Can a dozen orcs challenge a 17th level party?

[Dog Moon]

I think you should rename the title of your thread because when I saw it, I immediately thought no, but when I read your first entry, I saw that it was quite different from the title.

No, they cannot challenge a 17th level group, but try to use the atmosphere to mess with the character's heads. Say they're walking through a sewers. Make them hear strange noises coming from around them [This is the Orcs]. Let them see shadowy figures, but try to prevent them from ever seeing the Orcs. Build up mystery. Occasionally have an arrow fired at the group from the darkness from a long range away. It doesn't matter if it hits or not. And if they do manage to kill an Orc, they'll be confused because the Orc was felled in a single hit.

Of course nothing may work against 17th level PCs because height won't matter because most will have fly, Tanglefoot bags will hurt only the Orcs because the PCs will have high enough Reflexes they won't really matter, etc.

 

[the Jester]

Lure them into some kind of water trap. That's often deadly even to fairly high level pcs, if they're caught off guard.

 

[kigmatzomat]

* Give the orcs the literal high ground with hard-to-climb slopes.

* have significant amounts of hard cover. Supplement with caltrops & traps.

* Have an evironmental hazard, like incredibly strong winds, that will both give the orcs a move-silent bonus but also nerf arrow fire.

* drop a rockslide on the PCs (alternately divert a stream or start a stampede)

* Use Ranged Touch attacks (aka tanglefoot bags, flasks of alchemists fire, thunderstones, nets, etc)

 

[comareddin]

* Give the orcs the literal high ground with hard-to-climb slopes.

* have significant amounts of hard cover. Supplement with caltrops & traps.

* Have an evironmental hazard, like incredibly strong winds, that will both give the orcs a move-silent bonus but also nerf arrow fire.

* drop a rockslide on the PCs (alternately divert a stream or start a stampede)

* Use Ranged Touch attacks (aka tanglefoot bags, flasks of alchemists fire, thunderstones, nets, etc)

About dropping a rockslide on the party, if you made it so that the group was divided in two somehow (failed reflex saves, party formation...) the encounter might get a lot more interesting. If you use this tactic after a day of hard battles and manage to get the party wizard on one side, he might be in danger somehow. After all a x3 crit from an axe will hurt pretty much any mage. However I doubt the fighter types would feel any kind of trouble in this sort of situation. Something that might trouble the full-plated fighter would be to somehow immerse him in water, if he does not have high ranks in swim(or some magic items useful for the situation), the priority for the casters would probably be to save the fighter first and then deal with the orcs. In this sort of scenario, the orcs would probably last more than 1 round.

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[Mystery Man]

Give the orcs the literal high ground with hard-to-climb slopes.

Fly

have significant amounts of hard cover. Supplement with caltrops & traps.

Dimension door, fly

Have an evironmental hazard, like incredibly strong winds, that will both give the orcs a move-silent bonus but also nerf arrow fire.

Control weather and other elemental nastiness

drop a rockslide on the PCs (alternately divert a stream or start a stampede)

Use Ranged Touch attacks (aka tanglefoot bags, flasks of alchemists fire, thunderstones, nets, etc)

The only reason to roll a save for any of that is in case of a 1, not to mention touch attack AC at high levels is usually pretty high.

 

[Mystery Man]

About dropping a rockslide on the party, if you made it so that the group was divided in two somehow (failed reflex saves, party formation...) the encounter might get a lot more interesting. If you use this tactic after a day of hard battles and manage to get the party wizard on one side, he might be in danger somehow. After all a x3 crit from an axe will hurt pretty much any mage. However I doubt the fighter types would feel any kind of trouble in this sort of situation. Something that might trouble the full-plated fighter would be to somehow immerse him in water, if he does not have high ranks in swim(or some magic items useful for the situation), the priority for the casters would probably be to save the fighter first and then deal with the orcs. In this sort of scenario, the orcs would probably last more than 1 round.

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You would be running combats all night in order to get them to use up enough resources to even blink at this. My brain gets tired just thinking about it.

 

[Mystery Man]

Some players will enjoy the chance to lord over lesser NPCs with their gained power. If the opposition constantly levels with the PCs, there might be Diablo-like speed blindness. Encountering a couple of 'normal' world encounters ever now and then will remind the PCs of their deserved powers.

This would be the only reason. Hand wave, orcs dead.

 

[maggot]

You're wasting your time.

I prefer to see it as spending my time, but I'm probably spending it on something most people don't consider worthwhile.

A 17th level party could stand there and laugh at the party of orcs you described for dozens of rounds even if they did get a lucky shot in every now and then. Then in one round wipe them out.

That assumes that the 17th level party knows what they are fighting. In general, PCs reply to any type of violence with extreme prejudice. I can't image my PCs sitting around waiting for their opponents to get lucky. They would be too afraid that the orc were holding back waiting for the party to over commit.

 

[maggot]

Hand wave, orcs dead.

Do many DMs do that? Hand wave over the easy fights and have you only fight the hard ones. I've never had a DM do that. Seems very unsatisfying.

I have had a DM hand wave over the end of a fight after we got very far ahead, and we were all disappointed we didn't get to personally kill the bad guy, but only read about it in the campaign journal.

 

[maggot]

Why? Why are you doing this? What purpose does it serve?

The players requested it. That's why I'm doing it. And thus I will provide it.

I agree, it sounds pretty silly, but this isn't a campaign of 17th level characters against 1st level orcs, just one encounter. And I want to do the encounter as well as I can.