Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Dhaos 01-16-05, 01:25 PM	Hello and greetings, I have been playing with Dungeons and Dragons 3.0 and 3.5 for quite a while. But what I'm wondering is, have I been doing the damage system wrong. What I was taught was that when you attack, you roll a D20 and add your base attack bonus. And when you deal damage, your supposed to add your total attack bonus and your weapon damage and any misc penalties or nonpenalties. Well out of the blue, a friend says thats illegal and when you attack, you add your Base Attack bonus + your strength modifier to the attack and not the damage. When I heard this, I naturally got ****** off and said, "okey, so Mr. DM sends a group of orcs each with 150 H.P., are we supposed to spend the next three hours just rolling the weapon damage + our STR modifier". My question is, who is right and who is wrong.
Razoreface 01-16-05, 01:36 PM	Your attack bonus has nothing to do with your damage bonus... even the SRD explains pretty clearly what an attack roll and what a damage roll are. If you have a base attack bonus of +4, a strength of 16, and weapon focus longsword, and you make an attack roll against an orc with light cover, your attack roll is 4+3+1-2+1d20. Your damage roll will always be 1d8+3. The only ways to modify damage rolls are higher strength, feats such as power attack or specialization, or magic weapons. And that is a disturbingly high level orc.
Board_Rider 01-16-05, 01:43 PM	I got kinda confused there.... The one that said damage is dealt by: STR Mod + Weapon Damage die = Damage Dealt Then there are Modifiers, like: 1. Magical Enhancements to the weapon (i.e. +1) 2. Magical Enhancements to the PC (like the spell Bulls Strength) 3. Sneak Attacks 4. Magical Properties added to a weapon (think Frost or Fire) 5. Favored Enemy bonuses (read the Ranger section) 6. Criticals (damage die is rolled twice and x2 Str bonus to damage applied) Of course some just double the damage as rolled. There are may others..... Remember that a PC fighting with a "off-handed weapon" has his Strenth modifier cut in half for damage purposes. Meaning that an 18 Strength mod (+4) is down to a +2 as far as damage dealing is concerned. EDIT: An Orc with 150 HP is just weird....to me.
Dhaos 01-16-05, 01:55 PM	Thanks, though I hate being wrong.
Draco Strang 01-16-05, 01:59 PM	How is it weird for an orc to have 150HP? What's wrong with giving that orc 10 levels of barbarian? That, in additon to a high constitution would almost certainly give the orc those HP. And before everyone says "Draco...you added class levels." You are damn right I did. Honestly, I think fighting hordes and hordes of weird and bizarre monsters gets old after a while. It's nice to have a familiar enemy to square off against, albeit one with 10 class levels. Why couldn't an orc become a mighty barbarian, or spend 15 years in an elite fighting corps, or be a druid, cleric of Gruumsh, whatever?
Board_Rider 01-16-05, 11:13 PM	And before everyone says "Draco...you added class levels." Well I don't know that guy named everyone, but if he did say that he would be...well....wrong. I agree that putting levels on an Orc is nothing new or amazing but when somone writes "an Orc with 150HP" well, wow, that grabs me. Just kinda weird to read it. Although King Obould Many Arrows (in the FR setting) has levels, so I guess that I am just conflicted.
MrkGrismer 01-17-05, 10:24 AM	Not that surprising when the BBEG is an Epic-level Orc Lich. :D (it has been known to happen...)