Silentone98
2018-09-12, 05:03 AM
Hello all,
I am looking for some advice/feedback on my groups current campaign... we have a group of 4 people, a DM and 3 players.
We all started at level 1, a ninja an oracle and a kinetickist(she retrained to alchemist after the first dungeon)
I get told prior to starting this campaign that I would be doubling as tank,.... as a ninja... I pointed out thats possible to a limited extent, but im not a tank still. We are a smaller group as well so I assumed everything would be scaled with this in mind.
I get allowed to play a heavily watered down half-fiend human. But still enough bonuses to be somewhat better than other racial choices(and I do mean HEAVILY watered down compared to normal half-fiend, 2 +2 stats, darkvision, some energy resists and natural attacks and human bonus feat, a few odds and ends that usually dont factor in like darkness 1/day and smite good when we are fighting undead in a campaign we had no prior knowledge that would be primarily undead based enemies >.> but this is all I got worth noting)
Still,... not complaining, since it seemed better than taking most other racial selections and it wouldnt have been fair to the other players to get the full package.
This was kinda viewed as a slight boost to make up for the idea of doubling as a party tank,... while a ninja(facepalm)
Shouldnt be a problem tho I imagine as I had 14 Con, and high AC right off the start, with or without armor. I am a ninja after all, make use of my damage to drop the enemies before they drop me and we should be fine.
Before we begin our first session, we are informed the DM watered everything down already because he made everything too tough the first time.
our first dungeon was also our opening scene, being bond and dragged to this dungeon, no equipment. We have a lvl 4 equivalent blinkling antipaladin NPC bound with us, who the DM goes into cinematic mode explaining how the blinkling breaks his bonds and goes all incredible hulk on some of our captors, disarming them with his bare hands and all. Killing a few of them in the process.
This is fine and all, he gets re-restrained, and we all get thrown into this undead infested military fort and demanded to retrieve an artifact for our captors...
Alright, great.... not a bad way to start im thinking
the dead corpses from what our blinkling friend killed are locked in with us for some reason, so we loot them and gear up between that and the surrounding storage rooms before heading in deeper. Then we fight our first skeletons, 16 HP each.... even our CON heavy kinetickist only had 11 HP... >.>
And these skeletons had something like 14-16 strength to boot. (our highest strength character is 12 for reference) In fact, I think ONLY the skeleton mage we fought last session had less than 14 strength throughout both dungeons so far... and im just assuming he did.
This isnt including the captain, who had more HP, no idea what else he had.
Luckily we had the blinkling, but im thinking to myself, this room had 5 skeletons, all with massive HP compared to us, and the blinkling can only realistically handle 1 at a time,... assuming he doesnt breath weapon, as we also learn he is blessed by tiamat and has some kind of half dragon thing going(but not the same thing the DM assures)
Several more rooms of this go by with 3-4 more skeletons, with likewise stats.
Okay,... so, overpowered for us im thinking, but balanced out because we have this NPC? But I am not so sure, because then it would be a spotlight whoring issue with an NPC, he runs the whole dungeon with(for) us. We are forced to crutch on that, because this is too powerful a dungeon for us. Traps had DC's of 20, and damage in the range of 2d8 +4, or close to(it may have been a 2d6, or something else like that)
and yea... we were warned we would have trouble with the traps unless we had someone with skills for it,... but we were level 1.
anyhow, I brought up with the DM that all this seemed abnormal to me. Standard skeleton being 4 HP, Low level traps being in the DC 13 range, and much less damage- this is what I would have expected for a dungeon crawl with multiple rooms and multiple fights at level 1. But his game, his rules- but it is odd and I wanted to point that out. He wanted this to be a challenge he says and if we die, its not his fault, but the fault of his dice.
Next session, He tones the traps down thankfully(above mentioned trap brought to 2d4, and all traps to this day have been massively more reasonable,... maybe even too gentle, but I dare not go there!)
.... said he toned the enemies down also... but that really was just single beefed up undead with high HP's still. But 1 guy instead of groups. This is why I brought up the spotlight whore issue of his NPC earlier, because only him and I had enough damage potential to really do anything worth noting (the kinetickist was getting a few 10 point damage hits in surprisingly but she wasnt feeling too useful since she was earth type and couldnt hit often at all since earth doesnt hit touch AC) I could do damage just fine... but I couldnt take it, and I most certainly struggled massively to perform my main role of dropping an enemy, even when I had sneak attacks most of the time.
.... so we just spent 2 sessions backseating on an NPC basically... >.>
The only thing that felt useful about our characters was our "sucking up to those more powerful than us" ability
I ignored the boss fight oddities, as it was a boss fight after all. Somehow we all survived. During the entire dungeon I was down to -9 HP at one point, but that was the worst of it(We thought my character was next to death, since we didnt realize pathfinder changed it from -10 health to -"your constitution"). Skeleton kept attacking me even tho I was down, I forget to mention, these were intelligent undead and wanted me to be one of them.
we leveled from the dungeon to level 2.
Well,... I explained my reservations about this campaign to the DM,.. said anyone could push mobs to level 4 equivalent HP, and god knows what else, and make it more challenging thru pure numbers. That doesnt make for a very interesting game to me, it makes it a chore. As it is, I cant even fullfill my role as a 1 round kill sneak attacker most of the time due to the difficulty in hitting most targets. When I do, its a whooper due to having so many attacks at a low level(something even his high HP enemies have to fear), but that isnt going to last us- and the other party members cant do that.
Obviously this was going to be a problematic campaign, and I didnt trust any of this despite the DM saying he looked at the numbers and saw what I was saying,... enemies with 50% or more higher HP than us, and elite array of stats, while we were rolled stats(just assume we are mediocre for the most part) The numbers were against us, regardless of the dice.
Our kinetickist wasnt enjoying her class... so I did the only thing I could and suggested a class that would vastly improve our chances, alchemist.
She is now brewing up potions that are IMMENSELY helpful, and soon to be doing alchemical crafting as well. Problem is I have to help her every step of the way since she doesn't understand rulesets well. But she likes it,... she feels more included and useful now. I also had her take explosive bomb,... the catching fire thing was the real seller, if we cant beat them down in 1 turn, make them dance on their turns I say! (This has been priceless so far)
I don't mean to say every enemy has to go down in the first round,.. but if we cant even get 1, on a surprise round, AND a high initiative? Well,... time to lock down the battlefield.
Anyhow, the next session rolls around... we are done with that artifact thing, and back in town and sent off to a new town.... we fight some bandits, and sure enough the new tactics work like a charm... all more HP than us still, as I figured it would be, but it didnt matter... we massacre'd them. I think its about this time we notice one of our magic items we picked up from the first dungeon is a bit troublesome as it drinks the bodies essence away. It's basically a vampire in a sentient weapon, but it literally ashes any corpse(good garbage disposal) But feeding it makes it more powerful.
I think the main idea here is clear, so I will sum up the rest.
Next dungeon trash mobs HP's are 30+ (not all, but you get the idea, and we switch between groups of enemies and single enemies a few times), we are level 2 with HP's of 15/16 and such.
Also worth noting that I have a much harder time hitting things due to AC bumps, even on flat foots.
Sentient weapon gets more powerful because the Oracle keeps feeding it, and now it can float and make its own attacks, and 1/day make rays of ungodly power that basically kill anything(anything we are currently facing anyhow)
I should probally mention that it's basically taken the role of the earlier mentioned blinkling.
We fight in the boss room, perhaps one of the toughest fights yet, as it has 3 undead, a brawler, a barbarian, and a wizard. The wizard blasts our undead companion for 14 damage or so, but I was able to sneak up behind said wizard and 1 round drop him, first and only one that I could even do enough damage to pull it off with at this level. All I know is he had more than 12 HP as the first hit didnt drop him.
On the plus side,... we have been getting +1 to +2 equivalent magical gear, but not necessarily gear any of us would want. +1 Studded Leather of Insults for example,... could sell for alot and get us all something more useful(who in their right mind wants to draw all the attention to themselves with these kind of enemies? Sounds like a sick joke to me), but DM made it clear he would be peeved if we sold **** immediately after we got it.
It's worth noting I was informed prior to the campaign that this was a low magic campaign. It's since then proven otherwise. Not complaining, as we basically need everything we can possibly get.
Now, what I wanted from all of you,... I am not imagining this right? The game mechanics weren't set up to support fighting waves of enemies with HP 50% higher than us at first level, and double at 2nd right? Do note this is even after the DM saying he noted the problem and addressed it.
I 100% fear level 3 means triple our health on every trash mob.
As a player in the game, the feeling I get is overcompensation for the ninja damage potential with extra HP... but it ultimately screws over my companions(and me as well in effect) and in most cases, I can count on being unable to drop an enemy in 1 round reliably with stealth/sneak attacks. I dont think he understand the only way I can "tank" is by dropping an enemy fast(especially early game, mock ninja, vanishing, substitute does wonders, but its limited in usage and I dont have all that so early). Kill them before they kill me.
I also feel like, theres a sort of idea with the DM that its unfair if our enemies dont get to act and die too soon before they rough us up.
Thoughts? Tell me if im over-reacting.... I am just concerned rather this is a campaign entirely rigged against us, or one where I should only fear the dice as the DM states, as this doesnt seem normal.
I am looking for some advice/feedback on my groups current campaign... we have a group of 4 people, a DM and 3 players.
We all started at level 1, a ninja an oracle and a kinetickist(she retrained to alchemist after the first dungeon)
I get told prior to starting this campaign that I would be doubling as tank,.... as a ninja... I pointed out thats possible to a limited extent, but im not a tank still. We are a smaller group as well so I assumed everything would be scaled with this in mind.
I get allowed to play a heavily watered down half-fiend human. But still enough bonuses to be somewhat better than other racial choices(and I do mean HEAVILY watered down compared to normal half-fiend, 2 +2 stats, darkvision, some energy resists and natural attacks and human bonus feat, a few odds and ends that usually dont factor in like darkness 1/day and smite good when we are fighting undead in a campaign we had no prior knowledge that would be primarily undead based enemies >.> but this is all I got worth noting)
Still,... not complaining, since it seemed better than taking most other racial selections and it wouldnt have been fair to the other players to get the full package.
This was kinda viewed as a slight boost to make up for the idea of doubling as a party tank,... while a ninja(facepalm)
Shouldnt be a problem tho I imagine as I had 14 Con, and high AC right off the start, with or without armor. I am a ninja after all, make use of my damage to drop the enemies before they drop me and we should be fine.
Before we begin our first session, we are informed the DM watered everything down already because he made everything too tough the first time.
our first dungeon was also our opening scene, being bond and dragged to this dungeon, no equipment. We have a lvl 4 equivalent blinkling antipaladin NPC bound with us, who the DM goes into cinematic mode explaining how the blinkling breaks his bonds and goes all incredible hulk on some of our captors, disarming them with his bare hands and all. Killing a few of them in the process.
This is fine and all, he gets re-restrained, and we all get thrown into this undead infested military fort and demanded to retrieve an artifact for our captors...
Alright, great.... not a bad way to start im thinking
the dead corpses from what our blinkling friend killed are locked in with us for some reason, so we loot them and gear up between that and the surrounding storage rooms before heading in deeper. Then we fight our first skeletons, 16 HP each.... even our CON heavy kinetickist only had 11 HP... >.>
And these skeletons had something like 14-16 strength to boot. (our highest strength character is 12 for reference) In fact, I think ONLY the skeleton mage we fought last session had less than 14 strength throughout both dungeons so far... and im just assuming he did.
This isnt including the captain, who had more HP, no idea what else he had.
Luckily we had the blinkling, but im thinking to myself, this room had 5 skeletons, all with massive HP compared to us, and the blinkling can only realistically handle 1 at a time,... assuming he doesnt breath weapon, as we also learn he is blessed by tiamat and has some kind of half dragon thing going(but not the same thing the DM assures)
Several more rooms of this go by with 3-4 more skeletons, with likewise stats.
Okay,... so, overpowered for us im thinking, but balanced out because we have this NPC? But I am not so sure, because then it would be a spotlight whoring issue with an NPC, he runs the whole dungeon with(for) us. We are forced to crutch on that, because this is too powerful a dungeon for us. Traps had DC's of 20, and damage in the range of 2d8 +4, or close to(it may have been a 2d6, or something else like that)
and yea... we were warned we would have trouble with the traps unless we had someone with skills for it,... but we were level 1.
anyhow, I brought up with the DM that all this seemed abnormal to me. Standard skeleton being 4 HP, Low level traps being in the DC 13 range, and much less damage- this is what I would have expected for a dungeon crawl with multiple rooms and multiple fights at level 1. But his game, his rules- but it is odd and I wanted to point that out. He wanted this to be a challenge he says and if we die, its not his fault, but the fault of his dice.
Next session, He tones the traps down thankfully(above mentioned trap brought to 2d4, and all traps to this day have been massively more reasonable,... maybe even too gentle, but I dare not go there!)
.... said he toned the enemies down also... but that really was just single beefed up undead with high HP's still. But 1 guy instead of groups. This is why I brought up the spotlight whore issue of his NPC earlier, because only him and I had enough damage potential to really do anything worth noting (the kinetickist was getting a few 10 point damage hits in surprisingly but she wasnt feeling too useful since she was earth type and couldnt hit often at all since earth doesnt hit touch AC) I could do damage just fine... but I couldnt take it, and I most certainly struggled massively to perform my main role of dropping an enemy, even when I had sneak attacks most of the time.
.... so we just spent 2 sessions backseating on an NPC basically... >.>
The only thing that felt useful about our characters was our "sucking up to those more powerful than us" ability
I ignored the boss fight oddities, as it was a boss fight after all. Somehow we all survived. During the entire dungeon I was down to -9 HP at one point, but that was the worst of it(We thought my character was next to death, since we didnt realize pathfinder changed it from -10 health to -"your constitution"). Skeleton kept attacking me even tho I was down, I forget to mention, these were intelligent undead and wanted me to be one of them.
we leveled from the dungeon to level 2.
Well,... I explained my reservations about this campaign to the DM,.. said anyone could push mobs to level 4 equivalent HP, and god knows what else, and make it more challenging thru pure numbers. That doesnt make for a very interesting game to me, it makes it a chore. As it is, I cant even fullfill my role as a 1 round kill sneak attacker most of the time due to the difficulty in hitting most targets. When I do, its a whooper due to having so many attacks at a low level(something even his high HP enemies have to fear), but that isnt going to last us- and the other party members cant do that.
Obviously this was going to be a problematic campaign, and I didnt trust any of this despite the DM saying he looked at the numbers and saw what I was saying,... enemies with 50% or more higher HP than us, and elite array of stats, while we were rolled stats(just assume we are mediocre for the most part) The numbers were against us, regardless of the dice.
Our kinetickist wasnt enjoying her class... so I did the only thing I could and suggested a class that would vastly improve our chances, alchemist.
She is now brewing up potions that are IMMENSELY helpful, and soon to be doing alchemical crafting as well. Problem is I have to help her every step of the way since she doesn't understand rulesets well. But she likes it,... she feels more included and useful now. I also had her take explosive bomb,... the catching fire thing was the real seller, if we cant beat them down in 1 turn, make them dance on their turns I say! (This has been priceless so far)
I don't mean to say every enemy has to go down in the first round,.. but if we cant even get 1, on a surprise round, AND a high initiative? Well,... time to lock down the battlefield.
Anyhow, the next session rolls around... we are done with that artifact thing, and back in town and sent off to a new town.... we fight some bandits, and sure enough the new tactics work like a charm... all more HP than us still, as I figured it would be, but it didnt matter... we massacre'd them. I think its about this time we notice one of our magic items we picked up from the first dungeon is a bit troublesome as it drinks the bodies essence away. It's basically a vampire in a sentient weapon, but it literally ashes any corpse(good garbage disposal) But feeding it makes it more powerful.
I think the main idea here is clear, so I will sum up the rest.
Next dungeon trash mobs HP's are 30+ (not all, but you get the idea, and we switch between groups of enemies and single enemies a few times), we are level 2 with HP's of 15/16 and such.
Also worth noting that I have a much harder time hitting things due to AC bumps, even on flat foots.
Sentient weapon gets more powerful because the Oracle keeps feeding it, and now it can float and make its own attacks, and 1/day make rays of ungodly power that basically kill anything(anything we are currently facing anyhow)
I should probally mention that it's basically taken the role of the earlier mentioned blinkling.
We fight in the boss room, perhaps one of the toughest fights yet, as it has 3 undead, a brawler, a barbarian, and a wizard. The wizard blasts our undead companion for 14 damage or so, but I was able to sneak up behind said wizard and 1 round drop him, first and only one that I could even do enough damage to pull it off with at this level. All I know is he had more than 12 HP as the first hit didnt drop him.
On the plus side,... we have been getting +1 to +2 equivalent magical gear, but not necessarily gear any of us would want. +1 Studded Leather of Insults for example,... could sell for alot and get us all something more useful(who in their right mind wants to draw all the attention to themselves with these kind of enemies? Sounds like a sick joke to me), but DM made it clear he would be peeved if we sold **** immediately after we got it.
It's worth noting I was informed prior to the campaign that this was a low magic campaign. It's since then proven otherwise. Not complaining, as we basically need everything we can possibly get.
Now, what I wanted from all of you,... I am not imagining this right? The game mechanics weren't set up to support fighting waves of enemies with HP 50% higher than us at first level, and double at 2nd right? Do note this is even after the DM saying he noted the problem and addressed it.
I 100% fear level 3 means triple our health on every trash mob.
As a player in the game, the feeling I get is overcompensation for the ninja damage potential with extra HP... but it ultimately screws over my companions(and me as well in effect) and in most cases, I can count on being unable to drop an enemy in 1 round reliably with stealth/sneak attacks. I dont think he understand the only way I can "tank" is by dropping an enemy fast(especially early game, mock ninja, vanishing, substitute does wonders, but its limited in usage and I dont have all that so early). Kill them before they kill me.
I also feel like, theres a sort of idea with the DM that its unfair if our enemies dont get to act and die too soon before they rough us up.
Thoughts? Tell me if im over-reacting.... I am just concerned rather this is a campaign entirely rigged against us, or one where I should only fear the dice as the DM states, as this doesnt seem normal.