D&D 5E The impact of overkill damage

[Ovinomancer]

I don't think looking at averages and then comparing them actually helps answer the question here.

Why is that? This is exactly what's done with DPR, already. Why would we not look at overkill damage's effect on DPR the same way? You cannot hold out DPR as a valid statistic and then claim that it's inappropriate to evaluate DPR using similar metrics.

 

[Asisreo]

We can break fireball up into 3 distinct ranges.
1. Enemies fireball normally kills most of outright. Let's say 20 hp and below.
2. Enemies fireball normally reduces to below the hp threshold I'm wanting to look at. In this case I think I had said 37 hp which would be anything with 57 hp and below.
3. Enemies over 57 hp.

1. This is basically enemies in the CR 2 and below range
2. This is basically enemies in the CR 2 and 3 range.
3. Nearly every enemy CR 4+ range.

So yes, you bring up an excellent point, but I'm not sure that extending the CR range from 2 and below to 3 and below actually is substantial enough difference.

Enemies outright die from fireball at 4 HP if you want to be super correct. At 4 hp, there's no way a creature without some extra feature or resistance can survive fireball.

If you want to consider only the averages (which is 100% fair), then enemies outright die at 14 HP (because they won't survive even if they save based on averages).

The threshold would then be 51HP and below.

 

[FrogReaver]

Sometimes it will, sometimes it won't. For every time that you have a tight grouping of weakingling that's cries out for a fireball, you'll have a loose grouping of weaklings coming from multiple directions (such as if the PCs walk into the middle of an ambush). Presumably.

Fireball is a great spell, but if it's the solution to every mob of weak enemies then they DM is lobbing softballs IMO. So I mean, sure, if we assume that the DM never makes an effort to make groups of enemies tactical and tries to hammer on the PCs using only the toughest creatures they can, we can probably ignore overkill. However, that wouldn't be representative of my campaign, and I suspect the same would be true for many other campaigns.

Because any argument I make obviously means I'm playing my creatures dumb and not having enemies use any tactics, and lobbing players softballs, etc...

The main point I am making is that in the kinds of encounters where overkill can really and obviously start to matter there's a 1000% more effective option such that after that option is used the encounter is soo easy that overkill stops mattering again.

 

[FrogReaver]

Enemies outright die from fireball at 4 HP if you want to be super correct. At 4 hp, there's no way a creature without some extra feature or resistance can survive fireball.

If you want to consider only the averages (which is 100% fair), then enemies outright die at 14 HP (because they won't survive even if they save based on averages).

The threshold would then be 51HP and below.

Or one could look at 20ish hp because 21ish is the average damage and if you are killing half the enemies you hit and leaving the others nearly dead thats not alot different than killing the whole pack outright in terms of effectiveness IMO.

But sure, looking at the 14 hp benchmark is fair. I don't think it will yield as realistic of results but it's a fine starting point for the comparison.

 

[Mistwell]

Sometimes I wonder if moving away from hit points meaning "number of hits it takes to kill this target" was wise.

 

[Ancalagon]

Folks, it's not just about "killing". Say you are fighting a monster. Your cleric has 40 hp, and the cleric just took 35 damage in one hit from the monster.... sure this is "overkill damage" for the monster, but it completely changes how your play! the players will try to screen the cleric,hit and run attack, range/kite etc etc. But it's also true of the monsters! They might retreat, run away etc when it becomes apparent that one hit is is almost lethal (or is lethal). Large but non-lethal amounts of damage can change monster behavior (if they care at all about survival)

 

[Ancalagon]

Sometimes I wonder if moving away from hit points meaning "number of hits it takes to kill this target" was wise.

There is a lot of value in looking at old systems.

 

[Asisreo]

Sometimes I wonder if moving away from hit points meaning "number of hits it takes to kill this target" was wise.

It's a simple design, and simplicity breeds ease of access and dissuades nonsensical complexity.

Although, people can't resist the allure of big numbers. Everyone is doing 1HP of damage until this leveled-up super ability lets you do 2HP of damage. And this level 100 ultimate move does 4HP! Four! That's quadruple ones! That could kill a 4HP level 100 wizard in one hit!

...but this next edition, everyone does 4HP damage. And this ability does 6HP damage!

 

[Fanaelialae]

Because any argument I make obviously means I'm playing my creatures dumb and not having enemies use any tactics, and lobbing players softballs, etc...

No, I didn't say that. I said that if a fireball is always the solution to a group of weaker enemies, the DM is not playing them tactically. I never implied, or intended to imply, that this reflects your game.

However, it's a rather obvious sort of thing. Weak enemies CAN be played tactically in such a way that a fireball ceases to be a good option (ie. the creatures come from multiple directions, or in waves, such that it's impossible to get a majority of them with a fireball). Given that tactics exist to counter fireball, if the DM doesn't use such tactics then they aren't playing the creatures tactically.

Literally all I'm saying here is that creatures that aren't being played tactically, aren't being played tactically. The self evident statement is self evident.

The main point I am making is that in the kinds of encounters where overkill can really and obviously start to matter there's a 1000% more effective option such that after that option is used the encounter is soo easy that overkill stops mattering again.

You want to prove that overkill doesn't matter, so you start by declaring that any circumstances where it does matter are corner case scenarios and aren't pertinent. That's very convenient, but anytime someone does that I tend to be suspicious of the reasoning involved.

I'm in three D&D groups right now. I have a solo side game going in one of the groups, so it's four parties total. Of those four parties, only one even has fireball IIRC, despite that three of those four parties have wizards. One group doesn't have a wizard at all. In the solo game, the wizard is a theurge (UA) so I'm having to make my spell selections very carefully so that I can eventually unlock her full potential (I'll hopefully find a scroll of fireball that she can transcribe into her book at some point). Another group has a wizard but he opted for lightning bolt because he prefers precision, over fireball's large area. The last group does have a wizard with fireball, but even in that case fireball wasn't always an option as he's had to miss several games while away on business trips.

That's four examples of groups that either don't have fireball at all, or don't always have access to it. An overall small sample size, but I think what it shows is that you can't just assume fireball to be a given. Just because tools like fireball exist, doesn't mean we can just assume that those cases are negligible. Not every party will have fireball, and not every tactical scenario will enable its use.

I think that if you try to prove that overkill doesn't matter by disregarding any cases where it does matter, all you'll prove is that overkill doesn't matter in cases where it doesn't matter. Which is self evident.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Again, the focus is on specific scenarios and trying to hash out when and where low hp monsters exist. This is flawed. Overkill doesn't matter only in cases where a fresh monster is hit, it matters in any case where a killing blow lands. What leads to that blow is largely irrevant -- normal play will result in situations where the entire gamut of killing blow hp exist, especially in the infinite trial assumption that underpins DPR to begin with.

In short, instead of looking for example scenarios to prove a point, accept that killing blows obviously happen and start there.