Stupid High Skill Checks and Saves

[Piratecat]

Yeah sure, lets throw all rules and meaningful actions out the window and you can just tell them how the session ends!

Best to be clear about my perspective. There is a fundamental difference between the DM tweaking stats to provide a fun and challenging session, and a DM tweaking stats to "win" by making the PCs feel useless, helpless or ineffective. I think the former is a great idea, and I absolutely hate the latter. The point of D&D is that the players are playing heroes. Make them feel like that, and make them earn it.

That means that an adversarial relationship for the DM and players is a bad idea. I tend to prefer DMs who are rooting for the players, but who aren't afraid to make the game tough.

 

[gizmo33]

I was just wondering if anyone (specifically DMs) has ever found that by about level 10, most PCs have Spot/Listen checks so out of this world that nothing short of a shadowdancer wearing a Cloak of Elvenkind at Midnight has much chance of successfully staying unseen or unheard.

Since Hide/Move Silently work with the same skill rules as Spot/Listen, my guess is that you're not using opponents of an appropriate CR to the party. Then again, so far I can't tell anything about the actual situations you're talking about. Can you provide an example of an encounter that didn't go the way you thought it would?

 

[Henry]

Just take the direct approach and throw a few giants with greatswords at them. Who needs spells when you do 3d6+15 damage per hit?

Answer: The Giants do, when the spellcaster who is Superior-Invisible, non-detectioned, and flying and dimension dooring starts whacking them with empowered or maximized orbs of acid/force, or vortexes of Teeth, or walls of limbs, or forcecages with walls of limbs inside them, or other deleterious effects... I had one spellcaster, 11th level, take out 10 hill giants and 2 cloud giants, almost by himself, because the poor bastards didn't have a spellcaster in the group, and even if they had, would have had to have a 9th level cleric with true seeing jus to figure it out.

 

[hong]

Answer: The Giants do, when the spellcaster who is Superior-Invisible, non-detectioned, and flying and dimension dooring starts whacking them with empowered or maximized orbs of acid/force, or vortexes of Teeth, or walls of limbs, or forcecages with walls of limbs inside them, or other deleterious effects... I had one spellcaster, 11th level, take out 10 hill giants and 2 cloud giants, almost by himself, because the poor bastards didn't have a spellcaster in the group, and even if they had, would have had to have a 9th level cleric with true seeing jus to figure it out.

Well, he didn't mention that he was having trouble dealing with the PCs' offense, just their defense.

 

[gizmo33]

I had one spellcaster, 11th level, take out 10 hill giants and 2 cloud giants, almost by himself, because the poor bastards didn't have a spellcaster in the group, and even if they had, would have had to have a 9th level cleric with true seeing jus to figure it out.

Can't you just chuck a rock at the place where you see the orb emerge from?

 

[Halivar]

Disclaimer: OP is my DM, and I am a power-gaming offender. Ravilah, I figured it'd be okay to browse the thread because we'd had a discussion on managing power levels in the party a couple days ago. My comments here are not directed at you, but as a response to some of the topics discussed here.

As my contribution to the group discussion, I'll state that I, as a player, am not looking for a cakewalk. The problem of escalating PC-to-monster power levels is somewhat paradoxical. On the one hand, there must be a significant challenge; fighting with a handful of hit-points is where things are just starting to get really exciting. On the other hand, no player likes to feel useless. The perfect combination, from a player's perspective, is extreme coolness in a PC's ability and extreme danger in the encounters. In order to be a hero (in the literary epic sense), you need both great power and a great enough obstacle that you need every bit of it to prevail.

In response to some previous suggestions: to artificially "nerf" a PC to increase the relative danger of the encounter is probably the easiest solution, but removes a sense of heroism and greatness from the character (assuming a standard high fantasy heroes & monsters campaign). Conversely, to present an artificially weak encounter to pander to players' ego is also, ironically, pretty emasculating.

SO, assuming the goal is to present a challenging encounter suitable for power-gaming characters, I have a few thoughts from a player's perspective:

1) The monsters in the MM are not optimized the same way an NPC is. IMXP NPC's are much more challenging than MM entires because the DM is more at liberty to custom-craft it, and the possibility of meta-gaming the encounter is limited, if not eliminated. Another possibility is to roll for monster stats instead of taking the base-line 10 for everything. I don't know what the CR adjustment is for elite monsters, though.
2) If a group of creatures is too easy, adding more of the same creature to the fight is a more manageable way to escalate the encounter than adding higher-CR creatures. This also has the side benefit of allowing the PC's to strut their stuff against a horde (fun for players) while still slowly whittling away the PC's resources (challenging for players; convenient for DM). A too-high CR creature brought in to "manage" a party has an increased likelihood of killing someone outright in the first round (save-or-die monsters, I'm looking at you), and nothing is less heroic or more un-fun than dying during a surprise round (ah, fond memories of bodaks).
3) Party power-level management tools like level-drain and rust monsters are both infuriating (for players) and cliché. Using plot-points to remove equipment and powers from the players is fun and motivating ("I want my stuff back!"). They also give players a possible plot-hook to follow. Plots are good.
4) Did I mention NPC's?

Just my $0.02.

 

[JustKim]

Yeah sure, lets throw all rules and meaningful actions out the window and you can just tell them how the session ends! The game will be so much more fun without those pesky players impacting it!

Reminds me of my first edition games.

I don't consider making encounters more exciting by artificially adding challenge to be a big problem. The bigger problem, to me, is players running unchecked through the world, mowing down any opposition and becoming bored. I've been in that situation as a player, under a DM who did not have a head for the rules.

With a lot of study and investment, a DM can become rules savvy and legitimately challenge PCs without any fiat. But not everyone has that luxury and not everyone necessarily wants to dedicate that much time and money to the hobby. For DMs who more or less understand the rules trying to run games for powergamers, my advice is to close up shop. Without some major change, the DM is not going to run a game satisfying for the players and the players are not going to react to challenges in a way that can satisfy the DM. But if you just have to DM in this circumstance, the simplest way to challenge the players is to make numers 2 or 5 or 10 points higher. Not because you want to completely overwhelm the PCs, but because the chance for failure is too low otherwise.

If all you see when you read this is a child behind the DM screen, ignoring player actions and narrating a novel for her own benefit, I don't know what else to tell you.

 

[Shade]

My advice: Use monsters.

Humanoids with class levels make for horrible adversaries. They're difficult to guage CR-wise, rely on tons of equipment to be challenging (which you probably don't want to end up in the PC's hands).

Outsiders are your friend. They are easy to advance, have good everything, and usually can do things most humanoids with class levels could do without risking throwing your campaign futher off-kilter.

On the flip-side, aberrations, constructs, elementals, oozes, plants, and undead generally have more HD for their CR (and advance at 4 HD/1 CR increase), and thus generally have higher DCs on their special abilities.

 

[LostSoul]

But if you just have to DM in this circumstance, the simplest way to challenge the players is to make numers 2 or 5 or 10 points higher. Not because you want to completely overwhelm the PCs, but because the chance for failure is too low otherwise.

If all you see when you read this is a child behind the DM screen, ignoring player actions and narrating a novel for her own benefit, I don't know what else to tell you.

Does someone in this situation tell the players that he is doing this?

 

[Ravilah]

Wow. I've never posted anything that engendered this much discussion. I feel so very "in."

In my original post I called the post a rant, and in the nature of rants, it was not very well thought out.

Taking into account range penalties for spot checks, increasing the use of tactical magic (invisibility, etc), and making good use of setting can all fix the "surprise" element.

My complaint about saving throws stemmed from little more than a series of bad luck for my bad guys. It's much the same phenomenon that leads people to say, "I hate these dice! These dice roll ones all the stinking time! I haven't rolled over a 3 all night!" (forgetting, of course, the 19 and the critical hit just made last round).

I will, however, still be asking assistance from the venerable and wise members of the messageboard on making more efficient wizards.

Thanks for the feedback. Feel free to keep bantering with each other. It's fun!

R