[3.5E] In The Works - Changes to the Titan

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Elder

If you assume that every fighter-type character has Spring Attack

This is just based on my experiences, but that feat is so useful that pretty much every fighter I've seen takes it. It's worse to be a barbarian - good thing their rage gives them +8 Con

(Same for the cleric, although a cleric doesn't have many high-level Will save or die spells).

You missed this part. Typically, such an encounter would end with dominate monster or heighented hold monster. The wizard will have to cast several of these however, but it will also take the fighter a long time (and possibly many many lost hit points) to take down the titan. Now everyone is contributing and expending resources.

Grog

42? How do you figure? I guess if he uses a shield, he can get there... But then his damage really takes a hit.

I assume the use of a shield. (Sadly, a greatsword-wielder can use an animated shield.)

AC 42 (+1 Dex, +13 plate, +7 shield, +5 natural, +5 ring, +1 luckstone)

A fighter might, instead of a luckstone, have mithral + higher Dex, or of course they can still use their Dodge feat etc etc. Seems the average is more like a 41

Well, you'd want to kill the titan as quickly as possible before it wipes the party out with its SLAs, so Spring Attack might not be the best idea... And sure you can power attack, but then you're increasing the odds that you'll miss.

I'm assuming that the wizard is doing something as well... the fighter might be better off using his longbow and keeping away from the titan, allowing the wizard to dish out direct-damage, or use several save-or-consequences spells, or use greater dispelling (when appropriate), etc.

And as far as getting him with a Hold spell, note that that does nothing to prevent use of his SLAs, so he can just gate himself away if that happens.

Don't you mean Etherealness? He still has to step through the Gate.

I hadn't thought of that. I'm glad WotC included the escape option. It still won't save him from dominate monster though.

I come out to 15.75% with dominate monster and the four SR/save DC feats, assuming starting Int 15, and a +2 tome, for a 20th-level spellcaster.

He's better off using direct damage when facing an obviously magic-resistant foe A titan's Reflex save is his worst save, too.

You know they're going to nerf Spell Power (after all, they've nerfed Greater Spell Focus), so of course being an archmage or Red Wizard isn't going to help.

Dthamilaye

Also remember that if you have +3 flaming shock icy corrosive weapon, even if you don't get the normal damage through the DR, you still do 4d6 damage in different forms of energy.

I just hope this isn't required. I don't allow this type of weapon stacking IMC.

It's easy to quantify hit ratios, save ratios, etc, but hit points are another story.

 

[BryonD]

No that's why the old DR was so fun. It actually allowed you to play the game, and get to the business of heroic combat. The new DR, is a silly gimick sacrificing playability for a poor imitation of flavor.

Can you explain that please?
The old DR was a virtual non-issue.

95% of the time your magic weapon would overcome it so it did not exist. The other 5% you ran away because DR**meganumber**/+4 was pointless to challenge.

How in either of those cases does the old DR add to heroics?

The new DR is one of the Best changes in 3.5 because it adds brilliant flavor in with a cool variety of tactical playability.

Seriously, please explain to me how the old DR HELPED heroic combat. I can not see that in the slightest.

 

[randomninja]

Despite my post, I really don't see whats so wrong with the new DR rules. I WANT to see more fights like my example. It's way more fun to have the characters have to scramble and think fast, then for them to wade through a horde of monsters without even realizing they all had DR, because it simply didn't matter.
Whats so fun about allways being prepared anyway? I would love to see more Rogues killing Werewolves with their Silver butter knives, while the Barbarian tosses lesser demons through Dimensional doorways so the party has time to regroup an escape.
I once played a game (2ndEd.)with my brother where our questing band of Paladins, stupidly allowed a band of lycanthrope Gypsies to put them up for the night. They woke up swordless and having to fend off a band of voracious wolf-men. The next several rounds showed desperate Paladins using sheild rushes, bags of silver coins, grappling, rope, burning oil, and finally roasting the whole lot of the evil creatures over a blazing campfire.( and spending over a week nursing their wounds )
THAT was a memorable fight.

 

[Stalker0]

I like the new DR, if you think outside the box for a second, it can actually make combat much easier in this case. Take a look.

The titan swings and deals a nasty blow to Redgar. Then releases chain lightning upon the group, Jozan and Mialee look badly shocked, ember seems fine.
Redgar: Puts up his +5 tower shield for cover, and yells: Everyone back up, and prepare us for battle.

Jozan, Mialee, and Ember start backing up. Jozan casts mass cure crit upon the party. Mialee casts protection from elements upon herself.

The titan deals a mighty swing to Redgar but even his mighty maul cannot compete with the magic of redgar's tower shield.

Redgar lowers his shield and shouts: Mialee, Ember remember the battle of miorgans? He then delays for the action he hopes his friends will take.

Mialee's eyes grow wider and looks to ember: Ember?
Ember nods and smiles.
Mialee rushes forward as magic courses through her hands. She places the magic upon redgar, who feels assurance in his blade, and insight upon his foe (true strike).
Redgar chooses to act, and rushes forward, his eyes upon the maul. He swings heavily, and even though the titan's maul is huge, and the demigod's skill great, Redgar has trained a long time in the disarming of weapons, and with the true strike is good enough to put the maul upon the ground.

As the maul slams upon the ground with a thunderous roar, ember moves. Although she is taking a careful jog, her movement is a blur. She tumbles under the titan's fist, and reaches out for the maul. She smiles upon the titan, and takes the abundant step 800 feet back, the maul coming with her.

Jozan smiles at his comrades, and readies a greater dispel magic in case the giant should try anything else.

The titan releases a chain lightning upon the party, but Jozan was waiting and took it out. The titan then releases another one, and it got through. Redgar was shocked great as was Jozan, Mialee absorbing the blow. Redgar put up his tower shield again, and withdrew. Ember starts racing back at breakneck speeds. Mialee casted stone skin upon Redgar, and Jozan healed him.

The titan ran foward and struck at mialee, but fortunately his fist were no where near as powerful as his maul, and the damage was not excessive. Redgar and Ember ran upon the beast and struck at it. Mialee disengaged, and Jozan casts shield of law upon the party.

Redgar had the skin of stone, and Ember had obtained the perfect self, making the titan's blows ineffective against them. He dispelled Redgar's stone skin, but with other assistance from mialee and jozan, with ember's constant attacks, the titan's body eventually crashed upon the ground.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

simple it helped heroic combat by actually alowing you to fight the battles.

In the old way certain DRs were impossible to beat with the current group, it was assumed that they would only put into use as some form of motivation to get the palyes to run or circumvent the monster outside of just hitting it. But the vast majority of the time thes emosnters just wouldn't be used until the right + was in the group, or GMW was a commonly memorized spell.

And still there were creatures in the DR 5-10 category you could pull out if you wanted some oh no we can hurt him but this is a hard to do situation. Because aparently inflicitng a less damage rule on the fighters make things heroic.

Now in the lame version, you have a wide range of DRs. Where apparenlty your supposed to face monsters with DR you can't go against which mean you either play your character dumb for some lame flavor issue and then have your one type of sword and "heroically" struggle against DR. and unless its DR 5 you minds as well run away because its the same thing as 50, oh sure your nicking it here and there but please you'll be long dead before you do anywhwere close to what you need to do. So unless the spellcasters are up to handling it on there own your just a useless 3rd wheel and not heroic. Oh the fun and glory of doing less damage every time swing I can feel the heroism in that.

Or you caried a golf bag around, yep that's heroic. Of course then unless the monsters are dumb they'll sunder the one damaging weapon against them, so I hope this golfbag thing is a team theme. Oh and I forgot only go two handed style just in case you bump into a monster DR your not prepared for becasue the only way to do anything is power your way through the DR.

There's nothing heroic about the new DR, its just a lame mechanic that gets in the way of having fun and playing the game.

Basic end result old rules gave a smoother combat system which facilitates heroic play, new system gets in the way of a smooth combat system and facilitates metagaming and or borderline useless action.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

ah so if your playing the foes dumb enough the new DR works, great story.

seriously if you used an example other than the titan maybe it would work. I still think the new DR would get in the way of the comabt system and make the game a lot less fun, but at least the story would of worked.

 

[elbandit]

I've got an 11th level fighter who can achieve an AC of 46+, and all his equipment is only +1 or +2.

Granted, it will be much harder to achive this in 3.5, as two of the biggest AC boosts are diminished (Haste and Shield spells), but there are several AC enhancing options that you aren't considering.

Would you mind sharing this trade secret? I am sorta curious myself how this would be accomplished.

 

[splitinfinitude]

Admittedly, that is a much more interesting, tactical battle than most I've seen in 3E, but I still don't like the new DR rules. Sunder is now the must-have BBEG feat. If your BBEG is half-way intelligent and depends on combat at all, that should be it's primary attack, esp. w/ spell resistance sky-high. If it can take out the few weapons that can hit it, ouch.

I think combats are going to get very one-dimensional, and focus on grabs for weapons, sundered weapons, disintegrated weapons, etc. Unless you give your players a break.

I'm glad the Titan is finally a bad-ass.

 

[IanB]

With the old DR: numbers ranged as high as 50 for the before-the-slash number. Pretty hard to work around.

With the new DR: highest is 15, possibly 20 on epic critters. Easy for a high-level character to get through even without the right weapon, but the right weapon will still make a big positive difference.

It isn't all-or-nothing anymore, and that is a change I find very, very good.

 

[EricNoah]

With the old DR: numbers ranged as high as 50 for the before-the-slash number. Pretty hard to work around.

With the new DR: highest is 15, possibly 20 on epic critters. Easy for a high-level character to get through even without the right weapon, but the right weapon will still make a big positive difference.

It isn't all-or-nothing anymore, and that is a change I find very, very good.

I agree. The way I see it, in the new edition you may or may not have the right weapon to fully affect any particular enemy, but even without it you're still going to do some damage if you're against suitable creatures for your level. In the 3.0 hierarchical way your tanks, at least, typically have the "right" weapon when facing suitably challenging opponents, and so DR is a non-issue and thus it's like it's not even there.

Even if I don't end up switching to 3.5 for some time, I will likely see if there's a way to use the new DR rules in my game.