What Have We Done About Solos?

[DracoSuave]

Well that doesn't rule out terrain and traps, does it? In other words, if this guy is your BBEG, then have the party fight it on -its- element.

As for status effects, +5 to saves goes a long way (excepting orbizards.) But this is where you, as a DM, have to do your job. You make encounters to challenge your players--so if you have a party that, for example, can stunlock a guy, then you give them an item with a daily that allows them to break a stunlock.

'But it doesn't exist in the blah blah Player's Book of blah' is an irrelevent argument. A DM can control -all- parameters of an encounter outside the characters themselves.

For example, let's say you have a solo that is immune to poison. A trap in the room that the solo can prime on a deadman's switch (or magic equivalent) that poisons the party so long as they ignore the trap can make them rethink their tactics. -Especially- if you have a way for the party to learn this.

If it's a dracolich, you can go one further and have it in heaps of carrion that carries nasty diseases the party can catch if they step in the wrong spots... Heal or Perception checks to give the party the information that will protect them.

Terrasque? Burrow, Burrow, Burrow! Put it in a city that has is being destroyed by this beast, with the party fighting it amongst buildings that are -literally- crashing down around them, and a beast that can simply go into the ground and come up wherever it damn well pleases.

It doesn't even have to be intellegent to use 'tactics' that come naturally to it!

Just remember, no party can have every power in the game. So you -always- have access to a counter to them, they -always- have an achilles heel. It doesn't have to be a monster, it can be a situation they have trouble circumventing. Their nemesis SHOULD exploit that.

 

[Nurgle84]

I tried various solos now in my campaign (Level 1-almost 9 now). We had a giant troll, the skeleton of an orc king, a young black dragon and a solo reaper. The best fights were the skeleton king and the reaper.

The troll was bogged down by a flaming spehre negating its regeneration. But he had his moments, as he dropped houses on the party. He was supported by a bugbear strangler and a gnoll huntmaster.

The Skeleton was at the end of Level 1, so there were no ways of shuting him down completely. He dropped 4 of the 5 party members before being destroyed. He was alone, a true solo.

The young Black was obliterated by and archer ranger. He went down to bloodied after two rounds of combat. He was supported by 2 Human bandits.

The best fight was the reaper (Open Grave reaper + savage Berserker template + selfmade Invoker template. Then modified a bit to keep the feeling). He was able to teleport around, was supported by 3 Poltergeister, got an AP when he dropped a character for the first time, made retaliative attacks, could hover. He was just great.

I think stalker said, do not use monsters of a higher level and only soldiers and artillery of lower levels. There is much truth there. I am now only using monsters of the same level, and the combats move much faster.

 

[the Jester]

Earlier this week, I used a solo that I made with some design tweaks: half the hit points, double the damage (dice). I was worried that it would be too rough of a fight for my party, but it worked out fine- fast, furious and threatening, with the lone bad guy actually making the whole party feel challenged and forcing them to use different tactics to take him on. It was good stuff.

Lower hit points and increase the damage, that's what I say.

(But do note that my party is leader-heavy, which might let them handle the intense damage I was whipping out better than a leader-light party could...)

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

I'm playing with a larger-than-usual group, and running through the adventure path starting with KotS. My current thought is to check when they're scheduled to find a Solo encounter, lower it's level (and maybe up it's damage a bit) and then add minions to improve it.

Hopefully this way they'll still have a decent fight, but it won't be the boring grind that people have been talking about.

 

[keterys]

I only remember one solo encounter in KotS, but...
[sblock]I altered it slightly - mostly just its description and maybe a damage type here or there - because my group doesn't like oozes, so instead it was a water elemental laced with necrotic energy and the corpses of the two hobgoblins, and them howling in the minds of the party. When it was bloodied, I actually had it burst a bit and dump out the two hobgoblin bodies which I ran as slightly nerfed chillborn.

It went well, especially since it started with the party warlock darting across to the island to check out the treasure, then having to extricate himself.[/sblock]

 

[AllisterH]

It's interesting to see that WOTC seems to have a better feel for the Solo designation....

Contrast the preview of the Heroslayer Hydra with the Mordant Hydra from MMI

The former seems like a much more fun and interesting encounter

 

[lukelightning]

I find it funny that a lot of advice for making solos better is to add more monsters. Perhaps "solo" should have been renamed "BBEG" instead?

 

[keterys]

I also think it's decent to do Solos that have terrain/trap effects, especially things like falling ceilings, toppling buildings/walls, eruptions, etc... but yeah, having 5 people who can daze, stun, give penalties to attack, etc... the action economy is a very big deal, and the post linked is good for talking about that. Just be careful about making the PCs feel their turn is useless.

 

[keterys]

It's interesting to see that WOTC seems to have a better feel for the Solo designation....

Contrast the preview of the Heroslayer Hydra with the Mordant Hydra from MMI

The former seems like a much more fun and interesting encounter

Eh - the mordant hydra has ranged attacks and can mix them up with melee. They both look pretty darn boring.

 

[AllisterH]

Eh - the mordant hydra has ranged attacks and can mix them up with melee. They both look pretty darn boring.

Strange...I see the anti-Marking and the increased damage as heads become more numerous making this solo fight at least interesting as the fight goes on.