Damage type balance? (4e D&D)

[Fortuna]

First things first: I don't play 4e, and likely won't for a good long time. Still, I've got a casual interest in it, and a question just occured to me.

In 3.5, the different energy types are vastly different in strengths. Fire is awful, sonic is awesome, and the rest fall somewhere in between (simplified, but broadly true). Is the same, or similar, true in 4e? For instance, if I wanted to play a refluffed bard, would it be unbalancing (in either direction) to change all psychic damage from my powers to fire damage while changing any fire damage from wherever I might get them to psychic damage?

[Mando Knight]

Usually, Radiant is best (followed by Thunder and Untyped, with the latter just because it's almost never resisted... Radiant gets vulnerabilities), and Fire is the most resisted. If you're up against undead, Radiant is even better, and Poison is completely useless, followed by Necrotic. Outside of Elementals and Undead, very few things are outright Immune to damage types. However, Fire has support via lots ways to blast through resistance, especially if you're Arcane, and is probably one of the two most common power types to get paired with Radiant (the other is Lightning)... and if you resist one but not the other, you take the full damage.

[Fortuna]

So the short answer is yes?

[NecroRebel]

So the short answer is yes?

Not really, no.

While there's some difference in the strength of various damage types, it's minor. You might be a bit weaker if you did pyschic->fire, but the "weaker" damage types, like fire in particular, tend to have feats that give extra benefits for using them.

Also, it's fairly easy to change the damage type for most powers using equipment. There are weapons that can change the damage they deal to a particular type, including fire, cold, lightning, necrotic, radiant, and psychic. If you use one of those weapons as an implement (which can be done by any arcane class for a feat), it completely changes the damage type. A Bard, to use your example, could take the Arcane Implement Proficiency (Heavy Blades) feat, for instance, wield a Flaming Longsword, and switch any and all powers they wish to Fire damage, or not, at will.

[Xallace]

While there's some difference in the strength of various damage types, it's minor. You might be a bit weaker if you did pyschic->fire, but the "weaker" damage types, like fire in particular, tend to have feats that give extra benefits for using them.

It's something like this. Radiant is above-par, but otherwise each one is about on an even plane since there're plenty of ways to overcome resistance, not to mention that each damage type gets a couple feats to help it out. Necrotic damage seems under-supported, though.

So changing the energy type to Fire just means you don't take the Psychic Lock feat, you take Arcane Fire or something fire-related instead.