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4th Edition Encounter Ideas/Advice

   
4th Edition Encounter Ideas/Advice

I am a fairly new GM to 4th edition. I am an expert at pathfinder and 3.5, these systems are incredibly different to say the least.

My players are level 3, and currently in a dungeon. They just defeated a boss type guy who had the sole purpose of killing off a player that wanted to make a different character. (I used the GM cheat code to get the job done)

The problem I am running into, is that if I use the allowance I am allotted according to the DMG they breeze through my encounters, while if I ramp it up a bit they level up too fast. Any ideas on how to negate this?

I also need some good... "trap room" ideas. Something where the dungeon itself is the encounter, and players need to work together or die. The traps in the DnD insider don't seem to fit what I am looking for.

Adding extra minions to your encounters, and not identifying minions as minions until the players discover this in the course of play, might add some punch to the encounters without overly influencing the XP gain.

In PbP games, I tend to advance my 4e groups quickly. Usually after 3 substantive battles, they go up a level. I had alternate ways of calculating XP, though, until I did away with it altogether.

4E is horrendously balanced in the player's favor. I have not yet found a great solution for this, but I have toyed with altering healing to give them less, using the environment more, and using stronger monsters. Maybe you could use monsters of higher levels but if you are worried about them leveling too fast, give them XP for monsters of their level. Don't increase the monster AC though. And make sure you are using the corrected monster damage. Monsters should do far more than they say in MM 1.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Atlictoatl View Post
Adding extra minions to your encounters, and not identifying minions as minions until the players discover this in the course of play, might add some punch to the encounters without overly influencing the XP gain.

In PbP games, I tend to advance my 4e groups quickly. Usually after 3 substantive battles, they go up a level. I had alternate ways of calculating XP, though, until I did away with it altogether.
I am not playing by post, I'm using the virtual tabletop over at roll20.net, and theoretically the minions might add some punch to encounters, but my players use several AOE spells, resulting in instant minion death.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Farland View Post
4E is horrendously balanced in the player's favor. I have not yet found a great solution for this, but I have toyed with altering healing to give them less, using the environment more, and using stronger monsters. Maybe you could use monsters of higher levels but if you are worried about them leveling too fast, give them XP for monsters of their level. Don't increase the monster AC though. And make sure you are using the corrected monster damage. Monsters should do far more than they say in MM 1.
Playing the monster intelligently rather than as cannon fodder helps.

Let's see... third level... third level.... third level...

That gives you access to Imps, Hobgoblins, Several lower level undead, A Young White dragon, and various dungeon dwelling creatures.

Hobgoblins: A militaristic goblinoid race that is capable of high strategy. These guys will give your players the most pain and annoyance to your players because if played correctly *as in, intelligently* they will take full advantage of the terrain, lighting of the dungeon and the weaknesses of your players once they find them out. They usually order around goblins and bugbears.

Imps: Tricky little blighters, you could have one of these guys pretend to make a deal with one of your spell casters and then stab them in the back when they get into trouble, which it obviously planned.

Young white dragon: 'Nuff said. Don't forget that most dragons have a small army of kobolds that they order around.

Undead: Have a pack of Gravehounds attack them. Even if hteir zombies, they retain their use of pack tactics. Or even have a Deathlock Wight leading a small contingent of skeletons and zombies. Deathlock Wight's are just as intelligent as a parties wizard and can competently lead a squad of other undead in a fight and overwhelm the party.

Wererats: Sneaky little devils, don't forget that the party would be fighting on their own turf and deal with similar tactics as the hobgoblins.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Farland View Post
4E is horrendously balanced in the player's favor. I have not yet found a great solution for this, but I have toyed with altering healing to give them less, using the environment more, and using stronger monsters. Maybe you could use monsters of higher levels but if you are worried about them leveling too fast, give them XP for monsters of their level. Don't increase the monster AC though. And make sure you are using the corrected monster damage. Monsters should do far more than they say in MM 1.
There's an easy fix; have damage properly scale with player HP in the first place.

I.e. 8 + 2 x monster level, as opposed to 8 + 1 x monster level, based on the assumption that:
  1. Players gain on average 5-6 HP/level beyond the first and 12 HP at the first level.
  2. Players have a Con score of 14.
  3. Standards last 2-3 rounds apiece, and have 50% accuracy.

The goal should be to bloody a same level character in the mob's life expectancy of 2.5 rounds. For example:

(8+2*3)*.5*2.5 = 18.5 expected damage per level 3 standard vs a level 3 player's expected HP of ~37.

You could even go as far as 3 x monster level damage, though anything beyond that is risky.


The exception is minions which already deal inflated damage; these presently deal 2x as much damage as normal relative to their XP.


Also, the way to instantly challenge virtually any group of PCs is to throw a shit ton of ranged minions out them that are spread out (thus negating most of the threat of AoEs) and attacking from advantageous positions (behind cover/superior cover/concealment, beyond difficult/deadly terrain, etc). Preferably these minions should have some kind of 'death' attack, or other effect on death.


As a rule, lots of AoE Artillery mobs are devastating for comparable reasons.

Pits/hazardous terrain + forced movement are likewise an easy way to readily menace the players, especially if they're concealed.

Great ways to make the dungeon the encounter are using puzzle traps.

eg - a riddle inscribed on the edge of the door can only be answered by moving the plinths in the room, but any wrong move triggers a trap such as noxious gas, bear pit etc.

Also, I had great success in which an entire session was devoted to figuring out how to get into the dungeon in the first place. not just finding the dungeon, but upon finding the door figuring out how to open it.

In my games players don't level up until I say they do. That being for any given campaign I place a level cap on it by saying when you complete X amount of goals you get a level up. The reason for this is that in 4e players are much more powerful than they really should be. When they level they become that much stronger, which more or less to me screams that the world is in an Arms Race. I don't know how comfortable you are in manipulating your game with House Rules, but for the games I run that are 4e it seems to have improved the experience.

A few of my players were skeptical of this at first, but was more rewarding for them in the long run and made the experience much more realistic. I do happen to be a fan of more difficult games, but from what I have seen the players are happy they are being challenged rather than instantly gratified.

Among other things I do I also add special conditions to some combat scenarios that define victory. This allows everyone to contribute in a more meaningful way than, "I cast my Magic Missle." It also brings them together as a party by using things in unconventional ways.

You probably don't want me to give you trap room based encounters. A few weeks ago my players told me they wanted a challenging dungeon. They were in room suspended high in the air. The first trap was blatantly obvious, but was tied to a second trap. The players assumed since the first trap was disarmed they were ok. Nope. The second trap sealed the room they were in up. Desperately searching for a way out they triggered a third trap of poisoned needles. I didn't let them die, but I also don't let my players forget my worlds are dangerous places where if they get overconfident and by proxy sloppy there is a price to pay for that. I would however be willing to provide some templates for traps and you can use them how you will.

Have you tried to make a giant labyrinth? If you could manage having two parties at once, you could split them up, and eventually have them meet up right before they find out that the labyrinth had taken one of them. Also, you can make some simple, but hidden, traps. If you put an orc in a room, your players are bound to chase it, but they will most likely forget to check for traps, and run right into one. I'm not saying to kill your PCs, but you should at least make them hit a few traps

You could throw in something of a skill challenge in the combat as well. Bad guys are coming at them from a couple angles, bad guys on top readying to pour some molten nast on PC's from above, have to close trap door or disable a mechanism to stop it all or something?

But then your combat might take 2 days because it's D&D lol




 

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