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5th level characters vs a purple worm
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<blockquote data-quote="Dessert Nomad" data-source="post: 7523674" data-attributes="member: 6976536"><p>All of the of 'play it as something they see, or can easily avoid' type responses are good ideas, but boil down to 'don't treat the encounter as a combat encounter to a 'you see a thing in the distance encountter'. That's certainly an option, but to me it's same thing as saying 'yeah, having a full strength 5e purple worm just erupt from the ground like the module says and having the party fight it like the module implies is a bad idea'. It looks like my gut feeling was right (especially now that I dug up the numbers) and that running the encounter as the 'worm bursts out of the ground, roll initiative' fight the module implies is a bad idea, so I'll end up either toning the worm down or making it a 'sighting' encounter. I appreciate the suggestions, even though I'm not individually quote-reply on each of them.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>You have a 1 in 10 chance of a random encounter every 2 hours, then roll a d12 on the first table and, on an 11 or 12 roll a d6 on the second table, where one result is the worm. If the characters run through most of the 7 days water they're provided with while exploring (which is a reasonable here) that would be 5 days, or 60 rolls. That leads to an average of around six encounters, one in six of which will be special, and which has a one in six chance of being a worm. So the chance of it happening on a given adventure is around 1 in 6, and I don't consder a 1 in 6 chance 'exceedingly slim' or 'exceedinly unlikely'. I'm not really sure what relevance the unlikliness of the encounter has to do with the topic, but it's not some obscure 'lost the lottery' chance.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Here's the thing: No one here said anything like that. I'll repeat: No one here said anything remotely like "PCs should have a 90% chance of victory in every encounter". In the future, please respond to something that was actually written, or to the topic of the thread. Throwing in a monster that has more HP than the party put together, 2 attacks per round at or near one-shot level for all PCs, moves faster than the PCs, and frequently renders unconscious PCs unrecoverable is just not "PCs should have a 90% chance of victory", it's "Should a random counter likely trash the party to the point that they likely can't continue the adventure." </p><p></p><p>I also think my definition of 'creative' is pretty different than yours. I don't really consider 'run and hope DM fiat removes abilities from the monster (like its movement) or makes it decide to stop attacking' or 'throw one of the few spells that might disable it and hope it doesn't make its save' to be an interesting kind of creative. And trying diplomacy on an creature with 1 int that doesn't speak any languages is... yeah, good luck with that persuasion check.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Dessert Nomad, post: 7523674, member: 6976536"] All of the of 'play it as something they see, or can easily avoid' type responses are good ideas, but boil down to 'don't treat the encounter as a combat encounter to a 'you see a thing in the distance encountter'. That's certainly an option, but to me it's same thing as saying 'yeah, having a full strength 5e purple worm just erupt from the ground like the module says and having the party fight it like the module implies is a bad idea'. It looks like my gut feeling was right (especially now that I dug up the numbers) and that running the encounter as the 'worm bursts out of the ground, roll initiative' fight the module implies is a bad idea, so I'll end up either toning the worm down or making it a 'sighting' encounter. I appreciate the suggestions, even though I'm not individually quote-reply on each of them. You have a 1 in 10 chance of a random encounter every 2 hours, then roll a d12 on the first table and, on an 11 or 12 roll a d6 on the second table, where one result is the worm. If the characters run through most of the 7 days water they're provided with while exploring (which is a reasonable here) that would be 5 days, or 60 rolls. That leads to an average of around six encounters, one in six of which will be special, and which has a one in six chance of being a worm. So the chance of it happening on a given adventure is around 1 in 6, and I don't consder a 1 in 6 chance 'exceedingly slim' or 'exceedinly unlikely'. I'm not really sure what relevance the unlikliness of the encounter has to do with the topic, but it's not some obscure 'lost the lottery' chance. Here's the thing: No one here said anything like that. I'll repeat: No one here said anything remotely like "PCs should have a 90% chance of victory in every encounter". In the future, please respond to something that was actually written, or to the topic of the thread. Throwing in a monster that has more HP than the party put together, 2 attacks per round at or near one-shot level for all PCs, moves faster than the PCs, and frequently renders unconscious PCs unrecoverable is just not "PCs should have a 90% chance of victory", it's "Should a random counter likely trash the party to the point that they likely can't continue the adventure." I also think my definition of 'creative' is pretty different than yours. I don't really consider 'run and hope DM fiat removes abilities from the monster (like its movement) or makes it decide to stop attacking' or 'throw one of the few spells that might disable it and hope it doesn't make its save' to be an interesting kind of creative. And trying diplomacy on an creature with 1 int that doesn't speak any languages is... yeah, good luck with that persuasion check. [/QUOTE]
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