Need a good forest-y encounter for a level 6 party

[NewJeffCT]

I'm a big fan of the ettercaps + giant spiders idea. You could even fold the areanas idea in, too, with the sorcerous areana manipulating the ettercaps into doing its bidding.

If I may be shamelessly self-promoting for a moment, how about a caustic drake? The elves' forest is also home to a colony of lizardfolk, who live on an island in the middle of a good sized lake in the forest. The elves and lizardfolk mostly ignored each other in the past, but the reptilian humanoids have been growing more violent, conducting several raids on the elf tribe in the past few weeks. The problems stem from the caustic drake, who has convinced the lizardfolk to worship it as an avatar of their god. And it's starting to grow curious as to what elf flesh tastes like.

Demiurge out.

The ettercap/spider/areanas idea is under consideration. If I'm not mistaken, dropping a web would be a ranged touch attack, right? My problem in my last encounter with them was that a couple of the PCs were very hard to hit due to some new magic items, so my main bad guy wasn't nearly as effective as I wanted him to be (except when I rolled two natural 20s in a row to get a crit...)

I'm not trying to kill the players, but I do want them to feel threatened and in danger.

 

[demiurge1138]

Webs are indeed ranged touch attacks.

Demiurge out.

 

[Herobizkit]

The fun part of Aranea is the fact they are usually Neutral. This could be a recurring NPC in the making. I know I've been using a shapeshifting Aranea to excellent effect in my current campaign... it's been driving my player crazy wondering just what her 'true' form is.

 

[NewJeffCT]

Terrain effects: The altar is the center of an unhallow spell. The spells that were tied to it have long since worn off, but the unhallow has outlived the building it was cast for and has stained the terrain forever with evil. Practically, this gives Bitter Root the effect of a magic circle against good spell. The altar itself has been tainted by the blood of many sacrifices over the years and it, and the paving stones around it count as blood rock.

blood rock?

never heard of that one before?

 

[demiurge1138]

It's a D&D minis mechanic that got ported over to Heroes of Horror. A critical threat made on blood rock automatically confirms, but the attacker must make a Fort save or gain a point of corruption. If you're not using Taint, you could replace that with being sickened/nauseated for a while, which is a whole lot nicer.

 

[NewJeffCT]

It's a D&D minis mechanic that got ported over to Heroes of Horror. A critical threat made on blood rock automatically confirms, but the attacker must make a Fort save or gain a point of corruption. If you're not using Taint, you could replace that with being sickened/nauseated for a while, which is a whole lot nicer.

Thanks - I like the Taint idea and hadn't thought of it (I have the Heroes of Horror book, too)

However, not sure it's really fair to introduce into a campaign at 6th level.

Sickened/nauseated sounds like an idea, though.

 

[fba827]

Or how about Bunnicula?

(ok, move along, nothing to see here; we now return you to the otherwise productive comments in this thread)

 

[NewJeffCT]

Or how about Bunnicula?

(ok, move along, nothing to see here; we now return you to the otherwise productive comments in this thread)

A fiendish vampire bunny with nasty big pointy teeth!