BAB and animals

[mirror]

Hello, I have a question regarding animals.

In MM(3.5) why don't some animals gain aditional attacks with their natural weapon if their BAB gives them 2 attacks..

Lets say Rhinoceros (page 278 MM) has +6 BAB, but his full attack is only 1 Gore attack. Why doesn't his BAB grant him another Gore attack? :smallconfused:

Thanks.

EDIT: I found a sentence in MM that could explain this. "In general, a creature attacks once with each natural weapon it has".
Is this the answer?

[ahenobarbi]

Because high BAB never gives extra attacks with natural weapons. You might be interested in Natural Weapons and You: A Mini-Guide
(http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=10994.0;).

[mirror]

Thanks, I will definitely read that.

[TuggyNE]

Yeah, natural weapons do not gain iteratives. The reason for that is, basically, because otherwise high-level creatures with natural weapons would get absurd numbers of attacks, and that would either be extremely lethal to any creature in their reach, require dropping their HD for the same CR (and therefore be more vulnerable to ranged attacks and save-or-X), or require dropping the damage on each one to a pinprick, which is strange and interacts badly with PC-owned DR. It just doesn't work properly.

Concrete example: Pit Fiend would go from its current full attack of "2 claws +30 melee (2d8+13) and 2 wings +28 melee (2d6+6) and bite +28 melee (4d6+6 plus poison plus disease) and tail slap +28 melee (2d8+6)" to a far more imposing "2 claws +30/+25/+20/+15 melee (2d8+13) and 2 wings +28/+23/+18/+13 melee (2d6+6) and bite +28/+23/+18/+13 melee (4d6+6 plus poison plus disease) and tail slap +28/+23/+18/+13 melee (2d8+6)", which means 2-4 saves per round against poison and disease and roughly doubled total damage against AC 35. (Against AC 30, damage is instead tripled, and at AC 25, nearly quadrupled.) Also, imagine how many dice the DM has to roll in that case.