Round 3
Gildrim and Richard strike hard, sinking their blades into the hydra's flanks and opening large wounds that would fell a smaller beast in its tracks, then flopping underwater on their bellies.
Weel and Karl loose arrows at the huge beast, but between the water and the fighting, they do not manage to hurt the creature.
The large wounds opened by the two warriors begin to close with supernatural speed, and the hydra visibly recovers its strength! Its heads snake around, looking for Richard and Gildrim, but cannot find them. Instead, it lumbers forward toward the two archers on shore, mouths gnashing and snarling. In doing so, it passes right over Richard's body, missing him by inches. Gildrim is not so lucky, and a stump-like leg catches him in the back. The water absorbs most of the force of the blow, but there is still a bruise, and the hydra's bulk easily shoves the dwarf aside.
[sblock=ooc]Gildrim hits for 16, and flops prone underwater.
Weel misses. Soft cover doesn't matter, because the hydra is in deep bog, which provides it cover.
Richard hits. Your damage numbers don't add up. Using the bastard sword 2-handed, it should normally be +9 to hit for 1d10+3 damage. I assume you power attacked for 1, sacrificing the +1 to hit from bless for +2 to damage. Thus, +9 to hit, for 1d10+5 damage. But I don't see where the other +1 damage comes from. I'm going to go with 1d10+5, which comes out to 8 damage. In the future, can you please be explicit, if you're using power attack? Also, "then plops down below the surface" is unclear. Are you using a move action to duck down and get improved cover, as described in the rules for deep bog, or are you taking a free action to fall prone, going underwater completely and gaining total cover? Gildrim did the latter, so I'm going to assume you did too. Again, please be explicit about these things. It may make the difference between PCs living and dying here in a few rounds, and I'd rather not be guessing.
Karl's 17 misses, due to cover from the deep bog.
The hydra heals 15, leaving it 9 damage. Seeing neither Gildrim nor Richard, it double moves, going 2 squares NW. That enters both Gildrim and Richard's squares. What happens if you're hiding underwater, and an elephant runs over the area you're hiding in? Nothing good, that's for sure.
Here's how I'm gonna run this. The hydra moving into your space gets a slam attack. The attack bonus is as follows: +5 BAB, +3 str mod. -4 for untrained, since it doesn't have a slam attack listed on its sheet. -2 because it's huge. Another -2, and half damage, because it's attacking underwater; see
here. +2 because its targets, Richard and Gildrim, have effectively intentionally failed their swim checks to fall underwater, and are flailing. Also, Gildrim and Richard lose their dex bonuses to AC, and take a further -4 to AC for being prone. Finally, the hydra is effectively attacking blindly into total concealment, and takes a 50% miss chance. Bottom line, the hydra is at +2 to hit, with 50% miss chance. I make Gildrim's AC to be 15, and Richard's... 11? Is that right?
I'm gonna roll 2d6+4 for damage, and then halve that as described above. If it hits, of course. Damage is based on the slam attack of a huge animated object.
Results: Richard is missed, Gildrim is hit for 7/2=3 damage. Well, that was anticlimactic.
Finally, I'm not gonna leave Gildrim trapped underwater under the hydra. We'll say the thrashing leg hit him and pushed him aside.
Please note that Weel and Karl are now within bite range.
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[sblock=status and initiative]
Bless: +1 morale to attacks, lasts 20 rounds, cast in round 2.
- Richard 38/48, prone, underwater
- Karl 10/10
- Hydra 9 damage, 5 heads
- Gildrim 31/34, prone, underwater <== You're up
- Weel 18/18
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[sblock=map]
It's at
http://betahelix.net/pics/maps/SwampTrek/hydra02.png, if you can't see the embedded image above.
The greenish-blue squares are shallow bog. It's about 1 foot deep, and costs 2 squares of movement to enter.
The blue squares, such as T31, are deep bog. It has 4 feet of standing water, It costs medium or larger creatures 4 squares to enter such a square, and provides them cover. By spending a move action to duck down, that becomes improved cover. However, creatures with improved cover take a -10 penalty to attack creatures that aren't underwater.
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