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View Full Version : Why no love for @will?



Grug
2008-06-08, 09:50 AM
One small thing that dissapoints me about 4e is the lack of At Will combat powers. What the heck? Powers are supposed to be awesome things you can do, but every class has a whopping Four at will powers available, only TWO of which you can take (3 if you're human) throughout your adventuring career. As you gain levels and get encounter powers you can only use Once, it makes the potentially cool At Wills seem even more like fall backs, like the crossbow for 3.5 wizards.

Would it be balanced to give one or two new At Will powers to a character at 11th and 21st level? Could someone design some that would reflect the power level?

Also: Would it be balanced to give players the option: If you gain a new encounter or Daily power, you may instead ignore the new power and become able to use an Encounter or Daily power you already know an additional time per encounter/Day.

Skyserpent
2008-06-08, 09:59 AM
One small thing that dissapoints me about 4e is the lack of At Will combat powers. What the heck? Powers are supposed to be awesome things you can do, but every class has a whopping Four at will powers available, only TWO of which you can take (3 if you're human) throughout your adventuring career. As you gain levels and get encounter powers you can only use Once, it makes the potentially cool At Wills seem even more like fall backs, like the crossbow for 3.5 wizards.

Would it be balanced to give one or two new At Will powers to a character at 11th and 21st level? Could someone design some that would reflect the power level?

Also: Would it be balanced to give players the option: If you gain a new encounter or Daily power, you may instead ignore the new power and become able to use an Encounter or Daily power you already know an additional time per encounter/Day.

I dunno, I kinda figure the "At Will" is like the character's standby, that he can use throughout his adventuring career, I mean, the Cleric spends most of his time launching bolts of Holy power, the fighter swings his sword. I mean, yeah there isn't much variety in your "At Wills" but I'm kind of okay with that for some reason... I'd like more options to toy with at first level, yeah, that'd be nice, but honestly I'm okay with the power scaling of them... I don't NEED a new At-Will at level 20 or whatever, though I couldn't complain if I got one...

Honestly: I think you get enough encounter powers that you can make combat interesting enough without having to crunch a whole menagerie of options into a single battle...

Theodoxus
2008-06-08, 10:25 AM
When I first started reading the various encounter and daily powers, I thought 'there should be a mechanism beyond magic items that allows for faster recharge' especially lower level abilities being used at higher levels. Then I actually played a few sessions, and I realised they really are pretty well balanced.

In a way, it's like playing Hearts (the card game) where you want to pick out the perfect combo in the perfect tactical situation to make a sweet run. Maneuver into position and watch the dominoes fall - to mix metaphors. That's part of the fun, I think. I was always fairly tactically minded in 3.x - but 4e opens up a whole lot more 'if I wait til he moves there, I can really put the hurt on with THIS power!' Maybe it plays more like chess, in that respect.

How old school is that? D&D's gone medieval!

Tsotha-lanti
2008-06-08, 10:28 AM
The at-will powers are what you use instead of going "I attack with my weapon". I don't see a problem there; you pick two default modes of attack that you use. The "real" powers are limited to encounter or daily use.

Indon
2008-06-08, 10:49 AM
I honestly wish players could get one or two recharge-on-die-roll moves (like the ones monsters have).

And if I were to ever run a 4'th edition campaign, I would probably create and implement such moves.

JaxGaret
2008-06-08, 10:50 AM
When I first started reading the various encounter and daily powers, I thought 'there should be a mechanism beyond magic items that allows for faster recharge' especially lower level abilities being used at higher levels.

I and others had assumed such as well - that at higher levels, you could use lower-level Encounter powers as At-Will powers, but I can see why that would be difficult to balance, since At-Wills don't scale very much; also, it would mean that your basic At-Will powers would probably go by the wayside in favor of converted Encounter powers, which is bad design, since a whole section of the class would be ignored. Those At-Wills are the basic definition of the class.

I am almost certain that we will see quite a few more At-Will powers for each class get released as time goes on.


Then I actually played a few sessions, and I realised they really are pretty well balanced.

Agreed. Like 99.9% of 4e, it seems well balanced.


How old school is that? D&D's gone medieval!

Sweet :smallsmile:

JaxGaret
2008-06-08, 10:51 AM
I honestly wish players could get one or two recharge-on-die-roll moves (like the ones monsters have).

And if I were to ever run a 4'th edition campaign, I would probably create and implement such moves.

Not a bad idea. To the homebrewmobile! :smallbiggrin:

Myatar_Panwar
2008-06-08, 11:38 AM
I just got the books yesterday (Wootz :smallsmile:) but as far as I can tell, the at-will powers seem more like trademarks, or representations of the players actions, than anything else. Like a wizard with the magic missile and scorching burst @wills would most likely be a blaster type wizard, and these powers reflect that always.

I do like the whole rechargeable powers idea though, and for all of these homebrew type powers, they could probably easily belong in the utility category, as that is a host for all kinds of powers.