Dear Sam,

Don’t listen to Scott and Jared.  You can absolutely have a mechanic for character flaws in 4th Edition D&D – your only problem is that you’re trying to lead with the stick, not the carrot.   Let’s hop off the WotC train for just a moment, and go peek at the Dresden Files RPG for a second.  There’s a mechanic in that game called a Compel.  A Compel is a weak spot in your character.  It doesn’t necessarily need to be a character trait, it just needs to be some handle your DM can tempt you with or jerk you around by.  A short temper, rampant curiosity or even an easily kidnapped family member all make good Compels.  If you follow a Compel, thus getting you and your group into a little more trouble, you get a Fate point which is used to modify die rolls and stuff.  Without getting into specifics, the game is written such that you may need a couple more Fate points than what you’re normally allotted for the main story. The Compels, then,  provide a personal risk/reward option for you to get that extra help, though possibly at a cost.

This is the concept I think you want to model for D&D.  Your character’s flaw should be something you turn to when the chips are down in a sort of Faustian bargain, not a mechanic that does nothing but get in your way.   So you seem to want to play a  character with anger issues and you like the idea of throwing away your weapon mid-combat.  Alright.   Sit down with your DM and propose this idea:  if you throw away your weapon as part of taking your second wind, you can spend two healing surges.  You’re lowering your damage output  and burning through your surges faster, so it’s a risk, but you are getting the immediate healing you need and so your party has some time to mechanically to deal with your decision – it’s not just a hosing.   Your character flaw is not only a resource management option now, but it’s also probably not going to tick off your fellow players.  Heck, they may even encourage you to do it!   Your flaw contributes to both your character and the game rather than detracting from it.  If you don’t like that option, then maybe throwing your main weapon away on a roll of 1 causes your secondary weapon to gain the high crit property.    I don’t like that one as much, but it’s a thought.

If you like that idea,  here’s a few more character flaws you might like to attribute to your character.  I would strongly advise against having more than one, though.

Delusion of Invincibility

If you spend an Action Point when at least 5 squares away from your nearest ally, you gain a +2 bonus to your next d20 roll.  You also gain vulnerable 5 all until the start of your next turn.

Lecherousness

(Daily) You gain a +2 bonus to your next Diplomacy or Bluff check against one NPC to whom you could be attracted.  If you fail the check, you also lose a healing surge.

Butterfingers

(Daily) Trigger: You miss with a Daily power that carries the Weapon keyword and is not Reliable.  Effect: Your weapon is Pushed 3 squares  in a random direction.  You regain use of that power at the end of the encounter.

Masochist

You take a permanent -2 to Diplomacy.  Whenever you deal damage to yourself, you gain temporary HP equal to your Con modifier.

I understand that a lot of people like it this way, but I’m just never going to enjoy it as a DM and certainly never as a player.  What I don’t need in my game is a lot of arbitrary “Gotcha!”.  I’m going to minimize and eliminate that whenever  possible.  Let’s take an example:

Necklace of Strangulation: A necklace of strangulation appears to be a rare and wondrous piece of valuable jewelry and, short of the use of something as powerful as a miracle or a wish, can only be identified as a cursed item when placed around a character’s neck. The necklace immediately constricts, dealing 6 points of damage per round. It cannot be removed by any means short of a limited wish, wish, or miracle and remains clasped around the victim’s throat even after his death. Only when he has decayed to a dry skeleton (after approximately one month) does the necklace loosen, ready for another victim.

I don’t see how this can ever be fun.  This would make a fun trap, with some tweaking.  But a cursed item?  Not really.

Or what about a classic cursed item:

Spear, Cursed Backbiter: This is a +2 shortspear, but each time it is used in melee against a foe and the attack roll is a natural 1, it damages its wielder instead of her intended target. When the curse takes effect, the spear curls around to strike its wielder in the back, automatically dealing the damage to the wielder. The curse even functions when the spear is hurled, and in such a case the damage to the hurler is doubled.

These are both taken from the OGL for 3.5, but both of these items have been around in D&D for a very long time.  Neither are what I want in a cursed item.  Sure, I get to nerf a player for a time, but I don’t want to nerf a player.  I want to challenge him.  I want to complicate his life.  I want to give him good things and take them away, or even better, force the player to choose.  I want to force the player to sacrifice.

I want cursed items.  I want to give the player power and I want to complicate their life for taking it. But I just can’t use this model.  What became my model is Stormbringer.  Do items get more powerful than Elric of Melnibone’s cursed blade?  Do they get more complicated?  The only thing that needs tweaking is power level.  Your campaign is quickly moving towards ruin if one or more of your characters are walking through the plains with Stormbringer-level magic items.  Fortunately the concept of “power with complications” fits in any tier of play.

With that in mind, I created a vision of what  a cursed magic item should be.  It all starts with a little history.

History: The Tragic Imprint

Let’s think about cursed item creation as it exists in the game world. Why would someone make a cursed item in the first place?  Magical item creation is a rare skill requiring surpluses of time and resources.  If you had the skill, time and resources to make a magic item, would you use it making items that harm people for no reason, or would you spend it making something awesome?  Imagine going to your local forger’s gathering:

“I created the Sword of Seven Suns, a blade burning everbright. It punishes the servants of darkness with every epic swing.”

“Oh yeah? Well, I just made a sword that stabs its wielder whenever he tries to use it!”

<crickets>

Not really much to brag about.  Let’s assume that people create magical items to serve their own purposes or for the sake of craftmanship.  Bad magic items are unlikely to be crafted.

Here’s what I think.  All magical items are, to varying degrees, living sentient things that lack intelligence and will.  Most magic items live “to serve” their owners.  Artifacts are sentient but possess intelligence and will.

The cursed magical item has picked up the traces of an owner’s will.   Profound and/or traumatic events in the owner’s life have left an imprint on this weapon.  The cursed item is not intelligent.  It has no will. It lives to serve the imprint of that influential owner even after it has left the owner or the owner has died.

The fatal flaws of that owner have imprinted tragedy upon this item.

All of this to say: A cursed item needs a backstory.  Who was the user that imprinted himself upon the blade?  What tragic flaw did he have?  What tragedy befell him?

Answering these questions informs the rest of the cursed item’s design from its powers and curse effects to the conditions by which a player can be released from the curse.

Enticement

I’ll say it one more time:  We’re not going to make magic items that outright suck.  If we’re going to make an item with complications though, we need to make an item that is worthy of complications.  If you make a +1  sword with complications, there is absolutely no appeal to that.  Players should be enticed to keep the weapon.  Mechanically the weapon needs to be stronger than a typical item of the player level.

Cursed items offer power…at a price.  That’s the core philosophy to keep in mind when designing a cursed weapon.  Draw them in…

Entrapment

…then trap them.  The player will be happy to have this awesome item, and will want to use it to the exclusion of all else.  When they discover the drawback of the item, the item will have already locked them in.  Now the player takes some manner of penalty when he uses anything but that item.  Once the item has found a user, it won’t let go.  Unlike an artifact, a cursed item lacks the intelligence or will to what its wielder actually does.  All it knows is what it wants…

Whispers

…which it “whispers” to its wielder constantly.  This is completely roleplay, with no mechanical benefits or penalties whatsoever.  The cursed item isn’t strong enough to force its demand upon the character through anything but its entrapment.  All it can do is call for certain behaviors, with the PC deciding whether or not to comply.

Symmetry

You were wondering where the actual “curse” was, weren’t you?  It’s right here.  The cursed item gives but takes away at similar measures.  A blade grants you luck, but also gives that same luck to your most hated enemies.  Cursed items have a tendency to let you down when you need them most.

Mechanically, every cursed item has a daily power that the DM can control. Think of the cursed item as a coin.  The PC gets one side, and the DM gets the other.  Most of the time, the coin lands for the PC, but every so often it lands for the DM.  It lands heavily and  can cause real pain for the PC. A cursed item’s symmetry is the part of the  cursed item that will make the player consider whether they truly want to keep the item.  Once they decide to rid themselves of the item, can they manage to actually rid themselves of it?

Release

Release is what a PC needs to accomplish to actually get rid of an item. The luck blade referred to earlier might have as the terms of its release that it must be lost as a wager in game of chance.  Another might require the completion of a quest that was originally failed by its user long ago.

How a player seeks release from an item is going to be tied into the history created for it.  Some items are simply passed from wielder to the next, others transform into more conventional weapons, while others crumble to residuum when their desires are fulfilled.

You put all these elements together and you’ve got a cursed item that complicates the game in a way that both  the DM and the players can enjoy.

Cursed Items

I promised examples, right?  First, some ground rules.

Keyword

Cursed: an item with the cursed keyword have a curse effect, which is a daily effect that the DM can trigger. The curse occurs when the player chooses to activate a power on the item. After the first encounter in which a cursed item is used, the PC who used it (or the first PC who used it if multiple players used it) is consider the item’s owner.

(The owner takes a -1 penalty to attack rolls using other items based on the item’s type. A cursed weapon applies the penalty to other weapons that the owner uses, and a cursed implement applies the penalty to other implements. If the cursed item is a wondrous item, then the owner gets 1 less daily use of a wondrous item other than the cursed wondrous item.)

Gamble

Whispers: Gamble compels its wielder to stop calculating and to start taking more risks.  Seek thrills, embrace chaos, luck and fortune.

Gamble

This broad-bladed dagger feels incredibly light  in your hand.  It promises fortune and thrills aplenty. Gamble is a dagger with the following properties:

Valor

Known throughout the land for his chivalry and bravery Lorry Korrum never one retreated from a confrontation. He stood at the front line of every battle to keep the young king Frey Halmond enthroned. But one man cannot be an army.  The boy-king was loved by the people but did not have the force of arms to deny his challengers.  Soon his enemies stood at his gates.  A defender to the end, Lorry chose to stand and fight the besieging forces.

Opportunities to see Frey to safety presented themselves, but Lorry would never retreat from a righteous battle.  Lorry fought valiantly, but in choosing to fight he failed his king.  The usurpers killed Lorry.   They tortured  Frey and put him to the sword days later.  Lorry realized in his dying moments the error of his pride. His need for glory and valor doomed the king and the realm.  The only remains of the knight’s chivalry is his sword, wielded in battle by a hundreds of doomed protectors.  Each warrior’s name is etched into the blade upon his death.

Whispers: Valor compels its wielder to fight for justice always.  All wrongs can be righted with a blade.  All battles worth fighting are fought with mighty and just sword arm.  Only cowards retreat.  The innocent must be protected at all costs.

Valor

Writ in minuscule script on the bright blade are the names of hundreds of other valiant men and women who have wielded the sword before you, urging you on to even higher acts of bravery than before.

Choosing a Warlord power with a non-combat application was difficult, but not difficult in the same way as the Ranger or Rogue. While most classes are about hitting stuff, the Warlord is all about directing allies and creating a tactical advantage. Although I finally decided on showcasing Opening Shove, I’d like to point out that Commander’s Strike, Furious Smash, and Viper’s Strike also have excellent off-the-grid applications.

Opening Shove

Holly heard the cries down the market streets and turned to see a large, white horse careening down the cobblestone—wagon and frantic driver in tow. She began to retreat to the safety of a side alley when her sharp eyes spied a crumple of red and yellow fabric screaming on the road.

A little girl, no more than 8 years old, had been knocked over by the crowd. Her fine clothing was a flailing mass of frills as she tried to scramble to her feet. She might make it in time, she might not, but Holly was not the kind of woman who left anything to chance.

Holly pressed through the crowd, but was no match against the retreating mass of shoppers and keepers. Unable to make progress against the burly man in front of her, Holly raised a small slippered foot and kicked him out of the way. Now with a clear view ahead of her, Holly channeled her inner strength and shouted, “get off the road!”

The voice pierced the air like the note of a flute. It was a voice that had overpowered the clash of blades, the roar of fire, and the screams of the dying. It was a voice that years ago commanded thousands of men over miles of blood stained earth. It was a voice that had no trouble crushing the noise of a scared throng or the rapid impact of horse’s hooves on stone.

The little girl on the street stumbled and without standing completely upright, managed to scramble to the curb and avoid being trampled. Holly breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed her body.

The retired lady of war turned to be on her way, but was stopped by four fat fingers encircling her arm. “What do you mean by kicking me?” Holly turned and found a large face staring back at her. Her body tensed once more and she took a deep breath. The worst of the day may not be over.

The girl falls in the street and gets tangled up in her clothing, making her slowed. The crowd has become a mobile obstacle that Holly cannot move through to get to the girl, so she resorts to Opening Shove to grant the little girl a shift equal to Holly’s intelligence modifier. Holly makes a strength versus reflex attack against an innocent bystander and easily succeeds. The little girl then shifts as far as her slowed state allows, but it’s just enough to move her out of the way of the oncoming cart.

Before anything existed, the Maker dreamed. It dreamt motes of nova-bright light never-ending shrouded in dark mists. It dreamed of subtance that buoys the feet yet crumbles into grain between fingers. The Maker dreamed of fire.

The Maker opened its eyes. Flame filled its mind. The Maker thought, and in thinking discovered thoughts the same as its dreams. The Maker thought again and time flowed. Whirling gas condensed and stars shone into being. Worlds formed from sudden implosions of matter and ether. Life made its first shuddering steps in the wake of the Maker’s stream of thought. The Maker wove all that is into existence with furious passion and vision, his mind at the center of vast expanding web of being.

Not even the Maker can sustain such passion without strain or without limit. Now that life was beginning, it needed to be nurtured. The Maker’s presence was still required in through the creation of the cosmos and beyond. The true beauty of the Maker’s creations would be that would change and grow, but it could not without guidance. The Maker distributed attention through every strand of creation’s web, its thoughts galloping on etheric threads to the worlds built and now growing.

Though it could provide guidance and some protection to all creation, the Maker knew that it must provoke change with force, not mere observation. The last of the Maker’s will was kept for the Maker itself. With it the Maker created a hammer. It shaped a mountain in the lands floating around its body into the shape of an anvil which gathered the energies surrounding the Maker to its face.

With its last shred of consciousness, the Maker compelled its own body into the rhythm of striking the anvil’s face with its hammer.

When the hammer strikes the anvil, the collected energy flies apart, breaking away from the face in all direction. The sparks travel the infinite expanse of creation, imperceptible until they burst and manifest as dreams, as people, as gods, as planets, as stars.

All who have received the Maker’s Gift knows this story.

The Maker’s Gift

The Maker has never manifested in psychic or physical form, but its consciousness exists in all things. In the infinity of existence, it is always observing even as its body mindlessly toils at the Forge. It is content to watch for aeons, playing no part in the cycle of existence. The Maker loves all existence but loves living things the most. A star will always work as the Maker made it, as will a mountain, as will a flame. But life emerges from the Maker’s intentions at dizzying vectors and angles, impossible for the Maker to know fully.

On rare occasions, it grants a living being a gift. It transmits the first dreams of the Maker, filling the recipients mind with the images and sounds of the true story of existence. The gift informs the recipient how to visit the Maker’s realm. Last, the recipient receives a message in the form of a compulsion: Offer yourself to the anvil, and receive your deepest wish.

Most cannot receive the Maker’s Gift. The cosmos laid bare before them, unfortunate recipients typically become incoherent and mad, turning away from the Maker’s light. Those who retain their sanity often become known to their fellows as madmen or crazed, false prophets speaking of realities unheard and unheralded. Very few are able to hold the Maker’s Gift and their sense of self at the same time. They speak of the Maker little or not at all. These souls become known as the wisest men and women of their age, possessing a truly advanced understanding of reality.

Fewer still are those emboldened with that knowledge to make the pilgrimage to the Worldsoul, and fewer those who survive the journey.

But for those few, all things become possible.

The Forge of the Worldsoul

The Worldsoul is the Maker’s realm, a vast strip of land looping around its body. The landscape shifts constantly into new vistas and terrains. Plains become oceans and oceans become flame and flames become plains once again. The black sky is finds it light in the Maker’s aura, its form dwarfing planets and unable to be seen fully from anywhere in the Worldsoul. At most one can glimpse only a portion of the Maker’s form.

Sparks from the forge occasionally strike the Worldsoul itself , giving birth to many creations on the land of the Forge itself. The creatures of the Maker’s realm are the most unlikely sort, creations unlikely to be seen in any of the infinity of worlds. Whole races rise, live and die in the Worldsoul, as do beings of god-like power. Those who visit the Worldsoul are forever imprinted by the sprawling diversity and strangeness of beings and sites found in the Maker’s realm.

The only constant in the Worldsoul is change. And the Forge.

Almost anywhere you stand on the Worldsoul you can see the Forge on the horizon. It is a field of corruscating energy with an immense mountain shaped by the Maker’s thoughts into an anvil. Forge of the Worldsoul is the heart of creation.

The most difficult task in all worlds is to enter the Forge and ascend to the Anvil’s face. The Forge drains and tests and drains again the body and will of those who seek to conquer it. At the end of the journey, the ascendant traveller meets his reward. The thunderous breaking of sky, the sudden paralyzing shadow of the hammer’s descent…and the fulfillment of any wish.

The Forge of the Worldsoul is the first in a series of wondrous places for your 4e game.  The next part will be continuation describing how to use the Maker and the Worldsoul in your game, as well as key personalities and sites.  Like what you’re seeing?  Please comment and share!

Protectors of the earth and the natural world, primal characters reach into the energy of that same ecosystem they protect in times of crisis to bring punishment those who transgress against the natural order.

The Ultimate Exaltation of Earth

The eternal enduring cycle of life and death, of destruction and renewal, flows through you.  Your body takes the form of  earth that is constantly crumbling to dust and reforming.  Your spirit, like the earth, can never truly die.

Encounter*Primal,Limit,Polymorph
Minor Action

Effect: You drop to zero hit points, but are not dying, and not unconscious. You automatically pass all death saving throws.  You become immune to damage and are weakened. At the beginning of your turn, expend a healing surge or the power ends.
Heroic Effect:When this power ends, you regain hit points equal to your healing surge value and recover 1d4+2 healing surges.

Paragon Effect: When this power ends you regain hit points equal to your bloodied value and recover 1d4+2 healing surges.

Epic Effect: When this power ends you regain all of your hit points and recover 1d4+2 healing surges.

Howling Ascendancy

You connect with the wild, drawing forth the attributes of all of nature’s creatures. With a supernatural howl, you become nature’s vengeance.

Encounter *Primal,Limit,Rage
Minor Action

Effect: Your speed increases by 2.
Heroic Effect: Once per turn as a free action, you may choose one of the following:  +5 to Athletics, +2 AC, or +4 damage.  The effects last until the start of your next turn.

Paragon Effect:Once per turn as a free action, you may choose one of the following:  +5 to Athletics, +2 AC, +6 damage, or spend a healing surge to recover hit points.  The effects last until the start of your next turn.

Epic Effect: Once per turn as a free action, you may choose one of the following:  +5 to Athletics, +2 AC, +8 damage, spend a healing surge to recover hit points, or fly your speed.  The effects last until the start of your next turn.

Primal Army

The primal spirits that inhabit all things respond to your urgent need.  Nature’s threads bind you all, as you become a general of these wild spirits, if only for a time.

Encounter *Primal,Limit,Conjuration
Minor Action

Effect: You summon one or more wild platoons.  Each wild platoon counts as a large creature and can block movement and counts as concealment against enemies.  A wild platoon may not be destroyed, but may be dismissed by you as a free action. You may spend a move action to move all wild platoons five spaces. At the beginning of each turn, expend one healing surge or dismiss all wild platoons summoned.

Heroic Effect: You summon one wild platoon within 10 squares of you. Any enemy that starts its turn next to a wild platoon is slowed until the end of turn and takes 5 psychic damage.

Paragon Effect: you summon two wild platoons within 10 squares of you. Any enemy that starts its turn next to a wild platoon is slowed until the end of turn and takes 5 psychic damage.

Epic Effect:You summon three wild platoons within 10 squares of you. Any enemy that starts its turn next to a wild platoon is slowed until the end of turn and takes 5 psychic damage.

Form of the Great Sea

Let the salt of Earth admonish the water to bear the virtue of the Great Sea. Blood becomes water neverending.  Drenched in this water, past injuries are forgotten as you bring the force of the great yawning tides to bear upon your enemy.

Encounter*Primal,Limit,Polymorph
Minor Action

Effect: You assume the guardian form of the Great Sea.  Your hit points change to that of your bloodied value.  Whenever you expend a healing surge to regain hit points, those hit points become temporary hit points instead. If an effect would heal damage, it instead grants that amount of temporary hit points.

Heroic Effect: whenever one of your attacks hits an opponent, as a free action you may spend one healing surge to daze that enemy until the end of its next turn. The enemy is also weakened (save ends).

Paragon Effect: whenever one of your attacks hits an opponent, as a free action you may spend one healing surge to daze that enemy until the end of its next turn. The enemy also is immobilized (save ends).

Epic Effect: whenever one of your attacks hits an opponent, as a free action you may spend two healing surges to stun that enemy until the end of its next turn.  The enemy is also immobilized (save ends).

So there’s a lot of information on gaming with wave, but finding it can be a chore.  I do my best, but I’m just one person.  Many minds are always better than one, so kaeosdad and I created a small network (affectionately referred to by myself as a “tide”) called “The Echo Planes“.  If you’re on wave, and you have questions, need resources, or want to announce a game and find players, the Echo Plane is the place that you want to be!  The tide is publically accessible, so all you have to do is go there to find other people who are also interested in 4e and wave.  You can find collaborators and players for anything wave-related here.  I hope to see you there!

If you have questions for me specifically, I am gamefiend on twitter and quinn (dot) murphy (at) google wave.

Don’t go looking in your core rulebooks for this because you’re not going to find it.  It’s something I’ve  cribbed from other games and ported into 4th Edition D&D.   How often have you been adjudicating a skill challenge and one of your players makes a check that goes beyond a simple secondary skill, in a way that is both creative and reasonable but doesn’t directly contribute to winning the challenge?  Many times, you dole out a +2 to the next check and go on with it, but as a DM, I found that got really lame really fast.  It increases the odds of  the next check succeeding by 10% but if it doesn’t help (or isn’t necessary), the player may not feel particularly inclined to come up with another unique idea later and I definitely want to encourage that sort of thinking.

When one of my players goes in a direction with a skill check that I didn’t expect and passes a level-appropriate  DC, I throw them a little chip with the word “Bonus!” on it.  (I play mostly on MapTools VTT so I can make all sorts of weird virtual stuff).  It tells the player that I officially recognize the successful skill check and feel that it was somehow appropriate but have no idea how to incorporate that check at this exact moment.  I also take particular care to NOT describe that check in the game story when it’s made.

In this way, I don’t feel like I ever have to say “no” to anything, but the pressure to come up with the result immediately is lifted.  Later on in the challenge, players can ‘cash in’ their tokens for other effects related to the skill check.  Here’s an example – the players are chasing a thief through a busy town.  The primary skills are Athletics, Acrobatics, Perception, Endurance and Streetwise.  Your player’s Cleric is not trained in any of these things, so she decides to use Religion; she prays to Erathis, the goddess of law and civilization for help.   That seems both creative and reasonable, so upon making her check, you throw her a bonus token.  When the thief is caught, the cleric asks “is the thief part of the evil cult we’re looking for?” and waves her token.

If the thief wasn’t already a cultist, but you’re prepared to play it that way you have her return the token and you say “yes, in fact he is and he has the entry password tattooed on his left hand.”  Perhaps you don’t want to go just hand your players quite so much information.  You could trade that token for  “no, he isn’t, but one of the guards that comes to arrest the thief comments that the last couple burglars they’ve caught were dead and marked with a strange sigil in blood.”  Now if  the PCs were about to botch the challenge and had only one or two failures left, maybe the cleric player could decide to use the token more mechanically, say to add 2 to a check an ally has already failed in the hopes that it would then succeed or grant a new reroll altogether (much like the way the LFR card system works).

However you do it, the purpose of the bonus token is to teach your players that a unique, creative idea will pay out somehow in a meaningful way.  A simple +2 bonus may be the DM’s best friend, but after a few sightings, that Bonus Token will become your players’ best friend.

Limit Scaling

Limit powers scale up in effect at Heroic, Paragon and Epic levels.  Each limit break will list an effect as normal for the heroic level, as well as paragon and epic levels.

Divine Limit Breaks

Divine limit breaks summon the power of the gods themselves, creating a temporary unity of the mortal and the divine.  This energy is often harnessed to bombard foes or heal allies with radiant power, but can be used to reverse the flow of time or summon the power of a god’s avatar to this plane.

Called to Serve

Your god calls you to service, requesting you to vanquish this foe.  As radiant power fills your limbs, you answer the call.
Encounter Divine*Limit
Minor Action

Effect: Once per turn as a free action, you may expend a healing surge to regain the use of your channel divinity power for the encounter.

Heroic Effect: Whenever you use your channel divinity power, each enemy within 3 squares of you takes 5 radiant damage.
Paragon Effect: Whenever you use your channel divinity power, each enemy within 3 squares of you takes 10 radiant damage.
Epic Effect: Whenever you use your channel divinity power, each enemy within 5 squares of you takes 15 radiant damage.

Final Prayer

At your behest, your god wipes from the world the recent actions of a comrade or a foe.

Encounter Divine*Limit
Immediate Interrupt
Trigger: Any enemy or ally performs actions during his turn that you dislike.

Effect: Until the end of the encounter, you grant combat advantage to all enemies.

Heroic Effect: Rewind the ally or enemy’s turn and replay the turn, playing out actions as normal.  Any attack roll an ally makes gets a +2 bonus, while an enemy gets a -2 to any attack roll.
Paragon Effect: Rewind the ally or enemy’s turn and replay the turn, playing out actions as normal.  Before the target acts, you may use their move action for the target.  This move action that you take is considered forced movement. Any attack roll an ally makes gets a +2 bonus, while an enemy gets a -2 to any attack roll.
Epic Effect: Rewind the ally or enemy’s turn and replay the turn, playing out actions as normal.  Before the target acts, you may use their move action for the target.  This move action that you take is considered forced movement. Any attack roll an ally makes gets a +4 bonus, while an enemy gets a -4 to any attack roll.

Infinite Sanctuary

The area near you becomes a zone where all allies may find shelter, and no enemy can find peace.
Encounter Divine*Limit
Minor Action

Effect: All allies within 3 squares of you gain a +1 bonus to AC and a +2 bonus to saving throws.
Heroic Effect: All allies within 3 squares of you regain 1 healing surge at the beginning of your turn. Enemies within 3 squares of you grant combat advantage to your allies.
Paragon Effect: All allies within 3 squares of you regain 2 healing surges at the beginning of your turn. Enemies within 3 squares of you grant combat advantage to your allies.
Epic Effect: All allies within 5 squares of you regain 2 healing surges at the beginning of your turn. Enemies within 3 squares of you grant combat advantage to your allies.

Desperate Avatar

Summoning the power of your god, you briefly become an avatar of its wrath.
Encounter Divine*Limit
Minor Action

Effect: At the beginning of your turn you must expend a healing surge or the power ends.  You gain a +2 avatar bonus to your AC, gain immunity to radiant or necrotic damage (choose when selecting this power.  The choice lasts for the life of your character), and gain temporary hit points equal to your bloodied value.
Heroic Effect: You gain an additional use of your channel divinity power.  Once per turn as a free action, you may push one adjacent enemy 1 square.
Paragon Effect: You gain an additional use of your channel divinity power.  Once per turn as a free action, you may push one adjacent enemy a number squares equal to your Wisdom or Charisma modifier.
Epic Effect: You gain an additional use of your channel divinity power.  Once per turn as a free action, you may slide one adjacent enemy a number squares equal to your Wisdom or Charisma modifier. This movement can provoke opportunity attacks.