How to modify encounters to suit 7 characters?

[Blackbrrd]

Ah ha! If you are not tracking XP then you have the complete freedom to keep adding extra creatures as reinforcements when the need arises.

If the group are finding an encounter too easy (in your opinion) then bring in another wave flanking them or following up behind the first wave. If thats still not enough throw in some more.

This simple approach means that you can keep encounters dynamic and interesting while keeping everything under control. For important encounters I would look for interesting creatures to add if the need arises, or better yet design them yourself. I think a random (sort of ) group of creatures stumbling into the battle site would make for an excellent surprise (for both the PCs and whoever it was they were fighting!).

You say your group is level 3, imagine everyones surprise if in round 3 of a fight 2 Death Jump Spiders leap from hiding and attack the back row.

Now this idea is probably a very good one. It can't be done all the time, but maybe half the time would work out...

Usually it's a bad idea to string the monsters along, it means the characters are only fighting parts of the encounter at a time. In other words, making it easier.

On the other hand, since I don't really care about the xp budget for any other reasons than trying to have an inkling of how difficult the encounter will be, I can start the encounter with 5 monsters and add 2 monsters in round 2 and 3. This means that instead of starting at 7 monsters and going down as time goes by, I will probably start at 5 - and stay at 5 for the three first rounds.

The added bonus of this is that the "new" monsters won't have any status effects on them allowing them to wreck havoc where I want them to.

Additionally since I am only controlling 5 monsters at a time, the rounds will be pretty quick.

 

[Shin Okada]

I tend to agree that increasing the number of monsters per encounter should be the way to go.

In addition to this, maybe you should consider making the battlefields of each encounter wider. And consider adding more lurkers and skirmishers. Then PCs can't cover many monsters with a single area attack. That will somewhat soften that concentrate fire problem.

 

[KarinsDad]

I tend to agree that increasing the number of monsters per encounter should be the way to go.

I don't.

We have 6 PCs in our current campaign and one of the players wanted to know if a friend of his could join to make it 7.

Our group was on the fence, we didn't want to slow down combat, but we did want our friend to have his friend join.

We eventually decided to not let the friend join (we are starting a different campaign on a different day to do that), but the convincing argument by one of the players was "I already get too much time to check my e-mail between turns".

He's right. With 6 PCs, combat is often grindy and slow. It can easily take up to 1 minute per PC/NPC on average with rolls, conditions, movement, questions, illegal moves by players, spending action points, jokes, (passing food at our game which is important ) etc. and with 11 or 12 characters on the board, that's a minimum of 11 or 12 minutes between a given player's turn to his next turn. A 6 round encounter can easily take well over an hour, often more.

As DM, I try to speed it up in various ways, but the problem at the moment is 6 15th level PCs. There are just too many options for each player (10+ powers with magic items) and too many conditions and effects on the board and although the players try to plan their next move ahead of time, the game is just too fluid where their plans can quickly go awry with a single Slide.

Throwing more NPCs into the mix just makes the problem worse.

 

[Shin Okada]

Well, of course, increasing the number of PCs tend to make each encounter longer. But that is mainly because PCs have far more options comparing to typical monsters.

Strengthening monsters is often a bad idea as their stats tend to become too high comparing to PCs' attacks and defenses. Also, when monsters have high defenses it slows encounters down.

To avoid making a fight grindy, use a lot of artilleries, skirmishers and lurkers, and use wider battle grid. Don't use chocking points too much. And don't encourage encounters starts when PCs open a door.

Another good technique is to use minions. I know some DMs don't like to use minions at med-to-higher level campaigns. But they really make encounters faster.

 

[KarinsDad]

Another good technique is to use minions. I know some DMs don't like to use minions at med-to-higher level campaigns. But they really make encounters faster.

They make encounters non-threatening and non-challenging. Our 15th level PCs have so many different burst and blast attacks that minions are a waste of time.

I've also noticed that my players no longer enjoy minions. Contrary to popular 4e philosophy belief, mowing through a bunch of minions is cool the first few times a given player does it. But, after over 1.5 years of playing 4E, most of my players are disappointed when the first minion drops and they know they are fighting minions. They aren't challenging. They are paper tigers. The comments around the table when minions show up are not exciting ones. More like "Oh, a minion, let's drop these guys and get to a real fight". Here the player was all stoked to show his stuff and the guy falls over. Yawn.

My players are more excited when the monsters show off cool abilities. Powers and/or combinations and/or terrain and/or traps that the players have never or rarely seen before.

Minions? Meh. They are like eating plain melba toast. Bland. Even when you put jelly on them.

 

[Victim]

More characters means more potential synergy between them, so they can gain power faster than the XP budget indicates. Building better combos into the monster teams can help even the score without adding more guys or higher level guys. Having more ranged attackers also matters, since it makes it easier for you to focus fire on a single PC.

Terrain also matters. First of all, there are special terrain features that hurt PCs more than monsters. Also, simple geography is important. An encounter that can have multiple threats coming quickly from different directions can threaten rear element characters effectively or weaken their ability to cover each other and focus fire if they cover the different approaches.