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I looked up all the ACs from the monsters under “A” and “B” in Bestiary 1 and cross referenced those with Table 2-5 in the Gamemastery Guide and tallied the ACs into bins according to whether they were greater than High, High, Moderate, and less than Moderate and observed the following totals:
> High: 17
High: 21
Moderate: 12
< Moderate: 3
I stopped after "B" so I can't say with certainty if this trend holds but it sure looks like they skew high to me.
I heard that Jason Buhlman said somewhere that the design goal was to keep the success rate at about 55% on average which makes sense to me. But with this distribution, even a fully kitted out fighter on a good day is going to have a hard time keeping up, especially against bosses. And yes, I understand this is what flanking, demoralize, trip, inspire courage, etc. are for but even so, this makes it really hard to ever feel like anything more than marginally competent as a martial. (Oh and good luck to the casters trying to land an Acid Arrow without True Strike.)
Moreover, in a group with 6 players, having to wait all that time to finally get your turn only to wiff is super disappointing. Like, if I use all 3 of my actions to strike then at least one of those attacks should land at least 70-80% of the time otherwise it starts to get really frustrating. And this happens a lot when fighting bosses.
First - the Bestiary only covers a portion of the typical opposition that PC's will face. NPC's make up a large part of the opposition, and many will fit the narrative 'area' of having more moderate AC.
Second - If you're having trouble hitting things on your turn, take steps to swing that in your favor. Look for Status Bonus to Hit, Status Penalty to enemy DCs, Flatfooted, and Circumstance to Hit. You can easily get it to where your first attack as a non-fighter should be hitting on a 2-6 against a wide range of opponents, even those with high AC's.
Third - Don't use all three actions to Strike. I can't stress enough that a third action to Strike is a bad choice and you're extremely unlikely to hit with it - once you're in the range where you can reliably aid, aiding another characters first strike with no MAP is a much better use of an action.
In general, looking for ways to make your FIRST strike reliable and only falling back on a second and third strike when ways to support your parties first-strike accuracy are exhausted will result in better accuracy and effectiveness all around.
Pathfinder 2E is a team game, and trying to play outside of that context will result in a challenging experience. Martials in PF2E are WTF-Awesome, but not in a 'stand there and swing three times' sort of way. More of in a "I rolled a 13 and crit you for a bazillion damage" kind of way.
I just went and did "O" to highlight why what seems like a trend probably isn't and you'd need to compile the enter data-set to draw any conclusions with any useful level of accuracy:
> high: 3
high: 3
moderate: 2
< moderate: 6As for the experiential part of this - how it plays out at the table - My group running a 6-person party has had no issues with hitting, not even against "bosses."
And incidentally have only landed critical hits when casting acid arrow so far.
O is certainly a skewed dataset due to Ogres. A seems less skewed to me. My impressions from the game are that high AC is the most common, not moderate.
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I just went and did "O" to highlight why what seems like a trend probably isn't and you'd need to compile the enter data-set to draw any conclusions with any useful level of accuracy:
> high: 3
high: 3
moderate: 2
< moderate: 6
Did you just jump straight to "O" knowing that lower ACs would be there or did you randomly pick that letter? Also you have only 14 observations here compared to 53 for me so I'd say that if anything your data has less evidence than mine.
And no, you don't need to compile the entire data set to spot a trend.
Second - If you're having trouble hitting things on your turn, take steps to swing that in your favor. Look for Status Bonus to Hit, Status Penalty to enemy DCs, Flatfooted, and Circumstance to Hit. You can easily get it to where your first attack as a non-fighter should be hitting on a 2-6 against a wide range of opponents, even those with high AC's.
Um, I specifically called out these things:
And yes, I understand this is what flanking, demoralize, trip, inspire courage, etc. are for
You can easily get it to where your first attack as a non-fighter should be hitting on a 2-6 against a wide range of opponents, even those with high AC's.
I haven't seen this, but I'm happy to be proven wrong. What would be an example against an on level or higher enemy with high/extreme AC where a fighter only needs a 2-6 to hit?
Third - Don't use all three actions to Strike. I can't stress enough that a third action to Strike is a bad choice and you're extremely unlikely to hit with it - once you're in the range where you can reliably aid, aiding another characters first strike with no MAP is a much better use of an action.
I understand how subtraction works. Also are you referring to capital "A" Aid? To be fair, we probably aren't using Aid enough. But Aid is a reaction and so I don't see how that is a better use of an action.
I'll file this under "I used to hit 95% of the time with my first attack in PF1 and now I feel incompetent" category.
I never played PF1 so I wouldn't know.
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I'll file this under "I used to hit 95% of the time with my first attack in PF1 and now I feel incompetent" category.
I'll file this under "an even leveled monster does not have to waste actions on buffing and debuffing in order to hit better than all the players" category.
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You can easily get it to where your first attack as a non-fighter should be hitting on a 2-6 against a wide range of opponents, even those with high AC's.I haven't seen this, but I'm happy to be proven wrong. What would be an example against an on level or higher enemy with high/extreme AC where a fighter only needs a 2-6 to hit?
I agree, this does not match any reality I have seen. The lowest roll we have needed to hit any enemy that wasn't so low level as to be irrelevant is a 12.
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Having already done about 75% of the work in this regard:
< Low: 1
Low: 15
Mod: 37
High: 127
Extreme: 13
> Extreme: 0
This covers literally every monster from 10th level up (except a couple of the metallic dragons; their stats are very much in line with the others as well as good aligned, so not likely foes, but I'll get to them eventually) and a broad selection of monsters from -1 through 9 (I'm filling in that when I have time/inclination). Only Bestiary 1, Bestiary 2 is going to be its own long slog.
You can see what's accounted for here:
https://github.com/Draco18s/PF2StatisticsData/tree/master/Assets/Resources/ specific_monsters.
If you're interested in other attributes:
Also note that many monsters do not fit easily into a given category, so the nearest match was made.
ATK
wrst: 0
low: 3
low: 3
mod: 33
high: 127
ext: 25
bnk: 4
AC
wrst: 0
low: 15
low: 15
mod: 37
high: 127
ext: 13
bnk: 0
ABILITY_DC
wrst: 0
low: 1
low: 1
mod: 15
high: 130
ext: 21
bnk: 1
PERCEPT
wrst: 0
low: 33
low: 33
mod: 106
high: 40
ext: 2
bnk: 1
FORT
wrst: 0
low: 29
low: 29
mod: 61
high: 85
ext: 15
bnk: 0
REFX
wrst: 1
low: 55
low: 55
mod: 85
high: 35
ext: 3
bnk: 1
WILL
wrst: 1
low: 74
low: 74
mod: 72
high: 36
ext: 4
bnk: 0
STEALTH
wrst: 3
low: 34
low: 34
mod: 44
high: 39
ext: 8
bnk: 3
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I understand how subtraction works. Also are you referring to capital "A" Aid? To be fair, we probably aren't using Aid enough. But Aid is a reaction and so I don't see how that is a...
The Aid Reaction requires you to have spent An Action to prepare to Aid.
Example of Fighter vs. AC at most extreme case I can find - Extreme AC at level 20 is 48. A level 20 fighter has +38 to hit (+20 level, +8 proficiency, +7 stat, +3 item), meaning that they need +8 to their hit roll to hit on a 2...
Available to them is -2 target AC from Flatfooted, +3 Status (from Heroism), +3 circumstance (from aid, goes to +4 if you have a legendary assistant or something like Helpful Halfling), and an easy -2 targets AC from a success on Scare to Death (or any other source of Sickened, Frightened, Clumsy, etc. that reliably imposes these conditions).
Which means they generally have at least 10 points of available accuracy they can draw on from the rest of the party to hit an extreme, on level AC at level 20.
But that's level 20 you say! What about level 10?
Extreme AC is 33, Fighters are +23 (+10 level, +6 proficiency, +5 stat, +2 item). You need +8 accuracy (hmm... similar). You still at this level have easy access to - +1 status from Heroism, +1 circumstance (+2 about 50% of the time from aid), -2 target AC from flat-footed, and -1 target AC from Demoralize (potentially -2 from Fear, Phantasmal Killer, etc.). Thats a totally reliable +5, with +7 contingent on critical success vs. DC 20 aid checks, or normal failures vs. spells. Still doable to easily get into the 2-4 range to hit.
But what about LEVEL 1?! The earliest of levels?
Extreme AC is 19, Fighters are only +9 to hit (+1 level, +4 proficiency, +4 stat). Status bonuses to hit aren't common (need a bard), but you still get +1 from aid part of the time, -2 to target AC from flat footed, and -1 to -2 easily from Demoralize or Fear. That still a reliable 3-5 point shift, though it is notably harder to get to hitting on a 2 early on.
That said, even in this worst case - the fighter can be hitting on a 6 and critting on a 16 with just a bit of party investment (most of which is unlimited), against the highest tier of AC of a equal level foe.
Accuracy isn't really that bad - you just have to put in the work in PF2E. You can't build for it to just happen, you have to actually play the game well.
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Third - Don't use all three actions to Strike. I can't stress enough that a third action to Strike is a bad choice and you're extremely unlikely to hit with it - once you're in the range where you can reliably aid, aiding another characters first strike with no MAP is a much better use of an action.I understand how subtraction works.
That was needlessly salty on part. I apologize for that.
What I am trying to say is that if we *assume* taking all 3 actions as strikes (regardless of whether we actually do or not) then we should expect to hit at least once about 70-80% of the time.
Assuming the designers' stated goal of 55% success rate (not including MAP) then we get (assuming full MAP) the following miss chances:
0.45 * 0.7 * 0.95 = 29.925% chance to miss all 3 times or equivalently 70.075% chance to hit at least once - within my original claim.
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I'll file this under "I used to hit 95% of the time with my first attack in PF1 and now I feel incompetent" category.I'll file this under "an even leveled monster does not have to waste actions on buffing and debuffing in order to hit better than all the players" category.
Working as intended.
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Working as intended.I'll file this under "I used to hit 95% of the time with my first attack in PF1 and now I feel incompetent" category.I'll file this under "an even leveled monster does not have to waste actions on buffing and debuffing in order to hit better than all the players" category.
You mean, giving me additional actions, that I would not need if I had better hard stats to beginn with? Then yes.
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I understand how subtraction works. Also are you referring to capital "A" Aid? To be fair, we probably aren't using Aid enough. But Aid is a reaction and so I don't see how that is a...The Aid Reaction requires you to have spent An Action to prepare to Aid.
Thank you, I forgot about that.
Example of Fighter vs. AC at most extreme case I can find - Extreme AC at level 20 is 48. A level 20 fighter has +38 to hit (+20 level, +8 proficiency, +7 stat, +3 item), meaning that they need +8 to their hit roll to hit on a 2...Available to them is -2 target AC from Flatfooted, +3 Status (from Heroism), +3 circumstance (from aid, goes to +4 if you have a legendary assistant or something like Helpful Halfling), and an easy -2 targets AC from a success on Scare to Death (or any other source of Sickened, Frightened, Clumsy, etc. that reliably imposes these conditions).
Where is the +7 stat bonus coming from? It's my understanding that status bonuses don't stack.
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I would say that things are more challenging in PF2 and that is a good thing. I am not a mechanical metric kind of person, but it feels more balanced and that if you don't play smart you could get your proverbial clock cleaned.
You have to play and work smart as a team in PF2. The min/max power builds are gone as are the scene and show stealers.
I was critical of Paizo wanting to change to PF2, as I felt and still fill PF1 is a great system and game, but I really get all the changes and why we have PF2 and I really like PF2 as it makes Pathfinder I think stand more independently on its own two legs.
Well, the GMG guidelines DO say:
Because AC is one of the most important combat stats, you need to be more careful with setting this number for any creature you expect will end up in a fight. Low AC typically fits spellcasters, who compensate with their selection of powerful spells. Most creatures use high or moderate AC—high is comparable to what a PC fighter would have. Reserve extreme AC for a creature that is even better defended; these values are for creatures that have defenses similar in power to those of a champion or monk.
So your grouping of letters A & B having 33 creatures in "high or moderate" vs only 20 above or lower seems to match this, especially with high AC seeming to be the default suggestion.
That said, the first 2 letters of the alphabet seems like a rather poor sample size considering it does not take into account things like creature type, with nearly all the Celestials starting with the letter A and likely skewing results towards traits typical of them.
Finally, it is important to note that AC isn't a standalone value divorced from other aspects of the statblock with the GMG giving this suggestion:
COMPENSATING WITH HP AND SAVES
You might adjust your creature’s HP, AC, and saves in tandem. Almost no creature has great defenses in all areas, as such creatures often result in frustrating fights. A creature with higher AC might have fewer HP and weaker saves, and one that’s easy to hit could have more HP and a strong Fortitude to compensate. This depends on the theme of the creature. An extreme AC might mean reducing the creature’s HP to the next lowest category, or reducing its HP by a smaller amount and making another reduction elsewhere.
So just counting the categories of AC without accounting for HP & Saves on the same creatures doesn't seem like a good way of representing how difficult a fight would be or how easy something would be to take down with attacks.
That was needlessly salty on part. I apologize for that.What I am trying to say is that if we *assume* taking all 3 actions as strikes (regardless of whether we actually do or not) then we should expect to hit at least once about 70-80% of the time.
Assuming the designers' stated goal of 55% success rate (not including MAP) then we get (assuming full MAP) the following miss chances:
0.45 * 0.7 * 0.95 = 29.925% chance to miss all 3 times or equivalently 70.075% chance to hit at least once - within my original claim.
No worries.
You'll note in your math that the third swing does not significantly alter your final results - it only adds 1.5% to your overall chance to avoid a miss, if I'm adapting/reading that right? Generally, if you want to hit that third time you need to put in a lot of work or be exploiting a pretty extreme shift via class features (flurry ranger, for example) to make that third attack worth taking.
I personally wonder if a lot of peoples views here are related to Age of Ashes and Plaguestone - both of these APs early on are heavily weighted towards high target numbers and difficult encounters with single or few foes. My parties I ran through AoA struggled a lot more early on in book 1 of AoA, until they figured out chain aiding and bonus stacking against a pretty notorious enemy who is otherwise extremely difficult to deal with in AoA book 1...
Thus far in book 1 of Extinction Curse, the 'accuracy curve' of whether the party is fighting higher level enemies or multiple lower level ones feels much more forgiving (though my perspective is different - I GMed Age of Ashes, and am playing Extinction Curse).
EDIT - +7 stat bonus is from 22 stat (4 increases since creation) and an Apex Item for an additional +2, putting you at 24.
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You mean, giving me additional actions, that I would not need if I had better hard stats to beginn with? Then yes.Working as intended.I'll file this under "I used to hit 95% of the time with my first attack in PF1 and now I feel incompetent" category.I'll file this under "an even leveled monster does not have to waste actions on buffing and debuffing in order to hit better than all the players" category.
You're operating under the assumption that a monster should be equal in stats to PCs of its level. That's not how it works and that's not how the game is designed. Also, that ship sailed so long ago...
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You're operating under the assumption that a monster should be equal in stats to PCs of its level. That's not how it works and that's not how the game is designed. Also, that ship sailed so long ago...
No I am not. However when an even leveled monsters second attack has equal chances of hitting like a party martials first attack, that does for sure not counter the "we are not feeling like heroes but incompetent fools" general mood and related threads that are surfacing in this forum on a regular basis.
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You're operating under the assumption that a monster should be equal in stats to PCs of its level. That's not how it works and that's not how the game is designed. Also, that ship sailed so long ago...
Except it is?
Most creatures use high or moderate AC—high is comparable to what a PC fighter would have.
The irony is that even monsters that are clearly spellcasters have High AC and High to-hit.
Quick, without opening the book, which has a higher AC?
Purple Worm
Dryad Queen
You can see a trend, and that trend might even be accurate - but you can't be sure without the full data set.
I posted more complete data in reply #10
The sheer number of monsters at lower level makes the data entry slow, so its more complete at 10th and above.|
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You're operating under the assumption that a monster should be equal in stats to PCs of its level. That's not how it works and that's not how the game is designed. Also, that ship sailed so long ago...Except it is?
Most creatures use high or moderate AC—high is comparable to what a PC fighter would have.The irony is that even monsters that are clearly spellcasters have High AC and High to-hit.
Quick, without opening the book, which has a higher AC?
Purple Worm
Dryad Queen
Dryad Queen, of course, because the question was set up so blatantly to try to lead people into answering with the assumption "of course the narratively tougher monster has higher AC" that I'm shocked you even tried to pull this old trick and expected it to work. I feel disrespected.
But that leads into a neat counter, which monster in PF1 has higher STR, a CR 13 Cetus or a CR 25 Tarrasque? Watch out, it's an actual trap question.
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You're operating under the assumption that a monster should be equal in stats to PCs of its level. That's not how it works and that's not how the game is designed. Also, that ship sailed so long ago...No I am not. However when an even leveled monsters second attack has equal chances of hitting like a party martials first attack, that does for sure not counter the "we are not feeling like heroes but incompetent fools" general mood and related threads that are surfacing in this forum on a regular basis.
Well, if you don't like the PF2 paradigm and expect it to change based on framing your problem as a universal one, I have bad news and good news for you: bad is that this won't change as Paizo won't rewrite the game, the good one is that PF1 forum is few scrolls down and there a martial could easily set themselves up to feel truly heroic by hitting with all their first 2-3 attacks and having an equal CR monster hit them only on nat 20.
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That's true in my group's case (I am not the GM). The second to the last fight in Hellknight Hill. My goodness we would've TPK'd had the GM not pulled a couple of punches. In our current home brew adventure we've been fighting a lot of higher level constructs so... may just be the this particular adventure.I personally wonder if a lot of peoples views here are related to Age of Ashes and Plaguestone - both of these APs early on are heavily weighted towards high target numbers and difficult encounters with single or few foes. My parties I ran through AoA struggled a lot more early on in book 1 of AoA, until they figured out chain aiding and bonus stacking against a pretty notorious enemy who is otherwise extremely difficult to deal with in AoA book 1...
EDIT - +7 stat bonus is from 22 stat (4 increases since creation) and an Apex Item for an additional +2, putting you at 24.
Got it, yep that makes sense.
I think it might be a little harder in practice to get a +3/+4 on aid given that you need a critical success to do so, but it looks like you're right overall about the 2-6 range. Thank you for walking me through that.
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But that leads into a neat counter, which monster in PF1 has higher STR, a CR 13 Cetus or a CR 25 Tarrasque? Watch out, it's an actual trap question.
Dude...I think you completely missed the point.
They're both level 13 creatures (the iron golem is too).
So the "narratively tougher monster" means nothing in this context.
But then I guess you think that a level 13 wizard should have higher AC than the level 13 fighter, because the wizard is the "narratively tougher opponent."
I understand this is what flanking, demoralize, trip, inspire courage, etc. are for...
The way I see it, any exercise that disregards flanking, inspire courage etc. when calculating hit chance is a waste of time. It's like saying "I've been calculating hit chance but not included proficiency bonus and can't hit anything...".
I personally wonder if a lot of peoples views here are related to Age of Ashes and Plaguestone - both of these APs early on are heavily weighted towards high target numbers and difficult encounters with single or few foes. My parties I ran through AoA struggled a lot more early on in book 1 of AoA, until they figured out chain aiding and bonus stacking against a pretty notorious enemy who is otherwise extremely difficult to deal with in AoA book 1...
Thus far in book 1 of Extinction Curse, the 'accuracy curve' of whether the party is fighting higher level enemies or multiple lower level ones feels much more forgiving (though my perspective is different - I GMed Age of Ashes, and am playing Extinction Curse).
That's interesting to me, because my groups have had the exact opposite experience. AoA, with the exception of
EC on the other hand, cranks the difficulty past Dark Souls levels right from the start. The party would have TPK'd multiple times in Chapter 1 if I didn't pull punches.
Granted, that's because of a lot more than AC values, but still.
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The way I see it, any exercise that disregards flanking, inspire courage etc. when calculating hit chance is a waste of time.
If your argument is that groups with only one melee or no bard shouldn't even bother I think that does a lot more to make the point for the other side than indicate everything is fine as is.
I think it might be a little harder in practice to get a +3/+4 on aid given that you need a critical success to do so, but it looks like you're right overall about the 2-6 range. Thank you for walking me through that.
Likely, its GM dependent. The Aid rules entry indicates that the 'Typical DC is 20', but adjustable by the GM, which will allow for significant table variance.
For me, if it says the typical DC is 20, its 20 unless there's a very good, very specific reason for it to be otherwise.
And because of that, hitting a 30 and critically succeeding becomes trivial.
Leaving the DC at 20 helps players feel like they're progressing as what starts out hard at level 1 becomes attainable, and eventually critical success becomes the norm, so...
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But that leads into a neat counter, which monster in PF1 has higher STR, a CR 13 Cetus or a CR 25 Tarrasque? Watch out, it's an actual trap question.Dude...I think you completely missed the point.
They're both level 13 creatures (the iron golem is too).
So the "narratively tougher monster" means nothing in this context.
But then I guess you think that a level 13 wizard should have higher AC than the level 13 fighter, because the wizard is the "narratively tougher opponent."
No, I just read the entire statblock, not just some table.
The Dryad Queen has weakness 10 to fire and cold iron, which happen to be super common among mid level adventurers. So, its AC is a bit higher to compensate for the fact that it will eat extra 10 pts of damage on almost every attack against it.
Big old PW has no weaknesses, so its AC is a bit lower.
Not to mention HP, the fleeting queen of forest sprites has 220, the walk without rythm expy has 270.
There, mystery solved.
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The irony is that even monsters that are clearly spellcasters have High AC and High to-hit.Why is it ironic that spellcasters have decent AC in PF2? Seems totally expected to me.
Quick, without opening the book, which has a higher AC?Ah, but which is harder to take down in a stand-up fight?
Yeah, I'm not clear on whats unexpected about spellcaster's having high AC either. They've always had an easy time stacking all of the available defenses, AC included.
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Did you just jump straight to "O" knowing that lower ACs would be there or did you randomly pick that letter?That doesn't matter.
Except that it does if you've specifically cherry picked those examples.
And no, you don't need to compile the entire data set to spot a trend.
There's a difference between "a trend" and "an accurate trend" though, which was what I was trying to point out.
You can see a trend, and that trend might even be accurate - but you can't be sure without the full data set.
I am not saying that we can be *sure* about anything. I am only saying the trend looks real (or accurate as you say) and is worthy of discussion. And besides, Draco18s has already posted the compiled data set so there you go.
And then you get into figuring out whether the trend is a problem or not, which involves things like looking at whether the creatures that have high AC make sense to have high AC, and making sure that the other parts of the design are within expectations since AC isn't the only factor in a creature being on the mark for its level.
Yes, that is what I've been discussing with Krispy. I'm inclined to think its not an issue at this point.
Finally, how many Bestiaries does Paizo have to make the spread even out before we lock in our "AC is too high across the board" declaration?
That's like asking whether the mail will get delivered tomorrow. I have no idea, but based on past events it seems reasonable to assume that the status quo will continue.
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There are also other ways to apply Flat Footed than Flanking - its just generally the most available for most parties.
But that's a case of picking your priority
Or it means nobody wanted to play a bard and the second martial in the four person party thought bows looked neat.
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No it doesn't, because I'm using those examples to highlight that more information than just a few letters is needed - not to make a claim about what the overall data set will say.
Except that it does if you've specifically cherry picked those examples.
Okay, just to clarify, are you saying that your dataset of 14 cherry picked observations provides the same weight of evidence as my 53 observations which I didn't know anything about prior to picking? Or are you saying that it doesn't matter if the "O" data is weaker evidence because I'm trying to make a claim? Or something else?
And besides, Draco18s has already posted the compiled data set so there you go.Don't get mislead by missing a few words in a post - Draco18s posted a compilation of monsters 10th-level and up, not the whole data set.
That is a fair point.
That's like asking whether the mail will get delivered tomorrow. I have no idea, but based on past events it seems reasonable to assume that the status quo will continue.My point was that Paizo isn't picking monsters for the Bestiaries based on filling out the 'right' spread of how many have which tier of AC, so a Bestiary trending any particular way isn't enough evidence to definitively answer the question that is the thread title.
I agree with you that Paizo isn't picking monsters to fit a particular spread right now. But I disagree about not having enough evidence. A spread exists, it's just (apparently) not being intentionally selected by Paizo.
At the end of the day, I think we have to go with what we have today. We have a Bestiary 1 and a Bestiary 2 (which I don't currently own due to a subscription snafu). We don't currently have a Bestiary 3 even though it's been announced. So in judging the spread of monster ACs we have to go with the population we have now. Bestiary 1 and Bestiary 2 and whatever's been published in the current APs are literally the population we have right now.
By the logic you're using here, health researchers can't draw any conclusions about infant mortality because babies from 100 years from now haven't been born yet.
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Relevant reminder, a very very high percentage of foes the party will face do not appear in the Bestiary.
NPC's are built using the same rules, and tend to be purpose built for encounters.
The trends among foes inside just the Bestiaries therefore do not represent all the opposition the party will face.
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Caster monster ACs are higher because the GM should not be expected to have to char-op his encounters with an hour of spell research (or more than an hour at high levels where buff stacking becomes mandatory so even your lowest level spells are being ruthlessly optimized) and the creation of a "before combat -> during combat" flow chart of actions to stand a reasonable chance of surviving a full attack, let alone providing a memorable challenge for his players.
Monsters don't need to use debuffing/buffing actions in combat so that a new GM can plop down an encounter and have it work to a reasonable standard without having to make a hundred posts on this forum asking why their enemies die in one turn just to hear a cacophony of "add more hp!" and "rocket launcher tag :(" and "just fudge the numbers" back at them.
A lot of these "problems" are because the playing field between GM and PC has been leveled so that the GM doesn't need to be an absolute master of tactical wargaming in order to challenge a PC who has "Treantmonk's Guide to Wizards: Being a God" bookmarked on his cell phone.
And we're gonna keep arguing the math and making bar graphs of Bestiary stats instead of ever acknowledging this viewpoint because of the unspoken rule that no one actually cares about the GM's enjoyment of the game. Sit there, smile while you lose and have all of your prep work evaporate because of rage lance pounce, peasant. You may be struggling to keep up with the high level buff stacking meta and carousel of rotating monsters all with their own optimal play styles and monster synergies, but I read a guide.
And besides, Draco18s has already posted the compiled data set so there you go.Don't get mislead by missing a few words in a post - Draco18s posted a compilation of monsters 10th-level and up, not the whole data set.
Its more complete than "10th and up" as there are -1s through 9ths in there. The general trend of "attacks and AC are 'high'" continues regardless of creature level.
The only reason I say its complete above 9th is because there are only 98 creatures above 10th level (20 at 10th) while at just level 1 there are 50 creatures.
I started at the higher levels in order to complete the data set so I could do six or eight without burning myself out.
But I do have a nearly equal number of the creatures below 10th (92) and 19 of the 20 10th level creatures (missing Young Silver, see early comment about skipping a lot of the metallic dragons).
No, I just read the entire statblock, not just some table.
The Dryad Queen has weakness 10 to fire and cold iron, which happen to be super common among mid level adventurers. So, its AC is a bit higher to compensate for the fact that it will eat extra 10 pts of damage on almost every attack against it.
Every attack that hits*
Also, a cold iron weapon is worth roughly a +1 magic weapon. So you can EITHER have +1 to hit OR bonus damage.She also has spellcasting with a DC rating halfway between High and Extreme, including Regenerate, Chain Lightning, Cone of Cold, Haste, and Charm.
Remember, according to the monster building guidelines:
Low AC typically fits spellcasters, who compensate with their selection of powerful spells.
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It's that Low AC fits for a spellcaster that compensates with their spells (which not necessarily all of them do).
Shits and giggles, every monster with an AC rating of low (or lower) that I have in my data set so far. Spellcasters will be marked with a *.
Lemure
Zombie Shambler
Mimic
Sewer Ooze
Skum
Lich*
Veiled Master*
Crimsom Worm
Shoggoth
Warsworn
Brontosaurus
Deinosochus
Drakauthix
Ghost Mage*
Succubus*
Troll King
What about Moderate AC?
Giant Centipede
Spider Swarm
Boggard Swampseer*
Cinder Rat
Cyclops
Dhampir Wizard*
Kobold Dragon Mage*
Azure Wyrm
Cloud Giant* (does not cast spells that PCs save against: solid fog, levitate, obscuring mist; is not immune to the effects)
Gogiteth
Great Cyclops
Phoenix
Purple Worm
Quelaunt*
Stone Giant
Banshee
Rune Giant*
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No, I just read the entire statblock, not just some table.
The Dryad Queen has weakness 10 to fire and cold iron, which happen to be super common among mid level adventurers. So, its AC is a bit higher to compensate for the fact that it will eat extra 10 pts of damage on almost every attack against it.
Every attack that hits*
Also, a cold iron weapon is worth roughly a +1 magic weapon. So you can EITHER have +1 to hit OR bonus damage.She also has spellcasting with a DC rating halfway between High and Extreme, including Regenerate, Chain Lightning, Cone of Cold, Haste, and Charm.
Remember, according to the monster building guidelines:
Low AC typically fits spellcasters, who compensate with their selection of powerful spells.
Every attack that hits, splash weapons that miss but don't critically miss, and any AoE fire spell that isn't a critical success on the save.*
Basically, there are a lot of ways to easily trigger that weakness, combined with an HP that is below moderate. Considering the Dryad Queen is something that would have a roll of "boss monster" rather than being fought in groups as a "high level mook," I'd see it as justified to have a higher AC to help avoid being instantly focused and cut down before getting a chance to use any of those spells.Looking at the monster building guidelines, I'd view the section you quoted as a suggestion of when it is typically appropriate to use Low AC, not a demand that every spellcaster must use Low AC.
In the end, you're looking at a boss role creature that compensates above average AC with lower HP and multiple weaknesses, at least one of which is very easy to trigger and the other is common among fey, making it likely for the group to have access to if they're expect to fight fey.
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I'd view the section you quoted as a suggestion of when it is typically appropriate to use Low AC, not a demand that every spellcaster must use Low AC.
So 66% of the entire bestiary is fine using a High AC, High Attack, and High save DC? (not necessarily all on the same creature at the same time, but there are 127 high AC, 127 high attack, and 130 high save DCs)
There's incredibly low variance on those 3 stats. Nothing else even comes close.
Just realized I borked the logging and didn't actually print out the Terribles properly in my original post. Outside the edit window, so including the correct numbers here.
wrst: 0
ter: 0
low: 3
mod: 33
high: 127
ext: 25
bnk: 4
AC
wrst: 0
ter: 1
low: 15
mod: 37
high: 127
ext: 13
bnk: 0
ABILITY_DC
wrst: 0
ter: 2
low: 1
mod: 15
high: 130
ext: 21
bnk: 1
PERCEPT
wrst: 0
ter: 11
low: 33
mod: 106
high: 40
ext: 2
bnk: 1
FORT
wrst: 0
ter: 3
low: 29
mod: 61
high: 85
ext: 15
bnk: 0
REFX
wrst: 1
ter: 13
low: 55
mod: 85
high: 35
ext: 3
bnk: 1
WILL
wrst: 1
ter: 6
low: 74
mod: 72
high: 36
ext: 4
bnk: 0
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I genuinely can't tell if you understood what I said or not.It's that Low AC fits for a spellcaster that compensates with their spells (which not necessarily all of them do).S@*+s and giggles, every monster with an AC rating of low (or lower) that I have in my data set so far. Spellcasters will be marked with a *
There are more melee brutes with Low AC than there are spellcasters with Low AC.
Does that sounds right to you?
How about extreme AC?
Gnoll Cultist*
Sea Serpent
Ancient Red Dragon*
Ancient Silver Dragon*
Baomal
Treerazer*
Ankylosaurus
Bulette
Chuul
Hive Mother
Legion Archon* (PCs don't actually save against these)
Nilith*
Shield Archon* (PCs don't actually save against these)
Spellcasters actually outnumber the non-spellcasters!
Its almost like the guidelines and the bestiary don't align...