Optimization Tactical Challenge #5: 10th level party of four in a subterranean deadly fight [Archive]

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MaxWilson

2020-11-30, 11:09 PM

Please don't post on this thread just to say "this is too difficult for 10th level" unless you've tried it at least once and failed.

Hi guys,

This is a continuation of a series of tactical challenges originally spawned by @da newt. This goal: practice your tactical skills by solving a shared problem jointly with other players, while also helping DMs refine their intuition for how close a party really is to a TPK.

The rules for this challenge:

(1) Roll up or otherwise create a four-person 10th level party, using any WotC-published non-UA sources you like and any stat rolling method you like including "choose your own stats." Try to make it similar to a party that you'd actually play or run for. Note: I will say in advance, because you would know this already about the campaign, that the challenge consists of two parts, and the first part is a Deadly x2 fight (at least on paper) and the second is Deadly x4, but they can bleed into each other. Getting a short rest in between them is not impossible but not easy without specific preparation.

(2) Then look at the scenario in spoilers. It's pretty simple, simple enough that you can probably ToTM it if you don't want a grid. There is no hidden information in this scenario--you may assume that your scouts/Arcane Eye/whatever have already uncovered all of the monster positions. If you commonly use house rules such as a group initiative or different rules for hiding or obscurement (e.g. no advantage for unseen attackers at range), you may use them. Play this scenario out with the same rules and practices you would actually use at the table--but if these variants wind up being important to the outcome please mention them in step #3.

(3) Then run the scenario and post back on this thread whether you won or lost, how many PCs/HP/spells you used up, and how you did it. You may re-try multiple times with the same party until you find tactics that work for you, but if so please try to mention failures as well as successes.

This scenario is a subterranean dungeon crawl. You're coming from a 500' deep pit to the the northwest and retreat is not an option unless you're prepared to take 20d6 falling damage if necessary. To keep the scenario simple, when the combat begins you must have one character (or familiar, minion, etc.) on the red X to trigger hostilities. You may place other characters as far behind the character in front as you wish, anywhere between the red X and the map entry point (the pit). Furthermore, you may cast spells before leaving the entry point and proceeding to the red X. When combat starts, monsters will enter the hallway from three directions as illustrated.

No one is surprised by the start of combat. You know the monsters are there, and the guard monsters are insanely paranoid enough to always be expecting trouble. (They may also have noticed your scouting.) Your objective is to spend an hour uninterrupted in the map room studying the information it contains. To this end you will have to kill all the monsters.

The monsters are initially in two groups, but if there's an extended disturbance from outside (if the outer guards are still fighting, gibbering, and shrieking after three rounds of combat), monsters in the map room will exit the map room as illustrated and join the fight.

The area is in complete darkness, filled with the sounds of shrieking cacophany and what sounds like a throbbing heartbeat from the walls, which are moist and slippery.

https://i.postimg.cc/WtcLMWY0/Star-Spawn.png (https://postimg.cc/RJdDmRB0)

You've met these monsters before and know their capabilities, although perhaps by another name. I'm giving a default name below because I have to pick something, but know that whatever it is you choose to call the monsters, I as DM would adopt your name for them when talking to you.

"Inbred Cannibal" is a filthy, gaunt-looking humanoid which gibbers and shrieks and scratches insanely as it charges toward you gnashing its teeth. CR 1/4 monster with 17 HP, disorients and drives you mad just by being nearby. Its bite is poisonous. See Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes: Star Spawn Grue for stats, or ask me in a post below if you don't have it and need more details or look in the spoiler below.

"Scorpion-Troll" is a shiny-grey-carapaced, 9' tall monstrosity with hugely muscled arms too long for its body, swinging loosely like meathooks anchored to its enormous shoulders. It has no face, almost no head except for a slightly-rounded protrusion like an upside-down bowl of rice atop its shoulders, and seems to see in all directions at once. It's CR 10 with 136 HP. See Star Spawn Hulk for stats, or ask me see below.

"Scarecrow-bug" is a spidery, six-armed humanoid figure wrapped in a gaunt robe, with glimpses of silvery claws or perhaps knives from within the robe. It is deceptively fast, capable of blurring speed in short scuttling bursts, and hard to see in the shadows. CR 5, 71 HP, use Star Spawn Mangler stats.

"Grandpa Ghost" is an derisive nickname born of bravado for an anything-but-decrepit adversary. You fear these creatures greatly. Capable of phasing through walls and launching tremendously powerful psychic blasts, this... living vacancy can only be seen out of the corner of one's eye, as a faint psychedelic strobing like when you close your eyes for too long, but from a particular spot. When you look directly at it, it is no more visible than a blind spot. Capable of phasing through objects and mind-reaming with powerful psychic blasts, it is a CR 13, 153 HP, Int 22 monster and the ultimate commander of the monsters in this lair. Its mission is unknowable but you plan to exploit its hunger for knowledge. See Star Spawn Seer for stats.

Inbred Cannibal (Grue), CR 1/4. Str 6 Dex 13 Con 10 Int 9 Wis 11 Cha 6, AC 11, HP 17 (5d6), 30' move. Immune to psychic damage. Darkvision 60', passive perception 10. Aura of Madness: any non-aberration within 20' has disadvantage on saving throws, and also on attack rolls against creatures that aren't inbred cannibals. Can bite for +3 to hit, reach 5', 2d4+1 piercing, plus DC 10 Wisdom save or attack rolls against target have advantage until start of inbred cannibal's next turn.

Scorpion-Troll (Hulk), CR 10. Str 20 Dex 8 (Dex save +3) Con 21 Int 7 Wis 12 (Wis save +5) Cha 9, AC 16, HP 136 (13d10+65), 30' move. Resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, slashing from nonmagical attacks, immune to charmed and frightened, reflects psychic damage (effectively immune to psychic damage, but instead of ignoring it, each creature within 10' takes that damage instead), thoughts and location can't be detected by magic. Darkvision 60', Perception +5, passive perception 15. Multiattack: two slams for +9 to hit, reach 10', 2d8+5 bludgeoning each. If both hit same target takes 2d8 extra psychic damage, must save DC 17 Con or be stunned until end of target's next turn. Additional action option is Reaping Arms (recharge 5-6), one slam (+9 to hit, reach 10', 2d8+5 bludgeoning, DC 17 Dex save to avoid going prone) against each creature within 10.

Scarecrow-bug (Mangler), CR 5. Str 8 Dex 18 (Dex save +7) Con 12 (Con save +4) Int 11 Wis 12 Cha 7, AC 14, HP 71 (13d8+13), 40' move/40' climb. Stealth +7, resists cold damage, immune to psychic, charmed, frightened, prone. Can hide in dim light or darkness as a bonus action. Darkvision 60', passive perception 11. Claw attack at +7 to hit, reach 5', for d8+4 slashing damage, plus extra 2d6 if the attack roll has advantage, per hit. Can multiattack with two claw attacks, or Flurry of Claws (recharge 4-6) for six claw attacks all against one target, plus a bonus action 40' move without provoking opportunity attacks.

Grandpa Ghost (Seer), CR 13. Str 14 Dex 12 (Dex save +6) Con 18 Int 22 (Int save +11) Wis 19 (Wis save +9) Cha 16 (Cha save +8), AC 17, HP 153, 30' move. Resists cold, bludgeoning/piercing/slashing from nonmagical attacks. Immune to psychic, charmed, frightened. Darkvision 60', Perception +9, passive Perception 19. Can move through other creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain. Anyone it moves through takes 1d10 (5) psychic damage once per turn, but if the Ghost itself ends its turn inside an object it takes 1d10 (5) force damage.

Grandpa Ghost has two attack options, both compatible with Multiattack. Comet Staff is +11 to hit, reach 5', for d8+6 bludgeoning plus 4d8 psychic and a DC 19 Con save to avoid being incapacitated until the end of target's next turn. Psychic Orb is +11 to hit, range 120', for 5d10 psychic damage. Multiattack can be two Comet Staff attacks or two Psychic Orbs. Collapse Distance (recharge 6), action, Ghost chooses one creature it can see within 30', DC 19 Wisdom save. On success, target takes 3d12 psychic damage, otherwise target is teleported up to 60' to an unoccupied space the Ghost can see, and all other creatures within 10' of the target's original space take 6d12 psychic damage. Bend Space is a reaction: when the Ghost would be hit an attack, it teleports and changes places with an Inbred Cannibal/Scorpion-Troll/Scarecrow-bug it can see within 60' of it, and the attack hits them instead of the Ghost.
As mentioned above, if the combat is still ongoing at the end of round 3, Grandpa Ghost and the other creatures in the map room will exit the room and join the fight. Otherwise they will remain in the map room for thirty minutes and then exit to begin patrolling, re-initiating hostilities as soon as they discover the PCs' presence.

Suggested Tactics:

Utterly fearless but also pragmatic, Scarecrow-bugs aim to exploit their terrifying Flurry of Claws at every opportunity. On rounds when Flurry of Claws is not available, they will try to Hide in dim light/darkness, making a regular Multiattack if that is possible without taking more than one opportunity attack, otherwise Dodging. (Remember: successfully-hidden creatures cannot be seen and so do not take opportunity attacks.) On rounds when Flurry of Claws is available, they will use it as long as there is an opportunity to attack at advantage on all attacks, either due to their first-round Ambush, to a Scorpion-Troll's Stun or Reaping Attack, or to an Inbred Cannibal's Confounding Bite. They will also Flurry of Claws if it becomes clear that no further sources of advantage are likely to become available (e.g. all the other monsters are dead). They prefer soft (unarmored) targets to hard targets but prefer Flurrying a hard target to not Flurrying at all. They prefer to hit-and-run, ideally ending their turn 40' or more away from the nearest enemy, as long as they are still able to Flurry when it is time.

Scorpion Trolls preferentially attack hard targets with their Multiattack, but when surrounded by three or more enemies will use Reaping Attack. They will remain in melee to draw fire. When the Grandpa Ghost is present, Scorpion Trolls will attempt to move to a position with lot of enemies around so the Ghost can exploit Psychic Mirror.

Inbred Cannibals straightforwardly attack whatever enemies they see and attempt to bite them to death. Their role is to distract and to die. Their lives are not valued by the Grandpa Ghost. In rare circumstances a Ghost may order Inbred Cannibals to Dodge, in order to remain living distractions longer, but only if there are only one or two of them left. Otherwise it doesn't care.

Grandpa Ghosts have a number of powerful psychic AoE attacks to which the other monsters are all innately immune or better. If four or more enemy targets are within a 10' radius of a single creature, or if three or more enemy targets are within 10' of a Scorpion Troll, it seeks to Collapse Distance to injure as many targets as possible, even if that means Collapsing Distance on a an Inbred Cannibal (who is immune to the damage anyway), preferring small and weak-looking targets like familiars and Inbred Cannibals over large or strong ones like armored knights or even weapon-wielding humans. If it targets an Inbred Cannibal, the Cannibal will be moved into opportunity attack range of the softest (unarmored) enemy target in range. If it targets a PC or one of their allies (such as a familiar) it will try to move that character to where it is surrounded and outnumbered by enemies. It will attempt to exploit Collapse Distance and the Scorpion Troll's Psychic Mirror property to double the damage to those around the target.

When Collapse Distance is not available, the Ghost prefers to fling Psychic Orbs at Scorpion Trolls that are within 10' of at least two enemy targets, in order to exploit Psychic Mirror. Otherwise, the Ghost attacks spellcasting enemies with its staff, or flings Psychic Orbs directly at them if it is too far away. If enemies are within line of sight, it attempts to end every turn during combat inside of a rock wall if possible, accepting the damage, even if that requires taking one or two opportunity attacks. On its turns, it will gradually move towards spellcasters if it can in order to be able to incapacitate them with its comet staff, but this is lower priority than keeping itself safe from attack.

Did you run this scenario? If so, what happened? Did you win or lose, were there any casualties, and how did you do it?

I'll post my own results, party and tactics after a few other people have had a chance.

-Max

Unoriginal

2020-11-30, 11:32 PM

Please don't post on this thread just to say "this is too difficult for 10th level" unless you've tried it at least once and failed.

Hi guys,

This is a continuation of a series of tactical challenges originally spawned by @da newt. This goal: practice your tactical skills by solving a shared problem jointly with other players, while also helping DMs refine their intuition for how close a party really is to a TPK.

The rules for this challenge:

(1) Roll up or otherwise create a four-person 10th level party, using any WotC-published non-UA sources you like and any stat rolling method you like including "choose your own stats." Try to make it similar to a party that you'd actually play or run for. Note: I will say in advance, because you would know this already about the campaign, that the challenge consists of two parts, the first part of is a Deadly x2 fight (at least on paper) and the second of which is Deadly x4, but they can bleed into each other. Getting a short rest in between them is not impossible but not easy without specific preparation.

(2) Then look at the scenario in spoilers. It's pretty simple, simple enough that you can probably ToTM it if you don't want a grid. There is no hidden information in this scenario--you may assume that your scouts/Arcane Eye/whatever have already uncovered all of the monster positions. If you commonly use house rules such as a group initiative or different rules for hiding or obscurement (e.g. no advantage for unseen attackers at range), you may use them. Play this scenario out with the same rules and practices you would actually use at the table--but if these variants wind up being important to the outcome please mention them in step #3.

(3) Then run the scenario and post back on this thread whether you won or lost, how many PCs/HP/spells you used up, and how you did it. You may re-try multiple times with the same party until you find tactics that work for you, but if so please try to mention failures as well as successes.

This scenario is a subterranean dungeon crawl. You're coming from a 500' deep pit to the the northwest and retreat is not an option unless you're prepared to take 20d6 falling damage if necessary. To keep the scenario simple, when the combat begins you must have one character (or familiar, minion, etc.) on the red X to trigger hostilities. You may place other placers as far behind the character in front as you wish, anywhere between the red X and the map entry point (the pit). Furthermore, you may cast spells before leaving the entry point and proceeding to the red X. When combat starts, monsters will enter the hallway from three directions as illustrated.

No one is surprised by the start of combat. You know the monsters are there, and the guard monsters are insanely paranoid enough to always be expecting trouble. (They may also have noticed your scouting.) Your objective is to spend an hour uninterrupted in the map room studying the information it contains. To this end you will have to kill all the monsters.

The monsters are initially in two groups, but if there's an extended disturbance from outside (if the outer guards are still fighting, gibbering, and shrieking after three rounds of combat), monster in the map room will exit the map room as illustrated and join the fight.

The area is in complete darkness, filled with the sounds of shrieking cacophany and what sounds like a throbbing heartbeat from the walls, which are moist and slippery.

https://i.postimg.cc/WtcLMWY0/Star-Spawn.png (https://postimg.cc/RJdDmRB0)

You've met these monsters before and know their capabilities, although perhaps by another name. I'm giving a default name below because I have to pick something, but know that whatever it is you choose to call the monsters, I as DM would adopt your name for them when talking to you.

"Inbred Cannibal" is a filthy, gaunt-looking humanoid which gibbers and shrieks and scratches insanely as it charges toward you gnashing its teeth. CR 1/4 monster with 17 HP, disorients and drives you mad just by being nearby. Its bite is poisonous. See Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes: Star Spawn Grue for stats, or ask me in a post below if you don't have it and need more details.

"Scorpion-Troll" is a shiny-grey-carapaced, 9' tall monstrosity with hugely muscled arms too long for its body, swinging loosely like meathooks anchored to its enormous shoulders. It has no face, almost no head except for a slightly-rounded protrusion like an upside-down bowl of rice atop its shoulders, and seems to see in all directions at once. It's CR 10 with 136 HP. See Star Spawn Hulk for stats, or ask me.

"Scarecrow-bug" is a spidery, six-armed humanoid figure wrapped in a gaunt robe, with glimpses of silvery claws or perhaps knives from within the robe. It is deceptively fast, capable of blurring speed in short scuttling bursts, and hard to see in the shadows. CR 5, 71 HP, use Star Spawn Mangler stats.

"Grandpa Ghost" is an derisive nickname born of bravado for an anything-but-decrepit adversary. You fear these creatures greatly. Capable of phasing through walls and launching tremendously powerful psychic blasts, this... living vacancy can only be seen out of the corner of one's eye, as a faint psychedelic strobing like when you close your eyes for too long, but from a particular spot. When you look directly at it, it is no more visible than a blind spot. Capable of phasing through objects and mind-reaming with powerful psychic blasts, it is a CR 13, 153 HP, Int 22 monster and the ultimate commander of the monsters in this lair. Its mission is unknowable but you plan to exploit its hunger for knowledge. See Star Spawn Seer for stats.

As mentioned above, if the combat is still ongoing at the end of round 3, Grandpa Ghost and the other creatures in the map room will exit the room and join the fight. Otherwise they will remain in the map room for thirty minutes and then exit to begin patrolling, re-initiating hostilities as soon as they discover the PCs' presence.

Suggested Tactics:

Utterly fearless but also pragmatic, Scarecrow-bugs aim to exploit their terrifying Flurry of Claws at every opportunity. On rounds when Flurry of Claws is not available, they will try to Hide in dim light/darkness, making a regular Multiattack if that is possible without taking more than one opportunity attack, otherwise Dodging. (Remember: successfully-hidden creatures cannot be seen and so do not take opportunity attacks.) On rounds when Flurry of Claws is available, they will use it as long as there is an opportunity to attack at advantage on all attacks, either due to their first-round Ambush, to a Scorpion-Troll's Stun or Reaping Attack, or to an Inbred Cannibal's Confounding Bite. They will also Flurry of Claws if it becomes clear that no further sources of advantage are likely to become available (e.g. all the other monsters are dead). They prefer soft (unarmored) targets to hard targets but prefer Flurrying a hard target to not Flurrying at all. They prefer to hit-and-run, ideally ending their turn 40' or more away from the nearest enemy, as long as they are still able to Flurry when it is time.

Scorpion Trolls preferentially attack hard targets with their Multiattack, but when surrounded by three or more enemies will use Reaping Attack. They will remain in melee to draw fire. When the Grandpa Ghost is present, Scorpion Trolls will attempt to move to a position with lot of enemies around so the Ghost can exploit Psychic Mirror.

Inbred Cannibals straightforwardly attack whatever enemies they see and attempt to bite them to death. Their role is to distract and to die. Their lives are not valued by the Grandpa Ghost. In rare circumstances a Ghost may order Inbred Cannibals to Dodge, in order to remain living distractions longer, but only if there are only one or two of them left. Otherwise it doesn't care.

Grandpa Ghosts have a number of powerful psychic AoE attacks to which the other monsters are all innately immune or better. If four or more enemy targets are within a 10' radius of a single creature, or if three or more enemy targets are within 10' of a Scorpion Troll, it seeks to Collapse Distance to injure as many targets as possible, even if that means Collapsing Distance on a an Inbred Cannibal (who is immune to the damage anyway), preferring small and weak-looking targets like familiars and Inbred Cannibals over large or strong ones like armored knights or even weapon-wielding humans. If it targets an Inbred Cannibal, the Cannibal will be moved into opportunity attack range of the softest (unarmored) enemy target in range. If it targets a PC or one of their allies (such as a familiar) it will try to move that character to where it is surrounded and outnumbered by enemies. It will attempt to exploit Collapse Distance and the Scorpion Troll's Psychic Mirror property to double the damage to those around the target.

When Collapse Distance is not available, the Ghost prefers to fling Psychic Orbs at Scorpion Trolls that are within 10' of at least two enemy targets, in order to exploit Psychic Mirror. Otherwise, the Ghost attacks spellcasting enemies with its staff, or flings Psychic Orbs directly at them if it is too far away. If enemies are within line of sight, it attempts to end every turn during combat inside of a rock wall if possible, accepting the damage, even if that requires taking one or two opportunity attacks. On its turns, it will gradually move towards spellcasters if it can in order to be able to incapacitate them with its comet staff, but this is lower priority than keeping itself safe from attack.

Did you run this scenario? If so, what happened? Did you win or lose, were there any casualties, and how did you do it?

I'll post my own results, party and tactics after a few other people have had a chance.

-Max

Very interesting challenge. Must say I've accidentally not respected the first step, though.

Between this and other threads where you mentioned them, it seems the Star Spawns are among your favorite monsters for 5e.

Question:

-What's your policy for magic items/costly equipment/rare material/corpses for necromancy in this challenge?

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 12:04 AM

Very interesting challenge. Must say I've accidentally not respected the first step, though.

No worries, just do your best to create a party without thinking about the specific challenge. Since you're post #2, could you please spoiler-protect your post body or delete the monster name to avoid giving away details? I will spoiler-protect my reply:

Between this and other threads where you mentioned them, it seems the Star Spawns are among your favorite monsters for 5e.

Question:

-What's your policy for magic items/costly equipment/rare material/corpses for necromancy in this challenge?

They are indeed one of my favorites. I like Purple Worms, Mind Flayers, Skulks, Orcs, Goblins, Onis, Young White Dragons, Air Elementals, Earth Elementals, Fire Elementls, Summer Eladrin, Neogis, Neogi Masters, Hobgoblins (including Iron Shadows and Devastators), Trolls (all varieties), a bunch of other stuff... and Star Spawns.

On magic items and costly equipment: similar to how I don't care what stat rolling method you use, I don't really care how you come up with your equipment lists, just do what you've seen be usual at your tables for 10th level parties and state it when you create it.

However, when it comes to corpses for necromancy, I'm going to say the nature of the scenario effectively rules them out. They wouldn't make it up to where the scenario occurs. Neither would mounts, except those that can be summoned at the top of a cliff after the PCs have already scaled it, and of course flying mounts or those that can climb walls (with or without help from spells). If you need to cast a spell to get your mount into the scenario, count that against your spell points/expended in the scenario.

If your magic items or spells would let you get corpses into the scenario, then fine, use your best judgment there and what you've seen be usual. This isn't a competition.

After a few posts we can stop worrying about spoilers but for now please consider it.

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 01:17 AM

I will post my tactics first, and then I will edit the post to include the round by round.

I'm using excel to simulate dice.
I roll normal dice with the "=randbetween(1,20)" formula. I refresh the formula once and keep the result.
For the attack rolls and possible advantage I will use the formulas "=max(randbetween(1,20),randbetween(1,20))" and min for disadvantage respectively.

I will start with a very standard party and if I think it's impossible to win, I will optimize later. I'm going to use gear that even a lvl 1 party can afford and I will add Plate later if I think I have to.

I'm going to use a fairly boring/standard party with as few gimmicks as possible to keep the dice rolling simple. No familiars, no multiclassing. I'm using pointbuy.
My party moves in a tight 2x2 square formation and the meatshield will be the first to reach the spot. Fighter and Cleric (left to right) in the front, Sorcerer and Rogue (left to right) in the back.
The only preparation will be a Light spell on the Fighter's weapon from the Cleric which is standard practice in the Underdark. Party doesn't try to be stealthy anyway.

Samurai Fighter, Vhuman, Chainmail (16+1 = 17 AC), Glaive, Defense Fighting Style
Lvl1 - GWM
Lvl4 - STR
Lvl6 - STR
Lvl8 - PAM
20/10/16/8/14/8

Arcane Trickster, (Wood) Half Elf, Studded Leather (16 AC), Rapier
Lvl4 - Mobile
Lvl8 - Alert
Lvl10 - ASI: DEX
8/18/16/12/13/10

Shadow Sorcerer, Vhuman, Subtle/Twin/Quicken, Naked (12 AC)
Lvl1 - Alert
Lvl4 - ASI:CHA
Lvl8 - ASI:CHA
8/14/16/8/10/20

Life Cleric, Vhuman, Scale Mail + Shield (18 AC), Dagger
Lvl1 - Res: CON
Lvl4 - ASI: WIS
Lvl8 - ASI: WIS
8/14/16/8/20/10
----------------------------

Rolled initiative:
Fighter: 8, Total: 8+0 (dex) = 8
Rogue: 12, Total: 12+4 (dex)+5 (alert) = 21
Sorcerer:15, Total: 15+3 (dex)+5 (alert) = 23
Cleric:11, Total: 11+2 (dex) = 13
Inbred Cannibals:19, Total: 19+1 (dex) = 20
Scarecrow Bug:2, Total: 2+4 (dex) = 6
Scorpion Troll:16, Total: 16-1 (dex) = 15
Grandpa Ghost:8, Total: 8+1 (dex) = 9

Initiative Order:
Sorcerer
Rogue
Inbred Cannibals
Scorpion Troll
Cleric
Fighter
Grandpa Ghost
Scarecrow Bug

----------------------------

Tactics:
At this moment I haven't studied the enemies and I don't really have a clue how hard this is going to be, so I'm just going to do some number boosting and use heavy positioning against the melee enemies. I want to keep things very simple and not use gimmicks.

The goal here is to create a defensive position by nuking the hell out of the lone Scarecrow Bug and use that tunnel to hide my sorcerer and my fighter, then Block the path with the Cleric and cast a Spirit Guardian while dodging like crazy.

Since my sorcerer rolled high initiative, I will start with a twinned Haste. The targets are going to be Cleric for the AC and Rogue for Speed and increased chance to land a SA, I'm not going to do prepared reaction SAs in my first attempt, I may do it in my next attempt if I fail. After casting haste he will position himself as far as possible from the cannibals.

Rogue goes next, so he is going to unload on the northeastern Bug. He will also disengage (mobile) and move opposite from the cannibals.

Now it's the cannibal and troll turn, but the best targets the can find are the Fighter and Cleric so we are probably fine.

Cleric will position himself to cast the best possible SG and dodge, Fighter will unload on the bug, using action surge if need be. Between the rogue and the fighter, there is enough average dpr to kill the 14 AC bug.
If everything goes well, then in the next turn, the party will position themselves in the tunnel like this:

Sorcerer in the back
Fighter in front of him
Cleric in front of the fighter

Sorcerer will be safe in the back and probably out of vision to continue concentrating on haste.
Fighter will use his reach to attack behind the cleric
The cleric will dodge and hold the bottleneck with his stacked AC, Dodge and SW while SG kills the swarmers.

The rogue with haste will just run around the battlefield. He has 45 base speed (wood half elf + mobile), 90 with haste and 180 with Haste: Dash. So he literally can stay 90 ft away from the battle and every turn rush in, BB and get back at 90 ft. Melee enemies can't possibly reach him so they will be forced to go after the Cleric.

Rogue's damage priority will be Bug > Troll > Grandpa.

Summary:

Preparation and Items and Rules of Engagement:
The party starts with a Light cantrip on the Fighter's Glaive.
The items the party has access to are the same that a lvl 1 fresh party would reasonably have.
The party has knowledge of the enemy positions. Walks in a 2x2 formation towards the trigger.

Important points:

Everything except Grandpa is melee. Spells like Spirit Guardians, Spike Growth and Walls are extremely effective, especially considering that you will be fighting in a choke point. Also Trolls being large works in the party's favor.
Initiative Order also affects the encounter heavily. Cannibals won initiative and swarmed my party, creating a zone with difficult terrain when they died to AoE. This made things very hard for the Trolls and Bugs.
Low CHA saves and aberration types make the encounter very weak to the Banishment spell. Being level 10 characters, upcasting the spell as level 5 is a sound tactic.
Grandpa's Collapse Distance is exceptionally hard to shut down. The damage is not deadly by itself, but it has a high DC and it's enough damage to break concentration. Casters without CON proficiency are pretty much doomed.
Trolls and Grandpa are resistant to weapon attacks and immune to Shadow Blade. This complicates things. However their base defenses aren't abnormally high for a level 10 party.

How I used enemies:

Cannibals: All but one would swarm the party. The one would stay close enough to affect at least one weapon user with it's aura and dodge.
Bugs: They would try to stay safe for the most part and use their Flurry of Claws on the squishiest target they could reasonably reach.
Trolls: Fastest path to the closest enemy.
Grandpa: Collapse Distance when available, by targeting the target with the highest damage potential. (Damage meaning both numerical and breaking concentration effects)

Problems with this approach:
Cannibals: They are squishy and 20 ft range isn't enough to stay safely away from the majority of AoE attacks. Out of the 10, only one managed to survive a single hit from Spirit Guardians and died to the next attack.
Bugs: Since I used Spirit Guardians and had a PAM Fighter ready to AoO anything that gets into his range, it was impossible for them to find good targets. SG is a dome so it affects climbers too. One bug managed to use Flurry of Claws against my Cleric once, did 9 damage, and lost half his health to SG and PAM AoO, making it absolutely irrelevant after that, since it would just die passively if it attempted it again.
Trolls: 30 ft /2 = 15, which means that they can only move a single square while inside the Spirit Guardians because of the difficult terrain created by corpses. First time they reached SG they were out of range, second round they could only attack the Dodging Cleric. Fighter preferred to attack and run away, triggering AoO, because unless they hit 2 times in succession, their damage is relatively weak.
Grandpa: While a strong enemy regardless of tactics due to Collapse Distance, it's very vulnerable to party positioning. Granted the space is limited, so chances are that he will do some damage regardless (unless the target saves). Sorcerer was my most vulnerable character and was concentrating on the most volatile effect. As long as I kept him safe, everything would be fine.

Resources used:

Resolution 1: This was the highest cost run but it also triviliazed the encounter. I followed my tactic of using Haste and SG but mid fight I switched to Banishment, both upcasted to level 5.
Sorcerer: 2 Level 3 Slots, 1 Level 5 Slot, 3 Sorcery Points
Cleric: 1 Level 2 Slot, 2 Level 5 Slots
Fighter: 1 Fighting Spirit, Action Surge
Rogue: Nothing

Resolution 2: This was the best run resource wise.
Sorcerer: 1 Level 2 Slot, 2 Level 3 Slots, 5 Sorcery Points
Cleric: 1 Level 2 Slot, 1 Level 5 Slot
Fighter: 1 Fighting Spirit, 1 Action Surge
Rogue: Nothing

Resolution 3: This was the almost worse case scenario where I lost a lot of health.
Sorcerer: 2 Level 2 Slots, 2 Level 3 Slots, 9 Sorcery Points
Cleric: 1 Level 2 Slot, 2 Level 5 Slot, 1 CD
Fighter: 1 Fighting Spirit, 1 Action Surge, Second Wind
Rogue: Nothing.

I'm not used to running complex scenarios by myself, so each round was taking a very long time only to end abruptly by me either figuring out the Banishment weakness or having lucky rolls. So I decided to to a "branching" style where I would identify key moments in the fight (like an important Save, or a crit), and roll back the fight to replay them using a different roll, making sure that luck wasn't a factor.

To further illustrate the point about difficult terrain and initiative order, I kept 2 snapshots of the map. I did the best I could to recreate the map, it's not perfect. Also every enemy was stacked on one cell in the beginning of the fight so I wouldn't have to bother with the logistics of them getting out of the room.

https://ibb.co/6BsxVQg
https://ibb.co/Lz1vmLq

D = Corpses that create difficult terrain

Cannibals are pretty terrifying. This aura is very strong, so I decided to hard counter it.
Sorcerer casted Haste on Cleric and Rogue, then run opposite from the west bug.
Rogue and Fighter attacked the north bug, fighter had disadvantage, but left it with ~20 health, so I decided to gamble and not use resources yet.
My cleric upcasted a lvl 5 Spirit Guardians. These monsters have crappy WIS saves, and the average damage is 22.5 so I reasoned that my chances are good to oneshot both the hurt bug and all the cannibals.

I was right, cannibals and the first bug didn't got any turns. They died at the start of their turns from SG. So now I'm left with the troll, the bug, 15 ft of difficult terrain due to corpses. (A)

I plan to unload on the Troll, but notice that it has resistances to weapon damage and immunity to psychic, so I decide to bring my sorcerer and upcast a banishment. Enemies fail both saves, I get my Sorcerer to safety. I run the Rogue away from the combat and put the fighter next to the spot where the Grandpa will come while getting the Cleric ready to intercept with SG.

Cannibals rush, they die. One is left alive to dodge. Sorcerer and Rogue pass the turn, and at that time I think that I want to banish again. I'm about to banish the Troll and the Bug, but I decided to try for the Grandpa and Troll. Both fail the save, I Haste:Dash the Cleric to the other side of the map, pass the round.

By now the fight is over, I throw a fireball with the sorcerer for fun, kill the cannibal, then finish off the bug with Fighting Spirit. Game over. (I could probably kill them perfectly without spending resources but it didn't matter at this point)

Edit: I made a mistake, didn't account for the lost turn when I broke Haste concentration. However this wouldn't change anything. Rogue could take some damage because it would be near enough to the fighter for a collapse distance to worth it, but that's the worst that would happen. Also I probably missplayed the bug, I had it dodge behind the troll for cover and get in range for an attack. If it was hidden I wouldn't be able to banish it. Although bugs were mostly irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

Edit2: I replayed the fight and it was as I said, Rogue took some heavy damage because I transfered him near the hidden bug that used Flurry of Claws. He took 60~ damage. Not enough to kill him though and in the next turn he went after the Bug and afflicted it with BB. Rogue has 180 movement with Haste so there was nothing more the enemy could do to him. Fighter also took some damage but nothing serious, he saved for half. Cleric Banished grandpa again and it was the end of the fight. Grandpa is fairly unlucky with his cha saves but I don't feel like running this again.

Continuing from (A), I decide to go forward with killing the troll. It already took 25~ damage from SG so I bring the Sorcerer out of hiding, throw a quickened scorching ray and a firebolt for 30~, get back. Rogue did 25~ damage through resistance and Cleric casted SW and attacked with the Haste action (this thing triggers Divine Strike, I never noticed, mostly because Cleric is a really bad haste target, but I needed the AC). Fighter attacked 2 times with GWM, both connected for 20~ damage. It died on it's round from SG, overkilling it by 2. This could be worse if it survived with 1 hp or something, but it didn't really have any viable targets other than the dodging cleric.

Bug can only reach the cleric, and since it hasn't done much till now, I decide to try a Flurry of Claws, as expected, it deals 9 damage. It also takes some damage for being in SG and a PAM AoO from the Fighter. It's already at half health. I don't really know what to do with it, so I take it as far as possible, waiting for claws to recharge. It will probably just die if it attacks again through SG + PAM AoO.

So now I'm preparing for the big bad. The problem is that he will come into play after my last character acts, so I'm thinking that I have to gamble again. Grandpa can't really move at all with SG and the corpses, so he can either do a ranged attack against the cleric or the fighter with +2 cover, or throw a collapse distance on either cleric or fighter. Fighter hits all 4 if he misses the save. So after I make short work of all the cannibals with the cleric (damn this guy really slays, he even killed the dodging one without any trouble), grandpa comes out of the wall and casts collapse on the fighter. Samurai's WIS prof + indomitable passes the check and now we are at a spot where the new Troll and Bug will never get in range (climbing doesn't help against SG because it's a dome, it has to dash and it really doesn't have good targets because it will have to land on the corpses to chase after anything other than the cleric), the other bug will die if it tries to enter SG. (B)

I bring the sorcerer out of hiding and do the nova again, this time with Fighting spirit. Grandpa survives the turn by the skin of his teeth and the only thing he can do is to either attack ranged at disadvantage or melee the Cleric at disadvantage. Cleric is the most valuable target to break concentration so I go for it, one attack connects, doesn't break concentration, party turns to attack the troll. I throw a fireball for good measure, grandpa dies to SW and I suicide the bugs in a kamikaze attack.

I seriously think that while cannibals are terrifying in general, in this particular fight, all these corpses in combination with SG slow break the encounter. I didn't know what to do with the troll and the bug. They were between a rock and a hard place. It's also really difficult to dash because cannibals had won Initiative and swarmed the place, creating a nice buffer zone between me and the troll.

Resolution 3 will continue from (B) where I deliberately fail the save. If sorcerer loses concentration, it's probably going to be a death sentence. I will probably roll back a bit more and cast magic weapon on the fighter from the AT, he passed a turn early where he could cast anything he wanted, but I still hadn't take notice of the resistances. I don't want to do Schrodinger builds but I think I'm going to need this one. I will also try to think a few shenanigans with climb if possible. I don't believe it will help because unless the troll triggers the PAM AoO, Bug is in the 2shot territory, and troll can't get in range unless I decide to not use the cannibals for offense at all.

Sadly I kept the log only of the latest branch but I think 3rd it's going to be the most important anyway.

Edit: Rewrote some parts for better clarity. I played the third resolution and Sorcerer managed to keep his concentration. Party took some damage from Collapse Distance but nothing special, I recasted Spirit Guardians and finished the encounter. Grandpa's juking tactic didn't help him at all because the hasted Rogue can reach him anywhere on the map. I don't feel like running it again atm, at this point it's basically a slow fest where you have to manage the big nuke that isn't enough to kill you in the first place. If I have some time tommorow I will run it again from the beginning with new initiative rolls.

Edit2: I noticed that I made this even harder than it had to be. The second group got activated during the third turn, not after.

Edit3: I made quite a lot of mistakes in using the monsters with the most obvious being that I misread the Flurry of Claws ability. It can use the bonus action before the attack when I thought that it could only used it after. Also the location where I spawned Grandpa Ghost was way too advantageous for me and completely nullified his tactics, allowing the Fighter to do a number on him. This was an honest mistake but it trivialized the fight so I will give him a more advantageous position in my next run.

Initiative: For this attempt I won't roll, instead I will use the initiative modifier to determine order.
Rogue
Sorcerer
Bug
Cleric
Grandpa
Cannibal
Fighter
Troll

In my previous attempt I activated grandpa in third turn. I wasn't supposed to do that, which complicated things, but technically it made the encounter harder, although I got him stuck in a compromising position due to a combination of difficult terrain and spirit guardians.
This time I will activate him at the start of the fourth round by stepping into the fray and have him act according to his initiative.
For this run I'm not going to use any volatile RNG abilities. I'm not going to use anything with less than 70% success chance unless it's damage or a persistent effect (like Grease for example).

Round 1:
I started the fight with Rogue and Sorcerer nuking the **** out of the northern Bug. They killed it fairly easily although I kind of made it harder than I had to. I should had just casted Animate Objects since I ended up doing it anyway. I wasn't so sure how to tackle this and I didn't want to cast Haste again. The second Bug came out of the woodwork and attacked Fighter (being the lowest AC that still hadn't taken a turn) for 81 Damage, then it moved away. That's more like it, at long last these things could do something. Part of why they sucked so much in the first playthrough was because they rolled the lowest initiative.

Cleric move a bit and casted a Lvl 5 SG that hit everything. It covered both entrances and it got the Bug too. All the cannibals died, bug and troll took some damage. Fighter went after the bug, getting just in range to attack with his Glaive.

Round 2:
Since Bug had taken enough damage to have good chances to die from SG, I decided to go after the Troll. Rogue did a BB, but I wasn't sure what was the best course of action with the Sorcerer. I did some quick calculations and I had good chances to kill it. I decided to go full out on it with Animate Objects (not necessarily the highest possible damage, but I wanted something persistent for the next rounds. Cleric did an upcasted lvl 4 SW and a Toll the Dead, Fighter attacked with GWM (without Fighting Spirit). Thankfully it died with an overkill of 5, otherwise I would be forced to take an AoO with the Fighter, so it can die to BB.

Round 3 (Preparation):
Since everything was dead, Rogue was free to cast and used Magic Weapon on the Fighter. Fighter gets a Channel Divinity and a Healing Word from Cleric bringing him back to high health. He isn't at any danger atm cause the third Bug doesn't have enough speed to reach him. Sorcerer casted a Mirror Image, moved a bit to the back and everyone else, along with the Animated Objects got in formation.

The tactic is to cast Heightened Blindness on Grandpa. If he succeeds in saving (16% chance to do so), Cleric will cast one too (total of 6%~)
Grandpa Enters the Area, starting the:

Round 4:
Grandpa nuking turn.
1) Rogue Steady Aim BB, 23 Damage
2) Sorcerer casts Heightened Blindness, Grandpa rolls 7, fails and is Blinded. Attacks with AO for 24 Damage
3) Bug cant reach Cleric or Fighter due to SG, gets closer to the Fighter and Hides.
4) Cleric attacks with SW and throws a Guiding Bolt for 29 Damage
5) Grandpa's Turn:

He takes 13 Damage from SG making it a total of 89. I tried to have him attack the cleric twice from range but he missed both attacks and then entered the wall, but he was left with 10 Health from the AoOs, which means he is done for, he will die passively to anything. So I rolled back the fight and decided that the best course of action is to try and incapacitate the Fighter instead. With these rolls he can hit the fighter in melee with the second attack which leaves some wiggle room for the monsters. So I continue from there:

Fighter takes 28 damage and rolls 17 for the CON save which is a success (24 total). He can enter the wall at the opposite side and only take AoOs from 4 Animated Objects for 14 damage and 5 force damage from ending the turn inside the wall.. (I wish I would have thought of it sooner instead of rolling back the fight)
Rolls 11, fails the save and is still Blinded.

6) Cannibal turn and I don't really know what to do with them, no matter what they do, they can't deal damage because they will just die to SG. The only reasonable action is to have them past the turn and try to break Cleric's concentration with either the Troll or Grandpa later so I pass the turn.
7) Fighter doesn't really have much to do here. I move him towards a better position and prepare an attack.
8) Troll moves towards the Cleric

Round 5:

I'm thinking something crazy for this round, to make the Sorcerer tank the Grandpa. He is the defacto best target now, he is in range, so I will move all the minions in a way that will maximize this endeavor. It's also funny because the previous troll died in such a way that liters the place with difficult terrain. I can actually trap him outside of the wall. There is only one possible tile but he is subject to 2 AoOs from Rogue and Fighter and doesn't have line of sight to Sorcerer

1) Rogue can't do much at this point. He gets near Grandpa's wall and prepares an attack.
2) Sorcerer goes for the Banish on the troll. It's the most impactful thing he can do at the moment. He casts banishment, troll rolls a 13 and fails the check. Sorcerer uses the bonus action to move the AOs in a way that it makes Grandpa impossible to find a non difficult terrain tile. This way Grandpa will spend 10 movement to come out but he won't have enough movement due to SG halving his speed.
3) Bug still doesn't have a target. The best thing it can do is try to attack the Cleric with Flurry in hopes to break the concentration, but it's pretty much a death sentence for it at this point. I decide to have it wait on more turn because even if it manages to cast it, Cleric can recast it before Grandpa comes back. It now has a few targets but no advantage.
4) Cleric moves back to create cover for Sorcerer and Dodges just in case.
5) Grandpa comes out on a Animate Object tile, deals 5 damage to the 4 of them and takes 24 damage from SG. He is out of reach of the prepared attacks (he would die otherwise) and attacks the Sorcerer with Psychic Orb.

Sorcerer has 12 AC + half cover = 14
First roll 5+11 = 17, Sorcerer casts shield.
Second roll 8+11 = 19, Sorcerer takes 28 damage, Conc DC 14, rolls 10 and saves.

Grandpa rolls 3 and fails to end Blind.

6) Fighter attacks Grandpa with GWM (yay overkill), deals 38 damage. Grandpa dies.
7) Cannibals dash and try to swarm, they all die to SG the moment they enter. (I won't bother any more with them, I park one of them just outside the SG for the aura, he will die next turn)

Round 6:

Sorcerer casts fireball at the lone Cannibal, deals 30 damage, it also cleaves the Bug (totally not intentional ^^), Bug saves for half. Then sends AO to attack it, everything connects, Bug takes 57 damage and dies.

Party is victorious.

At this moment I wonder if I misplayed the Bug again. So I will roll a Flurry of Claws against the Cleric to see if it had any chance of breaking the concentration.
And holy ****! It actually got a critical with disadvantage! Talk about karma.
Cleric takes a total of 23 damage, rolls 2 Conc saves against 10 DC and passes them both with flying colors (11 and 19 respectively).

So I think this concludes this challenge for me. I had a lot of fun figuring out ways to counter these monsters. Thanks to MaxWilson.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 01:23 AM

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 01:26 AM

Just want to make sure because you may not have seen it, since I only see you mention one: there are two bugs, and BTW they can climb walls.

Yes I am aware, that's why they are rogue's priority target and I have pam reaction, hopefully they will die before they can reach my sorcerer. I may have to take an AoO to position myself better but I will work it out when I run the scenario. I use group initiative btw, hopefully that's alright with you.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 01:33 AM

Yes I am aware, that's why they are rogue's priority target and I have pam reaction, hopefully they will die before they can reach my sorcerer. I may have to take an AoO to position myself better but I will work it out when I run the scenario. I use group initiative btw, hopefully that's alright with you.

Okay, cool. Make sure you read the Aura of Madness text on the Inbred Cannibals before you do the fighter's turn--he will probably be attacking the bug at disadvantage, or neutral if he uses Fighting Spirit.

Sorry if that's starting the obvious.

Sure, group initiative is fine--whatever is normal for your table. This is a learning exercise including learning which rule variants are popular.

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 01:48 AM

Okay, cool. Make sure you read the Aura of Madness text on the Inbred Cannibals before you do the fighter's turn--he will probably be attacking the bug at disadvantage, or neutral if he uses Fighting Spirit.

Sorry if that's starting the obvious.

Sure, group initiative is fine--whatever is normal for your table. This is a learning exercise including learning which rule variants are popular.

No it's fine, I'm not familiar with these monsters so stating the obvious is a good idea. One last question, in my party description I'm using a Light on the Fighter's weapon as preparation. It's standard practice on non darkvision weapon users when I don't use stealth. Is that ok or should I add it in combat?

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 01:51 AM

No it's fine, I'm not familiar with these monsters so stating the obvious is a good idea. One last question, in my party description I'm using a Light on the Fighter's weapon as preparation. It's standard practice on non darkvision weapon users when I don't use stealth. Is that ok or should I add it in combat?

Standard prep is fine. You can take as much time as you reasonably need to after climbing out of the pit, before approaching the point where the bug is guarding (red X). If there are other spells you'd like to precast like Bless, Haste, etc., that's fine too. Remember, you know (from familiars/Rogue scouting/whatever) that these monsters are there.

Remember that the bugs can climb walls. I'm not sure how high the tunnel is, but let's say roll d6 and on 1-3 it's only 5' high, bug can't crawl above cleric and fighter to get to the sorc (assuming they get stacked as desired in the tunnel, which could be tricky with that initiative order). On a roll of 4-6 there's enough room that it could get through overhead, at the potential cost of opportunity attacks if it's not Hidden or Flurrying.

Let me know if you need detailed stats on the monsters. I am cognizant that not everyone owns every WotC book.

BTW I don't think the Arcane Trickster will be able to kite his way past a Large monster in a 10'-wide-at-the-most tunnel. There's just not enough room. You might have to try going in circles around the map room instead.

Dork_Forge

2020-12-01, 04:03 AM

I've not rolled this out yet, but my thoughts on the matter:

Party Composition (point buy, tasha's maleable stats):
Half Drow Celestial Chainlock, maxed charisma, Devil's Sight, Agonising, Repelling, Gift of the Ever Living, Cloak of Flies
V. Human (Walorck lite:Devil's Sight) Wild Fire Druid (notable spells: Spike Growth, buncha healing ones
V.Human (Warlock lite:Devil's Sight) Paladin Oath of the Watchers
V.Human (Tough) Goliath (Dex+Int) Psi Warrior Fighter (Blindfighting)

Note: All party members start with 10THP, the Warlock starts with 15THP

Strategy: Everyone stays within the Paladin's auras, the Wild Fires fire thingy goes and triggers the combat, leading the nasties into a combination of spikegrowth and Darkness. The Warlock uses Repelling Blast to maintain distance and maximise Spike Growth, healing is doled out as necessary.

What follows is the scene from Aliens with the autoturrets, allowing them to get close enough to whittle down their number advantage in the small corridors and leverage Darkness and Spike Growth to even the playing field. The Warlock is based on my Wolverine build and can act as a bulwark, Cloak of Flies acting as auto damage as it holds off the enemies and pushes them back into the Spike Growth.

The Psi Warrior can mitigate any particularly nasty damage, the Paladin Auras help push the team to top of the order and help against saving throws. If things get dire then the Paladin can try and turn them, giving reprieve to heal up and restart buffs/control spells.

In my games I allow parties of level 8 to get two uncommon items of their choice, this party is two levels higher and could justify at elast a rare, but I'll stick with the uncommons to be reasonable. The Warlock grabs a Rod of the Pact keeper and Pearl of Power, someone would have a Wand of magic Missiles. At the moment I'm not fussy about the rest.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 04:11 AM

Dork_Forge

2020-12-01, 04:21 AM

Hahaha, that Aliens image is quite apt. Do you think the Scarecrow-bugs' ability to climb will be an issue for Spike Growth? To me that seems likely, which is also very apt for Aliens. Edit: actually on consideration, given the tactics in post #1 it seems like the bugs are just going to be Dodging/Hiding at first since they can't gain advantage when you're in Darkness. I guess it's up to the Inbred Cannibals, Scorpion Trolls, and Ghost!

I look forward to hearing how it went!

At heart I'm a camper/turtler, and I'll be damned if I won't eek out a defensible perimeter whereever I end up, be it some random inbred cave or the defunct Der Riese Nazi facility.

I don't see climbing being much of an issue, though I'll ask the DM: If you have a non spider climb, climb speed and you get pushed, does that push you back along the vertical surface or would it break your climb?

Edit: I'll get firm stats together for the PCs and start rolling it out later after some sleep

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 04:25 AM

At heart I'm a camper/turtler, and I'll be... if I won't eek out a defensible perimeter whereever I end up, be it some random inbred cave or the defunct Der Riese Nazi facility.

I don't see climbing being much of an issue, though I'll ask the DM: If you have a non spider climb, climb speed and you get pushed, does that push you back along the vertical surface or would it break your climb?

Let's say it would knock you off the wall at the end of the push, so you'd take 2d4 from Spike Growth and land in the nearest unoccupied square to 10' from where you started. Additional pushes would cheese grater you along the floor. Does that sound physically reasonable?

How do you feel about jumping over Spike Growth? My feeling is that it's kind of cheap, obviously not intended to work that way, best ignored. (Maybe the spikes are 3' high.) You?

Dork_Forge

2020-12-01, 04:32 AM

Let's say it would knock you off the wall at the end of the push, so you'd take 2d4 from Spike Growth and land in the nearest unoccupied square to 10' from where you started. Additional pushes would cheese grater you along the floor. Does that sound physically reasonable?

How do you feel about jumping over Spike Growth? My feeling is that it's kind of cheap, obviously not intended to work that way, best ignored. (Maybe the spikes are 3' high.) You?

I think the climbing ruling is very reasonable, as for jumping, I'm not opposed to it in general re: Spike Growth, however I feel like in this scenario the tunnel height sounds too restrictive to permit jumping it (long jumping a pit is one thing, clearing spikes on the floor requires some clearance). Based on your ruling of tunnel height though I have to ask, is the Scorpion-Troll not going to be squeezing?

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 04:42 AM

Max, are these monsters considered outsiders (their type is aberration)? Cause I cheesed your encounter with upcasted Banishment. I even banished Grandpa.

da newt

2020-12-01, 08:22 AM

I don't own MToF - could you post bad guys stat blocks please?

What are the walls / floor / roof / doors made of? (loose earth, rock, flesh, other)

Do 'moist and slippery' walls/ceiling inhibit climbing (diff terrain or chance to fail)?

shipiaozi

2020-12-01, 11:41 AM

I assume characters have no half plate, plate and magic items. They could pre-cast hour long ability but not minutes one.

All of them are close to certain character I played, and probably the best 4 characters team in my opinion.

vHuman Rune Knight9/Divine Soul1
12/20/16/8/8/13
HP92 AC17 init+5
Feat: Crossbow Expert, Sharpshooter, Dex+2, Dex+2
Extra Attack(2)
Second Wind(1/short),Action Surge(1/short),Cloud Rune(1/short),Stone Rune(1/short),Hill Rune(1/short),Favored by Gods(1/short)
Action Surge(1/long),Giant’s Might(4/long),Runic Shield(4/long)
Hand crossbow+1: +7,1d6+16
2:Bless, Healing Word, Absorb Element

vHuman Valor Bard 10
10/16*/14/8/8/20*
HP73 AC17 init+5
Feat: Cha+2, Cha+2, Lucky
Longbow: +7, 1d8+3
Bardic Inspiration(d10, 5/short rest)
4: Find Familar, Healing Word
3: Lesser Restoration, Silence, Hold Person
3: Catnap, Hypnotic Pattern, Dispel Magic, Speak With Dead
3: Find Greater Steed, Dimension Door, Polymorph
2: Animate Object, Synaptic Static

vHuman Twillight Cleric 1/Time Wizard 9
10/10/16/16/8/13
HP74 AC19 init+3(2k20)
Feat: Inspiring Leader(+11), Lucky, War Caster
chornal shift(2/long), momentary stasis(3/long)
4: Cleric-Bless, Shield, Absord Element, Gift of Alacrity
3: Misty Step, Dragon's Breath, Knock
3: Counterspell, Fireball
3: Polymorph, Conjure Minor Elementals
2: Animate Object, Wall of Force

vHuman Forge Cleric 1/Divine Soul 9
14/10/16/8/8/16
HP74 AC19 init+5
Feat: Alert, Lucky, War Caster
Cantrip: +6,1d6+2+d8
Favored by Gods(1/short)
Sorcery Points(9,Quicken,Twin,Empowered Healing)
4: Cleric-Bless, Absorb Element
3: Spiritual Weapon, Prayer of Healing
3: Counterspell, Fireball, Revivify
3: Death Ward, Polymorph
2: Animate Objects, Greater Restoration

Pre-cast buff: Inspiring Leader, Gift of Alacrity, Conjure Minor Elementals

The team rolled high init with lucky, they spend 0HP, 1lucky, two animate object, one fireball, one action surge and one rune.
They killed everything except Scorpion-Troll before their turn and control the Troll, monsters don't even get any action.

Monsters rolled low init again... so I don't think it would be very different
It's 1:00am here, so I would finish the encounter and try it later tomorrow, but in general I think these monsters lacks meaningful abilities to threat a lv10 team.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 11:53 AM

Max, are these monsters considered outsiders (their type is aberration)? Cause I cheesed your encounter with upcasted Banishment. I even banished Grandpa.

Sure, why not? Let's say if you can keep concentration on Banishment for the full minute, their minds won't come back. The flesh will come back but it's no longer dangerous at that point, won't do anything but quiver and gradually disintegrate back into the original organic raw materials.

What did you use for the material component?

I look forward to the writeup.

I think the climbing ruling is very reasonable, as for jumping, I'm not opposed to it in general re: Spike Growth, however I feel like in this scenario the tunnel height sounds too restrictive to permit jumping it (long jumping a pit is one thing, clearing spikes on the floor requires some clearance). Based on your ruling of tunnel height though I have to ask, is the Scorpion-Troll not going to be squeezing?

He'll be squeezing in the 5' wide sections but there are also 10' wide areas that he's fine in. I drew the cave on a grid but not TO a grid, if you know what I mean, so use your judgment to determine which cave segments require squeezing. It should mostly be the stuff to the north and east.

I don't own MToF - could you post bad guys stat blocks please?

What are the walls / floor / roof / doors made of? (loose earth, rock, flesh, other)

Do 'moist and slippery' walls/ceiling inhibit climbing (diff terrain or chance to fail)?

Sure, I'll edit the OP to add stat details in the spoiler. AFB, give me an hour or so.

Walls surfaces/etc. are made of extruded intestinal tissue. Beneath that was originally rock, now it's closer to rock-hard flesh, at least for the first couple of feet. (Transformation is ongoing.) PCs won't know this exactly but they'll know that stone magic doesn't work on it.

Moist and slippery walls are not harder to climb than stone walls, just more disgusting. Scarecrow-bugs have no difficulty at all climbing them. (Their hooks dig into the tissue, leaving behind bleeding marks.)

I assume characters have no half plate, plate and magic items. They could pre-cast hour long ability but not minutes one.

All of them are close to certain character I played, and probably the best 4 characters team in my opinion.

vHuman Rune Knight9/Divine Soul1
12/20/16/8/8/13
HP92 AC17 init+5
Feat: Crossbow Expert, Sharpshooter, Dex+2, Dex+2
Extra Attack(2)
Second Wind(1/short),Action Surge(1/short),Cloud Rune(1/short),Stone Rune(1/short),Hill Rune(1/short),Favored by Gods(1/short)
Action Surge(1/long),Giant’s Might(4/long),Runic Shield(4/long)
Hand crossbow+1: +7,1d6+16
2:Bless, Healing Word, Absorb Element

vHuman Valor Bard 10
10/16*/14/8/8/20*
HP73 AC17 init+5
Feat: Cha+2, Cha+2, Lucky
Longbow: +7, 1d8+3
Bardic Inspiration(d10, 5/short rest)
4: Find Familar, Healing Word
3: Lesser Restoration, Silence, Hold Person
3: Catnap, Hypnotic Pattern, Dispel Magic, Speak With Dead
3: Find Greater Steed, Dimension Door, Polymorph
2: Animate Object, Synaptic Static

vHuman Twillight Cleric 1/Time Wizard 9
10/10/16/16/8/13
HP74 AC19 init+3(2k20)
Feat: Inspiring Leader(+11), Lucky, War Caster
chornal shift(2/long), momentary stasis(3/long)
4: Cleric-Bless, Shield, Absord Element, Gift of Alacrity
3: Misty Step, Dragon's Breath, Knock
3: Counterspell, Fireball
3: Polymorph, Conjure Minor Elementals
2: Animate Object, Wall of Force

vHuman Forge Cleric 1/Divine Soul 9
14/10/16/8/8/16
HP74 AC19 init+5
Feat: Alert, Lucky, War Caster
Cantrip: +6,1d6+2+d8
Favored by Gods(1/short)
Sorcery Points(9,Quicken,Twin,Empowered Healing)
4: Cleric-Bless, Absorb Element
3: Spiritual Weapon, Prayer of Healing
3: Counterspell, Fireball, Revivify
3: Death Ward, Polymorph
2: Animate Objects, Greater Restoration

Pre-cast buff: Inspiring Leader, Gift of Alacrity, Conjure Minor Elementals

The team rolled high init with lucky, they spend 0HP, 1lucky, two animate object, one fireball, one action surge and one rune.
They killed everything except Scorpion-Troll before their turn and control the Troll, monsters don't even get any action.

Monsters rolled low init again... so I don't think it would be very different
It's 1:00am here, so I would finish the encounter and try it later tomorrow, but in general I think these monsters lacks meaningful abilities to threat a lv10 team.

Interesting! Thanks. Would you mind explaining a bit more about what "control the troll" means and what eventually happened to him?

Maybe this says something about the importance of recon/intel and winning initiative. I don't think these monsters lack the tools to be a threat, although they are definitely supposed to be beatable.

Merudo

2020-12-01, 12:12 PM

Regarding the battle map:

https://i.postimg.cc/WtcLMWY0/Star-Spawn.png (https://postimg.cc/RJdDmRB0)

Do you have a version without the text and arrows? It would make it easier to turn into a VTT battlemap.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 12:14 PM

Unoriginal

2020-12-01, 12:38 PM

What is your position on the player choosing what creatures they summon for spells like Conjure Woodland Beings?

Maybe this says something about the importance of recon/intel and winning initiative. I don't think these monsters lack the tools to be a threat, although they are definitely supposed to be beatable.

How narrow the passages leading to the "start of the fight" room are is a major factor, IMO (as it allows more or less the PCs to dictates the terms of the engagement), but the prep time, the fact they start with all their ressources and can spend them all are even bigger factors as to why the scale is in the PCs' favor.

Not to mention the mostly straightforward tactics most of the opponents rely on.

If this was an ambush in a tunnel with only two ways out, it'd be incredibly more dangerous for the PCs

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 12:51 PM

I don't own MToF - could you post bad guys stat blocks please?

@da newt I have added the stats to the OP, in the spoiler section, right below the monster descriptions and before Suggested Tactics.

What is your position on the player choosing what creatures they summon for spells like Conjure Woodland Beings?

Sometimes I've done random tables, but generally I let players tell me what they're trying to summon and pretty much give them what they ask for unless those beings are totally foreign to their location--if you try to summon Sprites I'll generally assume that you know how to speak words and imagine scents that are pleasing to Sprites, and I might give you one Boggle and seven Sprites but I won't give you eight Blink Dogs.

However, I consider Pixies to be CR 2 so you only get one from a 4th level Conjure Woodland Beings. (But this also means you get more XP if you fight against a team with Pixies on it.) There's just no way those things are CR 1/4 as written! A dozen grimlocks and nine grimlocks plus three Pixies do NOT have the same threat level.

That's my position, but as I said in the OP, if you have house rules or whatever feel free to use them, just report them in your results if they are important to the outcome.

How narrow the passages leading to the "start of the fight" room are is a major factor, IMO (as it allows more or less the PCs to dictates the terms of the engagement), but the prep time, the fact they start with all their ressources and can spend them all are even bigger factors as to why the scale is in the PCs' favor.

Not to mention the mostly straightforward tactics most of the opponents rely on.

If this was an ambush in a tunnel with only two ways out, it'd be incredibly more dangerous for the PCs

I agree, but ambushes are also kind of contrived, and they fall apart if the party makes an effort at recon.

RE: resources, by the time you get to the Deadly x4 fight you probably don't have all your resources any more.

IME players who know what they're doing can handle multiple Deadly x3 or x4 encounters in a row without dying, and even casual players who just do what comes naturally (e.g. don't recon ahead as described above) have pretty good odds of winning a Deadly x3-4 encounter just through sheer die luck. It's not until Deadly x5-6 that the odds start to be tilted against the PCs, to the point where they are more likely than not to lose, using straightforward casual tactics like attack-attack-attack and Fireball. As you say, this is intended to be a relatively straightforward encounter with beefy glass cannons, not a super-complex uberfight.

I hate it when you scout ahead and the DM just makes bad things happen to you by fiat anyway, even if you've already checked things out (or the converse: makes bad things happen to the scout no matter how stealthy they are). I don't run my games that way and in this scenario for the sake of a common starting point I'm willing to grant all the PCs a similar presumption of competence: whether it's by Rogue or by invisible familiar or by druid wildshaped into spider or by Arcane Eye, when this scenario starts you already know what you're facing.

The alternative would have been to start you off below the cliffs with patrolling Scarecrow Bugs walking up and down the corridor and stuff, but in this case let's just assume that the cliff is outside their "territory" per se. Gotta start somewhere.

This scenario is kind of an ambush in a way, for players who allow themselves to be ambushed--you can see some of the posters definitely do set themselves up to be surrounded by monsters when the fight starts, instead of having one character/creature on point and the others hanging behind or invisibly lurking in the shadows. That's a choice and a playstyle and I respect that and look forward to seeing the results.
I'm curious to see how the turtle strategies (e.g. Dork_Forge) turn out when all the dice are rolled. I think the major risk there (besides losing concentration on Darkness) is that the turtling is slow-ish to inflict damage and may not kill all of part #1 before Grandpa Ghost activates, and not only does he have personal capabilities that can damage creatures in Darkness, he is also smart enough to pull everybody back behind total cover (the intersecting corridors) instead of letting them do their instinctive charge over Spike Growth. When your objective is to reach the map room and you KNOW there are half a dozen beefy monsters waiting around the corner for your spells to run out (and maybe doing other things while they wait), IME tension goes way up. So, I'm curious among other things to see how fast those turtle strategies wind up killing the bad guys.
It's very interesting to see the wide variety of approaches to both builds and tactics.

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 06:04 PM

Sure, why not? Let's say if you can keep concentration on Banishment for the full minute, their minds won't come back. The flesh will come back but it's no longer dangerous at that point, won't do anything but quiver and gradually disintegrate back into the original organic raw materials.

What did you use for the material component?

I look forward to the writeup.

I used a candle. Underdark creatures and all.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 06:12 PM

I used a candle. Underdark creatures and all.

Nice, I like it.

What happened, generally speaking? Was it like, "Won initiative, Cleric Banished both Manglers, then wizard Fireballed the grues, and Fighter mostly killed the Hulk. All bad guys dead or gone by round two, then held Banishment until it was all gone, then hid and waited for Ghost et al. to exit the map room and banished Ghost and Mangler before they could do anything (thanks to Pass Without Trace and unlucky Charisma saves), repeated Fireball + Hulk kill"? That's what I'm imagining right now based on your description.

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 06:24 PM

I edited my first post.

Dork_Forge

2020-12-01, 06:58 PM

I'm curious to see how the turtle strategies (e.g. Dork_Forge) turn out when all the dice are rolled. I think the major risk there (besides losing concentration on Darkness) is that the turtling is slow-ish to inflict damage and may not kill all of part #1 before Grandpa Ghost activates, and not only does he have personal capabilities that can damage creatures in Darkness, he is also smart enough to pull everybody back behind total cover (the intersecting corridors) instead of letting them do their instinctive charge over Spike Growth. When your objective is to reach the map room and you KNOW there are half a dozen beefy monsters waiting around the corner for your spells to run out (and maybe doing other things while they wait), IME tension goes way up. So, I'm curious among other things to see how fast those turtle strategies wind up killing the bad guys.

I'm getting things set up with the intention of rolling out in a little bit so not long to wait, just a note though:

When I first came up with the strategy I stopped considering this as two separate encounters and accepted that it'd be all at once. That may end up being pretty unwieldly, but the natural bottle neck and easy access to control (Spike Growth and Repelling are so, so cheap) feels like it will go a long way to neutralise the numerical advantage. Then the party I've constructed as a whole is pretty meaty and has deep pockets as far as healing and damage mitigation are concerned. Should they fall back behind cover the Wildfire spirit can be deployed (potentially alongside another summon) to re-engage whilst the party aoe and/or potentially advance the 'shell' deeper into the dungeon. I'm toying with the idea of the Paladin having a Mastiff (from FS) to act as fodder in the case of them holding off, would you say that it would be reasonable to carry a Mastiff up the cliff?

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 08:56 PM

I'm getting things set up with the intention of rolling out in a little bit so not long to wait, just a note though:

When I first came up with the strategy I stopped considering this as two separate encounters and accepted that it'd be all at once. That may end up being pretty unwieldly, but the natural bottle neck and easy access to control (Spike Growth and Repelling are so, so cheap) feels like it will go a long way to neutralise the numerical advantage. Then the party I've constructed as a whole is pretty meaty and has deep pockets as far as healing and damage mitigation are concerned. Should they fall back behind cover the Wildfire spirit can be deployed (potentially alongside another summon) to re-engage whilst the party aoe and/or potentially advance the 'shell' deeper into the dungeon. I'm toying with the idea of the Paladin having a Mastiff (from FS) to act as fodder in the case of them holding off, would you say that it would be reasonable to carry a Mastiff up the cliff?

[thinks] I don't know. 500' is a long way to carry a dog on your back. For the sake of argument let's just say that if your Str is under 18, you should spend the spell slot re-summoning the Mastiff at the top. If the paladin has Str 18+ though he could carry the dog without problems, not need to re-cast at the top. Does that sound reasonable as a snap judgment?

Dork_Forge

2020-12-01, 09:08 PM

[thinks] I don't know. 500' is a long way to carry a dog on your back. For the sake of argument let's just say that if your Str is under 18, you should spend the spell slot re-summoning the Mastiff at the top. If the paladin has Str 18+ though he could carry the dog without problems, not need to re-cast at the top. Does that sound reasonable as a snap judgment?

Oh entirely, you also made me reread the spell, I was remembering it as a longer duration cast (Paladins in my games tend to only cast it on long rests), 10 minutes is no biggie if we are triggering the start of the encounter ourselves.

Gtdead

2020-12-01, 09:39 PM

So after running it quite a few times by now, the most important thing that I took out of the whole experience is that metagame knowledge can triviliaze even extremely hard encounters.

I can safely say that without metagame knowledge about these monsters, which would be the case if this was an actual game of DnD, this fight would be waaaaaaay harder. Immunty+ to psychic is very dangerous. The reason I picked AT in the first place was Shadow Blade. I don't even want to know what would happen if I didn't know about psychic mirror. A shadowbladed rogue deals around 30 dpr on average which would take 1/3 of my cleric's and fighter's health. Such a mistake, along with the grandpa joining and doing any aoe, could potentially cause a TPK.

The encounter reinforced my view that optimizing for winning attrition battles is the best way to build in this game. I also remembered why I like Cleric so much in this edition.

I've updated my first post for clarity and posted a small summary of the third resolution. I will give it one more go tomorrow when I have some free time but I will do something different:

I will set a standard initiative order for everyone. No more rolls. It will be Dex+Feats for everyone
I will autofail every concentration check if the damage taken on a single hit is higher than 20, the WIS check of the primary target of Collapse Distance and all the saves for half.
I will also add magic weapon to the rogues loadout. Up till now I never really had a good reason to do it, but after running this encounter I think that Shadow Blade isn't the one true answer to every resistant enemy.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 10:25 PM

Okay, I ran my battle and it took a lot longer in clock time than I thought (over an hour and a half) even though it didn't feel that long, which is always a sign of a fun battle IMO. My results first:

My party spent 20 spell points on up-front preparations (summoning). During the battles another 14 spell points were expended for Erupting Earth V x2, and 74 total HP were lost, mostly on summoned elementals. Surprisingly, the only casualty this time was a conjured sprite.

I wanted to try something I've always wanted to do, a newbie-friendly strategy that's almost as straightforward as an all-Barb party: an all-Moon Druid party. But I also like monks, so instead of pure Moon Druids I made it three goblin Moon Druids (Gaz, Kal, and Teft) and a human Elemental Monk (Shallan).

In actual games I roll stats but for this I did standard array for the goblins just for fun, point buy for the monk.

Three Goblin Moon Druids: Gaz, Kal, and Teft
Str 8 Dex 16 (14) Con 17 (15) Int 12 Wis 13 Cha 10, AC 16, HP 83, Skulker feat, Resilient (Con).

One vhuman Elemental Monk: Shallan
Str 8 Dex 20 (15) Con 14 Int 10 Wis 16 (15) Cha 8, AC 18 (+4), HP 73, Defensive Duelist feat, ASI: Dex 18, Dex 20. Unarmored, carries a staff and torch.

Custom initiative, "everybody declares and then everybody acts," in order to encourage cooperative tactics and reduce artifacts of initiative order. E.g. a Scarecrow-bug can declare an intent to wait until a Scorpion-Troll completes its stun attempt and then mangle the victim if they got stunned, instead of being out of luck if the Scarecrow-bug goes first. In this fight I don't think it made a difference to the outcome but it does make it feel more realistic and easier to run, since instead of making sure everybody acts in a specific order on each turn I just need to make sure everybody got a reasonable action.

Also I use DMG spell points, and grant an extra +1 on ability checks (only) if you have an odd ability score. The latter turned out to be crucial-ish on turn 1 of the first battle because it let the Dex 17 Fire Elemental JUST BARELY beat the Dex 18 Scarecrow-bug's initiative (18 + 4 vs. 17 + 4) on Flurry of Claws, which was the difference between taking only 21 HP of slashing damage and presumably taking a whole lot more psychic damage. [I]Actually now that I think of it, PHB rules let players break ties, so I guess that one would have gone to the elemental anyway, except that I hate that rule--I resolve initiative ties with a tie-breaking roll. Oh, and I don't let unseen attackers have advantage on ranged attacks, only melee, but that probably wasn't important to the outcome--might have turned a few futile Produce Flames into small amounts of damage but that's it.

One more minor House Rule: for creatures like Air Elementals who do extra damage when flinging creatures into a wall, instead of doing the MM's way ("flung 20 feet, if you hit a wall you take d6 damage per 10 feet you were flung") I do it the opposite way: take damage for distance you didn't move. If you hit a wall immediately after travelling 0 feet, that's 20 feet of damage, 2d6. If you travel 19' first and then hit a wall, negligible damage since almost all the energy is spent. I don't think this rule made a difference in this fight, it would have been 1d6 damage either way.

Overall I think this would have played out pretty much the same under PHB RAW, although it would have been more mental effort to run. Also, Erupting Earth would definitely not have been upcast to level 5 under PHB rules--it would have been left at level 3--but as it turned out that wouldn't have changed the results.

In order to keep things simple and newbieish, the intention was to use a Fire Elemental summoned by Gaz as point, an Earth Elemental summoned by Kal as vanguard right behind, and have Kal and Gaz in air elemental form right behind them, blocking the tunnel, with Shal and Teft (not wildshaped) right behind them, to keep them safe until the Scarecrow-bugs could be neutralized because those things can inflict 160+ HP in a single round if you're not careful. Teft summoned 8 Sprites with the intention of using them to poison enemies and give them disadvantage, and because I thought that flying missile-equipped wouldn't detract too much from the "four elemental tanks" feel that I was going for.

Fight 1, round 1: both the fire and earth elementals rolled high on initiative and dealt significant damage to the bug charging the fire elemental before it retreated into a corner, having inflicted "only" 21 HP on the fire elemental. The Scorpion Troll emerged and swept its meaty hands through the air trying to kill 4 sprites and the earth elemental, but miraculously hit only a single sprite, killing it. Teft tossed an Erupting Earth V onto the Scorpion Troll, four Inbred Cannibals, and our own Earth Elemental in hopes of killing the Cannibals, who at the time were mobbing the Earth Elemental and Fire Elemental as the most visible targets (since everyone else was hidden including Shallan). He killed two Inbreds and damaged the others, which those inbreds and two others were mostly bouncing off the elementals' armored hides, doing minimal damage to the earth elemental and none at all as it happened to the fire elemental. At this point, a Bug who had previously been waiting for an opportunity (delaying) in the fungoid room to the south dashed out the door, intending to strafe Teft (a spellcaster!) with Flurry of Claws. Unfortunately it ran right into a hidden air elemental (Kal) between it and Teft, and spent its Flurry of Claws on the air elemental doing minimal damage (8 HP total), then hid again in the shadows and retreated a short distance into the darkness. Kal made his concentration save and kept control of the Earth Elemental. Then Kal and Gaz, who had also been delayed, made their own strafing runs: Gaz hit the first, wounded Bug for some more damage, and Kal moved into the space of three Inbreds who had survived Erupting Earth and killed all three of them with a whirlwind, flinging them all into walls. Shallan shot the Bug, hitting with one arrow for 10 points of damage.

The sprites, following orders, split their fire amongst the hulk and the manglers (when they appeared), doing minimal damage and unfortunately poisoning no one.

Fight 1, round 2: at the beginning of this round, the wounded bug which was heavily damaged and set on fire on round 1 died from fire. One Bug and the Troll were still alive. The Bug delayed, looking for an opportunity to Flurry. Shallan put down her bow and went to stun the Mangler, seeking to quiet it before the Ghost in the map room could hear the chaos outside, but she could not find it in the darkness (Search action failed to beat Mangler's Stealth-22 from last round). Kal and Gaz as air elementals used their Primal Strike to hammer through the Troll's damage resistance, and the fire elemental engulfed and burned it too, setting it on fire. Teft chucked Produce Flame at the Troll and missed. The again split their fire but failed to poison any enemies.

The Earth Elemental pursued the hidden Bug(located via Tremorsense) and attacked it, and the Bug retaliated by striking it with its claws (3 slashing damage) and hiding again in the darkness. [Rules error on my part: I probably should have allowed the Earth Elemental an opportunity attack here even though the Bug was hidden, due to Tremorsense. But maybe I was right not to--Tremorsense isn't quite the same as sight.]

Fight 1, round 3: PCs barely managed to finish off both wounded monsters before they managed to act (partly because the Bug was delaying until the Troll had acted, in hopes of getting a juicy Stunned target to Flurry on).

This gave the PCs time to set up an ambush for the Grandpa Ghost when it came patrolling. Everybody hid as best as they could in the shadows (I gave everyone mutual Help: advantage on Stealth rolls), which combined with disadvantage on vision rolls from darkness was enough to let about half the party including the Sprites beat the Ghost's passive Perception of 19. When it popped out of the wall, all it saw was a poorly-hidden goblin (Teft, with an unlucky Stealth roll), a Fire Elemental, and an Earth Elemental trying to conceal itself.

Fight 2, round 1: Instead of Dodging (which automatically wins initiative) while trying to retreat back into the wall, the Ghost instead attempted to blast Teft with its Psychic Orb and duck back into the wall, while commanding its minions to Dash towards the fight. Unfortunately for the Ghost, despite its excellent initiative roll of 22, Shallan rolled a superb initiative of 25 and managed to stun it, which also (since the Inbred Cannibals had not yet arrived) let everyone else hammer it at advantage for a full round. At the end of this round the Ghost had taken 103 HP of damage and was both stunned and on fire.

The rest of Fight 2 isn't interesting enough to relate. The Ghost remained stunned, and was dead by the end of round 2, while the Scarecrow-bug was denied a juicy advantaged target to mangle (because elementals are immune to the Inbreds' poison and the Troll didn't manage to stun anyone, although it did find a way to move into position to use Reaping Arms on Shallan and both the earth and fire elementals--but it missed Shallan, and the Earth Elemental was not knocked prone, and fire elementals cannot be knocked prone).

At the end of the fight, Kal's air elemental form was down 8 HP, the fire elemental was down 26 HP, the earth elemental was down 38 HP, Teft was down an additional 14 spell points (20 total), and Shallan was down 5 ki. Kal and Gaz had both spent 7 spell points before the fight.

Lessons learned:

Some of the tactics I expected to be effective were not--the Sprites had almost no impact on the fight at all. On the other hand, the Fire and Earth Elementals were both about as effective as I expected (fire counters weapon resistance, earth tanks), and the fire elemental took far less damage than I feared due to never suffering an advantaged Flurry of Claws. I was pleasantly surprised that at least this time, the dreaded Scarecrow-bugs didn't manage to get advantage against a single target, which turns out to be partially due to the convenient fact that elementals are immune to Inbreds' poison. [Oops! major rules mistake on my part, it's not poison-based at all! As I now, ad hoc after the fact, retroactively grant a guesstimated one advantaged Flurry of Claws against the Earth Elemental and one against the Fire Elemental, that adds 65 more damage to the Earth Elemental and 53 to the Fire Elemental, although it would have inflicted 50 damage on the Bug as well because to my utter surprise the Fire Elemental rolled five 10s in a row, 5d10 = 50, on its retaliation damage]

So anyway, if not for the rules error I probably should have ended the fight with a heavily-damaged earth elemental and an almost-dead fire elemental, but all the PCs at full health.

Anyway, my other takeaway was that Goblin skulker air elementals underground are soooo much fun! I was expecting Earth form to be the most fun, but it turns out that when you fit through tiny spaces without squeezing, and you have 90' of movement and +9 to Stealth and Nimble Escape, you can strafe enemies pretty much anywhere in a tiny tunnel complex like this one (even if they are mostly surrounded already by others) and still be back in position at the end of your turn to block a chokepoint protecting the squishies--or hidden somewhere else in the darkness ready to strafe from a different direction next turn. And since being hidden = unseen and unheard, and unseen = disadvantage to attackers, attackers have disadvantage too. The other surprising thing which I hadn't really experienced before was finding that against tightly-packed enemies like Inbred Cannibals, Whirlwind is actually a great ability, at least in Theater of the Mind. Whirlwind wound up being more effective than Erupting Earth! Instead of having Teft stay in caster form and spam Erupting Earth, I'd actually have been better off just having him shift to Air Elemental form too and spam Whirlwind for AoE. Obviously this works better against a mob of hungry cannibals than it does a disciplined group of hobgoblins in skirmish formation or something, but since I knew in advance that it was going to be hungry cannibals in melee, I should have anticipated this.

Note to self: an AoE for 3d8+1d6ish+2 (19) targeting a DC 13 Strength save is worth using if you've got it! Especially against weaklings with Str 6.

MaxWilson

2020-12-01, 10:36 PM

Hi Gtdead,

Thanks for posting your results! I think you were the first one. I have some questions about your encounter, below, if you don't mind. Hopefully they come across as inquisitive and/or helpful and not challenging. I appreciate your participation in the challenge.

*snip*

Bugs: Since I used Spirit Guardians and had a PAM Fighter ready to AoO anything that gets into his range, it was impossible for them to find good targets. SG is a dome so it affects climbers too. One bug managed to use Flurry of Claws against my Cleric once, did 9 damage, and lost half his health to SG and PAM AoO, making it absolutely irrelevant after that, since it would just die passively if it attempted it again.*snip*

I don't know if you saw that the Bugs have the ability to ignore opportunity attacks while moving 40' as a bonus action, as part of Flurry of Blows. So, it doesn't have to be irrelevant.

Low CHA saves and aberration types make the encounter very weak to the Banishment spell. Being level 10 characters, upcasting the spell as level 5 is a sound tactic.

Is it really that much of a weakness? The Grandpa Ghost (Seer) has +8 vs. Cha saves, and enough damage to break your concentration on other Banishment spells and pop enemies right back into existence before the minute is up. And, it's typically not even visible/targetable on your turn because it's inside a rock, so you have to Ready Banishment to use against it, and then your Banishment might get wasted if it only pops out from behind total cover far enough to see a Scorpion-Troll (Hulk) or Inbred Cannibal (Grue) so it can target THEM with Collapse Distance/Psychic Orb, damaging you via Psychic Mirror/Collapse Distance/Both.

And there's enough other monsters in play that Banishing them all would be prohibitively expensive. Of course you could get lucky and banish the Seer immediately, and as long as you can kill the other monsters without losing concentration that probably means you win the fight--which is fine. Getting lucky in a dice game means you win.

I wouldn't say Banishment is a particularly strong tactic here so much as it is swingy: when you win with it, it looks easy. When you lose with it you get annihilated.

I bring the sorcerer out of hiding and (C) do the nova again, this time with Fighting spirit. Grandpa survives the turn by the skin of his teeth and (A) the only thing he can do is to either attack ranged at disadvantage or melee the Cleric at disadvantage. Cleric is the most valuable target to break concentration so I go for it, one attack connects, (B) doesn't break concentration, party turns to attack the troll. I throw a fireball for good measure, grandpa dies to SW and I suicide the bugs in a kamikaze attack.

(A) Question: why were those his only two options? What would have happened if he'd e.g. moved 5' away from the cleric to avoid ranged disadvantage?

(B) Just making sure, but did the cleric pass his saving throw vs. Comet Staff incapacitation? DC 19 Con save is a pretty demanding for a cleric, and being incapacitated breaks concentration. Maybe this is already covered by "one attack connects, doesn't break concentration" but just checking.

(C) If Grandpa is using the suggested tactics (hiding in floors/wall between turns), this nova tactic shouldn't be possible by PHB rules. You can't Action Surge or Fighting Spirit on a readied action--you can't even use Extra Attack on a readied action. You'd have to grapple him first so he can't duck back into a wall and THEN have the Samurai nova on him. House rules are fine (I personally think the PHB rule on Extra Attack is dumb and don't use it) but I want to understand what happened and why.

I seriously think that while cannibals are terrifying in general, in this particular fight, all these corpses in combination with SG slow break the encounter. I didn't know what to do with the troll and the bug. They were between a rock and a hard place. It's also really difficult to dash because cannibals had won Initiative and swarmed the place, creating a nice buffer zone between me and the troll.

Bugs can climb walls, should easily be able to climb the walls or ceiling and avoid the corpses.

Grandpa's juking tactic didn't help him at all because the hasted Rogue can reach him anywhere on the map.

Rogue can't attack him when he's inside of a wall/floor. Neither can anyone else except maybe an Earth Elemental or something.

So after running it quite a few times by now, the most important thing that I took out of the whole experience is that metagame knowledge can triviliaze even extremely hard encounters.

I can safely say that without metagame knowledge about these monsters, which would be the case if this was an actual game of DnD, this fight would be waaaaaaay harder. Immunty+ to psychic is very dangerous. The reason I picked AT in the first place was Shadow Blade. I don't even want to know what would happen if I didn't know about psychic mirror. A shadowbladed rogue deals around 30 dpr on average which would take 1/3 of my cleric's and fighter's health. Such a mistake, along with the grandpa joining and doing any aoe, could potentially cause a TPK.

The encounter reinforced my view that optimizing for winning attrition battles is the best way to build in this game. I also remembered why I like Cleric so much in this edition.

I've updated my first post for clarity and posted a small summary of the third resolution. I will give it one more go tomorrow when I have some free time but I will do something different:

I will set a standard initiative order for everyone. No more rolls. It will be Dex+Feats for everyone
I will autofail every concentration check if the damage taken on a single hit is higher than 20, the WIS check of the primary target of Collapse Distance and all the saves for half.
I will also add magic weapon to the rogues loadout. Up till now I never really had a good reason to do it, but after running this encounter I think that Shadow Blade isn't the one true answer to every resistant enemy.

I agree, knowledge is super important. Recon/intel/divinations can get you that knowledge during the game, and this is one of the reasons why I think Chainlocks and/or Shadow Monks are awesome: because a Sprite familiar or a (Shadow Monk + scouting buddy like a Lore Bard, for emergencies) can take actual dungeons and turn them into exercises sort of like this one, where you have a good idea of what you'll be facing in advance and where.

You may not know everything about everyone--in a real game you won't have someone relying on you to play and DM simultaneously, so you might not know in advance about things like the Grandpa Ghost in the map room, or there might be hidden doors that let enemies attack you from an unexpected vector (secret door from the map room to the pit entrance). But things get a lot easier if you can choose your own terms of engagement, to use Bilbron's term for it, knowing what is likely to be in front of you.

In this case you got that knowledge through the metagame, but you can get it in character too. N.b. I also let my players autopsy dead monsters via Medicine/Nature/Arcana checks, depending, to ask questions and get somewhat reliable answers about the monster stat block afterwards. I do this because I'm always trying to maximize the amount of information the players have available to them, so they can have more fun making decisions, and so they're not bottlenecked by my limited verbal bandwidth as DM into missing information that logically should be available to PCs seeing/hearing/smelling/experiencing all the events of the adventure.

Thanks,
Max

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 01:26 AM

I don't know if you saw that the Bugs have the ability to ignore opportunity attacks while moving 40' as a bonus action, as part of Flurry of Blows. So, it doesn't have to be irrelevant.

I spent some time after reading your reply thinking about the consequences of totally missing that you can use this bonus action before attacking. In this playthrough it wouldn't matter. 80 speed isn't enough to reach my backline through both Spirit Guardians and the corpses. Sure the bug can climb but the difficult terrain is so extensive that it would have to circle around to attack from the back, mostly because it rolled such a pitiful initiative. If it dashes, the Rogue will demolish it with BB. It's better if it hides, but with 40 speed will probably take at least 2 round to deal damage. By that point I had already killed the troll and was positioning myself for the next phase. So then the Bug would have to waste 2 more turns to go back and attack from the other side.

It's something I will have to account for when I use the new initiative system.

Is it really that much of a weakness? The Grandpa Ghost (Seer) has +8 vs. Cha saves, and enough damage to break your concentration on other Banishment spells and pop enemies right back into existence before the minute is up. And, it's typically not even visible/targetable on your turn because it's inside a rock, so you have to Ready Banishment to use against it, and then your Banishment might get wasted if it only pops out from behind total cover far enough to see a Scorpion-Troll (Hulk) or Inbred Cannibal (Grue) so it can target THEM with Collapse Distance/Psychic Orb, damaging you via Psychic Mirror/Collapse Distance/Both.

And there's enough other monsters in play that Banishing them all would be prohibitively expensive. Of course you could get lucky and banish the Seer immediately, and as long as you can kill the other monsters without losing concentration that probably means you win the fight--which is fine. Getting lucky in a dice game means you win.

I wouldn't say Banishment is a particularly strong tactic here so much as it is swingy: when you win with it, it looks easy. When you lose with it you get annihilated.

If you try to build around banishment, at least with my party, Seer has 36% chance to succeed against a Heightened Banishment and you actually don't necessarily need to prepare because coming out of the wall inside the SG means he doesn't have any more movement to get back inside. Of course when trying to make this bulletproof, I have the same "metagaming" problem. If I know that Banishment is on it's way, I will Collapse Distance the Cleric, even if the Rogue would be a way better target. If Cleric loses concentration, then the Bug can easily go after the Sorcerer. If not, Sorcerer will never lose concentration. Between the difficult terrain and SW, even with it's climb, the Bug can't go everywhere. Then I will sanctuary the Sorcerer, hide and break line of sight.

However this exercise helps, because through trying to find a way to counter Collapse Distancing the Cleric, I noticed that obscurement counters Seer's strongest abilities and I have an Arcane Trickster in the party which makes Seer not worth the Banishment attempt. However if I can have both Troll and Bug in my line of sight, perhaps that would be a fairly strong use of Banishment, especially if Grandpa is inside the Fog Cloud. He can't really chase after Sorcerer while inside SG and his melee attacks are unlikely to break Cleric concentration.

Now I have to say that I still don't feel comfortable in my ability to control these monsters. Although to be honest, the more I understand how to use them, the more I understand how to make them irrelevant too ^^

(A) Question: why were those his only two options? What would have happened if he'd e.g. moved 5' away from the cleric to avoid ranged disadvantage?

(B) Just making sure, but did the cleric pass his saving throw vs. Comet Staff incapacitation? DC 19 Con save is a pretty demanding for a cleric, and being incapacitated breaks concentration. Maybe this is already covered by "one attack connects, doesn't break concentration" but just checking.

(C) If Grandpa is using the suggested tactics (hiding in floors/wall between turns), this nova tactic shouldn't be possible by PHB rules. You can't Action Surge or Fighting Spirit on a readied action--you can't even use Extra Attack on a readied action. You'd have to grapple him first so he can't duck back into a wall and THEN have the Samurai nova on him. House rules are fine (I personally think the PHB rule on Extra Attack is dumb and don't use it) but I want to understand what happened and why.

(A) I was getting tired I guess. The point here is that he had so little health that he would die to SG, so he attacked the Cleric to break concentration.

(B) He has Res: CON so he is as good as anyone. He rolled a 14 and a 5 respectively. I really need to make my logs presentable. I will change the format for the next attempt and present them for better scrutiny. There are probably a lot of things that I missed.

(C) Grandpa enters the Wall (10 ft) (at location L7 on my grid, if you check the screenshot), and then steps into difficult terrain and SG. When I ran it I didn't think much of it, because after all he was at full health. He took some damage from SG but it was mild at that point. When the fighter succeeded the check, Grandpa couldn't get back inside the wall. The next enemy was the third bug, which didn't have enough movement to do anything and just tried to get close. So everything unloaded on him. By that point, even if he goes into hiding, there is nothing he can do because he will either have to step into SG again and die, or try to get to the other side, where rogue can actually get him (double dash and throw a firebolt or something, then get away, grandpa can't really do anything in this scenario).

For clarity's sake, when I say Sorcerer did the nova "again", I meant he did it once before with the first Troll. Not that he had 2 rounds to smack the Ghost. Also Difficult terrain = Corpses, not the wall.

There isn't any scenario where Grandpa does his juking and doesn't take damage from SG. In my last attempt I positioned the cleric to cover the most ground possible with SG and dodge while keeping his SW on the Troll, Fighter had PAM, Rogue was annoying the Troll (I made it take the BB damage and try to reach whatever it could, which was nothing pretty much) and was getting away with Haste:Dash. It was harder but Grandpa's only option was to use a ranged attack, because he couldn't reach anyone in melee and still have enough movement to get back inside the wall. One thing I could do try would be to swap positions with the troll when Fighter's AoO connected. Perhaps it would make some difference although I doubt it. I didn't actually finish this one, he still had 60 health when I stopped but I didn't see how I can lose this. At most I would have to use channel divinity or something to heal a bit.

Thanks for posting your results! I think you were the first one. I have some questions about your encounter, below, if you don't mind. Hopefully they come across as inquisitive and/or helpful and not challenging. I appreciate your participation in the challenge.

Not at all, ask away. And whenever you find something odd point it out. I care about beating it fair and square and I posted as much info as I could for scrutiny. I want to beat it in a manner that is applicable to the vast majority of parties, otherwise I'd bring the big guns like Chronurgy Wizards, Sorlocks/Sorcadins, Schrodinger's Lore Bards etc. My sorcerer has 12 AC for a reason :p

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 01:47 AM

If you try to build around banishment, at least with my party, Seer has 36% chance to succeed against a Heightened Banishment and you actually don't necessarily need to prepare because coming out of the wall inside the SG means he doesn't have any more movement to get back inside. Of course when trying to make this bulletproof, I have the same "metagaming" problem. If I know that Banishment is on it's way, I will Collapse Distance the Cleric, even if the Rogue would be a way better target.

Nitpick: emerging 5' out of difficult terrain and then moving back into it costs 15' of movement, and SG cuts the Grandpa's movement from 30' to 15', so he actually could go back in if he started out in the rock originally (rounds 2+). But let's say it's round 1 and he started out in the map room.

My response to emerging into a Spiritual Guardians would probably be to look for a weak creature to Collapse Distance on, like an Inbred Cannibal, in order to inflict 6d12 (39) damage on the cleric (no save, except the Inbred Cannibal's save) and break Spirit Guardians, giving me my movement back so I can sink back into the rock. Otherwise I'd probably Dash back into the rock to emerge next round from a different angle, hopefully after the Inbred Cannibals and Scorpion Troll have arrived. What I really want to do is to inflict 12d12 by targeting a Cannibal/owl familiar/other weak creature and reflecting the damage off a Troll. Two Trolls would be even better, 18d12, if both Trolls are still alive.

Trying to Collapse Distance directly on the cleric could work, but is risky (I don't know his stats), so best saved for when I'm not personally at risk, caught in an SG field.

However if I can have both Troll and Bug in my line of sight, perhaps that would be a fairly strong use of Banishment, especially if Grandpa is inside the Fog Cloud. He can't really chase after Sorcerer while inside SG and his melee attacks are unlikely to break Cleric concentration.

I think the opposite is true: his melee attacks will utterly wreck the cleric if he gets within 5'. Two attacks at +11. (Dodging doesn't help because the Grandpa has advantage for being unseen, cancels out disadvantage.) On a hit, cleric takes about 28 damage, has to make a DC 14ish concentration save, then has to make ANOTHER DC 19 concentration save or be incapacitated, which breaks concentration. Cleric's AC is 20 when Hasted, right? Con save is +7 (Con 16, prof +4). He's probably getting hit at least once for 28ish damage, about 30% chance of losing concentration right there, and then he needs to roll 12+ on d20 to make the Comet Staff save, so 55% chance of losing concentration there. It's only 0.45 × 0.7 = 31.5% likely that he keeps his concentration on that hit, and the Grandpa gets two attacks. It's more likely than not (55%) that he loses both concentration and his next action.

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 02:43 AM

Nitpick: emerging 5' out of difficult terrain and then moving back into it costs 15' of movement, and SG cuts the Grandpa's movement from 30' to 15', so he actually could go back in if he started out in the rock originally (rounds 2+). But let's say it's round 1 and he started out in the map room.

My response to emerging into a Spiritual Guardians would probably be to look for a weak creature to Collapse Distance on, like an Inbred Cannibal, in order to inflict 6d12 (39) damage on the cleric (no save, except the Inbred Cannibal's save) and break Spirit Guardians, giving me my movement back so I can sink back into the rock. Otherwise I'd probably Dash back into the rock to emerge next round from a different angle, hopefully after the Inbred Cannibals and Scorpion Troll have arrived. What I really want to do is to inflict 12d12 by targeting a Cannibal/owl familiar/other weak creature and reflecting the damage off a Troll. Two Trolls would be even better, 18d12, if both Trolls are still alive.

Trying to Collapse Distance directly on the cleric could work, but is risky (I don't know his stats), so best saved for when I'm not personally at risk, caught in an SG field.

Cannibals died so quickly that he never had any chance to use it on one, at least with that initiative order.
I started him in the room because your arrow has it's tail inside the room. I can start him in the wall the next time. I only needed one turn to unload anyway.
From the room it's 10 to enter the wall, 10 to reach the difficult terrain, and he gets his speed halved which doesn't allow him to move anymore so I think I got that right. (In that particular scenario, when I say difficult terrain I mean the corpses that make it so, not the wall)

I think the opposite is true: his melee attacks will utterly wreck the cleric if he gets within 5'. Two attacks at +11. (Dodging doesn't help because the Grandpa has advantage for being unseen, cancels out disadvantage.) On a hit, cleric takes about 28 damage, has to make a DC 14ish concentration save, then has to make ANOTHER DC 19 concentration save or be incapacitated, which breaks concentration. Cleric's AC is 20 when Hasted, right? Con save is +7 (Con 16, prof +4). He's probably getting hit at least once for 28ish damage, about 30% chance of losing concentration right there, and then he needs to roll 12+ on d20 to make the Comet Staff save, so 55% chance of losing concentration there. It's only 0.45 × 0.7 = 31.5% likely that he keeps his concentration on that hit, and the Grandpa gets two attacks. It's more likely than not (55%) that he loses both concentration and his next action.

Edit: You mean he is unseen inside the Fog Cloud? In that scenario cleric is also unseen but also has dodge, which are 2 sources of defensive advantage and Grandpa only one source of offensive advantage. I'm fairly sure that only one instance gets cancelled out, although I could be wrong about this.

Edit2: You are right, fog cloud is out. I was confused because I played Baldur's Gate 3 recently and it works like that there.

PS. By the way I tend to edit my posts a lot and add information so I won't litter the thread. I edited my previous post to answer your A), B), C) questions in case you missed it.

SociopathFriend

2020-12-02, 03:26 AM

Alright so I'm on mobile but won't be at a PC for probably 8+ hours or more so I'm going to roll the party stats now and allocate/make them later.

Now the stat method I've seen used most when DMs intend to work a party hard and don't want normal rules is the traditional roll 4d6, choose highest 3, but reroll any 1s.

With that in mind:
16, 14, 15, 14, 12, 16
10, 13, 14, 12, 14, 15
12, 16, 13, 16, 17, 10
9, 15, 18, 15, 14, 11

Now these aren't allocated save by player but I've got some options to play with now. Or I will when I get to a PC.

shipiaozi

2020-12-02, 05:47 AM

Interesting! Thanks. Would you mind explaining a bit more about what "control the troll" means and what eventually happened to him?

Maybe this says something about the importance of recon/intel and winning initiative. I don't think these monsters lack the tools to be a threat, although they are definitely supposed to be beatable.

The troll lost its action due to Stone Rune, and get killed in second turn.

da newt

2020-12-02, 08:40 AM

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 12:27 PM

(A) I started him in the room because your arrow has it's tail inside the room. I can start him in the wall the next time. I only needed one turn to unload anyway.
From the room it's 10 to enter the wall, 10 to reach the difficult terrain, and he gets his speed halved which doesn't allow him to move anymore so I think I got that right. (In that particular scenario, when I say difficult terrain I mean the corpses that make it so, not the wall)

Edit: You mean he is unseen inside the Fog Cloud? (B) In that scenario cleric is also unseen but also has dodge, which are 2 sources of defensive advantage and Grandpa only one source of offensive advantage. I'm fairly sure that only one instance gets cancelled out, although I could be wrong about this.

Edit2: You are right, fog cloud is out. I was confused because I played Baldur's Gate 3 recently and it works like that there.

PS. By the way I tend to edit my posts a lot and add information so I won't litter the thread. (C) I edited my previous post to answer your A), B), C) questions in case you missed it.

(A) I agree, on round 1 of Fight 2 (or round 4 of fight 1 if that happens) he wouldn't have movement to get out of SG without Dashing. Wasn't sure if that was the case before. If no weak target is available I would Dash back into the wall, if I were an Int 22 Seer with reinforcements on the way for next round (presumably they're spending this move Dashing).

(B) Normally advantage + disadvantage = nothing. It doesn't matter if you have more than one "source" of disadvantage. It's fine if you play differently (it's not an uncommon house rule), but it's helpful to identify which house rules has an impact on the outcome. In this case this rule sounds important.

(C) Thanks, I didn't see before, will go back and look.

Ah, I see, so when the Ghost first sees the PCs he had already spent 30' of Movement, and now has only speed 15'? I agree that Dashing wouldn't help. In that case I personally would have readied an action to Collapse Distance on the Bug as soon as he got close enough (I think you said there weren't any Inbreds nearby but a Bug was incoming and next in initiative order), in order to damage both the Fighter and the Cleric. Would that have been possible, given the geometry?

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 01:04 PM

Max = thanks, I like these - I always learn something.

One of my big take-aways: When one player controls all the PCs it works MUCH better than when 4 players get to control one PC each.

Another: We all use different rulings, and the variation is much greater than I expected.

:)

One thing I learned is that Spike Growth + Repelling Blast doesn't work as well as you would hope in crowded tunnels, where there's no empty square to blast an enemy into. It's less like Aliens auto-turrets holding off aliens, and more like shooting an onrushing brick wall. The wall gets hurt but it still hits you in the face.

Dork_Forge

2020-12-02, 01:34 PM

:)

One thing I learned is that Spike Growth + Repelling Blast doesn't work as well as you would hope in crowded tunnels, where there's no empty square to blast an enemy into. It's less like Aliens auto-turrets holding off aliens, and more like shooting an onrushing brick wall. The wall gets hurt but it still hits you in the face.

Oh is this a case of the front creature slamming into the one behind it?

In case of Xenomorph clogs, break glass and deploy Thunderwave :smallcool:

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 01:54 PM

Oh is this a case of the front creature slamming into the one behind it?

In case of Xenomorph clogs, break glass and deploy Thunderwave :smallcool:

Funny, but doesn't actually work AFAICT. If you Thunderwave this formation:

https://i.postimg.cc/Y9BvfdMb/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)

you can blast the Inbred Cannibals back 10', but the Scorpion Troll only moves 5'. It takes 2d4 (plus another 2d4 next round when it moves back into melee range), but it doesn't move out of range, and if it spends 10' of movement and 2d4 HP to move 5' forward again it can even still pound guys in the back rank.

Meanwhile the Manglers/Bugs are threatening to dash along the walls and hit your flanks (DMG-evading the Shepherdlock to wind up between the party and the pit). They may or may not actually DO it but you have to worry that they will, if they find a way to get advantage. In your turtling strategy this would be less of an issue due to Darkness, but I wasn't using Darkness. (In your turtling strategy the main thing I personally would be worried about is if the Grandpa/Seer phases through the walls and hits you with Collapse Distance from the north--even if all PCs are covered by Darkness it could still potentially Collapse Distance on itself to damage the PCs, depending on their placement within the Darkness.)

Dork_Forge

2020-12-02, 02:33 PM

Funny, but doesn't actually work AFAICT. If you Thunderwave this formation:

https://i.postimg.cc/Y9BvfdMb/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)

you can blast the Inbred Cannibals back 10', but the Scorpion Troll only moves 5'. It takes 2d4 (plus another 2d4 next round when it moves back into melee range), but it doesn't move out of range, and if it spends 10' of movement and 2d4 HP to move 5' forward again it can even still pound guys in the back rank.

Meanwhile the Manglers/Bugs are threatening to dash along the walls and hit your flanks (DMG-evading the Shepherdlock to wind up between the party and the pit). They may or may not actually DO it but you have to worry that they will, if they find a way to get advantage. In your turtling strategy this would be less of an issue due to Darkness, but I wasn't using Darkness. (In your turtling strategy the main thing I personally would be worried about is if the Grandpa/Seer phases through the walls and hits you with Collapse Distance from the north--even if all PCs are covered by Darkness it could still potentially Collapse Distance on itself to damage the PCs, depending on their placement within the Darkness.)

I didn't realise that you had tried this yourself (I saw that you used elemental summons to great effect though), how did the Scorpion Troll end up in front of all the little guys? Attrition?

Small nitpick, you are omitting the actual Thunderwave damage from your numbers, it's not huge damage if cast at 1st level, but it does make the scenario look worse than it is.

I'm not worred about Gramps, if he can CD on himself then he needs to be outside of the Darkness, but the PCs have a 30ft stretch of Darkness to work within and the aoe range on CD is only 10ft. Denying sight to this particular bunch of monsters is pretty devastating and the tunnels provide a great way to control their numbers. Even if Gramps does phase thorugh (I find this unlikely to be honest, that's a massive amount of difficult terrain).

Side note, I'm not going to change my group now, but a Swarm Druid would be fantastic for this.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 02:48 PM

I didn't realise that you had tried this yourself (I saw that you used elemental summons to great effect though), how did the Scorpion Troll end up in front of all the little guys? Attrition?

It wasn't a full run, just a fraction of a scenario. But yeah, basically attrition--Inbred Cannibals had tried before and gotten blasted, but the Troll was the only one strong enough to make it through the spikes.

Small nitpick, you are omitting the actual Thunderwave damage from your numbers, it's not huge damage if cast at 1st level, but it does make the scenario look worse than it is.

Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot I even gave any damage numbers because I was focused on movement costs and whether or not you can actually prevent yourself from being attacked.

I'm not worred about Gramps, if he can CD on himself then he needs to be outside of the Darkness, but the PCs have a 30ft stretch of Darkness to work within and the aoe range on CD is only 10ft. Denying sight to this particular bunch of monsters is pretty devastating and the tunnels provide a great way to control their numbers. Even if Gramps does phase thorugh (I find this unlikely to be honest, that's a massive amount of difficult terrain).

Side note, I'm not going to change my group now, but a Swarm Druid would be fantastic for this.

https://i.postimg.cc/8cqbgqvM/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)post pictures (https://postimages.org/)

I've drawn Darkness on the map. If Gramps moves to the Red X and then Collapses Distance on himself, he'll hit all four PCs. If he moves to a Pink X he'll still hit two PCs, and possibly break concentration on Darkness. Even if he doesn't, Darkness and Spike Growth will run out eventually after 10 minutes, so after Gramps shows up and takes control of whatever monsters are still alive, pulling them back behind the corner for now, it turns into a waiting game: you're worried about him showing up and hitting you from behind, but you also need to move forward and engage him before your spells run out (or you'll eventually run out). I'm not saying you can't find a way to win, e.g. if someone else keeps concentration on Darkness you could have a warlock Ready a Repelling Blast every round to try to blast him into the pit if he shows up behind you, and meanwhile you send a scout ahead of you to find out what he's doing around the corner. But there's enough play and potential counterplay to still make it a fun scenario, not just a simple straightforward turtle.

Edit: I overlooked that you could position the Darkness closer to yourself so the party is in the middle four squares of it:

https://i.postimg.cc/HLvm425F/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)

If you do that, you can still be vulnerable to Collapse Distance, but not until after you start moving.

da newt

2020-12-02, 02:54 PM

Ruling: Would a LARGE creature completely block your tunnels due to it's size? (even to wall crawlers)

I'm thinking a Shepherd Druid could really clog things up w/ 8 Constrictors or other large beasts. I'm not sure if that would really help much, but it's a thing ...

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 03:00 PM

Ruling: Would a LARGE creature completely block your tunnels due to it's size? (even to wall crawlers)

Seems reasonable. In my run, I ruled that it does, barring DMG Overrun/Tumble maneuvers (bonus action, opposed Atheltics/Acrobatics contest to move through one enemy creature's space). Enemy Bug ran right into a hidden Moon Druid in air elemental form.

I'm thinking a Shepherd Druid could really clog things up w/ 8 Constrictors or other large beasts. I'm not sure if that would really help much, but it's a thing ...

I think that would work pretty well, forcing the enemy to engage with your meat shields. Your major worry in that case would be dealing with AoEs like Psychic Orb + Psychic Mirror from the Hulks, and especially Collapse Distance.

This scenario doesn't have one, but one of my favorite ways to use secret doors is as a way for enemies to surround invaders and attack from all angles, cutting off retreat. E.g. if there were a secret passage leading from the map room to the pit entrance, the map room monsters would use it instead of coming out of the east tunnel. The reward for players discovering a secret door is getting to exploit an enemy's own secret doors against them. (I tend not to use secret doors for treasure much.)

Dork_Forge

2020-12-02, 03:04 PM

It wasn't a full run, just a fraction of a scenario. But yeah, basically attrition--Inbred Cannibals had tried before and gotten blasted, but the Troll was the only one strong enough to make it through the spikes.

Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot I even gave any damage numbers because I was focused on movement costs and whether or not you can actually prevent yourself from being attacked.

https://i.postimg.cc/8cqbgqvM/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)post pictures (https://postimages.org/)

I've drawn Darkness on the map. If Gramps moves to the Red X and then Collapses Distance on himself, he'll hit all four PCs. If he moves to a Pink X he'll still hit two PCs, and possibly break concentration on Darkness. Even if he doesn't, Darkness and Spike Growth will run out eventually after 10 minutes, so after Gramps shows up and takes control of whatever monsters are still alive, pulling them back behind the corner for now, it turns into a waiting game: you're worried about him showing up and hitting you from behind, but you also need to move forward and engage him before your spells run out (or you'll eventually run out). I'm not saying you can't find a way to win, e.g. if someone else keeps concentration on Darkness you could have a warlock Ready a Repelling Blast every round to try to blast him into the pit if he shows up behind you, and meanwhile you send a scout ahead of you to find out what he's doing around the corner. But there's enough play and potential counterplay to still make it a fun scenario, not just a simple straightforward turtle.

In this I assume that the red area is the Spike Growth? I may be missing something here but you don't need Darkness and Spike Growth to overlap at all, you still benefit from being unseen and can't be messed up by sight based abilities. By having SG inside the area of Darkness you're greatly reducing the amount of defensible space you have to work with.

As for Gramps, I'm dialing in the characters now, but one method of dealing with him (and the Scorpion Troll if need be) that would be interesting:

Just have a Sprite or Pseudodragon try and poison Gramps into unconsciousness, spamming attacks at advantage until they fall unconscious. Leave them like that until the rest are done with, restrain, blindfold and execute at leisure

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 03:26 PM

In this I assume that the red area is the Spike Growth? I may be missing something here but you don't need Darkness and Spike Growth to overlap at all, you still benefit from being unseen and can't be messed up by sight based abilities. By having SG inside the area of Darkness you're greatly reducing the amount of defensible space you have to work with.

You're right. I don't know if you saw but I edited in a second picture showing a different Darkness configuration. You're still vulnerable to Collapse Distance once you start moving, but at least it's not possible to Gramps to Collapse Distance on himself and still reach you, if you're in the middle 10' of the Darkness. He'd have to Collapse Distance on a Large creature like a Troll that was partially sticking out of the darkness, and as long as you're in the corner you can shift the Darkness 5' forward to prevent that (as pictured in the diagram). Once you start moving you have to defend front and rear and so become vulnerable to this tactic from at least one angle.

As for Gramps, I'm dialing in the characters now, but one method of dealing with him (and the Scorpion Troll if need be) that would be interesting:

Just have a Sprite or Pseudodragon try and poison Gramps into unconsciousness, spamming attacks at advantage until they fall unconscious. Leave them like that until the rest are done with, restrain, blindfold and execute at leisure

Could work, but seems like a low-probability move. You might just get wasted by a Hulk or Mangler or the Seer--the Sprite/Pseudodragon's AC is only 15 after all, and enemies won't have disadvantage because the Sprite/Pseudodragon can't see either. For the same reason you won't be spamming attacks at advantage, just regular to-hit.

Remarks on encounter design:

Gramps is really the core of this scenario. Once he's dead, everything becomes much simpler. Fight #1 is really just a warmup to burn resources before you meet Gramps, and Fight #2 is oriented primarily around his abilities, although the Bugs are intended to remain a force-in-being that keeps you paranoid about granting them advantage, which makes you afraid of the Trolls and Cannibals. But Gramps is the only one with ranged attacks, he's the only one with superhuman intelligence, he's the only one who can go through walls, and aside from the Trolls' Reaping Arms he's the only one with an AoE attack (and his AoE is much, much stronger than Reaping Arms).

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 03:40 PM

(A) I agree, on round 1 of Fight 2 (or round 4 of fight 1 if that happens) he wouldn't have movement to get out of SG without Dashing. Wasn't sure if that was the case before. If no weak target is available I would Dash back into the wall, if I were an Int 22 Seer with reinforcements on the way for next round (presumably they're spending this move Dashing).

(B) Normally advantage + disadvantage = nothing. It doesn't matter if you have more than one "source" of disadvantage. It's fine if you play differently (it's not an uncommon house rule), but it's helpful to identify which house rules has an impact on the outcome. In this case this rule sounds important.

(C) Thanks, I didn't see before, will go back and look.

Ah, I see, so when the Ghost first sees the PCs he had already spent 30' of Movement, and now has only speed 15'? I agree that Dashing wouldn't help. In that case I personally would have readied an action to Collapse Distance on the Bug as soon as he got close enough (I think you said there weren't any Inbreds nearby but a Bug was incoming and next in initiative order), in order to damage both the Fighter and the Cleric. Would that have been possible, given the geometry?

Actually yes, it's possible. It would have to pass through a troll but I think it's doable. It would probably leave me in a really bad spot but it wouldn't be lethal if Sorcerer managed to hold concentration. Basically that Haste really narrowed my options. I think it was really awful for this map. Sure rogue could run around like crazy, but grandpa is the prize and haste doesn't really help.

I just completed my latest playthrough and posted a round by round. I tried Blindness and Banish this time. I forgot to take screenshots of the map.
I managed the first round of Grandpa the way you described it in your playthrough, let me know if I did something horribly wrong.

da newt

2020-12-02, 03:48 PM

Just for giggles I ran a party of 4 identical Warforged Forge Cleric 9 / Fighter 1 (defensive) who SG/dodge, SW, and then ready action to gang BANISH the Ghost. Over the entire encounter one bug hit once, both trolls hit once, and one Collapse succeeded before the whole thing was over. The ghost did make his first 5 BANISH saves.

I did allow the party to precast light, SGs and dodge before start, gave my guys a +1 shield and Scale for 22 AC, then used Dex for initiative and average damage. The overlapping SGs was very effective. The only foe with a ranged attack was the ghost. We did use 11 4th lvl spells and 4 3rd. There was one concentration fail.

I'll continue to mess with other parties.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 04:18 PM

Actually yes, it's possible. It would have to pass through a troll but I think it's doable. It would probably leave me in a really bad spot but it wouldn't be lethal if Sorcerer managed to hold concentration. Basically that Haste really narrowed my options. I think it was really awful for this map. Sure rogue could run around like crazy, but grandpa is the prize and haste doesn't really help.

I just completed my latest playthrough and posted a round by round. I tried Blindness and Banish this time. I forgot to take screenshots of the map.
I managed the first round of Grandpa the way you described it in your playthrough, let me know if I did something horribly wrong.

Nice! I really enjoyed reading that writeup--it was quite easy to understand the main events of each round. It was very gratifying to read about the Fighter getting reamed by the first bug, because now I know you probably share my fear and dread of the things. :) They are fragile but terrifying, kind of like X-Com Chryssalids, and that goes twice as hard in scenarios where Hold Person is a threat.

I don't know if this mattered to your playthrough but I did want to call out: since the Animate Objects happened after Spirit Guardians, the Cleric cannot designate them as immune to Spirit Guardians, and SG becomes a kill zone for them as well as for the monsters. It's easy to think of Spirit Guardians as "no friendly fire" but it's actually not that simple. You said in your writeup that you wished you'd cast Animate Objects earlier instead of waiting until round 2, and this is another reason to cast it early.

One thing I didn't understand about Round 4: how does everybody nuke Gramps before he takes his turn? Readied actions? But if it's readied actions, how can the Cleric still have Spirit Guardians up so he can throw his Readied Guiding Bolt? Readied spells take concentration. Also, if they're using readied actions, then he wouldn't take any AoOs as described moving back into the wall because they've already used up their reactions. So, it couldn't have been readied actions. What happened?

DM'ing tip RE: <<cannibal turn and I don't really know what to do with them, no matter what they do, they can't deal damage because they will just die to SG. The only reasonable action is to have them past the turn and try to break Cleric's concentration with either the Troll or Grandpa later so I pass the turn.>> When in doubt, have them Dash towards any PC who isn't already in melee with at least one monster, e.g. the Sorcerer or Rogue. It keeps pressure on them and sometime you'll wind up getting an opportunity attack or something.

When Grandpa is Blinded, one smart move might be for him to sink down into the floor (taking d10 per round) until the Blindness wears off. Depending on the situation it might make sense to have his minions keep attacking (if they have local force superiority) or to buy time Dodging or hiding behind corners (total cover), or Hiding in the case of the Bugs.

In general Grandpa should not be so eager to attack PCs directly with Psychic Orb--I was actually quite surprised that he didn't Psychic Orb any of his own trolls even once, not even when a Troll was explicitly close to the cleric. He wouldn't have disadvantage on this attack (Troll is on his side, if not an autohit should at least have "advantage" like an unseen attacker to cancel out disadvantage), and the cleric and possibly animated objects would take all the damage instead.

================================

Just for giggles I ran a party of 4 identical Warforged Forge Cleric 9 / Fighter 1 (defensive) who SG/dodge, SW, and then ready action to gang BANISH the Ghost. Over the entire encounter one bug hit once, both trolls hit once, and one Collapse succeeded before the whole thing was over. The ghost did make his first 5 BANISH saves.

I did allow the party to precast light, SGs and dodge before start, gave my guys a +1 shield and Scale for 22 AC, then used Dex for initiative and average damage. The overlapping SGs was very effective. The only foe with a ranged attack was the ghost. We did use 11 4th lvl spells and 4 3rd. There was one concentration fail.

I'll continue to mess with other parties.

If you've got a Readied Banish, there's no point in casting Spirit Guardians--you'll lose concentration on SG as soon as you Ready Banish.

Dork_Forge

2020-12-02, 04:19 PM

You're right. I don't know if you saw but I edited in a second picture showing a different Darkness configuration. You're still vulnerable to Collapse Distance once you start moving, but at least it's not possible to Gramps to Collapse Distance on himself and still reach you, if you're in the middle 10' of the Darkness. He'd have to Collapse Distance on a Large creature like a Troll that was partially sticking out of the darkness, and as long as you're in the corner you can shift the Darkness 5' forward to prevent that (as pictured in the diagram). Once you start moving you have to defend front and rear and so become vulnerable to this tactic from at least one angle.

it could play out differently, but I don't foresee much player movement (and Darkness on a mobile object like a visual shield wall).

Could work, but seems like a low-probability move. You might just get wasted by a Hulk or Mangler or the Seer--the Sprite/Pseudodragon's AC is only 15 after all, and enemies won't have disadvantage because the Sprite/Pseudodragon can't see either. For the same reason you won't be spamming attacks at advantage, just regular to-hit.

My choice here would be the Pseudo, which has 10ft of blindsight so can still function in Darkness. It's not particularly low-probability, advantage for the to hit and then against gramps (my numbers could very well be wrong here) but 60% chance of Poisoned and 40% chance of unconsciousness. Between the Darkness, temp hp, Psi Warrior reduction, Aid etc. a Pseudo should be able to last a decent time.

Remarks on encounter design:

Gramps is really the core of this scenario. Once he's dead, everything becomes much simpler. Fight #1 is really just a warmup to burn resources before you meet Gramps, and Fight #2 is oriented primarily around his abilities, although the Bugs are intended to remain a force-in-being that keeps you paranoid about granting them advantage, which makes you afraid of the Trolls and Cannibals. But Gramps is the only one with ranged attacks, he's the only one with superhuman intelligence, he's the only one who can go through walls, and aside from the Trolls' Reaping Arms he's the only one with an AoE attack (and his AoE is much, much stronger than Reaping Arms).

This is an interesting note, from my own perspective I would really be iffy about getting surrounded and ganked and so without flooding suimmons down the tunnels (always effective, but not my cup of tea) turtling and letting them come to the blender seemed the best bet.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 04:39 PM

it could play out differently, but I don't foresee much player movement (and Darkness on a mobile object like a visual shield wall).

Eventually someone is going to have to break the stalemate, either by assaulting or retreating.

My choice here would be the Pseudo, which has 10ft of blindsight so can still function in Darkness. It's not particularly low-probability, advantage for the to hit and then against gramps (my numbers could very well be wrong here) but 60% chance of Poisoned and 40% chance of unconsciousness. Between the Darkness, temp hp, Psi Warrior reduction, Aid etc. a Pseudo should be able to last a decent time.

Ah, I didn't know or had forgotten about the Pseudo's blindsight. Sounds like you're assuming Investment of the Chain Master. Yes, that could work pretty well, and frankly it's inexpensive so might as well add it in. With only AC 13 you're still likely to get swatted pretty quick by one monster or another despite disadvantage though. When I tried rolling it out just now a Troll hit with two attacks for 11 + 31 damage, plus another 15 Psychic damage, and then stunned the Pseudodragon. I don't think Aid/Psi Warrior reduction/temp HP would be enough to make this even a little bit safe.

This is an interesting note, from my own perspective I would really be iffy about getting surrounded and ganked and so without flooding suimmons down the tunnels (always effective, but not my cup of tea) turtling and letting them come to the blender seemed the best bet.

But the thing is, the Grandpa/Seer has the same incentive to do the exact same thing to you, especially once you've turtled. If he does materialize out of the wall behind you it's going to be at a random time (like, after five minutes and twelve seconds, not on Round 6) when you're not expecting him, but if your Darkness is positioned as per above he won't even try that--he'll pull his forces back and wait you to to at least move out of the bend in the corridor, and more likely will once again wait for you to approach the original trigger point (red X near the second corridor intersection). Hence the stalemate which must eventually be broken by movement.

And once you start moving you're vulnerable to Collapse Distance/Psychic Orb, among other things:

https://i.postimg.cc/pT2CQp3S/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)

(Also, depending on the details of the initiative system you use, it may not be possible to move all four PCs at the same time, so he could gain an advantage by separating the PCs from each other and/or attacking ones who temporarily aren't in Darkness.)

So it is smart for him to wait, and at Int 22 he is smart enough to know it even though he doesn't know all the details of the PCs' abilities.

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 04:59 PM

Nice! I really enjoyed reading that writeup--it was quite easy to understand the main events of each round. It was very gratifying to read about the Fighter getting reamed by the first bug, because now I know you probably share my fear and dread of the things. :) They are fragile but terrifying, kind of like X-Com Chryssalids, and that goes twice as hard in scenarios where Hold Person is a threat.

I don't know if this mattered to your playthrough but I did want to call out: since the Animate Objects happened after Spirit Guardians, the Cleric cannot designate them as immune to Spirit Guardians, and SG becomes a kill zone for them as well as for the monsters. It's easy to think of Spirit Guardians as "no friendly fire" but it's actually not that simple. You said in your writeup that you wished you'd cast Animate Objects earlier instead of waiting until round 2, and this is another reason to cast it early.

One thing I didn't understand about Round 4: how does everybody nuke Gramps before he takes his turn? Readied actions? But if it's readied actions, how can the Cleric still have Spirit Guardians up so he can throw his Readied Guiding Bolt? Readied spells take concentration. Also, if they're using readied actions, then he wouldn't take any AoOs as described moving back into the wall because they've already used up their reactions. So, it couldn't have been readied actions. What happened?

DM'ing tip RE: <<cannibal turn and I don't really know what to do with them, no matter what they do, they can't deal damage because they will just die to SG. The only reasonable action is to have them past the turn and try to break Cleric's concentration with either the Troll or Grandpa later so I pass the turn.>> When in doubt, have them Dash towards any PC who isn't already in melee with at least one monster, e.g. the Sorcerer or Rogue. It keeps pressure on them and sometime you'll wind up getting an opportunity attack or something.

When Grandpa is Blinded, one smart move might be for him to sink down into the floor (taking d10 per round) until the Blindness wears off. Depending on the situation it might make sense to have his minions keep attacking (if they have local force superiority) or to buy time Dodging or hiding behind corners (total cover), or Hiding in the case of the Bugs.

In general Grandpa should not be so eager to attack PCs directly with Psychic Orb--I was actually quite surprised that he didn't Psychic Orb any of his own trolls even once, not even when a Troll was explicitly close to the cleric. He wouldn't have disadvantage on this attack (Troll is on his side, if not an autohit should at least have "advantage" like an unseen attacker to cancel out disadvantage), and the cleric and possibly animated objects would take all the damage instead.

This is how I understand Grandpa joining the fight:

In your notes you say that Grandpa patrols the area after the 3rd round. So once the third round is over, Grandpa joins and rolls initiative.
Round 4 (or round 1 of the second fight if you will) starts and Grandpa has to wait for his turn to act, which means he is vulnerable for the time being. Rogue has the highest initiative, then Sorcerer, then Bug, Cleric and after all these, Grandpa can act. Fighter couldn't attack it because he had lower initiative. It also technically entered in a way that the fighter could do a PAM AoO, but I didn't want to deal with this and I just ruled that this AoO doesn't trigger because Grandpa wasn't in combat when he entered that tile. Btw I noticed than in your playthrough, Grandpa rolled 22 initiative but he has a 12 Dex which means 21 is the highest, does it have some modifier that I'm not aware of?

I don't see any reason for it to act the moment it appears. I'm not sure how others play it, but if I have to deal with this scenario again, I will roll a random tile for Grandpa to enter the fight. If I didn't abuse the meta knowledge this would probably be more difficult. It also happens to enter near the best choke point which makes this positioning exponentially stronger.

Good catch about SG friendly fire, I never noticed that it has such nuance. I will keep it in mind from now on. Casting AO first is the better idea anyway. Killing that bug is important early and Sorcerer had higher initiative than Cleric.

For the Cannibals: The problem is that my party is always inside the SG. I upcast it to lvl 5 exactly for this reason, to have enough average dpr to oneshot these things so I don't have to deal with them. Even if I keep them just in range for the aura, cleric can move one tile towards them and they are done for. In all my playthroughs, only 1 ever managed to survive SG.

Trolls could never get in range to even do a single melee attack, no matter being in a position to take advantage of psychic mirror. I start every enemy stacked on the door (I consider them immune to AoE unless they move) and trolls need to Dash in order to get in range (if I gave them proper positions, I doubt it would even make it out of the door). The first troll always loses initiative and has to move over the cannibal corpses, wasting it's movement. It then enters SG and it can't do anything because it already dashed. I killed it in one round. Then I movee my party towards the pit where we climbed up from. The next troll has to either take the long way around, which will take at least 2 turns to get into range if it dashes (because it will have to walk over allies which is difficult terrain), or take the short way, moving clockwise, where he will find corpses that will slow it down again. Once it managed to get into range I banished it.

Grandpa never had a troll to target and in this playthrough I blinded him, so he couldn't cast Collapse Distance on a Bug too. Granted, that Blind payed massive dividends.

Good tip about verticality, I didn't even think of making him sink into the ground.

Dork_Forge

2020-12-02, 05:29 PM

Eventually someone is going to have to break the stalemate, either by assaulting or retreating.

The response to that would be dependent on how much damage/casualties the other side has suffered in the initial assault before the Seer takes over.

Ah, I didn't know or had forgotten about the Pseudo's blindsight. Sounds like you're assuming Investment of the Chain Master. Yes, that could work pretty well, and frankly it's inexpensive so might as well add it in. With only AC 13 you're still likely to get swatted pretty quick by one monster or another despite disadvantage though. When I tried rolling it out just now a Troll hit with two attacks for 11 + 31 damage, plus another 15 Psychic damage, and then stunned the Pseudodragon. I don't think Aid/Psi Warrior reduction/temp HP would be enough to make this even a little bit safe.

Yeah, with so many benefits Investment of the Chain Master is a sound bet and with a total of 5 invocations a pretty low cost.

But the thing is, the Grandpa/Seer has the same incentive to do the exact same thing to you, especially once you've turtled. If he does materialize out of the wall behind you it's going to be at a random time (like, after five minutes and twelve seconds, not on Round 6) when you're not expecting him, but if your Darkness is positioned as per above he won't even try that--he'll pull his forces back and wait you to to at least move out of the bend in the corridor, and more likely will once again wait for you to approach the original trigger point (red X near the second corridor intersection). Hence the stalemate which must eventually be broken by movement.

And once you start moving you're vulnerable to Collapse Distance/Psychic Orb, among other things:

https://i.postimg.cc/pT2CQp3S/Blast.png (https://postimages.org/)

(Also, depending on the details of the initiative system you use, it may not be possible to move all four PCs at the same time, so he could gain an advantage by separating the PCs from each other and/or attacking ones who temporarily aren't in Darkness.)

So it is smart for him to wait, and at Int 22 he is smart enough to know it even though he doesn't know all the details of the PCs' abilities.

Will have to see how this happens as it happens, but just because the strategy is based on turtling doesn't mean that there's no offensive force, for example:
-I chose Wildfire Druid to simultaneously leverage Spike Growth and a minion
-Summon spells will definitely be prepared
-The Paladin will have minimum a Mastiff, maybe a Warhorse/Elk or something to contribute to the push
-Darkness can be moved up as necessary depending on the field of play

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 05:42 PM

This is how I understand Grandpa joining the fight:

In your notes you say that Grandpa patrols the area after the 3rd round. So once the third round is over, Grandpa joins and rolls initiative.
Round 4 (or round 1 of the first fight if you will) starts and (A) Grandpa has to wait for his turn to act, which means he is vulnerable for the time being. Rogue has the highest initiative, then Sorcerer, then Bug, Cleric and after all these, Grandpa can act. Fighter couldn't attack it because he had lower initiative. It also technically entered in a way that the fighter could do a PAM AoO, but I didn't want to deal with this and I just ruled that this AoO doesn't trigger because Grandpa wasn't in combat when he entered that tile. (B) Btw I noticed than in your playthrough, Grandpa rolled 22 initiative but he has a 12 Dex which means 21 is the highest, does it have some modifier that I'm not aware of?

(C) I don't see any reason for it to act the moment it appears. I'm not sure how others play it, but if I have to deal with this scenario again, I will roll a random tile for Grandpa to enter the fight. If I didn't abuse the meta knowledge this would probably be more difficult. It also happens to enter near the best choke point which makes this positioning exponentially stronger.

Good catch about SG friendly fire, I never noticed that it has such nuance. I will keep it in mind from now on. Casting AO first is the better idea anyway. Killing that bug is important early and Sorcerer had higher initiative than Cleric.

For the Cannibals: The problem is that my party is always inside the SG. (D) I upcast it to lvl 5 exactly for this reason, to have enough average dpr to oneshot these things so I don't have to deal with them. Even if I keep them just in range for the aura, cleric can move one tile towards them and they are done for. In all my playthroughs, only 1 ever managed to survive SG.

(E) Trolls could never get in range to even do a single melee attack, no matter being in a position to take advantage of psychic mirror. I start every enemy stacked on the door and trolls need to Dash in order to get in range (if I gave them proper positions, I'd doubt he would even make it out of the door). The first troll always loses initiative and has to move over the cannibal corpses, wasting it's movement. It then enters SG and it can't do anything because it already dashed. I killed it in one round. Then I movee my party towards the pit where we climbed up from. The next troll has to either take the long way around, (F) which will take at least 2 turns to get into range if it dashes (because it will have to walk over allies which is difficult terrain), or take the short way, moving clockwise, where he will find corpses that will slow it down again. (G) Once it managed to get into range I banished it.

Grandpa never had a troll to target and in this playthrough I blinded him, so he couldn't cast Collapse Distance on a Bug too. Granted, that Blind payed massive dividends.

Good tip about verticality, I didn't even think of making him sink into the ground.

(A) On Round 4, Grandpa and the others start taking turns, if the fight is still ongoing. (Otherwise they'll active about a half hour later.) Grandpa will move through the wall and take an action, then duck back into the wall. He starts off in the map room and so if he hasn't taken his turn yet, he's still in the map room. At least, that is how I was expecting it to be run. If you run things differently at your table, that's fine, but make sure that he acts intelligently, which means he shouldn't knowingly move into danger ahead of his troops without having a plan to be safe after he finishes his action. The opportunity to possibly ambush Grandpa away from his troops is a reward for winning Fight #1 quickly--even then, since there's not an active fight that he's rushing towards, I'd expect him to be patrolling with troops ahead of him specifically so he doesn't get caught alone and exposed. Catching him alone and exposed should require high stealth or a Rope Trick or something, so you can whack him after his troops have already swept the area ahead of him and moved on.

(B) No, I probably just misread my notes (or made a mistake while running it). I remember he rolled a 19 or 20 on initiative, and that I was super surprised and relieved when the Dex 20 Monk rolled a natural 20 on initiative too, and then I saw a 22 on my notes when I was writing up the battle and interpreted that as his initiative roll. But you're right, he can't exceed 21.

(C) That's fine, but IMO it's more important to make sure that he actually stays in the map room until his turn starts, at least on during fight #1 round #4.

(D) Only one? I guess they had bad luck on their Wisdom saves. About 20% of them should normally make their saves and take only half damage (11 HP on average). SG V is good against them but not foolproof, partly you got lucky.

BTW, It's interesting that you run Spirit Guardians as a 35' diameter instead of 30' diameter. I run it as 30' diameter because it's 15' radius. I think your way is more common than mine.

(E) This is one of the things that makes me think this fight is happening on round #4, inside the map room, instead of half an hour later during patrolling. And again, if so, Gramps should be inside the map room until his turn, just as the Troll is in the map room until its turn. Movement happens on its turn, not before or between turns.

(F) Taking two turns to move around the long way isn't something the Troll would naturally do, but it's totally something Grandpa would have it do once he sees the situation. Once he's active, he should know that doing the right thing is more important than doing the fast thing, especially if Gramps himself is waiting for his Blindness to wear off.

(G) That works, but this is actually a vulnerability for the party in some ways: if Gramps can break your concentration within the next minute, that Troll pops right back into existence. His Blindness will probably wear off within 2-3 rounds (which will cost him 2d10 or 3d10 of damage, waiting inside the floor) and that still gives him 7+ rounds to still hit you with the Troll and with whatever Bugs are still alive, hiding in the dark waiting for an opportunity.

Nhorianscum

2020-12-02, 06:06 PM

Dork_Forge

2020-12-02, 06:14 PM

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 06:14 PM

So, how exactly would our starspawny pals react to somone just jumping up and down on the X and then ddooring out while insulting their mothers behind a wall of force?

(My addiction to blast spells is showing here)

I'm not sure but it probably involves writhing and gibbering, and then going back to what they were doing before. Note: unlike other objects, I do not think Out of Phase Movement allows the Grandpa Ghost to pass through Wall of Force.

How would that accomplish your objective of spending an hour studying the info in the map room?

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 06:35 PM

(A) On Round 4, Grandpa and the others start taking turns, if the fight is still ongoing. (Otherwise they'll active about a half hour later.) Grandpa will move through the wall and take an action, then duck back into the wall. He starts off in the map room and so if he hasn't taken his turn yet, he's still in the map room. At least, that is how I was expecting it to be run. If you run things differently at your table, that's fine, but make sure that he acts intelligently, which means he shouldn't knowingly move into danger ahead of his troops without having a plan to be safe after he finishes his action. The opportunity to possibly ambush Grandpa away from his troops is a reward for winning Fight #1 quickly--even then, since there's not an active fight that he's rushing towards, I'd expect him to be patrolling with troops ahead of him specifically so he doesn't get caught alone and exposed. Catching him alone and exposed should require high stealth or a Rope Trick or something, so you can whack him after his troops have already swept the area ahead of him and moved on.

(B) No, I probably just misread my notes (or made a mistake while running it). I remember he rolled a 19 or 20 on initiative, and that I was super surprised and relieved when the Dex 20 Monk rolled a natural 20 on initiative too, and then I saw a 22 on my notes when I was writing up the battle and interpreted that as his initiative roll. But you're right, he can't exceed 21.

(C) That's fine, but IMO it's more important to make sure that he actually stays in the map room until his turn starts, at least on during fight #1 round #4.

(D) Only one? I guess they had bad luck on their Wisdom saves. About 20% of them should normally make their saves and take only half damage (11 HP on average). SG V is good against them but not foolproof, partly you got lucky.

BTW, It's interesting that you run Spirit Guardians as a 35' diameter instead of 30' diameter. I run it as 30' diameter because it's 15' radius. I think your way is more common than mine.

(E) This is one of the things that makes me think this fight is happening on round #4, inside the map room, instead of half an hour later during patrolling. And again, if so, Gramps should be inside the map room until his turn, just as the Troll is in the map room until its turn. Movement happens on its turn, not before or between turns.

(F) Taking two turns to move around the long way isn't something the Troll would naturally do, but it's totally something Grandpa would have it do once he sees the situation. Once he's active, he should know that doing the right thing is more important than doing the fast thing, especially if Gramps himself is waiting for his Blindness to wear off.

(G) That works, but this is actually a vulnerability for the party in some ways: if Gramps can break your concentration within the next minute, that Troll pops right back into existence. His Blindness will probably wear off within 2-3 rounds (which will cost him 2d10 or 3d10 of damage, waiting inside the floor) and that still gives him 7+ rounds to still hit you with the Troll and with whatever Bugs are still alive, hiding in the dark waiting for an opportunity.

A) I see, I ran it as a timed scenario where the grandpa patrols both rooms frequently so I have to rush and kill the first enemies before he comes back. Once he takes notice of us he calls for help. It's a common trope in video games so that was the more familiar scenario to me.

C) I will run it once more where he will come with his underlings this time while staying safe, because this way I kind of single him out.

D) Not exactly, PAM takes care of the odd one that manages to survive. I have some very particular tactics with SG+Fighter's PAM that really shine in these scenarios. In a SG turtling scenario, breaking the Cleric's concentration is probably the most important thing to do, so I position the fighter in a way that makes enemies dreading to attack him even if they don't care about SG particularly.

E) Ok, I will try this scenario: Once I kill the first monsters, Grandpa will send one cannibal to patrol the place. Once it finds me, the enemy will start moving in a scripted fashion like how it happens in XCOM when you pull a pod. So the enemy will start with cannibals spread out, troll in a position to reach the party easily and bug in flanking position. Grandpa will join at the furthermost point that still allows him line of sight to the party and I will reroll initiative. I don't really think it will make any difference as far as the minions are concerned. I'm not very creative, I just want to fight :p

G) In the last playthrough I used it to bait him. I reasoned that a ghost in the wall can't see if the party has positioned in a way that makes it hard for him to move but knowing that I stole his toy with banishment will make him furious. I actually made a mistake while writing this because I wanted to make it more "presentable". I forgot that I lost concentration of AOs and I was going on about how I used my bonus action to plan this. It didn't happen exactly like this ^^.

Edit: I actually thought changing the script is too much work. Can I have stats for the doors? I will do a Schwarzenegger attempt.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 07:44 PM

Edit: I actually thought changing the script is too much work. Can I have stats for the doors? I will do a Schwarzenegger attempt.

I assume you're asking about the door to the map room? Um, let's see, how about AC 14 (squishy) but HP 30 (thick), damage resistance of 3. Sound fair?

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 07:44 PM

Yep, thanks. I may not actually break it, I'm thinking something along the lines of making a ton of noise that everyone would be alerted but I'm weighting my options for a better engagement.

Nhorianscum

2020-12-02, 07:46 PM

I'm not sure but it probably involves writhing and gibbering, and then going back to what they were doing before. Note: unlike other objects, I do not think Out of Phase Movement allows the Grandpa Ghost to pass through Wall of Force.

How would that accomplish your objective of spending an hour studying the info in the map room?

Drop wall, turn everything behind wall into smoldering ash?

I'm a simple man.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 07:54 PM

Drop wall, turn everything behind wall into smoldering ash?

I'm a simple man.

I'm confused when you "drop wall". Didn't you already DD away? Or did I misinterpret what you meant by "somone just jumping up and down on the X and then ddooring out while insulting their mothers behind a wall of force"?

If you're still there to fight, they'll definitely be paying attention to you, and if you were hiding behind a wall and then you drop it, you'd get attacked. Yes, you could ready Fireballs (at least with the guy not concentrating on the Wall of Force), and then you'd get to start the fight with some huge explosions. Is that the plan? If so go ahead and try it, it might work really well, although if you wait until the Grandpa + reinforcements gets there he is too smart to put everybody in the same Fireball Formation. But that would be a great way to potentially wipe out Fight #1 with e.g. a party of four Evokers.

Nhorianscum

2020-12-02, 08:22 PM

I'm confused when you "drop wall". Didn't you already DD away? Or did I misinterpret what you meant by "somone just jumping up and down on the X and then ddooring out while insulting their mothers behind a wall of force"?

If you're still there to fight, they'll definitely be paying attention to you, and if you were hiding behind a wall and then you drop it, you'd get attacked. Yes, you could ready Fireballs (at least with the guy not concentrating on the Wall of Force), and then you'd get to start the fight with some huge explosions. Is that the plan? If so go ahead and try it, it might work really well, although if you wait until the Grandpa + reinforcements gets there he is too smart to put everybody in the same Fireball Formation. But that would be a great way to potentially wipe out Fight #1 with e.g. a party of four Evokers.

Oh the goal is just to gather them all in one spot. The damage is sorta overkill so as long as we tickle ghost daddy with each blast it's sorta irrelevant.

Three Vhuman (MA: Transmute, Quicken, Twin, Empower) Tempest cleric 2/ (lightning) Draconic 8 sorcerers. +Clockwork soul 9/Hexblade 1?

Rolls are 65, 65, 65, 17 + Miss, Hit (20), Hit (13), Miss on firebolt rolls.

Ghost daddy saved on one 65 FB and the sadness tier 17 damage FB and ate 199 to the face.

I didn't bother rolling for the rest and just sorta assumed they all autoexploded.

(I just went with trip draconic for simplicity in my own maths. That said Sorc parties are kinda a... blast.)

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 08:28 PM

I didn't bother rolling for the rest and just sorta assumed they all autoexploded.

Unless they were all in Fireball Formation, which Grandpa Ghost is too smart to make them do, that seems impossible. Mentally I'm going to put this one down as "a bunch of Draconic Tempest Clerics and their Clockwork Soul buddy ANNIHILATED a Grandpa Ghost with lightning bolts, took a bunch of damage from other monsters but didn't die, and then Dimension Doored away as quickly as they could afterward, laughing like loons."

Unoriginal

2020-12-02, 08:52 PM

Unless they were all in Fireball Formation, which Grandpa Ghost is too smart to make them do, that seems impossible.

To be fair, the area is really narrow on several places, and with most of the underlings' attack-attack-attack default tactic it's certainly possible to bait them into a cluster before Grandpa Ghost can make them change (given he stays in the floor/the walls when it's not his turn and he has no way to perceive or communicate with beings outside of the floor/stone).

It takes some manoeuvring but certainly not impossible nor that unlikely if the PCs have that ammount of info on their opponents.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 08:57 PM

To be fair, the area is really narrow on several places, and with most of the underlings' attack-attack-attack default tactic it's certainly possible to bait them into a cluster before Grandpa Ghost can make them change (given he stays in the floor/the walls when it's not his turn and he has no way to perceive or communicate with beings outside of the floor/stone).

It takes some manoeuvring but certainly not impossible nor that unlikely if the PCs have that ammount of info on their opponents.

Can you draw a picture of what you're imagining?

Gtdead

2020-12-02, 09:25 PM

So I was brainstorming how I can make this fun:

Idea #1: Sickening Radiance + Wall of Stone. These monsters have some CON but they will have a lot of trouble dealing with this. Grandpa will have to sink underground to save himself. I'm not sure how to do it best. I've been thinking about hasting the Fighter and breaking down the door to Grandpa room, then get the hell out. Sorcerer and Cleric will have readied the spells or something. I'm not sure how I'm going to send the Fighter there, but with haste he should have enough speed. I will work out the logistics later. Of course he can always knock and make funny faces.

Sickening radiance has a comically huge radius and lasts for 10 minutes. It's actually possible to trap most of the enemies in the radius, but we have to close off the northeastern tunnel. Trapping the Bug outside the aoe is a possibility but I don't care too much about it. Also we will have to kill the first cannibals manually, small price to pay.

Idea #2: Grapping/Restraining. These things can move through objects so it feels odd to say that you can grapple it. However something like Telekinesis could work. Sadly I have a lowly Sorcerer and not a Bard for this, but it really only needs a single round. Not sure how I will manage it, but how would you rule it anyway?

Idea #3: Contagion. Technically Grandpa can kite a lot, but if he catches a cold then there is nothing he can do. He will enter the wall and get stunned to death. It will take a couple of minutes but it's fine and we will know that he died due to receiving XP anyway ^^ . His Con saves aren't amazing.

MaxWilson

2020-12-02, 09:37 PM

So I was brainstorming how I can make this fun:

Idea #1: Sickening Radiance + Wall of Stone. These monsters have some CON but they will have a lot of trouble dealing with this. Grandpa will have to sink underground to save himself. I'm not sure how to do it best. I've been thinking about hasting the Fighter and breaking down the door to Grandpa room, then get the hell out. Sorcerer and Cleric will have readied the spells or something. I'm not sure how I'm going to send the Fighter there, but with haste he should have enough speed. I will work out the logistics later. Of course he can always knock and make funny faces.

Sickening radiance has a comically huge radius and lasts for 10 minutes. It's actually possible to trap most of the enemies in the radius, but we have to close off the northeastern tunnel. Trapping the Bug outside the aoe is a possibility but I don't care too much about it. Also we will have to kill the first cannibals manually, small price to pay.

Idea #2: Grapping/Restraining. These things can move through objects so it feels odd to say that you can grapple it. However something like Telekinesis could work. Sadly I have a lowly Sorcerer and not a Bard for this, but it really only needs a single round. Not sure how I will manage it, but how would you rule it anyway?

Sure, grappling/restraining clearly works on Star Spawn Seers so it works on Grandpa Ghost. If you're asking how I'd _explain_ I have two choices here, (1) point to WotC and look annoyed, (2) make something up. So I'm just going to say that other creatures' bioenergy interferes with Gramps' ability to send his own energy out of phase: he can't penetrate objects until you let go. (Despite the fact that he's like an afterimage that you can see only when you don't look directly at him, he still has a tangible form. It feels like... thousands of squirming maggots, but as long as you reach in and grip a solid handful of maggots he doesn't go anywhere.)

His response to grappling would be to try to incapacitate you with the Comet Staff because that breaks a grapple. For Telekinesis, assuming you're not in melee range, he'd hammer you as hard as he could with Collapse Distance/Psychic Mirror/Psychic Orb. What other choice does he have?

da newt

2020-12-03, 09:00 AM

I assumed the ghost could not see through stone walls, so he had to enter the tunnel with the party in order to see them. When he enters he steps into multiple SG AoE where his speed is reduced and he takes damage, then he has to decide to either dash to exit SG or attack action. I also assumed the SG AoE does not penetrate the walls/floor.

Yup - I missed conc requirement for ready action spells. I'll need to adjust so some keep SG, some ready.

If the ghost decides not to act for a while and camp in his room, the readied action tactic is useless (especially if your DM rules a readied spell burns a spell slot).

If the ghost decides to go with a war of attrition, skirmish, take full adv of pass through walls/floor, etc he can really cause havoc - any spell with duration of 1 minute, just wait until it's done.

someguy

2020-12-03, 11:50 AM

This is a party I often think about, I like the idea of fighter 11/gloom stalker 3 for Nova rounds, so I aim to have two of them for really nice realiable Nova rounds. They come online at 9 once you get Fighter 6 for the second feat, so are quite strong at level 10. I usually imagine them supported by a Sorc for good nova/control and some other caster, here a Cleric to provide one of the two necessary magic bows. Also the fighters are intended to be a custom subclass that is probably OP, eg each of them would be able to copy Spirit Guardians from the cleric, so we'd have three copies of SG up in each battle. So I left that out.

It basically goes fine, we easily wipe out the first group and get the short rest before the second group. We take a few attacks from the scarecrow bug in the 2nd group, but also destroy everything by round 2. In an earlier version where I wasn't as careful about positioning, the Sorc got 2x hit and stunned by the troll as well.

Party:
Samurai Fighter 7, Gloomstalker Ranger 3, Sharpshooter, Elven Accuracy, +1 Bow (from Forge Cleric), Archery style, 18 dex
Battlemaster Fighter 7, Gloomstalker Ranger 3, Sharpshooter, Elven Accuracy, +1 Bow, Archery style, 18 dex
Forge Cleric 10 (gave +1 Bow to Samurai)
Stone Sorcerer 10
Attacks use average damage, 26 damage at +6 attack for Billy and Bob with sharpshooter -5/+10 on first round, 21 on later rounds
I allow careful web the most useful possible reading, though you can see it doesn’t do a ton here.

Round 0:
Cleric Casts Stoneshape to make a hiding nook before the bend on the left to fall back to if neccesary
Cleric casts level 5 spirit guardians
Sorc casts careful web left of the X
Sorc puts its defensive aegis on the cleric
Cleric casts level 3 aid
All approach the Sorc starts behind web, rest of party starts in web

Round 1:
Initiative - Samurai, Scarecrow Bug, Battlemaster, Cleric, Sorc, Rest of Baddies
Samurai Moves to Slimey Door, opens door, back 20 feet away to avoid madness aura, action surge, shoots troll until dead - miss, hit, miss, crit, hit, hit - 114 damage, move back away from action with zephyr strike for extra move
Scarecrow bug moves towards party, fails save vs web, doesnt reach spirit guardians
Battlemaster action surge, shoot troll until dead - hit, troll dead
Shoot scarecrow bug until dead - hit, hit, hit, dead
Shoot next scarecrow bug in web until dead - hit, hit
Move back away from action with zephyr strike for extra move
Baddies move up
Top 5 of 6 cannibals die to SG, other stuck in web
Last scarecrow bug stuck in web
Assumed we can kill the two stuck in web without expending any resources

Short rest back near Pit
Cleric Casts 4th level SG
Sorc casts careful web near door
Party approaches start to the left of the web
Round 1:
Initiative - Sorc, cannibal, troll, Samurai, bug, cannibal, cannibal, Battlemaster, Cleric, cannibal, grandpa
Sorc moves to door, opens door, casts 5th level ice storm (mostly to be sure we roll enough damage to kill cannibals) and quickened firebolt on grandpa, move back to group
Ghost saves, bug fail, troll fails, 3 of 4 cannibal fail = 33 damage on fail
Firebolt does 9
Troll move out saves vs web, ice storm, web + SG prevent him from getting in range to attack, dashes to base part
Samurai action surge, unloads on troll, 4 hits, 1 crit, dead, 1 attack vs ghost that it reacts to killing cannibal, move to stand in front of alice using zephyr strike for extra move and damage
Bug moves out uses its bonus action move, saves vs web, attacks Samurai, saves vs SG for 11 damage
Battlemaster action surge, moves in attacks ghost - 4 hit, 2 miss, 108 damage, two trip attacks (10 damage), fails save vs 2nd trip (155 total), zephyr strike (4 damage) to move avoid AOO from bug and get back out of web
Sorc toll the dead bug for 12 damage (23 total)
Ghost stands up (15 move left), requires 20 to get into wall assuming it needs to move one square in the room, so i guess it readies an action to Collapse distance the next enemy it can see
Round 2:
Sorc readies 3rd level scorching ray for if it sees ghost
Samurai activates advantage, takes aoo from bug to step away, attacks bug, hit, miss, 21 damage (48 total)
Bug fails SG save, 21 damage (69 total, annoying!)
Bug moves to attack Cleric, miss, miss
Battlemaster moves to door (is invisible to ghost due to gloom stalker and lack of light, if not we just all ready actions and wait for him walk into SG, and Sorc lobs around the corner AOEs), attacks ghost, hit, hit, ghost dead
Assumed we can finish bug without more resources

Resources missing
Cleric 5th slot, 2 4th slots, 3rd level slot
Sorc 5th slot, 2 2nd slots, a few SP for careful
Samurai took 7 attacks from bug, didn’t bother to roll details, 2 first level slots
Battlemaster used 2 first level slots, 2 superiority die, action surge

MaxWilson

2020-12-03, 05:19 PM

Samurai Moves to Slimey Door, opens door, back 20 feet away to avoid madness aura, action surge, shoots troll until dead - miss, hit, miss, crit, hit, hit - 114 damage, move back away from action with zephyr strike for extra move

Hi someguy,

It's a very clever build, well-suited for this scenario: as you say, you're getting a ton of attacks on round 1, all at advantage because you're a Gloomstalker in darkness. Was a good writeup, Two quick questions about the Samurai's turn, some things that confused me:

(1) how do four hits add up to 114 damage? With 18 Dex and a +1 bow, plus Sharpshooter, that's d8+15 per hit, so four hits should be about 80 damage, plus another d8 for one crit and another d8 for Dread Ambusher, and another d8 from Zephyr Strike. If you roll max damage on all four attacks (23 * 4 = 92) and max damage on the extra 3d8 (24) then it's 114, so it's not impossible, but is that how it happened or was it something else? Edit: oh I see you also mentioned using 26 average damage on round 1, but I can't figure out the math. What's 26 from?

Edit2: oh, my bad, there should be +2d8 from Dread Ambusher because Dread Ambusher fires twice, due to Action Surge. That doesn't apply to all the attacks though so that can't be part of the 26.

(2) Scorpion Trolls (Star Spawn Hulks) have 136 HP, so what killed it? Had it already taken damage from Spirit Guardians before the Samurai opened the door? Edit3: or am I misreading, and the Troll was actually killed by the Battlemaster a short time later?

-Max

someguy

2020-12-03, 08:32 PM

I think the damage is d8 (dread ambusher) + d10 (longbow) + 4 (dex) + 10 (sharpshooter) +1 (magic bow) which actually averages 25 not 26. I misread dread ambusher and thought it applied to all attacks.

Yeah the first troll takes 4 hits from samurai and 1 from battle master before dying. I was writing the plan I guess “shoot troll until dead”, but the plan didn’t always work out. I haven’t gone back to see if correcting the damage affects anything. Maybe saying I had favored enemy aberration or something would even it out. Or just make them both battle-masters and use more maneuvers.

Thanks for taking the time to think about it.

da newt

2020-12-04, 10:00 AM

longbow = d8
dread ambusher - only applies to the extra attack (2 on first round w/ action surge)
zepher stike - I assume was precast round 0, extra damage applies once only

so normal hit = d8 (5) + SS (10) + dex (4) + bow (1) = 20
plus ZS (5), plus DA x2 (10), plus crit (5) and 4 hits = 100 [assuming the crit was on a normal, but best case if it happened w/ ZS and DA then +10 more)

I'm not sure how you find an hour for a short rest between phases of this combat, so no action surge for the second wave, but if you can wipe out the first wave quickly enough (and your DM rules the second wave is a new combat) your dread ambusher would reset.

Gloom stalker will be handy in this environment (INV). Assuming the ghost must see a target for his attacks, and the badguys have no light sources, a team of gloom stalkers might trivialize this encounter ...

Dork_Forge

2020-12-04, 12:36 PM

MaxWilson

2020-12-04, 03:03 PM

That's a very good point, is there any light sources? It's only a 3 level dip to get Gloom stalker into a build, leaving plenty of levels left to rack up casting and other abilities.

Per OP,

This scenario is a subterranean dungeon crawl. You're coming from a 500' deep pit to the the northwest and retreat is not an option unless you're prepared to take 20d6 falling damage if necessary. *snip* The area is in complete darkness, filled with the sounds of shrieking cacophany and what sounds like a throbbing heartbeat from the walls, which are moist and slippery.

This works to the advantage of the Scarecrow-bugs, but it's also possible for PCs to take advantage of it.

verbatim

2020-12-05, 10:42 PM

I ran this for real for my level 10 party of 4 in Out of the Abyss as a dream sequence (madness save if they fail), with them going in blind to the map and the enemy statblocks. Combat started when the first star spawn saw the first PC.

the party:
10 Beast Barbarian
10 Open Fist Monk
10 Celestial Warlock
8 Sea Sorcerer (UA) x 2 Tempest Cleric

It was pretty back and forth and looking like the PC's had a chance until the Seer bounced 70 damage off of the hulk onto 3 of the 4 PC's, effectively ending the fight.

My biggest takeaway was that the CR system doesn't do a good job of stressing (especially to new DM's) that the difficulty of a fight can be drastically altered by how close the party starts to the enemies. This would have been incredibly easy on a large open field and much more doable on a map that wasn't 25x25 with tight corridors.

My party's takeaway was that the Star Spawn Mangler should not be CR 5, and that the Grue's Aura of Madness makes them comparably better than any other CR 1/4 mob.

Unoriginal

2020-12-06, 05:39 PM

I ran this for real for my level 10 party of 4 in Out of the Abyss as a dream sequence (madness save if they fail), with them going in blind to the map and the enemy statblocks. Combat started when the first star spawn saw the first PC.

the party:
10 Beast Barbarian
10 Open Fist Monk
10 Celestial Warlock
8 Sea Sorcerer (UA) x 2 Tempest Cleric

It was pretty back and forth and looking like the PC's had a chance until the Seer bounced 70 damage off of the hulk onto 3 of the 4 PC's, effectively ending the fight.

My biggest takeaway was that the CR system doesn't do a good job of stressing (especially to new DM's) that the difficulty of a fight can be drastically altered by how close the party starts to the enemies. This would have been incredibly easy on a large open field and much more doable on a map that wasn't 25x25 with tight corridors.

My party's takeaway was that the Star Spawn Mangler should not be CR 5, and that the Grue's Aura of Madness makes them comparably better than any other CR 1/4 mob.

I mean the difference in the knowledge and tactical setup do advantage the Star Spawns enormously, compared to MaxWilson's presented scenario.

Without knowledge that cave is a killbox.

BaconChest

2020-12-07, 01:48 AM

This was a lot of fun!

My party was built before looking at the scenario and was as follows:

-Dragonborn Vengeance Paladin 10
-Hill Dwarf Life Cleric 10
-High Elf Divination Wizard 10
-Wood Elf Shadow Monk 8/Rogue 2

I tried to stick to a realistic party composition for my players, while taking reasonably powerful and efficient options where they existed. Paladin had Heavy Armour Master as a Feat, everyone else was just taking ASIs the whole way.

Magic Items: Went with 2 Uncommon Items per character, with 1 getting a Rare instead to reflect how my tables generally run. Pallie had +1 Maul and Winged Boots (lol, so useless as it turned out), Cleric had a Cloak of Eyes (helped a little), Monk had a +1 Longsword and a +1 Longbow (Longsword using the Tasha's ability to make it a Monk Weapon), Wizard had a Cloak of Protection and a +1 Wand of the War Mage.

Pre-Spells (cast before viewing the scenario): Both the Paladin and Cleric cast Aid (so they each had +5HP and the other 2 had +10HP), Cleric spent all their 4th level slots casting Death Ward on everyone else, Wizard cast Mage Armour. Portent Dice were 7 & 9.

Pre-Spells (cast after viewing scenario): Paladin cast Haste on themselves, Cleric cast Spiritual Weapon, Wizard cast Light on the Pally's Maul.

Positioning: Monk hit the X button, everyone was positioned to be within 10ft of the Paladin for the Auras. Note at this stage I still haven't read the stat blocks of the enemies.

Results:

Part 1: The party rolled incredibly on initiative (except for the Cleric), allowing the Monk to almost immediately Stunning Strike the NE Bug, the Wizard to Fireball the SW enemies (except the Bug, who had already escaped and dealt 63 damage to the Cleric OUCH).

Between the Monk and Paladin the SW Bug and N Cannibals were easy enough to deal with, before the Wizard upcast Banishment to remove the NE Bug (recovered from Stun) and the Scorpion Troll, using its Portent Rolls to ensure failure. Combat did not quite last 2 rounds, meaning the Map Room enemies did not leave to attack. Aside from the Cleric, everyone else was unharmed.

NOTE: I made an error here and played on with Haste and Spiritual Weapon still active, even though the party definitely would've stopped for a full minute to ensure Banishment of the Bug and Troll was completed. This did not impact majorly on results, see below.

Part 2: I made the trigger for the next encounter (given the party were not waiting for the patrol) them moving within LoS of the map room entrance. I then re-rolled initiative, which went HORRIBLY for the party, getting them 3 of the bottom 5 initiative rolls when previously they'd had 3 of the top 4.

The Paladin got focus fired as the one to step into LoS, passing their first 4 or 5 Concentration checks but eventually losing Conc on Haste, losing their first turn and being taken down to 2HP. Cleric (the only with good Initiative) cast Dawn on the Map Room to weaken everything (bad damage rolls meant the Cannibals survived with a few HP each). Wizard banished the Troll, and Monk went for the Bug after it had ganked the Paladin and hidden (Monk's Passive Perception with Expertise meant the Bug couldn't hide even in the unlit hallways), getting another Stunning Strike off on the second attempt.

Meanwhile Grandpa Ghost was trying to come out, weaken the party and then pop back into the walls. Eventually it got a clear shot at the Wizard, bringing the Troll back into play, but that just meant the party had something to hit instead of holding actions and hoping it got in range, so it got one set of attacks (popping the Paladin's Death Ward). It mostly used Psychic Orbs (including critting the Paladin for 10D6 OUCH) to avoid taking held action melee attacks, although when it could get the Monk and Cleric out of Aura range it did Incapacitate them for a round.

Eventually after never varying its strategy of popping out from the walls the Wizard took a risk and Held Action for Bigby's Hand, allowing them to Grapple the Ghost when it next emerged. It was going for a melee attack on the Cleric and Monk too, so it couldn't even Psychic Orbs the Wizard to try and break concentration unless it wanted Disadvantage. This ended the fight (especially since it fluffed both its melee attacks), with the Paladin able to use its last 3rd level slot to Smite and the Monk smashing away with many attacks to finish the job.

This 2nd combat lasted 9 rounds, with everything after R2 being vs the solo Ghost (except for the 1 round where the Banished Troll returned). The party ended up with the Wizard on 65 HP (with a low point during the scenario of 38), the Cleric on 94 (low of 35), the Monk on 58 (low of 55) and the Paladin on 55 (low of 1). The Paladin was completely out of resources (including LoH), the Cleric had 2 3rd levels and 1 5th level left plus 1 use of CD, the Wizard had a 1st and a 3rd and the Monk had 1 Ki.

Thoughts:

Very challenging for a (fairly normal) party but ultimately doable. Stunning Strike and Banishment were both very, very useful. I expected Wall of Force to be a great play at some stage but it never quite worked out, but Banishment plus Portent meant the Wizard still earned their keep. The Monk ate up the Cannibals, and the Paladin was great for nova-ing targets when necessary. The Cleric was definitely the MVP, but without the Spirit Guardians I have now read about everyone using XD That definitely would've made things easier.

Thanks Max, I *may* throw something like this at my party in a future one-shot just to see how they handle it...

verbatim

2020-12-09, 12:53 PM

RAW wouldn't the 3rd level Gloomstalker feature "Umbral Sight" negate this scenario entirely, since no Star Spawn would be able to see the ranger?

Ignoring that for a moment. I haven't done the math yet but I think that we can break this down into why it's hard and then synthesize a decent counter:

the Star Spawn Mangler has very high melee damage and can dash as a bonus action if Flurry of Claws is available
if the Hulk gets within 10 feet of a party member the Seer can ping it with Psychic Orb to nuke the PC

Therefore, a team that prioritizes ranged damage and means of preventing the star spawn from getting within 60 feet of the party will only have to worry about the Seer's ranged attacks. Problem to address: most means of preventing mobs from rushing PC's involve concentration, which the Seer can threaten from afar.

The team I'm proposing below is very obviously overkill/made entirely for the challenge and not the kind of characters that someone would roll up randomly, but I think that the core idea of banishing grandpa and then camping behind Sickening Radiance/Sleet Storm/Gust of Wind/etc is something that a random team of 4 level 10 PC's could conceivably come up with on their own.

Level 10 Celestial Warlock:
spells used: Sickening Radiance creates 30 foot radius sphere. Creatures that fail con saves from entering or starting their turn in the sphere take radiant damage and suffer a level of exhaustion. A Star Spawn that fails twice has halved speed as a result of being at exhaustion stage 2.

invocations used: Agonizing Blast and Lance of Lethargy power up Eldritch Blast and make it such that once per turn you can reduce the speed of a target hit by Eldritch Blast by 10, which stacks with most other forms of reducing speed (like Sickening Radiance induced exhaustion).

Level 8 Wild Magic Sorcerer / Level 2 Fathomless Warlock:
spells used: Banishment (on the Star Spawn Seer), Shield (to avoid hits that might force concentration saves on Banishment)

Metamagic used: Distant Metamagic (for Banishment)

Invocations used: Agonizing Blast and Lance of Lethargy (see Celestial Warlock)

Class Features used:

Bend Luck: spend 2 sorcery points to subtract 1d4 from the Star Spawn Seer's save against Banishment
Tentacle of the Deep: tentacle spawns within 60 feet of you that has a a reach of 10 ft, it has a movement speed of 30 ft and can make one attack a turn as a bonus action, reducing the speed of the target by 10 feet for one turn on a hit.

Level 7 Oath of the Watchers Paladin / Level 3 Fathomless Warlock:
Spells Used: Gust of Wind (60 ft long/10 wide line that forces a save vs being pushed 15 feet away, creatures in the line need to spend 2 feet of movement for every 1 foot they move in opposition to the direction the wind is blowing)

Invocations Used: Agonizing Blast and Lance of Lethargy (see Celestial Warlock)

Class Features Used:

Channel Divinity: Abjure the Extraplanar is basically turn undead but for aberrations within 30 feet
Tentacle of the Deep (see see Wild Magic Sorcerer)
Aura of Protection: adds the Paladin's Charisma modifier to saves of allies within 10 feet, especially important for maintaining concentration.
Divine Smite: In case an enemy manages to get within melee range of the party

Level 6 Stars Druid / Level 3 Peace Cleric /B]/ Level 1 [B]Bard

Spells Used: Plant Growth, Sleet Storm, Mirror Image, Spiritual Weapon, Guiding Bolt, Dissonant Whispers

Class Features Used:

Starry Form (Dragon): the druid can treat a roll of 9 or lower (before modifiers) on a Concentration saving throw as a 10
Cosmic Omen: if you rolled an even number after your last long rest you can use your reaction to add a d6 to the saving throw of a teammate within 30 feet 4 times before the next long rest, presumably on Concentration saves. If you rolled an odd number number you can subtract a d6 from the saving throw of enemies within 30 feet 4 times, presumably on saves vs Gust of Wind.
Emboldening Bond: at level 10 you can effect 4 creatures within 30 feet of and including yourself, effected creatures can add a d4 to a saving throw once per turn, ideally to help maintain concentration
Bardic Inspiration: You can give out a number of one-time use 1d6 die equal to your charisma modifier, one per person max, that can be added to saving throws, most likely saves to maintain concentration in this instance.

MaxWilson

2020-12-09, 03:21 PM

I ran this for real for my level 10 party of 4 in Out of the Abyss as a dream sequence (madness save if they fail), with them going in blind to the map and the enemy statblocks. Combat started when the first star spawn saw the first PC.

...It was pretty back and forth and looking like the PC's had a chance until the Seer bounced 70 damage off of the hulk onto 3 of the 4 PC's, effectively ending the fight.

My biggest takeaway was that the CR system doesn't do a good job of stressing (especially to new DM's) that the difficulty of a fight can be drastically altered by how close the party starts to the enemies. This would have been incredibly easy on a large open field and much more doable on a map that wasn't 25x25 with tight corridors.

My party's takeaway was that the Star Spawn Mangler should not be CR 5, and that the Grue's Aura of Madness makes them comparably better than any other CR 1/4 mob.

I've done dream sequences before as a way of giving players practice and information about an upcoming foe, but the idea of coupling it with consequences for losing (madness save) is brilliant. I may steal sometime that an actual campaign trope! "You are cursed with prophetic dreams, often dreaming in vivid and terrifying detail about events looming in your possible future(s)." Naturally in dreams you can frame the scenario even harder than you would in actual play, e.g. players start off already surrounded and low on spells.

I mean the difference in the knowledge and tactical setup do advantage the Star Spawns enormously, compared to MaxWilson's presented scenario.

Without knowledge that cave is a killbox.

Knowledge really is power.

This was a lot of fun!

*snip* Meanwhile Grandpa Ghost was trying to come out, weaken the party and then pop back into the walls. Eventually it got a clear shot at the Wizard, bringing the Troll back into play, but that just meant the party had something to hit instead of holding actions and hoping it got in range, so it got one set of attacks (popping the Paladin's Death Ward). It mostly used Psychic Orbs (including critting the Paladin for 10D6 OUCH) to avoid taking held action melee attacks, although when it could get the Monk and Cleric out of Aura range it did Incapacitate them for a round.

Eventually after never varying its strategy of popping out from the walls the Wizard took a risk and Held Action for Bigby's Hand, allowing them to Grapple the Ghost when it next emerged. It was going for a melee attack on the Cleric and Monk too, so it couldn't even Psychic Orbs the Wizard to try and break concentration unless it wanted Disadvantage. This ended the fight (especially since it fluffed both its melee attacks), with the Paladin able to use its last 3rd level slot to Smite and the Monk smashing away with many attacks to finish the job.

This 2nd combat lasted 9 rounds, with everything after R2 being vs the solo Ghost (except for the 1 round where the Banished Troll returned). The party ended up with the Wizard on 65 HP (with a low point during the scenario of 38), the Cleric on 94 (low of 35), the Monk on 58 (low of 55) and the Paladin on 55 (low of 1). The Paladin was completely out of resources (including LoH), the Cleric had 2 3rd levels and 1 5th level left plus 1 use of CD, the Wizard had a 1st and a 3rd and the Monk had 1 Ki.

Thoughts:

Very challenging for a (fairly normal) party but ultimately doable. Stunning Strike and Banishment were both very, very useful. I expected Wall of Force to be a great play at some stage but it never quite worked out, but Banishment plus Portent meant the Wizard still earned their keep. The Monk ate up the Cannibals, and the Paladin was great for nova-ing targets when necessary. The Cleric was definitely the MVP, but without the Spirit Guardians I have now read about everyone using XD That definitely would've made things easier.

Thanks Max, I *may* throw something like this at my party in a future one-shot just to see how they handle it...

That writeup was a lot of fun to read about. Thanks for sharing! It's really interesting that Banishment had more impact than Wall of Force, is that just because Wall of Force is more expensive so you kept saving it for later?

RAW wouldn't the 3rd level Gloomstalker feature "Umbral Sight" negate this scenario entirely, since no Star Spawn would be able to see the ranger?

It certainly would make the scenario easier, if you happened to build a party of all Gloomstalkers.

Other than that, it's not fundamentally different from just casting Greater Invisibility on everybody, or even just using a Fog Cloud. Many people on this thread, starting I think with Dork_Forge, have found that Star Spawn are mostly neutered by heavy obscurement, at least to the point where Manglers are merely respectable rather than buzz saws of death, and Seers are limited to bouncing psychic damage off Hulks as AoE damage. It's a good strategy but it doesn't quite negate the scenario entirely--you still have some die-rolling to do. It's not like you can walk into the map room and just sit there for an hour studying the maps without them ever noticing you're there. (Well, maybe if you were flying AND invisible you could. Chainlocks with Imp familiar and Voice of the Chain Master FTW?)

Ignoring that for a moment. I haven't done the math yet but I think that we can break this down into why it's hard and then synthesize a decent counter:

the Star Spawn Mangler has very high melee damage and can dash as a bonus action if Flurry of Claws is available
if the Hulk gets within 10 feet of a party member the Seer can ping it with Psychic Orb to nuke the PC

Therefore, a team that prioritizes ranged damage and means of preventing the star spawn from getting within 60 feet of the party will only have to worry about the Seer's ranged attacks. Problem to address: most means of preventing mobs from rushing PC's involve concentration, which the Seer can threaten from afar.

The team I'm proposing below is very obviously overkill/made entirely for the challenge and not the kind of characters that someone would roll up randomly, but I think that the core idea of banishing grandpa and then camping behind Sickening Radiance/Sleet Storm/Gust of Wind/etc is something that a random team of 4 level 10 PC's could conceivably come up with on their own.

Yep, that would work, and you're right, many groups should be able to pull off something like this.

If PCs have basic knowledge of what they're dealing with, my experience is that they can routinely deal with Deadly x4 fights (by "routine" I don't mean "it will be boring", just "DM can use these in basically every adventure and not have to feel like an unfair jerk"). PCs who don't engage in recon/etc. can often deal with them anyway, but Star Spawn do indeed punch above their weight so it was interesting to read on this thread about parties who went in blind. Interesting that we only had one actual TPK, for your players in the dream sequence.

BaconChest

2020-12-09, 10:37 PM

That writeup was a lot of fun to read about. Thanks for sharing! It's really interesting that Banishment had more impact than Wall of Force, is that just because Wall of Force is more expensive so you kept saving it for later?

I looked at it in Part 1, but positioning-wise I couldn't set it up such that it ended the fight and gave the party access to the Map Room. Combined with the Bug's manoeuvrability and high number of attacks, it made relying on a non-damaging concentration spell pretty risky in comparison to just throwing a fireball at a nice clump of enemies in Round 1, and then by Round 2 there were two enemies left on opposite sides of the cavern so Banishment became the more efficient use of a 5th level slot (especially with Portent).

In Part 2 the initiative rolls screwed the Wizard, I guess they could have used WoF on the Troll instead of Banishment but knowing the creatures would be perma-gone if they held it for 1 min vs no save but they have to hold it for 10 while GG is still out there they went for the Banish. GG coming in and out of the walls was something they considered trying to stop with a WoF as well, but 10 minute duration when they needed an hour to investigate meant all it could really do was give them some healing time OR trapp GG in there with them until he broke their concentration...I guess with infinite turn times there might have been a way to trap GG in with the rest of the party and the Wizard on the outside, but it would've meant some finagling and I wanted to keep the turns to a realistic length.

MaxWilson

2020-12-10, 12:47 AM

I looked at it in Part 1, but positioning-wise I couldn't set it up such that it ended the fight and gave the party access to the Map Room. Combined with the Bug's manoeuvrability and high number of attacks, it made relying on a non-damaging concentration spell pretty risky in comparison to just throwing a fireball at a nice clump of enemies in Round 1, and then by Round 2 there were two enemies left on opposite sides of the cavern so Banishment became the more efficient use of a 5th level slot (especially with Portent).

In Part 2 the initiative rolls screwed the Wizard, I guess they could have used WoF on the Troll instead of Banishment but knowing the creatures would be perma-gone if they held it for 1 min vs no save but they have to hold it for 10 while GG is still out there they went for the Banish. GG coming in and out of the walls was something they considered trying to stop with a WoF as well, but 10 minute duration when they needed an hour to investigate meant all it could really do was give them some healing time OR trapp GG in there with them until he broke their concentration...I guess with infinite turn times there might have been a way to trap GG in with the rest of the party and the Wizard on the outside, but it would've meant some finagling and I wanted to keep the turns to a realistic length.

Cool, thanks.

In retrospect since it was sometimes meleeing the monk over those 9 rounds, I'm a little surprised GG never got stunned on an opportunity attack. Did the monk forget this was possible or did the dice just never work out?