Spiked Chain + Great Cleave = DM's Nightmare

[Azlan]

Hmm. After reading these replies, it seems like the best thing for me to do, to keep things interesting and challenging for all the players in my group, is quit using so many bands of opponents against my group. And thus, make Great Cleave the "not so great" feat that it is, in most other mid- to high-level campaigns.

Oh, well. :\

 

[Azlan]

No, it's not too strong. One fireball should do the same.

Yes, but as I said, the wizard is extremely limited by how many fireball spells she can cast per day, whereas the fighter can use her spiked chain and Great Cleave effortlessly and endlessly.

 

[Wolfwood2]

Yes, but as I said, the wizard is extremely limited by how many fireball spells she can cast per day, whereas the fighter can use her spiked chain and Great Cleave effortlessly and endlessly.

Try using some hobgoblins for your horde of low hitdice monsters.

They'll have all sorts of disciplined tactics that can deal with your spiked chain weilder. A Shield Wall front line filled with hobs on full defense, backed up by archers shooting from higher ground. A simple first level spell like Obscuring Mist to introduce miss chances and stop the chain o' doom. Tanglefoot bags to keep chainmeister in place.

Listen, the spiked chain weilder isn't doing anything any other fighter type couldn't do. She's just doing it a couple of rounds faster. Ultimately, what difference does that make? These guys probably don't have the attack bonus to get through the PCs' AC anyway.

If you want to make combat with low HD humanoid bands interesting, you need to have them use clever tactics and terrain and low cost items to their advantage. Just screaming and leaping will lead to their quick deaths, spiked chain or not.

 

[shilsen]

Hmm. After reading these replies, it seems like the best thing for me to do, to keep things interesting and challenging for all the players in my group, is quit using so many bands of opponents against my group. And thus, make Great Cleave the "not so great" feat that it is, in most other mid- to high-level campaigns.

Oh, well. :\

I'd say you need to vary the sort of enemies the group fights, so that they sometimes fight large groups of weak enemies, sometimes fight spellcasters, sometimes fight a couple of strong enemies, sometimes fight ranged attackers, sometimes fight mounted enemies, etc. And sometimes combinations of the above, of course. And throw in terrain, tactics, and other elements to vary the combats.

 

[udalrich]

You probably want to stop having "a horde of 1 HD mooks" as your default encounter. However, occasionally throw a huge horde at the party so this player can enjoy her feat. You can even make it a plot hook. Here's an example from a campaign I ran a while ago.

An evil cleric of a nature god has created an altar in the wilderness. Every time an animal with 1 or less HD comes within 100 feet of it, the animal dies and becomes a skeleton. The skeleton waits around the altar until the full moon arrives, when all of them leave as a horde and rampage the country side.

One night during a full moon, the PCs are camped near the altar. Whoever is on watch hear an indistinct noise in the distance that starts getting louder. Several rounds later, the horde comes into sight.

The cleric can burn through all his turn attempts, and they keep coming. The wizard can use all his fireballs and they keep coming. The great cleave fighter wades in an keeps going and going.

The next day, the party can track them back to the altar (the track DC is negative, so it's simple even without a trained tracker). You get to describe the carnage that happened before the horde arrived and then they reach the altar. The party needs to figure out how to destroy it (or if they want to destroy it) (and can they safely approach it?) After destroying it, there's now an evil cleric who has them on his hit list.


There's nothing like the expression on your players faces when you reach into the jar of pennies you use for horde markers, grab a handful and toss them on the map without even bothering to count them.

 

[frankthedm]

Some folks feel Cleaving on AoOs is unreasonable since the AoO in the first place is on someone who dropped thier guard, something the person being cleaved into did not do.

Ranged attacks, range attacks, ranged attacks. Most humaniods have a few javalins, use them.

Cover blocks AoOs. AoOs are triggered for leaving the square. Use this as much as possible. It might sound cheasy and meta game, but so is the spiked chain.

 

[mvincent]

Cover blocks AoOs.

Yup. If you allies between you and the cleaver, you can often move about with impunity. So if a mook is planning to move towards the cleaver, her should either:
a) have no allies already there (so they'll be no one to cleave unto), or
b) move up behind his ally (using him for cover until the very last square).

Regardless, a great cleaver is still likely to clear out the scrubs quickly... but that's his job. If you do not have someone like this in your party to clear out these low XP mooks (via fireball, great cleave, whirlwind, or other "crowd-control" methods), then combat can move slower than it should.

The real issue though is the spiked-chain (it's indeed an uber weapon). A tripping build can completely control a 50' wide area (pretty much the whole battlefield) while enlarged.

 

[ronin]

Hopefully they won't start casting enlarge person. The reach created by that one low level spell is ridiculous. I have a player in my campaign that uses this combo every game. To make it even worse he combines it with the thicket of blades stance from Bot9S. Needless to say he wreaks havoc when fighting large sized or smaller creatures. The main weakness he has is being grappled. Not that he has a bad grapple score when buffed up, its just the only time I've really seen him ineffective.

 

[mvincent]

Hopefully they won't start casting enlarge person. The reach created by that one low level spell is ridiculous.

Yup. Note though: it has a 1 round casting time. By the time it takes effect (i.e. the next round), most opponent's should already be adjacent.

 

[the Jester]

Honestly, I think the problem is that you're expecting CR 1/3- CR 2 creatures to be a challenge to a 6th level group. In 3e, they really aren't. Back in the 1e/2e days, this approach worked fine, but 3e is a different beast entirely. I am hoping that using lower-level enemies will be viable and fun again in 4e, actually.