How to make 'being surrounded by enemy crossbowmen' deadlier?

[Derren]

Your problem is that you still expect things to work like in the real world but that is simply not the case in D&D.
I suggest you watch some chinese action movies (for example Hero) to see how such heroes tend to behave and how other people react to them.

If you don't want this kind of situation you must either only play on low levels or switch to a different system.

 

[Nifft]

"Drat, another nuisance monster. Sheriff, round up a dozen or so men and go slay it."

IMC, which is high-powered with scads of 10th level NPCs, this is pretty much what happens.

Why are heroes needed? Well...

Mayor: "Sheriff, I want you to round up a dozen or so men, go into the swamp, and kill that hydra."
Sheriff: "Nope."
Mayor: "Well why in the hells not?"
Sheriff: "Ain't gonna leave the town defenseless. We got them gnoll raiders up north what might decide to come down, we got two sightings of a wyvern over by the western hills, and I'll be damned if I'm gonna take a dozen men into that swamp, just to find out the hydra and his wife and his kids and his pappy decided to come eat the town while we're gone. Nope, I'm stayin' right here. Get some idiots -- I mean, get some heroes to go smoke him out an' lead him back here. I'll be mannin' the palisade."

Basically, given the mobility of D&D foes, it's insanity to leave a town undefended, and expect anything to be left when you come back. So NPCs are terribly conservative -- particularly with their own lives.

If a dozen guards with crossbows can do that, then imagine what an army could do! Forget dragons terrorizing a kingdom - they'd have trouble terrorizing a moderate sized city.

IMC, dragons get their gold the new fashioned way: they pay reasonable interest, compounded monthly, and enforce liquidity of convenient paper money. Dragons are notoriously hard to rob? Good, now they act as banks.

And a bank can easily terrorize a moderate sized city.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Mark Chance]

I'd be curious how 50 guards manage to surround the PCs without being noticed while getting into position....

By being very, very sneaky. Duh.

 

[Brace Cormaeril]

I'd be curious how 50 guards manage to surround the PCs without being noticed while getting into position, especially in an area that's large enough to hold 50+ people and, according to your diagram, is at least 60 feet across.

And since the guards beyond the first rank would be providing soft cover to the PCs, the chances of them confirming crits would be really low. Without that, if they're just using heavy crossbows with magical arrows and/or sneak attack, they're only doing an average of 5.5 pts damage per hit. These are 10th lvl PCs, so even the mage will be able to eat half a dozen crossbow bolts and be standing.

Wait, the town guard is supposed to sneak?

 

[shilsen]

Wait, the town guard is supposed to sneak?

I was talking about logistical issues. If fifty guards try to march up, the PCs will see and hear them coming and react in some way. If they try to sneak up, I'm pretty sure the PCs will still see and hear them coming and react accordingly.

Your scenario is dependent on fifty guards, with loaded crossbows in hand, being able to surround PCs and get into the sort of position you suggested. You really think a bunch of PCs will sit around and let that happen?

 

[green slime]

I was talking about logistical issues. If fifty guards try to march up, the PCs will see and hear them coming and react in some way. If they try to sneak up, I'm pretty sure the PCs will still see and hear them coming and react accordingly.

Your scenario is dependent on fifty guards, with loaded crossbows in hand, being able to surround PCs and get into the sort of position you suggested. You really think a bunch of PCs will sit around and let that happen?

But you're forgetting that they're the guards of the City of Union, 16th level Warriors decked out with all sorts of bells and whistles, to take care of these 10th level PC brats! I'm sure they're equipped with Baneful bolts of whiner-slaying, set in their keen crossbows of vicious deadliness, and boots of Epic Elfishness (+30 to Hide & Move Silently). In fact, they are so hidden and silent, no guard actually even knows where they are themselves, never mind each other.

 

[shilsen]

But you're forgetting that they're the guards of the City of Union, 16th level Warriors decked out with all sorts of bells and whistles, to take care of these 10th level PC brats! I'm sure they're equipped with Baneful bolts of whiner-slaying, set in their keen crossbows of vicious deadliness, and boots of Epic Elfishness (+30 to Hide & Move Silently). In fact, they are so hidden and silent, no guard actually even knows where they are themselves, never mind each other.

And they call me sarcastic

 

[Slaved]

Crossbows have a range increment of eighty feet. I bet that a hundred guards could be hiding somewhere within 160 feet without too much difficulty if they had time to prepare. The small group that actually approaches the party could tell them about the hundred other guys waiting to fire as well.

 

[Brace Cormaeril]

Crossbows have a range increment of eighty feet. I bet that a hundred guards could be hiding somewhere within 160 feet without too much difficulty if they had time to prepare. The small group that actually approaches the party could tell them about the hundred other guys waiting to fire as well.

hiding in upper level windows,at the corners of alleys, behind the produce stand, etc...
And yes, 10th lvl PCs in my games rarely acknowledge 1st level guards

 

[shilsen]

Crossbows have a range increment of eighty feet. I bet that a hundred guards could be hiding somewhere within 160 feet without too much difficulty if they had time to prepare. The small group that actually approaches the party could tell them about the hundred other guys waiting to fire as well.

So the PCs would need to be in a city where the locals can apparently send 100 guards after them. And in a location where 100 guards can all find hiding places around them, apparently all with clear shots at the PCs. And be able to do this without any of the PCs spotting them. And then apparently able to coordinate their fire so as to all fire just when needed.

green slime's scenario above isn't much more implausible than these suggestions. And this one is fairly useless. 1st lvl guards firing from over 80 ft away with issues of concealment and soft cover coming into play would probably be unable to hit the PCs without rolling a 20, so about 5 of them would hit, likely none of them critting, and the PCs would be just fine.

Seriously, the easiest and smartest thing to do is to acknowledge that one is not dealing with our reality when you're dealing with 10th lvl PCs, and to learn the D&D rules well enough to still be able to challenge such PCs with much lower level enemies. And there have been a lot of useful suggestions in this thread of how to do so.