When the PCs Can Beat Everything
- Thread starter Retreater
- Start date
Ulrick
First Post
Doug McCrae said:
...and try to DM at the same time!
--
I've been there. The PCs seem unscratchable. With some encounters, yeah, that's okay...the players get a chance to show off their abilities. But its really disappointing for everybody involved when a climactic encounter ends two rounds.
I think that your problem with this encounter is that you had three bad guys vs. six PCs. Despite the supposed challenge ratings, the side with the most numbers usually has the advantage (unless the monster is simply overwhelmingly powerful).
What has worked for me is having a bunch of low-level lackeys running around serving as cannon-fodder. They contibrute neither much XP or treasure, nor do much damage, but they can surround your main bad guys, preventing PCs from ganging up on them.
In your case, perhaps the 13th level fighter could have employed a group of 1st or 2nd level fighters, maybe led by a 5th level fighter. Or maybe the bone devils commanded a group of low-level devils (fire-resistant, so they won't fall victim to the sorcerer's fireball).
And this tactic won't shake your players sense of disbelief. Movies and literature are filled with main bad guys being surrounded by lackeys that take a hit or two before they die. But the heroes have to fight through them to get a clear shot at the villain.
WizarDru
Adventurer
Okay, let's start from the basics. Most monsters are, in 3.X, balanced against a group of the 'core four'. Groups of six usually have more rarefied characters who might not be used if those bases weren't covered....and they tend to have a stacking effect. As you go up in levels (and I've run a group of six from 1st to 28th), you're going to discover that some parts of 3.X need a shift in thinking to continue.
You have just hit the 10th-level shift. Players now have access to spells and abilities that make things much different than before. The nature of combat has now changed and your tactics as a DM to challenge players will have to change, as well. Your players are now going to begin teleporting, scrying and blasting in ways that will confound you. There have been a bunch of good threads concerning higher level games here that you can find by searching, but here's some pointers.
1) "The Piratecat Method": He's not just the president, he's a member.
One of Piratecat's best tricks is to take a popular monster, change his stats every so slightly and then resell it as an entirely different creature with a new set of paint. This requries very little DM time to accomplish and can reap great results. For example: at one point, PC's players came face to face with a huge undead construct formed entirely from writhing zombies interlocking in a mass that formed a giant worm. It had a 'head' of sorts, where arms formed a mouth with daggers for teeth. In actuality, it was a slightly modified Purple Worm, but the players didn't know that...and they had an exciting and tense encounter. And when in doubt, use the 'speed advance' option. Advance a monster by giving it a few levels; those bone devils are CR9...barely a speed bump in a straight up fight: make them CR 12s just by giving them an additional 3 HD, raise all their d20 rolls and DCs by an extra 3 and call it a day.
2) "Everybody Rolls a ONE" You need to accept that NOTHING you throw at your players is invulnerable. And that's OK. Your players fought hard for those skills...let them flex them. I once sent a Winter Wight (CR22) against my party, who were 17-18th level at the time. Twelve rounds in and they'd barely scratched it. It withstood over 25 spells from the three spell-casters, healed damage as fast as it was dealt and was overall very cocky and mocking as it slapped them around. As they prepared to flee, hoping some might survive, the wizard threw a disintegrate at the Winter Wight. The only way could it work is if the monster rolled a natural '1', which it did...and combat immediately ended. Such are the ways of high-level combat. Many battles can be decided one to three rounds.
3) "A foe for every hero and a hero for every foe": The problem with a single monster (though they're great...sometimes) is that in a large group, some folks are going to have NO use fighting them. Around 11th level, those players I mentioned fought some Frost Giants from a frozen path in the mountains. This was great for the archers and the wizard....but the cleric and the rogue went to the back of the cave and cooked up soup....because they had no way to contribute. The environment didn't play to their strengths and the foes weren't ones they could fight in that situation. It sounds like your players are facing a similar problem. The problem isn't victory that's got them down, it's boredom. And I'll bet it's because not only is there isn't a challenge, it's because often the battle is only relevant to some players. Two bone-devils and a 14th level fighter are all well and good, but a fighter could defeat them all in the right conditions. You might have fared better with Under what conditions? If the answer is: in a room that was X' by X', that's possibly part of the problem. There's a reason that 3.x separated Encounter Level from Challenge Rating. Four vrocks are more than four times as dangerous as ONE vrock...because of their interaction, they make for a tougher encounter. Two shocker Lizards are more dangerous in a wet environment than four are in a dry cave.
4) "Spoilers can be tougher than fighters" Those bone devils, even at CR 9s, should have been able to really mess the party up with one spell alone: Wall of Ice. I mention this not to say 'learn better tactics' (because realistically who has time to plan all of that out for every dang monster ) but to change the monster's goals. First thing I ever do with any monster is look at their powers...in this case, did the devils make things difficult or did the fight straight up? Did they just attack or did they use tactics like attacking defensively and their poison? Remember, they don't have to fight to win, just to wear the PCs down or keep them busy until the more powerful dude had his shot.
5) "Diversify the Portfolio": Use monsters that the PCs don't know that well, like the Digester, the Ethereal Marauder or the Yrthak. Look into the DMG sections for weather and hostile terrain. You'd be stunned how nasty an enemy deep cold or heavy winds actually are. Force your players to fight in places where they're at a disadvantage. Make them go in the water. It's HORRIBLE. If they prepare, let them enjoy the fruits of their labors. If they don't, let them find out what happens. Make them protect weaker allies against monsters, like townsfolk or nobles threatened by vampire spawn or something.
Hopefully that gives you some quick ideas. You want more? I got 'em.
You have just hit the 10th-level shift. Players now have access to spells and abilities that make things much different than before. The nature of combat has now changed and your tactics as a DM to challenge players will have to change, as well. Your players are now going to begin teleporting, scrying and blasting in ways that will confound you. There have been a bunch of good threads concerning higher level games here that you can find by searching, but here's some pointers.
1) "The Piratecat Method": He's not just the president, he's a member.
One of Piratecat's best tricks is to take a popular monster, change his stats every so slightly and then resell it as an entirely different creature with a new set of paint. This requries very little DM time to accomplish and can reap great results. For example: at one point, PC's players came face to face with a huge undead construct formed entirely from writhing zombies interlocking in a mass that formed a giant worm. It had a 'head' of sorts, where arms formed a mouth with daggers for teeth. In actuality, it was a slightly modified Purple Worm, but the players didn't know that...and they had an exciting and tense encounter. And when in doubt, use the 'speed advance' option. Advance a monster by giving it a few levels; those bone devils are CR9...barely a speed bump in a straight up fight: make them CR 12s just by giving them an additional 3 HD, raise all their d20 rolls and DCs by an extra 3 and call it a day.2) "Everybody Rolls a ONE" You need to accept that NOTHING you throw at your players is invulnerable. And that's OK. Your players fought hard for those skills...let them flex them. I once sent a Winter Wight (CR22) against my party, who were 17-18th level at the time. Twelve rounds in and they'd barely scratched it. It withstood over 25 spells from the three spell-casters, healed damage as fast as it was dealt and was overall very cocky and mocking as it slapped them around. As they prepared to flee, hoping some might survive, the wizard threw a disintegrate at the Winter Wight. The only way could it work is if the monster rolled a natural '1', which it did...and combat immediately ended. Such are the ways of high-level combat. Many battles can be decided one to three rounds.
3) "A foe for every hero and a hero for every foe": The problem with a single monster (though they're great...sometimes) is that in a large group, some folks are going to have NO use fighting them. Around 11th level, those players I mentioned fought some Frost Giants from a frozen path in the mountains. This was great for the archers and the wizard....but the cleric and the rogue went to the back of the cave and cooked up soup....because they had no way to contribute. The environment didn't play to their strengths and the foes weren't ones they could fight in that situation. It sounds like your players are facing a similar problem. The problem isn't victory that's got them down, it's boredom. And I'll bet it's because not only is there isn't a challenge, it's because often the battle is only relevant to some players. Two bone-devils and a 14th level fighter are all well and good, but a fighter could defeat them all in the right conditions. You might have fared better with Under what conditions? If the answer is: in a room that was X' by X', that's possibly part of the problem. There's a reason that 3.x separated Encounter Level from Challenge Rating. Four vrocks are more than four times as dangerous as ONE vrock...because of their interaction, they make for a tougher encounter. Two shocker Lizards are more dangerous in a wet environment than four are in a dry cave.
4) "Spoilers can be tougher than fighters" Those bone devils, even at CR 9s, should have been able to really mess the party up with one spell alone: Wall of Ice. I mention this not to say 'learn better tactics' (because realistically who has time to plan all of that out for every dang monster ) but to change the monster's goals. First thing I ever do with any monster is look at their powers...in this case, did the devils make things difficult or did the fight straight up? Did they just attack or did they use tactics like attacking defensively and their poison? Remember, they don't have to fight to win, just to wear the PCs down or keep them busy until the more powerful dude had his shot.
5) "Diversify the Portfolio": Use monsters that the PCs don't know that well, like the Digester, the Ethereal Marauder or the Yrthak. Look into the DMG sections for weather and hostile terrain. You'd be stunned how nasty an enemy deep cold or heavy winds actually are. Force your players to fight in places where they're at a disadvantage. Make them go in the water. It's HORRIBLE. If they prepare, let them enjoy the fruits of their labors. If they don't, let them find out what happens. Make them protect weaker allies against monsters, like townsfolk or nobles threatened by vampire spawn or something.
Hopefully that gives you some quick ideas. You want more? I got 'em.
mhensley
First Post
Ambush them with a few of these:
http://www.hackslash.net/?p=184
I had the same problems with my group recently and these guys gave them their best fight in weeks.
http://www.hackslash.net/?p=184
I had the same problems with my group recently and these guys gave them their best fight in weeks.
Our DM Shilsen (who really is broken) regularly beats up severely, our 5 char, caster heavy, extremely buffed, 15th lv group with stuff that is nominally well below our CR. There's a couple of examples starting with post #6. There's a couple of others in the Story Hour for our group.
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=182305
Some of his favorite tricks.
1) Just a level or two of a PC class.
A barbarian level or two helps substantially a lot of combat oriented monsters. Rage gets you 2xhd in HP (particularly effective for monsters with way more HD than CR), a +2 to hit and damage (+3 with 2 handed weapons) and a +2 to will saves. All for the cost of 1 cr. Plus they get the elite stat array for no CR increase (doesn't really make sense to me personally, but those are the rules).
As mentioned a level or two in Sorc or Wiz, offers access to a lot of buff spells that can make a huge difference to the power/survivability of monsters. Mage Armor + Shield are a +8 AC boost to a creature that doesn't wear armor.
Ranger for Favored Enemy bonuses.
There's a lot of ways that a level or two of various classes can have a HUGE synergistic effect with monsters for only a +1 or two to the CR.
2) Expendable magic items
- Potions of buff spells (cat's grace, bull's strength, bear's endurance, etc...) cheap, effective and last longer than they are going to survive in combats.
- Bane arrows : Especially effective if your player's char are all or mostly all the same race. A small number, just three or four, bane arrows per archer can deal a world of hurt, especially if used with Str bows. You get +2 to hit/dam and +2d6 per arrow. Coupled with a potion of Cat's Grace, Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot, you're talking a decent hit chance, 1d8+1 (PBS)+2 (Str)+2 (bane)+2d6 (bane) per arrow for damage. If you've got 4-6 archers shooting that adds up very, very quickly.
For a somewhat less expensive/lower level variant, you can use elemental (fiery, cold, acid, etc...) damage arrows.
Beads of Force are another favorite. Area effect damage + a chance to imprison a PC in a force sphere.
3) Bards, Marshalls, Dragon Shamans - Any class that has abilities that offers buffs to a large number of people. Start stacking them and you can get some obscene advantages.
4) Careful feat selection - You can utilize stuff like Vexing Flanker (extra damage/bonuses when flanking) and other feats, that might be useless 90% of the time, but that take advantage of the specific situation of an encounter. Which being the DM you can make sure will come into play.
5) Support casters - A couple of low level/relatively low level casters doing stuff like readying an action to disrupt casting or using dispel magic to counterspell PC casters can shut down PCs who might otherwise wipe out the group facing them.
6) Terrain and conditions - Read over these portions of the rules carefully. They can gimp a lot of stuff PCs do on a regular basis, while not significantly hindering carefully chosen opposition. Rough terrain has a number of interesting effects.
Remember though - ALL THINGS IN MODERATION - Cheap shot stuff has a place, but it can really grate on players nerves if over used.
http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=182305
Some of his favorite tricks.
1) Just a level or two of a PC class.
A barbarian level or two helps substantially a lot of combat oriented monsters. Rage gets you 2xhd in HP (particularly effective for monsters with way more HD than CR), a +2 to hit and damage (+3 with 2 handed weapons) and a +2 to will saves. All for the cost of 1 cr. Plus they get the elite stat array for no CR increase (doesn't really make sense to me personally, but those are the rules).
As mentioned a level or two in Sorc or Wiz, offers access to a lot of buff spells that can make a huge difference to the power/survivability of monsters. Mage Armor + Shield are a +8 AC boost to a creature that doesn't wear armor.
Ranger for Favored Enemy bonuses.
There's a lot of ways that a level or two of various classes can have a HUGE synergistic effect with monsters for only a +1 or two to the CR.
2) Expendable magic items
- Potions of buff spells (cat's grace, bull's strength, bear's endurance, etc...) cheap, effective and last longer than they are going to survive in combats.
- Bane arrows : Especially effective if your player's char are all or mostly all the same race. A small number, just three or four, bane arrows per archer can deal a world of hurt, especially if used with Str bows. You get +2 to hit/dam and +2d6 per arrow. Coupled with a potion of Cat's Grace, Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot, you're talking a decent hit chance, 1d8+1 (PBS)+2 (Str)+2 (bane)+2d6 (bane) per arrow for damage. If you've got 4-6 archers shooting that adds up very, very quickly.
For a somewhat less expensive/lower level variant, you can use elemental (fiery, cold, acid, etc...) damage arrows.
Beads of Force are another favorite. Area effect damage + a chance to imprison a PC in a force sphere.
3) Bards, Marshalls, Dragon Shamans - Any class that has abilities that offers buffs to a large number of people. Start stacking them and you can get some obscene advantages.
4) Careful feat selection - You can utilize stuff like Vexing Flanker (extra damage/bonuses when flanking) and other feats, that might be useless 90% of the time, but that take advantage of the specific situation of an encounter. Which being the DM you can make sure will come into play.
5) Support casters - A couple of low level/relatively low level casters doing stuff like readying an action to disrupt casting or using dispel magic to counterspell PC casters can shut down PCs who might otherwise wipe out the group facing them.
6) Terrain and conditions - Read over these portions of the rules carefully. They can gimp a lot of stuff PCs do on a regular basis, while not significantly hindering carefully chosen opposition. Rough terrain has a number of interesting effects.
Remember though - ALL THINGS IN MODERATION - Cheap shot stuff has a place, but it can really grate on players nerves if over used.
Last edited:
Templates are your friend.
Quickened Dreadnaught Bladed Horror Carrion Crawler, aka “the Cuisinart”
Large Aberration
Hit Dice: 6d10+42 (102hp)
Initiative: +13
Speed: 45’, climb 20’
Armor Class: 34 (-1 Size, +9 Dex, +14 natural, +2 deflection)
Touch: 20
Flat Footed: 25
BAB: +4
Grapple: +8
Attack: Bladed weapon +12 (1d8+6)
Full Attack: 8 Bladed weapons +12 (1d8+6), bite +4 (1d4+3)
Space/Reach: 10’/5’
Special attacks: punishing strike
Special qualities: darkvision 60’, scent, immune to disease, poison, paralysis, stunning, mind-affecting effects, fire resistance 10, spell resistance 16, damage reduction 15/magic, spider climb
Saves: Fort +12 Ref + 10 Will +11
Abilities: Str 22 (+6) Dex 28 (+9) Con 25 (+7) Int 1 (-5) Wis +15 (+2) Cha 6 (-2)
Skills: Climb +19, Listen +6, Spot +6
Feats: Alertness, Cleave, Combat Reflexes, Endurance, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Multiattack, Multidexterity, Multi-Weapon fighting Power Attack, Track, Weapon Finesse (whatever bladed weapon has been grafted on)
CR: 10
Punishing strike: 3/day, gain +6 bonus to attack and damage for one attack, usable once every 2-5 rounds
A mad wizard’s version of a guard dog, the bladed horror carrion crawler has had all of its tentacles replaced with bladed weapons.
I make no promises that the stats are exactly correct, but who cares...
Quickened Dreadnaught Bladed Horror Carrion Crawler, aka “the Cuisinart”
Large Aberration
Hit Dice: 6d10+42 (102hp)
Initiative: +13
Speed: 45’, climb 20’
Armor Class: 34 (-1 Size, +9 Dex, +14 natural, +2 deflection)
Touch: 20
Flat Footed: 25
BAB: +4
Grapple: +8
Attack: Bladed weapon +12 (1d8+6)
Full Attack: 8 Bladed weapons +12 (1d8+6), bite +4 (1d4+3)
Space/Reach: 10’/5’
Special attacks: punishing strike
Special qualities: darkvision 60’, scent, immune to disease, poison, paralysis, stunning, mind-affecting effects, fire resistance 10, spell resistance 16, damage reduction 15/magic, spider climb
Saves: Fort +12 Ref + 10 Will +11
Abilities: Str 22 (+6) Dex 28 (+9) Con 25 (+7) Int 1 (-5) Wis +15 (+2) Cha 6 (-2)
Skills: Climb +19, Listen +6, Spot +6
Feats: Alertness, Cleave, Combat Reflexes, Endurance, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Multiattack, Multidexterity, Multi-Weapon fighting Power Attack, Track, Weapon Finesse (whatever bladed weapon has been grafted on)
CR: 10
Punishing strike: 3/day, gain +6 bonus to attack and damage for one attack, usable once every 2-5 rounds
A mad wizard’s version of a guard dog, the bladed horror carrion crawler has had all of its tentacles replaced with bladed weapons.
I make no promises that the stats are exactly correct, but who cares...
Rackhir said:
Marshals with Motivate Dexterity can really annoy the PCs...imagine most (if not all) of the bad guys going before the party even gets a chance to do something.
Rackhir said:
Agreed. Pull a dirty trick once, make the players' jaws drop, and then put it away for a while (you can cackle evilly while the players spend time figuring out how to not let you get away with that again, knowing that you have a different dirty trick for next time).
When my players' PCs were about 9th level, they had to fight a vampire. Said vampire dominated the party's BDF (who had a truly abysmal Will save), and it looked for a little while like the BDF was going to commit a TPK on the rest of the party. The players spent much time and effort afterwards making contingency plans (with Magic Circles Against Evil, Dispel Magics, etc.) just in case it ever happened again...and it never has.
Well, this whole thing started when the group wanted to play "higher levels." I have to admit I'm most comfortable with the 1st - 7th spread of levels. We just wrapped up a Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign with another DM, ending at 9th level, so the guys were wanting to start a new campaign "where we left off." We also brought in three new players, so everyone made up new characters.
Here's what's been going on. This isn't based only on the number of players we have (though there are a lot). Many enemies (of equal CR to the party's level) have to roll a natural 20 just to hit the characters. Other enemies, even with a load of hit points, pretty good AC, and DR are getting chopped down left and right. The worst thing though is summoning. Both the druid and the cleric are throwing lots of monsters/animals with many attacks. It's slowing down the game by adding even more combatants into the fray. It's not unusual to have a 2 hour combat with what amounts to 10 or more PCs (including their summoned creatures and animal companions).
So the villains stand around pummelling the summoned creatures. Even if I did kill one of them before getting taken down ... well, big deal - that's what the creature is there for. Meanwhile the "real" party members aren't being challenged, escape every combat unscathed, and the players are getting bored waiting 30 minutes to 45 minutes for their turn to come around again.
So my problems are dealing with summoning, dealing with impossibly high ACs (in the 30s at 10th level), spell effects that (when combined through 2-3 casters) inflict close to 100 points of damage/round, and having monsters that can do some significant damage to a character before getting turned into ground beef by summoned creatures.
Retreater
Here's what's been going on. This isn't based only on the number of players we have (though there are a lot). Many enemies (of equal CR to the party's level) have to roll a natural 20 just to hit the characters. Other enemies, even with a load of hit points, pretty good AC, and DR are getting chopped down left and right. The worst thing though is summoning. Both the druid and the cleric are throwing lots of monsters/animals with many attacks. It's slowing down the game by adding even more combatants into the fray. It's not unusual to have a 2 hour combat with what amounts to 10 or more PCs (including their summoned creatures and animal companions).
So the villains stand around pummelling the summoned creatures. Even if I did kill one of them before getting taken down ... well, big deal - that's what the creature is there for. Meanwhile the "real" party members aren't being challenged, escape every combat unscathed, and the players are getting bored waiting 30 minutes to 45 minutes for their turn to come around again.
So my problems are dealing with summoning, dealing with impossibly high ACs (in the 30s at 10th level), spell effects that (when combined through 2-3 casters) inflict close to 100 points of damage/round, and having monsters that can do some significant damage to a character before getting turned into ground beef by summoned creatures.
Retreater
mhensley
First Post
Retreater said:
I hear you brother. Repeat after me... 3e is broken, 4e will save us.
Seriously, I had the exact same problems. It got so bad that we just decided to stop playing the current campaign and do something else due to how easily they beat everything. And I do mean everything. The only rational way to approach this is to estimate what their true character level is. Run them against 4 encounters of an EL that is equal to their level. If they beat that without a sweat, increase the EL by one and repeat. Do this until they actually have to rest after 4 encounters- that's their true character level. My group was around 3 levels higher in power than what they should have been.
My second suggestion would be to read the Dungeonscape book. It has some great ideas for high level traps. I almost wiped out my group with the EL 10 meteorstorm trap. It does ungodly amounts of damage.
Sounds like you need to fill us in a bit more.
How exactly do they get ac's in the 30's?
If they're doing it with buffs, those run out. Also they should get ambushed at least once in a while before/while they're buffing.
If items then you've probably been too generous.
If you're letting them get away with only one or two encounters per day, you're handing them a significant advantage.
If they are doing a lot of summons, you do know that's 1 round to do (ie. it takes until the start of their NEXT turn). So there's lots of time/opportunities to disrupt the summons.
Summoned creatures are hedged out by Prot Evil/Magic Circle against Evil (if evil or neutral) and Prot Good (if good or neutral). Note, the druid's summons are mostly going to be neutral so they are hedged out by either.
How exactly do they get ac's in the 30's?
If they're doing it with buffs, those run out. Also they should get ambushed at least once in a while before/while they're buffing.
If items then you've probably been too generous.
If you're letting them get away with only one or two encounters per day, you're handing them a significant advantage.
If they are doing a lot of summons, you do know that's 1 round to do (ie. it takes until the start of their NEXT turn). So there's lots of time/opportunities to disrupt the summons.
Summoned creatures are hedged out by Prot Evil/Magic Circle against Evil (if evil or neutral) and Prot Good (if good or neutral). Note, the druid's summons are mostly going to be neutral so they are hedged out by either.
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