Encounter: PC's vs. Half-Giant Archer

[Ursus Spelaeus]

The set up:

The PC's are in some opulent tower meeting with an NPC contact of theirs. Maybe they are inquiring about a job, or receiving payment for a job well done. There is a second tower, brightly lit, across from the tower the PC's are in. There's a third tower under construction. The towers are all separate buildings in a port city. A wide road passes between the towers. The towers and the road are all visible from the balcony and the wide open windows in the room the PC's are in. It's night time.

As the PC's are talking to their NPC contact, the lights go out in that second tower. Moments later, an arrow comes flying through a window. The window has a note attached to it listing the names of the player characters, and the prices on their heads (the PC's made someone powerful very upset earlier; they always do.)

There is an archer shooting arrows from one of those two towers across the street. He's well hidden.
The arrows deal 2d6+4 damage, suggesting that the attacker is using a large-sized composite longbow and may have a strength score of 18. The arrows are able to demolish stone walls somehow; maybe the arrows are adamant, or the attacker is using an augment crystal of demolition.

If the party goes to the second tower where the lights went out, they will have to navigate through traps and weak monsters all the way up to the top where they will find only a sardonic note, and explosive barrels. The bowman shooting at them is in the partially constructed third tower.

The archer attacking the party is a half-giant psychic warrior with the zen archery feat, wielding a composite longbow appropriate to his high strength. He has powers related to stealth, perception, and ranged combat. He may have a cheap dorje or two to supplement the powers granted by his class. He's not built for melee, but he may still put his strength to use with a maul.

He also has a spotter; there's a second enemy (perhaps a kobold) that aids him with powers of perception, powers of stealth, powers to affect wind speed and arrow trajectory, and skills related to trap-setting.

Let's say the PC's are between levels 4 and 6, all tier III. Any advice for building the encounter?

[Know(Nothing)]

Their classes and levels of optimization would be good to know. Depending on that, this encounter will either have them feeling helpless and frustrated, or they'll figure out what's happening and track the sniper immediately.

Some stuff to keep in mind that you may or may not be alright with: even with a spotter that has a better vantage point and, let's say, some kind of telepathy to tell the sniper which square to aim at, there will still be a 50% miss chance if he can't actually see the target. If adamantine arrows come pouring in, your players are going to now own some adamantine arrows. If you rule that an adamantine or augment-crystalled arrow can pierce stone, continue to it's target, and still connect with the same amount of damage, be prepared for your players to use the same ruling in their favor later. Players saying "oh that's a 2d6 arrow, they must be a large archer" is a weird, meta-gamey thing to say, so instead just roll damage behind the screen and give them an easy Int check to see that these arrows are far larger than normal ones. If your players do pick the correct tower, be prepared to answer(at least for yourself) how a half-giant escaped unseen from a tower, particularly after whatever aristocrat they're meeting with calls for the city guard(or whomever) to help. Same goes for the spotter. A kobold skulking around a fancy tower(even the under-construction one) with equipment to aid a sniper is going to raise some eyebrows if he's seen at all, and especially after arrows start flying in.

[Ursus Spelaeus]

Some stuff to keep in mind that you may or may not be alright with: even with a spotter that has a better vantage point and, let's say, some kind of telepathy to tell the sniper which square to aim at, there will still be a 50% miss chance if he can't actually see the target.

...Good point. Would the Sense Link power help with this?



If adamantine arrows come pouring in, your players are going to now own some adamantine arrows. If you rule that an adamantine or augment-crystalled arrow can pierce stone, continue to it's target, and still connect with the same amount of damage, be prepared for your players to use the same ruling in their favor later.

Hmmm... maybe just the augment crystal of demolition on the bow then.



Players saying "oh that's a 2d6 arrow, they must be a large archer" is a weird, meta-gamey thing to say, so instead just roll damage behind the screen and give them an easy Int check to see that these arrows are far larger than normal ones.

Maybe just tell them the damage and let them do the math in their heads? I'm okay with a little bit of meta-gaming.



If your players do pick the correct tower, be prepared to answer(at least for yourself) how a half-giant escaped unseen from a tower, particularly after whatever aristocrat they're meeting with calls for the city guard(or whomever) to help. Same goes for the spotter. A kobold skulking around a fancy tower(even the under-construction one) with equipment to aid a sniper is going to raise some eyebrows if he's seen at all, and especially after arrows start flying in.

...Well, he'd probably use the stuff going on in the other tower as a diversion.
Half-giant and his kobold spotter set up in the unfinished tower.
A team of kobolds comes up into the populated tower through a passage from the undercity, blocks the exits, then sweeps through the building. The kobold team plants explosives throughout the building. If the guard rolls in, the kobold team starts making noise. The burning, exploding building provides a diversion.
They make a daring escape via zip-lines to a nearby building where an extraction team is waiting to guide them through the sewers to a safe-house.

[Beheld]

Step 1) Beguiler Creates 900 square foot wall in between archer and spotter and party.
Step 2) Everyone moves more than zero feet.
Step 3) Archer can't hit anyone because he doesn't know where anyone is.
Step 4) Party leaves tower invisibly and waits hidden somewhere at the base of the tower, or just goes on their way, and next time they need to do something, they just remember to bring the Dread Necro's army with them.

[J-H]

Zen archery has a range limitation of 30' or 60'.

[LTwerewolf]

Zen archery has a range limitation of 30' or 60'.

Not according to the book it's written in. CW page 106 makes no mention of range requirements at all.

[Know(Nothing)]

...Good point. Would the Sense Link power help with this?

Not really. The spotter might see where people in the room are, but the shooter wouldn't be able to fire until he went back to his vision, and then couldn't switch back with the same casting. Also the players would have to be holding still.

[J-H]

Not according to the book it's written in. CW page 106 makes no mention of range requirements at all.

Ah, I was thinking of the 3.0 Sword & Fist version.