What adjustments should I make to run this campaign with a 6-man party? Should I simply add one monster to every encounter?
depends on your party's adventuring style. If they're a comb out the entire dungeon type party, you're probably fine. If they head straight for the BBEG, you might want to throw a few more encounters their way, or fill some of the rooms diffrerntly so that more of the encounters are directly between the PC's and the adventure's main antagonist.
What adjustments should I make to run this campaign with a 6-man party? Should I simply add one monster to every encounter?
I think you can safely leave the encounters as written. However, when dealing with 6 adventurers, show no mercy.
Leave your compassion at the door. Set up all the sneak attacks, flanking action, and area spells you can.
For example: recently, in a fight with Gottrod, the party tank was getting upset because the red dragon was staying in the air, raining fiery death upon the group. *shrug* Why bother to get within range of his sword when the adventurers will die just as easily from 50 feet away?
I have been running with six since I started 18 months ago (we play 1/week). I have had no problems at all. The only adjustment I made was to increase the frequencey of random encounters to keep the parties level in line with each chapter. An earlier reply to your post spoke of the parties sytle this is important, as is the party make up. All of my parties arcane casters are multi-classed. This really hurt the party early on as they lacked casters with spells consumate with the CR of most of the encounters. Most have now taken practiced spell caster (I think thats the name of the feat) and that helps. Personally, I would hate to attempt the SCAP with out an arcane caster.
What adjustments should I make to run this campaign with a 6-man party? Should I simply add one monster to every encounter?I think you can safely leave the encounters as written. However, when dealing with 6 adventurers, show no mercy.
Leave your compassion at the door. Set up all the sneak attacks, flanking action, and area spells you can.
For example: recently, in a fight with Gottrod, the party tank was getting upset because the red dragon was staying in the air, raining fiery death upon the group. *shrug* Why bother to get within range of his sword when the adventurers will die just as easily from 50 feet away?
I'm running the SCAP with a six PC party and having no problems with the adventures as written. They just finished up Zenith trajectory. One PC is 7th level, the others are 6th level. There is a centaur and a hound archon in the party, however, so the bad guys do use more ruthless tactics than they might otherwise. So far, no problems, even though the erinyes in Zenith Trajectory killed half the party...(that was one mean-ass encounter, I loved it!)
Urthblade, my party had the same problem with Gottrod. They eventually drove him off with spells and missile fire, but at one point the centaur threw the halfling barbarian at the dragon because the little halfling was so frustrated. The fall from 60' changed his priorities a little....he he
I know my PC's are a little behind on the XP curve, but the hound archon can teleport back to Cauldron whenever he wants to get healing potions and potions of restoration, so I'm planning on continuing the adventures as written, since that ability balances out the level deficit.
The SCAP is designed for 6 characters, so no need to make any changes.
I just pulled my copies of the dungeon magazines in which the SCAP appeared (which is what i'm using at this point,) and the notes clearly indicate that SCAP was designed for a 4 character party. Was it tweaked to a 6 character party in the conversion to the bound volume, or am I missing something else?
I will concede that it would be easy to play it as a reasonable challenge for up to a 6 character party, but the magainzes themselves belie the statement that Talon made earlier...
just curious
The SCAP is designed for 6 characters, so no need to make any changes.
I just pulled my copies of the dungeon magazines in which the SCAP appeared (which is what i'm using at this point,) and the notes clearly indicate that SCAP was designed for a 4 character party. Was it tweaked to a 6 character party in the conversion to the bound volume, or am I missing something else?
I will concede that it would be easy to play it as a reasonable challenge for up to a 6 character party, but the magainzes themselves belie the statement that Talon made earlier...
just curious
Unless there has been an adjustment made, all Dungeon adventures are written for a default four characters.
I've run SCAP with a group that ranged from 6 to 14 characters and adjusted the encounters along the way, from doubling everything verbatim (40 Kuo-Toa acolytes, anyone?) to dropping out an NPC or two (House Rhiavadi).
How much you'll need to boost the encounters for six characters will depend on how easily they're progressing through the material. If there doesn't seem to be any danger to the party ever, then beef it up a bit to build the sense of threat; otherwise, the group may get bored.
M
There is a centaur and a hound archon in the party, however, so the bad guys do use more ruthless tactics than they might otherwise. So far, no problems, even though the erinyes in Zenith Trajectory killed half the party...(that was one mean-ass encounter, I loved it!)
Urthblade, my party had the same problem with Gottrod. They eventually drove him off with spells and missile fire, but at one point the centaur threw the halfling barbarian at the dragon because the little halfling was so frustrated. The fall from 60' changed his priorities a little....he he
In the fight with Gottrod, the mage managed to distract him with a well-placed ice storm which greatly helped the elven cleric and her blessed comp longbow.
Aushanna the erinyes performed a re-enactment of the Valentine's Day Massacre with my party. She just machine-gunned the mage. If the player had said he died after the first shot, she probably wouldn't have wasted her next three shots liquifying him.
"I'm down to -30 hp! I have a frickin d4 for hit points, come on man!" *shrug* She was spiteful.
And the poor rogue. She never figured out that a shortbow, which does 1d6 dmg is pretty much wasted on something with DR 5/ good. Man it feels good to be a DM sometimes.
PS: By the way, are outsiders susceptible to a death attack?
I just pulled my copies of the dungeon magazines in which the SCAP appeared (which is what i'm using at this point,) and the notes clearly indicate that SCAP was designed for a 4 character party. Was it tweaked to a 6 character party in the conversion to the bound volume, or am I missing something else?
On page 400 of the hardcover it says, and I quote: "The SCAP is designed to challenge a group of six player characters - if your group has fewer numbers than this, you should consider reducing some of the dangers the PCs will face, or perhaps simply allow them more opportunities to rest."
The hardcover does differ from the magazine on this one. The hardcover says it's designed for six, and I completely agree with that assessment. I've run the first adventure twice now, once from the magazine and once from the HC. It's extremely lethal for a group of four, and my current group of five is finding it quite a challenge (lost my first PC to the Grell in Jzadirune).
I am also running this for 6 PC's. Hopefully starting it this weekend. And it should be quite interesting. The party is Fighter heavy.
We got 3 Fighters, 1 Wizard, 1 Ranger(non-spellcasting variant from Complete Warrior), and the last one I'm not sure of yet, but he is usually a Rogue or Bard.
So as you see, the party may be down a Rogue and probably down a Cleric or any other type of healing.
Any thoughts on what I should do about this. I did warn them about the lethality of this campaign and that a balanced Party would be best to survive, but I guess they didn't seem to listen.
I was mainly thinking of letting things take their course to show that they need a healer. I don't think I should bail them out if they ignored my warning.
Any thoughts on what I should do about this. I did warn them about the lethality of this campaign and that a balanced Party would be best to survive, but I guess they didn't seem to listen.
My group is also going to be Fighter heavy (Fighter, Ranger, Monk, Bard, and a Rogue). To compensate, I'm having them befriend Vortimax Weer the potions dealer. In return for performing odd jobs for him, he'll ply them with curative potions and discounts on his wares.
[IMC, Weer is secretly from Thay, and he has a long-term goal of establishing a Thayan Enclave in Cauldron.]
Urthblade--your reply made me laugh...the three PC's that got wasted by the erinyes got dropped to -30, -32 and -28 respectively...they christened her the fiendish MG-42....one comment by my players was:
"What the f*&! is this, Omaha beach???"
Respectable Hobbit--are you gathering from all these posts that it's probably okay to run a 6-PC party through the SCAP? 'Cuz it probably is okay!!
Yep, the Erinyes (sp) was doom on my party as well. TPK! She chased them out onto the steps and mowed them down with her bow. I think the party would have been ok, but they just dilly dallied in the main temple, and two of them failed their will saves to enter. It took them 20 rounds to deal with the clerics and guards.