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H1 and Party Size

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
dimitrix
May 08, 2008 16:30:38 I've been looking through the demo copy of Keep on the Shadowfell and I had a question about party size. There are 5 pregen characters in the adventure. Is the adventure designed to have 5 characters or a standard party of 4? Also, if the design is for 5 characters, how can we scale down encounters for 3 or 4 characters. My gaming group is small and we probably won't have 5 players and I hate asking my players to play more than one character. This is especially problematic because all of the options that characters have and that everything is new means that a player can get a bit overwhelmed by options and probably not play the characters as well as they could.
#2
strand0
May 09, 2008 0:35:15 I hope the character to monster tolerance is NOT as tight as you are suggesting. ;)
Also I don't remember any adventer being for only 4 characters.
#3
Gold_Katana
May 09, 2008 9:26:17 I imagine 5 PC's are offered so a standard group of 4 will have some options and avoid the "Too bad, Jimmy - you HAVE to character X because that's the only one left."
#4
jp4
May 09, 2008 9:49:41 While it's based on 5 characters, you can easily modify it for 4 or even 3. For example if an encounter is worth 575 Xp then reduce it to 475 or 450 XP for 4 characters or 375 or 350ish for 3 characters. Basically you just need to remove one non-minion monster for every PC that is missing. The standard encounter XP for a group in the adventure is 500 (1st) then 625(2nd) and finally 750(3rd).
#5
Chethrok_Bloodfist
May 09, 2008 9:52:08 In 4e, the "standard" party size is now 5 members. Solo monsters are worth XP for a 5-person party of their level.

That said, scaling encounters down shouldn't be that big of a deal, especially with the new 1-to-1 monster-to-pc ratio that they're building around.
#6
ian_demagi
May 09, 2008 10:30:23 One of the things WotC said they would be chaning in modules was scale-ability in 4E. I think they are designing for groups of 4-6 with 5 as a ballpark.

This was one of my main beefs with 3.0 & 3.5. I would lay out 36 bucks for a module (like EtCR) and have to do massive modifications to it-sometimes it took hours! Why did I spend the stash? I heard RHoD was scalable but guys in my group said they like my own stuff (and the other DM's stuff) better anyway.

Necromancer Games seemed to do this better (scale adventurers for larger groups), but I thought Necropolis was blantly unfair to Player Characters (really really harsh-worse than Rappnathuk), so I did not buy much more of their stuff either. I did not like WLD which I thought had tremendous design flaws by nerfing just about every character class core mechanic except fighters (clerical turning almost useless, backstab-only useable in certain portions of the WLD-screwed up summoning for Druids and others-good god it did not even seem like 3.5 D & D after a while)! There is a WotC feel that I like-what can I say...

Sorry for the long answer, Ian.
#7
strand0
May 09, 2008 15:35:58 Wait!

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4spot/20080507a Archive article
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=products/dndacc/217187400 D&D Products-H1 Keep on the Shadowfell

Nothing in the above items say how many characters are supposed to be it the game. There did you read that Shadowfell is a only four character adventure?
#8
Gold_Katana
May 09, 2008 15:41:18 I haven't seen any recommendations for party size for the adventure. My 4 party comment was based on the standard party size going back to 1E. If that has changed, I didn't know about it. Regardless, my table is not going to suddenly sprout another player. :D We've had our group at 1 DM and 4 players for decades now.
#9
strand0
May 09, 2008 16:02:09
I haven't seen any recommendations for party size for the adventure. My 4 party comment was based on the standard party size going back to 1E. If that has changed, I didn't know about it. Regardless, my table is not going to suddenly sprout another player. :D We've had our group at 1 DM and 4 players for decades now.

Thanks Gold Katana,
Mine over the same time has be 6, 7, or 8. (I know of a 1E game that is still going on with a 10 players, it has had months of 12 regulars.)
Never IIRC have I played D&D with only 4 players.

Adventures published in Dungeon Magazine listed a range of characters AND the number of levels they should have when added together.

Has anyone got a source for the party size intended for H1?
Seems to me one could double up on one or two of the supplied PCs and it probably wouldn't make the module unplayable. Maybe
#10
dimitrix
May 09, 2008 16:16:00 That's been one of my concerns: the module doesn't tell me how many characters are supposed to be in the adventure. So, I don't know if I even need to make adjustments to the encounters. I already know how to make adjustments, I just need to know if I should go through the effort.
#11
Gold_Katana
May 09, 2008 16:23:09 It appears we'll have to wait another 11 days to find out.
#12
dimitrix
May 09, 2008 16:42:18 I finally got an answer...on the enworld.org thread. Apparently, the WotC designers don't read the WotC forums. Here's the response:

In 4E, the assumed party size is 5, so the encounters are built for 5 PCs. As arghost said, if you have a group of 4 you can remove 1 monster to make it about right, and if the party's larger you can duplicate a monster. Remember that an elite monster counts as two (and is usually important enough that you shouldn't remove it!), and a solo counts as 5 (if you have a smaller group, you'll have to just lump it, but you can add a monster from another encounter if you have a larger party).
__________________
Logan Bonner
Mechanical Designer, Dungeons & Dragons
Wizards of the Coast

The thread can be read at http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=225711

To be honest, this is my first real complaint about 4e: it requires 6 people in a group to really get the most out of the game. I can't remember if I've ever been in a DnD group with more than four people.
#13
Istaran
May 09, 2008 17:55:28 If you're willing to do the work, you can actually scale down a solo monster to a lower level to get the XP value where you want it using the info from one of the excerpts. That could work for the smaller group.
#14
lostdm
May 09, 2008 18:25:05 Well one of the legitimate reasons for the XP system is that smaller parties should level faster under the same tempurature and pressure. Threfore, if you buy this book and run it as is for 4 people (assuming it was built for five)- then the encounters would run slightly high for a while, be pretty easy right after they level, then gradually be slightly high agian...

In fact, if they designed the adventure really well their shouldn't be any really hard lines between the levels. Encounters should always run between 60% and 120% of balanced.

This assumes they haven't changed things too radically. Je ne sais pas.
#15
strand0
May 10, 2008 2:30:52 Thanks DimitriX! Good man.

I'd like to add WOW! The new D&D is disgned to have that fine an encounter tolerance. or is that an intolerance? ;)
#16
psyguard
May 28, 2008 10:33:39 I'm likely to be running the mission with 6 players (Thank you for the Tiefling Warlord guys). Scaling seems pretty easy just figure out how much each PC, of a group of 5, is supposed to get for each encounter and add about that much to scale it up for 6 PCs.

For that first encounter I figure I'll add 3 or 4 minions or maybe just 1 extra slinger. If I was going to scale it down for a group of 4 players I'd probably drop one of the dragonshields
#17
powercat
May 28, 2008 12:10:21 After my party's first session, I feel safe saying running it as written with three PCs is a sure way to TPK. We came within one bad roll of getting wiped in just the second encounter.
#18
rajaat
May 28, 2008 12:15:43 I played today the Ironteeth Encounter (it's a Goblin Elite) with all 5 players. All of them died. Luckily I was the DM but my players didn't blame me...they blamed WotC.

The encounter was excessively tough and the players really had no chance (and I would say their rolls were good-ish and they worked pretty well together).

What happened is that they had to face a wave of 10 minions with 2 kobold skirmishers, and after 3 rounds another 2 kobold Dragonshield, a kobold priest, and the Elite goblin.

Let's just say they killed everyone (except the Elite)..and when he got bloodied he kicked ass so much they all died.

So whoever tells me an Elite is equivalent to 2 normals...I'd say...more like 3 ;)

Finally my players asked..."what, is he king of the world too?" we should be able to disarm him, pin him down and backstab him till death"! Too bad there is no rules for that yet

BTW the encounter alone lasted about 4 hours...and with just a minor 2 min pee break and with the players in a non-objecting non-irritating mood...they were all quite interested in trying out the new system.
#19
dwarvenarcher
May 28, 2008 12:22:23 4th ed scaling is really easy. Nearly all the encounters are made up of 5 enemy "spots", each one is either a standard enemy, or 5 minions. If you have 6 PCs, add another "spot". If less, remove some. The xp value of every enemy in the module is actually listed in it's stats, so you can total them up yourself if you like.

I wouldn't run the encounters as is with a smaller party, as they look pretty challenging for 5 PCs.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 dimitrix May 08, 2008 16:30:38	I've been looking through the demo copy of Keep on the Shadowfell and I had a question about party size. There are 5 pregen characters in the adventure. Is the adventure designed to have 5 characters or a standard party of 4? Also, if the design is for 5 characters, how can we scale down encounters for 3 or 4 characters. My gaming group is small and we probably won't have 5 players and I hate asking my players to play more than one character. This is especially problematic because all of the options that characters have and that everything is new means that a player can get a bit overwhelmed by options and probably not play the characters as well as they could.
#2 strand0 May 09, 2008 0:35:15	I hope the character to monster tolerance is NOT as tight as you are suggesting. ;) Also I don't remember any adventer being for only 4 characters.
#3 Gold_Katana May 09, 2008 9:26:17	I imagine 5 PC's are offered so a standard group of 4 will have some options and avoid the "Too bad, Jimmy - you HAVE to character X because that's the only one left."
#4 jp4 May 09, 2008 9:49:41	While it's based on 5 characters, you can easily modify it for 4 or even 3. For example if an encounter is worth 575 Xp then reduce it to 475 or 450 XP for 4 characters or 375 or 350ish for 3 characters. Basically you just need to remove one non-minion monster for every PC that is missing. The standard encounter XP for a group in the adventure is 500 (1st) then 625(2nd) and finally 750(3rd).
#5 Chethrok_Bloodfist May 09, 2008 9:52:08	In 4e, the "standard" party size is now 5 members. Solo monsters are worth XP for a 5-person party of their level. That said, scaling encounters down shouldn't be that big of a deal, especially with the new 1-to-1 monster-to-pc ratio that they're building around.
#6 ian_demagi May 09, 2008 10:30:23	One of the things WotC said they would be chaning in modules was scale-ability in 4E. I think they are designing for groups of 4-6 with 5 as a ballpark. This was one of my main beefs with 3.0 & 3.5. I would lay out 36 bucks for a module (like EtCR) and have to do massive modifications to it-sometimes it took hours! Why did I spend the stash? I heard RHoD was scalable but guys in my group said they like my own stuff (and the other DM's stuff) better anyway. Necromancer Games seemed to do this better (scale adventurers for larger groups), but I thought Necropolis was blantly unfair to Player Characters (really really harsh-worse than Rappnathuk), so I did not buy much more of their stuff either. I did not like WLD which I thought had tremendous design flaws by nerfing just about every character class core mechanic except fighters (clerical turning almost useless, backstab-only useable in certain portions of the WLD-screwed up summoning for Druids and others-good god it did not even seem like 3.5 D & D after a while)! There is a WotC feel that I like-what can I say... Sorry for the long answer, Ian.
#7 strand0 May 09, 2008 15:35:58	Wait! http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4spot/20080507a Archive article http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=products/dndacc/217187400 D&D Products-H1 Keep on the Shadowfell Nothing in the above items say how many characters are supposed to be it the game. There did you read that Shadowfell is a only four character adventure?
#8 Gold_Katana May 09, 2008 15:41:18	I haven't seen any recommendations for party size for the adventure. My 4 party comment was based on the standard party size going back to 1E. If that has changed, I didn't know about it. Regardless, my table is not going to suddenly sprout another player. :D We've had our group at 1 DM and 4 players for decades now.
#9 strand0 May 09, 2008 16:02:09	I haven't seen any recommendations for party size for the adventure. My 4 party comment was based on the standard party size going back to 1E. If that has changed, I didn't know about it. Regardless, my table is not going to suddenly sprout another player. :D We've had our group at 1 DM and 4 players for decades now. Thanks Gold Katana, Mine over the same time has be 6, 7, or 8. (I know of a 1E game that is still going on with a 10 players, it has had months of 12 regulars.) Never IIRC have I played D&D with only 4 players. Adventures published in Dungeon Magazine listed a range of characters AND the number of levels they should have when added together. Has anyone got a source for the party size intended for H1? Seems to me one could double up on one or two of the supplied PCs and it probably wouldn't make the module unplayable. Maybe
#10 dimitrix May 09, 2008 16:16:00	That's been one of my concerns: the module doesn't tell me how many characters are supposed to be in the adventure. So, I don't know if I even need to make adjustments to the encounters. I already know how to make adjustments, I just need to know if I should go through the effort.
#11 Gold_Katana May 09, 2008 16:23:09	It appears we'll have to wait another 11 days to find out.
#12 dimitrix May 09, 2008 16:42:18	I finally got an answer...on the enworld.org thread. Apparently, the WotC designers don't read the WotC forums. Here's the response: In 4E, the assumed party size is 5, so the encounters are built for 5 PCs. As arghost said, if you have a group of 4 you can remove 1 monster to make it about right, and if the party's larger you can duplicate a monster. Remember that an elite monster counts as two (and is usually important enough that you shouldn't remove it!), and a solo counts as 5 (if you have a smaller group, you'll have to just lump it, but you can add a monster from another encounter if you have a larger party). __________________ Logan Bonner Mechanical Designer, Dungeons & Dragons Wizards of the Coast The thread can be read at http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=225711 To be honest, this is my first real complaint about 4e: it requires 6 people in a group to really get the most out of the game. I can't remember if I've ever been in a DnD group with more than four people.
#13 Istaran May 09, 2008 17:55:28	If you're willing to do the work, you can actually scale down a solo monster to a lower level to get the XP value where you want it using the info from one of the excerpts. That could work for the smaller group.
#14 lostdm May 09, 2008 18:25:05	Well one of the legitimate reasons for the XP system is that smaller parties should level faster under the same tempurature and pressure. Threfore, if you buy this book and run it as is for 4 people (assuming it was built for five)- then the encounters would run slightly high for a while, be pretty easy right after they level, then gradually be slightly high agian... In fact, if they designed the adventure really well their shouldn't be any really hard lines between the levels. Encounters should always run between 60% and 120% of balanced. This assumes they haven't changed things too radically. Je ne sais pas.
#15 strand0 May 10, 2008 2:30:52	Thanks DimitriX! Good man. I'd like to add WOW! The new D&D is disgned to have that fine an encounter tolerance. or is that an intolerance? ;)
#16 psyguard May 28, 2008 10:33:39	I'm likely to be running the mission with 6 players (Thank you for the Tiefling Warlord guys). Scaling seems pretty easy just figure out how much each PC, of a group of 5, is supposed to get for each encounter and add about that much to scale it up for 6 PCs. For that first encounter I figure I'll add 3 or 4 minions or maybe just 1 extra slinger. If I was going to scale it down for a group of 4 players I'd probably drop one of the dragonshields
#17 powercat May 28, 2008 12:10:21	After my party's first session, I feel safe saying running it as written with three PCs is a sure way to TPK. We came within one bad roll of getting wiped in just the second encounter.
#18 rajaat May 28, 2008 12:15:43	I played today the Ironteeth Encounter (it's a Goblin Elite) with all 5 players. All of them died. Luckily I was the DM but my players didn't blame me...they blamed WotC. The encounter was excessively tough and the players really had no chance (and I would say their rolls were good-ish and they worked pretty well together). What happened is that they had to face a wave of 10 minions with 2 kobold skirmishers, and after 3 rounds another 2 kobold Dragonshield, a kobold priest, and the Elite goblin. Let's just say they killed everyone (except the Elite)..and when he got bloodied he kicked ass so much they all died. So whoever tells me an Elite is equivalent to 2 normals...I'd say...more like 3 ;) Finally my players asked..."what, is he king of the world too?" we should be able to disarm him, pin him down and backstab him till death"! Too bad there is no rules for that yet BTW the encounter alone lasted about 4 hours...and with just a minor 2 min pee break and with the players in a non-objecting non-irritating mood...they were all quite interested in trying out the new system.
#19 dwarvenarcher May 28, 2008 12:22:23	4th ed scaling is really easy. Nearly all the encounters are made up of 5 enemy "spots", each one is either a standard enemy, or 5 minions. If you have 6 PCs, add another "spot". If less, remove some. The xp value of every enemy in the module is actually listed in it's stats, so you can total them up yourself if you like. I wouldn't run the encounters as is with a smaller party, as they look pretty challenging for 5 PCs.