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Gaiwecoor
2007-09-28, 03:03 PM
Hello, all -

I am about to start up a campaign where, unfortunately, some of our regular players will not be able to join. What is the best way to run a campaign with three PCs? Unless we expect some multiclassing from the players, we'll definitely be missing at least one of our four major PC types. They will be starting around lvl 6, so some multiclassing options will be available.

Would it be a good idea to initiate gestalt characters in this case? Ignore the fact that there are only three? Simply give them easier encounters?

Techonce
2007-09-28, 03:20 PM
What I did when this happened to me was to create a fighter type to fill the gap. The guy had a pretty low int (~6) and pretty much did what the players told him to do.

with a low int, he had no chance of spotting or hearing anything and was never going to come up with the plan of attack.

He didn't take the spotlight away from the party and absorbed alot of damage. The other players were a cleric/wizard, rogue, and Pit Fighter (urban barbarian).

Crow
2007-09-28, 03:34 PM
...we'll definitely be missing at least one of our four major PC types...

Who Cares!?

It's not a requirement that your party be perfectly balanced. Our group isn't balanced in the least. No cleric, no rogue, no problem. We have 2 fighters, 2 wizards and a bard though...all low level. Before that, we just had 3 fighters...holy crap that was interesting. You are the DM. Let your players play whatever they want, there is no need to compensate with an NPC. Design an adventure for your friends that they will have fun with. Don't make an adventure that requires a rogue if nobody in your group is playing one. The same goes for any "role" that your group is missing.

So go with "Ignore the fact there are only 3 players" and maybe "easier encounters.

So there is my answer. Sorry if it wasn't very helpful.

internerdj
2007-09-28, 03:37 PM
I agree with crow. In fact if the players haven't picked a class or at least a flavor of their chosen class you may want to push it even more unbalanced and run something maybe stealthy oriented or religiously oriented or crack military squad oriented and tailor the events that way.

Crow
2007-09-28, 03:39 PM
Watch out if you use undead though. Those CR's have the cleric's ability to turn undead factored in, so if you don't have a cleric...

I felt bad for my players after that one...

truemane
2007-09-28, 03:40 PM
The only niche that causes REAL problems when it's absent is the Healer. I find, as a DM, inventing ways for a party to heal in the absence of a PC who can cast at least some healing magic to be tiresome.

But if there's no Skillmonkey, then be easy on the traps and the sneaking in the adventures. No meatshield? Go easy on the melee combat. No arcane caster? Good. Everyone else might actually have some fun for a change.

I like the consistency in CR's and wealth by level and all the rest that is built into 3.x, but I find so few DM's willing to experiment and mess around. "Back in my Day" you didn't have that nonsense. You had to make it up as you went along. Many's the party I destroyed for lack of experience.

"Hmmmm....Note to self...Beholder too tough for 3rd level group..."

But the trick with DM'ing at any level, in any configuration, with any of the infinite variety of options is this: take into account what the party can actually DO, and give them some encounters/challenges that they should get through with little problem, a few more than tax them, and one or two that push their limits.

Whatever those limits might be.

Hawriel
2007-09-28, 03:50 PM
I second crows post as well.


You dont need to stay away from a plot that would need a thief if a player does not have one. You make the stary its up to the players to figure out a way to acomplish the goals layed out by it. So if your story may requier a thief and they dont play one eather they figure a way to over come the obsticals themselve or they go and higher a thief to help them out.

The same goes for undead. Go to church as a priest for help. Who sais a fighter or wizard would not have the knowledge to fight them? oh wait 2 skill points and non-class skills do. any way they can still get silver weapons and holy water, and magic weapons that create sunlight. dont need a cleric just ingenuity.

Person_Man
2007-09-28, 03:52 PM
Beguiler, Cleric, Druid.

If people want to play classes that overlap in terms of party niche, just let them play gestalt.

kamikasei
2007-09-28, 04:45 PM
Who cares? Well, off the top of my head, a DM who wants to be able to a) run premade adventures without the need for extensive restructuring, and/or b) pick monsters according to CR without having to painstakingly analyze their abilities in case the CR assumes an ability the party lacks.

Dubie
2007-09-28, 05:23 PM
I doesn't take that much work. Just eyeball things quick before throwing it at them. I've run many oddball parties through even premade modules (in AD&D and 3.x). There are always ways around obsticals that don't require your Thief/fighter/mage/cleric combo. It just takes a little more creative thinking on the players part, and less "I rolled a 63 on my knowledge check. Whats the entry say..."

AslanCross
2007-09-28, 05:28 PM
Player's Handbook II talks a lot about how less-than-four-man parties could work. It really wouldn't matter in the long run, there are ways to get around the lack of people (Leadership is one).

As has been mentioned, you have to balance encounters appropriately. The base CRs of monsters represent their ability to properly challenge the iconic 4-man party. A six man party of Lv 6 characters could easily take on an EL 10 or 11. A 3-man party of the same level would only be able to probably take on a EL 4 or 5.

Monster types are also worth considering. Obviously if you have a cleric but don't have a rogue, undead won't be such a problem. If you don't have a cleric but have a rogue, then they will be a very serious threat, so Encounter Levels should be adjusted as appropriate.

Felius
2007-09-28, 05:57 PM
Consider making them gestalt. That can help with filling the gaps and the general power of the group, if it's too small.

Guy_Whozevl
2007-09-28, 06:16 PM
If no one is willing to play a healer, get a skillmonkey with UMD or a ranger using a wand of CLW. Round it out a good combat class and possibly an arcane spellcaster.
Or everyone can be clerics...
:durkon: "Go team cleric!"

Dubie
2007-09-28, 06:28 PM
Or just dish out appropriate magic items so as healing isn't to big a concern. Ever notice how in a book the hero's always seem to come across just the things they need to do the job? Less random rolling, more picking choosing off the charts to ensure they actualy find things they need rather then just a pile of junk. Besides, you won't have to dish out as much, and they'll appreciate thier little finds and rewards that much more.

Machete
2007-09-28, 06:35 PM
Factotum, cleric, scout or ranger, paladin of freedom (UA), artificer will get them past most anything and if the cleric or paladin goes with a bit more in DEX and with a stealthy god then you'll have a whole stealthy party.

Ponce
2007-09-28, 06:44 PM
Beguiler, Cleric, Druid.

If people want to play classes that overlap in terms of party niche, just let them play gestalt.

Seconded, particularly in the case of beguiler.

One interesting option I've heard is to have the second tier of gestalt be limited to NPC classes to allow greater flexibility without increasing power too much.

Alternatively, at level 6, a single well built cleric or druid could easily fill 2-3 of these four classical positions. The other two characters would pretty much have free range. High ability scores could help in this regard. Maybe 32-point buy or something equivalent.

malcolm
2007-09-28, 07:12 PM
Party of 3 should be just fine. No need for a dedicated melee fighter, your party will be very happy to absorb his share of the wealth and experience from encounters.

A rough list of my thoughts after several sessions DMing with 3 PCs:


2 casters is very helpful, at least 1 person should have some skills.
Belts of Healing (Magic Item Compendium), and to a lesser extent Wands of Cure Light Wounds will practically eliminate the need for a dedicated healer.
Possibly lower the CR by 1-2 on certain occasions... although you may be surprised how well your party can defeat encounters with the normal CR guidelines applied.
Marvel at how much faster the party makes decisions and finishes combat without a 4th person.

Gaiwecoor
2007-09-28, 07:34 PM
Wow - that's a whole lot more of a response than I expected in that time. :smallbiggrin:

Good insights all around. Helped me realize I probably should have mentioned what the players are planning on. The party will probably be consist of a rogue, paladin of freedom (UA), fighter. Of course, they might change their minds, now that the bard and cleric dropped out. For instance, I've heard the fighter saying he might like to try a warlock. Either way, it looks like it will be a very low spell-casting campaign (I hardly think of the paladin as a spellcaster, and although the warlock is decent, it's far from a primary caster).

My main concern with the "tailor things to your party" is that people can get bored with encounters that are primarily some big-ugly that's going to try to crack a skull with a greatclub, no?

So with a low magic party, how do I ensure the can last against a high magic foe? Make sure the paladin has a wand of cure something and hope the rogue gets good rolls on UMD?

Thanks for the tips so far.

malcolm
2007-09-28, 07:53 PM
Well, part of the fun is overcoming challenging encounters, and I agree with you that a high-powered spellcaster opponent will indeed prove to be a worthy foe for your party. Nevertheless, with some tactics and courage they should be able to beat a reasonably-balanced caster.

The paladin will (hopefully) have high saving throws, which will make him most likely to prevail in combat against casters. If the rogue can maneuver himself into a superior position prior to combat, he has the potential to do a great deal of harm to a (low HP) caster. He might want to look into buying some poisons or feats that reduce enemy attributes. Fighter will have to rely on the old smashy-smash, probably the most one-dimensional character in the party. He should have a composite longbow and a small arsenal of cheap wondrous items to improve his versatility.

As for varied encounters, try some of these.

Flying creatures that harass the party while they climb.
Enemy casters fighting near the edge of a big cliff. Hopefully fighter can figure it out.
Very high winds or a storm requires concentration checks from enemy casters.
Light-sensitive baddies inside a building with strategically placed windows. Party can try to lure them into place, then throw open the curtains.


Sounds like you've got a good imagination, you'll do fine. :smallwink:

Techonce
2007-09-28, 08:11 PM
What I did when this happened to me was to create a fighter type to fill the gap. The guy had a pretty low int (~6) and pretty much did what the players told him to do.

with a low int, he had no chance of spotting or hearing anything and was never going to come up with the plan of attack.

He didn't take the spotlight away from the party and absorbed alot of damage. The other players were a cleric/wizard, rogue, and Pit Fighter (urban barbarian).

I meant to add that I was running an adventure path out of Dungeon and well I have a job and kids so reworking stuff doesn't fit into the schedule. I had hoped to create a set of adventures just for them, but well I didn't have the time.

After 6-7 sessions, we found another person and he just used my filler NPC until it was easy to replace him.

Noneoyabizzness
2007-09-28, 08:48 PM
if a party itself wants suggestions on what to doin regards to what they should play

rogue warblade cleric. you have your prmary caster your main mundane damage doer and skillmonkey.

if the players themselves are smart and can make a character ment to survive class matters little. they can have bases covered with subpar choices like a warmage, bard, and scout combo

or if you want to go uber generic generic classes, caster, expert, and warrior.

Hawriel
2007-09-28, 10:10 PM
wow there really are two sets of peaple responding to this post. Thoughs who only answer is you need a character that can do every thing IE power game like crazy. The other are ones who recomend letting a person make a character they want and letting the GM and players work out encounters with their limitations in mind IE roll players.

Dr. Weasel
2007-09-28, 10:14 PM
As long as they can heal, the party should be fine. That's really all there is to it. One player's perfectly well off if they get to be a Bard/Cleric/Crusader/Druid/Favored Soul/Paladin/Shugenja/Spirit Shaman.

BardicDuelist
2007-09-28, 10:24 PM
Solid classes that can fill multiple roles at level six:
Druid (healer/warrior)

Cleric (healer/warrior). Domains can help to make a cleric more versitile.

Factotum (Skillmonkey/Partial Warrior/Partial Caster/Partial Healer)

Ranger (Skillmonkey/Warrior/Partial Healer). Using the trapfinding variant from Dungeonscape can help with this.

Beguiler (Skillmonkey/Caster)

Barbarian (Warrior/Partial Skillmonkey) The partial skill monkey comes from the Trapkiller Variant in Dungeonscape. Even without that, he can help by absorbing traps.

Paladin (Warrior/Healer). Both roles are better done by a cleric or druid however.

Scout (Skillmonkey/Warrior). Works best with the Riposte variant.

And last, but not least, the Bard (Partial Healer/Partial Caster/Skillmonkey). The bard works best with two other classes that fill multiple roles, like cleric and ranger.

A wizard can do a lot, and overshadow everything. A wizard and cleric really don't need anyone, but for that magic number three any of the above classes is really good (excpet probably paladin).

That pretty much covers mechanical roles for a three person party. I'm sure there are more classes which can do multiple roles, but there are the one's I use since I normally have a smaller group.

Within this, creating a character to fit what a player wants should be easy, since there are so many options. Having a blanced party makes everyone's life easier, but if they can't play what they want, the probably won't have as much fun. With these (or even a level dip here or there) they can probably make a character that will fit the idea in there head, and the "extra-crunch" that they have can help to round the party out.

AslanCross
2007-09-28, 10:37 PM
...paladin of freedom (UA)...

Might I suggest Fax's paladin instead:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33551 Of course it's ultimately up to your paladin, but I think this is much better.

Irreverent Fool
2007-09-29, 01:57 AM
The only niche that causes REAL problems when it's absent is the Healer. I find, as a DM, inventing ways for a party to heal in the absence of a PC who can cast at least some healing magic to be tiresome.

This is what hirelings are for. I've got a 3rd-level group I'm running. A ranged specialist fighter, a sorcerer/scout, a conjuration wizard (with PHB2 alt. class feature -- I hate that teleporting) and a drow warlock. Each person rolled their character without knowledge of what was already in the group and they're enjoying the game quite a bit.

I pepper loot with the occasional healing potion on the tougher baddies (of course sometimes the baddies drink said potions before the PCs can take them) and this is enough for the most part. They were running low on healing after a bungled infiltration, so they stopped by the nearest large town and did some gather information for hireling services. The party is now employing a 1st-level adept with the understanding that they are to keep her safe and that she intends to take as little a part in actual combat as possible.

It's simple, it's cost-effective, and it's another plot device standing at the ready. Most importantly, nobody gets 'stuck playing the healer'.

There's also the Healing Belt from the MIC. 750g for 2d8 healing three times a day. If you're letting them start with magical equipment of their choosing, introduce them to this little baby and they should be fine for quite some time.

If there's a rogue or anyone else with UMD, I believe wands of cure light wounds are affordable for what you get out of them.

(If this is unsatisfactory, there's the Light of Lunia spells in the Spell Compendium. Crappy arcane healing. Yay!)

My vote goes for the hireling though. With luck, your hirelings will serve their purpose and then die spectacularly in battle, alleviating the need to pay them or -- if you already have -- giving you an excuse to take their money. It's not stealing if they're dead!

But about gestalt... I think there are plenty of ways of being overpowered without doing that.

TheOOB
2007-09-29, 02:05 AM
Its my experience that a party of three gestalt characters is relitivly equal in power and versatility as a party of four equal level non-gestalt characters.

Machete
2007-09-29, 02:33 AM
A wand of vigor would be most useful for outside of combat healing and as a pre-combat Psudeo-buff (remember that the 1 hp of healing will stabilize a dying character and at a guaranteed 11 hp healing per use, well, its cheaper and more reliable) the Factotum is a really good choice over the rogue if your games are going to have 2-4 minutes between encounters(time the Factotums Inspiration Points needs to recharge)

kamikasei
2007-09-29, 03:42 AM
wow there really are two sets of peaple responding to this post. Thoughs who only answer is you need a character that can do every thing IE power game like crazy.

There are four basic party roles and three players, therefore it would be a good idea for one player to choose a class that can go some way towards filling multiple roles. This is not "power gaming", it's common sense. By all account Beguilers are fun so what harm in recommending one instead of a rogue?


The other are ones who recomend letting a person make a character they want and letting the GM and players work out encounters with their limitations in mind IE roll players.

I assume you meant "roleplayers", but the other way of looking at that is "people who don't really answer the question and put all the work back on the busy DM and his players". Presumably the players know what kind of characters they'd ideally like. They don't need our help with that. What they do need help with is choosing characters who complement one another and identifying the party's weaknesses to help calibrate challenges.

Gaiwecoor
2007-09-29, 08:39 AM
Ok - I seem to have two major suggestions that don't involve dictating what classes the players take.

1. Make the characters gestalt, and treat the three man crew the same as a four person party.
While this would probably add up the same way, and give some fun combinations, I'd rather avoid the headache of gestalt.

2. Scale down the encounters and ensure they find plenty of magic items (particularly belts/wands/potions of healing).
Sounds good.. particularly with the use of our probable rogue and warlock's UMD. As far as the degree to scale down encounters, that would just be by one, yes? So our party of three lvl 6 characters should be able to handle the same as four lvl 5, so long as they have the right healing/magic items.

Thanks, all.

Brawls
2007-09-29, 09:22 PM
We had a party of 5 that is now a party of 3. We have no Cleric and a Bard is covering some of the rogue skills. DM has made healing a bit easier by making potions of CLW and CMW fairly ubiqitous in society, due to the recent war. We have a Fighter (me), Socerer, and Bard. DM also introduced a Paladin NPC to help out, but she recently took one for the team and is no longer with us (damn showboater!). It gets to be a challenge when you have 50+ HP to heal for the party between encounters. I would say it should make us more cautious players, but I find my fighter is going down the "fight to the last breath" road, somewhat to my suprise. Sometimes it just feels good to say ""f*ck it, I continue full attacking the flesh golems so the others can get away!" :smallbiggrin:

Brawls