The Dungeon Master Experience: Perkins' new column

[Klaus]

Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Official Home Page - Article (Surprise! Epic Goblins!)

Chris offers some of his experience behind the screen, in this case how he used a simple encounter with goblins (of the usual levels) against an epic level party. There's also a small poll asking what readers might want out of the column.

 

[TarionzCousin]

I really liked this article.

I was thinking about giving my level 13 group some level 8 monsters real soon and watching them kick butt, so it's nice to have this article to reference when one of the players complains that "that's just wrong; all encounters should be challenging."

 

[Dungeoneer]

Chris Perkins is a brilliant encounter builder. That's good stuff.

 

[NewJeffCT]

Good article - thanks for posting the link.

An old DM of mine used to do something similar - he said sometimes you just want to be "knee deep in the dead." He meant it for similar reasons - a higher level group slaughters a bunch of lower level monsters. But, also as a reminder... "hey, when you were first level, two of these monsters dropped you in one round."

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Yeah, I've done that, had a level 6 party blow through some low level goblins. Not quite as extreme, but it pretty much went the same way. The gobs were able to get in a few shots, but they went down pretty hard! I think I'll do another similar one pretty soon as the same group is probably heading back into an area where they can meet some old low level foes.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Nice article.

 

[The Human Target]

I like the article.

And usually the "Dungeon Master Experience" costs me an extra 75 bucks, so its nice to get it for free.

 

[Primal]

Yeah, I've done that, had a level 6 party blow through some low level goblins. Not quite as extreme, but it pretty much went the same way. The gobs were able to get in a few shots, but they went down pretty hard! I think I'll do another similar one pretty soon as the same group is probably heading back into an area where they can meet some old low level foes.

This reminds me of the time we were playing AD&D, and had just finished In the Abyss; we had succeeded in returning back to Toril, and were traveling through the High Forest towards Waterdeep. It was the end of the final session of the adventure, and suddenly we were ambushed by a group of 20 orcs. I remember us grinning at each other as we hacked them down, and it was probably my character who said to the others: "Boy, it sure feels good to meet orcs once again!" (You have to remember that at that point we were pretty fed up with fighting scores and scores of different types demons with weird abilities; and in AD&D almost all the demons, IIRC, could hit you with SoS/SoD effects.)

We laughed and felt excited and heroic; maybe even more heroic than when we cut down a Molydeus guardian or destroyed the Ship. Anyway, that wasn't the only time we genuinely enjoyed massacring hordes of low-level monsters, and that is why I always try to remind myself as a DM that not every encounter needs to be absolutely balanced to average party level. Honestly, I don't think the 4E minion mechanic can quite capture the same feeling.

 

[Daern]

yeah. its great he didn't make the goblins any higher level, but added an environmental threat (kablam!) to keep it interesting all the same.