[4e] All Leader party: Overpowered?

[Saz]

Can an all leader party be overpowered, comapred to a similar level party facing the same encoutners? I mean, they will have tons of healing, respectable damage, good AoE effects, good AC and staying power.

Anyone try this in play?

[Uqbarian]

I haven't tried it in play, but I doubt it would be overpowered. My first thought is that their AoE effects won't be all that impressive and they won't be putting out as much damage as strikers. Lacking controllers and defenders also reduces their ability to dictate the tactical terms of the encounter.

[Omegatron]

Encouraging everyone to multiclass would be good.


Cleric [Avenger]
Artificer [Wizard]
Warlord [Fighter]
Bard [Everything]
Shaman [Nothing?]


This party could be really fun from a in-character standpoint. Big personalities, different ideologies.


Who Leads the Leaders?

[Ice9]

I think they'd have great staying power, but would take a long time to actually win an encounter, as they lack strikers or controllers. Things might get rather grindy, actually.

A primarily striker party (with a bit of control) would be almost the opposite - either their foes die fast or they do. Might be good for those who find 4E combats too long, actually.

[Saz]

The all striker party would only need control if they regularly went up against minions. Otherwise IMO they would do better with a bit of a leader, say as a secondary role/multi class feat for healing and combat bonuses.

[Dionysos]

No, it wouldn't be overpowered. They would have about the same chance to win a fight as a balanced party(or maybe even less), but the resolution would be a long, boring time coming.

[Beri]

With an all-Leader party, they're going to start feeling the hurt in their Healing Surges. They may win the first fight handily - but one of them might be down 3/4 of his healing surges already. It's the second or third fight of the day that's really going to challenge this party.

[1of3]

Can an all leader party be overpowered, comapred to a similar level party facing the same encoutners? I mean, they will have tons of healing, respectable damage, good AoE effects, good AC and staying power.

Anyone try this in play?

Almost. Cleric, Artificer, Paladin, Ranger MC Cleric (with several Power Swaps)

Yes, there is lots of healing. But you will need it, because your damage is so low that you cannot finish fights quickly.

[Starfall]

With an all-Leader party, they're going to start feeling the hurt in their Healing Surges. They may win the first fight handily - but one of them might be down 3/4 of his healing surges already. It's the second or third fight of the day that's really going to challenge this party.

Yeah, they'd win by grinding their enemies down and it wouldn't be pretty. They wouldn't have the defense to take a lot of damage, so they'd spend a lot of healing surges to stay up. And they wouldn't have the damage to burn the enemy down quickly, so the fights would take awhile (leading to more damage and more surges used). I imagine they could do fine, but they'd probably have to rest a lot.

[Saz]

Leaders can deal out damage quivalent to defenders. I'd say thats a ton of damage, esp. if the entire party is leaders. They can also take more damage than strikers, due to higher AC's and HP's.

[Whitemagebishieboy]

Eh, since buffs don't stack i highly doubt it. And buffs are more important than healing.

[capnzapp]

Can an all leader party be overpowered?
No. A party really can't be overpowered.

The only "overpoweredness" we're concerned about is between characters in the group. If one character's abilities are better than another characters, enabling him to steal more than his share of the spotlight, then there is a problem.

If the characters are balanced, but just happens to rock in concert (whether due to smart players, synergizing characters, or both) just throw more or bigger monsters
at them. Problem solved.

(Alternatively, don't allow the PHB2 feats. That'll teach'em not to be good at the game! ;) )

[Belphanior]

They can also take more damage than strikers, due to higher AC's and HP's.

Higher HP's? Every striker and leader from the PHB1 has the same 12/5 scheme.

I think an all-leader party is viable, just like most parties seem to be in 4e. But such a group has very low mobility, lower damage, low control, etc. It's very much a group that acts on reaction, grinding through the opposition and surviving through sheer resilience. A more classic compoition can dictate the terms of the battle, take out key hostiles (artillery and controllers) early, and generally has more proaction going for them.

[Naxuul]

All Leader would be bad for these reasons: The Bard works best with a Defender to help with marks and a striker to punish the enemies you debuff. Warlords really don't work unless there are 2-3 melee defenders or strikers around, preferable with strong basic attacks. Clerics buff everyone equally well, but their buffs don't stack and they do fairly poor damage. Shamans need a frontline, and a optional backline, for their dual-effects from themselves and their spirit to really shine and the clump of melee characters, preferable with a clump of enemies, is the perfect center for their various zones. I know nothing about the Artificier.

Now a full group of characters with Leader qualities would be something. Paladin, Invoker, Avenger and Druid all have Leader-y stuff they can do.

-Naxuul

[Some Guy Named Tim]

Leaders can deal out damage quivalent to defenders. I'd say thats a ton of damage, esp. if the entire party is leaders. They can also take more damage than strikers, due to higher AC's and HP's.

The problem, as others have noted, has to do with what I call "surge depth". In other words, the fact that leaders tend to get 7+ConMod surges, means that a party of 5 will likely have somewhere between 35 and 45 surges. Without anyone marking, the DM should be doing very concentrated damage on people, i.e. One Person should be picked on by most monsters until they die (just like PCs normally do). Result : Someone will likely be taking 4+ surges of damage every combat. That means the primary target will leave combat 1 down about half his surges, which obviously means he won't be able to keep that up.

I recently played an RPGA mod (SPEC1-2) with 2 leaders, 2 controllers, and a striker. Surge depth was a huge problem for that party. We had plenty of heals, just no surges to power them by fight 3.

[Njorhg]

A 5 warlord/bard party could be hilariously overpowered at higher levels, not so much early on.

I define "overpowered" as able to repeatedly take out monsters many levels their superior without breaking a sweat.

[Mr.Samedi]

It would probably look very much like this (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0077.html).

[Scarik]

It would probably look very much like this (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0077.html).

Go Team Cleric!

[selfcritical]

Chain-buffing would mean that this party would be unusually accurate- the cleric, bard, and artificer would all be able to buff attack at-will.....i would expect that this party will almost ALWAYS hit with it's encounter/ per days.

[neonchameleon]

I think you'd need to build for the party, but a properly built Leader party would be very scary indeed. A team of random leaders (without focussing on damage and multiclassing into striker) would struggle to get anywhere.

[Egyptian]

I don't know about all leaders, but our team of 1 warlock, 2 melee rangers, a rogue and a cleric routinely ended fights before many of the enemies even got a turn. Sometimes before the cleric got a turn. If your party has a problem in combat the answer is usually 'do more damage'. :D