Topic: Scaling Adventure Encounters

[jskinny]

Hey Guys,

I?m knew to the forums.  I started out in high school with MERP, then graduated to RM in college.  After that I quit role playing for a few years. Several years back I decided to start role playing again but went over to the dark side of D20. 

Anyway, to my question?.

How exactly do you guys scale your encounters with parties?  Here?s my example;

If I have a party of 4 1st level characters getting ready to fight a group of goblins, what is the appropriate number of goblins so not to overwhelm the party but still make it a good fight?

Thanks

[Thos]

This is a really tough question to answer simply. I have been running HARP for 3 years now, and I have basically found that it completely depends on the party that you are GMing for. It takes trial and error at the beginning. My best advice would be to start with a lesser number of goblins and see how the party fairs. If that is too easy, adjust the number as you see fit thereafter. I hope that helps! Take care!

[jskinny]

Thanks Thos,

That?s what I was thinking.  I will probably start with a smaller number and work my way up. 

[Defendi]

Remember that easy fights are an important part of good storytelling.  When a player thrashes a bad guy, he feels like his character is powerful and it starts to trigger wish-fulfillment impulses.  So it's never a BAD idea to start off with easy fights.  Sometimes there are better ideas, but starting with a jaunt and working your way up is a good dramatic build.

[Defendi]

Especially if it's a new game and the players need to learn the system.

[Rasyr-Mjolnir]

If I have a party of 4 1st level characters getting ready to fight a group of goblins, what is the appropriate number of goblins so not to overwhelm the party but still make it a good fight?

4 Goblins would be about an even match if your PCs are all fighters....

All monsters are the equivalent of a Fighter of their given level....

[Uriel]

Especially if it's a new game and the players need to learn the system.

And it's a system (ICE) where a goblin with a dagger can find a way to drop three adventurers in full armor...




-Uriel

[jasonbrisbane]

HI jskinny,

Firstly, Welcome to the Fold!

Personally, I'd put one less goblins than the number of party members and give two of them spears or short bows to use as ranged weapons until the party gets in close (ESPECIALLY if your planning an ambush!)
Oh, and dont forget to give the Ranged goblins some ranks in Sniping!

If you can scare the party in the initial first round, then they will be hesitant about trying to deal with "easy first level " goblins. Remember, Tactics, Tactics, Tactics!

I hope that helps!

[bunny]

One strategy I'd suggest early on (especially when designing a "climactic" encounter near an adventure's end) is to design a scenario where the foes arrive over time. Either there are reinforcements on the way, or some of the enemy are tied up elsewhere (fighting someone else, doing evil deeds, etcetera).

The advantage is you can modify the numbers, without the players noticing and if they're waltzing through the finale - more or tougher reinforcements turn up. If they're getting creamed, perhaps the reinforcements never arrive or arrived wounded/depleted in some way.

This allows you to fudge things on the fly without it being obvious to players. I have been in the situation, as a player, of entering the final battle - getting creamed for a few rounds, then suddenly the bad guys start "rolling really badly" and we sit there for rounds and rounds, near death's door while hardly getting hit as we chip away at the initially overpowered mastermind.

[chk]

The advantage is you can modify the numbers, without the players noticing and if they're waltzing through the finale - more or tougher reinforcements turn up. If they're getting creamed, perhaps the reinforcements never arrive or arrived wounded/depleted in some way.

Amusingly, both HARP and D&D caution against simply adding more monsters to an encounter. The general concensus is that you can't fool your players; they'll know.

Adjust the EXP for the encounter, and design the next one differently. Your players will like you better

OTOH If the players are getting *creamed*, the standard TV response is that they all get captured instead of killed, and then have to plot their escape...

Just my opinions, of course!

[Right Wing Wacko]

I agree with chk.
Makes good sense.

[munchy]

I guess that four goblin would also work for non-pure-fighter parties as well. We have a party running with a rogue, two clerics, and a ranger and four goblins were tough but doable without too much damage to the party. The ranger really kicked a... and at least one of the cleric has pretty handy spells ready to defend the party and himself.

[jasonbrisbane]

IN one combat  versus 6 skeletons one party of 5 got creamed (1 player Shadow Ported out otherwsie it would have been a TPK).
In the second encounter we had three people, two tough fighter types and a ranger and we kicked the skeletons A$$!
The difference?

We prepared and used tactics, botttlenecked the Skeletons so they couldnt reach us easily. Didnt all run to do our own thing... Tactics, while a buzzword, is very much needed and can be used to help or hinder any situation.

What you could do is think about the environment the combat is in:
If a forest then the trees will give hard cover (half or full) and thus +50/+100 DB).
Bushes will give Soft Cover against ranged weapons.

Give the players the opportunity to use the terrain against the goblins, and the goblins can do the same...
Just to make combat a bit more interesting!

[jurasketu]

I think that one of the most important lessons to "teach" adventurers is "when to retreat or run away". Too often, adventurers never plan for a tactical disaster - and so the GM either has to kill them or "cheat" the encounter. Even as veteran players, my friends and I would sometimes FAIL to retreat or worse make a spectacularly ill-advised aggressive tactical blunder. And we would die. Deservedly so. On the flip side, GMs often ignore the psychology of the bad guys - if an encounter turns ugly for the bad guys they should retreat or panic as the tactical situation dictates. This can lead to another lesson. Be careful chasing retreating bad guys - sometimes panic is not what it seems and suddenly adventurers have become disordered and vulnerable to the unexpected arrival of reinforcements.

So. I think its important to train adventurers in the art of planning a retreat and studying their tactical options. Storytelling of past misadventures either out-of-character or by clever use of an in-game storyteller can help encourage that kind of thinking. Sometimes it is good Gamemastering to hint that a retreat might be a good idea. Personally, I like to have a GM controlled adventurer. That adventurer's job is to subtly point out obvious "tactical" stuff that the players have never considered and sound the retreat when everyone else is focused on fighting to the death. Of course, sometimes the lesson is best learned the hard way and will often live on in the annals of "Stupid Things We Once Did".

Robin

[munchy]

I'd say skeletons are a lot harder to fight than goblins as they are undead and have all those special features that goblins don't have. Although the goblins my party once faced were pretty tough as they weren't a regular fighter/ranger patrol but a special "hunting" party led by a novice shaman, magic can pretty much ruin all the imagined balance ... I really love that "Fear" spell, got the players several times!

[GMLovlie]

skeletons are bad.... my first character had the quite fitting final words of "they?re only skeletons", got his arm chopped off and died of bleeding... we were 3 players, not facing too many skeletons (we were level 2 or 3), but lucky shots are killers...
There are lots of good suggestions here; I?d say keeping enemies less in numbers than the players to start with gives both the GM and the players a good grip on how volatile combat can be, and gives the players the necessary lessons of tactics, then you can start to challenge them more.

[mocking bird]

The goblin/skeleton difference brings up another interesting point - that HARP monsters are a bit different than their D&D or even RM counterparts.  There is quite a bit of difference in the undead and dragons are also a bit different.

But one thing HARP also has going for it is that you can pretty easily scale up an individual monster.  As mentioned they are built on a fighter template so you can add a few ranks or even spells to offer some variety to the 'stock' critters.

[Rivstyx]

Especially if it's a new game and the players need to learn the system.

And it's a system (ICE) where a goblin with a dagger can find a way to drop three adventurers in full armor...




-Uriel

Yep.  I had a character killed by a housecat once.  Rolemaster and HARP are so deadly that they can be very hard to scale. 

[jurasketu]

Re: Rivstyx

In 20+ years of RM and more recently HARP (literally 1000s of hours of gaming), I've never had a character slain by a single "weak" creature - ever. Yes, there is a probability that a really high open end and no defense plus a high critical could result in a character death. But most FUMBLE charts (in all systems) have a higher chance of slaying a character than having a basic goblin kill three characters in full armor or being killed by a housecat - and why did you get attacked by a housecat exactly? Which is why I despise most fumble charts... But that's another matter.

In HARP, Fate Points would avoid such a death critical - which is kind of what they were designed to do - avoid the silly vagaries of probability.

[jasonbrisbane]

The goblin/skeleton difference brings up another interesting point - that HARP monsters are a bit different than their D&D or even RM counterparts.  There is quite a bit of difference in the undead and dragons are also a bit different.

But one thing HARP also has going for it is that you can pretty easily scale up an individual monster.  As mentioned they are built on a fighter template so you can add a few ranks or even spells to offer some variety to the 'stock' critters.

Yes, the big difference is that HARP Combat has rules for Stun, bleeding and Maneuver penalties - something DnD doesn't have! They would consider any such thing anathema to the  HP system.

So Skeletons, while Easy for DnD, are harder in RM/HARP. A L1 goblin would die easily under a L1 Skeleton as the Skeleton doesn't take Stun or Bleeding.

Its the difference between a quick'n'nasty (IMHO) gaming system and a great gaming system (Which ICE systems are).
(I've played RMC-which I believe is now the Classic- as well as HARP, which I love for its combat complexity and ease and simplified skill tree.)