What roles in a 2 person team?

[Metaphorazine]

Hi all, I'm posting hoping that someone can help me with this. I've lurked the boards for a while and havn't really seen it come up to this extent, but what are the two roles or classes that would be most useful in a two person team?

I havn't got much experience with D&D and am going to run a little campaign for 2 of my brothers. I did start KotS with 3 of them, but 1's out of the country again, so I was going to restart with the encounter where kobolds smash through the wall from the FRCG, and then lead straight into the keep sections of KotS. In the previous setup I just let them choose from the pregens, but I think with an even smaller group, I should be encouraging them towards certain roles that'd help them out more.

Can you guys give me any advice here?

 

[fba827]

Well before I answer, I'll say my usual... "what types do they _want_ to play, and then build your encounters around that"

But to answer the question in the way you want it answered... a leader is always helpful for the healing, two leaders is twice the better (walord and melee cleric ). Or maybe a leader and defender.

Generally, strikers and controllers tend to be too squishy if they don't have enough allies for the monsters to focus on instead of them.

Having said that, I revert to my initial statement, find out what they want to play and try to build encountrs around that -- if they have particular tastes, then they'll have more fun.

 

[Rechan]

I'll second "Find out what they like to play, and accommodate that in your encounters."

I think either a Leader (and anyone else) or a Defender (and anyone else). I think Strikers can hold their own, depending on what kind of striker. A Feylock can get the heck out of dodge, given the amount of available Teleports (or Eyebite + Flee). An Infernal lock will be full of Temp Hp. Not to mention that an archer ranger can get nice distance. A Beastmaster ranger also has a buddy. (Barbarian = bad idea, without a leader; too likely to get blasted).

 

[Metaphorazine]

That's the thing, they've not really given me any input as to what classes they want to play, as such. They're viewing it more as the characters being "adventurers" who happen to have different abilities, not as fully fledged archetypes. In the last game they played a paladin and a ranger, and the reasoning respectively was "dragons are cool" and "I want to stay at the back and not get hit".

The other player (the one who's not here anymore) was a fighter, and seemed to carry a lot of the weight. Would that same combo work without a fighter in there mixing it up?

I was also thinking of adjusting KotS by scaling a lot of the monsters down a step, eg, standard to minion, elite to standard, solo to elite, as a way of making the game flow quicker and because in the previous games they have felt that they'd spend too long beating on any one monster. It seems they like the real cinematic hacking through hordes of beasties. I know that could unbalance classes with attacks that target multiple people, but it was just a thought.

So to get back to your advice, fba827, and sorry for straying so far, but how would I build encounters around specific roles? I'm still very new to D&D, I really don't know how the classes play yet.

 

[Metaphorazine]

I think either a Leader (and anyone else) or a Defender (and anyone else). I think Strikers can hold their own, depending on what kind of striker. A Feylock can get the heck out of dodge, given the amount of available Teleports (or Eyebite + Flee). An Infernal lock will be full of Temp Hp. Not to mention that an archer ranger can get nice distance. A Beastmaster ranger also has a buddy. (Barbarian = bad idea, without a leader; too likely to get blasted).

Thanks Rechan, going off this advice I could pretty much set them up with the KotS pregens they had previously, the Dragonborn Paladin and Elf Ranger?

Edit: By the way, I'm sorry to be more or less bumping my own thread, but I really do want help regarding this, as we're all very clueless when it comes to D&D. I've read the books, but I think it's no substitute for the experience of actually playing, which you guys have, and I'm really appreciating the help I've gotten so far!

 

[Rechan]

So to get back to your advice, fba827, and sorry for straying so far, but how would I build encounters around specific roles? I'm still very new to D&D, I really don't know how the classes play yet.

Well. The idea is looking at what monster roles would pretty much kill your characters/be very boring to fight.

Let's take a PC who's a wizard. Wizards have little AC and little HP. A brute (with fat hit points) is going to walk over to the wizard and squish him right quick. Even if the wizard unloaded, the brute will still likely be alive. This is also true of that same brute vs. Strikers.

Skirmishers can bounce in there and stick it to the wizard really quickly, but unless they have combat advantage extra dice, they're likely not going to kill him out right real fast. That's okay.

Artiller and controller monsters, however, often have ranged attacks. So the wizard and the ranged monsters are going to be shooting back. So it turns into a game of a western shootout; find cover, blast the guys, run around. That might very well be fun.

Minions die when a controller comes on the field. That's just how it is. Minions pose little threat to the controller.

Lurkers are dangerous. They have low AC/HP, so they are easy to kill, but they can really put the kibosh on the wizard. So, use lurkerse sparingly. Very good to have a gripping battle, with lots of tension.

Now, let's look at a striker. Strikers hit hard, do lots of damage. But they have low Hp. So, a brute is scary to a Striker, but not as scary. Lurkers are still very dangerous.

Minions, because they have 1 HP, are frustrating for strikers, because the striker doesn't get to do buckets of damage to the minion; it just dies on a hit.

Artillery and controllers generally want to get the hell away from a striker (and rightly so). But they're not overly dangerous for the striker.

Skirmishers are on par with a striker, and pose a nice challenge. As long as the striker isn't flanked by combat advantage double dice skirmishers, he should be okay.

SOLDIERS are fun for a striker. They don't hit too hard, and they don't have a lot of hit points. They're harder to hit, but still.

Defenders can deal with Brutes and Soldiers, in general tieing them down and making them less a threat to the other PCs. That's their job. However, unless you're looking at a Fighter, a defender is going to have trouble making a Skirmisher stay still. He might miss a lot on a soldier, and a fight between a Defender and a Soldier might get very boring because the two are slugging it out. Controllers/Artillery want to stay the heck away from a defender, because they will pound the heck out of the monster.

 

[Rechan]

Thanks Rechan, going off this advice I could pretty much set them up with the KotS pregens they had previously, the Dragonborn Paladin and Elf Ranger?

I think that the KotS pregens are badly designed, to be quite honest. Also, KotS is a real grindfest.

 

[Rechan]

You're not the first guy to pose this question. I really think someone ought to write a Guide to 4e Encounter Design for 1-3 party members.

 

[Metaphorazine]

Thanks for taking the time to post again, Rechan!

You're not the first guy to pose this question. I really think someone ought to write a Guide to 4e Encounter Design for 1-3 party members.

I think it should have been in the PHB, to be honest. Getting 3 people around a table when no-one's played before is a lot easier than 6.

I think that the KotS pregens are badly designed, to be quite honest. Also, KotS is a real grindfest.

My guys like the grind, for some reason. I'm going to try and get them more involved in the story, but it'll take some doing. I think working the FRCG raid encounter into the start of KotS might start getting them doing some investigation work, and from there lead to more story. Time will tell.

Regarding the pregens, they're not ready to start rolling their own characters yet, unfortunately, but I'm hoping for the next campaign they will. At the moment they're in the video game mindset a bit, but if I can get them into the mindset of following the character along and watching it grow... Might make them more interested in making a character with motivations and depth, built to their specs. And maybe one day, Pinnochio will be a real boy, Giuseppe!

So with a defender and a striker, I'd be setting up encounters so the defender could get to the minions and mash them, and let the striker take care of the bigger things til the defender wades in too?

 

[DEFCON 1]

My recommendation would be either a Great Weapon Fighter / Tactical Warlord, or an Avenging Paladin / Battle Cleric.

With only two players, I believe you're going to want both players to be melee combatants for the simple reason that having both characters near/next to each other (for flanking, for healing, for gaining bonuses from powers to adjacent allies) will be more than helpful and very necessary. Couple this with no longer having to worry about a monster getting past the melee combatant to pound on the ranged combatant, makes for one less thing the two players have to worry about.

Having one player be a higher-damage defender, the other a very solid melee leader, will give you the damage output you'll need to get foes off the battlefield, as well as give you the healing needed to keep the characters on their feet.