MM3 expected monster combo unnecessarily lethal?

[Rechan]

My players begone.

I am prepping a scenario with jackalwere in my game, and I realized something.

The Deceiver is meant to make a target go unconscious. Sure, I understand that. And the unconscious is even weaker because the target gets a save each time it takes damage.

But then I looked at the Bravo in conjunction with that.

The Deceiver makes a target unconscious. Then a Bravo hits the target. The bravo, wielding a falcion and coup-de-gracing a helpless target, deals 2d4+20+1d6 (because Bravos get a +1d6 for dazed, prone or helpless targets).

Not to mention that the Jackalwere entry suggests an encounter consists of a mated pair of Deceivers, a few bravos and the minions. So you have the likelihood of two targets getting turned unconscious on a hit, and getting piled on by massive CDGes.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Seems like a fairly nasty encounter, yes. OTOH the Encounters section says "Jackalwere's typically travel in packs consisting of..." which doesn't necessarily imply you would encounter all those figures in a single shot. Given their penchant for deception and secrecy it seems likely to me that they would be the focus of an adventure. You might first run into a bravo and maybe some harriers plus a couple hired thugs. Then you might run into a Deceiver and a Bravo, a brace of Harriers with a couple more thugs out to deal with you. Maybe then at the end you run into the other Deceiver etc. Those could be pretty tough encounters for say a 2nd or 3rd level party, but survivable.

Gaze of Sleep is +7 vs Will at range 5. Its fairly nasty and will probably hit more often than not against say a level 2 PC, but then again its AC 18, FORT 15 and has 56 hit points. A smart party should be able to take it out reasonably quickly. If they can't then yup, they run the risk of a nasty CDG from a Bravo.

Overall they're pretty nasty customers. They should be OK if the DM doesn't go overboard though. I'd think twice before messing with a pack of them though.

 

[Rechan]

Seems like a fairly nasty encounter, yes. OTOH the Encounters section says "Jackalwere's typically travel in packs consisting of..." which doesn't necessarily imply you would encounter all those figures in a single shot.

I figure it's more like the MM1/2's "encounter groups".

Given their penchant for deception and secrecy it seems likely to me that they would be the focus of an adventure. You might first run into a bravo and maybe some harriers plus a couple hired thugs. Then you might run into a Deceiver and a Bravo, a brace of Harriers with a couple more thugs out to deal with you. Maybe then at the end you run into the other Deceiver etc. Those could be pretty tough encounters for say a 2nd or 3rd level party, but survivable.

...

Overall they're pretty nasty customers. They should be OK if the DM doesn't go overboard though. I'd think twice before messing with a pack of them though.

See that's the problem.

In my game, the PCs just dropped anchor on a new continent, and are setting up a colony. And a pack of jackalweres (holed up several days from any other settlements) noticed this and have decided to try and infiltrate. Or rather, the Deceiver has posed as a native being attacked by natives of an enemy tribe (his jackalwere friends posing as enemies and hightailing it out of there as soon as the PCs showed up). The Deceiver has managed to get them to teach him their language, and the PCs (due to some good and bad insight rolls) think the Deceiver is just trying to get them to go after the other tribe because they have a feud. (Which isn't far off the mark, but still).

So when the PCs do meet the Jackalweres in combat, it's going to be in full force because they were led into a trap for believing their "Guide".

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I figure it's more like the MM1/2's "encounter groups".


See that's the problem.

In my game, the PCs just dropped anchor on a new continent, and are setting up a colony. And a pack of jackalweres (holed up several days from any other settlements) noticed this and have decided to try and infiltrate. Or rather, the Deceiver has posed as a native being attacked by natives of an enemy tribe (his jackalwere friends posing as enemies and hightailing it out of there as soon as the PCs showed up). The Deceiver has managed to get them to teach him their language, and the PCs (due to some good and bad insight rolls) think the Deceiver is just trying to get them to go after the other tribe because they have a feud. (Which isn't far off the mark, but still).

So when the PCs do meet the Jackalweres in combat, it's going to be in full force because they were led into a trap for believing their "Guide".

Sounds like an interesting adventure. Things do get tricky when you have deceptive monsters that have the upper hand. Sounds like the party is treading perilously close to total disaster. I suppose one option would be to have some 3rd group of monsters or some other event pop up and cause the whole situation to change.

 

[Mouseferatu]

I kind of like this sort of synergy, actually. It's a way of really hammering home some lethality, but because it requires the efforts of several creatures cooperating (and requires everything hit), it's still not as "swingy" as an instant-death effect. (And it'll be fun watching the rest of the PCs scramble to protect their downed comrade. And if they don't? Well, than the party has other issues. )

 

[the Jester]

My players begone.

I am prepping a scenario with jackalwere in my game, and I realized something.

The Deceiver is meant to make a target go unconscious. Sure, I understand that. And the unconscious is even weaker because the target gets a save each time it takes damage.

But then I looked at the Bravo in conjunction with that.

The Deceiver makes a target unconscious. Then a Bravo hits the target. The bravo, wielding a falcion and coup-de-gracing a helpless target, deals 2d4+20+1d6 (because Bravos get a +1d6 for dazed, prone or helpless targets).

Not to mention that the Jackalwere entry suggests an encounter consists of a mated pair of Deceivers, a few bravos and the minions. So you have the likelihood of two targets getting turned unconscious on a hit, and getting piled on by massive CDGes.

Looks good to me!

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I kind of like this sort of synergy, actually. It's a way of really hammering home some lethality, but because it requires the efforts of several creatures cooperating (and requires everything hit), it's still not as "swingy" as an instant-death effect. (And it'll be fun watching the rest of the PCs scramble to protect their downed comrade. And if they don't? Well, than the party has other issues. )

I was thinking about that, but really it isn't THAT swingy. The initial hit to put the PC unconscious is a +7 vs WILL attack, which is almost certain to be trivially easy against some party members. A WIS cleric aside you won't have many 4th level PCs with a WILL north of 15. The CDG itself is +8 vs AC, with a +5 kicker for attacking a helpless target, practically an auto-hit and a guaranteed kill on a hit.

It is a lot less deadly than old-fashioned SODs. Still one of the deadliest likely combos you're going to run into at those levels. Given that both powers are likely to come into play more than once it IS pretty scary. I agree though, scary is OK and the party CAN thwart it, as long as they have some idea what they're facing. Of course Jackalweres ideally will be something you DON'T understand, hehe. I'd be real careful about how I sprung it on the party.

 

[Kwalish Kid]

I kind of like this sort of synergy, actually. It's a way of really hammering home some lethality, but because it requires the efforts of several creatures cooperating (and requires everything hit), it's still not as "swingy" as an instant-death effect. (And it'll be fun watching the rest of the PCs scramble to protect their downed comrade. And if they don't? Well, than the party has other issues. )

In a recent D&D Encounters encounter, the PCs kept a monster from coordinating its attacks with itself. They kept two kanks from maintaining a hold from one round to the next. Monster coordination should be lethal, because it's not going to succeed very often.

 

[Scribble]

 

[keterys]

It might be worth using a creature that won't deal 'bloodied' hp worth of damage on the coup de grace, or make the Unconscious a little harder to pull off. It does seem a bit odd how easily they can achieve Unconsciousness - I actually recently ran an elite that had an ability that dazed the target for a turn, aftereffect: dazed (save ends), Failed Save: Unconscious... and even with all that prep and delay, I still got off a coup de grace that came within a hair of killing someone outright.