D&D 5E Challenging a tanky one-trick pony PC

[pukunui]

Not the why I tweak things.

Well, not everyone does things the same way you do.

 

[Zardnaar]

Well, not everyone does things the same way you do.

Think I pointed out the draws in the CR system back in 2015. Back then 5E was perfect though.

But yeah the CR system is wonk at best and the hit point bliat concept didn't work. IMHO of course.

 

[Velderan]

Because if you're having to redo all the encounters for an adventure msy as well right your own.

Because the maps, story, and items are all completely useless if I sub in a caster for a melee creature in an encounter? If the PCs can create their own PCs without destroying an adventure, a DM can modify encounters too. You're making it out to be this issue it just simply isn't.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

You may want to have a Rakshasa mage-hunter, riding a Flail Snail, hunting with its 2 crag cats bloodhounds.

Spell reversal galore!

 

[pukunui]

You may want to have a Rakshasa mage-hunter, riding a Flail Snail, hunting with its 2 crag cats bloodhounds.

Spell reversal galore!

Yeah, the Strixhaven mage hunter wasn't quite as effective as I thought it would be, mainly because Consume and Destroy requires a reaction. I might have to modify it so it just happens automatically, so it can use its reaction for the Mage Slayer feat benefit instead. (Or I need to use more than one.)

 

[Starfox]

Just use a bigger map, I'd say.

Give them multiple objectives across a larger area so he can't cover everyone and has to make choices.

This. Your players are basically turtling down. The weakness of the turtle is that it is slow. If all combats are slugfests where hordes of enemies charge our heroes, these tactics will work. If the fight is about grabbing three items, set in various locations around a large room, one of which is high on a wall, turtling will not work. Other similar mobile fights will force your players to avoid the one-trick-ponying and adapt to a changing battlefield. Hopefully they will find this fun too. But you may have to make these fights easier, at least starting out, or the players may feel you are out to punish them.

Edit: In my own games I sort of have the opposite problem. Everyone is very mobile, and there is no "frontline" - any tactical objectives such as mcguffins or enemy leaders are likely to be taken down very fast. I sometimes long for a set-piece battle where the PCs hold a line.

 

[pukunui]

It's OK. This thread has given me plenty of ideas. The player was absent for a few sessions, so I had Halaster teleport him away "to give the monsters a fighting chance". When the player returned, I said that his PC felt like he'd just been dreaming but that he'd been having a nightmare filled with floating diamond lozenge thingies and spider-like creatures. Now, anytime he uses his annoying tanky spirit guardians + Dodge combo, Halaster is going to have a Strixhaven mage hunter with the Mage Slayer feat show up to try and shake him out of his one trick poniness.

Currently, they're on a level that's a big, trap-filled obstacle course without many monsters to fight, but the main boss of the level is a death tyrant with a horde of zombies (seriously, there are like 40 of them, it's going to be a nightmare to manage at the table! I'll probably have to send them in in waves). He'll probably use his spirit guardians trick then, and so things will get more complicated when a mage hunter shows up too.

Elsewhere in the dungeon, Halaster has trapped a dwarf vampire in a coffin with a magic rune keeping him in there. The coffin's at the bottom of a pit. The first person to cross over the pit gets zapped with the rune (no save), which is a "death mark". The coffin then disintegrates and the vampire is free to hunt down the person with the death mark on them. Since the obstacle course is full of teleport traps designed to split the party, I'm hoping Mr One Trick Pony will end up triggering the vampire all by himself.

Welp, they avoided the vampire, found the death tyrant's weakness and killed it easily, and survived the obstacle course. The next dungeon level down is inhabited by hostile githyanki and red dragons. There are a number of large pits that are basically portals to the Astral Plane. Fingers crossed some of the githyanki (or one of their crystal golems) can shove the dwarf into a pit, and he can get permanently lost in the Astral.

This. Your players are basically turtling down. The weakness of the turtle is that it is slow. If all combats are slugfests where hordes of enemies charge our heroes, these tactics will work. If the fight is about grabbing three items, set in various locations around a large room, one of which is high on a wall, turtling will not work. Other similar mobile fights will force your players to avoid the one-trick-ponying and adapt to a changing battlefield. Hopefully they will find this fun too. But you may have to make these fights easier, at least starting out, or the players may feel you are out to punish them.

I understand all that. I guess part of the problem here is that Mad Mage doesn't really have goals like that. I've deliberately billed this campaign as an old school; beer and pretzels; kick in the door, kill the monsters, and take their stuff style of campaign.

As an aside, the PCs found a different way to turtle last session.