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  1. #1

    4e Blood Abilities

    I'm giving credit where credit is due. I've used tpdarkdraco's work as a template and revised the function of blood abilities to fit 4e containers and terminology (e.g.: at-will, encounter, daily, end of your next turn, end of encounter, etc.) as close as possible.

    I've attempted to take the essence of what these abilities were meant to do in 2nd Edition and discovered that many actually had similar effects here in the form of class powers, rituals, skills, feats, built-in mechanics such as difficult terrain, etc.

    One of the primary goals here was to balance any bonuses that resulted from a blood ability. So as a starting point, I took a Minor ability like Alertness and deduced that a skill bonus from a Minor ability would be +2 (+4 Major/+6 Great) because a Minor ability never just gives a single skill bonus (as in the case of Alertness, there was an additional anti-surprise mechanics).

    So going forward from that, I took the +2/+4/+6 and lowered it depending on how many other benefits an ability gives and whether or not those benefits extend to the scion's party.

    I would love some feedback. I wanted to find a balance anchor, which was easier than I thought because 4e lacks contradictions.


    EDIT:

    After having played and DM'd 4e for nearly a year now in regular weekly games and having been exposed to the material longer, I've updated the PDF with more streamlined 4e terminology and modified several abilities to be (what I consider) more balanced with the general ruleset.

    That said, I believe in preserving this unique feature to Birthright and as such most of these abilities are, to a degree, a step above the typical 4e power. It's also true that blood abilities in 4e can superpower a 1st level character, as they are not scaled by level. This is an issue that can't be fixed without a complete overhaul of blood abilities as a concept, but this PDF is meant to TRANSLATE from 2E, preserving the intent of the abilities rather than changing it.

    The link to the updated PDF is: http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0...thkey=CImE_6cK

    I would love feedback, ideas, to rekindle the discussion. There are several inconsistencies in the acquisition tables, as I had to remove blood abilities I did not translate, such as Bloodtrait, Bloodform, Invulnerability and others. I'm not sure how to proceed with those, as they were left more to imagination and improvisation than clearly defined rules. Again, suggestions would be welcome.
    Last edited by Rykros1; 07-25-2010 at 11:08 AM.

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    I'd love to take a look at this, but I keep getting the error

    "Sorry, the page (or document) you have requested is not available.

    Please check the address and try again."

    When I try to follow your link in google docs.

  3. #3
    Ouch, sorry about that. Should be fixed now.

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    I am in the process of a more thorough examination of the abilities now, but from what I have looked at so far, you have done a very good interpretation of the 2e bloodline abilities as written into 4e values. In fact, my group and I were in the process of our own 4e conversion of the bloodlines and many of the values and powers you chose match ours exactly.

    We're being a bit more liberal in our changes since we're trying to keep each tier balanced amongst itself (majors somewhat comparable in power to other majors, etc). Some powers were obvious must-haves compared to others.

    However, using your guideline of keeping as close in function to 2e as possible, I'll try to give some feedback of things that I noticed on first inspection.

    First off, I'll mention two general concerns. You used a (bloodline) bonus to defenses and saving throws often. Since bonuses of the same type do not stack, this means that a lot of these abilities will not stack with other bloodline abilities, causing some redundancy. Was this a design choice, or was bloodline to act like an untyped bonus? In comparison, I could find only two abilities that give a bloodline bonus to attack and damage, causing minimal overlap.

    Secondly, in 4e, alignment seems to be on its way out. The neutral evil rogue we would've encountered back in 2e might now just as easily be unaligned. I don't know of any examples of powers or abilities that work on a specific alignment any more, either. I'd gladly be corrected if I'm wrong, but attacks that might normally have focused on evil now do things like bonus damage to undead and/or demons, focusing on creature type rather than alignment. To keep up with 4e, that means bloodline abilities like Protection from Evil should be reworked to shift away from alignment.

    Here's a few specific notes on individual abilities:

    Battlewise: This change makes it much stronger than 2e, where it was purely relegated to the warcards. This actually makes battlewise useful in situations other than war, which I like, but I'm torn on the duration of an entire encounter for a rather large boost of +2 to realistically everyone. In contrast, the feat Action Surge for humans, which gives a +3 to attack to the one attack you use an action point for, is considered a prime pick feat. Granted, at least the bonus is typed, but as mentioned earlier this only overlaps with Divine Wrath, which is DM controlled. I'll think on this one more; I like where you're going with it, but it's a large change.

    Blood History: Typo, Maela should be Masela.

    Divine Wrath: An extra standard action every round, and all powers (including martial powers I'm assuming) deal maximum damage? 0.0 Also, you should clarify if the cause fear attack is an aura or if it takes an action.

    Heightened Ability: +2 to a statistic is very, very strong for a minor ability. Mind if I ask what your reasoning was on making this a +2, instead of its old +1?

    Iron Will: Why the Toughness feat instead of training in Endurance?
    Last edited by Jerrith; 11-20-2009 at 02:06 AM.

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    Site Moderator Sorontar's Avatar
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    Alter Appearance: In 2e, alter appearance lasts for 10 rounds plus one round per level. The 4e Disguise Self power lasts for one hour (1,000 rounds). This is an enormous increase in power for one of the already powerful major abilities.
    In 2ed, one combat round is 1 minute (10 rounds is a turn), so one hour is 60 rounds for 2ed. I believe that a 4ed round is shorter, so the comparison isn't quite right as it uses different units of measurements.

    Sorontar

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    Quote Originally Posted by Sorontar View Post
    In 2ed, one combat round is 1 minute (10 rounds is a turn), so one hour is 60 rounds for 2ed. I believe that a 4ed round is shorter, so the comparison isn't quite right as it uses different units of measurements.

    Sorontar
    You are correct, and I edited my post. Good catch. The 4e round is 6 seconds long, and I didn't account for the change in amount of round time.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Rykros1 View Post
    I'm giving credit where credit is due. I've used tpdarkdraco's work as a template and revised the function of blood abilities to fit 4e containers and terminology (e.g.: at-will, encounter, daily, end of your next turn, end of encounter, etc.) as close as possible.
    Thanks for the credit, but I had already put the Blood Abilities into 4e containers and terminology.


    One of the primary goals here was to balance any bonuses that resulted from a blood ability. So as a starting point, I took a Minor ability like Alertness and deduced that a skill bonus from a Minor ability would be +2 (+4 Major/+6 Great) because a Minor ability never just gives a single skill bonus (as in the case of Alertness, there was an additional anti-surprise mechanics).

    So going forward from that, I took the +2/+4/+6 and lowered it depending on how many other benefits an ability gives and whether or not those benefits extend to the scion's party.
    This is something I didn't do when I did my conversion. I like what you have done. The balancing of the bonuses seems good. The Blood Abilities was one of the first things I did with 4e. I think you have scaled my conversion alot better to balance with 4e. I admit that was something I wasn't going for originally. Nice work.

  8. #8
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    Rykros1. I have noticed that the Elemental Control blood ability you have made too powerful. Summoned creatures use Standard Actions to do attacks and not minor. Way to powerfull if it is only minor as a summoned creature with your rules could have up to 3 attacks per round or you could have an attack and it could have 2 attacks. Way to unbalanced.

    I would look at all of the Elemental Control powers you have. They all have a similar problem with balance.

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    First off, I'll mention two general concerns. You used a (bloodline) bonus to defenses and saving throws often. Since bonuses of the same type do not stack, this means that a lot of these abilities will not stack with other bloodline abilities, causing some redundancy. Was this a design choice, or was bloodline to act like an untyped bonus? In comparison, I could find only two abilities that give a bloodline bonus to attack and damage, causing minimal overlap.
    This was a design choice. The reasoning is not to let things get out of control and result in blood abilities being the sole factor for determining success or failure in an encounter. This reduces the potential for a munchkin/min-max factor to stain the game.

    Any ability that can provide a numeric bonus to the same skill check, for instance, also has its own situational use. If a character has the Alertness and Blood History abilities, he will not be a Perception god as a result of the bloodline type bonus. However, he will still have the anti-surprise mechanic of Alertness and the ability to recall ancestral knowledge in certain skills (except Perception, for balance).

    Let me know what you think about this.

    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    Secondly, in 4e, alignment seems to be on its way out. The neutral evil rogue we would've encountered back in 2e might now just as easily be unaligned. I don't know of any examples of powers or abilities that work on a specific alignment any more, either. I'd gladly be corrected if I'm wrong, but attacks that might normally have focused on evil now do things like bonus damage to undead and/or demons, focusing on creature type rather than alignment. To keep up with 4e, that means bloodline abilities like Protection from Evil should be reworked to shift away from alignment.
    Excellent point and one I admit I hadn't considered. Perhaps this can be changed to work only against creatures with the Aberrant, Demon, Devil and Undead subtypes? Although more 4e-ish, it still doesn't seem right, especially when you take a setting like Birthright, where the awnsheghlien are a clear presence of evil. With the above change, the ability would not benefit a character facing an awnshegh.

    I'm currently a blank for ideas on this.

    Here's a few specific notes on individual abilities:

    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    Battlewise: This change makes it much stronger than 2e, where it was purely relegated to the warcards. This actually makes battlewise useful in situations other than war, which I like, but I'm torn on the duration of an entire encounter for a rather large boost of +2 to realistically everyone. In contrast, the feat Action Surge for humans, which gives a +3 to attack to the one attack you use an action point for, is considered a prime pick feat. Granted, at least the bonus is typed, but as mentioned earlier this only overlaps with Divine Wrath, which is DM controlled. I'll think on this one more; I like where you're going with it, but it's a large change.
    I can see your point here and this was my line of thought for this ability (and many others like it). First, my decision was not to compare blood abilities directly with feats/skills/rituals/powers because of the concept of blood abilities. They are supposed to be passed down from the divine, so very few people in the setting have them (when compared to the rest of the population) and unlike the other game mechanics listed above, a character rolling for blood abilities can theoretically have enough bad luck that he only gets one.

    With that in mind, I return to my original +2/+4/+6 base and downgrade the normal +4 (Major) bonus to a +2 because it extends to the party. It is also a daily power, so if it lasts until the end of the encounter, the character can't use it again in any other encounter that day.

    Lets take several gaming situations as examples. In a situation where the party only faces one encounter in a day and that encounter is relatively meaningless to the story (such as a random encounter in a hostile domain) then the use of this ability helps them wipe out their opponents a little quicker than the time it would take to achieve the same result without it.

    In a situation where a single encounter in one day is a critical one to the story, it is the DM's responsibility to design it well enough to let Battlewise be a solid bonus, but not enough to overpower cunning opponents.

    In a situation where the characters are in a dungeon crawl (especially a time-sensitive one) the player will need to gauge when it's best to use this ability, knowing that it won't be available farther down the depths of the dungeon.

    Also take into consideration that these blood abilities are not a feat variant. The characters can still have blood abilities AND action surge. They are a part of the setting so, naturally, parties of scions will be a formidable force to be reckoned with - and that's part of the allure.

    Thoughts?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    Blood History: Typo, Maela should be Masela.
    Gotcha. Fixed.

    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    Divine Wrath: An extra standard action every round, and all powers (including martial powers I'm assuming) deal maximum damage? 0.0 Also, you should clarify if the cause fear attack is an aura or if it takes an action.
    Yeah. It sounds pretty intense at first. Here's the thing. For 90% of the game the player won't be able to use this ability. Whether it comes into play at a moment when the character encounters a hated enemy from his background prior to the game starting or an enemy that has repeatedly caused suffering to him and his party members throughout the campaign, it's just going to be something really fun to let loose for one battle.

    I don't think it's expected of the DM at this point to counter the summoning of Divine Wrath with just the right obstacles to make it near obsolete. That one time when a player is given the opportunity to use Divine Wrath, it should just be a moment of, "Ok man, let it rip."

    Nor does this ability have to impact that "final battle" element of any long term campaign. It's a good idea in most such stories to feature the "final boss" as an enemy who works the strings from a safe distance and if the scion does finally get to the point of a direct confrontation with this being, Divine Wrath wouldn't qualify. This person realistically would seldom have met the scion and his party up until this point and all the suffering they may have faced was through indirect intermediaries.

    An ability with such a conditional use and one that takes up a Major slot really should do something pretty awesome, else the player will be sitting on a pair of words on his sheet that don't mean anything.

    There is also an alternative of decreasing the potency of it and allowing for a more liberal use, but as it's defined in the original BRCS, I thought this was a pretty close copy.

    Thoughts?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    Heightened Ability: +2 to a statistic is very, very strong for a minor ability. Mind if I ask what your reasoning was on making this a +2, instead of its old +1?
    The reasoning was that this ability will only benefit the character once, at creation. Unlike a lot of other abilities, it will never serve as an element that solves a problem in an encounter.

    One can argue that it is a persistent aid in a lot of encounters because the additional +1 modifier is always present, but it doesn't have the same feel as another ability that the player can invoke to solve a unique problem.

    Quote Originally Posted by Jerrith View Post
    Iron Will: Why the Toughness feat instead of training in Endurance?
    It was a toss up. The original ability grants hit points and Endurance benefits, so it was either Endurance training and +2 hit points or the Toughness feat and a bonus to Endurance.

    I wanted to stay as close to the +2/+4/+6 base as possible, but training in a skill gives a +5 bonus to it. On the other hand, Toughness gives more hit points than the original ability does. In terms of copying terminology, it does make sense to give training (worded as proficiency in 2e) to Endurance and a flat HP bonus.

    Maybe this can be revised to be: +2 permanent HP, +2 to Endurance, +2 to saves vs. dominate effects?

    +2s across the board, not duplicating actual containers?

    Not sure.

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by tpdarkdraco View Post
    Rykros1. I have noticed that the Elemental Control blood ability you have made too powerful. Summoned creatures use Standard Actions to do attacks and not minor. Way to powerfull if it is only minor as a summoned creature with your rules could have up to 3 attacks per round or you could have an attack and it could have 2 attacks. Way to unbalanced.

    I would look at all of the Elemental Control powers you have. They all have a similar problem with balance.
    Yeah, it can definitely appear so.

    I looked at it in a similar way I looked at Divine Wrath. The summoning element of the EC ability can only be used once a week and then the character is on his own, having expended a use of one of his Great abilities.

    Additionally, and rightly so, I believe, the original ability meant for the summoned elemental to fight along side you, not instead of you, so decreasing its potency for a weekly power to one that replaces your abilities for the round you choose to attack with it doesn't quite pop as a Great blood ability that can be used in this manner with rarity.

    Also, the Arcane Power overview on Summoning explains that standard actions are required unless otherwise noted, which is intentional for DMs who want to inject some of their own ideas using these rules. Add to this the fact that the elemental has half the summoner's HP and can be concentrated on by a smart enemy, it can be killed fairly quickly and again, the scion needs to wait a week.

    On the other hand, it may perhaps be prudent to change the Encounter powers these elementals possess to Standard Actions. As they all have damage dealing abilities to targets in a burst along with a secondary effect, allowing the scion to have his own abilities in full use in addition to the elemental's encounter power may be too much.

    As for standard attacks, that's what it's supposed to be there for, once a week. To help the scion get the advantage in a potentially tough situation.

    What do you think?

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