Excerpt: Swarms

[keterys]

Assuming the aura is also not hitting Corrin. As long as your attack includes the paladin, your golden. And if corrin is a melee paladin, he has to be in the thick of it to keep the mark up.

It's not an area attack. They're individual melee attacks made on each target's turn. If all 5 people are huddled around it for some bizarre reason, it'll take 32 damage (24 for the dragonborn paladin) over 1 round.

Of course, they'll potentially take a bucketload of damage in that time, too.

 

[Dausuul]

Assuming the aura is also not hitting Corrin. As long as your attack includes the paladin, your golden. And if corrin is a melee paladin, he has to be in the thick of it to keep the mark up.

The aura is not a single area-effect attack, though. It looks as if it triggers individually on each target on the target's turn. So if there are three targets including Corrin, the swarm gets fried twice per round.

Also, you can't actually block the movement of swarms because they can simply move over your square. So they could just all converge on the caster and take him down fast if you want to...
I wouldn't play them that way as DM, but it does seem like they are unbalanced right now...

You can't block them in the sense of physically interposing yourself, but defender glue works normally. The fighter can use Combat Superiority to keep the swarms from leaving her square (as I pointed out earlier, it's not a push/pull/slide effect, so the swarm isn't immune), and the paladin can fry them when they attack someone else.

Consider though that vulnerability 5 is great, but you are halfling the damage of your fighter/paladin/ranger/rogue. A fighter with a greatsword is doing 2d6+4 lets say, which is 11 damage on average, dropped to 5 for half damage. So your losing 6 damage from the fighter right there. Add in the ranger or rogue and that's more damage your losing. And of course, let's say the fighter uses brutal strike, dealing 6d6 +4 = 25 damage on average, or 12 against a swarm, that's 13 damage your losing!!

The job of the defender against a swarm is to hold it in place. Inflicting damage is secondary, that's the controller's job... although the paladin looks like being the star of the show here.

As I say, I still want to test this, but it seems like a party of 5 has a fair shot--if they have the right mix. Controllers and defenders are vital. Leaders are so-so, and strikers are more or less useless.

 

[keterys]

I definitely like the way swarms work. I like the ideas and I even like the example monsters... I just object to the level (and possibly role) of the needledrakes. If it were higher level... potentially a brute with lower defenses... I mean, I _want_ swarms to be scary (and not boring). I just don't want it to be the wrong level for what it does.

 

[DylanCB]

Ya, know, the only wizard that can deal with the swarms is the guy from KoTS. His Burning hands is the only hope the teams got. Once he gets FIre Shroud at level 3, everythings OK. But that seems sorta crazy. You pick grenade powers instead of blast and burst, you get hosed. Heck, if you dont pick the at will burst, your totally dead. Eh, the drakes are way too good for second level. YOu need a burst and blast type wizard, or the paladins challenge.

This is the first thing I dont like about 4E. Thankfully, its the Drakes more than the stirges. By the time the Stirges come up, there should be a high enough range of powers to fight them. Multiclassing, stronger Dragonborn breath attack feats, Paragon paths, etc. The drakes seem like a screw-up, though.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I definitely like the way swarms work. I like the ideas and I even like the example monsters... I just object to the level (and possibly role) of the needledrakes. If it were higher level... potentially a brute with lower defenses... I mean, I _want_ swarms to be scary (and not boring). I just don't want it to be the wrong level for what it does.

Possibilities I see:
- We overestimate (how so?) the Swarms combat prowess
- R&D screwed up (unbalanced monster)
- The web team screwed up (typo)

 

[Knight Otu]

That needlefang drake does look wrong.

If you make monsters more like magic cards, you'll get magic card like results.

I suspect each new MM will have its 'trash' - low challenge creatures that give you lots of XP compared to the risk (zombie minion) - and its killer bombs - creatures that are much harder than thier XP suggests (needlefang drake swarm).

Without going too deeply into why Magic cards differ so much, most of the reasons (rarity, limited play, demographic appeal, iconic creature bonus, power point distribution, strategies, ...) do not apply to roleplaying games. Demographic appeal and iconic creature bonus (3.X dragons) can, and maybe a few others.

And it's as durable as many elite monsters unless you have a ton of area attacks in the party.

Many of the stats do seem to say that this guy should be an elite, actually, except for hit points and XP. I'd be interested to hear about someone testing the swarm that way. Still the same amount of damage to deal to them, but fewer squares covered in teeth. Probably should still drop to a d8.

The funny thing is that this is difficult to fix without changing the monster.
...
It needs to drop to a d6 or something to be appropriate for a non-elite creature of this level.

That didn't seem so difficult. Also knock 1 or 2 off attacks and defenses, maybe.

 

[Stormtalon]

Am I the only one toying with the idea of scaling up a KotS encounter via adding one or two Needledrake swarms? Specifically....

[sblock]I'm thinking the Dragon Grave encounter, and having the swarms be released by the excavations and start to attack EVERYONE.[/sblock]

I'm expecting to have 6-8 players, so it shouldn't be too lethal. Heh. Heh heh. AHAHAHAHA!

 

[Celebrim]

Remember, in 4e we don't have to be a slave to the numbers.

Of course you don't. But to the same extent, you didn't have to be a slave to the numbers in 3e either.

We can just slap on an elite sticker onto the creature, and .... its done. Now its an elite, only max 2 of them for a regular combat.

Sure, but per the rules the elite label has certain effects on creatures that have it, just as being a 'soldier' has certain effects on the monster that has the role. If you go by the rules, making the swarms elite creatures changes thier hit points. Sure, you can handwave away the rules and say 'they are elite soldiers without the extra hitpoints that normally implies' but you could have handwaved away the rules in 3e and said, 'By golly, I want these orcs to have an extra +4 inight bonus to hit and AC'.

The ability to break the rules as a DM is not revolutionary. Nor is the ability or need to break rules in itself something that says something positive about a game.

 

[Mengu]

After the TPK vs 4 drake swarms, I ran the same group (Kathra, Corrin, Erais, Skamos, Riardon) against 3 drake swarms. It took a couple daily abilities (from Kathra and Skamos), and 3 action points, but they managed to defeat the 3 drake swarms. Corrin was also out of all his daily healing. A total of 6 healing surges were used during combat (3 triggered by Corrin, 2 by Eraise, and 1 by Kathra). After the combat, everyone except Skamos would need 2-3 surges to heal up to fullish HP's again.

I don't think the party could face another similar encounter after this, and survive again. So even 3 swarms seems like more than a 500 XP encounter.

Can't help but wonder if there's something missing from the preview.

 

[Stalker0]

After the TPK vs 4 drake swarms, I ran the same group (Kathra, Corrin, Erais, Skamos, Riardon) against 3 drake swarms. It took a couple daily abilities (from Kathra and Skamos), and 3 action points, but they managed to defeat the 3 drake swarms. Corrin was also out of all his daily healing. A total of 6 healing surges were used during combat (3 triggered by Corrin, 2 by Eraise, and 1 by Kathra). After the combat, everyone except Skamos would need 2-3 surges to heal up to fullish HP's again.

I don't think the party could face another similar encounter after this, and survive again. So even 3 swarms seems like more than a 500 XP encounter.

So it seemed like this encounter took 70% or more of your party's resources. If we went by 3e logic, that's several CRs above your party's level, maybe +3.

Yeah, there's definitely something off about the drake swarms. I wonder if they are supposed to have vulnerability 10 to close and area like the stirge swarms.


I wonder if your group is willing, to give these swarms the elite treatment. Try giving the swarms an action point and a +2 to saving throws. Basically what we are saying is that the swarm is actually an elite creature, WOTC just forgot to add in some of its elite bonuses. Try running 2 of those against your party and see how it turns out.