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I just got done reading Arcane Power, WotC’s most recent class expansion book, and I thought I’d give my thoughts. In no particular order:
I love the new warlock pact. The vestige pact allows you to choose one of two “sub-pacts” after each short or extended rest, each with its own pact boon and its own augment to your at-will power, eyes of the vestige (which is a very cool power in and of itself). In addition, a lot of the new daily warlock powers give vestige pact warlocks access to additional vestiges that they can switch out for immediately upon using said power, and these vestiges last until the end of the encounter. The daily power vestiges tend to be a bit better than the basic ones you get access to, which is why they don’t stick around too long. The infernal pact warlock in my D&D campaign, Silus, is actually switching to vestige pact now that the option is available, which I’m all for.
Wizards get lots of cool new powers. Some classics return, and there’s a whole slew of summoning spells and illusion spells. What has me really excited about this is that Sredni, the party’s warlord, is multiclassed into wizard, and a lot of these new powers are right up his alley. Summoning servitors to do your bidding? Check. Using illusions to force enemies to do things against their will? Check.
The new sorcerer stuff is very cool. I particularly like the idea of a half-orc storm mage who zips around the battlefield as a bolt of lightning and tosses people around with thunderous magic. Very cool and evocative.
The swordmage now has an aegis that can teleport an enemy to him, and a lot of new powers that go along with that. Cool stuff, though I think I like being able to teleport and attack, personally.
The new prescient bard is thematically odd, but mechanically gets a lot of great stuff. The most interesting thing is that the lion’s share of the powers designed for the new build are ranged weapon powers, meaning that you can be an archer-bard now. Not quite an arcane archer, but pretty close.
The paragon paths and epic destines are all very cool. I like the arch-lich.
Lots of great feats. Some of the metamagic feats from 3rd Edition make a return, and there’s lots of new stuff, too.
Familiars. Oh, yeah. 4th Edition familiars are so cool that two of my players want one. The warlock is getting a familiar as part of his retcon; he had a feat that was only viable for infernal pact warlocks, so he’s swapping it out for a familiar. Sredni also plans on picking one up at the next opportunity, I think. I love the way they work; they’re simple and minimalist, but with tons of roleplaying potential.
Anyway, that’s all for now.
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