How would you defend against this?

[Belbarrus]

How would you defend against this? Here is the scenario:

Your party is in a huge underground cavern. To avoid getting lost, and to be able to better determine the size and shape of the cavern, your party is keeping close to the wall on your right. For the most part, the cavern is a pretty large, open space empty of landmarks. You have travelled about two hundred feet so far, when out of nowhere, an arrow plugs one of your party members.

Your party, at least partially, relies on a light source (light spell, everburning torch, sunrod, etc). About 150' away in the darkness is an enemy archer that uses Darkvision to see his own way around and can see your party because of the light source. The archer can keep shooting at the PCs as long as he can see their light.

How would the PCs notice where the arrows are coming from. Spot check (DC 20) and they get a general idea of the direction the archer is in?

How would you deal with this situation? You could determine that he is using you light source to target your group and douse the lights, but then what? You could run behind cover and get out of the way. There are a variety of things you could do to stop getting hit, but how do you fight back?

Even worse, what if the archer was a Pixie with natural invisibility and was flying/levitating?


B

 

[apsuman]

How would you defend against this? Here is the scenario:

Your party is in a huge underground cavern. To avoid getting lost, and to be able to better determine the size and shape of the cavern, your party is keeping close to the wall on your right. For the most part, the cavern is a pretty large, open space empty of landmarks. You have travelled about two hundred feet so far, when out of nowhere, an arrow plugs one of your party members.

Your party, at least partially, relies on a light source (light spell, everburning torch, sunrod, etc). About 150' away in the darkness is an enemy archer that uses Darkvision to see his own way around and can see your party because of the light source. The archer can keep shooting at the PCs as long as he can see their light.

How would the PCs notice where the arrows are coming from. Spot check (DC 20) and they get a general idea of the direction the archer is in?

How would you deal with this situation? You could determine that he is using you light source to target your group and douse the lights, but then what? You could run behind cover and get out of the way. There are a variety of things you could do to stop getting hit, but how do you fight back?

Even worse, what if the archer was a Pixie with natural invisibility and was flying/levitating?


B

If you were worried about pixies then you should be high enough level to not need the light source.

Here are my immediate ideas:
invisibility,

dark vision,

more lights (LOTS of 'em) -- illuminate the WHOLE cavern.

illusion spells I, simply cast minor illusion to make a pile of trash to hide behind.

illusion spells II illusionary images of your party. Confuse the shooter.

illusion spells III -- combine the above two, hide behind something (illusionary or not) and then make an illusionary party of yourselves. Have the archer take down the illusions, having them act appropriately and all, and when he comes for the bodies, ambush him.

protection from arrows,

darkness, on the opponet or to hide behind

obscuring mist,

pyrotechnics,

listen check to determine the approximate locaton and then cast some (widened if available) fireballs.

 

[Sejs]

Spot check (DC 20) and they get a general idea of the direction the archer is in?

Unless the archer is moving around, I'd think it wouldn't even require a skill check. If the arrow is sticking out of you with the fletchings pointing west, it means the archer is to the west. If the archer is moving around the good ol' standby of move silently vs listen would help to home in on them.


As for the first response that comes to mind for the Pcs? Daylight.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Well your main problem is that the archer can see you but you can't see him.

So, step 1 is to make sure he can't see you. Put out your lights. Seriously. They're not helping you target him and they're helping him target you. So they're counterproductive at this point.

Step 2 is finding a way to illuminate your foe. Darkvision (or natural darkvision) spells would help but he's be out of range at the moment. Daylight would help too but it's actually of limited use for this kind of thing--it's got a limited radius and he can see you from well outside that radius.

3.5 Darkness would actually help a lot. The shadowy illumination doesn't make you an obvious target but it would enable you to see.

However, the best spell in your arsenel for this situation is Dancing Lights. It's got a good range and very good movement so you can move the lights around (4 torches) until you spot your foe. Once you see him, you can follow him with the lights and turn the tables on him. Now he can't see you (if you put out you lights) but you can see him.

If it's a pixie, or some such thing, you'll of course also need See Invisible or True Seeing and you may want multiple dancing lights.

Another option is to summon something that will be able to see/find the pixie (dire bat, etc) and have it fight it. At that point, you can locate the pixie by following where the bat goes.

 

[Pielorinho]

Other ideas:
* Cast light on an arrow of your own. Ready offensive spells and faerie fire and the like. Have an archer shoot the lit arrow back in the direction the first arrow came from. Hopefully it'll illuminate the mysterious attacker, at which point you peg them.
*Obscuring mist; leave your lantern inside the mist and creep to the edges of it. Listen for the archer's approach.
* Mage hand the torch/lantern 20' ahead of you, so you're not within the area of illumination. See whether it gets shot at.
* Call out a surrender -- then, when the enemy gets close enough to see, trounce 'em .

Daniel

 

[Aluvial]

How would you defend against this? Here is the scenario:

Your party is in a huge underground cavern. To avoid getting lost, and to be able to better determine the size and shape of the cavern, your party is keeping close to the wall on your right. For the most part, the cavern is a pretty large, open space empty of landmarks. You have travelled about two hundred feet so far, when out of nowhere, an arrow plugs one of your party members.

B

You should alway stay on the LEFT wall. Works much better.

 

[DanMcS]

A listen check would work just as well as a spot to determine where the arrow was coming from. Especially in the still air underground, the whoosh of the arrow through the air would be very loud, and also the twang from the archer's bowstring. They'd be harder to hear if you were moving, but otherwise, DC 10 or 15 listen check to get a direction on him, if I required a check at all.

 

[Wolffenjugend]

That archer better be moving around...

 

[Darklone]

Use Full defense and move into the direction where the arrows come from if you can't do anything else.

 

[kwiqsilver]

It of course depends on the party, but in a fairly typical party there should be at least one really sneaky guy with darkvision. He was probably scouting ahead and communicating through Message or Telepathy. Tell him to move towards the center, listening, while the rest of the group (using what cover they can, including putting soft targets behind hard ones) moves back away from the scout. When they hear the Archer's muffled, blood-gurgled scream, they run towards it.