No place to stand?

[HandofMystra]

My PCs are rafting along an underground river. I could place 6 PCs on a raft that is 5''X10' while they are just traveling. What would happen if they were attacked? Would two of them have to stay out of combat? What if one of those two were attacked. I will probably just give them the 150 sq ft raft, but it seems silly.

 

[James McMurray]

Make two of them choose to abstain, swim, or learn to fly. Alternatively, bump the raft to 10'x10' and then four characters will be squeezed while two are not.

 

[James McMurray]

A triangular raft encompassing 3 squares would work too, forcing everyone to squeeze but letting them all participate in the fight.

 

[werk]

5X10 with 6 people on it? With hardly enough room for everyone to fit, I don't think it would be big enough to stay right side up, especially once it's that top-heavy.

I picture it as a large canoe, but I've never put 6 people in one...4 people in a regular (big) canoe is sitting really low and tends to be...squirrely.

Do they have any means to control the raft? As soon as it gets lengthwise across the river, it'll want to tip.
...Lots of balance checks and if anyone fails, reflex saves all around.

 

[lukelightning]

Non-combat-wise I'd say they'd fit no problem. And if they fight? Well they're just at -4 to hit and AC because they are squeezing.

 

[Reynard]

Questions like this one are why I threw out the battlemat (but kept AoOs, flanks, etc...) 5 feet is a *lot* of room and though i realize it is all an abstrction, my B/X, 1E and 2E trained brain can't quite wrap itself around the whole thing.