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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 6991446" data-attributes="member: 6785785">The part of the discussion on the gnolls was of course limited by what you had shared. We only had what you said to go off of, and while it certainly seemed to be an incomplete picture, it was enough for people to notice it and discuss. So would you say that your desire to test the mob rules was paramount? Or were you actually trying to challenge the players? Or both? Well, I'd say the fact that it hurts is obvious, and we seem to agree on that. The slowing effect would be more subtle, so I could see a DM going either way if it was noticed by the gnolls. I'd probably assume some noticed and some didn't. However, the "magical shimmer" seems off. An aura of angelic spirits is a bit different from a magical shimmer. I guess that doesn't matter all that much because the gnolls would avoid the aura anyway. Were the cleric's allies within the aura? The gnolls could survive long enough to attack other party members within the aura.And limiting them to the spear rather than a longbow certainly affects the encounter. I know that you had your reasons for the encounter, but I think it's clear that this may have played differently if they had longbows. That's a lot of attacks to make it all the way through without losing concentration. Dodging of course has a huge impact. Gotcha. I suppose it depends on how frequently Spirit Guardians comes into play for your party....mine tends to use it quite a lot, so when I design encounters, I always have it in mind.....but it sounds to me like you designed the encounter to funnel all the gnolls into the spell. Limiting their range, having all approach points terminate within the spell's radius....that kind of setting things up to work out exactly as they did, no? Gotcha. I think the important thing about this encounter is that you had a reason other than just a story element....you wanted to test the mob rules. I think that seems to have really had an impact on the encounter, which probably doesn't make it the most useful example in a discussion of either ranged efficacy or of sound monster tactics. That's a cool encounter. I think it is the exact kind of example of how terrain and tactics can have a huge impact. Let me ask....in this encounter, were the party's ranged attacks overwhelmingly more effective? I'd probably put the grimlock cannibal at a CR comparable to that of gnolls, which I think is 1/2. Maybe they'd be a full CR 1 due to the fact that they will often get bonus attacks? But even then, I don't really see them being so much more effective than a gnoll, in a one for one comparison. Of these two encounters, it's definitely a case of the tactics and environment being the major factor. If you replace the elite grimlocks with gnolls straight from the MM, I don't even think that the difficulty would change all that much, except that the gnolls would be at risk for the gazes.</blockquote>

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