|
Hello, well, fancy seeing me here. I just recently started to do a campaign of Hell's rebels as the GM and have gotten through maybe half of the first book, with my party sitting at level 4.
The current composition is a stock Fighter, an Evangelist Cleric of Shelyn, a stock Ranger, and some sort of Magus that throws cards at people. All characters are made with a 20 pb. However I noticed something pretty big today that started to really show itself.
The Magus was obliterating encounters pretty quick and damn near never missed. We fought the tooth fairies today and out of eight, he took out six. Earlier encounters had him literally owning the lemurs and the gremlins in quick order.
Maybe I'm panicking too much. Right now the party has only taken on random mooks with no name, but I feel more and more like if I don't give a challenge to him, it may be easy mode for some time, but I also don't want to make it too hard for anybody else or make it feel like I'm targeting him as that would be terrible.
Thoughts?
Post the magus' statblock. If he's using a Card Caster then I'm not sure what the problem is. I've played one and they're cool, but not death machines.
Anyways, are you positioning enemies in ways that they can benefit from cover or being engaged in melee? Does he already have precise shot?
Sounds like spell combat with the cards, dealing beaucoup combination damage. The cards have to hit regular AC and only have a 20' range.
Int-based tactics will thwart the card caster magus. (Meaning: dumb foes die, average+ Int foes will use more and more complex combat tactics.)
He's also a magus. 3/4 BAB, MAD (Dex, Int) and susceptible to Reflex saves. Yeah, not too worried. Nasty stuff will come along soon enough. :)
|
|
Well like I've said, the group has mostly fought against nameless mooks and creatures that aren't really a threat so far. I'm still waiting to sick a named one at them.
Sadly cat, I can't get their stat block on hand. But I do know they have Precise, Rapid, and Point blank. He also has an AC somehow in the 20s.
I myself have never played Magus.
Standard tactics for dealing with ranged characters: set up flanks, so hes provoking aoo on attacks and cant 5 foot step out of it, pay attention to cover and range penalties. Use smoke sticks and stuff to give miss chance
|
It sounds like you should get into the details of his character. Make sure he hasn't made any mistakes. Other good suggestions here, such as adhering to range increments, paying attention to cover, and creating situations where he provokes. It's important for you to understand how his character works to make sure you are ruling correctly.
|
|
Another common mistake I see at a lot of tables is remember that even with precise shot enemies still get a +4 to their AC if there is an ally or another body between the magus and his/her target.
Might not be too much help but like I said a frequently missed rule.
Enemies report back to the leadership that this magus is a problem and in future encounters enemies make it a point to close with them and negate their ranged advantage. This won't always be viable but it can be helpful.
I feel your pain however. I had a magus in my Rise of the Runelords game until book 3 (he multi archetyped bladebound/hexblade) and just wrecked every ogre I threw at him.
EDIT: I also had a game where I had a severely overpowered paladin archer so some of the strats I used against him might be crucial in the later game.
1.) Wind Wall
2.) Have NPCs who have encountered the group report back to their leadership about the typical types of damage this magus likes throw on his cards and have them prepare either spells, scrolls or wands of resist energy or protection from energy. (For paladins 'corruption resistance').
The only downfall of prepping for this character is that the others will start to feel marginalized by the focus the enemy seems to be throwing on him/her.
When you say your party is level 4...do you mean that's the average party level? Because if you're doing the first book of Hell's Rebels as written and everyone in your party is level 4, it's no wonder they're stomping all over it - the book's written for level 1-3 characters. To run the story with characters at level 4, you'd have to drastically rework, almost to the point of rewriting, every single fight. Quite possibly you've already been doing this; I just wanted to make sure. :)
^
^
As a fellow card caster, i agree that being a good way to screw up any ranged attacks that rely on projectiles.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Magi depend on spell combat and spells for the majority of their damage. Increasing the number of combats or the number of enemies can really put a hurt on the magus's limited resource pool and allow others to keep up.
Make sure you're applying penalties of ranged combat. Without Improved Precise Shot he takes a -4 penalty to attack rolls against the target if they have cover (including partial cover caused by another character being in between the attacker and target). As well as the fact that his attacks provoke, every ranged attack he makes provokes an AoO. He might be able to 5ft step out of a lot of them, but if you get two enemies on him he'll be in deep trouble.
Also, don't forget to apply range penalties to his attack rolls. Card Caster makes the cards act like darts, which have a range of 20ft. Each range increment after the first 20ft is a -2 penalty to attack rolls (21-40ft is -2, 41-60ft is -4). And also thrown weapons can only be thrown up to a maximum of 5 range increments. As well, his cards are destroyed each time he throws one. He might have multiple decks, they are cheap. However, it also means that they're destroyed even if he enchants them. It may not be relevant now, but in a few levels when he doesn't have an enhanced weapon to work he will miss it. This problem can be abated with a 3 level dip into Cartomancer Witch though.
Needing a high dex and a 16 in int hardly counts as "MAD"Sounds like spell combat with the cards, dealing beaucoup combination damage. The cards have to hit regular AC and only have a 20' range.
Int-based tactics will thwart the card caster magus. (Meaning: dumb foes die, average+ Int foes will use more and more complex combat tactics.)
He's also a magus. 3/4 BAB, MAD (Dex, Int) and susceptible to Reflex saves. Yeah, not too worried. Nasty stuff will come along soon enough. :)
Since we don't know the Magus' race, he spends 20 out of 20 from that point-buy getting 16 in Dex and Int. Hardly crippling, save that leaves juggling racial mod et al to not die from the first serious poison or melee foe encountered that can keep up with him. Or worse, has access to something as simple as resist electricity or protection from electricity. ;)
The prime limit is on the cards (barring an errata): they have a range equal to the card's increment, which is all of 20 feet.
If CoT was any indication, there are going to be a whole lot of encounters where that range bites the magus in the rear.
Devils quickly accumulate SR, probably starting about now. Magus' have to prepare their spells, so at best he nukes a half-dozen targets/day (4 total 1st, 2 total 2nd @ 4th), leaving only gear, piddly cantrips and whatever his arcana lets him do.
Unless Hell's Rebels is pulling a Kingmaker and making frequent use of 1-a-day encounters, sooner or later that Magus is going to be running on fumes.
Theoretically, he extends the adventuring day a little longer, which is a good thing.
All of which is why I'm not overly concerned about it over the course of the campaign. There'll be stuff he can't easily cope with or that flat-out wrecks his character. Almost always is. :)
|
|
Turin brings up a good point, which I will put in spoilers.
Even though book 2 does have some 'mission of the week' once you hit the Lucky Bones that kind of thing is going to seriously start falling off later in the game.
When your group gets to that section you might be glad you have that character around to deal with those junkie ghosts and keep your party from TPK'ing (giving up on being Silver Ravens to go find the nearest opium den). :)
If your party is at level 4 at that point in the adventure, something's gone horribly awry. When I ran that section, they were barely halfway into level 2. Make sure you're calculating their experience correctly, because it sounds like something has gone a little off. The only way I can see that happening, is either you're throwing a LOT of random encounters at them, or you're given the total XP earned to each party member, rather than dividing it amongst them.
|
|
If your party is at level 4 at that point in the adventure, something's gone horribly awry. When I ran that section, they were barely halfway into level 2. Make sure you're calculating their experience correctly, because it sounds like something has gone a little off. The only way I can see that happening, is either you're throwing a LOT of random encounters at them, or you're given the total XP earned to each party member, rather than dividing it amongst them.
that is what im doing wrong. I haven't divided the XP.
|
|
Magus is a Human btw, he also wants to make the cards Adamantium tipped later on. I think they are is a lot of things that just haven't happened yet, like facing intelligent creatures that are worth a salt.
I'll also sort of buff some things to give them a challenge just for book one. I am going to stop XP ffor now since they are way now over level. I may just stop giving XP and tell them when to level up,
that is what im doing wrong. I haven't divided the XP.
Hmm, happened to me too once. They still should have the gear of level 2 or 3, and the XP gaps between future levels become larger and larger, so not everything is lost. Cutting their XP in half was already a good idea, I think.
Think I solved my problem.
Can I recommend you go a step further and eliminate the XP awards all together?
It has some interesting effects on the minds of the players. It helps get the game off the rails per se.
One thing you can always do, that doesn't actually require making any major changes to the encounters, is to simply punish any bad habits or poor tactics your players may have. If they don't position to cover their flanks, just have two enemies run up and jump on the Magus. If they don't bother making perception checks often, just have a few enemies hide behind cover and then jump up and ambush them. If they aren't protecting each other well enough, then ignore the magus, and just throw everything at the weakest member of the party. That way the next encounter will be even tougher with them down a body.
If that doesn't work, then you can look into adjusting the encounters afterwards. But try to make them as challenging as possible as written first. A bunch of nameless CR 2 mooks can still wipe a party (under the right circumstances) if you play the encounter more intelligently than your players do.
One thing you can always do, that doesn't actually require making any major changes to the encounters, is to simply punish any bad habits or poor tactics your players may have. If they don't position to cover their flanks, just have two enemies run up and jump on the Magus. If they don't bother making perception checks often, just have a few enemies hide behind cover and then jump up and ambush them. If they aren't protecting each other well enough, then ignore the magus, and just throw everything at the weakest member of the party. That way the next encounter will be even tougher with them down a body.
If that doesn't work, then you can look into adjusting the encounters afterwards. But try to make them as challenging as possible as written first. A bunch of nameless CR 2 mooks can still wipe a party (under the right circumstances) if you play the encounter more intelligently than your players do.
If this is not indicated by the NPCs intelligence or wish for cooperation, this sounds like arbitrary punishment on the GMs part. Bad style IMHO, but your mileage may vary.
After all the usual NPCs have neither the information needed nor the time to study the characters and adapt their tactics to it. Or see HP bars over h their heads or know which powers 8if any) have been expended. It might be feasible for some of the mooks in theMost NPCs are unaware of the PCs or their capabilities. Given that the final chapter of Act I is pretty long and harrowing and logically must be finished in one run, it will certainly put the Magus in his place and make him hold on to some resources. Facing Nox at the end after the preceeding two levels will most certainly check him
besids the magus will feel out of his depth in wide parts of the second AP and the early parts of the third^^
One thing you can always do, that doesn't actually require making any major changes to the encounters, is to simply punish any bad habits or poor tactics your players may have. If they don't position to cover their flanks, just have two enemies run up and jump on the Magus. If they don't bother making perception checks often, just have a few enemies hide behind cover and then jump up and ambush them. If they aren't protecting each other well enough, then ignore the magus, and just throw everything at the weakest member of the party. That way the next encounter will be even tougher with them down a body.
If that doesn't work, then you can look into adjusting the encounters afterwards. But try to make them as challenging as possible as written first. A bunch of nameless CR 2 mooks can still wipe a party (under the right circumstances) if you play the encounter more intelligently than your players do.
If this is not indicated by the NPCs intelligence or wish for cooperation, this sounds like arbitrary punishment on the GMs part. Bad style IMHO, but your mileage may vary.
After all the usual NPCs have neither the information needed nor the time to study the characters and adapt their tactics to it. Or see HP bars over h their heads or know which powers 8if any) have been expended. It might be feasible for some of the mooks in the ** spoiler omitted ** but not your average riff-raff or the mercs at the Salinery or the Gills (which actually can be pretty deadly )
Most NPCs are unaware of the PCs or their capabilities. Given that the final chapter of Act I is pretty long and harrowing and logically must be finished in one run, it will certainly put the Magus in his place and make him hold on to some resources. Facing Nox at the end after the preceeding two levels will most certainly check himbesids the magus will feel out of his depth in wide parts of the second AP and the early parts of the third^^
I'm not suggesting that anyone arbitrarily attacks one character. Don't go into the encounter saying "How can I ruin X player's day." But even a 10 int goon should be able to tell the difference between a 200 lb fighter carrying a big sword, and his 90 lb friend carrying a stick. If the 90 lb friend carrying a stick happens to be 15+ feet away from everybody else in the fight, and there's nothing between him and the goon, the goon is probably gonna jump on him.
And if an encounter says "these enemies are dumb and disorganized" then yeah, you play them dumb and disorganized. Otherwise, I assume that they are at least of average intelligence and don't make completely awful choices.
|
It's worth mentioning that the early encounters in this campaign are deliberately easy. For example, at the salt works, it flat out says the "guards" spend most of their time sitting around and playing cards, and half are asleep if the party attacks at night.
Likewise, with the tooth fairies, it directly states that they're used to easy kills and aren't tactical. I played the encounter that way, because that's how it's written.
One of my party members split u, taking a vantage point on a nearby roof when they were looking for the Devil's Nursery killer. I could have punished him by having 3-4 of the tooth fairies ambush him. Were I running NPCs who were smart, I would have done just that. But I wanted to play the encounter as it's meant to be.
Factor the non-tactical encounters in with the fact that (as others mentioned), you're currently running just one encounter per game day, and it's easy to see how most parties/players wouldn't have a hard time.
I think it says somewhere in the book that you can increase the encounters per day if the party is breezing through. They can always be stopped by dottari or the Chellish Citizens' Group. Or the Red Jills. Or even just a wandering pack of dogs. Adding in a second encounter prior to rest, even a small encounter, can really hurt a spell caster who's used to blowing all his spells right away.
Anyhoo, seems like you figure it all out. Good luck to ya, and keep us updated on how your campaign is going.