Forge of Fury: Deathtrap? (spoilers)

Ok, so I'm DMing 3.x for the first time. The players are all relatively inexperienced (havent played in years, or have only played one other game) and seem to fall into the odd characterization of HACK AND SLASH COWARDS. They seem to prerfer combat over stealth/ magic/ diplomacy BUT are afraid of EVERYTHNG. All this has already led to one character death and I suspect more will follow. Details below, with MANY spoilers for the Forge of Fury. (looong post)

After sucessfully getting through the Sunless Citadel, the party is given a map leading to ancient dwarven forge. They do NO further questioning about what they can expect to find there, or any other information. They head STRAIGHT to the Stone Tooth. The party consists of an Elven Monk3, an Elven Druid3 (with wolf4), a Human Cleric3, and a Human Barbarian3. They have VERY good stats and a decent amount of stuff thanks to the Sunless Citadel.

Even though the description of the mountain implies a chimney of some sort, the party did no searching of the area for any of the "back doors". They marched straight up the path. Upon seeing the two orc guards "paying no attention", they have the options of magic, stealth attack, waiting and observing the orc schedule, creating a diversion, or countless more.

Instead, the barbarian, who speaks Orc, approaches and asks for permission to go past. When the orcs refuse, HE SAYS "PLEASE?". the orcs threaten violence, the PCs attack, and the orcs immediately yell out "Intruders, close the door" The PCs don't bother to run along to try to get through this door, avoid the arrow-fire from above, or even break off and regroup. Instead they just casually dispatch the two orc guards while under arrow-fire and then get straight against the wall and openly discuss what theyre going to do next as the cleric heals them.

The PCs manage to get through the door relatively quickly into the first room with the 30 foot rope bridge over the 200ft deep chasm. The two PCs with low-light vision see two more orcs on the other side. With the monk and barbarian getting across the bridge quickly, these two orcs are dispatched before they can cut the bridge. The druid is standing next to the secret door leading to the orcs at the arrow slits and notices it. The cleric randomly wanders through the secret door EXPECTING one or two orc archers, even though the barbarian and monk are on the other side of the rope bridge, but is SHOCKED to find FOUR more orcs. She leads them back to the front room. The party is dismayed by the fact that all these orcs have great axes and STR bonuses. I've explained numerous times to those who ahvent played in years that in 3e, EVERYONE got a power upgrade, not just the PCs. Apparently they didnt previously believe me.

Anywho, they dispatch these 4 and are left with a choice of 1> the door on the other side of the rop bridge or 2> the door on the other side of the barracks through the secret doors. They hear orcs behind BOTH doors.
The party seems ready to go through the barracks door, but I'm making a comment about how they found the secret doors and are going through the rooms "backwards" so I have to carefully check the module descriptions to make sure I don't miss anything. This gets meta-gamed into "uh oh, we're gonna fight the hard thing first, lets go the other way" , rather than the more logical "they wont expect us to come from THIS way" or "at least this way if we have to RUN, we wont have to cross the rope bridge". I even warned them to NOT meta-game based on my off-hand comment and just continue what they were going to do.

Instead, they crossed the bridge and opened that door. Faced with 3 more orcs and Old Yarrack (Orc War3) It seemed like they were gonna hold their ground at the door to fight only 2 orcs at a time, but when the orcs called out their location, the party got antsy and edged forward to start fighting. When the battle started turning sour and ULFE (the ogre) squeezed his way onto the scene (he doesnt fit in 3.5 and I forgot to make the map bigger) the barbarian called for a retreat. The cleric immediately tried to stumble her way across the bridge and almost fell, but used her Luck domain ability to re-roll. The druid (and his wolf) stayed another round to fight. The monk left on his turn and when the barbarian's turn came up again, he decided not to wait longer for the druid and leave. By this point, Yarrack has run up to the bridge to try to cut it down while the party crosses. The Druid moves to the bridge and to avoid any AOOs has to wait another round before crossing with the now much higher balance DC. He fails both his balance and reflex saves and plummets into the abyss. The wolf slips, and follows his master into the abyss when the bidge is fully cut. The other PCs retreat.

Thats where we ended the session.

At first glance, and again at second glance, this groups planning is abysmal. (or non-existent) Their combat tactics arent much better. Combine these factors with a lack of a true rogue and an arcane caster and they can easily be in for a world of hurt. To make it worse, it looks like the druid's player is rolling up a Half-Orc Ftr2/Rog1 and trying to make him a str-based combatant.

We're using the modules to re-teach me how to DM and them how to play before moving on to a homebrew campaign. So I'm trying to let the dice fall where they may. I'm worried that I'm being too critical of their play, but when I present the case to them of "what I think youve done wrong" they all agreed with me. So...

is learning from their mistakes the best way to teach them? When the druid actually died, the all did a double take like they couldnt believe I let it happen. I tend to be AGAINST fudging of DM rolls and miraculous last-minute rescues when a player fails all his checks/saves, but I don't want to have them rolling up new characters every session (especially once we start a real campaign that I've done a lot of work on)

The ogre will pose some problems if they just storm back in next session, but on further levels they will have even bigger problems. The roper looks particularly ugly. And the dragon is going to be deadly if I run it right.

Did anyone else run a mostly inexperienced group through this adventure? How many character deaths? How did they avoid a TPK? Is there something else I can be doing to encourage survival that isnt leading them around by the hand?

Hmm. If I was DMing, I might introduce an intelligent friendly sword who was constructed to advise the weilder on battle tactics. Thus, the sword could analyze the pros and cons of different approaches, actually teaching the players in the process. You'd have to be careful not to come across as condescending, and to make the sword's personality interesting; perhaps making the sword have a weakness (requires blood, scared of something) would help humanize it. And when it's no longer needed, sundering will be like killing a favorite NPC.

In this adventure, I'd give it to some clever orc who did something stupid - and have it thank the Gods when it is reclaimed by the human PCs, telling them that it deliberately gave the orc bad advice so that it could be reclaimed by REAL heroes.

Wow your group did much worse then my group (3 level 4 characters at the begining) did for this level. My group found the chimney used a rope to climb down, and the orcs started coming but the party was well ready in the kitchen with only 1 entrance. Eventually the orcs figured out that a frontal assult on the kitchen was foolish but they had suffered so many losses that the next time the party came the orcs were wiped out. So the orcs had fairly bad tactics (hey their orcs, they have an intelligance penelty, its roleplaying) and the party had good tactics leading to a tough but winable fight.

If you want to see a fight go sour, you should check out how my party dealt with the brown bear. The brown bear got out and engaged the fighter. The whole party was still in the passage leading to the room from the south. The fighter was knocked down and the bear attacked the sorceror who was trapped between the cleric and the bear. Finally the cleric killed the bear, but two out of three party members were dying. But since it was the cleric who was standing they didn't die.

Edit: You asked about the roper and dragon. I haven't got to the dragon yet (waiting eagerly for that fight) but the roper I just took out, because it was an encounter diplomancy seemed to be the only option for, but it gave far to few hints that the monster was to tough. I replaced it with 3 dugear warriors who used nice tactics (invisable as they here the party come, and two enlarge, then crossbow barrage, followed by the nonenlarged one at a bottle neck using full defesne, and the enlarged ones attacking with their reach. ) but they had to low of an attack bonus to make much of a dent in the fighter who led and I rolled realy poorly. You win some you lose some.

Well, it sounds like they are having fun at least. Sounds like some of my games. Players tend to fluctuate between thick and brilliant.

Aaron.

stevelabny said:

We're using the modules to re-teach ... them how to play before moving on to a homebrew campaign.

Click to expand...

Heh. I do the opposite, actually - I use my own adventures and campaign to prep them for modules. They do okay in my game, but they have gotten slaughtered in published modules in the (long) past....

is learning from their mistakes the best way to teach them?

Click to expand...

For my players it is, but I don't know about yours. Letting them make their mistakes (and then discussing afterwards) has certainly helped my players - their recent record is more than 5 years without a TPK.

And note - my players have played regularly for more than a decade.

Many interesting points...

Stevelabny,

First, I ran both the same modules early on with our gaming group for many of the same reasons as you. I think it's a very good idea to use WoTC modules as test ground, because they are generally balanced (challenge-wise and treasure-wise), and I think do make a pretty good representation of the core game. So, I agree here.

Second, I gotta say your description of the encounters leading up to the fortress (and the following battle around the rope-bridge) sounded pretty cool to me! I'd like to know the following details: did your players clap or cheer or high-five it when, say, they downed that last orc (of the group of four)?; did they give out a whoop when the cleric nearly fell off the bridge but managed through the Luck reroll to make it? That is to say: did they seem to have fun? Sure, I might have taken it a little more stealthily as a player, but it seems to me like your players stepped up and dealt with the "world of pain" they opened for themselves. If they generally had a good, exciting time (which can <include> dismay, e.g. "oops, shouldn't have opened up that secret door...") then everyone playing the game did their job.

Third, you handled the death of the Druid perfectly. In fact, I think you gained the players' respect for it, and they'll know that paper and pencil D&D isn't a video game where you can "reboot" to prevent deaths. Congratulations to you for this decision, and do not waiver from this approach.

Fourthly, the moment you agreed to be the DM, you have to remember that you have agreed to let the players be the characters. That is: let them make all the "bone-headed" choices they want to. Sure, perhaps YOU would have approached the fortress with more stealth and diplomacy, but YOU aren't a player.

Fifthly, I have to respectfully and strongly disagree with an above poster who suggested that you provide some "intelligent sword" to the party as a way of dropping hints, etc. Never, ever do this. You would be stripping the players of part of the fun of playing the characters: muddling through by yourselves, winning the battles yourselves, figuring out the puzzles yourselves, and (yes) sometimes dying yourselves. If an adventure you have in front of you seems too hard for your PCs, then soften a few encounters (2 Orcs rather than 4) instead of giving your players some magic item, or providing them with a powerful NPC friend to win their battles.

In short: the way you ran the session was fine. Let that druid player roll up whatever he wants, and let your group learn their own "mistakes" (and you, yourself, be open to the fact that some of these "mistakes" aren't "mistakes" at all--just different styles of play).

Suggestion for how you run the party's next approach to the fortress: have Ulfe the Ogre standing guard on the front ledge with 2 or 3 Orcs! Look, the PCs have alerted the entire complex, and waxed quite a few of their warriors. The orcs are pissed, now, and alert to another attack. As the DM, it makes perfect sense to have Ulfe standing guard, AND what better a hint for your players to perhaps NOW look for a more stealthy approach inside...? Remember, however, that if even then they decide on a frontal assault, let the dice fall where they may...

Good gaming

My players did worse. Some greataxe crits (by them, not the orcs) saved the day though... Ulf died from a crit from a fire orb without attacking once. Otherwise they would have been stomped into the ground. Half of the group was nearly dead or unconscious before they even entered through the big door.

Things tend to sink in better when you've done them yourself. So your players should learn from their mistakes better. Of course, they have to know they are mistakes.

Are your players aware that these are 'training' sessions? Are they actively looking to learn lessons? Do you point out mistakes as they happen? Do you also point out where they survived on pure luck?

I ran a pair of new players (not complete novices) they FoF, and they did OK. They lost a PC (each player had multiple) and an NPC. They did very well against the orcs, decently against the lizardmen, and unevenly against everything else. My players did a much better job of setting the battles than yours tho, so my experience may not be applicable.

And my players rolled amazing against the dragon. I was all set to kill half the party, but everyone made the spot rolls, everyone beat the miss chances, more than half the attacks were confirmed critical hits (not kidding), and about half the hits did maximum damage (including the raging barbarian with the waraxe critical hit). I never saw such rolling. I killed one NPC.

PS

Please reconsider NOT to include the Roper - the party I dm:ed - wich btw are seasoned players and good friends - somehow belived that a Roper was no match for four 4 lvl characters.. well obviously it was a TPK. It wasn´t even close. To bad - it was a great gang with lots of cool characters.


Asmo

Our group of 4 fourth level characters monkey-stomped the roper. Of course, it helped that one of the characters actually make the insane spot check to notice it before anyone entered the range of it's tentacles. That, and some extraordinary good luck with the dice during the combat.

So it is possible to win the encounter with some good fortune. Of course, one can't plan for 'good fortune'