Fixing iterative, unarmed, and natural attacks?

[Sylrae]

They do some things that seem to greatly up the power levels of things. They have some good ways to make monsters into player characters though, better alternatives than LA and Racial HD.

I personally am liking their armor system, and may use it wholesale, but it may be a bit powerful, in which case I'll tone it down. I also noticed none of the armor has a price. lol

 

[Matrixryu]

They do some things that seem to greatly up the power levels of things. They have some good ways to make monsters into player characters though, better alternatives than LA and Racial HD.

I personally am liking their armor system, and may use it wholesale, but it may be a bit powerful, in which case I'll tone it down. I also noticed none of the armor has a price. lol

Hmmm, alternatives to LA and Racial HD sounds interesting. Nether of those was really working probably in the core anyway, though I'm using the UA rule for buying back LA with exp at certain class levels. One thing that worries me about their armor system though, is that at high levels rogues with a high bab could end up wearing plate with their full dex bonus, lol. Though, for all I know that might be level 40 or something XD

Just wondering, what do you think of that houserule that I mentioned in my last post, where creatures with class levels can get additional attacks on their primary natural weapon? Since it is based on the BAB from class levels, it doesn't affect any of the creatures in the monster manuals, but allows creature characters which rely on natural attacks to gain something.

An alternative would be the one that Hawken mentioned where instead of a bonus attack the penalty for secondary attacks is lessened. I've been thinking about it, and it really just eliminates the need for the greater/improved multiattack feat if you happen to take enough class levels. It still benefits creatures with a lot of secondary attacks the most though.
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Hmm, I have one other thing to ask about. I've heard of itteritive attack systems where at BAB 6 characters still get +6/+1, but at BAB 11 and BAB 16 instead of getting additional attacks at another -5 penalty their weapon's base damage gets multiplies. What do you think of those systems?

Though, I guess the problem is (like Wulf Ratbane said) that it doesn't help on hit effects like sneak attack, so it doesn't help rogues enough. Hmmm. Maybe special attack users should get an additional bonus or something?

The reason why I was thinking this might be a good system is because it makes somewhat low armor still count for something, since they might have a good chance of the 2nd attack missing. (unlike Wulf Ratbane's system, where everyting is at the full BAB). plus, it makes weapon damage actually mean something at higher levels (1d8 doesn't mean much at level 20, but if it is multiplied to 2d8 or 3d8 it could mean a lot).

Hmmmm....maybe the 2nd attack from BAB could count as a secondary attack like natural weapons. Then people could take multiattack feats to eliminate the -5 penalty.

 

[Hawken]

How's it going, Sylrae? The 3.5 Rev forum seems to be pretty dead, so its good chatting you up out here.

I get that the SW Saga rules are designed for everybody to normally have 1 attack, but it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to change it for D&D either. The game revolves around 1 attack per character doing a baseline of d6 damage plus modifiers. To compensate for wizards and clerics getting "nukes", rogues get sneak attack and fighters get multiple attacks. Yes, rogues and clerics can get multiple attacks, but if a cleric is going melee, he's not making the most of his spells and if a rogue does, his extra attack is offset by his BAB being lower than the fighter.

Everything seems pretty fair until you get near epic levels where the fighter can make 4 primary attacks, 4 off hand attacks (with perfect two weapon fighting), get an extra attack from a Haste/Speed effect, and maybe an extra attack from a Frenzy, and then Dervish lets you double all of that--so, 18-20 attacks in a round is pretty damn silly.

But at the same time, if you limit extra attacks to one extra at +6 BAB, you leave little to no incentive to continue advancing in the fighting classes unless you are just feat hungry. I say cap the number of attacks at 4--period. No more than that regardless of whatever feat, class ability, spell or whatever is in effect. So, a fighter can get 4 attacks at BAB 16, a rogue won't get up to BAB 16, but with two weapon fighting, he could get two primary and two off hand attacks. And I would treat unarmed attacks in the same manner as armed attacks.

For natural weapon attacks, sure, their BAB can go up, but no extra attacks. Instead, damage increases. A 5hd brown bear gets two claw attacks, and a 20hd dire bear gets 2 claw attacks. The difference lies in the damage. The brown bear may get 1d6 for his claw attacks, but the dire bear could get 4d6 (increasing the number of damage die by 1 per extra attack they would have received--at 6th, 11th and 16th). This may seem unfair when you consider that monsters may also get a bite, tail slap or whatever else, and even a Rake attack (2 rear claws). So, yeah, against a single person the damage can be devastating, but PCs rarely fight monsters solo. The monster has some good damage, but a limited number of attacks, and is typically fighting multiple opponents, each as individually tough as the monster itself.

And for those with iterative attacks, they could increase damage as well. Lets say a fighter gets 4 attacks, but doesn't want to make four attacks that may or may not hit, he wants one good attack. So, he adds 1d6 damage per extra attack he would have made! You could change this to 1 extra die of the weapons damage or whatever.

Or you could limit it to a maximum of 2 attacks per round instead of 4. And limit natural attacks to the same number. Personally, I think its silly that in the span of 5-6 seconds that a dragon is fast and coordinated enough for the claw/claw/bite routine, plus wing buffet plus tail slap. If everyone was limited to 2 attacks per round, I think that would solve the problem quite nicely. Then you could tweak either damage or even AC to balance out the reduced number of attacks.

 

[Matrixryu]

Yay, you came back Hawken Yea, this place does seem kinda dead...unfortionately I bet most 3.5 forums are like this right now.

I get that the SW Saga rules are designed for everybody to normally have 1 attack, but it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to change it for D&D either. The game revolves around 1 attack per character doing a baseline of d6 damage plus modifiers. To compensate for wizards and clerics getting "nukes", rogues get sneak attack and fighters get multiple attacks. Yes, rogues and clerics can get multiple attacks, but if a cleric is going melee, he's not making the most of his spells and if a rogue does, his extra attack is offset by his BAB being lower than the fighter.

Yea, and honestly I think I like the saga edition version better. It is just that it might be hard to get those rules working while making all the classes still do as much damage as they were supposed to, hmm.

I guess I'm trying to do things the hard way: getting the game's attacks to work in a simple and logical manner while not having to worry about changing the difficulty of the game, haha.

Everything seems pretty fair until you get near epic levels where the fighter can make 4 primary attacks, 4 off hand attacks (with perfect two weapon fighting), get an extra attack from a Haste/Speed effect, and maybe an extra attack from a Frenzy, and then Dervish lets you double all of that--so, 18-20 attacks in a round is pretty damn silly.

But at the same time, if you limit extra attacks to one extra at +6 BAB, you leave little to no incentive to continue advancing in the fighting classes unless you are just feat hungry. I say cap the number of attacks at 4--period. No more than that regardless of whatever feat, class ability, spell or whatever is in effect. So, a fighter can get 4 attacks at BAB 16, a rogue won't get up to BAB 16, but with two weapon fighting, he could get two primary and two off hand attacks. And I would treat unarmed attacks in the same manner as armed attacks.

Wow, 18-20 attacks in a round is nuts, I would never allow a player to do that XD

The thing is, isn't it true that the attacks you get at BAB +11 and +16 are pretty much worthless except for killing very weak creatures and hoping that you get a random 20 when rolling them against strong ones? The first bonus attack is probably the most important one, I wouldn't miss not having the final one honestly

Limiting a character to 4 attacks a round kinda makes sense, though I worry that it would make a lot of feats suddenly become worthless and
limits a character's options a bit.

A few solutions I was looking at were giving characters an extra attack at BAB 6, then give them something they would still want at BAB 11 and 16. Like one version was giving the equivalent of flurry of blows at BAB 6, and 11 and 16 decrease the penalties for using it.

Another idea was giving the normal extra attack at -5 at BAB 6, and then giving a bonus to damage to the first attack at 11 and the second at 16. Unfortunately, this version has scaling problems with sneak attack if you give just flat bonuses (such as doubling base weapon damage). I did some calcuations and found that a flat 50% bonus to damage for a 0/-5 attack round does almost the exact same damage as a 0/-5/-10/-15 attack routine, even with sneak attacks, but I'm not sure that I want to have to calculate 50% damage done, lol.

The -2/-2 , -1/-1, then 0/0 at BAB 16 routine was much simpler. I would just apply those penalties to any other attacks the character made as well (such as from 2 weapon fighting) to encourage them to aim for BAB 16, lol.

For natural weapon attacks, sure, their BAB can go up, but no extra attacks. Instead, damage increases. A 5hd brown bear gets two claw attacks, and a 20hd dire bear gets 2 claw attacks. The difference lies in the damage. The brown bear may get 1d6 for his claw attacks, but the dire bear could get 4d6 (increasing the number of damage die by 1 per extra attack they would have received--at 6th, 11th and 16th). This may seem unfair when you consider that monsters may also get a bite, tail slap or whatever else, and even a Rake attack (2 rear claws). So, yeah, against a single person the damage can be devastating, but PCs rarely fight monsters solo. The monster has some good damage, but a limited number of attacks, and is typically fighting multiple opponents, each as individually tough as the monster itself.

And for those with iterative attacks, they could increase damage as well. Lets say a fighter gets 4 attacks, but doesn't want to make four attacks that may or may not hit, he wants one good attack. So, he adds 1d6 damage per extra attack he would have made! You could change this to 1 extra die of the weapons damage or whatever.

Yea, increasing damage for monsters is definately something I'm trying to look into. I think I would have the damage increase be only based on BAB from character levels though, that way I can leave all the monsters in the monster manual alone, haha. Even when you increase their hit dice in the MM, their size usually increases and automatically increases their damage.

Hmmm, maybe.....maybe with character levels, the damage could go up at a rate which depends on how many natural attacks the creature has? That would fix it. Say, it's BAB from char levels has to go up by +2 for every natural attack the creature has or something?

Of course, that would have to be an alternative to itteritive attacks, lol. Another possiblity is instead of giving creatures flat bonuses, you can give them an improved natural attack or simmilar bonus feat for their natural attacks every time that they would normally gain itteritive attacks.

Or you could limit it to a maximum of 2 attacks per round instead of 4. And limit natural attacks to the same number. Personally, I think its silly that in the span of 5-6 seconds that a dragon is fast and coordinated enough for the claw/claw/bite routine, plus wing buffet plus tail slap. If everyone was limited to 2 attacks per round, I think that would solve the problem quite nicely. Then you could tweak either damage or even AC to balance out the reduced number of attacks.

Lol, that's another thing that always bothered me: that creatures with natural attacks got to use them freely with no limits. Technically speaking, they should be alternating between each kind of attack.

Simply limiting their attacks is possible, but I would leave this alone unless there was some kind of simple template I could apply to all creatures to fix the problem. Hmmm.




Blah, a lot of good ideas being throw around, but no perfect solution in sight since the best thing would be a way to change attacks without having to rebalance the entire game. I wish wizards had thought out all this attack stuff. They should have realized it would get rediculous XD.

Well, maybe I'm trying to get things too perfect. I'll have to come up with theories based on the stuff you just said Hawken. Doing something like directly placing a limit on the number of attacks sure would be game changing though, lol XD

 

[Hawken]

Didn't mean to ignore you, Matrix. Syl and I have been arguing the longest, so its still kind of refreshing that we're seeing eye-to-eye on a lot of stuff lately.

Unfortunately, you're not going to be able to rewire the game without difficulty. Combat is the point that the rules were based on, and if something so pervasive as BAB and such is broken, its not so much like an organ transplant as trying to transplant an entire nervous system! And since that's an impossibility, the next best thing is to go Frankenstein and build your own.

The attacks at +11 and +16 are not useless by a longshot. At the higher levels, its not unreasonable for a fighter type to have +10 or so in modifiers to his BAB, so those extra attacks at +6/+1 are suddenly +16/+11, which is pretty fair odds at hitting an AC 25 enemy.

How exactly do you mean that limiting attacks to 4/round reduces options and makes feats worthless. Which feats, for example, are you thinking of?

Your idea about the extra stuff has potential, but I think as you're writing it, you're forgetting about the other BAB progressions. Rogue BAB is going to get +6 BAB at 8th level, +11BAB at 15th and doesn't get +16 at all. Wizard BAB is going to get +6 BAB at 12th level. While your thoughts about the extras at +11 and +16 BAB are good, they are not level, meaning some classes don't get them until much later and a couple of classes, not at all. Core combat mechanics should be able to apply to all classes.

The only problem with the flat 50% extra damage is that you are concentrating that damage on a single target instead of multiple targets or missing. This will reduce the life expectancy of enemies by 2-3 rounds with almost no enemies lasting more than 5 rounds. And they die even faster when you consider critical hits with the multiplier changing that 50% damage into 100% or 150% more damage (not counting the normal critical damage for the weapon), or even 200% more damage if you get a X4 multiplier.

And considering the incredible difficulty in hit point recovery and the way damage increases far faster than hit points can be acquired and you're reducing just about every battle to 3 rounds tops unless you just jack up bad guy hit points the way 4E does. Actually, throw in sneak attack and whatever other bonus damage, and combat is pretty much done in 1-2 rounds.

Your idea about flurry is not bad, but it breaks the rule if you're limiting attacks to 4 or 2 per round. Instead of extra attacks, treat a flurry as an area attack--everyone adjacent takes Str mod damage. An improved flurry could do base weapon damage + Str, while a greater flurry could do normal damage. Yes, its a progression that basically leads to Whirlwind Attack, but since its exclusively a Monk thing it seems like a fair thing to let monks get a whirlwind attack at 11th when anyone else gets it at 6th or so.

If you're giving monsters character levels, you're not really 'leaving them alone', are you? Try this: Treat the monsters in the book as they are. To make them more powerful, give them +1 AC/BAB/Saves per 2 extra HD and an extra 1d4 damage every 3 or 4 extra hd. Just because you increase a monster's HD doesn't mean you have to increase their size. That doesn't even really make sense. That means a 10HD goblin could be ogre sized. Why? What causes the size change? How does suddenly becoming a tougher opponent equal mutant growing powers? That's another aspect of the MM that's kind of broken. Larger things tend to be tougher, things don't get larger just because they get tougher. See the difference?

If you want a goblin with 5 extra HD, give it to him. That doesn't mean you got to screw with the size change.

Try it that way. You don't need to give out class levels either. I'm kind of old school in that I just never accepted the idea of giving classes to 'monsters'. Yeah, taking a Troll straight out of the MM and giving him 5 levels of fighter would make him a beast. But why bother. If you want him tougher, just give him extra HD in increments of 2, and each time you do that, give him a +1 to AC/BAB/Saves and skills. If you want him to have an extra feat every 2 levels, give it to him. That's as simple as you can make it.

Another thing is monsters having feats. Do you really think a wolf has weapon focus? If a human takes 3 levels to learn a new feat, why would a wolf, an animal who has no higher brain functions beyond satisfying his urges for food, sex and shelter be able to learn a feat? Just give the wolf a +1 bonus to his bite attack. Along those lines, it wouldn't have Track as a feat either, that's more of a special quality or ability of the wolf--he always knows how to do it, it wasn't ever taught to him.

 

[Matrixryu]

Oh, don't worry about it, I noticed that most of your discussions were with Syl. Ack, unfortionately I don't have time to type up as much for this reply as I should XD You're making some good points though.

Unfortunately, you're not going to be able to rewire the game without difficulty. Combat is the point that the rules were based on, and if something so pervasive as BAB and such is broken, its not so much like an organ transplant as trying to transplant an entire nervous system! And since that's an impossibility, the next best thing is to go Frankenstein and build your own.

Yea, and you're exactly right XD I just don't want to have to apply my changes to do many things at once.

How exactly do you mean that limiting attacks to 4/round reduces options and makes feats worthless. Which feats, for example, are you thinking of?

Oh, I was thinking about the two-weapon fighting feats and the like. People might think that there's no point in two weapon fighting if all it would mean is their -15 attack would get replaced by a -0 (and all attacks also get a -2 on top of that). Well, maybe the first two weapon fighting feat would be worth it, but the others certainly wouldn't. Though, I guess that's the entire point if you're trying to limit characters to 4 attacks per round anyway XD

Your idea about the extra stuff has potential, but I think as you're writing it, you're forgetting about the other BAB progressions. Rogue BAB is going to get +6 BAB at 8th level, +11BAB at 15th and doesn't get +16 at all. Wizard BAB is going to get +6 BAB at 12th level. While your thoughts about the extras at +11 and +16 BAB are good, they are not level, meaning some classes don't get them until much later and a couple of classes, not at all. Core combat mechanics should be able to apply to all classes.

True, but isn't this the same as the game currently is? Wizards and Rogues don't always get their 4th attack from bab +16. The only difference is that instead of those, their missing out on bonus damage on full attacks instead. I'm just switching out one BAB related bonus with another. So, doesn't that mean the core combat mechanics are applying to all classes just as much as they were before?

The only problem with the flat 50% extra damage is that you are concentrating that damage on a single target instead of multiple targets or missing. This will reduce the life expectancy of enemies by 2-3 rounds with almost no enemies lasting more than 5 rounds. And they die even faster when you consider critical hits with the multiplier changing that 50% damage into 100% or 150% more damage (not counting the normal critical damage for the weapon), or even 200% more damage if you get a X4 multiplier.

Actually, believe it or not, I did some number crunching and it seems like the 50% damage idea causes players to do roughly the same amount of single target damage that they did before since they're getting the 50% boost instead of their 3rd and 4th attacks. Plus, it would only apply to their two main attacks, not all attacks(such as offhand attacks, unless I made it so that things like perfect multiweapon fighting applied those bonuses to offhand as well). Though, I didn't test it too much with crits, maybe I should look into those too.

If you're giving monsters character levels, you're not really 'leaving them alone', are you? Try this: Treat the monsters in the book as they are. To make them more powerful, give them +1 AC/BAB/Saves per 2 extra HD and an extra 1d4 damage every 3 or 4 extra hd. Just because you increase a monster's HD doesn't mean you have to increase their size. That doesn't even really make sense. That means a 10HD goblin could be ogre sized. Why? What causes the size change? How does suddenly becoming a tougher opponent equal mutant growing powers? That's another aspect of the MM that's kind of broken. Larger things tend to be tougher, things don't get larger just because they get tougher. See the difference?

If you want a goblin with 5 extra HD, give it to him. That doesn't mean you got to screw with the size change.

Try it that way. You don't need to give out class levels either. I'm kind of old school in that I just never accepted the idea of giving classes to 'monsters'. Yeah, taking a Troll straight out of the MM and giving him 5 levels of fighter would make him a beast. But why bother. If you want him tougher, just give him extra HD in increments of 2, and each time you do that, give him a +1 to AC/BAB/Saves and skills. If you want him to have an extra feat every 2 levels, give it to him. That's as simple as you can make it.

Another thing is monsters having feats. Do you really think a wolf has weapon focus? If a human takes 3 levels to learn a new feat, why would a wolf, an animal who has no higher brain functions beyond satisfying his urges for food, sex and shelter be able to learn a feat? Just give the wolf a +1 bonus to his bite attack. Along those lines, it wouldn't have Track as a feat either, that's more of a special quality or ability of the wolf--he always knows how to do it, it wasn't ever taught to him.

Oh, I don't normally hand out class levels to monsters. I just worry about when you have something like player who chooses a monster race. For example, what classes are characters with dragons going to choose? Monk for unarmed attacks, or maybe fighter for the feats. Nothing else really benefits their natural attacks. I was thinking giving some sort of bonus to natural attacks for players using those races would even things out.

That's just one example, I don't really consider dragons to be too playable as characters. But I did play an rpg where I had an intellegent bear like character and I had to resort to unarmed attacks to get stronger, and it was silly because the unarmed attacks got stronger than my claw and bite attacks. There should be a way to just improve natural attacks directly without hacking the monk class so that it improves claw attacks or taking tons of 'improved natural attack' feats.

Yea, it might be possible to just increase natural attacks as the monster's hit dice increase, and it would probably work for a plain old monster, but isn't that interesting for a player who's running it.

Though, to answer your question about HD and monster sizes, I always considered HD to be a sign of a monster's natural/unnatural growth in strength rather than class levels, so they would naturally get larger as their hit dice increase. If it is impossible for a monster to 'grow' any larger, that's when class levels come in

 

[Hawken]

Oh, I was thinking about the two-weapon fighting feats and the like. People might think that there's no point in two weapon fighting if all it would mean is their -15 attack would get replaced by a -0 (and all attacks also get a -2 on top of that). Well, maybe the first two weapon fighting feat would be worth it, but the others certainly wouldn't. Though, I guess that's the entire point if you're trying to limit characters to 4 attacks per round anyway XD

I think 2 attacks per round tops would be simple enough. But that doesn't mean it has to ruin two weapons fighting. One attack normally, then with TWF, you get an offhand attack at -4 (-2 if Light weapon), or you can get the bonus for Fighting Defensively or using Total Defense that 5 ranks in Tumble provides. Upgrade to Improved TWF, and you get either the offhand attack (now with full Str mod to damage) or you deflect one melee attack automatically (as per Deflect Arrows, but melee attacks only). Greater TWF means you can make an offhand attack AND get a shield bonus to AC equal to 1/2 Str mod. Perfect TWF means no penalty to attack roll and the shield bonus increases to full Str mod.

How's that for a solution? Its just me but I see no reason for TWF and two weapon defense to be separate feats.

True, but isn't this the same as the game currently is? Wizards and Rogues don't always get their 4th attack from bab +16. The only difference is that instead of those, their missing out on bonus damage on full attacks instead. I'm just switching out one BAB related bonus with another. So, doesn't that mean the core combat mechanics are applying to all classes just as much as they were before?

You're probably right. I was going somewhere with that train of thought, but I just can't recall it right now.

Actually, believe it or not, I did some number crunching and it seems like the 50% damage idea causes players to do roughly the same amount of single target damage that they did before since they're getting the 50% boost instead of their 3rd and 4th attacks. Plus, it would only apply to their two main attacks, not all attacks(such as offhand attacks, unless I made it so that things like perfect multiweapon fighting applied those bonuses to offhand as well). Though, I didn't test it too much with crits, maybe I should look into those too.

Numbers don't lie. But see what you can figure with crits factored into your formulas. I've played with enough crit focused guys that frequent crits can really bring fights to a quick, anti-climatic end.

I just worry about when you have something like player who chooses a monster race.

As the DM, you have the right to say what monsters are playable. If you don't think a troll or dragon is appropriate, don't allow it. Really though, who is going to teach a dragon how to be a monk? Even if they shapechange into a humanoid, they are learning kung fu as a human, that doesn't translate well into other forms and would be next to useless in their dragon form. That's really a flawed concept, that would be like you watching a wolverine fight a bear to try and pick up a level of barbarian so you could rage. I know you're just tossing off examples, but this is just the non-fluff/crunch stuff that comes to mind on these topics.

There should be a way to just improve natural attacks directly without hacking the monk class so that it improves claw attacks or taking tons of 'improved natural attack' feats.

I hear ya. The Improved Natural Attack feat is really about as pathetic as Toughness and Endurance. Best thing to do is my suggestion, limit attacks to 4, use the Double Attack/Triple Attack feats and/or TWF. Instead of a second attack, have double attack inflict double (base) damage when natural attacks are used. This would also eliminate the discrepancy between natural and unarmed attacks. Allow TWF with natural attacks; the two claw attacks become the main hand attacks and a third claw attack could be made as an off-hand attack, and then throw in a bite as a secondary attack. That's 4 attacks per round too.

Though, to answer your question about HD and monster sizes, I always considered HD to be a sign of a monster's natural/unnatural growth in strength rather than class levels, so they would naturally get larger as their hit dice increase. If it is impossible for a monster to 'grow' any larger, that's when class levels come in

The only problem with that is that creature's can't really increase their size when they become stronger. Look at gorillas, they are roughly human sized, yet they are somewhere around 10 times as strong as a really strong human. Even if gorillas could hit the gym and get even stronger, they wouldn't bulk up really any more than they are now.

Real world example for fantasy world premise, I know. But the same logic should apply. Anything less would indicate that the animal is just not fully developed yet, and thus not the norm for that MM entry. Dragons are the only creature in the MM that are listed with growth stages as they mature, and I think that's done largely just to allow for the aircraft carrier sized monsters on all the fantasy artwork. The amount of food needed for dragons to grow that size would wipe out a continents animal food supply within a year or two at the most!

Plus with the size change comes all the other modifiers and adjustments that you have to look up like AC, Str, Dex, Natural Armor, etc. It becomes more complicated. Just leave it at improving monsters in 2hd increments that give a +1 bonus to everything else per increment. Sprinkle on a few or two to mix things up and you're good to go.

You know, I know we got the 3.5 forum we can rattle stuff back and forth on, but it would be cool to chat with you, Syl and some of the others like on an IM sometimes--you know, have a real conversation or something.

 

[Matrixryu]

Numbers don't lie. But see what you can figure with crits factored into your formulas. I've played with enough crit focused guys that frequent crits can really bring fights to a quick, anti-climatic end.

Yea, I'm going to have to get that tested out some time when I'm more awake. Just so you know, I used D&D/DDO/NWN Melee Damage Tool to do the calculations. I found a way to cheat with it and calculate the attacks that I wanted by setting setting the BAB to 0 and using the enhancement bonuses to adjust the accuracy of the two attacks (main hand was attack 1, offhand was attack 2). I just used the left side as the 'standard DnD iterative attacks' and used the left to compare it to various alternative attack modes.

I found that using flurry for 0/0 and using 0/-5 with 50% boosts both did just a little more damage (from 0 to 25% more at the very peak) than the standard 0/-5/-10/-15. The only problem is that having fewer attacks means you don't do as well against large numbers of enemies, but maybe that'll make whirlwind attack stink less.

It would be good if a 2nd person tried it out though, maybe I miscalcuated.

As the DM, you have the right to say what monsters are playable. If you don't think a troll or dragon is appropriate, don't allow it. Really though, who is going to teach a dragon how to be a monk? Even if they shapechange into a humanoid, they are learning kung fu as a human, that doesn't translate well into other forms and would be next to useless in their dragon form. That's really a flawed concept, that would be like you watching a wolverine fight a bear to try and pick up a level of barbarian so you could rage. I know you're just tossing off examples, but this is just the non-fluff/crunch stuff that comes to mind on these topics.

Yea, I know exactly what you mean. I haven't let any of that come up in my game yet, but this is why I'm trying to come up with alternatives before it actually happens XD I have actually been thinking of making a 'paragon creature' class which boosts a creature's natural attacks and abilities. It is based on the paragon template in theory, but less OP, lol.

I hear ya. The Improved Natural Attack feat is really about as pathetic as Toughness and Endurance. Best thing to do is my suggestion, limit attacks to 4, use the Double Attack/Triple Attack feats and/or TWF. Instead of a second attack, have double attack inflict double (base) damage when natural attacks are used. This would also eliminate the discrepancy between natural and unarmed attacks. Allow TWF with natural attacks; the two claw attacks become the main hand attacks and a third claw attack could be made as an off-hand attack, and then throw in a bite as a secondary attack. That's 4 attacks per round too.

Hmmmm, something like what you just mentioned with the Double and Tripple attack feats could work, I'll have to think on that. I don't think I would make TWF work with natural attacks though because that could get confusing with some creatures.

The only problem with that is that creature's can't really increase their size when they become stronger. Look at gorillas, they are roughly human sized, yet they are somewhere around 10 times as strong as a really strong human. Even if gorillas could hit the gym and get even stronger, they wouldn't bulk up really any more than they are now.

Real world example for fantasy world premise, I know. But the same logic should apply. Anything less would indicate that the animal is just not fully developed yet, and thus not the norm for that MM entry. Dragons are the only creature in the MM that are listed with growth stages as they mature, and I think that's done largely just to allow for the aircraft carrier sized monsters on all the fantasy artwork. The amount of food needed for dragons to grow that size would wipe out a continents animal food supply within a year or two at the most!

Plus with the size change comes all the other modifiers and adjustments that you have to look up like AC, Str, Dex, Natural Armor, etc. It becomes more complicated. Just leave it at improving monsters in 2hd increments that give a +1 bonus to everything else per increment. Sprinkle on a few or two to mix things up and you're good to go.

Yea, you're party right. I just checked in DND and natural animals don't get size growth with hit dice increases. However, there are a few non dragon types that do, dire animals, magical beasts, and abberations seem to grow as their HD increase. SRDire Bear - D&D Wiki SRD:Aboleth - D&D Wiki SRD:Owlbear - D&D Wiki

But yea, those aren't real world creatures XD But that's where I got the idea that HD increases size.

I think I'm going to just try and make that paragon class that I mentioned earlier. I want a standardized way that I can increase any creature's power because you're right about things getting too complicated with HD increases. It'll be hard to make it be balanced for all creatures, but it'll be worth a try. I think I'll make it focused on things that have a bite and 2 claw attacks.

You know, I know we got the 3.5 forum we can rattle stuff back and forth on, but it would be cool to chat with you, Syl and some of the others like on an IM sometimes--you know, have a real conversation or something.

Hah, that would probably be a good idea, though honestly I do a lot of my posting either late at night or when I'm at work so I don't know if you would ever see me XD What chat system are you talking about using?

 

[Hawken]

I had a big response to this but it got lost last week when everything slowed down. I can't paste it because this is the first time back on this site since last Friday.

I don't think I would make TWF work with natural attacks though because that could get confusing with some creatures.

How? Plenty of animals "use" TWF; cats, bears, scorpions, those are just natural creatures, but if they can, then plenty of the unnatural monsters could too. I'd probably limit attacks to either Double/Triple Attack OR TWF, but not both.

I think I'm going to just try and make that paragon class that I mentioned earlier. I want a standardized way that I can increase any creature's power because you're right about things getting too complicated with HD increases. It'll be hard to make it be balanced for all creatures, but it'll be worth a try. I think I'll make it focused on things that have a bite and 2 claw attacks.

That's doing the same thing you're trying to stop doing; giving class levels to monsters. Try playing with the numbers for my idea (per +2HD over the MM entry, you get +1 to BAB, Saves, Skills, and maybe an extra feat and +1d4 or d6 damage). That keeps things even and using a simple formula.

Hah, that would probably be a good idea, though honestly I do a lot of my posting either late at night or when I'm at work so I don't know if you would ever see me XD What chat system are you talking about using?

The times I can post are pretty random too. I have Yahoo installed as my IM right now, but I can download just about any of the others out there. And it would be a heck of a lot better than this site which is so slow it makes turtles seem like jackrabbits.