Teaming With NPCs And CR

[Afgncaap5]

So, my players, who are low in level but many in number, are about to take on a pretty tough challenge in the form of a Treant. There are at least six PCs, but they're all level 3; even with the standard action economy boost that lots of PCs get, I worry that the Treant being 5 CRs above the norm might make it a bit deadlier than intended. The goal is to get the PCs to fear for their life without actually dying.

Now, I've also introduced a wizard to the story. The wizard has been helping the PCs, but I've been trying to keep his direct involvement minimal. Due to story concerns and due to the players keeping close enough tabs on him that I wasn't able to realistically just have him be "not there" for a scene (they're onto me and my tricks...), said wizard has been helping more than normal this time around. They don't know what "level" he is, and I've honestly been leaving that unspecified other than "high". I had him split from the party long enough to handle an issue with some phantom fungi on the other side of town and then buff himself before this fight, so it's fair to say that whatever spells he cast will be limited in some way. I'm trying to figure out roughly what "effective" wizard level to make this guy; ignoring things like caster level effects, I'd like him to focus on buffing the party rather than fighting directly so that this +5 CR fight is more along the lines of a +2 or 3 CR fight.


Some other factors are in the Spoiler area, though most of these aren't as relevant to the situation as, well... the situation. They could just help or hinder the calculations in one way or another, so feel free to read or ignore as you see fit.


-Player base: the table size fluctuates. Six is a good modal average number of players, but I've seen this particular group get as low as four, or once as high as nine. I'm guessing I won't have nine next time we play, but it's a matter of some concern. Also, the players had the common sense to stock up on things that could cause fire damage by raiding a police evidence locker, so their damage to the treant will at least not be totally absorbed by DR. Oh, and there's a complete lack of healers. BOTH players who went Cleric went for the cool, edgy, you-can't-tell-me-what-to-do Negative Energy option and ah-hahaha they're burning through those health potions they bought so quickly...

-The Treant: This guy starts as baseline, but is also aligned with a group of sinister druids and arcane casters who've got a number of resources that said Treant likely would've drawn from. I'm guessing at least a few potions or wand-like items or consumable wondrous devices to help things. They've not come up in-game yet, but players are making the not-unreasonable assumption he's got some. Also, the Treant has a number of level 1 and 2 druid casters doing general legwork, a gang of roving Redcaps helping nearby, allegedly certain other fey creatures and plant creatures working behind the scenes, and at least one hieracosphinx in the area. Some or all of these creatures could easily be summoned by the sound of combat or by the Treant just calling for aid. He doesn't necessarily need to, but it'd be weird if he didn't.

-The Wizard: As I said above, his level is an unspecified "High" compared to the PCs. Also, I run magic a little weirdly in my personal game world, and "arcane" magic is an umbrella term for all the dozens or even hundreds of different varieties of magic that can go together in a wizard's studies. So while the implication is that he's not capable of bringing his A-game due to the previous encounters he handled by himself, he's likely got a lot of tricks up his sleeve. He's a laid back Merlin-ish figure, so if a few Druid or Bard spells creep into his repertoire, that's probably not the end of the world. Also, not really important to the power level question, but he's got kind of an outer space theme going (his magic missile and ability to summon fire elementals both involved literal stars falling from the sky, for instance; the first were silvery stars that crashed into opponents, while the latter was a star that fell to earth and then started fighting for him.)

-The plot: Long story short, the Treant had an agreement with some druids to let a city be built on its land in ancient times, and the sinister druids who now run that circle have taken back that deal and have convinced the Treant to join them for their cause. For both of those reasons, the Treant is using a mysterious ritual to turn all the people in this town into trees as step one of making the town his personal grove again, but the ritual requires a lot of steps to be taken over a wide area (which is why there are so many roving fey, druid, and plant creatures around, all helping to maintain the magic.)

[Blu]

One of the big problems of dealing with a lot of players(6 or more) is that "apropriate" encounters of one enemy start to get to strong for each individual, with even encounters 1 or 2 CR abobe the party's average level can become deadly for one or two characters.
The treant is a good example of this. Considering an average level 3 character with d8 HD and 16 CON, they have an average of 26 HP, while the treant attacks do around 16 damage per hit. So your characters are one full attack away from being droped(the treant to hit bonus being not that high can be a saving grace, but it's still dangerous since the treant can just trample).
Factoring that the treant has at least one animated tree the fight can go wrong really fast.

The number of players being able to flutuate is just another problem for you. Also, i need to ask, how can the number of players vary so much(from 4 players to even 9)?

I would advise you to instead use more of weaker enemys, since then the encounter is more in line with the party's numbers.

[Falontani]

So, my players, who are low in level but many in number, are about to take on a pretty tough challenge in the form of a Treant. There are at least six PCs, but they're all level 3; even with the standard action economy boost that lots of PCs get, I worry that the Treant being 5 CRs above the norm might make it a bit deadlier than intended. The goal is to get the PCs to fear for their life without actually dying.

Now, I've also introduced a wizard to the story. The wizard has been helping the PCs, but I've been trying to keep his direct involvement minimal. Due to story concerns and due to the players keeping close enough tabs on him that I wasn't able to realistically just have him be "not there" for a scene (they're onto me and my tricks...), said wizard has been helping more than normal this time around. They don't know what "level" he is, and I've honestly been leaving that unspecified other than "high". I had him split from the party long enough to handle an issue with some phantom fungi on the other side of town and then buff himself before this fight, so it's fair to say that whatever spells he cast will be limited in some way. I'm trying to figure out roughly what "effective" wizard level to make this guy; ignoring things like caster level effects, I'd like him to focus on buffing the party rather than fighting directly so that this +5 CR fight is more along the lines of a +2 or 3 CR fight.


Some other factors are in the Spoiler area, though most of these aren't as relevant to the situation as, well... the situation. They could just help or hinder the calculations in one way or another, so feel free to read or ignore as you see fit.


-Player base: the table size fluctuates. Six is a good modal average number of players, but I've seen this particular group get as low as four, or once as high as nine. I'm guessing I won't have nine next time we play, but it's a matter of some concern. Also, the players had the common sense to stock up on things that could cause fire damage by raiding a police evidence locker, so their damage to the treant will at least not be totally absorbed by DR. Oh, and there's a complete lack of healers. BOTH players who went Cleric went for the cool, edgy, you-can't-tell-me-what-to-do Negative Energy option and ah-hahaha they're burning through those health potions they bought so quickly...

-The Treant: This guy starts as baseline, but is also aligned with a group of sinister druids and arcane casters who've got a number of resources that said Treant likely would've drawn from. I'm guessing at least a few potions or wand-like items or consumable wondrous devices to help things. They've not come up in-game yet, but players are making the not-unreasonable assumption he's got some. Also, the Treant has a number of level 1 and 2 druid casters doing general legwork, a gang of roving Redcaps helping nearby, allegedly certain other fey creatures and plant creatures working behind the scenes, and at least one hieracosphinx in the area. Some or all of these creatures could easily be summoned by the sound of combat or by the Treant just calling for aid. He doesn't necessarily need to, but it'd be weird if he didn't.

-The Wizard: As I said above, his level is an unspecified "High" compared to the PCs. Also, I run magic a little weirdly in my personal game world, and "arcane" magic is an umbrella term for all the dozens or even hundreds of different varieties of magic that can go together in a wizard's studies. So while the implication is that he's not capable of bringing his A-game due to the previous encounters he handled by himself, he's likely got a lot of tricks up his sleeve. He's a laid back Merlin-ish figure, so if a few Druid or Bard spells creep into his repertoire, that's probably not the end of the world. Also, not really important to the power level question, but he's got kind of an outer space theme going (his magic missile and ability to summon fire elementals both involved literal stars falling from the sky, for instance; the first were silvery stars that crashed into opponents, while the latter was a star that fell to earth and then started fighting for him.)

-The plot: Long story short, the Treant had an agreement with some druids to let a city be built on its land in ancient times, and the sinister druids who now run that circle have taken back that deal and have convinced the Treant to join them for their cause. For both of those reasons, the Treant is using a mysterious ritual to turn all the people in this town into trees as step one of making the town his personal grove again, but the ritual requires a lot of steps to be taken over a wide area (which is why there are so many roving fey, druid, and plant creatures around, all helping to maintain the magic.)

Haste, Good Hope, and Stoneskin will be some of the best buffs (all level 3 and 4 spells) he can throw out fairly easily
If the party decides to retreat a summoned earth elemental (meteor falling from the sky) along with a haste spell should get them away quickly enough.
All of that could be done while keeping your wizard level 7 or lower. If you want to truly make him high level a mass bull's strength or Mass Cat's Grace could easily turn the table in the groups advantage.

Alternatively you could have him throw out a few buffs, have the Treant make a successful spellcraft check, realize that "merlin" is buffing the group and call for aid. Then have "merlin" cast a few summon creatures and fight the treant's aid. You could have the Treant even try to drink a potion or use a wand and have "merlin" throw a dispel magic while calling to the group that they have it on the ropes.