Moral checks

How are the moral checks done?

Curious since Alastair (level 21) just scared the bejeebus out of an ogre with a moral check DC of 52!! O_O

The scripts compare the enemy's hit dice or level and their current hit points against the PC's. There's some math involved in there, but if the result is low enough on the enemy's side of things, it has to make a morale check. Failure means trying to run away and escape.

Not all enemies check for morale (such as orcs), and ones above a certain hit dice or below a certain intelligence don't.

Why do enemies disappear after a short time when they start to run? And why do insects, that are immune to mind spells, make morale checks?

If the enemies get far enough away from you, they've "escaped" and they disappear.

Which insects are making the checks? Anything with a 3 Int isn't supposed to be smart enough to have to make them, so there must be some smart bugs out there.

The Amethyst Dragon wrote:If the enemies get far enough away from you, they've "escaped" and they disappear.

Not necessarily. I've been taking swings at fleeing goblins (hee hee! DC: 72 or run vs my 4th level monk), and they still make a getaway. This while I stand next to them...

The issues with the moral checks are this:

1 - My prey loot xp opponents frequently escape. I can live with that. I'll catch up to them another time.
2 - Sometimes my PC will automatically chase them. This provokes AoOs vs all the other nearby opponents that are engaging me. At later levels, this doesn't matter so much, but at the earlier PC levels, this can be deadly...
3 - Sometimes when the opponent flees, I'll simply drop out of combat mode. All the surrounding hostiles will be taking swings at me for a round or two before I notice my PC isn't doing anything, and again, my target gets away. ...

If you look at the combat log, you *do* get xp when they fail their morale checks. Usually a good bit more than what you would get if you actually kill them. I have gotten around 15xp from a fleeing goblin that would only net 5xp if I killed it.

buddha5442a wrote:If you look at the combat log, you *do* get xp when they fail their morale checks...

True today, not true August 2009 :-)