Well, if it kills one of 4 party members, that's 1/4 of the party's resources... ;)
Seriously, though, ouch.
Well,
Not trying to be a snark or anything, but I'd expect just about any CR 5 to come close to killing a 5th level anything if he get's surprise round. That's just the way it is. Surprise is devastating.
I think the CR's are more calculated as 'Let's put them in an arena, open the cage doors, and see what happens'. If you take that approach, the lion is probably dead in one round, as everyone unloads on him, but with his initiative he's probably shreded someone pretty thoroughly, requiring the cleric to expend a couple of spells to heal them back up.
In other words, used about 25% of their resources, as advertised. Any monster of any CR can be overwhelming if you give them the right circumstances. Imagine a dozen CR1 goblins using long bows and snipping a level 6 party from the tops of a canyon wall. Those goblins can't total up to more than a CR3 or 4 by themselves, but the situation has boosted them up to a CR 7 or so.
In your example, I'd boost the Lion up to a CR6 based on the situation (preset ambush, only a 15% chance of the rogue seeing him). A GM has to always keep in mind that CR is highly situational. For example, a black dragon is super dangerous... unless you corner him in a large cave with no exit and collapse the rocks to trap him inside. Then while he's digging his way out you snipe him and drop flaming oil on him. Now you've taken a CR 10 threat and gotten him so he's not a threat to even a level 4 party, because of the situation.
And honestly, there are some creatures you just dont engage in melee if you can help it...dire lion has always been among them to me.It has higher speed than you, at least as good an init roll as you, and when it hides you cannot see it. Additionally, its stated environment is naturally a hiding place. It's like saying, "Oh, they can't have figured that a giant ant lion would live at the bottom of a pit trap, you'll have to raise the CR for that."
How do you suggest that you avoid melee with it, without already knowing where it is beforehand?
Wait, I thought stealth didn't work in Pathfinder?
When you're a lion the size of a bull, able to down and devour ogres
That's just not true.
Not even a great wyrm dragon can devour ogres. It's not about size, it's about things no living thing will do.
Imagine a piece of really rotten meat. Crawling with maggots. And spiders. And poison. And excrement.
Could you eat that?
Ogres are worse.
:P
It does when you don't need to move and live in an environment with concealment.
But concealment doesn't count in bright sunlight, remember?
When you're a lion the size of a bull, able to down and devour ogresThat's just not true.
Not even a great wyrm dragon can devour ogres. It's not about size, it's about things no living thing will do.
Imagine a piece of really rotten meat. Crawling with maggots. And spiders. And poison. And excrement.
Could you eat that?
Ogres are worse.
:P
Black dragons like that kind of thing.
It does when you don't need to move and live in an environment with concealment.But concealment doesn't count in bright sunlight, remember?
eally it would here. , if the lion was black maybe not, but he is the same color as his environment, not a dark ally
Black dragons like that kind of thing.
With dragons it becomes a game of "will Mikey eat it?"
eally it would here. , if the lion was black maybe not, but he is the same color as his environment, not a dark allyIt does when you don't need to move and live in an environment with concealment.But concealment doesn't count in bright sunlight, remember?
Not according to A Man In Black, it wouldn't. I'm just pointing out that he's not using his own rules.
First, let me say that I really enjoy reading your analyses on the boards, they're quite interesting. That aside, I don't have much to add to the conversation, but I will add this:
Unless specifically driven by something, I would think that a Dire Lion would be apt to live another day than waste its life on something that can take a serious chunk of its HP out. Now in this particular instance, you could make the claim that it was, for some reason, driven to get this fighter, but more often then not I would think an injured lion would flee in favor of savoring a less damaging prey. That is, as soon as it took the hit from the fighter and the rest of the party, I would think it would run away to lick its wounds. Of course, I would give the party XP for having defeated it, as normal.
I hate to feel like I'm always picking on you, MIB, so let's just say I'm picking on your scenario.
First, I agree, this critter is very dangerous.
But you need to rethink the lion's surprise round.
First, how does he attack so much? Surely not the Pounce ability, which requires a Charge, and Charge is a Full-Round action. The surprise round is only a partial action, so it's impossible to Charge or Pounce during a surprise round.
(note, even if you could bite and claw during the surprise round - let's say the DM is being sadistic today - it's still only two claws since the lion cannot use Rake unless it starts the round grappling).
So the lion will only bite, zero claw attacks.
The bite will probably hit and the Grab will take place most of the time, just as you described.
Then on the first real round of the combat Bill won't be anywhere near death. The rest of his team can act to kill the beast or heal Bill as needed, and this encounter is going to end with a dead dire lion and a living Bill (critical hits aside, of course).
Well,
Not trying to be a snark or anything, but I'd expect just about any CR 5 to come close to killing a 5th level anything if he get's surprise round. That's just the way it is. Surprise is devastating.If surprise means you just kill people, why does a lion have a Stealth bonus so high that no level-appropriate party is likely to spot it? In 3.5, its Hide check was +10 in tall grass. DC 20 is reasonable for a level 5 party. DC 25 is not.
As stated by others above, Perception is not a skill to be left out. My group also maxes out Perception in their builds (I previously houseruled under 3.5 that EVERY PC class had Spot and Listen as class skills, it makes no sense that any adventurer wouldn't). One of my favorite changes in Pathfinder is the way the skills work now. Now it makes sense for some classes to have Perception as a class skill and some not. As currently recreated, my players would have at level 5 :
Druid : 4 Ranks + 4 Wis + 3 Trained + 2 Racial = 13 Perception
Cleric : 5 Ranks + 4 Wis = 9 Perception
Wizard : 5 Ranks + 2 Wis = 7 Perception
Duskblade : 5 Ranks + 1 Wis = 6 Perception
So, even the lowest of the group get's him on a 19-20, the wizard on a 18-20, the cleric on a whopping 16-20 and the druid on a 12-20. Note that the druid is a catfolk with Scent and lots of movement when she takes a feline form (she took the shapechange ability instead of the wild shape ability) so it's very unlikely she would have failed to notice the Dire Lion.
On top of this, goblins do not have longbows in their statblocks nor is their natural environment "the top of canyon walls." Lions seriously only live in places where they can hide and then ambush things. They are ambush predators. They have three abilities in their text, and hiding in undergrowth is one of them.
Seriously? Seriously? This is the best argument you can come up with? Goblins don't have longbows in their stat blocks nor is their natural environment 'the top of canyone walls'? So goblins, despite having sentience, and despite it stating in the book that they use class levels only use the weapons in the sample statblock even if they don't have weapon proficiency with it because the only weapon they have is what's in their statblock? You run your game so rigidly that a creature that is sentient and uses class levels has exactly and only the weapons listed in the statblock for it, regardless of level or class? I think I begin to see the problem you are having getting the game to work the way you think it should.
However, even if the lion isn't expected to use one of the three abilities it has, if it pounces someone who doesn't have full plate or a d10 or better hit die that someone just dies. Against AC 15, the lion pounces for an average of 52 effing damage. If it wins init, someone just dies, in the lamest way possible.
I think we are back to the GM needing to balance the game. A CR 5 creature that you give an advantage to is going to perform as a higher CR, that's just the way the game works. Take any CR 5 creature, give them an upper hand (and Ambush is the ultimate leveler of playing fields, just ask any historian) then you have to adjust the CR on the fly. Would you be quite as surprised if a CR 6 creature almost killed a single level 5 character in one round?
I was leafing through some of the bestiary PRD files for another discussion, and I ran across the dire lion, already a nasty customer for its CR in 3.5.
...and it's been hugely buffed, as a result of buffs to rake, claw attacks, and the feat changes.
In this post, I tested Bill the 5th-level fighter, a scratch character for testing, against a handful of CR 5 opponents for demonstration purposes. They were all 3.5 opponents, because, at the time, that's what I had.
But with the buffs to a dire lion, I believe it's been pushed past even large earth elementals (who are absolutely brutal to fight in melee).
Here's Bill again.
Bill the fighter specializes in greatswordery. His stats (same 28 point buy) are 19/14/16/8/10/8 after racial and statup. His feats are Power Attack, Weapon Focus (greatsword), Weapon Spec (greatsword), Dodge, Improved Initiative, and some other junk. He has a +1 greatsword, +1 full plate, and +2 str gloves and some minor stuff. (Wiser than the +2 str gloves would be paying for a permanent Enlarge Person but let's say he's not that clever.)
52 HP
AC 21 (22 when Dodge is applied)
CMD 22
Attacks: +13 greatsword (2d6+11)And here's a PF dire lion.
The dire lion is laying in some underbrush, waiting for a meal on the hoof. When you're a lion the size of a bull, able to down and devour ogres, you tend to be a tad fearless. The lion has nestled down into the dry grass, a task it has done many times before.
Bill the fighter is at the head of the party, as they traipse down the...
Enter the arcane archer, well future arcane archer. He's from the plains and he knows about these crazy predators, he has several dire lion heads on his wall.
"Dire Lion, I'm happy for you, and I'm gonna let you finish, but Elfman has one of the best perception checks of all time!"
Elfman the 1 Diviner/4 Ranger Half-elf
5 ranks +3 class skill +1 wis + 2 racial +2 favored enemy +2 favored terrain = +15 perception vs Lions +15 stealth if in tall grass.
50% chance he sees the lion without any feats to boost it
5 ranks +3 class skill +4 dex +2 favored enemy +2 favored terrain = +16 vs lions +11
Most likely Elfman will be ambushing the lion
He knows they're bad and he doesn't want to get charged, so he lays down an entangle. 2 rounds later we have lion for dinner
If the lion ambushes Elfman, he still knows something is wrong and readies an action to entangle the first non-friendly that moves. You can't charge through that so Elfman has saved his friends and provided dinner.
Is this an unlikely character.. possibly, in a 4 person fighter wizard cleric rogue group yes. What does this prove? It proves that in the right circumstance a set monster or character can reign supreme. Putting up a +15 stealth pouncer against a group with no perception is going to do some damage, just like an invisible creature against a group without any way to deal with invisibility.
...I was leafing through some of the bestiary PRD files for another discussion, and I ran across the dire lion, already a nasty customer for its CR in 3.5.
...and it's been hugely buffed, as a result of buffs to rake, claw attacks, and the feat changes.
In this post, I tested Bill the 5th-level fighter, a scratch character for testing, against a handful of CR 5 opponents for demonstration purposes. They were all 3.5 opponents, because, at the time, that's what I had.
But with the buffs to a dire lion, I believe it's been pushed past even large earth elementals (who are absolutely brutal to fight in melee).
Here's Bill again.
Bill the fighter specializes in greatswordery. His stats (same 28 point buy) are 19/14/16/8/10/8 after racial and statup. His feats are Power Attack, Weapon Focus (greatsword), Weapon Spec (greatsword), Dodge, Improved Initiative, and some other junk. He has a +1 greatsword, +1 full plate, and +2 str gloves and some minor stuff. (Wiser than the +2 str gloves would be paying for a permanent Enlarge Person but let's say he's not that clever.)
52 HP
AC 21 (22 when Dodge is applied)
CMD 22
Attacks: +13 greatsword (2d6+11)And here's a PF dire lion.
The dire lion is laying in some underbrush, waiting for a meal on the hoof. When you're a lion the size of a bull, able to down and devour ogres, you tend to be a tad fearless. The lion has nestled down into the dry grass, a task it has done many times before.
Bill the fighter is at the head of the party, as
Wait, you're all assuming your PC's are even MAKING the perception checks. Reflexive perception checks to avoid an ambush are not always a gaurantee. I believe the original point the poster was trying to make was that the Dire Lion is BUILT to ambush the party (your average party, not a diviner/ranger/perception monkey). It's racial powers are built around stealth and a really, really nasty charge.
So I guess I see two main points;
1. The creature is designed to be used in a way that makes it nastier then it's CR reflects -- I agree completely.
2. Should a creature with a CR equivalent to the prevailing level average be killing a character in the opening round of combat? -- HELL no. this game is about fun....in what conceivable world is that fun?!?!
Wait, you're all assuming your PC's are even MAKING the perception checks. Reflexive perception checks to avoid an ambush are not always a gaurantee. I believe the original point the poster was trying to make was that the Dire Lion is BUILT to ambush the party (your average party, not a diviner/ranger/perception monkey). It's racial powers are built around stealth and a really, really nasty charge.
So I guess I see two main points;
1. The creature is designed to be used in a way that makes it nastier then it's CR reflects -- I agree completely.
2. Should a creature with a CR equivalent to the prevailing level average be killing a character in the opening round of combat? -- HELL no. this game is about fun....in what conceivable world is that fun?!?!
I guess I didn't get the point across very well. The point of my character presented was if you give one person or Dire Lion all the advantages they SHOULD win. If you have 4 drunken clerics of Caiden Kayleen or however you spell it walking along and their wisdom is down to 6 because they've been drinking for 3 days and they can't even read the label to see what they're drinking, they're not going to spot this Dire lion and they're probably going to die. If your group comes across the dire lion while he's sleeping because he just killed a buffalo and ate half of it himself and his perception is at -10 for being asleep + all the other penalties, they can sneak up and coup de grace him with a scythe.
Also for the record perception vs stealth is an opposed roll. If you get to roll a stealth check I get to roll a perception check hands down 100% of the time, otherwise your DM is cheating in my book. Unless of course your character is blindfolded or purposefully has his eyes closed and has wax in his ears. This is a pet peve of mine because I find it highly annoying when someone every five seconds wants to make a spot check, it bogs down the game and is stupid.. not ignorant, stupid.
Wait, you're all assuming your PC's are even MAKING the perception checks. Reflexive perception checks to avoid an ambush are not always a gaurantee. I believe the original point the poster was trying to make was that the Dire Lion is BUILT to ambush the party (your average party, not a diviner/ranger/perception monkey). It's racial powers are built around stealth and a really, really nasty charge.
Uhm,
No, we are not assuming. The original post stated the four characters were out hunting down whatever had been attacking travelers on the road. If you are hunting something attacking people on the road, you really do sort of have to look.
[Dire Lion] "Yeah?, well I disagree. I think Watford are a good team, they just need a new manager. Anyway Bob, you're going to die amigo..."
If in the scenario these four adventurers are going out looking for the whatever it is (in this case the dire lion) and are not being careful, not moving as quietly as possible, not trying to figure out what they might be facing by the signs left from the attacks, not using the rogue to scout for them, not moving with weapons out then they deserve to get eaten in my view. And the CR could easily remain the same. It will teach the players not to have their characters go blundering after things when they dont know what they are.
On the other hand if the party does take the above steps, they have a big advantage over the dire lion. They know what it is, they probably have an idea where it is, and it doesnt know they are coming. And are probably going to come out of the encounter with less resource loss than the CR would suggest.
This does not even touch on the IRL issues of the amount of undergrowth necessary to conceal a 6 foot tall, 15 foot long, 3500lb animal. Or the hunting fixation problems most felines suffer from once they get prey in sight.
Worth noting that the Masai have been hunting lions for generations with spears, knives and hide shields...some of them solo kills.
-Weylin
This sounds suspiciously like the old "Dragons have low CR because adventurers know they are there" technique for CR assignment. I think the merits of the dire lion should be as compared to other CR 5 monsters. Haven't gotten my bestiary, yet; so I don't know. Grrr!
Looking over other CR 5 critters he is pretty much spot on. Most have a lesser to hit number but more damage. The same hp range normally more AC, some have such fun things as rend or have breath weapons can regenerate or have reach.
Really he is in the same power scale of other CR 5 critters You can see them here take a look see
Looking over other CR 5 critters he is pretty much spot on. Most have a lesser to hit number but more damage. The same hp range normally more AC, some have such fun things as rend or have breath weapons can regenerate or have reach.
Really he is in the same power scale of other CR 5 critters You can see them here take a look see
I think I love you.
Your welcome, that was awesome of paizo to put them up was it not.
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The dire lion has two feats allowing attacks in the same round, that would occur normally in separate rounds:
Grab: allowing a grapple immediately after a succesfull melee attack
and
Pounce: allowing the 2 rakes attacks in the same round the grapple is won.
The combination of these two makes the dire lion pretty nasty.
At least, I would add the following line to the Pounce description
The creature can make the rake attacks only if he wins the grapple check (just for clarity).
A CR 3 lion and also do the same thing as can a CR2 leopard and a CR 4 tiger
::OFF TOPIC:: I can't say I agree with the entire scenario, or some of the posts about stealth (you can't break your rules just because the creature lives in that environment). If concealment (less than total concealment) is acceptable for the lion to hide in during the day it should be acceptable for everyone. So, house-rule it or go by RAW or make up your own system entirely, but give everyone the same standard.
::ON TOPIC::
That said, I do agree with OP that this lion would be rough on a party if he got surprise round advantage, or even highest initiative in first round of combat. And with a slight change to the scenario, he might even take out the whole party. In fact it could be quite a bit worse than the OP stated.
Judging from what I see on a quick look at the lion I noticed two major things: 1) Huge Stealth bonus 2) Low-light vision. Both of these give the creature the highest advantage if he is a nocturnal hunter.
So, let’s say for a second that the party didn't find him their first day out in the wilderness looking. Night falls and the make camp. Now let's say the lion tracks them to their camp, or even just happens by them.
His Stealth now works and is 100% effective because it is night time, in fact any Perception check to spot him would suffer negatives for unfavorable or even terrible conditions. He pounces and tears up the first guy. Now combat begins. You would think the lion is going to suffer now that the whole party can attack him but not necessarily. They all have a 20% miss chance because they are in the dim light of a moonlit night. The lion however doesn't suffer this miss chance to hit the party members because he has low-light vision.
Characters with low-light vision can see outdoors on a moonlit night as well as they can during the day.
This scenario would vary a bit due to racial makeup of the party and whether or not they had a camp fire going but you get the point.
Now, to be fair I would roll a percentage to see which of the party members he would attack first. I must admit, the shinny Fighter would be tempting, but imagine if he went after the Wizard of the party first, or even worse what if he took out the Cleric in round one.
That is why if you are hunting this guy, you should probably have a Ranger who is ridiculously good at tracking and you should attack the lion during the day when he is sleeping in his thicket or den or whatever.
The point of my character presented was if you give one person or Dire Lion all the advantages they SHOULD win.It's not a matter of "all of the advantages." It's a matter of "if the lion uses one of the abilities in its statblock, an ability lions in the real world use all the time when they are hunting, then a PC is likely to die."
Reasonable modifiers, not characters optimized to maximize their ability in an edge case (someone suggested a savannah-specialized, animal-focused ranger >:| ), mean that the PCs have only a slim chance to avoid this, whereas in 3.5, the dire lion had a reasonable Hide modifier and did level-appropriate damage.
I want to know what this was playtested against and what the party is expected to do against this lion without spending 2.5K gold on magic items (that's a quarter of your personal wealth at this level) or making several levels worth of anti-lion optimization choices.
Arguments by analogy, especially bad analogies (like plainly ridiculous parties or completely unlike monsters), don't answer these questions.
It is a matter of all the advantages. In this scenario the lion has been made aware of the PC's, while the PC's are assumed to be unable to spot the lion. It has had time to find cover and hide to take full advantage of it's improved stealth. It has been assumed to be able to charge through this cover, typically natural cover will also be hindering terrain and stop a charge. Everything has been stacked against the PC's. This isn't a problem, the PC's can still win, but in this scenario they SHOULD have a hard fight on their hands. Also the dire lion is by definition a one trick pony. It can't do anything but kill.
The PC's have the kill it option. They can also use a lot of other options, charm animal, calm animal, dominate animal, hold animal, calm emotions, slow, deep slumber, fear, bestow curse, blindness/deafness, hide from animals, summon swarm, grease, web, glitterdust, ray of enfeeblement, color spray, fog cloud, stinking cloud, hideous laughter, scare, ray of exhaustion all options for a party of this level, not to mention using wild empath to make it your friend.
Grab: allowing a grapple immediately after a succesfull melee attack
and
You brought up good points. One nitpick, you have to start the round already grappling to get rakes with grab. So you need minimum 2 successful grapple checks in a row to make the rakes. The pounce works as you put it.
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I don't see an issue here, either with the CR Rating or the Scenario.
Lion (modern day, 400-800lb kitty of doom), hides in tall elephant grass or savannah brush. Lion jump dude, eats his head, drags him back into grass.
If a lion gets the pounce on you, unless you are a very very tricksy kind of dude, you get eaten. That being said, there are PLENTY of defenses for this.
1: Maximize your AC/Flatfooted AC. I know Bob the Fighter is pretty decent, but it could be higher, especially if it KNOWN the party is looking for an ambush-predator (even more so if its known to be a Dire Lion).
2: Maximize your ability to act before he does. Rogue stealth, possibly while invisible (wait, the wizard cast a spell on a friend, gasp?!?), Druid AC with Scent, flying animal familiar (High grass from 90 degrees above provides NO cover, maybe concealment), diviner with "act in the surprise round" ability.
3: Maximize your grapple ability: Monk/Fighter/Barb with IUS, Imp Grapple, Enlarged and possibly Bull Strength-ed will have a CMB approaching the same as the Lion (+15 or so with just the listed stuff above, can get trickier and trickier). Do this right, and you have Heracles wrestling the Nemean Lion, rather than kitty chow in the grass.
4: Confuse the kitty. Oh, that dude you just pounced on was actually an illusion...commence beatdown. For extra evil points, that was actually a hireling named "Kibbles".
Point being, the Dire Lion is a serious threat to a Level 5 party (as I believe it should be) and requires serious planning/thought/tactics to walk away from alive.
(with a Diviner and the "Ray of Stupidity" spell-noncore, but humor me-, this becomes a non-issue. Surprise round happens, lion eats someone or not, lion becomes unconscious for a couple of days...I've seen it happen, more than a few times...)
-t
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If a lion gets the pounce on you, unless you are a very very tricksy kind of dude, you get eaten. That being said, there are PLENTY of defenses for this.
Also the night attack senario talked about earlier:
1) build easy traps ( a pit trap, a tripwire with bells on it, ect) to allow the party to be alerted as the preditor attacks
2) as others have said - the scenario included 'hunting what has been eating farmers' if the party gathers information on the type/location of the attacks, it could lead them to a boon on their perception checks as well, even without a ranger (I would rule this wouldn't work for a ranger who already was getting a bonus from favored enemy/terrain).
fire + parched grass anyone ;)