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After a few sessions with the latest packet - the results have confirmed my initial impression of the packet:  Monsters are just too wimpy.  

The next step was to expand my spreadsheet to look at the numbers - both how the two packets different and how the numbers of this game differed from (for comparison) AD&D.

What I found was, to be honest, a bit surprising:  The numbers are closer to the AD&D numbers than I had first thought.    In fact - looking at the monsters numbers in isolation - they are not far off of what one would expect if one set out to take AD&D numbers and translate them into the 5N system.

So why, I wondered, do they feel so 'wimpy' in play?

Simple:  The characters are too awesome.

A 5N fighter does around 11 points of damage per round, once the hits and misses are averaged in.  An AD&D fighter did around 3.5 points of damage per round.  This means that a 5N fighter will kill things around three times as fast.  (Likewise for his companions).

So, although a three die creature (e.g. bugbear) in 5N has 18 hit points, compared to 17 points for an AD&D creature - despite the apparent similarity, what this really means is that in 5N a bugbear could be killed in one round (if the PC rolls well or crits) and will typically die after two rounds, compared to it taking five rounds to kill the creature on average in AD&D.

The players just do too much damage.  And since I don't expect them to change this (over a third of this is the expertise dice, with other bonuses adding the remainder) - the only solution is to increase monster hit points - to at least triple them.

Yes - this results in hit points values that look inflated.  But that is what is necessary to make the numbers work out properly. 

The second problem is that, in some cases, they started down the right path with the 'special attacks' - but then they pulled back and decided that, "no, the monsters weren't supposed to worry the PCs afterall."

A couple of examples of this are the Gray Ooze (which no longer risks the PCs armor - and of course dies so fast that the threat to the weapon is nearly meaningless - if a creature dies in three hits, does it matter that after five hits your weapon is destroyed?) and the Wight (whose 'energy drain' no longer has any effect on the PC beyond just doing damage).

I'll look at how I might redo these monsters in later posts (focusing on Wight and Ooze just because my party happens to be in the House Center in Blingdenstone at present).  I might look at others later.

Carl

New Wight
Medium
Undead
Armor Class 15
Hit Points 59 Spoiler: Show

Speed 30 ft.
Senses Darkvision 60 ft.
SDCIWR: 15/12/10/10/7/15
Alignment Neutral evil
Languages Common
ACTIONS
Melee Attack—Energy Drain: +4 To hit (reach 5 ft.; one creature). Hit: the target takes 1d4 +2 damage and must make a Constitution save against the Wight’s energy drain.  If the creature fails the save the wight does an extra 1d4 hit points of necrotic damage to the target and the target is weakened until the start of their next turn.  In addition, the wight regains the same number of hit points.  While weakened, the target does minimum damage with their attacks (as ray of enfeeblement).   If the Energy drain attack drops the target below 0 hit points and the target dies as a result of this attack, the creature will rise again as a zombie [maybe a ghoul?] under the control of the wight.Spoiler: Show
Melee Attack—Longsword: +4 To hit (reach 5 ft.; one creature). Hit: 1d8 + 2 Slashing damage.
Ranged Attack—Longbow: +3 To hit (range 150 ft./600 ft.; one creature). Hit: 1d8 + 1 Piercing damage.
Multiattack: The Wight makes two longsword attacks or two longbow attacks.

ENCOUNTER BUILDING
XP 350

If the increase is done proportionally, it won't result in an inflation of combat time (well - it will, but it will be a desirable inflation taking combats up from their ludicrously short current times to lasting a reasonable length of time.)  But it won't result in an inflation of combat times as was seen in 4E.  The goal of my suggestions is to get combats to laslt about as long a they did in AD&D, and few have ever accused AD&D combats of being too long).  The purpose is to make an Ogre (which currently drops after three hits from a L1 fighter) to take six to nine hits to kill and thus allow a fight with an Ogre take more than one round to resolve. 

   I would prefer to pull back character damage and my immediate reaction to the first open playtest packet was "what's with all these high hp monsters?".  But the reality is:  The fighters do damage that would be acceptable coming from a 4E striker; and thus to be balanced with that kind of damage output, you need monsters with hit points more appropriate to 4E than to AD&D. 

But if you assume that they won't be pulling back character damage because much of it comes from desirable features, such as the expertise dice - then inflating the hit points becomes the only way to make it work.


There are a few changes I would make to expertise dice, however.  One is to (as you suggest) drop it a die size (so it's a d4 at L1).  On the other hand - I would then give them two expertise dice at L1.  But I would also add a rule which says that they can't use more than one die for the same manuever.


This does two things - it reduces the damage (although only by 1 pt at levels 1-4, but by another die at L5+) and it solves the problem I have observed in play which is that, despite the other options, most players see 'more damage' as the best option and go to Deadly Strike by default, only using the other dice if they miss (and even then using Glancing Blow by default if they have it and they correct the silly 'must roll a 10' rule).   What this means is that the expertise dice aren't really making the fighter more varied in actual play - fighter still just swings and damages in most cases.  But by giving them two dice from the start but not letting them spend more than one on Deadly Strike, you set up a situation where the players have to look for other ways to use their expertise dice  - and this ends up making fighters a little more interesting to play than just "I hit it with my axe.  Oh, and I add my expertise damage on top."

But that only gives a small decrease in the damage output.  


I also, since before even seeing the closed playtest, lobbied for a flatter ability score progression (+1 every three points) which would have also slightly reduced the damage.  This I am confident will never happen (unfortunately - I think that high additive bonuses to damage and to hit points are part of the problem in later editions and that the game would have been far better had they gone with this flatter progression back in 3.0).


And last, the bonus to damage to the dwarves - dwarves being the best fighters because they do the most damage with their special weapons has become a fixture of the game (and of course now they either have the best armor or the best hit points).  They don't appear likely to dump this feature either, and instead are trying to balance it with the other races and other items (although for some reason dwarves get two entire categories - hammer and axes - and other races get three specific weapons).  Regardless - unless they roll back every single weapon by one die size, so that the racial bonus is just bringing the weapon up to it's traditional value - this is another point of damage inflation.  Or at the very least, they should cut the dwarven bonus back to Battleaxe, handaxe and Throwing hammer.

And the final point of major average damage inflation (and the one I have the most hope - although still slim - of their correcting) is the inflated attack bonuses.  As it currently stands, the PCs (assuming typical 16 primary stat) hit some monsters on a two, the PCs hit the average monsters on an eight, and the PCs hit the highest AC in the Bestiary on an eleven.  Even in 4E, with its much vaunted balance - the goal was to hit most things around 50% of the time.  Not the toughest monster in the book.  That 'eight' ought to be an 'eleven' just to bring it back to parity with 4E (and, to be honest, many felt that players hit too often in 4E but it was accepted due to the belief that players get frustrated if they can't hit).  So fine, lets bring the odds of hitting back down to the 4E level (and in the process trim the PCs damage by twenty percent or so).

Step One:  Get rid of the +2 bonus.  It is unnecessary (if you are giving a bonus to everyone you have a flaw in your mechanics and the system can be simplified to get rid of that bonus) and it inflates their attacks which (especially when combined with their high base damage) necessitates the increase in hit points I propose.  Step Two (I wish) flatten the ability score bonuses (this would eliminate another +1).  


If they made most of these changes - the players would still be doing more damage than expected.  Perhaps twice as much and hit points would likely still have to be increased.  But not by nearly as much.


Carl