1. This, and the previous session, were possibly the most social interaction-intensive games I've run yet. I prefer high-bodycount sessions, but this time, the first half was spent in talking between a female ex-assassin NPC and the rest of the group. I enjoyed it, and the people who were involved probably enjoyed it, but those who weren't involved may have felt left out.
I'll have to think more on how to handle this. Possibly do everything in front of the entire group, even when conversations are private, and trust people to keep player and character knowledge separate. They're a good bunch of guys in this respect, so this may not be a problem; OTOH it may be too much of a hit to suspension of disbelief.
2. Opponents that seem unkillable are a real downer. The fight goes for hours, and at the end, the bad guy dimension doors or teleports away, leaving you with nothing to show for it. While technically you may have won, it leaves an empty feeling inside (not to mention no spoils of war).
This seems to be a combination of various factors:
2a. NPCs/monsters that can heal themselves. From a game balance PoV anything that's good for the PCs is probably also good for the NPCs, but the result of having monsters that can heal is that fights tend to drag on for a lot longer. Even though I'm all for tough fights, a combat that goes for 3 hours realtime just sucks the energy out of people.
2b. Monsters with super defenses, so that the PCs can't do a thing to them. The strength of the whiff factor is undeniable, plus, like 2a, it makes for drawn-out fights.
2c. Monsters that can escape via teleport/dim door. In D&D, running from a determined enemy is really hard -- unless you can teleport. Then it becomes a lifesaver. The flipside is that if you're the one doing the chasing, it becomes really annoying to reduce an enemy to 1 hit point and have him blink out at the last moment. Note that I'm using the OA spell lists, which means dimensional anchor isn't available.
The enemy in this case was a fallen ghaele eladrin (all good-aligned powers switched to evil) wearing a chain shirt and using a greatsword. I toned down some of her powers, eg removing her greater invis and light globe form. I did give her wings, but most of the (12th level) group had flight items or spells, so this wasn't a big deal.
The ghaele had an AC of 36 vs good creatures, which was close to impervious, and an SR of 28, which was the same. She also had sky-high saves, so even if they beat SR, often it was to no avail. Two out of four party members were rendered almost useless; the knight was hitting maybe once every other round; and the assassin ditto. Meanwhile the ghaele was hitting for 70 points of damage per round with a greatsword, or doing the same thing via spells. They finally managed to reduce her to -1 hit points, at which point she healed herself (I use a house ruled hit point system IMC). After more rounds of combat they did it again, at which point she decided enough was enough, and dim doored away.
I did not really have a happy bunch of campers after that. The last bit where the ghaele escaped was, I think, what made the difference. They would probably have been willing to overlook the tediousness of the 3-hour fight if they got a hard-earned victory, but the enemy blinking out just made it seem like a waste of time. Although there have been quite a few enemies who have done this in the past, so perhaps it's just a case of me overdoing it.
Possible things I'm mulling over:
1. Reintroduce dimensional anchor/dimensional lock. But this seems very much like a hack.
2. Take away at-will dim door/teleport from monsters like demons and the like. But all you really need is one use per day; and it doesn't stop sorcs from casting it as often as they want.
3. Leave the mechanics as they are, and either have the monsters play dumb, or introduce plot reasons why they might not run away. But playing monsters dumb all the time is just ... dumb, and it can become a bit of a stretch to rationalise just why someone wouldn't run. Especially if they have self-preservation as a high priority, which would probably be a description fitting most top-end villains.
4. Drop anything that can heal as an enemy. This wouldn't be too hard; the ghaele was a one-off, and most bad guys IMC have been necromancers, ninjae, or monsters without major healing abilities. But this isn't the real problem, I don't think.
I'll have to think more on how to handle this. Possibly do everything in front of the entire group, even when conversations are private, and trust people to keep player and character knowledge separate. They're a good bunch of guys in this respect, so this may not be a problem; OTOH it may be too much of a hit to suspension of disbelief.
2. Opponents that seem unkillable are a real downer. The fight goes for hours, and at the end, the bad guy dimension doors or teleports away, leaving you with nothing to show for it. While technically you may have won, it leaves an empty feeling inside (not to mention no spoils of war).
This seems to be a combination of various factors:
2a. NPCs/monsters that can heal themselves. From a game balance PoV anything that's good for the PCs is probably also good for the NPCs, but the result of having monsters that can heal is that fights tend to drag on for a lot longer. Even though I'm all for tough fights, a combat that goes for 3 hours realtime just sucks the energy out of people.
2b. Monsters with super defenses, so that the PCs can't do a thing to them. The strength of the whiff factor is undeniable, plus, like 2a, it makes for drawn-out fights.
2c. Monsters that can escape via teleport/dim door. In D&D, running from a determined enemy is really hard -- unless you can teleport. Then it becomes a lifesaver. The flipside is that if you're the one doing the chasing, it becomes really annoying to reduce an enemy to 1 hit point and have him blink out at the last moment. Note that I'm using the OA spell lists, which means dimensional anchor isn't available.
The enemy in this case was a fallen ghaele eladrin (all good-aligned powers switched to evil) wearing a chain shirt and using a greatsword. I toned down some of her powers, eg removing her greater invis and light globe form. I did give her wings, but most of the (12th level) group had flight items or spells, so this wasn't a big deal.
The ghaele had an AC of 36 vs good creatures, which was close to impervious, and an SR of 28, which was the same. She also had sky-high saves, so even if they beat SR, often it was to no avail. Two out of four party members were rendered almost useless; the knight was hitting maybe once every other round; and the assassin ditto. Meanwhile the ghaele was hitting for 70 points of damage per round with a greatsword, or doing the same thing via spells. They finally managed to reduce her to -1 hit points, at which point she healed herself (I use a house ruled hit point system IMC). After more rounds of combat they did it again, at which point she decided enough was enough, and dim doored away.
I did not really have a happy bunch of campers after that. The last bit where the ghaele escaped was, I think, what made the difference. They would probably have been willing to overlook the tediousness of the 3-hour fight if they got a hard-earned victory, but the enemy blinking out just made it seem like a waste of time. Although there have been quite a few enemies who have done this in the past, so perhaps it's just a case of me overdoing it.
Possible things I'm mulling over:
1. Reintroduce dimensional anchor/dimensional lock. But this seems very much like a hack.
2. Take away at-will dim door/teleport from monsters like demons and the like. But all you really need is one use per day; and it doesn't stop sorcs from casting it as often as they want.
3. Leave the mechanics as they are, and either have the monsters play dumb, or introduce plot reasons why they might not run away. But playing monsters dumb all the time is just ... dumb, and it can become a bit of a stretch to rationalise just why someone wouldn't run. Especially if they have self-preservation as a high priority, which would probably be a description fitting most top-end villains.
4. Drop anything that can heal as an enemy. This wouldn't be too hard; the ghaele was a one-off, and most bad guys IMC have been necromancers, ninjae, or monsters without major healing abilities. But this isn't the real problem, I don't think.
.
And if you trust your players to block knowledge from their characters -as you seem to in this case- you might as well go with it.
