So what IS going on with 4E these days.

[Aharon]

But the same argument can be made for lots of classes in the game. Archivist has the potential to be broken, so does the Factotum. Lots of people on this board repeatedly pointed out that the potential of the Factotum to pull some highly theoretic tricks have no meaningful impact on its actual worth as a class in play.

To use your extreme example: By level 4, any group with four players could throw together their stuff, sell it all, get a candle of invocation and start chain-gating efreeti. They don't, because it's stupid. Broken elements are only broken if you use them, and if you have access to strong, but non-broken stuff to use instead, your a-ok. It's only the classes for which this middle ground doesn't exist that suffer, and the Artificer doesn't belong to them. He can be firmly within the middle ground if he focuses on strong, but non-broken stuff - just like a level 9 wizard doesn't automatically break the game by his potential to chain bind, or a level 5 wizard doesn't automatically break the game by his potential to abuse explosive runes (note that this is one trick where I'm rather sure it doesn't work, but it still is occasionally mentioned).

(As a reminder, I was answering to this argument by Frank initially:

That is stupid and you are stupid. Things your character could theoretically do don't matter. What matters is what your character can actually do. And Artificers, by that metric, suck monkey turd. An Artificer can't "use any spell", he has the power that if he had spent his down time and vast personal fortune differently, he could have prepared different wands. Well excuse me, but so fucking what? You know who else could have done something different if they'd planned their character differently? Every other character. That's not even a thing.

An actual Artificer is a very weak character. Sure, you can masturbate to how awesome it would be to mix Wizard and Cleric spells, but it really isn't. The Artificer has to spend days of downtime and mountains of gold, and at the end all he gets is a couple of fucking wands. Wizards actually know more different spells than an Artificer can make scrolls or wands of, and Wizards can make scrolls and wands too. In all the literally years of fappery to mystic theurges, geomancers, and true necromancers, no one has ever come up with a single combo that particularly meaningfully benefits from cherry picking spells off of the Wizard and Cleric lists. It's just not important.

)[/i]

[Psychic Robot]

Deliberately low-balling sucks, though. And it's quite possible for people to inadvertently stumble upon overpowered options.

[Username17]

Deliberately low-balling sucks, though. And it's quite possible for people to inadvertently stumble upon overpowered options.

This. Also the "reasonably strong" artificer that keeps getting thrown about is incredibly contrived, doesn't even work at the first couple of levels, requires immense amounts of downtime to do anything, and requires the use of special rules and books that are banned at almost every table because they break the game so trivially in other ways.

-Username17

[DSMatticus]

Aharon, that's a little different.

In the artificer example, the artificer isn't consciously choosing not to use all the spells he hasn't made magic items for. He literally can't use them because he didn't make magic items for them. Sure, he has the theoretical to take gold and downtime and create any power he wants, but that doesn't mean that power is concretely on his character sheet before he makes it.

A wizard with the requisite chain-binding spells, though, has a concrete power that is in his hands. It is right there on his character sheet that he can do that. It is not a theoretical power that he might have. It is in fact a power he actually has at that very second, and is choosing not to do. And that's different, and that means there's something wrong with the game, because there is something on that character's sheet that will ruin the game the second he decides to use it, so to keep the world flowing smoothly we have to either hope he doesn't notice, understand, or use the power at his fingertips.

So, yeah. Not noticing/using broken combos does not mean the game is fine. We can expect a certain number to get ignored (no game as complex as D&D should be perfect), but there are some glaring errors that need to be fixed. And in 4e, which is much simpler, broken options are far more noticable and harder to avoid using because they may be the only good ones at that level.

[Aharon]

@PR
Yeah, that's true. But it's part of D&D that most classes are either weak as shit or have both strong and broken abilities.

@Frank
As I said, if you focus on your infusions in addition to crafting, you are completely fine. If you insist, I could limit the properties to those found in the DMG, DMGII, MIC and Eberron sources. It wouldn't be as strong, but I'm sure there are still plenty of options left.
Last post, I mentioned some offensive options. On the defensive side, you have stuff like blur 3/day, 5 rounds each or Deathward 1/day (both from the MIC). And most of the Artificer guides do include a section of how at low levels you might not make UMD checks and should use your infusions. They tend to bring up the bane weapon property, which is also a +1 enhancement, but a bad example on how to use them IMO.

@DSMatticus
Sorry, the thread was kind of diverted when God's Trick brought up Artificers. The last two pages have nothing to do with 4e. Is it possible for mods to split threads? This might make sense here.

[DSMatticus]

Oh no, I realized the diversion - it's just that Psychic_Robot mentioned something about "inadvertently stumbling across overpowered options," and I was just pointing out that while you're right that it takes some deliberate effort to find them in 3.5 (you have to be pretty aware of what you're doing to start chain-binding efreeti), the simplicity of 4e makes it easy to stumble across its broken options (though it also made it easier for designers to find and fix them). I probably should have made it more clear that my comment about 4e was a diversion from the diversion of the thread, as jumbled as that is.

The rest of my post is very much related to the original diversion (and not my diversion from said diversion). That the "level of theoreticalness" is different in an Artificer's ability to make stuff at a future date than the "level of theoreticalness" in not envisioning all the possible applications of all the spells you have. Because the Artificer is a lot of in-game resources away from even adding the ability to his character sheet. The wizard has the ability on his character sheet, and can do it anytime he wants, whether the DM wants to give him gold or downtime or not.

[Aharon]

But the ability we were discussing is one the artificer actually has at hand without creating items. He gets infusions that let him put enhancements on weapons/armor for x minutes/level (usually 10, there are also some 1minute/level floating around).

PHBII (or DMGII, AFB right now) introduced synergy properties - +1 enhancements that require the item to have another enhancement before they can be applied. Among these are some that summon elementals.

So you use Personal Weapon Augmentation to give your weapon, i.e., the +1 equivalent enhancement Shock. For the purpose of synergy properties, your weapon now has this enhancement - there's no step in the process of applying a synergy property that says "the prerequisite has to be permanently applied", most likely because the PHBII writers weren't thinking of the Artificer infusions when writing them. You then use Lesser Weapon augmentation to apply the Air elemental power enhancement to your weapon. Voilà, you just summoned a large elemental at level 3 for 20 gp.

The Artificer infusions are very often disregarded - Frank certainly does so - but they do contain quite a few jewels that enhance the Artificer's power.

[DSMatticus]

Ahh, the augmentations. Consider what the artificer is doing, though. He is spending a 2nd level and 1st level infusion slot to summon a CR 5 creature for what I believe is one minute. At the levels where this is an interesting ability, the artificer can do it once or twice a day, and we don't care. At the levels where the artificer can do it a lot, a CR 5 creature is laughable and we don't care. And most of the other artificer's infusions are not really interesting, in that they are just regular spells.

Side note: This is probably just a case where they forgot the possibility of stacking differently named weapon enhancement spells, at which point this trick doesn't work unless you already have an appropriate sword or are a higher level. But that makes the infusions even weaker, sooo... meh.

Yes, this particular artificer really shines at level 3. And then this technique fades gradually into obsolescence over a few levels. And every other technique the artificer has is something a wizard can do and can usually do better.

[Aharon]

Yeah, we do care. It's roughly equivalent to a summon monster vi, and quite useful at the level he can bring it to the table. And one minute is far longer than one battle, which is all you need. And guess what: there are costlier weapon
enhancements that summon bigger elementals, so this trick doesn't get obsolete that fast.
Plus, it's just a fucking example. He isn't limited to that one trick. There are hundreds of weapon and armor enhancements printed in the MIC alone. If you have the patience, you will probably find similarly powerful stuff. Some of the other infusions are interesting, because they are like regular spells, which means they have regular casting times, which makes a large complaint against artificers moot.

Your side note is idle speculation.

Are you even reading what I say? I specifically brought this up because Frank said Artificers are weak at low levels, which isn't true. At higher levels, they can fucking craft, which is powerful in any campaign that uses WBL and downtime. Yeah, Frank doesn't like it. You don't seem to either. But within those constraints, which many people adhere to, the artificer is powerful.
And a wizard can't do that better than an artificer. He has to spend all his feats on it if he wants to do so, the artificer gets them as bonus feats. He has to spend all experience from his own pool, the artificer gets a craft reserve (albeit small).

[MfA]

The elemental summoning weapon enhancements are awesome for an artificer.

[Username17]

The elemental summoning weapon enhancements are awesome for an artificer.

Well... it requires an obscure item and a dubious interpretation. But mostly it requires you to:

• Get your DM to allow you to "temporarily" mimic a charged power and then use that charged power to full effect. This is the interpretation that allows for Shapechange -> Zodar -> Alter Reality -> Repeat.
• Get your DM to allow the late printing short duration charged summoning items. This list includes the Amber Amulets of Game Breaking.

So sure: that specific combo in the hands of an artificer is limited but pretty good. But it requires the use of a game breaking line of reasoning with a game breaking line of magic items. I don't think I've ever seen a game where it would be allowed.

-Username17

[Data Vampire]

The Book of Vile Darkness has been added to the product catalog.

[RobbyPants]

The Book of Vile Darkness has been added to the product catalog.

For 4E? This ought to be good. Although, while it will likely be boring, I suppose it won't have any infinite Strength cancer mages running around.

[Psychic Robot]

The 3e versions of alignment were bad, but the 4e versions are worse. I recall Mike Mearls not even being able to list the five alignments off the top of his head in an interview. I can't wait to see how they do "dark" morality.

[PhoneLobster]

Will it be 4 pages long, take 12 months to write and only have a single class tacked on at the last minute? (AKA their apparent current publishing regime)

Or is it a real book?

[Orion]

For 4E? This ought to be good. Although, while it will likely be boring, I suppose it won't have any infinite Strength cancer mages running around.

Yeah, one good thing about 4E is that they would never publish the yogi hat ranger.

[Doom]

Vampire is now a character class in Heroes of Shadow.

Will werewolf not be far behind? Does anyone else see "Copulate" as a daily utility power?

[Data Vampire]

The Book of Vile Darkness has been added to the product catalog.

For 4E? This ought to be good. Although, while it will likely be boring, I suppose it won't have any infinite Strength cancer mages running around.

From the catalog description is sounds like a DM resource book, rather than a player one. Cite

It is also a tie in with a Book of Vile Darkness movie.

[Psychic Robot]

It is also a tie in with a Book of Vile Darkness movie

[Blicero]

It is also a tie in with a Book of Vile Darkness movie.

Pixoritdidnthappen.

[Leress]

It is also a tie in with a Book of Vile Darkness movie.

Pixoritdidnthappen.

Here we are.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1733125/

[DragonChild]

Forget the 3e BOVD. Syfy original D&D movie? THAT is terrorism.

[Username17]

Forget the 3e BOVD. Syfy original D&D movie? THAT is terrorism.

Why are so many of the actors alumni from Casualty? I had never even heard of that show before this moment.

-Username17

[K]

Forget the 3e BOVD. Syfy original D&D movie? THAT is terrorism.

Why are so many of the actors alumni from Casualty? I had never even heard of that show before this moment.

-Username17

Most of the actors are from the UK. Since UK movies and television seem to recycle the same actors quite a bit from a vastly smaller pool than Hollywood, I think it's mostly a happenstance that the same actors were unemployed when the casting call went out.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Ha. Whoa. The WotC forums are exploding. The latest batch of stealth errata is even more unpopular than the item rarity rules.

I can't wait until everyone realizes what an incompetent Mike Mearls is. The light is slowly but surely dawning on them.