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Minor spoilers ahead, but this is the ROTRL thread.
I just finished Chapter 2 with my group. The initial runs in Burnt Offerings were a challenge, but the PCs seem to have found their niches, and this AP is having a hard time challenging them now. The Xanesha fight was very one-sided. The party just can't seem to fail saving throws at all.
What I have:
Aasimar Bard (Thundercaller) 7
Halfling Paladin/Oracle with damage soaking ability via link 2/5 or 3/4
Tiefling Magus (Bladebound/Kensai) 7
Human Barbarian/Rogue (demoralize optimized build with dog flanker) 7
Fights normally go like this:
Bard thundercalls forcing most enemies to take sonic damage and save to avoid being stunned.
Magus and Barb/Rogue use spell combat and sometimes massive sneak attack damage to mow down the mooks that aren't stunned.
Pally/Oracle provides support, and in the event that anyone does take damage, slowly soaks it up over the next few rounds to keep anyone from falling down.
Some fungi and undead have advantages versus the thundercall approach due to immunities to sonic damage and inability to be stunned, but the next chapter really worries me. Ogres are going to be falling all over the place. It's going to be a bloodbath.
Without doing a major overhaul of the chapter and without doing something that specifically singles out the Thundercall ability to nerf the one PC, what are my options for making this a challenge for them again? Do I need to resort to giving a whole bunch of the ogres the zombie template along with one or two doses of advanced template?
AbyssLord
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And I hesitate about splashing undeath everywhere because part of the psychology of this next chapter is that the ogres are sentient and thinking and utterly vile and horrible beings that are doing the worst things imaginable. Making them undead will ruin the flavor of the chapter, because they are no longer "thinking" beings.
AbyssLord
Where does Thundercaller come from?
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Where does Thundercaller come from?
Varisia, Birthplace of Legends
Which is very appropriate for this AP.
I allowed the group to be PFS legal.
This archetype is broken, IMHO. Allowing a seventh level caster 20+ uses of a spell daily that is the equivalent of a second level divine spell is broken. It needs fixing. Especially since SR doesn't work because it's defined as (Su).
AbyssLord
AP's do not stand up to optimized groups. Throw in some advanced templated ogres, and take away some of the normal ones if you want to keep XP the same. I also like advanced ogres because I can use tactics that make sense.
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1. That chain of events happening in every fight is contingent on them winning initiative. Do what it takes behind the screen to ensure that something else gets to act sometimes.
2. Related: surprise rounds.
3. Thundercall is only a ten foot radius. Spread enemies out.
4. Thundercall makes a deafening noise. You have just alerted every enemy on the floor to the presence of combat. Keep track of when a thundercall drops and start moving everything else on the map towards their position. Don't leave initiative, have said creatures play intelligently, taking up flanking positions behind doors, readying actions, etc.
5. Ranged attacks from attackers that this party can't get to easily will be a massive threat to them. Use archers in a balcony that can only be accessed from another room, that hit them right when a melee combat starts to clog them up.
Bottom line: your players are playing smart and strong. Play the creatures they are fighting just as smart and strong.
The bard has made sure to optimize his initiative.
It's hard to spread out foes when they are constricted within dungeon rooms.
I've done the Thundercall alerting enemies thing. This hasn't hurt them yet. Tons of ghouls were no problem and tons of low-level Skinsaw mooks were no problem. Tons of goblins did give them some issues in the first chapter, though.
Ranged is a problem for them. In the rare instances that this has happened, the Barb/Rogue was able to take on the proper role of a barbarian (taking damage) while using the barbarian speed to close with the squishy archer enemies.
Most of these options aren't readily available in a lot of the parts of the next chapter, though. The fort could be fun, fast, furious, and over within a few minutes.
AbyssLord
What's the DC he's working with? The Grauls have a decent Fort save and the ogres have +13.
Is he really rocking a 23+ DC on that spell?
If not the ogres should be saving way more than the stuff they've fought so far.
As it's a bard song (in essence) you could toss in a couple of bardish ogres for countersong (giving a huge bonus to the save) - perhaps after seeing this tactic used against them they call for their 'ogre rhymers' to shout back...
If it's a rush situation - as in everything notices the thunder and rushes them you can spread the ogres out - stay in initiative - and use delay/ready actions to stay out of range and rush\charge the bard if they spam the ability.
Also I'd have the really stupid ogres (the ones without class levels) start stuffing bit's of ranger/grass/whatever they can in their ears if they see this happen giving a +1 or 2 circumstance bonus on the stun save (not on the damage).
As to other critters - silence works as a counter, as does surprise and range.
I do have to agree - that ability seems pretty nasty, if it's *really* giving you fits perhaps a sit down with the player and ask them if they could avoid spamming it - or possibly changing the effect to staggered instead of stunned - which would at least allow things to either move or attack/defend themselves.
Other things immune to stun...
Undead
plants
constructs
elementals
behemoths
inevitables
robots
Unless that bard really sank everything into CHA, I have trouble seeing him get much harder than a 17-19 DC on that sound burst, which the Ogres will make on all but the worst rolls.
Rebuild encounters. Count all exp for particular fight, and from this budget make some though enemies with more class levels. For example - my party will come to Grauls being 10-11 levels. Instead of a big family of low-level (in terms of challenge) ogrekins, I'm going to throw only 3. Two 11 level "parents" (gravewalker witch with occult patron and antipaladin), and one 9 lvl "son" (chameleon scout rogue). With some good ambush tactics, I really plan to give players a challenging fight.
Optimized builds often do optimized things - there's nothing wrong with letting the PC's be successful, even wildly successful, when their characters are operating as they were intended to be so.
Some things to keep in mind:
Flyers and ranged foes will definitely cause this group some problems. Nothing wrong with mixing in the occasional challenge that involves them.
Opposing saves should begin out scaling what the Bard is able to do pretty quickly.
As the group's tactics become more and more known (remember, Special K and his minions will be keeping an eye on them very soon), people will begin preparing for them. A simple thunderstone and some deliberately failed saves is enough to cancel out that strategy.
Don't be shy about throwing in extra waves of mooks whenever and however you wish. I often do to keep things interesting.
You could remove one of the Ogre Fighters and replace him with an Ogre Cleric. Level 5 Cleric with the summons feat that lets him or her cast a summon monster spell as a standard action instead of a full round.
You could also use a Surprise round in which the ogre fighter holds its action instead of attacking - and the moment the bard starts casting, hit him with a thrown javelin. Spell disruption. ;)
Given that ogres are 10x10 monsters, it will be difficult to get more than three of them in a Thundercall. Probably only two will be hit.
BTW, what point builds are the players? If it is above 15, compensate the monsters. A 25-point build is the equivalent to +1 to every single stat, down the line. A 35-point build (caused by 4d6 rolling of stats) can be compensated for with +2 to each stat, down the line.
First thing - ignore the tactics in the AP, they stink. No shot at the writer, the tactics are written for a lowest common demonimator set of players. If your pc's are optimized and your players know what they're doing, the monsters/npc's are going to get run over.
When a fight starts, immediatelly have any nearby occupants head directly for it. There's no reason for anyone to sit still when their companions/allies/clan members/fellow thralls are getting mauled. It's only a matter of time before that trouble comes for them. And that behavior should spread through whatever complex the pc's are invading. You can always turn the spigot off if the pc's are getting overwhelmed, but the single advantage the monsters likely have is in numbers - they need to press that advantage.
Second, ranged attacks rule. They are the dominant force in real world warfare and every npc should have some kind of effective ranged attack whether weapon or spell. And they should use them in preference to melee. If the monsters don't have ranged attacks you like, change them to ones you do like and will use.
Third, if any npc caster has healing spells on their class spell list, make sure they have some memorized/selected. And use them. And not just on themselves. This is the #1 advantage pc's have in most encounters - they slug it out with the monsters for a couple rounds - then the pc's get their hp level back to where they started and then the monsters die after more slugging.
True, but this isn't the real, MODERN world, where I might also add ranged combat only reigned supreme when it became more efficient than close-quarters, which only happened at a technology level far in advance of everybody on this particular FANTASY world save Numeria. Plus, these are Ogres we're talking about.
That said, ain't nothing wrong with some Ogre Javelin-/Axe-Throwers in the mix as supporting fire. In fact, have one of them specifically target the Bard, forcing him to cover his own ass for a while.
I mentioned this before in another thread.
Concentration of Firepower.
This works quite well with ranged attacks. Never forget the ranged attacks. Have the ogres and other critters move and if unable to reach their target then throw their javelin or boulder or whatever. And have them go after the healer or bard first. Preferably bard. Take out the bard, then take out the healer. Ignore the big damage dealers as you want to eliminate the source of buffs and healing, at which point the group is suddenly running scared (if they're smart).
Use tactics. Eliminate their support and that results in their big damage hitters being less effective.
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This is something I've done in the past when I found the indoor encounters were extremely tight, such as a small hallway or small room, I would double the size of the entire map. If the map squares are 5 ft, I would make them 10 ft. While this does make the players go "omg, this bedroom is f-ing huge!", those enemies now have some room to manuever around the PCs. It also makes those ranged enemies a bit harder to reach in a round or 2.
Just my $.02 :)
What ckdragons said. I've noticed the maps in this AP are constrained. Increase the size....
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As mentioned upthread, thunder down the hall can be pretty noticeable (but for Fort Rannick don't pull everything at once if it's raining and they're outside). If they end up using it during the fight with the sorcerer ogre or the big boss ogre you could very easily end up with those two fights together, which can turn nasty fast.
Your group may be in for a bit of a wakeup call if ogre hook crits start falling, especially if the ogres are hasted and the party is being blasted by lightning bolts at the same time.
As general advice, Runelords tends to have spikes in difficulty. For a reasonably optimized party, they'll walk easily through large portions, then be slammed by an occasional difficult encounter. As you get higher levels, you'll want to add things on occasion to keep it interesting. Applying simple templates and increasing hit points are nice things for simple modifications. Adding a few extra enemies can also work nicely just to make sure fights last long enough for everyone in the party to act.
In order to make certain fights more memorable, it can be nice to add custom monsters that are a bit more optimized than the standard. This works especially well for recurring villains since their prior knowledge of the party might help them plan accordingly.
Here are a few of the changes I've made:
party - goblins - wall of stone - the slow guy in full plate
The party tossed a fireball, killing every last goblin, and then moved on to the gunslingers, while the full plate guy approached the wall. Then Nualia (leveled up as a melee cleric) riding a Bebelith, a gift from Lamashtu, attacked the poor unsuspecting plate wearer. After shelling his armor off, and the party deciding he could fend for himself, the plate wearer died. Nualia went on to attack the party during the gunslinger fight, but was eventually forced to retreat via Plane Shift.
Obviously, this type of change only works if you have Nualia or another character that escaped and holds a grudge against the party
We have only 2 sessions to go until the end of book 6, and I have some fun things planned for their party with Karzoug.
Don't forget: If the giant ranger thinks the party is particularly tough, he'll blow his horn to summon reinforcements - including Longtooth and any other giants in the area. I'd say that gives you every incentive to increase the number of giants by two to four (or more if your party can handle it) in a couple of waves (ie, a round or two apart).
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I've done a few things to curb player strength in my game and we are just finishing book 3. As a general rule I gave everything 20-25% more hp. Here is what I did for each of the big encounters of that book if they could be helpful at all. (I should note that I have 5 pretty experience players)
1.) There is a thread where either Gluttony or Tangent101 suggest new tactics for Crowfood where he waits for a party member (or Shalelu) to pass the corn field and then he uses a sneak attack CMB and improved drag to pull that person into the corn field and then start doing spring attacks on them (gave him improved drag in place of one feat). Worked pretty well. When they started walloping him and flying around the corn field he stealthed his way to the barn for reinforcements. As they say in the thread, "He's a rogue, he should act like one."
2.) Give the regular ogrekin either the barbarian or fighter templates from monster codex.
3.) Hucker Graul sneaking around in the house after they have already set off traps resetting them is fun. Downstairs I allowed his pets to draw attention to the room he is typically found in and then he put an oil of deeper darkness on his ogre hook and sandwiched the party from the southern room. (Also from the same thread I gave him blind fight in place of combat reflexes). I had him run away really early and run to join with Muck Graul and have the Tendriculos ready an action to attack the first thing that opened the door.
4.) Mammy I upped two levels and trapped her door with symbol of pain (also a thread suggestion). She dim doored out into the yard when the party started in on her boys and then flew from place to place using animate dead to raise all her dead sons (and a large number of other corpses they were using for fertilizer in the corn field) into a small zombie army. Topping it all off they had to go back through all the traps that Hucker Graul had been resetting.
1.) I didn't change this much and the party kind of churned through it. They had problems with Pappy but ultimately the only problem they had was when they split the party. I would keep Lucrecia on the move dim dooring away at the slightest notion of being outnumbered severely. I kept her alive, up until the fight with Barl when the party essentially got very tired of her.
2.) I didn't use this for Fort Rannick but the level 5 ogre (manhunter) from the monster codex is a much better build than the one in the AE. I used it for later fights and the whole trip/vicious stomp combo works really well.
3.) If I had it to do again I would at least give the basic ogres the fighter creature template from the MC.
1.) Don't start the Demo Crew of Ogres fatigued. They are already well outmatched and are going to get steamrolled.
2.) This is perhaps a horribly evil plot and one I didn't actually have the heart to use but consider having Grazuul, when hurt swim into the tunnel between his area and the one with the Skull Ripper to draw the party in there. He can then return to his original pool and attack them from behind while they try to deal with the construct.
1.) All regular ogres given fighter creature template and mwk ogre hooks.
2.) Manhunter (Ogre Fighter 5) from MC once again.
3.) The adventure doesn't specify but I'm not sure I wouldn't have Lamatar attack a group fighting Barl from behind. Otherwise he is a VERY minor speed bump.
4.) If Lucrecia is at the fight with Barl have her cast Mage Armor on the Stone Giant and Barl if he doesn't have it. Invisibility on the Stone Giant and herself before the fight. Haste on the first round, use her spell tattoo to cast dim door back to Barl and haste him as well. Once again if she is getting outnumbered dim door away.
I'm running this friday and I'm a little worried about it. Not content to have Longtooth go down like a chump I gave him the Invincible Template, all the stone giants the ranger template, and upped the number of mooks in ever fight (hill giants).
I also added an extra fight at the river with Kaye Tesarani and her bouncers protecting an escaping ship of Sandpointers (seriously thank all you guys for all the ideas I got from the boards) and shortened the number of rounds over all to make things more tense.
I feel as if I might have gone overboard but every time I worry about that they start making a new parking lot out of dead monsters.
Raisse I am going to use that idea about the Mok fight. Sounds great! :D