Okay, so I'm putting together a campaign in Taldor and its gonna be focused on dragon hunting and politics. I got the campaign down, but my group has surprised me in that they are basically all martials with exception of 1 vanguard.
Now I'm very interested in how this will play out since most are focused on mainly melds with some range sprinkled in. Now I'm usually the type of GM who rolls in open and let's dice fall where they may, so while I don't shy away from pc deaths, I don't actively seek it out, because without the players how else am I to tell a story that they enhance and interact with.
So I am asking for advice in what should I tweek so that basically the players have a chance to survive without a class healer or really a class caster? I thought about reducing the enemy casters to where there still are casters but not underneath every rock. But I thought about what spells to shy away from unless they add something themeactically or just used sparingly. Also about healing, should I up the chances for potions or wands of clw? Should I adjust the wealth?
I'm in new waters and while the thought excites me, I would like some advice so that things could run smoothly and advoid situations where they cannot overcome at all etc.
Tyvm in advance
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Drop plenty of consumables. Magic items with spell 1/day can also be useful.
/cevah
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If the players aren't willing to balance out their own party, then let the chips fall where they may. After a near TPK or two, they'll start considering multi-classing out of necessity.
Well my party have played for a few years and this has kinda shocked me, but I'm kinda excited in having an unusual party since I'm so used to a party full of barbarians and wizards with a single healbot, so I wanna try my luck at making this party composition work.
I may start out with adding just a few health potions at first but not enough for everybody, to kinda passively make them think about the dangers. I just want them to have fun and not think that one or a few of them has to drop what they doing just so they can fill a role....hope that makes sense lol.
What are the exact classes?
Rogue, monk, slayer, cavalier archtype without mount, and paizo version of vanguard.
Unless the Rogue is looking to be a Sneak-Attack specialist, he/she might consider Multi-classing as you progress. Rogues are possibly the best for MC because they are, at the core, skill-monkeys. The monk is in almost as good a position to be the party scout.
If he/she wants to do Sneak Attack damage, however, that won't work, but in a party full of maximum-hurty types, the sneak damage isn't as important (except, perhaps, to the player!).
My advice would be to talk to the players and ask them whether they want to be spending much of their gold on potions and wands, or whether someone might reconsider their class and go for a spellcaster/buffer.
so no range specilist and no casters.. and they going to hunt dragons? as in flying things that have breath weapon,reach and usauly spells? get trhough one air skirmish and see that who ever is left alive realaze he need a more balanced group.
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Let the chips fall where they may. They chose to play those characters. Be fair, but don't make special considerations just because of their choices. Resource management will be key. There are potions and other items to offset their lack of diversity. They will need to be very intelligent with how they approach their Dragon prey.
Let the chips fall where they may. They chose to play those characters. Be fair, but don't make special considerations just because of their choices. Resource management will be key. There are potions and other items to offset their lack of diversity. They will need to be very intelligent with how they approach their Dragon prey.
Runing stright at it yelling "xp xp xp" might not be the best aprouch...
They could always present themselves as Encyclopedia Dragonica Salesman...
Or, politely inform the Dragon they wish to Burgle him/her only to reveal themselves to be Encyclopedia Dragonica salesman moments after being allowed into its lair.
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I would disagree that they need a more well balanced group (at least in this type of situation).
This can be offset with consumables, magic items that provide protection vs. spells and energy, and maybe some slightly high wealth targets.
However, an actual bunch of heroes should come to a healthy realization they may be underequipped once they learn of the dragon menace and discuss tactics upfront in addition to progressing in feats, skills (UMD maybe), and equipment that will help.
so no range specilist and no casters.. and they going to hunt dragons? as in flying things that have breath weapon,reach and usauly spells? get trhough one air skirmish and see that who ever is left alive realaze he need a more balanced group.
True. Granted 3 of the 5 classes will have evasion for breath attacks, the vanguard can counter spell and eventually reflect spells back at the caster, and the cavalier is being design more around protecting party members than actual damage. The slayer and rogue will be focusing on both range and melee, so while they won't be super great at both, they will be decent. Also they will have at least 4 or 5 mythic tiers before its all over.
So they ain't gonna be helpless per se, but also not optimized for it as well.
Any chance of getting additional players? Is this in a PbP?
It's a home game with some friends. First time going full blown theatrics instead of using maps and minis and etc. might have 1 more person coming in but have no idea what they wanna play
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This is the party composition they chose. They should live with that, until they don't. Don't make things easier for them just because they picked an unbalanced group, but certainly don't make things harder. Perhaps even drop a few more consumable items, just to be cooperative.
Glad to see they are playing without a healbot. Having one is a needless crutch that promotes awful tactics. They're better off without a healbot. In fact, playing without the crutch of a healbot, if they are accustomed to one, is quite likely to up their game considerably.
While they are better off without a healbot, the lack of a Support Caster (aka Arm) will hurt badly. The lack of a battlefield controller (aka Anvil) will hurt even worse. This group seems to be all melee Hammers, lacking even a ranged hammer. With this sort of awful group composition they are likely to get their heads handed to them by the first serious flying, spell casting foe they face.
The OP already observed how unbalanced the group is. According to The Forge of Combat, here's the sort of pain they are likely to experience:
Groups without Anvils: Groups without anvils typically end up having an overabundance of hammers with one or two members playing the part of arms. These groups typically have fast, furious fights where the group takes a lot of damage. In these situations the arms often take on a reactive role providing healing and buffs as able while the hammers frantically try to end the encounter quickly. Depending on the nature of the hammers this often drains the arms very quickly of resources or forces the hammers into more and more defensive roles draining overall resources more as the group is not ending encounters efficiently enough.
Groups without Arms: Perhaps the most forgiving of the three major imbalances. These groups usually spend more resources than necessary to finish an encounter. When they don’t they exist on a razor’s edge where an enemies passed save or a characters failed save can mean the difference between failure and victory. This is much worse in groups that lack the means to magically heal themselves and are thus forced into shorter adventuring days or burning wealth on tons of cure light wound wands.
Expect this group to display both the above behavior patterns in combat. Unless the GM keeps the kid gloves on they are likely to be crushed by the first serious encounter. Hopefully, after a few PCs die horribly, they will be replaced with PCs who balance the group better. Hopefully, by this time, the players have figured out the problem and take decisive action to fix it. That would probably be the best outcome.
If these were new players I'd suggest going easy on them. It's not. This is a group of very experienced players. They chose to build an unbalanced group, when they ought to know better. Let the chips fall where they may.
Perhaps, by way of driving this lesson home, have the PCs face a group of Hobgoblins or Orcs who use combined-arms tactics. I'm talking about a party of weak foes with a well balanced group composition and smart, rehearsed tactics. Like a typical non-elite military unit. Each foe is weaker than each PC, but make sure they have an Arm, an Anvil, and a bunch of Hammers. Let the PCs squirm and twist as they see these obviously inferior foes pose a serious threat through the use of superior tactics, positioning, and group composition. The PCs still ought to win, but they might learn something. E.g. Orc Shaman casts Entangle to hinder PC movement, the best orc warriors get Enlarge Person & buffs and wield a reach weapon to defend the archers with readied actions, trips and AoOs, while most of the orcs are archers (with some active Buff spells ), concealed in difficult terrain, who keep pouring on the missile damage. A few archers have Tanglefoot bags, which they throw at PCs who get close. PCs will likely be doubly-Entangled in Difficult Terrain taking constant damage. For extra bling give the orcs Bardsong (drums!), have them choose a battlefield that restricts PC mobility, have both casters cast multiple Summon Monster spells from the backfield, and have a trench of soon-to-be-flaming oil to block the PCs advance (stranding and separating the 1-2 PCs have got past!) on those annoying archers.
Okay, I have a 6th player now and he's going tiefling hunter. He finds it exciting that he gets to focus on range and helping with support.
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Remeber: the point of the game is for you and your players to have fun.
I don't have an issue with occasionally punishing the players for making a bad decision (tactical or strategic). I don't like constantly punishing the players because they aren't playing the way i want them to; that's not going to be fun for anyone.
I think you have 3 options:
1) Adjust your game to accommodate your players choices of class.
2) Talk to your players about adjusting their class choices because dragons.
3) Let eh beatings begin.
I'd start with 2. If they don't budge, go with 1. 3 is a last resort.
-Skeld
I was in a dragon fighting campaign that the rest of the party were 3 melee people, The dragon was super nice and would move into the party, on the ground, where he'd get surrounded by the three melee people. Then the dragon would use it's breath weapon instead of making a full attack. It drove me nuts because the GM complained that the fights were too easy but it was because of his bad tactics, but hey, it let the melee people look awesome and kill dragons. So you could always play the fights dumb like this in their favor.
I try to keep the game fun at all times. I believe if I tweek it the right way, I think I have a way for magic to really impress as far as enemies and what not. I think the first route will be to scale back the amount of casters in the world, aka make it feel like their isn't a caster around every nook and cranny in wilderness and civilizations. I guess with dialing them back, make them look more "deadlier" without having to resort to high fantasy loopholes etc etc. I'm gonna have to dial back the type of spells as well, or at least use some sparingly. And the type of items as well on both sides.
Got a lot of work cut out for me but I think I can make this work. It's something new, almost like it adds a new tone to the game and I'm very curious in seeing how it plays out. Will also have to adjust the encounters and situations when I see my players finally seeing retreat as an actual option.
I dunno, is it bad that I somehow feel very excited about this mash up of party composition and in how I'm gonna have to tweek the game for them to have fun and a chance to succeed without pulling punches when the dices fall?
Putting together a homebrew for a martial heavy party is pretty easy because they're easier to predict. You are going to have a much better idea of what they can handle.
You'll just need to keep a few things in mind.
1. Cevah's suggestion for consumables is a good one.
2. Make sure that they've got gear sufficient to the challenge.
3. Perhaps allow them special dragon-killing feats.
4. They don't have to know that the BBED isn't statted as a Great Wyrm, but merely as an Ancient.
Let them play what they want and ignore everyone saying that your players are doing it wrong.
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I liked the Dragonlance Dragon Orbs. These powerful magical mind control devices forced dragons to use really bad tactics. One was the critical component of a Trap to kill Dragons. So this artifact-level magic item mind controlled hostile dragons to do exactly what Chess pwn's GM had the dragons do by choice. I like it :-)
If the melee party focuses on magic that ups their mobility, and UMD for that and utility and post-combat healing, you might be surprised at how effective they are. Big 'if' of course, but the amount of damage they can pump out could turn the game into rocket tag really fast.
They just need to work on scouting or other mundane intelligence gathering means (social skills to get informants or to interrogate captives) to avoid being surprised and to choose their battlefields, and work on exit strategies when things look bad (low level mists and fogs to cover retreats, high level dim doors and teleports to bug out, preferably using spell storing or umd spell trigger).
If their tactics or DPR are lacking, though, there will be plenty of room for replacement characters to fill the holes though.