Baldur's Gate 3 is actually going to be a third-person-survival-action-RPG-Souls-like-retro-clone-base-builder-card-based-proto-moba-deck-builder with a social-media-enhanced-online-meta-RTS-PvP-kingdom-battle element. With Twitch integration.
Baldur's Gate 3 is actually going to be a third-person-survival-action-RPG-Souls-like-retro-clone-base-builder-card-based-proto-moba-deck-builder with a social-media-enhanced-online-meta-RTS-PvP-kingdom-battle element. With Twitch integration.
Baldur's Gate 3 is actually going to be a third-person-survival-action-RPG-Souls-like-retro-clone-base-builder-card-based-proto-moba-deck-builder with a social-media-enhanced-online-meta-RTS-PvP-kingdom-battle element. With Twitch integration.
This was my table last night for a one-shot to introduce coworkers. It got out of hand quickly, and I feel like I gave Bad D&D in a few ways. That's my co-DM across from me, and most of the players are regulars in other campaigns or in general. As the night wore on we slowly lost everyone until we were down to three players and called it at 2am. I felt like a teenager again, because playing a game for too long, and designing encounters that would easily be too long instead of neatly working different narratives and plots in together. I'll do better next time.
Compared to my weekend bender sessions, I'm always surprised at how little my Dungeon Dads 3-4 hour sessions accomplish, but still how fun they can be.
Last night the group simply handled the Calling Horns troll/giant encounter on their way down the road in SKT. But I think a good bit of fun was had!
Especially when the barbarian rolls a 19 on acrobatics to superhero land from a 2nd story inn window to fight off trolls trying to eat their horse, and the dwarf cleric amazingly launched herself out the second story window like a rocket using her boots if striding and springing, then wiffed on her landing, find the ground with her face.
Not to worry, she still cast Spirit Guardians around the dirt in her mouth.
So I'm working on converting the adventure Beyond the Crystal Cave, drawing on both the original and 4E versions. It's kinda amusing in that the 4E version has a ton of fights while the original only has two scenarios that are supposed to lead to combat, but the creatures in the original have tons of loot to steal and will not hesitate to throw down if the party antagonizes them.
The plot of the original version is to find two lovers who eloped to a garden encased in a wall of force. The 4E version moves the garden to the Feywild and introduces a hag and cambion pair who wish to use the lovers' souls as a means to control the garden as their magical lair.
Both versions also have a pretty terrifying monster called a barkburr. They're trees made from adventurers who desecrated a fey garden. If they sense you desecrated the garden they use a reach attack to inject you with a substance that turns you quickly into a new barkburr.
Does anyone have any ideas for other features and hazards to be found in a fey garden (a 20 square mile garden, btw) that wishes to protect itself?
Butterflies that cast reverse Fear, causing anyone who fails a wisdom save to have to move toward them on their turn and have disadvantage if they attack any other target.
A field of long grass so thick and deep you can swim and drown in it. The garden rolls up the wall into the underside of a hill/cave and becomes a literal hanging garden. In the same vein, a vertical section on a cliff face. Fog. A windstorm of petals, allergens, and pollen. Roving bands of wild seasons, some of which aren't the traditional spring, summer, autumn or winter. Scarecrows, gardener automatons. Gigantic jack o lanterns that try to chew people who go into them. A hill with a face that gives terrible directions. Garden gnomes complete with silly pointed hats that pop out of the ground to advise, annoy or antagonize our adventurers. Those silly hats planted in a long oval, that don't respond to being tapped on or bothered. Those silly hats in an oval shape that slowly come together as the jaws and teeth of a huge thing. (Could combine this all together into one encounter as gnomes which are the teeth of a big hill that gives bad directions due to multiple gnome-derived personalities.)
Anyone have an idea for a good one player one shot I could DM for my wife who wants to try out D&D for first time? I’ve found a couple things through googling and could probably just convert and/or run with a sidekick or two that I play to keep her character alive and moving.
Just wondering if anyone has done similar and maybe knows a published adventure they like for this purpose?
She wants to get a taste before I start what hopefully becomes a multiple session campaign for her and her coworker friends in a few weeks time.
The game Solasta: crown of the magister has a free demo on steam
It's "pre alpha" and this shocks me because of how polished it is, it's got a few bugs (eg: the bless spell doesn't work), some jankiness in places, and it doesn't call itself D&D anywhere but
I mean
I did a little video rq
Seems really polished for an alpha. Had some fun with the demo, got shoved off a cliff and orc murdered. Then I got ripped apart by a giant swarm of deep spiders.
The spiders have disadvantage if you are next to a light source. They weren't that tough(i also think you're supposed to just run away from them)
I'll have to keep that in mind next time I give it a go. The second time I went through, I was able to kill off all the orcs without taking damage. Just have to start thinking more tactically.
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Mostlyjoe13Evil, Evil, Jump for joy!Registered Userregular
otoh, go you!
otoh, you're slowly becoming that player.
Try be humble about all the favoritism flying your way! ;P
tip.. tip.. TALLY.. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
+2
Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
edited September 2019
I need some D&D folks opinions on some monster stats.
My next session I'm running, my six players are 3rd-level and each have command of nine soldiers (so there will be 54 soldiers in their "force") against an army of cavernous undead.
These are the current stats I have for the zombies, skeletons, ghouls, & tombstone golems that will comprise the bulk of the undead army.
I just want to make sure everything looks good before I throw these at them.
Zombie Medium undead, Neutral Evil AC: 8; HP: 10 (1d8+2); Speed: 20 ft.; Saving Throws: -- Str 12 (+1), Dex 6 (-2), Con 14 (+2), Int 3 (-4), Wis 6 (-2), Cha 3 (-4) Skills/Feats: -- Damage Resistances: necrotic Damage Vulnerabilities: fire, radiant Damage Immunities: poison Condition Immunities: exhaustion, poisoned Senses: passive Perception 8; darkvision 60 ft. Languages: understands Common, Dwarven, & Gnomish but can't speak Special Abilities Monstrous Abilities: Undead Fortitude
--- Actions Slam & Slash. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 3 (1d4+1) bludgeoning/slashing damage
--- Notes
-- Undead Fortitude. If damage reduces the zombie to 0 hit points, it must make a Constitution saving throw with a DC of 5 + the damage taken, unless the damage is radiant or from a critical hit. On a success, the zombie drops to 1 hit point instead.
Ghoul Medium undead, Neutral Evil AC: 15 (armor scraps); HP: 18 (2d10+2); Speed: 40 ft.; Saving Throws: -- Str 12 (+1), Dex 18 (+4), Con 12 (+1), Int 6 (-2), Wis 8 (-1), Cha 6 (-2) Skills/Feats: Acrobatics +6, Athletics +3, Perception +1, Stealth +6 Damage Resistances: necrotic Damage Vulnerabilities: fire, radiant Damage Immunities: poison Condition Immunities: exhaustion, poisoned Senses: passive Perception 11; darkvision 60 ft. Languages: Common, Dwarven, & Gnomish Special Abilities Monstrous Abilities: Acid Spit, Death Burst
--- Actions Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 7 (2d6+1) piercing damage. Claws. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (2d4+4) slashing damage. If the target is a creature other than an undead, it must succeed on a DC 10 Constitution saving throw or be paralyzed for 1 minute. The target can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.
--- Notes
-- Acid Spit (Recharge 5 & 6): You can use your action to vomit acid up to ten feet away. Any creature or object in that area must make a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw, taking 10 (3d6) acid damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.
-- Death Burst: When the ghoul dies, it explodes in a burst of acid. Each creature within 5 feet of it must make a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw, taking 10 (3d6) acid damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.
Tombstone Golem Large undead-construct, Neutral Evil AC: 16 (natural armor); HP: 108 (9d10+45); Speed: 20 ft.; Saving Throws: -- Str 20 (+5), Dex 6 (-2), Con 20 (+5), Int 3 (-4), Wis 8 (-1), Cha 1 (-5) Skills/Feats: Athletics +13 Damage Resistances: necrotic; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from non-magical attacks that aren't adamantine Damage Vulnerabilities: radiant Damage Immunities: poison, psychic Condition Immunities: charmed, exhaustion, frightened, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned Senses: passive Perception 9; darkvision 120 ft. Languages: understands Common, Dwarven, & Gnomish but can't speak Special Abilities Monstrous Abilities: Immutable Form, Magic Resistance, & Magic Weapons
--- Actions Multiattack: The golem makes two slam attacks. Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 7 (2d6+1) piercing damage.
--- Notes
-- Immutable Form: The golem is immune to any spell or effect that would alter its form.
-- Magic Resistance: The golem has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
-- Magic Weapons: The golem's weapon attacks are magical.
Thoughts? Critiques? Ideas?
My goal is to basically bring down the force of 54 characters to just six, so that the next few sessions can be a horror-based dungeon-crawl.
Or next session in a couple of days is probably the end of Curse of Strahd (they plan to go to the castle and not leave until they gave killed him, and i believe them capable of it). The last time they were there they got him low once, he ran away trying to get them to chase him but they didn't take the bait, then they destroyed the heart and fought him a bit later and got him low again and again he ran. They were out of all reduces at that point and choose to leave rather than try to find him. I had them level at that point from 9 to 10.
Several of them have taken gifts from the Amber Temple, one of them is evil now, and they have killed a vampirized Ezmeralda, and almost wholesale slaughtered the Valaki Vistani camp. Most of the elves from that camp came along with them the last time to act as a distraction and have been killed by Strahd. They haven't seen Rictavio in ages.
While they ran around killing some more vampire minions, i had Strahd put on his actual armor instead of fighting in a tuxedo the way he has been, get his great sword, and visit the Amber Temple to beef up himself too.
The plan is to open the session by having Strahd whisper each PC via special sending bribery offers to have them switch sides, each offer customized to appeal to the specific character in tempting ways. Going to have them write down an answer and a roll for either deception if they are lying or persuasion if they are telling the truth, but not tell me yet which it is.
Then later when they fight Strahd he'll indicate the time has come and then respond appropriately. I.e. if he believes they are going to switch he won't target then right away unless they keep fighting him after that point. I'm hoping to snare at least one because of the roleplay. Metagaming speaking, I'm sure none of the players would trust Strahd, but the characters might.
I need some D&D folks opinions on some monster stats.
My next session I'm running, my six players are 3rd-level and each have command of nine soldiers (so there will be 54 soldiers in their "force") against an army of cavernous undead.
These are the current stats I have for the zombies, skeletons, ghouls, & tombstone golems that will comprise the bulk of the undead army.
I just want to make sure everything looks good before I throw these at them.
Zombie Medium undead, Neutral Evil AC: 8; HP: 10 (1d8+2); Speed: 20 ft.; Saving Throws: -- Str 12 (+1), Dex 6 (-2), Con 14 (+2), Int 3 (-4), Wis 6 (-2), Cha 3 (-4) Skills/Feats: -- Damage Resistances: necrotic Damage Vulnerabilities: fire, radiant Damage Immunities: poison Condition Immunities: exhaustion, poisoned Senses: passive Perception 8; darkvision 60 ft. Languages: understands Common, Dwarven, & Gnomish but can't speak Special Abilities Monstrous Abilities: Undead Fortitude
--- Actions Slam & Slash. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 3 (1d4+1) bludgeoning/slashing damage
--- Notes
-- Undead Fortitude. If damage reduces the zombie to 0 hit points, it must make a Constitution saving throw with a DC of 5 + the damage taken, unless the damage is radiant or from a critical hit. On a success, the zombie drops to 1 hit point instead.
Ghoul Medium undead, Neutral Evil AC: 15 (armor scraps); HP: 18 (2d10+2); Speed: 40 ft.; Saving Throws: -- Str 12 (+1), Dex 18 (+4), Con 12 (+1), Int 6 (-2), Wis 8 (-1), Cha 6 (-2) Skills/Feats: Acrobatics +6, Athletics +3, Perception +1, Stealth +6 Damage Resistances: necrotic Damage Vulnerabilities: fire, radiant Damage Immunities: poison Condition Immunities: exhaustion, poisoned Senses: passive Perception 11; darkvision 60 ft. Languages: Common, Dwarven, & Gnomish Special Abilities Monstrous Abilities: Acid Spit, Death Burst
--- Actions Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 7 (2d6+1) piercing damage. Claws. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (2d4+4) slashing damage. If the target is a creature other than an undead, it must succeed on a DC 10 Constitution saving throw or be paralyzed for 1 minute. The target can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.
--- Notes
-- Acid Spit (Recharge 5 & 6): You can use your action to vomit acid up to ten feet away. Any creature or object in that area must make a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw, taking 10 (3d6) acid damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.
-- Death Burst: When the ghoul dies, it explodes in a burst of acid. Each creature within 5 feet of it must make a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw, taking 10 (3d6) acid damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.
Tombstone Golem Large undead-construct, Neutral Evil AC: 16 (natural armor); HP: 108 (9d10+45); Speed: 20 ft.; Saving Throws: -- Str 20 (+5), Dex 6 (-2), Con 20 (+5), Int 3 (-4), Wis 8 (-1), Cha 1 (-5) Skills/Feats: Athletics +13 Damage Resistances: necrotic; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from non-magical attacks that aren't adamantine Damage Vulnerabilities: radiant Damage Immunities: poison, psychic Condition Immunities: charmed, exhaustion, frightened, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned Senses: passive Perception 9; darkvision 120 ft. Languages: understands Common, Dwarven, & Gnomish but can't speak Special Abilities Monstrous Abilities: Immutable Form, Magic Resistance, & Magic Weapons
--- Actions Multiattack: The golem makes two slam attacks. Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 7 (2d6+1) piercing damage.
--- Notes
-- Immutable Form: The golem is immune to any spell or effect that would alter its form.
-- Magic Resistance: The golem has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
-- Magic Weapons: The golem's weapon attacks are magical.
Thoughts? Critiques? Ideas?
My goal is to basically bring down the force of 54 characters to just six, so that the next few sessions can be a horror-based dungeon-crawl.
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
I've run battles with about 4 Pcs versus 20 opponents that took upwards of two hours. This sounds like a much, much greater ordeal. I understand the desire for a mass battle, though.
Maybe you could run in advance some mock battles between nine of the soldiers and a fraction of the undead to see how they fare? One battle where the soldiers use suboptimal tactics, and one where they use flanking and such. Then during the actual session you could ask the players how they are commanding their squad and make some kind of roll to determine if their soldiers use optimal or suboptimal tactics. Then the PCs can take the field with the strongest remaining soldiers (ideally a small number) to handle whatever is left (ideally about 20 or so). You could also use some siege weapons that fire from off the battlefield to give the feeling of their being more troops.
It'll still be time consuming, but at least a bit more manageable with some verisimilitude versus just handwaving the mass battle.
Why does Disintegrate mention Wall of Force as something it can target if you can't target Wall of Force with Disintegrate because its invisible? Both spells mention the other as having an interaction but according to Mike Mearls on twitter Disintegrate can't be cast on it.
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Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
Oh, I want the first session to be a huge fucking battle. I want the spectacle of mass death.
So, I'm prepared for it to go sideways but I want to at least challenge myself in seeing if I can do it.
I know the first thing I am doing for this battle is having the players do average damage instead of rolling damage, just to cut down on time.
I only played 3.5 before jumping over 4E to 5E, what are the minion rules?
Why does Disintegrate mention Wall of Force as something it can target if you can't target Wall of Force with Disintegrate because its invisible? Both spells mention the other as having an interaction but according to Mike Mearls on twitter Disintegrate can't be cast on it.
Maybe Disintegrate would be targeted through the wall at a target on the other side. But would be blocked by the wall, both cancelling the Disintegrate and destroying the Wall of Force, even though it wasn't targeting the wall directly.
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
Oh, I want the first session to be a huge fucking battle. I want the spectacle of mass death.
So, I'm prepared for it to go sideways but I want to at least challenge myself in seeing if I can do it.
I know the first thing I am doing for this battle is having the players do average damage instead of rolling damage, just to cut down on time.
I only played 3.5 before jumping over 4E to 5E, what are the minion rules?
Minions took one hit to kill, but are immune to "half damage on miss" type effects
They also did a static amount of damage rather than rolling for it
In the xp economy, I think they were worth 4 of a non-minion of the same level
[Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
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Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
Oh, I want the first session to be a huge fucking battle. I want the spectacle of mass death.
So, I'm prepared for it to go sideways but I want to at least challenge myself in seeing if I can do it.
I know the first thing I am doing for this battle is having the players do average damage instead of rolling damage, just to cut down on time.
I only played 3.5 before jumping over 4E to 5E, what are the minion rules?
Minions took one hit to kill, but are immune to "half damage on miss" type effects
They also did a static amount of damage rather than rolling for it
In the xp economy, I think they were worth 4 of a non-minion of the same level
Oh, cool!
I'll adopt the one-hit to kill for my zombies.
I won't do the xp thing because my games don't really use xp.
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
Oh, I want the first session to be a huge fucking battle. I want the spectacle of mass death.
So, I'm prepared for it to go sideways but I want to at least challenge myself in seeing if I can do it.
I know the first thing I am doing for this battle is having the players do average damage instead of rolling damage, just to cut down on time.
I only played 3.5 before jumping over 4E to 5E, what are the minion rules?
Minions took one hit to kill, but are immune to "half damage on miss" type effects
They also did a static amount of damage rather than rolling for it
In the xp economy, I think they were worth 4 of a non-minion of the same level
Also, importantly, their to hit rolls were decent enough to be a real threat. This would be basically impossible in 3e but sorta assumed in 5e which doesn't have the level scaling thing to hit.
I'm considering an adventure idea where the party has to take a plane shifting ship to various layers of the Abyss to collect obscure magical ingredients for an amoral employer.
The Driller's Hives - A realm dominated by giant demonic parasitic wasps. Get a stinger from one of them.
Malignebula - It's atmosphere is composed of poison and acid. Find a drifting chunk of frozen acid.
Slugbed - Some angels established a fortress here in the clouds above the sleeping demon lord Lupercio's realm. They also have a fraction of the psyche of another demon lord that you need.
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
Oh, I want the first session to be a huge fucking battle. I want the spectacle of mass death.
So, I'm prepared for it to go sideways but I want to at least challenge myself in seeing if I can do it.
I know the first thing I am doing for this battle is having the players do average damage instead of rolling damage, just to cut down on time.
I only played 3.5 before jumping over 4E to 5E, what are the minion rules?
Minions took one hit to kill, but are immune to "half damage on miss" type effects
They also did a static amount of damage rather than rolling for it
In the xp economy, I think they were worth 4 of a non-minion of the same level
Oh, cool!
I'll adopt the one-hit to kill for my zombies.
I won't do the xp thing because my games don't really use xp.
i'd recommend it for both the skelemans and the zombos honestly; what this allows you to do is roughly add 4 times the number of guys and let them be the bowling pins. that way you can sprinkle in your Ghouls and Golems and those can be credible threats without having to do HP bookkeeping for the skellies and zombies
i applaud the desire to attempt it but this could turn into something REALLY boring real quick if your nameless undead don't go down in one hit, and you're going to lose track of who has what HP in the miasma REAL quick (speaking from experience)
if you don't like that idea and want to keep the skeletons distinct, instead of making them minions glob them together into battle groups (stealing from Fantasy Flight/Genesys)
essentially make many creatures one "large" creature, similar to a swarm; add their HP together, give them vulnerability to AoE attacks, and have their attack bonus be the same (maybe give em an additional +1 or +2) and then just add the damage together
so instead of one skeleman taking a turn to roll a d20 at +4 with their gladius to deal 5 slashing, instead make a group of X skelemans attack at +5 or +6 but deal x * 5 damage (where x is the amount of skelemans in the swarm)
Are there going to be options to wipe out multiple bad guys at a time, even for the high-damage single-target types?
I avoided one recent fight taking too long by being generous with the thrown explosives rule and letting a player fashion a Molotov cocktail out of a bottle of cheap spirits she'd picked up earlier
[Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
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Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
Are there going to be options to wipe out multiple bad guys at a time, even for the high-damage single-target types?
I avoided one recent fight taking too long by being generous with the thrown explosives rule and letting a player fashion a Molotov cocktail out of a bottle of cheap spirits she'd picked up earlier
I don't know the party layout yet but I am pretty flexible.
Last session they used the Control Water cantrip with a Decanter of Endless Water to make ice boulders.
I'm converting Beyond the Crystal Cave and just got to converting the 4E version's "Rider's Water."
Rider's Water. A tiny beast with a walking speed and without a fly speed that has this water poured upon it grows to large size for eight hours. Until the effect ends, the target also has advantage on Strength Checks and Strength Saving Throws, and it deals an extra 1d4 damage on its attacks.
The intent is to turn squirrels or whatever into temporary mounts. Anything abusable about this that I'm not seeing?
I'm converting Beyond the Crystal Cave and just got to converting the 4E version's "Rider's Water."
Rider's Water. A tiny beast with a walking speed and without a fly speed that has this water poured upon it grows to large size for eight hours. Until the effect ends, the target also has advantage on Strength Checks and Strength Saving Throws, and it deals an extra 1d4 damage on its attacks.
The intent is to turn squirrels or whatever into temporary mounts. Anything abusable about this that I'm not seeing?
How many familiars does this party have? Or ranger pets. Or druids
And is this a consumable, or something they're going to get to use repeatedly?
I'm converting Beyond the Crystal Cave and just got to converting the 4E version's "Rider's Water."
Rider's Water. A tiny beast with a walking speed and without a fly speed that has this water poured upon it grows to large size for eight hours. Until the effect ends, the target also has advantage on Strength Checks and Strength Saving Throws, and it deals an extra 1d4 damage on its attacks.
The intent is to turn squirrels or whatever into temporary mounts. Anything abusable about this that I'm not seeing?
How many familiars does this party have? Or ranger pets. Or druids
And is this a consumable, or something they're going to get to use repeatedly?
Consumable.
The 4E version was basically just "use the stats of a horse for the enlarged creature", but I based this on a potion of growth. It bumps up the creature more size categories than a potion of growth would, but the mechanical effect is otherwise identical.
I'm converting Beyond the Crystal Cave and just got to converting the 4E version's "Rider's Water."
Rider's Water. A tiny beast with a walking speed and without a fly speed that has this water poured upon it grows to large size for eight hours. Until the effect ends, the target also has advantage on Strength Checks and Strength Saving Throws, and it deals an extra 1d4 damage on its attacks.
The intent is to turn squirrels or whatever into temporary mounts. Anything abusable about this that I'm not seeing?
Millipedes!
Throw it at a zombie, and watch a maggot the size of a cow come bursting out of it!
(Shudder)
GNU Terry Pratchett
PSN: Wstfgl | GamerTag: An Evil Plan | Battle.net: FallenIdle#1970
Hit me up on BoardGameArena! User: Loaded D1
My first thought was using it on a creature that the PCs already control, so they can use the enormous creature as an additional combatant or whatever, but for a consumable item that's probably fine.
My second thought was pouring it into an ant colony in an evil base as a distraction and/or to soften up a garrison. If my players came up with something like that, I'd be quite pleased.
Posts
I can't believe you've done this
Ah, a modern take on a throwback rogue-like then.
This was my table last night for a one-shot to introduce coworkers. It got out of hand quickly, and I feel like I gave Bad D&D in a few ways. That's my co-DM across from me, and most of the players are regulars in other campaigns or in general. As the night wore on we slowly lost everyone until we were down to three players and called it at 2am. I felt like a teenager again, because playing a game for too long, and designing encounters that would easily be too long instead of neatly working different narratives and plots in together. I'll do better next time.
Last night the group simply handled the Calling Horns troll/giant encounter on their way down the road in SKT. But I think a good bit of fun was had!
Especially when the barbarian rolls a 19 on acrobatics to superhero land from a 2nd story inn window to fight off trolls trying to eat their horse, and the dwarf cleric amazingly launched herself out the second story window like a rocket using her boots if striding and springing, then wiffed on her landing, find the ground with her face.
Not to worry, she still cast Spirit Guardians around the dirt in her mouth.
The plot of the original version is to find two lovers who eloped to a garden encased in a wall of force. The 4E version moves the garden to the Feywild and introduces a hag and cambion pair who wish to use the lovers' souls as a means to control the garden as their magical lair.
Both versions also have a pretty terrifying monster called a barkburr. They're trees made from adventurers who desecrated a fey garden. If they sense you desecrated the garden they use a reach attack to inject you with a substance that turns you quickly into a new barkburr.
Does anyone have any ideas for other features and hazards to be found in a fey garden (a 20 square mile garden, btw) that wishes to protect itself?
Fields of flowers that entangle you, grow long thorns, and start drinking your blood.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
......fertilizer shit constructs.
Just wondering if anyone has done similar and maybe knows a published adventure they like for this purpose?
She wants to get a taste before I start what hopefully becomes a multiple session campaign for her and her coworker friends in a few weeks time.
Edit: @Hexmage-PA
Seems really polished for an alpha. Had some fun with the demo, got shoved off a cliff and orc murdered. Then I got ripped apart by a giant swarm of deep spiders.
Just... so many spiders.
so I guess we're gonna go out for breakfast
I'll have to keep that in mind next time I give it a go. The second time I went through, I was able to kill off all the orcs without taking damage. Just have to start thinking more tactically.
As long as they're cute and consenting. Have fun.
otoh, go you!
otoh, you're slowly becoming that player.
Try be humble about all the favoritism flying your way! ;P
My next session I'm running, my six players are 3rd-level and each have command of nine soldiers (so there will be 54 soldiers in their "force") against an army of cavernous undead.
These are the current stats I have for the zombies, skeletons, ghouls, & tombstone golems that will comprise the bulk of the undead army.
I just want to make sure everything looks good before I throw these at them.
Thoughts? Critiques? Ideas?
My goal is to basically bring down the force of 54 characters to just six, so that the next few sessions can be a horror-based dungeon-crawl.
Several of them have taken gifts from the Amber Temple, one of them is evil now, and they have killed a vampirized Ezmeralda, and almost wholesale slaughtered the Valaki Vistani camp. Most of the elves from that camp came along with them the last time to act as a distraction and have been killed by Strahd. They haven't seen Rictavio in ages.
While they ran around killing some more vampire minions, i had Strahd put on his actual armor instead of fighting in a tuxedo the way he has been, get his great sword, and visit the Amber Temple to beef up himself too.
The plan is to open the session by having Strahd whisper each PC via special sending bribery offers to have them switch sides, each offer customized to appeal to the specific character in tempting ways. Going to have them write down an answer and a roll for either deception if they are lying or persuasion if they are telling the truth, but not tell me yet which it is.
Then later when they fight Strahd he'll indicate the time has come and then respond appropriately. I.e. if he believes they are going to switch he won't target then right away unless they keep fighting him after that point. I'm hoping to snare at least one because of the roleplay. Metagaming speaking, I'm sure none of the players would trust Strahd, but the characters might.
this seems great and all, but if your goal is to pare everything down to the party vs a dungeon, why not abstract the battle and start the camera rolling in the aftermath?
running a full combat with 100+ characters sounds like a nightmare
if you really want there to be a battle i would make extensive use of minions from 4e
Maybe you could run in advance some mock battles between nine of the soldiers and a fraction of the undead to see how they fare? One battle where the soldiers use suboptimal tactics, and one where they use flanking and such. Then during the actual session you could ask the players how they are commanding their squad and make some kind of roll to determine if their soldiers use optimal or suboptimal tactics. Then the PCs can take the field with the strongest remaining soldiers (ideally a small number) to handle whatever is left (ideally about 20 or so). You could also use some siege weapons that fire from off the battlefield to give the feeling of their being more troops.
It'll still be time consuming, but at least a bit more manageable with some verisimilitude versus just handwaving the mass battle.
Oh, I want the first session to be a huge fucking battle. I want the spectacle of mass death.
So, I'm prepared for it to go sideways but I want to at least challenge myself in seeing if I can do it.
I know the first thing I am doing for this battle is having the players do average damage instead of rolling damage, just to cut down on time.
I only played 3.5 before jumping over 4E to 5E, what are the minion rules?
Maybe Disintegrate would be targeted through the wall at a target on the other side. But would be blocked by the wall, both cancelling the Disintegrate and destroying the Wall of Force, even though it wasn't targeting the wall directly.
Minions took one hit to kill, but are immune to "half damage on miss" type effects
They also did a static amount of damage rather than rolling for it
In the xp economy, I think they were worth 4 of a non-minion of the same level
Oh, cool!
I'll adopt the one-hit to kill for my zombies.
I won't do the xp thing because my games don't really use xp.
Also, importantly, their to hit rolls were decent enough to be a real threat. This would be basically impossible in 3e but sorta assumed in 5e which doesn't have the level scaling thing to hit.
The Driller's Hives - A realm dominated by giant demonic parasitic wasps. Get a stinger from one of them.
Malignebula - It's atmosphere is composed of poison and acid. Find a drifting chunk of frozen acid.
Slugbed - Some angels established a fortress here in the clouds above the sleeping demon lord Lupercio's realm. They also have a fraction of the psyche of another demon lord that you need.
Yeah! Use the word "ovipositor" if the employer is one of them book-learning types.
i'd recommend it for both the skelemans and the zombos honestly; what this allows you to do is roughly add 4 times the number of guys and let them be the bowling pins. that way you can sprinkle in your Ghouls and Golems and those can be credible threats without having to do HP bookkeeping for the skellies and zombies
i applaud the desire to attempt it but this could turn into something REALLY boring real quick if your nameless undead don't go down in one hit, and you're going to lose track of who has what HP in the miasma REAL quick (speaking from experience)
if you don't like that idea and want to keep the skeletons distinct, instead of making them minions glob them together into battle groups (stealing from Fantasy Flight/Genesys)
essentially make many creatures one "large" creature, similar to a swarm; add their HP together, give them vulnerability to AoE attacks, and have their attack bonus be the same (maybe give em an additional +1 or +2) and then just add the damage together
so instead of one skeleman taking a turn to roll a d20 at +4 with their gladius to deal 5 slashing, instead make a group of X skelemans attack at +5 or +6 but deal x * 5 damage (where x is the amount of skelemans in the swarm)
I avoided one recent fight taking too long by being generous with the thrown explosives rule and letting a player fashion a Molotov cocktail out of a bottle of cheap spirits she'd picked up earlier
I don't know the party layout yet but I am pretty flexible.
Last session they used the Control Water cantrip with a Decanter of Endless Water to make ice boulders.
They're an inventive group.
The intent is to turn squirrels or whatever into temporary mounts. Anything abusable about this that I'm not seeing?
How many familiars does this party have? Or ranger pets. Or druids
And is this a consumable, or something they're going to get to use repeatedly?
Consumable.
The 4E version was basically just "use the stats of a horse for the enlarged creature", but I based this on a potion of growth. It bumps up the creature more size categories than a potion of growth would, but the mechanical effect is otherwise identical.
Millipedes!
Throw it at a zombie, and watch a maggot the size of a cow come bursting out of it!
(Shudder)
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My second thought was pouring it into an ant colony in an evil base as a distraction and/or to soften up a garrison. If my players came up with something like that, I'd be quite pleased.