"Easy if handled properly"?

[Jon_Dahl]

I don't know how many of you give any value to the DMG page 49, which talks about encounter difficulty, but I'd like to hear examples of encounters that are "easy if handled properly". According to DMG, such encounters should be challenging to very difficult unless handled properly. Please note that 20% of all encounters should be EIHP!

Long ago, I had a gladiator tournament which was filled with that sort of encounters. The fights were 1 vs 1 and majority of the NPC opponents had the same level as the PCs (level 6). Since the PCs had to enter the fights one by one, their APL was 2 (a single 6th-level character has APL 2, even though there is no actual "party", of course), so APL 2 vs CR6 is a "very difficult" encounter. However, I gave each of the NPC gladiators a glaring weakness which was completely obvious. There was a halfling sorcerer NPC with a greataxe, and he wasn't proficient with that weapon (attack bonus +0). All you had to do was to win the initiative and grapple the bastard => a certain victory. Others were pure melee fighters with no ranged weapons whatsoever. One of the PCs had Fly spell, so there was an option that the PCs could have worked together and shared spells according to opponents.

However, none of the weaknesses were exploited, and all the PCs died or lost the fights. Well, c'est la vie... After that I haven't really had any "easy if handled properly" encounters.

[Hand_of_Vecna]

A statue that animates and attacks that can be smashes while it's inanimate.

Mind controlled member of an order that would be violating his vows by killing you, a simple knowledge check reveals heraldry that makes you know his vows and a spellcraft check recognizes the enchantment. If you prominetly display your allegiances he gets a new save at a bonus.

In the same vein any mistaken identity encounter; difficult combat or easy diplomacy.

Any telegraphed encounter where appropriate items are provided; like say an environmental hazard or some magma men in a volcano fortress where other minions all have fire resist equipment so they can function from day to day.

[Mystral]

It can be hard for players to guess the "proper" way to handle an encounter. Like, a monster could be weak against an element, but if the party has no way to know that, it might as well not be.

You should provide tips accordingly. Knowledge checks, sense motive, and so on.

[Sith_Happens]

I'd say that Ethereal Marauders (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/etherealMarauder.htm) are the perfect example of "easy if handled properly." Those things are CR 3 if and only if you forget that readied actions exist. Otherwise, they crumple in one hit to a 1st level Fighter.

[Amphetryon]

IMHO, "Easy if handled properly" shouldn't be contingent on winning the Initiative, as the first example, and the choice to grapple a caster - particularly one wielding a melee weapon and thus likely to have close-combat spells - is one that is not necessarily an intuitive one.

"Easy if handled properly," to my mind, includes a majority of Undead without significant Turn resistance, which can be quite difficult to handle effectively if nobody has Turn Undead, and quite easy to handle if they do.

[Jon_Dahl]

IMHO, "Easy if handled properly" shouldn't be contingent on winning the Initiative, as the first example, and the choice to grapple a caster - particularly one wielding a melee weapon and thus likely to have close-combat spells - is one that is not necessarily an intuitive one.



It's still easy, but if you lose the initiative then a successful saving throw maybe needed, but after that the stage is all yours :smallbiggrin:
And I provided a hint: "The halfling barely knows which way to hold the greataxe. He's reminiscent of a farmer boy holding a men's weapon."
The hint was ignored, though.

[PersonMan]

I don't know, somehow 'he is bad with his weapon' doesn't scream "ignore my main method of dealing damage and rush in to grapple" to me. It says "cut him to pieces while he misses me".

[Jon_Dahl]

I don't know, somehow 'he is bad with his weapon' doesn't scream "ignore my main method of dealing damage and rush in to grapple" to me. It says "cut him to pieces while he misses me".

Well actually, that would've worked too. Low hp, not too much AC.

[SciChronic]

In my experience, "Easy if handled properly" has typically come from utilizing environmental hazards or having awareness of your surroundings, and making tactical decisions with the party.

I once had to defend a the party wizard as he performed a ritual that would activate a magic item that functioned like a circle of teleportation, taking us to the location the item was attuned to (it was a plot thing). As the ritual began our scout sees half a dozen trolls were headed our way, but it would take an hour or so for them to traverse the cliffside path (the only way to the cave, and the way we had gotten where we were). trolls were something our party was in now way capable of fighting under normal circumstances, and it was even worse with our wizard unable to help. So what did we do? well a Knowledge check revealed that they had a weakness to fire, so we set up a series of barricades in the 100ft, narrow, slightly downward entrance using the wooden remains of carts and wagons scattered about the cave and passed around some alchemist fire. When the trolls arrived we lit the first barricade on fire and then peppered them with arrows. The smoke caused by the fire obscured their vision, and the flaming barricades slowed them down immensely. The bottleneck also slowed down their progress. In the end we actually managed to kill 2 and knock out a third before the ritual was complete and we got whisked away to safety.

[limejuicepowder]

The problem with encounters like that is they rely on the player's ability to think like you. It's often times extremely difficult to judge just how hard it is to figure something out that you made; what you think is obvious actually isn't.

A ran an encounter once that involved a melee heavy party fighting a chain tripper in a long narrow room. Even though the tripper was the same level as them and fighting 4 v 1, the party nearly wiped because they didn't pick up on my clues to use the alchemical mixtures in the room for ranged attacks.

[Telok]

Eh, my players are trying to clear out the dungeon of a famous lich right now. This is the second time in and half the party is dead again. There is no time pressure and there two libraries, a major good-gods temple, a wizard college, and four 12th level casters (arcane and divine) within less than one weeks travel time. The party is tenth level and has about 70,000 gold in cash with them. They started with one undead bane heavy crossbow and four potions of Lesser Restoration. They have no Death Ward ability, no Ghost Touch ability, and almost no [force] effects.

The first time the ninja went scouting out of sight of the group he went etherial to pass through a door and got himself grapple ganked in a solo fight. The dread necro died when a single CR7 specter drained ten levels off of him and a few more off the rest of the party, that one specter was the whole fight. They failed to chase down a vampire that they defeated so it got back to it's coffin and regenerated, it's now setting an ambush for them. They have gone swimming with a evolved undead giant octopus in an inky black lake, twice. And people died both times.

Magic Circle against Evil (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magicCircleAgainstEvil.htm) would have saved them so much pain. It would, in fact, have saved them from everything. Instead they die like flies.

[SciChronic]

The problem with encounters like that is they rely on the player's ability to think like you. It's often times extremely difficult to judge just how hard it is to figure something out that you made; what you think is obvious actually isn't.

A ran an encounter once that involved a melee heavy party fighting a chain tripper in a long narrow room. Even though the tripper was the same level as them and fighting 4 v 1, the party nearly wiped because they didn't pick up on my clues to use the alchemical mixtures in the room for ranged attacks.

Thing is, there wasnt even supposed to be an encounter in that cave. Our DM expected up to take the box that the item was in to the next town and figure out what it did there. But the party wizard rolled really well on his checks. The cave was where the trolls lived, and all the cart/wagon remains had been put there by the trolls, spoils of there attacks on caravans and travelers, which is why the box with the item was even there. We inferred that something lived in the cave but didn't know what, and figured that they wouldn't be back for a while, so we started the ritual there (a poor decision in hindsight).

[Amphetryon]

It's still easy, but if you lose the initiative then a successful saving throw maybe needed, but after that the stage is all yours :smallbiggrin:
And I provided a hint: "The halfling barely knows which way to hold the greataxe. He's reminiscent of a farmer boy holding a men's weapon."
The hint was ignored, though.

Did any of them ask for the chance to roll Sense Motive on the Halfling? Lulling one's opponent into a false sense of security is not an unknown tactic; they may have suspected he was faking. See also: "I am not left-handed."

In other words, they struggled because something that was obvious to you, the DM and creator of the encounter, was not obvious to them upon hearing the description. This happens.

[Jon_Dahl]

Did any of them ask for the chance to roll Sense Motive on the Halfling? Lulling one's opponent into a false sense of security is not an unknown tactic; they may have suspected he was faking. See also: "I am not left-handed."

In other words, they struggled because something that was obvious to you, the DM and creator of the encounter, was not obvious to them upon hearing the description. This happens.

No, they didn't ask for SM checks, unfortunately, and you're right: It wasn't obvious, but it was enough to qualify the halfling for the "Easy if handled right" category.

In fact, the halfling spammed Deep Slumber and used the greataxe to execute opponents. Non-proficiency isn't a problem with Coup de Grace. One of the PCs died like this.

[Eldariel]

"Assassinate cult leader in his home". Easy if you create a good plan that works as expected, hard-impossible-run-to-the-hills if you end up having to fight.

[Deophaun]

EMagic Circle against Evil (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magicCircleAgainstEvil.htm) would have saved them so much pain. It would, in fact, have saved them from everything. Instead they die like flies.
How would a mere +2 deflection bonus to AC and +2 resistance bonus to saves (which would probably run into stacking issues at that level) have saved them from everything?

[Slipperychicken]

I gave each of the NPC gladiators a glaring weakness which was completely obvious. There was a halfling sorcerer NPC with a greataxe, and he wasn't proficient with that weapon (attack bonus +0).

How on earth is a player supposed to ever know that, short of reading your mind?


This comes up so often, I almost feel like there should be a sticky thread for "My players didn't read my mind, so I killed their PCs, they're so dumb hahaha".

[Eldariel]

How on earth is a player supposed to ever know that, short of reading your mind?

This comes up so often, I almost feel like there should be a sticky thread for "My players didn't read my mind, so I killed their PCs, they're so dumb hahaha".

Honestly tho, if hints are provided, "reading somebody's mind" isn't as hard as you'd think. That's basically what e.g. quizzes or crosswords amount to and I've yet to meet somebody who couldn't perform adequately there if they put their mind to it. Essays (and indeed, most tests) require you to know what the controller expects you to bring up or know what they consider important on the topic; that is, to find the key points from the books/whatever you read for it and prove you can not only learn stuff by heart but also analyze it.

If somebody tells you "The halfling barely knows which way to hold the greataxe. He's reminiscent of a farmer boy holding a men's weapon." you can probably figure out that:
1) He's too weak to be a threat and it's a curbstomp battle.
2) He has some other form of attack he's much more comfortable with.

Then you can use logic to infer that you should always assume the second case because the first case is a certain victory anyways so you assume he has some other form of attack. Then you think "what kind of attacks can humanoids perform if they do not have skills in weapons combat" and you arrive at "Ah, he's a mage!"

The only way to not figure that out is if your character only finds the first conclusion and jumps on it; if the character's personality is brash and careless, that's certainly possible. Still, the tip itself is not at all hard to figure out and I'm certain everybody who reads this forums has performed much more difficult "mindreading" in school and in their everyday life, social interaction and hobbies.

[Cirrylius]

1) He's too weak to be a threat and it's a curbstomp battle.
2) He has some other form of attack he's much more comfortable with.


So if the player infers that it's the former, and that the challenge is either 1) a moral conflict, 2) a roleplaying opportunity, or 3) just a warm-up fight so the patrons can see a quick kill, and the player doesn't go balls to the wall right off the bat, the DM is justified in making the encounter a save-or-die?

If I were in that scenario, unless there was something else to indicate specifically that the halfling was a magic user, I wouldn't have assumed a magic user; most players I know don't play that analytically. The phrase "a farmer boy holding a man's weapon", especially, changed the feel of the encounter because it brought to mind (for me) a terrified child. Obviously that's not where he was going with it, but the imagery flipped an aggressor/victim switch I wasn't even aware of.

Strictly logically, it's pooossssible to puzzle out the sequence of events (nonproficiency=magic user, magic user=spells, battleaxe instead of simple weapon=coup de gras, coup de gras=incapacitating spell), but it's only obviously the correct choice (over the curbstomp battle option) if you already know what's coming.

[Jon_Dahl]

Eldariel's reply = So much win. Thank you Sir, this is exactly how I think and how I write my adventures.

We should be able to play with the assumption that adult people with jobs and/or university degrees should be able to read into hints, even hard ones at times.

If I wrote adventures assuming that players are mentally handicapped, I'd quit DMing and started to do something more worthwhile, such as drinking beer and watching football.

[Deophaun]

I'd say if you threw in a clue that pointed to his spell component pouch, you would be on much firmer ground.

[Slipperychicken]

If somebody tells you "The halfling barely knows which way to hold the greataxe. He's reminiscent of a farmer boy holding a men's weapon."

As good as an idea as that is, in all my years playing dnd, I have never heard an NPC described by the DM as not knowing how to hold/use his weapon. If John_Dahl said something like that, then I take my comment back.

The DM would need to also communicate that there's a spellcasting threat to be negated, if he wanted his players to attempt to grapple.

[Jon_Dahl]

So if the player infers that it's the former, and that the challenge is either 1) a moral conflict, 2) a roleplaying opportunity, or 3) just a warm-up fight so the patrons can see a quick kill, and the player doesn't go balls to the wall right off the bat, the DM is justified in making the encounter a save-or-die?

If I were in that scenario, unless there was something else to indicate specifically that the halfling was a magic user, I wouldn't have assumed a magic user; most players I know don't play that analytically. The phrase "a farmer boy holding a man's weapon", especially, changed the feel of the encounter because it brought to mind (for me) a terrified child. Obviously that's not where he was going with it, but the imagery flipped an aggressor/victim switch I wasn't even aware of.

Strictly logically, it's possible to puzzle out the sequence of events, but it's only obviously the correct choice (over the curbstomp battle option) if you already know what's coming.

I'm embarrassed to say that I forgot to mention one detail, which I did mention to my players: The halfling had a spell component pouch on his belt (with loads of fine sand).

Sorry for not being specific, but I didn't know that people were going to dig in to my examples this much. My fault, I'm sorry.

Edit. Ninja'ed

[Cirrylius]

I'm embarrassed to say that I forgot to mention one detail, which I did mention to my players: The halfling had a spell component pouch on his belt (with loads of fine sand).

Sorry for not being specific, but I didn't know that people were going to dig in to my examples this much. My fault, I'm sorry.

Edit. Ninja'ed

Heh. Yeah, that changes things a little. The only reason I could see for sand in an arena is to throw it in your opponent's face, and telegraphing it by carrying it in a pouch would be counterproductive.

Plus, the only leather pouch typically provided by the overseers of gladitorial combat is...

...y'know, the one that holds your junk.

[Slipperychicken]

I'm embarrassed to say that I forgot to mention one detail, which I did mention to my players: The halfling had a spell component pouch on his belt (with loads of fine sand).


This is why, whenever my PC encounters an NPC, I always take care to ask about his weapons/held items, clothes/armor, and if he has a component pouch or holy symbol on him. NPCs almost never use Disguise/Sleight of Hand to conceal the tools of their trade, and they typically only carry what they need because of bookkeeping concerns, so details like that tend to be quite useful.


Between the race, "can't hold his axe" bit, and the spell component pouch, I agree that your players should have gone straight for a grapple.

[Eldariel]

This is why, whenever my PC encounters an NPC, I always take care to ask about his weapons/held items, clothes/armor, and if he has a component pouch or holy symbol on him. NPCs almost never use Disguise/Sleight of Hand to conceal the tools of their trade, and they typically only carry what they need because of bookkeeping concerns, so details like that tend to be quite useful.

Between the race, "can't hold his axe" bit, and the spell component pouch, I agree that your players should have gone straight for a grapple.

Many of my NPCs (the ones without overbearing pride in their profession, and the ones that try to work incognito) and PCs try to conceal such signs of obvious information if possible; at least on low levels where such misdirection is useful.

Cleric doesn't need Holy Symbol for many of their spells so a more underhanded Cleric can keep it tugged away under clothes and only reveal it when Turning or casting the spells that require Holy Symbols. Wizard's pouch is unfortunately quite hard to hide but it's still occasionally possible (aside from the obvious Eschew Materials) to keep it somewhat covered in clothes or such.

More useful kind of disguise is of course wearing something other than the classic Wizard robes (but on the flipside, robes have the advantage of being able to conceal things with relative ease) and visibly carrying a weapon, especially a bow of some sort. These ease surviving with only a modicum of useful magic (over low levels) where people want to target the mage but can't unless they know who he is. Of course, it's again not for every character.

[PersonMan]

Well actually, that would've worked too. Low hp, not too much AC.

ok what

What did your players do?

[Jon_Dahl]

ok what

What did your players do?

The rules of the tournament said that all gladiators have to start the fight in their default form. When the fight started, the 8th-level psychic warrior PC (the other PCs were at level 6) won the initiative and manifested a heavily augmented Claws of the Beast. At that point the halfling was in front of him, just 30 ft. away.

Those psionic claws looked really nice on the PC as the halfling danced merrily next to his sleepy head and, after some lengthy aiming, cut it off with a single CdG. Unfortunately the PC didn't succeed in the DC 30 Fort save.

Before the fight I had mentioned the player twice that this halfling is by far the most dangerous combatant of the tournament.

[Slipperychicken]

The rules of the tournament said that all gladiators have to start the fight in their default form. When the fight started, the 8th-level psychic warrior PC (the other PCs were at level 6) won the initiative and manifested a heavily augmented Claws of the Beast.

That's only a Swift action. What did he do with his Standard+Move?

[Jon_Dahl]

That's only a Swift action. What did he do with his Standard+Move?

Can't remember, it was some other self boosting stuff. Duodimensional Claws? Can't remember.

[Deophaun]

Meh, a problem is that kind of fighting style doesn't work for a successful arena fighter. Sure, you get the first guy you fight with that tactic. But, since you're fighting in front of a crowd, that trick isn't going to surprise anyone for much longer. If it was a simple matter of grappling, the guy should not have been around long enough to establish any sort of reputation beyond "That smarty pants mage whos gots whats came to him in the second round."

So, I would say that you included an anti-clue with your remark that he was the most dangerous combatant.

'Course, shame on the party if they didn't bother to ask about their competition.

[Jon_Dahl]

I don't know how to respond you Deophaun. All the gladiators were gathered from different corners of the world. The halfling had to repeat his antic only four times to win the whole thing. He had other spells too, powerful ones, since he was at 6th level.

Since it was his first fight, and no one knew what he did, and it was impossible to know that without divination magic, some good questions+SM checks or bribing his entourage to reveal his secrets, I felt that my warning was all right. After the first fight and the loss of the element of surprise, he wasn't the most dangerous opponent any more.

[Deophaun]

OK, I didn't know the warning that he was the most dangerous combatant was given OOC. I thought he had gained some sort of reputation that the PCs heard of.

[Psyren]

I'd say that Ethereal Marauders (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/etherealMarauder.htm) are the perfect example of "easy if handled properly." Those things are CR 3 if and only if you forget that readied actions exist. Otherwise, they crumple in one hit to a 1st level Fighter.

I think this is a stellar example

[Telok]

How would a mere +2 deflection bonus to AC and +2 resistance bonus to saves (which would probably run into stacking issues at that level) have saved them from everything?

Ach, my bad. I keep thinking that it keeps out undead too. On occasion I still slip back to OD&D/AD&D and old house rules. That still doesn't excuse the total lack of preparation. The lich was famous before death, Kn:History or Kn:Nobility would have turned up details about him, there are books written about him, he pioneered unique necromancy spells, he's in a mural of important magical people in the wizard college, and there are warforged and elves around who are old enough to remember him and have met him when he was alive.

The players had a chance to learn detailed history of the wizard who went lich, chances to scry on most of the dungeon, and chances to prepare for an undead themed dungeon. They did nothing but buy a single undead bane heavy crossbow.

[137beth]

I'd say the Tarrasque is a pretty good example of an easy-if-handled-properly monster. If you attack it in melee combat...you will probably die. On the other hand, there are lots of ways to solo it by level 14ish, frequently lower.

[Crasical]

I once lost a warblade charger fighting a Hydra because I didn't realize how much better it was better than me at melee. We had two casters in the party who locked it down with an entangle and the emerald planes spell, and we proceeded to pepper it with crossbows. I eventually (Dumbly) charged the thing and got pasted after I realized it had fast healing and wasn't going to ever be killed with ranged bolts. I got chomped to bits and the rest of the party ran away.

.. Which was the correct way to handle the encounter, really. It was a big, scary animal but we weren't getting paid to kill it, we could have bypassed it or escaped easily and headed on to our actual goal, or killed it easily by being more tricky.

[Herabec]

I once lost a warblade charger fighting a Hydra because I didn't realize how much better it was better than me at melee. We had two casters in the party who locked it down with an entangle and the emerald planes spell, and we proceeded to pepper it with crossbows. I eventually (Dumbly) charged the thing and got pasted after I realized it had fast healing and wasn't going to ever be killed with ranged bolts. I got chomped to bits and the rest of the party ran away.

.. Which was the correct way to handle the encounter, really. It was a big, scary animal but we weren't getting paid to kill it, we could have bypassed it or escaped easily and headed on to our actual goal, or killed it easily by being more tricky.
Hahahaha...

Reminds me of a very similar situation my own group went through while I was DMing. The group's looking a black dragon out in a swampy area and come across a cave. They'd seen evidence of the dragon's recent passing, so they made the assumption that the dragon lived within the cave.

Being kinda... not so smart, they called it out, made a lot of whooping and clanging noises, the Cleric in particular. After a few minutes, they heard a loud growling noise echoing from within the cave's darkness, so they prepped some Protection from Acid spells and the like.

And then a raging twelve-headed Hydra charged out from the cave entrance and full-attacked the Cleric, killing him outright in one pass. Rest of the group vacated their bowls and teleported out. XD These weren't low level characters either. Level 11 I think they were, so I was just as shocked as they were.

[Fyermind]

Easy if handled properly depends more on the PCs than the encounter in most cases. A wizard with Shivering touch and a way of getting it at range calls dragons easy if handled properly. To make an encounter generally EIHP the environment has to work against the encounter.

For example consider an archer in a room full of cover options. If the PCs stand around and try to exchange fire with the archer it will be very hard. If they dive for cover and sweep the room carefully, they can get the archer in melee and fight where they have the advantage.

Monsters lacking ranged combat in environments that support it (difficult terrain for example) or that lack movement modes the PCs possess are another example of EIHP.

The DMG notes an invisible cleric buffing undead minions in a battle as EIHP. The cleric probably has very little actual combat spells prepared and relies on invisibility to stay alive. Without his boosts the undead are easily killed or turned. Because he keeps buffing and healing them (while saying his spells aloud) it's a hard fight until somebody drops glitterdust on him.

As an extension of this I'd say any fight where the primary enemy is a booster with minions. Bards can make very weak allies or summons deal a lot of damage very easily. A fight where you have a summoner and a bard taking cover or hiding while the summons attack the PCs is a great example of an EIHP fight.

Tangential story about an EIHP fight I ran
In fact I have a great spell turret and bard combo encounter I ran. The spell turret had Summon Monster IX, Summon Nature's Ally IX, Twinned Mass Snake's Swiftness, and Call of the Twilight Defender. The Bard was a level 8 bard who used Dragonfire inspiration with words of creation and the spells harmonize and inspirational boost. The PCs were level 10 (an evil). This was a CR 10 encounter, but the spell turret would make things very hard if they didn't find a way to deal with the swarm of large elementals and twilight defenders it produced. When the bard who was commanding everything died, the new summons did very little damage and weren't accurate enough to hit.

It took the PCs two rounds of more summons showing up (and old summons disappearing even when the PCs hadn't killed them) to realize that the summons didn't need to be fought directly. When Twinned Mass Snake's Swiftness hit them they all took a deep breath. With the power of DFI and IC behind it, it nearly killed all of them. That got them to all attack the Bard except the spellthief who went after the turret. It lead to the most interesting discussion about travel and magic turrets I've ever had as well as the party warblade arguing that since he could carry several hundred pounds of rock he should be able to take the turret with him. When the disabling wore off and the turret went back to attacking him, he agreed it should be destroyed.

As an added bonus it gave me an excuse to give the party bard a pair of harmonizing daggers so he could sustain two songs and still contribute on a round by round basis. She'd never thought of something like that, so she'd spent most of the game doing other things during combat.

[Big Fau]

Low-level dragons are a really good example. If used as a melee monster they get slaughtered within a few turns, but if used as a hit-and-run monster with their breath weapons they are a huge pain to deal with even with ranged weaponry. And then you start optimizing one, and it goes even further downhill.

[TypoNinja]

Did any of them ask for the chance to roll Sense Motive on the Halfling? Lulling one's opponent into a false sense of security is not an unknown tactic; they may have suspected he was faking. See also: "I am not left-handed."

In other words, they struggled because something that was obvious to you, the DM and creator of the encounter, was not obvious to them upon hearing the description. This happens.

This is... a really easy trap to fall into. I once had my players end up breaking the multi-verse because they missed the clues I'd been dropping that I thought were obvious. Ended up getting the attention of an old (and insane) god of evil that had been imprisoned.

Clues that look obvious to the person designing something when strung together can sometimes go right over your PC's heads. They get lots of details from you all the time, and most only matter to them for as long as they are in that particular room. Non-specific information tends not be retained in my experience.