Howdy everybody, I'm running a two character campaign with Saern and another friend (who less frequently visits these boards as Dragonnerd). And I was hoping to draw on some of the minds here at paizo to help out.
I'm dealing with a CG 4th lvl gnome sorcerer (Saern) that he intends to develop as a battlefield control specialist (he has done wonderful things with his web spell thus far). And a CG hulking orc barbarian with a greataxe. HUGE str score while raging and the gnome likes to spice him up with bulls str and enlarge person. He has been power attacking zombies and drow into powder recently. Oh, also 4th lvl.
What works well with small party sizes?
The things I've been trying out so far include.
The friend in high places I've injected an influencial powerful NPC wizard who will be near the adventurers for at least the next few levels and will have ample opportunity to hear of and experiance first hand the PC's bravery and merit. The character will be nearby to help the PC's find jobs and step in to settle any misunderstandings that might arise (vouch for them if they get into trouble ect.) I figured this was a good idea since the parties diplomatic abilities consist of the sorcerers cha modifier.
Things I'm wary of doing include adding tag along NPC's to increase their numbers and survivalbility. I'm a very active voice at the table when I'm a player, if I throw in too many DM controlled influences I'm afraid it will just be me talking to myself and no one else will have fun.
Right now the PC's are in a crisis situation in an urban setting involving hordes of 2 hit dice zombies that are easy to evade/destroy and very low level drow threats. Beacause of good use of terrain and the barbarian tearing through anything that gets close the party has done very well and after our next session they will have wrapped up their buisiness in the city and be headed somewhere else.
What I'm trying to figure out is what to do in the future? I built the city scenario with two PCs in mind and it has been great. I've got lots of potential encounters per day that put stress on the players constantly but have little chance of forcing them to abandon their mission. I've got ample reason why they are the only ones capeable of solving the delimma at hand (most of the city has been killed and rised as undead) and I can provide a decent amount of variety with encounters (they've been rescuing survivors, crashing though warehouses, ambushing drow patrols and more to come)
But this chapter is coming to an abrupt end and I'm not sure how to keep applying the ideas that are keeping my game fun witout being repetative.
If any of you guys have some small party wisdom to depart that would be awesome.
Please and thank you, as always.
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The biggest disadvantage of small parties is fragility. Their biggest advantage is probably focus.
You can tailor an adventure to the desires of two easier than to the desire of four (or more). Also, they are likely to be able to coordinate better than a larger group. The downside is that they will have some really big capability holes that you'll need to consider when doing adventure design.
Design to what they want to do. If they want to be Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser (Grey Silkworm?), then do the theft and intrigue thing. If they want to become lords of manors, give them adventures that will allow them to curry favor with nobles. The small party dynamic requires much less intra-party negotiation, so picking a course of action should be easier.
Mechanically, watch out for encounters that hit them in their weaknesses. They probably have some gaping holes in capability that ordinary encounters will hit. Also, watch out for the one bad roll kind of encounter. If you have a save or debilitate effect (Dominate, Sleep, go insane, whatever), be prepared for a single bad roll. Even if only a 1 will fail, people roll 1's, and a small party is less able to recover from that than a larger party.
Thanks Doug you actually touched on one of the issues I've been grappling with. I wanted to try building some troglodyte encounters and see if I came up with any fun ideas. I abandoned the thought because of their stench ability. If the duo encounter area effects with any regularity I'm going to get a TPK of a most undesireable nature. Eventually the barbarian and sorc will fail a save and I'll have two soft targets quickly surrounded by enemies.
I can't have them slaughtering kobolds until 9th level, but what can I do? If they come across a creature with the swallow/paralyze/petrify/etc ability they simply won't have enough actions in the combat to rescue their friend or escape without their assistance. Super easy encounters seem to be the only way to ensure a round or two of bad dice rolls can't kill the party. But that seems lackning greatly in fun.
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I don't think you need to go with easy, necessarily, just choose the sorts of challenges carefully. Creatures whose biggest threat is damage, for instance, should work just fine, as long as they won't take the barbarian from unwounded to dead or unconscious in a single attack. Similarly, monsters whose special abilities degrade the capabilities of the PCs are much less of a problem than creatures who debilitate.
So, perhaps swarms, or creatures that do characteristic damage, or oozes, or groups of humanoids of lower level than the PCs. Your choices are somewhat more limited, but there should still be a fair amount of variety.
And of course none of that necessarily limits non-combat encounters.
I've tried two-person parties before with the gestalt character rules from Unearthed Arcana. I don't recommend it, since the players had a hard time keeping up with their overly-complex characters.
It might sound a bit overpowered, but try giving them extra hp. As mentioned in another post, one of my groups can't do anything right to save their lives. I gave them double hp and everything's fine now.
One of the most obvious problems with two-person parties is that have only have the actions per round that a four-person party does and represent only half as many targets. (Am I a mathematical genius or what? lol) This means they get hit twice as often and therefore lose twice as many hit points per battle. Increasing their hit points should fix this problem.
Also, I notice they don't have a cleric. You may want to provide some way for them to get healing more readily.
4th level eh? Only two more levels until the Sorcerer can pick up leadership. Might be a good plan to help exp[and out the parties numbers.
4th level eh? Only two more levels until the Sorcerer can pick up leadership. Might be a good plan to help exp[and out the parties numbers.
Or go one step further, give them both Leadership as a bonus feat at 6th. Even if the barbarian has an abyssmal charisma score, having a low level rogue or healer can help, so long as they are cautious.
-c
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I wonder if the issue isn't that there are only two characters as such, but that the party is very focussed and therefore lacks (1) healing and (2) stealth. (2) is probably not a huge miss, but it probably suggests that sneaking-around type scenarios might be out (though not necessarily, if the gnome has Invisibility, or access to wands/potions). (1) is a big miss, however, as it reduces party stamina majorly, and potential cleric buffs are out. As such, big attritional-type scenarios might be a problem without access to healing potions, which is obviously an expensive way to do it.
Maybe you could focus on the use of skills to overcome challenges (the gnome's CHA and the physical prowess of the barbarian)? And maybe you could concentrate on big set-piece fights, rather than hacking your way into the dungeon. Maybe let them gather intelligence so they can prepare a bit and get suitable equipment for some of the challenges, to reduce the likely death rate. And consider the action point rules in UA/Eberron - these are very handy for getting out of a dicey situation. If they are playing a dynamic duo rather than a more team-oriented (i.e. larger) party, the action points might give it more of a seat of the pants/heroic feel, which might be appropriate for the tone of the game. Personally, I'd avoid NPCs - they are hassle for the DM.
That said, you mention the trogs - stench doesn't kill or instantly incapacitate, just reduces STR a bit. If you don't have too many, I don't really see a big problem. After all, I'm not convinced the stench effect stacks.
There were some articles in Dragon maybe a couple of years ago which suggested ways to adapt the game if you lacked certain character types, like fighters, rogues, clerics and so on. Sorry I can't be specific about which editions of Dragon they appeared in, but I'm sure someone out there knows.
I'm actually running into the same problem in my SCAP campaign, since two (of five) of the party just dropped out. And they were both the arcane casters of the group. But the way I see it, and honestly the way I always look at any of my tabletop games, is this: Story is all that's important. The way, I think, a D&D game should be run/evolve is that there's a story to tell, with combat, while fun, only existing to further the story or to break up the roleplaying encounters. Sure, there can be a lot of combat, but it should exist for a reason. Much like you did with the city adventure, there's a story there. You build your adventures around a story that you want to tell, that wants to be told, and that your players want to be a part of.
The way you're going about it is "What kind of monsters can I use that my party can handle..." But there's only so many times you can kill an Orc King. I think you need to just sit down, and write an adventure - without specifically tailoring it to your players. And after you've finished designing your 6th sublevel of the Queen of Spider's Dungeon, then go back and specifically look at a monster's abilities and be like "This might cause a big problem, what other type of similar monster can I replace him with, or for what reason would he not have that ability?" I mean some of the most engaging, exciting parts in any of the adventures I've ever played in have been those times where the Rogue just got taken down by an ogre in the last room, the cleric is out of healing spells, and the trapped room is slowly filling up with sand. Some of the most memorable, creative aspects of the game come from when characters NOT meant to be in a situation, such as a barbarian stuck in court, actually occur. What would your characters, who aren't skilled in something, do to handle the situation? It shouldn't be impossible, but it should be a challenge.
Another thing is to look at the characters themselves. One of the newer players (even one of the older players) are having a hard time realizing that their characters have their own desires and goals, and aren't just a set of stats on a piece of paper. Find out what that gnome wants in life, or what that barbarian wants to do. Sure the barbarian might just want to kill stuff, but if something in his backstory (like being born under the full moon at winter solstice, while flavor text, and doesn't mean anything when they write it), can actually turn into something that DOES mean something exciting further down the road, it will draw the character, and more importantly, the player, deeper into the game.
As you can tell, I like story, and throw things out there that I love seeing how the players handle it, especially if they aren't specifically built to handle what it is. And I agree with Aubrey, the Action Points are a great idea for parties with fewer members. I definately plan on implementing them now that my party's dropped down to three.
Another thing is to look at the characters themselves. One of the newer players (even one of the older players) are having a hard time realizing that their characters have their own desires and goals, and aren't just a set of stats on a piece of paper. Find out what that gnome wants in life, or what that barbarian wants to do. Sure the barbarian might just want to kill stuff, but if something in his backstory (like being born under the full moon at winter solstice, while flavor text, and doesn't mean anything when they write it), can actually turn into something that DOES mean something exciting further down the road, it will draw the character, and more importantly, the player, deeper into the game.
The characters have given me a pretty healthy backstory to work with. The barbarian escaped his homeland beacause, as the largest and strongest orc warrior, he was constantly being manipulated and used by members of the tribal politics. The gnome a wanderer/womanizer/nancy boy helped him escape and is helping him coexist in human lands. Which is how they ended up in the city.
The city adventure itself was born directly from asking Saern what he wanted to play. Originally the party was an elf ranger specializing in undead and an elf rogue but they died assaulting a team of drow in the second session (a combination of bad rolls and not enough recon to learn the drows numbers or positions). As soon as this adventure comes to a close I fully intend to use the characters story to fuel events. I'm not at all concerned with that I can come up with stories. It's fun encounters I'm having trouble with.
I've got a friendly cleric NPC that has been providing healing and hide from undead spells that make life easier for the party. The hide from undead keeps them from being harassed by the undead horde as they navigate the city (at least until they start a fight). And the healing gives them an instant recharge every time they make it back to home base, which the cleric can't leave (he is slowly charging a magical artifact that will be able to clear the city of undead, the deploying of which will be the apex of the adventure).
Go with it. All I'm saying is that don't force yourself into an "I only have a barbarian and a bard" mindset. Throw what you want at the players (doing the whole CR thing). Just because a creature has something deadly/challenging to overcome doesn't mean you have to completely write it out. Perhaps they're running into a weaker tribe of Troglodytes or something. Just because you think of a cool idea doesn't mean you shouldn't use it, you should just work around it. Like there's no rogue in the group I'm playing in -- The DM knows this, and traps aren't super deadly/unfindable (and therefore able to be skipped) and most of the time aren't even an issue. From your group, there's a fighter and a performer/persuader. Hitting up heavily on their abilities are fun, but don't unnecessarily take things out just because it would be a greater challenge.
As for ideas themselves, it's really hard to say. You know your players better than I do, so I don't know what kind of encounters they like. On that note though, some points I do have to say is that Dungeons are probably not your best friend. For having only two people, going down into the 15th sublevel of the Dark Vampire's Dungeon Fortress... Yeah, that shouldn't be ANYWHERE near your characters. If one goes down, the other is most likely going to go down quickly as well, or even end up having to leave his friend behind to save his own skin. And getting stuck so far down without ANY help is folly on their part in the first place. I think a dungeon with one, MAYBE two levels... That's best for your party. Ever. Anything more in depth/deadly and extraneous would be wasted and asking for a 2 man TPK (Especially with only limited access to healing).
Urban adventures, things about cities, really play on the Bard's skills. Anything more run the wild plains stuff, that plays on the Barbarian's. I'd have to say something like a frontier-ish kind of place. Some place on the edge of civilized lands, where there's a really good sized city, but beyond that fortress/city lies unknown dangers; That's the kind of thing I would run. You could have some dangers threatening the city, and that would play the bard, and then the characters go check it out and find out what it is, that's the barbarian. Especially since they're helping the city with their "big problems", access to healing and shops and such would be much more accessible because of their aid in the city.
Going from the SCAP, perhaps there's some group like the Striders of Farlaghn, or the Harpers or something that take interest in the characters, and watch them. And if they ever get into some serious hot water where they're missing for longer then a week, then agents are sent after them to see what became of them (aka to bail them out and keep the adventure going). Not to mention the possibility of these characters joining such a group. Something like in the DMG2, an Adventurers Guild, where there's known dungeon adventures sites, and they can gather aid from the guild in exchange for a share of the booty.
Honestly a mix of all of these things might be good for your group of two players, as access to Divine and Rogue abilites are nonexistant. But I would definately focus more on small dungeons they hit up, and more urban adventures. I'm not saying the dungeons should be so small and retarded they're not worth going to, but I'm saying anything really deep would be just asking for some kind of end to the game. Hope that helps some.