[4E] Wizards and Glass

[Isomenes]

Something I have been very excited about: wizards made of glass are GONE! No longer must we rely on torturous multiclassing or suffer loss of caster levels to be a wizard capable of mixing it up in the fray!

Power Attack is finally a non-silly option for a Wizard! Str is no longer necessarily a dump stat! Toughness is no longer a joke!

Have you been exploring melee wizard builds? I have--a Human with Toughness and Power Attack, and a (quarter)Staff for his combined weapon and implement. Int and Str are the focuses of the abilities (though Con is obviously necessary), and Wis is preferred over Cha. Dex is meh--Improved Initiative will fix the only reason a Wizard needs Dex at second level.

Huzzah!

[Arakune]

Something I have been very excited about: wizards made of glass are GONE! No longer must we rely on torturous multiclassing or suffer loss of caster levels to be a wizard capable of mixing it up in the fray!

Power Attack is finally a non-silly option for a Wizard! Str is no longer necessarily a dump stat! Toughness is no longer a joke!

Have you been exploring melee wizard builds? I have--a Human with Toughness and Power Attack, and a (quarter)Staff for his combined weapon and implement. Int and Str are the focuses of the abilities (though Con is obviously necessary), and Wis is preferred over Cha. Dex is meh--Improved Initiative will fix the only reason a Wizard needs Dex at second level.

Huzzah!

Welcome.

Also, you need at least Cha 13 for the clas... I mean, feat spell focus (the target take a penalty to saving throws).

[Azerian Kelimon]

Wrong, brotha. What happened was that wizards can actually take two hits now before going down, instead of one. They're still squishy as ever. And STR is THE dump stat for wizards. It's still much better to start from, say, Warlord, and then pick up Mage of the Spiral Tower through multiclassing if you're hellbent on a combat mage.

But yeah, toughness is no longer a joke. Everyone should pick it up.

[Isomenes]

Wrong, brotha. What happened was that wizards can actually take two hits now before going down, instead of one. They're still squishy as ever. And STR is THE dump stat for wizards. It's still much better to start from, say, Warlord, and then pick up Mage of the Spiral Tower through multiclassing if you're hellbent on a combat mage.

Eh, not so much. With Toughness, a staff, and feat-equipped leather armor, it's far from the worst AC. And much more flexibility in defense stats means that Con is far less of a must-have--if the Wizard's not hit by the Fort attack, it's half damage at most. HP is less differentiated, too--with Toughness, a Fighter and Wizard are on par at first level (assuming Con parity, a fair assumption). And the difference only expands to 20 by 10th level. With the fighter adding toughness, that expands to...25.

Str is only a dump stat if you're not interested in going into melee. Fortunately, 4E Wizards can be, in ways that 3E Wizards were almost not allowed. Sure, it's not Twinker McFighterstein, but it's a far cry from ineffective.

Sure, absorbing hits is a Fighter's milieu. But it's no longer sub-optimal to want to have a Wizard who is not a pansy.

[Saph]

It's not so much that Wizards aren't made of glass as that all classes are now fairly similar in terms of toughness. There's a small HP and AC difference between wizards and strikers/leaders, and between strikers/leaders and defenders, but it's minimal. A Fighter will have a base AC of 17, or 19 if he uses a shield. A Wizard will have a base AC of 16 if he takes the feat for leather armour (which he will) or 17 if he uses a staff. Not much in it, and that's comparing the class that's supposed to be squishiest with the class that's supposed to be joint-toughest.

In practice the fall of the dice and miniature placement will far outweigh your class choice in deciding how tough you are. (In other words, if the monsters mob you or get lucky rolls, you're going down, and if they don't, you're staying up, no matter your class.)

- Saph

[Isomenes]

Welcome.

Aroo?

Also, you need at least Cha 13 for the clas... I mean, feat spell focus (the target take a penalty to saving throws).

But that's not even until Paragon tier. With 3 possible bonuses to Cha, you could start with a 10 and be set. Again with the flexibility. However, thanks for reminding me; I won't forget to account for it.

[erikun]

Well, not sucking and being capable are two different things. Yes, your wizard with a good Str can swing a sword as well as a fighter, but he isn't doing the same damage as a fighter without the fighter feats.

And unless you have an INT of 30, shield proficiency and proficiency with a one-handed weapon, you won't have the AC of a fighter or paladin. You can do pretty well, but falling 3 to 5 points short can make you just easy enough to hit.

Either way, enjoy your melee wizard!

[wodan46]

Wizards can take Staff of Defense, but that runs on Con, and as the name says, its primary purpose is to keep you from getting smushed, not mixing it up in melee combat.

If you want to do that, be a Warlock, focus on Con, take the Infernal Pact, and grab a Pact Blade as soon as you can. Its a magic weapon that can be used as a spellcasting implement by Warlocks. If you make a ranged attack with it and trigger an opportunity attack, if the AoO creature is cursed, the Pact Blade will damage it regardless of whether or not it hits, and if you were using Hellish Rebuke, it will trigger for 1d6+Int if you are hit and damaged. You can also smack people with the weapon for regular damage. I'd suggest taking a feat so that you can go for a Rapier for a Pact Blade with its snazzy +3 attack bonus and 1d8 damage, otherwise stick to the trusty Short Sword, which is +3 but merely 1d6.

Sadly, Pact Blades do not grant their proficiency bonus to attack rolls when spellcasting, though they still give their enhancement bonuses.

[Aquillion]

But 4e also eliminated the point of a melee wizard. Playing a gish used to have a significant impact on the way you played, since magic and melee were governed by such different systems -- there was a definite 'feel' that you were blending two diverse paths.

Now the distinction between magic and melee is essentially just flavor.

[Oracle_Hunter]

But 4e also eliminated the point of a melee wizard. Playing a gish used to have a significant impact on the way you played, since magic and melee were governed by such different systems -- there was a definite 'feel' that you were blending two diverse paths.

Now the distinction between magic and melee is essentially just flavor.

I dunno, I'm kind of wanting to play a Paladin-Wizard so that I can wear full plate and smack people around with Thunderwaves

Sure, it's silly and sub-optimal, but you gotta admit, it's pretty cool.

[marjan]

Sure, it's silly and sub-optimal, but you gotta admit, it's pretty cool.

Maybe not sub-optimal as you think. All you need are good STR or CHA and INT, rest is optional. The silliest thing about it is that Thieflings would be the best way to do it.

[Dan_Hemmens]

But 4e also eliminated the point of a melee wizard. Playing a gish used to have a significant impact on the way you played, since magic and melee were governed by such different systems -- there was a definite 'feel' that you were blending two diverse paths.

Now the distinction between magic and melee is essentially just flavor.

Depends on what you want out of a game. Speaking personally, I don't think the words "flavour" and "just" have any business being in the same sentence. I'd much rather have two mechanically identical abilities with different flavour than two mechanically different abilities with different the same (edited) flavour.

[bosssmiley]

Toughness is no longer a joke!

+5hp / tier (Heroic, Paragon, Epic) isn't pointless?

Sure, it's effectively +3HD-worth of hp over 30 levels (rather than the bad joke 3.X Toughness was), but - given the rampant hp inflation in effect in 4E - will someone please point out what tasty goodness I'm missing here?

[Morty]

+5hp / tier (Heroic, Paragon, Epic) isn't pointless?

Sure, it's effectively +3HD-worth of hp over 30 levels (rather than the bad joke 3.X Toughness was), but - given the rampant hp inflation in effect in 4E - will someone please point out what tasty goodness I'm missing here?

Well, 4ed feats tend to be not very powerful in general, so Toughness doesn't look all that bad.

[Roderick_BR]

I guess you could say that wizards multiclassing with other militar types are now possible without falling in the "wizards shouldn't lose spell levels!!!111" crap.
A nice change of pace, IMO.

[Saph]

Well, 4ed feats tend to be not very powerful in general, so Toughness doesn't look all that bad.

Yeah, Toughness and Improved Initiative are now arguably the best all-class feats available - they've stayed (roughly) the same from 3.5 to 4e while the quality of other feats has dropped. Plus you can just retrain it out if you find something better (which probably won't happen until splatbooks start arriving).

For a wizard with 10 Con, Toughness is a 25% increase in HP at level 1, and a 17% increase at level 11. Compared to how weak most other heroic tier feats are, that's a pretty good deal. They get more interesting at the paragon level, but there are still only a few really good ones.

- Saph

[Indon]

I dunno, I'm kind of wanting to play a Paladin-Wizard so that I can wear full plate and smack people around with Thunderwaves

Sure, it's silly and sub-optimal, but you gotta admit, it's pretty cool.

It's not all _that_ sub-optimal.

I mean, yeah, you spend 4 feats and your paragon path to get it, but one of those feats is significantly more powerful than standard, the other feats aren't much sacrifice, and while your paragon path is one of the few things that actually adds powers, at least you end up getting new powers from the Wizard class instead.

Though, I wouldn't multiclass that deep unless I was a human - I would want 3 at-wills so I could have more than one from each class.

[Glawackus]

I see what you did there, sai Isomenes.

came in here expecting a thread about a Mid-World campaign and everything

[Isomenes]

I see what you did there, sai Isomenes.

came in here expecting a thread about a Mid-World campaign and everything

Sorry to disappoint; I just liked the pun. Though that also seems viable in a 4E context....hmmm. Too bad I'm the only Dark Tower junkie around my circle of friends.