Raining Dead

This week’s blog covers last night’s session and some changes I’ve made to how I DM.

Last night’s session was definitely a memorable one.  The players are still in the thick of the battle fighting waves of drow.  It took the whole night to get through the wave I put them against.  I was a mean DM and put the three PC’s up against four drow fighters, one drow wizard, one drow psionic, and two drow barbarians on riding lizards. A trebuchet was manned by the four drow fighters.   Starting out the evening the heroes were at level five, but after working so hard to defeat their foes the rose to level six after the encounter. 

Tyr was still in griffon form when we began but quickly decided that this battle required him in his natural form.  He dove down for a landing knocking three of the fighters on the trebuchet prone as he landed.  Hal’s barbarian raged hard but he was pummeled by the two lizard riding barbarians and the psionic, bringing him near death several times during the fight.  As the party started to worry that they wouldn’t all survive this encounter a goliath in black armor and a ram companion came charging at Gaut’s (Hal’s halfling barbarian) back wielding a great hammer.  Before the party could determine if this goliath was an ally or an enemy the goliath brought his mighty hammer down over Gaunt’s diminutive head……striking the barbarian that was trying to kill Gaunt.  Immediately after striking the barbarian the goliath patted Gaunt on the back, healing him.

The stranger’s presence gave the party a second wind.  They rallied, defeating the last of the wave.  I started a new mechanic last night.   When it gets to the last enemy and a player makes a roll that will be the death blow of that last enemy I ask them “So how do you want to do this?”  They then describe the manner in which they kill the last opponent.  Carter had the pleasure last night, he took out the last fighter by shooting him in the foot with an arrow then dragging him over and loading him into the trebuchet.  The party turned it around so that it would fire back into the enemy’s lines and fired the drow back at his own.  They then proceeded to loot the bodies, taking what was of value and then loading the rest into the trebuchet and firing it.  They also loaded the rest of the dead drow in so that they could send the dead raining down on the advancing army.

The goliath introduced himself as Argon a cleric (played by Tyr).  They know little about him but they can use any ally they can get.

We’ve been playing 5e since it came out last year, and something that my players have whined about is that 5e is a very low magic world and they just don’t like it.  I’ve decided to make it more like 3.5 where magic played a heavy roll.  To do this I’m making scrolls and wands more available.  I’ve also gone through the DMG and made a complete list of all of the potions and they will be available in varying degrees throughout the realm.  Everything is much more common that 5e intends.  They will also be finding magic items more often. 

High magic doesn’t work well with the way 5e is written it makes the PC’s too overpowered so I’m compensating for it by tweeking the monster stats and providing potions and magic items to their enemies as well.  My players are ecstatic that I’m going back to my 3.5 handling of magic items.  Time will tell if this will work but I think I can pull it off.

We will finish the battle next week and I hope it turns out to be worth the build up.

5 Tips to Help the DM Play Adversaries

Part of being a quality DM is creating memorable encounters and in order to do that a DM must be able to bring creatures and villains to life. We spend time creating memorable NPC’s but it can be easy to forget about role playing and make combat nothing more than a numbers game. The following are some tips for the DM to bring the creatures and villains in your encounters to life.

1.Read the description in the monster manual. This is a role playing game and it’s not just the players who role play; the DM has the daunting task of role playing all NPC’s and all of the opponents that the party will face. It’s easy to get caught up in the combat and forget that it’s not just as simple as slashing with a sword and casting spells. Playing the advisory is more than just a numbers game, and it is the DM’s responsibility to make encounters richer by role playing each creature and villain the party encounters. When you choose an opponent for your players to face the first thing I recommend you do is read the description in the Monster Manual. It is not just fluff, the description about each creature contains valuable information to help you play the opponent you’ve chosen.

2.Do they fight alone or with friends? This ties in with tip number one. Some creatures fight alone, some fight as a pack, some are usually found alongside other creatures. Reading the description in the Monster manual will give you insight into this question. By following the advice found there you can construct more fulfilling encounters. Fighting an ogre that has crossed the party’s path is fine, but knowing that ogre bands are frequently found with goblinoids, orcs, or trolls makes an encounter much more exciting.

3.Play up or down to their intelligence. It’s easy to have the creatures just fight as you deem would be the best course of action, but remember this is role playing. You have to think about how intelligent your creature or villain is. Ask yourself, “How smart is this creature or person? Would it have the sense to take out the biggest threat first or would it just target whoever is closest to it?” An ogre is not going to have the same tactical knowledge that a half-elf barbarian has. As the DM you need to look at things through the intelligence level of the creature you are playing and be sure to play true to that creature's abilities.

4.Find their motivation. Being a DM is a lot like being an actor. Good actors always know why their characters are doing what they do. Role playing a creature or a villain is no different. Why the creature is doing something affects how they do it. A halfling forced to steal an artifact or have his family killed is going to have a different fighting style than a human warlock bent on world domination. Always know the back story of why your villains and creatures are doing what they do even if the motives will never be revealed to your players.

5.Understand their tactics. This is where you need to have at least a little knowledge about how animals hunt and military strategy. You don’t have to be an expert but having some knowledge will help you out. Watch some documentaries on predatory animals. Knowing that a wolf and a shark hunt in different ways will help you to bring life to your creatures by making your encounters more fleshed out. Watch some history documentaries, how was the Huns’ fighting style different from the Romans or the Celts? By looking into these real world examples you can make your villains more three dimensional and realistic. Have different villains or creatures use these different tactics and you will create memorable encounters.

Take to the Skies

My players are always full of surprises and creativity, that’s what I love about being their DM. Here was last night’s situation with a bit of background. Their party has been hired to aid a town of surface Drow who is under threat of attack from a group of Underdark Drow. Our intrepid heroes were first tasked to infiltrate the Underdark Drow city to discover when they were planning their attack for. They managed to steal some parchments from the war room which contained two plans for routes of attack but none of the parchments said when they would attack. The priestess in charge of the above ground Drow asked them upon return if they would stay and aid in the fight against the Underdark Drow. There was quite a bit of debate about whether or not to stay but after a long discussion, they all agreed that they would stay and aid in the town’s defense. They had two days about town before the Underdark invasion began, the army of Underdark drow coming at them from three sides.

The party decided that they would aid the side with the least defense. Their plan of attack was not something I expected. Tyr is playing a shape-shifter (a race that we homebrewed) and their plain was to used aerial combat by having him shift into a griffin. Here’s the mechanics of how I ran the all-out war. The surface Drow have an army comprised of themselves and the aid of a dwarvish division and a deep gnome division. The other side is composed of Drow and slaves of varying races. Everyone is technically fighting all at the same time, our party is engaged with one small group of bad guys at a time. When that group falls they engage the next group of combatants. There is no time for rest or even to down a healing potion in-between encounters.

Hal and Carter’s PC’s jumped on Tyr’s Griffin took to the skies circling over their prey. Carter’s PC is an excellent archer so he was doing some amazing damage from the back of the griffin. Hal, to the contrary, is not designed for ranged combat so after a couple of rounds of him not even giving the evil Drow a sting he waited until one of the times Tyr dove down for an attack and jumped off of Tyr’s back in order to engage the enemy on the ground where he was more effective. Now this is one of those times where you have to not be a slave to the rules. If you want to be technical for Hal to dismount Tyr would have had to land and stay standing on the ground until Hal’s next turn for Hal to take the action to dismount. That would mean that Tyr and Carter would have to stay vulnerable on the ground until it got back around to Tyr’s turn again when he could use his movement to take back to the skies. It doesn’t make for very entertaining game play. However a griffin screeching on an attack dive with a raging halfling barbarian leaping from his back and landing soundly on the ground beside an opponent, now that is interesting game play. For the rest of the night this is how they battled; with Hal on the ground raging connecting with flail and shield bash (aiming specifically for the Drow’s groin region), Carter sniping them from the sky with his bow, and Tyr ripping them to ribbons with his griffin talons and beak. It was pretty epic.

They are only two encounters into the war. There are waves to come and a few other surprises up my sleeves. The guys enjoyed themselves and hopefully they will continue to have fun with what lays in store for them. It will probably take two if not three more sessions to get through the war. I’m know I’m looking forward to it, and I hope my players are too.