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<blockquote data-quote="S'mon" data-source="post: 5683629" data-attributes="member: 463"><p>I would definitely have used the APs in round 1 vs the Paladin. (a) I halve all monster hp, so if they don't AP on round 1 they may be dead before they can AP and (b) I play the monsters organically - 'what would this wolf do' - not in the metagame way you seem to assume. The wolves wanted to kill a single target and drag them off to eat. If they were going to attack the Paladin at all, it would have been in order to kill him as quickly as possible.</p><p></p><p>I don't run encounters 'to teach people lessons', that's not my style at all, and you should not be using my post-match analysis as a basis for thinking that's how I wanted the encounter to turn out. What actually happened was that the other PCs fought heroically, killed or drove off the wolves, then took the wizard Ashara's body into Treona's tower, where (much to all the players' surprise) the wise woman was able to use her Raise Dead ritual to bring Ashara back to life in what turned out to be a great roleplaying moment.</p><p></p><p>The lessons learned were:</p><p>(1) For the wizard player, Catherine - she learned that winning init and going right before the monsters, you may not want to move up and put yourself in a vulnerable position before you know what you're up against. Let the Defender do that, he's designed as the damage soak. I had learned the same lesson playing a Thief in another campaign BTW - and this was an organic, emergent effect of play in the 4e system, not a vindictive DM 'teaching me a lesson'. </p><p></p><p>(2) As DM, I learned that turning monsters into Elites was maybe not the best way to level-up an encounter, after all. I still Elite-ify 'named' leader monsters. But in general, adding more monsters seems to work better for a more balanced fight.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="S'mon, post: 5683629, member: 463"] I would definitely have used the APs in round 1 vs the Paladin. (a) I halve all monster hp, so if they don't AP on round 1 they may be dead before they can AP and (b) I play the monsters organically - 'what would this wolf do' - not in the metagame way you seem to assume. The wolves wanted to kill a single target and drag them off to eat. If they were going to attack the Paladin at all, it would have been in order to kill him as quickly as possible. I don't run encounters 'to teach people lessons', that's not my style at all, and you should not be using my post-match analysis as a basis for thinking that's how I wanted the encounter to turn out. What actually happened was that the other PCs fought heroically, killed or drove off the wolves, then took the wizard Ashara's body into Treona's tower, where (much to all the players' surprise) the wise woman was able to use her Raise Dead ritual to bring Ashara back to life in what turned out to be a great roleplaying moment. The lessons learned were: (1) For the wizard player, Catherine - she learned that winning init and going right before the monsters, you may not want to move up and put yourself in a vulnerable position before you know what you're up against. Let the Defender do that, he's designed as the damage soak. I had learned the same lesson playing a Thief in another campaign BTW - and this was an organic, emergent effect of play in the 4e system, not a vindictive DM 'teaching me a lesson'. (2) As DM, I learned that turning monsters into Elites was maybe not the best way to level-up an encounter, after all. I still Elite-ify 'named' leader monsters. But in general, adding more monsters seems to work better for a more balanced fight. [/QUOTE]
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