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Gaming Discussion => D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder => Topic started by: Nanashi on November 12, 2018, 12:24:32 AM
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3.5 Ogre Mage was so useless for its CR Wizards remade the monster from scratch on their website. Bad caster, bad brute, has poor ranged attacks so it can't use its at will flight to any effect.
Hobgoblin Warsoul (MMV) is a Lightning Warrior as a monster with Wizard 9 casting paired with full BAB and higher HD and leadership lite at CR8. While not stupidly far off its CR (10 at most), it gets points for how blatantly it is under CR, given a plain old Wizard 9 is CR8 without all the extras.
Honorable mention to the monsters low level PCs have no chance of killing, Swarms, Incorporeal and Wererats. These aren't too bad for a group against higher level PCs, but impossible even as a boss for lower level ones.
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you mentioned the incorporeals...
specifically specter or whatever one it is that takes out 90% of MM1.
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Fleshraker Dinosaurs (CR2) and Monstrous Crabs (http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=21046) (CR3) are the classic heavily undervalued monsters that will wreck any party of their supposed level.
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Among Incorporeals, the CR 3 Shadow stands tall as its 19 HP is tough to take out even with Magic Missile (only does 7 damage average at CL3) which would require three castings and its Strength damage can incapacitate the one or so person who has a +1 weapon or quickly deplete the caster, who'll turn into another Shadow in just a bit. +2 Turn Resistance also means a Cleric is having a hard time keeping it away. At the Spectre's CR at least you'll be more likely to have an option to attack it or at least flee.
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In the other side of the scale, a lot of high-CR monsters lack both flight and ranged attacks so they can just be easily kited. The tarrasque in particular is quite guilty of this.
Said monsters also often lack magic attacks and high-level parties get access to get etherealness/incoporeability so yeah.
Honorable mention to the monsters low level PCs have no chance of killing, Swarms, Incorporeal and Wererats. These aren't too bad for a group against higher level PCs, but impossible even as a boss for lower level ones.
What's wrong with the wererat? It has DR10/silver which is nasty yes, but still only 12 HP and 1 HD. A good old barbarian with a greatsword or a color spray/sleep can take it down, unlike a swarm/incorporeal undead.
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Some more here from a couple years back.
http://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=17533.0
Clearly a Kobold Wizard 17 but CR 14, is stronger than any other regular NPC Wizard 17 with CR 17.
CRO/DA is either an Outsider or Dragon with an LA+1 or CR+1 template, on the one side, and an Adept on the other.
So a CR 20 version is Outsider 20 // LA+1 / Adept 19. Any number of level 20 Tier 4 classes are weaker than this.
Fey with racial hitdice advancement get quite wonky. You can't control initial conditions that well but lets say:
1 rhd + a 1 cr template = roughly around cr 1 ; then advance it 4 rhd per cr. CR 8 = 28 rhd = pow.
It's off the random# range on skills and attacks v ac, with slightly more feats than a fighter feats stack build.
Undead version of this has all those yummy resistances and a bunch of Improved Turn Resistance feats,
so it can't be turned by the very surprised Cleric.
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Remembered Cockatrice. Save or die on CR3!
I think Pathfinder's fix for them is one of core PF's few changes over 3.5 that's clever, functional and a genuine improvement: They do dexterity damage with gradual petrification fluff. This is very simple mechanically, but keeps their iconic ability without making it stupidly swingy.
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In the other side of the scale, a lot of high-CR monsters lack both flight and ranged attacks so they can just be easily kited. The tarrasque in particular is quite guilty of this.
Honestly, I'm of the opinion that the Tarrasque's CR isn't far off for limiting collateral damage. It's not difficult to defeat overall, but defeating it quickly is another matter entirely.
My nomination for over CR'd creatures is the Mountain Landwyrm. CR22, but it literally has no special qualities, only a 1/day supernatural (Greater Shout) for ranged attacks, and a 30ft movement speed with 20ft reach. Given enough crossbow bolts, a level 1 commoner on a horse will kill it without concern (though it is relying on nat 20's to hit).
And when I mean "No special qualities," I mean "Doesn't even have the usual Dragon traits of Darkvision and immunity to sleep and paralysis." Seriously, WTF?
It is strangely hard to spot, though, boasting a +23 Hide modifier (with further bonuses in mountains). No Move Silently bonus, so it's still not going to sneak up on you.
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There is a CR 5 Gargantuan (flightless) dragon in Monsters of Faerûn. It's slow (20 ft land speed) and only deals 2d6 fire damage on its breath weapon. The Ibrandlin also has a bite attack for 4d6+12 damage, and can pin multiple opponents with a standard action (by jumping on top of them, and can be avoided with a Ref save), that deals 4d6 points of damage each round a struggling opponent is pinned.
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I would have to say that the most over-CRed monster in 3.5 is the Devastation Beetle. Spot and Listen +6, no special detection besides darkvision, can't fly or teleport, has no attacks at greater range than 60 ft., has no means of affecting incorporeal creatures. CR 50.
I mean yes, it has nearly 3000 HP, its lowest save is +42, it's got SR 60 and DR 20/-, its land speed is 70 ft., and it does 30d10+24 trample + a 6d6/round acid aura, but it literally loses to Walls of Force + (Shadow or Cloudkill or Melf's Acid Arrow), and that's just in core. It doesn't even have the Tarrasque's set of immunities, regeneration, or DR/epic to potentially (yes, I know, the RAW's weird) let it hit incorporeal.
The other really obvious case of an over-CRed monster is the Shrieker, which is CR 1 despite being unable to move or attack in any way.
@awaken_D_M_golem: Kobold wizard 17 isn't CR 14. The CR = level - 3 text only applies to kobolds with NPC classes, which Wizard is not. Also, the Races of the Dragon web enhancement (though not RotD itself) is explicitly intended to improve kobolds to parity, so it'd be more than a little mean as DM to use that material and then still count kobolds as weak.
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You don't need to do any CR = level - 3 math to create under CR'd kobolds.
Wizard is probably a nonassociated class level for kobolds (depending on DM interpretation) so every two levels only increases the CR by one.
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Nonassociated only works until it is their highest theme. For a Kobold, which can sub it's 1HD, that'd be lv1.
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You don't need to do any CR = level - 3 math to create under CR'd kobolds.
Wizard is probably a nonassociated class level for kobolds (depending on DM interpretation) so every two levels only increases the CR by one.
You're not applying nonassociated class levels correctly. Let's look at the MM's actual text.
Advanced Monster Challenge Rating
When you add higher ability scores, class levels, more Hit Dice, or a template to a monster, you make it a more challenging opponent for your players.
When adding class levels to a creature with 1 or less HD, you advance the creature like a character. Otherwise, use the following guidelines.
Adding Class Levels
[...]
Associated Class Levels
[...]
Nonassociated Class Levels
[...]
Nonassociated class levels are in (a subsection of) the section immediately following the bit about "if 1 HD advance like character, otherwise use the following". Kobolds have 1 HD. So we advance them like a character - i.e. an NPC. To the DMG!
Challenge Ratings for NPCs
An NPC with a PC class has a Challenge Rating equal to the NPC's level. Thus, an 8th-level sorcerer is an 8th-level encounter. As a rule of thumb, doubling the number of foes adds 2 to the Encounter Level. Therefore, two 8th-level fighters are an EL 10 encounter. A party of four NPC 8th-level characters is an EL 12 encounter.
Some powerful creatures are more of a challenge than their level would suggest. A drow, for example, has spell resistance and other abilities, so her CR is equal to her level +1.
[stuff on monster levels, basically treating all classes as associated; overridden by MM]
Since NPC classes (see Chapter 5: Campaigns) are weaker than PC classes, levels in an NPC class contribute less to a creature's CR than levels in a PC class. For an NPC with an NPC class, determine her Challenge Rating as if she had a PC class with one less level.
Kobolds have CR = level - 3 instead of level - 1 when given an NPC class (because it's in their monster entry and specific trumps general), but when given a PC class CR = level.
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Kobolds have CR = level - 3 instead of level - 1
No they don't, thats not how numbers work, and I don't think you understand fractions, or how the DMG uses them to determine EL, or the fact CR isn't the same thing as EL.
What I do know is nothing you just quoted adds -2 to their CR and how the hell you think 1/4+0=-3 is unfathomable. But clearly you're not the kind of person that should attempt to talk about it.
The actual CR value of a Kobold Warrior 1 is CR 1/2. And it has nothing to do with math, rather creatures with at least one level in an NPC Class have a minimum of a 1/2 CR. So nice job reading into the subject too.
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There are a large number of templates that grant hd that can be used on kobolds which I was assuming would be used.
I'm going to channel SorO and be amused that you're attempting to educate people who have been doing this on this very forum for many years.
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There's a guide (http://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=578) with whole sections about this.
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Kobolds have CR = level - 3 instead of level - 1
No they don't, thats not how numbers work, and I don't think you understand fractions, or how the DMG uses them to determine EL, or the fact CR isn't the same thing as EL.
What I do know is nothing you just quoted adds -2 to their CR and how the hell you think 1/4+0=-3 is unfathomable. But clearly you're not the kind of person that should attempt to talk about it.
The actual CR value of a Kobold Warrior 1 is CR 1/2. And it has nothing to do with math, rather creatures with at least one level in an NPC Class have a minimum of a 1/2 CR. So nice job reading into the subject too.
Challenge Rating
Kobolds with levels in NPC classes have a CR equal to their character level -3.
Kobold, 1st-level Warrior
Challenge Rating: 1/4
I did not quote these particular sections earlier because I assumed they were common knowledge. We are, after all, discussing the possibility of kobolds being under-CRed, and these are the parts which reduce their CR below that of a PH race.
I am not sure why you are deriding me so, but I do know that you are saying things that directly contradict the Monster Manual's entry on kobolds.
@Nanshork: I do not know all the tricks you are alluding to. However, counting added HD from templates toward the limit of nonassociated class levels seems to have a fairly shaky RAW basis, considering the direction for when to stop counting levels as nonassociated is "one of its nonassociated class levels equals its original Hit Dice". This line is ambiguous, but considering the direction to "Err on the side of overestimating" when calculating the CR of a monster with class levels, it's a little silly to take the reading that reduces CR (to count all non-class HD, rather than merely the HD of the original printed monster) and then hold up the result as an example of an under-CRed monster. The guidelines didn't under-CR that monster, the person building it did. This is in contrast to cases where a printed monster's CR is directly inaccurate (Adamantine Horror, Devastation Beetle, etc.), or cases where simple application of the guidelines for improving monsters produces an inaccurate result (e.g. nonassociated class levels lasting far longer than they should for high-HD monsters like undead, resulting in nonassociated-class monsters with CR < class level) - which really are a mistake in either the printed monster or the guideline.
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So what you're saying is you read how a Kobold Warrior 1's CR is 1/4 and how a Kobold with "levels in NPC classes" (plural, not singular) and arbitrarily decided one of these things didn't matter because if doesn't support you instead of reading how you're supposed to adjudicate the rules? Welcome to your very first act of confirmation bias. Now when you're ready. You can read page 7 of the Monster Manual, it's Errata, and the ever important in the RC to learn how D&D says you're supposed to handle that.
And welcome to D&D. The best heads up I can give you is everything exists in a stack of inherited rules but it's not written by programmers or lawyers. It's why WotC had a habit of printing multiple rule iterations on some of their more complicated rules so you also have to understand how D&D handles them. In fact come to think of it,I think they wrote a multiple part series article that was posted in the Game Rules section of their website to help with the HD/LA/ECL/CR/EL confusion too. So after you get done with the DMG you can try reading that too.
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The generally accepted interpretation (at least here) of "original Hit Dice" is HD before adding class levels, not HD in the base creature entry. And the guidelines didn't under CR the monster, the CR rules themselves did (which is partly why CR is generally accepted as not very good although it's hard to come up with an alternative).
Also, if you don't like rules interpretations that are a little out there you should probably avoid the "You Break it You Buy it" section, that kind of interpretation is the whole purpose of theoretical optimization (as compared to practical optimization).
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The generally accepted interpretation (at least here) of "original Hit Dice" is HD before adding class levels, not HD in the base creature entry. And the guidelines didn't under CR the monster, the CR rules themselves did (which is partly why CR is generally accepted as not very good although it's hard to come up with an alternative).
I don't think most of us have any issue with the CR system, rather that those who wrote the books weren't good at estimating CR for some creatures. The majority of challenge ratings are fairly close to accurate, but there are the Shadows and Tarrasques thrown in as well.
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The generally accepted interpretation (at least here) of "original Hit Dice" is HD before adding class levels, not HD in the base creature entry. And the guidelines didn't under CR the monster, the CR rules themselves did (which is partly why CR is generally accepted as not very good although it's hard to come up with an alternative).
I don't think most of us have any issue with the CR system, rather that those who wrote the books weren't good at estimating CR for some creatures. The majority of challenge ratings are fairly close to accurate, but there are the Shadows and Tarrasques thrown in as well.
I'd like to chime in as one of those who don't approve of the CR system as written. While it looks "good enough" for some stuff, it feels entirely arbitrary when you start digging into it. There have been multiple attempts over the years to find mathematical benchmarks for what an appropriate CR is, or to find what constitutes a +/- CR change, and it all seems to boil down to "looks good to me".
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The generally accepted interpretation (at least here) of "original Hit Dice" is HD before adding class levels, not HD in the base creature entry. And the guidelines didn't under CR the monster, the CR rules themselves did (which is partly why CR is generally accepted as not very good although it's hard to come up with an alternative).
I don't think most of us have any issue with the CR system, rather that those who wrote the books weren't good at estimating CR for some creatures. The majority of challenge ratings are fairly close to accurate, but there are the Shadows and Tarrasques thrown in as well.
I'd like to chime in as one of those who don't approve of the CR system as written. While it looks "good enough" for some stuff, it feels entirely arbitrary when you start digging into it. There have been multiple attempts over the years to find mathematical benchmarks for what an appropriate CR is, or to find what constitutes a +/- CR change, and it all seems to boil down to "looks good to me".
That's because this game really can't have any accurate mathematical benchmarks on that front. Two parties of Fighter+Wizard+Rogue+Cleric can be vastly different in capabilities, despite having the same class combos. Heck, it makes a big difference if a monster is encounter 1 or encounter 5 in a day. There are just too many variables to get anything that's not "looks good to me."
Which, honestly, is exactly what the writers intended. Challenge Rating is explicitly stated to be a guideline, not hard rules (screwed up a bit by the fact XP is calculated off CR, but I digress). "Looks good to me," is literally the only method of presenting stock challenges that will work in any but the most rigid tabletop RPG's.
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The generally accepted interpretation (at least here) of "original Hit Dice" is HD before adding class levels, not HD in the base creature entry. And the guidelines didn't under CR the monster, the CR rules themselves did (which is partly why CR is generally accepted as not very good although it's hard to come up with an alternative).
I don't think most of us have any issue with the CR system, rather that those who wrote the books weren't good at estimating CR for some creatures. The majority of challenge ratings are fairly close to accurate, but there are the Shadows and Tarrasques thrown in as well.
I'd like to chime in as one of those who don't approve of the CR system as written. While it looks "good enough" for some stuff, it feels entirely arbitrary when you start digging into it. There have been multiple attempts over the years to find mathematical benchmarks for what an appropriate CR is, or to find what constitutes a +/- CR change, and it all seems to boil down to "looks good to me".
That's because this game really can't have any accurate mathematical benchmarks on that front. Two parties of Fighter+Wizard+Rogue+Cleric can be vastly different in capabilities, despite having the same class combos. Heck, it makes a big difference if a monster is encounter 1 or encounter 5 in a day. There are just too many variables to get anything that's not "looks good to me."
Which, honestly, is exactly what the writers intended. Challenge Rating is explicitly stated to be a guideline, not hard rules (screwed up a bit by the fact XP is calculated off CR, but I digress). "Looks good to me," is literally the only method of presenting stock challenges that will work in any but the most rigid tabletop RPG's.
The issue isn't that CR is bad for different parties, the issue is that CR isn't consistent between monsters with similar abilities.
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Yeah, that damn crab is a classic example since it's a typical grappler brute that's much tougher and hits much harder than any other brutish monsters of the same CR. Consider the basic ogre that at CR 3 only has 29 HP and 16 AC vs that damn crab's 66 HP and 19 AC plus the crab's immune to mind-affecting too. The ogre technically deals more damage at 2d8+7 vs 1d8+9, but that damn crab has better to-hit (+8 vs +10) plus constrict and considering it's virtually impossible for a lv 3 PC to beat that damn crab's grapple bonus then its claws will often be hitting for double damage at a whooping 2d8+18 damage per hit. And the crab gets two claw attacks in a full attack to the ogre's single greatclub attack!
Something else that's really unforgivable is how so many monsters have more HD than CR, sometimes even double or more (then sometimes less HD than CR), which really screws with all the different effects based on HD. That's why in my monster classes one of the key rules is that each level brings one HD, no more and no less.
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There's a way to benchmark the basics at the very least, as shown by people mathematically breaking down average stats by level across entire monster manuals and sorting them into combat roles. We can say that a bruiser with X HD should be a challenge for a level Y bruiser character. Party dynamics and minmaxing skill make this kind of thing useless for defining any kind of "absolute balance", but it still hopefully keeps things like That Damn Crab or TPK Shadow from happening.
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Sack-o'-XP? (http://minmaxforum.com/index.php?topic=11255.0)
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snip
The meaning you appear to impute to my posts is so bafflingly different from the meaning I intend in them that I do not believe further conversation between us will serve any purpose.
Also, if you don't like rules interpretations that are a little out there you should probably avoid the "You Break it You Buy it" section, that kind of interpretation is the whole purpose of theoretical optimization (as compared to practical optimization).
I would disagree. There are TO builds without questionable interpretations of rules (e.g. much of Pun-Pun's cheese).
I'm more skittish than usual in this particular case because the rules actually tell you to be careful when improving monsters, and that the guidelines for CR (as opposed to the actual effect of advancement or templates on the monster's abilities) are only that. In particular, monsters with class levels and monsters advanced by HD beyond twice their original CR have a note that you "should modify its CR as seems logical"; I feel that this note, unhelpful as it may be, is still a rule and that holding up monsters in those regions as "badly-CRed" amounts to wilful ignorance of that rule (effectively, the official CR of monsters in those regions is "figure it out yourself", which is lazy but tautologically accurate). On the other hand, I see printed monsters, printed templates and suggested-in-monster-entry HD advancement to mostly be fair game here, as that's stuff they are telling us to trust.
Speaking of which: advancing Spell Weavers by Hit Dice goes crazy very quickly, as their racial casting scales as HD+2. Dragon 338 actually published an Advanced Spell Weaver of Legend Archmage 3, which was allegedly CR 21 but cast as a 35th-level sorcerer with Improved Metamagic, two instances of Multispell and Epic Spellcasting. If you just straight advanced it to max it'd supposedly be CR 16 (or 17, depending on how you round it) but would still have four epic feats and 32nd-level casting.
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Given that was isn/isn't logical varies for everyone, you can't really hold that up as a rule that people are ignoring and expect any sort of agreement on the subject.
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Kind of like how everyone's RAI may vary.
Template stacking (Or cascading like my uses of tauric/were-/ento-) are the most consistent way to blowup the CR system.
Another is just who is in playing/running and their optimization levels. An group of veterans can compete with higher CRs than noobs or even average players, because they know what to do to build to their strengths.
There's a lot of circumstantial changes to CR, just based on environment setting.
I feel like the higher the CR, the higher the probability of getting it wrong drastically increases, usually over.
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I'm having a tough time sorting out the CRs needed in my PF Reign of Winter game, because they're all good, but I have a grappler/slaver than is brutal. I don't like limiting people reasonably, but I'm also trying to not go out of my way to introduce things specifically neutralize his character.
That said, I did just nearly PK/TPK with a mandragora (3.5 stats from an earlier AP). Got 5 of 6 confused for 3 rounds. But the crit cards (both 1s and 20s) seem to help them.
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Hobgoblin Warsoul (MMV) is a Lightning Warrior as a monster with Wizard 9 casting paired with full BAB and higher HD and leadership lite at CR8. While not stupidly far off its CR (10 at most), it gets points for how blatantly it is under CR, given a plain old Wizard 9 is CR8 without all the extras.
Y'know, ordinarily I'd go in to point out that casts-above-CR monsters aren't too unreasonable since NPCs choose gear while monsters have random treasure (and that gear is typically about "triple treasure" in value).
But the allegedly-CR-8 Warsoul has chosen gear - and more of it than a 10th-level NPC. This is almost "sextuple treasure".
Also, a hobgoblin Wiz9 is CR 9, not 8. Between a bonus feat (if a bad one), an additional +0/+4/+2/+6/+2/+2 stats for a total +0/+6/+4/+6/+2/+2, 10 monstrous humanoid hit dice, +4 natural armour, DR, SR, the dwarf anti-spell bonus, and a couple of frills it's definitely CR 10, and on the high side of it.
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A CR25 Leviathan (Monster Manual II) was trivialized with one casting of reverse gravity.
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A CR25 Leviathan (Monster Manual II) was trivialized with one casting of reverse gravity.
You'd need a pretty high CL for that due to the Leviathan's size. And since RG on the surface of a body of water creates a waterspout, it could possibly swim off the top and fall back into the ocean (definitely can't swim directly down, though, since that's DC 80).
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Two castings of Reverse Gravity?
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Two castings of Reverse Gravity?
Even that probably wouldn't be enough with only CL 20. The Leviathan was updated to 3.5, but its size wasn't changed - it's technically still 50x200. If you assume it's of a similar height to its width... that's 500 10-ft. cubes. You won't need the full 500 cubes affected to lift it, since the weight of the reversed parts is opposing the weight of the normal parts and the waterspout will also create a current, but you'll need a decent chunk of that. Maybe 100-200? And then there's the aforementioned issues with swimming off the waterspout. If you've got the insane caster levels needed to pitch the thing into the sky... why not just fry it with Wings of Flurry or a godslaying Holy Word or something? Or heck, even Dominate Monster; its Will save isn't that great and if you've got a cheesed CL its SR is irrelevant.
I'm not saying the dumb thing lives up to CR 25, but Reverse Gravity isn't the solution to this one.
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3 of the 5 devastation insects seem to be really over CR'd, the beetle and web spider at least have a ranged effect/attack.
Flight and ways to bypass their defenses, and their toast. None have hp regeneration.
The scorpion has a mistake in its DR.
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The scorpion has a mistake in its DR.
What's wrong with 15/-?
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I was looking at the unupdated pdf, listed as 4S/+8