TBH, the only piece of the rules update that currently interests me was the new 'damage by level' chart and the accompanying 'monster statistics by role'.
So, I immediately dug in and analysed the changes:
1) Damage By Level:
The table is now very clean and the math obvious:
Single Target damage on average is always (level + 4). Nice!
I also like that dice expressions only go up to 4 dice.
This also means that damage should be adjusted by +/-1 per level when adjusting monster levels (rather than by +/- 0.5).
Everything else follows from there:
- Multi-target damage is simply 25% less.
- Brutes will get 25% more, and limited expressions are 25-50% more.
- Minions aren't mentioned, but using the DMG2 guidelines, probably should use 50% of the new average damage.
- Lurkers aren't mentioned, which is odd but confirms my suspicions after analysing the MM3 Lurkers:
Lurkers no longer do high damage. Imho, that's a bad change. Lurkers are generally designed to only deal damage every other round. What's the point of using a lurker if that damage isn't noticable?
2) Monster statistics by role:
- The first row has a formatting error: Brute should say '-', soldier '+2', and lurker '+4'
- changes to attacks:
- Brute: +2 vs. all defenses - this change had already been mentioned by Greg Bilsland.
- Soldier: -2 vs. AC but not vs. other defenses. I believe this hasn't been mentioned before but was something I noticed when analysing MM3, however:
I believe the table is in error and the attack vs. other defenses should be reduced by 2, as well. Almost all MM3 soldiers have reduced attack values vs. every defense. Interestingly many MM3 soldiers have a +2 bonus to immediate and opportunity attacks.
- Controller: -1 vs. other defenses. This change might make sense in an attempt to streamline attack values overall. Looking over the MM3 there are quite a few controllers that still have a higher to hit chance for _some_ of their attacks. So, maybe the footnote for the artillery should be applied to controllers, too.
- Artillery: -2 vs. all defenses, but because of the footnote, it's really only the melee attacks that are reduced.
To sum it up:
- Lurker damage needs to be increased by 25%
- Soldier attack vs. other defenses should be +3
- Controller attack vs. other defenses should get a footnote
So, I immediately dug in and analysed the changes:
1) Damage By Level:
The table is now very clean and the math obvious:
Single Target damage on average is always (level + 4). Nice!
I also like that dice expressions only go up to 4 dice.
This also means that damage should be adjusted by +/-1 per level when adjusting monster levels (rather than by +/- 0.5).
Everything else follows from there:
- Multi-target damage is simply 25% less.
- Brutes will get 25% more, and limited expressions are 25-50% more.
- Minions aren't mentioned, but using the DMG2 guidelines, probably should use 50% of the new average damage.
- Lurkers aren't mentioned, which is odd but confirms my suspicions after analysing the MM3 Lurkers:
Lurkers no longer do high damage. Imho, that's a bad change. Lurkers are generally designed to only deal damage every other round. What's the point of using a lurker if that damage isn't noticable?
2) Monster statistics by role:
- The first row has a formatting error: Brute should say '-', soldier '+2', and lurker '+4'
- changes to attacks:
- Brute: +2 vs. all defenses - this change had already been mentioned by Greg Bilsland.
- Soldier: -2 vs. AC but not vs. other defenses. I believe this hasn't been mentioned before but was something I noticed when analysing MM3, however:
I believe the table is in error and the attack vs. other defenses should be reduced by 2, as well. Almost all MM3 soldiers have reduced attack values vs. every defense. Interestingly many MM3 soldiers have a +2 bonus to immediate and opportunity attacks.
- Controller: -1 vs. other defenses. This change might make sense in an attempt to streamline attack values overall. Looking over the MM3 there are quite a few controllers that still have a higher to hit chance for _some_ of their attacks. So, maybe the footnote for the artillery should be applied to controllers, too.
- Artillery: -2 vs. all defenses, but because of the footnote, it's really only the melee attacks that are reduced.
To sum it up:
- Lurker damage needs to be increased by 25%
- Soldier attack vs. other defenses should be +3
- Controller attack vs. other defenses should get a footnote
