Targeting specific players when creating an encounter - is it right?


Advice


Is it right to target a specific player in the creation and execution of a combat encounter? I have run into sort of a wall in trying to figure this out. On one hand, I want to create a challenge for each player when designing my encounters, but when I have run into characters that are disproportionately more powerful than the other characters I end up basically changing the encounter to challenge that specific character. I believe that you are supposed to be somewhat ambivalent as a GM when creating situations so that you don't appear to just be targeting certain players to the possible detriment of others, but I don't see any other proper way around it.

Thoughts?


Well, if the PCs are powerful enough/well known to warrant the attention of others, it's somewhat to be expected. I just advise you to approach these sorts of situations thinking less of "Will it seem like I'm targeting X?", and more "Which character would the enemies reasonably target first?" - there's a reason why most creatures with tactics/morale lists usually have "Targets obvious healers and spellcasters first", after all. Monsters aren't stupid - well, some of them.


If you design an encounter around a single PC, with everything rushing them and ignoring everyone else, that would constitute "targeting certain players to the possible detriment of others".

If your encounter just contains a specific opponent for each PC, that's fine - well, as long as it's done within reason and not every single encounter they run into. Having the BBEG behind a group of PC-specific bodyguards in the final encounter, or a group elsewhere within the dungeon designed to beat them, works nicely.

Just make sure it all makes sense in the overall story. How do they know about the PCs, for example?

It's just sensible to ensure encounters are designed to challenge your players. Just make sure there's a good mix in there of encounters that challenge them through sheer power, or numbers, or tailored abilities, and some that really are just walkovers to break up the monotony :)


I try to set up diverse encounters, including some which really do target particular character weaknesses, but my players to a certain extent have encouraged me to do so because it makes things more interesting and challenging for them.
However take care that you aren't just continually trying to make sure you are targeting (or trying to make things challenging for, or however you want to phrase it) just that one player, otherwise you are actually going to start excluding other players and make things less interesting for them. Try to challenge as many of them as you can, even if it means focusing more on one (or a few) characters in one encounter and then switching it up the next.
Also I try to make a lot of non-combat situations that are challenging as well, since I find my players really get into those, and also throw situations at them where death is not the only risk (they could be challenged by some moral dilemma, something they care about could be at risk, situations where killing the enemy isn't ideal so they have to find some other way than just obliterating the enemy in combat and so on).


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As far as I'm concerned, no.

But there's no actual "right" answer, and it's impossible to "play wrong." You need to ask your players, not us, because they're the ones you have to please, not us.


At the point where you're considering this, it's time to talk to the overpowered player and ask him or her to lower the powerlevel of their character to ensure the maximum amount of fun for all.

Including yourself.


Poink wrote:

Is it right to target a specific player in the creation and execution of a combat encounter? I have run into sort of a wall in trying to figure this out. On one hand, I want to create a challenge for each player when designing my encounters, but when I have run into characters that are disproportionately more powerful than the other characters I end up basically changing the encounter to challenge that specific character. I believe that you are supposed to be somewhat ambivalent as a GM when creating situations so that you don't appear to just be targeting certain players to the possible detriment of others, but I don't see any other proper way around it.

Thoughts?

If you have a PC who is far more powerful than another PC, you already have a problem. You might want to fix that problem first.

Encounters are all about the NPCs. What do the NPCs know? If the NPCs have tangled with the PCs before (or some part of their organization, or did research such as ask witness) then customizing to take down a powerful PC makes sense. On the other hand, random encounters don't know any better.

Beware of the arms race. If someone has a really high AC, you probably don't want to use opponents with ridiculous attack bonuses. Indeed, you want your opponents to be able to target other PCs, even if they intend to take down this one PC. So let's suppose you have a badass greatsword-wielding PC who has a high attack bonus and does lots of damage. You respond with a grappling warrior, because you can't use a greatsword if grappled. But during the battle, the greatsworder was immobilized by Hold Person. Go grapple the wizard instead.

There's a thread on these messageboards where a DM has to deal with a synth summoner, with very high AC. While synths are incredibly powerful, they do have a few weaknesses, such as losing a lot of power if the synth is banished. So is Banishment a good option?

IMO, that's a no. That's too specific about gunning for the summoner. Banishment is actually a spell with limited use anyway so why would most NPC casters prepare it? The summoner could be targeted by:

Almost any type of nasty spell that could impede anyone else. (Glitterdust, Blindness, Resilient Sphere... targeting all three save types! Which of course works on anyone else.) Target their weak touch AC, and note that nearly everyone else in the party has that too. There was even a suggestion of gunslingers, although those are so overpowered they'd probably just kill the whole party.

Lastly, I would just add one or two opponents per encounter who are capable of targeting the powerful PC, without being too obvious about it. If the PCs were expecting to face an evil adventuring party, but said party has an extra wizard who likes throwing around Resilient Sphere, well... Resilient Sphere also locks up clerics pretty good. And heavily-armored fighters.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Is your BBEG stupid?
If not, then yes, all of your main story line encounters should be tailored to the characters after they prove to be a nuissance.


Poink wrote:

Is it right to target a specific player in the creation and execution of a combat encounter? I have run into sort of a wall in trying to figure this out. On one hand, I want to create a challenge for each player when designing my encounters, but when I have run into characters that are disproportionately more powerful than the other characters I end up basically changing the encounter to challenge that specific character. I believe that you are supposed to be somewhat ambivalent as a GM when creating situations so that you don't appear to just be targeting certain players to the possible detriment of others, but I don't see any other proper way around it.

Thoughts?

One thing to look at is what is the player looking for.

One group I play in has a player who basically likes his PCs to be "Safe". He commonly build PCs that are difficult to hurt and/or plays them in a way that means they are unlikely to get hurt. In that case you set the encounter at a level that will challenge the other players and if he walks through with only a few scratch's then it's fine because they all get what they want.


Occasionally I think it is fine, but not every combat. I like for the players to get the benefits of what they built their characters to do. During boss fights I assume they know their forces are being slaughtered so at certain levels I assume divination are taking place so they know something, but I don't give them everything.


synthesists are hindered by any spell that hinders martials, but at the same time, they have a harder time healing their eidolon suit in combat. it isn't permanently sustainable due to having it's own health bar, it's difficulty with healing, and preserving it beyond that limit, hurts the summoner.

2hand fighters who deal nasty melee damage are hindered by bad will saves, ranged combatants whom can soften them up from a distance, skill checks, grapple checks, and anyone with more mobility whom uses their mobility to their advantage.

Gunslingers are defeated when they have to count their crafted bullets, track their grit, and factor encumbrance, and at the same time, they have to account for the need for a third hand, and their damage requires them to pretty much be in enemy 5 foot step range, or later on, giant's polearm range.


I think what you're really asking here is, "how to challenge the party when one character is more powerful than the others?"

Which is different from asking whether it's right to target a specific character (I assume you mean "character" and not really "player").

If your problem is challenging this one character without killing the entire group, there really is no way to accomplish this without either helping the rest of the group to optimize, or nerfing the character in question. In the long run, having a discussion with everybody as to how you can equalize them and get them all on the same footing is going to be less complicated and much less deadly to the rest of the party than trying to challenge the powerful guy by throwing in bigger and bigger meanies, while trying to fight around the others.

If you're actually asking if it is okay to have baddies come after a single character, then I have two responses.

1. No, not if your objective is to knock him down or take him down a notch to equalize him with the "less powerful" heroes. See what I said above. You need to talk to the whole group about the imbalance.

2. Yes, it is perfectly fine to assign bad guys to individual characters for reasons of story. For instance, somebody might be the child of some notorious conqueror, and his old enemies might target the child. Or, maybe one of the characters simply pissed off the wrong gangster. Or perhaps one of the party has unwittingly snatched up a magic item that somebody else is after.

I often switch the spotlight between characters to add a personal touch to each of their stories. The trick is to make sure everybody gets a fair share of the spotlight - that everybody gets a turn and a chance to be chased by their own villains. In any case, unless they are caught alone, the others will in most cases jump in to help. And when they are alone, you just make sure to tool it to be fair.


what is the overpowered character so we can come up with ideas to help?


Thanks for all of the replies, they are very helpful. However, let me present something more specific to clarify;

BBEG can bestow the wonderful gift of negative levels at he beginning of combat, but he doesn't have a preference for any one character (no advance intel, no way of knowing their power levels). Would it be wrong to afflict the more-powerful person with the negative levels to bring him down to the levels of the other players, power-wise? Even if I can give some kind of excuse/reason, I know what I am doing and why.

Let's take it further; Would it be wrong to plan on doing that? You could easily do it with some "reason" to back it up.

Or let's look at the designing phase: When making an encounter, I pick an adversary (assuming one for now) that has an immunity to fire when the more-powerful person relies on fire spells to be super effective. The other players are not affected by this immunity. Is it wrong, then, to use this scenario?

EDIT: No specific character in mind really when making this, I am just using these as examples.


Poink wrote:

Thanks for all of the replies, they are very helpful. However, let me present something more specific to clarify;

BBEG can bestow the wonderful gift of negative levels at he beginning of combat, but he doesn't have a preference for any one character (no advance intel, no way of knowing their power levels). Would it be wrong to afflict the more-powerful person with the negative levels to bring him down to the levels of the other players, power-wise? Even if I can give some kind of excuse/reason, I know what I am doing and why.

Let's take it further; Would it be wrong to plan on doing that? You could easily do it with some "reason" to back it up.

Or let's look at the designing phase: When making an encounter, I pick an adversary (assuming one for now) that has an immunity to fire when the more-powerful person relies on fire spells to be super effective. The other players are not affected by this immunity. Is it wrong, then, to use this scenario?

EDIT: No specific character in mind really when making this, I am just using these as examples.

the negative levels aren't a problem if they are used sparingly, and can actually be cured in an easy method after the fight

the enemy with the blatant immunity might make the single type user feel upset they are facing a foe with immunity. i'd use that sparingly, but at the same time, i'd include a means for them to do something in the fight. such as a rod of Energy Substitution (Cold) or whatever type can actually damage the enemy


Poink wrote:

Thanks for all of the replies, they are very helpful. However, let me present something more specific to clarify;

BBEG can bestow the wonderful gift of negative levels at he beginning of combat, but he doesn't have a preference for any one character (no advance intel, no way of knowing their power levels). Would it be wrong to afflict the more-powerful person with the negative levels to bring him down to the levels of the other players, power-wise? Even if I can give some kind of excuse/reason, I know what I am doing and why.

Let's take it further; Would it be wrong to plan on doing that? You could easily do it with some "reason" to back it up.

Or let's look at the designing phase: When making an encounter, I pick an adversary (assuming one for now) that has an immunity to fire when the more-powerful person relies on fire spells to be super effective. The other players are not affected by this immunity. Is it wrong, then, to use this scenario?

EDIT: No specific character in mind really when making this, I am just using these as examples.

IMO, no, as long as it is not a habit.


Poink wrote:

Thanks for all of the replies, they are very helpful. However, let me present something more specific to clarify;

BBEG can bestow the wonderful gift of negative levels at he beginning of combat, but he doesn't have a preference for any one character (no advance intel, no way of knowing their power levels). Would it be wrong to afflict the more-powerful person with the negative levels to bring him down to the levels of the other players, power-wise? Even if I can give some kind of excuse/reason, I know what I am doing and why.

Let's take it further; Would it be wrong to plan on doing that? You could easily do it with some "reason" to back it up.

Or let's look at the designing phase: When making an encounter, I pick an adversary (assuming one for now) that has an immunity to fire when the more-powerful person relies on fire spells to be super effective. The other players are not affected by this immunity. Is it wrong, then, to use this scenario?

EDIT: No specific character in mind really when making this, I am just using these as examples.

If he's the BBEG, he should have advance intel. Every BBEG has some kind of intelligence network.

The BBEG will likely be more afraid of casters than casters. Or they saw a horse kill a clown and hate anyone who is mounted. Yes, I watched Leverage :) The BBEG has a personality, and since the PCs don't directly interact with them, you can make these aspects of their personality whatever they want.

You don't need to use fire immunity. Fire resistance will do, and it's relevant, since it's common knowledge that lots of wizards like fire. (Even if the PC in question is a half-dragon or something else that uses fire.)

I wouldn't use that one a lot. I would keep trying different things. Maybe next time the bad guy has a cleric on staff who can cast Spell Resistance. That will also stop Fireballs.


Well, I have heard people mention the idea of getting the "more-powerful" person to tone down his character, but how do you do that without getting beyond the scope of player fiat versus GM fiat? In other words, wouldn't you be directly interfering with the creation of a player's character if you said, "No, you can't get that feat because it would make you too powerful compared to the others."? And wouldn't the same hold for the reverse if you went in and changed the other players characters to make them more powerful? I understand that you can outrule things and so on, but I am talking about not letting this one person get feat A because it would make his character much more powerful than the others, but let the others get that feat because they are less powerful and it balances out. Wouldn't that be wrong?


Targeting a character for an encounter is fine as a long as there is a reason for it, and as long as this is done to all players equally. Setting up an encounter to challenge a particular character is perfectly acceptable as long as you do the same for all the characters. If all your encounters are designed to challenge a particular character then you are out of line. The biggest problem with this is that it robs the spotlight from the other players. By concentrating on a single character you have lessened the other characters.

If you have problems with a particular character talk to the player about it. I build very optimized characters and have had many GM’s ask me to tone them down. As long as the GM is upfront about it this does not create a problem. Most of the time all it takes is some minor adjustments. I also offer to help other people with their characters so that the power level is more constant. The only thing that gets annoying is when the GM constantly changes my character. Also if you have someone in your group who is significantly better at optimizing than look over his character at the beginning and look for problems. I would much rather have a concept vetoed at the start of the campaign then after I have spent time building him up. Don’t be afraid to veto a concept if it does not fit your game, but don’t overdo it.


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Creating an encounter to deal with a single character is perfectly fine and acceptable because the leaders of the people fighting them are going to try and find out exactly who is dangerous and who isn't, and then try to kill them.

Furthermore,
WE ALREADY TOLD YOU HOW TO DEAL WITH THE SUMMONER IN ANOTHER THREAD!

Thank you,
that is all.

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