Quote Originally Posted by Zombimode View Post
But the point is that Dire Rats in Next are NOT small 25 kg creatures. They are about the size of Mabari Dogs of Dragon Age.
If we would talk about rats how they are portrayed in many video games, like in Oblivion or Morrowind, I would totally agree.
I think the core of misunderstanding here is that James Wyatt was talking about 'giant rat,' while playtest packet provides stat block for 'cave rat' (small creature) and 'dire rat' (medium creature) and it is unclear which he meant. And in previous packet those two monsters were tiny and small respectively. 4 feet long and 50 pounds of weight comes in turn from 3.5 edition monster entry for dire rat I guess. I am fine with dire rats being supersized to the point they are dangerous to an adventurer, otherwise there would be nothing dire about them. They should be unnatural, unusually aggressive mutated specimens. Cave rats on the other hand should never be a danger to PCs when solitary. As others have said, they are no larger than a capybara. 4-5 cave rats against 1st level wizard? Yes, it could be a threat. One on one fight with any adventurer? Why would you go into any sort of dungeon when you can't even handle a single rat?