KotS -- built for 5 PCs?

[Xorn]

After DMing a session of KotS, and seeing two kobold fights take most of the session, I decided to review the encounter numbers. They all seem to be geared at a 5-PC party. Seeing as I only have 4 PCs (dragonborn warlord, tiefling fey warlock, human fighter and human 2-weapon ranger), I decided to reduce later encounters to bring them closer to the XP value of the PCs (400 for a Level 1 encounter). In the Kobold Ambush, I'd have removed one of the two dragonshields across the road. Outside the lair, 3 minions will be removed. Inside the lair, I'll remove two minions and one skirmisher (the ones in the middle) from the first wave, and a dragonshield from the second wave.

Sidenote: keeping track of all the shifty shifting of the kobolds in a pain in the @**!

Interesting. My 4-player group pulverized up to Irontooth (fighter, warlord, rogue, ranger). Irontooth actually got one swing and died before his next attack. The kobold that did the most damage was the wyrmpriest, actually.

 

[ff6shadow]

How the hell did that happen Xorn. My group smashed through the kobolds, surrounded Irontooth, and still got ripped to peices. They had a Ranger, Cleric, Rogue, Wizard, and Paladin. By the time the battle was over the paladin and rogue were dead.

 

[essenbee]

I'm DMing a party of 4 through KotS at the moment; they have just defeated the kobolds outside the lair without any difficulty at all. The wyrmpriest and the dragonshields in the previous encounter proved to be a little tougher, but in the end everyone was okay apart from the cleric, who was down at negative HPs. The part consists of the human cleric, Eladrin ranger, Dragonborn fighter and human rogue. I'm leaving Irontooth as-is and seeing what happens!

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I posted my KotS experience with 4 players yesterday.

I didn't scale back anything, but the party rested more then I had hoped for, and I had to pull my punches in the final encounter against Irontooth a little bit (fudging 2-3 rolls, I guess, and having the Wyrmrpiest stabilize the dying PCs for enslaving purposes). But the dice were also on my side that day. Kobold Minions shouldn't hit AC 20 Paladins that often...

 

[joganrosh]

hey man, how did you scale it back for 3 pcs? i'm running KotS on saturday and one of my players dropped out. am a bit nervous as its the gangs first 4e session and i want it to go well (i.e. not too easy, not too hard).

I intend them to do all the kobold stuff, finishing with Irontooth in the session; am worried the Irontooth fight is going to decimate them.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

hey man, how did you scale it back for 3 pcs? i'm running KotS on saturday and one of my players dropped out. am a bit nervous as its the gangs first 4e session and i want it to go well (i.e. not too easy, not too hard).

I intend them to do all the kobold stuff, finishing with Irontooth in the session; am worried the Irontooth fight is going to decimate them.

Remove NPCs until you reach 3/5 of the XP of the suggested XP? Maybe a little more, even, at least in the Irontooth encounter (you could "delevel" Irontooth as suggested in the DMG)

 

[vagabundo]

I've levelled up my 4 player party to 2nd level and I'm not changing any of the encounters. I noticed in the XP table that 4pcs and 5pcs were, mostly, just a level apart.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

I've been playing with a 4 man party, but I made all of the adjustments on the PC side.

There are two kobolds who help the characters out from time to time.

And the Cleric happened upon a very 'liberal' interpretation of the rules for healing word that I haven't corrected.

He's not that big into 4E yet anyway so I don't see him spreading the mistake around.

 

[Ginnel]

But the dice were also on my side that day. Kobold Minions shouldn't hit AC 20 Paladins that often...

Well should or shouldn't, they do quite a lot our paladin was peppered in his AC 20 as well using up 5 healing surges in the first fight

 

[ozziewolf]

How the hell did that happen Xorn. My group smashed through the kobolds, surrounded Irontooth, and still got ripped to peices. They had a Ranger, Cleric, Rogue, Wizard, and Paladin. By the time the battle was over the paladin and rogue were dead.

I'm the Rogue in his part and I'd have to say a lot of it was timing and strategy.

We had the first wave down before the end of the third round. At which point I was close enough that I spotted Irontooth. I attacked him and the ranger got an attack off. The fighter either hadn't gone yet in round 3 or had higher initiative and went before Irontooth in round 4. Irontooth was a good distance away from us so the Figther positioned himself between the two walls and readied an action. When Irontooth charged in the Dwarf nailed him.

During this time the Warlord was south taking care of the Wyrmpriest and the one or two guys he had with him. I ran around another wall and attacked Irontooth from behind. The ranger tore into him from behind the Dwarf. Then we finished off either the last wyrmpriest or Dragonshield. The Warlord was hurt pretty badly and was in danger of going down after another hit.. two tops. The Ranger and I where for the most part unhurt and the Fighter was ok although I think he'd used his healing surge by then.

Having the entire first wave dead early and the fighter blocking the path while readying an action was the major factors in us taking the fight apart.

I even commented early on in the first wave when we heard a commotion that we needed to get these guys down as fast as possible. Being caught between the first and 2nd wave would have brutalized us. I think all or most of us actually spent our action points to finish off the first wave as fast as possible.

Edit: We also had some great rolls for hits and damage on Irontooth. Rolling poorly could have pushed it the other way as well.