The Veteran's Tavern (combat discussion)

[Clovenhoof]

"Have a seat, tough guy, and have a pint to wet your whistle."

I just had the idea we could have a collective thread for talking about how you would or did tackle special combat encounters. Like, what is the most efficient tactics against Opponent X. Actual game experiences are as welcome as theoretical calculations.

Let our first topic be: Large Monsters.

Alright, so you are a battle-trained warrior and can wade through full companies of lowlevel thugs taking only a few bruises. But what do you do when you encounter real monsters? These can be real inconvenient opponents.

The good news:
+ Large creatures are a wee bit easier to hit.

The bad news:
- Large creatures usually have 10ft reach. This usually means you provoke an AoO as you close in on them.
- Large creatures usually have high strength, and on top of that they gain another +4 bonus to most manoeuvres: Bull Rush, Disarm, Grapple, Overrrun, Sunder, and Trip.
- while I find no reference to this in the Core rules, Large Creatures should by common sense have a higher Massive Damage Threshhold than medium-sized characters.
- being non-human, you can't easily Feint them
- Many Large Monsters also have a very nasty Grapple attack bonus.
- Monsters also often spread Fear.

What do we make of that?

Here are my ideas so far how to handle these beasts:
- stay out of range as long you can, peppering them with Ranged Attacks from a distance.
- if you know you are going to face critters with 10ft reach, bring Pikes. However, you can expect these to be good only for a few attacks until the monster closes in on you.
- if you know you will be facing large monsters often, consider taking the Monster Slayer feat that makes your Power Attacks more effective.

What advice do you have?

 

[Axerules]

"Have a seat, tough guy, and have a pint to wet your whistle."(...)
Let our first topic be: Large Monsters.

Funny introduction and interesting thread. I hope my players will not see it.

- while I find no reference to this in the Core rules, Large Creatures should by common sense have a higher Massive Damage Threshhold than medium-sized characters.

Large and bigger creatures have only a 20 Massive Damage threshold. They have often a lot of hit dices (don't forget that creatures, unlike humans, are not limited to 10 HD) and a high fortitude save, so do they really need a different threshold ?

What do we make of that?

Here are my ideas so far how to handle these beasts:
- stay out of range as long you can, peppering them with Ranged Attacks from a distance.
- if you know you are going to face critters with 10ft reach, bring Pikes. However, you can expect these to be good only for a few attacks until the monster closes in on you.
- if you know you will be facing large monsters often, consider taking the Monster Slayer feat that makes your Power Attacks more effective.

What advice do you have?

I do agree with most of your ideas. Another possibility, if you are outdoor is to use a heavy lance on the back of a charging mount. One of my PC's was a Nomad/Barbarian, with Spirited Charge. He was able to get rid of a lot of creatures, even big ones, when he was on his mount. Another thought : when you use Large-size opponents in game it's often only one creature per encounter against PC's who are more numerous. In this case the multiple attack rule will come to the help of the players. This rule is so often used against them when they face hordes of low-level mooks...

 

[Clovenhoof]

Ah right, the Fort save, that should cover all bases then. If a critter has a +20 Fort save, it has a good chance to survive a 30HP blow.

To make things more interesting, let's assume that our monsters attack in groups. So it's not like 4 PCs vs. 1 Monster, but 4 PCs vs. 4-6 Monsters.

Come to think about it, remember the Battle for Minas Tirith? There you had these hulking Olog-Hai, fighting in the middle of orcs. Deadly combination.

The Spirited Charge is a great idea. The lance has 10ft reach, so the attack is resolved before the Monster gets its AoO, and thanks to triple damage, it's likely to be killed outright.
However, the lance will probably be lost, either shattered or stuck in the Monster's body. Also, should it survive the first attack, it will probably attempt to kill the mount. Just to keep that in mind.

By the way: can Spirited Charge be combined with Power Attack?

What if the terrain or other limitations don't permit mounted attacks?

 

[Axerules]

To make things more interesting, let's assume that our monsters attack in groups. So it's not like 4 PCs vs. 1 Monster, but 4 PCs vs. 4-6 Monsters.

Come to think about it, remember the Battle for Minas Tirith? There you had these hulking Olog-Hai, fighting in the middle of orcs. Deadly combination.

In the Hyborian Age ? If my players face such kind of horde, they don't fight, they run. If they make a terror check for each monster, they will have to, because statistically they will probably fail one. I do not often use a lot of monsters during the same encounter and I don't remember ever using more than two large creatures in one fight.

However, the lance will probably be lost, either shattered or stuck in the Monster's body.

It sounds logical, but it's not covered by the rules. You need to think about a homerule for that.

By the way: can Spirited Charge be combined with Power Attack?

Why not ? Nothing prevents it, my nomad player used it a lot of times.

What if the terrain or other limitations don't permit mounted attacks?

Then they should use pikes, ranged attacks, take the Monster Slayer Feat and so on...It was only a possibility. My nomad PC knew he was extremely lethal when he was in a plain on his warhorse and less dangerous in an old tomb or a tavern.

 

[Aholibamah]

I'm trying to remember, was it in "Red Nails" where Conan kills a monstrous reptile by using the environment around him ultimately against it? Anyway that's one way--to use pits or log traps or the like, to frankly prepare in advance for the killing of the beast. In truth one rarely hunts a large dangerous creature off the cuff unless one has no choice at all. Certainly if you are in a forest you have natural tools around you for hunting large creatures.

Furthermore, well trained animals can help. A trained hawk or other large bird can be alarming to anything, nothing likes having claws and beak going for its eyes. Dogs can also help too--remember Balthus' dog?

 

[tekkaman]

while I find no reference to this in the Core rules, Large Creatures should by common sense have a higher Massive Damage Threshhold than medium-sized characters.
Large and bigger creatures have only a 20 Massive Damage threshold. They have often a lot of hit dices (don't forget that creatures, unlike humans, are not limited to 10 HD) and a high fortitude save, so do they really need a different threshold ?

I disagree with this, if u apply the 20 massive damage threshold to large and bigger creatures that makes a unrealistic combat, because for a dragon with 200hp a 20 hit loss is mostly a scratch in their scales, not the same for a human with 40hp, also this makes the combat very anticlimatic, lets picture u got a monster as the final boss of a session, it wont be challenging if the player can hit´n kill them in one round.

I use the d&d rule as reference increasing 10 the threshold as the size of the creature goes bigger

 

[Clovenhoof]

Then let's elaborate the Massive Damage Threshold further. There are two views to this matter:

A) The MDT is meant to be 20 for all sizes, but bigger creatures will have higher Fort saves, so they are more likely to survive a mightly blow.

B) The MDT should increase noticeably, possibly by 10 per size category, to prevent overly simple kills.

So let's see if the bestiary gives us some clues. (Note that I have 1st printing's stats). Unfortunately, the core book bestiary doesn't give us many suitable creatures.

Man Apes weigh 350 lbs, have normally 6HD, DR5, and a Fort save of +7. Being solitary creatures, they are likely to be encountered one by one, so they are probably intended as challenge for a party 1 to 2 levels lower.
If we inflict the bare minimum of 20HP (after DR), the Fort save will be a DC20, giving the Man Ape a 35% chance to survive. Since a 6HD Man Ape has only around 30HP on average, that's quite okay, the critter would have gone down soon after anyway. A MDT of 30 would even exceed its standard HP.

Maybe not such a good example.

Elementals of various kinds are rather high-level foes with 20HD and more, at DRs around 10-14. Clearly rather for end-level parties. At these levels, we can expect a fighter to inflict a lot of damage on a regular basis. There's a very good chance that the first strike already exceeds an MDT of 20.
Now a Fire Elemental, with a measly +6 Fort save, would be a goner immediately. An Earth elemental has significantly better chances at Fort +17, but a solid critical hit could also do it in. There's no mention of Elementals being immune to critical hits (as would be the case in D&D).

And that for Gargantuan creatures -- sorry folks, I think this is not on. A creature the size of a house should have more HP to begin with, but we can easily decree 20d8+70 is worth 250HP. Being outsiders, they should probably be immune to critical hits anyway. And last not least, 20HP MDT seems ridiculous for a creature occupying 16 squares on the board.

Assuming a MDT increase of 10 per size category, that would mean 50 for a Gargantuan creature. The good news, if you inflict that much, the chance of making the Fort Save DC 35+ is rather unlikely.

Now finally, let's have a look if the D&D massive damage rules are comparable at all: there we have a 50HP MDT for medium creatures, and a DC15 Fort save. That means only high-level chars will typically inflict enough damage in one blow, but on the other hand, DC15 is ridiculously easy for creatures with so many HP. So all in all, the massive damage rule is pretty moot in D&D, in my opinion. So the +10 increase doesn't say much either.

Maybe for Conan, an intermediate solution works best. How about changing the MDT in increments of 5? That way you could also scale it down for smaller creatures.

Size -----> MDT
Tiny -----> 10
Small ---> 15
Medium -> 20
Large ---> 25
Huge ----> 30
Gargant. > 35
Colossal > 40

What do you say?

 

[tekkaman]

Nice example, sounds good to me.

 

[argo]

Here are my ideas so far how to handle these beasts:
- stay out of range as long you can, peppering them with Ranged Attacks from a distance.
- if you know you are going to face critters with 10ft reach, bring Pikes. However, you can expect these to be good only for a few attacks until the monster closes in on you.
- if you know you will be facing large monsters often, consider taking the Monster Slayer feat that makes your Power Attacks more effective.

All good ideas. I'll also add that, depending on the type of monster you are facing, it may be better to use Fighting on the Run to bounce in and out rather than stand your ground and fight. Yes you will soak an AoO every round but that would be preferable to taking, oh lets say a claw-claw-bite-tail slap routine (with possible Improved Grab on the Bite, or Rend damage if both claws land).

Good teamwork can help you out here as well, few "big monsters" get Combat Reflexes which means they get just one AoO. Send the party tank in first with Combat Reflexes and Fighting Defensevly both up to draw the AoO and the rest of the team is in the clear.

By the way: can Spirited Charge be combined with Power Attack?

Oh hell yes. A Spirited Charge with a lance deals automatic x3 damage on a normal hit. Get some power attack behind that and whatever you are charging can kiss its sweet butt goodbye. There is a reason for people to fear the lance-charge.


As for your question on Massive Damage threshold, I will repeat my post from your other thread. The source material has plenty of examples of Conan dropping "big monsters" in one massive-blow. Killing a "dragon" (why are we talking about dragons in Conan? ) in one massive damage blow isn't anticlimatic, it is that critical hit that drives the sword through his open maw. Very dramatic. High natural armor and a good Fort save should protect most big creatures from your run-of-the mill massive damage, that makes them scarry enough.

Later.

 

[Brass Jester]

I'm trying to remember, was it in "Red Nails" where Conan kills a monstrous reptile by using the environment around him ultimately against it?
Yes it was in "Red Nails", he got it by poisoning a homemade spear with the juice of an Apple of Derketo and sticking it into the creatures mouth.

Argo: Conan himself called the creature a 'dragon', and from reading the description of it (in "Red Nails") it certainly seems to look like one. It just doesn't breathe fire (ice, steam, gas, goo, whatever) Oh, and it can't fly.

 

[Axerules]

• About the really big monsters (Gargantuan and Colossal): unlike in D&D, charaters in the Hyborian Age will almost never fight against them. Why ? First because of the Terror save. They have a lot of hit dices and most of the PC classes have not good Will saves. If a creature has 20 HD, the Terror save is DC 20. How much characters in a party will succeed their Will save ? Statistically, the fighting classes (Barb, Soldier, Nomad and Borderer) have less chances to succeed than the Noble or the Scholar. What will a Noble do if he faces alone such a creature ? He will run.

• Large and Huge are appropriate challenges for PC's in Conan, but not bigger ones. So the Earth elemental Damage Threshold is really not a problem. And speaking about Massive damage saves, the Gargantuan and Colossal creatures will oblige the PC's to make one almost at every hit. Did Conan only once killed a creature of this size with a sword in a REH story ? Do you remember what were Conan thoughts when he faced the giant snake in the Scarlet Citadel ? He prepared himself to die. Killing a huge monster is something incredible that marks my players as heroes in my games. Killing a bigger creature is for D&D, where it's appropriate.

 

[tekkaman]

• About the really big monsters (Gargantuan and Colossal): unlike in D&D, charaters in the Hyborian Age will almost never fight against them. Why ? First because of the Terror save. They have a lot of hit dices and most of the PC classes have not good Will saves. If a creature has 20 HD, the Terror save is DC 20. How much characters in a party will succeed their Will save ? Statistically, the fighting classes (Barb, Soldier, Nomad and Borderer) have less chances to succeed than the Noble or the Scholar. What will a Noble do if he faces alone such a creature ? He will run.

• Large and Huge are appropriate challenges for PC's in Conan, but not bigger ones. So the Earth elemental Damage Threshold is really not a problem. And speaking about Massive damage saves, the Gargantuan and Colossal creatures will oblige the PC's to make one almost at every hit. Did Conan only once killed a creature of this size with a sword in a REH story ? Do you remember what were Conan thoughts when he faced the giant snake in the Scarlet Citadel ? He prepared himself to die. Killing a huge monster is something incredible that marks my players as heroes in my games. Killing a bigger creature is for D&D, where it's appropriate.

I agree, this is supposed to be a sword & sorcery not a high fantasy so you shouldnt see giant beasts lurking around everyday

• 
  As for your question on Massive Damage threshold, I will repeat my post from your other thread. The source material has plenty of examples of Conan dropping "big monsters" in one massive-blow. Killing a "dragon" (why are we talking about dragons in Conan? ) in one massive damage blow isn't anticlimatic, it is that critical hit that drives the sword through his open maw. Very dramatic. High natural armor and a good Fort save should protect most big creatures from your run-of-the mill massive damage, that makes them scarry enough.

Dragons (maybe not the typical conceptual ones) are actually in conan, well, at least they were until conan killed the last one in the red nails story .
And about the mdt stuff, im not against a cinematic kill, hell, no!, but i think every master hates the player that kills in the first round in a lucky shot that final boss which was supposed to last a few ones more...

And taking some numbers to sample (correct me if im wrong somewhere)

Taken from ruins of hiboria:
Tyrannosaurus
HP:224 DR:4 DD:22 SF:16

Now taking a low level player:
Soldier, lvl 5, BA:5 STR: +3, plus has power attack and wears a greatsword (2d10).

-Attack rolls, supposing soldier stills lives (LOL) attacks using power attack (2)
-DD is 22, so he must roll 16 or more (tought, but possible), lets suppose he hits
-rolls damage (2d10 + 4 (STR +1.5 for two handed) + 4 (2x2 power attack bonus damage)
-Supposing that it gets a maximum in the d10 dices that gives a 28 dmg
-damage reduction applied 24 total dmg, that makes a massive damage roll of (10+12)
-SF of tyrannosaurius is 16 so its easy to beat that 22, but still the soldier has a 30% chance in the SF roll to kill the beast in one blow, and not using criticals.

Just a sample, indeed game should be brutal, thats ok, but killing a T-Rex in a single blow its just a bit out to me, just in my opinion

 

[Clovenhoof]

I agree with you that PCs should not normally fight the really gigantic creatures. However, I believe they _could_.

A Will save DC20 is a piece of cake for a high level character. Let's assume a level 18 Barbarian, with Wis 16, +3, Will +6, Fearless +2, Honour +3, that's already +14, so he only needs to roll a 6 to make that save, a 75% chance.

If the character is really into fighting monsters, he will have a bit more Wisdom (18/+4), and Iron Will (+2), and Demon Killer (+2), for a total Will save of 19 at level 18, so he could only fail on a 1.

Of course things are different for non-Barbarians without a code of honour (unless they have the No Honour feat) -- such a character will most likely have a Will save in the Single-digit range, now that's a runner.

By the way: are mounts like horses, especially warhorses, also affected by Terror?

 

[slaughterj]

From my experience, larger/tougher creatures do not have enough Fort save to protect them enough from massive damage saves, so some sort of fix would be good, whether the scaled system based on size or simply increasing their fort saves is the solution, or a combination of both.

 

[Clovenhoof]

As a GM, I am always prepared to change monster stats, if the original ones turn out to be too wimpy. Battles need to be challenging or the players lose interest. So sometimes you just have to scale up standard critters as you go.

I learned that years ago from my former Shadowrun GM. The battles in his games were always very tough and challenging, and usually we managed just barely. In other words, we did break a sweat, even when we played a published module. After the games, the GM would show us what kind of wimpy foes were included in the module, and what nasty bastards he turned them into. He always got their power just right.

So back to Conan, I'd just look at the creature, and try to imagine how powerful/dangerous it should be, and then spice up its Fort save accordingly. For example, I think all those Gargantuan Elementals could easily get a +10 added to their stated Fortitude.

 

[argo]

-Attack rolls, supposing soldier stills lives (LOL) attacks using power attack (2)
-DD is 22, so he must roll 16 or more (tought, but possible), lets suppose he hits
-rolls damage (2d10 + 4 (STR +1.5 for two handed) + 4 (2x2 power attack bonus damage)
-Supposing that it gets a maximum in the d10 dices that gives a 28 dmg
-damage reduction applied 24 total dmg, that makes a massive damage roll of (10+12)
-SF of tyrannosaurius is 16 so its easy to beat that 22, but still the soldier has a 30% chance in the SF roll to kill the beast in one blow, and not using criticals.

Just a sample, indeed game should be brutal, thats ok, but killing a T-Rex in a single blow its just a bit out to me, just in my opinion

Are you assuming the soldier spends a Fate Point on a Mighty Blow (and breaks his greatsword) in order to get max damage? Because otherwise you have something like a 0.0025% chance of rolling max in that scenario (not counting critical hits) and, as a GM, I'm not bothered too much by those odds. The average damage is 5.5+5.5+4+4 = 19 which is just shy of massive even before DR.


Anyway, I'm not going to comment any more on this. Personally I don't mind one-hitting big monsters but I can think of many worse house rules than increasing the MDT for large critters. It's not a deal-breaker by any stretch of the imagination.

Later.

 

[Clovenhoof]

Alright, I think we have covered the most important points about fighting larg creatures. Now for something completely different, in the spirit of this thread:

Mounted Combat

When you are fighting from horseback, it is pretty much a no-brainer to get and use Spirited Charge, preferrably with a lance. As has been noted on the previous page, the damage can be upped further by using Power Attack. The damage you can inflict this way is phenomenal and should force a MDS on every hit.

BUT what if you are on the receiving end? How do you defend against attacking riders?

If both you and the opposition are mounted, my guess is that the higher initiative wins, due to the enormous damage than can be inflicted in a charge.

So, what if you are on foot?
If you can prepare, long weapons are the way to go. Pikes are best, because they give you some breathing space. Due to its extreme Reach, you can get two attacks in before the enemy can make his attack: first, when a charging rider enters your threatened area, if you used a ready action to set the pike against a charge, and then an Attack of Opportunity as the attacker leaves your threatened space.
But they are also cumbersome and you won't carry a bunch of pikes around just in case.

If I interpret the rules correctly, even a charging rider with set lance has a right to a Ride check (if he has the Mounted Combat feat) to avoid the spear you set against his charge. So I'd still rather place a bet on the rider.

Other weapons that can be set against a charge are also good, provided the rider does not have greater Reach than you do. It's no good setting a 5ft Bill against a 10ft Lance.

However, here's a matter for discussion: do you attack the mount, or the rider?
In real life, it's probably far easier to hit the horse. In Conan, thanks to the Mounted Combat feat, the mount can easily have a higher DV than the rider (although the rider gets the Higher Ground bonus).
Moreover, if you kill the horse, you will still have to deal with the rider (but he will be a lot less dangerous once unmounted).
However, if you manage to take out the rider without harming the mount, you may be able to capture the horse and use it yourself (or, if nothing else, at least capture and sell it after the battle).

So what do you have to say to that: attack the horse or the rider? And what other tactics are useful against mounted opponents?

 

[Kyorou]

And what other tactics are useful against mounted opponents?

Choose your ground : horses won't be able to charge on an uneven ground. Traps may also do the job.

Shoot down as many as you can with ranged weapons before they get to you.

 

[Clovenhoof]

Which reminds me of another question, what are the penalties for Ranged Attacks?

I think there is a range penalty of -2 for every range increment beyond the first, but atm I can't even find that in the book. Anyway I'm quite sure I remember that.

But what is the penalty for shooting a moving target? There has to be _some_. And it should depend on the target's speed. Again, that doesn't seem to be covered by the rules.

 

[Kyorou]

But what is the penalty for shooting a moving target? There has to be _some_. And it should depend on the target's speed. Again, that doesn't seem to be covered by the rules.

I don't remember. But this makes me think that there should be no penalty when the targets moves towards you.