how to manage a defender heavy group

[Askaval30]

I have recently begun brainstorming in earnest for the beginning of my first 4th edition campaign and my players are very much looking forward to the new system, to the point where they have come up with a consolidated background for all their PCs.

So far so good, unfortunately they chose to create the remnants of a battle-scarred mercenary band ala Black Company. This gives me a group consisting of three fighters, a warlord and a rogue.

Having them collectively come up with a background for their PCs is both awe-inspiring and unheard of and gives me a ton of RP material to use for later, however I was wondering how such a group would function as a cohesive whole...

3 defenders backed up by the warlord and a rogue sounds pretty formidable on paper, but I was wondering at the ultimate efficacy of this lineup... will the absence of a Controller be felt? what kind of adversary would provide a suitable challenge for 3 tanks with massive HPs and AC?

 

[DEFCON 1]

It will entirely fall upon the types of encounters you throw at them. Controllers are more useful the more enemies on the battlefield there are, because their AoE spells will hit more at a time. So encounters with many minions are ones that are more easily handled with a controller.

Without a controller, you'll primarily want to throw encounters at them where there are smaller but more powerful numbers of enemies. Three fighters against an elite and a solo would usually be pretty good. You'll not want to do that all the time obviously... mixing things up is the name of the game in 4E... but with a party that has three fighters, they will line up more favorably against elites and solos rather than wave after wave of minions. Design your encounters accordingly.

 

[Stalker0]

Their big weakness is the lack of ranged power. Groups of archers can focus fire and mow them for a round or so without much retaliation. Now of course, once the fighters get into melee with the archers its over, so use of terrain, obstacles, and defender monsters will help with that.

The key is to remember that with 3 fighters, your group has a much better AC and hitpoints than normal. But they have lost a lot of damage, ranged ability, some minion killing ability, and some of the terrain controlling that a wizard would provide.

 

[Hedgemage]

Don't throw too many minions at them. Without a controller or some area effect damage, minions will do much more damage than they would normally. Instead of minions simply throw in a couple more monsters that are a level or two below the party average to provide the meat shields for the big bads.

 

[AkaKageWarrior]

This gives me a group consisting of three fighters, a warlord and a rogue.

This is effing awesome!
just start to play and see how it goes.
and give them some minions every now and then - D&D is about having fun!

 

[Mad Hamish]

It might well depend largely on how the fighters are built.

If you have 1 sword and board as the main tank and 2 two hand fighters you might well be putting out enough damage to churn through mobs anyway.

In terms of minion clearing fighters have enough bursts, cleave storm of steel etc that they can probably do o.k. at it.

As has been pointed out the lack of ranged damage in the goup might be the biggest problem.

which races they are could also be important for them.

 

[mach1.9pants]

yeah controllers are a 100% optional extra. You do not need them. You need a leader (to heal) and you need a defender (to absorb damage). A striker is nice cos it will bring down BBEGs quicker.
A controller is nice, esp against minions, but so is any dragonborn....once they have enlarged breath thats the end of any minion problems!
Ranged attackers with no way for the ftrs/striker to close is gong to be the major problem IMO

 

[ac_noj]

Actually the group can deal with minions pretty easily if several of them are Dragonborn. A 5x5 breath attack is great for minions.

Also a Tactical Warlord could multi-class into Wizard for some minion shreadding and control powers.

 

[Stalker0]

Actually since 3 of them are fighters, if they take cleave then minions will be no problem just because of that.

 

[OSD]

You want to give them challenge? Quite easy.

Use skirmishers, insubstantials, and range/arcane units with Difficult Terrain between them and your monsters.

Want to REALLY challenge them? Give minion mobs range ability with pack tactics and a surprise trap somewhere. This would drive them nuts and greatly reduce the strength of their striker (rogue).

And as other have said, solo and elite makes for nice fights