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Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 12:48 AM
Greetings Playgrounders!

So here's the basic setup. At the last session my group was in (D&D 3.5, just for reference) we were involved in a D-Day style battle. Beaches, fortifications, enemy army and us trying to break them down. Our blasty characters, a pair of warlocks, went and started mowing down mooks by the dozens while our tank steamrolled the enemy fortifications. A rather unpleasant looking NPC with a squad of warforged under his command went and engaged a friendly NPC, lost, and fled so he could heal himself. I, a Cloistered Cleric 7/Fiendbinder 1 (with no fiends, the last died when the tower he was attacking blew up), moved in to intercept him. He healed up before I reached him and I quickly challenged him to single combat because there was no way I could hold off him and the handful of warforged that broke off with him. He accepted.

Obviously the DM had figured I was going to die horribly to this guy, and I like throwing the DM for a loop. With some quick buffs (Divine Power chief among them) I was able to abuse the tripping rules with a spiked chain I had on me to lock down the barbarian guy. Yet I still couldn't lay a finger on him. Several rounds later our tank had mopped up all the warforged, and my Divine Power was about to wear off, so I disengaged myself and let him slaughter the boss. He didn't inflict a single hit on any of us.

This is where things get a little crazy. After killing him the DM revealed the guy was a Barbarian 14, and his fancy greataxe was a +3 Greataxe of Speed. This guy would have slaughtered me in a single round, yet we killed him without him laying a finger on any of us. (I had managed to disarm him earlier, which apparently was a very good thing) The DM nearly cried when this guy went down without putting up much of a fight. Then he nearly went insane when the two warlocks started bickering and one killed the other.

The truly bizarre part? This is par for the course. The DM has thrown half a dozen boss-level enemies at us with the express purpose of killing one of us off, then had them die without us taking a scratch. He had even thrown a Bodak at us back when we were level 6. Followed by a Chain Devil. Neither could hurt us. Yet after just about every major battle ends one of us does something that gets us or someone else killed without the DM helping at all.

So I'm just curious, does anyone else have a party like this? One where the only thing anyone seems to fear is being left in an empty room to chat with the rest of the party for a few minutes? How would you handle a party like this? I'd almost be concerned at the power level of the enemies the DM's throwing at us, except we're consistently ruining all his hard work in the most hilarious ways then getting ourselves killed off while everything's safe.

Toofey
2011-04-07, 01:03 AM
It sounds like your DM hasn't gotten the feel of balancing the fights out. A lot of the time when you're trying to gauge the general power level of things you totally blow it, and then after a round or two of combat you realize, "hey if this guy I clearly spotlighted actually gets near the PCs, they're paste" So you let them abuse a trip rule, or just ignore a weapon ability (weapons of speed tend to be a lot more powerful than you first think they are, which is the one that seems to have tripped your guy up this time) so they don't kill the party. Also a lot of the time the DM plans to kill you then realize that won't be as fun as not killing you yet.


give your DM some time to hit his stride, if you like how the story is going it's worth waiting it out till he can get the combat together. Anyone will get the combat eventually, if he can tell a story it's well worth the wait.


Wait Wat?

One where the only thing anyone seems to fear is being left in an empty room to chat with the rest of the party for a few minutes? what do you mean by this?

kenjigoku
2011-04-07, 01:09 AM
While I would say this is not uncommon, from experience I would have to say a lot factors are to consider on why you win so much.

First, consider your level of optimization. This includes your ability to play well. If you are well optimized and the situation is right, then yes taking out an absurd foe is not impossible.
From what I read, it seemed like you made some good calls and had some good rolls. Lucky day for you!

Since this is par for the course, your GM may want to look into his or her tactics. I would never accept a duel when I have the upper hand. This applies to my real life sword fighting as well as my GM style.
Tactics also play a huge role in the challenge of an encounter. If you feel encounters are too easy from a tactics point I would point your GM to Tucker's Kobolds.

As to why you are killed against non bosses. DnD has this idea that a 1v4 fight is a good encounter. This is not the case. The action economy means that even a beastly opponent has 1/4 the actions of any give player. Which means if you cannot survive the combined tactics of 4 players, you are going to lose.

It also seems your bosses are melee oriented. I find that toppling melee in DnD is not a big challenge. As you pointed out, disarming your foe was indeed a huge benefit. No weapon means many feats go down the drain, as well as the CR dropping since the foe does not have appropriate gear for his level.

To sum it up. Your GM may want to rethink tactics, and you guys play well.

Eldan
2011-04-07, 06:22 AM
Not too uncommon, really. After the earliest levels, creatures that can't do much beyond "I hit it with my pointed stick again this round" start to lose, badly. With some clever tricks, or even just a good tripper build, as you did, you can easily keep them at least away from you forever. That same barbarian most likely couldn't have touched you if you were flying higher than a few feet, as an example.

So if the DM continues to throw brutes without magical support at you, then yes, fights will be easy.

Zaranthan
2011-04-07, 07:43 AM
I see another achilles heel to your DM's bosses: single-monster encounters. Even if he puts together a versatile NPC, fights against one powerful creature tend to be extraordinarily swingy. If he wins initiative, he's likely to kill a player in the surprise round, but as soon as the party gets their feet unflattened, he's toast. A moderate amount of luck plus good tactics on your part (big scary guy with big scary weapon? disarm! encounter solved!) can reverse most planned curbstomps.

Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 08:29 AM
It sounds like your DM hasn't gotten the feel of balancing the fights out. A lot of the time when you're trying to gauge the general power level of things you totally blow it, and then after a round or two of combat you realize, "hey if this guy I clearly spotlighted actually gets near the PCs, they're paste" So you let them abuse a trip rule, or just ignore a weapon ability (weapons of speed tend to be a lot more powerful than you first think they are, which is the one that seems to have tripped your guy up this time) so they don't kill the party. Also a lot of the time the DM plans to kill you then realize that won't be as fun as not killing you yet.


Actually he was well aware of how dangerous this guy was. He had planned for all of us to go after him. In my corner I had Divine Power, a spiked chain, and an item that let me grow to huge size. When I attempted to grapple the boss to see if I could kill him (just wailing on him with the chain wasn't enough, even while he was on the floor I couldn't hit him) I found out he was able to match my grapple check. Our party tank/steamroller is a Monk/Swordsage. I can't remember what his race was, some sort of aasimar that didn't have the level adjustment. I think he's feral too, since he has claw attacks. Point is the guy's throwing out some 4d6/attack and gets 4 attacks a round. This boss was obviously supposed to fight this guy and win. :smalltongue:



Wait Wat?
what do you mean by this?

The only times our characters have died, with a single exception, (Guy decided to break into a cage full of prisoners on a rescue mission. Obvious trap is obvious and he got killed when the tightly-packed group of unconscious prisoners he was standing in the middle of turned out to be zombies fond of grappling) have been when the DM has given us nothing to do or otherwise had no hand in it. Two died when one decided swallowing a mysterious red stone was a good idea and promptly blew both up when the stone turned out to be a crystallized fireball spell, immediately after a rather difficult fight. A psion dropped using a 7d6 Sonic Ray attempting to break through some magical crystal that turned out reflected spells and powers. This was immediately after a boss fight when we were basically looting the room. The latest was when Warlock A wanted some NPC barbarians under his command to take the fastest route to combat, which was through Warlock B's much weaker fighters. Warlock A died with a dozen enemy mooks to a burning hands. (Admittedly he had been weakened by the mook swarm before this, but they still weren't able to kill him)

So yeah, when the DM tries to kill us nothing happens. When he leaves us with nothing to do in an obviously safe room we start dropping like flies.



Since this is par for the course, your GM may want to look into his or her tactics. I would never accept a duel when I have the upper hand. This applies to my real life sword fighting as well as my GM style.
Tactics also play a huge role in the challenge of an encounter. If you feel encounters are too easy from a tactics point I would point your GM to Tucker's Kobolds.


I only challenged the boss to a duel because he had accepted one from the NPC he was fighting before. I assumed if he kept acting that way (the DM described him as definitely being a very competent combatant) that that would keep the warforged off of me. And considering the party tank is all honourable and whatnot the DM probably expected single combat to happen.



As to why you are killed against non bosses. DnD has this idea that a 1v4 fight is a good encounter. This is not the case. The action economy means that even a beastly opponent has 1/4 the actions of any give player. Which means if you cannot survive the combined tactics of 4 players, you are going to lose.


You misunderstand. It isn't that the non-bosses are killing us, it's that we're dying due to our own actions in ways the DM could never have planned for. We only seem to be getting ourselves killed off when there is absolutely no reason for it to happen. Which makes the DM cry. :smalltongue:



It also seems your bosses are melee oriented. I find that toppling melee in DnD is not a big challenge. As you pointed out, disarming your foe was indeed a huge benefit. No weapon means many feats go down the drain, as well as the CR dropping since the foe does not have appropriate gear for his level.

To sum it up. Your GM may want to rethink tactics, and you guys play well.

A much earlier boss was killed when he failed to make a reflex save and got caught in a web, then had a feather token tree dropped on him. Similar tactic worked against a pair of angels later. (Not sure if they were homebrew or actual archons) Another boss was basically an immobile hydra with stupid amounts of spell-like abilities. On of the warlocks (who was the character with the least hp at the time) tanked it. In melee. And the only reason I was able to disarm this boss is because I wanted him to lose his Dex bonus to AC (since I wasn't hitting him) and tried to pin him to the ground with an immovable rod while he was prone. He let go of the axe to get it off of him, and I promptly picked it up and dropped it behind me.


I see another achilles heel to your DM's bosses: single-monster encounters. Even if he puts together a versatile NPC, fights against one powerful creature tend to be extraordinarily swingy. If he wins initiative, he's likely to kill a player in the surprise round, but as soon as the party gets their feet unflattened, he's toast. A moderate amount of luck plus good tactics on your part (big scary guy with big scary weapon? disarm! encounter solved!) can reverse most planned curbstomps.

Early boss had four wizards with him, but he didn't live long enough to be able to keep us from reaching them. Later one had 8 tentacles with ray attacks and a big primary eye (the previously mentioned hydra thing, more like a cross between a hydra and a beholder really) and had no problems getting more actions than us. The latest guy also had a backup weapon on him, which he still never had time to use.

So yeah, it isn't like the DM's not trying, or even that he doesn't seem to quite understand what he needs to do. He's throwing plenty of good challenges at us, they just don't seem to go anywhere near as well as planned. :smalltongue:

Telonius
2011-04-07, 08:39 AM
He had even thrown a Bodak at us back when we were level 6. Followed by a Chain Devil. Neither could hurt us. Yet after just about every major battle ends one of us does something that gets us or someone else killed without the DM helping at all.

Bodak is only CR8, with 58HP, and only 20 feet of movement. The scariest thing about them is the Death Gaze attack. Ganging up on it, and using intelligent tactics? I can see a level-6 party with excellent tactics being able to take it with no problems. If you have a Warlock in the party, it's even easier. Just Fell Flight out of range and plunk away with Eldritch Spear until it's dead.

Chain Devils are CR6, and only nasty because of the Regeneration. No Good weapons, no Silver weapons, means bad day for the adventurers. But what I'm a bit confused about is how that guy was't able to hurt you at all. Chain Devil's full attack is +10/+10, and the PCs are only level 6. Are your AC's through the roof, or are you buffed for miss chances?

Raz_Fox
2011-04-07, 08:42 AM
Beating boss fights without even getting scratched isn't normal.

In D&D 3.5, it is.

D&D: Not even once.

Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 08:50 AM
Bodak is only CR8, with 58HP, and only 20 feet of movement. The scariest thing about them is the Death Gaze attack. Ganging up on it, and using intelligent tactics? I can see a level-6 party with excellent tactics being able to take it with no problems. If you have a Warlock in the party, it's even easier. Just Fell Flight out of range and plunk away with Eldritch Spear until it's dead.

Chain Devils are CR6, and only nasty because of the Regeneration. No Good weapons, no Silver weapons, means bad day for the adventurers. But what I'm a bit confused about is how that guy was't able to hurt you at all. Chain Devil's full attack is +10/+10, and the PCs are only level 6. Are your AC's through the roof, or are you buffed for miss chances?

Our tank's AC is indeed through the roof. That and we had a pair of warlocks (one a dual wand wielder) and a psion at the time. Lots of blasting.

Eldan
2011-04-07, 09:10 AM
+10/+10... that would need an AC in the high 20s to withstand reliably, I'd guess. Full Plate and dex makes an AC of 19. Where do the other +10 come from?

Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 09:25 AM
+10/+10... that would need an AC in the high 20s to withstand reliably, I'd guess. Full Plate and dex makes an AC of 19. Where do the other +10 come from?

He's a Swordsage/Monk. Wis to AC twice as well as Dex. And he has both quite high. I forget what type of armour he's wearing, but I believe he had at least 18 in both at the time (I don't know what type of bonuses his race gives him) so he was sitting at at least 22 AC unarmoured. He also has the Wandlock constantly hit him with Mage Armour, so it would have been at least 26 AC. During the last session I think the question of his touch AC came up and he's currently sitting at about 27 touch.

Eldan
2011-04-07, 09:26 AM
Ah. That kind of tank. Yeah, makes sense, then.

Ability bonus stacking is really the way to go in D&D. I've seen characters with triple charisma to basically everything.

Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 09:33 AM
Oh, and also because he's using the Feral template he has at least +2 Wis and -2 Dex. So that would put him at 27 AC at the time.

Telonius
2011-04-07, 09:39 AM
Yeah, if you're rocking a 26 AC at level 6, then that's going to be a bit hard to deal with. When something like that happens, I (as the DM) would stop thinking in terms of hard-hitting foes and start with things that deal status effects - Entangled, Slowed, Fatigued, that sort of thing - and working the terrain to my advantage. Even something as sneaky and simple as, "Hey, here's a bag of rocks that weighs exactly 1 pound more than your medium load. I'd really <Suggest> that you pick it up!" might help.

Douglas
2011-04-07, 09:42 AM
He's a Swordsage/Monk. Wis to AC twice as well as Dex.
Those two don't actually stack, you know.

Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 10:59 AM
Those two don't actually stack, you know.

Actually we looked that up. Or at least I did because I'm the resident rules lawyer and didn't believe they stacked until I could find out where it says they do. It wasn't errata'd, but apparently there's a Q&A somewhere where they say that the swordsage's bonus applies when unarmoured as well as when in light armour. Unless that isn't what you mean, at which point as far as I can tell it's an untyped bonus and as such stacks.

Kylarra
2011-04-07, 11:27 AM
Erm, CustServ Disagrees with you. Not that that's really the best of sources, but here it is.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ask/20060904a

Douglas
2011-04-07, 12:06 PM
Actually we looked that up. Or at least I did because I'm the resident rules lawyer and didn't believe they stacked until I could find out where it says they do. It wasn't errata'd, but apparently there's a Q&A somewhere where they say that the swordsage's bonus applies when unarmoured as well as when in light armour. Unless that isn't what you mean, at which point as far as I can tell it's an untyped bonus and as such stacks.
By strict RAW, Swordsage bonus doesn't work when unarmored.

By probable RAI, they represent the same concept in nearly identical ways and should be counted as not stacking because they're really the same ability.

By arguable RAW (I agree with this, but a significant number of people would debate it) the two class features have the same name and not wildly different effects so they are considered two instances of the same ability and therefore don't stack.

In conclusion, they don't stack. Unless your DM house rules that they do, but that's a house rule.

Kyouhen
2011-04-07, 12:16 PM
Huh. Y'know, I had looked up to see if it applied when unarmoured but never actually thought to find out if they actually stacked. Well the DM's declared they stack, or at least he believes they do. I'll have to point this out to him just so he knows, though he probably won't change his mind.

nedz
2011-04-07, 08:21 PM
Its perfectly normal for PC mistakes to kill other PCs. Deliberate PvP is less common, but does happen with some groups. I once had a TPK in an empty room:smallmad:. This sort of thing was a lot more common in 1E and 2E than in the modern game however.

erikun
2011-04-07, 08:45 PM
It is not noticably abnormal, no.

Mainly, it sounds like your DM is just not optimizing and/or playing his characters intelligently. The boss your cleric fought, for example, could have just crawled over to you and hacked you apart from the ground. Or stood up, and jumped at you. (Standing up provokes an AoO, but the attack is before he stands. You can't trip someone during the action they are using to stand.) Or he could have used the same tricks you guys do to pump his AC. Or he could have taken a class that allows him to throw his weapon, or just throwing returning.

Yes, you will get lucky - but when a level 8 character can spend several rounds in battle against a level 14 character and walk away untouched, it sounds more like a difference in play than a difference in luck.

Tael
2011-04-07, 09:51 PM
Not really that strange. In our group, unless an encounter's CR is 2-4 higher than the party ECL, it's a cake walk. Our DM has learned to adjust and play smart enemies, yours probably still needs to.

MrRigger
2011-04-07, 10:24 PM
I don't know, I had my DM run a few encounters for my tenth level Necropolitan Dread Necromancer before the campaign actually started (I wanted to game but he didn't have all his notes in order) in order to get a couple zombies under my control and see just what kind of encounters would work against me. (since it was house ruled that Corpsecrafter and Undead Mastery stack and I was allowed to take the Libris Mortis Zombie variants as feats, my zombies are actually worth something). A single casting of Fear combined with my Fear Aura was enough to make a Drow scouting party disappear, a single Slay Living spell took out a Githyanki Gish build, and a lucky roll on my Ray of Enfeeblement allowed me to coup de grace the Dark Talon King Lizardfolk from Monster Manual 4. Then I took out two Cashme Demons from the BoVD. All in all, I didn't just solo the encounters, they never even dented my temporary HP from False Life. So yeah, if your DM underestimates the PCs, overestimates the encounters, or just fails on a critical save, you can walk away without a scratch pretty easily.

MrRigger