The Cake Maker of Kiev
Registered User
A lot bit spoilery-- if you have not played, maybe skip this thread.
Also, a bit scattered:
-Overall, I'd like to write dungeons like this for myself in the future. I didn't really get into loving D&D until 4th, and the dungeons in 4th just weren't written like this. If the dungeon were a piece of the campaign, I would write it much shorter (maybe about one half the floor plan, and only requiring a third of it to finish). If it were THE ENTIRE CAMPAIGN / "Story", I'd make it about twice the size with even more wrong ways. Then again, I'd require the group to vote a Caller & a Mapper. The number of ways the pc's could just go down the wrong hallways was entertaining at first...
-I am kinda sad that the adventuring party isn't going to advance with their own Mud ship, but ah well. I knew what I was getting into, and should have known not to let my feelings get in the way.
-On day one, I was running for a balanced party while also being able to listen to a party of OMG_DAMAGE_LOL players. My balanced group kept making the right choice by accident, or having the solution, or making completely reasonable half solutions (freezing the ACID water room felt like a good-enough-for-three-rounds plan, and they found the secret door right away). The Monk-Monk-Fighter-BOOM_WIZARD group kept finding puzzles they could not merely beat their way through, and thus took many dice of Acid as they.. punched? the acid?
-Days 2 & 3 there was only the one table running. Go figure. Day 2 inherited 1 LOL_DAMAGE player, and 1 player who was absent from days 1 & 3. Day 3 was the core table +1 guy who'd never seen 5th ed before, but grew up on 1st ed. He seemed like he was right at home.
Monsters: using the beasts inside as written, it seems that the most threatening thing you can do with Monsters is use MANY monsters, as opposed to one beast. The lv6 Water Elementals (AC12, 60hp) were a much larger threat to the party (with or without being reformed by the rooms magic waters) than any Lv14 beast (Ac15+, 150+hp) in any other room.
This had something to do with my dice (rolling high for the elementals, low for the "solos"), but even if I would have rolled awesome on the bigguns, the rest of the party would have disabled it before it could take a 2nd action. Conversly, when the Monk flurries a single elemental for 60+ damage, the extra just gets wasted, as opposed to spreading to its compatriots. Letting the several small pools act as a sort of, um, Firewall? against pc damage.
In general, I'd advise at least 1 "equal level" monster per two player characters if the DM wants to feel like they're threatening the player party. Alternately, giving the monster a trap-thing that they can also use to threaten the PC's. But empty-room, one-monster encounters are at best a 2-Round encounter where the monster typically gets one attack.
Were I to run this particular adventure again, I'd put in a pair of all the "Single" monsters, but leave the water elementals as-is. Unless PC damage takes a huge dive in a future playtest, then maybe I'd have to reconsider.
Skill Checks:
In a group without many overlapping skills, these "DC25" checks feel insane. +5 Attribute, +"5" skill (average on a d10), you'd need a 15 on the 20 to meet the dc. 13 for a rogue (assuming we treat 2d10, keep high, and call it an average of 7). To keep proceeding at an orderly rate, you would really want a pair of rogues (one high Str, one high Dex, assist each other all day) with you just to avoid rolling under the dc.
Might just be a product of the times it was written in, but this dungeon seemed to need two rogues, a cleric and a wizard to run smoothest. Any extra character could be a fighter or monk, or an additional Thief/Cleric/Wizard.
By night #3, I ended up telling the rogue that he's seen how the lock-logic works in this dungeon, and his DC has gone down considerably. This worked better in my eyes than waiting for him to roll a combined 25 over & over, and only made him roll for things directly attached to traps.
Anyone else run through this adventure? Thinking of something I'd done silly-wrong? Let me know all about it
Also, a bit scattered:
-Overall, I'd like to write dungeons like this for myself in the future. I didn't really get into loving D&D until 4th, and the dungeons in 4th just weren't written like this. If the dungeon were a piece of the campaign, I would write it much shorter (maybe about one half the floor plan, and only requiring a third of it to finish). If it were THE ENTIRE CAMPAIGN / "Story", I'd make it about twice the size with even more wrong ways. Then again, I'd require the group to vote a Caller & a Mapper. The number of ways the pc's could just go down the wrong hallways was entertaining at first...
-I am kinda sad that the adventuring party isn't going to advance with their own Mud ship, but ah well. I knew what I was getting into, and should have known not to let my feelings get in the way.
-On day one, I was running for a balanced party while also being able to listen to a party of OMG_DAMAGE_LOL players. My balanced group kept making the right choice by accident, or having the solution, or making completely reasonable half solutions (freezing the ACID water room felt like a good-enough-for-three-rounds plan, and they found the secret door right away). The Monk-Monk-Fighter-BOOM_WIZARD group kept finding puzzles they could not merely beat their way through, and thus took many dice of Acid as they.. punched? the acid?
-Days 2 & 3 there was only the one table running. Go figure. Day 2 inherited 1 LOL_DAMAGE player, and 1 player who was absent from days 1 & 3. Day 3 was the core table +1 guy who'd never seen 5th ed before, but grew up on 1st ed. He seemed like he was right at home.
Monsters: using the beasts inside as written, it seems that the most threatening thing you can do with Monsters is use MANY monsters, as opposed to one beast. The lv6 Water Elementals (AC12, 60hp) were a much larger threat to the party (with or without being reformed by the rooms magic waters) than any Lv14 beast (Ac15+, 150+hp) in any other room.
This had something to do with my dice (rolling high for the elementals, low for the "solos"), but even if I would have rolled awesome on the bigguns, the rest of the party would have disabled it before it could take a 2nd action. Conversly, when the Monk flurries a single elemental for 60+ damage, the extra just gets wasted, as opposed to spreading to its compatriots. Letting the several small pools act as a sort of, um, Firewall? against pc damage.
In general, I'd advise at least 1 "equal level" monster per two player characters if the DM wants to feel like they're threatening the player party. Alternately, giving the monster a trap-thing that they can also use to threaten the PC's. But empty-room, one-monster encounters are at best a 2-Round encounter where the monster typically gets one attack.
Were I to run this particular adventure again, I'd put in a pair of all the "Single" monsters, but leave the water elementals as-is. Unless PC damage takes a huge dive in a future playtest, then maybe I'd have to reconsider.
Skill Checks:
In a group without many overlapping skills, these "DC25" checks feel insane. +5 Attribute, +"5" skill (average on a d10), you'd need a 15 on the 20 to meet the dc. 13 for a rogue (assuming we treat 2d10, keep high, and call it an average of 7). To keep proceeding at an orderly rate, you would really want a pair of rogues (one high Str, one high Dex, assist each other all day) with you just to avoid rolling under the dc.
Might just be a product of the times it was written in, but this dungeon seemed to need two rogues, a cleric and a wizard to run smoothest. Any extra character could be a fighter or monk, or an additional Thief/Cleric/Wizard.
By night #3, I ended up telling the rogue that he's seen how the lock-logic works in this dungeon, and his DC has gone down considerably. This worked better in my eyes than waiting for him to roll a combined 25 over & over, and only made him roll for things directly attached to traps.
Anyone else run through this adventure? Thinking of something I'd done silly-wrong? Let me know all about it