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

[mvincent]

Dont award XP because the players used metagame knowledge to react

I reckon 1st level crossbowmen wouldn't be worth anything to 10th level characters anyways.

 

[mvincent]

Should PCs be able to just shrug off being peppered with crossbow bolts that have been trained on their throats and eyes and hearts by would-be capturers?

As mentioned, your hypothetical situation is a common enough problem in D&D, and is a side effect of the system used.

If I want my players to acquiesce, I can:
1) Ask them to play along
2) Threaten someone that can be take down easily: NPC, cohort, the mage (assuming everyone aims at him), etc. The threatened individual need not even be present.
3) Use superior opponents (and describe them as such), possibly with poison or nasty magical devices. Maybe have a symbol spell clearly visible on some of the bolts.

Otherwise, if I surround my players with obviously easy opponents, I would fully expect them to fight it out.

 

[shilsen]

Nice post, Shilsen. I'll definitely consider some of the things you said. (I've tried to use some of what you said in the past, but none of it ever really seemed like it worked, felt forced, etc. Anyway, I'll just keep at it.)

Glad to help. I think one of the most effective ways to do the things I mentioned is to be consistent about it right from the start of the campaign. And clear communication with the players about what the campaign world is like and what their PCs are likely to encounter goes a long way, especially if backed up with regular in-game reinforcement.

I honestly never read that guideline in the DMG, though, about how many encounters should be what EL- and I have to say, that's brilliant! I'll keep that in mind as well.

I think a lot of people either miss that or gloss over it, plus a lot of DMs don't use it (at least partly because they missed it), so there's an impression out there that the default in 3e is for PCs to always face things they can beat handily.

 

[IceFractal]

As mentioned, PCs past 5th level or so have gone outside the normal human range. By 10th level, we're not talking Conan - we're talking Hercules.

But that's been said. What hasn't though, is that there's a risk to adding any kind of "compensating" rules to make groups of mooks more dangerous - it significantly inflates the power of armies, to the point where even a small town barely ever needs heroes.


For instance - at 10th level, each character is CR 10. Interestingly, an 11-headed Hydra is also CR 10. Yes, that in fact means each character is as dangerous as an 11-headed Hydra (not just coincidence I mentioned Hercules). Now let's say that hydra is seen headed toward a town. Which seems a more appropriate response by the mayor?

"A great monster approaches, and we have little time to defend. Barricade everyone inside the town hall, get every armed man ready, and send the fastest rider to summon the royal knights. If only there were some heroes to aid us!"

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

And if a Hydra doesn't seem impressive enough, consider a Bebelith, Fire Giant, or other monster of that level instead - there's lots to pick from, none of which seem easily defeated by a small squad of guardsmen.


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. Ancient forest of evil? Screw that, we've got crossbows! March through it, wipe out the ur-demons there, and get some logging going.

 

[Slaved]

I would expect 20 guys with crossbows, longspears, and warning to be able to take out or scare off an eleven headed hydra or fire giant pretty easily actually. I would imagine town guards ranging from warrior 1 to warrior 3 for the lower ranks and then a commanding officer with a couple levels in both nonplayer character and character classes.

There is definately something to be said for extra actions and preperation time.

 

[Shin Okada]

Last sunday, a party which I DMing, composed of seven L6 heros, has fought against a Large Green Dragon and six L4 Hobgoblin Warriors and two L3 Hobgoblin Fighters. The Green Dragon was the only real foe, actually.

Not only Higher level PC are stronger themselves, they mean to have much better equipment comparing to NPCs and monsters. So in this case, only the 3 levels (or 3 CR worth) of difference made Hobgoblins into simple bate (though, they could inflict certain amount of damages via their bows).

And, pure bunch of warriors are always weaker than a group which have good mixture of warriors and spell casters. Though, most towns or even large cities unlikely to have that many mages, 20 robed mages with some kind of wand in their hand will be much threatening to higher level PCs. Unless PCs have some kind of Spell Resistance or countermeasure against magic missile which is always active, 20 Magic Missiles are not something they can ignore.

 

[Shape D.]

My suggestion for something like this would be to give the players more to worry about than initial damage. having one or more of the crossbow men tossing out a tanglefoot bag or a web spell, or something similar, ie PC's not able to move, would bring a lot more hesitation on the part of the adventurers.

even at level 10 a 15 DC reflex save isn't a guaranteed roll for a Fighter or a wizard.

And I would highly encourage Sneak attack damage. 1d8 per attacker may not mean much to each PC, but when they each take 1d8+2d6 per bolt they may start to think differently.

 

[Will]

I second (third? Fourth?) E6. If you don't feel comfortable with characters being glowing superbeings, then you don't want to play D&D at 10+ level.

Alternately, you could have regions where everyone is higher level. So in The Fire Wastes of Doom, even the peasants are 6th level, because otherwise they'd never survive the random farm monster encounters.

 

[Brace Cormaeril]

If anything the penaties are unrealistically harsh. Try it some time. Someone with 2 swords who doesn't know what they were doing is a match for someone with one sword who does. (Unlike DnD most people find it easier to fight with a pair with the same length, 2 longswords is easier than one longsword and one short as the short sword can only be used to block as it doesn't get close enought). It gives you more options to block and parry and if they block one they've probably left themselves open to the other one.

You've obviously never played Kendo, in either nito or standard shiai.

Here's how you can make your "surrounded" by crossbowmen scenario tougher. It is a favorite of mine, the ole' surrounded by crossbowmen.

Give the xbowmen Precise Shot. Let them split a quiver of "Keen" bolts.

XXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX
XXXX OO XXXX
XXXX OO XXXX
XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXX

The PC's are the "O's", and surrounded by 50 guards. You roll about 5 crits, each dude with a heavy crossbow. They attack the party mage, then the Cleric. Party soils pants.

And in response to SwtichBlade's remark. In case you don't know this, Don't Try it sometime. (Fighting with Longswords) They are sharp, and they were designed to kill people.

 

[shilsen]

The PC's are the "O's", and surrounded by 50 guards.

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.