What would you have done?

[Ravingdork]

Hindsight is always 20/20!

Our party consisted of...
...a gnome brutal strength rogue.
...a human two-weapon fighting ranger.
...a polearm-welding elf fighter.
...a polearm-wielding dragonborn polearm paladin.

After realizing that the treasure in the lair was only a trap to lure adventures in to be eaten by the solo "blue ooze," we all ran away. My gnome got outside the door first where I readied an action to close it on the ooze once all my comrades were clear. Then, another ooze showed up on my side of the door. My allies barreled through and engaged the new threat outside the lair. When the last PC made it through the door I shut it and made sure the blue ooze couldn't even slip under the cracks after us.

Then suddenly the ooze split into two oozes, somehow trapping every one of us against the wall! We did everything we could think to do, but it was to no avail. The oozes were just too tough.

What might you have done differently?

 

[tanj]

Concentrate attacks on one of the Ochre Jellys. When it dies either run (possibly with the defenders holding off the rats) or flank the other Ochre Jelly with strikers and have the defenders hold off the rats.

 

[Ravingdork]

Concentrate attacks on one of the Ochre Jellys. When it dies either run (possibly with the defenders holding off the rats) or flank the other Ochre Jelly with strikers and have the defenders hold off the rats.

That's exactly what we were doing...until we all died.

 

[tanj]

There's not much else to do once in that situation.

Couldn't you have bull rushed Jr. to the right?

The only other thing I could suggest would be a different party composition or making sure to not have everyone bunched together before attacking, but that seemed outside the scope of what you were asking. It does seem weird that you got the jelly to bloodied, but was unable to do another 1/4 of its HP.

 

[fissionessence]

1) Have a tank climb the wall behind you, scale across it, jump down, then pull one of the oozes away

2) Or, beg your DM, since you were all about to die, if you could attempt to bull rush through an ooze since, you know, they're all jelloish.

3) Have a strong character toss the gnome (and maybe the ranger) over one of the oozes to hopefully pull one off for better tactics.

Also, I'm assuming the blue ooze room had no other exits, or that would have been an obvious possibly to at least attempt. Hey, maybe you could even get lucky and the different colored oozes would hate each other.

Oooh, also I heard salt melts oozes (or is that slugs? ); did you have any salt with you?

~ fissionessence

 

[Ravingdork]

Couldn't you have bull rushed Jr. to the right?

That's the thing about PUSH effects. The enemy has to be pushed AWAY from you. If we would have pushed them to the right, then they woud still be adjacent to us, which is illegal for Push effects.

1) Have a tank climb the wall behind you, scale across it, jump down, then pull one of the oozes away

I wonder if that would have worked. *scratches head*

2) Or, beg your DM, since you were all about to die, if you could attempt to bull rush through an ooze since, you know, they're all jelloish.

I dunno. I'm real big on the rules and don't like bending them to my benefit. Takes all the challenge out of it.

3) Have a strong character toss the gnome (and maybe the ranger) over one of the oozes to hopefully pull one off for better tactics.

Oh I would have loved that! Shame we didn't think of it.

Also, I'm assuming the blue ooze room had no other exits, or that would have been an obvious possibly to at least attempt. Hey, maybe you could even get lucky and the different colored oozes would hate each other..

It didn't have any other exits that were immedietly apparent. We were all too afraid that if we opened the door again we would be trapped between three oozes.

 

[Goumindong]

Acrobatic Stunt.

Bull Rush won't work[no legal squares].

Kill one of the jellies then book they should not have had 1 round of HP left once they split. 30 some divided by two? For a brute? Yea, tiny.

Also, pretty sure the jellies should have become medium size when they split rather than staying large.

 

[Ravingdork]

Also, pretty sure the jellies should have become medium size when they split rather than staying large.

Quote me rules on exactly what happens when oozes split. They're aren't any really.

I mean, when an ooze splits, where does the "child ooze" appear? Does it appear adjacent to the "parent ooze?" Or can the parent ooze have it appear, say, on the other sides of enemies in a flanking position? Perhaps the two halves occupy the same square the whole time and are treated as two seperate targets with their own actions?

When an ooze splits, how big are the individual halves? Are they both still large sized (in the case of the ochre jelly)?

Also, if an ooze with action points splits, do both halves each have an action point? What if the ooze split after having spent its action point? Would the new ooze have a new action point?

In other words, what exactly happens when an ooze splits besides division of hit points?

These are all questions I sent verbatim to CS the day after the TPK. I got a messege back saying that it was being escalated for further review. Later I got this messege back: Unfortunately, there isn’t an official answer for the situation you describe. I’ve passed along this conversation to the game’s developers. Hopefully, we’ll see an update or FAQ entry covering it soon, but until then it’s up to the campaign’s Dungeon Master to decide. The DM is always the final arbiter on how they want their campaign to run.

Haha! NOBODY KNOWS!

 

[zillah]

Hmm, the honest truth? I would have rolled an optimized party. Polearms and no shields on both defenders? a human ranger dual wielding? and a gnome brutal rogue. Ok, I always advocate that rule of play what you want, but I will admit that your party make up did in fact have something to do with it.

No cleric/warlord. your defenders are using 2h weapons instead of a sword and board. You have no caster/controller.

I honestly think if you had a different make up and were siutabley equipped for a hard encounter you could have pulled it off. Props to the DM, who used your weaknesses to kill you

 

[lgw]

How to brake the lock and run away:
* PCs at E7 and E8 use an Aid Attack action on Ooze Jr, giving the PC at E6 +4 on his next attack.
* E6 then bull rushes it with a +4 bonus, because he has legal squares to push it to: from CD-78 to CD-89. He then moves himself to square D7.
* PC at E5 uses a readied move action to move to B7 to prevent further trapping.

But in general I have to agree with Zillah. If you had no positing powers, nor the DPS / health to nuke Ooze Jr while one of the Fighters holds attention of Ooze Sr, then your party was easier very weak or the encounter way too hard or you were well to blind to run into such a trap.