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<blockquote data-quote="Ridley's Cohort" data-source="post: 1160560" data-attributes="member: 545">Interesting analysis, but I will disagree about the subsidiary benefits.Refl targetting spells rarely kill a reasonably healthy PC.&nbsp; Fort targetting spells easily can.Failing a Fort is often extremely bad, e.g. fighting ghouls.&nbsp; And those Fort saves that are not so bad often come in multiples, e.g. poison.&nbsp; A Barbarian or Fighter with a good Con can easily suck up a Fireball and not slow down.&nbsp; If you need a 14 to save vs. a 10-die Fireball, average damage is 28.7.&nbsp; If you need a 13 to save vs. a 10-die Fireball, average damage is 27.8.&nbsp; So the Barbarian is usually better off taking a higher Con and getting that +1HP/lvl as a defense against Fireballs.As for Power Attack, NPCs do not get to check the PC's character sheet when deciding how to boost the damage.&nbsp; Even if a DM were inclined to cheat in this manner, he is usually too busy to precisely minmax.&nbsp; Most DMs just guestimate, e.g. '+2 damage vs. heavy armor, +6 damage vs. medium armor, +8 damage vs. light armor'.&nbsp; So the Power Attack effect you describe is theorectially possible, but just doesn't show up in real play.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Ridley's Cohort, post: 1160560, member: 545"] Interesting analysis, but I will disagree about the subsidiary benefits. Refl targetting spells rarely kill a reasonably healthy PC. Fort targetting spells easily can. Failing a Fort is often extremely bad, e.g. fighting ghouls. And those Fort saves that are not so bad often come in multiples, e.g. poison. A Barbarian or Fighter with a good Con can easily suck up a Fireball and not slow down. If you need a 14 to save vs. a 10-die Fireball, average damage is 28.7. If you need a 13 to save vs. a 10-die Fireball, average damage is 27.8. So the Barbarian is usually better off taking a higher Con and getting that +1HP/lvl as a defense against Fireballs. As for Power Attack, NPCs do not get to check the PC's character sheet when deciding how to boost the damage. Even if a DM were inclined to cheat in this manner, he is usually too busy to precisely minmax. Most DMs just guestimate, e.g. '+2 damage vs. heavy armor, +6 damage vs. medium armor, +8 damage vs. light armor'. So the Power Attack effect you describe is theorectially possible, but just doesn't show up in real play. [/QUOTE]

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