Excerpt: Swarms

[The_Fan]

Has anyone tried a 5-swarm fight against the KotS characters? I wonder if the Dragonborn will make a difference with his breath weapon.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

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.

Hmm. Maybe you need better tactics. You need to run away from the drake Swarm. And you need to help your comrades. If you stand close to it, it use its minor action to put you down, and a second minor action (giving up his move action) to put someone else down. Don't allow that. Someone (maybe the Defender) should probably try to use his own actions to move any prone foe away from the Swarm, while someone else hammers it from distance or by doing some fancy maneuvering.
Still sounds very dangerous. But the feel is totally like you'd want it. RUN RUN RUN, help me, I stumbled, o my god, they are all over me... aaaargh

 

[Celebrim]

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.

How is a writing desk like a raven?

They both have black quills.

See if you can spot the common ground that I think are shared by both MtG cards and the new stat blocks, other than that they both are produced by WotC. Hint: it's not that they come in randomized packs.

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

It wasn't. But it was changing the monster, nor am I sure that it fixes the problem (but it definately helps). I said that the problem (XP doesn't match challenge) is hard to fix within the rules without changing the monster. That is to say, there is no XP point or label for this monster where it is fairly costed. It's abilities are well suited for a level 1 solo monster, not for a level 1 normal monster.

This suggests to me that designing good 4e monsters might be harder than it first appears.

 

[Dausuul]

edit: deleted

 

[Mengu]

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.

Problem is, they get double hitpoints if they become elites. That would make them utterly over the top. Either they need to be limited to 1 swarm attack per round, or Pulldown needs a recharge, or there is a swarm rule, that reduces their effectiveness when they are bloodied (like they do half damage or something). Perhaps they really are meant to be this tough. Guess we'll just have to wait a couple more weeks to know for sure.

 

[AllisterH]

I wonder...

what would Alchemist Fire be considered as? If it a burst/area attack, then wouldn't this be a (bad) example of not having the right gear?

 

[Dausuul]

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.

Problem is, they get double hitpoints if they become elites. That would make them utterly over the top. Either they need to be limited to 1 swarm attack per round, or Pulldown needs a recharge, or there is a swarm rule, that reduces their effectiveness when they are bloodied (like they do half damage or something). Perhaps they really are meant to be this tough. Guess we'll just have to wait a couple more weeks to know for sure.

Er, no. Stalker said the swarm IS ALREADY elite, WotC just forgot to give it its action point and its save bonus. So it doesn't need any more hit points to "become" elite, just +2 saves and an action point (and double its XP value).

 

[Stalker0]

Problem is, they get double hitpoints if they become elites. That would make them utterly over the top.

No, what I'm saying is think of them like this.

The drake swarm is actually an elite. Its defenses, hitpoints, and damage are already for an elite creature, its just someone forgot to add the AP and +2 to saving throws.

Basically what I'm saying is the "true" regular old drake swarm would have less hitpoints, defenses, and damage. This one is "actually" an elite monster, just someone forgot to pencil in the details.

 

[keterys]

Its hp are not an elite's hp.

 

[Dausuul]

Its hp are not an elite's hp.

But it takes half damage from most attacks. Its "effective" hit points are therefore much higher than the raw number would indicate.

Again, I'll want to test it myself before I say for sure what I think, but if it's as tough as people are suggesting, I'd have no problem calling it elite.