Small parties

I'm going to be trying my hand at DMing (finally), and there will only be 3 people in the party. This is an Eberron 3.5 game, and I'll be using the Forgotten Forge campaign path (goes up to 6th or so) to start. I have some ideas for balancing/tweaking the game so that the players don't feel like they're "missing" a player, but that they don't end up uber-powerful, either.

1. Ability Point Buy - A "tougher campaign" uses 28 points. 4 players x 28 points = 112. Divided by 3 players = 37 & change. Make it 36 to keep the math easy and everyone starts with a 14 in each stat. The PCs are exceptional, but hopefully not outrageous. A few extra spells, a bit of extra damage, but not out of control. And not everything will be a 14, because they're going to want some higher stats which will come at the cost of lower ones.

2. Do the same thing to skill points - multiply by 4/3. Classes with 2 & 4 points get 3 & 5. Those with 6 & 8 get 8 & 10. Again, hopefully enough to cover any "holes" without going overboard and knowing EVERYTHING.

3. Correspondingly, I'd like to take CRs down by 3/4, to keep them from gaining experience too quickly.

So, my question - What do you think? Too much work? Too powerful? Etc. I'm coming at this from someone who's playing in another campaign where I'm one of three (DH & I and another couple, since we live close enough to get together during the week) players and find that we're missing things occasionally. Also, I think right now they're leaning towards a party that will each have some small amount of healing: goblin psychic warrior, ? druid, warforged artificer. Although they keep threatening to make an "all-Small" party - goblin, gnome, & scout warforged... :\

I think those HR of yours will help and are easy to use. Much more simple & smooth than gestalt or similar heavier modifications.

You may add something to Hp, such as giving always max (at least the first few levels) to make character stand even more than now.

I'd use your 1 and 3, and give them 75% hp all the way through. Your 1 might be too much, though.

Since the 'average party size' is 4, losing 1 person isn't going to be a huge deal, I think. I recommend making only small changes (maybe give only 32 point buy and dont' mess with CRs) and then balance as you go on.

My advice on small parties is not to run standard adventures (which are usually geared toward the party of four). Instead come up with your own adventures geared toward the capabilities of the party themselves. Got a druid, a scout and a fighter - go with a wilderness campaign, and don't use powerful undead. Got a wizard, a cleric and a rogue - go more urban and not too many 'big hitting' opponents. Plus tailor the stories to the actual chcarcters - the druid wants to set up a grove let her and have some of the adventures centre on the process of conscecrating the place.

However as this seems to be your first time at running a game it's probably worth using a module so you don't have to worry about it. I have to say I'm not the best at determining balance of things rules wise - but it doesn't look too overpowering to me. On the XP front I'd say don't bother figuring out what the new CRs are - just calculate as if there was a fourth member of the party who is soaking up the XP.

Either way good luck with running - it took me a while to start as well but nowadays I almso never do anything else.

The Hoard

Well, I'd love to make my own adventures, but I'm not sure where to start, and I do like the adventures I've chosen. They're fairly well developed, actually, and I'll flesh out anything missing. I'm going to really analyze things to make sure they can do it, and I'm also going to make sure that I really grok what's going on so that I can act on the fly without looking things up. I think they'll give a good idea of the scope of Eberron, since they start out local (Sharn) and eventually you go all over the place, including Xen'drik.

The problem with just dumping xp is that I have two rules lawyers in the game, one of which is prob not happy with the minor changes I'm making already. He's very much a by-the-book person, and the book has to be written by WotC. I'm not going to go crazy. Mostly it's going to be things like one less goon, or maybe strip a level from a really high level BBG. I'm aware of the math involved, so I don't want to make it harder on myself then necessary! OTOH, I'll probably be using DM's Familiar, so once I do the math once I won't have to do it again.

The gestalt rules bug me - I think they're too powerful in some areas, and not powerful enough in others.

I had thought about something for hit points, but the stat increase should mean that those who care about their HP total will have a decent Con bonus. I'm trying for a heroic but not godly type of game. Does that make sense? Also, Eberron doesn't have a whole lot of high level NPCs running around, which is where my xp concerns come in. Particularly in a "book" module, it's assumed that party size difference is offset by characters advancing faster, and that's something I'm trying to avoid.

Three instead of four players may not be as much difference as I think. HR#2 (skill points) is prob the one I'm most likely to include, since it's easy & just more fun for the players I think. It stinks to just not be able to do something for lack of skill ranks. Besides, I think fighters need more skill points anyway.

I agree with you that more skill points will round them out pretty well, and give the players more options.

If you feel comfortable knocking down CRs a little then I think I would just go with 32 point buy. 36 just seems too much to me. Plus, you can make your adjustments based on whatever your party of 3 is missing. If they lack healing power, throw in more potions or wands (if someone can use a wand). If they lack trapfinding, drop some of the traps from the adventures, or lower the DC to find and disable the traps. If they lack muscle and/or firepower, go with your idea of dropping a goon from some encounters.

On HP, I really like the option to take 1/2 of your hit dice, rounded up. This keeps the low hit dice guys from being stuck with extremely low HP, but gives the higher hit dice guys a chance to get even more.

I'd think that a party of three wouldn't need extra bonuses. Maybe subtract a monster or two from the number appearing in each encounter and they should be fine. If there's not a rogue in the party, cut out some of the traps as well.

I have a similar dilemma. I tried 2 players with 2 PCs each, but that didn't work out so well--especially when it turned into 3-4 players irregularly. I am thinking baout trying gestalt PCs (but I don't have that book). I may make it more like the old multiclassing with HPs averaged but everything else being the best of each class. A benefit to you is that the rules lawyer(s) can verify the gestalt options in the WotC book. Good luck.

Jyrdan Fairblade said:

I'd think that a party of three wouldn't need extra bonuses. Maybe subtract a monster or two from the number appearing in each encounter and they should be fine. If there's not a rogue in the party, cut out some of the traps as well.

Click to expand...

I have been running a 3 PC party with purchased adventures for about 5 months. Works fine.

A few things have helped:

1) The party is well balanced: with a rogue, cleric and sorcerer, all of whom have now taking a level in another class. Encourage this, and keep in mind that certain roles, like the archery only rogue or ranger or the retiring cleric who buffs others and doesn't fight much, may not work.

2) I am not to stingy with the XP (or the treasure). I did this mostly for other reasons, but in any case having a little bit higher level can make a key difference. Maybe you can start at 3rd (though we didn't)

3) The fudge. Every level, the PC gets a fudge that can be used to annul an enemy attack. I did this becuase I went to an "open roll" and wouldn't be fudging the dice behind the screen, and because people aren't raised from the dead every day in Terra (to balance it, I occasionally give NPCs fudges). In any case something like this, or action or hero points, could help alot.

And on a slightly different point:

4) encourage everyone to get involved. This means that they all show up to play, and then they all are fairly active. If you are used to 4 or 5 people, you may find the social dynamic dragging a little. But three active players can more then make up for it.


Hope that helps!

We ran our first few 3E campaigns with a GM and 3 players and I found that it worked fine so long as the players understood that they needed to make characters who could fill more than one role in the party. In my first campaign we had:

A Druid who handled all the healing plus had an Animal Companion to help with combat and wasn't afraid to jump in with his longspear from time to time either.

A Rogue/Sorcerer who handled the traps/locks and also could make use of any Arcane Wands and Scrolls they came across.

A Ranger who was the primary fighter and could scout/track as well.


I think if your players go into it with a beefy point buy and the willingness to make PC's who are broad based and not "one trick ponies" then they'll probably fare well.