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Gralamin
2009-10-06, 02:35 PM
Released today on D&Di. It's a primal controller that uses Bows. I'm going over it now, and thought I'd put up a thread if anyone had any questions about it.

Artanis
2009-10-06, 03:08 PM
A...a bow using class? Something for a bow Ranger to multiclass into?

Holy hell. I can honestly say that I am really excited over this :smallbiggrin:

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 03:14 PM
A...a bow using class? Something for a bow Ranger to multiclass into?

Holy hell. I can honestly say that I am really excited over this :smallbiggrin:

It's stats happen to exactly line up, as well as synergize very well.

Hzurr
2009-10-06, 03:15 PM
Er...link please? I'm looking around on the D&Di site, and not seeing it. Is this something that's being released with Primal Power (which is odd, because those books aren't typically used to introduce new classes)

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 03:18 PM
Er...link please? I'm looking around on the D&Di site, and not seeing it. Is this something that's being released with Primal Power (which is odd, because those books aren't typically used to introduce new classes)

PHB3. And its in the Character Builder currently, the article isn't up yet.

Shadow_Elf
2009-10-06, 03:21 PM
I guessed that the Seeker would be a Primal-flavoured Ranger. I was wrong about role (Controller, not Striker), but my guess was pretty close!

I am pretty happy with it so far, and I get the feeling its going to be WIS/DEX for Archery and WIS/STR for throwing, which makes a lot of sense and stays away from a V class.

I'll have to DL the new CharBuilder Update to really get a sense for it though.

Hzurr
2009-10-06, 03:21 PM
PHB3. And its in the Character Builder currently, the article isn't up yet.

Hmm...that's actually a little frustrating. I mean, the good thing about Martial Power and Arcane Power was that they had "finished" with those Power Sources before they started releasing the supplement books.

However, I am looking forward to taking a look at it once I get home and can fire up the character builder.

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 03:22 PM
Hmm...that's actually a little frustrating. I mean, the good thing about Martial Power and Arcane Power was that they had "finished" with those Power Sources before they started releasing the supplement books.

However, I am looking forward to taking a look at it once I get home and can fire up the character builder.

Except there will be a Martial Power 2. And Arcane Power didn't touch Artificer which wasn't out yet. So in fact, there is no such pattern :smallwink:

Starsinger
2009-10-06, 03:45 PM
Also PHB3 has "Divine Characters" (or is it "Divine Heroes") on the cover... or atleast the last shot of the cover that I saw had it.

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 03:56 PM
Also PHB3 has "Divine Characters" (or is it "Divine Heroes") on the cover... or atleast the last shot of the cover that I saw had it.

Yes. Psionic, Primal, and Divine Heroes.

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 04:19 PM
Posting just to alert others that the Debut Article is up if you have D&Di. Nice and easy reading that way.

Artanis
2009-10-06, 04:26 PM
It's still greyed out for me *commences chain-refreshing*

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 04:31 PM
It's still greyed out for me *commences chain-refreshing*

How about a direct link (http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article.aspx?x=dnd/drfe/20091006)?

Artanis
2009-10-06, 04:36 PM
Perfect! Many thanks! :smallbiggrin:



Note to self: in the future, look in places other than just the one page I'm on.

Mando Knight
2009-10-06, 07:54 PM
I read the at-will powers for the class, and immediately thought of this.
http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/bleach/en/images/1/11/Uryu_frist_seen_using_his_powers.jpg

Oracle_Hunter
2009-10-06, 08:25 PM
Man, with this class proliferation, I have to think WotC is going to run out of good names pretty soon.

I mean, when I heard "Seeker" I imagined a Divine character of some sort. A forest guy who actually tracks down folks... isn't that a Ranger? :smallconfused:

Perhaps this is all part of the class fragmentation... but I gotta say, "Seeker" ain't doing it for me, name-wise.

Mando Knight
2009-10-06, 08:28 PM
Perhaps this is all part of the class fragmentation... but I gotta say, "Seeker" ain't doing it for me, name-wise.

Hm. How about "Quincy?" No, wait, that's probably trademarked by Tite Kubo...

"Soul-Shooter?" "Spirit Bowman?"

"Ranger-Druid?"

VanIsleKnight
2009-10-06, 08:34 PM
Mmm... I loves me my archery. I wish that you didn't always have to be a ranger/nature oriented person to be great with bows. It really irks me that I can't be an awesome archer without being a tree hugging hippy.

Mando Knight
2009-10-06, 08:36 PM
Mmm... I loves me my archery. I wish that you didn't always have to be a ranger/nature oriented person to be great with bows. It really irks me that I can't be an awesome archer without being a tree hugging hippy.

Don't have to be. Pick Ranger, then pick Dungeoneering rather than Nature as the fixed skill. There. Now you're an archer who delves into the nastiest holes in the ground and knows how to survive in the streets and sewers of the cities.

Jack_Banzai
2009-10-06, 08:37 PM
Mmm... I loves me my archery. I wish that you didn't always have to be a ranger/nature oriented person to be great with bows. It really irks me that I can't be an awesome archer without being a tree hugging hippy.

Nobody says you have to like trees. For instance, I have played a rugged desert ranger. And he uses a boomerang. A tundra-based ranger might be fun.

Oracle_Hunter
2009-10-06, 08:40 PM
Hm. How about "Quincy?" No, wait, that's probably trademarked by Tite Kubo...

"Soul-Shooter?" "Spirit Bowman?"

"Ranger-Druid?"
Hell, I'd go with "Stalker" or "Hunter" by the sort of search-and-destroy function in the description. Maybe throw "Spirit" in there if you must...

Arbitrarity
2009-10-06, 08:47 PM
Call it the Soulbow :smallbiggrin:

Bleah. IMHO, it's a bit too weak. You pretty much have to MC it with ranger for anything interesting (Spitting Cobra Stance FTW), and it doesn't actually dish out much in the way of damage or control, despite being controller secondary striker. It doesn't have large areas, it doesn't have multiattacks, and it doesn't have many solid control powers. Many of its powers suffer just for being weak, like... Host of Sparrows. Compare to Wizard's escape. It's... daily, reaction, rather than interrupt, and the only benefit is you take half damage until the start of your next turn, it can be triggered any time you get hit, and you move maybe 1 extra square.
Most of the powers simply don't impress. They don't do enough compared to other powers of other controllers, and a few hit points and a surge don't nearly compensate. The only real benefit is the range on various powers, and if you have some way of massively boosting RBA's, like certain Warlord powers.

Also, their primary AOE mechanic is really, really dumb. Almost every power is a "burst 1 centered on target", which is pathetic. At least with my DM, I might see adjacent enemies every 3 turns or so. There's no freedom in positioning AOE's like with wizards, no real way to guarantee affecting multiple targets, and the pathetic damage dealt is always to a single target, with some minor secondary in the AOE.

Shadow_Elf
2009-10-06, 09:07 PM
Call it the Soulbow :smallbiggrin:

Bleah. IMHO, it's a bit too weak. You pretty much have to MC it with ranger for anything interesting (Spitting Cobra Stance FTW), and it doesn't actually dish out much in the way of damage or control, despite being controller secondary striker. It doesn't have large areas, it doesn't have multiattacks, and it doesn't have many solid control powers. Many of its powers suffer just for being weak, like... Host of Sparrows. Compare to Wizard's escape. It's... daily, reaction, rather than interrupt, and the only benefit is you take half damage until the start of your next turn, it can be triggered any time you get hit, and you move maybe 1 extra square.
Most of the powers simply don't impress. They don't do enough compared to other powers of other controllers, and a few hit points and a surge don't nearly compensate. The only real benefit is the range on various powers, and if you have some way of massively boosting RBA's, like certain Warlord powers.

Also, their primary AOE mechanic is really, really dumb. Almost every power is a "burst 1 centered on target", which is pathetic. At least with my DM, I might see adjacent enemies every 3 turns or so. There's no freedom in positioning AOE's like with wizards, no real way to guarantee affecting multiple targets, and the pathetic damage dealt is always to a single target, with some minor secondary in the AOE.

The key here is that the Seeker chains combos, basically. Slides and pulls and pushes to position enemies, followed by an immobilization (they get a daily that is basically Immobilized: No Save) and stacking areas on a group of enemies. They're not the "murderize minions" or the "lock down solos" type of controllers - if anything, I would think that they're better against standard enemies, yanking them around into the same general place and then unleashing a bunch of harsh nukes. There's also the part about how, if you play it right, you should be dealing damage every round. I was disappointed with the lack of class features, but overall its a solid class.

Guinea Anubis
2009-10-06, 10:11 PM
gave it a fast once over and it looks like its not a bad class. I think it could have some good combos with some of the other classes.

Gralamin
2009-10-06, 10:17 PM
I think on its own, yes, it is weak. However, it shouldn't ever be on its own, but in a group. And I can see it working very well, opening up all kinds of combos. I like it, and I think its solid, though I know others think its weak.

Shadow_Elf
2009-10-06, 10:21 PM
I think its level 29 Dailies should each get +2[W] at least, first off (I mean, did they seriously think that Distortion Arrow (sic?) = Legion's Hold? Really?) and that the level 19 Daily, Avenging Spirits, also needs another 1 or 2 [W]. Avenging Spirits is about powerful enough to be a level 5 power, 9 tops, since its just a better version of the Fungal Spore thing, with very little "better" involved.

Nai_Calus
2009-10-06, 10:28 PM
I like it, and it scratches an itch for me I didn't even know I had. I really want to play one now.

I found it interersting that while Sehanine seems to be the one usually associated with archery, the religion section calls out Corellon as being sometimes credited with the creation of archery.

Artanis
2009-10-07, 12:51 AM
I think its level 29 Dailies should each get +2[W] at least, first off (I mean, did they seriously think that Distortion Arrow (sic?) = Legion's Hold? Really?) and that the level 19 Daily, Avenging Spirits, also needs another 1 or 2 [W]. Avenging Spirits is about powerful enough to be a level 5 power, 9 tops, since its just a better version of the Fungal Spore thing, with very little "better" involved.

I dunno about the others, but Uttercold looks pretty decent in the damage department to me.

Going by Rage Strike, the benchmark for a pure-damage L29 daily is 9w+stuff. Uttercold itself does 4w+stuff. That vulnerable 10 is like another 2w per other hit, so two more smacks from anybody would bring it up to about equivalent to 8w+stuff or so. That seems fair to me, given what a Ranger - or an entire party's worth of focus fire - can do with that kind of a static damage boost. That's before mentioning the debuff and continuing AoE damage.

incubus5075
2009-10-07, 08:27 AM
I also found it a bit weak. i currently have a ranger, elf archer rolled up and even at lvl 7 he does awesome damg. As for the controller part our party wizard constantly does massive damage to multiple targets. So it seems that when they tried to combine striker and controller they sort of fell short on both in order to have a bit more versatility.

Mando Knight
2009-10-07, 10:22 AM
Interesting that none of the Controllers seen so far have primary stat synergy with Dragonborn... though Illusion Wizards, Cha-Psions, and Str-Seekers get boosts to the secondary stats...

...Wonder if one of the Divine characters will be a Cha/Str controller?

Haven
2009-10-07, 10:47 AM
Yes. Psionic, Primal, and Divine Heroes.

Wait, I thought PHB3 was going to introduce the Shadow power source. Or is that something else?

Artanis
2009-10-07, 10:49 AM
It didn't really look like trying to combine striker and controller so much as a (relatively) "standard-issue" primary controller + secondary striker. With a secondary striker, I expect damage output about like a Paladin's healing: it can more or less keep up with a primary striker, but it sure as hell ain't a Ranger.

When looking at a power's damage, I try to look at how much HP the target loses as a result, not how much damage it does directly. The Warlord's Commander's Strike is a good example of this: the enemy loses a lot more HP than just the Warlord's INT mod. I mentioned Uttercold earlier, which I think is a pretty good example of how a primary controller can do secondary striker stuff:

secondary STRIKER:

-2w+stuff initial damage
-Also 2d8 more initial damage, which is about equivalent to another 2w
-Vulnerable 10 all SE. 10 damage is roughly equivalent to 2w, so while it doesn't directly add to the initial damage, it increases the HP Loss Due To This Power by about 2w per additional hit that the Seeker's buddies get.
-This means the HP Loss Due To This Power is 4w + 2w per additional hit (save ends) + stats/WF/etc. So if the Seeker's buddies get two more hits before the target saves, that's a total equivalent to 8w.
-Rage Strike for a level 29 daily is 9w. A third hit from the Seeker's partymates puts Uttercold over the top.


SECONDARY striker:

-For one, getting up to par depends on partymates.
-It also takes time. In the time it takes for the vulnerability to pile up striker-level damage, the enemy is still fighting. He's restrained and debuffing other enemies, but nonetheless still fighting.
-If vulnerability is already in play for some other reason, that reduces the effectiveness.
-A miss does a hell of a lot less than half the potential damage. If you do half-damage on an 80-damage attack, that's 40. If you do half damage and no vulnerability on a 50+10+10+10 damage attack, that's 25.
-The "acceptable damage" assumes using a d10 or d8 weapon. It can't get much of a boost out of a bigger weapon like a Greatbow.

Stuff like that.

There's also the rest of the class's powers. We only see half of what they're going to get. The other half might half a hell of a lot more firepower, and a hell of a lot more control. If the Seeker has a few more powers like Captivating Missile...

Mando Knight
2009-10-07, 10:51 AM
Wait, I thought PHB3 was going to introduce the Shadow power source. Or is that something else?

Shadow, as a power source, seems to be mostly dead... except for the DDI exclusive Assassin class.

Haven
2009-10-07, 10:53 AM
Shadow, as a power source, seems to be mostly dead... except for the DDI exclusive Assassin class.

Ah, gone the way of Ki? Oh well.

Kurald Galain
2009-10-07, 11:13 AM
Shadow, as a power source, seems to be mostly dead...

I am reasonably sure we'll be getting more Shadow classes - after all, we were promised a necromancer (shadow controller, I suppose) and it's not that hard to imagine a shadow defender, either. That would be for the PHB4, perhaps.