The 88 Hit Point Ogre in the Room

[Stormonu]

I've read through the playtest documents several times now in anticipating playing with my wife and kids.

Reading through the Caves of Chaos, I started noticing the various cheiftains having large numbers of hit points. Then I hit the Ogre - and was floored. Go ahead, look at room E22.

I do not like this one bit. Most of the "common" monsters in the adventure have hit points fairly close to the original values in the module, until you start getting to the "set-piece battles". Then the hit points look awfully inflated.

I know that we're supposed to be concentrating on making sure the mechanics work, but I hope WotC backs away from this. I don't want monsters to be given huge gobs of hit points to "force" combats to be more epic. I've still yet to actually play this out, but I'll be severely disappointed if 2nd or 3rd level characters can dish out that much damage in a few rounds (say 4 to 5) in this edition.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I know that we're supposed to be concentrating on making sure the mechanics work, but I hope WotC backs away from this. I don't want monsters to be given huge gobs of hit points to "force" combats to be more epic. I've still yet to actually play this out, but I'll be severely disappointed if 2nd or 3rd level characters can dish out that much damage in a few rounds (say 4 to 5) in this edition.

The thing is, you HAVE to do this if you want combats to last longer than a round. A group of adventurers does about 10 damage each time one of them acts. That means if they all hit against the same creature in one round, it takes 50(or more if they use some of their limited resources, like spells) damage. Even with missing factored in, I would expect it not to take much longer than 3 rounds to defeat an 88 hp ogre if he's by himself.

If you want a monster to seem big and tough and you want to challenge an entire group with it, it needs that many hp.

 

[Leatherhead]

Playtests intentionally throw out broken stuff all the time. Mostly to see how it is broken and how it might be fixed.

They are also fishing for feedback. If you want accurate feedback you got to throw out a few extremes.

 

[DogBackward]

A party of five adventurers should be able to take a single ogre down in about 3 rounds. What makes it a longer, more dangerous battle is that it really shouldn't be a single ogre.

 

[Campbell]

That encounter could actually theoretically be over in a round or two. Between the rogue's sneak attack, the fighter's surge, and the dwarven cleric's smite that ogre could be in for a rough day before spells even enter the equation.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

A party of five adventurers should be able to take a single ogre down in about 3 rounds. What makes it a longer, more dangerous battle is that it really shouldn't be a single ogre.

Whether Ogres should be the kind of monster you fight by themselves is another debate. However, there should be SOME monsters you do want to fight by themselves. And for them to survive even a short while against a whole group, they need lots of hp.

Though, I think in this case they are trying to makes ogres lie the cave troll in LOTRs.

 

[Mengu]

The Fighter is going to deal about a sixth of the ogre's hit points in one hit at level 3. With advantage from, let's say a wizard, he has an excellent chance to hit, and with Fighter's Surge, can get two hits in, with a Cleric's Battle Psalm, you might be looking at about 36 points of damage in one turn from the fighter. The rogue can follow it up with about 20 points of damage. At 3rd level, those 88 hit points aren't going to last very long at all if the PC's expend a few resources (and facing an ogre, they'd be quite likely to use those resources).

To throw another test at it, five 3rd level wizards would deal sufficient damage in about two and a half rounds with magic missile alone.

88 hit points seem fine, just looking at the math. 3rd level PC's can deal with it in a few rounds, it might take an extra round for 2nd level PC's.

 

[underfoot007ct]

I've read through the playtest documents several times now in anticipating playing with my wife and kids.

Reading through the Caves of Chaos, I started noticing the various cheiftains having large numbers of hit points. Then I hit the Ogre - and was floored. Go ahead, look at room E22.

I do not like this one bit. Most of the "common" monsters in the adventure have hit points fairly close to the original values in the module, until you start getting to the "set-piece battles". Then the hit points look awfully inflated.

I know that we're supposed to be concentrating on making sure the mechanics work, but I hope WotC backs away from this. I don't want monsters to be given huge gobs of hit points to "force" combats to be more epic. I've still yet to actually play this out, but I'll be severely disappointed if 2nd or 3rd level characters can dish out that much damage in a few rounds (say 4 to 5) in this edition.

Is the Ogre really that tough? Compare that the room with 22 5-hp Goblins. That is 100+ hp of goblins. The Ogre only attacks once a round (yes doing good dam), but as to 22 Goblins attacking 22 times (fairly epic to me). The Ogre might be the easier combat or at least less lethal.

 

[Minigiant]

Welll, ogres are high level. And in the playtest.

Attack rolls don't increase
AC doesn't increase
Spell DCs don't increase
Skills don't increase
Abilities score don't increase
Initiative doesn't increase

Something has to go UP with level.
Damage and Hit points go up with level.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I don't want monsters to be given huge gobs of hit points to "force" combats to be more epic.

Does 5e still have SoDs/SoLs easily accessible to the PCs? If so then I think this doesn't go far enough. Epic monsters need more than just lots of hit points, they need anti-SoD/SoL defences of some sort.

The other alternative is to dispense with planned BBEGs entirely, which I'm not necessarily opposed to, but it gives the game a significantly different flavour.