Will they ALL die?!

[Grundle]

I'm thinking of opening my new campaign with the following scenario for a group of five 5th level characters, but I'm not sure what CR to slap on the darn thing...

The party all pass through a long forgotten (one way) portal and appear inside a sunken tower in the frigid north. Unfortunately, they rematerialize under 10-20 feet of dark, murky, icy water- which should come as a big surprise to all. The room will be illuminated by a single continual flame torch on the wall far above them. Directly in front of them. some 30 ft away from the portal, will be a wide set of stairs which can be climbed up to escape from the water. Depending on vision, these stairs may or may not be visible. The tower will be leaning on a 30 degree angle such that the left side of each stair will be much lower than the right.

I was thinking of having the PCs make a Fortitude save (DC 13) as they first pass through the portal. A successful save would mean they would start the clock on the standard drowning rule. Failure would mean that due to the suprise and shock of the cold water they were not able to hold their breath and begin making Fort saves (DC 10 + 1 per round) to see how many rounds until they become unconscious, begin dying, and subsequently drown (similar to the DMG Drowning rule without holding breath for 2xCON rounds) .

I'll have them make the standard swim skill check for calm water (DC 10 + 1 for each subsequent round under water) to make 1/4 standard move as a MEA or 1/2 a standard move as a FRA. Fighting or casting while standing on the slanted stone surface will require a Balance check (DC 5), or (DC 10) if standing on submerged section. If the balance check is failed the PC is prone and must make a climb check (DC 5) to avoid sliding down the sloping surface.

Now to make things interesting , a shadow will arrive on the scene 1d4 rounds after they PCs disturb the surface of the water. Will this prove to be a rat bastard DM thing to do with the danger of drowning and the strength draining ability of the shadow?

So how difficult is this really? Your standard shadow all by his lonesome is a CR 3. This encounter involves a potentially deadly (undetectable) trap in combination with the shadow. One mitigating factor is that the stairs provide a way for a PC (with enough remaining strength) to escape from the water.

 

[clark411]

Whoa that's quite a start for the campaign! (far better than a tavern meeting though huzzah!)

Lessee... certain factors can make this extremely deadly.

1- Armor: even if your fighter types are strong as oxen, it's very likely that they'll simply start sinking rather than floating up the 10-20 ft. So consider how far down the watery tower they can go before they hit a slanted juncture of a wall and the floor. I say this because going down slanted walls is probably harder than slanted stairs, and their balance will be just as messed by their armor.

2- Fort SVs- 5th level fort saves without con bonuses / penalties (and magic items) range between +1 and +4 (barring a Paladin's Divine Grace). So the chances are, for caster types, a 40% chance of success for caster types and a 55% chance for melee types. Bump the chances by 5% for every +2 Con a char has over the average 10. If my math is off slightly forgive me.

3- Shadow- Nasty, but an effective combination. If you want a true meat grinder, stick in an Evards Black Tentacles trap at the bottom as well (CR 4 if i'm correct.. that plus Shadow CR 3 plus difficult situation comes out to CR 6 or 7). The only major pain in the ass with the Shadow is that casters are going to have to go through two checks to see if they actually affect it (concentration to cast, percentile to hit incorporeal being) and the melee's are going to suffer for their swinging with balance checks if they can't swim enough to stay afloat.

4- Concealment- Actually, I was mistaken. Due to the presense of only one torch-equivalent light in the room (far above as you said), the players will also have to deal with darkness concealment rules- so fighters will be dealing with concealment percentile dice to hit as well.


On the whole, I think that at least one character is going to bite it in this scenario- probably more, possibly all (if half dies in the first encounter, the rest are as good as dead unless the remainder of the module is a milk run). If this trap truly comes out of the blue, they will have no means of planning for it, ramping up the difficulty of overcoming the swimming considerably. On top of that, if they are underwater, you may rule that they are unable to communicate effectively enough to coordinate any sort of battle plan... which, depending on how veteran your players are, could add to the disaster as some stay in the water to fight the shadow while others flee- some ending up drowning helplessly all the while.

Beyond this, you'll have to contend with the fact that should any of them die, their players will be pretty stuck watching the action for the rest of the trip unless you have contingency plans for introducing new characters into this tower. I seriously recommend you draft up at least a couple very interesting characters that they can play should their characters fall dead in the first ten minutes of the campaign.

This looks to be either a very exciting scenario, or one that could rapidly fall slide downhill with bad rolling and saves. The problem with requiring them to make saves constantly vs you making attacks is that you'll be very hard pressed to come up with any fudging tactics if they keep rolling 4's.. or even 10's in some cases. I'm interested to see how this turns out, so let us know how it goes eh?

 

[Stalker0]

I think the scenario without the shadow is difficult enough. Most players are known (at least when I play) to not have the best swim scores. The fighters will start to sink like mad, most likely some of the party may start drowning right off the bat, and as you said they may not even find the stairs.

I think its a very interesting encounter, but difficult enough, unless they have some kind of preparation. Expect to see some deaths.

 

[bret]

Unless the group as Analyze Portal available to see the other side of the portal, I expect deaths even without the shadow. People will drown before they can reach safety.

Those who make it have most likely cast off equipment and armor. They would want to go back in and retrieve this equipment.

If it wasn't for having a Gatecrasher in the high level group I play in (11th level characters), I think that our group would have several deaths.

So the real question becomes, do any of your PCs have access to Analyze Portal and are they likely to use it before entering?

 

[Sanackranib]

encounter

this also assumes the party has ranks in swim. this is a really tough encounter. the rogue and other lightly armored folks should make it out if the make their swim checks but the fighters, clerics and paladins are gonna really hate you for this one. if you do it then I wouldnt make it too difficult to retrieve their stuff. a shadow could very well kill people in a situation as grim as this

 

[bret]

The rogues and other lightly armored folk are likely to miss their Fortitude saves. Only thosw who make the original Fortitude save will have a chance to swim out.

Lets run the numbers:
5th level: Fort +1 for rogues. Assume a Con bonus, lets make it a +3 total.

Original Fort save is DC 13, so at a +3 they have a 55% chance of saving. Not a very good chance. Assuming they missed that, then they have a DC 11 to remain concious next round. About a 1 in 6 chance of both rolls being missed.

Very harsh.

Now the swim check. Rogues generally have a weapon or two, light armor, and some supplies. Assuming they immediately dump their backpack, it is not unreasonable for them to be carrying 30 lbs of equipment for a total of -6 to swim checks. They most likely have a better chance of just climbing along the slanted tower wall than swimming, especially considering how rare it is for anyone to take swimming skill.

Wizards and Sorcerers don't have swim as a class skill. They will either Alter Self (if they have it), or sink. They can't even climb out without help.

Rangers and Barbarians can do well here. Good Fortitude save, light armor, and Swim as a class skill. I can see a Ranger taking some ranks in swimming. Less likely for the Barbarian, but still possible.

The Cleric is probably the worst off. Swim is crossclass, and they are most likely wearing heavy armor. They will make the Fortitude saves, but that will not help them get out of there. To get just one rank of swim costs a cleric all of their base skill points for a level.

I assume you've got copies of the characters who will be sent through this. Make three mock runs through the encounter, see how the characters fair. That will give you a good idea of how well things can come out. When it happens for real, expect the group to make a few mistakes precisely because it is a surprise and they don't know the best way out.


Looking back over what you originally wrote, I think it would be a Reflex save to determine if someone caught their breath originally. They have to think/react quickly, it isn't something where just being tough would save their hides. This would also give the rogues a much better chance of surviving the initial situation, so they can help the rest of the group out of there.

 

[Sanackranib]

tough encounter

first off I want to aplaud you creativeity here. this encounter the group will likly have to work togather if they are all to survive. I plan to use somthing like this in my game at a later date, so thanks for the idea. I also agree with bret here, it should be a reflex save. also while its possible that they will breeze through this encounter its doubtfull. as far as the CR goes. look up the traps CR section in the DMG and base it off a teleportation trap then I would add +2. now the rogue won't be able to disable this one but if he rolls high enough I would write up a short discription of what to expect and give him all of 6 seconds or less to convey that info to the rest of the party. this might give them a situation modifier on their save, but if not then at least no one should start to drown on round 1, also I wouldn't make the water more then 12' deep. If they start at the bottom then the water is going to be 6' or more above them, and even if its a bit murky then they should be able to see the light. even doing that this encounter is gonna scare your PC's as well as force them to work togather both to retrieve their companions as well as their gear. If it looks too easy then feel free to throw some low CR monster at them while all this is going on. just remember its going to be a lot harder to fight without the whole party. another option is to have a goblin or some such on sentry duty, he's as surprised as they are. does he get to sound the alarm? roll initiative and lets find out! and thats what its all about.

 

[Grundle]

The rogues and other lightly armored folk are likely to miss their Fortitude saves. Only thosw who make the original Fortitude save will have a chance to swim out.

Lets run the numbers:
5th level: Fort +1 for rogues. Assume a Con bonus, lets make it a +3 total.

Original Fort save is DC 13, so at a +3 they have a 55% chance of saving. Not a very good chance. Assuming they missed that, then they have a DC 11 to remain concious next round. About a 1 in 6 chance of both rolls being missed.

Very harsh.

Now the swim check. Rogues generally have a weapon or two, light armor, and some supplies. Assuming they immediately dump their backpack, it is not unreasonable for them to be carrying 30 lbs of equipment for a total of -6 to swim checks. They most likely have a better chance of just climbing along the slanted tower wall than swimming, especially considering how rare it is for anyone to take swimming skill.

Wizards and Sorcerers don't have swim as a class skill. They will either Alter Self (if they have it), or sink. They can't even climb out without help.

Rangers and Barbarians can do well here. Good Fortitude save, light armor, and Swim as a class skill. I can see a Ranger taking some ranks in swimming. Less likely for the Barbarian, but still possible.

The Cleric is probably the worst off. Swim is crossclass, and they are most likely wearing heavy armor. They will make the Fortitude saves, but that will not help them get out of there. To get just one rank of swim costs a cleric all of their base skill points for a level.

I assume you've got copies of the characters who will be sent through this. Make three mock runs through the encounter, see how the characters fair. That will give you a good idea of how well things can come out. When it happens for real, expect the group to make a few mistakes precisely because it is a surprise and they don't know the best way out.


Looking back over what you originally wrote, I think it would be a Reflex save to determine if someone caught their breath originally. They have to think/react quickly, it isn't something where just being tough would save their hides. This would also give the rogues a much better chance of surviving the initial situation, so they can help the rest of the group out of there.

Thanks for all the feedback.

Yeah, a Reflex save rather than Fortitude does sound reasonable. And I should drop the DC considerably - perhaps DC 5 - 8 or so.

I do want this to scare the hell out of them, but I certainly don't want to start off the campaign with a TPK or even the likelihood of a PC death.

If they are able to see (and hold their breath) they should be able to walk along the bottom and up the stairs in front of them to get out of the water, but I image they'll all flounder about trying to swim for the first couple rounds.

This campaign probably won't start for about a month yet, and so no PCs have been generated yet. But, I definitely need to run through this a couple times with some mock PCs.

 

[Grundle]

So the real question becomes, do any of your PCs have access to Analyze Portal and are they likely to use it before entering?

Knowing my players and the fact that this won't start off as a planar travel sort of campaign, I would doubt that any would have this Spell on hand.

 

[Grundle]

Re: encounter

this also assumes the party has ranks in swim. this is a really tough encounter. the rogue and other lightly armored folks should make it out if the make their swim checks but the fighters, clerics and paladins are gonna really hate you for this one. if you do it then I wouldnt make it too difficult to retrieve their stuff. a shadow could very well kill people in a situation as grim as this

If I change the initial Fort save to a Reflex with a DC between 5-8 it will help reduce the risk of drowning.

I would assume that someone in the party will fire off a light spell relatively soon in the encounter - assuming they don't all decide to play fighters and barbarians!

It sounds like the concensus is that this is a difficult encounter for a group of 5th level PCS. Where does this fall on the CR scale. Probably greater than CR 5, but how much so? What kind of XP should be doled out for this encounter?