I am currently gamemastering a new group in an adventure path that so far has had lots of 5 foot wide hallways. There are 5 characters and a small animal companion. Due to a variety of circumstances, they keep getting themselves stuck fighting in a doorway or pinned in a long stretch of hallway in a line. The healer needs to touch people to heal and the ranged people have a hard time hitting because of the minuses for in melee and cover from their party members.
I am letting them move through each other but not end in the same square. Once they get in this long line, they really start getting frustrated. The front line character is a paladin and can't seem to do a bull rush to save his life and every time he fails is a round that he can't do damage. They are only 2nd level right now, but are close to moving up to third.
Are there any good ways of increasing mobility for those in the back? Any ways to increase reach for beneficial touch spells? Should I just draw the corridors as 10 feet wide?
The good news is that tactically what they're doing is good. They only have one point of contact with their opponents at the front as well. Minimizing the enemy's options is wise.
That said, if someone invests in Acrobatics, there's a decent chance they can tumble through the opponent, setting up a flank. VERY risky, but do-able.
Also, if you've got a mage who can fly or cast it on someone else, they may be able to stay up near the ceiling and get around cover that way.
Otherwise it's really a matter of rotating out people from the front as they get hurt.
What adventure are you running?
One of my friends, when he's GM, just changes all the corridors to being 10 ft. wide, with double-wide doors. Sometimes that's a decent solution, especially if your players don't care about dungeons making absolute sense from their residents' perspective. That is, if the corridors are meant to be defensive, or are for small creatures, or are little-used, it may not make sense for them to be wider, although, by the same token, it may not make sense for the halls to be so narrow if they are frequently used, are used for everyday activity, or are used by larger creatures. How many 5 or 6 foot wide hallways do you come across in real life, and how long do they extend? If you're in a house, maybe you have such a hallway connecting bedrooms, but it's probably not more than 10-15 long, and it's rare for such a space to be present anywhere else in a house. Hotels and apartment buildings tend to have slightly wider hallways so people can move past each other easily.
A question to consider is: why do they keep getting stopped at doorways? Is it because monsters are standing in doorways all the time, or because the PCs are alerting everything around and ahead of them to their presence?
In my game, if the players make no attempt at being stealthy, creatures are frequently alerted to their presence and waiting ready for them, while, if they do attempt to employ some tactical stealth, if they are successful on their rolls, I tend to give them a significant opening (like monsters sleeping, or with their backs to the players, or standing in a precarious position). That said, the players in my group haven't picked up on that, I think, as they rarely make the attempt...and sometimes even when they do, and are successful, they flub it anyway.
You should also consider whether it is beneficial for the monsters to be fighting the PCs like that. It may make better tactical sense (if they're intelligent) to allow the players into the room where they can be surrounded. Also, enemies should be hitting the party from both sides in those narrow corridors occasionally. Similarly, you should give the players some opportunities where the situations are reversed, where either they are sandwiching their foes in a narrow hallway, or defending a room with a single defensible entry point.
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Yep. Adjust the adventure to fit the pc's. The pc's are more important than the adventure!
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Any ways to increase reach for beneficial touch spells?
It's not immediately helpful, but there's the Reach Spell feat.
Should I just draw the corridors as 10 feet wide?
It depends a lot on the dungeon. Some might work better with wider corridors.
Others, the enemies that can't get into melee might be able to circle around and attack the party's back ranks. Certain encounters might begin as ambushes from the sides (or above) after entering a room. Enemies with ranged attacks can use them from within a room, drawing the party into the room.
There's also a good chance that one side or the other can withdraw into a room. If melee enemies are bottlenecked and getting peppered with ranged attacks, it makes sense for them to withdraw around corners, drawing the party into a larger encounter area.
If the party's tactics aren't working for them, though, give them a while to try and figure out different tactics. There are probably things they could be doing to move their fights to more advantageous locations as well.
Cheers!
Landon
What adventure are you running?
Rise of the Runelords.
A question to consider is: why do they keep getting stopped at doorways? Is it because monsters are standing in doorways all the time, or because the PCs are alerting everything around and ahead of them to their presence?In my game, if the players make no attempt at being stealthy, creatures are frequently alerted to their presence and waiting ready for them, while, if they do attempt to employ some tactical stealth, if they are successful on their rolls, I tend to give them a significant opening (like monsters sleeping, or with their backs to the players, or standing in a precarious position). That said, the players in my group haven't picked up on that, I think, as they rarely make the attempt...and sometimes even when they do, and are successful, they flub it anyway.
Some of it is poor tactics and timidity. They are terrified that something is going to sneak up on them from bypassed passages and doors, so they do stuff like spike doors shut near other unopened doors.
Another problem is that the paladin in front has crappy initiative and something in the room usually rolls higher and clogs up the door when it moves to attack.
The oracle has decided to take Cause Fear to replace Prot Evil as an attempt to break logjams.
If I'm playing a martial character, I always bring along a Reach weapon. So if I end up stuck in a narrow hallway I can attack through the person in front. I'll still be taking penalties (due to cover) but I'm still doing something.
Party members can also delay and want for someone to attack and then move. This might draw a AoO but unless the target has Combat reflexes will only happen once a round.
They might like the idea of reach weapons. I wonder if a touch spell can be delivered with a reach weapon?
No one else really wants to be at the front, the paladin has the best defenses by far.