What do all the +'s mean?

[Jerome]

And lets not even mention the Adamite (sp) Golems

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[Cavern Sniffer]

I still get confused over this. Suppose my bloke does a natural +7 to damage through his strength. He then uses a bow giving an additional +3 to damage with arrows giving +2 to damage. Is the bow damage and the arrow damage cumulative giving a +5 to damage on top of the arrows standard damage rating...ie 1D4. Effectively giving a possible (not critical) 9 damage for one arrow and then his +7 strength bonus added giving a base score of 16 damage. Or am I barking up the wrong tree here...........this still confuses me.

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It's bleedin dark down here, slippery too.
Man, that's a pisser.

[Northraven]

In response to Cavern Sniffer's question here's how it works in AD&D:

With missle weapons you do not get your strength bonus added to damage or THACO unless you have some kind of Magical weapon which posseses that ability. I have only seen one of these in IWD but there could be some in BGII. Also keep in mind that only your arrow's bonus counts towards damage inflicted, the bonus of the actual missle weapon only adds to THACO as far as I know...

[Amergin]

mechanical missile weapons (bows, xbows) don't give STR bonuses. iirc, thrown weapons such as axes and darts DO get the STR damage bonus.

[Northraven]

That is very true...sorry I forgot to mention.

[DonkeyWan]

Ok, what is the benefit of using a +2 arrow then and how would it work on a thrown dice set?

And how is strength determined on a dice throw?

Finally, you say that +1 makes a difference (especially on 20 sided dice I know), but what I said is still vaild, if you have a faster weapon that does less damage, the longer the battle, the more attacks you will make than a slower, bigger hitting weapon and therefore the more damage you will deal, thus a +3 halberd will probably be less useful than a +2 short sword.

[kitson]

you may get more attacks in , but a good hit with a Two handed sword could deal a devastating blow!.

[DonkeyWan]

could being the operative word....

[Northraven]

In response to DonkeyWan, here is my take on the weapon speed/damage/etc. situation:

Bigger, more damaging weapons are generally slower but one has to remember that the speed factor only determines when an attack gets made in a round, not how many attacks are made in a round. The number of attacks is determined by things like class, lvl, and weapon specialization. So a tank wielding a +5 2-handed sword may strike after the thief with the fast +2 dagger, but I garuntee that he will hit a hell of a lot harder...also fighter types generally have more hits/better AC and so can afford to take a few minor hits before they deal out their devastating attack.

Another consideration with big, slow weapons is that taking proficencies in specific styles ie. Two-handed weapon style actually gives bonuses to speed factors, helping to curb the slow attack problem. Some magic weapons have faster speed ratings also.

I'm currently playing as an assasin, so I have no bias against fast-hitting small weapons, but to see Keldorn chunk something with the Holy Avenger IS a thing of true beauty.

As they say in the strategy guide, "Black and Brown Dragons are immune to acid...but nothing's immune to a Holy Avenger..."

[Cavern Sniffer]

As I posted elsewhere - Gimme the Warblade 1D12 +4 all day long. Speed factor of 6. Grand Mastery in 2H swords & 2 points spent in 2H weapon style brings the speed down to 2.

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It's bleedin dark down here, slippery too.
Man, that's a pisser.