Hey All, thanks for the replies so far!
@Trit One-Ear : Yeah I hear ya about the NPC soldiers seeming to be useless. Of course, since the PCs are about to hit Epic, they SHOULD seem to be far and away better than the soldiers. That being said, I did run across a SC in an LFR adventure today wherein it required a certain number of successes per round or the challenge (actually a cut scene in the challenge) reset. In that instance, the party had to try to draw a ritual circle during a fight and if they did not make X number of attempts in a round, the circle was erased in the chaos of battle. Something like that should work in my scenario. Sure, you CAN all aid one person, but in the meantime, you'll be overrun.
[MENTION=2]Piratecat[/MENTION]: Excellent idea about having the PCs being able to influence certain events. That should work perfectly in this scenario, especially since the city in question has plenty of strategically important locations. Particularly with a 3-way battle there could be some interesting implications for things like seizing a bridge (or demolishing it to cut off a retreat), etc. I particularly like the idea of presenting them with multiple options at once, with different challenges for each option.
@Quickleaf : Excellent idea. I had already planned to not map it out on a grid, so as to clue them into the fact that its not a typical combat, but the idea of skill checks to move from one zone to another is particularly good when combined with PCat's idea. For example, they can choose to either try to push back the nearest group of enemies, or they can try to get to the next zone to rescue a favorite NPC. To get to the next zone though, they need to succeed on a number of checks or get caught up in a "brief" combat that while not particularly threatening to the party, is enough that it could slow them down, etc.
As always, thanks for the ideas and keep 'em coming!
@Trit One-Ear : Yeah I hear ya about the NPC soldiers seeming to be useless. Of course, since the PCs are about to hit Epic, they SHOULD seem to be far and away better than the soldiers. That being said, I did run across a SC in an LFR adventure today wherein it required a certain number of successes per round or the challenge (actually a cut scene in the challenge) reset. In that instance, the party had to try to draw a ritual circle during a fight and if they did not make X number of attempts in a round, the circle was erased in the chaos of battle. Something like that should work in my scenario. Sure, you CAN all aid one person, but in the meantime, you'll be overrun.
[MENTION=2]Piratecat[/MENTION]: Excellent idea about having the PCs being able to influence certain events. That should work perfectly in this scenario, especially since the city in question has plenty of strategically important locations. Particularly with a 3-way battle there could be some interesting implications for things like seizing a bridge (or demolishing it to cut off a retreat), etc. I particularly like the idea of presenting them with multiple options at once, with different challenges for each option.
@Quickleaf : Excellent idea. I had already planned to not map it out on a grid, so as to clue them into the fact that its not a typical combat, but the idea of skill checks to move from one zone to another is particularly good when combined with PCat's idea. For example, they can choose to either try to push back the nearest group of enemies, or they can try to get to the next zone to rescue a favorite NPC. To get to the next zone though, they need to succeed on a number of checks or get caught up in a "brief" combat that while not particularly threatening to the party, is enough that it could slow them down, etc.
As always, thanks for the ideas and keep 'em coming!
