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J. Alfred Prufrock
Sep 9, 2008
Welcome to the D&D 4E CharOp thread! CharOp is short for Character Optimization, which, to be brief, means tweaking your character-building choices to produce maximum performance. This thread is mainly for posting characters you want feedback on and asking questions about how to eek out the most mechanical power from your powers and feats. You can also use it to share your awesome builds or post neat combos or whatever.

What's CharOp?

Character Optimization basically means building the mechanically strongest character you can within whatever parameters you're working with. It does not necessarily mean shameless min/maxing (though it certainly can) or completely throwing away flavor for mechanics. It also doesn't “destroy roleplaying” or whatever stupid poo poo grognards say. If anything, good charop actually supports roleplaying by letting you play whatever weird concept you want while still contributing to the party. "Halfling pastry chef" might sound dumb to you, but here we can turn it into an awesome and incredibly effective character (hint: it's a warlord!)

Why CharOp?

There are lots of reasons to optimize. First, 4E expects everyone in the party to contribute mechanically during encounters and skill challenges. Make sure you can hold your own so that you don't dissapoint your teammates! Second, it's cool to be awesome at whatever it is you do. If you enjoy playing an incompetent mudfarmer with no useful abilities you're probably not playing 4E in the first place! Third, it's just fun! Yeah, that's right, some of us are such incredible nerds that we have fun building strong characters that we may never even play. You too can benefit from our aspergers-esque rules knowledge, just by posting on the InterWebs!

RAW

RAW stands for Rules As Written. In essence, it means that everything does exactly what it says it does. It typically precludes more creative interpretations of the text. This thread assumes that you're using the RAW, so if your DM isn't make sure to point that out in your post. Also if your DM has banned material, it's probably a good idea to say so up front or you'll get a lot of unhelpful suggestions.

Pay Your Taxes

Character building in 4E includes a certain number of “taxes”, options that pretty much everybody needs to take, most frequently because they're math fixes or balance patches masquerading as choices. They typically come in the form of feats, and everyone should pay them. The most notable feat taxes are:

1) The math fixes. Everybody should take the Essentials Expertise feat appropriate to their weapon and/or implement, or for mixed weapon users or totem users, Master-at-Arms. These feats are mandatory and are usually better than any other feat anyway.
Characters that typically don't get attacked much (backliners like Wizards or archers) can possibly skip out on Improved Defenses, but anybody who expects some blows to come their way (defenders, melee classes) should pick it up. Also in this category, for implement users, is Superior Implement Training (Accurate). Take it! Just loving take it already!
2) Melee Training or an equivalent. Every melee character needs a good Melee Basic Attack. Unfortunately, many non-Str-based melee classes don't have access to an at-will that functions as one. Those guys (Battleminds, Swordmages, Monks, Avengers, Dodger Rogues, Warpriests, etc.) need to spend a feat to use a different score for MBAs. Melee Training is the basic option, but other routes like Power of Skill, Intelligent Blademaster, or Heavy Blade Opportunity are also available.
3) Balance patches. These vary from class to class, because they're feats put out to bring the weaker classes or builds better into line with their peers. Stuff like the Avenger's Painful Oath and the Warlock's Cursed Spells fall into this category.

A Note On Ability Scores

You want at least an 18 in your primary attribute post-racial bumps. No exceptions. Whether you should buy all the way up to 20 depends on how important your secondaries are and whether you need the 13 to qualify for feats. But anything less than an 18 is definitely subpar. If you don't have strong riders and don't need to qualify for specific feats, you should strongly consider the 20, particularly if your primary stat also contributes to AC (Rogues, Monks, Swordmages).

NOTE: I politely request that debate over 18 vs. 20 be kindly kept out of the thread. It seems to come up every couple months and then never manages to go anywhere productive, so just stop bringing it up already, nobody cares you loving nerds goddammit.

Blanket Tips
1)"How does dpr work? How striker get maxxed?" If you want to optimize your damage, the absolute best way to do so is to build a character focused on making lots of attacks each turn, also known as a 'murderblender'. Obviously the Ranger is the king of this poo poo, but almost every class can, with a bit of work, get blendin'. Besides looking for powers that are multiattacks, look for off-actions attacks as well (anything that's not a standard action). If your class doesn't have any/enough natively, multiclass and grab them. At paragon tier, be a half-elf or even maybe paragon hybrid and grab Twin Strike to do it all day. Alternatively, optimize Brutal Barrage because that poo poo is retardedly broken.
The second best way to top tha meterz is charging. Vanguard Weapon, Surprising Charge, Horned Helm, Spear Expertise, and more stack up lots and lots of bonus damage.

2)"Hey guys, how does my defender look?" If you don't have Superior Will by paragon at the latest, it looks like crap. Superior Will is goddamned mandatory for any defender anywhere ever. If you get dazed, you can't do your job (no OAs, almost always no mark enforcement) and dazed gets really common really quickly. Do you want to do poor damage, mediocre control/leader effects, and nothing else? No? Take Superior Will. Take Superior Will. Take Superior Will.

Links

Super good resource for character optimization, including class-specific handbooks:
CharOp Wiki

J. Alfred Prufrock fucked around with this message at 12:02 on Apr 1, 2012

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Legit Businessman
Sep 2, 2007


Flail users should be taking Master-at-arms as it scales faster than versatile expertise and it gives you quickdraw to boot. :colbert:

Edit:
Do non-str monks really need to take melee training? Is it really worth spending a feat just to make sure their OA's are good?

Legit Businessman fucked around with this message at 04:54 on Jun 5, 2011

DontMockMySmock
Aug 9, 2008

I got this title for the dumbest fucking possible take on sea shanties. Specifically, I derailed the meme thread because sailors in the 18th century weren't woke enough for me, and you shouldn't sing sea shanties. In fact, don't have any fun ever.
It should also be mentioned that Heavy Blade Opportunity is a pretty good substitute for Melee Training for heavy blade users.

adaz
Mar 7, 2009

Drewjitsu posted:

Flail users should be taking Master-at-arms as it scales faster than versatile expertise and it gives you quickdraw to boot. :colbert:

Edit:
Do non-str monks really need to take melee training? Is it really worth spending a feat just to make sure their OA's are good?

Depends on how often you are getting MBAs really. I'd say if you have a leader in the party who is granting them out like candy, probably. Otherwise...

Legit Businessman
Sep 2, 2007


adaz posted:

Depends on how often you are getting MBAs really. I'd say if you have a leader in the party who is granting them out like candy, probably. Otherwise...

True, but if you were the only striker in the party, I don't think that Monk is the best choice there.

J. Alfred Prufrock
Sep 9, 2008

Drewjitsu posted:

Edit:
Do non-str monks really need to take melee training? Is it really worth spending a feat just to make sure their OA's are good?

Absolutely yes. Having the ability to make good OAs is like having a permanent Aura 1 that damages adjacent enemies when they move without shifting. Having a good OA makes you a significant factor in limiting enemy movement. It lets you play a part in defining the battle space. It lets you harass artillery. Every melee character should have a good OA. Honestly, you'll probably never even make OAs, but the important part is that you can.

Legit Businessman
Sep 2, 2007


J. Alfred Prufrock posted:

Absolutely yes. Having the ability to make good OAs is like having a permanent Aura 1 that damages adjacent enemies when they move without shifting. Having a good OA makes you a significant factor in limiting enemy movement. It lets you play a part in defining the battle space. It lets you harass artillery. Every melee character should have a good OA. Honestly, you'll probably never even make OAs, but the important part is that you can.

Not that I don't disagree with you, but I rarely see melee training on the above mentioned classes that need melee training and don't have a good alternative (like Intelligent blademaster, power of skill, etc), like the Dodger Rogues or Monks. Most melee classes are either Str based, or if they aren't are controllers who have some way to get a good MBA (battleminds notwithstanding, as they have to take Melee training and like it).

Considering that feats are the most limited resource that a PC has, is it worth it to take a feat that has a more controller-y slant than to focus on the striking feats which is what they should be focusing on in the first place (ie. the "best status effect you can give is the dead condition" argument)?

I know that CharOp has a hard on for High Damage, reliable DPR strikers, is this just a matter of personal preference between boards?

J. Alfred Prufrock
Sep 9, 2008
Even going purely "by the numbers" if you make even one OA during an encounter, the feat to make good OAs is worth it. Of course, in actual play, that won't regularly happen, which is why the value of a feat that makes you competent at OAs is so hard to quantify. The weird bit is that the value of feats like Melee Training rests in the things that don't happen, the shift-instead-of-full moves and the subpar-melee-instead-of-good-ranged actions that the enemy takes.

You're right about the Wizard's CharOp boards, in that they can sometimes get a little too obsessed with dpr, to the occasional neglect of other valid concerns, but a lot of what they do there is focused on pushing boundaries.

From my perspective: how valuable a controller daily would a movable, sustain-less zone be that read "whenever an enemy in the zone moves without shifting, make the following attack..." ? Pretty good, right? So a feat to make a decent OA is basically getting a solid, scaling controller daily power that is active all the time always. Hell, if anything, it's actually more valuable on a lot of strikers because they get to apply their bonus damage.

So yeah, while it won't make your Monk five storms + flurry any harder, it's such an incredible value for the price that I think every non-Str melee should buy in.

Locus Cosecant
Jan 12, 2008
Unless there is some reason for the enemy to think you can't back up an OA (like, if you're casting through the staff, maybe you are not great at hitting people with it), just brandishing your weapon should be plenty to maintain the threat. Unless you're playing open stats, or word gets around about the guy who is good at punching people but bad at punching people who are running away.

Endorph
Jul 22, 2009
I saw it brought up in the last thread, but I'm gonna re-ask it here: What's the best way to make a beastmaster decent?

Locus Cosecant
Jan 12, 2008

Endorph posted:

I saw it brought up in the last thread, but I'm gonna re-ask it here: What's the best way to make a beastmaster decent?

Ignore beast powers, take all the archer ranger powers, use your beast companion as a warm body to stand in the way of enemies while you shoot them with arrows.

smug jeebus
Oct 26, 2008
I've become a little frustrated with the constant waves of new powers and feats while gaming with my last group. What's the most solid class you could make using just the PHB? Up through paragon anyway; I know that the PHB is kinda starved for epic feats. My conclusion was that you could do a decent rogue that way, but it would be nice to have a second opinion.

J. Alfred Prufrock
Sep 9, 2008
Warlord is fine, so is Wizard. Fighters do alright since most of their good powers are in the PHB (provided you're content with sword-n-board). Archer Rangers don't suffer much (melee Rangers really miss the minor action attacks though), neither do Str Rogues.

Absolutely do not try to play a PHB Paladin or PHB Warlock, though. It's laughable how completely rubbish they are.

Synnr
Dec 30, 2009
This probably isn't the greatest spot to ask but is it at all possible to make a Conan or Fafhrd without it being some weird wonked out build?

Hwurmp
May 20, 2005

I know gently caress all about either character beyond their Wikipedia synopses, but a Warlord or one of the three Fighter classes(Weaponmaster, Slayer, Knight) ought to do.

Synnr
Dec 30, 2009
Well I ask because I have vague recollections of people talking about a Conan build needing far too many stat points, etc. I'm not good at character building!

adaz
Mar 7, 2009

Locus Cosecant posted:

Ignore beast powers, take all the archer ranger powers, use your beast companion as a warm body to stand in the way of enemies while you shoot them with arrows.

More or less this, but more specifically below. However there are other ways of using your beast too, but they mostly involve other hybrids or powers that aren't beast powers. Basically you're using your beast companion to give yourself more attacks to up your damage.

Beast Protector Feat - http://www.wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/display.aspx?page=feat&id=753

Whatever beast feat is applicable to yours so its instinctive behavior allows it to be more than 10 squares away from you

Sharpshooter PP, so your ranged attack can be used as a OA- http://www.wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/display.aspx?page=paragonpath&id=178

Hwurmp
May 20, 2005

Synnr posted:

Well I ask because I have vague recollections of people talking about a Conan build needing far too many stat points, etc. I'm not good at character building!

They were probably talking about one of the ridiculous builds from old issues of Dragon, where they gave Conan five 18+ stats and psionics and all this other nonsense.

-Fish-
Oct 10, 2005

Glub glub.
Glub glub.

My wife is looking for ways to improve her Pyromancer's damage (She's the group's striker and the Hexblade is the group's controller).

She's level 7, and everyone got an expertise feat for free at level 1. Inherent Bonuses are on.

Race: Cindersoul Genasi

Current feats
MC Swordmage for light blade implements
Incendiary Dagger proficiency
Implement Focus Dagger
Implement Expertise Light Blade

Class Choices
Pyromancy Apprentice
Evocation Apprentice
Pyromancy Expert
Evocation Expert
Pyromancy Master

Magic Items
Flaming Incendiary Dagger
Khyber Shard of the Fiery Depth (Paragon Tier)
Burning Gauntlets

Any advice for anything else to do to further improve her damage? Feats, magic items, paragon path?

Edit: Race added

-Fish- fucked around with this message at 06:39 on Jun 6, 2011

Locus Cosecant
Jan 12, 2008
What race? Tieflings can take Hellfire Blood.

UrbanLabyrinth
Jan 28, 2009

When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence


College Slice
Pre-errata, Elemental Empowerment would be the answer. Still, a lot of the good Fire feats (Burn Everything, Stoking the Fire, etc) require being a wizard, so a multiclass feat might be a good move. Learned Spellcaster is the better option, if she has the Wis 13 requirement, as most of Arcane Initiate is wasted.

Edit: Sorry, misread that as her being a Swordmage somehow. As she's already a Wizard, Elemental Empowerment might work depending on Str, and the feats from the Pyromancer article are probably useful too.

RPZip
Feb 6, 2009

WORDS IN THE HEART
CANNOT BE TAKEN
If she's a Genasi and went for a good STR score (if she didn't, consider letting her swap some of her scores for it) then Elemental Empowerment is flat-out amazing. Why yes, I will add my STR mod to all damage done, thanks.

Stoking the Fire gives you a +2 power bonus to damage rolls that stacks with everything for an alternative option, and there's always Dual Implement Spellcaster if she can get an offhand magic item for another boost.

E: For Paragon Paths, Master of Flame is a pretty good bet. The L16 feature lets you increase the size of all fire burst/blasts by 1.

LightWarden
Mar 18, 2007

Lander county's safe as heaven,
despite all the strife and boilin',
Tin Star,
Oh how she's an icon of the eastern west,
But now the time has come to end our song,
of the Tin Star, the Tin Star!
When Elemental Empowerment was written, Genasi were only an Str/Int race. Now that they're Int with a choice between Str and Con, letting them use Con instead of Str for Elemental Empowerment could work (though it's so incredibly better than using Strength that it may be too good).

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



I just read in a previous post in this thread that PHB-only Warlocks are very underpowered. That's disappointing, I wanted to play one. My group hasn't played a whole heap of 4th ed, and we've decided that we're going to stick to the core rulebooks when we do play, so things don't get out of hand like they did in our 2nd ed days.

What can I do in the core rules to make a warlock acceptable? I was thinking Tiefling / Infernal Pact. Will that gimp me completely? I don't care if I'm not the MOST BESTEST GUY IN THE GAME, but if I'm going to be a burden on the party, I'd really rather not do it.

Locus Cosecant
Jan 12, 2008
With just the PHB, Tieflings don't get a bonus to con. If you don't want to be a burden on the party, you should think twice before not having a 20 in your attack stat.

UrbanLabyrinth
Jan 28, 2009

When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence


College Slice

AlphaDog posted:

I just read in a previous post in this thread that PHB-only Warlocks are very underpowered. That's disappointing, I wanted to play one. My group hasn't played a whole heap of 4th ed, and we've decided that we're going to stick to the core rulebooks when we do play, so things don't get out of hand like they did in our 2nd ed days.

What can I do in the core rules to make a warlock acceptable? I was thinking Tiefling / Infernal Pact. Will that gimp me completely? I don't care if I'm not the MOST BESTEST GUY IN THE GAME, but if I'm going to be a burden on the party, I'd really rather not do it.

Are you allowing the core Essentials books as well? A Tiefling Hexblade (melee Warlock) is a pretty cool character who can throw out decent damage fairly reliably.

Elector_Nerdlingen
Sep 27, 2004



Ah, I see. I need to rethink my attitude to ability scores if I'm going to play 4th ed then. I'm still mentally stuck in 2nd ed, where 18 was completely awesome and fairly rare and 20 was out of the question without some sort of enhancement.

I'll see about Essentials, especially if it's fairly cheap. D&D hasn't been our main game since the late 90s so spending money on it beyond the core rules isn't a priority, but if it balances things out better I can see people agreeing to it. A melee warlock sounds pretty cool, too.

Kobold
Jan 22, 2008

Centuries of knowledge ingrained into my brain,
and this STILL makes no sense.
The Essentials books also provide feats that help the players keep pace with the enemies. Specialization feats provide a +1 bonus to-hit per tier, along with a little perk depending on weapon or implement... and Improved Defenses helps shore up those NADs. I'm not a fan of Essentials as a whole, but the feats are very handy.

Mr Beens
Dec 2, 2006

AlphaDog posted:

Ah, I see. I need to rethink my attitude to ability scores if I'm going to play 4th ed then. I'm still mentally stuck in 2nd ed, where 18 was completely awesome and fairly rare and 20 was out of the question without some sort of enhancement.

I'll see about Essentials, especially if it's fairly cheap. D&D hasn't been our main game since the late 90s so spending money on it beyond the core rules isn't a priority, but if it balances things out better I can see people agreeing to it. A melee warlock sounds pretty cool, too.

18 is fine for most characters, you have to give up quite a bit to get 20. Having an 18 in your stat is not really "a burden" to your party.

LogicNinja
Jan 21, 2011

...the blur blurs blurringly across the blurred blur in a blur of blurring blurriness that blurred...
Yeah, 18 +2 racial for 20 is nice for some specific characters, but it's not necessary for anyone, and you're not a burden without it. 18 can often be better, because of how many extra points you spend getting to 20.

Joe_Richter
Oct 8, 2005

Laser Lenin approves of hobo murder simulators.
Coming back to the Conan question (and having just finished reading the collected stories) I'd say a Battlerager fighter would fit best.

Locus Cosecant
Jan 12, 2008

LogicNinja posted:

Yeah, 18 +2 racial for 20 is nice for some specific characters, but it's not necessary for anyone, and you're not a burden without it. 18 can often be better, because of how many extra points you spend getting to 20.

Actually, the extra stat points you get from not taking 20 in your primary is nice for some specific characters, but you should only do it if you have a really good reason.

Not taking a 20 in your primary stat is like not taking an Expertise feat. Except it's worse, because you're not just giving up +1 to hit on all your attacks, you're also giving up +1 damage, and +1 to your best skills. Unless you have some absolutely overriding need for a high secondary stat, there's no sense in taking a -1 to basically every roll you ever make.

adaz
Mar 7, 2009

Locus Cosecant posted:

Actually, the extra stat points you get from not taking 20 in your primary is nice for some specific characters, but you should only do it if you have a really good reason.

Not taking a 20 in your primary stat is like not taking an Expertise feat. Except it's worse, because you're not just giving up +1 to hit on all your attacks, you're also giving up +1 damage, and +1 to your best skills. Unless you have some absolutely overriding need for a high secondary stat, there's no sense in taking a -1 to basically every roll you ever make.

For most non-striker classes taking a 20 would be retarded, and even taking an 18 (before racials) might be too much. The secondary rider effects are too important or, in the case of a defender, your NADS would be so terrible you'd never be able to do anything since you'd be dead or dazed.

LogicNinja
Jan 21, 2011

...the blur blurs blurringly across the blurred blur in a blur of blurring blurriness that blurred...
Your secondary defenses, skill bonuses, stat, etc also matters. Even with a +primary/+secondary stat bonus race, with an 18 (20) primary and 14 (16) secondary, you have, what, 11 CON if your secondary isn't CON?

20 INT wizards are boss. 20 DEX rogues... maybe. For everyone? No way.

Danhenge
Dec 16, 2005
This argument always happens it always comes down to the fact that a monster that is dead is the best defense. Besides which, if you're a defender you WANT to get hit some of the time. Otherwise monsters will start ignoring your impossible to hit but inaccurate defender.

RPZip
Feb 6, 2009

WORDS IN THE HEART
CANNOT BE TAKEN

LogicNinja posted:

Your secondary defenses, skill bonuses, stat, etc also matters. Even with a +primary/+secondary stat bonus race, with an 18 (20) primary and 14 (16) secondary, you have, what, 11 CON if your secondary isn't CON?

20 INT wizards are boss. 20 DEX rogues... maybe. For everyone? No way.

Most DEX primary classes should go 20, considering that it gives them Reflex, AC and Initiative. Monks in particular are pretty well known for this.

For most other classes it's much more of a toss-up, when looking at the loss of rider effects, defenses and HP. And feat pre-reqs, of course.

adaz
Mar 7, 2009

Danhenge posted:

This argument always happens it always comes down to the fact that a monster that is dead is the best defense.

And a dead character does no damage. We can toss like meaningless sayings around all day, there are certain drawbacks and reasons why you don't want to sacrifice everything to the damage god.

adaz fucked around with this message at 17:42 on Jun 6, 2011

Danhenge
Dec 16, 2005

adaz posted:

And a dead character does no damage. We can toss like meaningless sayings around all day, there are certain drawbacks and reasons why you don't want to sacrifice everything to the damage god.

The only reason that a monster is going to do enough damage to your characters to kill them in a balanced encounter is if people consistently miss.

adaz
Mar 7, 2009

Danhenge posted:

The only reason that a monster is going to do enough damage to your characters to kill them in a balanced encounter is if people consistently miss.

This is demonstrably false though, just using a few creatures off the top of my head and not even really trying. For instance,

let's see, how about EL 19, party level 19. Congratulations, I picked an encounter of 6 x Dream Hags (perfectly balanced!) http://www.wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/display.aspx?page=monster&id=4909 You're all dead.

El 14 or so, congratulations you're facing 20x Lich Remnants, and now you're all dead since you have no defenses. http://www.wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/monster.aspx?id=115814

We can go on and on throughout the monsters but there are many, many monsters who can daze/stun/dominate/do enough damage to kill your party outright in one or two turns in equal level encounters (or el+1/+2) that defenses and healing are needed.

e: the only time damage > * is if you are running very broken super high initiative builds that can nova strike for > 150 or so damage to multiple creatures their first turn thereby ensuring that monsters get no turns and die the first round. But that's broken and why even bother to play the game.

adaz fucked around with this message at 18:20 on Jun 6, 2011

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Danhenge
Dec 16, 2005
Nearly everything you do is keyed off that primary stat - things like riders and effects (with the exception of the occasionally used daily power) DEPEND upon your hitting. Plus, if you are fighting 20 of those Lich Remnants, a few of them are definitely going to hit, and you can't kill them on a miss no matter what. Better hope that extra 3 HP saves you.

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