make a trap that no save, spawns socks on every character on every limb. if the PCs have no limbs then instead they gain a large sock that covers their whole body. in the next room is trap that fires sock seeking Enervation spells.
Another consideration is that when exploring dungeons (or BBEG lairs), some denizens may play upon the usefulness of others.
Say the party has gone into some lair to fight an evil witch. Before the heroes make it to the final area to face off with the BBEG witch (level 6, CR 5 alone), they find themselves face-off against 2x Vampiric Mists. It is only when the fighting has stopped and the PCs are licking their wounds that the witch and his pet Necrophidius construct bring the fight to the party.
The party will have had the chance to maybe heal some of the constitution damage and/or get some of their buffs, but they won't be completely prepared. Bring the fight to them instead of letting them get set.
Something like this has the BBEG take into account his pet's special abilities and he has made sure to gather creatures that will make his pet's abilities more effective. The witch can use tactics such as using Evil Eye to increase the odds further of paralyzing a party member.
You do need to make sure you give the PCs a chance at a breather, otherwise it is not much different than a larger encounter and if they lose someone might call foul (and rightly so).
The above 2 encounters come in at CR5 and CR6. For the basically APL 4 group, these are not even super difficult encounters, but will at least give the sense of possible danger. You can make it a bit deadlier without going beyond normal ranges; make it 3x vampiric mists (CR 6) and change the pet to a Wraith (CR 7 when with his master the CR5 lvl 6 witch) which would be good for closing a small arc.
EDIT: And if you go the Wraith route, remember that the animal companions will not go approach within 30 feet of the Wraith unless the master makes a handle animal or wild empathy check (which may results in lost actions as well).
I don't think that a strong party should get more rewards for a challenging encounter than a weak party should.
Why not?
A weak party can have a challenging encounter with a few orcs. They should get about 300 XP and about 260gp per the table in the book. If the party is strong enough, they could have a challenging encounter with a few very large dragons. Surely you're not suggesting that dragon encounter should only be worth 300 XP and 260gp? The book suggests over 1.5 million XP and 67,000gp for that encounter (assuming it's CR 20).
I do not believe you're suggesting that a strong party should expect 260gp out of a CR 20 encounter.
I have though stopped using XP a long time ago, and I provide treasure based on how much I want the party to have (usually pretty close to WBL) so CR of a monster means nothing to me in terms of treasure or level advancement.
Yeah, I don't use XP anymore either, but you have to admit that the WBL tables are part of a system that equates CR ---> Treasure/Encounter ---> WBL, and that system definitely gives more loot to higher CRs.
A weak party can have a challenging encounter with a few orcs. They should get about 300 XP and about 260gp per the table in the book. If the party is strong enough, they could have a challenging encounter with a few very large dragons. Surely you're not suggesting that dragon encounter should only be worth 300 XP and 260gp? The book suggests over 1.5 million XP and 67,000gp for that encounter (assuming it's CR 20).I do not believe you're suggesting that a strong party should expect 260gp out of a CR 20 encounter.
Perhaps I wasn't very clear. I meant that if I but together a challenging encounter for a party of optimized PCs and a challenging encounter for a different party of non-optimized PCs, everything else being equal (level etc.) then I would consider both to have overcome a challenging encounter.
The foes in the two encounters would be quite different, with the one for the optimized party being of a higher challenge rating, but I would (if I used xp etc.) give both groups the same amount of stuff. I don't think that an optimized party should race through levels faster than a non-optimized one, partly because I think playing the game for multiple encounters at each level is part of the fun.
but you have to admit that the WBL tables are part of a system that equates CR ---> Treasure/Encounter ---> WBL, and that system definitely gives more loot to higher CRs.
Obviously they are related. Although I think from a design perspective your order is wrong, in that how much wealth you want the pcs to have, and how many average encounters you want them to have at each level determine how much treasure and experience they should get per encounter, and that those encounters should vary in difficulty with harder ones counting for more than easier ones. CR assumes a certain difficulty of encounters, which isn't always correct, hence the point of this thread.
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players are the ones who suffer the most from having a lot of monsters in an encounter, especially if you use the regular rules, mostly because of the automatic success and failure:
-critical attack, while probably won't confirm, will definitely be a hit from a swarm of low cr creature.
-Always failing a save when you roll a 1...yeah that blows. Imagine a group of level 5 wizards throwing fireballs and you happen to roll a 1 on your reflex save, damage all your magical items, which some of them might even get the broken condition.
When in doubt, a flock (herd? murder?) of erinyes devils is usually quite effective, especially at night and in the open. Even if they have effective ranged weapons (most parties don't), they need a way to see past 60 feet in the dark as well as overcome DR, energy resistance, and SR. (If you're really in a bad mood, give them Haste.)Especially since an Erinyes is CR 8 & his party is level 3. A flock of them would definitely be deadly. :P
I'd be impressed if they could deal with one.
He did say he wanted to kill them. :-)
A single one destroyed on our level 5 party a while back. (Fun fact: Unholy Blight is a spread, not a burst, so you can't even hide around a corner from it!) It wasn't a "tough" encounter: it was demoralizing. To me, it was a great lesson in the difference between "challenging" the party and just "killing" them.
I use a lot of templates..especially for mooks and bosses.The advanced template I slap on almost everything at mid to high levels.
The Mythic templates really spruce up bosses.
Attack them with waves of enemies...try to milk their spells and limited use abilities out of them, before the big heavies show up.
Use larger numbers of mid range monsters to thicken up the combat, not only do they soak up damage...they act as moving terrain. Also,use lots of combat maneuvers with your mooks instead of attacking..many times PCs neglect their CMD or it's just not as good as their AC. Grabbing and tripping are great for this.It can kill PC action economy, and prevents the party from focusing on the BBEG.
The only way to really challenge very powerful PCs (without killing them outright) is to use attrition, drag them into deep waters (metaphorically) and see how they perform when the enemy has taken all of their best hits and JUST KEEPS COMING.
I've been very surprised at the resilience of Pathfinder characters and have watched them easily overcome challenges I thought might kill them.
Give your players a chance to surprise you.
So don't kill 'em. Death is easy. Break or steal equipment. Player's hate having their PCs forced to surrender. Round 'em up and throw 'em in prison without their equipment as the start of the next encounter. Have the dragon curb-stomp them and make the standing party members swear to perform a service if it is to spare the party (downed party members can be hostages if the players are going to be out for the next session. Otherwise perhaps a nearby village is hostage for their completion of the task (especially if it helped supply the PCs before they came to the dragons lair). There a lot of ways for PCs to "loose" that don't require character death. Likewise PCs can "win" without killing the villain. When the players are happy to disrupt the recurring villain's plans or bloody his nose and get out alive - you've got a good villain.
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You don't have to make the situation forced and feel cheesy. Try designing your enemies intelligently.
Classes that are marked “key” generally add 1 to a creature's CR for each level added. Classes marked with a “—” increase a creature's CR by 1 for every 2 class levels added until the number of levels added are equal to (or exceed) the creature's original CR, at which point they are treated as “key” levels (adding 1 to the creature's CR for each level added).
Creatures with class levels receive +4, +4, +2, +2, +0, and –2 adjustments to their ability scores, assigned in a manner that enhances their class abilities.
Feel free to also add templates you think would create an interesting enemy. These changes can make your vanilla encounter into something memorable and tough if you choose.
Before: Fort +7, Ref +9, Will +10
Bab 8
Str 13, Dex 17, Con 20, Int 18, Wis 14, Cha 27
After: Fort +22, Ref +20, Will +23
Bab 10
Str 15, Dex 19, Con 24, Int 16, Wis 14, Cha 31
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My players are complaining i'm too easy on them.
Part of it is mechanical (they are min maxed and use good tactics), but part of it is me. It is just hard for me to "let loose" and go after them.
Do you remember the game "Dungeon Keeper"? the idea was you were the hidden power behind the building of an underground lair. you created monsters and traps Specifically to defeat heroes. Prepare a one-shot from that angle; be ready to say "them are the breaks" when a favorite PC is lost. Be the Bad guy and have fun doing it!
One rule; do not assault a character's hook/lynch pin. if someone is a fey bloodline sorceress with a 20 charisma, Don't have her get grappled for the express purpose of immediately making half-orcs. Certainly, do not use curses with ability drain to "ruin" the character's valued beauty. Ultimately, if "it" is absolutely central to the character do not mess with it!Another way of being a HARD D.M. is to use the environment as a weapon against the PC's; Have the PC's chasing a Halfling acrobat who uses boots of leaping and striding to jump across a dry creek. The creek bed could be quick-sand with steep crumbling dirt walls on either side. World war II - "Third man on a match"; Normal darkness with hidden dark vision enemies attacking from range, anyone with a light source draws attention from a mile away alerting enemies to their presence and making the soon-to-be archery target quite easy to spot. Conditions such as "Difficult terrain" due to the stone ruins being, well, ruins... can make it impossible to 5 foot step, charge, even move 10 feet in armor.
Use conditions to impair the group; daze, stun, sleep, dazzle, blind, deafen, paralyze, diseased, poisoned, the game world is much bigger than dice rolling to kill foes, and much more than saving throws. In some rare situations the entire party might be exposed to something...
Good for the heroes, good for the bad guys; Give your bad guys alchemical devices, scrolls, wands, potions and make the bad guys USE THEM!
In one adventure I ran a group against Brainy spider-monsters that could disguise themselves as people. They used tangle-foot bags to snare melee characters or the web spell where the spider-folk had no problems before closing in on squishy casters...
It is Human to err, Your player's are human; Don't force failures with dice rolls! let a player's distraction, confusion, and fear be your ally. When the player's make mistakes and accidentally; poison, disease, slime, trap, themselves - what happens next IS NOT YOUR FAULT! Have a dungeon crisscrossed with small troughs of "Something nasty" (but harmless if the player's take time to avoid it) with a few rooms with a few small doses of the cure. when player's round a corner and face a powerful fear spell, or are obviously facing a foe too deadly, the player's may forget the small little detail of avoiding the traps/troughs as they flee pell-mell.
Never run an adventure that does not include action, challenges, and foes that deserve a solid trouncing. if you have an "Intrigue adventure" where player's are supposed to keep the peace and prevent a revolt as they gather information... you may as well tuck them in. ZZZZZZ.
Dont do what most DM's bizzarely do and leave the squishy wizard at the back free to cast unimpinged.
As someone famous once said:
"The answer to most of a GM problems is..... ninjas!"
As per the great Roger E Moore's article Tuckers Kobolds.
Not only do you get to kill your PCs but you get to do it with Kobolds.
Best advice is contingent on your situation. Instructions to build certain encounters are less than helpful unless they can be integrated into the campaign without feeling..."bumpy". Mismatched. So what's the plot of your campaign? What are their current objectives, opponents, and complications? What are the strengths and weaknesses of your party, and how can you prey on their weaknesses without breaking immersion in the game?
Generally speaking, though, these pieces of advice are good ones. Up the average CR a little, make your monsters smarter, use terrain and multi-stage combats to the enemies' advantage...think about how your PCs are fighting. Remember that the average human is Intelligence 10- it doesn't take much brains to stack the odds in one's favor, just a little patience. Entrenched enemies would fortify their position- the first few rooms of a dungeon inhabited by intelligent humanoids would be their preferred battleground, and they'd be on the defense. Play that up. Put caltrop fields in front of your PCs and archers with cover on the other side. Arm the little guys with longspears and tower shields and have them turtle up while fending off the PCs again and again. Have a small force draw them into an ambush, then hit them from all sides. Have a dungeon react like a poked beehive as your PCs try to murder their way through it and empty everyone inside at them in a raging mob if you must.
Monsters are smart, and will pick battlefields to their advantage. Humanoids encountered together, will fight together.
As for the guilt...that's not something we can help you with. In my experience, most players can recognize when they lose a fight fairly, or when they provoke an unfair fight and lose. Roll your dice in the open and if they get gutted on a crit, so it goes. Risk is part of what makes games like Pathfinder fun, and the personal element of having your character endangered is part of that. I wouldn't stay in a game where my team effortlessly curbstomped everything the DM threw at us. Would you?
Narrow Tunnel + Rockfall to trap them in tunnel + a Shadow or two in the walls. = Terror!! and CR appropriate.
Between CR 5 and 6 depending on whether you decide that they shadows get a CR bump for "Unfavorable Terrain for the PCs."
Trust me incorporeal creatures attacking out of solid matter and doing strength damage + spawning more or themselves in a confined space = Giggles.
1. Better tactics from enemies (have them flank, use combat maneuvers to trip, disarm, grapple,, etc.)
True, i gave mooks improved trip and weapon focus on a trip weapon, making a lvl 2 warrior a +7 trip annoyance.
A trap of decent CL that sends them berserk, have them kill each other. ^^
Something i saw elsewhere; darkness + silence + tentacle monster on the ceiling.
A flooded tunnel with swimchecks...someone's bound to fail a few that could be vital.
Incorporal swarms?
Have the PCs encounter a room with very limited mobility (difficult terrain + trapped squares that cause entanglement.) Then throw in some swarms.
That could be nasty, what if some of the tiles are 'hold person'?
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If the handler succeeds on a DC 25 check, they can force the animal into the area (presence of the monsters) but it is still panicked (it just won't run away, presumably as long as the handler is there or functionally close and soothing). It still can't attack, and it will basically suffer penalties to any saves it has to make for being put into that danger (it cowers and goes total defense). It cowers, it doesn't move around, it doesn't follow the PC as he moves (unless he's riding it). It should only move (other than to run away) if the PC spends another action making the DC 25 check to move it somewhere specifically.
They aren't panicked unless you fail the check. It can attack as long as you have the 2nd attack command to train it to attack unnatural enemies.
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They do not willingly approach nearer than that and panic if forced to do so unless a master succeeds at a DC 25 Handle Animal, Ride, or wild empathy check.
Emphasis mine. They won't panic if you succeed on the check. You pretty much keep them calm in the face of something they would be frightened by.
They do not willingly approach nearer than that and panic if forced to do so unless a master succeeds at a DC 25 Handle Animal, Ride, or wild empathy check.Emphasis mine. They won't panic if you succeed on the check. You pretty much keep them calm in the face of something they would be frightened by.
Yep, exactly true. But the best part of the ability (because a player with an animal companion should make a good habit of keeping relevant animal skills high) is that in cases such as Handle Animal, it requires a move action to push it (unless you aren't a Druid or ranger and then it is full-round action). Anything that eats action economy will force players to choose their actions more carefully and break up the status quo. Not a killer, but it does act as a built in obstacle for an encounter.
Give them something to protect, like a caravan, important NPC, or some story based McGuffin.
If the primary goal isn't winning combat, then your encounters might be more engaging.
Or have something like "we need to diffuse this bomb."
That can preoccupy one of the players while the others have to fight off enemies at a single location, which may or may not be advantageous for them.
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Thanks these are great. The best tactician played football in college, and two others are army, another played ball in college for 2 years, so only one player (and I) has not had some kind of tactical training to read enemy movement and adjust. So they tend to do things like "attack through the ambush" to eliminate bad guy advantages like fog cloud, which I thought would work but didn't do anything but hinder the monsters, since the PCs just moved right through it until reaching the other side.
And thinking "if I were a PC what would I do" is another great suggestion. Or just combat testing the encounters to improve enemy tactics.
I'm running a module against some farmer cultists who use sickles, and based on the above I'm giving at least some of them teamwork feats, as well as the advanced template (they are farmers and need muscles, after all) and will try to flank or at least gang up to trip and attack while down.
Feast of Ravenmoore , they all have blue whinnis poison too, which ... might really ruin the PC's day.
And since I'm supposedly running a horror campaign in Ustalav, Unnatural Aura is a great addition. I can't believe I didn't see that before. That will also be great for flavor besides neutralizing the animal companions.
If you're running homebrew adventures, you'd be better off running something published by Paizo or one of the other reputable publishers. Published adventures are often better balanced, creative and challenging and if you don't agree with any of that - they're at least easy enough to modify.
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Ravenmoor is a pretty easy module - especially if you don't believe the cultists - though it's interesting.
I might rebuild the cleric boss to be a bit less lame though.
Of course - my group skipped the whole fair, because we investigated the creepy house the first night. Actually - we skipped the whole evil corn-maze thing too because we confronted the cleric in his home. (I looked up the module after playing it.) So - that made the whole thing much easier than it would likely have otherwise been.
Just for a sense of grounding, you normally don't throw templates onto basic, core races. A farmer with muscles is just an un-templated farmer with better ability scores.
Templates make fundamental changes to the creature, often even changing the creature's Type. Once you apply a template to a human fighter, you don't really have a "human" anymore; he's something else, some kind of weird mutant (even if his type didn't change). Usually you need a good reason (radiation, magical transformation, etc.).
I'm not saying you can't do it; I'm merely suggesting that it's an unusual solution and it might seem strange to your players.
Feast of Ravenmoore is a good adventure. The climactic battle is just that as long as you don't hold back any punches. Though like many Paizo adventures, to make it a true and considerable challenge, it is best played at 15 point-buy, anything higher and it becomes less threatening (especially for experienced/optimized/tactical players).
have a trap that is a plain blank room, when the PCs enter the doors slam shut and a small ball the size of about an eye is shot in through a hole in the wall, this ball will bounce off of everything slowly gaining speed after each bounce. this ball however is extremely soft and only does 1 point of non-lethal damage to any PC it hits, however, all PCs must make a DC 10 will save to not become fascinated by the ball for the rest of eternity(roll every round) or until the ball is destroyed. the ball has 1 HP but has an AC of 20 and increases by 1 AC every round.Magic Missile. Can't miss. What do I win?
magic missile cant target objects
magic missile cant target objectshave a trap that is a plain blank room, when the PCs enter the doors slam shut and a small ball the size of about an eye is shot in through a hole in the wall, this ball will bounce off of everything slowly gaining speed after each bounce. this ball however is extremely soft and only does 1 point of non-lethal damage to any PC it hits, however, all PCs must make a DC 10 will save to not become fascinated by the ball for the rest of eternity(roll every round) or until the ball is destroyed. the ball has 1 HP but has an AC of 20 and increases by 1 AC every round.Magic Missile. Can't miss. What do I win?
shhh, it can't miss.
When in doubt, a flock (herd? murder?) of erinyes devils is usually quite effective, especially at night and in the open. Even if they have effective ranged weapons (most parties don't), they need a way to see past 60 feet in the dark as well as overcome DR, energy resistance, and SR. (If you're really in a bad mood, give them Haste.)Especially since an Erinyes is CR 8 & his party is level 3. A flock of them would definitely be deadly. :P
I'd be impressed if they could deal with one.
He did say he wanted to kill them. :-)
A single one destroyed on our level 5 party a while back. (Fun fact: Unholy Blight is a spread, not a burst, so you can't even hide around a corner from it!) It wasn't a "tough" encounter: it was demoralizing. To me, it was a great lesson in the difference between "challenging" the party and just "killing" them.
I pitted ONE of these things against an 8th-level party in a village full of civilians she could use to her advantage against them. She gave them a real run for their money.
Always failing a save when you roll a 1...yeah that blows. Imagine a group of level 5 wizards throwing fireballs and you happen to roll a 1 on your reflex save, damage all your magical items, which some of them might even get the broken condition.
Failing your Reflex save on a 1 against an area attack only ever harms one item, not all of them.
Goblins have better stat adjustments. Kobolds are -4 STR, -2 CON, +2 DEX, Goblins are -2 STR, +4 DEX, -2 CHA. Kobolds have a +1 Natural Armor, but the Goblin +4 DEX gives the same amount of AC as the Kobold +2 DEX and +1 Natural Armor.
Goblins are tougher, more agile, stronger, and uglier (-2 CHA) than Kobolds. Use Goblins.
I did. :D
Kobolds do thoughtful teamwork and trained actions better than goblins, though. ;)
Hmm. Upping the difficulty of
Again, if they opt to go off the rails and the townsfolk know they know, maybe a mob of cultists might be the right way to go. Adding more stirges couldn't hurt, either; they're not exactly easy to hit, and Con damage sticks and sucks.
Ultimately, if you have your PCs' stats and a good idea of their tactics, field-testing the encounters is a good way to go. Just remember to hold over damage and lost resources from one to another; no matter how good they are, each fight is gonna take something out of them, be it channel uses, or ammunition, or (hopefully) hit points.
Lot's of good ideas here. Put me in the camp of "use tactics rather than inflate AC/Accuracy/Saves." If a player is really good at something, let them be good at that, but mix it up with some things that make doing it harder or even impossible. Magic Circle Against Good if they like to summon, evasion if they like evocation, etc. Grapple the casters, and force the martial to come to the rescue.
One enemy made to be stealthy and a sniper at range, whatever CR seems appropriate. He/she has darkvision (possibly longer range due to race, item, etc) and a high stealth roll. The sniper is in a prepared area with lots of blinds and preset spots scattered around the advantageous (to him/her) terrain.
You won't get the one shot, one kill sniper (probably) but a sniper who shoots from 100-150 feet out in the dark is basically invisible. They shoot and move, move some more and hide. Two minutes later, they shoot again. repeat ad nauseam until your characters are crying. SNipers may not be optimized as a PC but that doesn't make it less dangerous.
The point is that the sniper never stops shooting and never lets them rest. He knows the terrain and knows the quickest way around. He has taken every step necessary to ruin their whole night and won't ever let himself be seen.
REALLY like this idea. Definitely going to run it in my campaign. Now to figure out mechanics. Probably a ranger in his favored terrain...
When I have player's whining at me - I've come to realize it isn't the _characters_ that need to pass away at the next session. The _characters_ are often good-aligned, heroic, with interesting backgrounds and a charisma above 8. No, it's not the _characters_ that you should be targeting at all. Maybe supply the snacks for the next session?
The difficulty with snipers is that it's hard to prevent the PCs from heading full speed in the direction the arrows came from, and after they get into the general area it's hard for the sniper to move around without drawing attention. You almost need flying greater invisibile foes to pull that off.
Yes, dim light hurts, but if the PCs extinguish their light sources, darkvision has only a very limited range.
1 sniper?
Make him have a buddy who takes shots at the group when they want to go into direction of sniper #1.
Make them disorientated, better yet, have the arrows be poisoned.
There's also poison that induces confusion, well if the barbarian suddenly turns around and jamms his axe into his buddy...sure, villains are villains for a reason, employing as many devious tactics as they can pull off. :)
A heavy crossbow with a distance enchantment has a range increment of 240 feet. That means you can be sniping from over 1000 feet away. When you start to apply distance penalties to perception that becomes quite hard to spot. Make the sniper a ranger and put it in the wild, and suddenly the Ranger is getting favored terrain bonuses and undergrowth is causing difficult terrain to slow down the party and make it harder for them to close before he's moved on. Sure, they can cast fly, but if they don't catch him then and he just disappears for 20 minutes and hits them again once it's worn off.
A vital strike ranger with gravity bow and aspect/bracers of the falcon is doing 4d8+ static bonuses, which can include deadly aim, enhancement bonuses, and favored enemy. You can probably get higher damage using a Zen Archer, Crossbowman, or some rogue variant or another, but the goal isn't to one shot the PC. It's to make an elaborate cat and mouse game. (Which is part of my concern with using poison. Makes it almost too easy to take them out.) But 4d8 (6 if it's high enough level to include improved vital strike) getting rolled is kinda terrifying to a PC.
Other enemies to throw at the party, be they more snipers or melee brutes, further complicates the scenario. Hell, maybe the sniper doesn't just straight up murder them when he has the chance. Maybe the party gets attacked and he winds up sniping a troll to prevent it from stealing his kill.
Ranger/Horizon Walkers make the nastiest, nastiest snipers/skirmish/shoot-n-scoot enemies I've ever statted up.
Especially one that is a particularly Ustalavan breed of werewolf. Mhah.
Ranger/Horizon Walkers make the nastiest, nastiest snipers/skirmish/shoot-n-scoot enemies I've ever statted up.
Especially one that is a particularly Ustalavan breed of werewolf. Mhah.
Care to share?