Oots 439

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

It's funnier to see him go nuts with tiny little daggers.

 

[AnonymousOne]

Huh. I always thought they were piercing-only, just like a longsword is (illogically) slashing-only. Well, I don't particularly mind being wrong, seeing as I was playing devil's advocate. Personally, I'd let the player do some beheading if they really wanted to.

Dagger = Piercing & Slashing
Punching Dagger = Piercing

 

[Deuce Traveler]

For a moment, it almost seemed to me like a stick-figure version of "Samarai Jack".

 

[Victim]

A 1st level hobgoblin has +2 to grapple. If 8 hobgoblins tried to grapple Belkar at the same time, one would roll, and 7 others would use the "aid another" action. They need to roll a 10 on the grapple check to grant the +2 bonus, for which they have a 65% chance; in other words, the average bonus they'd provide is +9 (+2 x 7 x 0.65), for a total grapple modifier of +11.

On the other hand, Belkar is small (-4), but he has something like 11 levels of ranger (+11) and at least one level of barbarian (+1), and he was shown in previous comics to be fairly strong for a halfling (so, at least a Str 10... if not more). When he rages, he gets another +2 from Str increase, for a total of +10. They'd be evenly matched, but Belkar uses light weapons, so he'd be able to stab hobgoblins while grappled, whereasthey wouldn't be able to do much of anything to him (he has a lot of hp).

It's worse than that. Belkar can take an AoO on one prospective grappler each round. Since we're dealing with low HD warriors and a high level Belkar, the situation is in 1 shot, 1 kill territory. In order to grapple Belkar, they basically need to have a sacrifical hobo use up his AoO (assuming he doesn't have Combat Reflexes, but that doesn't seem likely).

Second, the hobgoblin needs to make a touch attack to initiative the grapple, which isn't all that great.

Belkar probably also has far higher than 10 STR. That'd mean he'd only have a 12 as a human. Since Belkar is portrayed as actually doing damage, even to dangerous monsters, he most likely has a good STR. He's a mental wasteland, so of course his physicals are good.

Finally, Aid Another works on attack rolls. Grapple checks aren't attack rolls.

So in summary, attempting to grapple Belkar means giving him a free attack (another .95 kills per round or so), probably doesn't work (touch attack, plus only ~50/50 shot on the grapple - and Belkar is small), and even if it does work, only does ~1d3+1 non lethal damage. If aiding on grapple checks is even possible - both in general, and from outside the grapple. Then Belkar stabs the guy holding him, ends the grapple, and resumes killing normally. Just by swinging and hoping for natural 20s, the hobgoblins will be more effective.

Now tripping might be the way to go, since the swing in AC might shift things from the hobs needing 20s. Even needing a 19 basically means all the other hobs do double damage. Since Tripping is a Stat+Size check, higher level characters only have a minor advantage, and Belkar is smaller. But again, without special weapons, AoO provoking.

 

[seans23]

I use Andargor's XP chart, so a 12th level character would get 75 xp per CR1, or 38 xp per cr 1/2.

All he has to do is kill 320 of 'em to get Uncanny Dodge.

 

[darious777]

I want a black shirt with the last frame on it.

I think it would have to be the full strip to really get the impact.

This one was brilliant. Rich has managed to convey that battlefield feeling of adrenalin and anger, of having to grab the inner beast in a no-time-for-thought-pure-animal-instinct*, no second chance, no save spot,no best two-out of three... simply if you aren't good enough right now, you die.

And Rich did it with stick figures.

And, of course, then there is that primal moment when the action stops but the adrenalin is still pumping, when you have faced the ultimate challenge and all those who came before you are vanquished, and you bellow forth to the very heavens of your victory... the fact that Belkar happens to shout _that_ is where the real punchline is for me.



*Admittedly, not much of a stretch for Belkar.

 

[Nyeshet]

No, there's no rules for that. It doesn't mean you must not give out XP in such a situation, it's that the rules don't attempt to say how much XP you should give out (and also say that in many such situations, XP shouldn't be handed out).

The rules don't cover it, so the DM can assign however many XP they want (which could be zero).

So it is impossible to determine the CR of an encounter involving, say, 8 Half-elf Fighters (half 2nd level, half 3rd level), 1 Human Wizard (8th level), and a Wight Fighter 4 (CR 7)? Granted, you would use an Encounter Level calculator, but if the Encounter level has a given CR that could result in an xp award then xp should be granted, I think.

Using an online encounter calculator, a 12th level PC - on his own - has a Party level of 8 (equivalent to a party of four 8th level PCs). Also according to the calculator, 100 1/2 CR creatures (hobgoblins) has an encounter level of 11 (equivalent to one CR 11). An encounter of 4 8th level PCs against 1 CR 11 creature is considered "Very Difficult" and has a reward of 1800 xp and treasure equivalent to 7500 gp. I would guess that the 'treasure' is little more than about a hundred sets of non magical armor and weaponry - some in poor condition. That works out about right, actually: 150gp chain shirt + 15 gp longsword * 100 sets = 16500, then divide by 2 for a resale value of 8, 250gp - quite close to the 7500 gp suggested. Presume some of the armor to be leather and the price falls even close to the suggested value.


Or at least that is how I would likely work it out. :\

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Link to this calculator?

 

[Jdvn1]

Of course, V probably could've handled all of those hobgoblins with one spell.

 

[Sammael]

Encounter calculator: http://www.d20srd.org/encounterCalculator.htm