ECL of Monsters Part III: Are Ogres ECL 8? The Adventures of Ghorgor.

[Mal Malenkirk]

If you say that orcs would be +1, than what would you rate Dwarves at?
As i remember, when calculated, the dwarves have the highest ECL of any base race.

Orcs are not really ECL 1 but they're not ECL 0 either.

If a player wanted to have an orc character in my campaign I'd put it at ECL 1 and give it a few additional racial advantages to put it on par with other ECL 1 races.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

Mal - i think you should be aware that your continual assurance that "I've playtested this, therefore it is proven" is starting to get tiresome. <-- just an observation, not an attack

Hint - I don't care what you "determine", based on your play"testing".
Your campaign is not necessarily like mine, and I think you are sweeping too many restrictions under the rug.

I agree with Reaper's first statement, but let me qualify myself. I don't really like it when you just say "that's the way it is." Often, you explain *why* something happened the way it did in your group, and I appreciate that. That's helpful to me.

OPn the whole, I agree with your conclusion that ogres are ECL +8, though I'd have to playtest myself to be sure of it. Thanks for filling us in!

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

Mal - i think you should be aware that your continual assurance that "I've playtested this, therefore it is proven" is starting to get tiresome. <-- just an observation, not an attack

I have never said it was proven. I didn't even say I was done testing. Ghorgor only has two sessions under its belt.

But the quotation you chose simply expressed that I am getting tired myself of seeing my playtesting totally ignored in favor of theory. I am not asking that everyone shut up and accept my opinion. And I am not asking that we stop using theory altogether.

But maybe we could accept some basic fact about how Ghorgor performs in combat (Huge damage, nice tactical advantage because of his reach etc.) and push the discussion beyond that.

If you have some scenario in mind that might test the strenght of an ECL 8 ogre, I'm listening and I'll be happy to try them in my campaign insofar as possible.

Originally posted by reapersaurus
Hint - I don't care what you "determine", based on your play"testing".
Your campaign is not necessarily like mine, and I think you are sweeping too many restrictions under the rug. (just like many others have repeatedly said).

What have I been sweeping under the rug?

And please don't tell me it's roleplaying considerations.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

I agree with Reaper's first statement, but let me qualify myself. I don't really like it when you just say "that's the way it is."

Oh well, I'll try to tone down the affirmative statements.

 

[Marshall]

Re: Re: Re: Apologies

ARG! Enough with that argument! That's true of any standard fighter. Heck, that's also true of the psychic warrior and of quite a few barbarians (those with low INT like most half-orc).

Except that this is the crux of the whole argument, a Human Fighter IS useful outside of combat. He will most likely have more than 1 SP per level, he might have a chance of sneaking, he could do a little (non-magical)healing, he might come up with some ideas on party direction, he could be a party spokesman.

Your Ogre, if you actually roleplay the -4 INT and -4 CHA, stands there with at least 1 finger up his nose and contributes "Me Ghorgor" and "Ghorgor Smash!"

Now you could spend the points to not have a 4-6 int INT/CHA but then you give up those nice big numbers that youve been flinging around and you come down to earth in combat and up to average in group interaction. BTW, so far your descriptions of ghorgors massive contibutions to the fight are about what a good Human with a reach weapon does.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

Your Ogre, if you actually roleplay the -4 INT and -4 CHA, stands there with at least 1 finger up his nose and contributes "Me Ghorgor" and "Ghorgor Smash!"

For crying out loud, how often must I write this;

Ghorgor has INT 10, WIS 12 and CHA 4. He is reasonably smart but is very shy and sensitive. He likes to paint and likes flower but is ashamed to admit it because it isn't manly (or ogrely).

He is prone to discussing low key philosophy with the awakened tiger, which prompted the dumb animal to dance around singing "I've got free will, I've got free will".

When the party required a sanctuary for the night, Ghorgor guided them to his secret cave, warning his new friends that pesky vandals had painted all over the cave! One painting showed Ghorgor smelling a flower while stepping over a mountain of slain enemies, his great axe resting lightly on his shoulder.

"These damn vandals, how could they disrespect you so! A mighty ogre like you wouldn't be caught dead smelling flowers..., commented slyly the druid. This resulted in a lot of light hearted banter between the reddening Ghorgor and the rest of the party.

Ghorgor isn't a common ogre and he doesn't have to act like one.

 

[Spatula]

If you say that orcs would be +1, than what would you rate Dwarves at?

*I* would put orcs at +0. But then I would do the same for hobgoblins, which were recently re-assessed as being +1.

Personally, I just wish WotC would playtest material before publishing it. The revisions to the monsters-as-PC rules (the stuff going on now is the third stab at it), the multiple versions of Polymorph Self, Sword and Fist, Defenders of the Faith, etc. Publish something and stand behind it, dangit. And if you can't stand behind it, don't publish it.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

Except that this is the crux of the whole argument, a Human Fighter IS useful outside of combat. He will most likely have more than 1 SP per level, he might have a chance of sneaking, he could do a little (non-magical)healing, he might come up with some ideas on party direction, he could be a party spokesman.

And yet in my current campaign the psychic warrior, the fighters and Sohei never had to do any of these things.

There was always someone better qualified to do these kind of tasks. In fact, there were usually two or three persons better qualified than them for these kind of jobs.

Such characters might be called upon to play such roles. But then the fact that Ghorgor can dead lift 1,600 pounds above his head, push an 8,000 pounds rock out of the way or break down an Iron door might come in handy too. In fact I suspect that the feats of strenght of Ghorgor will prove more useful to the party in the long run than the scouting capabilities of the human fighter.

 

[Marshall]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

For crying out loud, how often must I write this;

Ghorgor has INT 10, WIS 12 and CHA 4. He is reasonably smart but is very shy and sensitive. He likes to paint and likes flower but is ashamed to admit it because it isn't manly (or ogrely).

You are aware that you are well over a 32pt buy?

Before Racial mods your stats were-
(Ogre being STR+10,DEX-2,CON+4,INT-4,CHA-4)

STR 18 - 16pts
DEX 12 - 4
CON 16 - 10
INT 14 - 6
WIS 12 - 4
CHA 8 - 0
________
40 pts

That could account for a couple ECL right there.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Apologies

You are aware that you are well over a 32pt buy?

*sigh*

Have you even read the stats of Ghorgor? I posted a link in my first post that lead to the thread were his design was explained in detail.

To make a long story short, my campaign uses an houserules; +1 bonus attribute point every 2 level instead of every 4. (You can't put 2 consecutive attribute poinst in the same stat)

That meant that the normal PCs had 5 bonus attribute points. That was unfair to a high ECL character. Under normal rules Ghorgor should only be trailing by 2 bonus attribute points.

Therefore I gave him 3 bonus attribute points.

Which means that even though Ghorgor's base statistics are high, those of the ECL 0 PCs are two point higher.