I am currently designing a brief Chuul encounter (big bad is an aboleth) and want to use it to expose my players to underwater combat.
The characters are a party of 8 made up of an Artificer, Cleric, Warlock, Barbarian, Rogue, Fighter, Ranger and Sorcerer. They are currently level 3 and might be level 4 when they fight the encounter (I am running a sandbox so they may deal with it soon, or in a while depending on when they decide to go there)
The encounter is fairly straightforward, a Chuul has snatched a dockworker from the dock side of the small town the party are in, there is a small cave system the Chuul is holed up in. One of these caves is large and submerged (60 foot deep at it's deepest point) with 3 large boulders that are just beneath the surface allowing a character to stand on them.
The Chuul will be underwater in the large cavern, with evidence of the remains of bodies in the other and the 3rd just there for flavour :).
My question, how many Chuul would you put against the party? According to the CR calculation 3 would be very hard, but if you add in the issues of underwater combat it feels that this suddenly becomes much harder, especially because if a player becomes paralysed under water then that could lead to a very bad situation.
I mean, since it’s a challenge level 4 and they are gonna be level four, and the challenge system is based off of four players at that level that are well rested and equipped, I would say do two chuuls and slightly modify them to have 100 health and 17 ac just to make it a bit harder on top of it being underwater
If the party isn't going to have water breathing or swim type magic to keep from drowning, I would imagine the encounter to be pretty difficult. The questions is:
Do you want the characters to go into the underwater combat prepared or, do you want the characters to see how difficult underwater combat is IF you don't prepare?
If the party isn't going to have water breathing or swim type magic to keep from drowning, I would imagine the encounter to be pretty difficult. The questions is:
Do you want the characters to go into the underwater combat prepared or, do you want the characters to see how difficult underwater combat is IF you don't prepare?
I want them to understand how hard it is if you dont prepare so they can understand, once they find out there is an aboleth, how dangerous it will be.
If the party isn't going to have water breathing or swim type magic to keep from drowning, I would imagine the encounter to be pretty difficult. The questions is:
Do you want the characters to go into the underwater combat prepared or, do you want the characters to see how difficult underwater combat is IF you don't prepare?
I want them to understand how hard it is if you dont prepare so they can understand, once they find out there is an aboleth, how dangerous it will be.
I guess my advice would be to play test the encounter out as best you can before you DM the actual encounter for the group. Tweak as needed.
I am currently designing a brief Chuul encounter (big bad is an aboleth) and want to use it to expose my players to underwater combat.
The characters are a party of 8 made up of an Artificer, Cleric, Warlock, Barbarian, Rogue, Fighter, Ranger and Sorcerer. They are currently level 3 and might be level 4 when they fight the encounter (I am running a sandbox so they may deal with it soon, or in a while depending on when they decide to go there)
The encounter is fairly straightforward, a Chuul has snatched a dockworker from the dock side of the small town the party are in, there is a small cave system the Chuul is holed up in. One of these caves is large and submerged (60 foot deep at it's deepest point) with 3 large boulders that are just beneath the surface allowing a character to stand on them.
The Chuul will be underwater in the large cavern, with evidence of the remains of bodies in the other and the 3rd just there for flavour :).
My question, how many Chuul would you put against the party? According to the CR calculation 3 would be very hard, but if you add in the issues of underwater combat it feels that this suddenly becomes much harder, especially because if a player becomes paralysed under water then that could lead to a very bad situation.
So how would you balance this?
I mean, since it’s a challenge level 4 and they are gonna be level four, and the challenge system is based off of four players at that level that are well rested and equipped, I would say do two chuuls and slightly modify them to have 100 health and 17 ac just to make it a bit harder on top of it being underwater
If the party isn't going to have water breathing or swim type magic to keep from drowning, I would imagine the encounter to be pretty difficult. The questions is:
Do you want the characters to go into the underwater combat prepared or, do you want the characters to see how difficult underwater combat is IF you don't prepare?
I want them to understand how hard it is if you dont prepare so they can understand, once they find out there is an aboleth, how dangerous it will be.
I guess my advice would be to play test the encounter out as best you can before you DM the actual encounter for the group. Tweak as needed.