DM advise for an all-striker party?

[sunrisekid]

All four of my players are into strikers. Does anyone have any advise on the type of foes I should be throwing at them? I seem to recall seeing references to brutes as suitable combatants for strikers; no huge bonus to attack (which balances the low AC of the strikers) and high HP (which balances against the high damage output of the strikers). Does this make sense? I'm starting a new campaign and it would save me a lot of dice-fudging if I could select the sort of foes they'll be fighting based on some kind of balanced mechanic.

 

[Eldorian]

You can probably throw normal encounters at them with little consideration that they're all strikers, just throw lower level stuff instead of level appropriate stuff, because they're not as good in a single fight as a balanced group. They might be able to handle enough lower level encounters in a day to make up for the difference.

 

[Anthony Jackson]

An all-striker party does well against solos, and poorly against minions. The combination of a lack of healing and a lack of suppression makes a striker party very brittle, though -- it does a lot of damage, but if all the monsters decide to target one character, there's not much the PCs can do about it.

 

[cmbarona]

You also might want to consider fudging the loot pool if they need it. In particular, consider adding healing potions to the mix or enough gold to make their purchase appealing.

 

[DLichen]

An all-striker party does well against solos, and poorly against minions. The combination of a lack of healing and a lack of suppression makes a striker party very brittle, though -- it does a lot of damage, but if all the monsters decide to target one character, there's not much the PCs can do about it.

Have you tested that hypothesis? It seems to me that solos have enough hp to tank the first couple rounds and then start chewing characters up one by one without proper healing going around. Our group fought against a young black dragon and I would have a hard time imagining how we would've made it out without timely castings of healing word. Of course, your experience may vary.

If I had to make a guess, I would say strikers are optimal against the elite + support spread rather than soloes or horde. But I don't have any experience in the matter.

 

[Rechan]

My suggestion, first off, is to send them on infiltration and sudden strike missions. Think Special Forces. It's what they're good at.

Minions are going to harass them a lot, because it doesn't matter how much damage they do, minions die from a hit. So use minions with care (Unless you want to really scare them).

Skirmishers might offer some interesting play, because they're as mobile as your PCs by nature. Problem is, with fast PCs, they will run those fast guys down and feed them steel.

Artillery and Controller monsters are very interesting. They, like Strikers, are glass cannons. It results in a very "Fire fight" type situation where the PCs are ducking behind cover to fire back, or trying to get in the artillery's face. Giving these guys elevation or cover behind a wall of muscle would be an interesting challenge.

Brutes are scary, because they will certainly put the pain on your strikers. However, I think Soldiers are very good, because they shut down mobility. Strikers, all about the mobility, will have to deal very cautiously with Soldiers. Also, Soldiers have higher AC and Defenses, making them a good foil for your strikers.

I would suggest to actually mix your battles up, and see how they play out with your PCs. Give your players an escape route if they are real low, or the enemy doesn't make a habit of killing foes (hostage rescue?).

I do think that a fight with two beefy soldiers and then some lurkers might actually scare your players (namely because Lurkers can bring the hurt).

 

[Stalker0]

Strikers also tend to do well against melee guys, because with their mobility they can pull in and out of danger.

However, archer lines can be very dangerous for them. While strikers can take out archers quickly, archers can focus fire and pull down strikers just as easily.

In general you need to remember two things:

1) Fewer fights per day. With no leaders, a party can't stand up as long as a normal one can. While they can handle one or two fights, more than that they will likely need to rest.

2) Standard XP encounters need to be tweaked. Certain normal XP encounters will be a breeze for an all striker group, and some will be very hard. Take the advice this thread has given you and make some adjustments based on that.

 

[Anthony Jackson]

Have you tested that hypothesis? It seems to me that solos have enough hp to tank the first couple rounds and then start chewing characters up one by one without proper healing going around.

That's a problem for the all-striker party no matter what it's facing. However, single-target debuffs are very nice vs solos, and there are a lot of those available to strikers.

 

[DLichen]

That's a problem for the all-striker party no matter what it's facing. However, single-target debuffs are very nice vs solos, and there are a lot of those available to strikers.

Well, I was thinking that if the party can significantly decrease the encounter's damage output over time by killing stuff, it would lead to increased survivability. I mean, all roles have some access to debuffs, and some of them have arguably better debuffs than what strikers get, so I would assume that just because debuffs are good against soloes doesn't mean that an all striker party would have an easier time against soloes.

Again, I haven't looked over all the ranger/rogue/warlock stuff (mostly a fighter, cleric, wizard guy myself) and strikers being able to knock off more hp during the time period when the solo is debuffed might make it up.

 

[ac_noj]

I would recommend a somewhat different tactic to those suggested above. Use normal encounters but have the monsters split up their damage over all the players. This in my opinion is the only way to make up for the lack of a balanced party.