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<blockquote data-quote="KarinsDad" data-source="post: 6415116" data-attributes="member: 2011"><p>Sounds like his minions are not doing that great of a job if they let a bunch of guys get close enought to smack him for 45. Maybe he should call a better temp agency.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Actually, in 4E, I had some interesting discussions about action economy. My theory was that PCs should take out most of the mooks in the first two rounds and leave the big bads for later rounds. Sure the big bads do more damage and sometimes have real nasty attacks, but from an action economy POV, the mooks fill up the battlefield, limit movement, and as an overall group, they can sometimes do about as much damage as a big bad. As an example, 5 minions and a big bad. Minions do 5 average points of damage, big bad does 20 average points of damage per round.</p><p></p><p>It takes 10 PC attacks to take out the big bad, it takes 2 PC attacks to take out a mook. 5 PCs. The NPCs attack first (just to simplify it).</p><p></p><p></p><p>Attacking Big Bad: PCs take 130 damage</p><p></p><p>1) Big Bad and 5 mooks do 45 points to the team.</p><p>PCs damage Big Bad with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p>2) Big Bad and 5 mooks do 45 points to the team.</p><p>PCs take out Big Bad with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p>3) 5 mooks do 25 points to the team.</p><p>PCs take out 2.5 mook with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p>4) 3 mooks do 15 points to the team.</p><p>PCs take out last 2.5 mooks.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Attacking Mooks: PCs take 120 damage</p><p></p><p>1) Big Bad and 5 mooks do 45 points to the team.</p><p>PCs take out 2.5 mooks with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p>2) Big Bad and 3 mooks do 35 points to the team.</p><p>PCs take out 2.5 mooks with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p>3) Big Bad does 20 points to the team.</p><p>PCs damage Big Bad with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p>4) Big Bad does 20 points to the team.</p><p>PCs take out Big Bad with 5 attacks.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Not much of a difference and granted, one can change these numbers around to make either side look better, but the basic idea is to get fewer attacks per round from the enemy as possible as soon as possible. The real gain in the latter example is that the PCs only have one foe in rounds 3 and 4 whereas in the earlier example, they still have multiple foes even in round 4. The more foes per round, the higher the chances that something bad will happen that the PCs cannot necesarily react to.</p><p></p><p>This doesn't mean that the PCs totally ignore the big bad, but they could wall off the big bad with a spell, do hold monster, or whatever so that they have enough time to take control of the mooks. And for big bads that get a lot of attacks per round (like 4 or 5), this strategy might just be reversed (presuming that the big bad is not too uber like maybe a Dragon).</p><p></p><p></p><p>In 5E with many mooks being one or two hit foes, it is probably even easier to clean up mooks quickly (maybe while the Fighter holds off the big bad).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="KarinsDad, post: 6415116, member: 2011"] Sounds like his minions are not doing that great of a job if they let a bunch of guys get close enought to smack him for 45. Maybe he should call a better temp agency. Actually, in 4E, I had some interesting discussions about action economy. My theory was that PCs should take out most of the mooks in the first two rounds and leave the big bads for later rounds. Sure the big bads do more damage and sometimes have real nasty attacks, but from an action economy POV, the mooks fill up the battlefield, limit movement, and as an overall group, they can sometimes do about as much damage as a big bad. As an example, 5 minions and a big bad. Minions do 5 average points of damage, big bad does 20 average points of damage per round. It takes 10 PC attacks to take out the big bad, it takes 2 PC attacks to take out a mook. 5 PCs. The NPCs attack first (just to simplify it). Attacking Big Bad: PCs take 130 damage 1) Big Bad and 5 mooks do 45 points to the team. PCs damage Big Bad with 5 attacks. 2) Big Bad and 5 mooks do 45 points to the team. PCs take out Big Bad with 5 attacks. 3) 5 mooks do 25 points to the team. PCs take out 2.5 mook with 5 attacks. 4) 3 mooks do 15 points to the team. PCs take out last 2.5 mooks. Attacking Mooks: PCs take 120 damage 1) Big Bad and 5 mooks do 45 points to the team. PCs take out 2.5 mooks with 5 attacks. 2) Big Bad and 3 mooks do 35 points to the team. PCs take out 2.5 mooks with 5 attacks. 3) Big Bad does 20 points to the team. PCs damage Big Bad with 5 attacks. 4) Big Bad does 20 points to the team. PCs take out Big Bad with 5 attacks. Not much of a difference and granted, one can change these numbers around to make either side look better, but the basic idea is to get fewer attacks per round from the enemy as possible as soon as possible. The real gain in the latter example is that the PCs only have one foe in rounds 3 and 4 whereas in the earlier example, they still have multiple foes even in round 4. The more foes per round, the higher the chances that something bad will happen that the PCs cannot necesarily react to. This doesn't mean that the PCs totally ignore the big bad, but they could wall off the big bad with a spell, do hold monster, or whatever so that they have enough time to take control of the mooks. And for big bads that get a lot of attacks per round (like 4 or 5), this strategy might just be reversed (presuming that the big bad is not too uber like maybe a Dragon). In 5E with many mooks being one or two hit foes, it is probably even easier to clean up mooks quickly (maybe while the Fighter holds off the big bad). [/QUOTE]
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