Wow! You actually clicked on the link to this? huh. …you know, I wasn’t planning on making it this far.
In all seriousness though, this has been a goofy sort of tower defense idea that I’ve thought about seeing if could be transferred into the world of DnD (almost typed Warcraft! Lol)
So anyway, I had an idea for a one-shot based around a friend’s campaign. He’s encouraged us in the past if we wanted to try something to let him know. Well, my crazy idea is to use the characters we have except mine of course at whatever level is decided upon.
The idea would be my character from the campaign who was a soldier in the starting town knows a group that are being targeted. He knows the oldest known living one from the service, but they had a falling out. Hence why my character isn’t there.
The story starts one night around the fire with them. How much you get to know the three residents/brothers will be based on conversations chosen to have and rolls.
Al: The youngest of the 3 and it shows. Naive with a strong heart and no real combat training or experience.
Woody: The apparent middle-child, trying to live up to bis big brother while also protecting the youngest. Some combat training. Likes to whittle with his knife.
Rick: The oldest and a former adventurer himself. He was let go due to his anger issues. He uses a war hammer.
If you are persistent enough without saying the wrong things (like not bringing up my character sent you) you’ll learn there was a fourth even older brother Ron that was like a father figure to them, but was lost on a mission and was never heard from again. He was an artificer investigating a dungeon.
(We play in a post-apocalyptic world where advanced technology exists in ruins.)
If you do bring up my character and things go badly, Rick locks himself in his house alone and makes a con save to determine whether or not he becomes intoxicated.
(Trying to persuade him after that:
20+: He apologizes and unlocks the door.
11-19: He agrees, but the doors stay locked.
2-10: He yells at you to go away.
1 or less: He throws a hand axe at you!)
Where in or out of the three houses you choose to stay and things like the fireplace is meant to be up to the players. The homes themselves form a diagonal line from Al’s to Woody’s and finally Rick’s.
My creature would make a stealth check near the first house. If undetected, the shelter will be attacked (I was thinking of even it being destroyed in one hit.)
The monster is a lycanthrope with a massive gauntlet. If a character happens to ask the right questions, the gauntlet will be determined to be advanced technology. Another possible piece of information obtainable is that it appears to resemble the settlers’ species.
The monster’s primary task is to consume the settlers whole! If characters can get in the way though or distract in some manner, it will attack more normally.
Besides the gorging, I want it to have 3 other types of attacks. The first would be something basic like a melee hit(s). The second would be a wind (thunder) breath attack that recharges on a 5 or 6 and fires in a cone. It’s designed to destroy the first two houses in one hit (and perhaps does damages or stuns anyone inside?) The third would be the gauntlet’s lightning based attack with limited slots capable of destroying the final house!
If you catch the monster in the act, you can alert the rest of the party and/or start attacking. If you do not, he will cause the house to collapse on itself.
If someone detects this, they can engage/raise the alarm. If no one is there but Al, he runs the risk of being consumed (and will either take damage each turn or begin making death saving throws.)
If no one has detected the monster by this point, it will use its’ breath attack on the second house. Roll for initiative.
(If the players are persuasive and creative, they could arrange to set a trap of some kind and have all 3 settlers hide together while they use the homes as bait. Or there’s even the classic push down the chimney! The past few paragraphs are just the default way of things happening.)
If Al comes face to face with the monster, hewill be paralyzed with fear and will keep muttering what sounds like “run.” The players need to carry him in some way.
Woody will panic if he sees the monster, particularly if he figures out that Al or Rick have been consumed, but he can be snapped out of it as long as one of his brothers are still safe. Otherwise, he will need to be carried. If both brothers are consumed, he will become inconsolable.
“I blame myself!”
Rick will attack normally unless persuaded otherwise. If one of his brothers is in danger though, convincing him to hide will be at a disadvantage. Remember too he may be intoxicated. If Al is consumed, Rick will attempts to persuade the adventurers to freak the monster into a trap via his chimney. Woody will insist Al might still be alive in there and will try to convince Rick not to (the players of course can chime in.) If Woody disagrees, Rick will hold him back with a strength check. If at any point Rick fails the strength check, Woody will run into battle and attack with his knife. If Woody is consumed, Rick will suggest the same thing, but Al will not do much of anything still. If both Al and Woody are consumed, Rick will attack without stopping.
“I already lost one brother; I ain’t loosing another one!”
Basically as long as the players are fighting outside and the settlers are inside a building, the monster will not focus on the NPCs. Keep in mind if convinced that Woody or Rick can be used as bait to lure the monster somewhere, such as the roof of the final home in the line where the chimney can be used as a trap (at the expense of any consumed brothers.)
Like everything, you can choose whether or not to kill the monster. If you can figure out the clues, you can convince the others that Al isn’t saying “run.” He’s saying Ron! However, unless the players can come up with a brilliant way to get the settlers out of the monster’s stomach, the only way to save and gorged characters is to kill Ron!
Possible bonus boss: Rick!
If Rick is too lost in a (possibly drunken) rage, especially over any of his brother’s apparent deaths, he will become violent and attack. (I had also considered him getting bit and becoming a Lycanthrope too!)
At some point when they meet back up with my character, he will reveal that both Ron and Rick were stationed with him looking for an item in a dungeon believed to be cursed. My character couldn’t stop Ron for going back into the collapsing building for the cursed gauntlet. Rick never forgave him and eventually got himself kicked out of the militia.
Which of the four is alive or not is up to the players!
Thank you if you made it thus far. This was surprisingly interesting for me and I would like to possibly see it through to some extent. I’m open to constructive criticism of any kind, but I had several questions in particular:
What is a good level for something like this?
We are currently at level 5 in the campaign. Should I allow whatever items they have from their quests so far?
Are there any existing races/species like pigs or lycanthropes? Maybe even something home-brewed that could be shared and rated? Do there happen to be any minis that you all know of that resemble them? (The four brothers don’t have to be pigs.)
How strong should I make the brothers and the houses? I considered making all the houses one hit knock outs with some of the monsters attacks based around destroying each. It’s simpler, but is it interesting?
How should I roll for whether or not the settlers get swallowed? (Especially Rick and possibly Woody if they may be fighting.) The closest thing I can think of to this is the gelatinous cube, but that’s still very different. Isn’t there some conditions where the target is restrained and blinded when inside a monster.
Is the futuristic weapon taking away from the story too much? I wanted a way to link it to our campaign, but maybe I shouldn’t.
On a similar note, what about my character basically sending the team? I don’t mean to make it about him, just a way to link characters together and explain mine’s absence. Oh, and speaking of absence, should he show up at the end for a reunion?
Is it normal to have an NPC frozen in fear? What about being carried? The more I think about it, the strongest character in our party and most likely to do any lifting is me!
Can any of you actually think of a way that would make sense to get the settlers out of the monster’s stomach without hurting it?
In particular among the NPC’s, how strong should Rick be. As strong as the other heroes? I don’t want him to feel like a DMPC.
Especially if he is possibly a secret boss! Should he even be?
I’m sure I’m not thinking of obvious questions, so please let me know what I should be doing here. Thank you.
Very fun idea, I kind of skimmed the mechanics at places but I love the premise and general idea...
Some thoughts:
1) Give the Piggy-Brothers families that live with them in the houses. Could be wife/children or just a loving dog but make the survival/destruction of the houses narratively compelling so that the players have to choose between chasing after the big-bad-wolf or saving people trapped in the rubble - this also gives a reason for the NPCs to be uncooperative other than just being frozen in fear.
2) Don't make the piggy-brothers look like pigs, your players will feel so smart when they realize its based on the three little pigs based on indirect clues / hints - e.g. there might be a pig's head mounted above the door to a house, the brothers might make pig-related jokes/puns, the name of the town or local inn might be a pig pun, or one could have "hair as curly as a pigs' tail" etc... For lycanthropes you've got Shifter, Beast barbarian, and Order of the Lycan for PC related content.
3) I wouldn't have your PC send the party. At least at my tables all the PCs want to be therapists and help a PC get over their trauma or rebuild their relationships so if one PC said something like "Former friends of mine need help, but I can't go b/c we had a falling out" all the other PCs would insist they come. Either have them discover for themselves it is related to your PC, or have it be a separate thing just loosely related to your PC. Instead give your PC something personal/important to do or just have them get sick and not want to travel to justify them staying behind.
4) For timing the collapse of the houses, I'd typically give the NPCs/PCs one round to try to escape before the house collapses on them. So 2 rounds to destroy it, but since we're 3-little pigs themed, the straw house should be obliterated in one hit by the breath attack, the second one should take 2 rounds to collapse by combining the breath attack with something else (e.g. fire or punching), the third house should take 1-10 minutes of punching.
5) If Rick is a secret boss, he needs to be much stronger than the other NPCs and more powerful than the players. You might want to make 2 statblocks for him, one for regular him, one for his final boss form. Rather than make Rick a wolf-lycanthrope you could make him a boar-lycanthrope to justify him getting boss-level strong.
2) Understood about the pigs, but for the big bad wolf and possibly Rick are you saying to just create another character in DnD Beyond? What level do I make it? Also, I’m guessing I should get rid of the gauntlet and tech?
3) I’m struggling to think of a good reason why my character would not be there. I’ve been fortunate to not have to miss any DnD sessions. Maybe my normal DM can come up with something that has to do with the main story.
4) That makes sense too.
5) Based on what you suggested. I guess I’ll make Rick a Beast Barbarian and the monster a Shifter Order of the Lycan Blood Hunter. The Barbarian should hopefully be easier for me since I play as an Ancestral Guardian in our campaign, but I’ve heard Blood Hunters are notoriously hard to deal with.
I guess I’m still just struggling with what level to make these characters compared to the party and how strong to make the breath weapon. Any ideas?
In general you shouldn't make enemies as PCs. PCs and monsters are designed differently for a reason. Assuming you have a typical party of 4 level 5 characters...
Big Bad Wolf - CR 7 - Use the Chimera statblock with the following changes:
remove fly speed, instead give it a Bonus Action: Powerful Leap, the BBW jump up to 30 ft as a bonus action.
swap the Horn attack into a second Claw attack
give it resistance to bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing damage.
increase the DEX to 14, and give it proficiency in Stealth (total: +5 Stealth)
for the Breath attack : change it to Thunder damage and change the saving throw to Constitution rather than Dexterity, add in that the target falls prone if they fail the save
Alright, I can work with this! Thank you. The truth is I don’t own a monster manual, so I’m kind of going in blind.
What do you think for the settlers? Just take a dice block and multiply it by 5? Should I even give them health bars if they are meant to just be swallowed up?
I did something similar a few years back. I had the 3 little were-boars, Jack and the Beanstalk - complete with cloud giants and a ridable golden goose. I find adapting fairy tales to be a great adventure hook and it can be a fun homebrewed diversion. Great ideas btw!
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Wow! You actually clicked on the link to this?
huh. …you know, I wasn’t planning on making it this far.
In all seriousness though, this has been a goofy sort of tower defense idea that I’ve thought about seeing if could be transferred into the world of DnD (almost typed Warcraft! Lol)
So anyway, I had an idea for a one-shot based around a friend’s campaign. He’s encouraged us in the past if we wanted to try something to let him know. Well, my crazy idea is to use the characters we have except mine of course at whatever level is decided upon.
The idea would be my character from the campaign who was a soldier in the starting town knows a group that are being targeted. He knows the oldest known living one from the service, but they had a falling out. Hence why my character isn’t there.
The story starts one night around the fire with them. How much you get to know the three residents/brothers will be based on conversations chosen to have and rolls.
Al: The youngest of the 3 and it shows. Naive with a strong heart and no real combat training or experience.
Woody: The apparent middle-child, trying to live up to bis big brother while also protecting the youngest. Some combat training. Likes to whittle with his knife.
Rick: The oldest and a former adventurer himself. He was let go due to his anger issues. He uses a war hammer.
If you are persistent enough without saying the wrong things (like not bringing up my character sent you) you’ll learn there was a fourth even older brother Ron that was like a father figure to them, but was lost on a mission and was never heard from again. He was an artificer investigating a dungeon.
(We play in a post-apocalyptic world where advanced technology exists in ruins.)
If you do bring up my character and things go badly, Rick locks himself in his house alone and makes a con save to determine whether or not he becomes intoxicated.
(Trying to persuade him after that:
20+: He apologizes and unlocks the door.
11-19: He agrees, but the doors stay locked.
2-10: He yells at you to go away.
1 or less: He throws a hand axe at you!)
Where in or out of the three houses you choose to stay and things like the fireplace is meant to be up to the players. The homes themselves form a diagonal line from Al’s to Woody’s and finally Rick’s.
My creature would make a stealth check near the first house. If undetected, the shelter will be attacked (I was thinking of even it being destroyed in one hit.)
The monster is a lycanthrope with a massive gauntlet. If a character happens to ask the right questions, the gauntlet will be determined to be advanced technology. Another possible piece of information obtainable is that it appears to resemble the settlers’ species.
The monster’s primary task is to consume the settlers whole! If characters can get in the way though or distract in some manner, it will attack more normally.
Besides the gorging, I want it to have 3 other types of attacks. The first would be something basic like a melee hit(s). The second would be a wind (thunder) breath attack that recharges on a 5 or 6 and fires in a cone. It’s designed to destroy the first two houses in one hit (and perhaps does damages or stuns anyone inside?) The third would be the gauntlet’s lightning based attack with limited slots capable of destroying the final house!
If you catch the monster in the act, you can alert the rest of the party and/or start attacking. If you do not, he will cause the house to collapse on itself.
If someone detects this, they can engage/raise the alarm. If no one is there but Al, he runs the risk of being consumed (and will either take damage each turn or begin making death saving throws.)
If no one has detected the monster by this point, it will use its’ breath attack on the second house. Roll for initiative.
(If the players are persuasive and creative, they could arrange to set a trap of some kind and have all 3 settlers hide together while they use the homes as bait. Or there’s even the classic push down the chimney! The past few paragraphs are just the default way of things happening.)
If Al comes face to face with the monster, he will be paralyzed with fear and will keep muttering what sounds like “run.” The players need to carry him in some way.
Woody will panic if he sees the monster, particularly if he figures out that Al or Rick have been consumed, but he can be snapped out of it as long as one of his brothers are still safe. Otherwise, he will need to be carried. If both brothers are consumed, he will become inconsolable.
“I blame myself!”
Rick will attack normally unless persuaded otherwise. If one of his brothers is in danger though, convincing him to hide will be at a disadvantage. Remember too he may be intoxicated. If Al is consumed, Rick will attempts to persuade the adventurers to freak the monster into a trap via his chimney. Woody will insist Al might still be alive in there and will try to convince Rick not to (the players of course can chime in.) If Woody disagrees, Rick will hold him back with a strength check. If at any point Rick fails the strength check, Woody will run into battle and attack with his knife. If Woody is consumed, Rick will suggest the same thing, but Al will not do much of anything still. If both Al and Woody are consumed, Rick will attack without stopping.
“I already lost one brother; I ain’t loosing another one!”
Basically as long as the players are fighting outside and the settlers are inside a building, the monster will not focus on the NPCs. Keep in mind if convinced that Woody or Rick can be used as bait to lure the monster somewhere, such as the roof of the final home in the line where the chimney can be used as a trap (at the expense of any consumed brothers.)
Like everything, you can choose whether or not to kill the monster. If you can figure out the clues, you can convince the others that Al isn’t saying “run.” He’s saying Ron! However, unless the players can come up with a brilliant way to get the settlers out of the monster’s stomach, the only way to save and gorged characters is to kill Ron!
Possible bonus boss: Rick!
If Rick is too lost in a (possibly drunken) rage, especially over any of his brother’s apparent deaths, he will become violent and attack. (I had also considered him getting bit and becoming a Lycanthrope too!)
At some point when they meet back up with my character, he will reveal that both Ron and Rick were stationed with him looking for an item in a dungeon believed to be cursed. My character couldn’t stop Ron for going back into the collapsing building for the cursed gauntlet. Rick never forgave him and eventually got himself kicked out of the militia.
Which of the four is alive or not is up to the players!
Thank you if you made it thus far. This was surprisingly interesting for me and I would like to possibly see it through to some extent. I’m open to constructive criticism of any kind, but I had several questions in particular:
What is a good level for something like this?
We are currently at level 5 in the campaign. Should I allow whatever items they have from their quests so far?
Are there any existing races/species like pigs or lycanthropes? Maybe even something home-brewed that could be shared and rated? Do there happen to be any minis that you all know of that resemble them? (The four brothers don’t have to be pigs.)
How strong should I make the brothers and the houses? I considered making all the houses one hit knock outs with some of the monsters attacks based around destroying each. It’s simpler, but is it interesting?
How should I roll for whether or not the settlers get swallowed? (Especially Rick and possibly Woody if they may be fighting.) The closest thing I can think of to this is the gelatinous cube, but that’s still very different. Isn’t there some conditions where the target is restrained and blinded when inside a monster.
Is the futuristic weapon taking away from the story too much? I wanted a way to link it to our campaign, but maybe I shouldn’t.
On a similar note, what about my character basically sending the team? I don’t mean to make it about him, just a way to link characters together and explain mine’s absence. Oh, and speaking of absence, should he show up at the end for a reunion?
Is it normal to have an NPC frozen in fear? What about being carried? The more I think about it, the strongest character in our party and most likely to do any lifting is me!
Can any of you actually think of a way that would make sense to get the settlers out of the monster’s stomach without hurting it?
In particular among the NPC’s, how strong should Rick be. As strong as the other heroes? I don’t want him to feel like a DMPC.
Especially if he is possibly a secret boss! Should he even be?
I’m sure I’m not thinking of obvious questions, so please let me know what I should be doing here. Thank you.
Very fun idea, I kind of skimmed the mechanics at places but I love the premise and general idea...
Some thoughts:
1) Give the Piggy-Brothers families that live with them in the houses. Could be wife/children or just a loving dog but make the survival/destruction of the houses narratively compelling so that the players have to choose between chasing after the big-bad-wolf or saving people trapped in the rubble - this also gives a reason for the NPCs to be uncooperative other than just being frozen in fear.
2) Don't make the piggy-brothers look like pigs, your players will feel so smart when they realize its based on the three little pigs based on indirect clues / hints - e.g. there might be a pig's head mounted above the door to a house, the brothers might make pig-related jokes/puns, the name of the town or local inn might be a pig pun, or one could have "hair as curly as a pigs' tail" etc... For lycanthropes you've got Shifter, Beast barbarian, and Order of the Lycan for PC related content.
3) I wouldn't have your PC send the party. At least at my tables all the PCs want to be therapists and help a PC get over their trauma or rebuild their relationships so if one PC said something like "Former friends of mine need help, but I can't go b/c we had a falling out" all the other PCs would insist they come. Either have them discover for themselves it is related to your PC, or have it be a separate thing just loosely related to your PC. Instead give your PC something personal/important to do or just have them get sick and not want to travel to justify them staying behind.
4) For timing the collapse of the houses, I'd typically give the NPCs/PCs one round to try to escape before the house collapses on them. So 2 rounds to destroy it, but since we're 3-little pigs themed, the straw house should be obliterated in one hit by the breath attack, the second one should take 2 rounds to collapse by combining the breath attack with something else (e.g. fire or punching), the third house should take 1-10 minutes of punching.
5) If Rick is a secret boss, he needs to be much stronger than the other NPCs and more powerful than the players. You might want to make 2 statblocks for him, one for regular him, one for his final boss form. Rather than make Rick a wolf-lycanthrope you could make him a boar-lycanthrope to justify him getting boss-level strong.
1) The families make sense.
2) Understood about the pigs, but for the big bad wolf and possibly Rick are you saying to just create another character in DnD Beyond? What level do I make it? Also, I’m guessing I should get rid of the gauntlet and tech?
3) I’m struggling to think of a good reason why my character would not be there. I’ve been fortunate to not have to miss any DnD sessions. Maybe my normal DM can come up with something that has to do with the main story.
4) That makes sense too.
5) Based on what you suggested. I guess I’ll make Rick a Beast Barbarian and the monster a Shifter Order of the Lycan Blood Hunter. The Barbarian should hopefully be easier for me since I play as an Ancestral Guardian in our campaign, but I’ve heard Blood Hunters are notoriously hard to deal with.
I guess I’m still just struggling with what level to make these characters compared to the party and how strong to make the breath weapon. Any ideas?
In general you shouldn't make enemies as PCs. PCs and monsters are designed differently for a reason. Assuming you have a typical party of 4 level 5 characters...
Big Bad Wolf - CR 7 - Use the Chimera statblock with the following changes:
Alright, I can work with this! Thank you. The truth is I don’t own a monster manual, so I’m kind of going in blind.
What do you think for the settlers? Just take a dice block and multiply it by 5? Should I even give them health bars if they are meant to just be swallowed up?
I did something similar a few years back. I had the 3 little were-boars, Jack and the Beanstalk - complete with cloud giants and a ridable golden goose. I find adapting fairy tales to be a great adventure hook and it can be a fun homebrewed diversion. Great ideas btw!