D&D 4E 4e limit of beatability

[Badwe]

In a few months time I have cooked up special encounters for my PCs to usher them into paragon level and cover the gap between H3: Pyramid of shadows and Revenge of the Giants. I wanted a little change of pace and something unique, so the idea is that each encounter is meant to showcare the story behind a particular PC. To that end, i sort of envisioned them exiting the transdimensional pyramid in H3 in something akin to "The end of time" from chrono trigger, which had incredibly tough encounters that had no consequence for losing.

That's where I'm looking for some crowd-sourced advice. Since there's no (or at least, not as bad as usual) consequence for losing and since they will reasonably attempt to restore all their daily powers in between, what's an encounter level that will still be decently challenging? I'm looking for a point at which the chance of TPK hits about 50/50. I know the book says level + 4 is about the limit before character death becomes a serious possibility, but i'm wondering how much farther i can go.

 

[RangerWickett]

Are you thinking the party might try repeatedly to achieve victory, or is this a one-off thing, where if you fail, you just move on to the next encounter and don't have to try again?

If it's a Groundhog Day style combat, you'd want it to be fast, so I'd say have an elite of party level +6, and give him some niche but serious vulnerabilities that the PCs can exploit if they memorize his pattern. You want to limit it to just one opponent so that combat doesn't drag.

If it's a one-off encounter, do you just want to smash the PCs and show them how bad-ass a given opponent is so that when they face him later, they'll know what they're up against? In that case, level +12, just to get the pointless fight over with faster. Even then, it'll take the bad guy 3 or 4 rounds to kill each PC.

 

[renau1g]

If you use the MM3 monster guidelines and terrain properly plus synergizing the monsters well an n+4 is a good barometer. I killed 4/6 with an n+3 encounter where enemy had a slight terrain advantage at the start of the fight and were synergized well.

 

[Brys]

To answer: I dunno. But maybe this is a chance for you to figure that out and report back with empirical data. If you're open to the idea, I would suggest some sort of arena scenario. The party takes on challenges of various strength for audience amusement. "Dead" characters are removed from the arena via teleportation and revived for the next fight. They only fight once per day (and know that going in, so they know not to save dailies).

Start the challenges at L+4 and see how tough you can make them. Let them know that some fights are going to be outside their range, and they get rewarded for putting on a good show (take risks, try fun/dangerous tactics). Maybe give an XP boost to the crowd favorite for that fight. Everyone gets full experience whether they live or die (so no consequences) and with battles that tough they should be levelling in half the normal time (5 fights or fewer).

After a few weeks, they are no longer as interesting as the new kids that just showed up and the hosts teleport them back to their own time and place (or is it...?). And it's just in time for the giants to rise up.

Now that I've layed that out, I may try it in my own game. Has a very Star Trek-Q-messing-with-Picard feel to it.

 

[renau1g]

Oh one other thing, if the players know this may be like a one fight in a day situation they may throw out all the stops, i.e. all their dailies, item powers, etc. so that would likely have a pretty big effect on the challenge level. Especially if you have a wizard or other encounter-long daily PC's/

 

[KidSnide]

It's also worth noting that the ability of a party to max-out for a single encounter is heavily dependent on player skill. A tactically effective party with optimized characters can experience the same challenge with an encounter 2-4 levels higher than a less tactically-inclined less-optimized party.

-KS

 

[UnknownAtThisTime]

I just wanted to say that this is a neat idea, and exiting "PoS" is a nice and plausible way of executing it. (I hated that place).

 

[jester_gl]

I had an idea while reading this thread. What if only the character related to the ongoing fight could uses his daily. That particular character would look awesome for his own storyline, and it would partly eliminate the problem of the 5 minutes workday.

 

[Lancelot]

Similar to renau1g above, I TPK'ed a 5-man party this week (40 sessions into the campaign, at 19th level) with a level+3 encounter, with some terrain advantage.

I used the new "essentials" Red Dragon, as shown on the WotC site. I found dragons, in general, are pretty nasty opponents. You don't have to go crazy-stupid with the encounter difficulty to make it brutal. You just have to play them to the hilt, and then some.

• Stay in the air. Keep out of reach of melee opponents.
• Grab opponents with claws or bite; fly into the air (high), and drop them.
• Go for the Leaders first, and any ranged Strikers. Ignore the Defenders.
• Always go for the coup. When a PC drops, take the time to finish them. Don't give them a chance to "kick up", and don't give them a chance to be healed. If you need to, use an Action Point to make sure of it.
• Go for the Uber-Round. Don't use Action Points at the start of the combat. Wait until the dragon is nearly bloodied, then Breath Weapon - action point for a big melee attack - move to provoke one or more opportunity attacks - get bloodied - and Breath Weapon again as free action.
• Make sure you're using a MM3 or later dragon, and/or update older dragons to the new damage format.
• Use terrain that really works to the dragon's advantage. I used lava pools to drop PCs into from a great height (falling damage, then ongoing 30 fire per round until the crawl out of the lava) and a wall of fuming smoke cutting the battlefield in half (the dragon would fly from side-to-side, forcing the PC's to "chase it" to keep it in line of sight).

I wouldn't recommend this for a non-expert party or if the stakes are "real". But if the stakes are "non-real", you should use the opportunity to show the party just how deadly dragons can be if you play them like most players play their PCs.

 

[Mr. Wilson]

I've found that if a party knows that it is there only encounter for the day, and thus are free to 'nova, then encounters ranging from n+3-7 is where the party really feels like they are in a fight for their lives.

N+5-7 is usually done for Solo fights or fights where the PCs have some terrain advantage, and using pre MMIII figures.

N+3-4 taxes PCs using MMIII figures and terrain that places PC at the disadvantage.