[3.5] Damage Reduction & Andy Collins

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Monsters weren't enough of a challenge if the PCs could ignore their DR? Are you serious? Are you telling me that an Ancient Blue Dragon wasn't enough of a challenge for a 20th level party because they could bypass its DR? And what about something like an Iron Golem? It was obvious that the designers intended for the party to be able to bypass its DR of 50/+3. There's absolutely no way a 13th level character could do 50 points of damage in one hit to a creature that's immune to crits.

I'm saying that if DR was always supposed to be bypassed, why bother putting it in the monster SQ line?

Moreover, the smae issue exists... it wont capture the werewolf flavor because the fighters will just do their thin while the mages blast the werewolf to pieces with non-dr-worried magic missiles.

I give them regeneration instead.

 

[Grog]

Every edition has had DR.

Just in older editions it was unlimited. Creatures were immune to damage unless the weapon had a high enough PLUS.

This wasn't DR; it was weapon immunity. And it was mainly there to prevent low-level parties from harming certain enemies. It didn't really come into play that often.

I have thought MANY times that, for example, werewolves would be much more cool if you actually needed silver to harm them.

Well, this isn't even the case with the new DR rules. You can still harm werewolves if you don't have silver, you'll just harm them a little bit less.

I suppose I can agree with your sentiment up to a point, but when powerful magic weapons enter into the situation, I have trouble believing that the silver requirement is still relevant. I mean, I think the fact that your sword is a +5 holy avenger near-artifact weapon should pretty much trump the fact that it's not made of silver...

 

[BryonD]

If those kinds of creatures make up more half of the foes PCs face, non-archers who use a single "primary" weapon will have great difficulty.

Not only is it not they "will have great difficulty", it is they DO not have great difficulty. When your predictions of future disaster do not appear in actual use, I put my actual experience over your speculation.

(See the previous 20th level fighter/Titan comparisons for the reasons Power Attack isn't a magic bullet--at best (and a 20th level greataxe fighter vs. DR/15 is a "best case scenario) it bumps the fighter up to half effectiveness).

A) I remember that pretty well because I did the analysis. As I recall, I biased the fighter pretty heavily and it still was better than 50%.

B) So, are you saying that the fighter class may never be reduced in effectgiveness?

 

[Grog]

I'm saying that if DR was always supposed to be bypassed, why bother putting it in the monster SQ line?

In 3E, I'm guessing it was there to give players incentive to add plusses to their weapons instead of just stacking on a bunch of special abilities (although GMW got around this to a large extent). I think another reason for it was to prevent parties from challenging foes that were too much for them.

 

[BryonD]

This wasn't DR; it was weapon immunity. And it was mainly there to prevent low-level parties from harming certain enemies. It didn't really come into play that often.

???

You really fail to see the relationship? It would be pretty stupid to keep the name weapon immunity when it is no longer immunity. This is the exact same thing, just improved on. Now that it reduces damage instead of providing immunity, it is called damage reduction instead of weapon immunity. There seems to be a touch of logic there.

Well, this isn't even the case with the new DR rules. You can still harm werewolves if you don't have silver, you'll just harm them a little bit less.

Not according to the end-of-the-worlders. If it aint in your golf bag you better run.

Besides, now it is a matter of degree. In 3E it effectively did not exist because everyone had a +1 weapon, so silver was pointless.

I suppose I can agree with your sentiment up to a point, but when powerful magic weapons enter into the situation, I have trouble believing that the silver requirement is still relevant. I mean, I think the fact that your sword is a +5 holy avenger near-artifact weapon should pretty much trump the fact that it's not made of silver...

And you would not have a hard time convincing me of that. But your +2 longsword would be another matter entirely.

 

[BryonD]

I'm saying that if DR was always supposed to be bypassed, why bother putting it in the monster SQ line?

Exactly.

You may as well just go back to weapon immunity. That is how DR was used in 3E.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Not only is it not they "will have great difficulty", it is they DO not have great difficulty. When your predictions of future disaster do not appear in actual use, I put my actual experience over your speculation.

From the assertion that you have "actual experience" should I conclude that you are/were a 3.5e playtester? In that event, perhaps you would care to share:

1. The build of the single primary weapon character who did not have difficulty--including his magic items.

and

2. The mixture of opponents that the party faced at mid to high levels.

My prediction assumes a number of factors, the most significant of which are significant percentages of creaturs having alignment or material based DR and a variety of creatures from Slaadi to devils to golems to inevitables being faced. Our calculations have also assumed a starting strength below 18 and few if any inherent bonusses. If your actual experience is a half orc fighter with a 19 or 20 starting strength and inherent bonusses against a smaller range of enemies (perhaps Devils, Demons, golems, and Inevitables), your experience can be expected to differ from those that I expect (especially if he had a +5 Holy Adamantium greataxe).

A) I remember that pretty well because I did the analysis. As I recall, I biased the fighter pretty heavily and it still was better than 50%.

The greataxe fighter came in at 36.48 points of damage per round including crits. If he could penetrate DR, he would deal an average of 64.49 points of damaer per round while power attacking for 5. It comes out to 78.66 points of damager per round if he doesn't power attack but can penetrate DR.

The longsword fighter came in at 28 points of damage per round including crits. If he could penetrate DR, he'd be weighing in at 62.56 points of damage per round.

In both cases, the fighter deals less than 50% of the damage he would deal without DR. I think that justifies the 50% figure.

And, of course, neither is examining the other popular fighting style: the twin shortsword fighter (Ftr 20, GWF, GWS, 28 strength and 2 +5 shortswords). He deals 28.61 damage/round if he can't penetrate DR and around 86.66 points of damage per round if he can penetrate DR. And he can't power attack to help against DR under the new rules. (Although I must say the no DR figures here reveal that GWS and the improved TWF feats have done a lot for TWF characters)

B) So, are you saying that the fighter class may never be reduced in effectgiveness?

Feel free to stop building straw men and rolling your eyes at them any time you want.

What I'm saying is that the ability to penetrate DR makes a big difference to the effectiveness of any fighter-type character (it makes even more of a difference to the effectiveness of a a paladin--raging barbarians will see slightly less effect than fighters armed with the same weapons and rangers will be too situationally adjusted to predict (if the ranger had Favored enemy: chaotic outsiders +10, he'd plow through the Titan better than any other character but Titans weren't a favored enemy at all, he'd need average rolls to do any damage with his primary attacks and crits to deal damage with his off hand). And, when facing an opponent with SR and good AC, whether your fighter types are operating at 10% (probably the worst case ranger scenario), 33%, 50%, or 100% effectiveness makes a huge difference to the amount of challenge the creature will pose.

 

[BryonD]

A) Sorry NDA

B) I am not EVEN going to respond to a complaint from you about Straw Men.

 

[Henry]

Why is it that, in every battle I've ever seen in D&D from 1st edition onward, that when PC's faced skeletons or zombies, that they never changed their weapons out, and proceeded to hack the living daylights out of the enemy with whatever they had handy?

We've been dealing with Damage resistance for many years. YES, it was in 1st edition, but it had no name. It was simply called, "crushing/blunt weapons do half damage."

I recently ran a fight with Baneguards in a Forgotten Realms game (converting to the new DR rules for skeletons.) No one switched weapons, except for the wizard. The wizard, realizing he was prepared with nothing but two negative energy rays for offensive spells, whipped out his quarterstaff. The rest of the party used their swords/hammers/greatswords (whatever their primary weapon was) and hacked them to bits.

Why is it?

I think it's because players hate to switch weapons, even when their weapon is doing a little less damage. Even if the weapon was doing half its normal damage, they accepted it, because they didn't want to use unfamiliar weapons. By the time you switch to an unfamiliar unmagic'ed weapon, you are already doing about as much damage with it as you are using your tried and true with the damage resistance.

So far, that little change-up worked well for me, and I am curious to see how the materials and aligned weapons work in practice.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

A) Sorry NDA

Well that's awfully convenient for you. First you get to sound the superior note by saying "my EXPERIENCE is better than your predictions" and then you beg off actually producing any of the data that makes your "experience" relevant to the conversation.

It's pretty cheap making superior sounding comments about experience if you're then going to hide behind your NDA as soon as any questions are asked about that experience.

B) I am not EVEN going to respond to a complaint from you about Straw Men.

You're obviously implying that my argumentation here is deeply dishonest. How about you tell me what's wrong with it instead of smugly pretending to be superior?

My arguments are on the table as are my figures. (And those figures demonstrates that I was right about the 50% figure you questioned). Your counterarguments are hiding behind smug superiority and NDAs. How about you put aside the pretenses and address the arguments?

1. Given a relatively even spread of high level opponents, parties can regularly expect to come up against non-negatable DR.

1.25 And, in the absence of information about a specific party's exact alignment and makeup, the ability of parties to negate DR will no longer be predictable.

1.5 DR has a dramatic effect on the ability of a fighter-type character to deal damage and can be expected to reduce the damage output of a fighter-type by 50-70%.

2. SR and good saves are also prevalent among high-CR creatures.

3. Reducing the effectiveness of fighter types by 50-70% against creatures with SR and/or good saves significantly increases the challenge they pose to an adventuring party.

Conclusion 1: Designer DR makes the difficulty of combats very difficult to predict in the absence of specific knowledge about party makeup. The real difficulty of an encounter featuring designer DR may well be CR+/-3 depending on the ability of the PCs to negate the DR.

Premise 4. Climactic fights are often 2-3 ELs above average party level.

Conclusion 2: If conclusion 1 is accurate, then climactic fights prepared without specific knowledge of the party makeup will often be EL: [APL-1 to APL +6].

Premise 5. ELs of APL +4, +5, and +6 often lead to TPKs.

Conclusion 3: The introduction of designer DR is likely to dramatically increase the deadliness of modules and other games not prepared with specific information about party makeup in mind.

Now, which of those arguments is a straw man?