D&D 4E [4e] Eldritch Knight

[NotAYakk]

Eldritch Knight
I traded my soul to protect others. What are you doing with yours?
Prerequisite: Warlock class, Warlock's Curse class feature, Defender role

Most warlocks are more concerned for saving their own skin than their allies. However, a few warlocks chose the path of power not for selfish reasons, but to defend and protect others.

The path of the Eldritch Knight is one of self-sacrifice: in order to aid your allies, you encourage enemies to attack you and suffer the consequences. Your ability to help others is limited by the agreements every Warlock has with their patron: but by harvesting the pain of their enemies, they both feed their patron and protect others.

Eldritch Knight Path Features:
Eldritch Mark (Level 11): You may treat creatures you mark as being under the effects of your Warlock's Curse, except you may not deal Warlock's curse damage when you hit them with non-Warlock or non-Eldritch Knight powers. If a marked creature makes an attack that does not include you, you may deal your Warlock curse damage to them as an immediate reaction, or as part of another immediate action triggered by the creature making an attack that does not include you.

Eldritch Action (Level 11): When you spend an action point to gain an extra action, you gain total concealment from your enemies until the end of your next turn.

Eldritch Protection (Level 16): You and your allies have concealment against creatures cursed by you.

Powers:
Eldritch Blade + Eldritch Knight Attack 11
Your blade wounds more than the body.
Encounter + Arcane, Weapon, Psychic
Free Action
Trigger: You hit an enemy using a weapon
Target: The enemy hit
Effect: [W] psychic extra damage, and the target is under your Warlock's Curse until the end of the encounter. Until the end of the encounter, when you deal your Warlock's Curse damage to the target, you deal an additional [W] psychic damage.

Eldritch Retribution + Eldritch Knight Utility 12
Transgressions will be punished.
Encounter + Arcane
Immediate Interrupt + Close burst 10
Trigger: An enemy in range under your Warlock's curse makes an attack that does not include you.
Target: The cursed enemy
Effect: The cursed enemy takes a -4 penalty to their attack roll, and you gain a +4 power bonus to attack rolls against the target until the end of your next turn.

Eldritch Void + Eldritch Knight Attack 20
The life you suck out of your enemies bolsters your own.
Daily + Arcane, Stance, Implement
Minor Action + Personal
Effect: You assume the Eldritch Void stance. While in this stance, whenever you deal Warlock's Curse damage, you gain temporary HP equal to the curse damage dealt, you may use the Cursestorm At-Will Power, and creatures under your Warlock's Curse have Combat Advantage against you.

Cursestorm + Eldritch Knight Attack 20
Unseen winds tug at your enemies souls
At-Will + Arcane
Minor Action + Close Burst 1
Special: You may only use this power once per round when in the Eldritch Void stance.
Targets: Enemies in Burst
Effect: Each target is subject to your Warlock's curse, and takes your Warlock's Curse damage. This does not count as your one per round use of your Warlock's Curse damage.

[sblock="Design Notes"]
This is a Warlock / Defender paragon path. It is intended to work with hybrids, defender sub warlocks, and warlock sub defenders.

Eldritch Knight
I traded my soul to protect others. What are you doing with yours?
Prerequisite: Warlock class, Warlock's Curse class feature, Defender role

This PP revolves around your Warlock's Curse and Marks. The path would be usable without a Defender role, but it lacks sufficient ability to generate marks within the path.

Did you catch the ambiguity in the quote?

Most warlocks are more concerned for saving their own skin than their allies. A few warlocks chose the path of power not for selfish reasons, but to defend and protect others.

The path of the Eldritch Knight is one of self-sacrifice in order to aid your allies, as limited by the agreements every Warlock has with their patron. By harvesting the pain of their enemies, they both feed their patron and protect their allies.

Fluff. I think it needs more meat. Suggestions?

Eldritch Knight Path Features:
Eldritch Mark (Level 11): You may treat creatures you mark as being under the effects of your Warlock's Curse, except you not deal Warlock's curse damage when you hit them with non-Warlock or non-Eldritch Knght powers. If a marked creature makes an attack that does not include you, you may deal your Warlock curse damage to them as an immediate reaction, or as part of another immediate action triggered by the creature making an attack that does not include you.

Is this too complex?

It gives a damage boost against marked targets with warlock powers. I couldn't make it a full curse, because then defender sub warlocks would have a huge, huge damage boost. So I used wording similar to the hybrid warlock.

The punishment mechanism is the boost for defender sub warlocks and hybrid warlocks. I didn't want it to be a free action, but the wording required to let it work alongside existing punishment mechanisms is ... annoying.

Eldritch Action (Level 11): When you spend an action point to gain an extra action, you gain total concealment from your enemies until the end of your next turn.

Concealment is the defensive perk of this class. This prevents it from self-stacking too much (and stacking with already existing warlock class features, such as shadow walk).

Eldritch Protection (Level 16): You and your allies have concealment against creatures cursed by you.

This is a -2 penalty to all attacks that doesn't stack with the previous action point feature, or warlock shadow walk, or dim light, etc. It also enables some stealth fun.

Powers:
Eldritch Blade + Eldritch Knight Attack 11
Your blade wounds more than the body.
Encounter + Arcane, Weapon, Psychic
Free Action
Trigger: You hit an enemy using a weapon
Target: The enemy hit
Effect: [W] psychic extra damage, and the target is under your Warlock's Curse until the end of the encounter. Until the end of the encounter, when you deal your Warlock's Curse damage to the target, you deal an additional [W] psychic damage.

As a defender|warlock hybrid, you are going to have access to weapons. As worded, even pact blades qualify when used with implement powers (or at least that is the intent).

This is a free mark that applies early enough to deal curse damage, an "auto-hit" damage boost, and an encounter-long damage boost against the target. Oh, and I suspect it adds the psychic keyword to powers when you deal warlock's curse damage with them -- but I'm not sure how it would interact?

The free action on a hit design was inspired by the 4e essentials line of products, in particular the fighter and rogue encounter powers.

Note that this grants Defender sub Warlocks with a 1-target encounter-long Warlock's curse.

Eldritch Retribution + Eldritch Knight Utility 12
Transgressions will be punished.
Encounter + Arcane
Immediate Interrupt + Close burst 10
Trigger: An enemy in range under your Warlock's curse makes an attack that does not include you.
Target: The cursed enemy
Effect: The cursed enemy takes a -4 penalty to their attack roll, and you gain a +4 power bonus to attack rolls against the target until the end of your next turn.

This turns your Warlock's Curse into a one/encounter mark, with a bit of an offensive kicker at the end.

This does use up your immediate interrupt, so hybrid defenders and sub warlocks will find this less useful. For warlock sub defenders, whose marking abilities will be quite weak, this lets them use curses as pseudo-marks.

Eldritch Void + Eldritch Knight Attack 20
You form a void in your soul, and fill it with the life of your enemies.
Daily + Arcane, Stance, Implement
Minor Action + Personal
Effect: You assume the Eldritch Void stance. While in this stance, whenever you deal Warlock's Curse damage, you gain temporary HP equal to the curse damage dealt, you may use the Cursestorm At-Will Power, and creatures under your Warlock's Curse have Combat Advantage against you.

Cursestorm + Eldritch Knight Attack 20
Unseen winds tug at your enemies souls
At-Will + Arcane
Minor Action + Close Burst 1
Special: You may only use this power once per round when in the Eldritch Void stance.
Targets: Enemies in Burst
Effect: Each target is subject to your Warlock's curse, and takes your Warlock's Curse damage. This does not count as your one per round use of your Warlock's Curse damage.

A two-fold stance. It is an auto-damage stance (warlock's curse damage, unboosted by any static modifiers, is weaker than the [W] damage stances in practice) and one that grants a supply of temporary HP ('stolen' from your curse victims).

The "pull" of the Void on your Curse targets means that they get combat advantage against you, which is both flavorful and makes up for the two-fold feature of the stance.

This went through a few revisions. Earlier versions had the auto-curse damage being applied at the start of the creatures turn: however, this made the original power more wordy, and (in my experience) doing damage at one point is less bookkeeping than doing it at multiple points.

Plus, as written, it both encourages enemies to attack the Eldritch Knight, and to get away and scatter before the Eldritch Knight's turn.

This also provides Defender sub Warlocks with a 1/day encounter-long source of Warlock's curse.

---

This paragon path was originally designed as a narrow warlock|swordmage PP. I decided it would be better if it worked with all defender mixes instead of just warlock. For those who don't know, Elritch Knight is also the name of a Prestige Class from 3rd edition D&D.
[/sblock]
Thoughts?

 

[shamsael]

Personally, I would remove the Defender role requirement and instead focus the PP on bringing a secondary role to vanilla warlocks, while also being a natural choice for hybrids.


Eldritch Knight's Curse (Level 11): Creatures cursed by you are also marked by you.

That's simple, but possibly a bit too powerful.

Slightly Worse Eldritch Knight's Curse (Level 11): Whenever you apply your curse to a creature, you may also mark that creature until the end of the encounter. This effect ends if you mark another creature.

Or maybe a defendery mechanic that doesn't involve the marked condition at all?

Reckless Eldritch Knight's Curse (Level 11): Whenever a creature cursed by you makes an attack that does not include you as a target, you may deal your curse damage to it.

This last version, combines well with the Reckless Curse feat, which is available only to humans but grants victims of your curse a +1 bonus to attack rolls against you (along with some other inconsequential "bonus"). A +1 to hit YOU is exactly half as good as a -2 to hit anyone else, as far as a would be defender is concerned.

 

[EP]

Aha, now I know where to find you on here.

All looks good except for the level 11 PP feature and power, IMO:
Eldritch Mark (Level 11): You may treat creatures you mark as being under the effects of your Warlock's Curse, except you may not deal Warlock's curse damage when you hit them with non-Warlock or non-Eldritch Knight powers. If a marked creature makes an attack that does not include you, you may deal your Warlock curse damage to them as an immediate reaction, or as part of another immediate action triggered by the creature making an attack that does not include you.

Eldritch Blade + Eldritch Knight Attack 11
Your blade wounds more than the body.
Encounter + Arcane, Weapon, Psychic
Free Action
Trigger: You hit an enemy using a weapon
Target: The enemy hit
Effect: [W] psychic extra damage, and the target is under your Warlock's Curse until the end of the encounter. Until the end of the encounter, when you deal your Warlock's Curse damage to the target, you deal an additional [W] psychic damage.

How about this instead or something like this...

Eldritch Mark (Level 11): When you mark a target that is already marked by an ally or grants combat advantage to an ally, you can inflict your Warlock's Curse damage on the target when it attacks any character other than the previous allies. For example, if the target attacks another ally other than the one who also marked the target or grants combat advantage, the target takes damage equal to your Warlock's Curse.

Eldritch Blade + Eldritch Knight Attack 11
Your blade cuts though flesh to burn the soul.
Encounter + Arcane, Weapon, Psychic
Immediate Reaction
Trigger: You hit an enemy using a weapon
Target: The enemy hit
Effect: 1[W] psychic damage, and the target is marked. When you deal your Warlock's Curse damage to the target, you deal additional damage equal to one-half your level and the target grants combat advantage until the end of your next turn.

These allow your marks to compound with other marks (since I know what party you're using this for) but still work on its own. It has a defender/warlock kind of quality to it, particularly if you have an infernal pact. Plus there are a couple of us who will truly benefit from some combat advantage.

 

[NotAYakk]

Thanks for the feedback!

<b>Eldritch Mark (Level 11)</b>: You may treat creatures you mark as being under the effects of your Warlock's Curse, except you may not deal Warlock's curse damage when you hit them with non-Warlock or non-Eldritch Knight powers. If a marked creature makes an attack that does not include you, you may deal your Warlock curse damage to them as an immediate reaction, or as part of another immediate action triggered by the creature making an attack that does not include you.

So this is intended to reduce the amount of overhead I, as a player, have to deal with by marking and cursing different critters.

My first version involved Marking whenever you curse, and "if you have a class feature that lets you mark a creature, the creature may be considered marked by that class feature".

That is, in my opinion, too strong. Cursing many targets is far easier than marking many targets, especially with some defender class features.

A default mark doesn't do much for me. And having the mark fade seperately from the curse also isn't of much use.

Hence, mark->curse, which is reasonable (marks tend to be harder to accumulate than curses), so long as I prevent multiclass defender sub warlocks from exploiting it too easily...

I could give up on it, and go with something like EP says. But for a twist:
"When a creature under your curse who is marked makes an attack that does not include the ally who marked it, roll your warlock's curse dice. Gain that many temporary HP."
This is weaker than dealing warlock's curse damage dice in damage (as damage > healing, because a dead monster doesn't do any more), but it avoids having to communicate out-of-turn damage to the DM.

<b>Eldritch Action (Level 11)</b>: When you spend an action point to gain an extra action, you gain total concealment from your enemies until the end of your next turn.<br />

This is too weak for a pure warlock (who has shadow walk).

<b>Eldritch Protection (Level 16)</b>: You and your allies have concealment against creatures cursed by you.<br />

This is quite fiddly -- you have to tell the DM "my ally has concealment" etc, or say "everyone is concealed from this monster".

So I'm thinking of stealing a page from the Feytouched, and reversing it:
Eldritch Elemental Advance (Level 16): Select a damage type from Fire, Cold, Acid, Poison, Necrotic and Radiant. When you teleport adjacent to a creature, the next time you attack the creature before the end of your next turn you may deal 1/2 your level extra damage of that damage type.

Slashing Wake deals int auto-damage to every adjacent creature when you teleport away. The above doesn't deal auto-damage (so doesn't kill minions), and if you miss on your next attack the effect is wasted. This gives it about a 50% landing rate, resulting in slightly lower average damage per round than slashing wake (6 to 9 damage per round from slashing wake, untyped -- 2.5 to 7.5 damage per round from the above feature, but it is typed damage as a bonus).

However, it is far less annoying to keep track of. The damage is bundled with the attack, which means that the DM has to be communicated to once, at the same time as the .

The "next attack" clause is important to keep this balanced: if it was "every attack", multi-attack techniques could be used to make it extremely powerful.

Another idea I was playing around with was a reserve die mechanic. When a creature under your warlocks curse (does triggering condition), roll a d20 and place it into your Eldritch Prophesy pool. Until the end of your next turn, when you roll a d20, you may replace it with one of your Eldritch Prophesy dice as a non action.

<b>Powers</b>:<br />
<b>Eldritch Blade + Eldritch Knight Attack 11</b><br />
<i>Your blade wounds more than the body.</i><br />
<b>Encounter + Arcane, Weapon, Psychic</b><br />
<b>Free Action</b><br />
<b>Trigger</b>: You hit an enemy using a weapon<br />
<b>Target</b>: The enemy hit<br />
<b>Effect</b>: [W] psychic extra damage, and the target is under your Warlock's Curse until the end of the encounter. Until the end of the encounter, when you deal your Warlock's Curse damage to the target, you deal an additional [W] psychic damage.<br />

Agreed, encounter-long effects should be avoided.

Out of consideration for my DM, I also want to avoid one-turn status effects on monsters.

I like the feel of the four winds blade of the wandering swordmage, and the one sword from wizard of the spiral tower.

At the same time, I want as much bookkeeping as possible pushed on the player side.

Maybe an attack that is against both AC and Will with the same attack roll, deals 1[W] per defence it hits, and if it hits will it grants a power bonus to your next attack against the target?

A slightly different one would be one that attacks AC. If it hits, you then make a secondary attack against Will.

Stronger than both those options: make an attack against AC, and a separate attack against Will.

The double-tap attacks deal more damage (as you add static bonuses twice). The single-roll, compare against both defences, attack is the weakest. All of these powers have the problem that you need to ask the DM for both Will and AC target numbers.

The power bonus to attack is supposed to represent setting up a connection to the target's soul-stuff that draws your blade back. While dazed or the like might model a sword cutting through your soul better, I'm trying to avoid making the DM track more status...

Can you think of an alternative game mechanic to generate the "feel" of a blade that is cutting through both flesh and soul?

<b>Eldritch Retribution + Eldritch Knight Utility 12</b><br />
<i>Transgressions will be punished.</i><br />
<b>Encounter + Arcane</b><br />
<b>Immediate Interrupt + Close burst 10</b><br />
<b>Trigger</b>: An enemy in range under your Warlock's curse makes an attack that does not include you.<br />
<b>Target</b>: The cursed enemy<br />
<b>Effect</b>: The cursed enemy takes a -4 penalty to their attack roll, and you gain a +4 power bonus to attack rolls against the target until the end of your next turn.<br />

So, a -4 penalty to the attack roll basically means 1/encounter, you get to negate some random attack. And then you get a bonus against that random monster at that random time.

Some alternative mechanics include "force a reroll" (on the upside, this works on an attack of one's choice that hits: on the downside, it has a good chance of doing nothing), with a kicker-clause of "if the attack still hits".

A completely different feel would be a power with the same trigger, but gives you temporary HP equal to the damage dealt.

Warlocks' Schicks are "temporary HP/life force manipulation", "die roll modifiers/fate", "teleportation", "insanity" and "killing stuff". My DM would go insane if I teleported more, and he's already been driven insane -- so what remains is "killing stuff", "fate" and "life force".

Ideally I want at least one toy of each of those 3 in the paragon path.

I want this to be a paragon path that encourages defender/warlock mixing (so interacts in some fun way with marks), and also encourages the warlock to "get in close" and use melee weapons.

<b>Eldritch Void + Eldritch Knight Attack 20</b><br />
<i>The life you suck out of your enemies bolsters your own.</i><br />
<b>Daily + Arcane, Stance, Implement</b><br />
<b>Minor Action + Personal</b><br />
<b>Effect</b>: You assume the Eldritch Void stance. While in this stance, whenever you deal Warlock's Curse damage, you gain temporary HP equal to the curse damage dealt, you may use the Cursestorm At-Will Power, and creatures under your Warlock's Curse have Combat Advantage against you.<br />
<br />
<b>Cursestorm + Eldritch Knight Attack 20</b><br />
<i>Unseen winds tug at your enemies souls</i><br />
<b>At-Will + Arcane</b><br />
<b>Minor Action + Close Burst 1</b><br />
<b>Special</b>: You may only use this power once per round when in the Eldritch Void stance.<br />
<b>Targets</b>: Enemies in Burst<br />
<b>Effect</b>: Each target is subject to your Warlock's curse, and takes your Warlock's Curse damage. This does not count as your one per round use of your Warlock's Curse damage.<br />

This one is crap, now that I have spent more time thinking about it.

Too many strange exceptions. It was my original attempt to introduce "life stealing" to the paragon path, plus an incentive to get in close.

I want a stance or an encounter-long polymorph type effect.
[sblock="Sample Stances"]Dancing Defence
Bonus melee attack. (I think this one might be too strong)

Rain of Steel
Auto-damage aura (downside: out of turn damage, annoys DM)

Unyielding Avalanche
This is a level 15 upgrade to the level 1 Rain of Steel stance.

Here is an offensive stance that isn't an extra attack/autodamage:
Persistence of Blades

Directly comparable:
Dance of Blood, which is a level 20 paragon path attack stance. At the start of your turn you slide an adjacent enemy one square, then make a melee basic attack.

Modment of Triumph is a fighter paragon path stance. You get a static bonus to attack rolls, and your mark punishment is improved.

Slayer's Ascendancy is another basic-attack granting level 20 stance. It is a basic attack 1/round as a minor action.

Heritage of Blades is a modest ally defence boost, with a minor action auto-damage attack 1/round.

Crag of Steel is yet another [W]+static autodamage aura with a pile of bonus riders.

For "top balancing", here we have some level 22/25 stances.

Martial Supremacy is an encounter utility stance that grants attack rerolls (and goes away when you spend a healing surge).

Reaper's Stance is a top-end auto-damage aura. 19-20 crit range, dex bonus to damage, 1[W]+static auto damage, 10 ongoing auto damage. A level 25 fighter stance.

The ranger version is:
Vengeful Fangs Stance which gives you an OA against creatures attacking you (via your pet), 18-20 crit range and damage boost on your pet.

Tiger’s Reflex is simpler (but an immediate interrupt, not an OA, and your attacks not your beasts). Aid the Beast is a ranged basic as a minor (against targets adjacent to your beast), plus an initial attack.

The Rogue Reaching Blade is a free attack triggered by an enemy making an OA near the Rogue.

Quicksilver Blade swordmage 25 stance is a minor action basic melee attack.

Precision Stance is a warlord 25 stance that gives an ally a reroll per round.

Skirmisher's Command grants 10 vuln to anyone you hit.

Level 29 stances are so far beyond a level 20 stance power that they aren't that useful. Force the Battle is 3[W]+Stat+Static at-will attack as a free action against each adjacent enemy, Warlord 29 Perfect Front turns you and everyone adjacent to you into avengers, etc.
[/sblock]

A Fate stance would roll a d20 at the start of your turn, and could use it on the turn to replace an attack roll, or something like that -- pedestrian. I sort of like the "triggered" pool ideas above more.

A Life draining stance would get temporary HP off of some trigger.
Life Drinking Blade + Arcane, Weapon, Stance: your attacks against adjacent opponents gains a power bonus to your attack roll equal to your proficiency bonus of your weapon, and deals an extra [W] necrotic damage. Whenever you deal necrotic damage to an adjacent opponent, you gain an equal amount of temporary HP.

A raw damage stance ... Soulblade Echo -- Whenever you miss an adjacent target, you may make a basic melee attack against the target as a free action. This basic melee attack targets the lower of AC or Will, and deals psychic damage.