Glass Cannons in PFS

[kinevon]

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

And as mentioned, sometimes the tactics outlined for the group in the scenario specifically calls out their preferred targets. Which may or may not be "person with the heaviest armor".

Or Clerics/Divine casters, preferably Human...

[Kahel Stormbender]

Or even it could be "use save or suck spell on heaviest armored foe, then target the least armored". Or any variation. The point is that Pathfinder isn't an MMO. Okay, there is a pathfinder MMO, but PFS isn't playing it. Thus there is no real "tank" role. There's the front line fighters, who hopefully are occupying the attention of the enemies. But no Taunt abilities that force things to fight only that front line fighter.

[Zach Davis]

The Antagonize feat "draws aggro,"but it ends if it hits you or if it can't hit you due to obstacles. Plus I think you can only target a given creature once per day.

[Zach Davis]

Oh! Also doesn't work on things with animal intelligence.

[nosig]

Finlanderboy wrote:

Lau Bannenberg wrote:

My Con 12 paladin has been on the edge of death (-11 hp) so often I almost retired the character in disgust. As for actual deaths:

Hey nosig a 10 con may have died here.(the points elsewhere "could" have made a difference.)

Perhaps with more DEX he wouldn't have been hit as much? If the enemy needs a 16 to hit someone, one point of AC means you take 20% less damage (on average). But we'll never know...

[Kahel Stormbender]

Course there are diminishing returns at higher level from Dex. That +1 AC that made a huge difference at level 1 means far less at level 6. Keeping your AC high enough to matter is an ongoing process, and an expensive one. A 24 AC at level 1 makes you nigh untouchable. At level 7 things will typically hit you far more often if you're AC is still 24.

[Zach Davis]

nosig wrote:

Perhaps with more DEX he wouldn't have been hit as much? If the enemy needs a 16 to hit someone, one point of AC means you take 20% less damage (on average). But we'll never know...

I think it really boils down to this. We'll never know, because there is no clear cut answer. Character deaths are super situational. High scores in Dex and Con are both important, and there will be plenty of examples of how someone died due to a lack of one or the other(or dice that just hate you.)

People should just build their characters however they want, but without the expectation that someone will bail them out if things go wrong. This is a community and people very well might pitch in, but problems obviously start to arise when anyone whether it be the player in question or the GM think that its definitely going to happen.

[Zach Davis]

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

Course there are diminishing returns at higher level from Dex. That +1 AC that made a huge difference at level 1 means far less at level 6. Keeping your AC high enough to matter is an ongoing process, and an expensive one. A 24 AC at level 1 makes you nigh untouchable. At level 7 things will typically hit you far more often if you're AC is still 24.

And a 20 will always hit. I think I read a post by John Compton where he said a GM killed his character with an AC over 50, because lets face it crits happen. You could say the same thing about the value of HP though. At higher levels enemies hit HARD. My Dwarven Druid has over a hundred HP, but he's still been dropped in the first round.

[Buba Casanunda]

Martin Weil wrote:

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

And as mentioned, sometimes the tactics outlined for the group in the scenario specifically calls out their preferred targets. Which may or may not be "person with the heaviest armor".

Or Clerics/Divine casters, preferably Human...

Actually, I played that with one of my Clerics....

the shooter's preferred target:

I spent several rounds (maybe as many as 6? Or 8? It was a long time...) in the street taunting the shooter. I did happen to be the guy with the heaviest armor (Full Plate and a Tower Shield). If I recall correctly, my 12 DEX saved me from the one close call - and my Cleric never actually got hit.

I do remember pointing at the arrows stuck in his Tower Shield (they matched the one we found earlier).

Overall a very fun game.

OH! And that PC has a CON of 12 - but he's a Dwarf, so he only bought a 10. (And he put two points in DEX, as I like the extra point of AC more than the extra HP). His Favored Class bonus points always go to Skill Points - that way he get's 2 skill point per level.

When I ran the same game sometime later... I did shoot a 4th level Kyra dead in the street... The 12 CON didn't save her - though a 12 DEX might have...

[Katisha]

Zach Davis wrote:

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

Course there are diminishing returns at higher level from Dex. That +1 AC that made a huge difference at level 1 means far less at level 6. Keeping your AC high enough to matter is an ongoing process, and an expensive one. A 24 AC at level 1 makes you nigh untouchable. At level 7 things will typically hit you far more often if you're AC is still 24.

And a 20 will always hit. I think I read a post by John Compton where he said a GM killed his character with an AC over 50, because lets face it crits happen. You could say the same thing about the value of HP though. At higher levels enemies hit HARD. My Dwarven Druid has over a hundred HP, but he's still been dropped in the first round.

Actually a 20 is not always a hit.

If your PC can get a Miss Chance from something (several of my PCs use MistMail for this), a 20 can still miss. I know. Katisha has been missed many times - twice in one game Crits missed (I figure the armor paid for itself right there).

[BigNorseWolf]

14 con 5 character points

Toughness 1 feat

Fast learner 1 feat

Surviving 1.5 blasts from a runelord to the face because you had shield other on your animal companion.

Priceless.

[nosig]

Zach Davis wrote:

nosig wrote:

Perhaps with more DEX he wouldn't have been hit as much? If the enemy needs a 16 to hit someone, one point of AC means you take 20% less damage (on average). But we'll never know...

I think it really boils down to this. We'll never know, because there is no clear cut answer. Character deaths are super situational. High scores in Dex and Con are both important, and there will be plenty of examples of how someone died due to a lack of one or the other(or dice that just hate you.)

People should just build their characters however they want, but without the expectation that someone will bail them out if things go wrong. This is a community and people very well might pitch in, but problems obviously start to arise when anyone whether it be the player in question or the GM think that its definitely going to happen.

Agreed! +1

It just sort of bothered me when people started saying things like "I won't chip in to have someone raised BECAUSE they didn't build their PC with a 12+ CON." I just wondered if I should respond to this with "I shouldn't chip in to have someone raised/healed because they didn't build their PC with a 12+ DEX...after all, anyone not investing in DEX is just asking to be hit..." Yeah... Sheesh. Build what you want. I'm constantly amazed by the PCs people bring to the table. Sometimes I take notes, sometimes I even ask "what the heck? Why does your Wizard have a 12 INT and a 16 STR?". And every now and again I learn something new...

[Zach Davis]

Fair enough. And I would definitely say it payed for itself if you avoided two crits in the same game. You had some pretty lucky percentile rolls in that game.

You have me vaguely considering Mistmail now. You can't upgrade it because its a specific magic armor though right?

[nosig]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

14 con 5 character points

Toughness 1 feat

Fast learner 1 feat

Surviving 1.5 blasts from a runelord to the face because you had shield other on your animal companion.

Priceless.

Yeap. shield other, great spell. My Dwarf Clerics will often have Watchful Eye so that I can split the damage put on the "barbarian" who didn't invest in AC. Many times it's kept him up and in the fight. Realizing my Dwarf Clerics only have 12 CONs, and no Toughness, and put their favored class points in Skill Points....

[Silbeg]

It does come down to personal choice.

I have three wizards in PFS out of 24 characters, and all have 14 Con and I think toughness on 2/3 of them. Angelo, my tiefling conjurer, was saved by this on his first mission (at the time he also had a toad familiar, but that got retrained) - his 14hp and 14 CON at level 1 kept him alive after getting attacked by two bandits with precise strike (his after they made his DC16 will save on color spray with their -1 modifier).

At level 5, Lucius Vizzini would have died twice in the Golemworks Incident had he not had hp increased in this way as well.. In the initial combat he was left with 1hp... All the Dex in the world doesn't help if you lose initiative (yes, DEX adds to init and improved init is a thing, but that wouldn't have helped, either with how I rolled).

In the final combat he was down to single digits before he was able to get free to cast hold person to save the day (twice!). So, I can honestly say that CON saved him.

I rarely go with a con less than 14, to be honest, but I also actually play a lot of martials (or divine martials like Paladins, warpriests, and inquisitors), so my characters tend to get hit. As a friend has said, secondary armor class (or reflex saves) is hit points.

If you can play a lower con character successfully, more power to you. If you are playing an 8 CON cleric in the front line with 23 hp at 5th level, I am sorry, I don't really feel sorry for you (even less if you got that CON playing a racial with negative energy affinity, and we couldn't easily heal you). I would hope you have banked on the eventuality of your death... I might help you, financially, for your raise, but it would depend on my character, and what you managed to pull off in that time,

[Katisha]

Zach Davis wrote:

Fair enough. And I would definitely say it payed for itself if you avoided two crits in the same game. You had some pretty lucky percentile rolls in that game.

You have me vaguely considering Mistmail now. You can't upgrade it because its a specific magic armor though right?

Yep, and it's a pain if you suffer fire damage or fall in water. But it's real kewl for the RP factor.

"MistMail, the original Peek-a-boo armor" (wink)

Kortos Envoy:

It actually happened in the encounter with the Ice Drakes - I teleported the Barbarian right into combat - and the Drakes went after me. If I recall correctly, it was a Claw and a Bite that Critted (my AC is a bit low due to no armor), and I likely would have survived one of them - but not both- unless the judge rolled low. Some of the other attacks had hit....

And I actually did it wrong at the time. I got the judge to roll the miss chance. I have sense found out that I am supposed to roll it...

[Silbeg]

Unklbuck wrote:

Well I have a Lvl 10 Dwarf Wizard with a 23 Con (Belt+4) and 122 HP

18 Int with a +2 Heaband...so he uses more Buff Spells for the party...Fly, Haste, etc and more no save spells Magic Missile, etc rather than Save or Suck high DC spells.
I had Illusion as an opposition school so no access to Invisibility, Mirror Image, etc...my reasoning was if he can't avoid a hit then be able to take one.
He's been a blast to play and as some of my friends can attest to he has saved their butts but sucking up AOO's to drag them to safety

Yeah, I GMed him once, in what turned out to be a relatively lethal 3-4, and he got critters with a heavy pick... Took 44hp of damage, as I recall, and still had 3 left. Anyone else at the table would have died.

[Ethan Kaenes]

Yeah, I had to make sure I was fit. I knew that the punk meat shields were going to fail me, and let the enemies through to attack my far superior self. Guess that is what becomes of being the most powerful member of an adventuring party.

So, the rule is, I protect myself first, and destroy the enemy when I am ready.

It is such a pain in the ass to get my blood out of my beautiful clothes. Those are expensive, you know!

[nosig]

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

Course there are diminishing returns at higher level from Dex. That +1 AC that made a huge difference at level 1 means far less at level 6. Keeping your AC high enough to matter is an ongoing process, and an expensive one. A 24 AC at level 1 makes you nigh untouchable. At level 7 things will typically hit you far more often if you're AC is still 24.

Math warning - It's just math....skip the if reducing the game to numbers bothers you

If the monster hits you with 25% of it's rolls (at whatever level) - a (+1) on AC means it only hits you with 20% of it's rolls. Which means you take 20% less damage (on average).

If the monster does 5 HP, a reduction of 20% is 1 HP less. If it does 60 hp, a 20% reduction means it only does 48.

[Kahel Stormbender]

Having to go over it, but I think you may have messed up the math a little at the end, nosig.

I'm trying to go over the math to see if the error on the side of understating or overstating things. Gut feeling though says in your example it's not a 20% reduction in overall damage. I'm tempted to say the reduction in your example is smaller then you claimed though. Still meaningful, but not as big of a difference as you indicate.

Course, your figures also presuppose damage values are consistent.

[tlotig]

Last game I played was tier 6-7 with a 4th level sorcerer.
My con 14 vs con 12 was the difference between me being one shot by dragons breath and not

[nosig]

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

Having to go over it, but I think you may have messed up the math a little at the end, nosig.

I'm trying to go over the math to see if the error on the side of understating or overstating things. Gut feeling though says in your example it's not a 20% reduction in overall damage. I'm tempted to say the reduction in your example is smaller then you claimed though. Still meaningful, but not as big of a difference as you indicate.

Course, your figures also presuppose damage values are consistent.

If you get hit on a 16,17,18,19 or 20 that's a 25% chance of getting hit. 5 out of 20, or 25%.

If you get hit on a 17, 18, 19 or 20, that's a 20% chance of getting hit. 4 out of 20, or 20% (and improving the AC by one raises it from a 16 to hit to a 17 to hit.)

So... 1 hit in 5 would miss the higher AC. 1 is 20% of 5. If we average out the damage, then 1 in 5 fewer hits is a reduction of 20% of damage. So, 20% less damage. (And the Critical damage is reduced by as much, as the chance to Crit is reduced by the same amount.)

SO, if the monster hit's 25% of the time, adding 1 to the target's AC reduces the damage (on average) by 20%.

Now, if the monsters chance to hit is LESS to start with (say a 15% chance) than the addition of 1 to AC reduces the damage by an even greater percentage (33% damage reduction for adding one to the AC if the monster has a 15% chance).

If the monsters chance to hit is GREATER to start with (say a 50% chance to hit) then the addition of 1 to the target AC reduces the damage by a smaller percentage (10% for adding on to the AC if the monster had a 50% chance to hit).

Hope that helps!

Edit: OH! And 20% of 5 HP damage is 1 HP, 20% of 60HP is 12 HP, so a 20% reduction turns a 5 into a 4, and a 60 into a 48. Or 4 HP and 48 HP.

[nosig]

tlotig wrote:

Last game I played was tier 6-7 with a 4th level sorcerer.

My con 14 vs con 12 was the difference between me being one shot by dragons breath and not

And how close was the Reflex save? And how close was the INIT?

To many variables here...

SO - if you had died, would it have be "OK" for someone to say "I'm not going to chip in on raising you - cause you didn't put enough into DEX - and so died because you missed the Reflex Save"?

IMHO- No - it wouldn't have been "OK". You build your PC the way you want. The way you think you can play him. And if you die, then I'll chip in on your raise dead depending on my whim (I normally would, cause we're team mates) - not depending on how you built your PC.

[nosig]

Martin Weil wrote:

Many of my PCs have died, usually at a high enough level to afford raise dead. My 5th level Bard, due to dying not long before, was only raised due to the party donating for it.

Many of the deaths have been to having to tank or making a priority target of my PC. My 8th level Rogue died due to being the only one to hit and damage an enemy during the surprise round, but not having enough AC to prevent the last attack from confirming a crit, when he was down to 3 hit points.

My worst death, as a GM, was when a new player built an Elf Witch, and spent no points on Con, then moved up to try and save an ally who was unconscious with a CLW, but got crit by the enemy, going from uninjured straight to Con dead.

Equally, my archer, having to frontline an encounter in a 5-9, was hit by a threat from the leader of a band of enemies, saved from a confirmation by the enemy rolling a 4 (a 5 would have confirmed, only to have the damage be something of an anticlimax, 1d4.

@nosig: Katisha has been extremely lucky, IMO, not to have gone down multiple times. AoEs are a thing, targeting the PC who is healing is a thing, targeting the least armored, or a certain race is a thing. That archer Ranger with Favored Enemy Human, who deliberately targets human PCs, with Rapid Shot, in a 1-5 scenario, is real.That Magus using a keen rapier, with Shocking Grasp[, out of invisibility, against a probable squishy, is a thing.

We won't even go into things like enemies with "see in darkness" who also get Deeper Darkness as an at will SLA, and have sneak attack...

I should not say this:

Oh, I've been told that my PCs are "lucky" a lot. I figure at least part of it is "play style"... But so far, I tend to "be lucky" and not get hit enough to kill them. (Katisha has actually done damage to herself twice... But she tends to finish games without taking any damage. She has used her wand of endure elements more than her wand of cure light wounds

And I realize this now means there will be some judges who target her because I've mentioned this. I just hope I don't hit one of the ones that alters dice rolls "to raise dramatic tension" or "to teach the player a lesion"".

If you don't mind the question, What are the CONs on your PCs you mentioned above as having died to HP damage?

So far, the totals seem to be

KIA
CON=12, total of 1
CON=14, total of 2
CON=16, total of 2

[nosig]

Quentin Coldwater wrote:

Had quite some deaths, all against 14 CON characters. Can't remember them all, but some highlights:

- Level 1 Inquisitor walked into a room not knowing there were Goblins with horsechoppers there (curtain obscured the view). Provoked from two Gobbos. Both critted. It was unlikely, but I saw the rolls. Put me from 11 HP to -40.
- (Barely) level 3 Halfling Cavalier playing up in a 4-5 tier. Was foolish enough to stand on the frontline. This was my fault, really.
- Level 7-ish Inquisitor with decent AC took an AoO to flank. Enemy critted.
- Same Inquisitor at barely level 3 or 4, with four-player adjustment in My Enemy's Enemy. Ascalaphus already explained why. Got down to 4 HP in the surprise round, didn't last for long afterwards.
- Level 11 Druid. Took some friendly fire because I was dragged over the ground by a mammoth during a chase, then landed prone right in front of an invisible high-level Rogue. I survived the first attack. Then I advised the mammoth to trample over and around me, to at least deal some damage to the Rogue. I failed my save, ended on 5 HP, stupid Rogue of course had Evasion and didn't take anything. Second attack from that Rogue put me at -50. Ironically enough I took Toughness at level 11, so without it I would've been down, but no longer a target.
- Level 3 or 4 Occultist, who ironically died due to too much HP. Very defensive-focused character, uses Mind Barrier pretty much every round. Archer with three attacks put me at exactly 0 with two attacks, then rolled max damage and killed me exactly at -14. If I hadn't used that Mind Shield, I would've gone down at -4 or so and be out of the fight, but not dead.
- Gibbering Mouther on a low-level Rogue. Thing had a surprise round and I scouted ahead, so party couldn't reach me in time.

One GM has a reputation for being very kind and having only two kills on his name, both are me. The two deaths in question were the last two I listed.

Some deaths were certainly my fault, but others were just bad luck.

Can we ask what the CONs are on your PCs liked above as dying from HP damage...

Totals at this point are
CON 12, = 2
CON 14, =3
CON 16, = 2

[nosig]

Alexander McGuire wrote:

Lets see...

My support Cleric died in Waking Rune. Swapping his 12 dex and 16 con wouldn't have changed that.

My Alchemist died in a situation where the group (APL 5.5 playing up in a tier 3-7) fought 6 CR 6 creatures (3 were summons, not that we knew that) and due to the cramped quarters I provoked two attacks for every attack I made. My super high AC couldn't save me.

My Magus died to a fellow magus' shocking grasp crit (I got dominated). My super-high AC should have stopped it from confirming, but no such luck.

My Summoner got crit by a ghost, failed the fort save. I was already down a bit of hp from an earlier encounter, so took somewhere around 16d6 and died. This one was my fault because I spent several rounds trying to talk to the ghost before the ghost got fed up and attacked me. Later, I bought a jingasa.

My Sorcerer got death-attacked by an assassin and died (Failed the save AND the reroll with my at the time 4 stars!). Initiative roll was poor enough that swapping my 7 dex and 16 con and toughness for improved initiative still wouldn't have beaten the assassin on initiative.

My 16 dex, 16 con fighter survived being crit by a X4 trap a devious GM used a monster's ability to push me into. Not having toughness or having a slightly lower con would have killed me.

My Tank Alchemist with 12 dex and 16 con survived being crit by a X4 trap that took him from full hp to -2. If I had only had a 12 con I'd have been dead.

Watched an ally's summoner with a 10 con die to a slay living from full HP. He was in the right tier, just didn't have the HP. Dude survived when the GM later realized that we should have been playing with the 4-player adjustment and the monster that had slay living would have been removed.

Watched an ally's sorcerer with a 10 con die in the first round of the first encounter by an "AOE" that rolled average damage (for that AOE) with a reflex save DC of 31. The character was 8th level in a 7-8 scenario. He didn't make any tactical mistakes, but...

You listed 2 of your PCs with CON 16 as dying by HP damage, but didn't list CON on 3 others (Alchemist, Magus, Summoner) ...

Totals are
CON 16 - 4KIA so far
CON 14 - 3 KIA so far
CON 12 - 2 KIA so far

[Muser]

Sometimes we coddle, other times we don't.

I know some players locally who neglect their saves because they seem to always roll really well. I never roll well(5 ones and 7 fours in a recent combat, for instance), so I tend to play it on the safe side(and run it too, with home campaigns) by simply not using some classes. Anything without inbuilt attack bonuses and/or rerolls/roll 2, pick better, I'm wont to skip. Furthermore the less I have to lower my hitting changes to get more damage, the better. Deadly Aim? Never. Power Attack? Maybe, with enough buffing.

[nosig]

UndeadMitch wrote:

The Many Deaths of UndeadMitch:

My -2 almost died from a carnivorous blob, would have been dead without 12 con.

My -3 took a Destruction right on the chin, that sucked, but since I was partying with some A+ individuals they helped me out with the cost of the True Res.

My -4 perma-died during a TPK at level one during The Godsmouth Heresy fighting that thing that comes up out of the pit.

My -5 perma-died during a TPK in First Steps I, thanks to Color Spray and Ledford.

My -6 perma-died during a TPK during In Wrath's Shadow, this was mainly due to playing up with my Thassilonian Evoker Ifrit after being encouraged to play up for the [REDACTED] on the cert. The entire scenario was a cluster. We had someone that didn't remember that he had played this until after the first fight that then dropped, leaving us with four (three sevens and my third level). We TPK'd in the final fight, I was dropped before I even got to act because surprise round.

My -9 took a flaming burst greataxe crit to the face, way past dead from full.

CONs please? On the dead ones....Thanks!

[nosig]

Dorothy Lindman wrote:

I'm on character number 25. I've retired 2, with 4 more in the upper tier. Most of them are melee builds. Only 2 have Cons over 12.

I've had exactly 1 character death, and that one was hit by an invisible attacker who critted with an intensified shocking grasp with sneak attack, and the GM rolled near max damage. The character went from unhurt to 10 below dead in one shot. That character had a 14 Con.

YMMV.

Looks like my totals.

So, 25 PCs, only 2 with a CON over 12 and one of those is the only KIA...

Totals are now:
CON 16 - 4 KIA
CON 14 - 4 KIA
CON 12 - 2 KIA

[nosig]

RealAlchemy wrote:

Since we're counting character deaths ...

One paladin taking a 200 foot fall. At L7 20d6 could easily leave you SOL unless you have a very high Con.

CON?

RealAlchemy wrote:

One dwarf magus taken to the bottom of Absalom harbor and drowned because he didn't have the CMD to escape a devilfish. He had a 16 Con, which isn't bad. He also had the devilfish down to single digits before dying.

I don't think this one counts for the totals - Not KIA by HP damage.

RealAlchemy wrote:

Same magus caught in black tentacles, cloudkill, and (Most importantly) silence. The last effect negated the boots of escape I specifically bought to get out of that type of situation. When he finally got out with very few HP remaining, the surviving bad guy lightning bolted him.

One elf rogue failing both phantasmal killer saves. In my defense, this was at about 3 AM and I was no longer thinking straight on tactics or I might have approached the final encounter differently.

Note that only one of these (the rogue) had a 10 Con.

As said above, YMMV.

And I don't think the Rogue counted as it really wasn't HP damage...

So totals are:

CON 16 - 5 KIA
CON 14 - 4 KIA
CON 12 - 2 KIA

[nosig]

Muser wrote:

Lives lost on the field:

4961-3: Failed every attack against a spider swarm and got eaten. Con 14 would have saved him, funnily enough.

4961-4: Took something like 50 damage after a crit and some sneak attacks from an invisible stalker hiding in a hedge maze. Con 14 but no fave class bonus. Fortunately this was before the module rules were finalized so her death didn't stick.

4961-5: Vescavor enema + poison + 3 negative levels + confused alchemist force coning everything. Bigger fort save would have saved me.

4961-7: Ended up prone next to 2 large earth elementals. A bit more hp would have been preferable.

4961-10: Bonekeep 2's boss. Failed every save. 66 hp wasn't enough!

My dice hate me. They hunger the blood of player characters and mine are no exception.

Adding one to the CON 14 total, but what are the other PCs CONs? For the ones' that died to HP damage...

[Buba Casanunda]

Quentin Coldwater wrote:

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:

Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:

Pathfinder play isn't a classic MMORG. You can't rely on a character to "hold aggro" to anywhere near the same degree. You can try to position yourself, and there are a few limited aggro directing effects, but thinking in terms of playing Pathfinder like WOW is a good way to a new character.

Well, yeah. My limited experience of trying to do the 'tank' type thing is that the GM deliberately moves everything away from the 'tank' unless the party is in 'fireball formation' and can't do that.

*Every* *single* *time*

Almost like there's an unspoken rule to target all the 'weak' characters at the table...

It really depends. In a lot of cases, creatures are mindless and will hit the first target they see, but there are also many cases where there's no tactics printed or they're smart enough to see that trying to hit 25 AC with a +8 doesn't work, and they'll move on to different targets.

I think he's talking about the times the monster never even swings on the PC with a good AC. Even the ones that LOOK like they don't have one...

First encounter:
Judge: "What's you AC again?"
Player with a grin: (something ridiculous)

Following encounters the monsters ignore the "hard to hit guy"....

[BigNorseWolf]

nosig wrote:

I shouldn't say this

Most PC deaths I've seen happen from things that the vague concept of "better play" wouldn't prevent: particularly when DM's and the scenarios area little surprise round happy.

Double 20's with max damage crits happen. If you favor builds that work from behind the meatshields they don't happen all that often. But if you play melee murphy's rule of combat is in effect: if the enemy is in range then so are you.

[MadScientistWorking]

TJ Brooks wrote:

Andrew Christian wrote:

I was playing last night, and another player was playing Kyra. She apparently has a 14 Charisma. He wanted to deselect while channeling, and could only do 2 people.

GM: Dang! I thought she was better built than that.

Me: What?!

Yeah, this was a secondary or tertiary ability in a 20-point buy, and she was getting slammed for only having a 14. Probably one of the best pregens.

Use eagle's splendor, Kyra!

As for the OP's bard cannon, I'm just confused by it. A core bard with 18 Cha is gonna do... what exactly? Sure their DC's are high, but like bards don't have whole lot of offensive damaging spells, especially not in the core book only. They'd be a good controller maybe?

Fun fact that was the wrong bard. The bard he's thinking of is still alive and honestly even made me cringe. The bard that died had an AC in the range of my actual tank and that character has had investments in her stats whereas the bard didn't. I also made the goofy assumption that bards are on par for support compared to mesmerists which they aren't even close. Higher casting stats drastically favor the mesmerist compared to the bard.

[BigNorseWolf]

MadScientistWorking wrote:

. I also made the goofy assumption that bards are on par for support compared to mesmerists which they aren't even close. Higher casting stats drastically favor the mesmerist compared to the bard.

The mesmerist is still a little new, but mesmerist support seems to be situational and tactical whereas bard support is more +'s. They're very different types of support that are very hard to compare.

[nosig]

So far no one has listed one of their KIA PCs as having a CON of less than 12.

And of the dozen PCs so far listed, only two have 12s....

Totals are

CON 16, 5 PCs KIA
CON 14, 5 PCs KIA
CON 12, 2 PCs KIA...

Wow, I wasn't expecting this... I figured it would be about an even split. But it's looking like the HIGHER the PCs CON, the MORE likely it is to die from HP damage. But it is a real small sample size...

Perhaps the people posting don't have low CON PCs?

Or what?

[BigNorseWolf]

Or perhaps no one plays PCs with cons of less than 12 so they don't exist in large numbers to be killed? Kind of like no blind pilot has ever crashed a commercial airline. They must be doing something right.

[nosig]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

nosig wrote:

I shouldn't say this

Most PC deaths I've seen happen from things that the vague concept of "better play" wouldn't prevent: particularly when DM's and the scenarios area little surprise round happy.

Double 20's with max damage crits happen. If you favor builds that work from behind the meatshields they don't happen all that often. But if you play melee murphy's rule of combat is in effect: if the enemy is in range then so are you.

Actually, I have more than one "scout" that works in front of the PCs... (And I never said "play better". I just said I must have a different "play style". Not better - just different.)

Two always go in the surprise round (Divination Wizard), and have very high INIT.

Judge: Surprise round!
"Rogue": If I don't Percieve anything with an XX, I cast vanish and 5' step to here.

Edit: Double 20s happen 1 time in 400. And a Miss Chance still applies. (20% raises it to one in 480 I think...)

[nosig]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

Or perhaps no one plays PCs with cons of less than 12 so they don't exist in large numbers to be killed? Kind of like no blind pilot has ever crashed a commercial airline. They must be doing something right.

Could be...

Wait. I play them. And at least one other poster listed 23 others.

But we only had 2 KIAs between us (both with PCs with CONs above 12).

Edit: so that is...

50+ PCs with CONs of 12 or less - zero KIAs
6 or 8 PCs with CONs of 14 - 2 of which have died...

Bah! I post to much - time to go to bed.

[BigNorseWolf]

nosig wrote:

Could be...

Wait. I play them. And at least one other poster listed 23 others.

But we only had 2 KIAs between us (both with PCs with CONs above 12).

That doesn't tell you anything. You would have to know not only the cons of the people that died but the cons of the entire population. I mean, no ones reported a death of a 5 constitution elf. Either they're really good at living or.. they're just not a very popular build choice.

Thats before you get into variables like characters that can stay in the back where its safe(er) tend to have lower cons whereas people who get up close and personal tend to have higher ones but also tend to die more often because their job is dangerous. Kind of like lumberjacks are more likely to be killed in the woods than office workers doesn't make them better woodsmen.

There's also play habits. You've stated a few times that you walk away from oncoming train wrecks of tables. Some people aren't as picky.

What it comes down to for me is that no one can articulate what exactly it is about their play thats better thats allegedly leading to the fewer deaths.

[Nefreet]

Of course, counting the number of Con 16 deaths is a little pointless, because you're missing all the times that having that score prevented dying.

Edit: as an example, take a 10th level character with a Con of 16 that's lowered to 8 HP from damage. Having a Con of 12 would mean that character was instead killed, but nobody thinks in those terms.

[Kahel Stormbender]

Buba Casanunda wrote:

Quentin Coldwater wrote:

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:

Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:

Pathfinder play isn't a classic MMORG. You can't rely on a character to "hold aggro" to anywhere near the same degree. You can try to position yourself, and there are a few limited aggro directing effects, but thinking in terms of playing Pathfinder like WOW is a good way to a new character.

Well, yeah. My limited experience of trying to do the 'tank' type thing is that the GM deliberately moves everything away from the 'tank' unless the party is in 'fireball formation' and can't do that.

*Every* *single* *time*

Almost like there's an unspoken rule to target all the 'weak' characters at the table...

It really depends. In a lot of cases, creatures are mindless and will hit the first target they see, but there are also many cases where there's no tactics printed or they're smart enough to see that trying to hit 25 AC with a +8 doesn't work, and they'll move on to different targets.

I think he's talking about the times the monster never even swings on the PC with a good AC. Even the ones that LOOK like they don't have one...

First encounter:
Judge: "What's you AC again?"
Player with a grin: (something ridiculous)

Following encounters the monsters ignore the "hard to hit guy"....

Assuming the encounter is directly related to the others (From Under Ice for example) and one of the badguys gets away to warn others, this could be legitimate.

"Oh man, it was horrible. There was this one guy wearing bring pink robes. Nothing seemed to ever hit him. He just kept coming, took out Carl and Earl all on his own. Didn't even use a weapon, just kept slapping us."

[Kahel Stormbender]

nosig wrote:

So far no one has listed one of their KIA PCs as having a CON of less than 12.

And of the dozen PCs so far listed, only two have 12s....

Totals are

CON 16, 5 PCs KIA
CON 14, 5 PCs KIA
CON 12, 2 PCs KIA...

Wow, I wasn't expecting this... I figured it would be about an even split. But it's looking like the HIGHER the PCs CON, the MORE likely it is to die from HP damage. But it is a real small sample size...

Perhaps the people posting don't have low CON PCs?

Or what?

The ones getting hit most often, are often the ones who charge forth to engage the enemy directly. Which means they often go "You know what, I WILL be hit. It's inevitable. I need to survive those hits. So more constitution is good".

My kineticist hasn't been killed yet. Come close enough to worry a few times, but hasn't dropped below zero even. Then again, I KNOW she's a ranged combatant. So she tries to stay at range. And while it hasn't really helped much yet, she has the possibility to ignore ranged attacks from bows and crossbows.

[Wei Ji the Learner]

Buba Casanunda wrote:

I think he's talking about the times the monster never even swings on the PC with a good AC. Even the ones that LOOK like they don't have one...

First encounter:
Judge: "What's you AC again?"
Player with a grin: (something ridiculous)

Following encounters the monsters ignore the "hard to hit guy"....

*THIS*

"My AC is at 29 with fighting defensively currently. I'm wearing a pretty nifty wooden shield and it looks like some sort of fine clothing. Glammered agile breastplate"

All the critters/opponents:

Hmm. This gal over here with chain mail on looks a lot easier to hit than that guy in the fine clothing. Let's focus fire on her instead!

[Kahel Stormbender]

Might have been a case of "that gal over here with chain mail on looks a lot more dangerous then that guy in the fine clothing. Let's focus fire on her so she isn't killing us".

[Rei]

A quick overview of my character deaths and almost-deaths:

-1: Pulled like three encounters together by semi-accident (one of them actually wasn't pullable, but we didn't notice the GM's mistake until five years later) and got steamrolled. Less a case of Con 14 not being enough and just bloody stupidity. Permadead.
-3: Same swarm episode Muser mentioned above, plus a case of added stupids from little old me. I actually can't recall what this character's Con was, but it can't have been above 12. It wouldn't have helped, I was too stupid at the time to have survived no matter what. Permadead.
-5: During a very tense scenario (that ended in humiliation) this character was standing in a swarm at 1 HP and trying to decide whether to heal herself or heal the unconscious arcane archer in the swarm next to her. Because she was NG (heading into LG and paladin levels) she healed the archer and dropped to -13 on the swarm's next two turns while the rest of the party struggled to slay it. She would have bled to death on her next turn had the rest of the party not managed to kill the swarm and run over on the very last turn before hers. So Con 14 did save that character there.
-6: Died once so far (he's level 13 now and in the middle of a module) and almost died far too many times. The actual death was him scouting and getting shot in the face with drow poison, then getting CdG'd because the tactics said so and also because half the party getting CdG'd actually prevented a TPK (the mission was still a failure). He's also squeezed into a small space and gotten immediately shanked by several opponents (Aegis of Recovery saved him there), fallen into a pit and gone unconscious next to a hungry ghoul at level 2 (the rest of the party got there in time), almost got sneak attacked to death by a teleporting outsider (until we figured there was no way it would have seen him with the Stealth roll he pulled off and Kyra got blown to chunks instead), gone unconscious in countless other battles especially at low levels, and once almost got nuked by his own life partner. Con 10, later Con 12 with a belt, probably caused most of these.
-7: When a greater earth elemental punches you in the face several times at level 7, no Con is high enough (in this case, Con 12 - he's a damn tengu and there's a reason this character is retired).
-11: This was a one-short-of-TPK and the character failed a Fort save. His Fort must have been like +8 at the time (level 4) so Con 12 contributed less to this death than the bad roll and very difficult module did. Later, Bonekeep 2 happened. Most of the party was down, he was the last target remaining and actually stabilized (to his detriment), so Con 13 again wasn't much of a culprit. A botched Ref save was more to blame and his Dex is 18.
-15: First-level magus vs. longsword crit for 3d8+27. Con 14 does nothing at that point. RIP Kirza, we hardly knew ye. Permadead.

[Woran]

Bob Jonquet wrote:

Tineke Bolleman wrote:

I've not had a character die yet

I will talk to Auke about that and see if we can't correct that little oversight ;-)

Sure! I'd love to play more :P

[UndeadMitch]

Nosig, you should not assume that only having one death out of 30+ characters is typical. I cringe at the thought of only having two stats above ten, myself, but whatever works for you. I cringe at you drawing such ridiculously skewed results from a handful of people, and using that to back your assertions. Wait, the people in the front protecting the squishies are often the ones that die of HP damage? Amazing! Any other pearls of wisdom to share?

The thing we should take out of this thread is that we should all shut the hell up and let each other play what we choose, without judgment. Also, we should let a character's actions during a scenario decide whether or not we decide to chip in on a raise, and not their build.

Edit: That came off slightly more caustic than I intended. *Shrugs.*

[The Fox]

I've only experienced a couple of character deaths.

My -2 (a paladin) died an inglorious death at a high level (9th?) game run by Walter Sheppard. She has Con 10. If she had Con 16 or 18, she might have survived, maybe? I'm not really sure actually. She took massive sneak attack damage during a surprise round, and dropped before half of the antagonists were done attacking. We nearly TPked in that one, actually.

I have had one other character death (I don't remember which character number he was). He died from Str drain by a shadow. He had Con 12. Obviously he would have still died even if he had Con 20. Or 200. A higher Str score probably would have saved him. But you never know.

I think I have only 1 other character who has Con 10. Most seem to be at Con 12, but a couple are higher. The highest Con score I have is 16, I think (my barbarian).

In my opinion, players should build and play the character they want to play and not worry about what other people think. It's a game.

Story Time:

About 10 years ago, I played in Paizo's very first AP, The Shackled City, in a 3.5 game group. At the time that we started the campaign, there was a similar "glass cannon" thread on the WotC messageboards, and the general consensus was that wizards and sorcerers "needed" a Con of 12+ or they were "unplayable."

Of course, I built a sorcerer with the intention of trying to play one with a low Con. We rolled for stats in that campaign, and my lowest roll was a 10. So I asked the GM if I could lower my score to 8 or 9, so that I could dump Con, and he agreed.

There were jokes from the other players about my "glass cannon," but no one objected.

That character survived until the end of the campaign, at 20th level. He died a couple times along the way, but not until high level. He didn't even take a single hp of damage until level 4 because he was able to compensate for low hp with having a high Dex, and magical protections. Everyone at the table was shocked when he was first hit.

The bottom line is that this particular character turned out to be one of my favorite characters ever. His nom de guerre was "The Fox."

I owe all those nay-sayers a debt of gratitude for inspiring me to play an "unplayable" character all the way to level 20 in my first-ever AP.

[Ascalaphus]

nosig wrote:

Kahel Stormbender wrote:

Course there are diminishing returns at higher level from Dex. That +1 AC that made a huge difference at level 1 means far less at level 6. Keeping your AC high enough to matter is an ongoing process, and an expensive one. A 24 AC at level 1 makes you nigh untouchable. At level 7 things will typically hit you far more often if you're AC is still 24.

Math warning - It's just math....skip the if reducing the game to numbers bothers you

If the monster hits you with 25% of it's rolls (at whatever level) - a (+1) on AC means it only hits you with 20% of it's rolls. Which means you take 20% less damage (on average).

If the monster does 5 HP, a reduction of 20% is 1 HP less. If it does 60 hp, a 20% reduction means it only does 48.

The problem with this is that if enemy to-hit rises fast enough, you get into the other side of things.

If an enemy only needs to roll a 4 to hit you, raising AC by 1 will only reduce damage by 6.67%. Getting AC high enough to be meaningful isn't practical for all classes/builds; for many of them that would consume so much capital you wouldn't be able to do anything else.

I'm thinking that if I can't hit AC 30 by level 8, should I even bother? It might be more realistic to build for surviving at least a single hit, and killing the enemy with at most one full attack.

I was playing with my level 10 paladin last week and some idiot NPC sundered his armor. I was really considering whether it wouldn't be more practical to go unarmored than to accept the movement penalties for some lump that only gave me a +8. At that level, if you're going to have AC 22, you might as well not have AC. The only thing it's protecting you from is summoned monster speedbumps.