I tried the 4 player standard, what a mess...

[Fishbone]

Meleeing with an ogre with a two weapon fighting ranger? Are you out of your mind?
Color Spray and Sleep followed by coup de grace, then use Grease to disarm it of the greatclub if it passes the will saves. You stay as far away as possible. 2d8+7 damage is a one hit kill.
The system isn't broken, Ogres are epitome of glass cannons.
And don't let it turn you off Goodman Games, they make very fine products.

 

[Old Gumphrey]

An ogre - which as everyone mentions is mis-labelled in terms of CR - also hits hard enough that most 1st level character go down in 1-2 hits. Throw in a critical and it's all over.

That's very true. I just lost an ogre to one swing of a level 1 dwarf fighter's heavy pick on Saturday, I believe it was 30 damage. Yes, that is 2 points shy of maximum possible damage on a x4 crit with 14 str.

 

[molonel]

One single combat at level 1 doth not make any important statements about the CR system as a whole. It kinda sounds like a few rules were ignored, 3.0 CR was used where 3.5 CR should have been observed, and a 1st level ranger dual-wielding anything meant you had 3 1st level PCs against a CR 3 ogre.

Color me unimpressed on the reasoning which leaps from this situation to, "The CR system is broken!"