set things up so that the monsters are not clumped together all the time. One of my party just got fireball so now I have 2 that can cast it.
As a DM I also apply laws of physics. if they cast a fireball in a room that isn't much larger than the fireball it is going to cause a compression.
Why? No where does it state Fireball is a high pressure explosive, it is more like a flammable substance, it is akin to letting your gas stove run for a minute and then lighting it, no explosion, just a ball of flame...
I remember reading an article back in high school, probably in Dragon magazine, arguing that when fireball is used in a small area it should expand to fill a total volume that is equal a sphere of its radius. In 5e the radius is 20', so we are looking at a volume of approximately 33,500 cubic feet. The article author argued that if placed into a smaller area, say a 10x10' room, the fireball would expand to fill other spaces -- for example, he talked about how much space a fireball would fill in a 5' wide but very long corridor, etc.
For example, let us imagine a corridor 10' wide, 10' high, and any number of feet long. A single 10' square of that corridor has a volume of 10^3 or 1,000 cubic feet. The article author argued that if you throw a fireball into a 10' wide corridor, the total volume occupied would be 33 squares long up and down the corridor, centered at the center of the blast... i.e., it would expand out to fill 160 feet on either side of the center 10' square. This would cause the fire to fill up the same volume as a single 40' diameter (20' radius) sphere.
Now, of course, the rules don't say to do this, which the author readily acknowledged, but I remember reading this with my friends and we all thought it might lead to some really interesting tactical situations. However, I don't remember us ever actually implementing it. My vague memory of it that we decided it was too much work to calculate every time we let loose with a fireball. Might also be that the guy who owned the article stopped playing with us as well and we lost access to it.
However, provided the DM has warned the players ahead of time that this is the house rule we are using (that in enclosed areas, Fireball expands to fill up its max volume), I see nothing wrong with it.
@BioWizard we tried that out, problem was friendly fire, it was hard to cast it far enough away to not get caught in it.
Um yeah, that was the whole point of the article.... you have to be careful where you throw the fireball or you'll catch your own self in it.
That's what we liked about it -- that's what made us think it would make for a more tactical game instead of just "fire away." Now you have to think about positioning yourself and figure out how much blow-back there will be.
Again it's not RAW or RAI... just a house rule that was proposed by Dragon Magazine to make players have to think before casting fireball and not just going knee-jerk "blam!" all the time.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Back to the OP question, seems like you could kind of do both, and this is a bit like others suggested. If they're coming on rafts, for whatever reason, let the sorcerer do his thing. It's fun to be able to be the hero. (My tempest cleric had a lot of fun with control water when my party was on a boat and enemies came at them with a boat of their own. I got to feel cool, and the rest of the party was happy for a fight won with a single spell.) But then the survivors know what's going on and change their tactics to account for it after they gather some reenforceents, in this case, maybe by just swimming up underwater and boarding the ship. Or, since they'd probably rather fight in their own element, they could simply come underneath and smash a hole in the hull. When the ship sinks, they can fight anyone who's swimming and gather the loot from the bottom at their leisure.
I didn’t read the part of the OP that stated the Kuo Toa were definitively hostile. Maybe the rafts are approaching by day as a sign of peace, so as not to alarm the ship with beings climbing up the hull. Really, I think that’s your best defense against having a player fireball every encounter. They have to feel the consequences of rash murder-hoboism. They just killed an ambassadorial delegation. Now it’s about to hit the fan. (And the loot is at the bottom of the ocean)
I didn’t read the part of the OP that stated the Kuo Toa were definitively hostile. Maybe the rafts are approaching by day as a sign of peace, so as not to alarm the ship with beings climbing up the hull. Really, I think that’s your best defense against having a player fireball every encounter. They have to feel the consequences of rash murder-hoboism. They just killed an ambassadorial delegation. Now it’s about to hit the fan. (And the loot is at the bottom of the ocean)
This literally occurred during a session I ran about 6 months ago. Dozens of Kuo-Toa approaching by rowboats in broad daylight. In truth they were a suspicious but ultimately non hostile delegation of KT wanting to provide a show of force against the ship (the Party) which they assumed were possible pirates. It was tense on both sides, fingers getting itchy, the KT leader yelling out commands and declarations and demand in a language the Party didn't know. Thank goodness sorcerer of the Party, after finally using a spell slot to enable communication, got both sides to ease up, convince each other there's no problem, and a regrettable and unnecessary bloodbath didn't occur. The KT ultimately asked the party (now knowing they weren't pirates) to assist them retrieving their religious icons and statues from a cave that Hill Giants took over.
Motivation is key. Tactics sensible. What do the KT even want? Is anything religious driving their actions?
KT definitely are crazy religious, only want to initiate a battle with superior numbers, but will retreat quickly if necessary. No matter ultimately the concern for Fireball potentially wiping out a good number (if the encounter design has to be battle), getting a sense of what KT tactics ought to be will shape the encounter into something very memorable for everyone.
Also a +1 up vote to that The Monsters Know link previously
set things up so that the monsters are not clumped together all the time. One of my party just got fireball so now I have 2 that can cast it.
As a DM I also apply laws of physics. if they cast a fireball in a room that isn't much larger than the fireball it is going to cause a compression.
Why? No where does it state Fireball is a high pressure explosive, it is more like a flammable substance, it is akin to letting your gas stove run for a minute and then lighting it, no explosion, just a ball of flame...
1. You are missing the point of the Kuo-Toa being underwater: If they are 10' or more deep in open water they are impossible to see without polarized vision/glasses/lens. Hence they can't be targeted at all.
2. The Fireball would impact with the surface of the water. Think of the surface of the water as a "floor" to the above water portion of the world. It would be akin to trying to cast fireball through a glass window.
3. Kuo-Toa have no need for a raft as stated above. They would attack at night, and the first the party would know of them would be as they climb the guardrails of the ship. A la Pirates of the Caribbean final ship boarding scene.
You completely missed the point, he was asking about his caster casting fireball and laying waste. The are on rafts also and not 10 feet under
Hi Bob, no I’m not missing the point. Why would Kuo-Tia be in the rafts in the first place? Why would they sacrifice their single largest tactical advantage?
Hi Bob, no I’m not missing the point. Why would Kuo-Tia be in the rafts in the first place? Why would they sacrifice their single largest tactical advantage?
Best reasonable explanation for this would be if they are not approaching for combat. If they are closing the distance to attack, there is no advantage to riding on rafts on the surface and a lot of tactical disadvantage as you point out.
And when do all these amazing coincidences of gusts of wind and pooping seagulls kick in and benefit the Players randomly? Or are they just for the GM's benefit?
The GM changing the way the world works, to specifically sabotage Player choice & Player agency, in an asymmetric way that the Players cannot also benefit from, without Player knowledge or consent, is cheating. It's also damn lazy.
The rules-as-written are in no way symmetric, and Players and Monsters both have advantages over each other in given situations. Player Feats and creature Legendary Actions are examples of these - but in those cases the Players are fully aware of the structure of the rules ( or at least can be - they are literally written down where they can read them). I am also of the opinion that homebrew rules introduced to the game need to be well communicated, discussed, and agreed upon by all participants at the table.
Role playing is about people making choices as if they were their Characters. Meaningful choices need to be informed - that is, the Players need information as to the situation, and they need to have an idea of how the world works - that is, the game mechanics. Information can be incomplete, or wrong - in fact part of the game is the Players uncovering and putting information together - but having the mechanics of the world change at the whim of the GM, without Player knowledge, is to negate the Players' ability to make meaningful choices in the game. They make choices as if one set of rules are in effect, and the GM has secretly changed those rules without telling them.
If you can't find a way to shape events without literally breaking the mechanics of the game, you need to become a better GM.
If the mechanics of the game don't suit the style of the gaming group, by all means, you are free to change them to match your style - but those changes need to be communicated and agreed upon by your Players as well. You don't get to keep the rules & mechanics a secret, and you don't get to lie to your Players about how the mechanics of the world work.
Numenera has a wonderful mechanic called a GM intrusion. How it works is that any time the GM can add something unexpected, usually with the goal of increasing the drama by adding complications, and by doing so the GM awards the party 1xp each or 2xp if it's severe (you might have surmised that xp is a lot more valuable per point in Numenera.)
Now, gusts of wind that only affect the players aren't bad storytelling. A lot of "battlefields" in D&D have gimmicks that only work to the "DM's" advantage, which are thought of as interesting tactical challenges. Ideally, it shouldn't be just for one attack. But the battlefield having a storm, that gives disadvantage on all ranged attacks, when the enemy only employs melee troops isn't the DM cheating, it's creating a more interesting tactical challenge for the players to overcome. I recently read that the battlefield should always favour the home team and that should be the basis of a D&D encounter.
I can speak from experience, as I am sure most other people can, a fight, or a series of fights, in which the mage nukes everything isn't fun. Not as a DM or as a party member. So, having encounters designed so that they can't just use the same tool to brute force every encounter by having terrain effects than only really impact the players (or certain players) isn't a bad thing. It just needs to be tactfully executed.
Numenera's mechanics are an excellent example of my point. The GM's ability to twist the plot in interesting ways are written into the mechanics, and known and agreed upon by the Players, and the Players are even compensated for it. Players are fully aware the this is "a thing", and have - by playing the game - have given their consent for the GM to be able to do this.
I agree battlefield situations which provide interesting tactical challenges are also a common thing - and I agree that they add spice to the game. They are also not secret to the Players. The Players can see the tactical situation. There may be complete surprises baked into the tactical situation, but that's a spice best used in moderation. They are also usually pre-built into the tactical situation, and not invented "on the fly" by the GM specifically to screw over the Party. I think that if you set up a plain grass field with nothing but perfectly hidden pit traps which the Characters could never detect, and just fell down them randomly and took damage - and that furthermore, the GM decided where they were on the spur of the moment and used them to beat the Party with - that most Players would find that frustrating and stupid. Creatures may have abilities the Party isn't aware of at first, but those abilities are consistent across all creatures of that type, and are thematically appropriate for that creature ( try giving you kobolds the ability to squirt web attacks out of their butts, or make these particular Orcs have breath weapons when no other Orc in your game world does, and see how your Players react).
As I pointed out - even RAW isn't symmetrical.
The point here isn't that some facet of the game is stacked against the Characters, and that some are stacked against their opponents. Everyone knows that, everyone has accepted that, and most agree that it adds drama and tension, and therefore is a good thing - myself included.
Plot twists - when used correctly - add spice and interest to the game; no arguments there.
The point here is that with some of these suggestions the mechanics of the world are inconsistent, randomly & temporarily changing, and capricious - and for no other reason than the GM is too damn lazy, or not creative enough, to come up with a solution which fits within the established mechanics (there are several suggestions in this thread already for GM tactics which functionally fix the OP's problem without doing this). What do you think the odds of the wind gusting and throwing off an enemy spell caster, or a seagull pooping in a Dragons' eye are? I'd put money on those odds being zero (unless the GM wanted to break the mechanics and get that outcome to make things easier for them). These suggestions are meant to nullify Player choice only, and in a fashion which they neither know about or have consented to.
Meaningful Player choice is based on the world behaving consistently. They are already working against having incomplete ( or sometimes incorrect ) knowledge; making the world inconsistent on top of that is overkill. What do you think Player reaction would be if you said "yeah, that's not how your spells work this time", "no you don't get attack advantage for raging this combat", "sorry, your Dragonborn can't use their breath weapon for this encounter" - for no other reason than DM fiat? It might make sense if you had in-world justifications for that , and the changes (usually, likely) are telegraphed to the Players ahead of time - that is, with Player consent and foreknowledge. It could be used as a plot twist surprise, but there had damn well better be an actual in-world justification for it that the Characters can find out about later. No matter how you slice it, there needs to be a meaningful, in world, justification for the change in mechanics. The world needs to be explainable and consistent.
Some might say that plot twists aren't bad storytelling ( that's an arguable point - I hate detective fiction where the critical clue is withheld from the reader/audience until the detective's big reveal ), but D&D is not just storytelling. It's a Role-Playing Game. The Game part is important. The mechanics are important. Consistent mechanics are important. I love the narrative aspects of TTPRG, and I am by no means a crunchy wargamer, tactical monster combat focused Player or GM - to me the story of the Characters is the focus. But an inconsistently behaving world is also bad storytelling.
DM fiat for convenience loses on all fronts: it's unfair; it's bad game design with inconsistent mechanics; it's bad storytelling with an inconsistently behaving world; and it's breaking faith with your Players by changing the conditions of the game without their consent.
Back to Numenera - in that case, it's built into the balanced mechanics, it's known ahead of time, it's agreed upon by the Players, and the Players are compensated for the world acting in an inconsistent way. It's still possible to break the world or the story by introducing capricious or stupid plot twists - but one hopes the GM has at least a little skill.
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( try giving you kobolds the ability to squirt web attacks out of their butts, or make these particular Orcs have breath weapons when no other Orc in your game world does, and see how your Players react).
( try giving you kobolds the ability to squirt web attacks out of their butts, or make these particular Orcs have breath weapons when no other Orc in your game world does, and see how your Players react).
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Have the rafts appear deserted and adrift, as they are being steered from below by swimming enemies; Perception and Insight could let the party notice that the rafts are moving against the wind/currents
Natural concealment from sea fog, darkness, heat shimmer, or the glare of sunset off the water
Unnatural concealment with spellcasters using Fog Cloud or illusion spells; illusions could include the rafts appearing elsewhere to where they actually are, or perhaps some crew see helpless castaways instead of enemies, and try to talk the players out of attacking
A cheeky false white flag
Have something the players want on the rafts; captives to rescue, or cool loot that would be blasted into the sea; an innocent porpoise struggling against a net
Fireball has a range of 150ft, but if the rafts can survive one round to close by 30ft, Silence has a range of 120ft
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Currently homebrewing the Mistveil Rogue, an elusive infiltrator that can vanish into thin air.
I remember reading an article back in high school, probably in Dragon magazine, arguing that when fireball is used in a small area it should expand to fill a total volume that is equal a sphere of its radius. In 5e the radius is 20', so we are looking at a volume of approximately 33,500 cubic feet. The article author argued that if placed into a smaller area, say a 10x10' room, the fireball would expand to fill other spaces -- for example, he talked about how much space a fireball would fill in a 5' wide but very long corridor, etc.
For example, let us imagine a corridor 10' wide, 10' high, and any number of feet long. A single 10' square of that corridor has a volume of 10^3 or 1,000 cubic feet. The article author argued that if you throw a fireball into a 10' wide corridor, the total volume occupied would be 33 squares long up and down the corridor, centered at the center of the blast... i.e., it would expand out to fill 160 feet on either side of the center 10' square. This would cause the fire to fill up the same volume as a single 40' diameter (20' radius) sphere.
Now, of course, the rules don't say to do this, which the author readily acknowledged, but I remember reading this with my friends and we all thought it might lead to some really interesting tactical situations. However, I don't remember us ever actually implementing it. My vague memory of it that we decided it was too much work to calculate every time we let loose with a fireball. Might also be that the guy who owned the article stopped playing with us as well and we lost access to it.
However, provided the DM has warned the players ahead of time that this is the house rule we are using (that in enclosed areas, Fireball expands to fill up its max volume), I see nothing wrong with it.
But I wouldn't just spring it on the players.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
@BioWizard we tried that out, problem was friendly fire, it was hard to cast it far enough away to not get caught in it.
Um yeah, that was the whole point of the article.... you have to be careful where you throw the fireball or you'll catch your own self in it.
That's what we liked about it -- that's what made us think it would make for a more tactical game instead of just "fire away." Now you have to think about positioning yourself and figure out how much blow-back there will be.
Again it's not RAW or RAI... just a house rule that was proposed by Dragon Magazine to make players have to think before casting fireball and not just going knee-jerk "blam!" all the time.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
It actually was RAW in first edition. It was very hard to avoid cooking yourself with fireball, and moderately hard to avoid it with lightning bolt.
Back to the OP question, seems like you could kind of do both, and this is a bit like others suggested. If they're coming on rafts, for whatever reason, let the sorcerer do his thing. It's fun to be able to be the hero. (My tempest cleric had a lot of fun with control water when my party was on a boat and enemies came at them with a boat of their own. I got to feel cool, and the rest of the party was happy for a fight won with a single spell.) But then the survivors know what's going on and change their tactics to account for it after they gather some reenforceents, in this case, maybe by just swimming up underwater and boarding the ship. Or, since they'd probably rather fight in their own element, they could simply come underneath and smash a hole in the hull. When the ship sinks, they can fight anyone who's swimming and gather the loot from the bottom at their leisure.
You can’t stop us! You can only hope to contain us! Hahahahaha ha! Lol!!!
I didn’t read the part of the OP that stated the Kuo Toa were definitively hostile. Maybe the rafts are approaching by day as a sign of peace, so as not to alarm the ship with beings climbing up the hull. Really, I think that’s your best defense against having a player fireball every encounter. They have to feel the consequences of rash murder-hoboism. They just killed an ambassadorial delegation. Now it’s about to hit the fan. (And the loot is at the bottom of the ocean)
Just don't float the two rafts within 30' of each other or there may be nobody left to tell the tale :O
"Not all those who wander are lost"
This literally occurred during a session I ran about 6 months ago. Dozens of Kuo-Toa approaching by rowboats in broad daylight. In truth they were a suspicious but ultimately non hostile delegation of KT wanting to provide a show of force against the ship (the Party) which they assumed were possible pirates. It was tense on both sides, fingers getting itchy, the KT leader yelling out commands and declarations and demand in a language the Party didn't know. Thank goodness sorcerer of the Party, after finally using a spell slot to enable communication, got both sides to ease up, convince each other there's no problem, and a regrettable and unnecessary bloodbath didn't occur. The KT ultimately asked the party (now knowing they weren't pirates) to assist them retrieving their religious icons and statues from a cave that Hill Giants took over.
Motivation is key. Tactics sensible. What do the KT even want? Is anything religious driving their actions?
KT definitely are crazy religious, only want to initiate a battle with superior numbers, but will retreat quickly if necessary. No matter ultimately the concern for Fireball potentially wiping out a good number (if the encounter design has to be battle), getting a sense of what KT tactics ought to be will shape the encounter into something very memorable for everyone.
Also a +1 up vote to that The Monsters Know link previously
Boldly go
You completely missed the point, he was asking about his caster casting fireball and laying waste. The are on rafts also and not 10 feet under
Hi Bob, no I’m not missing the point. Why would Kuo-Tia be in the rafts in the first place? Why would they sacrifice their single largest tactical advantage?
Best reasonable explanation for this would be if they are not approaching for combat. If they are closing the distance to attack, there is no advantage to riding on rafts on the surface and a lot of tactical disadvantage as you point out.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Numenera has a wonderful mechanic called a GM intrusion. How it works is that any time the GM can add something unexpected, usually with the goal of increasing the drama by adding complications, and by doing so the GM awards the party 1xp each or 2xp if it's severe (you might have surmised that xp is a lot more valuable per point in Numenera.)
Now, gusts of wind that only affect the players aren't bad storytelling. A lot of "battlefields" in D&D have gimmicks that only work to the "DM's" advantage, which are thought of as interesting tactical challenges. Ideally, it shouldn't be just for one attack. But the battlefield having a storm, that gives disadvantage on all ranged attacks, when the enemy only employs melee troops isn't the DM cheating, it's creating a more interesting tactical challenge for the players to overcome. I recently read that the battlefield should always favour the home team and that should be the basis of a D&D encounter.
I can speak from experience, as I am sure most other people can, a fight, or a series of fights, in which the mage nukes everything isn't fun. Not as a DM or as a party member. So, having encounters designed so that they can't just use the same tool to brute force every encounter by having terrain effects than only really impact the players (or certain players) isn't a bad thing. It just needs to be tactfully executed.
Numenera's mechanics are an excellent example of my point. The GM's ability to twist the plot in interesting ways are written into the mechanics, and known and agreed upon by the Players, and the Players are even compensated for it. Players are fully aware the this is "a thing", and have - by playing the game - have given their consent for the GM to be able to do this.
I agree battlefield situations which provide interesting tactical challenges are also a common thing - and I agree that they add spice to the game. They are also not secret to the Players. The Players can see the tactical situation. There may be complete surprises baked into the tactical situation, but that's a spice best used in moderation. They are also usually pre-built into the tactical situation, and not invented "on the fly" by the GM specifically to screw over the Party. I think that if you set up a plain grass field with nothing but perfectly hidden pit traps which the Characters could never detect, and just fell down them randomly and took damage - and that furthermore, the GM decided where they were on the spur of the moment and used them to beat the Party with - that most Players would find that frustrating and stupid. Creatures may have abilities the Party isn't aware of at first, but those abilities are consistent across all creatures of that type, and are thematically appropriate for that creature ( try giving you kobolds the ability to squirt web attacks out of their butts, or make these particular Orcs have breath weapons when no other Orc in your game world does, and see how your Players react).
As I pointed out - even RAW isn't symmetrical.
The point here isn't that some facet of the game is stacked against the Characters, and that some are stacked against their opponents. Everyone knows that, everyone has accepted that, and most agree that it adds drama and tension, and therefore is a good thing - myself included.
Plot twists - when used correctly - add spice and interest to the game; no arguments there.
The point here is that with some of these suggestions the mechanics of the world are inconsistent, randomly & temporarily changing, and capricious - and for no other reason than the GM is too damn lazy, or not creative enough, to come up with a solution which fits within the established mechanics (there are several suggestions in this thread already for GM tactics which functionally fix the OP's problem without doing this). What do you think the odds of the wind gusting and throwing off an enemy spell caster, or a seagull pooping in a Dragons' eye are? I'd put money on those odds being zero (unless the GM wanted to break the mechanics and get that outcome to make things easier for them). These suggestions are meant to nullify Player choice only, and in a fashion which they neither know about or have consented to.
Meaningful Player choice is based on the world behaving consistently. They are already working against having incomplete ( or sometimes incorrect ) knowledge; making the world inconsistent on top of that is overkill. What do you think Player reaction would be if you said "yeah, that's not how your spells work this time", "no you don't get attack advantage for raging this combat", "sorry, your Dragonborn can't use their breath weapon for this encounter" - for no other reason than DM fiat? It might make sense if you had in-world justifications for that , and the changes (usually, likely) are telegraphed to the Players ahead of time - that is, with Player consent and foreknowledge. It could be used as a plot twist surprise, but there had damn well better be an actual in-world justification for it that the Characters can find out about later. No matter how you slice it, there needs to be a meaningful, in world, justification for the change in mechanics. The world needs to be explainable and consistent.
Some might say that plot twists aren't bad storytelling ( that's an arguable point - I hate detective fiction where the critical clue is withheld from the reader/audience until the detective's big reveal ), but D&D is not just storytelling. It's a Role-Playing Game. The Game part is important. The mechanics are important. Consistent mechanics are important. I love the narrative aspects of TTPRG, and I am by no means a crunchy wargamer, tactical monster combat focused Player or GM - to me the story of the Characters is the focus. But an inconsistently behaving world is also bad storytelling.
DM fiat for convenience loses on all fronts: it's unfair; it's bad game design with inconsistent mechanics; it's bad storytelling with an inconsistently behaving world; and it's breaking faith with your Players by changing the conditions of the game without their consent.
Back to Numenera - in that case, it's built into the balanced mechanics, it's known ahead of time, it's agreed upon by the Players, and the Players are compensated for the world acting in an inconsistent way. It's still possible to break the world or the story by introducing capricious or stupid plot twists - but one hopes the GM has at least a little skill.
But D&D has none of that.
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Let the sorc blow up the rafts. Then have a second wave come from the water.... Everyone wins.
I fail to see the problem with the kobider.
If I could upvote you more than once for building that, I would :D
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
Some ideas for similar encounters:
Currently homebrewing the Mistveil Rogue, an elusive infiltrator that can vanish into thin air.
Just keep in mind that attacking under a white flag is a war crime for a reason: it results in everyone ignoring white flags.
If you fake one surrender, the party will never trust another surrender again.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
Longbows have a range of 600 feet.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale