Quick one on Attacks from Above

[Athanbeli]

As usual, I'm in a hurry, as I have just a few hours left to figure this out:

* Campaigns does not mention any damage bonus from melee attacks from above. I guess this should at leat grant the same bonuses of flying lunges from MA. Am I missing anything?

* Campaigns also reminds us how predators often fall unto their victims, and that damage from the fall itself should be resolved separately from the attack. This means that the 2 damage rolls are to be added, when the attack is succesful? DR is to be taken into account twice or only once?

Thanks!

[davidtmoore]

Attack from Above does not provide a damage bonus. It assesses a hit penalty due to the difficulty of the attack, and adds a defense penalty, due to most people's ignorance of the world above their LOS. It does not automatically increase damage.

However, for the purposes of a Slam (including a Flying Tackle, Pounce, or Drop Kick), calculate your Move based on your falling speed, based on the Collision and Falling rules. If you're falling from a decent height, this should be higher than you're normally capable of running, and TBH honest most attacks from above should be slams or variations thereon anyway.

[Captain Joy]

Originally Posted by davidtmoore

Attack from Above does not provide a damage bonus. It assesses a hit penalty due to the difficulty of the attack, and adds a defense penalty....

This is discussed in some detail in this Higher Ground [Combat] thread. In short, while increasing the damage done by the higher attacker seems a reasonable thing to do, it is not part of the rules as written.

[Bruno]

I missed that one.

If I had someone who was worried about the damage in my game, I'd yank out the rules for slamming with a weapon from Martial arts, and the rules for combat with a Lance - if I recall correctly, it runs roughly like "Calculate slam damage normally, use that as the base dice before applying weapon modifiers". Use falling speed as per the table to calculate damage.

I wouldn't use it unless a player was really antsy about it, however, because it's a LOT of math to drop into the middle of a fight.

[Athanbeli]

So here's this kind of monster - say, a sort of clawed and armored giant chamaleon (Hp 19; DR 5) - dropping on the pcs from 7 yards:

*2 attacks: CLAW + CLAW

* damage per attack: 2 x 19 x 12 / 100 = 4,56 = 5d cutting

Is that right?

Wait! How did the pendulum ghoul (creature of night X...) attack?!?

[Captain Joy]

Originally Posted by Athanbeli

So here's this kind of monster - say, a sort of clawed and armored giant chamaleon (Hp 19; DR 5) - dropping on the pcs from 7 yards:

*2 attacks: CLAW + CLAW

* damage per attack: 2 x 19 x 12 / 100 = 4,56 = 5d cutting

Is that right?

Personally, assuming the monster has Extra Attack 1, I would give it two attacks:

1. The intial drop-onto/slam-attack from above without any cut/imp claw bonus
2. It's usual claw attack