Maybe another aproach to the regeneration ability and how it works, and why it's out after the Troll took fire damage:

The regeneration that normally heals the 'normal' wounds is 'busy' converting the burnt or corroded flesh to 'normally hurt' flesh. After that is done, it's back to normal regeneration.

If the troll was too heavily hurt (below -CON), it's regeneration ability s to overloaden with keeping him alive, that the single point of damage from it's vulnerability is enough to kill it.

BryonD wrote:

James Jacobs wrote:

And if a computer needs a simplification... then chances are good that the GM needed one!

Yikes, I really really disagree with that.

Yikes, I really really disagree with you.

Under the new mechanics, there is actually an incentive to use fire and acid on a troll as often as possible! Player and character agree on what to do! A fireball is still good for something once the troll has nonlethal damage. A fighter has a reason to dig out that +1 flaming longsword instead of the +2 shocking burst one he usually fights with.

I very much disagree that PF regen will cause a player to changes tactics to use fire. A group of characters can bring down a troll fast enough that 2 or 3 rounds of regen is not going to make the kind of difference that switching weapons is worth it. I'll agree that if the fighter has a "back-up" flaming weapon that is nearly as good the primary weapon, then they may as well. But that seems an improbable situation (one I've never had in a game I've run, at least).

And anyway, even in your case, there is an added 5% chance of a miss with the flaming sword and a virtually 10% chance of each attack bursting with the shocking sword. Either one of these happenings will more than off-set the advantage of stopping 5 points of regen for a single round. There is still no motive to switch.

Where you and I strongly disagree is this:

In theory, the proper way to fight a troll is use fire and acid as often as is practical.

Again, your three scenarios play out exactly as you describe. And it is awesome! At least, it is awesome when you start getting in to groups of trolls.
But the fighter is going to weigh in with his best attack, knowing full well that the troll is going to regenerate. Of course anyone with ready access to fireballs and the like is going to go to those as frequently as possible. But the fighter is just doing temporary damage to the troll and absorbing as many attacks as he can in the mean time. His job is to make the trolls be unconscious so that someone else can take care of them permanently.

Your claim that trolls are “advertised” to force characters to immediately switch to fire and acid attacks exclusively as much as they possibly can was surprising to me. I don’t feel they fail at this advertisement, because I’ve never thought they advertised it.

The tactical difference between fighting trolls and fighting ogres is huge, even though the fighter and other characters may individually go after them exactly the same. When fighting ogres or hill giants the fighter can smash away at one and hopefully the rogue can sneak attack one. The cleric can either attack another or support someone, whatever. And the wizard can blast away. Everyone knows that once the ogre goes down, that threat is done.

When fighting trolls the fighter does the same thing because he needs to deal with the immediate threat. But rather than assuming the fighter’s troll will be dealt with, everyone knows a permanent destruction will need to be applied before this situation is done. I have run fights with ten or more trolls and had more than one occasion in which one character ended up full time running around just making certain that downed trolls stayed down until someone could get free to burn them. I’ve had clerics sweat over whether or not the fighters HP are good enough to take another round and so the cleric can deal with keeping trolls from popping back up, or should he risk facing more trolls to avoid the fighter going down right now. If these had been ogres then the downed ones would be irrelevant. But as trolls, even the downed ones are neutralizing PCs and hugely impacting the tactics of the battle.

What trolls advertise is a completely different combat experience than ogres. That doesn’t make ogres boring. But it makes trolls distinct. And they very much deliver on that advertisement. Under PF rules, trolls are just ogres that you acid splash after the fight.

3X trolls don’t deliver on the advertisement you described. But that isn’t their advertisement. And, honestly, I don’t see PF trolls as delivering on your goal either. I think if you play it out you will find that to be the case. Even in your optimized hypothetical situation, the fighter is probably at least as well off just staying with his shocking burst sword. Fast healing is cool for good hit and run monsters because they get to fully reset. But for toe-to-toe creatures, like trolls, it is pretty insignificant. You beat them down using your best option to get them below 0, then you acid splash them.

I know what I expected 3X troll to deliver. And I know that they delivered it in spades many many times.

um you do realize that the arguement you just made is basically, "I've been doing it wrong this whole time and the way I've been doing it wrong is better than the new way you have of doing it" right?

No. I realize I've been doing it correctly for quite a long time and having a blast doing it that way.

No. I realize I've been doing it correctly for quite a long time and having a blast doing it that way.

You know, back in the day ( 1e was my first D&D, though I watched my mom and dad and uncles play basic,) you had regeneration and that's it, and any monster that healed rapidly had it. And honestly, I was happy with it.

When 3e came out, I poked my nose into the books and was like... what? You have regeneration, which allows you to heal damage rapidly, and fast healing, which... also allows you to heal damage rapidly, but one was more rule-complex and clunky (regeneration) and the other was easy and ran more like the old editions did, excepting the fire/acid stopping it bit (fast-healing.) Weird.

That's why I appreciate that Pathfinder is simplifying regeneration... because this is one of those cases where back in the day, we had a solution for how trolls worked, and it ran smoother than what 3rd Ed wrought. The fact that I can imagine the 'physics' of how PF regeneration works, and it doesn't cause mental disconnects about why trolls don't bite off burnt fingers and slough off burned flesh is a bonus.

If I had my druthers, PF fast-healing would kill PF regeneration, claim its name, and the Pathfinder fire-acid-stops-it thing, and be done with it. (Okay, I might still tinker it a little bit, but you know how that goes.)

I apologize for being presumptuous.

I was expressing a point of view from total sincerity and I'm still pretty shocked by the response. But, obviously the response is clear so I'll retract any complaint and just house rule the game for the best for my personal preference.

BryonD wrote:

No. I realize I've been doing it correctly for quite a long time and having a blast doing it that way.

No you haven't you specifically haven't been allowing coup de grace to kill them, that means no you haven't been. You've been doing it 95% correct with one important bit left off that made it a lot more challenging and interesting.

I'll stick with my challenging and interesting fights. And encourage others to consider trying it some time. Trust me, it is awesome fun.

I apologize for being presumptuous.

I was expressing a point of view from total sincerity and I'm still pretty shocked by the response. But, obviously the response is clear so I'll retract any complaint and just house rule the game for the best for my personal preference.

But... seriously, I think we all could stand to take it down a notch. I don't want to say that things are getting flamey, but it seems like people are starting to get a wee bit defensive and accusatory here.

I mean, we're just talking about trolls, aren't we? They're not all that important. Almost didn't make it into the Bestiary, I hear. ;)

Almost didn't make it into the Bestiary, I hear. ;)

And a better fate that would have been, for my beloved trolls to go down in history as the great terrors they were is better than the shame they now face. :P

And a better fate that would have been, for my beloved trolls to go down in history as the great terrors they were is better than the shame they now face. :P

In one of your descriptions, you had someone running around making sure that the trolls stayed down until the fight was over and they could be properly killed.

Now, you can have the same problem/setup. If the mage is "free", they can go around casting acid splash on the downed trolls (but are they far enough in the negative that this will kill them?), but they still have at least that 5% miss chance (same as the flaming sword) due to the fact that acid splash is a ranged touch spell.

Likely, the trolls will target a mage that is casting acid splash over a fighter armed with a 2 handed sword, because the fighter (as is) cannot kill a troll, but the mage can cause one to die. And, the trolls will change out where they are in the line, to allow for some regeneration.

I feel that you can still have those challenging, busy fights. But you will have to change a few of your tactics to do so. The main elements of trolls are still there - regeneration, acid and fire affect that regeneration.

I am still having a problem understanding on how the change will stop your running, busy fights.

Okay, now you're just being silly. And stop talkin' about succubi! They don't even have regenerate! :p

The troll would need to be at -23 before an acid splash would kill it. Players don't know exactly how many hp any creature is at, if it dropped at -1, -9, or what. Just dropping a troll and hitting it with a single acid splash then moving on to other threats strikes me as very foolish, since that troll may not actually be neutralized.

Also, if they wait for the troll to drop before using any acid or fire attacks, swap the troll's feats so he has Endurance and Die Hard. Then no matter how much they hit it, the troll literally never goes down.

Now, you can have the same problem/setup. If the mage is "free", they can go around casting acid splash on the downed trolls (but are they far enough in the negative that this will kill them?), but they still have at least that 5% miss chance (same as the flaming sword) due to the fact that acid splash is a ranged touch spell.

;)

Mistwalker wrote:

Now, you can have the same problem/setup. If the mage is "free", they can go around casting acid splash on the downed trolls (but are they far enough in the negative that this will kill them?), but they still have at least that 5% miss chance (same as the flaming sword) due to the fact that acid splash is a ranged touch spell.

Don't forget the downed troll gets +4 AC for being prone!

;)

Wow....and to think, this all started because I asked why undead can't have regeneration (shakes head).

Wow....and to think, this all started because I asked why undead can't have regeneration (shakes head).

I need to put my PF books on a high shelf and just assume what they say from now on....

:)

Heh, I came here to find out what was up with undead and went "Wait! They did WHAT to regeneration?" I may have gone years without reading that passage, just blissfully presuming the regen rules were pretty much like before. But you went and ruined it.

I need to put my PF books on a high shelf and just assume what they say from now on....

:)

We have been converting "piece meal" as we go through our current module, and plan on going FULL BORE PATHFINDER in our next game.

But I still have a LOT to catch up with, some of it, not so obvious ;)

As they say, life is change.

Really? You claim that anything the human brain can easily do can be easily programed? That's interesting.

The new way of doing Regeneration is better in every way and I wish I had thought of it long ago so I could have house ruled it in 3.5 games.

BryonD wrote:

Really? You claim that anything the human brain can easily do can be easily programed? That's interesting.

No, I think your stance on this thread is pointless and you are just being argumentative. If you like the old way, fine house rule it in your games.

The new way of doing Regeneration is better in every way and I wish I had thought of it long ago so I could have house ruled it in 3.5 games.

Out of curiosity, does preserving the old school flavor I quoted from the 1E MM count as "a way" amongst the "every way" you cite? Or was that simply a pointless and argumentative statement you were making?

Saying you disagreed with my statement about programming

Or was that simply a pointless and argumentative statement you were making?

The 3.0 system of Regeneration was difficult and complicated to implement. I never liked it. The 3.p way doesn't disagree with the 1E flavor of regeneration in any meaningful way to me. I'm all about tradition, I hate that Cleric's lost their right to Heavy Armour because they have had it from the beginning to 3.5, but not 3.p. But in this case, tradition hasn't been broken and defending a poor system (the 3.5 one) doesn't help enhance tradition.

Guy's, at this point you appear to be just trying to be the one to get the last poke in.

Agree to disagree and move on.

Guy's, at this point you appear to be just trying to be the one to get the last poke in.

Agree to disagree and move on.

Oh man, I've gotta get me some of those aliases. Nice one, Meepo. :D

As an aside: "keeping track of numbers" is always easier for a computer than a person. Period. I'm not trying to be antagonistic, but that really was a silly argument. :) Even in the very old games, the only issue was having the correct data structure in memory to keep track of every number you might need to; nonlethal/subdual damage has been part of the system forever; omitting it from e.g. Curse of the Azure Bonds was merely an omission, not a meaningful technical limitation. (I'm sure it reduced development time by a hair, but still.)

They're having a discussion about flaming trolls. Surely a certain amount of flaming and trolling is appropriate. :P

As an aside: "keeping track of numbers" is always easier for a computer than a person. Period.

...if my old group gets back together to finally save the Tarrasque...