D&D update
by Denise Sawicki on July 28, 2008
The guys made it to 4th level and then we added 2 new characters. We had a dragonborn warlord and an elf ranger, at 4th level we added an eladrin wizard and a dwarf fighter. Darrell is playing the fighter and warlord, Darrin has the ranger (though he's not exactly into the game so we're lucky if we're able to call him to the table to actually make his dice rolls) and I got the wizard even though I'm DM :-P. Her name is Gazandra. I like her... Oh, we are taking double experience for everything since the DM guide says that is OK. So that is how we managed to make levels so fast. All 4 characters just made it to 5th level though we haven't done any playing at that level yet.
It's going OK. I don't think we're quite smart enough for this game though. There are lots of crazy rules we keep forgetting. I sent them after the smallest dragon in the monster manual, the Young White Dragon, which is a 3rd level Solo monster, which is supposed to mean that it is the equivalent of 5 3rd level monsters. The DM guide actually has a little suggested adventure for 5 first level characters and that adventure ends with them still being at first level and fighting this same dragon. So hey, it shouldn't be too hard for 4 fourth level characters, right?? Wrong of course... This dragon can recharge his breath weapon upon rolling a 5 or 6 on a 6 sided dice. The idea, I'm sure, is that the guy will recharge it about once every three turns but he recharged it about 6 out of 7 times. There was definitely only once that he didn't recharge it. Then everybody hit with the breath weapon takes I think 3d6 + 4 damage and is weakened and slowed, meaning they can only walk 2 squares per turn and they only deal half damage. (Apparently only half damage for magic attacks too.. it just says "attack"). I guess we were a bit stupid on certain counts, such as the wizard probably should have been walking her measly 2 squares every turn to try to slowly maneuver out of a spot where she could be hit by the breath weapon in the same blast with the fighter... The we forgot a few weird effects that could have helped us, including flanking (+2 bonus to attack roll)... can't believe we forgot that one... the whole time I was trying to have the dragon go easy on them by not attacking anyone who was too heavily damaged... it could very easily have killed some people..... needless to say, despite all this, they barely made it out alive... Every one of the awesome daily powers that the fighter and warlord had, missed... We feel a bit pathetic that we are apparently supposed to be able to kill this thing at 1st level and barely managed it at 4th... sigh.... I know we have only 4 characters, but 4th level is a lot better than 1st... 1st level characters only have about 24 hit points for crissake, I'm pretty sure that thing could kill them in one round since it can get two attacks per round... So we must just be stupid. :-P Darrell's convinced he has supernaturally bad luck. I mean, literally supernatural :P
anyway... that fight took freakin 3 hours even without us remembering to account for all the things we were supposed to account for. I guess I like it though. It was nice to pass the time keeping out brains occupied and not thinking about other things that might be bothering us. I wish Darrell didn't have this idea that he has to do it the "official" way and always fight monsters of the suggested level. It is so much more fun fighting lower level monsters. He keeps suggesting I throw something tougher at them but every time I do it is a total disaster :) Oh well.
Three Replies to D&D update
Denise Sawicki | July 29, 2008
I tried to put in a little bit of plot but I don't have it all worked out in advance I guess... I just would prefer not to fight anything of the suggested level because it's too hard :P
Lilly Kyle | August 14, 2008
Well my DM gives us a little of both...the tough fights and simple ones too....so any low lev. character can have an equal playing ground with the higher lev. characters....but the easiest thing to do is to pick something that would best suit the whole party....because believe you me....putting a lev. 1 hero against a lev. 4 creature is not fun...i have had that happen
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Scott Hardie | July 29, 2008
Do you play with much plot, or just traditional dungeon crawls where you slay monsters and win treasure? If you have a bigger story to tell, low-level encounters can be a part of that, setting up a bigger battle later. For instance, your heroes could liberate a village controlled by low-level cultists, but in defeat they promise to summon a powerful monster against the town that your heroes have to figure out how to beat before it gets there.