NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Hussar" data-source="post: 4221702" data-attributes="member: 22779">How could he have prevented that?  He was killed in a single attack before his turn.  There is nothing he could have done.  And, as far as targetting the wizard goes, well, should I play with kid gloves and never target someone because I might kill them?  Isn't "get the wizard" a pretty understandable tactic for humanoids?Or maybe my humanoids should all just stand in a nice neat line, attacking the party one at a time using pointy sticks?YES.  It's been shown to you multiple times.  A single hit from a monster can kill a PC.  Give an orc a greataxe and he can do 45 points of damage in a single hit.  That will kill any PC up to about 3rd level.  Now, it won't happen a lot, but it WILL happen.  Say 10 encounters per level, 4 rounds per encounter, 4  attacks per round (roughly).  That's 400 attacks against the party per level.  And that's a pretty low assumption.  That's 20 threatened criticals per level.  Assume that half succeed.  That's 10 crits by monsters per level.Now, all of a sudden, it's not all that out of line for a PC to die before making a single die roll.  Heck, out of 400 attacks, it's quite possible to make back to back criticals.  The creature has a claw/claw/bite routine, crits twice and hits all three times.  PC dies.  At almost ANY level.I averaged a PC death every three sessions the last time I DM'd, because I played by the rules.  Rolled in the open, didn't fudge, and didn't cheat.  That's WAY too lethal.  The reason we see Action Points in 3e is to mitigate this.  Never mind other concepts to reduce the lethality.  3e combat is extremely lethal if you don't fudge.</blockquote>

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