What are your party's combat tactics?

[BenBrown]

right now, our tactics are rather "by default" than objectively planned. We've got 6 characters in roughly three "lines"

First are the Fighter and the Psychic Warrior. These guys can take the most damage, and so tend to mix it up the most. Ideally the fighter takes central position so he can cleave, and the psi-warrior gets in a position to get flanking bonuses.

Second we have our cleric and a rogue/ranger. They both get into melee, but with more of an eye to their specialties. The rogue flanks and gets god-awful levels of sneak attack damage with two weapons since he's also got that level of ranger. the cleric is fairly near the center, and hauls off with spiritual weapons and other such things. Also, he's principally responsible for directing the party's magic use and decides when the bull's strength and stuff is necessary.

Third we have the ranged attack folks. this includes our sorceress, who likes flaming spheres and such, and the bard (me) who is the archer of the group. We stick back and pop off anybody who isn't directly in combat with the rest (or who is, if we need to).

Of course the tactics in the last session were just bizarre. Lots of fighting by proxy. We had a summoned Celestial Bear assaulting a bugbear, and a rat out of a Bag of Tricks providing flanking bonuses. We never got into the fight (the bear was blocking our way).

 

[drnuncheon]

Let's see...how does it normally go...

The swashbuckling sailor (Rog5/Fgt3) charges forward with intent to protect his brother (Sor/Wiz) and wife (Clr7). Sadly, he's the closest thing we usually have to a frontline combatant.

Scholarly magic-user either summons a monster or tries (unsuccessfully) to protect his brother.

The priestess of the luck goddess usually outdoes him by summoning more monsters, then a spiritual weapon, and by then it is usually time to start patching the rest of us up. Occasionally she'll make a melee attack to devastating effect, but she tends to forget that clerics are decent in a fight and acts more like a wizard.

The tiefling sorceress fills the air with magic missiles.

I swear, we only survive through sheer luck.


In my other game (see the .sig!) the tactics are usually either "Get them!" or "Oh crap! We're being ambushed! Get them!"

J

 

[UniversalMonster]

3rd level party

The 3rd level party I GM for does it this way:

Everyone sneaks everywhere! Well, at least the Rogue and the Ranger sneak up ahead. The Cleric follows at a distance. They do everything they can to get the drop on anything they have to fight.

Once they have established contact (hopefully with the bad guys still unaware), they try and get good positions with cover for the ranger, with the rogue hidden and the cleric well-back.

The rogue tries to move up for a sneak attack using sword and dagger. The ranger takes his surprise round with a heavy crossbow from cover. The cleric actually runs in one round later swinging his mace.

The rogue tends to use tumbling to good effect when moving from villian to villian. The ranger fights at range until something attacks him, at which point he drops his crossbow and uses a longsword. The ranger is the pary's tank if anyone is. The person who always gets hit, however, is the rogue. The person who got knocked out last night was the cleric.

It seems to work. By having a pretty good sneak in the party, they tend to have advance notice of things, and they use that to talk about tactics before they take on the encounter.

Then again, this only works when they have advance notice of the encounter. I got the drop on them last night with a wererat, and they were reduced to basically mobbing it (and only one character had a silver weapon- so my little 5hp wererat became kind of a tough threat). A single 4th level fighter was able to hold the party off from the room guarding his employer (who escaped invisibly after summoning a fiendish wolf).

Anyhow- tactcis is a concern! I'm happy to report. I'd like combat to be more than two sides basically standing toe-to-toe and whittling each others hit points down.

 

[Kobold Curry Chef]

What kind of combat tactics does your party use? I'm curious to learn more about different techniques, ones I haven't experienced before. DMs, this goes for you, too.

How do you set up flanking? What spell/combat combinations are most effective? When do you retreat? Do you have any special dirty tricks? How do you take advantage of your party's unique matrix of traits & abilities?

Our pair of intrepid rogues set up flanking with a combination of invisibility and massive tumbling. One uses a sword of speed, the other is death with a shortbow or a mace. They will flank critters themselves and then start the cuisinart. It's brutal. Together, they often do 15-20d6 in melee in one round.

We like to use blade barrier in order to deny terrain to the enemy. Or just to spray them all over the battlemat. It's messy.

Aside from that, we mainly try to keep the paladin from getting himself killed. ;-)

 

[Eraslin]

English?!??

"tactics" -- an English word you say? <looks in dictionary> Oh! Hey! Yah, there it is. Hmm, novel concept...
Ya know, it might actually be difficult to hurt my players if they knew of this word. <hides dictionary>

-Eraslin

<Edit> In all fairness, the two rogue multiclassers do actually try to flank things...

 

[DMaple]

Tactics? Nope they tend not to display those, well at least not team tactics.

The Ranger shoots things with her bow, three shots a round 1d8+4 each.

The Barbarian charges power-attacks and waits for a luckly hit to drop most enemies with one blow.

The Sorcerer well she makes herself useful with fire-support. Magic-Missile or Fireballing most things.

Unfortunately our most tactical player is taking a break from leading and being tactical by playing the barbarian, only interested in beer and sex.

 

[Richards]

The party I DM for has a psion that's recently gotten enough Power Points to be able to whip off three mind blasts a day, and has knocked out the big, powerful villain at the end of the adventure several times now (just recently, the little bugger stunned two of the three hags in a covey with one shot). I'm going to have to stock up on some psionic bad guys!

 

[Grendel]

My DM has an irrational hatred of my druids (4th level) animal companions (first a dire badger, now an advanced 4hd wolf).

Standard tactics include head-on engagement. All attacks go to the Animal Companion so fighters are free to power attack, and rogue is free to flank for sneak attack. cleric and druid are on healing duty, and between the two of them can usually keep the animal on its feet. Sorcerer, is an NPC (from a player who dropped out) her only job is to ready a magic missile to attack any spell casters who might show up.

 

[Dagger75]

Tactics, Tactics???? The group I DM for they have no tactics. I define thier fighting style as.........

Brute Strength and Ingorance

Actually thats how they go through the whole campaign.

 

[SonOfLilith]

Depends on what character.

My Barb's group (Hight Level)-send my barb in first and watch the blood fly.

My fighter/rouge group(low Level)- I use my intimidate skill and make one of the monsters charge me, then the three rouges pop out and it's back stab time!