Smart DM, Stupid Monsters (possible KotS spoilers)

[Bold or Stupid]

While I'm waiting to run KotS fully me and a friend have played through these encounters. I feel the secret to winning is simple. Come through the waterfall!! You look fly doing it and thus kick ass. The real killer in the encounter is that Wyrm priest as with the pre gens he dominates the long range. Give the party a bow ranger or warlock and he'll be toast. Oh for the record I TPKd the other guy on his attempt (he got bottle necked and Irontooth destroyed him) while I survived (but I did have 6 pc with the warlord).

On topic. I going to try and play in character, kobolds and gnolls will always try for the flanking manoeuvre as that is their instinct, orcs on the other hand will just go head on for example.

 

[Twilightwaits]

My players had a so-so time with Irontooth.

Thanks to an escaped Kobold and a short rest, they had to deal with the whole thing at once. They fared alright; no one died, two people went into the negatives at one point, but they pulled it out ok.

Admittedly, they were level 2 at this point; I had run them through Kobold Hall in the back of the DMG, so they had a little treasure and XP to back them up. In particular, the Rangers Lifedrinking weapon (He's a scimitar junkie, so he got one of those...yes, he's also an elf. No, I wouldn't let him be a Drow. He tried, and I almost pimp slapped him =p).

 

[AntiPaladin]

My party wiped on the Irontooth encounter the first time as well. It is very difficult for a group of level 1s, even five of them. I think that a great deal of leniency is involved in interpreting the "waves" of enemies. You really must give the PCs three entire rounds of beating up minions before you bring the heavies and Irontooth into the fight.

Tough encounter, but it serves as an invaluable lesson to PCs and DMs that are just starting 4E.

 

[zlorf]

TPK here too, i couldnt stop laughing (im DMing)

Irontooth is brutal and with his backup is always going to cause havok, abeit the party only had 4 characters and really need a extra 3.

2 died during the first raid of the cave, that was even before Irontooth made his appearance. They could have ran but decided to chance it, after all this is more of intro to 4e and the players are using the pregens more just to learn the new system. The next raid the party managed to get Irontooth down to 8 hp's but couldnt finish him off. There were still 2 kobold dragonshield and the priest, the party started going down quickly after that. The wizard ran but got OA'ed and died.

Everyone had fun and were keen to make up there own PC's and start a new adventuring party to tackle the might of Irontooth

I think fighters with low INT, should still know how to fight at their best ability, alot of that is natural and instinctive. They wont do anything spectacular like leap onto tables or swing down from ropes or throw dirt in there opponents face etc



Cheers
Z

 

[Regicide]

I think the trick to the kobold lair assault is to attack the first time, and retreat once Irontooth comes out.

I don't remember if Irontooth takes a movement penalty for his armor or not, pretty sure he's 6. The kobolds get a free shift as well. So generally the monsters will be faster than a party and should hunt them down and kill them.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Look at it this way: I have a chipmonk living under my shed. I like to think that I am smarter than a chipmonk, but still he manages to thwart my efforts to displace him at every turn.

No wonder, either. A chipmonk will kick your ass two ways from Sunday. A chipmunk on the other hand . . .

 

[Bjorn Brimbooze]

You don't always have to fight. I'm not sure if the adventure actually allows you to do it but this is how our DM ran it.

Use that sub-par intelligence they have to your advantage! Our party convinced them to mutiny (thanks to an intimidating/bluffing Dragonborn who catered to their ambitions and put his foot down to assert his dominance over them) and killed Irontooth fairly handily at level one with the help of all the kobolds. Afterwards, the paladin insisted on dividing the gold equally between everyone including every kobold in attendance (much to the rogue's dismay, as well as the wyrmpriest, both of whom wanted bigger shares). We handed out loot and walked out. Waited 5 minutes. Walked back in after they had basically finished slaughtering each other, mopped up the rest, collected all the gold, and called it a day.

Back on topic though, when I DM I'm a softie and I just try to make things a good experience for my players. This spills over to monster tactics.

 

[VannATLC]

I use wisdom as a general basis for individual tactics.

Intelligence is for commanders and chess players. Wisdom is the stat for Sergeants and Lieutenants.

I'm basically using the sound of the waterfall to mask the sounds of fighting, so unless a Kobold gets past my party (Which is possible.. I'm having to carefully rebalance based on my group. 7 Players is a large party, but 1 Leader and 2 Controllers makes for painful solo's and stupidly easy minion encounters.

 

[erik_the_guy]

If it is a very smart monster I use tactics as best I can (ambushes, retreats, traps, etc).

If it an average monster, it doesn't have to be smart to use basic tactics, just a little experienced in battle. Even an orc knows how to position himself in a fight. These monsters will often use 5 ft step to gain flanking or try to use some basic ambush strategies. They may retreat if wounded but then return to the battle using ranged attacks, or attacking the PCs again when they have chosen new targets.

With stupid monsters like zombies or animals, I never use a 5ft step to gain flanking. They only retreat if it is to save their lives, so they won't return to the battle or use ranged attacks, they just run.

And about kobolds, they are actually reasonably intelligent combatants. They are very good at using traps and ambushes, and fight especially well in their underground tunnel systems. I will generally have kobolds use strategies against the PCs to the best of my ability.

 

[Spido]

If I think up a brilliant tactic for a dumb NPC, I give them an INT check to see if they think of it too. If they succeed, they get to use my genius idea. If they fail, they just take the path of least resistance without thinking about it.

Cheers,
-Spido

P.S. Make sure you use "whom" correctly after pointing out that you consider yourself to be reasonably intelligent.