So I'm usually a player but wanted to try my hand at DMing and to give our regular DM a break. I'm designing a one-shot for our group of three. It will be a small village that is secretly a Cult dedicated to the nearby Green Dragon.
I want my final boss fight to culminate at the 'completely normal harvest festival', and for it to be the Adult Green Dragon, plus a bunch of cultists, depending on how they deal with the village people. Considering they won't level up in this one-shot, what is the appropriate level to pick?? Also keeping in mind there are just the two of them, and they are picking Paladin of love (our usual DM) and a Wizard combo.
Just want to get the parameters clear. Are you saying two characters, against an Adult Green and some number of cultists? How many cultists, what kinds of levels and abilities?
Yes, two characters against the dragon. And the number of cultists depends on how they deal with the villagers (planning on letting them find the cult shortly before the harvest festival starts), so maybe zero maybe 5 (no more than 10)... I'd adjust it to how well they are doing, I don't want them to die, just give them a near victory. I am kinda going for the 'Hot Fuzz' movie cult so nothing serious maybe if little creepy.
2 level 6 characters against an Adult Green Dragon. The Dragon is a Challenge Rating 15 opponent with Legendary Actions. Challenge Rating is a touch difficult to calculate as it is based on Experience Points and many use Milestone leveling and never know how many xp they have or gain. 2 level 6 characters against one CR 15 opponent is a deadly encounter worth 2100 xp. The Dragon? 22,500. Yup. That's over ten times what they can handle.
They can take down a Green Dragon Wymling as it is worth 675, which makes it a Medium encounter for your two players. A Young Green Dragon is 5850. That's deadly all the way up to 14th level for two characters. The Adult Green Dragon remains beyond deadly for a pair of level 20 characters. If you don't want them to die, you don't want to throw that at them. A Wyrmling they can take. Even a Young one is going to kill them.
I have not even mentioned the Cultists. As many as 10 of them you say? Who needs a Dragon? It should be trivial for you to kill the two of those characters with just the Cultists if the Cultists are strong enough to stand up to the Dragon's Frightful Presence.
Not sure if it will help, but not long ago, our group (Lv 8 Monk, Druid, Fighter and Barb) faced an adult Black Dragon. VERY close to TPK. No minions either. Dragons CAN be huge issues for a party, with insane movement ability and a myriad of seriously damaging attacks. Your group of 2 would not likely last 3 rounds and I would expect, inflict minimal damage on the Dragon, much less minions.
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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.
Yes, two characters against the dragon. And the number of cultists depends on how they deal with the villagers (planning on letting them find the cult shortly before the harvest festival starts), so maybe zero maybe 5 (no more than 10)... I'd adjust it to how well they are doing, I don't want them to die, just give them a near victory. I am kinda going for the 'Hot Fuzz' movie cult so nothing serious maybe if little creepy.
Is lvl 6 too low for that??
Ummm....yeah. 2 chars against a CR 15 creature, plus its minions, how about level 14 or 16? Minimum. More like level 18.
I have apparently SEVERLY underestemated the drangons and overestimated my players, yikes. XD This gives me a hell of a lot better perspective. And I'll plan accordingly.
Without getting into CR, having any sort of enemy that can fly vs a party that can't fly is always going to be tough. That applies both to the PCs ability to fight it, and for you to run it. Considering that this is your first time running a big bad, I would definitely recommend a non-flying enemy. Much easier to run a combat when there's only 2 dimensional movement on the battlefield. Sure, you could have the dragon not fly that much, but that's not a satisfying victory as a player.
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So I'm usually a player but wanted to try my hand at DMing and to give our regular DM a break. I'm designing a one-shot for our group of three. It will be a small village that is secretly a Cult dedicated to the nearby Green Dragon.
I want my final boss fight to culminate at the 'completely normal harvest festival', and for it to be the Adult Green Dragon, plus a bunch of cultists, depending on how they deal with the village people. Considering they won't level up in this one-shot, what is the appropriate level to pick?? Also keeping in mind there are just the two of them, and they are picking Paladin of love (our usual DM) and a Wizard combo.
Help?
Just want to get the parameters clear. Are you saying two characters, against an Adult Green and some number of cultists? How many cultists, what kinds of levels and abilities?
Yes, two characters against the dragon. And the number of cultists depends on how they deal with the villagers (planning on letting them find the cult shortly before the harvest festival starts), so maybe zero maybe 5 (no more than 10)... I'd adjust it to how well they are doing, I don't want them to die, just give them a near victory. I am kinda going for the 'Hot Fuzz' movie cult so nothing serious maybe if little creepy.
Is lvl 6 too low for that??
2 level 6 characters against an Adult Green Dragon. The Dragon is a Challenge Rating 15 opponent with Legendary Actions. Challenge Rating is a touch difficult to calculate as it is based on Experience Points and many use Milestone leveling and never know how many xp they have or gain. 2 level 6 characters against one CR 15 opponent is a deadly encounter worth 2100 xp. The Dragon? 22,500. Yup. That's over ten times what they can handle.
They can take down a Green Dragon Wymling as it is worth 675, which makes it a Medium encounter for your two players. A Young Green Dragon is 5850. That's deadly all the way up to 14th level for two characters. The Adult Green Dragon remains beyond deadly for a pair of level 20 characters. If you don't want them to die, you don't want to throw that at them. A Wyrmling they can take. Even a Young one is going to kill them.
I have not even mentioned the Cultists. As many as 10 of them you say? Who needs a Dragon? It should be trivial for you to kill the two of those characters with just the Cultists if the Cultists are strong enough to stand up to the Dragon's Frightful Presence.
<Insert clever signature here>
Not sure if it will help, but not long ago, our group (Lv 8 Monk, Druid, Fighter and Barb) faced an adult Black Dragon. VERY close to TPK. No minions either. Dragons CAN be huge issues for a party, with insane movement ability and a myriad of seriously damaging attacks. Your group of 2 would not likely last 3 rounds and I would expect, inflict minimal damage on the Dragon, much less minions.
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.
Ummm....yeah. 2 chars against a CR 15 creature, plus its minions, how about level 14 or 16? Minimum. More like level 18.
Thanks a lot, to all of you.
I have apparently SEVERLY underestemated the drangons and overestimated my players, yikes. XD This gives me a hell of a lot better perspective. And I'll plan accordingly.
Thanks again!!
Without getting into CR, having any sort of enemy that can fly vs a party that can't fly is always going to be tough. That applies both to the PCs ability to fight it, and for you to run it. Considering that this is your first time running a big bad, I would definitely recommend a non-flying enemy. Much easier to run a combat when there's only 2 dimensional movement on the battlefield. Sure, you could have the dragon not fly that much, but that's not a satisfying victory as a player.