CR / XP of interrupted "overwhelming" encounters


Advice

Grand Lodge

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I am currently planning an adventure/campaign for my group and I have an encounter that will put the players against an overwhelming enemy force.

I plan to introduce my players in a shameless "you wash up on a strange foreign beach" scenario after the slave ship the were on is destroyed (I have a whole scenario for this already).

Upon arriving on the desert beach, the players will almost immediately come under attack by a group of native people who will be ferociously attempting to bite them. Each of them will also have a deep gash on their neck or shoulder as if a wild dog had attacked them. They are actually zombies but very fresh. After they manage to kill them, a group of camel-mounted uniformed men will show up brandishing spears, surround them, and begin screaming in an accusatory way at the players. If anybody speaks his language (likely), they will know he is accusing them of murder of the people the men had just found (the zombies).

At this point, the party face can work some magic if he speaks their language, however if anybody attempts to aid him that doesn't speak the language he will unknowingly incur a -2 each as the natives are extremely xenophobic.

Now... if they don't talk their way out, they will be at a tactical disadvantage and outnumbered. The men will attempt to execute them for their crimes at which point they can stand and fight or try and run.

I am hoping that they run, but I bet they will try and fight. Regardless, halfway through this scenario. A giant fire-spewing sand worm will erupt out of ground and begin using his fire breath to heard his prey and feast "indiscriminately" (i.e. the bad guys). At this point the players will be nudged to a nearby stone structure were hopefully they realize lies safety from the worm.

My biggest concern right now is how to award experience for this/these encounters? The zombies are easy.
But should I just assign ad hoc experience for the encounter with the brutes?

What I am trying to do here is establish several things about this campaign/setting in quick succession:

  • Zombies. Somewhat odd zombies.- The ultimate focus of this campaign is the return of a long dead king who turned against his people and became a lich. In ancient times he and his 'Army of Souls' were sealed away in the valley he called home. However, the magical protections were not maintained because the church which has come to dominate the land has outlawed all magic and all other faiths. Now these protections are beginning to fail and creatures capable of devouring the soul of a person are escaping. Whenever they kill somebody the soul is transferred to the lich and they then rise as a zombie under his control.
  • Xenophobic populace and potential language barrier - In this tomb the players will find a researcher who is very helpful, accommodating, and ultimately will be a good friend. However, he is somewhat of an outcast in the nearby city and holds very little sway. But he will acquaint the players will the general customs and things not to do.
  • Giant fire-breathing sandworms are nothing to f+*~ with - They are a real threat that must be taken into consideration on any long distance travel. Learning about the sand worm ecology/biology will be essential in surviving
  • Dungeon delving - This stone structure will be the first of several tombs that the players will enter. These will be the tombs of the ancient kings high council who sealed him away to protect the world. In these tombs will lie the way to re-seal the king away, but they are spread out across the region and thus will require understanding how to safely avoid/kill the sand worms. Alternatively, the players will later meet a church leader who wants to do away with the anti-magic and xenophobic policies who believes that the ancient king must be freed in order to stop the growing undead menace. This is actually completely reasonable as the king rose to power as the savior of his people for fighting back this same evil. However, when he became evil and was sealed away the church, due to a doctrinal issue and in order to save face, white washed his legacy and have continued to hold him as a prophet and savior. That being said, the key to understanding how to release the "Glorious Dawn King, our savior and prophet" will also lie in these same clues in the tombs of the ancient mages.

EDIT: THIS IS NOT THE 1ST SESSION!


Expect a TPK.

Why? Because players rarely act the way you want them to. So expect them to behave in the worst possible way during an encounter. I would expect them to end up fighting the sandworm critter.

There seems to be a logic hole with your natives as well. Extreme xenophobia would be worth far more than a -2. And why don't the natives know about the zombies if they are from this area?


PS: I wouldn't grant any XP for the unfinished fight. It was merely a skirmish with no real chance to win or lose.

Grand Lodge

Aranna wrote:

Expect a TPK.

Why? Because players rarely act the way you want them to. So expect them to behave in the worst possible way during an encounter. I would expect them to end up fighting the sandworm critter.

There seems to be a logic hole with your natives as well. Extreme xenophobia would be worth far more than a -2. And why don't the natives know about the zombies if they are from this area?

I was planning to make the scene utterly terrifying. These guys will be kicking the PCs asses and this worm pops up from the sand and swallows them camel and all then breaths some napalm-like fire cutting off the escape of those that flee. We've got a huge 4-6' mat which would be great for it. I expect it more likely to have some table-flipping "wtf is this s!#+!?!?" more than the possibility of them trying to actually fight it. I know our sorceress will nope the hell out of there and the guy who tends to play the cleric is pretty good at reading where I'm leading them. We also will have a druid who can knowledge nature that this thing is going to destroy them.

What do you mean by logic hole? As for the negative, I'm only planning to apply the xenophobia negative if they try defending themselves in anything but the language used as an aid another or simultaneous diplomacy checks. Any attempt at diplomacy in a different language will automatically fail.
The players will be level 4 so a bard with an 18 cha would have a +11 or at most a +13 if they have a trait bonus. Against a DC 25 diplomacy check for being hostile that's only a 40% chance of success, 50% if I give a +2 circumstance bonus. Then that is contingent upon the bard speaking this specific language (it's one of the most prominent languages but he won't have more than 3 out of the 12 most likely, so lets say there's a 50% chance of that). I think a -2 is fair given those odds are already against him and he's the face. The wizard is most likely to speak the language but will have terrible diplomacy and wont be able to succeed. However, I wish I could remove the "extremely" adverb in my original post to reflect this.

The zombies are a new thing just beginning to happen. It happened before a long time ago but that had been pretty much covered up by the church at the time. For now it is entirely confined to the areas where people don't go because the Army of Souls/Dawn King is focusing on building their forces in preparation. They are focusing on picking off people lost in the desert and trade caravans. It will be a growing threat that they will need to prove is occurring later ("Just crazy foreigners seeing things in the desert.")

Liberty's Edge

Aranna wrote:

Expect a TPK.

Why? Because players rarely act the way you want them to. So expect them to behave in the worst possible way during an encounter. I would expect them to end up fighting the sandworm critter.

I agree. Also, starting a campaign with an unwinnable fight with a built in Deus Ex Machina is generally not a good idea. The players, not the whims of the DM, should be heroes of the story.

Edit: Also I typically give xp for players resolving/surviving an encounter regardless of the means (Truth be told, however, I don't use xp in most campaigns and level through fiat). There is a real danger of a TPK in this encounter so I would definitely grant some kind of reward.


If you give the players free will they probably will fight... I can't guarantee that but it is distinctly possible. And if they do then your scenario is a TPK. If you strong arm them with warnings to run and hide then they probably will but to them it will feel like a railroad they have no choice to not ride. Either way you start your game on a sour note. Why not introduce elements one at a time rather than pummeling them with all three scenarios at once. And the sandworms I would intro with plenty of foreshadowing.

PS: Your game sounds like the intro to Storm of Zehir with a Helix style zombie situation and some Dune sandworms for good measure.


The way to win the npc and worm encounter is not to fight. Award story exp for good role playing if they avoid confrontation. If they fight, they're probably going to die, so I wouldn't award xp for that. Or I would just divide up some monsters killed xp for the group, or use a reduced story award (you sort of managed not to fight for a while?)

Frankly, I would try to make the diplomacy easier to make fighting less appealing. Give the leader a couple of different languages and maybe mancatchers and have them not be executed on the spot.


Here is a reality: If you tell your PCs that they can fight something they assume that they can win. It is probably at maximum a +5 encounter where the PCs have a huge chance to fail if the heart of the cards (er dice) are against them.

So, if you let your party fight an encounter that is far beyond themselves and they die then you are the one who is at fault if they have no chance to actually win. It screams to me of bad design.

If the PCs encounter something that they have no chance of defeating then they should encounter it in such a way that neither they nor it can actually threaten each other. Perhaps they are with caravan, and when they go out some day they turn around about 1000-ft off they see a giant worm rear up to annihilate the caravan that the PCs wouldn't have had a chance of defeating--hence proving that it is beyond them.

Otherwise all that is going to happen is they fight something that they cannot defeat, then go out of their way to build characters that can defeat said threat in some way. If it has melee and short range fire attacks then they all build ranged focused strixes and fly into the sky to pepper the worm to death while it cannot do anything to them. If it runs away they technically defeated it so congratulations you just gave them a ton of XP. Its showing up for its surprise attack and AAOs start to feel cheap and just the DM being a dick, and so eventually they just go make joke characters because they're just going to die randomly anyway. Eventually something corrects, either the campaign fixes itself or the other players create a campaign to play instead.

Remember, the THREAT of danger is often far more oppressive than actual FIGHTS with impossible dangers.

Players don't like TPKs, it annoys them because it means you made something that they probably didn't have a chance of defeating. If they know the dice were against them then that is one thing, but if it is just that the monsters were too powerful for them to really defeat then they just assume you are incompetent at building encounters or just someone who shouldn't be DMing.

I'm not condemning you, mind you, I am simply warning you that this might have consequences that you are not predicting. If the players just feel like you are sadistically killing their characters because you can then all it takes is for someone to suggest they could make a campaign or run scenarios modules or adventure paths, and your campaign is done.

You want full transparency with your players when it comes to certain aspects. If they cannot win against something then they should be informed that they do not have a chance of victory. Therefore if they do fight it and die then they have no one to blame save for themselves.

Grand Lodge

bfobar wrote:

The way to win the npc and worm encounter is not to fight. Award story exp for good role playing if they avoid confrontation. If they fight, they're probably going to die, so I wouldn't award xp for that. Or I would just divide up some monsters killed xp for the group, or use a reduced story award (you sort of managed not to fight for a while?)

Frankly, I would try to make the diplomacy easier to make fighting less appealing. Give the leader a couple of different languages and maybe mancatchers and have them not be executed on the spot.

I may spin this as a more favorable way to go. These NPCs are mostly church brutes lead by an inquisitor (a title, not the class). If I raise his disposition to unfriendly and have them be extremely suspicious rather than assume they are guilty then if they succeed I can have him strong-arm the PCs into doing the jobs they weren't sent out into the desert to do. I initially was having them in the area to investigate the tomb they are supposed to take shelter in in suspicion that the friendly NPC ("Alim") is there (and thus guilty of "tomb raiding").

I could move Alim deeper into the tomb or have him not even be there and instead approach them later. Then I can have the inquisitor and maybe a few brutes survive the sand worm attack and tell the PCs to help search the tomb for Alim. Then I can also ramp up the difficulty of the tomb and kill off some brutes. The church authorities believe Alim is a warlock and thus it wouldnt be a stretch for them to think he could bypass some of the challenges (traps, fire elementals, and scorpions mostly). The problem is Alim is mundane... he's just a scholar. He wouldn't be deep able to go deep in the tomb. And if he's not there then what can I do to "reward" them or provide some climax.

Brainstorming: What if I put a "trap" that moves Alim from the entrance and traps him deeper in the more dangerous/deadly parts of the tomb? Then the inquisitor would feel he has evidence of Alim's sorcery and could order the PC's to arrest him in exchange for clemency. They then have a choice. Kill the church inquisitor, or arrest Alim. I could rewrite his role into another scholar or even a church official. However if they side with Alim then I can continue with my original plans of having the church view the fact that the men never returned from the tomb as further suspicion that he is a warlock who was at the tomb and killed the inquisitor and brutes.

Sovereign Court

You could just ditch XP and level them when you feel they earned it.


I'm weighing in to agree with the folks that have said that this is a TPK situation.

It's awesome that you're excited and being clever. That's absolutely wonderful and you should never be faulted for it. But there's a bunch of collected experience on these forums that might offer some insight.

Terror is very, very hard to invoke in players.

You need your players to be attached to their characters. That isn't something that will happen for a few sessions, but it's essential. The fear of losing a character you've played for six months to a year is very, very deep. The fear of losing a statblock you just rolled up is... not fear.

Secondly you need credible threat. That comes from the experience of knowing your character is bad-ass, hardy, and effective, then encountering a situation when the character is neutered and fragile. You need a mid-level character to basically take one hit that nukes them down to a quarter hit-points while nobody in the party can actually hit the threat. THAT screams "you're in trouble". But to do that you need to have established prior competence and resilience. Again, that won't happen in the first session. Or the second. The characters ARE fragile at 1st.

Worse, because of that fragility, the NPCs won't be a credible threat. No matter what you do, you can't sink in the sense that the island-dwellers are bad-ass. It's just too fresh and there's no sense of relative competence. So when they get eaten, there's no calibration to recognize "gee, those guys were so much better than us and they're just worm-food... we should crap ourselves."

I again applaud your efforts. Thing is I think you should save this sort of thing for later in your campaign. The early days are about establishing a bond between player and character (and/or statblock), and setting the ground for a truly epic person to exist in this pretend world. THEN you can play the drama game.

I'm not saying to not present threats to PCs early on, just not to expect the players to feel any fear.

Grand Lodge

Why does everybody seem to think I am at all going to be trying to kill my players or that I am completely incapable of describing something as overwhelming with big red flashing "don't fight this" over it's head?

These are level 4 PCs who have been playing with me for awhile... they understand the power of a level 4 character and that it isn't enough to fight what is basically a wingless, burrowing dragon. Yes, I have a reputation for challenging fights among my players but I do not intentional or light-heartedly kill PCs. When I do it's because they ran past 2-3 warning signs and did something very stupid. In fact both of my only PC kills in the last campaign I ran over 5 months involved both PCs abandoning a fortified position to charge into a friendly stinking cloud and black tentacles across a narrow bridge with sorcerers on the other side who they knew had my infamous lightning bolts; the ONLY 2 deaths (that fight battle was pretty awesome though).

This is an encounter that is supposed to be interrupted but the issue is the amount of enemies that the PCs would defeat (and technically earn XP for) is not appropriate for the challenge faced to kill those enemies.

Lets put it like this:

PCs are attacked with theoretical odds of 2:1. Forced to fight, they manage to kill half/nearly half of the enemies (or less) before they are beaten, bloodied, and forced into submission. Then the worm shows up and feasts. Now is the chance for escape. If a PC is stupid enough to be nearly out of spells or almost death then decides "I'm going to attack that big fire-breathing beast because clearly the DM meant for me to kill it" then they deserve to die for being f~$$ing stupid. I know for a fact that at least 2 of my players will be intelligent enough to run and a third will have to tools to be directly told so if he needs it so forgive me for building encounters around my players.

Note: This is not the first or second session. This will be at best the 3rd session in and likely the 4th or 5th. The PC's are starting at lvl 3 and will have leveled already.

Grand Lodge

Anguish wrote:


Worse, because of that fragility, the NPCs won't be a credible threat. No matter what you do, you can't sink in the sense that the island-dwellers are bad-ass. It's just too fresh and there's no sense of relative competence. So when they get eaten, there's no calibration to recognize "gee, those guys were so much better than us and they're just worm-food... we should crap ourselves."

As I've said, the PCs will not be fresh and they will have had a chance at easier combat, namely aboard the slave ship I mentioned. Preceding that there will also be a full setup session leading to their capture. If a PC doesn't try to lead a revolt then another NPC slave will. However, after they take the ship (if they do) they will be spotted by a warship of the nation that they are going to be shipwrecked on and at that point they will fired upon and destroyed. Thus if they rush right into an uprising this will be the 3rd session. Likely the 4th.

I don't see why you assume that the NPCs will appear to be pushovers. This is more of a situation like in The Mummy where the Medjai arrive to muscle the archaeologists out of Hamunaptra or when Legolas, Aaragon, and Gimli encounter the Riders of Rohan. These are mounted warriors wielding longspears (just much fewer in number).


Artemis Thunderfist wrote:

Why does everybody seem to think I am at all going to be trying to kill my players or that I am completely incapable of describing something as overwhelming with big red flashing "don't fight this" over it's head?

...

PCs are attacked with theoretical odds of 2:1. Forced to fight, they manage to kill half/nearly half of the enemies (or less) before they are beaten, bloodied, and forced into submission. Then the worm shows up and feasts. Now is the chance for escape. If a PC is stupid enough to be nearly out of spells or almost death then decides "I'm going to attack that big fire-breathing beast because clearly the DM meant for me to kill it" then they deserve to die for being f@!$ing stupid. I know for a fact that at least 2 of my players will be intelligent enough to run and a third will have to tools to be directly told so if he needs it so forgive me for building encounters around my players.

First part, I don't think people are assuming you're out to kill your players. I think most GMs, myself included, have had a deus ex machina moment break because the characters acted in a suicidal fashion against overwhelming odds. You can still keep the train on the tracks, it's just going to take a bit more work/finesse on your part.

Second part, if you know your players that well and are pretty comfortable with the feeling that they'll know well enough to run away, then by all means gear the encounter to how you believe they'll play it. That's what good GMs do.

PS: Relax, nobody is trying to demean you or attack you. These posts seem to me to all be well intended advice from other GMs to just be ready to handle an outcome you might not originally expect.


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Firstly, I applaud your creativity! But, I'd like to weight in a bit:
You have a lot going on all at once here. Assuming the players arrive on the beach at full resources (do they have their equipment? spells prepared? are they at full health?) this is still going to be a tough fight. Introducing one element at a time and giving them time to react to it may be more appropriate.
That being said...

Artemis Thunderfist wrote:

Lets put it like this:

...

I like this a lot more than the original idea. Having them face the "zombies" (while potentially not at full strength, having just woken up on the shore), then meeting the cavalry soon after gives the impression that the cavalry were hunting the same group, and thus exist as some sort of enforcement/hunting party (establishing threat). Maybe diplomacy happens, maybe it succeeds, maybe it fails, it all leads to the players travelling with this organized unit (either as prisoners or as not-so-honored guests)... then introduce the Great Wyrm! Now, the players have a chance to escape/seek shelter - lo and behold, a giant stone complex!

you're still keeping the same tone, without too much room for misinterpretation on the players part. They still feel in control, and you've completed your story arc.

This all being said, you have to account that things aren't going to go the way you planned. "No plan survives initial contact with the enemy" is a great rule to live by when writing out encounters. What if the players hide from the cavalry? what if the players attempt to fight the Wyrm? Having simple solutions to get the players back on track isn't a bad idea. That Archaeologist/lore-guy could be just inside the "dungeon" entrance. Maybe he did find a way deeper into the complex. You may not even know until the players find out! Just keep it interesting for the players, and don't expect them to follow your written stuff to the 'T'. As long as players get through this to Point B in your campaign, who cares how they got there?

EDIT: As to OP question, I'd award XP for every encounter, won or lost. If they manage to get the cavalry to back down without a fight, is that not worth some experience? If they get captured, but manage to take a few down with them, is that not something you learned from? Even if they throw down their weapons and surrender, I'd award them something for progressing the story line!

good luck in your adventure! I hope it goes well!

Grand Lodge

I would dump XP entirely.

Event based leveling has been a godsend, and all my groups use it.

Pathfinder is very easily run without XP.

Shadow Lodge

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Sindakka's post had some excellent suggestions for your specific situation. More general comments:

Some players are definitely incautious and will charge an opponent that they really should have been frightened of. But many groups are more cautious and will flee if given indication that an opponent is beyond them. This is particularly likely at low levels when characters are more fragile. A GM friend of mine threw a Taiga Linnorm at us at 2nd level to make sure we knew that not everything we'd run into would be CR-appropriate.

If you don't want your players to fight something, make sure it's clearly an overwhelming encounter and make sure they don't have a reason to fight it. If you want them to run from the dragon, make sure it's a big dragon, and that it hasn't just kidnapped the princess and the PCs aren't questing for dragonhide armour. When someone in my group has gotten in over their heads it's almost always because the threat wasn't obvious or because there was something pushing us to confront a particular opponent (for example, the opponent was standing directly in the path to an important objective).

Deus ex Machina can also be pulled off occasionally without diminishing player importance, though it can be tricky. I've got less personal experience here, but I'd say the most important things would be not to allow the DeM to accomplish player goals, not to use it to show off how cool an NPC is, and to if possible make the DeM result from something the players are involved in (for example, if they called for reinforcements for local law enforcement before heading in to confront the cultists, the law enforcement can show up).

In general, if you're planning on putting PCs in an unwinnable battle and then cutting the battle short, I'd give XP but for an encounter of reduced difficulty (since they weren't required to fully defeat the challenge). Nonlethal combat is worth some XP, but not full XP because risk is reduced. Abridged combats should be similar. The XP should probably be between that for an encounter of APL -2 to APL +1 depending on how long the PCs hold out and whether there's a risk of dying before the help arises (for example if reinforcements arrive in 5 rounds but the PCs might be killed before then). Players who cleverly avoid confrontation should in general be given the same XP as the combat would have given, though this might not be the amount for defeating the opponent.

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