 16 temporary hit points. It's comparable to what you gain from Armor of Agathys (about 13), but the aura damage over 6 rounds is considerably more than what the barbarian does with the initial attack.

I could go with a B+ because of the powers use for a Thaneborn barbarian.



Evilhalfling said:


> A, B- Rage Drak's Frenzy




This is good for chewing up minions. But difficult fights where you need a rage is usually fights where you're fighting few tough opponents. And in those fights, this might net one, maybe two attacks. There is usually no guarantee you'll be the one taking down an opponent, so the rage effect might even go wasted.



Evilhalfling said:


> C+, C- Swift Panther Rage




I find that the speed boost hardly comes into play. If you're a chain wering barbarian, it might come into play a bit more. The shift two is almost completely useless to any barbarian with Pressing Strike. For a barbarian without pressing strike it could be useful. I'd be willing to take the difference between our grades, and go with a C for this one. 



Evilhalfling said:


> A, B Faerie Fire




Damage is average, slow is a very situationally useful condition, and combat advantage is not difficult to gain. I mean it's a solid daily power, but I'm curious why you think it deserves an A?



Evilhalfling said:


> A-, B Fires of Life: < only a AB1, in most cases will hit 2 opponents, and rarely kill any.




If you miss, this is a dismal daily. The after effect is usually what you're counting on. And that's a mere Con bonus healing. If you can coordinate with your strikers to take down the targets that are taking the ongoing damage (assuming you hit), is what keeps this power at the B level for me, instead of knocking it down to a C.

But just to note, it's hard to compare this power to others, because it's rather uncommon to see controller powers that act like leader powers.



Evilhalfling said:


> B+, C Savage Fenzy




I'm not sure what I was thinking of on this one... It looks like it should be at least around a B. I think it's better than Freezing Cloud, which is a B-. Less damage but much better effects. It's not easy to use though. The druid has to be built like a defender to make the best out of this.



Evilhalfling said:


> B, C Purging Flame




It's just a bit of damage to one target. For a controller daily, this is a dud as far as I'm concerned, but I gave it a C since the damage isn't bad.



Evilhalfling said:


> A-,B- Chromatic Orb




The uncrontrollable nature of this power is very unfortunate. Against an undead, you might be hoping for some radiant damage, and get ongoing poison instead, which does nothing. Not an A.



Evilhalfling said:


> _B+,C+ Dazzling Ray , < lots of damage but just dull._




Comparing to some thing like Brute Strike, it's about the same damage. Brute Strike is a C+, I didn't think the unreliable nature of the wild magic was enough to bump it up a knotch.



Evilhalfling said:


> B-, C Dragonfang Bolt




It's a power vs fortitude, and poison is the most resisted energy type. I guess if you were going with a poison theme it would be all right, but this is definitely not an impressive daily. It's comparable to Acid arrow, which is a C power.


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## ChristopherA (Apr 14, 2009)

My level 9 ratings:

A Divine Power, Wall of Fire, Knockout
A- Blade Barrier
B+ Ice Storm
B+ Flame Strike, Attacks on the Run, White Raven Strike
B Spray of Arrows, Victorious Surge
B- Shift the Battlefield, Thicket of Blades
C+ Summons of Khirad, Radiant Pulse, Astral Defenders
C+ Crimson Edge, Deadly Positioning, Knock them Down, Crown of Glory
C/B Curse of the Black Frost
C Close Quarters Shot, Iron Spike of Dis, Lightning Serpent
C- Swirling Leaves of Steel, Mordenkainen’s Sword, Iron Dragon Charge
D+ Thief of Five Fates, One Stands Alone

Blade Barrier: Maybe it isn’t as good as Wall of Fire, but it is still a very potent power. I like how you can nab opponents in the wall without hurting your melee-fighting friends. This makes it more practical for them to try to stop the enemies from moving out of the barrier.

Victorious Surge: Free hit points are a good thing, potentially better than damage in my view (since players normally dish out a lot more damage than they receive). And this is a around 4W free hit points, and they are reliable. So this is much better than the 5W/half miss that I figure is C+ at this level.

One Stands Alone: Without the limitation, this power is good but not great, at best the B- you gave it. But the limitation is so onerous! The party is always fighting close together, there will so often be a party member within 5. Sure, you are bound to find some point during the day when you are allowed to use the power – but daily powers are much less effective when you have to use them the first chance you are allowed to, rather than when they are really needed or tactically useful.

Spray of Arrows: I do not at all see how Spray of Arrows can be ranked the same as Swirling Leaves of Steel. Close burst 3 (enemies only) is much, much better than close burst 1 (enemies only). This power causes a lot of damage!

Knockout: I give an A under the proviso that the party has something spectacularly evil to do with its free critical hit.

Iron Dragon Charge: One of my parties actually has a charge specialist, and this power still didn’t seem very tempting to take. It just seems like you would have to work so hard to set it up.

White Raven Strike: To me, this stands out way ahead of the other two warlord options at this level. 30 automatic temporary hit points is a lot of temporary hit points.

Mordenkainen’s Sword: I’m happy to spend lots of minor actions and some move actions to sustain a potent conjuration, but this just isn’t so potent.


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## keterys (Apr 14, 2009)

ChristopherA said:


> Spray of Arrows: I do not at all see how Spray of Arrows can be ranked the same as Swirling Leaves of Steel. Close burst 3 (enemies only) is much, much better than close burst 1 (enemies only). This power causes a lot of damage!




_blast_ 3, not burst 3. They're both a 3x3 area for the same damage.


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 14, 2009)

keterys said:


> Fireball: B vs. C+
> 
> Yeah, I'm pretty sure this will get bumped back up... I think it mostly lost points on 'But, Fireball is supposed to be cooler'




I'd still campaign for to go down. Heck, I'd rate it a C- and recommend it never gets taken.

The big area might look useful, but it's basically a trap because you are very unlikely to get a big area with lots of foes to use it against.  Perhaps in a battle with dozens of minions in an open area you could get it off before your mates get into the fight and don't give you the area - but the damage is still pitifully low and, crucially, every minion you miss is untouched by it.

Stinking Cloud by comparison is only radius 1 smaller area, is *guaranteed * to kill every minion inside it, by the start of your next round has done more damage than a fireball (2d10 + 2* bonuses) and can still be sustained for more and moved around and obscures vision. Sure, stinking cloud is very strong, but fireball? Bah. In any situation other than a battleboard completely filled with mooks it is weak, and even then it isn't exactly strong because you don't kill them on a miss.

Cheers


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 14, 2009)

ChristopherA said:


> Mordenkainen’s Sword: I’m happy to spend lots of minor actions and some move actions to sustain a potent conjuration, but this just isn’t so potent.




I agree here - Mordys sword doesn't seem that potent compared to spiritual weapon. It attacks Ref which is a slight advantage to hit, but it doesn't grant CA (so SW is sorta giving +2 to everyone else, which is probably stronger on balance).

Cheers


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## keterys (Apr 14, 2009)

At the end of the day, PS, Fireball deals as much damage as the other area powers at that level to a huge area at huge range.

It's no Stinking Cloud, but neither are most powers that level. Stuff like Consecrated Ground and Stinking Cloud don't make other things failures. They just make it really easy to pick out the 'As'


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 14, 2009)

The thing is, 9 times out of 10 the huge area is a limitation rather than a benefit. People get hung up on "Wow, 49 squares!" without asking themselves how often there are enough things that can get in it.

By the grading system you set out:



> B - Good. This is a solid power. Most powers should fall into this grade.
> C - Okay. This power is certainly adequate but pales somewhat in comparison to other powers.
> D - Poor. This power is certainly usable (and may even excel in certain rare situations), but is definitely lacking compared to other options.




personally I'd give it a D. Usable and may excel in certain rare situations, but definitely lacking. I don't see how it could be rated better than some form of C though. A solid power? I don't think so. Every time I've seen it used it has been relatively feeble. It is a power doomed to always have considerable potential.


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## keterys (Apr 14, 2009)

It's easy to hit 3 targets with it. It does 1.5 or 2W damage (2d10 equivalent). Compare it to W-based area options at 5th or 9th, and it's looking quite good.

It's not a great power. It's not even impressive. I wouldn't recommend it over other choices.

That doesn't make it bad.


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 14, 2009)

keterys said:


> It's not a great power. It's not even impressive. I wouldn't recommend it over other choices.
> 
> That doesn't make it bad.




Isn't that like saying 


It's not a great power (A). It's not even impressive (B). I wouldn't recommend it over other choices.

That doesn't make it bad (D).

ergo, it fits in as a C?



I'll stop bugging you about it now, I promise


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## Mengu (Apr 14, 2009)

Fireball is a weird one. I don't recommend it to anyone, and the wizard in my game lives for fireball. The huge are is not too much of a disadvantage because in close quarters you can pretty much confine it to as small as a 4x4 area. Placed in a 4x7, it can attack the front and back ranks of the enemy, without catching any allies (that you care about). If you get a good string of rolls, or have Action Surge or some other temporary bonus, it can really ease up a big encounter with many opponents (which is the purpose of a wizard daily power).

I don't think it's a power to be underestimated, BUT, it is situational, requires a certain type of encounter to be useful in, and compared to sustainable affects or whole encounter duration powers, it is simply not as versatile. I'd keep at around a C (+/- doesn't really matter too much). I definitely couldn't give it a B, just looking at the other powers that are getting B's.


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## keterys (Apr 14, 2009)

So, it's clearly worse than Hunger of Hadar (B+) which itself is clearly worse than Stinking Cloud (A)... but compare to Avernian Eruption (C+) - Fireball's damage is comparable, and it's area is tripled and its range is doubled.

Maybe almost all of the damage powers are off, though... 

I have to admit, stuff like Rain of Steel and Stinking Cloud and Consecrated Ground make everything look silly.


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## Mengu (Apr 14, 2009)

keterys said:


> So, it's clearly worse than Hunger of Hadar (B+) which itself is clearly worse than Stinking Cloud (A)... but compare to Avernian Eruption (C+) - Fireball's damage is comparable, and it's area is tripled and its range is doubled.
> 
> Maybe almost all of the damage powers are off, though...
> 
> I have to admit, stuff like Rain of Steel and Stinking Cloud and Consecrated Ground make everything look silly.




Avernian Eruption definitely does more damage, extra ongoing 5 fire has expected value of a bit less than 10 damage, and you might get a curse target in there, hit or miss you're doing extra damage to. Plus it's a control/striking power for a striker, which adds a little extra to its value. Fireball does do something Avernian Eruption can't, and that's to catch creatures in a bigger net, but that doesn't necessarily make it better, it just changes the timing of when you would use a Fireball vs Avernian Eruption. I don't see anything wrong with both powers graded as C (+/-).


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## keterys (Apr 14, 2009)

ongoing 5 damage != 10 unless you have save penalties to attach to the effect, and even then damage delayed 1 or 2 turns is less valuable than damage now.

Avernian's base damage is the same as Fireball's, but with no miss damage. Miss damage may not seem like much, but it has a large effect on average damage all the same.

Curse damage does not apply to ongoing damage or to misses, just to hits, so no... their damage is functionally equivalent. The only way to bring Fireball back to Avernian's level is to assume that increased burst size is a _penalty_, which is downright silly.

Fwiw, I'm not opposed to Fireball being a C+ - it just means I need to take a more grim look at the other powers of that level most likely 

But, after posting the at-wills. They're all rewritten now and I just need to finish rereading the thread and see if it's at all viable to put the grades into the wiki for others to maintain, then I can start looking at fixing the dailies


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## Mengu (Apr 14, 2009)

keterys said:


> ongoing 5 damage != 10 unless you have save penalties to attach to the effect, and even then damage delayed 1 or 2 turns is less valuable than damage now.




Yeah, that's why I said a bit less than 10 (because of the 45% chance, and the fact that combat will never last an infinite number of rounds).



keterys said:


> Avernian's base damage is the same as Fireball's, but with no miss damage. Miss damage may not seem like much, but it has a large effect on average damage all the same.




Oops, I missed that Avernian doesn't do half damage, that's pretty stinky. Ok, we'll call it comparable damage.


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## DracoSuave (Apr 15, 2009)

Fireball's a -great- power.

For a sorcerer.

Wizards on the other hand can't work that mojo so well.


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## ChristopherA (Apr 15, 2009)

keterys said:


> _blast_ 3, not burst 3. They're both a 3x3 area for the same damage.




Whoops, missed that. Whose bright idea was it to use two words that start with b and end with st?


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## ChristopherA (Apr 15, 2009)

Plane Sailing said:


> The thing is, 9 times out of 10 the huge area is a limitation rather than a benefit. People get hung up on "Wow, 49 squares!" without asking themselves how often there are enough things that can get in it.
> 
> By the grading system you set out:
> 
> ...




Sure, the area is deceptive, 49 squares certainly isn't 5 times as useful as 9 squares, especially when you have to worry about hitting your friends. But all that matters is how good the power actually is. It is very easy to catch 3 foes in the fireball, and then your average damage is already significantly better than a B damage power like Two-Wolf Pounce. And sometimes, you will fire it off at the start of a fight and catch 4 enemies and 4 mininons in the blast, and really soften up the opponents. Fireball is more effective at dealing damage than any other non-A power at this level.

Fireball feels kind of depressing because you are typically firing it at full-health opponents, and it has no immediate effect at all on the game, or really even much of a short term effect. All it does is make you win the combat more quickly. But what else can you ask from a game-balanced area effect damage spell?


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## keterys (Apr 15, 2009)

ChristopherA said:


> Whoops, missed that. Whose bright idea was it to use two words that start with b and end with st?




I remember making that same complaint a little over a year ago - I don't remember what alternates I suggested. Maybe radius for burst? Or... something... for blast, since blast is a much more generically used attack term?


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## Plane Sailing (Apr 15, 2009)

keterys said:


> I remember making that same complaint a little over a year ago - I don't remember what alternates I suggested. Maybe radius for burst? Or... something... for blast, since blast is a much more generically used attack term?




I think 'cone' would have done the job nicely for blast.

Burst and Cone.

Or use 'spread' instead of burst.

While they were at it, they could have given bursts (spreads) as a diameter rather than a radius, thus making it clear that 'blast 3' and 'burst 1' are actually the same area.


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## keterys (Apr 15, 2009)

They might have, if not for close bursts I suspect.

I think cone would cause too much confusion since they're really not cone-like at all, and can be used for many things that aren't cones.

But yeah, that is the first option that occurred to me. Oh well, too late now.


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## Wolfwood2 (Apr 16, 2009)

What are folks' feelings on Summoning type Dailies?  At least for lower levels, have to trade your own attack for the Summons' generally pretty weak attack isn't that great.  The main benefit is to have the Summon soaking up some extra attacks and that you don't have to sustain it every round if you need your minor action for something else.

I'd have a hard time rating them all that high, but perhaps experience from actual play says differently.


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## ChristopherA (Apr 28, 2009)

My level 15 ratings:

A+ Unyielding Avalance, Wall of Ice
A Prismatic Beams, Bigby’s Grasping Hands, Tendrils of Thuban
A- Seal of Warding, Confounding Arrows, Stunning Steel, Renew the Troops, Purifying Fire
B+ Blast of Cold, Garrotte Grip
B Bleeding Wounds, Otiluke’s Resilient Sphere
B- True Nemesis, Holy Spark, Blade Cascade
C+ Dragon Fangs
C Thirsting Maw, Serpent Dance Strike
C- Bloody Path, Slaying Strike, Fireswarm
D Warlord’s Gambit, Bloodied Retribution, Break the Wall, Make them Bleed
NA Curse of the Golden Mist

Wow, the powers at level 15 seem to take a big jump over level 9. If I were rating the barbarian rage strike (6W / half miss), I would put it below C-.

Comments:

Bigby’s Grasping Hands: Yes, this is a ridiculous action hog. But the upside potential is so huge, you don’t have to keep this up for that long to be causing a massive amount of damage plus immobilization. 

Blade Cascade: This power is just asking to be minimaxed (I can’t believe it used to have no limit to the number of attacks!). But I don’t care too much, as you say keterys, it isn’t particularly effective most of the time.

Blast of Cold: I think this power is getting the “fireball effect” of seeming weak compared to the other wizard powers. Enemies-only area effects are great. You can do lots of damage and immobilize lots of enemies, with save ends to boot. The one big drawback is that some wizards might be too vulnerable to get anywhere near the battlefield. But my “figher/magic-user” wizard would love it (except that prismatic beams is far better).

Bleeding Wounds: This seems to be the most powerful single target damage power at this level, so maybe that counts for a lot. But compared to the other powers, it doesn’t seem A-level to me. Seems not as good as the far greater damage output of prismatic beams, or the stunning ability of confounding arrows.

Curse of the Golden Mist: I agree, this power is just wrong. Seems like something which, in a given fight, will either be useless or abusive. In ordinary combat situations, I think the former is much more likely.

Serpent Dance Strike: I can’t see this being rated that high. Yes, you could potentially get 4 attacks, but that is only because this is sort of a limited area effect, and we aren’t rating area attacks as being 3 or 4 times as powerful as single target attacks. Compare to blast of cold: much less damage, much less control effect, and no damage on a miss.

Garrotte Grip: Hard to judge, but three rounds seems like a long time.

Otiluke’s Resilient Sphere, Wall of Ice: I’m just guessing, hard to judge without seeing them in action.


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