Lets say at the end of the campaign it's not some apl+ 3 or 4 necromancer, but rather a party of adventurers the same level as the PCs, with full PC gear.
I think this idea is different than the rival party that may be more like friendly rivals, who are theoretically adventurers, or fight for the same cause, but just tend to piss the PCs off.
What effect would this have on the game in general?
What effect would it have on combat?
What effect would it have on GM work load?
Why don't we see it very often in adventure paths?
Would you run it?
How would you run it?
Edited: added a question
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well, in an optimized party, (both) it leads to who goes first probably.
I have ran it, though its always party size-1 and APL+1. the workload was, making 4 characters.
I would run it as the PCs attacking them/their base/holdout if its the other way around, couple failed perception rolls= dead party.
It'll be deadly if the npcs are even remotely optimized. Normally action economy is on the PCs side, they have more actions to deal with whatever damage or status effects are coming in from the opponent, and typically the actions are staggered (IE the little mooks are hitting for a little damage in between the big damage the BBEG does so you are only actually really worried about that action segment). You have "room" to plan accordingly. Seeing as each NPC is on equal footing with what a PC does, each action the NPCs take could be a game changer in the fight, that magus who just crit with shocking grasp? Just dropped the tankish player in one hit. The caster with heighten spell? Just immobilized the entire party with web and next round the fireball will take half of them out of the fight.
You have to be very very careful when doing a full party as an enemy. Combat will be deadlier, you as a GM need to know the party (will they run if things get bad or die fighting to the end?) and will have to plan contingencies if things get out of control (string of bad rolls on the PCs end, lucky rolls on the NPCs side, etc.) Single monsters/BBEG are more consistent, reliable. They are easier to tweak as needed, give them full hp if the party has significant damage dealers, a few consumable magic items if the party is full of casters, easy fixes.
If I were running it, I would probably introduce each NPC as the game progresses. Maybe the druid was watching or prompted that night attack by the bears in the area. When the fight is over, the PCs see them leave the area. Later the PCs see a figure in the shadows take off after they were ambushed in the city. That way the PCs know someone is watching, they can use their resources to try and figure out who they are (some role playing hooks) and hopefully get some idea of what the other party's abilities are so they aren't completely blindsided when the NPC party encounter happens.
What if somehow it ended up that bothe teams ended up in a bad situation. They each are I. The middle of the wilderness because they are, resources terribly crippled, and for whatever plot reason they have to fight here. I would think it would require intelligent hit and run tactics, good tactics in general, setting up various contingencies, etc.
Like if it wasn't a lets to storm their castle thing, or lets ambush them and beat them on initiative kind of session, but rather a tough grueling, position, where both sides are struggling.
Wouldn't that be epic?
I've tried this out before. The answer to these questions greatly depends on your players. I know I can't do this with my players because they'll quickly die. Even a small party of 1 Wizard and 1 Barbarian nearly obliterated the PCs to the point where I just let the wizard stay invisible and pretended he didn't exist.
What effect would this have on the game in general?
Based on what you originally posited (“at the end of the campaign”) – no effect, the game is over.
What effect would it have on combat?
Combat would last much longer and odds are good you would TPW your PCs unless you built underwhelming opponents or gave them some sort of handicap to make things more even.
What effect would it have on GM work load?
Depends on the GM. For most, a huge increase. For some, an additional 4 or 5 NPCs isn’t as big of a deal. Some GMs might also want to plan their OOP escape route from the area they will be running the game in.
Why don't we see it very often in adventure paths?
Because it’s not very thematic. It’s generally the “Evil Overlord” not “the 33rd Congress of Bureaucratic Bullies”.
Also, page count, page count, page count, GM skill requirements, and fun factor. See also “Likely TPW” as Adventure Paths are written for the “middle ground” players & GMs.Would you run it?
Sure. I’ve also run games of Paranoia. I’ll let you drawn the lines of inference. :)
How would you run it?
As a table top RPG … ?
(ie this question isn’t very clear)A “Linear Guild” style of opponents can be appropriate, but as mentioned up-thread, the players should USUALLY be given some level of heads-up unless your players prefer “hard-mode” games. (Like most of my “home game” groups do.)
-TimD
If you do a full party, of equal level, with full wealth by level, and 20 point buy I believe that would be CR = APL+5.
Which means the PCs should have a 50% chance of success, provided they haven't had any other encounters that day.
Equal level and full PC gear? As others have said this is theoretically VERY deadly. Particularly if there are equal amounts of optimization and strategy on both sides. You essentially have yourself a coin flip on whether or not the party lives or dies, because in a situation like this, a loss is likely a tpk given how deadly an equal level npc party would be.
I occasionally do something similar and I have played under a DM who did this with our party. It was AWESOME! It wasn't exactly what you are describing, they weren't exactly the collective BBEG. We had already faced down many run of the mil (as well as exceptional) BBEGs and had many more after this. But the enemy party we faced was probably the most brutal fight our party ever had.
The scenario was: One of the BBEGs or BB organizations we had angered hired a mercenary organization to send a group to hunt us. The mercs were very well funded and had some excellent training. The merc Wizards even had specially researched, unique spells. They didn't just roll up on us and draw weapons. They watched us for weeks, maybe a month I can't remember. They learned our common tactics and they specifically prepared for this fight. Then they set up the ambush, first thing in the morning as we were stepping out of a tavern IIRC. As we walked out we were force teleported into an ambush point in a dead end alley. They had specially prepped the ambush point too with a major illusion spell blocking alley's exit, making it appear as just another wall. They also had the alley prepped with a kind of area effect Dimensional Anchor spell because several of our characters (my rogue-ish character, the Wizard and the party Cleric) used Dimension Door like abilities commonly for battlefield maneuvering.
We had a Barbarian, wizard, cleric, and rogue-ish character. They had a Fighter, Wizard, Cleric, and Rogue of their own. It was brutal fight, even for a well optimized, very tactical party who were used to brutal fights that many times would see one of us drop below 0 hp. Several of us were dropped to almost 0 hp and that was even with me killing the enemy Wizard in round 2 of combat. I had HiPS so my first round was spent Stealthing out and double moving to position myself behind the enemy Wizard, round 2 I unloaded on him (like a boss-Rogue). We won, but it forced the whole party to the edge of our seats. We had to think very rapidly, concentrate on group tactics, and do so using a lot of secondary or on the spot tactics since many of our primary tactics were crippled. All of us were close to 0 hp and I think two of us had dropped below 0 at some point in the fight.
Obviously there are things the DM could have done to make it harder, like put the Wizard up on the roof where we couldn't get close to him or throw greater invisibility on the Rogue, but if it had been any harder we probably would have TPKd and I believe the DM knew just how far to push it. Any DM can outright murder any party, I don't want to give the wrong impression that's not what was going on here. He was just a great DM and knew exactly how far he could push this party. It was one of our most epic fights.
Now here's the kicker, someone mentioned not wanting to double the party's wealth up-thread. Our DM definitely didn't want that to happen and here's how he addressed that issue. The mercenary organization never gave up their dead, when the enemy party was down to one guy who knew he couldn't win at that point he triggered a contingency that disabled the area effect Dimensional Anchor and teleported the entire enemy party out of the area. While obviously a deliberate step to avoid doubling our party wealth, it did three things very well: 1) It was a believable tactic from a well organized and funded, intelligent merc party. 2) It left us able to pursue the mercenary organization and those who hired them to kill us as a side quest option. 3) It left us wondering when the next ambush would come. 4) It left an epic impression, years later I remember that as one of our parties most epic and brutal moments!
Who the heck hired those mercs? That sounds hardcore!
I looked back through my old game notes and actually I think they were hired to recover something from the party. It was a Urn that was cursed and contained an ancient imprisoned lich. I was actually carrying the Urn with me when I joined the party. My character and the Urn were from a previous campaign I had been in with the same DM, and he decided to turn it into a major story arc for this group. The lich ended up getting free before we could figure out what to do with the Urn, then he became our final BBEG for that campaign.