Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lancelot" data-source="post: 3045194" data-attributes="member: 30022">Played this shortly after it came out. My credentials: 20+ years (mostly DM'ing); have played 80+ consecutive 3.0 and 3.5 sessions without losing a character; other players in my group have minimum 5 years experience each.Having said that, I'm totally with Merric. If your DM is playing it smartly, it is very difficult for a non-optimized party to take out the entire fortress in a single raid. Our party was average 5th level; gnome conjurer (me), shifter barbarian, elf bard, human druid. The elf bard had an atypical "non-combat" build, but the other three were reasonably buff... although only 25-point buy and relatively few magic items.We entered the fortress under cover of illusions and silence. Listened and searched every portal before entering; used familiars to scout; used disguises to look like orcs. Ultimately, though, no PC can be all things. Not everyone in the party has a good Move Silent skill (nor should they); not everyone had a good Disguise skill; not everyone could speak Orc.We took out two rooms by surprise, but we simply failed our initiative rolls in the third room (and/or were heard by other foes some distance away). A quick yell later, and the entire fortress was alerted. From then on, it became brutal. The DM played the orcs smart: they pursued, sent forces to cut off our escape routes, got a wyvern in the air, cast divination spells, the works. I challenge any 5th level party to have an easy time of beating scores of orcs (supported by ogres, spellcasters, etc) when they're on the orcs' home turf and the DM is playing them to the hilt.I guess it might have been different if the party was 90% rogues, or if the DM was giving us more than a free ride. I puzzle over statements like: "Smart players should be able to take out the fortress easy." I'd counter with: "Smart DMs should be able to turn this place into a death trap".</blockquote>

Verification