D&D 5E Dungeons of the Mad Mage Player Party questions

[Jaiken]

I was wondering what would needed to be changed to be challenging to the players of this 6 group team:

1) Warforged Artillerist Artificer with black smithing tools to make weapons and armor for the party.

2) Variant Human Oath of Redemption Paladin with Tavern Brawler Feat as the Paladin only uses armor and Shields.

3) Variant Human Open Hand Monk with Grappler Feat will be taking resilience and tough feats later.

4) Variant Human Scout Rogue with Unarmed Fighting Feat will only use a Rapier as a weapon.

5) Variant Himan Hexblade Walrock with reflavoring Necrotic damage to Radiant and chose the Great Weapon Master feat. Will only use a Longsword as their hex weapon.

6) Variant Human Necromancer Wizard with the Magic Initiate feat and took spells in Cleric such as Blessing, Spare the Dying and Healing Word. Agreed to only be able to summon 7 skeletons but each one as tough as a Wight without the ability to summon more undead.

How would this group fair in the Dungeon of the Mad Mage? Should I change anything?

 

[aco175]

First I see having 6 people means that you can boost the monsters up by one or two per encounter since most books are made for parties of 4-5, but I tend to think 4. Add more HP and a cool power to solos and such.

It also seems that half the party wants to have a high AC and grapple everything. Brush up on those rules and change every once in a while to monsters with auras that damage you or something like a sea urchin that is hard to grapple. Not a lot to penalize them a lot, but a few along the way.

I'm not sure how soon the caster can make 7 skeleton/wights, but this seems like trouble. It will slow play and be powerful enough so it seems like another player. I had something like this at my table and I ended up making one horde creature statblock. A group of orcs agreed to help the party, so instead of having 6-8 of them, I made one large group called the horde. It was more powerful than just one and if it took enough damage it broke down into just 1-2 of them with a smaller statblock until it could be healed or gather more orcs. The player liked it and it sped up play, but it was a large creature that stayed together instead of 7 medium creatures all moving about. It did have it's own initiative and actions like a NPC though.

 

[Jaiken]

First I see having 6 people means that you can boost the monsters up by one or two per encounter since most books are made for parties of 4-5, but I tend to think 4. Add more HP and a cool power to solos and such.

It also seems that half the party wants to have a high AC and grapple everything. Brush up on those rules and change every once in a while to monsters with auras that damage you or something like a sea urchin that is hard to grapple. Not a lot to penalize them a lot, but a few along the way.

I'm not sure how soon the caster can make 7 skeleton/wights, but this seems like trouble. It will slow play and be powerful enough so it seems like another player. I had something like this at my table and I ended up making one horde creature statblock. A group of orcs agreed to help the party, so instead of having 6-8 of them, I made one large group called the horde. It was more powerful than just one and if it took enough damage it broke down into just 1-2 of them with a smaller statblock until it could be healed or gather more orcs. The player liked it and it sped up play, but it was a large creature that stayed together instead of 7 medium creatures all moving about. It did have it's own initiative and actions like a NPC though.

The Necromancer will be able to summon one Wight at level 10 instead of multiple skeletons and the wight will power up alongside the Necromancer.

 

[ECMO3]

I was wondering what would needed to be changed to be challenging to the players of this 6 group team:

1) Warforged Artillerist Artificer with black smithing tools to make weapons and armor for the party.

2) Variant Human Oath of Redemption Paladin with Tavern Brawler Feat as the Paladin only uses armor and Shields.

3) Variant Human Open Hand Monk with Grappler Feat will be taking resilience and tough feats later.

4) Variant Human Scout Rogue with Unarmed Fighting Feat will only use a Rapier as a weapon.

5) Variant Himan Hexblade Walrock with reflavoring Necrotic damage to Radiant and chose the Great Weapon Master feat. Will only use a Longsword as their hex weapon.

6) Variant Human Necromancer Wizard with the Magic Initiate feat and took spells in Cleric such as Blessing, Spare the Dying and Healing Word. Agreed to only be able to summon 7 skeletons but each one as tough as a Wight without the ability to summon more undead.

How would this group fair in the Dungeon of the Mad Mage? Should I change anything?

This group is average or maybe a little under. They certainly are not optimizers or OP in terms of builds.

With good tactics and average dice on the part of the PCs DOMM should be fine as written.

Also I want to point out that DOMM goes to level 20, so I am not sure the Monk should get resilient as she is going to get save proficiencies in everything eventually.

 

[Jaiken]

This group is average or maybe a little under. They certainly are not optimizers or OP in terms of builds.

With good tactics and average dice on the part of the PCs DOMM should be fine as written.

Also I want to point out that DOMM goes to level 20, so I am not sure the Monk should get resilient as she is going to get save proficiencies in everything eventually.

What feat would you suggest the Monk take? The Monk player would be open to taking a different feat.

 

[ECMO3]

What feat would you suggest the Monk take? The Monk player would be open to taking a different feat.

I don't really like any of the 3 feats you mention on a Monk. Of them tough is the best.

Open Hand Monk is a pretty weak subclass, but the feat I would look at are Fey Touched with the Hex spell or a Wisdom ASI.

 

[Jaiken]

I don't really like any of the 3 feats you mention on a Monk. Of them tough is the best.

Open Hand Monk is a pretty weak subclass, but the feat I would look at are Fey Touched with the Hex spell or a Wisdom ASI.

The player suggests Wisdom ASI to increase defense and to make Open Hand Monk abilities harder to overcome.

 

[ECMO3]

The player suggests Wisdom ASI to increase defense and to make Open Hand Monk abilities harder to overcome.

Yeah I like that a lot.

 

[Simonb1]

I was wondering what would needed to be changed to be challenging to the players of this 6 group team:

1) Warforged Artillerist Artificer with black smithing tools to make weapons and armor for the party.

2) Variant Human Oath of Redemption Paladin with Tavern Brawler Feat as the Paladin only uses armor and Shields.

3) Variant Human Open Hand Monk with Grappler Feat will be taking resilience and tough feats later.

4) Variant Human Scout Rogue with Unarmed Fighting Feat will only use a Rapier as a weapon.

5) Variant Himan Hexblade Walrock with reflavoring Necrotic damage to Radiant and chose the Great Weapon Master feat. Will only use a Longsword as their hex weapon.

6) Variant Human Necromancer Wizard with the Magic Initiate feat and took spells in Cleric such as Blessing, Spare the Dying and Healing Word. Agreed to only be able to summon 7 skeletons but each one as tough as a Wight without the ability to summon more undead.

How would this group fair in the Dungeon of the Mad Mage? Should I change anything?

Starting at what level? I joined a campaign at level 8. I have seen some deaths, you probably can increase battle sizes by 50% as the scenario is written for 4 characters.

 

[Jaiken]

Starting at what level? I joined a campaign at level 8. I have seen some deaths, you probably can increase battle sizes by 50% as the scenario is written for 4 characters.

Starting at level 5.