D&D 5E Volo's Guide to Monsters: General Discussion.

[FormerlyHemlock]

Either I'm misreading you or your misreading the extra damage. The extra damage is added once per turn on top of what you normally inflict. Aside from the action to enter it, it's free damage.

You're misreading me. My analysis goes something like this:

Suppose I'm a 5th level Aasimar. If I activate my ability, it will do (at most) 15 damage over three rounds of combat. Can I do 15 damage with my action by just attacking? Or in other words, how many rounds does it take for my ability to start turning a damage-profit*?

The weaker my normal attacks, the more attractive the Aasimar ability is--but a 1/day ability to turn weak attacks into stronger ones is not that exciting.

I don't think Aasimar are very interesting from a powergaming standpoint, unless you're that silly kind of munchkin "powergamer" who is more interested in peak performance numbers than operational efficiency. ("I once did 300 points of damage in a single punch!" Meh, who cares?)

* Obviously it is possible to leverage the ability more effectively, with lower opportunity cost, e.g. by activating it while hiding, since you wouldn't be able to attack while maintaining stealth anyway. Now you have a bigger nova when you come out of hiding and make your initial attacks, possibly during a surprise round. So Aasimar Shadow Monks could potentially be a thing--but it's still only 1/day. Not overpowered at all.

 

[flametitan]

50 - whatever you otherwise would have dealt during the action you used to activate it. So say normally you deal 2D12 + 10 damage in a round via 2 attacks that's what an average of 27 damage? So 50-27 is only 23 total bonus damage over a whole encounter, less if everything is dead before the minute is up.

So no, not over powered.

Right, I see what you and hemlock mean now. It's not too concerning to me, then (it never really was, but still). It's a nice free damage bonus at low levels, where your damage output is low enough that any boost is warranted (and immunity to fear is uncommon at this point in the game) (and also for people who aren't sharpshooters or GWM) but it doesn't scale to higher levels, much like most racial features (I'm looking at you, Dragonborn Breath Weapon.)

I'm kind of surprised the fear only lasts a round, rather than "until they make their save," that might make it a little more competitive with the other subraces, or maybe it'd be too potent at lower levels.

 

[gyor]

You're misreading me. My analysis goes something like this:

Suppose I'm a 5th level Aasimar. If I activate my ability, it will do (at most) 15 damage over three rounds of combat. Can I do 15 damage with my action by just attacking? Or in other words, how many rounds does it take for my ability to start turning a damage-profit*?

The weaker my normal attacks, the more attractive the Aasimar ability is--but a 1/day ability to turn weak attacks into stronger ones is not that exciting.

I don't think Aasimar are very interesting from a powergaming standpoint, unless you're that silly kind of munchkin "powergamer" who is more interested in peak performance numbers than operational efficiency. ("I once did 300 points of damage in a single punch!" Meh, who cares?)

* Obviously it is possible to leverage the ability more effectively, with lower opportunity cost, e.g. by activating it while hiding, since you wouldn't be able to attack while maintaining stealth anyway. Now you have a bigger nova when you come out of hiding and make your initial attacks, possibly during a surprise round. So Aasimar Shadow Monks could potentially be a thing--but it's still only 1/day. Not overpowered at all.

Also works well with Timestop at guess. For Scourages and Protectors facing undead and any other creatures vulnerible to radiant damage its going to be more worth it.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

If you assume that a player has even 50% uptime on the ability, at 10^th level that’ll be an extra 50 damage that encounter. Are there any other racial abilities that can contribute that level of combat strength?

Yes. Goblin Nimble Escape could give you advantage every round (great for goblin evokers and bardlocks) plus defensive benefits; variant human Inspiring Leader can easily the whole party 100 HP over the course of a day, and 100 HP is far, far better than 50 damage (PCs tend to have a higher AC and fewer HP than monsters do, so 1 HP goes farther); variant human Sentinel can double a melee rogue's damage (at 10th level, that would be +21 damage where the Aasimar is only getting +10 damage, and the human gets his benefit all day every day instead of just 1/day); variant human Mounted Combatant grants advantage on every attack against Medium creatures if you're riding a Large mount, which also BTW lets you use bigger and more damaging weapons (specifically d12 lances), and it also grants you defensive benefits via your mount's mobility.

Apparently goblins also have some kind of bonus damage once per short rest against taller people, but I don't even care about that because it's going to be puny compared to the power of Nimble Escape.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Also works well with Timestop at guess. For Scourages and Protectors facing undead and any other creatures vulnerible to radiant damage its going to be more worth it.

Mildly interesting racial ability + unexciting 9th level spell = still worse than other 9th level spells.

The ability becomes more interesting if you're playing with a tactical-ish party and DM. If things actually happen like a goblin hit squad vanishing into the trees after the first round, so the party hides too and everyone spends a few rounds hunting for each other with Search actions--in that situation, no-concentration abilities like Necrotic Scourge become more interesting, because the opportunity cost drops. You're only missing out on a Search action instead of an attack.

But I do run a game like that, and I don't think it's going to be anywhere even close to overpowered even then.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

Since the book is out for early access, and most of the discussion has been about the PC races.

I'm curious what version of the Yuan-Ti Anathema they went with, was it the one made of snakes in 4e or the more Hydra-like version of 3e?

Anything about the Morkoth?

 

[flametitan]

Mildly interesting racial ability + unexciting 9th level spell = still worse than other 9th level spells.

The ability becomes more interesting if you're playing with a tactical-ish party and DM. If things actually happen like a goblin hit squad vanishing into the trees after the first round, so the party hides too and everyone spends a few rounds hunting for each other with Search actions--in that situation, no-concentration abilities like Necrotic Scourge become more interesting, because the opportunity cost drops. You're only missing out on a Search action instead of an attack.

But I do run a game like that, and I don't think it's going to be anywhere even close to overpowered even then.

I would also argue it's more useful at lower levels of play. Fewer low CR creatures are immune or resistant to fear unless they have PC levels (meaning the fear half of feature is actually meaningful), and the amount of time it'd take for it to catch up is slightly quicker (though I forgot to calculate the impact of the Duelist fighting style in my tests, and it'd certainly wouldn't be too great of a boost for GWFers and maybe TWFers)

Would this be accurate, or is there reason to assume it's not too useful at low level play? I'm not arguing it's overpowered, mostly just trying to find more cases where it's beneficial

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I would also argue it's more useful at lower levels of play. Fewer low CR creatures are immune or resistant to fear unless they have PC levels (meaning the fear half of feature is actually meaningful), and the amount of time it'd take for it to catch up is slightly quicker (though I forgot to calculate the impact of the Duelist fighting style in my tests, and it'd certainly wouldn't be too great of a boost for GWFers and maybe TWFers)

Would this be accurate, or is there reason to assume it's not too useful at low level play? I'm not arguing it's overpowered, mostly just trying to find more cases where it's beneficial

(thinks) Your analysis sounds plausible to me. The one countervailing factor I can think of that at low levels, with only one attack, your bonus damage is less likely to get applied.

Let's run some quick numbers. A fourth level Aasimar Paladin with Defense style, a longsword and Str 18 (we'll say he's aiming for GWM at 8th level but chose to prioritize Str) will do 6.18 points per round against AC 13 (e.g. Orc), or 4.90 against AC 16 (e.g. Mind Flayer). If he activates his radiant/necrotic damage, that increases to 8.98 against AC 13 (45% increase) and 7.10 against AC 16 (also 45% increase), which means it takes between two and three rounds to show a profit. At fifth level, with two attacks and prof +3 and a more powerful Necrotic Shroud, he'd be going from 13.20 to 17.89 damage against AC 13 (36% increase), and from 10.65 to 14.85 against AC 16 (39% increase), so it takes three rounds to show a profit. At 12th level, with prof +4, Str 20, GWM and a greatsword, and Improved Divine Smite plus a 12-HP Necrotic Shroud, he'd be going from 32.95 to 43.03 points of damage against AC 13 (31% increase) and from 25 to 35.17 points of damage against AC 16 (41% increase). So even at high level, it will still take 2-3 rounds to pay off for him, but the dropoff isn't as bad as you might expect.

BTW, GWM turns out to be fairly negligible in all these cases, and the 12th level Paladin with Necrotic Shroud up is actually better off against AC 16 if he stops power-attacking. Even against AC 13, power attacking only boosts damage for him from 29.20 to 32.95 (13% increase) without the shroud, or from 40.93 to 43.03 with the shroud (5% increase).

Anyway, put that together with flametitan's observations on fear, and I find it plausible that Necrotic Shroud is more useful at low levels of play, but the difference is smaller than I would have expected.

Also consider BTW that the above DPR analysis is a bit simplistic and therefore conservative. Against an actual AC 16 Mind Flayer, there's some benefit to minimizing the number of rounds you spend within 60' of him (because Mind Blast, etc.), so it might actually make sense for the paladin to hang back for a round and activate Necrotic Shroud before wading in for the kill. Necrotic Shroud is therefore somewhat better than the above numbers estimate.

Still, I'm confident that the ability is in no way overpowered. Call it "balanced" or "unexciting," whichever more accurately reflects your mindset.

 

[flametitan]

(thinks) Your analysis sounds plausible to me. The one countervailing factor I can think of that at low levels, with only one attack, your bonus damage is less likely to get applied.

<snip for space>

Anyway, put that together with flametitan's observations on fear, and I find it plausible that Necrotic Shroud is more useful at low levels of play, but the difference is smaller than I would have expected.

Also consider BTW that the above DPR analysis is a bit simplistic and therefore conservative. Against an actual AC 16 Mind Flayer, there's some benefit to minimizing the number of rounds you spend within 60' of him (because Mind Blast, etc.), so it might actually make sense for the paladin to hang back for a round and activate Necrotic Shroud before wading in for the kill. Necrotic Shroud is therefore somewhat better than the above numbers estimate.

Still, I'm confident that the ability is in no way overpowered. Call it "balanced" or "unexciting," whichever more accurately reflects your mindset.

Yeah, that sounds about in line with what I was expecting. It's probably less useful on a Fighter though (especially w/ reliable bonus action attacks from PM/XBE) simply because of the extra chances to land the +10 from GWM/SS if you know how to counteract the -5.

EDIT: Assuming there aren't situations where you wouldn't want to attack over activating this. Obviously when you get those situations the ability is better. I agree it isn't overpowered, but it is fairly different from what has come before.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

As far as I can tell the Fey I counted are Quickling, Redcap, Darkling, Darkling Elder, Annis Hag, Bluer Hag, and maybe Xvart, but I don't know if they are Fey. I'd personally make the Boggle into a Fey, but its likely a Monstersity or Abberrantion.

For Celestial all I saw was the Ki-rin.

Fiends include Maw Demon, Shoosuva, Yeth Hound.

My copy is here I can name all the Fey in the book and Fiends

Fey are Annis Hag, Bluer Hag, Boggle, Darkling, Darkling Elder, Korred, Meenlock, Quickling, Redcap, Yeth Hound. (Yes yeth hound is a fey.)

Ki-Rin is the only Celestial.

Fiends are Babau, Barghest, Devourer, Dreagloth, Maw Demon, Shoosuva, Tanarukk, Vargouille

Since the book is out for early access, and most of the discussion has been about the PC races.

I'm curious what version of the Yuan-Ti Anathema they went with, was it the one made of snakes in 4e or the more Hydra-like version of 3e?

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]Anything about the Morkoth?

[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]The Anathema is the 6 headed version it's fairly powerful particularly if fought with other yuan ti or snakes.

[/FONT]I have not looked at the Morkoth too much yet but it's also one of the more powerful monsters in the book.