Funny that you suggest this cooper. I tried it the first time around and they just slaughtered the volunteer. One of my players jokes that his favored enemy is NPC's.
D&D 5E Grind fest is imminnent, how can I prevent it?
- Thread starter dpkress2
- Start date
Funny that you suggest this cooper. I tried it the first time around and they just slaughtered the volunteer. One of my players jokes that his favored enemy is NPC's.
A lot depends on the setup to date as far as how the kobolds have been shown and the pc goal but if it were me and i wanted to steer away from the bloodbath BECAUSE my players would not find it fun...
Kobolds set up bartiers and send someone to talk.
Kobolds are under the thumb of the orcs or some other "dark one" (tm) and want out.
They will give info to the PCs they need to get to the real danger and promise to leave and go away if the PCs agree to let them go.
Maybe this will need for the PCs to beat a local "monitor" which can also prove the kobold case if you want a boss fight to close out this leg.
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Kobolds set up bartiers and send someone to talk.
Kobolds are under the thumb of the orcs or some other "dark one" (tm) and want out.
They will give info to the PCs they need to get to the real danger and promise to leave and go away if the PCs agree to let them go.
Maybe this will need for the PCs to beat a local "monitor" which can also prove the kobold case if you want a boss fight to close out this leg.
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Bacon Bits
Legend
Give the Kobolds some Ogres hired by the chief for muscle, and send them at the PCs. When the PCs defeat the chief's muscle, his power is broken and his Kobolds turn and flee. Kobolds are cowardly, after all.
This way you can have one combat defeat the entire army.
This way you can have one combat defeat the entire army.
Quickleaf
Legend
Gotcha. No worries, we all hit the creative wall as DMs.
Since, from your anecdotes, your players sound a bit bloodthirsty, I think offering you targeted advice about making combat with the kobold chief interesting would be most helpful...[SECTION]Your scenario as I understand it: Bloodthirsty players have led their PCs in assaulting kobold warrens; they're the types who love a good boss fight / tactically interesting fight & earlier killed off a friendly kobold NPC rather than parlay. As their PCs approach the kobold chief's lair, the players are a bit worn down from "Tucker's kobolds/fantasy Vietnam/claustrophobic tunnel-fighting". Party is just outside chief's lair, but chief is alerted to their presence. General alertness of kobolds in the rest of the lair is TBD (to be determined). There are 20+ kobolds protecting the chief and possibly tentative orc allies. Other monsters & traps & details of the lair are TBD (to be determined). There are collapsible passageways...but it's unclear how or whether you intend to use those.
You, as DM, want to present a challenging boss fight, rather than a parlay like I earlier suggested or skill challenge type scenario like [MENTION=97077]iserith[/MENTION] suggested with the kobolds withdrawing, sealing entrances, and smoking out the PCs.[/SECTION]
Am I understanding your situation right?
If so, here is my 4-Part Plan of Kobold Chief Viciousness and Ensured Adventurer Doom™
Part 1: Net trap of kobold awesomeness
Think vertically & split the party. The kobold throne room in Volo's is tiny - about a 30-foot diameter circle - that gives no room to manuever...unless you think vertically. I mean, nothing on Volo's map makes the throne room stand out, so you as DM need to give it character, interesting features, a reason that it was chosen by the "smartest and oldest" kobold (their chief) as throne room.
There's a great line in Volo's about a trap: Nets attached to ropes that pull creatures up vertical shafts far away from anyone who can help.
Now imagine those shafts in the ceiling concealed by loosely draped tattered tarps in mockery of a noble's throne room replete with tapestries and hanging silks, and the floor covered in tapestries stolen from a noble caravan strewn about like carpets (concealing net traps which trigger when > 50 lbs presses on them). And then imagine along those shafts are little alcoves with kobolds wielding poisoned knives and little javelins. And now imagine the cave fisher spinnerets (or whatever) they make the rope as being a little springy...
Adventurer steps on a net trap and suddenly they're hoisted upward, blinded by tattered tapestries and/or tarps, and provoking opportunity attacks from moving up the shaft from all the kobolds lurking in the alcoves. Moreover, neither they nor allies have line of sight to one another. Simply cutting free incurs falling damage. Yet if they don't escape the "bungee-cord effect" of the spinneret will cause PC to provoke opportunity attacks from lurking kobolds *again* on the next round. And PC must contend with being poisoned by poison daggers/javelins (imposing disadvantage on attack/ability checks...including checks to escape the net trap). And make sure to grin evilly.
That's the first trap...
Part 2: Trap of Kurtulmak's spell thieving & hidden squicky chamber
The throne room in Volo's is described as featuring a shrine-idol to Kurtulmak behind the throne. Let's run with that! While seated in the throne, the kobold chief gains the ability to, as a reaction, attempt to steal any spell he sees being cast. This is in fitting with the lore on Kurtulmak, who stole the gift of sorcery from a dragon deity to give to his kobolds. This could be an opposed check, or a set DC Wisdom or Charisma save. If successful, the chief knows the spell's name and purpose, determines its new target, and then it's resolved using the PC's spell attack / spell save DC (if pertinent to the spell). OPTION: You could use scroll mishap rules for the spellcasting instead for more randomness.
Of course, when this happens the idol's eyes need to start flaring with putrid green light dramatically as soon as the PC begins casting a spell, growing brighter the closer the PC gets to completing their spell. This gives the PCs a chance to attempt countermeasures like casting dispel magic on the idol, or a sorcerer to use Subtle Spell to conceal their spellcasting from the idol, or a warrior with a big hammer to try and smash it to bits.
But these are nasty kobolds, and the chief is the smartest of them all.
The shrine-idol serves as a critical roof support, and if it is destroyed, the roof collapses around just the throne, separating the chief and whatever PC smashed the idol from the rest of the throne room (a dwarf PC with Stonecunning should recognize this). It also reveals a secret chamber behind the throne room (not depicted on Volo's map...it's that secret) which happens to be filled with the sorts of nasties adventurers hate: swarms of rot grubs, rust monsters, and so forth. Naturally, the kobold either is naturally resistant to these monsters / doesn't have metal items, has a magic item granting immunity to them, or has control over them through mundane or magical means. Only a vertical shaft leaves the secret chamber, with a tattered hemp rope leading up it; any creature weighing more than 50 lbs. who attempts to climb the rope finds it snaps under their weight after 20 feet or so, dropping them back into the swarm of squicky monsters.
Part 3: Gnome skull ornaments and green slime cauldrons
There's a reason the chief's throne is elevated on a slight dais, and his closest bodyguards wear small stilts made of bone, and it's not just to look bigger to other kobolds. No, the massive ceramic cauldrons suspended in the "corners" of the throne room actually are filled with green slime! One pull of a chain from a kobold will cause the cauldron to dump the green slime, which covers the throne room's floor....Green slime eats through wood/metal but not bone. Oh, and it also eats through adventurer's feet.
But wait, there's more. Gnome skulls with veiled eyesockets are mounted on ornamented pikes around the throne room, ostensibly because even in death gnomes aren't worthy of witnessing the majesty of the kobold chief. Kobolds hidden in alcoves behind some of these skulls can swivel control sticks to raise or lower the veils and rotate the skulls – within the eye sockets are pieces of obsidian enchanted with continual light focused into precise beams. When aimed at the light-fearing green slime, they can evoke reflexive movement in the slime, forcing it to move into squares where it was previously eradicated or to clear a safe path for kobold troop reinforcements (or for the chief's escape!).
Part 4: Release the secret weapon! It's stirges!
Covered cages along the perimeter of the throne room, blending in with the other kobold accouterments/tables/boxes/etc., actually contain stirges, the cage doors kept pinned by fishing line held in tension to the floor with pitons. These stirges are kept hungry and trained to favor mammal blood (and disfavor reptilian blood...or perhaps whatever nasty root the kobolds eat makes their blood non-stirge-appetizing). If a PC "triggers" a cage opening by stumbling across a taut piece of fishing line (or if a kobold opens one, or if green slime from part #3 corrodes a piton), six stirges pour forth from a cage and attack!
The stirges aren't much of a threat to skilled adventurers in and of themselves, but may fly up the shafts in part #1 to feast on a suspended/restrained PC, and removing one in the midst of combat requires an action that might be better spent dealing with the kobolds or counteracting a trap.
This can be foreshadowed by having kobold slingers fire pots of sticky bloody ichor at one or more PCs, making them for the stirges.
.......
The real beauty of this is when the 4 parts start to work together... say a PC gets hoisted up in part #1 and stabbed and painted with bloody ichor, then they might fall down but their ally's feather fall is intercepted in part #2 only to rescue a kobold-with-a-paintbrush who was falling with them, and land smack in green slime in part #3 (perhaps the feather falling kobold lands on top of them to add insult to injury), only to witness the stirges burst free of cages and come swarming at them in part #4 ("Ooo, that's what the kobold with the paintbrush was doing!").
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Cyrinishad
Explorer
Here's another angle on this situation, now that you have established that the Kobolds aren't just monsters to be destroyed, but are actually humanoids which are fully capable of both Good & Evil... Which means that when the PCs slaughtered the short, scaly dude, they were treading on Murder/Evil territory... So, you could flip the script on them, and have the remaining Kobolds be non-combatants that successfully flee and abandon their home, while the Orcs come to investigate the lair of their Kobold allies and end up fighting the PCs...
THEN when the PCs get back to town they find that the Local Good Temple has given the remaining Kobolds sanctuary, and that the Kobolds have become converts of the Temple... If you are hoping to explore storylines or quests that involve them interacting with so-called "monstrous" humanoids in the future, it may be worthwhile to show them that there are more options on the table than killing... Perhaps one of the surviving Kobolds is the mother of the unfortunate volunteer, and she has already told the Priests how her son was convinced that these so-called "Heroes" were going to rescue their unfortunate tribe from the clutches of their Evil Kobold Chieftan, and his Evil Orc allies... But when her idealistic little Kobold Boy tried to help, these Murderous Adventurers revealed themselves to be genocidal monsters intent on killing defenseless Kobold women and children...
S
Sunseeker
Guest
This is an idea I have often run with in the past.
The players get swarmed first, just to give them an idea of the odds they're facing.
But then they start noticing the enemy is thinning out...not by their own doing which is when they'll pick up on the chanting. Some kobolds run off for fear of being sacrificed, while others just "pop" right around them as their spirits are drained out to enhance the Leader.
Now you've got 3-5 kobolds and one Kobold Monstrosity, or whatever you want to call it. Depending on how powerful you want to make it, and if perhaps the Orcs could be potential allies in the future, make the Kobold Boss Way-Too-Powerful (TM) and have a goodguy/badguy teamup.
Interesting. After reading through the above ideas an additional one came to mind. If you have an idea what the next story or plot is then consider providing some foreshadowing with this fight. Some of the above responses suggested starting off with a hoard but then reducing that number in some way. Is there foreshadow opportunity here to show signs of a powerful necromancer? Does a purple worm come through the tunnels and consume half the kobolds because of some evil elemental events elsewhere? Does this kobold leader or any servents threaten that they are expected to be somewhere to drop off a gold fish soon or a particular "criminal" organization is going to become unpleasant very soon? Do the tunnels begin to collapse because giants are flinging bolders from an airship at a nearby town?
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Quartz
Hero
So the party have been kicking kobold butt for a long time? And they've just penetrated the inner sanctum? And you and the players are bored of it? How about having the kobolds flee en mass? Maybe the PCs will encounter them again later as servants of Flame (from Dungeon magazine)?
Brotton Goodfellow
Explorer
If the chief is dead, make the rest of the kobolds flee. The civilians run off to try and find a new home and the warriors flee to the Orc's, hoping to find a stronger chief. You said it yourself: The group is tired of kobolds. So why are you continuing on with Kobolds? Time to move on to something different. I guess what I'm trying to say is skip the entire grindfest to keep the story/adventure moving along.
Eltab
Lord of the Hidden Layer
Give the PCs a fight with a Kobold Enforcer (a tough guy) while the rest of the tribe back waaaaay up (but keep shooting arrows / slingstones). Somebody - a fast runner? - stomps on an obvious "this triggers a trap" lever. The tunnels leading further into the lair collapse.
Somehow suggest to the PCs - maybe via the kamikaze Enforcer - that if they also collapse the 'front door' to the lair, the rest of the tribe will be trapped inside. They might die of starvation or eat each other or whatever - but they will no longer be a problem to the rest of the world.
This presumption is not actually true; the kobolds might just wait for the PCs to go home, dig another front door, and go back to their lives. But the Enforcer isn't worried about that, either way, any more.
Somehow suggest to the PCs - maybe via the kamikaze Enforcer - that if they also collapse the 'front door' to the lair, the rest of the tribe will be trapped inside. They might die of starvation or eat each other or whatever - but they will no longer be a problem to the rest of the world.
This presumption is not actually true; the kobolds might just wait for the PCs to go home, dig another front door, and go back to their lives. But the Enforcer isn't worried about that, either way, any more.
