Help me utilise Dominated

[Colmarr]

In an upcoming session, I get to use a creature that has an at-will power that dominates (save ends)*. The power targets Will.

The PCs consist of a knight, a thief, a swarm druid, a cunning bard, and a centred breath monk. The fight will take place in pretty tight quarters from which the PCs can move, but doing so would likely mean they fight in the pitch dark. I therefore suspect they'll stick together.

Without going too much into which PC has what at-wills, which PC do you think I should target with this power for maximum effect?

I initially planned to target the thief, before realising that Dominated doesn't turn allies into enemies and Sneak Attack only works on enemies. Then I wanted to target the bard (to prevent healing), but he has a Will defence significantly higher than most of the other PCs.

Thoughts?



* Not quite. It's actually recharge, but recharges whenever the monster doesn't have a target Dominated, which is pretty close to the same thing.

 

[marelion]

Take the thief. He is using Basic Attacks, so he is the one who can lay the most hurt down. After two or three rounds when the first PC goes bloodied switch to the bard just for the shocked looks

 

[OnlineDM]

I'd go with the thief or the monk. Also, if it were at my table and I had a monster dominate a thief, I would totally allow the thief to sneak attack his allies, no matter what the rules say. Yay for Rule Zero!

By the way, I've been playing around with modifications to Dominated, and I had a lot of fun with it this past Friday this way:

When a Monster dominates a PC, the PC immediately uses an at-will power of the Monster's choice (this is on the Monster's turn - different from normal domination).

The PC is dazed (save ends). Whenever the PC fails its saving throw against the daze, it again immediately uses an at-will power of the Monster's choice.

The same works if a PC dominates a monster, of course.

This way you still get the fun of making someone attack their allies, but the dominated party still gets to act (though the daze means that they still can't flank, can't take opportunity attacks, can't take immediate actions).

 

[Infiniti2000]

Even with the houserule that sneak attack works on an ally, the thief will be very hard pressed to gain combat advantage (he no longer flanks while dominated). Anyway, I would attempt to dominate the monk first, and then bard. By choosing not to target the bard because "he has a Will defence significantly higher than most of the other PCs" I feel you are unfairly metagaming. If the dominate fails, who cares? If it doesn't, then that's icing on the cake. Unless the bad guys are presented with crystal clear evidence, my opinion is that as a DM you should do your utmost to not metagame things like this. It's okay (no, really, it is!) for the bad guys to make suboptimal decisions during combat. Generating a new bad guy is simply a mouseclick away!

The better way to focus this decision, however, is really about the personality of the bad guy. Does he perchance hate bugs? Target the druid! Does he hate the religion of the monk? Target the monk! Does he hate dwarves, or elves, or anything else? Is he simply afraid of certain things? It's okay for the a bad guy to be irrational about these things. I guarantee you this, though, if you roleplay the attacks the players will really enjoy it, regardless of what happens. There's nothing like having the bad buy trying to force a particular opponent to do his bidding. Succeeding or failing, the encounter is still likely to be more memorable than simply making the best (but bland) tactical decision.

 

[OnlineDM]

Even with the houserule that sneak attack works on an ally, the thief will be very hard pressed to gain combat advantage (he no longer flanks while dominated). Anyway, I would attempt to dominate the monk first, and then bard. By choosing not to target the bard because "he has a Will defence significantly higher than most of the other PCs" I feel you are unfairly metagaming. If the dominate fails, who cares? If it doesn't, then that's icing on the cake. Unless the bad guys are presented with crystal clear evidence, my opinion is that as a DM you should do your utmost to not metagame things like this. It's okay (no, really, it is!) for the bad guys to make suboptimal decisions during combat. Generating a new bad guy is simply a mouseclick away!

The better way to focus this decision, however, is really about the personality of the bad guy. Does he perchance hate bugs? Target the druid! Does he hate the religion of the monk? Target the monk! Does he hate dwarves, or elves, or anything else? Is he simply afraid of certain things? It's okay for the a bad guy to be irrational about these things. I guarantee you this, though, if you roleplay the attacks the players will really enjoy it, regardless of what happens. There's nothing like having the bad buy trying to force a particular opponent to do his bidding. Succeeding or failing, the encounter is still likely to be more memorable than simply making the best (but bland) tactical decision.

First, let me say that I totally agree with your advice to make this decision based on role playing the bad guy. Who would the enemy perceive as being the most hated, or the most lethal to dominate? Don't make it a meta decision based on your knowledge of the characters; make it based on what the bad guy knows. Good point.

Second, if I were house ruling that the dominated thief could sneak attack, I would further rule that the thief can't flank with his normal allies, but that he could totally take advantage of a flank from an enemy in order to stab an ally in the back. Heck, I might even rule (using my own house rule of the immediate attack on the dominate) that the dominated character (in this case, the thief) automatically has combat advantage against allies because they don't see it coming (but future dominations wouldn't have that benefit). I'm trying to be more flavorful and less rule-focused as a DM, though, so that's just me.

 

[Infiniti2000]

[MENTION=90804]OnlineDM[/MENTION], I've seen enough of your posts to get the impression that you're a very competent DM. However, in general I wouldn't agree with your advice for less experienced DMs. So, if any such DMs out there are reading this, my word of caution is that players (meaning the friends of yours around the table) really dislike dominated conditions to begin with. For most players, in my experience/opinion, this is really "unfun," because they are essentially out of the game for a round. It's like losing a turn in jail while playing Monopoly. Making the condition even worse via houserules should be considered very carefully., thus only do what OnlineDM suggests if you really know what you're doing and are sure that your players are up for the adding hassle. Note also that Rule 0 isn't just about the DM coming up with rules, it's about an agreement between DM and players on modified rules.

 

[OnlineDM]

[MENTION=90804]OnlineDM[/MENTION], I've seen enough of your posts to get the impression that you're a very competent DM. However, in general I wouldn't agree with your advice for less experienced DMs. So, if any such DMs out there are reading this, my word of caution is that players (meaning the friends of yours around the table) really dislike dominated conditions to begin with. For most players, in my experience/opinion, this is really "unfun," because they are essentially out of the game for a round. It's like losing a turn in jail while playing Monopoly. Making the condition even worse via houserules should be considered very carefully., thus only do what OnlineDM suggests if you really know what you're doing and are sure that your players are up for the adding hassle. Note also that Rule 0 isn't just about the DM coming up with rules, it's about an agreement between DM and players on modified rules.

Sorry, I think I was unclear.

My change to dominate makes the condition LESS severe. The dominated character immediately makes an attack against an ally. However, when that character's regular turn comes around, THEY CHOOSE THEIR OWN ACTION. They're just dazed (save ends). The character still gets to attack an enemy, take second wind, run away, whatever.

At the end of that character's turn, they make a saving throw against being dazed. If they fail the saving throw, the dominator immediately has the character make another attack against an ally (or whatever other at-will action the dominator chooses).

When the character's next turn comes up, they still get to choose their own action (but just one, because they're dazed). And so on, until they save.

My tweak to dominated gives the character an extra action that the dominator gets to choose, but they still get an action of their choice on their own turn.

I completely agree with you that DMs should NOT make conditions like dominated a bigger penalty than they already are. They definitely have the potential to be unfun. My tweak is to allow the character to struggle against the domination, possibly by attacking the dominator. If the dominator dies, the domination ends.

 

[NewJeffCT]

I would always try to eliminate the attack of a striker, since they usually do the most damage. If you can make them move away from the bad guy as part of using the at-will, it's even more of a plus. (they'll eventually make their save, and then will be farther away from getting into attack position when they do)

Also, while it may seem like DM metagaming to not target a high Will PC, we don't know what the bad guy knows - maybe the bad guy has been studying the PCs, or has gotten a scouting report on them? While I agree that if the bad guy goes into the combat cold, he should not know which PC to target right away, we don't know the entirety of the situation here on enworld.

 

[Unwise]

I would actually consider going for the knight depending on who else is involved in the combat. Dominate would entirely turn off the knights defensive measures. This leaves the enemy free to attack whoever they want. I think that will lead to PC death quicker than dominating a striker.

If I were the dominator, I would want to take out the biggest threat (the knight, a defender always looks like the biggest threat I reckon) and allow my minions and subordinates to kill the healer.

I think OnlineDM's Dominate rule works well for a power that gives the person delusions, or where the person should be trying to fight it off and having limited success in doing so. It does not really reflect a total domination like you would expect to see in a more subtle charm, but it reflects forced madness well. Fun wise, I think players would much prefer this option.

 

[Ryujin]

Take out the Knight. It leaves the squishies vulnerable, while not dragging combat out to an ungodly length. Taunt him while doing it.