Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Lomiat 07-03-06, 03:55 PM	As a curious person and sometime author of LG mods, I wonder what all of you think have been the coolest combats you've faced. I'm not looking for spoilers, here, but rather a breakdown and ranking of certain elements, such as: classed NPCs vs. raw (unclassed) monsters advanced monsters vs. monsters at their base CR 1 BBEG vs a pair or multiple opponents opponent's survivability vs. opponent's ability to dish out damage other factors: terrain, tactics, etc. Which combination of things have produced the most memorable combats? What do you think is most important to a good LG fight?
Namarus 07-03-06, 04:09 PM	Best fun fights I've had were when characters were able to just unleash hell, knocking opponents down right left and centre. I really get annoyed personally with module writers who artifically put templates, etc.. on creatures just to boost the EL. I'd much rather see lots and lots of monsters, so that wizards get a chance to do those AoE spells, fighters get to whirlwind, etc... I like to see fights that make sense, or offer alternative routes to by pass the fights, without losing out on xp or access. I also like to see fights where the enemy doesn't box text 3-5 rounds worth of actions, with players unable to do anything.
JohnduBois 07-03-06, 04:20 PM	As a curious person and sometime author of LG mods, I wonder what all of you think have been the coolest combats you've faced. I'm not looking for spoilers, here, but rather a breakdown and ranking of certain elements, such as: classed NPCs vs. raw (unclassed) monsters advanced monsters vs. monsters at their base CR 1 BBEG vs a pair or multiple opponents opponent's survivability vs. opponent's ability to dish out damage other factors: terrain, tactics, etc. Which combination of things have produced the most memorable combats? What do you think is most important to a good LG fight? I like to see things I haven't seen before in adventures. Whether it's unique storylines, a new monster/template combination (I swear, if I see another random half-fiend or fiend...), or unique tactics, I think it's fun. Things I would watch out for if you're trying to make people happy: 1. Linear adventure. There's only so much you can do with four hours, but dragging players by the nose (especially when many reasonable characters wouldn't play along) isn't good. If you want the players to help an evil creature, include something for paladins or dogmatic cleric. If you want players to help out the Church of Trithereon, provide a way to get Pholtans or Cuthbertians involved. And so on. 2. Not including consequences of common PC choices. What if the PCs had a hard time in te first encounter and want to rest? What if they decide to walk away and attack from a different angle? Can the PCs use their Level X spells to get in? This is especially an issue at higher APLs, where PCs can do all kinds of crazy stuff. If you're not talking about Teleport at APL 8 or higher, you're missing something. 3. Templates and advanced creatures, especially at low APLs. The mechanics of templates and such don't always make an APL-appropriate challenge. Just because you CAN put rogue levels on a spriggan and put it in and intro mod doesn't mean you SHOULD. The biggest culprits of this are level draining monsters at APL 2 and advancing anything with Improved Grab. It can get very bad, very quickly. There may be others I'm missing, but those are the big ones.
boogahwoof 07-03-06, 07:05 PM	Im not sure if this will make alot of sence, but i think the most fun i have had was when the dm played the villians to the best of thier abilities. Like when i run mods i love to play the villians like i would play my own characters.Looking to maximise spells based on terrain, situation, and other variable factors. But i do think i agree with the other threads, I loved it when there were a ton of monsters to fight. Even if they were lower level, just streams of them that kept coming and coming, with maybe a few higher level ones as leaders. Although I did have alot of fun battling a cadaver collector. I think some of the best encounters end up when the party thinks that they cannot live and make it out by the skin of thier teeth. I guess what i am saying is I like the encounters based on how they play, not so much as what they are.
smerwin29 07-03-06, 09:03 PM	I loved the barge chase combat in "Mad God's Key": different than a mere "go kill something" combat, lots of ways it could go based on luck and skills checks, defintely interesting terrain (or lack thereof), random effects on different barges, etc. I enjoyed the final combat in Festival Knight where the combat depending a great deal on where you were along the parade route. The final combat of Lerera comes to mind, with the clues about where not to walk in the chamber. I really like combats that promote strategic thinking, whether it be because of situational modifiers, terrain, alternate combat goals, etc. And I don't just mean things that make it tougher for the PCs. I'm talking about aspects of the combat that can work to their advantage as well: objects that can be used for cover, items that can offer situational advantages, or terrain that favors the PCs if they use it wisely. Shawn
ithardin 07-04-06, 12:29 AM	I also enjoy the combats where tactics and teamwork combine for mutual success. As much fun as it is to watch the combat brute lay into all the bad guys with sundering cleave while we watch and cheer him on, I think combats that makes you use your brains were the most enjoyable to me. Advanced, 1/2 fiend and other templates just **** me off when they are there to do nothing but add DR, etc. Anything having DR5 or more at APL 2 or 4 is just malicious. Also having a creature at APL2 or 4 that is +10 or more to attack and does minimum damage of 10 or more is even worse.
Cynric 07-04-06, 12:48 AM	One I liked was where the players fight an "evil party" of adventurers. It was fun as both a player, and eventually when I got to run it at top APL, it was really nice. Personally, I would like to see more of it at high levels, it should really make the players work for the win.
Maesto 07-04-06, 01:57 AM	I'll add four things to this. One thing I didn't enjoy as a DM was running a module that scaled from APL 2-12, where there was 1 critter at APL 2, two at APL 4, 4 and APL 6, 8 at APL 8, or whatever the scaling is. I ran it at the higher APLs, and the critters with 15 hitpoints were one hit kills for everything, and didn't have the attack bonuses or DC's or special attacks to even touch the PCs. Facing an evil party as Cynric mentioned I've often found to be a lot of fun. When there are two major NPCs (eg, fighter + wizard), a party of six will generally tear them apart for fairly obvious reasons. Multiple combatants are certainly more fun than one BBEG. I always enjoy seeing advanced critters, even if they've only been advanced by a little bit. It means that the PC's don't automatically know "A vrock has x hitpoints, this many hitdice, this AC", which stirs things up a bit. That being said, although advancing by hitdice is more interesting than giving them class levels, doing it to outsiders isn't pretty due to the fact that hitdice for outsiders are obscene. Perhaps the most fun that I've seen (although quite scary) was a beholder with a bunch of sorceror levels, so it could actually use it's standard actions. The higher tiers had a fiendish beholder with sorceror levels, which I thought was starting to be a bit rude. Note - beholders are always more fun when they have minions. A single beholder combat is quite boring after you've done it a few times. I saw one module that had an assassin vine advanced a stupid number of hitdice so it was gargantuan (highest tier for the mod). Yes, this did make it rather ugly, but the combat was set outside. I thought it highly amusing that the module writer gave it "run" and "dash" as feats, so it could actually move quite quickly. Note that the module author also wrote in to always take -20 to the grapple checks so that it still threatened, but gave the PC's a chance of making the grapple checks. One module has four trails to get somewhere along with a warden at the forking point. If you ask him which way the BBEG's went or you track them, he shows you the path. If you ask for the quickest path, he gives you a different one. If you ask for the safest path, you get a different one altogether. On the safe path, you got hit by one X. On all the others, you got hit with 2 X's, which I thought was really cute. That being said, the best combat I've ever played or run was in the Perrenland module Tinderbox from year 3. You entered in on a fight in a small cavern with a bunch of evil soldiers fighting a bunch of army guys (your side). However, the army guys were actually Iuzians in disguise, so when you joined in the combat, you were set upon by both sides. Furthermore, one side has a wizard, an assassin that was invisible at the start of the combat, and four grunts, whilst the other had a cleric, five grunts, and a tiefling rogue. It took a while and it was a bit messy, but it was a very enjoyable combat. Terrain was included, and there was a big pillar sort of in the middle of the room, so the combat was tactical as well as amusing from the point of view of "What do you mean he turned around and sneak attacked me? Isn't he in the Perrenland army?" Furthermore, after killing them all, the tiefling had a cursed rapier that you couldn't get rid of, and one round after killing them all the BBEG ran through the door after planting a bomb. If you spent 10 rounds taking out the melee, the BBEG joined in the fray. Then there was a time limit on the bomb as well... it was great fun ;-) Cheers, Jolyon
Samo 07-04-06, 10:28 AM	I also enjoy the combats where tactics and teamwork combine for mutual success. As much fun as it is to watch the combat brute lay into all the bad guys with sundering cleave while we watch and cheer him on, I think combats that makes you use your brains were the most enjoyable to me. Advanced, 1/2 fiend and other templates just **** me off when they are there to do nothing but add DR, etc. Anything having DR5 or more at APL 2 or 4 is just malicious. Also having a creature at APL2 or 4 that is +10 or more to attack and does minimum damage of 10 or more is even worse. I was recently in an APL 2 party which was basically all level one characters, and we ran across a mummy and almost all got the crap kicked out of us, 2 players died becasue of the minimum damage of 13 that it dealt, we could barely injure it becasue of it's DR/5, and another player left with mummy rot......bottom line is that baddies with a challenge rating that high don't belong in an APL 2 adventure
JohnduBois 07-04-06, 10:38 AM	bottom line is that baddies with a challenge rating that high don't belong in an APL 2 adventure Most adventures have one encounter that has an EL of the APL plus 3, which makes the mummy technically fit. However, most adventure writers (and editors) are better at looking at the challenge they place before parties and saying, "Is this really an appropriate challenge for a group?" Of course, in the context of the mummy, the answer is no, but a CR 5 zombie could easily show up.
Samwise 07-04-06, 02:00 PM	Things I would watch out for if you're trying to make people happy: 1. Linear adventure. Unfortunately, beause of the limits of LG, non-linear adventures are nearly impossible to write. There are simply too many options available in such cases to fit into anything short of a major tome. 2. Not including consequences of common PC choices. Part of this is related to linear adventures above. There are simply limits on how much an author can anticipate, and how much of that can be included in the adventure. 3. Templates and advanced creatures, especially at low APLs. And ithardin's comment on DR. I would strongly advise that ALL characters buy silver and cold iron ammunition after their first adventure. Period. Just like an "emergency" potion and scroll of cure light wounds. Don't play games about "saving" for something, just buy them. I've suggested that a note on that be added to the LGCS for next year. It won't cover everything, but forewarned is forearmed.
JohnduBois 07-04-06, 02:34 PM	I agree that the format limits what is available, and I'm not saying that there should be a character path for every conceivable possibility (it's the DM's job to make that up). What I'm saying is that if you're going to have the PCs do a favor for an evil being, you KNOW that the paladin isn't going to want to play along under ANY circumstances, and that has to be accounted for in the adventure somewhere. Otherwise, you're cutting an entire core base class out of the adventure. Same thing with accounting for PC choices. PCs can do a lot of crazy stuff in adventures (I've done a lot of it), but many normal options should be discussed in adventures to a greater length than currently exists. Every time a terrain-based challenge or puzzle arises, the DM should run down the list of skills and PHB baseI class abilities and see how they might affect things. I'm not talking about "Well, what if the mindbender decides to charm the guard". I'm talking about things that, at certain APLs, most parties will have. Knowledge checks. Common mid-level spells like Teleport (easily lumped into "magical travel"). The desire to rest and recover spells after a particularly difficult combat. IMO, an author that is not anticipating these things is not doing his or her job. And I'm saying this having been that author.
Paul H 07-04-06, 08:16 PM	Hi Just part way through a mod, at APL 4. Had pack of wolves, one had over 50HP, immune to magic under 6th level, plus DR5 (Magic or something). First combat encounter, my spells didn't work, creature doing 17 damage with bite, then claw attacks. Didn't take long to put me down to -4 from 48 HP! Party Halfling Scout 1 Human Cleric 1 Human Bard 2 Dwarf Barbarian 1/Fighter 1/Ranger 1 Elf Ranger 5 Dwarf Clr 3/Warmage 4 (Practiced Spellcaster on Warmage) (Me). Only Magic Wpn was Ranger's. We thought just pack of wolves, though one slightly bigger than others. Opened up with Scorching Ray. No effect on 2 targets. Bard singing. Magic Missile not working. Downhill fast from there. Even Raging Barbarian went down shortly after I did. Now neither cleric nor bard has any spells (exept orisons & domain spells), even using both Pearls of Power, 4 charges WoCL, & 2 scrolls . At least we're all conscious. Not sure if this combat was properly thought out at design stage. Even with 7th lvl character, we nearly all died. Cheers Paul H
Lupo 07-04-06, 08:44 PM	Hi Just part way through a mod, at APL 4. Had pack of wolves, one had over 50HP, immune to magic under 6th level, plus DR5 (Magic or something). First combat encounter, my spells didn't work, creature doing 17 damage with bite, then claw attacks. Didn't take long to put me down to -4 from 48 HP! Party Halfling Scout 1 Human Cleric 1 Human Bard 2 Dwarf Barbarian 1/Fighter 1/Ranger 1 Elf Ranger 5 Dwarf Clr 3/Warmage 4 (Practiced Spellcaster on Warmage) (Me). ok, from the start, a party with two first level characters and one second level playing at APL 4 is asking for trouble anyway, as a divine/arcane mix you don't muster enough BOOST power to get the first level characters to par. warmages are very poor sole arcane casters, they are wandering blasters, that's it. no boost, support or battlefield control to speak of at your level. Only Magic Wpn was Ranger's. We thought just pack of wolves, though one slightly bigger than others. Opened up with Scorching Ray. No effect on 2 targets. Bard singing. Magic Missile not working. Downhill fast from there. Even Raging Barbarian went down shortly after I did. yea, that is a nasty surprise, module writer's assume magic weapons at APL 4, and when the party is not fullfilling it you should grab your oil of magic weapon or your magic weapon spells really fast. actually as a wolf normally doesn't sport claws, i suppose it was a lycanthrophe, so maybe silver would have done it. and buying a silver weapon after first set of adventures is a no-brainer for every melee type. the always usefull silvered morningstar and a cold iron glaive should be bought without second thought by any "frontliner" and a ranged wepon of some sort. Now neither cleric nor bard has any spells (exept orisons & domain spells), even using both Pearls of Power, 4 charges WoCL, & 2 scrolls . At least we're all conscious. Not sure if this combat was properly thought out at design stage. Even with 7th lvl character, we nearly all died. maybe it wasn't designed to kill you anyway, with the nasty trip ability of a large wolf, a party is always unhappy to see them popping up. untill a MIX character gets to the point where the beef of the mix kicks in (i suppose you are going for a mystik theurge??? so it is around 10th level or 12th) he is way underpowered. so you can NEVER make up for an underpowered party. Cheers Paul H ciao martin m.
Namarus 07-04-06, 09:42 PM	Hi Just part way through a mod, at APL 4. Had pack of wolves, one had over 50HP, immune to magic under 6th level, plus DR5 (Magic or something). First combat encounter, my spells didn't work, creature doing 17 damage with bite, then claw attacks. Didn't take long to put me down to -4 from 48 HP! Party Halfling Scout 1 Human Cleric 1 Human Bard 2 Dwarf Barbarian 1/Fighter 1/Ranger 1 Elf Ranger 5 Dwarf Clr 3/Warmage 4 (Practiced Spellcaster on Warmage) (Me). Only Magic Wpn was Ranger's. We thought just pack of wolves, though one slightly bigger than others. Opened up with Scorching Ray. No effect on 2 targets. Bard singing. Magic Missile not working. Downhill fast from there. Even Raging Barbarian went down shortly after I did. Now neither cleric nor bard has any spells (exept orisons & domain spells), even using both Pearls of Power, 4 charges WoCL, & 2 scrolls . At least we're all conscious. Not sure if this combat was properly thought out at design stage. Even with 7th lvl character, we nearly all died. Cheers Paul H I remember doing a mod like that, probably the same mod. When we faced the 'magical' wolf with a balanced party it got spanked. The problem in this case was not the mod, but rather your party makeup. Having one character that boosts the APL of the mod up significantly is always a bad idea. If the 7th level character was a tank, that creature would probably have died in round or two. But with your high level character being a multi-class caster, I play one myself, you are going to have trouble.
clik_ml 07-05-06, 04:01 AM	Combats I've enjoyed that I remember: * 3 mounted enemies (1 spirited charger, 1 barbarian, 1 cleric)=APL 6 * 4 vile spewers spaced out with a couple rounds between fighting each one=APL 8... a surpise round breath weapon dealing 54 damage to almost the entire party at APL 8 sure put us on the edge of our seats. Hearing the next one come and then the next one, and then the next one. That was exciting. * party of 4 evil gnomes (cleric, wiz, ftr, rog?) * rogues vs. monks fight (players had to choose side to help out) * vampire spirited charger and vampire sorceress=APL 8 * 2 mohrgs (advanced?) and a dominated unequipped level 15 paladin=APL 8 * huge tank and couple nuisances (forces party to work as a team to handle the dangerous tank, example: thaksor and 2 bearded devils=APL 8) * white dragon flying over slippery dangerous plateau Combats that irked me: * 4 pouncing griffons while party was sleeping=APL 6 * quickened benign transpositioning advanced apes with +1d10+10 damage buffs on=APL 6. * majorly augmented Dreadwraith and uber-buffed 11 cleric=APL 8 * any mods that have extensive tunnel fighting. Having to deal with tons of combats with tiny chokes adds at least an hour to combats, sometimes more. Half the party has to sit back and twiddle thumbs during combat, which is not fun.
Lupo 07-05-06, 08:14 AM	Hi Party Halfling Scout 1 Human Cleric 1 Human Bard 2 Dwarf Barbarian 1/Fighter 1/Ranger 1 Elf Ranger 5 Dwarf Clr 3/Warmage 4 (Practiced Spellcaster on Warmage) (Me). ok, i assume it was a convention table, sort of leftover players of some sort. then why did you play your level seven at all????? first you force table up to APL 4 second you get only half xp of APL 4 = 675/2 third you force the two level ones to get only half xp = 675/2 and half gold in such a case i would just pull one of the not-yet-played character concepts from my folder and start a new character. playing the module at APL 2. then only the level 5 ranger would get half xp and the party might better fit for the APL. ok, there might be in character reasons (have played all the modules in a series, is a module or yery fitting for in-character reasons) or meta gaming reasons (need just so few xp to level, need a module from region x). ciao martin m.
solbergb 07-05-06, 02:13 PM	There've been a lot of memorable combats. I agree with other posters that usually something unique about the terrain or situation is what made it memorable. Finale of a regional mod, end of a long-running series - we had some very high AC outsider-sorcerers sniping while a steady stream of gas spores were pouring out of a dimensional gate and constricted terrain (one long tunnel filled with gas spores). Our goal is to dump an artifact in the dimensional gate, destroying the artifact. Said artifact is resisting that destruction by hampering attempts to move it closer to the gate. If we had not acquired blunt arrows for the party archers, I don't think we would have succeeded - nonlethal damage on the gas spores was the key to victory. There's a module still active in our metaregion which involves rescuing a previous party from the consequences of a TPK. It greatly rewards inventive tactics and approaches - a brute force approach can backfire spectacularly or turn into a real battle royale, which can be fun too for a tough party that likes a challenge. I ran one fight with a dire rat druid and his dire rat animal companion, in the woods at APL4. The party had made choices that made this encounter as difficult as possible They were so HATED by the PC's due to taunting, and just frustrating and difficult to overcome tactics that we had things like one guy wanting to coup-de-grace the animal companion after it was finally dropped while the druid was chasing the rogue (screaming like a little girl for help) around the treetops with a produce flame effect. The best part was, when they were done, battered, scorched and triumphant - all they had to show for it was a couple dead dire rats. That party ended up getting the boar corpses from an earlier fight and lying about how they got so badly hurt :) There is a haunted-house/horror movie-like intro-mod that also works really well, but explaining why would be too many spoilers for an active module. In Ket we had one encounter made memorable by the Judge's roleplay of NPC's we were protecting - it is against the law to use lethal force there, even in self-defense, against citizens. Observing that we might lose a close fight some of them piped up and said "We're watching the back way, to make sure nobody sneaks up. We can't see anything clearly where you are fighting" clearly hinting that if we were to use lethal force to win, they wouldn't "notice". Our summoner promptly dropped a lion onto the battlefield...and the tide turned. In the BK, I had a couple encounters that were memorable mostly because the NPC's that were added on the players side to let them raise the EL of the overall encounter a bit actually pulled their weight. There were also a lot of encounters where the situation was in front of you, the PC's clearly needed to intervene or take action, and it was not at ALL clear what the "right" action was. Most of their mods can handle any path, near as I can tell. I thought that was very cool. There was one module where a T-Rex scaled to our level snuck up on us...because we were in a hurricane at the time. The table reaction to that was "huh...they actually found a reasonable way to have a critter that size not be noticed". The fact that it favored awsome blow (in high winds), and that our battle tactics involved balancing a TWF rogue on the shoulders of a monk to get at its vital points also made it more amusing than such a obligatory thug encounter usually is. I also have a fondness for encounters where the NPC's have counterparts to PC's in the party, where they can go toe-to-toe (so to speak) in their specialities and have a bit of a rivalry. Like when my monk gets to fight other monks, or when my archer fights archers, or when my baby druid got into a battlefield-control fight with an enemy shaman. I like it on either side of the table, and it doesn't have to be my character - and it doesn't have to go well for the PC either, as long as he makes a decent showing.
kenobi65 07-05-06, 02:20 PM	* any mods that have extensive tunnel fighting. Having to deal with tons of combats with tiny chokes adds at least an hour to combats, sometimes more. Half the party has to sit back and twiddle thumbs during combat, which is not fun. Yup. Tunnel fighting and "door clogs" get old real fast. So does overuse of battlefield control spells, like Web and Entangle. OTOH, "interesting" terrain can add a lot of good flavor to a module, as well as opportunities for maneuvers that don't get used very often (like bull rush)...though mostly I've seen terrain just used to hose the PCs while not hampering the NPCs one bit.
Paul H 07-05-06, 05:03 PM	Hi Lupo Actually, believe I still get full GP. (1/2 XP). Yes - there were reasons - Oskar's already played the sequel, other players originally were going to play their main characters, etc. Don't get many games LG - lucky to get 3-4 year at home, plus Conception, where I get most my games. Even then I've had to 'Play Down' to get some games. Meanwhile, back on thread................ One most memorable was we had to attack a walled village, as part of a larger army. We were allowed to start at any distance from wall. Think we chose something like 400-600 feet. Cast Accuracy on few of our shooters who advanced on the wall, preceded by our monk snatching arrows. We took the wall. We took the big bad monster after it. (Coup de Gras with Acid Splash)! We then had to take on monster's boss. All in sequence. Another was when we were on 'secret' mission. (Think this was first combat in same mod). Came across orc caravan, with females & young. Our NPC leader ordered the caravan attacked & all slaughtered. (Reported him, but no effect this adventure. Later he led another, less prestigious mission as demotion). Orc beserkers charged. Most party down, monk running interference while our 5th lvl Clerics wounds healed from his own Lssr Vigor. Once conscious the cleric healed us, we kicked butt. Too close for comfort! Cheers Paul H
JohnduBois 07-05-06, 07:03 PM	Yup. Tunnel fighting and "door clogs" get old real fast. So does overuse of battlefield control spells, like Web and Entangle. I've been very surprised about how much even the more fluid battlefield control spells, like Obscuring Mist, make combats last longer. Not because of the miss chance or because people can't see each other, but becuase there's so much maneuvering and hesitancy to go in or move around inside.
solbergb 07-05-06, 07:34 PM	Battlefield control spells trade safety for longer fights. Properly used, a party might not take a single point of damage, while defeating the enemy effortlessly. But it does take longer than charging in and taking your lumps. Part of the skill of using such spells is knowing when to dismiss/remove them to get them out of the way of party members and/or buffing party members so they can ignore the effectcs.