I am about to run the brotherhood blockade in Sea Wyvern's Wake. I was looking at the opposition, and they seem to not be much of a challenge. (A CR4 character and 9 CR 1/2s?)
My group is four players with an average level 6 at this point but they cakewalked through the demon and will o'wisp in Tamoachan (The warblade one-shotted both of them with criticals!) and they have not been challenged by much recently. The group I think is not too optimized or maxed out but they play really smart.
They have resolved the Rowyn plotline so they will have Amella, Lirith and Skald helping in combat (and even with Conrad waiting in the wings to help in healing) so they have a little army but I wanted to make this a memorable and epic encounter.
This path is my first time running a campaign, so I want some good suggestions. (Especially about power level.)
I am going to change so the group spots a ship "in trouble" that actually turns out to be a pirates laying a trap by faking distress (Fire in a barrel making smoke and their mage casting illusions of flames, bodies and battle damage to draw people in.)
I was thinking:
* Captian: rogue 1 / Fighter 5 / Scarlet corsair 2
* Ship Mage: Sorceror 5
* (8) Pirates: fighter 1 / rogue 1
* A Pet: ?
For a pet I was thinking of some semi-trained chained beast the bad guys unleash from the hold if they start to lose. (And I can skip if the party is getting their butts kicked by everything else.) Maybe a Skrag? I don't know what book it is in in the 3.5 set or how powerful it is now... if not that something else that would look cool chained up... a Gorillion maybe? (non-lusty) :)
Thanks for help in advance!
And the game is tomorrow night...
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 32
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There are some good ideas in this thread.
My favourite was letting the players fight the pirates using the NPCs from the Wyvern, and run it as if it happened while the PCs were busy elsewhere. It was also mentioned that the encounter was written to show the PCs how much they have grown since the beginning - hence easy fight, trivial xp.
Anyway - no point in me summarizing the whole thing when you have the link!
I was thinking the same about beefing up the pirates, when my PCs get to that point. First thing I was going it do is add a wizard, since it'll probably be the last opportunity in quite a while for the PC wizard to learn any new spells other than the bonus ones he gets when he levels up. A few Stormwrack spells to protect/enhance the ship are probably in order, both because they'll make the encounter tougher, and because they'll do the PC wizard a lot of good down the track in the Abyss etc when it comes to protecting the Sea Wyvern. I'll have to make sure that there's nothing that will let them prevent the wreck, though!
As for pets - recommend against using an actual creature. Remember the pirates are near-starving, and in that case any living pet that they might have had may have met with an 'accident' and found its way into the stewpot. Perhaps a construct of some sort, which the pirates discovered on some distant island and intend to return to the Brotherhood for study? A clockwork horror or elder eidolon might be nifty - though a nimblewright is probably too tough for the party level...
I'm going to beef this one up a little bit, but not too much. I want it to be fairly easy because the Mother of All section of the adventure is where I plan to pound on them. They took some good beats in TINH and BWG, so going to give them a bit of break in the first section of SWW. I want to get their confidence back up before I bring it down again.
It was posted on another thread that this wasn't supposed to be an overly tough encounter, and I don't want every leg of the voyage to be near death experience. If the journey is that dangerous than it would never be feasible to establish any kind of trade route between Sassereine and Farshore.
I will boost up Lars a little and I will change the pirates to 2nd-3rd level warriors, and I may add a few more of them into the fight, but I don't think I'll bother with wizards or pet monsters. I may set up a couple of situations where the characters have to make some risky tactical moves in order to save a passenger. For instance, a PC catches a glimpse of a pirate about to cut down a passenger on the far side of the ship and the only way to get to the passenger in time would be to run through multiple threatened squares.
Playing in Eberron, I made the pirates Seren barbarians and added barb. levels to each of them, enough to give them a rage. I also handed out potions of Jump to the entire crew, so once the ship got within grapple range the entire contingent leaped onto the boat and raged. It had quite an effect, even though half of them died before getting to the ship. Just enough to make them beefier than normal pirates.
I agree that this should be a fight the players should be able to cut loose on; I used it as an opportunity to test my players' morale. When given an opponent of obvious lesser skill, how do you conduct yourselves? Do you give no quarter, capture them and offer them jobs, or hold them to give to the authorities?
They killed the pirates to a man and stole their ships, so I informed them that they shifted alignment slightly toward chaotic and evil; not enough to change anything (the pirates were the aggressors), but enough they should watch out if they didn't want to actually take a shift.
I kinda like the big group fight, it will fit my campaign. I just want to know if I am going overboard on their power level....
BTW: I appreciate the linkage to the other thread. Attacking the NPCs while the party was in Tamochan *would* have totally rocked.
I realize the design choice but in my case they are already feeling powerful, having ruled over ever encounter that they came up to recently, so I want to ramp it up.
Hmmm... I think my original idea was too much fire power.
I am going to have a wild captain: Grund SeaFroth
-Sample 5th level barbarian from DMG
Sea Mage: Pud Sprakle
-Sample 5th level kobold sorceror from DMG
the pirates:
(8) fighter 1 / rogue 1
the pet: Slurp
-Merrow Ogre
Have you considered that Goblin ship from Stormwrack? :)
I was totally going to suggest that!
But, would the Brotherhood employ lesser beings like goblins or kobold sorcerors?
When I ran it, the PCs quickly gave up trying to damage the ship and went after the crew. Once the ships got close enough for boarding, it was over quickly.
I would definately power-up that encounter. This is the only encounter the PCs have that day (in game), so they are at full strength. Plus, they have a few powerful NPCs helping them.
The other side is a group of experienced pirates, so they probably know how to use thier ship to good advantage. I gave them a cover bonus as they shot at the PCs from behind barrels and through the railings.
Also, they have had some training working as a group. By employing loaders, I doubled the rate of fire for thier balista.
I suggest, but failed to do this myself, that you boost the pirates magic until they can trade spells with the PCs at range. Otherwise a few fireballs will wipe them out in no time.
Storm Wrack... hmmm... one of the players bought it but it did not read all the way through it yet...
I ran it as I described in my last post and it went very well, a good challenge but they won at the end.
Amella and Lirith were both at -9 HP and there was warblade who had to make the classic choice of which one to save... the babe or the really useful crew member.
The babe of course...