Tony Vargas
Legend
Controllers - the monster type, that is - seem to be the worst. They have good all-around defenses, no glaring weakness like brutes (REF) or skirmishers (FORT) - even thier WILL tends to be good. Thier attacks hit reasonably well and inflict conditions. Conditions are frustrating.
However, level-apropriate n+/-1, controllers aren't that bad. It's overlevelled (n+4 or more) controllers that are a nightmare. You can't bring them down quickly or count on hitting with a significant encounter or daily at a critical moment, even if it is heavily 'buffed' by your allies, while they layer conditions on you every round, rarely missing. If it's one with an AE condition-inflicting attack, it becomes especially bad.
The examples that drove this home IMX were the final encounters from H1 & H2.
There are also some monsters that just seem a little off. I haven't encountered needlefang drake swarms yet, but I've noticed a similar issue with Ghouls. The problem is 'soldiers' who have 'striker like' (I guess 'skirmisher') damage boosts. Soldiers work like defenders, they have good hps, are tough, and somewhate 'sticky.' That's fine. But, give a soldier extra conditional damage, and he can use that durrability to deliver it over and over again - and kill you. Ghouls were the ones we experienced: soldier defenses, good hps, conditional high damage /that also stunned/, /and/ regular attacks that inflicted the condition that enabled the high damage. A couple of rounds of failed saves and a ghoul will litterally eat an apropriate-level PC alive - even a defender. On paper, needlefang drake swarms suffer from the same kind of bug.
OTOH, IMX, brutes - even brutes like Gnolls, evistros and gaurd drakes that have similarly inapropriate extra-damage powers (that should be given to skirmishers) - aren't /that/ bad. They don't hit that well, and you can hit them dependably, bringing them down by concentrating attacks, high hps or no, or inflicting conditions or forced movements to sieze control of the battle from them.
Lurkers and Skirmishers are potentially big problems, especially on paper, but it all depends on how viciously the DM plays them, whether and to what degree terrain/situation favors them, and how the PCs react and deal with them. So far, we haven't had a major problem with them, like have had with overlevelled controllers or uber-damage soldiers.
Artillery, like ranged PCs, can dish a lot of damage if you can't get cover/concealment from then, and can't reach them, yourself. Our party is fairly strong on range - wizard, lazer cleric, & archer-ranger, enhanced by a tactical warlord - so artillery hasn't be a major problem for us.
Finally, believe it or not, minions will kick your ass if you don't sweep them early in the encounter. They hit about as often as regular monsters, and there can be a lot of them, causing thier fixed damage to add up - and they can provide flanking or otherwise set up other monsters' conditional damage powers. Some of them even have such attacks themselves. We've had two encounters (albeit, over 6 levels) in which we failed the minion-sweeping early, and that made both of them significantly tougher.
However, level-apropriate n+/-1, controllers aren't that bad. It's overlevelled (n+4 or more) controllers that are a nightmare. You can't bring them down quickly or count on hitting with a significant encounter or daily at a critical moment, even if it is heavily 'buffed' by your allies, while they layer conditions on you every round, rarely missing. If it's one with an AE condition-inflicting attack, it becomes especially bad.
The examples that drove this home IMX were the final encounters from H1 & H2.
There are also some monsters that just seem a little off. I haven't encountered needlefang drake swarms yet, but I've noticed a similar issue with Ghouls. The problem is 'soldiers' who have 'striker like' (I guess 'skirmisher') damage boosts. Soldiers work like defenders, they have good hps, are tough, and somewhate 'sticky.' That's fine. But, give a soldier extra conditional damage, and he can use that durrability to deliver it over and over again - and kill you. Ghouls were the ones we experienced: soldier defenses, good hps, conditional high damage /that also stunned/, /and/ regular attacks that inflicted the condition that enabled the high damage. A couple of rounds of failed saves and a ghoul will litterally eat an apropriate-level PC alive - even a defender. On paper, needlefang drake swarms suffer from the same kind of bug.
OTOH, IMX, brutes - even brutes like Gnolls, evistros and gaurd drakes that have similarly inapropriate extra-damage powers (that should be given to skirmishers) - aren't /that/ bad. They don't hit that well, and you can hit them dependably, bringing them down by concentrating attacks, high hps or no, or inflicting conditions or forced movements to sieze control of the battle from them.
Lurkers and Skirmishers are potentially big problems, especially on paper, but it all depends on how viciously the DM plays them, whether and to what degree terrain/situation favors them, and how the PCs react and deal with them. So far, we haven't had a major problem with them, like have had with overlevelled controllers or uber-damage soldiers.
Artillery, like ranged PCs, can dish a lot of damage if you can't get cover/concealment from then, and can't reach them, yourself. Our party is fairly strong on range - wizard, lazer cleric, & archer-ranger, enhanced by a tactical warlord - so artillery hasn't be a major problem for us.
Finally, believe it or not, minions will kick your ass if you don't sweep them early in the encounter. They hit about as often as regular monsters, and there can be a lot of them, causing thier fixed damage to add up - and they can provide flanking or otherwise set up other monsters' conditional damage powers. Some of them even have such attacks themselves. We've had two encounters (albeit, over 6 levels) in which we failed the minion-sweeping early, and that made both of them significantly tougher.
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