Toning down adventure for 3 players (My players stay out)

Moon_Goddess · Jun 12, 2009

I'm wanting to run Touch of madness, and then on to the rest of the Tears of Ioun series.

Problem is I only have 3 players,

Genasi Swordmage 10
Goliath Barbarian 10
Elf Cleric (Ioun) 10

I need some advice on toning the encounters down so I don't kill them off too quickly.

Edit: In case anyone's not aware what adventure I'm talking about, Touch of madness is in Dungeon 161, http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/duad/20081217

Rechan · Jun 12, 2009

Keep your minions at a bare minimum. While your Swordmage can do some controlling, minions are going to present a little more challenge (especially LATER in the series when the minions use the new minion rules). Don't avoid minions completely, but use perhaps 2. Experiment.

The adventure uses lots of elites, and one or two solos. Cut this back significantly; either downgrade them (Solo to elite, elite to normal), or reduce their HP by 40% maybe. An elite is equal to two PCs - when an elite fights three PCs, he's practically a solo. However, you do have a Barbarian in the group; he might tear right through Malachi and the Kaorti badguy at the end of the series.

Enemies that immobilize and daze are going to eat your group up. They are a very mobile group (except the Cleric), and with a 3 man team, when someone loses their actions it's going to show. Just keep your eyes on it.

Avoid soldiers. Or perhaps reduce their defenses by 1-2. You have 3 guys (not 5), so this means fewer attacks coming at the soldier, so fewer will hit over all.

Definitely offer opportunities for their mobility - jumping on things, climbing things, etc; the Barbarian is a charge man, the swordmage can teleport about.

I'm curious how this comes down.

S'mon · Jun 12, 2009

Reducing monster numbers to 3/5 of listed should balance well.

For solos, 3/5 hit points (and give 3/5 XP) will have the same effect.

Rechan · Jun 12, 2009

Oh, btw.

You've got a Swordmage and a Barbarian. That means light armor (especially in the defender department). Anything that gets a lot of attacks, or things with low attack ratings but high damage (Brutes), or (potentially) minions are going to eat these guys up.

Jack99 · Jun 12, 2009

3 players, especially if they have a decent party composition, can still accomplish astounding things. IMC, 3 level 15 characters (fighter, cleric, wizard) encountered and killed the Aspect of Tiamat (Level 17 solo, slightly improved compared to the Draconomicon version)

Ofc, I wouldn't recommend tossing n+5 encounters at them everyday.

Edit: Regarding the toning down: Just change each encounter to match the new number of players. If you have a 6000 xp encounter, you make it as close to a 3600 xp encounter as you can. Basically you just take the amount of xp in the encounter, divide by 5, then multiply by 3 and you have your target number.

Be careful with powers that stun though, small parties are more vulnerable to them that larger parties.

Nebulous · Jun 12, 2009

Have you considered adding a 4th NPC for a player or you to run? That's what i usually do when the number of players are low. Although tinkering with the numbers is certainly viable too.

MortalPlague · Jun 12, 2009

My first 4th edition campaign was a three player affair, and it was a great game. In our group, we had a warlord, a fighter, and a warlock, so the spread was pretty good. I designed all the encounters for a three person experience budget, and I had no problems.

The suggestions in this thread are very good. My group did run into challenges against some elites, whereas they stacked up well against normal monsters. I didn't use many minions, but the ones I did were easily taken care of (our fighter had cleave).

Also, be sure to leave an escape route to most of your encounters; bad dice luck can affect a group this size much more dramatically, and they may need to flee.

Moon_Goddess · Jun 12, 2009

Thank you everyone, Especially Rechan just the kinds of specifics I was looking for.

I love the plot on Touch of Maddess but I was surprised when it didn't have notes for toning up or down.

Havn't read through the others in the series yet, wanna get through this one before I worry about what else I'll try to kill them with.