WarpedAcorn
First Post
My players have finished our previous homebrew campaign recently and are about to start up the next one. I have a reputation of a "Killer DM" because I use subtle tricks to make the players think they are in more danger than they are. I specifically wanted everyone to live through the first campaign, but I want this next one of be legit deadly.
That being said, my players all have very powerful characters. I let them roll for stats the way I used to in 3rd Edition, so everyone has VERY high stats (I refer to them as Hero stats). I also gave out a lot of magical items, including defensive items, so everyone has a magic weapon and the minimum AC is the Sorcerer at 18. The players themselves are all level 7 and party comp is Barbarian-Totem, Fighter-EK, Sorceress-Dragon, and one guy is changing to a Monk. For reference, one of their last encounters was against a Paladin 6/Warlock 3 (build via player rules) who constantly had x2 Vrocks out (throughout the encounter they killed 5 total Vrocks and eventually the Warlockadin). So it was a pretty tough encounter, and they did it with 2 characters dropping to 0 and 1 guy dieing due to being thrown into the Abyss (instakill with the caveat of him coming back if he made a deal with the Pit Fiend they encountered earlier).
So...the next session is mainly going to be some housekeeping and downtime activities, but I wanted to provide the option for an encounter in the form of a Bounty mission. Monsters have taken over an important bridge that is disrupting commerce and the city is offering a reward. The encounter will include x1 Oni, x2 Hill Giants, x2 Ogres. The monsters will have terrain advantage in the form of the Guard Towers stationed on either end of the bridge. This is intended as a 1-Encounter of the Day and I might hint at that, but this is also something I am OK with the players retreating from because my goal is to make a statement, "things are going to get tougher". This is also an encounter where the player will have to choose to fight because the Oni just wants to bargain for passage across the bridge.
My question to the community is, should I tweek this encounter? Are these enemies WAY too tough for the players, or would you recommend sprinkling some more enemies in there?
(Just a note, writing it out here makes me feel much better with the encounter as I planned it. Especially writing out that the intention is to have a difficult encounter that is not supposed to be winnable right now)
That being said, my players all have very powerful characters. I let them roll for stats the way I used to in 3rd Edition, so everyone has VERY high stats (I refer to them as Hero stats). I also gave out a lot of magical items, including defensive items, so everyone has a magic weapon and the minimum AC is the Sorcerer at 18. The players themselves are all level 7 and party comp is Barbarian-Totem, Fighter-EK, Sorceress-Dragon, and one guy is changing to a Monk. For reference, one of their last encounters was against a Paladin 6/Warlock 3 (build via player rules) who constantly had x2 Vrocks out (throughout the encounter they killed 5 total Vrocks and eventually the Warlockadin). So it was a pretty tough encounter, and they did it with 2 characters dropping to 0 and 1 guy dieing due to being thrown into the Abyss (instakill with the caveat of him coming back if he made a deal with the Pit Fiend they encountered earlier).
So...the next session is mainly going to be some housekeeping and downtime activities, but I wanted to provide the option for an encounter in the form of a Bounty mission. Monsters have taken over an important bridge that is disrupting commerce and the city is offering a reward. The encounter will include x1 Oni, x2 Hill Giants, x2 Ogres. The monsters will have terrain advantage in the form of the Guard Towers stationed on either end of the bridge. This is intended as a 1-Encounter of the Day and I might hint at that, but this is also something I am OK with the players retreating from because my goal is to make a statement, "things are going to get tougher". This is also an encounter where the player will have to choose to fight because the Oni just wants to bargain for passage across the bridge.
My question to the community is, should I tweek this encounter? Are these enemies WAY too tough for the players, or would you recommend sprinkling some more enemies in there?
(Just a note, writing it out here makes me feel much better with the encounter as I planned it. Especially writing out that the intention is to have a difficult encounter that is not supposed to be winnable right now)