el-remmen
Moderator Emeritus
The scope of what random encounters can do for your adventure goes well beyond just interrupting short rests.
Sure. . .my game has random encounters. I just got rid of the rolling for them part.
The scope of what random encounters can do for your adventure goes well beyond just interrupting short rests.
You mean rolling for when they should happen or rolling what exactly the random encounter should be?Sure. . .my game has random encounters. I just got rid of the rolling for them part.
You mean rolling for when they should happen or rolling what exactly the random encounter should be?
Then you cannot call those Random Encounters.Both.
Then you cannot call those Random Encounters.
Mate, do you even like 5E?Then you cannot call those Random Encounters.
What are you going on about, mate?Mate, do you even like 5E?
Sure they are. They were randomly picked by the DM.Then you cannot call those Random Encounters.
All the time. And usually my PCs factor that in to their strategy, either by trying to learn enemy spellcasters' rest patterns and timing their attacks when the enemy is low on slots, or else engineering a situation where the enemy will want to use lots of slots and then attacking them after that expenditure.I'd be curious to know if anyone ever designs encounters with a possible variance based on what the NPC opponents are doing or not doing? I mean, who is to say the BBEG has access to all their abilities and spell slots when they happen to meet? Usually they do out of convenience - but I have had situations where I had to remember a villain had one less slot of a certain level because according to the plot (and outside of the PCs' sight) he had cast some spell for something and thus did not have it available for the final confrontation. These days, however, I find it a lot easier to use a Matt Colville approach to designed NPC opponents, just giving them whatever at-will, long and short rest abilities I want them to have and not bothering building them using the rules for a class.
Encounter # | Monsters (#) | # of (N)PCs / Levels | CRs | Difficulty |
---|---|---|---|---|
38 | Pelopia, New Constable, Guards (8) | 2/5 and 1/3 + 1/5 and 2/4 | 4, 1/4, 1/8 | Deadly* |
39 | Cultists (5) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 1/4 | Trivial |
40 | Grell (2) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 3 | Easy |
41 | Guards (6), Giant Toads (2) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 1/8, 1 | Easy |
42 | Cultist Elders (4), Cultist Guards (10) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 1/8, 1/4 | Easy |
43 | Ash Jomgobbar (fighter), Ingmar Greeves (rogue), Meredith Grin (rogue) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 5, 3, 3 | Deadly |
44 | Farrar Segundo (priest), Cultist Guards (4), Amphisbaena (2) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 4, 1/4, 1/2 | Hard |
45 | Cultist Guards (2) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 1/4 | Trivial |
46 | Troglodytes (4), Troglodyte Meatseeker | 4/5 and 1/3 | 1/4, 2 | Easy |
47 | Troglodyte Scouts (2), Troglodytes (4) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 1/2,1/4 | Trivial |
48 | Troglodyte Meatseeker, Troglodytes (4), Trog Juggernaut | 4/5 and 1/3 | 2, 1/4, 3 | Hard |
49 | Bonesnapper | 4/5 and 1/3 | 2 | Trivial |
50 | Spirit Naga, Trog Scouts (2), Trog Mystic, Crocodiles (3) | 4/5 and 1/3 | 10, 1/2, 3, 1/2 | Deadly |
51 | Harpy | 4/5 and 1/3 and 1/4 | 1 | Trivial |
I think that's the issue with the name though. To me as a new DM of 5e, I took deadly to mean....you know.....DEADLY. Aka this was a "BIG FIGHT", the party was going to be in big trouble, etc.If you add potentiall before deadly, you are closer to the truth.
If you know something about expectation value and standard deviation and you want to tell acoherent stroy without a constant change in cast, deadly should only have very low chance of lethality. If deadly would mean 20 Percent chance to kill a PC, would mean an average one character dead per adventuring day.
I think most people don't want that.
Finally an update as yesterday the PCs finished my remix of Against the Cult of the Reptile God and received XP (getting to 6th level). Also managed the most encounters between long rests (or their equivalents) probably since I ran 2E.
Against the Cult of the Reptile God - part two (1E AD&D Adventure adapted to 5E)
Encounter # Monsters (#) # of (N)PCs / Levels
CRsDifficulty 38Pelopia, New Constable, Guards (8) 2/5 and 1/3 + 1/5 and 2/4 4, 1/4, 1/8 Deadly* 39Cultists (5) 4/5 and 1/3 1/4 Trivial 40Grell (2) 4/5 and 1/3 3 Easy 41Guards (6), Giant Toads (2) 4/5 and 1/3 1/8, 1 Easy 42Cultist Elders (4), Cultist Guards (10) 4/5 and 1/3 1/8, 1/4 Easy 43Ash Jomgobbar (fighter), Ingmar Greeves (rogue), Meredith Grin (rogue) 4/5 and 1/3 5, 3, 3 Deadly 44Farrar Segundo (priest), Cultist Guards (4), Amphisbaena (2) 4/5 and 1/3 4, 1/4, 1/2 Hard 45Cultist Guards (2) 4/5 and 1/3 1/4 Trivial 46Troglodytes (4), Troglodyte Meatseeker 4/5 and 1/3 1/4, 2 Easy 47Troglodyte Scouts (2), Troglodytes (4) 4/5 and 1/3 1/2,1/4 Trivial 48Troglodyte Meatseeker, Troglodytes (4), Trog Juggernaut 4/5 and 1/3 2, 1/4, 3 Hard 49Bonesnapper 4/5 and 1/3 2 Trivial 50Spirit Naga, Trog Scouts (2), Trog Mystic, Crocodiles (3) 4/5 and 1/3 10, 1/2, 3, 1/2 Deadly 51Harpy 4/5 and 1/3 and 1/4 1 Trivial
Encounter 38 was a weird non-standard battle, thus the asterisk next to difficulty. The party was split two ways. The druid was dominated and helping the bad guys (some whom were also dominated) try and find the party. The barbarian and ranger/sorcerer along with their NPC cleric/monk ally led the bad guys away, while the gnome bard/wizard used his cloak of elvenkind to hide and touch base with some other very secretive potential allies. Eventually, the gnome and the new allies joined the fight in a hillock where the others decided to stage an ambush.
Thankfully, they were also able to break the druid's domination and win the day and he cast call lightning for the first time in his rage over being compelled. Pelopia, the prefect's warrior daughter, was stabilized and revived and she broke her domination too, she became an important ally in learning more of the cult's plans and winning over reticent townsfolk. Anyway, that fight started out difficult, but as the conditions changed, it became easier and easier.
Encounter 39 was later the same day after a short rest and the party mopped up some remaining cultists in town.
Encounter 40 was on the way to the cultist's swamp lair and was the only encounter they had in two days - except in a dangerous environment where they had no way of knowing how many more monsters they might face - so there was no "going nova" (always a mistake unless completely unavoidable, in my opinion).
Encounter 41 was complicated by the fact that the giant toads were excitable and one ended up swallowing on the guards that were ostensibly on the same side, when he tried to flee from the PCs - leading to one fight bleeding into the other with no break.
Encounter 42 may be technically "easy" but I would say it was more like medium - as the cultists made use of their knowledge of the layout and came in waves.
Encounter 43 was an ambush and thus actually hard and Encounter 44 was made easier because the PC found a secret passage they used to get the drop on the priest and his attendants. The party took a short rest between these fights.
They'd end up taking short rests after encounter 45 and 46 as well.
The bonesnapper (#49) was esp. trivial because it was chained by way of a collar and could not fight back, but it blocked the hallway and made a lot of noise to warn the big bad.
Encounter #50 was the climax and you can see photos from it in this post. And a video of the chamber's layout in a post I made earlier in that same thread. It took 13 rounds. Afterwards they took another short rest, and then found the harpy's lair (#51) on their way back to meet up prisoners they had freed and then had hole up "somewhere safe." This was also a non-standard encounter because they probably could have killed her easily, but they knew she was cursed into this form and had the means to break the curse - which they did, adding yet another NPC they needed to guide back to safety.
After that they took a long rest, holing up in the lieutenants' quarters which had a lockable door. So that was 11 encounters between long rests and they took four short rests in that time.
So there is more data - do with it what you will and I am happy to try and answer any questions.
After 51 encounters, they have just gone from level 1 to 6, despite many of their encounters deadly?