Take them alive!


Advice

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Ok, I have an encounter coming up where I want to capture the party alive. I really want to have this succeed, but don't feel right using vastly more powerful opponents against the party. I was thinking EL+3 to EL+4-ish. They will be orcs or half-orcs, one of which needs to have 3 levels of Barbarian, both for story reasons. Other then that, I am open to suggestions of all types to make the most awesome capture team of all time!

The party consists of the following:

Half-elven Fighter 4th
Half-elven Rogue 4th
Kitsune Sorceror(Draconic) 4th
Half-ogre Arminger 4th
Human Druid(no pet, caster) 4th
Half-elven Inquisitor 4th

The Fighter and Rogue have some teamwork feats that make them a nasty flanking duo and fight that way whenever possible. The Arminger is a tank that ties up the nastiest critter or shelters the casters, whichever is needed most. The spellcasters do summoning and illusions, with some direct damage and control spells. The Inquisitor is built for mid-range combat, using ranged attacks within 30' and popping close for healing the front liners when needed. In total, they are a powerful group. I've been hitting them with EL+1 to EL+2 encounters since day one and they have had little trouble with most of them.

Whether its builds, items, scenarios (city based campaign, at the moment) or any other useful suggestion, I am open to them.


Just script it when they are asleep parties hate hopeless battles and it is best if you don't draw it out.


Scarred witchdoctor witch with sleep?

Ways of dealing nonlethal damage without penalty: Monk, Order of the Blue Rose cavalier, Bludgeoner feat

Liberty's Edge

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Have a crapload of barbarians smack the crap out of them with saps. Or magic. Or maybe have one or two paralyzing assassins that come out of the darkness.


Hit them hard with higher npcs and when they complain remind them that there are bigger fish in the sea than them.


lucky7 wrote:
Have a crapload of barbarians smack the crap out of them with saps.

Large saps, so they can two-hand them.


Kill them all kill them all mwahahahahaha


toss in some half-orc casters with Hold Person (prepped, wand, scroll) and arm the others with drow poison. Where'd they get the drow poison? Hey, new adventure thread if you need one.

Holds on the beefy guys with modest will saves, poison on the casters with the modest/poor Fort saves & low-AC.

Once the holds are in place and the casters out like a light, they can stab the heavies with drow-poisoned daggers until the stuff kicks in. Enough doses can overcome any fort save.

EDIT:

10' deep spiked-pit trap, spikes coated in drow poison.

Also, if you put the Hold Person spells in a magic item, now you have a new shiny the player's casters can fight for if/when they overcome their adversaries.


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I played a capture scenario just today.
My party:
F elf magus 7
M aasimar paladin (Sarenrae) 7
M human fighter TWF 7
F tiefling rogue 7
F human sorcerer (draconic bloodline) 7
M dwarf cleric (Pharasma) 7

I only used one NPC, a human rogue 7 / wizard 1 / shadowdancer 1 (CR 8).
He approached the PC on guard turn, which was the dwarf, during the night (with 40+ stealth roll) and grappled his face from behind while pressing a blade against his throat,intimating him to surrender.
The whole party surrendered without a second thought and is now playing the rest of the scenario as prisoners (i'm not going to let this scenario going on for too long,just needed it for story reasons,players hate being taken prisoners after all)


Have enemies using weak ranged weapons with really high BaB and Drow poison. Sure, the Fort DC is only 13, but eventually, they will fail.

Drow poison doesn't deal Ability damage, but when it hits it's almost gauranteed to make the target knocked out for the rest of the fight (1d3 minutes initial, hours if they fail the second save). If you have a player who only goes unconscious for a few minutes, use manacles on them.


Joex The Pale wrote:
Kill them all kill them all mwahahahahaha

That will teach me to leave my window open with my wife about... >.<


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Just use GM fiat to have them get captured. Say the food/wine was drugged, or they all get hit by KO darts and fail their saves. Don't roll any dice, just tell the players it is part of the story that they get captured.

Otherwise the players will be upset that you put them in an impossible encounter. Or the spell caster will have a way of escaping and then won't be able to participate in the following adventure.


If you don't like the low save DC on drow poison, any poison that deals ability score damage other than Con will work. As noted by Warhawx, use low-damage ranged weapons on a high-attack bonus creature to keep from killing them.

When Ability Damage exceeds the ability score, the character falls unconscious until the damage heals down low enough.

So, take some goblin allies of the orcs, as small creatures, that's a +1 bonus already. Now, custom-build them with 3 levels of warrior, they're still CR 1 each, but now they've got Ranged Attack = +6 (+2 Dex, +3 BAB, +1 Size) and their bows only dish out 1d4 damage (using shortbows).

Give them Point-Blank Shot & Precise Shot (Or Weapon Focus (shortbow)) instead of their normal feats. This raises that attack up to +7 (or +8).

And that's without re-building the goblins to have better dex. If you're willing to invest the effort, you could use the goblin race, Heroic stats, and fighter (or ranger) class to make them even higher attack without significantly upping their CR (two levels of heroic class, instead of 3 NPC). They'll just be weaker if they get caught out in melee.

Sovereign Court

Have a couple clerics who channel negative energy with the feat that allows them to do non-lethal. Mix in a few brutes and try and get those HPs to even out with the non-lethal damage and there you go.


demontroll wrote:

Just use GM fiat to have them get captured. Say the food/wine was drugged, or they all get hit by KO darts and fail their saves. Don't roll any dice, just tell the players it is part of the story that they get captured.

Otherwise the players will be upset that you put them in an impossible encounter. Or the spell caster will have a way of escaping and then won't be able to participate in the following adventure.

While that works for some groups, I've seen more griping about "rail-roading" the players via GM fiat than I ever have with the outcome of difficult, but not impossible, encounters.

Not only that, but the story where the bulk of the party has to find a way to escape works better if the brains of the operation (or at least, a cunning assistant) is on the outside looking in, ready to support the sudden break-out. Or surreptitiously lending aid to her companions while they labor through their captor's demands.


Drow poison is excellent, they have already encountered it, and it works as advertised. :) And manacles, good idea!

I like the Bludgeoner feat, might make use of that. Combined with saps and the relevant sap boosting feats, that might do it. And two-handed saps is just nasty, I love it! Should I just go all Barbs then, ya think? Or toss in Rogues for the SA? Rogues might be too squishy for this party though.

I like the Intimidate angle. I was thinking of calling for surrender after a few went down, but hostage/intimidate might work even better.

I'll have to take a look at that Scarred Witchdoctor, that might fit really nice with the story angle...

The "party asleep" angle would work better if they weren't in a city based campaign, sleeping in a lightly guarded building. If the encounter took place there, they would have NPC allies that would get involved pretty quickly and that would complicate things greatly. But if they go travelling, that comes to be an option again.

(And yes, I realize it is annoying to the party to lose and be prisoners. Just need it to introduce a BBEG in a dramatic fashion, they are wanted for "questioning". I *DO* plan on asking them to come along nicely for the meeting before I "insist", just not planning on them accepting... ;) )


Pan wrote:
Have a couple clerics who channel negative energy with the feat that allows them to do non-lethal. Mix in a few brutes and try and get those HPs to even out with the non-lethal damage and there you go.

I like this one, and didn't even know that feat existed before now. (proceeds to crack open books in search of it).

Silver Crusade

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As they've said above, never structure your game so it relies on a "forced failure" model. Really, there are two choices:

1) Make the CR crazy high, so the PC's are beat down. The problem is, this will just feel unfair, and will break the social contract between players and GM.

Or...

2) Tell the players (out of game) that you need them to be captured for the plot to advance, and ask THEM to help you script a scene where they captured.


  • Gas.
  • Nets.
  • Demanding a surrender (possibly while threatening hostages).
  • Spiked drinks.
  • Tranquilliser darts.


uriel222 wrote:

As they've said above, never structure your game so it relies on a "forced failure" model. Really, there are two choices:

1) Make the CR crazy high, so the PC's are beat down. The problem is, this will just feel unfair, and will break the social contract between players and GM.

Or...

2) Tell the players (out of game) that you need them to be captured for the plot to advance, and ask THEM to help you script a scene where they captured.

In response to item 1, I think a number of the responses previously posted demonstrate that you don't need "crazy high" CR, just "high", with intelligent tactics.

Regarding item 2, it can work for some groups, but it ruins the surprise (for the players) of an interesting story, which is presumably one of the things they're there for. Proceed with caution, you're the GM, you should have enough trust from them that a difficult counter won't result in permanently upset players. If not, what have you been doing to the poor people and why are they still putting up with you?

I think the real trick is to realize that there's a third option:

3- Don't think in terms of "forced failure" model, come up with a reasonable, rational, level of power for the enemies to bring to bear, and use it. Then, be prepared for the fall-out of not capturing the party. The story isn't over because it didn't go the way you wanted it to. If anything, it's probably improved, because now you're as surprised as the players with the way it plays out.

It's not a play, it's not a book, it's not a movie. It's a game, with success and failure. Cut-scenes are always the worst part of video games, and tabletop has the benefit of not having them. Don't feel compelled to introduce them just to preserve your pre-planned story. Learn to roll with the punches & improvise.


I also don't think you should force them to surrender for the sake of the story. Make it a difficult fight, and if they miraculously win then make up a new story for that.

You could use houseruled drow-like poison with a higher save DC. I always use expanded poison rules in my games, although depending on the temperament of your PCs that might backfire. Maybe you could look into the rogue and alchemist options that enhance poisons for the whole group.

If the spellcasters have any escape spells, target them first (unless you want them to be outside the action and help the rest of the party escape). Once you have a number of the party down, and only one or two remain, demand surrender by having one of the enemies threaten to coup-de-grace one of the downed party members. This will hint to the players that you planned for them to get captured, and help them feel like they're going along with it rather than you're forcing it upon them.


BillyGoat wrote:

If you don't like the low save DC on drow poison, any poison that deals ability score damage other than Con will work. As noted by Warhawx, use low-damage ranged weapons on a high-attack bonus creature to keep from killing them.

When Ability Damage exceeds the ability score, the character falls unconscious until the damage heals down low enough.

The problem is that Ability poisons take a rather long time to knock out and even a far longer time to recover from without Recovery spells or potions. They also gives players a better chance to resist every turn despite their higher DC. But fail that DC13 Fort save once? Say goodnight.


Why do you think it's a good idea to capture them? That's usually bad writing.

You also have your work cut out for you. You have a large party, and a party is more powerful than the sum of its parts. Actually capturing a PC is even harder than killing them.

You need an OP encounter if you want this to work. Go way over the top, since at least you won't kill them.

Lure them into a place filled with noisy traps, for instance, pit traps with thunderstones or dinner bells underneath them. 4th-level PCs have a hard time making the DC 20 Reflex saves of even the simplest pit traps, and plate armor and Mirror Image do nothing for this. (Then the rat swarms pour down the traps and start eating the trapped PCs.)

Have illusory bushes and the like, which the villains can hide in. Once combat starts, the bushes vanish. (Or not, which can give them concealment!)

What will you do about items? Noncasters are especially nerfed when NPCs take their items. Even if they didn't have magic items to begin with, a fighter loses a lot of damage when using a rock rather than a sword. A wizard also needs their spellbook back pronto.

Liberty's Edge

Mancatchers!

The Exchange

Make sure if they win, they will have good rewards. You can kill a few since the potential loot can pay for raise dead.

Let them have a chance to surrender first.


Just knock them all into negative hit points, and have a scroll or two of 'breath of life' on hand in case you accidentally hit one of them too hard. No special technique is required other than to avoid x3 and x4 crit weapons. I suggest tossing several tanglefoot bags and nets etc to make sure they don't escape. Use focus fire on them but don't hit anybody who goes down. You can grapple casters, pin them and tie them up if you like pretty easily at this level.

However, I'm going to warn you. What you're doing is a railroad. This is likely to piss off most players. You might even piss off your players at BOTH ends of your scenario. You'll piss some of them off for the railroad, since it'll be clear that they have no chance in this scenario and you're doing it for metagame reasons. THen you'll piss others off because they'll be given a suspension of disbelief breaking opportunity to escape. Some of the people annoyed might be annoyed at BOTH ends. Unless you're a really GOOD narrativist and you have serious buy-in from all of your players you are treading on very thin ice.


Thanks again for all the great suggestions. And to those with the warnings against railroading, that is precisely why I want a winnable scenario. If they pull off a win, I will let them have it. But, by Crom, they are going to have to work for it! I :-D

Liberty's Edge

A Rogue with one level as Shadow dancer, With one or more Enchanted Sap's and the Sap Master feat. PCs will go to dreamland left and right. It may frustrate them but that makes beating the tar out of this sap wielding kidnapping expert all the more worthwhile when it happens.

Spoiler:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/sap-master-combat

Grand Lodge

No need for Shadowdancer.

Hellcat Stealth is just as good.


Make it an awesome battle where they can make their stand, but just include too many enemies for them to have much of a shot. Give them XP based on how many enemies they can down.

Taking them alive is the easy part - there's lots of ways to do nonlethal damage!

1) Bludgeoner feat, Bludgeoner feat, Bludgeoner feat!! Even archers can take this feat and use blunt arrows at no penalty. Melee characters use an earthbreaker. (side note: you do want to win the battle so make sure the archers don't fire until the casters start casting!)

2) Merciful spell means blast away. If the PCs are 4th level, give the enemies one 5th level wizard with Merciful Fireball prepared.

3) Sap Adepts can be quite nasty when they are two-weapon fighting.

4) If you can fit it in story-wise, you could throw a Heavens Oracle at them. Bright lights, then lights out.

5) Use a tetori monk to pin and tie up the party. Casters especially will hate this.

6) Definitely throw in a Buccaneer bard. At 4th level he gets a performance that forces someone to surrender, he can always do nonlethal damage with no weapon restrictions or penalties, and every big party needs a bard!

I think this could be a fun scenario for both the players and you. It will give you an idea how far you can push the PCs, and it will give them an idea of what their breaking point is, so they can shore up their defenses later. Running it like a normal battle (no poisons, sneaking in the night, or GM fiat) but just doing nonlethal damage and having an excess of enemies could seem less forced and more fun - the PCs get to down a bunch of bad guys, but you still get to drive the story along by capturing them.


Do one of the reasonable things already suggested, but have a backup planned for when/if they manage to escape. There must always be a chance.


demontroll wrote:

Just use GM fiat to have them get captured. Say the food/wine was drugged, or they all get hit by KO darts and fail their saves. Don't roll any dice, just tell the players it is part of the story that they get captured.

Otherwise the players will be upset that you put them in an impossible encounter. Or the spell caster will have a way of escaping and then won't be able to participate in the following adventure.

I kind of like this, though it depends on the group.

Even better, have them wake up one morning in a dungeon with no memory of how they got there. :P

Practically, though, you have an encounter in mind in which the players will be captured, yes? If so, it is important to ask: are the enemies trying to capture the players? If so, they will use weapons like nets and saps. Also, orcs, with their high STR, will be quite good at grapple checks. Give some of them the Improved Grapple feat and let them go to town. A well-built orc NPC can actually be pretty scary.

The Scarred Witchdoctor is a good idea, especially if she has Spell Focus on enchantment; a rod of persistent metamagic will help. However, a normal sleep spell only will affect one character at level 4.

They could attack with regular weapons, but make sure the orcs also have a neutral cleric who channels positive energy. This will allow you to stabilize player characters who are at negative hit points when the enemy cleric channels to heal his friends.

There is also the whole preparation issue. Attacking the characters when they have made camp works well and also encourages your characters to take precautions when they are camping in the future. Enforce the donning armor rules and you will greatly impede the party tanks. As a side note, in my mind every character should have an armor coat as a backup piece of armor for this exact reason. Furthermore, casters have not had the rest they need to get new spells for the day.

You could have a preparatory encounter beforehand in which the players are "set up." Like a feast where they all get really drunk and are therefore easy to bag when the orcs show up.

I envision a feast being held at which the players are attending; if they have just finished another adventure then the feast could be in their honour. Have it held by a tribe of friendly but rowdy barbarians or other rowdy types. Have the players decide how much they are drinking at the feast, but have the alcohol they consume grant a morale bonus equal to their "drunkenness level" for social interactions with drunken NPC's and for the various games and entertainments that occur, like arm-wrestling and bawdy singing and dwarf-tossing. :) Of course, you could also implement some rules that give the players non-lethal damage that may cause them to pass out from drinking too much.

Have the players, when successful in these events, gain prestige in the eyes of the barbarians, and they might particularly have a goal of winning the tribe over for some reason, so that gives them a reason to whoop it up. Also make sure that the various entertainments include things that non-combat players can participate in, like performance checks and riddle games. Riddle games could use straight INT checks. They could have a game where you have to make someone flinch which would use WIS or sense motive checks, which your party cleric might be good at.

If you do it right they will get into the spirit of things, and then will not be as miffed when the drunken factor is used against them.

If you want more ideas, I suggest you download the We Be Goblins module, and have a look at the party at the beginning for ideas. It's a fun module and it's a free download.

Peet


AtomicGamer wrote:
Do one of the reasonable things already suggested, but have a backup planned for when/if they manage to escape. There must always be a chance.

Agreed.

I planned carefully the attack of that assassin because he was almost certainly going to succeed.
Of my party, the elven girl magus so far was stripped and interrogated,but nothing really disturbing;have already planned her escape/recovering of her equip.
The others have yet to play this part, but it will be just as easy.


Joex The Pale,
how well do you know your players? In general there are 2 things most players HATE more than their characters dying. 1- having there "toys"/magic items taken away (destroyed or stolen) and 2- not having control(railroading). A "capture them/prisoner" scenario does both. Most players will do ANYTHING to avoid this fate, and luck can be funny. It sounds like you are prepared for them to avoid capture, so that's good. But be prepared for "interesting" reactions if you do manage to capture them.


As a quick aside, I have had a few of them arrested for break and enter, assault and attempted burglary when they broke into a warehouse that slavers were using, overpowered the guards and waited confidently for the guardsman to arrive after the fight spread into the street. Did I mention that the guardsmen in this city are largely corrupt? They lost some nice items, and some cash too, when they were released from holding. They were annoyed, not at me (well, not JUST at me) , but at the corrupt guardsmen for taking their stuff. I did explain at the beginning that this was going to be a gritty campaign, the law would apply to them while they were in the city and that bad things would happen to good people. And sometimes those good people will be the PCs... ;-)

I plan to have them speak to this fellow at one point. He is a shadowy man of power, so he would prefer to have the party brought to him in a position of submission, or at least in a respectful demeanor. But if they successfully resist that, he will instead go to them in a position of overwhelming power. He really does just want to talk to them concerning some of their recent exploits, but I just really hope they don't piss him off. While he is a BBEG, he is not *their* BBEG. He might even end up as a very powerful ally, if the party recognises the opportunity and goes against their first instinct. But if he is disrespected, they will quickly end up fighting a two front war...

Liberty's Edge

This sounds cool. I'll write that down.


Bearded Ben wrote:
lucky7 wrote:
Have a crapload of barbarians smack the crap out of them with saps.
Large saps, so they can two-hand them.

Aren't those just called Greatclubs?

Liberty's Edge

I guess, but those are lethal. Maybe have them brought to dying and then stop-bleed whatever that is?


I think it's important to decide (or indicate here) why they are being captured, and how you intend for them to escape.

For example, if they are being captured because they have stolen and hidden a precious object of the orc tribe, it would make sense for the WHOLE tribe to descend upon them, which would justify overwhelming force. They would then escape by either talking their way out, revealing the location of the hidden item, or by breaking out when the guard force is at an ebb (ie., they were overpowered by 12 orcs earlier, but there are only 5 around right now).

If the orcs want to use them for entertainment, such as by throwing them into gladiatorial combat, it would make sense that the orcs wouldn't want them too badly harmed, which lends itself to using nonlethal damage or something like drow poison. Their escape, then, would likely be either through favor by winning their matches, or by themselves overwhelming a small guard force, or rallying other prisoners. Maybe by inuring themselves against poison.

My point is that whatever strategy you use to capture them has to allow for them to get OUT of the situation eventually while still making sense. If you just throw 4 EPL+4 orcs at them that are simply overpowering, when they escape later there may be a question as to why the orcs were so much easier this time around and, "Where did those really powerful guys that beat us go?" Poison works, but then, do they have stores of the stuff? Where are they? Did they just HAPPEN to have enough of it to capture the players and no more? Do you want to give your players gallons of the stuff?

I've only captured a whole party once in one of my games, and it was completely unintentional--I over-tweaked an encounter and it was beating the crap out of my players. The attackers were merely patrolling the borders of their land on which the players were unwittingly trespassing, so they had no specific animosity toward them. They aren't the sorts to back down from a fight normally unless it is VERY apparently out of their reach (ie., a colossal sized dragon lands in front of them when they are level 6), so when I saw that they were hurting and getting kind of desperate, I had the leader of the attacking force call for their surrender. Realizing that they were in serious mortal danger, the players relented. Then they were brought before THAT leader's boss, who charged them with a quest as ransom for their lives, with assurances that if they shirked their agreement, he would find and kill them (a threat backed up by the previous encounter in which they nearly wiped).

Grand Lodge

I am putting my vote in for Scarred Witch Doctor as well.

With Ability Focus(Slumber Hex) the party should be asleep quickly.

Also, have the others start out throwing Nets, then pounding with nonlethal.


Sounds like a job for a nice devious trap! Once the PCs are hanging from the ceiling in a net they are fairly helpless, barring an astromech droid.


Scarred witch doctor, and H-orc Skulking slayer/scout rogues with greatclubs, bludgeoner, and sap feats. 2d6+6d8+18 nonlethal on a single attack on a charge should put down most players, and that's available at level 5 completely legal. (around 52 average damage non-lethal) in a single swing. they still have 2 rogue talents to spend and are so simple you can play one in PFS (I do.) I recommend fast getaway (so they can move after a sneak attack without AoO) and a teamwork flanking feat.

And this is -if- the witch doctor doesn't sleep the guy on watch and just end it before it begins.

Grand Lodge

Oh, and throw in some Drow Poison for added probability of sleep.


Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

The party in the homebrew game I play in just got our shit pushed in by a group of Tiamat worshipers using Drow poison and Sleep. They snuck up on us while we slept in the middle of a nasty storm. Tagged the teifling on watch, hit the cleric and barb with sleep while they slept and made off with the dragonborn sorcerer while the rest of them slept.
Took the tiefling about 20 minutes to get the rest of the party awake and figure out what happened. They eventually managed to catch up to the cultists who had my poor dragonborn strung up in chains and with a metal muzzle holding her mouth and were draining her blood for use in some sort of ritual after spending some time torturing her. Worst part about that was watching them wipe the floor with the party while my poor sorcerer was unable to escape the chains or the muzzle and help them. Eventually they drove the cultists off (who fled with a lot of the poor girl's blood.)

So I second sleep + poison, ambush them when they least expect it for bonus points.


I'm going to run a sample encounter later using a trio consisting of a wizard, cleric and barbarian at 7th. With scouting and advance preparation, as well as some vicious merciful weapons and merciful spells, I think I can take down the party in three rounds tops.

As for them escaping, no need. They will be released once they have answered the BBEG's questions. Like I said, he just wants to talk to them, but if they don't agree to come along willingly, well, nothing like having a highly trained and competent hit/retrieval squad at your disposal...


DON’T. Really. It comes a time where every DM wants to do the whole “take the PC’s prisoners, take their stuff away…” encounter. Players hate & despise these. But besides this, there is no way to do this without DM fiat or super-powerful foe (which is DM fiat) where one or more of the PC’s won’t die or escape.

And if you use DM fiat, you will just tick off your players that much more.

This is a great way to start a campaign. It’s Ok to use it as a way out of a TPK. But never, ever use it in the middle of a campaign. Cheap DM trick.


DrDeth wrote:
But besides this, there is no way to do this without DM fiat or super-powerful foe (which is DM fiat) where one or more of the PC’s won’t die or escape.

There is another way - just use lots of low-level guys. The PCs will get to take down a dozen or so of their attackers before they get knocked unconscious, so it's a fun battle (unlike fighting one unhittable boss.)

Have the enemies use nonlethal tactics (I gave a bunch of examples above) to keep PCs from dying. The enemies will be surrounding them, which limits the chance that the PCs can escape.

If your group is full of "I must always win always"-type players, this may annoy them. But personally I find it boring that the PCs always win everything, and I would appreciate being given an actual challenge.


I would use the nonlethal damage tactic as well, use spells and items which are meant to capture them like web, entangle, tangle-foot bags, etc.

Sleep will work on 1/2 the party if you are using the spell (half elves immune), but the drow poison is a good idea since it's not a spell or spell-like effect and if they fail their saves they are knocked out.

It sounds like it'll be a fun encounter for you and your players, just keep it light-hearted and don't overdo it, if they are able to escape then let them and come at them again later. Don't be afraid to use other means to procure the information that the BBEG wants, he/she won't be adverse to using more nefarious means such as kidnapping, blackmail, or even killing people that they love.

As long as you don't just dm-fiat with "you are all captured" w/o them being able to do anything about it, you should be fine.


RumpinRufus wrote:
DrDeth wrote:
But besides this, there is no way to do this without DM fiat or super-powerful foe (which is DM fiat) where one or more of the PC’s won’t die or escape.

There is another way - just use lots of low-level guys. The PCs will get to take down a dozen or so of their attackers before they get knocked unconscious, so it's a fun battle (unlike fighting one unhittable boss.)

Have the enemies use nonlethal tactics (I gave a bunch of examples above) to keep PCs from dying. The enemies will be surrounding them, which limits the chance that the PCs can escape.

If your group is full of "I must always win always"-type players, this may annoy them. But personally I find it boring that the PCs always win everything, and I would appreciate being given an actual challenge.

Alternately, the party will realize there are too many enemies and attempt to escape early on.


RumpinRufus wrote:
DrDeth wrote:
But besides this, there is no way to do this without DM fiat or super-powerful foe (which is DM fiat) where one or more of the PC’s won’t die or escape.

There is another way - just use lots of low-level guys. The PCs will get to take down a dozen or so of their attackers before they get knocked unconscious, so it's a fun battle (unlike fighting one unhittable boss.)

Have the enemies use nonlethal tactics (I gave a bunch of examples above) to keep PCs from dying. The enemies will be surrounding them, which limits the chance that the PCs can escape.

If your group is full of "I must always win always"-type players, this may annoy them. But personally I find it boring that the PCs always win everything, and I would appreciate being given an actual challenge.

Being swarmed with so many mooks that you can’t possibly win is not a “challenge”.

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