The Heroes, together with their armies, are about to assault the imperial capital. As Heroes, their task is to capture/kill the enemy king.
Apart from the RP encounters that are going to take place, which are related to the ongoing campaign so I already have them loosely planned, I needed some help with the combat encounters.
I know that I want them to face three important moments:
- a fight on the walls of the city (or at the gate)
- a fight in the streets of the capital (loosely based on Venice, so canals, bridges, etc)
- a fight in the throne room against the king and his elite guards
The setting is Birthright, kind of low magic / game of thrones style, but of course the king may have access to bigger/more extravagant resources than other villains.
As opponents, I have in mind guards, soldiers, archers, knights, and more soldiers, but it seems a bit repetitive. So I'm looking for some idea for creative opponents that fit the style of the campaign. Some ideas for environmental hazards to face during the fights would also be nice.
I'm open to any suggestion, the only opponent that is "fixed" is the enemy king, which is a warrior type that despises arcane magic.
Party is 5 x level 9 PCs
thanks in advance for any help!
Playing on a grid or theater of the mind?
Because chess comes to mind and giving those "repetitive" NPC some chess moves might be fun. For example, "pawns" attack enemies in a diagonal square with advantage, the "bishops" can dash diagonally as a bonus action, and the "rooks" have protection fighting style when it comes to protecting the king.
Though really that might be a little silly for your theme.
We do mostly TotM, but for the boss fights sometimes we use the grid. I'm predicting the "throne room" fight will definitely be on the grid.
Quick question first, do you feel pretty confident the PCs are going to assault the place in a standard way and not just magic their way to the throne room?
Placement can make a decent difference. Archers on the rooftops can have PCs diving into shops for cover. An "underwater" unit of soldiers using reeds to breath air while they wait in ambush can take the PCs by surprise. Barricading off parts of the streets and dumping oil from the rooftops might have the PCs dive into the water. Blowing up a bridge could redirect them or dump them into the water as well. Make sure the PCs have a decent way to detect this sort of stuff and possibly turn it to their advantage.
As far as other creatures, war dogs could be used as well focusing on tripping enemies. Maybe they have some more exotic trained beasts like a tiger, bear, or war elephant.
Put The Creature From the Black Lagoon - excuse me, a Shambling Mound - in the king's castle's moat. Or in one of the canals.
One clobbered my L5 HotDQ group because we were stuck in canoes. Your PCs might have better plans than we did (we had NO plan).
Can the PCs get inside the city without being seen, say via a sewer system? They could sneak inside and be a Fifth Column while their allied army attacks the walls.
Getting sucked underwater and into an oytugh's lair could be an interesting -and totally unexpected - opportunity to sneak into the king's castle via the Royal Waste Disposal System.
"Everybody knows" that Kings Who Hate Magic always wield a 2-Handed Greatsword (or maybe a Battleaxe). "Everybody knows" the King is a Fighter or Barbarian by training.
For something different, make the King a Monk! Give him special NPC-only training that allows him to Disengage whenever he Moves, so the PCs can't use the plain-and-obvious counter-ploy to his hit-and-run tactics: an Attack of Opportunity as he moves away. And the King does in fact carry a Two-Handed Sword / Axe - part of the State Regalia - but he doesn't use the heirloom weapon.
xanral wrote:
I came up with one idea fo the battle in the streets. I usually play the Combat Encounter with maptools in my games. Here's how I would do it.
First I took a screenshot from Ritten (skyrim):
I made some editions in PS and added some elements with maptools:
Here are the routes possibilities:
The players are on the right side. Their objective is to get to the blue cross in the left side of the map. The entrance to the palace is there. The barrels represents barricades. This battle should be more about expending the resources of the players, so the enemies shouldn’t be so difficult, but they should cause some damage nevertheless. I will let you create them, sorry =P. I would put some fighters, archers and wolves probably.
They have two street’s route: the orange and the red.
The orange route: This is a more traditional fight in a way.They go there, defeat a bunch of enemies, go throught the barricade, defeat another and so on. Still, there are more enemies there.
The red route: This route have more enemies and the street is narrow (?). In the rooftops there are soldiers. So, besides the fights, they will have to worry about arrows, spears, rocks, etc being thrown at them. You might want to put some hot oil for fire damage maybe? I would treat these enemies in a similar fashion as traps. So, in the beginning of every turn, the player must make a Save DC (13 or 15 maybe?) or take some damage (around 2d10, since is every turn it shouldn’t be too big)
Once the players get through the first barricade and defeat the enemies, a Wall Explosion trap may trigger:
DC 15 to spot it by smell – The players smells the explosive substances (gunpowder maybe?) and can act before the explosion occurs to avoid it.
DC 15 reflex save to avoid damage if the fail to spot it - 22 damage (4d10)
I have come up with two alternative routes:
The Yellow Route: In this route they don’t fight enemies but they must make some Skill checks: Athletics to jump from one boat to the other and Acrobatics to maintain balance while running through the boat. If they fail, they don’t progress and the enemy makes one (or more) ranged attack against them.
The Green Route: In this route, the players climb walls of the house and go through the rooftops. They have to fight their way through the enemies and to make skill checks to jump from one side to the other risking falling damage. Once the fight is over, the last enemy may try to scream to warn their comrades to blow the construction or to collapse the rooftop. The players must make an Insight Check to predict what he will do and silence him in time. If they fail a trap triggers and they must roll Reflex DC 15 to avoid 22 Damage (4d10).
I don’t know if the DC’s and Damages are balanced with your character levels and possibilities of healing. So you may adjust it as you see fit.
Once they get to the Blue X, you can describe that their army advances and put their enemies to the sword, so they don’t have to worry about being followed inside the palace or with the enemies they left behind.
I hope this helps with some ideas.
Other things to take into account:
-Maybe while the battle is in progress, another army starts looting. This creates an optional goal, where the players can choose to capture the local cathedral, to safeguard it against looters.
-The enemy could make use of the slopes in the streets, to roll burning debris down upon the players.
-There might be a prominent watch tower that is an important strategic building to capture. But it is also very easy to defend. So present this as an optional goal.
-The king may choose to set fire to part of his city on purpose.
-Maybe some of the King's followers are willing to change sides, and exchange information in return for their guaranteed safety.
-Maybe the players get routed by a backup army from an ally of the king. This puts the players in the position to use what's left of the city's defenses against this army.
-Maybe at some point the guards open all the kennels, and set rabid guard dogs loose upon the enemy army.
-Maybe the king has sent an escort to bring his heir to safety. News of this reaches the players mid battle, but they can't pursue the king and the heir at the same time, because this would split their forces.
all great ideas!
keep them coming!