Running Large Groups of Players to High Lvls

[twofalls]

I am in the enviable position of having a lot of players that want into my game. I've had to turn a few away, and am now running two games. One is set in Forgotten Realms, and one is set in the Kingdoms of Kalamar. The FR game has seven players and after three years of play is at 12th level, wheras the KK game has six and after six months of play is at level 3. Each game meets twice monthly, so I run one game a week. My concern focuses mostly upon the FR game as it is a larger group, and the higher levels of play make it more difficult to prepare for.

I have run games for 26 years, however not a single game has ever progressed over 13th level, for at that time a game has gone on for about 3 years and its time to retire those characters. However, this being my first d20 game the players exacted a promise out of me to run the game until someone hits 18th level. I agreed, and I will abide to the spirit of the agreement rather than the letter. I'm finding that running a large number of players up into the higher levels of play is one hell of a lot of crunch work.

For example, right now they are heading for a fight between two temples. The Battlehall is a small fortified Temple of Tempus that is going to war against a much larger and better equipped Temple of Bane the Tyrant. The PC's are fighting for the Tempus faction, and every character is at least 10th level. I need to make this combat challenging, without being overwhelming. We play 3.0 rules and I've had some problems accurately challenging the party during sessions without fudging dice rolls. I've designed the encounter so that there are enough opponents to engage the troops and Clerics of the Tempus faction, leaving a few high level opponents for the players. There are three PC class opponents of 12 level, and two Gelugon's. During combat, one Gelugon will succsessfully summon 6 Hamatula's (already rolled). This combat is not designed to use up 1/4 of the parties resources, its designed to seriously test them and require every ounce of thier skills and magic. Problem is, I have no idea if it will or not. The CR system breaks down seriously at upper levels, so I dunno if I am not throwing enough at this very powerful PC party, or not enough.

Any suggestions?

 

[Pinotage]

You might want to try the Grim Tales CR system for designing encounters. In this system, every creature has a power rating which is equal to its CR or level squared. Tally up the power of the 'friendlies' and then design an encounter with enough enemies to equal about half the power level of the friendlies. This should use up about 50% resource. If you get closer to the power of the 'friendlies' with your enemies, then there's going to be a lot of death around.

Pinotage

 

[Rystil Arden]

3.0 Gelugons are terribly wimpy. I've seen a 5th-level half-orc barbarian kill one himself, and he didn't even have baseline magic items. Making the demons and devils actually not suck is something that 3.5 did right. I really dropped my jaw in consternation when my 6th-to-7th party's 4th-level fighter cohort killed a 3.0 balor while the cohort was trying to simply hold it off so that everyone could escape while he died. Granted the cohort was buffed and the Death Throes did kill him, but still...Your party of 7 PCs will probably trounce the 3 enemy NPCs of equal level and two gelugons, but it all depends on tactics. If the party doesn't have someone who can deal with the summoned hamatalus easily and instantly (and it should), the battle might be a little more challenging. Same goes for if the NPCs are more optimised than the PCs.

 

[Khairn]

Twofalls,

I have the same "lucky" problem with lots of players, who are now high level, enjoying a long running game. Your problem regarding challenging the players without bringing about a TPK is another thing we have in common.

What I have begun to do with "major encounters" is flesh out all the NPC's (monsters, villians etc) that I think will be a good challenge. Then I prepare to adjust the encounter on the fly depending on how the combat goes.

I do this by having created in advance, another powerful NPC that will come into the encounter via a secret door or t-port if the players are handling things with ease. Whereas if they are having trouble with my initial design for the encounter, I will lower the HP's of all the NPC by approx 25% - 50%, and their "to hit"; "dmg" & "AC" by another couple of points.

I know this requires some additional bookkeeping and prep time, but I'm satisfied with the control & tools it gives me to adjust the encounter to keep the party on edge, without killing all of them.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

Any suggestions?

How about a TPK? If they have to start over that solves your high level issues. (joking)

I don't have any useful suggestions, not having DMed at that level myself, but I hope your players appreciate all the work you're putting into this.

 

[Runesong42]

It seems to me that your biggest issue is sticking to what the d20 RAW expects you to reward your players. You've run games longer than I have, and I've run them for about 13 years myself. This says a lot about what kind of gamer you are, as you've been around through all 4 (counting the OD&D box sets) editions of the D&D game.

With that kind of DMing experience, the last thing you should be expected to do is adhere to the experience tables for challenge ratings. This also ties in to your players wanting to reach 18th level. If, according to the xp charts, a PC is expected to endure X encounters before acquiring a new level, throw X encounters at them. Make the encounters as tough or as easy as you like. If their resources are drained, stop throwing encounters; if they're not, throw harder ones.

Generally speaking, acc'd to the CR system, one (1) Monster of challenge rating Z can challenge a party of 4 PC's of the same Z level and be expected to drain 1/4 of their resources (I think). Though not always, CR is based on the HD of the monster, affected by its number of special abilities and qualities (kinda like those xp bonuses with asterisks in OD&D, eh?). This in mind, let me take an example from AD&D2: The Ogre. IIRC, the ogre had 4+1 HD, an AC %, and was worth 420 XP. I know, from experience, that a party of 2nd level heroes, played intelligently, can take an ogre.

Then, award story xp rather than individual encounter xp. That way, you can gauge how fast you want your party to level without worrying about how many monsters of whatever challenge ratings you would normally need to supply in order to advance the PCs. For example, if the PC's need 30k xp to level, award them 10k xp a session and poof. Three sessions later, they've levelled and are as happy as can be.

I'll write more when I have time.

 

[Keeper of Secrets]

High level encounters can be much more challenging to design than low level ones. You have to use either uber-powerful critters that have a chance of swallowing some characters whole or you have to put a lot of work into maxing out some NPC bad guy-types.

Do your players like mental challenges or are they kind of the hack and slash crowd?

 

[Yair]

I never played to such high levels, but it is my understanding that CR itself breaks apart at such high levels as well. I believe that Upper Krust designed a system for gauging CR that is supposed to work properly, to infinite level, that is used by Grim Tales.
Both the Creature Creation (essenitally UK's system) and the Gamemastering (a short treatise explaining the system Keeper of Secrets described) are available through RPGNow, so you don't need to purchase Grim Tales itself.

That said, I think the trouble of having to crunch lots of numbers won't go away without a very strong and flexible character&monster creation software, which I can't help you with. And the problem of challenging your PCs without a TPK is, I believe, inherent to the system.

 

[Xath]

I'm currently in a campaign with 6 players who are now at 17th level (having started at level 1). While it's true that CR is never quite accurate at these levels, never forget that players and parties have certain weaknesses and strengths. We've been able to knock out CR 20 creatures in one round, while taking an entire session to kill something that's merely CR 12. Play to the character's strengths and weaknesses, more than what the book says. And don't forget, you can always invent your own monsters just to mess with them.

 

[Rystil Arden]

I'll second Xath's observations with one from the campaign I DM, which is currently at level 18-20 (3 PCs + cohorts and allies, etc). They have a Elven FB 19, Azer Cleric ECL 18, Nymph Archmage ECL 20, Pixie Ninja Cohort, Juvenile Silver Dragon Cohort, and a Mystic Theurge and Psion (both level 20, but not maximised for battle, particularly the Psion) who are party allies that they generally bring to battle, among others. They've taken out CR 27 challenges and barely blinked, but there was one CR 13 NPC whom they faced with the above characters minus the Nymph Archmage but managed to convince a Human Archmage/Shadow Adept 24, Human Archmage/Loremaster 21, Elf Archmage/Incantrix 27, and Elf Cleric 25 to help them. Every single character died (well, the powerful NPCs had only sent projected images and such, so they didn't technically die) except the Azer who ran away, although the FB managed to still kill the one CR 13 enemy due to Deathless Frenzy, barely.
Fortunately, playing with these guys all the way from level 1 to 20 has allowed me to balance encounters appropriately (I knew the CR 13 encounter would be damn hard, and they had plenty of opportunity to elicit powerful allies and plan a strategy, and I knew that the CR 27 encounters would be easy). You just need to get a feel for your group. My gut reaction would be that 7 PCs will trounce that opposition you set up, but it really comes down to the group.