Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Character

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dark cauliflower
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Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Character

Post by dark cauliflower »

Hi guyz,

I'm fielding this to you DCCers to get your thoughts on this to. I'm trying to answer the perplexing question of when is a DCC character 10 times as durable/ability to deal damage as a Normal man. The reason is that I'm trying to get a good idea of when a DCC character enters the Hero category in OED's Book of War. In Book of War, a Hero is someone who is 10 times as durable as a normal man. In Dnd terms that means level 10 at least.

I'm defining a Normal Man as a Man at Arms on page 434. I've considered using the Peasant that is listed on the same page. Either one gives me different answers.

So what I'm thinking is that when a Warrior(page 42-44) can have 40 Hp is when they become a BOW Hero. I got 40 from 4 HP times 10. A Man at Arms has a 1d8 HD, and I'm taking 4 HP as the average score for them. Using the same kinda of idea for the Warrior, I'd want to meat the 40 HP for an average Warrior.

What I'm thinking:
2 HP from the funnel
+ 6 HP per level

Somewhere around level 6 or 7 is when they are 10 times as durable as a normal man.

The author of BOW mentioned the "damge scale" as well. A Man at Arms gets 1 attack per round. In BOW, the Knights and Barbarians listed in the Hero section get 2-3 attacks in normal ODnd combat. Warriors appear to get multiple attacks at level 5.

Ok, where is my thinking all wrong on this? :lol:

thoughts?
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by TheNobleDrake »

I would just go with calling DCC characters "Hero" for the purposes of mass combat rules like Book of War at 3rd level.

Reasoning: in OD&D, which book of war is built for, there is next to nothing separating "regular dude" from "hero" that is difficult to quantify, and HP are the main way in which the staying power of the character is measured - especially in the case of a warrior.

In DCC, most of every class' staying power comes from hard to measure and extremely nebulous features like Luck, Mighty Deeds, and theoretically infinite spell-casting of extremely potent variety.

...and I like the way it lines up with the Heroes table on page 359 of DCC - making a "hero" type 1 in a thousand rather than the 1 in 50,000 or 250,000 that level 6 or 7 would represent.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

that was a great post.

I am somewhat skeptical that a 3rd level warrior is going to last that long against 10 men at arms, even with the cool stuff mixed in. He gets 1 attack a round and may have something like 18 hp. He'd need 10 rounds to knock those guys out and they might need like 6 hits to take him down in that time.

is he mince meat or a hero?
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by GnomeBoy »

He does have a d20+d5 to-hit vs. their d20+1, and potentially Deeds that could trouble multiple mooks at once.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by TheNobleDrake »

dark cauliflower wrote:that was a great post.

I am somewhat skeptical that a 3rd level warrior is going to last that long against 10 men at arms, even with the cool stuff mixed in. He gets 1 attack a round and may have something like 18 hp. He'd need 10 rounds to knock those guys out and they might need like 6 hits to take him down in that time.

is he mince meat or a hero?
Math paints one picture, but I think actually rolling out numerous scenarios with the Warrior having been generated genuinely (rather than assuming some kind of "average warrior") and being equipped as you would expect to see a 3rd level character equipped.

Using math though... let's see what that gets us:

Mathematically average 3rd level Warrior - 19 AC, 22 HP, 1d20+d5 attack for (prior d5 roll)+d8 damage, Saves of R/F/W +1/+2/+1, +3 initiative

Mathematically average man-at-arms - 14 AC, 4 HP, 1d20+1 attack for 16 damage, Saves of +1, +0 initiative

Breakdown:
Initiative: The warrior gets 13, the men-at-arms get 10
Round 1: Warrior attacks, misses (result 13 vs. AC 14), Men-at-arms attack and all miss (result 12 vs. AC 19).
Round 2: Exact replication of round 1.
...
Round 4,398: Exact replication of round 1.

Why? because statistical probability is in no way a guarantee of what will happen, and how many times you have rolled 1d20+1 doesn't even become a part of the calculation how likely the result is to be 19 or higher.

Alternate breakdown, actually rolling attack & damage:
Initiative: Warrior 14, men-at-arms 5
Round 1: Warrior attacks, hits for 4 damage killing a man-at-arms. 9 men-at-arms attack 1 critical for 9 damage, 8 misses.
Round 2: Warrior attacks, hits for 11 damage, killing a man-at-arms and improving AC by 1, 8 men-at-arms attack and all miss.
Round 3: Warrior attacks, misses. 8 men-at-arms attack, 1 hits for 2 damage
Round 4: Warrior attacks, hits for 11 damage, killing a man-at arms and improving AC by 1, 7 men-at-arms attack and all miss.
Round 5: Warrior attacks, critical (8 on table IV) deals 11 damage killing a man-at-arms and allows a second attack which misses, 6 men-at-arms attack and all miss.
Round 6: Warrior attacks, critical (5 on table IV) deals 5 damage killing a man-at-arms and shattering his weapon, 5 men-at-arms attack, 1 fumbles and damages his weapon, the rest miss.
Round 7-9: an incredible miss-fest.
Round 10: Warrior criticals (3 on table IV) for 18 damage and a follow-up attack on the prone corpse of a man-at-arms (which happens to hit for 9 damage). 4 men-at-arms attack, 1 fumbles and gets his weapon entangled in his armor.
Round 11: Warrior attacks, hits for 5 killing a man-at-arms (not the one made useless by his fumble). 2 men-at-arms attack and miss.
Round 12: Warrior attacks, hits for 9 and gets +1 AC. 2 men-at-arms attack, 1 hits for 3 damage
Round 13: Everybody misses.
Round 14: Warrior kills man-at-arms with 12 damage, gets +1 AC. Single man-at-arms attacks and misses.
Round 15: Everybody misses.
Round 16: A 17 damage critical (that would have driven the foe back and force him to forgo his next attack) from the warrior ends the battle.
Warrior wins, ending the fight with 8 HP left.

Alternate version of the above where I don't ignore morale rules:
Round 6: Warrior attacks, shatters the weapon of a man-at-arms and the blow carries through to kill the man - the remaining 5 men-at-arms flee for their lives.
Warrior wins, ends fight with only 11 of 22 HP missing.
warrior HP 8

Of course, you should roll out similar scenarios as well to really solidify your opinion on the matter - which no amount of math can actually give you a good impression of.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

I don't know if it was the dice roller I was using or not:
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/dice/dice.htm

but I was seeing alot of 18+ with it on my round experiments. At round 5 he would have been close to dead! :shock:
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

I looked at the Warriors chance of whacking a Man at Arms and he seems to be hitting them 1/3rd of the time. Out of 15 rounds he hit 5 times. I'm going to look for a different dice roller but it doesn't look like he is going to win against 10 of these buggers.

Data:
-----------
Roll(1d20)+5:
9,+5
Total:14

Roll(1d20)+5:
2,+5
Total:7

Roll(1d20)+5:
14,+5
Total:19

Roll(1d20)+5:
6,+5
Total:11

Roll(1d20)+5:
6,+5
Total:11

Roll(1d20)+5:
6,+5
Total:11

Roll(1d20)+5:
8,+5
Total:13

Roll(1d20)+5:
11,+5
Total:16

Roll(1d20)+5:
19,+5
Total:24

Roll(1d20)+5:
7,+5
Total:12

Roll(1d20)+5:
2,+5
Total:7

Roll(1d20)+5:
3,+5
Total:8

Roll(1d20)+5:
19,+5
Total:24

Roll(1d20)+5:
2,+5
Total:7

Roll(1d20)+5:
7,+5
Total:12
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by TheNobleDrake »

My advice on finding a die-roller to do testing with: a fistful of real dice - I use Gamescience myself, but Chessex and the rest do just fine.

Best to test all scenarios and theorycraft with what you will actually be using to play, so stay away from digital die rollers unless you plan to use them for playing too.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

you must have some pretty darn good dice there or had a pretty good run on the rolls. I'm going to have to dig up me ol "lucky" d20 I have stashed away. I still can't get these good results where the Warrior whacks everyone, but dang it... I will. :twisted:
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by TheNobleDrake »

dark cauliflower wrote:I still can't get these good results where the Warrior whacks everyone, but dang it... I will. :twisted:
They aren't even particularly "good" results, they are simply the most probable outcome - and that becomes even more true when dealing with a character that is more like the type that you would expect a typical player to play as a Warrior (read: one with ability scores that a warrior would draw a benefit from - such as strength, agility, stamina, luck, or some combination of those).

I am surprised you haven't had more scenarios turn out in favor of the warrior... might want to check the bias on your die roller of choice, or use a dice tower or dice cup with some physical dice to lessen your personal impact upon the die roll (a person's physical technique of rolling dice can, even unintentionally, create a bias - and most people don't even realize it; I've had players look at me like I was speaking in tongues when I answer their complaints of a string of cruddy rolls with "shake your dice more.").

The old roll it around in your palm and then drop it thing is not proper dice rolling - do the two-hand "box' and shake your dice inside for at least a full 5 seconds with some gusto before letting them roll out onto the table, and the results are less biased.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

yeah, I just ran into one that seemed really bogus. Gave me like 5 20+ scores out of 7 rolls right off the bat. Think I'll forget about that dice roller! :lol:
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

nobledragon guy,

I got my ol d20 out and some other dice. From what I've found so far, I'm seeing the Warrior go down typically in the 3rd round. I had him go down once in the 2nd round and once in the 4th. I didn't include criticals hits for the Men at Arms, but I probably should have; those early critical hit entries do give some extra damage and 20's did come up. Usually I saw 2-3 hits a round. I haven't ran into a round where there were 0 hits. The big warrior guy does have misses.

good clean fun all around.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by GnomeBoy »

dusky vegetable dude,

How many grunts can get a whack at the Warrior at a time?

I'd say two to four at most, generally. Sure, 8 folks could crowd around one guy, but can they all swing a weapon and hit him -- without also hitting each other? Can they coordinate what they are doing effectively that they all get a chance to hit each round?

If the Warrior is smart and makes use of floor plans and/or terrain, he can even reduce that 2 to 4 down to just one or two, by using doorways, high ground, obstacles like tables and such.

If I were playing that one Warrior against a bunch of mooks, you can bet I'd be trying every trick I could think of to hamper them first and take them out while they were vulnerable...

And once I got about half of them down, when do the others decide to run and fight another day...?

Just some thinks.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by TheNobleDrake »

Time to share some anecdote:

The party was attempting to sack a temple out in the desert in the name of the party cleric's god, and had managed to foul up their plans and get surrounded by a horde of lizard-man slaves being commanded into battle against he party by a trio of priests.

As the battle wore on, every member of the party save 1 - a 1st level warrior in chain mail, with a shield and longsword - was face down in the dust and assumed dead. The warrior was surrounded, outnumbered 12 to 1, and fighting for her life.

She had 8 HP, AC 16, her d3 deed die, and a +1 strength modifier.
The lizard-man slaves had 2d8 HP each, AC 14, and could claw twice with 1d20+1 attack and 1d6 damage.

...and the warrior killed 11 of the 12 before finally being taken down.

The fight was static to start, the lizard-men surrounding the warrior and clawing away while the ones that couldn't reach waited their turn to jump in... but the warrior used some push back maneuvers (in vain) to try and get to an advantageous position (her friend's body for the potion he had), and resort to defensive maneuvers to try and reduce the lizard-men's chances to hit, and made good use of environment by way of mighty deeds such as sweeping great clouds of the dusty sand into the air and maneuvers to put construction materials that the lizard-men would have to go around since they couldn't go over as easily as the warrior did.


Call me crazy, but seeing that possible at level 1 with a little luck makes me absolutely sure that by level 3 you can downright expect it to work.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

GnomeBoy wrote:dusky vegetable dude,

How many grunts can get a whack at the Warrior at a time?

I'd say two to four at most, generally. Sure, 8 folks could crowd around one guy, but can they all swing a weapon and hit him -- without also hitting each other? Can they coordinate what they are doing effectively that they all get a chance to hit each round?

If the Warrior is smart and makes use of floor plans and/or terrain, he can even reduce that 2 to 4 down to just one or two, by using doorways, high ground, obstacles like tables and such.

If I were playing that one Warrior against a bunch of mooks, you can bet I'd be trying every trick I could think of to hamper them first and take them out while they were vulnerable...

And once I got about half of them down, when do the others decide to run and fight another day...?

Just some thinks.
I don't know the answer to that yet... it could be alot?

I was looking in the good book for what kind of advantages you get if your attacking someone from behind but I haven't found it.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by smathis »

GnomeBoy wrote:dusky vegetable dude,

How many grunts can get a whack at the Warrior at a time?

I'd say two to four at most, generally. Sure, 8 folks could crowd around one guy, but can they all swing a weapon and hit him -- without also hitting each other? Can they coordinate what they are doing effectively that they all get a chance to hit each round?

If the Warrior is smart and makes use of floor plans and/or terrain, he can even reduce that 2 to 4 down to just one or two, by using doorways, high ground, obstacles like tables and such.

If I were playing that one Warrior against a bunch of mooks, you can bet I'd be trying every trick I could think of to hamper them first and take them out while they were vulnerable...

And once I got about half of them down, when do the others decide to run and fight another day...?

Just some thinks.
Against an active defender (a.k.a. one who is swinging back), I'd speculate that the max number of people who can engage is 4. Just too much movement going on. That said, in my rolloff of the TATG Reaver against 10 men-at-arms, I allowed 8 men-at-arms to swarm and attack. In (quasi-)reality, I don't think that's very likely unless the Reaver is laying down on the ground in a fetal position.

But I wanted to see how the Reaver would do.

Granted he rolled like absolute crap. But he didn't last much longer than the Warrior in darkcaul's rolloffs.

In a *real* game, I would've enforced the "no more than four" rule (unless the opponents were kobolds or brownies or something small). And maneuvered the Reaver with his back to a wall or into a doorway or something. During the rolloff, I was just going for a blow-by-blow -- wondering if a 3rd-level Reaver was really as tough hit-for-hit as 10 men-at-arms.

Answer... not really.

Hit-for-hit, I'd speculate that a 6th or 7th level Reaver would be the equal of 10 men-at-arms. And I'd extrapolate that a 6th-7th level Warrior would be about the same.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by smathis »

dark cauliflower wrote:I don't know the answer to that yet... it could be alot?

I was looking in the good book for what kind of advantages you get if your attacking someone from behind but I haven't found it.
If the attacker is a Thief or has a "backstab" ability, then the attacker should be allowed to use that. Beyond that, I'd give a +2 to hit.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by Ogrepuppy »

TheNobleDrake wrote:The party was attempting to sack a temple out in the desert in the name of the party cleric's god, and had managed to foul up their plans and get surrounded by a horde of lizard-man slaves being commanded into battle against he party by a trio of priests.
You could've stopped there and the anecdote still would've been TOTALLY EFFING METAL.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by reverenddak »

TheNobleDrake's thinking that 3rd is about right. 4th, for sure. Due to the swingy nature of DCC RPG, a 1st-Level Warrior is about 1d3 as powerful as a 1st-level 0e D&D Figher. By 6th level they're Super-heroes, and should be the right-hand man of kings, and lords or barons of their own domains. Or inter-planer travelers.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by dark cauliflower »

smathis wrote: Hit-for-hit, I'd speculate that a 6th or 7th level Reaver would be the equal of 10 men-at-arms. And I'd extrapolate that a 6th-7th level Warrior would be about the same.
You might be right about level 6 or 7. I've done some testing on level 5 and he hasn't won so far. Went down in round 3, 5 and 9. I thought he was going to win in the 9 rounder but was unpleasantly surprised. It seems like the extra attack awarded at level 5, a d14, isn't that good. The and the deed die doesn't always give high results either and it came across as a level 3 character with a some more hit points. That extra attack did help some in the 9 rounder though. With the numbers getting knocked down their chances of hitting went down too.
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Re: Durability and Power: comparing Normal Man vs DCC Charac

Post by GnomeBoy »

What kinds of Mighty Deeds is your Warrior doing, out of curiosity?
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