D&D 5E How many vegepygmies is too many vegepygmies for a 4th level party?

[jgsugden]

Nobody wants the vegepygmies. Give them the steak.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

The other 6 are hiding up ahead with their Plant Camouflage, some 30 feet up on a ledge, ready to use their slings – using the Help action to attack in pairs, either to negate disadvantage from distance or to have better hit chance against armored targets.

Unless you are a Mastermind (Rogue), using the Help action to help with an attack is illegal at distances greater than 5' from the target.

Just as the title says. Assuming I have 1 chief, and n numbers of vegepygmies, how many would be a completely ridiculous number of that such that I should be ashamed as GM.


The rules in the DMG for this seem like complete garbage to me. 10 Vegepygmies would be, according them, "deadly", when the reality is that any sort of AoE spell will likely destroy most of them. Granted, my PCs don't have access to fireball, but even 20 vegepygmies would be a complete cakewalk to a 5th level party which does.

I'm AFB and don't remember the vegepygmy stats except that they are weak-ish CR 1/4 humanoids with, I think, built-in regeneration and around 13 HP.

For a Combat As Sport party, I'd be ashamed at about the point where the party is outnumbered 7:1. For a Combat As War party, I'd be ashamed at about the point where vegepygmies outnumber all other potential combatants in the region by about 10:1. Say, over five thousand vegepygmies, in a typical pseudomedieval society.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I'm gonna say your answer is the same as the maximum capacity limitation on Korean public transport: 1 more. Always 1 more.



*I lived in Korea for 4 years, and that was a very common running joke. If you've ever taken the bus in Seoul, you'd know

 

[CapnZapp]

It depends more on context than on numbers.

Let's take those 10 Vegepygmies.

Now let's say 4 of them are about to emerge from Russet Mold infecting two Medium-sized corpses with very tempting loot like a potion, a sack of gems, and either a map or key. Russet Mold is described in Volo's Guide page 196.

The other 6 are hiding up ahead with their Plant Camouflage, some 30 feet up on a ledge, ready to use their slings – using the Help action to attack in pairs, either to negate disadvantage from distance or to have better hit chance against armored targets.

The wall of the ledge itself is covered in razorvine (see DMG page 110), making climbing up a risky proposition.

Maybe the potion appears to be anti-venom, but is actually a potion of poison (a minor tweak from the DMG which has potions of poison appear as healing potions).

Not so easy anymore, is it?

And if this is a room deeper in a dungeon which the PCs are likely to encounter while their resources are depleted, it becomes more challenging.

But none of that is suggested, or taken into account, by the DMG guidelines!

So yes, the DMG guidelines are complete joke to any competent set of players (tactics, party composition etc).

The fact a DM can spend a lot of time is irrelevant. Or rather, your theory, that the guidelines sort of work given enough DM prep time, leads us down the wrong road.

The game certainly doesn't assume it. And all that work is hard.

Of course the guidelines are and should be directed towards the straightforward encounter where the DM simply plops down the enemies.

Then you and I could turn up the difficulty when we feel like it. Not because we need to for the difficulty level to be trivial.

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I'd set 3x Deadly encounter as about the upper limit. If you don't want to risk the party barely pulling through, maybe 2x Deadly.

Both of those are entirely usable numbers, depending on other variables.

 

[Quickleaf]

But none of that is suggested, or taken into account, by the DMG guidelines!

So yes, the DMG guidelines are complete joke to any competent set of players (tactics, party composition etc).

The fact a DM can spend a lot of time is irrelevant. Or rather, your theory, that the guidelines sort of work given enough DM prep time, leads us down the wrong road.

The game certainly doesn't assume it. And all that work is hard.

Of course the guidelines are and should be directed towards the straightforward encounter where the DM simply plops down the enemies.

Then you and I could turn up the difficulty when we feel like it. Not because we need to for the difficulty level to be trivial.

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

Don't know why you responded as you did. I wasn't saying anything for or against the DMG guidelines.

I was illustrating that there are other ways to boost challenge instead of boosting monster numbers.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Don't know why you responded as you did. I wasn't saying anything for or against the DMG guidelines.

I was illustrating that there are other ways to boost challenge instead of boosting monster numbers.

Exactly. Which is what my original response to this thread was I couldn't really give an answer without knowing what the environment was like (because it can make such a huge difference, as your example highlights)

But for the sake of argument, if one were to compare your example to what's in the DM's Guide, I would posit the developers assume that DMs will look at the features, abilities, and flavor text of a monster, and incorporate them into the environment. I don't think that's much of a reach of an assumption or stretch to a person's imagination, and to me at least seems pretty obvious. After all, one of the most basic functions of a DM is to treat the NPCs and monsters as living creatures who would behave in accordance with their flavor text. Additionally, I don't see how it's logistically possible for the DM's Guide to spell out every possible way you can incorporate a monster's abilities/features/behavior into the game world. It would be a book weighing a 100 pounds.

 

[Harzel]

It would be a book weighing a 100 pounds.

That's only a problem if your DM makes you track carrying capacity.