Yakk
2012-05-13, 02:48 PM
HP:
Level 1: Unchanged
Level 2: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round down.
Level 3: Gain no HP.
Level 4: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round up.
Level 5: Gain no HP
Level 6: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round down.
Level 7: Gain no HP
Level 8: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round up.
Level 9: Gain no HP
Level 10: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round down.
Level 11: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round up.
Level 12-20: As levels 2-10.
Level 21-30: As levels 11-20.
Feats: You never leave the Heroic tier. So any feat that requires paragon, or a level above 10, cannot be gained.
Magic Items: The level of all magic items doubles. Magic items are not for sale, and are divorced from the gold piece economy. The expected rate you'll find magic items is 1 every 5 levels or so (so 1 per level for a party of 5).
Power progression:
Level 1-10: Unchanged
Level 11/21: Gain a level 1 daily power.
Level 12/22: Gain a level 2 utility power.
Level 13/23: Gain a level 3 encounter power.
Level 14/24: Gain a level 1 encounter power.
Level 15/25: Gain a level 5 daily power.
Level 16/26: Gain a level 6 utility power.
Level 17/27: Gain a level 7 encounter power.
Level 18/28: Gain a level 1 at-will power.
Level 19/29: Gain a level 9 daily power.
Level 20/30: Gain a level 10 utility power.
(Psionic and Essentials progression not designed).
Damage expressions: When you use a power, you may only use 1 source of additional damage above the expression. This does not include class features (like sneak attack), nor does it include powers that provide a one-shot damage boost (like power attack), and critical damage bonuses from the High Crit weapon property and magic item critical damage dice. This does include vulnerability, feat bonuses, non-feat bonuses from feats, enhancement and item bonuses, and bonus dice from items such as a horned helm.
Additional Attacks: Excluding action points, you may only use 1 free, minor action, or immediate action attack per round. This is your "bonus attack". (This is to avoid massive nova builds that have 9 different non-standard action attacks as encounter powers that they burn through in 2 rounds.)
Attacks, Defences, Skills, Attribute checks: You do not gain a 1/2 level bonus to any of these.
Healing: Once per day when you take an extended rest, you can make an endurance check with a bonus equal to your maximium healing surges. Divide it by 10, rounding down. Regain that many healing surges. All surge-less healing grants temporary HP.
Criticals: When you score a critical hit, you deal [W] extra damage (increasing to 2[W] at level 11 and 3[W] at level 21). This damage bypasses the damage expression limitation above.
Rituals: Rare, and double in level. DCs remain unchanged.
Encounters: Treat the party as being 1/2 their level, roughly. Even though the party doesn't "leave heroic", feel free to use paragon tier monsters.
---
The power growth of these characters is about half that of standard 4e characters. And the "flashier" powers at paragon/epic are forever out of reach.
Thoughts? Did I miss anything? Can you produce ridiculously broken characters using the above system?
Level 1: Unchanged
Level 2: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round down.
Level 3: Gain no HP.
Level 4: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round up.
Level 5: Gain no HP
Level 6: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round down.
Level 7: Gain no HP
Level 8: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round up.
Level 9: Gain no HP
Level 10: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round down.
Level 11: Gain 1/2 standard HP increase, round up.
Level 12-20: As levels 2-10.
Level 21-30: As levels 11-20.
Feats: You never leave the Heroic tier. So any feat that requires paragon, or a level above 10, cannot be gained.
Magic Items: The level of all magic items doubles. Magic items are not for sale, and are divorced from the gold piece economy. The expected rate you'll find magic items is 1 every 5 levels or so (so 1 per level for a party of 5).
Power progression:
Level 1-10: Unchanged
Level 11/21: Gain a level 1 daily power.
Level 12/22: Gain a level 2 utility power.
Level 13/23: Gain a level 3 encounter power.
Level 14/24: Gain a level 1 encounter power.
Level 15/25: Gain a level 5 daily power.
Level 16/26: Gain a level 6 utility power.
Level 17/27: Gain a level 7 encounter power.
Level 18/28: Gain a level 1 at-will power.
Level 19/29: Gain a level 9 daily power.
Level 20/30: Gain a level 10 utility power.
(Psionic and Essentials progression not designed).
Damage expressions: When you use a power, you may only use 1 source of additional damage above the expression. This does not include class features (like sneak attack), nor does it include powers that provide a one-shot damage boost (like power attack), and critical damage bonuses from the High Crit weapon property and magic item critical damage dice. This does include vulnerability, feat bonuses, non-feat bonuses from feats, enhancement and item bonuses, and bonus dice from items such as a horned helm.
Additional Attacks: Excluding action points, you may only use 1 free, minor action, or immediate action attack per round. This is your "bonus attack". (This is to avoid massive nova builds that have 9 different non-standard action attacks as encounter powers that they burn through in 2 rounds.)
Attacks, Defences, Skills, Attribute checks: You do not gain a 1/2 level bonus to any of these.
Healing: Once per day when you take an extended rest, you can make an endurance check with a bonus equal to your maximium healing surges. Divide it by 10, rounding down. Regain that many healing surges. All surge-less healing grants temporary HP.
Criticals: When you score a critical hit, you deal [W] extra damage (increasing to 2[W] at level 11 and 3[W] at level 21). This damage bypasses the damage expression limitation above.
Rituals: Rare, and double in level. DCs remain unchanged.
Encounters: Treat the party as being 1/2 their level, roughly. Even though the party doesn't "leave heroic", feel free to use paragon tier monsters.
---
The power growth of these characters is about half that of standard 4e characters. And the "flashier" powers at paragon/epic are forever out of reach.
Thoughts? Did I miss anything? Can you produce ridiculously broken characters using the above system?