Battle Strategy

[SleepyShadow]

I was talking to one of my players yesterday, and she was trying to devise a battle strategy for the group if/when a battle occurs between them and Team Evil. I did not want to give advice myself, but I did say that Playgrounders are usually quite helpful with such predicaments.

Team Good Guys includes:

Paladin 5/Knight of the Raven 4
Wizard 10/Paragnostic Apostle 1
Ex-Monk 2/Lion Totem Barbarian 1/Fighter 8
Healer 5/Combat Medic 5
Druid 10
Paladin 2/Wizard 5/Eldritch Knight 1
Barbarian 7

Team Evil includes:

Succubus Unarmed Swordsage 2/Soul Eater 3 (Team Leader)
Fallen Astral Deva 14 (As per Savage Species)
Incubus Blackguard 7
Vampire Fighter 2/Rogue 6/Shadow Dancer 1
Tiefling Ranger 2/Barbarian 1/Cancer Mage 10


Is there any workable strategy that you guys can see for Team Good Guys vs. Team Evil?

[Morghen]

I don't know your system, but I'll give a couple of generic tips:

Script the first few things you're going to use against the casters. Focus all of your party's energies on eliminating the strongest caster as soon as possible while holding a healer/buffer/tank or two in reserve for something going wrong.

Be willing to switch on the fly. Maybe the casters are kept out of missile range, or they're not immediately visible. Do you hold your actions for the round or do you throw all your resources at a tank?

Be willing to run away. Especially if you're not going to win.

Read this (http://www.chinapage.com/sunzi-e.html).

[gbprime]

Concentrated Damage.

As the fight begins, everyone holds for the wizard. Wizard then uses Greater Dimension Door to bring Paladin, Barbarian, and Eldtritch Knight right up into the enemy's shorts. They full attack one target, joined by the ex-Monk who presumably charges the same target. Then the Druid casts Mass Snake's Swiftness and they all hit the same target again.

Repeat round 2, with the wizard also throwing a damage spell if the combo didn't drop someone instantly.

This tactic should be capable of annihilating the fallen Deva (1st) and the Cancer Mage (2nd) in short order, leaving you to face off the Vampire Rogue, the Incubus, and the Succubus. Which, if you have Protection from Evil (for the charms and dominates) and Death Ward (for the energy drain) up on everyone, should be quite manageable.

The probable result is that the Incubus and Succubus will flee via teleportation by round 4 and you will have annihilated all the others. Unless your GM is either kind (and has them stick around to be killed and looted) or lethal (in which case Contingency spells go off and your targets spontaneously refill on hit points when you beat them down).

[SleepyShadow]

Thanks for the advice, and I agree with Morghen wholeheartedly: Sun Tzu is an excellent read.

As for executing battle strategies, that only works if the party is cooperating well, or indeed at all. That is the greatest challenge that the party faces. Team Good Guys is overall more powerful on paper, but in practice Team Evil has proven to be more than capable of trouncing the PCs because the players do not work together. They act as individuals, each one fighting almost as if in a vacuum. However, they scatter like dry leaves when confronted with the well-regimented tactics of Team Evil.

Tonight's session more than proved that point. Rather than concentrating their firepower on a single foe, the players split up their forces, trying to force the villains to fight them one on one. Being a proper team, however, the villains coordinated their attacks with one another to quickly bring down the Barbarian, the Druid, the Fighter, and the Eldritch Knight, using their various abilities to press the advantage. The party suffered a severe beating and was forced to retreat.

As I see it, Team Good Guys needs to learn to work together if they are ever to stand a chance.

[gbprime]

Thanks for the advice, and I agree with Morghen wholeheartedly: Sun Tzu is an excellent read.

Ah, but as we all know, there's a big gap between READING The Art of War and UNDERSTANDING The Art of War. We all know players who claim to have mastered this "prestige tome" and still have their characters charge in hoping brute force will prevail. :smallsigh:

[SleepyShadow]

Ah, but as we all know, there's a big gap between READING The Art of War and UNDERSTANDING The Art of War. We all know players who claim to have mastered this "prestige tome" and still have their characters charge in hoping brute force will prevail. :smallsigh:

I understand this all too well. Unfortunately, I seem to be the only one at the table who does, as my previous post shows.

Perhaps I should not have Team Evil utilize such tactics as presented by The Art of War.

[Diarmuid]

Having Team Evil work cohesively completely depends on if they have any motivation to work together.

Is the Succubus secretly plotting against the Incubus and maybe wouldnt move to help if it got flanked and spanked? Is the Cancer Mage not going to worry too much if one of his "allies" gets caught in a big blast he throws out?

Also take into account how long "Team Evil" has been working together and just how open and honest they would be with each other about all of their tricks and abilities.

Just because you as the DM know exactly what abilities best synergize within Team Evil doesnt mean that Team Evil does. Nor can Team Evil hear the OOC planning/talking that the players are doing so you shouldnt be making counterplans ahead of time.

Edit - By my count, you're looking at approximately a EL 18-19 for Team Evil, so saying that the party is more powerful may be a bit of an overstatement with them being mostly ECL 9-11. Really, the only thing on their side is numbers and action economy, but if their actions arent on the same playing field with the mostly CR 14 monsters then you shouldnt necessarily be so surprised that they're getting trounced.

When you're preparing their spells/abilities/etc for these encounters are you specifically making a plan of attack against Team Good in mind? Does Team Evil know that they're going to be encountering TG on a given day? If not, make sure you're giving them what a normal daily allotment of spells/abilities/etc would be for their daily routine.

[Vandicus]

Sort of tangentially related, but I don't think that the Soul Eater's drain abilities can be used alongside multiple attacks because it takes a standard action to activate. Having said that, I'm no expert in the class, but in the case that I am right, you could've simply houseruled otherwise. Your post here seems to imply that the party actually knows the classes of Team Evil, meaning one of your players could bring up the question if it hasn't already been addressed.

As for tactics, Team Evil seems to lack any serious spellcasting capabilities, besides whatever SLAs the fallen Deva may have, so the casters in Team Good should focus on damage spells, to help nuke down the greatest threats, the Succubus and Deva, in that order.

[Karoht]

I understand this all too well. Unfortunately, I seem to be the only one at the table who does, as my previous post shows.

Perhaps I should not have Team Evil utilize such tactics as presented by The Art of War.

Team Evil should not play to win per se.
Team Evil should play dirty pool. As much dirty pool as they can reasonably get away with and still come out alive.

Think more of a harassment strategy rather than a decisive battle.

Traps, contingencies, damsels in dire peril and other such distractions. Misdirection and loads of it. Think Joker Bard VS Batman Wizard. Only on a scale of an entire pair of teams.

Their first engagement should be to mangle the party as much as possible. The second encounter to hit them while still weakened with a decisive follow-up.

[SleepyShadow]

None of the NPCs on Team Evil are CR 19, as Diarmuid would like to believe. They are all individually roughly CR 14, and I fail to see where you come up with these numbers. If I am wrong in that respect, please enlighten me.

Vandicus, you are right. Team Evil has exactly zero spellcasters in any true sense of the word. The fallen Deva brings the most spells to the table, with the Incubus and the Cancer Mage tied at a distant second. Having no spellcasters on Team Evil should theoretically tip the balance in favor of Team Good Guys.

Karoht, I do like this idea. However, I worry that if the players cannot handle straight-forward combat, they will be at a loss to handle anything more out of the ordinary.

[Karoht]

Karoht, I do like this idea. However, I worry that if the players cannot handle straight-forward combat, they will be at a loss to handle anything more out of the ordinary.With all due respect and not a knock at your players...

Good!
Trial by fire tends to produce some awesome tactics, some great responses, and above all encourages some fast learning.

But, maybe walk them into it. Have them fight 2 at a time first. Introduce them to the abilities and tactics of each of these bad guys. But once you've introduced them to all 5 of the bad guy team, the trial by fire begins.

[Diarmuid]

None of the NPCs on Team Evil are CR 19, as Diarmuid would like to believe. They are all individually roughly CR 14, and I fail to see where you come up with these numbers. If I am wrong in that respect, please enlighten me.

Vandicus, you are right. Team Evil has exactly zero spellcasters in any true sense of the word. The fallen Deva brings the most spells to the table, with the Incubus and the Cancer Mage tied at a distant second. Having no spellcasters on Team Evil should theoretically tip the balance in favor of Team Good Guys.

Karoht, I do like this idea. However, I worry that if the players cannot handle straight-forward combat, they will be at a loss to handle anything more out of the ordinary.

I didnt claim that any of TE are CR 19, what I claimed was that the group of 5 roughly CR 14 baddies makes up an encounter lvl ~19.

Edit - I arrived at those numbers by using the chart of page 49 of the DMG to break the group into pairs/mixed pairs that fit the numbers on the chart the best.

[SleepyShadow]

I like the idea of testing their response time so to speak, so I believe next session we will have such a trial by fire.

As for the CR of Team Evil, I suppose as a group they would be EL 19, but I have yet to throw the entire group at the PCs. They're dealt with them essentially in chunks: Fallen Deva + Succubus, Incubus + Cancer Mage, and Incubus + Cancer Mage + Vampire. The PCs still have trouble.

Regardless, I think I'll have Team Evil start to use more underhanded tactics, just to see how the PCs respond.

EDIT - I just realized how far off-topic we've gotten. I initially started this thread to help my players with their tactics :smallbiggrin:

[Diarmuid]

Well now you've gone and muddied the waters even further. If you're not throwing Team G vs Team E all at once, how are we supposed to help either team develop a strategy?

The way you originally presented it was a list of Team G and a list of Team E and how can Team G better fight Team E.

Response have been varied, but would have been even more diverse depending on what subset of Team E is being presented. Likewise, the simple listing made it seem like they would be encountering all of Team E and in that scenario I wanted to make sure you realised that a Team G vs Team E fight should be a very difficult encounter by normal DMG encounter building guidelines.

[Karoht]

Stuff your players can do the the NPC's?

Barbarian-Grapple a caster. Or just rip it's head off. Both are effective and valid.
Paladin-Anti-Evil attacks is your job. Go nuts.
Healer-Buff and keep people alive? If you have hold person, use and abuse it.
Druid-Turn into something big (preferably with Pounce). Grapple a caster. Crowd control the areas around as much as possible. Summon. Buff people. Do not prioritize being blasty. Sleet Storm is your friend and is highly effective VS almost everything on the battlefield. Don't forget terrain. Master the terrain and you master your enemies.
Wizard-Nuke casters ASAP, or focus on keeping your party protected. Scry the crap out of the badguys as much as possible prior to battle.

Thats some general advice, and even then, I'm sure others are going to come up with better.

[SleepyShadow]

Well now you've gone and muddied the waters even further. If you're not throwing Team G vs Team E all at once, how are we supposed to help either team develop a strategy?

The way you originally presented it was a list of Team G and a list of Team E and how can Team G better fight Team E.

Response have been varied, but would have been even more diverse depending on what subset of Team E is being presented. Likewise, the simple listing made it seem like they would be encountering all of Team E and in that scenario I wanted to make sure you realised that a Team G vs Team E fight should be a very difficult encounter by normal DMG encounter building guidelines.

I plan on having Team G encounter Team E in its entirety at some point, but I'm waiting until they toughen up a bit. Until then, I'm keeping the encounters to small skirmishes between the groups, rather than full-fledged war. However, my Druid player (the one that initially asked me to start this thread) is far more concerned with Team E as a whole. The only component of Team E that anyone seems concerned with as an individual is the Succubus, Valenessa.

[gbprime]

The only component of Team E that anyone seems concerned with as an individual is the Succubus, Valenessa.

And I still think that if you're prepared with Death Ward and Protection from Evil for everyone in the group, the Succubus (and Incubus, and Vampire) are reduced from being a serious threat. Take away Energy Drain, Charm, and Dominate and they don't have a lot left.

[SleepyShadow]

And I still think that if you're prepared with Death Ward and Protection from Evil for everyone in the group, the Succubus (and Incubus, and Vampire) are reduced from being a serious threat. Take away Energy Drain, Charm, and Dominate and they don't have a lot left.

Succubus: Still has Swordsage maneuvers and such, plus the druid's primary concern of "grapple-and-teleport".

Incubus: Still hits fairly hard with his greatsword, plus the blackguard's Dark Blessing makes him practically immune to any spell that allows for saving throws.

Vampire: Still has decent sneak attack, plus HiPS makes it quite difficult to lock her down.

And that still leaves the Cancer Mage causing Con damage via poison and disease, as well as the Fallen Deva dealing on average 50 damage per round with two attacks. One of the druid's major concern is still the fact that Team Evil has superior organizational and tactical skills. In Character, Valenessa has the mental stats and ranks in Knowledge (Warfare), (Dungeoneering), and Martial Lore, which give her the backing to come up with advanced battle plans. Out of Character, the players (for the most part) are so disorganized that they can barely function as a party.

The Wizard has unintentionally killed the Fighter mid-battle. Twice.

[Vandicus]

The Wizard has unintentionally killed the Fighter mid-battle. Twice.

Seriously? This might necessitate some serious revision of battle strategy, namely focusing on making sure the party members all perform their roles and don't interfere with each other while doing so. Also, someone put that wizard on buff duty.

[sonofzeal]

The party seems all mid-op ECL 10-ish characters. The enemy seem all low-op ECL 14-ish characters. Still, the power difference is enough to cause serious trouble. The party should expect to be able to take out individual members of team evil in a fair fight, but I can see why fighting two or more at the same time causes problems. If they were organized, or Team Evil was disorganized, they could handle two, maybe three. But even so they'd likely have to level up a few times, or pull something really hardcore, to win against the full team.

If the wizard is repeatedly killing the fighter, then it honestly seems like they're their own worst enemies. They need to get their act together, and no threads here are going to help with that.

[NNescio]

The Wizard has unintentionally killed the Fighter mid-battle. Twice.
Props if both happened in the same battle (Due to Revivify/Revenence/Last breath).

[SleepyShadow]

The party seems all mid-op ECL 10-ish characters. The enemy seem all low-op ECL 14-ish characters. Still, the power difference is enough to cause serious trouble. The party should expect to be able to take out individual members of team evil in a fair fight, but I can see why fighting two or more at the same time causes problems. If they were organized, or Team Evil was disorganized, they could handle two, maybe three. But even so they'd likely have to level up a few times, or pull something really hardcore, to win against the full team.

If the wizard is repeatedly killing the fighter, then it honestly seems like they're their own worst enemies. They need to get their act together, and no threads here are going to help with that.

Well, they've leveled up since the posting of this thread, so the PCs are all about level 12 now (not counting cohorts). Naturally, I have not bothered to level up Team Evil. Why bother? They still can't handle even the Blackguard + Cancer Mage mini-team, as was proven again tonight's session.

You have a very valid point, though. Between a careless wizard, a gish that forgets to use spells, and a paladin that can only break the 15 damage barrier while mounted, it's little wonder why Team Good Guys is struggling so much. To reiterate a point I made earlier, what is occurring is a group of strong individuals (the PCs) going up against a cooperating team (the bad guys). My players are just too disorganized, in and out of combat, to stand a real chance. :smallsigh:

[Karoht]

Trial by fire. Force them to pull up their socks and go.

[Aergoth]

They need to fight the enemy on their terms as Sun Tzu might advocate. If spells or magical items are the problem, an antimagic field solves that pretty handily.
Banishment? That will work on the Deva, Incubus and Succubus if I don't miss my mark, as long as the person casting it has high enough CL.
Hell, animate rope could pull some neat tricks.

It seem to me the problem is that the players are trying to go at a matter of tactics sort of... mob-handedly.

[SleepyShadow]

They need to fight the enemy on their terms as Sun Tzu might advocate. If spells or magical items are the problem, an antimagic field solves that pretty handily.
Banishment? That will work on the Deva, Incubus and Succubus if I don't miss my mark, as long as the person casting it has high enough CL.
Hell, animate rope could pull some neat tricks.

It seem to me the problem is that the players are trying to go at a matter of tactics sort of... mob-handedly.

That is the problem in a nutshell: The PCs react to the situation, while the villains respond to it. Last game session, the PCs encountered the Incubus and the Cancer Mage. Everyone except the Paladin beat them in initiative, so I thought that the baddies would finally be forced on the defensive, putting them at a disadvantage. Instead, the general consensus was roughly along the lines of "let's wait until the baddies take their turns so we know what they are going to do". :smallsigh:

You would think that the players would have figured out by now that the bad guys won't change tactics when their tactics have beaten the players three times now.

[Karoht]

That is the problem in a nutshell: The PCs react to the situation, while the villains respond to it. Last game session, the PCs encountered the Incubus and the Cancer Mage. Everyone except the Paladin beat them in initiative, so I thought that the baddies would finally be forced on the defensive, putting them at a disadvantage. Instead, the general consensus was roughly along the lines of "let's wait until the baddies take their turns so we know what they are going to do". :smallsigh:

You would think that the players would have figured out by now that the bad guys won't change tactics when their tactics have beaten the players three times now.

Then give your players some different encounters that teach them how to respond to threats rather than react. Try to condition their responses where possible.

For example, I was trying to teach a party of mostly casters how to deal with something when their magic failed or was less effective. So I threw a magic immune (well, not completely, he did have a few holes in his protection which they eventually learned how to find and how to utilize) Barbarian in their face. But what happened every time I did that was they would focus fire to the point where they would ignore any other threats. So, I paired him up with a Ranger who would wait until the Barbarian engaged and then ambush people. Eventually they learned to scout the entire situation better, hold an action or two to respond to issues, and how to better apply their strengths. From there, I added a few more bad guys and they became the evil league of evil of the campaign.


By all means, don't pigeon hole yourself into thinking that your big bad guys are your only means of teaching your party how to fight. Likewise, don't pigeon hole yourself into thinking that all encounters other than your big bads has to be random.

[SleepyShadow]

Then give your players some different encounters that teach them how to respond to threats rather than react. Try to condition their responses where possible.

For example, I was trying to teach a party of mostly casters how to deal with something when their magic failed or was less effective. So I threw a magic immune (well, not completely, he did have a few holes in his protection which they eventually learned how to find and how to utilize) Barbarian in their face. But what happened every time I did that was they would focus fire to the point where they would ignore any other threats. So, I paired him up with a Ranger who would wait until the Barbarian engaged and then ambush people. Eventually they learned to scout the entire situation better, hold an action or two to respond to issues, and how to better apply their strengths. From there, I added a few more bad guys and they became the evil league of evil of the campaign.


By all means, don't pigeon hole yourself into thinking that your big bad guys are your only means of teaching your party how to fight. Likewise, don't pigeon hole yourself into thinking that all encounters other than your big bads has to be random.

Of course. There are many pre-planned encounters aside from the big bads, but the players have the same problems, just to a lesser degree. Against a group of ragtag foes that utilize few or no tactics (mindless undead, golems, etc), the players can handle the situation without much trouble. They even can handle things of that nature that are quite a bit higher than the party's own ECL. However, against foes that have even a modicum of discipline and tactics (bandits spring to mind), the players struggle to handle something even equal to their ECL.

The players seem to have the same response regardless of the situation: throw their biggest attacks first, and split up their attacks against as many foes as possible.

[Karoht]

Okay, they shoot first and ask questions later. We can work with that.

Do they know how to set up the situation so that they do indeed "strike first strike hardest" as the phrase goes?

Do they know how to utilize terrain to minimize incoming damage potential?
By which I'm refering to utilizing things such as breaking line of sight, cover, stealth, misdirection and ambushes, etc?

You might want to make some helpful suggestions to sort of coach them into the situation in an ideal way.
IE-You know, if you hide in that ditch there, the caravan will pass right by you and probably not even notice you. You could easily ambush them from the flank as they pass (which is their most vulnerable point), or maybe even convince them to surrender.

IE-If you leave some caltrops in this mud, they probably won't notice them, and they have to pass this way. Which means you'll hamper the horses or anyone that dismounts.


Eventually they will sort of get it.

Worst case scenario...
You have to accept as a DM that your players might not be up to the challenge, or even that playstyle. Scale back, tone down. It sucks but there it is.
What is the average age of the players at the table, if I may ask?

[SleepyShadow]

Okay, they shoot first and ask questions later. We can work with that.

Do they know how to set up the situation so that they do indeed "strike first strike hardest" as the phrase goes?

Do they know how to utilize terrain to minimize incoming damage potential?
By which I'm refering to utilizing things such as breaking line of sight, cover, stealth, misdirection and ambushes, etc?

No, not at all. It seems that they think if it cannot be attacked head on, it cannot be attacked at all.


You might want to make some helpful suggestions to sort of coach them into the situation in an ideal way.
IE-You know, if you hide in that ditch there, the caravan will pass right by you and probably not even notice you. You could easily ambush them from the flank as they pass (which is their most vulnerable point), or maybe even convince them to surrender.

IE-If you leave some caltrops in this mud, they probably won't notice them, and they have to pass this way. Which means you'll hamper the horses or anyone that dismounts.


Eventually they will sort of get it.

I feel that if I start doing that, it may feel is if I am coddling them. I want them to at least feel like they won without outside interference. However, I may have to start doing that, since it does not seem that they are picking up on anything more tactical than flanking for the +2 bonus to hit.


Worst case scenario...
You have to accept as a DM that your players might not be up to the challenge, or even that playstyle. Scale back, tone down. It sucks but there it is.
What is the average age of the players at the table, if I may ask?

They are the same age I am, roughly. The average is 20 years old, with the youngest being 18 and the oldest being 25.

[Karoht]

No, not at all. It seems that they think if it cannot be attacked head on, it cannot be attacked at all.That IS a problem. You might just have to have them slapped with defeat, though this is not the only avenue I advocate here.



I feel that if I start doing that, it may feel is if I am coddling them. I want them to at least feel like they won without outside interference. However, I may have to start doing that, since it does not seem that they are picking up on anything more tactical than flanking for the +2 bonus to hit.Given what you've told us, you're probably going to have to coddle them a bit. Thats what teaching is sometimes. Sometimes.

Another way to do it is via example. Have them watch team evil take down something, with the defenders making the exact mistakes your players are making. Have a DM NPC demonstrate superior tactics. Have them join a military unit with some specific orders (but with some wiggle room). There are options, the key is just not railroading them at the same time.



They are the same age I am, roughly. The average is 20 years old, with the youngest being 18 and the oldest being 25.Huh. Thats odd. Are any of them any good at cards by any chance? Should I invite them around for poker night?