Please could someone confirm whether we played this correctly?
First ever play of D&D for any of us.
We are playing 3 players + myself as GM, using three of the premade characters. The group stopped at the two dead horses on the path. The Fighter went to explore the horses.
The Wizard remained on the wagon, whilst the Rogue was on the road, behind the wagon.
The goblins won the stealth roll, beating both the Passive Wisdom (Perception) of the Fighter and the Wizard - however, as the halfling Rogue was behind the wagon, I figured the Goblins would not know he was there, so he was able to take part in the first turn.
We then rolled for Initiative for the Rogue - 1d20 + Dex moderator - and once for the goblins - 1d20 + Dex. Rogue won, so he went first.
He chose to move a little, so that he was half-covered by the wagon and then fired his short bow into the bushes. 1d20 + Dex. His roll was less than the Goblin's AC so missed.
Then the Goblins took their turn. Two rushed down to attack the Fighter by the horses. Both rolled 1d20 -1(Strength as it was melee) +4 (for Scimitar attack). Neither was greater than Fighter's AC so no damage done.
Then one of the goblins on higher ground opted to attack the Wizard sitting on the wagon. I rolled 1d20 +2(Dexterity as it was ranged) +4 (for shortbow attack). This was greater than the Wizard's AC of 12, so was a hit.
So to deal damage, I rolled 1d6 +2. Total 8. Wizard's maximum HP is 8, so Wizard is now unconscious. Not a great start. And pretty off-putting for a new player.
You did, more or less. Your handling of the stealths > surprise and such was a little clunky, but overall, it seems the rules were applied well enough.
You also got to experience one of the most glaring challenges in early D&D, the fragile casters/PCs. It is VERY easy for a low level party to wipe with just a couple bad die rolls. Your example of a goblin getting a decent roll to hit followed by a good damage roll spelled disaster for the Wizard. It is the bane of every DM running a low level party, couple good dice from the enemies and your group is in dire trouble. Some DM's will spoof rolls to allow the game to continue. In your case, I would likely have checked the wizard's HP and when advised it was 8, the goblin's damage, while totaling 8 in maths, would present to the group as 7. Keeps the Wizard upright (for a few more moments a least) but has brought him/her to the brink of Death's Door.
It's a learning experience and some DM's are less forgiving that I, and will have your player simply roll a new character if they are not properly rescued/revived) What works best for your table, you will apparently need to see. There is an argument for introducing players with character deaths early to show them to NOT get TOO attached to any character lol.
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Talk to your Players.Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
With only 3 players, and new ones at that, you will need to down tune most if not all encounters in LMoP. They will meet;
At level 1, a bugbear with a Wolf and 2 goblins. Room with ?7? Goblins. 4 wolves.
At level 2, a Banshee. A Necromancer with 12 skeletons at his command. Possibly a mansion full of bandits, one monster, one wizard.
At level 3, 3-4 Orcs with an Ogre. Dozen cultists. A Green Dragon!
Most of these (sans banshee) are potentially deadly encounters for a low level party of 3. You should read ahead so you're prepared for what they'll meet. You should also consider not rolling hit die for monsters and just taking minimum or close to it HP. For example; say a monster has 3d6 +4 hit die. That represents a range or 7 - 22 HP. As the DM, you can just set the HP to something like 10 if you want to make the encounter easier, or 20 if you want it to be harder. You can also reduce the number of enemies. And in the case of the banshee and Necromancer w/ skeletons (as a new DM with new players) remind them that not all monsters need be slain, some can be talked to. The Banshee quest itself does a good job of stressing that.
Please could someone confirm whether we played this correctly?
First ever play of D&D for any of us.
We are playing 3 players + myself as GM, using three of the premade characters. The group stopped at the two dead horses on the path. The Fighter went to explore the horses.
The Wizard remained on the wagon, whilst the Rogue was on the road, behind the wagon.
The goblins won the stealth roll, beating both the Passive Wisdom (Perception) of the Fighter and the Wizard - however, as the halfling Rogue was behind the wagon, I figured the Goblins would not know he was there, so he was able to take part in the first turn.
We then rolled for Initiative for the Rogue - 1d20 + Dex moderator - and once for the goblins - 1d20 + Dex. Rogue won, so he went first.
You should have rolled initiative for the fighter and wizard here as well; they still have their turns as initiative ticks down, they just begin with the surprised condition which means they can't act on their turn and can't take reactions until after their turn.
He chose to move a little, so that he was half-covered by the wagon and then fired his short bow into the bushes. 1d20 + Dex. His roll was less than the Goblin's AC so missed.
Rogues are proficient with shortbows, so the roll should have been 1d20 + Dex mod + proficiency bonus.
Then the Goblins took their turn. Two rushed down to attack the Fighter by the horses. Both rolled 1d20 -1(Strength as it was melee) +4 (for Scimitar attack). Neither was greater than Fighter's AC so no damage done.
This is incorrect. First of all, scimitars have the finesse property, so they use either strength or dexterity. Second, that is already factored into the +4. The +4 in the attack's description is the only thing you need to worry about.
Then one of the goblins on higher ground opted to attack the Wizard sitting on the wagon. I rolled 1d20 +2(Dexterity as it was ranged) +4 (for shortbow attack). This was greater than the Wizard's AC of 12, so was a hit.
Similarly, the +2 from dexterity is already factored into the +4. If that would still have been at least 12, it would have hit anyway, so no harm no foul, but you gave the goblin an extra +2 it shouldn't have had.
So to deal damage, I rolled 1d6 +2. Total 8. Wizard's maximum HP is 8, so Wizard is now unconscious. Not a great start. And pretty off-putting for a new player.
This is correct. Rolling max damage on that can be rough. 8 is actually pretty high HP for a first-level wizard.
Did I do it all correctly?
Many thanks in advance!
Paul
Read up on how the proficiency bonus works and keep in mind that the numbers given for specific attacks in monster stat blocks already have all the math done for you; you don't need to add any ability modifiers to them. That aside, it seems like you handled the encounter pretty well. D&D can be dangerous at low levels, especially to classes with lower hit points. A party composition of fighter, rogue, wizard also doesn't give you any access to spells like healing word that are particularly useful in just this situation. But hopefully the party pulled through and the wizard recovered. As the characters level up and get more HP, things get a little more consistent and predictable.
The only thing I could see that didn't jive was that you roll Intiative for everyone at the same time - the Fighter and Wizard should have rolled at the same time as the Goblins and the Rogue. It's possible that's what happened, but you didn't mention it.
Normally, the effect of stealth is that anyone who didn't spot the side sneaking doesn't get to act the first round. Whether the Rogue was spotted by the Goblins was irrelevant - if he didn't spot the Goblins, he wouldn't have had a turn in the first round, if he did spot the Goblins, then he would have had a turn in the first round.
But you got the important bits. If you're worried about the the fact that the Wizard got KO'd...that's not unusual. For the first few levels, your Max HP is not much more than what the enemies dole out with individual hits. Sorceror's and Wizards are particularly prone, since they have low Hit Dice and tend to havelw Constitution (so get low health), and a low AC so they tend to actually get hit when targeted. It's just how the game is built. As you get higher levels, the Max HP increases so PCs can tank hits better, AC improves, and they tend to be better equipped to deal with hits, so encounters become more survivable.
Ankther problem you'll have at lower levels is that it's much more dependent on dice rolls. Because the Wizard had 8HP and the Goblin could do 1d6+2, they just happened to max out and KO Wizard as a fluke. At higher levels, the Wizard.may have 30HP, but that takes multiple hits to take out, so the average matters more. The Wizard can tank that 8 damage, then next time might only be 3 and balance it out. At lower levels, those heavy hits really cause problems.
So yeah, don't worry too much. These problems largely disappear at higher levels. A bit of advice: keep your rolls hidden and especially at low levels, feel free to tone them down. They're prone to doing more damage than OCs are designed to take.
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Please could someone confirm whether we played this correctly?So to deal damage, I rolled 1d6 +2. Total 8. Wizard's maximum HP is 8, so Wizard is now unconscious. Not a great start. And pretty off-putting for a new player.
Did I do it all correctly?
Everyone else has covered most of it, but most monster stat blocks list attack damage as something like:
Hit: 11 piercing damage
Instead of rolling, you can just use the first number. This both speeds things up by rolling less dice, and makes the damage consistent, so random lucky rolls are less likely to swing a fight as much.
Also, while it may seem off-putting, the very first time I played, new players and GM, many, many, many years ago, we got completely slaughtered by the monsters, and it didn't dissuade us any.
The only other thing I would add is that the goblins should use their dex mod rather than strength as a scimitar is a finesse weapon. The ac will vary as well, the ones using bows should have their ac reduced by 2 as they aren’t using their shields. So your rogue - if he had targeted a goblin bowman would only need a 13 total, even with a 16 dex he would only have needed to roll an 8 or higher to hit. (10 or higher to hit the ones attacking with scimitars).
Lastly the premade characters are absolutely terrible and should only be used if you want to make the adventure super tough.
Combat is random, sometimes the dice wants you to win, other times they want you to lose. It's a good lesson for players to learn the death mechanic and how dangerous the world can be.
The wizard for instance could have taken the Shield spell and had it set that the moment he takes damage he casts shield without looking at the dice and that would have saved him OR he could have taken Mage Armor can cast it he'd probably have had an AC 15 and that might have saved him. It doesn't hurt to sit down with newbies and go over the importance of Armor at low levels and escapes for casters.
You can also go to encounter builder and look at the combat, for newbies you had three level 1's. I'd try not to give them hard or deadly encounters if they are completely brand new for the first session. Meaning you'd have to nerf the first encounter and cragmaw cave a bit to give them more of a fighting chance. You can also give them sidekicks as well, most likely a healer to help them out and maybe a few healing potions. Ensure at least one of them has a healing kit. And if one player dies, they die, it happens. Other things you can do is put in some hirelings in the game to help them out like the guard. They are hit point sponges, very easy to run to help pad the group out a bit as they are making it down to phandalin. Maybe the players are reinforcements sent down to the town to help deal with the goblins why they have some guards with them.
I bought the Essentials Kit and one thing that the EK had and I was really surprised to find that LMoP did not was an encounter adaption mechanic. In the EK adventure, DoIP, most encounters told you how to adapt them for different size parties, but LMoP just drops the DM in it...which is strange since logically, you'd have new DMs start with LMoP and then progress to DoIP.
If I were in charge of redoing LMoP, there a few changes I'd make, and putting in an encounter adaption mechanic is one of them.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The wizard for instance could have taken the Shield spell and had it set that the moment he takes damage he casts shield without looking at the dice and that would have saved him
That’s not how shield works. You cast it as a reaction after an attack hits you, not when they roll the damage. At that point it is too late.
The wizard for instance could have taken the Shield spell and had it set that the moment he takes damage he casts shield without looking at the dice and that would have saved him
That’s not how shield works. You cast it as a reaction after an attack hits you, not when they roll the damage. At that point it is too late.
However you want to go with it is fine with me. I state when you take damage you can set it where Shield then goes off, damage means an attack hits you. I always make it where the caster has to state if Shield is off or on because I roll without a screen. Otherwise they can metagame and know exactly when they have to use Shield to avoid damage.
Shield says your Reaction is triggered by you being hit, so they know that you've hit them before they have to decide whether to use it or not.
I've not seen anything that tells me if they should know the value of the roll (ie, the number that you compare to AC to see if it hits) before deciding to use it or not. I could see why open rolls would be problematic if you think they shouldn't know the value before deciding, but it seems like a flaff to me. I remember first playing Silvery Barbs and the DM pausing after every hit to let me intervene...in the end it was so frustrating that I told him to just play as normal - if I wasn't quick enough to jump in, that's on me. It was just annoying having to consider it so frequently. That's just me.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
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Please could someone confirm whether we played this correctly?
First ever play of D&D for any of us.
We are playing 3 players + myself as GM, using three of the premade characters. The group stopped at the two dead horses on the path. The Fighter went to explore the horses.
The Wizard remained on the wagon, whilst the Rogue was on the road, behind the wagon.
The goblins won the stealth roll, beating both the Passive Wisdom (Perception) of the Fighter and the Wizard - however, as the halfling Rogue was behind the wagon, I figured the Goblins would not know he was there, so he was able to take part in the first turn.
We then rolled for Initiative for the Rogue - 1d20 + Dex moderator - and once for the goblins - 1d20 + Dex. Rogue won, so he went first.
He chose to move a little, so that he was half-covered by the wagon and then fired his short bow into the bushes. 1d20 + Dex. His roll was less than the Goblin's AC so missed.
Then the Goblins took their turn. Two rushed down to attack the Fighter by the horses. Both rolled 1d20 -1(Strength as it was melee) +4 (for Scimitar attack). Neither was greater than Fighter's AC so no damage done.
Then one of the goblins on higher ground opted to attack the Wizard sitting on the wagon. I rolled 1d20 +2(Dexterity as it was ranged) +4 (for shortbow attack). This was greater than the Wizard's AC of 12, so was a hit.
So to deal damage, I rolled 1d6 +2. Total 8. Wizard's maximum HP is 8, so Wizard is now unconscious. Not a great start. And pretty off-putting for a new player.
Did I do it all correctly?
Many thanks in advance!
Paul
You did, more or less. Your handling of the stealths > surprise and such was a little clunky, but overall, it seems the rules were applied well enough.
You also got to experience one of the most glaring challenges in early D&D, the fragile casters/PCs. It is VERY easy for a low level party to wipe with just a couple bad die rolls. Your example of a goblin getting a decent roll to hit followed by a good damage roll spelled disaster for the Wizard. It is the bane of every DM running a low level party, couple good dice from the enemies and your group is in dire trouble. Some DM's will spoof rolls to allow the game to continue. In your case, I would likely have checked the wizard's HP and when advised it was 8, the goblin's damage, while totaling 8 in maths, would present to the group as 7. Keeps the Wizard upright (for a few more moments a least) but has brought him/her to the brink of Death's Door.
It's a learning experience and some DM's are less forgiving that I, and will have your player simply roll a new character if they are not properly rescued/revived) What works best for your table, you will apparently need to see. There is an argument for introducing players with character deaths early to show them to NOT get TOO attached to any character lol.
Talk to your Players. Talk to your DM. If more people used this advice, there would be 24.74% fewer threads on Tactics, Rules and DM discussions.
Thanks - that was very helpful. How would you advise doing the Stealth rolls?
With only 3 players, and new ones at that, you will need to down tune most if not all encounters in LMoP. They will meet;
At level 1, a bugbear with a Wolf and 2 goblins. Room with ?7? Goblins. 4 wolves.
At level 2, a Banshee. A Necromancer with 12 skeletons at his command. Possibly a mansion full of bandits, one monster, one wizard.
At level 3, 3-4 Orcs with an Ogre. Dozen cultists. A Green Dragon!
Most of these (sans banshee) are potentially deadly encounters for a low level party of 3. You should read ahead so you're prepared for what they'll meet. You should also consider not rolling hit die for monsters and just taking minimum or close to it HP. For example; say a monster has 3d6 +4 hit die. That represents a range or 7 - 22 HP. As the DM, you can just set the HP to something like 10 if you want to make the encounter easier, or 20 if you want it to be harder. You can also reduce the number of enemies. And in the case of the banshee and Necromancer w/ skeletons (as a new DM with new players) remind them that not all monsters need be slain, some can be talked to. The Banshee quest itself does a good job of stressing that.
You should have rolled initiative for the fighter and wizard here as well; they still have their turns as initiative ticks down, they just begin with the surprised condition which means they can't act on their turn and can't take reactions until after their turn.
Rogues are proficient with shortbows, so the roll should have been 1d20 + Dex mod + proficiency bonus.
This is incorrect. First of all, scimitars have the finesse property, so they use either strength or dexterity. Second, that is already factored into the +4. The +4 in the attack's description is the only thing you need to worry about.
Similarly, the +2 from dexterity is already factored into the +4. If that would still have been at least 12, it would have hit anyway, so no harm no foul, but you gave the goblin an extra +2 it shouldn't have had.
This is correct. Rolling max damage on that can be rough. 8 is actually pretty high HP for a first-level wizard.
Read up on how the proficiency bonus works and keep in mind that the numbers given for specific attacks in monster stat blocks already have all the math done for you; you don't need to add any ability modifiers to them. That aside, it seems like you handled the encounter pretty well. D&D can be dangerous at low levels, especially to classes with lower hit points. A party composition of fighter, rogue, wizard also doesn't give you any access to spells like healing word that are particularly useful in just this situation. But hopefully the party pulled through and the wizard recovered. As the characters level up and get more HP, things get a little more consistent and predictable.
The only thing I could see that didn't jive was that you roll Intiative for everyone at the same time - the Fighter and Wizard should have rolled at the same time as the Goblins and the Rogue. It's possible that's what happened, but you didn't mention it.
Normally, the effect of stealth is that anyone who didn't spot the side sneaking doesn't get to act the first round. Whether the Rogue was spotted by the Goblins was irrelevant - if he didn't spot the Goblins, he wouldn't have had a turn in the first round, if he did spot the Goblins, then he would have had a turn in the first round.
But you got the important bits. If you're worried about the the fact that the Wizard got KO'd...that's not unusual. For the first few levels, your Max HP is not much more than what the enemies dole out with individual hits. Sorceror's and Wizards are particularly prone, since they have low Hit Dice and tend to havelw Constitution (so get low health), and a low AC so they tend to actually get hit when targeted. It's just how the game is built. As you get higher levels, the Max HP increases so PCs can tank hits better, AC improves, and they tend to be better equipped to deal with hits, so encounters become more survivable.
Ankther problem you'll have at lower levels is that it's much more dependent on dice rolls. Because the Wizard had 8HP and the Goblin could do 1d6+2, they just happened to max out and KO Wizard as a fluke. At higher levels, the Wizard.may have 30HP, but that takes multiple hits to take out, so the average matters more. The Wizard can tank that 8 damage, then next time might only be 3 and balance it out. At lower levels, those heavy hits really cause problems.
So yeah, don't worry too much. These problems largely disappear at higher levels. A bit of advice: keep your rolls hidden and especially at low levels, feel free to tone them down. They're prone to doing more damage than OCs are designed to take.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Everyone else has covered most of it, but most monster stat blocks list attack damage as something like:
Hit: 11 piercing damage
Instead of rolling, you can just use the first number. This both speeds things up by rolling less dice, and makes the damage consistent, so random lucky rolls are less likely to swing a fight as much.
Also, while it may seem off-putting, the very first time I played, new players and GM, many, many, many years ago, we got completely slaughtered by the monsters, and it didn't dissuade us any.
The only other thing I would add is that the goblins should use their dex mod rather than strength as a scimitar is a finesse weapon. The ac will vary as well, the ones using bows should have their ac reduced by 2 as they aren’t using their shields. So your rogue - if he had targeted a goblin bowman would only need a 13 total, even with a 16 dex he would only have needed to roll an 8 or higher to hit. (10 or higher to hit the ones attacking with scimitars).
Lastly the premade characters are absolutely terrible and should only be used if you want to make the adventure super tough.
Combat is random, sometimes the dice wants you to win, other times they want you to lose. It's a good lesson for players to learn the death mechanic and how dangerous the world can be.
The wizard for instance could have taken the Shield spell and had it set that the moment he takes damage he casts shield without looking at the dice and that would have saved him OR he could have taken Mage Armor can cast it he'd probably have had an AC 15 and that might have saved him. It doesn't hurt to sit down with newbies and go over the importance of Armor at low levels and escapes for casters.
You can also go to encounter builder and look at the combat, for newbies you had three level 1's. I'd try not to give them hard or deadly encounters if they are completely brand new for the first session. Meaning you'd have to nerf the first encounter and cragmaw cave a bit to give them more of a fighting chance. You can also give them sidekicks as well, most likely a healer to help them out and maybe a few healing potions. Ensure at least one of them has a healing kit. And if one player dies, they die, it happens. Other things you can do is put in some hirelings in the game to help them out like the guard. They are hit point sponges, very easy to run to help pad the group out a bit as they are making it down to phandalin. Maybe the players are reinforcements sent down to the town to help deal with the goblins why they have some guards with them.
I bought the Essentials Kit and one thing that the EK had and I was really surprised to find that LMoP did not was an encounter adaption mechanic. In the EK adventure, DoIP, most encounters told you how to adapt them for different size parties, but LMoP just drops the DM in it...which is strange since logically, you'd have new DMs start with LMoP and then progress to DoIP.
If I were in charge of redoing LMoP, there a few changes I'd make, and putting in an encounter adaption mechanic is one of them.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
That’s not how shield works. You cast it as a reaction after an attack hits you, not when they roll the damage. At that point it is too late.
However you want to go with it is fine with me. I state when you take damage you can set it where Shield then goes off, damage means an attack hits you. I always make it where the caster has to state if Shield is off or on because I roll without a screen. Otherwise they can metagame and know exactly when they have to use Shield to avoid damage.
Shield says your Reaction is triggered by you being hit, so they know that you've hit them before they have to decide whether to use it or not.
I've not seen anything that tells me if they should know the value of the roll (ie, the number that you compare to AC to see if it hits) before deciding to use it or not. I could see why open rolls would be problematic if you think they shouldn't know the value before deciding, but it seems like a flaff to me. I remember first playing Silvery Barbs and the DM pausing after every hit to let me intervene...in the end it was so frustrating that I told him to just play as normal - if I wasn't quick enough to jump in, that's on me. It was just annoying having to consider it so frequently. That's just me.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.