TOPIC: 2021 Ultra Rare Feedback

As someone on a team that did their first hardcore run at V1A, it feels like there are some very attractive options here for some of our players that may want to transition from Red level into adding UR's.

Thank you for considering players at all levels and not just the "same cost as a car" setups, from those of us that are at the Schwinn Bike level.

Exbalz wrote: As someone on a team that did their first hardcore run at V1A, it feels like there are some very attractive options here for some of our players that may want to transition from Red level into adding UR's.

Thank you for considering players at all levels and not just the "same cost as a car" setups, from those of us that are at the Schwinn Bike level.

Your analogies are awesome.

Which URs are you most excited about?

Are there any that you think are too good or not quite good enough?

Wade Schwendemann wrote:

Exbalz wrote: As someone on a team that did their first hardcore run at V1A, it feels like there are some very attractive options here for some of our players that may want to transition from Red level into adding UR's.

Thank you for considering players at all levels and not just the "same cost as a car" setups, from those of us that are at the Schwinn Bike level.

Your analogies are awesome.

Which URs are you most excited about?

Are there any that you think are too good or not quite good enough?

Our Druid, Paladin, and Ranger (me) are our 3 highest geared players. For myself, the Platinum Nugget (of course), Shirt of the Dancer (I'm on the multi-year shirt train), Earcuff of Orbits, and Ioun Stone transmute are my targets.

Biggest improvements for the rest of our team: Axe of Dwarvish Kings for our Dwarf Fighter, Stu-Pendous Pendant reprints for Rogue and DF (Ranger has relic, Barb and Monk relics got pulled for us at V1A), Gloves of the Dire Bear. Hoping our Elf Mage and Cleric get excited about their UR -> Relic chain. Shield of the Scholar for Cleric and Bard make sense for us but may end up lower priority (5th level Bard is top team priority right now).

Off-topic but the light blue transmutes of the Bead and Tankard will be priorities almost universally. May see a few Greater Rings of Reflexes. Shirt of the Elder may not see much action from us since we're packing linked shirt of healing synergy though.

I do share the concern on the Bead that it doesn't leave a ton of design space between it and the Lucky Traveler for the UR level in the future, but it definitely feels like a plug n play token as designed, having odd CON in the bead slot can be a benefit for min-maxing builds at our level.

It looks like there's a difference of opinion about where the +3 saves item should go. For my group, I am glad to see it back at the Back slot. There, we'll want to pick up 8-10 of them. As a Feet slot item, it would be more like 1-2 (or not being mad to see it as a random UR or treasure draw). But I totally understand that others might be in a different position. A few other thoughts:

Cranston's Helpful Hat - as currently designed, this could be helpful to many Ranged builds.
Earcuff of Orbitz - I think occasional reprints of highly valued tokens are a good idea, and making this available as a PYP will help keep the debate among Arcane Earcuff, Icecrag's, and Orbitz going.
Gloves of the Dire Bear - thrilled to see a functional reprint of Mithral Gauntlets.
Medallion of the Sweetwoods - glad to see this hanging in there; it's great for Ranged builds
Shield of the Scholar - again, great to see a high-demand reprint
Shirt of the Dancer - my group will be picking up a lot of these for the multi-year transmute
Stu-pendous Pendant - another great high-demand reprint.

Overall, I like the direction of the 2021 URs. Thanks again to Jeff for letting us be part of the process.

I don't understand the purpose of the Necklace of Prayer beads if it is a Neck item, its just going to get transmuted for the cleric legendary and no one is going to use it.

Stu necklace reprint nice, I know a lot of people like it, functional mithril gloves reprint nice i know a bunch of reprints people wanted.

I still don't know what The Brewmaster charm is trying to accomplish, I have a pouch of Tulz and I almost never use it.

Question regarding orbits.

We have Orion’s and arcane bracelets in print now. If orbits gets reprinted now, how long will we go without a IS expander in print once orbits is out. 8-9 years?

Wouldn’t it be best to wait until next year when arcane bracelets are OOP just to drag it out availability a little longer?

James wrote: I don't understand the purpose of the Necklace of Prayer beads if it is a Neck item, its just going to get transmuted for the cleric legendary and no one is going to use it.

It seems like it would still be pretty useful for Clerics just starting down the UR path.

Please change subject title to say 2021 instead of 2020 - it will make looking for threads later much easier besides any obvious benefits of not thinking this is some old thread that people got excited for.

Rod of the Meek

A version of this last year was +3 with a massive damage wheel and "Requires 18 or lower Strength". I never understood why moved away from something so simple to interpret, clean ruleswise, and interesting from a design perspective as it encouraged using all of the +dmg tokens instead of +str tokens (well, and +hit tokens). It may not have been that meek, but it was meek-ish and weird in a very simple way.

That limitation even makes for a wacky 5th level barbarian build where you lower your strength by one to qualify. I imagine precisely nobody (else) on the forums would do that, but, then, there are 11 other classes to do weird things with.

Jinn's Magebook Medallion

I have played a lot of CCGs, even the lead developer for one of them. I'm used to lots of text on a card. I'm not sure I'm motivated to acquire new tokens that embrace the "Seven lines of text" philosophy. That applies to tokens besides URs, probably more so. For one thing, creating demand for these tokens only encourages more and more tokens that essentially are "Go spend time interpreting tokendb.com and the PHB and the DMG because you can't possibly understand every nuance otherwise."

Medallion of the Sweetwoods

With Stu-pendous Pendant returning, seems like save this for another year. Someone, I'm sure, could argue that having two neck slot stat pumpers in the same year cannibalize sales. I'd point out that the Year of (also) the Fighter could use another fighter token, like say Dwarven [insert word] Plate that is fighters only with lots of AC and/or special that's ... IDK, like Dwarven Fighter gets +2 Will saves or something.

Does Cranstons hat add damage to all spells? Sliding spells? Or physical ranged only?

Adam Guay wrote: Does Cranstons hat add damage to all spells? Sliding spells? Or physical ranged only?

Cranston's Hat adds to hit, not damage.

James wrote: I don't understand the purpose of the Necklace of Prayer beads if it is a Neck item, its just going to get transmuted for the cleric legendary and no one is going to use it.

Stu necklace reprint nice, I know a lot of people like it, functional mithril gloves reprint nice i know a bunch of reprints people wanted.

I still don't know what The Brewmaster charm is trying to accomplish, I have a pouch of Tulz and I almost never use it.

Pouch of Tulz is once per combat. Brewmaster charm is each turn and does not restrict to combat.

Do we need a Stu’s reprint with sweet wood in the set? Sweet wood could start the Fighter transmute.

The slot could be used for something else - maybe nightshade?