My PCs are walking into a problem!!

[Plane Sailing]

The one thing I've noticed with 3e is that, sadly, starting all the pcs at 1st level is simply not viable anymore.

Ironically it should be easier because of the faster rate of advancement... is it the increased deadliness you're thinking of?

 

[Hypersmurf]

Give the PCs "bad-feelings" about this, along with an Int roll or two when battle erupts as they realize it's a trap!

In fact, it's obligatory to have a Kuo-Toa NPC along just to deliver the line!

-Hyp.

 

[Grishnak]

If you consider this acceptable, then go ahead, but this problem is one most groups are facing at some point in their adventuring career: they get too cocky, and their attitide changes to something like "the DM wouldn't send me into an encounter I couldn't win".

Ryltar

Unfortunately myself a player will always think the DM wont kill us because we're the heroes but after the 3rd encounter where we had character deaths we've started taking to running away a bit more, even more so now where there are no raise dead or resurection spells in play. We are currently trying out the fate point system that was used in Warhammer Roleplay and it seems to be working fine so far, shame it was me who had to test it out 1st lol.

 

[Grishnak]

They can win it easily with good use and decent spellcasters. If they have 2 wizards it's all over if you use Magic of Faerun.

If there are 2 wizards with the firebrand spell and there is some decent wall of force; wall of ice usage.......

Wall's and reverse gravity and the likes will make or break this kind of encounter imho.

I tend to agree with The Forsaken One a well planned attack and surprise can really hit the enemies hard. I'm part of a group which consists of a 15th level Mage/Fire Elementalist, a 16th level Mage/Fighter/Blade Singer, a 16th level Mage and myself 16th level Rogue/Vigilante.
We encountered a den of 20 were rats each 12th level (9 Fighter & 3 for template) 3 were rat ogres 16th level each and a were rat sorcerer 18th level. We had surprise so 1 wizard blocked all entrances out and upto us with a wall of force, the elemantalist cast an attacking spell (Cant remember name of spell) which caused high damage to the sorcerer, I shot 3 times and luckily critically hit twice (No sneak) and hit with the 3rd and the blade singer cast a fireball to damage the sorcerer and the rat ogres. Init was rolled and the party ended winning that and continued by slaying the sorcerer, 2 rat ogres and 12 of the were rats. The last rat ogre was shot down by me after it attempted to climb up the wall and the rest of the were rats were taken out by area effect spells.

This combat went really well due to good planning before going in and a lot of lucky rolls but had we lost surprise and/or init it could had been messy.

 

[National Acrobat]

I agree....

I agree with most of the folks who say that the players may surprise you. As a player and a DM, I know that there are many times in the past when we have totally blown away the DM's assumptions of what might happen due to our tactics or methods. Other times, well, we've died.

One thing that I as a DM, and my party that I run understand, is that you can die in any encounter, especially if the dice are having a bad night. You can't let them believe 'the dm won't kill me because we're heroes' line, because even if you try to not kill them, sometimes it happens anyway. They are adventurers, adventurers don't have the most safe of occupations.

Hopefully your hints will help, but sometimes you have to just trust that the players will come up with something interesting that will work.

 

[Balrog]

Well, after 2 years of real time and about 13 levels of adventuring for these heroes, they do understand one thing by now in my campaign. I have no problem killing PCs if they do something stupid, have bad luck, or just get in against overwhelming odds (again, maybe stupid). They do not suffer from any misconceptions that they are the #1 heroes of the entire world, and their survival is pre-ordained. Its not. But this is still a special group, and they have overcome formidable obstacles and opponents before.

 

[Taneel BrightBlade]

My rule of Battles: if the fight is imposible to win then the PCs will win in one round. trust me, a half dragon black guard put my party to the sword, three times and then after that they killed him in one round with out growing more than one level.
Also this sounds fun and should be interesting, wish I was playing. Do they have a frenzied Berserker? If so this with be an easy victory I bet.

 

[Grishnak]

Also this sounds fun and should be interesting, wish I was playing. Do they have a frenzied Berserker? If so this with be an easy victory I bet.

If there was a frenzied berserker with the don't die even when negative hit points are reached then id say it's pretty much a win even though the berserker would be dead. If it was a minotaur berserker then pain would be dealt in large amounts I loved my zerker!!!!!

 

[the Jester]

Ironically it should be easier because of the faster rate of advancement... is it the increased deadliness you're thinking of?

It's mostly the damage output of monstes.

In the old days, a monster might do 1d6/1d6/1d8 with a claw/claw/bite... now it's more like 1d6+6/1d6+6/1d8+3. That extra 15 points of damage output makes an unconscious low-level pc into a dead low-level pc all too easily.