I’m planning a session for my Eberron campaign and I need some help. The party (5 level-8 characters) need to get into an old vault in a dungeon for some magic items and dragonshards. To do this, they use a drill, which needs time to cut through. When the vault is disturbed an assortment of dolgrims, dolgaunts, and other aberrations will go on the attack.
What would you do when designing an encounter like this? How many rounds would the party need to hold out for? What means do you provide for them to escape? What defensive tools do you provide for them to set up in advance or in-the-moment? Do you throw any non-fighting challenges in the mix?
I think that's a smart call. Here's the basic structure of how I would run something like this, mostly lifted from the Holdout Sitrep in the Lancer RPG system, lightly modified for D&D:
First thing, draw up or find a map you can use for the battlefield. Place a roughly 3x5 zone near where the drill is going to be; this is your PCs Deployment Zone (DZ). The area two spaces deep around the perimeter of the map is the enemy's Incursion Zone (IZ). The less space between the IZ and the DZ, the harder the encounter will be (because the players have less time to deal with reinforcing enemies before they reach the objective). Place a few (3-5 depending on map size) objects of varying size that can be used as cover outside the DZ. Don't make your players' lives too easy by pre-building a fortress for them, but if they have setup time and want to move some cover objects with a high-DC Athletics check, I'd say let them do that. Maybe also include a few piles of rubble that can be spread to create small (no larger than 2x3) areas of difficult terrain, depending on map size. I wouldn't go any further than that with on-site resources, but if they have things like caltrops or ball bearings, they can use those too.
Now, design a Hard encounter, tending slightly towards Deadly. (This assumes the map is fairly large; you can lower the target encounter difficulty for a smaller map.) For a group of 5 level 8 PCs I think a 9000 XP budget should do it. Once you've got your monsters picked out for that, double them. You'll deploy half up front as your first wave, and may use the other half as reserves over the course of the encounter.
Have your PCs deploy themselves in their DZ and start the drill. Now, deploy your first wave of monsters in the IZ. Their goal is to destroy the drill, but they'll happily kill the PCs on the way to their main objective. You may want to designate some monsters to attack the drill and others to attack the PCs, but if you do try to keep that a secret as best you can. At the end of each round after the first, deploy reinforcements from your reserve monsters. How many you want to deploy at a time may depend on how well the PCs are doing, but I would deploy no more than 5 CR worth in a given round. Have them immediately enter into turn order, but don't let the newly deployed monsters go before the PCs if the map is small. Maybe give them a penalty to Initiative or something if they can reach the drill in a single turn.
The drill is an object with 10 to 15 AC depending on how many enemies you're using. If you expect the monsters on the field to significantly outnumber the PCs most of the time, I'd use a higher AC, otherwise use a lower one. Ranged attacks have Disadvantage against the drill, and your monsters should drastically prefer attempting to attack it in melee. If the drill gets hit 5-10 times (again, adjust based on how badly outnumbered the PCs are) it breaks and the mission's a failure. If the drill survives for 4-6 rounds (I think 4 will feel tough, 6 will feel arduous, but again, adjust based on the size of the map and the number of monsters) it breaks into the vault and the mission is a success. Upon success, the monsters should either flee or become drastically easier to defeat; if you don't want them to flee, maybe cut the HP of any surviving monsters in half. Either way, stop deploying reinforcements once the drill succeeds or breaks.
That sounds awesome! I’ll definitely be using this for the session, I especially like the idea of the drill being harder to hit at a distance and the ways the party can use cover. Thank you so much!
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Hey everyone!
I’m planning a session for my Eberron campaign and I need some help. The party (5 level-8 characters) need to get into an old vault in a dungeon for some magic items and dragonshards. To do this, they use a drill, which needs time to cut through. When the vault is disturbed an assortment of dolgrims, dolgaunts, and other aberrations will go on the attack.
What would you do when designing an encounter like this? How many rounds would the party need to hold out for? What means do you provide for them to escape? What defensive tools do you provide for them to set up in advance or in-the-moment? Do you throw any non-fighting challenges in the mix?
Does the drill need to be operated manually, or does it run in its own?
It’ll run on its own, I don’t want one player feeling like they have to run it themselves unless there’s something engaging I can do with that
I think that's a smart call. Here's the basic structure of how I would run something like this, mostly lifted from the Holdout Sitrep in the Lancer RPG system, lightly modified for D&D:
First thing, draw up or find a map you can use for the battlefield. Place a roughly 3x5 zone near where the drill is going to be; this is your PCs Deployment Zone (DZ). The area two spaces deep around the perimeter of the map is the enemy's Incursion Zone (IZ). The less space between the IZ and the DZ, the harder the encounter will be (because the players have less time to deal with reinforcing enemies before they reach the objective). Place a few (3-5 depending on map size) objects of varying size that can be used as cover outside the DZ. Don't make your players' lives too easy by pre-building a fortress for them, but if they have setup time and want to move some cover objects with a high-DC Athletics check, I'd say let them do that. Maybe also include a few piles of rubble that can be spread to create small (no larger than 2x3) areas of difficult terrain, depending on map size. I wouldn't go any further than that with on-site resources, but if they have things like caltrops or ball bearings, they can use those too.
Now, design a Hard encounter, tending slightly towards Deadly. (This assumes the map is fairly large; you can lower the target encounter difficulty for a smaller map.) For a group of 5 level 8 PCs I think a 9000 XP budget should do it. Once you've got your monsters picked out for that, double them. You'll deploy half up front as your first wave, and may use the other half as reserves over the course of the encounter.
Have your PCs deploy themselves in their DZ and start the drill. Now, deploy your first wave of monsters in the IZ. Their goal is to destroy the drill, but they'll happily kill the PCs on the way to their main objective. You may want to designate some monsters to attack the drill and others to attack the PCs, but if you do try to keep that a secret as best you can. At the end of each round after the first, deploy reinforcements from your reserve monsters. How many you want to deploy at a time may depend on how well the PCs are doing, but I would deploy no more than 5 CR worth in a given round. Have them immediately enter into turn order, but don't let the newly deployed monsters go before the PCs if the map is small. Maybe give them a penalty to Initiative or something if they can reach the drill in a single turn.
The drill is an object with 10 to 15 AC depending on how many enemies you're using. If you expect the monsters on the field to significantly outnumber the PCs most of the time, I'd use a higher AC, otherwise use a lower one. Ranged attacks have Disadvantage against the drill, and your monsters should drastically prefer attempting to attack it in melee. If the drill gets hit 5-10 times (again, adjust based on how badly outnumbered the PCs are) it breaks and the mission's a failure. If the drill survives for 4-6 rounds (I think 4 will feel tough, 6 will feel arduous, but again, adjust based on the size of the map and the number of monsters) it breaks into the vault and the mission is a success. Upon success, the monsters should either flee or become drastically easier to defeat; if you don't want them to flee, maybe cut the HP of any surviving monsters in half. Either way, stop deploying reinforcements once the drill succeeds or breaks.
That sounds awesome! I’ll definitely be using this for the session, I especially like the idea of the drill being harder to hit at a distance and the ways the party can use cover. Thank you so much!