Do you have a link to that thread, by chance?
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NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
D&D 4E Running player commentary on PCat's 4E Campaign - Heroic tier (finished)
- Thread starter Sagiro
- Start date
Trevalon Moonleirion
Explorer
Yet another upvote for OSM--fantastic adventure that made my first public DMing experience an easy easy success. (And I got to have the author autograph it, as he was at our Chicago gameday!)
I'm eager to see what 4e psionics look like to run an update of it.
PC, your newest skill challenge variants are really neat--I'll have to give those a try as well. I like that really good rolls are rewarded that much more (or bad ones penalized) when you're shooting for a target number instead of X successes before Y failures.
I'm eager to see what 4e psionics look like to run an update of it.
PC, your newest skill challenge variants are really neat--I'll have to give those a try as well. I like that really good rolls are rewarded that much more (or bad ones penalized) when you're shooting for a target number instead of X successes before Y failures.
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Thanks, Trev. I do some additional skill challenge musing in this thread. Feel free to weigh in.
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
We just played! First time in a month. Sagiro will give you the tactical breakdown from his perspective, including both his moments of dice-related glory and tragedy, but I'll speak a little about how I structured the game.
Logan's player (Alomir) missed last game, and I had separated him from the rest of the group for a special mission. While the main group were off thwarting would-be assassins, Logan was ordered to scout in the sewers under the "Poor Docks" where people who can't afford the long pier tie up their ships. Apparently people were seen bringing corpses in, and the Grey Guard wanted it investigated.
Alomir came over an hour before tonight's game and I ran him through it: he foundf the entrance and snuck through the sewers (informal skill challenge) and found a passage behind a broken pipe. It opened up onto a cave with dozens of dry, bloodless corpses (all with multiple sucker wounds) hanging from meathooks. Something in the well, speaking in a multitude of voices, asked him if he was the messenger or the offering. Logan lied, had his bluff called, and fled for his life (another skill challenge) without ever getting a good look at the monster. Unfortunately, he heard a groan as he fled; there may have been someone alive in there.
Thus, he didn't have to try and fight the bloodkiss beholder - an undead abomination from Open Grave - by himself.
A side note: sometimes, audio-visual stuff helps. I was trying to figure out how to get the idea across of many mouths all saying the same thing at the same time, only in different pitches. I downloaded the (immensely cool) VoiceBand for the iPhone. Using just the voice tool, I repeated the same thing five or six times in a slightly different way each time, layering each voice track onto the others. The result was something that you could imagine a creature with many many mouths saying. I'm not sure it was as effective for Alomir (my kitchen was loud when I played it, and I didn't have time to put the actual bad-guy monologue in there) but it totally amused me.
Logan rejoined the rest of the group after he escaped and reported in. They (along with Nuntle the Cloakmaker, a minion ally assigned to them for training) headed back down to the sewers to find the missing guardsmen. They ended up fighting two lvl 7 carrion crawlers with lvl 8 foulspawn manglers mounted on their backs. I liked the synergy: crawlers paralyze people, manglers go stabbitty-stab with sneak attack damage. Sagiro can discuss this fight, which featured good tactics and good die rolls for the PCs and lots of messy bleeding for my monsters -- along with two very immobile PCs.
The group wiped out the nest of baby carrion crawlers and found signs that most of the missing guardsmen had been paralyzed and dragged elsewhere through the sewers. They followed the trail back to the beholder lair, and that's where things started getting messy.
We're mid-fight, so I'll wait for any comments from the rest of my group; but if nothing else it's going to be an exciting battle.
So, a good session:
- advanced two different mystery-related sub-plots
- advanced ongoing political plot/background
- good role-playing and lots of funny jokes
- got to do cool solo stuff with one character
- had one good, fun, on-level fight
- am halfway through another very dangerous fight that will test my group's strategies and tactics
In other news, I'm tickled that WotC's new Underdark book has a combat encounter I wrote (pp 110-115) - not much, but fun to write!
Logan's player (Alomir) missed last game, and I had separated him from the rest of the group for a special mission. While the main group were off thwarting would-be assassins, Logan was ordered to scout in the sewers under the "Poor Docks" where people who can't afford the long pier tie up their ships. Apparently people were seen bringing corpses in, and the Grey Guard wanted it investigated.
Alomir came over an hour before tonight's game and I ran him through it: he foundf the entrance and snuck through the sewers (informal skill challenge) and found a passage behind a broken pipe. It opened up onto a cave with dozens of dry, bloodless corpses (all with multiple sucker wounds) hanging from meathooks. Something in the well, speaking in a multitude of voices, asked him if he was the messenger or the offering. Logan lied, had his bluff called, and fled for his life (another skill challenge) without ever getting a good look at the monster. Unfortunately, he heard a groan as he fled; there may have been someone alive in there.
Thus, he didn't have to try and fight the bloodkiss beholder - an undead abomination from Open Grave - by himself.
A side note: sometimes, audio-visual stuff helps. I was trying to figure out how to get the idea across of many mouths all saying the same thing at the same time, only in different pitches. I downloaded the (immensely cool) VoiceBand for the iPhone. Using just the voice tool, I repeated the same thing five or six times in a slightly different way each time, layering each voice track onto the others. The result was something that you could imagine a creature with many many mouths saying. I'm not sure it was as effective for Alomir (my kitchen was loud when I played it, and I didn't have time to put the actual bad-guy monologue in there) but it totally amused me.
Logan rejoined the rest of the group after he escaped and reported in. They (along with Nuntle the Cloakmaker, a minion ally assigned to them for training) headed back down to the sewers to find the missing guardsmen. They ended up fighting two lvl 7 carrion crawlers with lvl 8 foulspawn manglers mounted on their backs. I liked the synergy: crawlers paralyze people, manglers go stabbitty-stab with sneak attack damage. Sagiro can discuss this fight, which featured good tactics and good die rolls for the PCs and lots of messy bleeding for my monsters -- along with two very immobile PCs.
The group wiped out the nest of baby carrion crawlers and found signs that most of the missing guardsmen had been paralyzed and dragged elsewhere through the sewers. They followed the trail back to the beholder lair, and that's where things started getting messy.
We're mid-fight, so I'll wait for any comments from the rest of my group; but if nothing else it's going to be an exciting battle.
So, a good session:
- advanced two different mystery-related sub-plots
- advanced ongoing political plot/background
- good role-playing and lots of funny jokes
- got to do cool solo stuff with one character
- had one good, fun, on-level fight
- am halfway through another very dangerous fight that will test my group's strategies and tactics
In other news, I'm tickled that WotC's new Underdark book has a combat encounter I wrote (pp 110-115) - not much, but fun to write!
Last edited:
Mr. Wilson
Explorer
Grats on the publication, PC. I'll check it out once I get Underdark. I haven't played 4E in about 6 months, I'm really missing it.
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Some notes on the combats this session:
- The first fight was in a long, 3-square-wide sewer tunnel. The floor actually sloped up to the walls at the edges, meaning we had some extra squares to use while moving, but if you ended a move there you were subject to balance checks. The enemies came at us from both directions, so we were effectively bottled in.
- The monsters themselves were two Foulspawn Manglers, each astride a Carrion Crawler. The former were incredibly dextrous, with an encounter power that let them make four different basic dagger attacks in one round, shifting between each. And while the dagger attacks are only 1d4+3, they get an additional 2d6 with combat advantage.
- The Crawlers themselves have tentacle attacks that a) are +10 vs. Fort, which means they rate to it us about 65% of the time, b) cause ongoing damage and slow with a save at -5, and c) as you fail these brutal saves, you go from slow, to immobilized, to stunned. With no bonuses to saves (and our leader, a Shaman, has no such powers), we have a 30% chance to make a save. The math words thusly:
- For all of that, this was actually a pretty easy fight. (This was our 2nd fight of the day; the first had been of modest difficulty, and had wrung out a majority of our dailies.) It was an object lesson in the wisdom of focused fire. We all pounded on the nearest Crawler while the other was still way, way down the tunnel, and finished it off in a round or two. Then we finished off its rider in similar fashion, just as the second pair was arriving. As such, we never actually got caught in the tactical pincers.
- It helped that luck was with us in that fight. Cobalt in particular hit with every attack he made, doing massive sneak attack damage and getting good use out Blinding Barrage. We were coordinated, effective, and won decisively.
- Unfortunately, that left us with almost no group dailies remaining, and Doc Caldwell only had 2 Surges. And the boss-battle was yet to come. We ended up starting that battle but ran out of time; we'll finish it next game.
- Regarding that second battle, against a “Bloodkiss Beholder,” which I'm guessing is a level 9 or 10 solo (we're a party of six 6th level characters, plus an NPC whose effectiveness is unclear to me): Uh oh.
- With no dailies and a powerful opponent, we really need(ed) luck to be on our side. No such luck. Our first two collective attack rolls (Cobalt and Stron) were “1's.”
- Our first 15 attack rolls included: 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3. Particularly galling to me was the round in which I burned Ignoble Escape to shift past its OA, rolled a “1” on Dazing Strike, and then rolled a “3” with Low Slash. All of this was with combat advantage from the Shaman's Haunting Spirits, which meant I was at +16 to hit with those rolls!
- Of the 15 individual players' turns thus far, we've managed to land FOUR hits. We've only done 80 points of damage, 24 of which is from the Paladin's mark. I think we have one Daily left among the whole party (Cobalt's Downward Spiral), and the monster has dealt out a LOT of damage in its two turns.
- Grim, grim, grim, but fun!
- Piratecat has also introduced a difficult terrain type into this battle which is awesomely gruesome, or gruesomely awesome: bodies hanging from the ceiling by chains. They're dangling right at ground level, so we have to push past them if we move through a square that has one. I don't know if it's better or worse that they're desiccated from the Beholder sucking out all of their blood.
- Did I mention that it's also undead? Which would be great, if we had a source of Radiant damage. Which Piratecat knows dang well that we don't! (Actually, Toiva the paladin has one on a Daily, long-since used.)
- Piratecat did hint after the session that he had modified the creature's power downward somewhat from its “official” template. It still seems pretty bad-ass to me; it has an aura that gives it free attacks against as many targets within 2 as it wants, that do between 15 and 20 points of damage each. And our party is not strong at range, what with three primarily-melee fighters as our strikers, and a melee paladin as our defender.
- We are experiencing one of 4E's strange adventuring-day dynamics: the dramatic arc wants the big boss battle to be at the end of the day, but that's when you've run out of your best powers! Maybe Piratecat is just trying to teach us better resource management. And to be fair (to him), we knew we were going to have this third battle, even as we were engaged in the second one.
- Can't wait for next session! Best case: we win! Worst case: some or all of us get to try out interesting new character classes!
- The first fight was in a long, 3-square-wide sewer tunnel. The floor actually sloped up to the walls at the edges, meaning we had some extra squares to use while moving, but if you ended a move there you were subject to balance checks. The enemies came at us from both directions, so we were effectively bottled in.
- The monsters themselves were two Foulspawn Manglers, each astride a Carrion Crawler. The former were incredibly dextrous, with an encounter power that let them make four different basic dagger attacks in one round, shifting between each. And while the dagger attacks are only 1d4+3, they get an additional 2d6 with combat advantage.
- The Crawlers themselves have tentacle attacks that a) are +10 vs. Fort, which means they rate to it us about 65% of the time, b) cause ongoing damage and slow with a save at -5, and c) as you fail these brutal saves, you go from slow, to immobilized, to stunned. With no bonuses to saves (and our leader, a Shaman, has no such powers), we have a 30% chance to make a save. The math words thusly:
Chance of making your first save: 30%
Chance of missing your first and making your second: 21%
Chance of missing your first two saves and making your third: 15%
Chance of becoming stunned, a.k.a. Paralyzed: 33%
- For all of that, this was actually a pretty easy fight. (This was our 2nd fight of the day; the first had been of modest difficulty, and had wrung out a majority of our dailies.) It was an object lesson in the wisdom of focused fire. We all pounded on the nearest Crawler while the other was still way, way down the tunnel, and finished it off in a round or two. Then we finished off its rider in similar fashion, just as the second pair was arriving. As such, we never actually got caught in the tactical pincers.
- It helped that luck was with us in that fight. Cobalt in particular hit with every attack he made, doing massive sneak attack damage and getting good use out Blinding Barrage. We were coordinated, effective, and won decisively.
- Unfortunately, that left us with almost no group dailies remaining, and Doc Caldwell only had 2 Surges. And the boss-battle was yet to come. We ended up starting that battle but ran out of time; we'll finish it next game.
- Regarding that second battle, against a “Bloodkiss Beholder,” which I'm guessing is a level 9 or 10 solo (we're a party of six 6th level characters, plus an NPC whose effectiveness is unclear to me): Uh oh.
- With no dailies and a powerful opponent, we really need(ed) luck to be on our side. No such luck. Our first two collective attack rolls (Cobalt and Stron) were “1's.”
- Our first 15 attack rolls included: 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3. Particularly galling to me was the round in which I burned Ignoble Escape to shift past its OA, rolled a “1” on Dazing Strike, and then rolled a “3” with Low Slash. All of this was with combat advantage from the Shaman's Haunting Spirits, which meant I was at +16 to hit with those rolls!
- Of the 15 individual players' turns thus far, we've managed to land FOUR hits. We've only done 80 points of damage, 24 of which is from the Paladin's mark. I think we have one Daily left among the whole party (Cobalt's Downward Spiral), and the monster has dealt out a LOT of damage in its two turns.
- Grim, grim, grim, but fun!
- Piratecat has also introduced a difficult terrain type into this battle which is awesomely gruesome, or gruesomely awesome: bodies hanging from the ceiling by chains. They're dangling right at ground level, so we have to push past them if we move through a square that has one. I don't know if it's better or worse that they're desiccated from the Beholder sucking out all of their blood.
- Did I mention that it's also undead? Which would be great, if we had a source of Radiant damage. Which Piratecat knows dang well that we don't! (Actually, Toiva the paladin has one on a Daily, long-since used.)
- Piratecat did hint after the session that he had modified the creature's power downward somewhat from its “official” template. It still seems pretty bad-ass to me; it has an aura that gives it free attacks against as many targets within 2 as it wants, that do between 15 and 20 points of damage each. And our party is not strong at range, what with three primarily-melee fighters as our strikers, and a melee paladin as our defender.
- We are experiencing one of 4E's strange adventuring-day dynamics: the dramatic arc wants the big boss battle to be at the end of the day, but that's when you've run out of your best powers! Maybe Piratecat is just trying to teach us better resource management. And to be fair (to him), we knew we were going to have this third battle, even as we were engaged in the second one.
- Can't wait for next session! Best case: we win! Worst case: some or all of us get to try out interesting new character classes!
blargney the second
blargney the minute's son
Isn't the paladin's mark radiant damage?
-blarg
-blarg
Iron Sky
Procedurally Generated
Paladin's mark does radiant damage? Edit: Ninjar!
- Can't wait for next session! Best case: we win! Worst case: some or all of us get to try out interesting new character classes!
We had the same issue in my game. I even had a couple players turn down free raise deads after a near party-wipe since they wanted to try new classes!
theskyfullofdust
First Post
Sounds like a great session... love the hanging bodies as difficult terrain And looking forward to seeing how you escape this combat
And looking forward to seeing how you escape this combat Similar Threads
