D&D 5E 5e: the demystification of monsters?

Slobo, those changes you tested - was that an ogre against one fighter or a mixed party of 5?

48 hp "feels" right - the HP in the first playtest seemed too high.

I do kinda wish they would come down on damage for 1st level PCs. Have the fighter do something like [W] + d4 (possibly even removing Str mod from the equasion*), and the cleric doing [W] or d6 (if spell), the rogue doing [W] (and sneak attack not kicking in until 2nd level) and the wizard doing d4, d6 or d8, based on the severity of the spell being used. That should reduce the amount of hp monsters need, and flatten the damage curve somewhat like the other math flattening they have done.

* This would be a somewhat radical change, but I'd like to see them drop the Str mod to melee damage, dex mod to ranged damage and int/wis mod to spell damage. Keep the modifiers to hit, but not to damage. And perhaps put a "Strength Minimum" on certain weapons if you don't want to see Str 6 fighters wielding two-handed swords or the like for some reason. Adding the ability mods could be an option or module for more "heroic"/deadly combat.

Stormonu said:

Slobo, those changes you tested - was that an ogre against one fighter or a mixed party of 5?

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It was versus the same 3 (very tired*) dwarves, and I tweaked the numbers so that rates of TPK, success, injury etc looked the same as the battles with 3 ogres that I ran earlier. For simple brutish monsters I think this should be reasonable.

My code has still a way to go before handling the play choices of wizards, clerics and rogues. It's what I want to do; my current hurdle is simulating movement and position, and I haven't quite figured out where to take that.

* These three dwarves have been in several million simulated adventuring days full of combat by now!

.

Slobo, give those poor dwarves a break!!

j/k btw, you're running simulations using Matlab, or Stats software of some kind?

Gorgoroth said:

Slobo, give those poor dwarves a break!!

j/k btw, you're running simulations using Matlab, or Stats software of some kind?

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I changed them to humans with greatswords just recently, after someone mentioned that they didn't allow Dwarves to become Intoxicated

The current implementation is in Perl.

I'm moving it to Ruby - because I am moving to Ruby professionally, and it's good to have a goal when learning new stuff.

It seems the world and his dog has implemented Genetic Algorithms as a (usually incomplete) project in Ruby, so I have plenty of source material for the next big part of this - adding a battle board. I flirted with the idea of implementing a simpler TotM for ranged versus melee, spell-casting etc, but couldn't get away from the fact that any TotM on the computer would contain all my own prejudices about how useful movement was versus attacks etc.

MerricB said:

In AD&D and original D&D, an ogre can easily be taken down by a 1st level party. Likewise, your regular drow is weak and easily slain.

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Not exactly - a THAC0 15, 1d10* damage ogre is a holy terror to OD&D or B/X D&D PCs with by-the-book hit points; Fighters with 1d8, Thieves with 1d4. AD&D upgraded PCs, while AD&D MM ogres stayed unchanged, and then AD&D with Unearthed Arcana gave us 1st level PCs who could easily kill ogres. 3e finally upgraded ogres, restoring the OD&D balance.

*We had an 8 hit point 2nd level Cleric killed by a single blow from a B/X ogre in the last Labyrinth Lord session I played. He rolled a 9 on his d10 for damage.