Thanks, guys, you've ruined Haste for the rest of us.

[Pax]

It's not that hard with just the core rules. It is easier to do more damage with melee types.

Fighter6/Barbarian5, Half-Orc

Strength 16 base, adjusted for Race 18, adjusted for level increases 20.

Weapon Focus (Greatsword), Weapon Specialization (Greatsword), Improved Critical (Greatsword)

+4 Belt of Giant Strength, +2 Keen Greatsword

BAB +10, Strength +7 (+9 when raging), +1 Focus, +2 Magic = +22/+17/+12 Attack Bonus when raging

Damage 2d6+17 when raging = average of 24
Critical on a 15-20 (25% of typical attacks) increases average to 30

Damage 2d6 +9 (strength x 1.5) +2 (magic) +2 (specialised). That's 2d6+13, not 2d6+17. You applied the 1.5x modifier for two-handed wield twice ... oops.

And, 25% of attacks will -threat-; you then have to confirm the critical hit itself (I admit, on the first swing of that series, it'd be nigh impossible not to, and still very difficult for the second, but on the third, we're down to roughly 50/50 odds). I'd guess, roughly, only 20% will -actually- manage a critical hit, overall.

Against a cloud giant (AC 21) average damage per round is ~70.5 points of damage per round

This does not even begin to consider the increased damage potential from feats like Power Attack, Cleave, or Great Cleave

That's still not 30 damage per hit for four to five hits per round, and is still barely over half the cited 120 to 150 per round which I originally objected to. And that's without factoring in yoru miscalculation WRT damage done (a 4-point-per-swing difference, before criticals).

Also power attack cuts down on how many hits you score, and therefor, how many threats you convert to actual criticals.

At 2d6+13, vs AC 21, with +22/+17/+12, I see a 2+, 4+, and 9+ being needed to hit. Thus, aside from criticals, I see 95%, 85%, and 60% chances to score a hit. So aside from criticals, we have 2.4 hits per round. Threat or not, nomore than 2.4 actual connecting attacks should occur, on average, per round.

At 2d6+13 damage per hit (averages to 20), that's 48hp of damage each round.

However, the character presented is semi-optimised to achieve those criticals, so -- each round we have three 25% chance for hits which are "threats"; of those, there is still a 95%, 85%, and 60% chance to confirm the critical hits.

.25 x .95 = ~.24 (rounded up slightly)
.25 x .85 = ~.21 (rounded down slightly)
.25 x .60 = .15

So, of those 2.4 hits per round, some .60 of them will be a critical hit. The additional damage will be an extra 2d6+13 per critical; this adds about 12hp to the per-round average damage.

Net total is only 60. HALF of the non-hasted total I initially objected to. So -- and I honestly mean no offense by this -- try again. You need to get to an AVERAGE[/.b] damage per attack, not per hit, of 30hp.

For your 1.8-normal and 0.6-critical routine above, (or the damage equivalent of three solid hits), and a x2 damage multiplier ... you need an average per-hit damage of roughly 40. Given the same greatsword, you need to garner another TWENTY points of damage.

GMW would turn the +2 sword into a +5 sword; that's three. To use Strength for any more ... either you get an epic item, or a ludicrously-empowered buff (+12 more strength bonus would do it ... with ONE point to spare!).

The only other option is adding elemental damage types to the sword (or bettr, Burst enhancements). Even then, I'm not sure it's achievable.

BTW, a Falchion is better for crit-whoring, than a Greatsword. Wider base threat range ... you can get it down to 12-20, with core rules only.

 

[Henry]

...which would you rather have: a spell that does 500 points of damage to one target or a spell that does one point of damage to 500 targets? Are they really going to have the same usefulness?

against an army of fire ants, or a druid's creeping doom, then yes.

Damaging lots of foes is not as useful as doing the total damage to one individual, unless the horde of foes is very weak, weak enough to die from the damage, in which case, the foes probably did not pose a challenge anyway, so the method of defeating them is fairly irrelevant.

Not necessarily. Anotehr perfectly valid DM'ing tactic is to face off your PC's against large numbers of weaker creatures. This presents a different challenge: that of attrition. The super-duper fighter had better have spent some of his feats on cleave and great cleave, and even then, that's a maximum of 8 opponents per round he can kill. Any enemy faced by a superior foe will take otehr means to neutralize that foe, be it ranged attacks, or means such as grappling. In the case of the barbarian with the 30+ strength, ranged attacks will be his downfall. The wizard, however, excels at eliminating large groups of smaller foes quickly, and this is just as valuable to the group. Not every fight will come to melee, and even the Fighters with powerful ranged attacks will get cut down. All it takes is one or two criticals, which are quite likely to happen in a mass combat. The wizard will still be powerful, not matter what, in killing large numbers of smaller yet tough foes quickly, and at range.

In combat situations, is not the most useful tactic going to involve trying to gang up on one opponent rather than spreading damage to a variety of opponents? I think so, because the sooner that you take down one foe, the sooner he'll stop doing damage to you.

But maybe in a fight with several opponents, you'd[*] rather attack each foe once before heading back to the guy that you damaged the first time? I wouldn't.

in most situations, you are correct - applying massive damage to one foe at a time is the surest way to victory. However, the best solution is to expend effort on taking out as many foes as possible, if you are sure you can do it - and to that extent, the wizard has always been the sawed-off shotgun of the group, the room cleaner. As a fighter, I would not want to clean out a warren of goblins one by one, over a period of several hours, if the wizard can achieve the same effect with spells such as cloudkill, fireball, and chain lightning.

[*] I don't mean you specifically, but instead anyone who thinks that a fireball that does 50 points of damage spread among 5 targets is as useful as 50 points of damage done to one target.

If those targets are small HD creatures and spread out, then the wizard has done in one round and with one spell what it has taken the fighter to do in 5 to 8 rounds with multiple attacks, and a risk of a critical hit or two to himself.

Against a few strong physical foes, the fighter is king; against supernatural foes with DR, or against large amounts of foes, the Wizard rules the roost.

 

[Wrahn]

You forgot Power attack, and believe me, if the DM wishes, he will miss a lot. (AC 35 and you're down to less than a quarter of the 120 pts of damage and yes many monster in the monster manual can have ACs that high and even higher without squinting too hard (nothing lilke meeting a Dragon with Mage Armor, Shield and Haste up))

The simple fact of the matter is the Arcanists do a lot of damage over many targets. They were not meant to be able to match a Fighter in straight up pound on your enemy sort of way. That Haste permits you to get close or even exceed the fighter in this way is a sure indicator the spell is too powerful.

 

[Pax]

Yeah, but you don't often get to pick your fights. If there's an army of evil out there, great. How many armies are lurking in dungeons? (And recall the motto of 3e, "the return to the dungeon"?) For those who say that damage spread among multiple targets is just as good as damage done to one opponent, which would you rather have: a spell that does 500 points of damage to one target or a spell that does one point of damage to 500 targets? Are they really going to have the same usefulness?

Nice way to over-polarise the situation.

You will note, when I cited the issue with fireballs, I said only four targets hit (in a 20-foot-radius, or fourty foot diameter, globe!!) ... four targets ... and the wizard passes the fighter. Not only that, leaves him in the dust.

Damaging lots of foes is not as useful as doing the total damage to one individual, unless the horde of foes is very weak, weak enough to die from the damage, in which case, the foes probably did not pose a challenge anyway, so the method of defeating them is fairly irrelevant. In combat situations, is not the most useful tactic going to involve trying to gang up on one opponent rather than spreading damage to a variety of opponents? I think so, because the sooner that you take down one foe, the sooner he'll stop doing damage to you.

That, as it turns out, is dependant on how the GM handles his "OpFor units" (IOW, hostile NPCs and such). If said OpFor simply lines up to trade blows with the PCs, then yes, the fighters have the advantage.

And a very boring game ensues.

However, using terrain, tactics, environment, and similar issues can change things. Especially if combats don't end up "let's line up and trade blows" affairs.

But maybe in a fight with several opponents, you'd[*] rather attack each foe once before heading back to the guy that you damaged the first time? I wouldn't.


[*] I don't mean you specifically, but instead anyone who thinks that a fireball that does 50 points of damage spread among 5 targets is as useful as 50 points of damage done to one target.

Fireballs, at 10d6, do an average of 35 points. Saves reduce this to 17. Thus, for five targets it's more like 85 points (assuming everything makes it's save, BTW, IMO accounts for the few SR-check failures, as some enemies might escape harm entirely, while otehrs take the FULL brunt of the fireball).

THEN figure the Fighter (prudently protected from fire magic and already standing amidst those five hapless badguys) getting that cleave (or even great cleave) on the now-softened-up enemies, during his or her full-attack.

Wizards, sorcerors, and so on are not meant to be point-click-and-kill characters. They're meant to pump damage out to lots of folks, and the fighters step in and finish off whatever's still standing, and/or tie down the main opposition while the spellcasters and archers pick off the underlings and/or support said fighter.

By the by, the "Gang up on one until it drops" issue is IMO a flaw of the d20 combat mechanic. I prefer GURPS' method -- you take penalties, based on how much damage you've taken since your last action. So, sandpapering lots of foes at once is a very good thing (e.g., instantly dropping one HT(10) enemy with 60 points of damage might not be as helpful as making TWENTY enemies suffer a 3-point penalty apiece on their next actions ...).

 

[aliensex]

FRIENDLY RANT FORTHCOMING

I have a secret for everyone- they DO.

{snip}

The past two years, these boards have been AWASH in "Harm/Haste/Rangers are broken" threads. I'm not saying they're wrong or right, but DOZENS of posters have presented thousands of words of exposition, facts, figures, and anecdotes for or against the power level of Haste.

It's really a "darned if you do/don't" scenario. I guarantee anyone cash on the barrel-head that, had they not touched Haste come July's revision, there would be threads on ENWorld, about 25% of which we would have to lock up, with titles like, "I CAN'T BELIEVE THEY DIDN'T FIX HASTE!!!" or WTH is up with Harm not getting fixed!?!?!?! and so on, and so forth.

But Henry, as I remember, the big Haste poll was sitting at about 55% of people saying haste was fine and used it as is (just approximating, can't remember the actual number). It seems that everyone was pretty close to evenly divided on Haste being broken or not. That is why I found it surprising myself that they actually changed Haste. Why are they keen on satisfying barely 50% of the audience? Unless the Wizards message board had a stronger majority saying Haste was broken, it seems weird to go ahead and change it. Actually, a TON of arguments dealing with Haste as a broken spell involved a lot of examples of abuse by Sorcerers. The Haste is Broken? poll almost turned into a Sorcerers are broken poll, because they can use the spell so much and so easily, yet they seem to be doing little to change the sorcerer (have to wait and see I guess).

As for the rest, I vow, at this very moment to never stop debating how broken and unfair the new Haste spell is! If Wizards did this just to stop the Haste is Broken threads, well then, they have a war on their hands!

 

[Tom Cashel]

Well, the change will certainly make damage-dealing spells even more pointless than they already are. A mid-level fighter will get three attacks, plus one for Haste and maybe more (if using two-weapon fighting or Rapid Shot), for about 30 points of damage with each attack, for a total of about 120 to 150 points of damage. A wizard can cast one fireball to do 10d6 damage, save for half, meaning about 17 points of damage, once a round. Yeah, that seems balanced.

Wizards able to do the same amount of damage as a fighter are UNBALANCED. Dealing out damage is the fighter's main (and arguably only) specialty. Wizards have an amazing, truly stupendous variety of abilities if you take all the spells into account.

If you're an unimaginative player whose only use for a wizard is to make him a mobile artillery platform, then of course they'll end up weak. If you get creative with your spells, you'll find that wizards are still the most powerful class out there.

 

[Petrosian]

He's got a 33 strength, so that's another +11 to hit, making his attacks +30/+25/+20. I really don't think he'll miss that often.

My game is urrently up to 12th level. In the recent battles they have encounterd some creatures with ACs in the 16-20 range... against those your suggestions may indeed hold, but those were not serious threats.

The more typical Ac is in the range of 25-35, with somewhere around 30 being most common. At those your +30 hits fine, your +25 misses 20%, and your +20 misses 45% of the time which drops your damage significantly.

The occasional threat was higher...ACs of 40-45. Against those, the +30 itself is down to 50%.

Maybe +30-+20 is enough for an autohit in your 14th level game to be reasonable. It doesn't appear to be that way in mine.

 

[Storm Raven]

Damage 2d6 +9 (strength x 1.5) +2 (magic) +2 (specialised). That's 2d6+13, not 2d6+17. You applied the 1.5x modifier for two-handed wield twice ... oops.

Umm, no. A 20 Strength raging barbarian with a Belt of Giant Strength +4 has a base Strength modifier of +9.

20 Strength = +5 modifier
+4 Rage = +2 modifier
+4 Belt = +2 modifier

That is a base Strength modifier of +9, multiplied by 1.5 gives you +13.

The character's total damage per attack is 2d6+17, like I said. Perhaps you shouldn't talk about people getting calculations wrong when you didn't actually work them out right yourself.

And, 25% of attacks will -threat-; you then have to confirm the critical hit itself (I admit, on the first swing of that series, it'd be nigh impossible not to, and still very difficult for the second, but on the third, we're down to roughly 50/50 odds). I'd guess, roughly, only 20% will -actually- manage a critical hit, overall.

This is already accounted for in the calculations I gave, the average damage for a hit by this character is 30. The average damage per attack against a typical AC of 21 is 23.5 (including the calculations for lowered to hit chances).

That's still not 30 damage per hit for four to five hits per round, and is still barely over half the cited 120 to 150 per round which I originally objected to. And that's without factoring in yoru miscalculation WRT damage done (a 4-point-per-swing difference, before criticals).

I've already addressed the fallacy in your argument that the damage was miscalculated. The issue here is that it is relatively easy to get an average damage of 30 poiints of damage per hit, which was what you challenged.

Also power attack cuts down on how many hits you score, and therefor, how many threats you convert to actual criticals.

The issue is not in using Power Attack, but in gaining extra attacks as a result of using Cleave and Great Cleave, which will drive up your damage totals considerably.

[snip erroneous calculations]

GMW would turn the +2 sword into a +5 sword; that's three. To use Strength for any more ... either you get an epic item, or a ludicrously-empowered buff (+12 more strength bonus would do it ... with ONE point to spare!).

A +6 Strength enhancing item is standard in the DMG, I only used a +4 Strength enhancing item. If you assume the use of GMW and a +6 Strength enhancing item, the damage totals go up, a lot.

BAB +11, Strength +10, Magic +5, Focus +1 = +27/+22/+17

Damage = 2d6 + 15 (Strength) +5 (Magic) +2 Specialization = 29 per hit before criticals (average damage per round without accounting for criticals = ~76).

Accounting for criticals: ~33.3 points of damage per attack or ~100 points of damage per round. (That is 36.25 points of damage per hit on average).

 

[Shalewind]

the big Haste poll was sitting at about 55% of people saying haste was fine and used it as is (just approximating, can't remember the actual number). It seems that everyone was pretty close to evenly divided on Haste being broken or not.

Again. This board is not the sole source of WoTC information. While we are a good slice and fair representation, this isn't the end all be all of testing or relevant issues. (For instance, DR wasn't a big issue here, but it might have been elsewhere...)

In any case, if we were divided on an issue, that leaves it up in the air as to what the best course of actions is? Say by the in house playtesting staff, no?

 

[aliensex]

Again. This board is not the sole source of WoTC information. While we are a good slice and fair representation, this isn't the end all be all of testing or relevant issues. (For instance, DR wasn't a big issue here, but it might have been elsewhere...)

In any case, if we were divided on an issue, that leaves it up in the air as to what the best course of actions is? Say by the in house playtesting staff, no?

Oh, I can see that. It is odd that they would not catch this the first time, no? I mean, if it really is that broken, and every single playtested Wizard and Sorcerer had it, and it ruined every playtested session so that every playtested Fighter and every playtested sucky Ranger rarely got to do any damage, then how could they just catch it now, and not then? I guess its just a simple case of nobody's perfect. It just seems that anything that is as unbalancing as many people claim Haste to be, they would have easily discovered it. I mean, Haste was argued since first printing, and they never errata'd it? Not through the web or printed in Tome and Blood? I've seen 10,000 times more arguments over Haste and Harm then over Polymorph Other or Wild Shape, yet they seemed worthy of re-printing.

Just seems like a ploy to get as many people to buy the new books as possible.

THIS CONSPIRACY GOES ALL THE WAY TO THE TOP PEOPLE!