D&D 5E (2014) Design Debate: 13th-level PCs vs. 6- to 8-Encounter Adventuring Day

[CapnZapp]

If she's getting her ass beat, boom she hates in a few vrocks

The OotA adventure uses the demon summoning variant that way and it bugs me greatly.

Why? Because all summoned monsters disappear when their summoner dies!

The only strategy that gives summoned monsters any chance at all of impacting the encounter is for the marilith to summon them as soon as possible, preferably before the fight even starts! (The second before it starts, that is. They only last one minute)

Any DM directive of "Ilvira summons a Yochlol when bloodied" is nonsense.

The most likely outcome of that strategy is that the yochlol appears and disappears without even taking an action (if you roll initiative; otherwise it will get to make one (1) action).

The best way to use summoned monsters is to send them into the fight without you even being seen. And only revealing yourself once the party have committed to fighting the summons (bloodied or killed at least one of them), presenting the party with the difficult choice of
a) continuing to kill off the summonings - otherwise all resources (actions, spells, etc) used to hurt the summonings will go to waste
b) switching to kill off the summoner and main monster - allowing the battered but still functional summonings to keep attacking the party for a maximum length of time (namely when the summoner is completely fresh and ideally buffed up too)

The ideal is to hold off until it would take slightly less effort by the party to kill off the summonings through direct means (i.e. attacking them) than through the indirect means of killing the summoner. Assuming the bunch of summonings as a group presents a comparable threat to the summoner, that is.

Meaning the party is encouraged to hold off attacking the main monster for ever so shortly...

 

[Celtavian]

I keep wondering why the Marilith, which is supposed to lead a legion of demons, is fighting the party solo. Give her some troops to command and see how hard it becomes. Likewise the Balor is not a solo monster. That's like complaining that Napoleon is a wimp because you can take him out with a musket when he is alone and only has his ceremonial sword.

Generals command troops, give them some troops.

How about 2 Glabrezu, 2 Vrocks, 6 Quasits, and 24 Dretch (need fodder).

And adding that would have made it a way above deadly fight according to the encounter building guidelines against six level 10 PCs. But I did that anyway.

It was a demonic warband She had four hezrou, four vrocks, and six chasme with her. Party ignored her troops and annihilated her first. Rest of the demons were like orcs after she was gone. Bladesinger spent his time dancing around them causing them to use AoOs while he laughed at them. A few banishment spells thinned them out. Hammer fell on them after that.

The problem is that melee is fairly low value in 5E, especially at higher levels. It's always been very easy to control and destroy melee creatures without spell support in every edition of D&D as you gain levels. In a game like 5E where mobility is very high, it's even easier to destroy melee creatures with ranged attacks while moving. You literally have to put them in situations like Flamestrike did where they start off on top of you. But really, how often can you do that? Every time? 50% of the time? 25% of the time? I at least had them in an environment where they started only 120 feet from each other since it was a roving warband and they were in darkness both could see only 120 feet apart. When power on power met, the PCs had more power due to spellcasting support. That's why I think a marilith and balor should be designed as though they will be the spellcasting support for a demonic warband rather than as more powerful melee demons. Demonic warbands need casting support to withstand parties.

 

[CapnZapp]

They don't need to design every monster with a dozen answers when many parties only ask one question.

If a low optimization/tactics party charges a bog standard dragon head-on and is challenged... Great! Does the dragon need fifteen spells for the DM to keep track of in this scenario? Probably not.

That's a straw man, though.

Nobody insists on "every monster" having a dozen tricks up its sleeve.

But a monster described as "intelligent"?

Either make it clear it won't be encountered alone, or give it the means to survive on its own.

To survive on its own, a high CR monster absolutely should be able to counter, say, the four most common "cheats" that the game itself gives the heroes.

Each designer should absolutely be expected to write CR 15ish monsters that can hurt heroes at a range, or have a semi-reliable way of delivering melee damage. Running 60 feet a round might work at low levels, but doesn't cut it in tier III.

This is, or should be, monster design 101.

Nobody is asking for intricate strategies to counter every single plan the PCs come up with. You're right, that would be unreasonable.

But making sure class abilities doesn't trivially shut down the monster? You betcha!

By this metric, the 5th edition Monster Manual is a definitive fail. Let's hope a MM2 won't be.

 

[Celtavian]

Re: the total cover thing (and sharpshooter). I think it's important to remember you can move, shoot, and move back again.

In other words, there's no reason to take half cover, like ever.

An artillery monster can step out of total cover, fire, and move back into total cover.

The sharpshooter can set up a rection shot, sure, but that reduces him by 2/3rds.

A melee monster that starts out several rounds away simply must have conveniently placed chunks of total cover to end its movement behind each round. Period.

(And of course this doesn't protect it from attacks that can round corners, such as Fireball)

Of course, you can fix this in other ways, such as making the archers preoccupied with other monsters. Either monsters that have snuck up on the party to distract them while the big bruiser lumbers on; or simply by not having a single monster rush at them. If you know the archers will take down 1,8 Marilith on average in the time it takes to run towards the party; then have three of them start out.

But all this boils down to the one solution we don't want: more monsters. The challenge is to make the solo challenging while staying solo.

Sharpshooter must be toned down. What usually happens is the melee members of the party engage the creature or creatures, the ranged attackers hammer it from behind. Normally, half cover due to positioning behind another creature slightly improves AC and is a good tactic for a melee creature. Or even maybe using mobile cover like a tower shield or something similar a DM designs. A Sharpshooter obviates this tactically for the DM as well as all the other benefits. Limiting Sharpshooter is done to limit how a party can use it, not just an individual. Melees can almost always impede attack to the archer long enough to destroy nearly any creature's hit points.

I tried to have Shadow Demons as scouts sneak up on the party. Very hard to do with a Devilsight character in the party or a ranger with double proficiency perception. Even worse with the usual double proficiency lore bard perception multiclass warlock with Devilsight.

Sharpshooter gives too much. I'm toning it down after this campaign. Not even going to deal with all the tactical garbage that feat provides in one package. Whoever made it the way it is lost their damn mind as far as I'm concerned, especially with additions to the game from Unearthed Arcana like Close Quarters Combat which allows melee ranged attacks without Crossbow Expert.

 

[Celtavian]

Well she's been a recurring villain over several levels, so I was able to test it out a bit without it being a major issue. She first fought my party when they were level 5, so she was just toying with them, and it was more a case of them realizing they were outclassed before something major happened that interrupted the fight.

That gave me a foundation for what to expect with them a bit. So I decided to make teleport a move action just because I feel that's easily justified and I felt a bonus action allowed for a bit too much. Blocking missiles seemed thematically cool, and one player is an archer with sharpshooter, so I was ready for that, and used that to effect the second time they fought.

I was thinking about adding some spells or spell like abilities for their next encounter (which I expect will be the last), but I think I'll just give her some potions and then one or two other items to help her be able to withdtand the onslaught they can release. Adding spells would require more prep beforehand, which I try to keep to a minimum, if possible. If I really think an opportunity presents itself to use a particular spell that seems appropriate for the Marilith, then I'd likely just go ahead and have her do it. But I'm very improvisational at the table, and many DMs don't seem to like that approach.

She will have some underlings with her, some lesser demons, so that will be a factor.

I think one of the abilities I miss, and correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think they have it anymore, is the ability to gate in other demons. None of them still do that do they? I forget off the top of my head, and don't have my book handy. But I think that's an easy way to add to the Marilith which doesn't require a lot of mechanical tinkering. If she's getting her ass beat, boom she hates in a few vrocks or a couple of glabrezu or hezrou.

And if you want or need to calculate it by the guidelines, you simply treat them as additional creatures and calculate the difficulty that way.

They have demon summoning as an optional rule. Definitely want to add that back in.

 

[Celtavian]

You can just lie prone. Sharpshooter doesn't remove the disadvantage from firing at prone targets.

A marilith might consider this beneath her dignity though.

I must prefer the deflection of ranged attacks added to her parry ability. Fits her thematically.

 

[CapnZapp]

And if building those things into her stat block makes her too challenging for other parties?

There's plenty of big stupid brutes in the MM already.

The specific complaint here is that the Marilith is given the stats of a big stupid brute.

Some times its okay for the designer to do the job, instead of relying on the DM to do it for him. Some monsters should be given tools. The expectation here was that the Marilith would be one of them.

But the sad truth is that the MM exhibits very few showcases of the designers really having understood high level play. There's simply too many naively designed high-level monsters.

The tarrasque-killing wizard-on-a-bike is definitely an absurd example, but the lack of even the most cursory analysis of the environment a party projects around it that any monster has to get through in order to present a challenge is telling.

That monsters have true sight and blind sense and teleport and "spell resistance" isn't by accident. These things are there because without them, a monster is helpless against a half-competent high-level party.

So offering up CR 15ish monsters that can be shut down in three different ways none of which are particularly taxing is simply what's professionally known as...

not good enough

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I must prefer the deflection of ranged attacks added to her parry ability. Fits her thematically.

Sure. You could in fact do both. My point about prone wasn't specifically about the Marilith--it was a bit of tactical advice about how to counter Sharpshooter.

 

[CapnZapp]

Flamestrike makes a harsh environment to increase the challenge. I redesign the death slaad to be challenging against a party. I'm not sure why one is viewed as better than the other.

Sadly one inescapable theory is:

Because in the first case, the blame rests with the unimaginative DM (that would be you and me!), and the Monster Manual goes free.

The second case means criticism could be directed towards the professional game designers that make the product we pay money to not have to all the monsters ourselves.

(Yes, that was sarcasm. And passive agression. I'm not proud)

 

[hawkeyefan]

Variant right there in the MM:

A marilith has a 50 percent chance of summoning 1d6 vrocks, 1d4 hezrous, ld3 glabrezus, 1d2 nalfeshnees, or one marilith.

Your welcome

Haha my bad. I was unsure. I suppose that's the price of having multiple editions rattling around in my memory! Wires get crossed.

I would definitely use that ability.

The OotA adventure uses the demon summoning variant that way and it bugs me greatly.

Why? Because all summoned monsters disappear when their summoner dies!

The only strategy that gives summoned monsters any chance at all of impacting the encounter is for the marilith to summon them as soon as possible, preferably before the fight even starts! (The second before it starts, that is. They only last one minute)

Any DM directive of "Ilvira summons a Yochlol when bloodied" is nonsense.

The most likely outcome of that strategy is that the yochlol appears and disappears without even taking an action (if you roll initiative; otherwise it will get to make one (1) action).

The best way to use summoned monsters is to send them into the fight without you even being seen. And only revealing yourself once the party have committed to fighting the summons (bloodied or killed at least one of them), presenting the party with the difficult choice of
a) continuing to kill off the summonings - otherwise all resources (actions, spells, etc) used to hurt the summonings will go to waste
b) switching to kill off the summoner and main monster - allowing the battered but still functional summonings to keep attacking the party for a maximum length of time (namely when the summoner is completely fresh and ideally buffed up too)

The ideal is to hold off until it would take slightly less effort by the party to kill off the summonings through direct means (i.e. attacking them) than through the indirect means of killing the summoner. Assuming the bunch of summonings as a group presents a comparable threat to the summoner, that is.

Meaning the party is encouraged to hold off attacking the main monster for ever so shortly...

Well, I'd use it as the situation demanded. My comment you quoted above was only one example. But I'd certainly have a Marilith use the ability to summon other demons in a tactfully meaningful way.

Or I'd remove the summoning ends when summoner dies rule for demons and handwave it as it being different than standard summoning because it's innate.