The looking glass continues...
5 capable level 5 adventurers versus one *static* Behemoth Frog
Behemoth Frog:
AC 22 (melee) AC 26 (missile) 98 HP
(whoever made this game really hates ranged weapon users)
5 hearty adventurers:
Sweetness, Fighter, Longsword, +12 attack, hits on a roll of 10-20 for 9-16 damage
Shortstack, Fighter, Warhammer, +9 attack, hits on a roll of 13-20 for 7-14 damage
Splinter, Ranger, Longbow, +9 attack, hits on a roll of 17-20 for 2-9 damage
Snuggles, Cleric, Light Mace, +5 attack, hits on a roll of 17-20 for 4-9 damage
Rhubarb, Rogue, Crossbow, +5 attack, cannot hit without critical as suffering a -4 to attack as firing into melee (even though the ranger does not suffer this penalty in this particular encounter)
+
Searing Light, cannot hit without critical as treated as a ranged weapon.
Spiritual Hammer, cannot hit without critical as treated as a ranged weapon.
First off, before we get down to the fight, why does fighting a creature the size of 2 large vans stacked on top of each other produce a 'firing into melee penalty'?
Secondly, under what circumstances will adventuring bow users NOT be firing into melee?
Thirdly, why does a giant frog (and most evil characters in the game) have a better missile AC than melee AC? Excuse me, but as far as I'm aware, don't MOST (read 'all') D&D entities have weaker missile AC than melee AC - hence the need to aquire buffs and special equipment to assist this stat?
Right, onto the fight, seconds out...
Round 1:
Roll 15 - Shortstack hits for damage of 14
5 - Splinter misses
2 - Sweetness misses
4 - Rhubarb misses
16 - Searing Light failes a ranged attack hit for Snuggles
ouch - Behemoth Frog's tongue grapples Shortstack.
End of round feelings: ok, so my ranged weapons AND spells are not going to help, OMG how crap is this, and now one of my 2 dedicated melee characters is effectively paralyzed. Uh-oh, I forsee long boring reloads ahead
Round 2:
Shortstack succeeds in a 'break free' attempt - huraah!
Roll 6 - Splinter misses
2 - Sweetness misses
8 - Rhubarb misses
4 - Spiritual hammer fails a ranged attack hit for Snuggles
nice - Behemoth Frog does nothing
End of round feelings: I'm getting nowhere here, but oh well, at least Shortstack is back he seems to like hitting it. And since when was a spiritual hammer a ranged attack? It's a morning star and it floats next to the target in melee for 4 rounds. There's no range involved in it's combat at all. The bad guys even attack it... in melee. What weird world of reversal is this game playing at?
Round 3:
Roll 18 - Shortstack hits for 14 damage
11 - splinter misses
17 - Sweetness hits for 10 damage
18 - Rubarb misses
18 - Snuggles gives up spellcasting and joins the melee and hits for 7 damage
18 - Spiritual hammer misses
Frog does nothing
End of round feelings: Wahey, looks like the frog is glitched after the shock of Shortstack breaking free - This shouldn't take long at all!
Round 4:
Roll 15 - Shortstack hits for 9 damage
6 - Splinter misses
2 - Sweetness misses
15 - Rhubarb misses
17 - Snuggles hits for 7 damage
11 - spiritual hammer misses
Frog just sits there
End of round feelings: OMG Snuggles is on fire! Must really hate frogs... low-end hit from Shortstack, not an overly progressive round.
Round 5:
Roll 11 - shortstack misses
10 - Splinter misses
3 - Sweetness misses
12 - Rhubarb misses
18 - Snuggles hits for 9 damage
18 - Spiritual Hammer misses
Frog just sits there looking dumb
End of round feelings: So... out of all my team of mixed adventurers, the only character who can hit a prostrate giant frog is... the cleric. The one who only carries a weapon because it would look silly not to.
Round 6:
Roll 12 - shortstack misses
9 - Splinter misses
9 - Sweetness misses
1 - Rhubarb misses
1 - Snuggles misses
Spiritual hammer evaporates
Frog does nothing
End of round feelings: Yawn.
Round 7:
Roll 3 - Shortstack misses
15 - Splinter misses
12 - Sweetness hits for 10 damage
19 - Rubarb misses
11 - Snuggles misses
Frog silently prepares for death
End of round feelings: What a lot of swash for so little buckle. Is it dead yet?
Round 8:
11 - Shortstack misses
19 - OMG Splinter hits for 7 damage
16 - OMG Sweetness hits for 16 damage (it would have been dead with a lot less)
Frog dies. Dead.
End of round feelings: Sure glad it couldn't fight back with 3 attacks per round like so many other creatures in this game.
To conclude:
Sweetness - 55% chance to hit for 9-16 damage (36-64)
miss, miss, hit (10), miss, miss, miss, hit (10), hit (16) = 37.5% hit for 27-48 damage (36)
My best character only just scraping in a last minute reaching of the minimum of expectation.
Shortstack - 40% chance to hit for 7-14 damage (21-42)
hit (14), N/A, hit (14), hit (9), miss, miss, miss, miss = 40% hit for 21-42 damage (37)
My tank fighter hitting expectations, but in a very bizarre and frushtrating manner.
Splinter - 20% chance to hit for 2-9 damage (4-18)
miss, miss, miss, miss, miss, miss, miss, hit (7) = 12.5% hit for 3-14 damage (7)
Again, just scraping in at the last minute to 'normalise' otherwise terrible stats.
Rhubarb - 5% chance to hit for critical
miss, miss, miss, miss, miss, miss, miss - 0% hit for 0 damage
Snuggles - 20% chance to hit for 4-9 damage (4-9)
N/A, N/A, hit (7), hit (7), hit (9), miss, miss = 60% hit for 4-9 damage (23)
Well above average stats, dramatically so.
Spells - various
miss, miss, miss, miss, miss = 0% hit for 0 damage.
Utterly depressing.
You see... everything is just all wrong. It's D&D but in reverse.
This was my first reload of this encounter. The first encounter failed because the AI dumped my rouge in the first hit position, so I moved him 4cm to the left so he could fire ranged weaponry (being a low HP character). Unfortunately this triggered an onslaught of 6 additional lizard creatures of varying types who surrounded my entire back-line - causing me incapable of either firing, spellcasting or even moving without incuring at least 3 attacks of opportunity. This left my two fighters up front fighting a small big frog and a big big frog by themselves. Needless to say, one was quickly despatched by the behemoth Frog, and since I was going to reload anyway I didn't bother using any HP potions.
For the reload I just moved my rogue 3cm instead of 4cm and everything was fine. Even the first small big frog died nice and quick, leaving me with the sceario I described above.
So I've just spent about an hour of gaming time killing one big frog who, even when non-glitched, is not that big a menace.
And just what is it with all these 'attacks of opportunity'?
I move during melee - generates an attack of opportunity
I use a potion - generates an attack of opportunity
I use a ranged weapon - generates an attack of opportunity
I cast a spell - generates an attack of opportunity
I simply approach a Hill Giant to deliver my first blow - generates an attack of opportunity (and I'm not even joking)
Example:
Approach Hill Giant.
Hill Giant gets 2 attacks of opportunity, hits Once.
I attack Hill Giant once and miss.
Hill Giant attacks 3 times, hitting twice.
Fighter uses round to swill a HP potion.
Hill Giant gets 2 free attacks of opportunity and hits once.
Hill Giant attacks 3 times and I'm dead.
(I ended up killing it without even using fighters, but used Spiritual hammers as my fighters and got lucky with ranged weapons and spells - on my 10th/15th encounter).
Now... excuse me if I'm wrong, but aren't the regular attacks a creature gets during their round their 'attacks of opportunity'? Being as the whole attack by round system and gradual HP loss simply metaphores the whole battle - and that any 'realism' added to this approach simply muddles rather than 'improves' an established dueling structure?
For example, we all know that one arrow is normally enough to take any living soul out of action, but for these games we accept that we can take 40 because the battle is merely representing your characters general hardiness, not assuming you have actually taken 40 arrow hits.
Once you get into the anality of these 'attacks of opportunity' you enter the road to RPG insanity. Take my above example as an example. How long would it take 5 people to chop up a frog? Would any of them ever 'miss'? How can an archer miss a barn door at 5 paces? Wouldn't a hit to the face be worse than a hit to the leg? OMG, it's endless and all beside the POINT.
Also, in reality even, if you decide to run from battle the opportunity is with YOU, not the person attacking, as it is a 'surprise' move! And what about simply backing away with your sheild raised?
I mean, OMG, what has this game got against bows, potions and spells? Why not just field us with 5 fighters and have a function which denies the use of potions during combat? But then... OMG, fighters are useless against Giants... LOL.
It's D&D but for grandads who don't like anything which involves 'ass-kicking' and prefer spending an hour infront of the computer killing one creature in gradual small lumps thinking they are doing it 'properly'.
The game might have been released with glitches, but, really, there's a lot more wrong with this game than simply 'glitches'.
Still, I'm relatively old now, so on I plod. Bring on the big fish. yay.