Monster bonus damage on multiple attacks?

[FreeTheSlaves]

Just like Needlefang Drake Swarms at 2nd level, for a more well known example.

Shudder... I toned the needlefang down to d4 instead of d10 dmg, and they still tore the party apart.

 

[Stalker0]

Shudder... I toned the needlefang down to d4 instead of d10 dmg, and they still tore the party apart.

So far I think the needlefang still holds the 4e record for most broken monster!

 

[FireLance]

I think that this is decided by the context. If the wizard just leveled 5 minions with some well placed 'burning hands', then the halflings cry 'SPELLCASTER!' and focus fire until either the wizard is dead or the party striker drops them.

But that's how I run my games. If the monsters are smart enough to recognize a serious threat, and know to neutralize the threat, then focus fire with huge damage till the cows come home. Thats what you have defenders for - to defend the poor spellcaster getting creamed by sneaky halflings (and to provide cover, dropping said halfling's to-hit bonus by another 2).

And not to derail the thread or anything, but if that wizard is dropped, but jumps back up next round due to a 'healing word'? The next time he goes down he gets the coup de gras.

Setting aside the oft-levelled criticism that "everyone is a spellcaster" for now... this post got me thinking: should spellcasters still be priority targets in 4e?

Forked here to avoid derailing this thread.

 

[Saeviomagy]

One point to note is that they're less likely to kill you than drop you. Once you're prone you get a +2 bonus to AC from ranged attack, canceling out any combat advantage.

Except that you're also unconscious/helpless, so you get a penalty to your defenses that outweighs that.

 

[Turtlejay]

Except that you're also unconscious/helpless, so you get a penalty to your defenses that outweighs that.

What penalty? You grant CA (which you already were in the hypothetical scenario) and that is cancelled out by you being prone. Now the slingers are at a +2 to hit total.

Sure, the next round the slingers can take their standard action to try and coup de gras, but his point was that in the midst of this 3 attack burst, dropping an enemy worsens their already horrific attack bonus by another 10%. This makes it even more unlikely that they will outright kill someone with this power.

And since everyone seemed to miss what Draco said, I'll popint it out again. You can try to put 5 slingers against a party, but the meleers among them will make life tough for a few of those. More likely you will have 2 or 3 against the party.

Jay

 

[keterys]

Slingers are level 1. Their attack bonus is _not_ horrific for that level. Nor is it necessarily impressive, but they'll be at +8 to hit with sneak attack, +6 with Stone Rain. Many characters at level 1 will be hit by at least 50% of the attacks from that Stone Rain (for example, an 18 Int or Dex with Leather armor is 50%, most clerics are 55%, melee rangers 60%, bear shamans or sorcerers 65%, etc)

But, yes, don't hit someone whose unconscious with more sling bullets. Take down the rest of the party.

 

[Markn]

What penalty? You grant CA (which you already were in the hypothetical scenario) and that is cancelled out by you being prone. Now the slingers are at a +2 to hit total.

The penalty that is stated on pg 277 underneath unconscious.

UNCONSCIOUS
✦ You’re helpless.
✦ You take a –5 penalty to all defenses.
✦ You can’t take actions.
✦ You fall prone, if possible.
✦ You can’t flank an enemy.

 

[Turtlejay]

Ooooooh, that penalty. The one that I had been ignoring.

See, this is why trolling the Enworld boards pays off, I learn something useful every time!

Jay

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Meh, I can see the point that against a 1st level party they could be pretty deadly if you have the terrain set up exactly to their advantage and you use a number of them, and they get a bit lucky, and the party either doesn't or for some reason can't respond properly. There ARE some few monsters like this that in the right situation are particularly deadly.

Personally I'd just never use more than 1 or at most 2 of them in an encounter. I'd probably also set it up so there is some way the party can outmaneuver them if they use their heads a little bit. You could hack on their stat block and "fix" it as well, but then I'm just going to want to use more of the little buggers.

Its like needlefang drakes, we KNOW they're broken. Yeah, you can say newbie DMs may not know that, and its a valid point, but even so it gets dull when monster damage output is too predictable. Those wacky screwed up monsters leave a warm feeling in my heart when I drop them on the table

Overall I can see the problem from a numerical standpoint. I just don't find that things like this usually translate to such a problem in most real games.

 

[keterys]

Doesn't take perfect terrain. Doesn't take a number of them. Doesn't take luck. Doesn't take an unresponsive party. All those sure help though

Having played+run a few dozen LFR adventures and run a few wotc modules now, I can say that these kind of things come up in play. In both directions.

Some fights are way too easy, and some fights are crazy boring, and some fights are a total grind, on the merits of the creatures picked. And some fights start with you lose initiative to something, it goes, and one or more people are down or several people are bloodied, and, hey, time to avoid the TPK.

And this from products that are playtested, receive peer review, professional assistance and design, etc.

So yeah, I have to assume that newbie DMs face some real problems. Like the thread about cool encounters where one was marred because 4 people died due to a monster being cooler than it should have been for its level.