Hey Paizo Community
I've been shadowing the boards for a while but and this is my first post.
Anyways, I plan on GMing a campaign (not an AP) starting in a couple of months for my Dad and brother. I told them that they would each play two characters and start at Level 7, and would be playing the campaign in the Belkzen, Lastwall, Ustalav area. They both got excited, because area is mostly plains, so they wanted to be a bunch of horse archers. This idea soon evolved into riding giant eagles an roc's.
I want to play along, but given the fact that they will be flying and running around shooting people while saying "can't touch this," I'm asking you for some fun, challenging encounters, given the circumstances; as well as any other ideas.
Current Party make-up. note the lack of full casters.
-archer paladin with mount special bond with Roc AC (yes I know questionable
-archer ranger with ROC AC and boon companion feat, with maybe only power attack invested in melee
-archer fighter, possibly archer archetype, taking leadership for Giant Eagle without npc gear, to adjust CR while maintaining concept
--archer bard, taking leadership for Giant Eagle without npc gear, to adjust CR while maintaining concept
Thanks In advance!
Bump
lull them into a false confidence with some ground without range enemies, then from out of the sun lizardy wings!
set up a cool cabaret in the sky on some floating sky barge passing through the area, then what they find out there leads them to delve into a primitives cave full of paintings, a tree gets blown over in a storm revealing a mysterious hole...
then what effect can an alchemical chimney have in the air? what about a planar rip in the air?
okay what about some tiny avian piranhas?
or a ship crashed 60 km's inland
or exploring a giant celestial mobile- in motion and inhabited each area with its own mini adventure.
then revisit the adapted ground without range guys again, but now they are thick with wizards and thousands of burning paper lanterns
stinging jellyfish in the air and japanese style combat kites full of samurai kyodoka.
sorry i cant be more creative right now, tired...
okay crash them into an invisible floating castle full of the servants of a painfully shy super-celebrity bard who actually died a week ago but no one noticed...
oh yeah and because they are family bring a family pet into it as a super villian.
@ligtminder thx for those ideas
@Ecw don't want to rely on protection from arrows and wind wall all day long
Not specific advice, more like a general caveat: Don't come up with a string of encounters that completely negate or counter their forte. Maybe throw one in there to give them the "fish out of water" feel but don't overuse that. If they feel awesome riding those giant eagles give them plenty of time and opportunity to feel awesome. Let them face flying enemies that challenge their strong suits, don't single out their weaknesses and make them feel stupid.
Ya I was actually thinking about throwing encounters at them to make them feel awesome
Any more comments or ideas?
I like to think of a Summoning mage that summons an air elemental that can create a thunderstorm or twister.
Also invisible assailants still pose a serious threat, flying or not, if you do not see the attack coming you are vulnarable.
Griphons can be trained as war mounts and you will be able to field a flying cavalry against the heroes if need be.
Dragons will be a serious threat as well as cloud giants.
Nameless beasts being mounted by the Nine may be overkill.
Certain undead will be able to fly, like ghosts or wraits. Even animated zombies of birds or other flyers are possible.
And sometimes force them to go into a dungeon or indoors. But you could allow them to enter by the roof (a nice change).
I don't know if Pathfinder still supports these rules, but in AD&D rules stated that flyers reduced to less then 50% hp could not maintain flight anymore and forced to land requiring saving throws in order to land save. Failure would indicate landing prone next to your mount or even damage if failed badly. When flyers are reduced to 10% hp or less you would simply plummet and need saving throws in order to reduce damage taken on crashing.
Remember to have fun, you as well as the party.
Thanks people. I like the huge cliff idea:)
Maybe some underwater enemies that surface quickly to attack -- their mounts will have to dive to get them, which may be effective for the guy that just popped out but expose them to danger from those enemies that are still submerged!
I also support the idea of if they pick a party composition to give them a certain feeling of awesome -- don't try to break that. That being said, you can choose things from history that have been an established counter for archers, like:
1) Large concentrated blocks of defending enemies with reach weapons (ie, a Phalanx)
2) Siege weapons (good vs. archers and anti-air)
3) Wagons with mages in them -- the cloth and wood coverings will provide cover for the mages, and they will be able to zap at the fliers.
and lastly --
4) What's good for the goose is good for the gander -- throw some of the same thing back at them!
I also like the idea of fog or bad weather obscuring potential obstacles. Make a storm that is so horrible flying up into it is suicide, so they have to take cover in a canyon to get from one point to the next (making it a race against time or a chase or dogfight could also enhance such scenarios) -- now that they are racing down a canyon with darkness and weather making low visibility (or low to the ground where rock-spires or high trees are a threat -- make reflex saves or riding checks a real threat for them (and their adversaries) -- crashing into terrain was a vital part of dog fighting in a lot of movies -- make such cinematic fare (and fear!) part of yours!
-V
[Q]1) Large concentrated blocks of defending enemies with reach weapons (ie, a Phalanx) [/q]
Unfortunately that doesn't work against archers on horseback (though it would work against your average melee horseback riders)
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For a campaign without mixed classes: This is actually going to take a lot of work on your part. Not having a self-sufficient character party means that the story you tell with them has to be survivable. You'll need to plan encounters around rest periods, provide healing items as loot or buyables, and friendly NPC's whom are willing to heal the party (even if only for a cost). You can essentially defeat this party with nothing more than a few dozen hit and run raids that interrupt the requisite 8hr sleeping periods. Harrying techniques will turn them into a battered, exhausted, and eventually defeated team. Any smart villain would do exactly that.
You're going to need to think of what a clever enemy would do to oppose your party, and how you as a GM can provide opportunities for the party to overcome that. This might mean the chance to make friends with a local healer, or convert an enemy ("They were holding my sister hostage or I'd never have attacked you!" or something), or loyal followers and hirelings. Your dungeons and traps need to be more about disabling than killing, and the fights will become incredibly brutal the first time an NPC or two rolls critical hits. Certainly, if your bard and paladin build themselves into strong support roles they can probably make up for the lack of healing between them. Since it's an archer paladin, I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen. LoH is touch, and so are many other healing spells and...well...Roc's don't allow the rider to get close enough to the other rider to activate Wonder Twin Powers...so that idea is a bust.
Just think your encounters and healing items through. Unless you drop them like candy from a pinata the game will obtain a very gritty feeling as the characters go through half the day's encounters at half health, saving buffs and heals for the really scary fight coming up.
Anyway, just some food for thought. Good luck!
I understand the whole disabling but not healing thing, but paladins are pretty boss healers. Plus the ranger, and bard will probably be carrying around wands of clw, so I think they got the healing covered.
Also the riders can touch anything advance not to their mounts, so they can touch their friends.
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I understand the whole disabling but not healing thing, but paladins are pretty boss healers. Plus the ranger, and bard will probably be carrying around wands of clw, so I think they got the healing covered.
Archer paladins are not. Paladins are boss healers of themselves. The bard and Ranger can grant themselves 1d8+1 hp as their entire action once each round for an average of 5.5 per round. At level 7 your enemies have that beat no problem. Your group is very good for out of combat healing, but not in combat healing.
Also the riders can touch anything advance not to their mounts, so they can touch their friends.
I am not sure if you can touch something 10' away. I'd have to dig deeper into the mount rules to see if they allow that, particularly when talking about flying creatures. I'm certain someone has been through them already and can answer that.
Either way, feel free to throw traditional challenges at them and see how it plays out at tier 6-7 to get a feel for things. Maybe it works out.
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@Kayerloth: Overall sound advice. Some very good points.
The Reach metamagic feat can solve any spacing issues if they need to use touch spells in combat. Enlarge may also prove useful given that 'proximity' to each other when flying is a bit different than when everyone is on the ground. Doubly so since everyone is an archer.
From the specific examples provided, I should point out that you cannot Reach with LoH or devices like wands. LoH does get a feat that gives it some distance if they pick it. I do not remember what it is called off the top of my head, and Reach would work on the healing spells the characters memorized. At which point you are healing 1d8+X for a second level spell slot. Better than nothing, I agree.
Enlarging yourself on your mount is really mean to do to your mount! You become 8x as heavy double in height. If the mount can still carry you because your size category didn't make you ineligible and because you now way around a ton, then that could work out. If you take a second standard action to first increase the size of your mount through some effect then that would probably work out, but you'll still be spending two actions on that one buff alone and the primary weapon for the PC is ranged, which cannot benefit from Enlarge Person. I do not think that's a viable tactic, personally.
I say give em what they are asking for
Flying Castles
Mysterious Caves at the top of stormy mountains
Aerial Dogfights against Dragon Riding Anti-Paladins and Evil Wizards
Desperate race against time to fly ahead of advancing armies of orcs and warn the kingdom.
All the kinds of adventures where you need flying mounts to enjoy are yours for the running.
Make damn sure you read all the rules on Flying and the Fly Skill
Weather is going to be really important to your game. I'd work out a week's worth of weather before each game session. Don't feel shy about having really climactic fights happen in a thunderstorm
Hold Monster on the mounts. :D
I'm still confused about the size thing. AC rocs and giant eagles are both large size and should therefore allow paladin to heal friends.
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I'm still confused about the size thing. AC rocs and giant eagles are both large size and should therefore allow paladin to heal friends.
After looking over the relevant rules for Mounted Combat, Fly, and Ride it appears my initial concern (based on being 5'/10' away from your target who was also on the back of a mount of size Large) is not addressed anywhere specifically. So we'll assume you can lean and they can lean and high five each other for spell delivery. That leaves you only with making Concentration checks and the mounts making Fly checks to pull it off. Sometimes it's good to be wrong.