Dark Sun Creature Catalog: Damage Inflation

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Dark Sun 4e is a big higher-power. You get a free theme, giving you one free 1st-level encounter power. That's about it.

Why do so many monsters and NPCs in this sourcebook have such high damage, going far beyond the guidelines?

For instance, a 6th-level skirmisher's regular (meaning atl-will) attack should be doing about 1d10+4 damage. An aarakocra diver, a level 6 skirmisher, does 2d10+4 damage with a longspear at-will. (His Diving Charge special ability lets him do 2d10+10 damage, which is probably beyond the guidelines as well.)

The next pair of pages has the anakore hunter, a level 5 lurker, which does... 2d8+4 damage.

The cilops creeper (a level 5 skirmisher) does a much more reasonable 1d10+8 damage. Still above the guidelines, and has an array of abilities to boost damage (including something like combat advantage).

The dwarf sunpriest (level 5 artillery) does 1d10+8 radiant damage. (None of its stats are high enough to justify this, either.)

The halfling wilder (level 3 artillery) has a melee at-will that deals 2d6+2 damage. The forest keeper, a 6th-level controller, has a melee at-will that does 3d6+3 damage.

And the human gladiator novice (a 4th-level soldier) is just... confusing. He has Strength 20 and Dex 15. He is armed with a short sword. He does 2d8+3 damage, which is probably not too ridiculous for his level, but ... none of his stats justify a +3 bonus, a short sword shouldn't do 1d8 damage, and it certainly shouldn't do 2d8. I can't fault the balance too much for this one, but he makes my brain hurt.

Quite a few monsters do extra dice of damage for no reason, and a few get random bonuses. Has this been discussed elsewhere? It's probably the only big problem I have with the book.

 

[zoroaster100]

When you say these are above the guidelines, are you talking about the original guidelines, or do you mean even above the new damage guidelines since Monster Manual 3 and Demonomicon?

 

[renau1g]

Have you seen the MM errata? Level 6 skirmisher should be 2d6+7 or around 14 damage on a hit, the 2d10+4 approx. is 15, or 1 point higher. Dark Sun should be more challenging as that's its schtick.

Page 4 of the below:
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/files/UpdateJuly2010.pdf

 

[Dice4Hire]

I think that was a deliberate choice on the part of the designers to make the world more deadly, but I cannot remember wehre I heard that or give a source.

Plus, I have no problem with monsters wandering out of the expected zones a bit.

 

[SkullThrone]

For the longest time I've thought the higher level creatures needed a damage modifier. I typically give them a x2 on the adjust for level 6 to 10, and on 11 to 20 almost all of them get a x2 on the dice.

This goes along with a HP mod, as I think combats should be faster to resolve, but deadly as well...so by the 11-20 range creatures have about 50% Hps, and for the 6 to 10th I give them 75%.

His comes from playing Revenge of the giants, where I'm not kidding every battle was this Epic 3 to 4 hour dice rolling fest, where each side nickel and dice the other to death. The characters all typically have resist 10 against most the damage being done, and some fights the giants side had over 2,000hp...My shaman was hitting to d10+4 (whoohoo), granted the minMax'd strikers could deal 100hps in an attack if they crit'd, which made me feel like why am I even here...I no that was not my characters role, but come'on 2,000hps in one battle, ridiculous.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Dark Sun 4e is a big higher-power. You get a free theme, giving you one free 1st-level encounter power. That's about it.

Why do so many monsters and NPCs in this sourcebook have such high damage, going far beyond the guidelines?

Going by interviews and such, it doesn't seem like 4e Dark Sun was supposed to be "higher power." You're supposed to be able to take an element from Dark Sun and mix it with the rest of the game without having to re-balance it. Themes should be applicable to any character outside of Dark Sun as well. You should be able to take a monster from Dark Sun and pit it against any basic 4e party and it should be fine.

The impression was that earlier monsters did not have enough damage output. So, to correct that, the MM3 monsters upped damage output. DS monsters were made with similar guidelines to MM3 monsters. Both of those categories will look "more deadly" than monsters before, but they are just supposed to be "deadly enough." Earlier monsters may have been "too weak."

 

[the Jester]

Why do so many monsters and NPCs in this sourcebook have such high damage, going far beyond the guidelines?

...

And the human gladiator novice (a 4th-level soldier) is just... confusing. He has Strength 20 and Dex 15. He is armed with a short sword. He does 2d8+3 damage, which is probably not too ridiculous for his level, but ... none of his stats justify a +3 bonus, a short sword shouldn't do 1d8 damage, and it certainly shouldn't do 2d8. I can't fault the balance too much for this one, but he makes my brain hurt.

First of all, it sounds like you're unaware of the revised monster damage values. These guys are pretty much the new style of bad-ass monster.

As for the gladiator, your mistake is trying to look at his damage like a pc's. Instead look at it like a monster's.

 

[BASHMAN]

No Reason? Its ATHAS. No crying allowed- it's a waste of precious moisture.

 

[Obryn]

Mostly what the folks up there said - it uses the revised damage tables from MM3.

However, I'd also like to note that in 4e, damage isn't related to a monster's stats, weapon, or anything else - it's based only on a table. The dwarf sunpriest does 1d10+8 because he's Level 5 Artillery, not because of his Wisdom bonus. The human gladiator does 2d8+3 because he's a skirmisher, not because his stats should give him a +3 bonus or shortswords should do 2d8 damage.

-O

 

[UHF]

I checked the monsters you listed against the MM3 errata, and they are spot on right.

Just an FYI, but if you do the math, MM3 monsters do about 30% more damage than MM1 and MM2. (It varies, but that's about it.) In order to understand the damage better, you should always look at Average damage. WOTC loves mucking around with damage, but they are always spot on for average damage.

Its very important that you use monsters that are pretty much the same level as the PCs, or grind may set in. These changes to monster damage pretty much address that.