Is this encounter 2 hard for my party?

[ShirAhn]

Hi guys, as a new DM I still find it hard to plan encounters. I use the website kobold.club to help me plan these. My party consists of 5 level 3 players.

For our next session I have the following planned:
my party comes across a rusty old house near some woods where they they camped last session. Near the house they find a old woman in a well. If they choose to converse with the old woman she explains that she and her sisters were charged by some corrupted soldiers for witchcraft and that her 2 sisters were kidnapped. She asks the party to help her.

If they do, and the party is eventually able to retrieve the two sisters, the hags now feels save and will attack the party once the sisters are reunited. This will start the encounter containing 3 (Coven) Green Hags. If I read the MM (page 177) correctly it states that the hags can use spells like lightning bolt and eyebite. If one of the hags decides to cast a level 6 lightning bolt it is able to do a avarage of 35!! Damage on a failed save. I believe our wizard has around 20HP at this level.

Any advice on how to handle this situation? The coven is listed as 1800 XP in CR 5 according to kobold.club, I really like the idea of hags tricking the party to kill innocents, they sorta have a reputation for "shoot first ask questions questions later" kind of actions and I want to punish them for it.

[lebefrei]

You aren't correct on Green Hag CR, and you are looking at an almost definite TPK.

A single Green Hag as a part of a coven is CR 5. That alone is near a deadly encounter for your party.

Have them find and fight one Green Hag. It will be challenging. You can throw some distracting crap like skeletons in if you must. Let her try to flee when her HP is low (don't railroad and force it, if they kill her they kill her).

They should get exp for the defeat either way, and the coven will want revenge. This gives them an ongoing enemy until they can handle all 3. Probably at level 8.

If the first one dies, they can either face two, or find a Night Hag that joins and makes them even stronger.

[Ninja_Prawn]

Let her try to flee when her HP is low (don't railroad and force it, if they kill her they kill her).

I suggest a secret door at the bottom of the well, hidden by a permanent illusion. Until they get access to True Seeing or an item that mimics it, all they know is 'the hag jumped into the well and vanished.' That allows you to skill-gate the coven encounter until they are strong enough to face it.


If the first one dies, they can either face two, or find a Night Hag that joins and makes them even stronger.

I like this too. It gives the coven some personality and shows them improvising in the face of adversity. Also it increases the possibility of tension between the hags that the party may be able to exploit.

[ShirAhn]

Thank you for the great advice!!!