Does this sound like a compelling/workable encounter?

[tyrlaan]

Starting a new face-to-face campaign (at level 1) and likely kicking it off with a goblin attack.

Long story short, the campaign setting has primordial/elemental heavy themes. So I'm thinking about using "fire goblins" that attack some of the farmland at the outskirts of a town.

The goblins are being directed by other beings to basically just do maximum damage, so their goal will be to just run through the fields and set as much of it on fire as possible. The party, of course, will want to take them out and minimize damage, probably moving a lot during the fight to try to keep up with the goblins.

Here's what I came up with as far as rules for handling the fire as well as cover:

Cover

Crops are tall enough to provide superior cover to small creatures (i.e. the goblins)

• Partial cover when within 2-3 squares
• No cover when adjacent

Fire squares create thick smoke that provides additional cover, same as above but for all sizes​

Fire spreading:

At end of their turn, the square a goblin occupies lights up
If a goblin ends its turn the same place it started (i.e. doesn't move), all adjacent squares light up
Fires spread 1 round after they started. To manage this:

• Make small paper chits for fire, one color per player
• Establish a breeze in a specific direction so fire always spreads the same way
• Roll a d6, on a 6, flares to all adjacent squares instead of just one
• Use a coin to manage when to spread - player flips coin at end of turn, when heads its time to spread fire matching the chits he/she has

I figure the players will both try to kill the goblins as well as try to come up with ways to put out the fire. No pre-planned rules for the latter, I'll just handle that on the fly.

Curious if folks think this is interesting and manageable. My estimation (hope) is that having the work of spreading the fire, erm, spread across the players, it will be easy to deal with and not slow things down.

I was thinking of doing things like "attacks that hit the goblins causes them to spark and set an adjacent square on fire" but that might be too much? Selling point would be it might inspire the players to see if they can get the goblins out of the field without doing too much damage until they're out.

 

[Tinker]

Sounds fun. Hard to guesstimate how difficult it will be to control the fire as well as taking out the goblins. Maybe have somewhat fewer goblins than you would for a straight combat encounter. I suppose if you secretly decide that it doesn't really matter how much field gets burnt, that the villagers will in any case be grateful that the damage wasn't worse, then the only requirement for a successful encounter is that the players engage with the effort to save the fields. That shouldn't be hard to pull off, and you don't need to worry too much about the mechanics. You can fudge the spread checks, or the extinguishing checks, to maintain the threat and tension at a level that feels gripping, and once the goblins are out of it you can just say 'the villagers now help you put out the remaining fires'.

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[Eltab]

Some ideas, not in any particular order:

- For simplicity, have the fire spread at Initiative = 0.
- Fire can spread perpendicular to the wind, or along with the wind, or any angle in between, but not towards the wind.
- When you kill a fire goblin, that square catches fire immediately.
- Using a Cold attack on a square will put out the fire in that square. (Is there a zone Cold cantrip or 1st-level spell, to clear multiple squares?) Likewise things involving Water put out fires.
- A PC could create a firebreak by cutting down everything in a square. This is a full-round action (do nothing else - not even move). This takes a big bladed melee weapon to accomplish.
- Use existing rules - maybe fog cloud? - for the smoke. Smoke spreads at a speed of 1 or 2, moving only downwind.
- A Bard can use Bardic Performance to get the civilians to form a bucket brigade, with no further ado.
- The farmer might not appreciate thunderwave in the middle of his field - unless the area was already on fire.
- Casting bane on a fire goblin could put its fire out instead of the normal effects.
- Let your PCs come up with clever ways to use their spells in this situation, creating some kind of effect instead of doing HP damage. (Do tell them they can try.)

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

This sounds compelling to me. I think the biggest hook is the risk to NPCs and property. PCs are tough, even at 1st-level, but the goblins can bypass them and burn stuff up.