Will a pair of Owlbears wipe out a 6th-level party?

[Holy Bovine]

As long as folks don't feel like a wagon, some trees and some icy terrain make for a boring encounter, I'll go with that. The frozen lake sounds like it might be an interesting location for an encounter someday, but I think the party will have enough to think about with just the owlbears in this one.

Thanks for all the feedback on this!

Sounds great. You want the terrain to be a side attraction not the main event!

Did the frozen lake with some will-o-wisps. The wisps, of course, lure the PCs on to it while they fly over it, basically a variation on the standard lure into a swampy ground.

Multiple charecters and their horses go into the water. This included the armored cleric. And he stayed in it for a while. Rounds are short, and its takes a while to drown or be effected by exposure. Eventually he got to the edge and hacked his way out. Can't remember if I let him cast under water, but being there kept him from getting zapped by the wisps, who hammered the rest of the party.

That sounds much more like how a 'frozen lake' encounter would go. Something using the lake to lure people out on to it until it is too late. Love it.

 

[OnlineDM]

Original poster here. I thought I should let everyone know how this battle turned out. In the end, I decided to go with a momma Owlbear and her two cubs (Young Owlbears).

The fight was brutal but survivable. I did drop two of the four PCs to unconsciousness, but they were revived by the healer in the party. On two occasions an owlbear hit the same target with both claws and grabbed it, getting ready for the auto-hit beak attack, but in both cases the claws dropped the PC to unconsciousness (so the owlbear moved on during the next turn rather than taking the coup de grace).

I'd say the luck in the battle was pretty even - some crits on both sides, some misses on both sides - and it was indeed a challenging battle for the 6th-level party. It was not insurmountable, though. The party did have the advantage of telling the wagon driver when he should keep the wagon moving and when he should stop, so there was some interesting terrain.

I think that a pair of adult owlbears would have been too much for this party. The party focused fire pretty well on the one adult in this battle, and dropping her first was VERY important. If after dropping her they still would have had one adult owlbear to deal with, which wouldn't drop until it was all the way dead (as opposed to the two young owlbears with half the hit points), they would have had a harder time. I think that could have spelled a total party kill, so I'm glad I went with mom and the cubs.

As a side note, the party now finds itself tracking some Duergar in an underground cave system (getting close to the Underdark, essentially). Can anyone point me toward good adventures or other materials that showcase interesting Duergar encounters? I've never used Duergar before, but they seem to be a good fit for the direction this campaign is taking.

 

[the Jester]

It's from the late 2e days, but the Gates of Firestorm Peak has a great duergar complex, with cool bits of duergar lore- nephilium is a translucent metal analogous to steel, for instance. Also, they traditionally rode giant jumping spiders called steeders.

For 4e, H2 has a duergar in it, but although the encounters are fine, I don't remember them being anything special.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It's from the late 2e days, but the Gates of Firestorm Peak has a great duergar complex, with cool bits of duergar lore- nephilium is a translucent metal analogous to steel, for instance. Also, they traditionally rode giant jumping spiders called steeders.

For 4e, H2 has a duergar in it, but although the encounters are fine, I don't remember them being anything special.

I'm pretty sure H2 actually has an entire Duergar COMPLEX. Not that I've generally heard that it is a great module or anything but it is a pretty open-ended one that you can hack a lot if you really want to.

Other than that Duergar have been something of the red haired stepchild of evil races. There just hasn't been a ton written on them and few adventures they are a major part of.

They could make nice opponents. You'll just have to do the legwork to come up with some good hooks and interesting twists. Gates of Firestorm Peak might be adaptable or at least a good place to crib from.

 

[Wednesday Boy]

It's from the late 2e days, but the Gates of Firestorm Peak has a great duergar complex, with cool bits of duergar lore- nephilium is a translucent metal analogous to steel, for instance. Also, they traditionally rode giant jumping spiders called steeders.

That's what sprung to my mind too. I played in that way back when and it was on of the most entertaining 2nd Ed. modules that we played.

 

[OnlineDM]

Thanks for the suggestions! I've ordered Gates of Firestorm Peak now and will see what I can use from it in a 4th Edition game.