Is anyone else disappointed by the number of combats in the Adventure Path that end up being a single mage standing in the middle of the room?
My group just reached Luonim, and after talking to him through the doorway for a couple rounds, the monk charged him. Here's the rounds:
1) Luonim won initiative, and cast invisibility.
2) The monk reached the ziggurat, rolled to successfully grapple, and made his 50% miss chance.
3) The bard cast glitterdust, revealing the bloatmage.
4) The bloatmage flipped the switch to rotate the room, as a move action. The monk does not get pushed back.
5) The bloatmage casts Cone of Cold, doing 40 points of damage.
6) The monk pins the bloatmage.
Total time in combat: 2 minutes. Who designed the tactics for the bloatmage, and expected him to get to do anything?
"Dumbest combat ever" is a bit of a stretch, given that "single caster against party" encounters in small rooms aren't exactly rare in published adventures (Paizo, Wizards, and otherwise). I wouldn't even call this a particularly egregious example, as it at least attempted to give him an advantage through the centrifuge. It isn't strong enough, and the room too small, but it was at least an effort.
Even his tactics as written are passable given the situation. At least it is better than the solo opponents whose default tactics are to cast buffs for the first five rounds of combat or drink multiple potions while stuck in a 10x10 room.
So, dumbest combat ever? Not even close. I mean, there are solo melee Wizards out there. An example of a type of encounter I wish was avoided? Absolutely.
A prepped mage can be nasty. Level 10 or so mage soloed 5 level 10 pcs by a combo of flight,stoneskin, interposing hand and cone of cold. Only took off after getting smited by the paladin.
My players pretty much nail everycaster suspect with dispel magic as a first strike.
Works considerably well with all the pre-combat buffs their default tactics seem to be...
Hmm...need to mix things up...more berserk barbarian gnomes ought to work for a while...they'll just spend their first action "disbelieving".
My players pretty much nail everycaster suspect with dispel magic as a first strike.
Works considerably well with all the pre-combat buffs their default tactics seem to be...
Hmm...need to mix things up...more berserk barbarian gnomes ought to work for a while...they'll just spend their first action "disbelieving".
In PFRPG, unlike 3.5, you can never strip away more than one buff with a casting of dispel magic. Since it isn't even a sure thing that you do, that's a pretty good deal for the gnome.
Cool! Thanks for the data.
I'd give it a bit more slack. APs are modules so its still up to the DM to know their group. It sounds like you should've thrown at least some melee type mooks into the battle to mix it up.
I'd give it a bit more slack. APs are modules so its still up to the DM to know their group. It sounds like you should've thrown at least some melee type mooks into the battle to mix it up.
I'm running the Adventure Path because I don't have much time to prep, and the way the adventure it doesn't make sense for the spellcaster to have any minions.
I'd really like to know why the adventure writer designed the encounter the way he did. Did he expect parties won't have something like Gitterdust handy? Because the tactics are laughable.
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Combats are designed for "average" parties, which, according to James, are composed of players who have not played the game together for more than 6 months.
Combats are designed for "average" parties, which, according to James, are composed of players who have not played the game together for more than 6 months.
Playing through a single adventure path surely takes the average party more than six months, doesn't it? We've been playing for a year, every other week, and we're still only about halfway through the third book.
I'm just relaying what he said about what level of expertise AP writers expect from the players.
One day James will have to explain to me what "moderate experience" means to him, so that I can compare my baseline against his. :pIt's hard to quantify...
But "moderate experience" more or less means players and a GM who have been playing together regularly in a group for 6 months to a year. They know each other's quirks and play styles, and are perhaps ready to start branching out into building characters using things other than the Core Rules.
Once you have players who have gamed together for years, have completed a few Adventure Paths, or are comfortable building characters using a wide range of books beyond the Core Rulebook, they are no longer moderately experienced at the game, but are increasingly experts at the game.
And it should go without saying that the more experienced at the game the players are than the GM is, the more profound the player experience will be and the greater it will affect game play.
Basically, long story short, the writers assume the players are not excessively tactical, mechanically optimized, extremely familiar with one another's abilities and gaming style and play patterns, or have larger than a 4-person group, and build encounters and such from there. If your players are superior to one or more of those assumptions, then it's a given that you'll need to spend at least a little time upping the ante on the AP's encounters.
If you're running the AP because you don't have time for that kind of adjustment, then you'll need to fake it somehow, by giving your players some sort of handicap (lower point buy, keeping them lower level, smaller group, or such like). Otherwise they simply will run roughshod over nearly everything in the modules.
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If you're running the AP because you don't have time for that kind of adjustment, then you'll need to fake it somehow, by giving your players some sort of handicap (lower point buy, keeping them lower level, smaller group, or such like). Otherwise they simply will run roughshod over nearly everything in the modules.
I mean, some adventures still seem like they are going to be tough to beat... and I heard a lot of GMs saying things like "we gave creatures maximum HP and added 50% opponents to each fight (/added minions to boss fights) and it pretty much works". That's not a lot of work, really.
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In my take on the Luonim fight, I had the lurkers in light from one room over move in with him. He thought they were angels, they wanted to gauge how easy it would be to murder him to fuel their escape back to their home plane. They kept him alive a bit longer due to splitting up actions, and helped the players feel like badasses when all went down pretty quickly anyway.
Thank you for the heads up, i will probably have him pre buffed (if he can hear the players beforehand in order to have shield up he can also have invisibility up).
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I'd really like to know why the adventure writer designed the encounter the way he did. Did he expect parties won't have something like Gitterdust handy? Because the tactics are laughable.
As the adventure writer, I've been avoiding commenting in this thread, as your tone strikes me as insulting and thus doesn't make me want to interact with you. But here's the answer:
As people in this thread have pointed out, every party is different. In this case, your players were particularly adept and well equipped to take on this encounter. Even then, it involved some good rolls (your 50% miss chance). In playtesting this combat, my own party (which runs the gauntlet from total novices to professional game designers) had a longer battle which, while not particularly deadly, lasted longer than yours. (Luonim hit the switch first as the thing that launched them into initiative--before that they were just talking, as he wasn't threatening them, and part of their mission was to rescue the previous expedition. While the party dealt with the centrifuge, Luonim got his invisibility on and moved off the pedestal, and it took them a few shots with glitterdust to find him. So not terribly difficult, but fun for us.)
In my personal opinion, not every encounter is about the tactics. I'm a big fan of storytelling and general weirdness, and for me, a crazy gnome bloatmage in a spinning room is suitably entertaining, even if it ends up being more of a roleplaying encounter than a particularly challenging tactical one. You're welcome to disagree. That's one of the reasons we have a wide variety of authors and adventures. In retrospect, I could have beefed things up a little so that it wasn't single-caster-on-many. I hope that the other 95% of the adventure was more to your liking.
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The other thing that people should keep in mind it is not about difficulty but about whittling down the parties resources and such between rests and overall resources such as potions and or wands and staves.
People forget that not every single encounter needs to be the one that ends the party. I have a party of 6 people in my group all experienced running together and have pretty decent characters. I have yet to beef up the encounters in this AP at all and they have gone in to fights in some of them thinking that they are going to have a complete party wipe only to pull it out in the last second. It has made for some pretty memorable and epic fights.
As a GM I enjoy this AP a lot and think I would not change much if at all. The luonim fight, while not an epic one was a memorable one as the centrifuge was difficult for the characters to get INTO the room once it was activated as the door was spinning as well as the room. So some of the party was trapped outside of the room. A couple of them tried to jump in to the room and almost died for their efforts. It was a difficult encounter. Did Luonim go to down to a glitterdust.. nope.. but he did go down fighting and in such a way to make the party wonder why he was so insane to begin with and what happened to the rest of the party that he was with too.
People need to keep in mind that this is an adventure and not a one shot encounter and ties in to the rest of the adventure and the group should be trying to figure out how and why. Encourage them to ask questions, leave clues for them. Make the insane ramblings be clues themselves of the so called missing party that your group is supposed to find out about for the librarians.
If every encounter was epic and a really tough fight, I would not blame the group in not wanting to continue through the adventure as it would be to tough for them then.
the centrifuge was difficult for the characters to get INTO the room once it was activated as the door was spinning as well as the room. So some of the party was trapped outside of the room. A couple of them tried to jump in to the room and almost died for their efforts.
This happened to my party as well! I was reminded of that scene in The Rock where they have to time the whirling fan blades...
Thanks, Aeshuura! And to be fair, I really *like* hanging out on the messageboards and answering questions/talking with folks--it's one of the best parts of my job! It's only every once in a while that I start reading a post and see this instead. :D
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Personally, I found this encounter hilarious and I'm looking forward to hamming it up as Luonim, especially since it's going to be stressed that the PC's are expected to rescue him.
"STOP DISTRACTING ME I'M THE GOD OF CENTRIFUGAL FORCE AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M DOING"
Personally, I found this encounter hilarious and I'm looking forward to hamming it up as Luonim, especially since it's going to be stressed that the PC's are expected to rescue him.
"STOP DISTRACTING ME I'M THE GOD OF CENTRIFUGAL FORCE AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M DOING"
Consider that line stolen.
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Personally, I found this encounter hilarious and I'm looking forward to hamming it up as Luonim, especially since it's going to be stressed that the PC's are expected to rescue him.
"STOP DISTRACTING ME I'M THE GOD OF CENTRIFUGAL FORCE AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M DOING"
YES. THIS.
As people in this thread have pointed out, every party is different. In this case, your players were particularly adept and well equipped to take on this encounter. Even then, it involved some good rolls (your 50% miss chance).
I don't know. We just had another very similar combat (against Malagast), and it went even worse. Turn by turn:
1) Malagast threatens the party. Everyone rolls initiative.
2) The archer goes first, and readies an attack if Malagast casts a spell.
3) Malagast turns on his fear aura, and two members of the party are shaken.
4) Malagast casts a quickened magic missile, triggering the archer's readied action. The archer misses.
5) Malagast decides casting a Summon Monster spell is foolhearty, since he'd be subjected to a lot of attacks and it would never go off. He casts Dismissal on the Magus, who fails the save, and disappears.
6) The monk charges, and grapples. The monk has a +20 to grapple, and Malagast has a CMD of 22. The monk rolls a 2, and succeeds.
7) At this point, everyone delays. Malagast attempts to cast Dimension Door, against 10 + the monk's CMB + spell level, and with his +15 concentration needs to roll a 13 to succeed. He fails.
8) The monk pins as a standard action and gags Malagast as a move action, only failing on a natural 1. Malagast is now completely helpless.
This wasn't fun or interesting. Spellcasters get a single round to do something if they win initiative. After that, the combat is over. And this is the fourth combat against a single spellcaster in the Adventure Path.
I'm enjoying the adventure story and design. It's just very disappointing when combats I'm excited about are over before they even start. And it happens again and again.
First of all it's Maligast and not Malagast.
I assume that the 4 single spellcasters you mean are the "Shorshen", Berkanin, Luonim and Maligast?
I assume that the 4 single spellcasters you mean are the "Shorshen", Berkanin, Luonim and Maligast?
Not "Sorshen", but the Dark Naga, Silasni.
I can think of two party-vs-single-spellcaster fights in the previous book, but they were aided by the fact that the combats existed in a larger space against flying combatants, at a level where the party didn't have access to flight magic. That held true for Berkanin, as well.
Well my party hasn't yet reached even Luonim yet(the game is paused due to exams) but what i did in the Shorshen encounter was to add a juvenile green dragon named Aeteperax, change sorshen's spells a little and add 1 wizard level (and the corresponding +1800gp gear) because i knew my party would probably wipe the floor with her becuase the party had access to flight (2 spellcasters capable of casting it and the wand from Chanukrah). So if you don't use XP (and level them up at specific times during the campaign) i suggest that you also start adding things so that you don't have the lone spellcaster issue (you really shouldn't have lone anything) since your party seems quite capable.
Keep in mind that my party is moderately optimized (nothing crazy), hasn't lost any bit of treasure + 2 crafting feats (wondrous items and arms and armor) leading to ~210%-250% WBL* and halfway through the dungeon decided to return to Magnimar (and craft for one month).
For the record they still defeated the encounter with Shorshen and the dragon without a death but they sweat for it instead of walking over it.
Yeah, I'll admit that when I was creating this adventure, I didn't really keep the whole "single spellcaster is weak" angle in mind. It's really too bad that single-spellcaster combats don't work better under our rules set, because from a story angle, it always seems cheesy to me to add a bunch of meat shields just to balance things (especially when you're in a small space, like castle rooms). But I should have taken that into account.
Hopefully the flavor is satisfying enough to even things out. :)
Yeah, I'll admit that when I was creating this adventure, I didn't really keep the whole "single spellcaster is weak" angle in mind. It's really too bad that single-spellcaster combats don't work better under our rules set, because from a story angle, it always seems cheesy to me to add a bunch of meat shields just to balance things (especially when you're in a small space, like castle rooms). But I should have taken that into account.
Hopefully the flavor is satisfying enough to even things out. :)
As someone who enjoys spellcaster encounters that don't have seemingly arbitrary mookstoo, one thing I sometimes like to do is to cause the additional distractions due to a magical effect, rather than a hired meat shield. In that room, quick thoughts might be:
*As the orrery spins, each round one of the planets aligns with a crystalline pointer set into the orrery by Karzoug. This summons a CR-appropriate creature from that planet into the fight.
or
*On its own action, the orrery can draw a party member of its own choice (i.e. GM's choice) into a three-dimensional maze of tiny stars and planets, similar to a maze spell. Only one character can be drawn into this maze at a time. Several akatas and void zombies drift through the maze as well, giving the mazed character something to fight so they don't feel bored on their turn.
or
*The orrery itself is a powerful animated object (or instead can cast various spells to assist Luonim or harm the PCs) with a difficult hardness (higher than adamantine can penetrate), but there are levers in the room such that a clever wizard or charismatic UMDer might be able to spend their actions to deactivate it.
@Rogue Eidolon
Luonim isn't at the orrey room, it's on the centrifuge room.
@Rogue Eidolon
Luonim isn't at the orrey room, it's on the centrifuge room.
Darn, it's been a while, so I remembered those rooms being the same room, with a spinning centrifuge and an orrery at the same time. But you're totally right.
Unfortunately, as much as I attempted otherwise, this encounter was a bit of a disappointment.
There was the initial door opening. The talking with the crazed lunatic which lasted...A couple minutes maybe? Eventually the party decided to approach cautiously. The switch was flipped. One character got bullrushed to the wall and got some damage. And then the witch got higher initiative and slumbered him. He was tied up and gagged and I could see no significant silent/still no verbal/somatic component spells to do anything about it.
The conversation was...Briefly entertaining? But nothing quite like making a pact with Lockerbie or Stink in the first book, or roleplaying interactions with the Grey Maidens in the second book.
*sigh* I was looking forward to him being a nice mid-book damage boss mage. Such nice potential to just be a blaster to the party. Maybe he could've benefitted from an elemental gem or something to summon aid to him on the same turn he activates the spinning.
It seems to me that the primary issue with single caster bosses is this thread are mostly issues with PC's who specialize in non-HP methods of defeating enemies. Grapple Monks and Hexing Witches will steal the show every time against single foes, because that is what they are made to do. Saying a single boss encounter is dumb because you have one of them is like saying a battle with a war band of orcs is dumb because your blockbuster mage or cleaving/whirlwinding fighter killed them all in one round.
Still, a single-boss encounter is often a too-easy fight unless:
1) The Single-Boss has ample time and knowledge to prepare against the PCs, particularly if they know the PC's strengths and weaknesses
2) The Single-Boss has massive terrain advantage
3) The Single-Boss has ways of splitting up the PC's attention via spells, traps, etc.
But the best way for Single-Bosses is to give them some mooks to distract the PCs, even if this is simply summoned Mooks.
Luonim has a little bit of terrain advantage, but little in the way of the others. His insanity however probably prevents him from being a particularly dangerous threat though. Plus, his entire terrain advantage can be nullified by flight, which the PCs likely have access to.
And then theres the Slumber Hex that'll ruin his entire day. :\
In my own campaign, I'm gonna find a way to make his encounter much more.. insane, hue hue hue. And since I'll have 6-8 players, I can get away with it ;)
Now if only they'll finish beating up Zograthy for information so we can get onto the fun parts..
Loumin isn't even a boss:) just a bloated little gnome with a spinning chamber:)
Something that might help future APs is listing a full suite of spells a spellcaster enemy will have up given prep time. Wizards did this for three of there high level adventure modules but seemingly abandoned it later.
Something that might help future APs is listing a full suite of spells a spellcaster enemy will have up given prep time. Wizards did this for three of there high level adventure modules but seemingly abandoned it later.
Paizo already does this.
I've found them to usually be a bit sparse. Rarely are there more than two or three spells. If a high level mage is going into combat in a life or death situation, where he has had prep time, he should have in the realm of 8-12 buffs and preferably a favorable environment. If the players get the drop on him the decreased number of buffs is their reward.
For Luonim specifically I just had him switch out burning hands for alarm. He then cast one copy immediately outside the centrifuge and one some distance further away that still indicated PCs were on their way. When the PCs failed to find the earlier one he used the shield wand, cast fly, and cast invisibility. When they failed to disarm the second spell he cast summon monster 3 and fire shield. His opening round was casting entangle on the walls of the centrifuge. This led to a fairly challenging fight that actually utilized the environment. I'm not sure if this was right but I did rule his lantern archons were immune to the centrifuge.
I've found them to usually be a bit sparse. Rarely are there more than two or three spells. If a high level mage is going into combat in a life or death situation, where he has had prep time, he should have in the realm of 8-12 buffs and preferably a favorable environment. If the players get the drop on him the decreased number of buffs is their reward.
For Luonim specifically I just had him switch out burning hands for alarm. He then cast one copy immediately outside the centrifuge and one some distance further away that still indicated PCs were on their way. When the PCs failed to find the earlier one he used the shield wand, cast fly, and cast invisibility. When they failed to disarm the second spell he cast summon monster 3 and fire shield. His opening round was casting entangle on the walls of the centrifuge. This led to a fairly challenging fight that actually utilized the environment. I'm not sure if this was right but I did rule his lantern archons were immune to the centrifuge.
Well, but that's a very metagame attitude to the whole encounter. The point is that he is insane, not thinking rationally. He would not have had the presence of mind or purpose to cast those prior alarms. He basically stumbled into this room and fell in love with it. I'm not saying you ran it incorrectly. Certainly, you seemed to run it as an effective challenge. However I feel that, in running it in such a way, you did ignore the story of it, which does provide as much uniqueness as the interesting terrain.
I'm not saying that I feel this should've been a very difficult caster encounter (This adventure already provided that in the form of Berkanin, Silasni and Malighast). However I am disappointed that it was basically no encounter at all. I mean, it happens. I just kinda wish it didn't. If I were to run it again, I think I would've found a way to get him still and silent spell, so even tied and gagged, once he woke up he could be a surprising pain for the part.
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Well for what it's worth the encounter ended with my PCs subduing him. They then had him start studying the structure for them instead. He eventually becoming a reoccurring "homebase" NPC. Having this flavor base to build the mechanics off of is why I really love Sutter AP modules.
Weird, my group's encounter with this room apparently was very different than everyone else's. First of all, we were level 7 and having some difficult with the dungeon so far.
So we get to the room and I don't even think there was any conversation. He just flicked the switch. We were all sorta beat up at the time and out of resources so after three people failing to get into the room through the spinning wall we ended up retreating [our healer was absent that day which meant that continuing was difficult]. So we ended up healing up and preparing for combat.
We return. We all go Invisible and apparently the Gnome knew we were coming or something so he was Invisible as well. So we enter the room. One person had glitterdust but sadly there was no Invis Purge or anything. So we all kind of putz around, including the Gnome, for a few rounds. So we figure it's safe, that the Gnome left, so in comes the only person in the group who wasn't Invisible. Then the Gnome attacks. We get blasted by a Cone of Cold that deals like 50-something damage. One person is down, the rest of us are scrambling. The Mesmerist gets a Confusion on the Gnome, but then he gets Act Normally and Fireballs us for like 40-something more damage. Only the Monk wasn't in the area. The only one still alive, he flees. So in two rounds we managed to take nearly 100 damage from two spells...
This Gnome almost resulted in a TPK for our group. Vengeance was ours though... our new group came in, completely prepared and totally minmaxed, and annihilated the Gnome. We sent his corpse back. The DM reminded us we were recommended to return him alive, but at that point no one in the group cared enough to do that.
As people in this thread have pointed out, every party is different. In this case, your players were particularly adept and well equipped to take on this encounter. Even then, it involved some good rolls (your 50% miss chance).I don't know. We just had another very similar combat (against Malagast), and it went even worse. Turn by turn:
1) Malagast threatens the party. Everyone rolls initiative.
2) The archer goes first, and readies an attack if Malagast casts a spell.
3) Malagast turns on his fear aura, and two members of the party are shaken.
4) Malagast casts a quickened magic missile, triggering the archer's readied action. The archer misses.
5) Malagast decides casting a Summon Monster spell is foolhearty, since he'd be subjected to a lot of attacks and it would never go off. He casts Dismissal on the Magus, who fails the save, and disappears.
6) The monk charges, and grapples. The monk has a +20 to grapple, and Malagast has a CMD of 22. The monk rolls a 2, and succeeds.
7) At this point, everyone delays. Malagast attempts to cast Dimension Door, against 10 + the monk's CMB + spell level, and with his +15 concentration needs to roll a 13 to succeed. He fails.
8) The monk pins as a standard action and gags Malagast as a move action, only failing on a natural 1. Malagast is now completely helpless.This wasn't fun or interesting. Spellcasters get a single round to do something if they win initiative. After that, the combat is over. And this is the fourth combat against a single spellcaster in the Adventure Path.
I'm enjoying the adventure story and design. It's just very disappointing when combats I'm excited about are over before they even start. And it happens again and again.
I know this is a year old post, but wanted to comment: your example, as the one in the OP, speaks more about the effects of grappling focused chars on spell casters, than about the encounter design. Change that monk for some other clases, and that other class probably moved + hit for some damage, giving Maligast another action to buff or do some damage or raise a Wall or whatever. Sadly, not every spellcaster can have a Ring of Freedom
The onus is on the GM, so OP, heal thyself.
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Yeah, not really. Paizo writers sadly have a tendency to put single opponents against a four member party.
This is thematically good, since having a single tough guy be a credible threat to four players is something we'd see in movies (only that the shoe normally is then on the other foot, i.e. the heroe is able to outfight four attackers, not the villain).
However, mechanically, the D20 system has no good way to cope with the huge advantage four characters have in the action economy. A single opponent will almost always lose to a party of four, since he has only one full round action per round and they have four. The exceptions to that are if he outclasses them to a ridiculous degree or gets in an alpha strike which takes out two or more of the party (i.e. Prismatic Spray or the like).
A sub-set of the action economy problem is initiative. Since acting first can be so incredibly important in how a fight develops, very many players choose to emphasize having a high initiative. Since Paizo writers don't do that in many cases, the single opponent basically loses after the first five D20 have been thrown.
Single boss encounters should not happen in Pathfinder. Either put some minions in-between the PC's and the boss or obstacles which emulate the blocking factor minions would have.