The Darkness That Comes Before [Closing Down]

Quirhid · Jun 9, 2004

Less meat to the next battle please! These zombies offer no challenge.

Erekose13 · Jun 10, 2004

Right I think I need higher challenges all round. I dont think I hit any of you. Actually there is a reason that this was not a very difficult battle. Your strategy of skirting south. Half the group went after Tir. Reacting quickly you went in a completely unexpected direction. So half of the group is roughly 3 hours behind you. Meaning you managed to ambush half of them unprepared.

Ghostknight · Jun 10, 2004

Erekose13 said:
Right I think I need higher challenges all round. I dont think I hit any of you. Actually there is a reason that this was not a very difficult battle. Your strategy of skirting south. Half the group went after Tir. Reacting quickly you went in a completely unexpected direction. So half of the group is roughly 3 hours behind you. Meaning you managed to ambush half of them unprepared.

Now ain't I glad I wasn't listened to? It can help to be gung ho at times! :heh:

Thanee · Jun 10, 2004

Heh.

Don't forget, that we were prepared and they were not.
We blew almost all available power on this single encounter, I think.
And with the cocoons taking out two of the three more dangerous opponents right away, there was not really much going for them.

Unless they were seriously more powerful, that should have been easy.

BTW, Ghostknight...

Ghostknight said:
...and then casts charm person while she is still unconscious but looks like she is waking.

I have that strange feeling, that your spell is going to fail...

Most persons don't have six fingers...
But we'll see soon...

Bye
Thanee

Ghostknight · Jun 10, 2004

Thanee said:
Unless they were seriously more powerful, that should have been easy.

BTW, Ghostknight...

I have that strange feeling, that your spell is going to fail...

Most persons don't have six fingers...
But we'll see soon...

Bye
Thanee

On the point of the encounter - well a CR encounter for a party is meant to use 30% of its resources, this probably used a bit more than that, no ways we could face another encounter like this right away!

As for my spell- you never know until you try! But yep, it does not look good for it working.

Erekose13 · Jun 11, 2004

Yeah that is true, it did use a bunch of your resources. But I am sure you guys could still take a significant force on in the same day. As for CR it worked something like 1xCR6, 3XCR4, 2XCR3, 6XCR1/2. So all totaled about an EL8 without taking into account the situational modifiers. Should drop down to a EL6 or so then.

Quirhid · Jun 11, 2004

Don't forget that the CR is for four that level characters so you can freely put CR 6-7 encounters. As long as we treat them right, there shouldn't be a problem.

I still remember when my players took a CR 8 Lammasu down with three 3rd level characters!

It took atleast two criticals! What I've learned: High initiative mod is vital!

Ghostknight · Jun 11, 2004

Erekose13 said:
Yeah that is true, it did use a bunch of your resources. But I am sure you guys could still take a significant force on in the same day. As for CR it worked something like 1xCR6, 3XCR4, 2XCR3, 6XCR1/2. So all totaled about an EL8 without taking into account the situational modifiers. Should drop down to a EL6 or so then.

Looking at the above, the Cr1/2s are basicly insignificant at this level, just grist to the mill (as was seen in this encounter) so I would not factor them in, similarly the CR3's are not much of a threat for fifth level characters. A CR of 5/6 seems about right for this, I tend to ignore cannon fodder in my calcs unless they are actually effective (and at fifth level area attack spells tend to remove the cannon fodder before they have any effect.

Thanee · Jun 11, 2004

If the CR3 (bear, I suppose, altho I had guessed them to be more difficult than standard black bears, similar to the wolves we had encountered who had been quite nasty) would have had a chance to act, they could have caused some trouble at least. Surely not life-threatening, but not insignificant either.

I'm pretty sure, that the encounter would have been A LOT tougher, if we didn't have been able to surprise them and prepare ahead.

We were looking at huge room for Donner to charge (which makes him like twice effective

), two reasonably dangerous opponents (including the single most dangerous one) being out of the fight before they could act even once, and then what was left? Three CR 4 cultists and one CR 3 bear (the Zombies can be ignored pretty much, yeah) against six level 5 PCs (not counting Folco) plus an NPC. Of course, we were wiping the floor with them.

With less room to maneuver and without surprise, the bears would have joined in at least and maybe the fireball wouldn't have gone off. The leader would still have ended up in a cocoon, I guess, tho. She failed her save after all.

Still it would have been quite a bit more dangerous then.

With Dara, we are talking a difference of 8 Str points for any further encounters, which translates to 14 points of damage with the same attack bonus! That's roughly 50-60% less effectiveness in combat, so to say!

I'd guess the spellcasters used up even more of their effectiveness this day already, not sure how many manifestations Ian has left, but he used up quite a few as well.

So, what am I saying basically... it wasn't really the opposition, but rather the situation, which made this look so incredibly easy.

Bye
Thanee

Ferrix · Jun 11, 2004

wide open spaces! what's that song again?

yeah, Donner has had a good advantage lately from the back of his mount, and we've basically been able to use most of our abilities to their fullest. If it had been a not surprise encounter it might have been different, but maybe not too much.