Forum Fridays: Eating Ice Cream with Your Bare Hands
By Nick - November 13, 2009
“Over these 29 levels, monsters gain +29 to their to-hit and to all defenses. Compared to the monsters, players lose 2 on AC, players lose 4 on to-hit and their two strong FRWs, and lose 7 on their weak FRW. These numbers don’t take into account powers, Paragon paths, Epic destinies, or feats. This is just the raw effect of levels, stat increases, and enhancement bonuses of magic items.”
If you didn’t understand all that jargon, I’ll summarize it: your accuracy and defenses are weaker than the monsters you are fighting when you reach high levels.
I found the math of this kind of interesting because I’m a nerd for D&D theory like this, but it completely falls apart when you reach the last two sentences about not considering feats, powers, Paragon Paths, or Epic Destinies. That’s like saying you don’t enjoy ice cream because you tried to eat it using your bare hands.
You could potentially never choose a feat that increases any of your defenses. Your Paragon Paths and Epic Destinies generally don’t boost your defenses either. I doubt most of us want to burn feats to try to raise our weakest defense 7 points. Even Defenders have more interesting and aggressive feats they could get instead. Still, there are some interesting defense boosting feats out there so it wouldn’t hurt them to pick up one or two.
4th Edition D&D’s combat is about taking intelligent tactics. You’re meant to deal with these defense-touting enemies by using a combination of powers that hurt their attack rolls and defenses while raising your own. Combat Advantage is a common affliction in 4th Edition, so knocking off 2 points on your enemies’ defenses is a very common occurrence. Defender’s Marked targets take a -2 penalty to attack rolls versus targets other than them and is more commonly caused than Combat Advantage. Even so, there are some staple powers that can easily help a party get past some of this high defense problem.
Cleric’s Righteous Brand: An at-will power that adds their strength modifier to the next party member’s melee attack against that target. This could easily get to about +6 at epic levels if they’re the kind of Cleric that focuses on Strength.
Cleric’s Astral Seal: Another at-will power that not only gets a +2 attack roll bonus at base, but inflicts a -2 penalty to all of the target’s defenses. Though it doesn’t cause damage, it does heal the next ally that attacks the target.
Cleric’s Chains of the Peacemaker: A nearly maximum level daily power, it simply causes a -5 attack roll penalty that the target must save against twice in order to overcome it. It is also weakened while trying to save against it the first time, which is always welcome if you’re trying to think defensively.
Warlord’s Furious Smash: This at-will power adds the Warlord’s Charisma modifier to your next ally’s attack and damage roll against the target. Charisma is a very important stat for certain kinds of Warlords, so this bonus should be very healthy at higher levels.
Warlock’s Dreadful Word: With this encounter power, a Star Pact Warlock can cause a -4 penalty to Will at low levels and anywhere from -7 to -8 at Epic.
Warlock’s Thorns of Venom: Another great encounter power from the Warlock, this epic level attack causes a -6 to -8 penalty to the target’s AC and Reflex if the Warlock has a high Intelligence and has chosen the Fey Pact class option.
Sorcerer’s Chaotic Defense: Weirdly enough, one of the best daily defensive powers happens to come from the Sorcerer. Though the benefits of this power are random, there’s a 25% chance you gain all three, giving you temporary hit points, the effect of creatures that attack you take damage, and a +2 power bonus to all of you defenses until the end of the encounter.
Bard’s Insightful Shot: If a target has a known defense that is clearly weaker than the others, this power is the way to go. The next attack that aims against it rolls against its lowest defense instead of what defense you would normally aim at.
Rogue’s Imperiling Strike: A Brutal Scoundrel Rogue can cause a hefty penalty to the target’s AC and Reflex with this power if they’ve got a high enough strength. This in combination with the Cleric’s Astral Seal or Righteous Brand should guarantee some good hits in on what are the two most commonly aimed for defenses.
Avenger’s Shielding Symbol: A potent immediate interrupt encounter power that lets you use a wisdom based attack roll to act as your defense against the triggering attack. With a decent proficiency bonus and a lucky roll, you could have a defense as high as 40 to 50 at epic levels.
Avenger’s Final Oath: Though the target also gets a wicked +5 bonus to attack rolls against you, you carry the bonus against them as well until the end of the encounter. The massive amount of damage this deals makes it an easy choice as well. This power is probably best for a Defender that is multi-classing and really wants a power that keeps the attention of their foe.
Fighter’s Interposing Shield: The immediate interrupt encounter power is always nice, but the fact that this can be used on an ally that could also simultaneously use an immediate interrupt power against the attack as well makes this deceptively good.
Shaman’s Spirit of the Unbroken Vow: This high-level epic daily confers a nameless attack roll bonus against a target that slowly builds as your allies damage it. At maximum, it grants a +10 bonus to all allies’ attack rolls against the target. By far the best power you could choose if you are worried about hitting defenses, especially for a long term fight.
Powers selection doesn’t play the only part in getting your defenses up to speed with the cruel creatures you’ll be facing. Don’t forget the most customizable aspect of character creation: feats. At Epic levels, you can combine Robust Defense and Epic Reflexes, Epic Foritude, or Epic Will to increase a defense by 6 points. If this is applied to a Defender wielding a shield with a high Intelligence or Dexterity, their Reflex could be nearly impossible to hit. Mark of the Defender is also an important feat to consider when looking at any of the defense boosting powers I’ve named that a Defender doles out.
What’s really stupid about only considering enhancement bonuses is that this doesn’t include very common bonuses from things like shields. Shields offer another +2 to AC and Reflex and easily could grant this bonus to Fortitude by picking a proper enchantment or gaining a Paragon Path feature. By just wielding a shield, a player’s defenses aren’t that far behind an opposing enemy. Throw in a few powers and feats, their defenses should be just fine. Monsters don’t get a many powers as a player at base, so they need some of high defenses at base. They just have brute numbers while players have more options to play it smart with, they way it always should be.
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