Some thoughts on your tactics.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Ranger was about 100 feet in front scouting.
Too far out. Especially at low levels when success on Spot and Listen is still so much of a gamble, a scout who's too far ahead to be reached by the meat shields within a round of charging/double-moving is a very dead scout.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Monk saw something and went up ahead to warn the Ranger
- The rest of the group stayed back unable to see what the Monk had seen.
Not sure what happened here. Did the monk just run off without telling the others what he had seen? If so, bad move.
Knowing that their scout was out of reach from them and knowing the monk appeared to have spotted some danger ahead, the party needed to move in to close some of the distance to their scout.
The monk made another mistake moving up the entire way to the ranger. If he'd already spotted some sort of danger sign, he needed to make sure he wasn't putting his foot into the very trap he was trying warn the scout against.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Ranger and Monk were then ambushed but made a spot and listen check respectively to avoid being ruled out of the partial surprise round. Unfortunately, the others failed DC 15 checks.
- Within 4 slashes of enraged Great Axe beats - one being a critical and another being for max damage - both the Ranger and Monk were down.
Bit of black luck rolling on the DM's part, it looks like.
Still, at this point it should have become apparent to everyone watching that those weren't likely to be untrained (read, classless Monster Manual) orcs. Leading to obvious next tactical decision: run away.
Deciding not to run away at this point pretty much determined the eventual outcome of the fight. The ones who might still have gotten away after the party moved into melee range were the wizard with Exp Retreat cast on her and the Monk (if he'd been healed).
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Wizard acted next using a Glitterdust to blind 3 of the 4 Orcs.
- Both the Cleric and Fighter ran up to get some hitting happening.
What was the cleric doing not casting cure spells, not casting Hold Persons, Commands etc.? Each round a strong melee opponent can't attack is another chance for the main fighter to live a round longer and deal out more greatsword goodness to the enemy.
If the scout hadn't been so far out ahead or if the party had moved closer before, both the fighter and the cleric (if he decided to melee at this point) would have gotten their first attack in this round.
If the two had ranged weapons available, ranged attacks would have been good at this point, which would have forced the orcs to come moving in losing a round of attacks.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Orcs slightly bedazzled were directed by the one non-blind orc to prepare for the others.
- The Wizard cast expeditious retreat and ran up to the fallen Ranger and Monk - she had healing potions.
What was the wizard doing not casting more spells to help with the combat? Didn't you have spells with combat application prepared?
Also as others have remarked, a wizard in melee isn't usually a good thing. The channeler (mage) in my Midnight game has stepped out from behind the melee line to Colour Spray a bunch of attacking orcs and lived - but he had a melee line to retreat behind and avoid being squashed the following round. You can do a stunt like that but it's wise _only_ if you have a melee line to retreat behind to get out of the way of counterattacks! That's just tactically speaking of course. If you as a player decided that she was going to go out as a hero, that's perfectly fine of course - sure is stylish as hell.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Fighter lashed into the the group of Orcs missing miserably.
- The Cleric attacked the one Orc who had broken off and went toe to toe.
- The Orcs then hacked into the fighter whacking him to within an inch of his life.
The cleric needed to gang up on an orc with the fighter. Help flank to increase chances to hit, take an orc out of action as quickly as possible to reduce the number of counterattacks from the orcs next round, hope to draw attacks rather than let everybody gang up on the fighter. Might have allowed the fighter to live for a round longer.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Wizard then healed the Ranger with a potion.
Without knowing the build of the two unconscious PCs, I'd suspect the monk would likely have been more useful in melee than the ranger, so he ought to have been healed first.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Fighter and Cleric got in a hit each before the Orcs responded killing the big Greatsword wielding fighter.
Herremann the Wise said:
- The Wizard in an act of desperation pleaded to the Ranger to remember her as she went into range targetting a color spray at the three Orcs who had just felled the fighter. Only two of them were stunned with the other making a DC 16 Will Save check while enraged.
- She was then quickly killed while the Ranger attempting to avoid as many blows as possible succumbed to two Orcs taking one down in the process.
- The Cleric was the last one down having taken out his opponent only to be killed by the others.
Nice roleplaying, which was about the only tactical decision left to you at this point. Except of course running away, which would have saved your wizard rather than take her down together with the others. Even if the Colour Spray had stunned all three orcs, the Ranger and Cleric couldn't have killed them all three in just one round of stunning effect, so thinking tactically, those two PCs two were dead anyway at that point.
All this said, the encounter was very hard to win - and also hard to escape for some of the party unless the orcs had a reason not to pursue once the party fled. The fighter and cleric would have been caught first, the ranger might have escaped if the orcs took theri time about killing those two, the monk and the wizard with Ex Retreat could have gotten away.
