Saw a lot of threads asking about good party compositions for this AP, and was wondering what kind of horrible partys people have run into. Mine seems to almost take the cake.
I decided to be very lax with creation rules. 48pt buy, and pretty much anything you wanted as long as I approve. Reason for this is because we only have 3 people, and my groups really hate using cohorts and friendly NPCs.
We have:
Elf Rogue2/Fighter 1. Uses a bunch of wine bottles to fight with. Is usually drunk most of the time so sets off a lot of traps.
Human Brawler 3. Home brew class that might be similar to a chaotic monk but without any kind of magic/divine stuff.
Goliath Barbarian 3. Only reason the party is still alive. He's the only one that can hit anything most of the time and does way too much damage. Anyone that has played with goliaths know how strong they are.
I'm trying to figure out how they are still alive. No one carries any kind of healing, whatsoever. Now... Do you change everything to accomidate them (changing adventures) or just keep going?
I *still* want to see a party of all bards.
It will either wipe the floor with everything, or die. Miserably. A lot.
To make it a successful party, the bards would have to be like a team of con men or soemthing. Roleplay heavy.
I *still* want to see a party of all bards.
It will either wipe the floor with everything, or die. Miserably. A lot.
Oddly enough, if I offered up that idea to my group, I think they'd take it. My group is oddly fond of bards.
My group has made noises about trying a party of bards from time to time. I think it could be fun if done right.
I *still* want to see a party of all bards.
It will either wipe the floor with everything, or die. Miserably. A lot.
A regular rock band. Would be fascinating, and totally plausible. Consider both the Words of Creation feat from Book of Exalted Deeds, and the Eberron feat Heart of the Song. Now, one of the Dragon magazines printed in one of their class acts a set of bard feats, one of which, called Focused Performance (?) allowed for a bard to double the bonus from his Inspire Courage (at least), though it only applied to one ally. Throw in the first level bard spell from Spell Comp, called Inspirational Boost, and you have a serious buffer, who should be able to make anyone into a warrior-type combatant.
If you consider other prestige classes for the bard to pursue, such as Seeker of the Song, Virtuoso, or Sublime Chord, you can build your bards into specific roles as needed.
Give it a try, and rock on.
BTW, the aforementioned "Words of Creation bard" was what my brother played in my own AoW campaign. He went into Seeker of the Song, and was a serious force, primarily due to his buffing. Though the seeker music didn't hurt, it was the "subsonics" (?) ability which allowed him to perform two songs a round, pretty much.
Back to the topic at hand:
I've only really seen my one party that played through AoW, and it was generally well built to face it, over the course of things.
A bad party for AoW is one without any way of dealing with undead, for sure.
Parties without their own knowledge skills (all of them, really, but especially arcane, religion and the planes) will constantly be forced to rely on the NPCs for information, which in turn amplifies the AP's over reliance on NPCs for providing motivation.
For the love of all that's holy, make sure the party has a level-headed face man by Prince of Redhand.
Parties without dedicated spellcasters are going to be in for a serious world of hurt, and a hard time traversing the distances between many of the encounters. The downside of that is that it runs the risk of turning the campaign into a story about how a wizard and his little friends stopped the Age of Worms.
Played in game once were it seemed everyone decided, without talking to anyone else, to be a multiclass bard.
We had:
Human Barbarian5/Bard5/Warrior Skald1
Elf Bard5/Fighter1/Eldirtch Knight5
Assimar Bard4/Cleric3/Mystic Thuerge4
Half-Elf Bard6/Loremaster5 (my character)
It all became runduant during combat because 2 of usfascinate and the other 2 would lay the smacksdown. It was also one of the few games were we didn't run out of healing spells in the first three or four encounters. Between the cleric and I we were handling the traps that the no-show-rogue would have been taking care of. And knowledge checks became one of the high lights of the game, usually if someone didn't beat the DC at least 2 others did.
Yeah is was all good 'till the DM got sick of us kicking the crap out of his homebrew monsters and beating his custom Dungeon that took him 3 months to make. The party ironically died in a room that had been silenced...
Certainly, some spells are practically requisite for this game. Death ward shines right at the top of that list. Other notable spells include heroes' feast, restoration, freedom of movement, mind blank...all of these suggest that a party without a spellcaster (cleric, ideally, but wizards score big here, too) is going to have twice as hard of a time.
How about three commoners and an adept. I guess you could substitute one commoner for an expert if they got desperate.Sounds like CoC...
I love CoC for scary fun, but ultimately it can feel like every adveture boils down to:
DM: A nameless horror from beyond comes out of the dark at you, everybody roll SAN checks.
Player 1: Failed.
Player 2: Failed.
Player 3: Made it.
DM: Okay, Player 1 and Player 2, you both run screaming off into the night because you've just suffered a psychotic break from laying eyes on the nameless horror. Player 3, you can stand and fight.
Player 3: I shoot it with my revolver.
DM: Okay, you hit it. You blast a soft, fleshy chunk out of its bloated body. It oozes goo. On its turn, it eats your face, and you die.
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How about three commoners and an adept. I guess you could substitute one commoner for an expert if they got desperate.Sounds like CoC...I love CoC for scary fun, but ultimately it can feel like every adveture boils down to:
DM: A nameless horror from beyond comes out of the dark at you, everybody roll SAN checks.
Player 1: Failed.
Player 2: Failed.
Player 3: Made it.DM: Okay, Player 1 and Player 2, you both run screaming off into the night because you've just suffered a psychotic break from laying eyes on the nameless horror. Player 3, you can stand and fight.
Player 3: I shoot it with my revolver.
DM: Okay, you hit it. You blast a soft, fleshy chunk out of its bloated body. It oozes goo. On its turn, it eats your face, and you die.
Classic!
Here's our party for an Eberron campaign we've started. Leaves me worried a little, too.
Drow Fighter 2/Sorcerer 1 (may have decided to be a Fighter 3 at last level up, still unknown)-wielder of a drow spiked chain
Warforged Artificer 3/Fighter 1
Warforged Fighter 2/Cleric 3 (headed to Spellcarved Soldier, DM relaxed entry req)(main tank)
Human Ranger 2/Rogue 3 (Lara Croft wannabe)(definitely the expert, quite daring)
Changeling Ranger 5 (headed toward shadowdancer possibly)(me, using archery style)
Not sure yet how we managed to survive last adventure fighting shifter barbarians with better equipment than us; strategy and tactics might be our redeeming points. DM lets us create what we want (though he ruled I couldn't become a warshaper, as he saw the ability bonuses and fast healing and freaked). We're a bit of a mess and a little underpowered compared to a party with standard starting gold (we started at 3rd with 450gp each, the DM citing the fact he normally has Monty Hall-esque campaigns. Good campaign so far, we're back from an expedition to Xendrik and are probably going to find trouble in Sharn.
See, other people have screwed up parties too!
I *still* want to see a party of all bards. It will either wipe the floor with everything, or die. Miserably. A lot.
Oddly enough, if I offered up that idea to my group, I think they'd take it. My group is oddly fond of bards.
Oddly fond is one thing -- stupid is another. I'm guessing a party of bards would go with the 'die miserably' option.
DM: A nameless horror from beyond comes out of the dark at you, everybody roll SAN checks. Player 1: Failed. Player 2: Failed. Player 3: Made it.
I was always player 3.
I might add that I didn't go into the room, but rather convinced others that 'I had their back.'
Discretion is the only part of valor :)