Monster Never Miss Part 2: Swinfar vs the Skeletons

A reader sent me a message that he didn’t understand the Monsters Never Miss post. He said that he didn’t want his character to get hit every turn.

Clearly I didn’t explain myself well enough. So I thought I would provide an example combat.

The Combatants

This fight will be between Swinfar the Barbarian and a couple of skeletons.

Swinfar the Barbarian

Attribute	Score	Modifier
STR	13	+1
INT	5	-2
WIS	11	±0
CON	9	±0
DEX	9	±0
CHR	12	±0
Hit Points	6
Attack Bonus	1st level fighter + strength bonus	+2
Defense Bonus	Leather + Shield	+3
Movement	12

Skeleton

Attribute	Value
Hit dice	½
Hit Points	2 & 3 (cause there’s two skeletons)
Combat Class	11
Armor Class	12
Movement	6

The Setup

The village of Towe lies in the Dreadwood. The people there have a problem: someone has been stealing the remains of their loved ones from the graveyard. A fortnight ago one of the villagers, Marion Milner, set out to discover what was happening. She returned a few days later saying that she had discovered the body of Tobin Collier working a field outside a stone tower a day's walk to the northwest.

Tobin had died the previous winter.

Marion pleaded for a force of villagers to follow her to the tower and put an end to the wicked goings on there. No one volunteered, so she set off alone.

She never returned.

The town is holding a memorial in her honor when Swinfar comes into town. Hearing the tale, he sets out the next morning in search of gold and glory!

The Encounter

Swinfar follows a game trail to the northwest. Using his Wilderness Survival talent, he finds (what he assumes to be) Marion’s trail and follows her tracks throughout the day. Sure enough, as twilight falls he spots an old tower. He sets up camp a short distance away, so he can approach the tower in the morning with the advantage of full daylight.

Unsurprisingly, the tower is populated by a necromancer. Unbeknownst to Swinfar, the necromancer has the area patrolled by undead to warn him of any intruders. This is how Swinfar and the skeletons will meet.

Step 1: Surprise

Swinfar has a campfire, so there’s no chance of him surprising the skeleton, but they might surprise him. Swinfar must roll a 5 or better on a d12 to avoid surprise.¹ He rolls a 6, so he’s not surprised.

Step 2: Distance

To determine how far apart they groups are when they spot each other, the DM rolls 2d4 and multiplies by 10. The result is the number of feet (for an indoor encounter) or yards (for an outdoor encounter) separating the groups.

If one (or both) of the groups was surprised, then the DM would roll 1d3² instead of 2d4, but that doesn’t apply in this case.

Here the DM rolled 4 (a 3 and a 1, if you care), so the skeletons are 40 yards away.

“As you’re setting up your camp, you see two faint glowing lights in the distance. One is green and the other is blue. The lights get closer and closer until they’re about 40 yards away. You can make out that they’re skeletons with glowing pendants around their necks!

Step 3: Initiative

We’ll calculate initiative as spelled out in last week’s post: Combat Speed = (Dex Bonus + Weapon Factor) - Armor Penalty

Swinfar’s combat speed is 5:

• Dex bonus: 0
• Weapon Factor: 5 (He carries a true barbarian weapon: a spear)
• Armor penalty: 0 (as a first level fighter, Swinfar is proficient in leather armor)

Right now we can’t calculate the Skeleton’s combat speed, because we don’t know their dexterity. But, in the words of J. Eric Holmes in the 1977 printing of Dungeons & Dragons:

The character with the highest dexterity strikes first. If the Dungeon Master does not know the dexterity of an attacking monster he rolls it on the spot.

Simple enough. Rolling 3d6 results in 12, for a modifier of 0. So:

• Dex bonus: 0
• Weapon Factor: 2 (unarmed attack)
• Armor penalty: 0 (no armor)

Skeleton’s combat speed is 2. Swinfar goes first.

Step 4: Swinfar’s First Round

“I charge at the foul beasts and run them through with my spear!”

Swinfar was 40 yards away, and he has a movement of 12. The “12” doesn’t mean “12 yards” but rather it means “120 yards, unless he’s inside in which case it means 120 feet.” A weird convention, but it’s traditional. He can easily close the distance and attack.

“Make an attack roll,” says the DM.

The player rolls a d20, and gets a 13. He adds Swinfar’s attack bonus of +2 for a total of 15. Because the skeleton’s have a AC of 12, he only needed a 12 or better. Swinfar hits!

“Roll damage!,” says the DM, cheering on Swinfar.

Swinfar rolls 1d6. He and gets a 5 and adds 1 for his strength. “Ha! 6 points!” he shouts triumphantly.

The DM crinkles his nose. “Well, it would be 6 points, but you’re attacking with a weapon designed to pierce flesh and the skeleton has no flesh. You only do 3 points of damage.”

“Curses! What sort of vile wizardry is this?,” shouts the player.

“But wait!,” says the DM. “It was still enough! At first Swinfar stabbed his spear and it went right through the one of the skeleton’s rib cage. When it happened again, you quickly wedged the spear tip between its vertebrae and ‘popped’ the shaft of the weapon, causing the spine to be dismembered. The creature falls into a heap of bones at your feet.”

With glee Swinfar shouts. “I AM VICTORIOUS!”

“Not so fast,” says the DM.

Step 5: Skeleton’s First Round

“Skeletons are not alive,” the DM starts. “They have no minds. They do not fear. They never need to check morale. The other one rakes you with it’s sharp, boney fingers. Make a defense roll.”

Swinfar’s player picks up a d20. He knows that Swinfar gets +2 for his leather armor and another +1 for his shield. He rolls an 8. 8 + 3 = 11. It’s a low roll.

“Eleven,” says the player. There is nervousness in his voice. If this wasn’t enough the skeleton will do 1d6 of damage, and Swinfar only has 6 hit points. While it’s not likely, it's far from impossible.  This could be the fall of Swinfar.

The DM looks at the skeleton’s stats. It’s combat class is 11. Swinfar made it exactly.³ He will live another round. “The creature claws at you repeatedly, but you keep your shield between you and it.”

Step 6: Swinfar’s Second Round

“I swing my spear like a baseball bat,” the player says. He picks up the die and rolls an 11, +2 = 13. “Thirteen.”

“Roll damage.”

“1,” says the player, crestfallen.

The DM marks off the hit point. There’s only one hit point left, but he doesn’t tell the player.  Instead DM the just says, “You spend the round pushing the skeleton back with your shield.”

Step 7: Skeleton’s Second Round

“He’s not giving up. Roll your defense.”

Swinfar’s player roll a natural 20! ⁴

“YES! YES! YES!” shouts the player.

“You made such a good defense, that you scored damage… make your roll.”

Conclusion

So Swinfar lives to fight another day, and hopefully it’s now clearer how defenses rolls work in practice.

What do you think?

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Footnotes:

1. The traditional rule is to roll a 3 or better on a d6. This is mathematically identical, but uses my favorite die. For Crowfield I’m tempted to change this to a talent roll instead.↩

2. There is no 3 sided die, though there are some d6’s numbered 1-3 twice. I find those irritating because if you use them you end up constantly checking your d6’s to make sure the d3 didn’t sneak in. A lot of people do 1,2 = 1 , 2,3 = 2, and 4,5 = 6. I don’t like that, either. I just roll the die. 1 = 1, 2 = 2, 3 = 3; on a 4, 5, or 6, just subtract 3.↩

3. I fudged that roll to show how the defense roll works. I actually rolled a 1.↩

4. I really rolled it that time!↩