I have a open dialogue with my players, its my first campaign and I welcome feedback as I want to get better, and I want them to have fun.
My last two "boss battles" have gotten similar feedback. The combat was difficult, but not necessarily fun or scary.
I would love some advice on some how to make the combat engaging. Narratively, the party will be baiting the creature out, so I cant set the battle in a liar. I have set a precedent that its minions include assorted blights and corrupted druids.
Here is the stat block of one of the next big boss the party will fight, they are a group of 6 level 7's
Here was a minion they fought previously to hint at the boss's capabilities.
In the first place, you're going to need the minions. Your players already defeated a CR 8, and now you're planning to use a CR 7 as a boss fight.
I find the monster that you're planning to use pretty boring. Most of what those totems do is act as extra HP, but your players won't now this until they get Fjornath down to 0 HP the first time, and then many/most of them will be used up. Your other effects are not big enough to be worth taking down the totems for. Most likely, the players will just treat the damage as an unavoidable attack, rather than avoiding the totems. (Unless avoiding them proves easy, in which case why bother?) In addition, taking away movement doesn't do much is the enemy doesn't use range.
If you're open to changing Fjornath, I'd swap his claw attacks for ranged attacks (spitting acid, or shooting quills) with the same stats, increase his movement and give him a climbing speed to help him move around, and perhaps let the totems self activate every so often. If you want to use him as written, I would consider having him be prone to fighting for a round or two and then running. He could have spread his totems around the area [why wouldn't he] so that with each combat there are a few in the area that the players need to smash or avoid. He could take advantage of narrow paths and/or underbrush to make having more than one PC target him, and/or reaching his totems, difficult. (Note that you will need to prepare multiple forest locations for this idea.) You might have him be at low HP, but with several totems lying around, the first time the PCs meet him, so that they know what the totems will do.
(If you're looking for ideas in general, I write a blog called dragonencounters.com, creating interesting encounters for the various monsters in the monster manual. Please come visit, and see if any of my ideas can help you.)
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DM, writer, and blog master of https://dragonencounters.com/ a blog dedicated to providing unusual, worthwhile encounters for each monster, making each one unique.
Also, suggestions for which monsters might be found together (for people tired of dungeons full of one humanoid race, and perhaps a few beasts and undead.)
Just realized that I should have added: Having your boss use an entire action to set up totems during a boss fight is a big waste. It will give the players too much time to smash into him and/or his minions. (I know he has legendary actions, but even so.)
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DM, writer, and blog master of https://dragonencounters.com/ a blog dedicated to providing unusual, worthwhile encounters for each monster, making each one unique.
Also, suggestions for which monsters might be found together (for people tired of dungeons full of one humanoid race, and perhaps a few beasts and undead.)
The best advice I have seen is from Matt Colville as a part of his "Running the Game" YouTube series, all of which are excellent. Here is a link to a particular video, Action Oriented Monsters. https://youtu.be/y_zl8WWaSyI?si=suuVIGp0RYmZYYa6 Basically, he gives his bosses a number of small but consequential out-of-turn abilities that allow them to keep changing the combat environment. These actions are scripted to occur in a particular order to lend a more cinematic flavour to the encounter. This approach is also reflected in some of his MCDM products, including his 5e alternative Monster Manual, "Flee Mortals!".
Good luck, and congratulations on your commitment to up-ing your DM-ing game.
In addition to the above, a level 7 party will roll over a CR 7 monster every time. And that’s a standard 4-person party. With 6 PCs, the boss won’t have a chance. Xanathar’s guidelines would recommend a CR11 for a solo vs 6 characters. And that’s usually pretty conservative. In short, make the monster much tougher.
And, about the party baiting the boss out of the lair, did they have a really good plan for that? Certainly, you don’t want to shut it down when the players are doing something clever. But with a 12 int and a 17 wis — in particular a 17 wis — this creature should not be easy to fool. It should take a really, really good idea to get them to leave their lair, where they would presumably have some advantages, such as lair actions.
Added a narrative ranged attack in addition to a more normal ranged attack
Added some terrain limiting with the blightstep; leaving a trail of necrotic damage
As far as minions, I plan on having 1 blighted druid as a minion in addition to some blights to prevent sneak attacks from the pair of rangers in the party
for some reason the builder didnt change the CR its calculated as follows;
In the first place, you're going to need the minions....
Thank you for all the advice, I beefed him up quite a bit (shown above
Regarding the totems, there bunch of them already on the battlefield (he is summoned by bringing a bunch of animals to bait it out (2x party members visible). With their low hit points, they will be killed very quickly with the help of blights and the like.
Maybe I can have him use the soul totem at will like a health potion? That way they know to consider breaking them?
And, about the party baiting the boss out of the lair, did they have a really good plan for that? Certainly, you don’t want to shut it down when the players are doing something clever. But with a 12 int and a 17 wis — in particular a 17 wis — this creature should not be easy to fool. It should take a really, really good idea to get them to leave their lair, where they would presumably have some advantages, such as lair actions.
He is summoned by bringing a bunch of animals to bait it out (2x party members visible). He kills weaker animals to create AOE attacks with the totems. Do you think the animal bait is enough? Narratively that is what I have set up, but I m open to tweaking it
A fun combat isn't just one where the boss has cool moves, but it's one where there are tangible stakes during the fight. The last boss fight I had was the end of an arc in Avernus (homebrewed version of WD: Descent into Avernus) and had the party throwing themselves into the middle of an all-out war in order to protect Zariel. There was a massive boss battle that ensued in a flying fortress, which was cinematic and fun, but the main aspect was that they weren't even really *fighting* the boss, they were just trying to *protect* Zariel.
If you add stakes, such as protecting an NPC, stealing an artifact, or imposing a time limit, or something like that, then the players will definitely have more fun in trying to navigate that narrative.
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I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
I think this combat scenario still lacks something. Fjornath's attacks are not quite strong enough. Against a group of level 7s, you probably want a group of monsters/NPCs who have a combined CR of at least 14. It's also better to add some minions to this fight because even with Legendary Actions, one creature with 2 attacks still gets overwhelmed by a group of 6 PCs, many of whom have bonus actions and probably the Haste spell prepared. Minions need to be at least CR 2. Fjornath should also have some control spells or abilities that limit the usual tactics of the PCs to gum up their bonus action & action economy and/or prevent them from helping each other to some degree. Spells like Confusion, Wall of Thorns, and Storm Sphere are good examples. I would actually recommend changing the "Claw" Legendary Action to something like Grasping Vine without the concentration part.
I have a open dialogue with my players, its my first campaign and I welcome feedback as I want to get better, and I want them to have fun.
My last two "boss battles" have gotten similar feedback. The combat was difficult, but not necessarily fun or scary.
I would love some advice on some how to make the combat engaging. Narratively, the party will be baiting the creature out, so I cant set the battle in a liar. I have set a precedent that its minions include assorted blights and corrupted druids.
Here is the stat block of one of the next big boss the party will fight, they are a group of 6 level 7's
Here was a minion they fought previously to hint at the boss's capabilities.
In the first place, you're going to need the minions. Your players already defeated a CR 8, and now you're planning to use a CR 7 as a boss fight.
I find the monster that you're planning to use pretty boring. Most of what those totems do is act as extra HP, but your players won't now this until they get Fjornath down to 0 HP the first time, and then many/most of them will be used up. Your other effects are not big enough to be worth taking down the totems for. Most likely, the players will just treat the damage as an unavoidable attack, rather than avoiding the totems. (Unless avoiding them proves easy, in which case why bother?) In addition, taking away movement doesn't do much is the enemy doesn't use range.
If you're open to changing Fjornath, I'd swap his claw attacks for ranged attacks (spitting acid, or shooting quills) with the same stats, increase his movement and give him a climbing speed to help him move around, and perhaps let the totems self activate every so often. If you want to use him as written, I would consider having him be prone to fighting for a round or two and then running. He could have spread his totems around the area [why wouldn't he] so that with each combat there are a few in the area that the players need to smash or avoid. He could take advantage of narrow paths and/or underbrush to make having more than one PC target him, and/or reaching his totems, difficult. (Note that you will need to prepare multiple forest locations for this idea.) You might have him be at low HP, but with several totems lying around, the first time the PCs meet him, so that they know what the totems will do.
(If you're looking for ideas in general, I write a blog called dragonencounters.com, creating interesting encounters for the various monsters in the monster manual. Please come visit, and see if any of my ideas can help you.)
DM, writer, and blog master of https://dragonencounters.com/ a blog dedicated to providing unusual, worthwhile encounters for each monster, making each one unique.
Also, suggestions for which monsters might be found together (for people tired of dungeons full of one humanoid race, and perhaps a few beasts and undead.)
Just realized that I should have added: Having your boss use an entire action to set up totems during a boss fight is a big waste. It will give the players too much time to smash into him and/or his minions. (I know he has legendary actions, but even so.)
DM, writer, and blog master of https://dragonencounters.com/ a blog dedicated to providing unusual, worthwhile encounters for each monster, making each one unique.
Also, suggestions for which monsters might be found together (for people tired of dungeons full of one humanoid race, and perhaps a few beasts and undead.)
The best advice I have seen is from Matt Colville as a part of his "Running the Game" YouTube series, all of which are excellent. Here is a link to a particular video, Action Oriented Monsters. https://youtu.be/y_zl8WWaSyI?si=suuVIGp0RYmZYYa6 Basically, he gives his bosses a number of small but consequential out-of-turn abilities that allow them to keep changing the combat environment. These actions are scripted to occur in a particular order to lend a more cinematic flavour to the encounter. This approach is also reflected in some of his MCDM products, including his 5e alternative Monster Manual, "Flee Mortals!".
Good luck, and congratulations on your commitment to up-ing your DM-ing game.
In addition to the above, a level 7 party will roll over a CR 7 monster every time. And that’s a standard 4-person party. With 6 PCs, the boss won’t have a chance.
Xanathar’s guidelines would recommend a CR11 for a solo vs 6 characters. And that’s usually pretty conservative.
In short, make the monster much tougher.
And, about the party baiting the boss out of the lair, did they have a really good plan for that? Certainly, you don’t want to shut it down when the players are doing something clever. But with a 12 int and a 17 wis — in particular a 17 wis — this creature should not be easy to fool. It should take a really, really good idea to get them to leave their lair, where they would presumably have some advantages, such as lair actions.
So I beefed up Fjornath;
Added a narrative ranged attack in addition to a more normal ranged attack
Added some terrain limiting with the blightstep; leaving a trail of necrotic damage
As far as minions, I plan on having 1 blighted druid as a minion in addition to some blights to prevent sneak attacks from the pair of rangers in the party
for some reason the builder didnt change the CR its calculated as follows;
ESTIMATED CR 17
OFFENSIVE CR 10
DEFENSIVE CR 25
Thank you for all the advice, I beefed him up quite a bit (shown above
Regarding the totems, there bunch of them already on the battlefield (he is summoned by bringing a bunch of animals to bait it out (2x party members visible). With their low hit points, they will be killed very quickly with the help of blights and the like.
Maybe I can have him use the soul totem at will like a health potion? That way they know to consider breaking them?
Ill take a look thank you!
He is summoned by bringing a bunch of animals to bait it out (2x party members visible). He kills weaker animals to create AOE attacks with the totems. Do you think the animal bait is enough? Narratively that is what I have set up, but I m open to tweaking it
A fun combat isn't just one where the boss has cool moves, but it's one where there are tangible stakes during the fight. The last boss fight I had was the end of an arc in Avernus (homebrewed version of WD: Descent into Avernus) and had the party throwing themselves into the middle of an all-out war in order to protect Zariel. There was a massive boss battle that ensued in a flying fortress, which was cinematic and fun, but the main aspect was that they weren't even really *fighting* the boss, they were just trying to *protect* Zariel.
If you add stakes, such as protecting an NPC, stealing an artifact, or imposing a time limit, or something like that, then the players will definitely have more fun in trying to navigate that narrative.
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
I think this combat scenario still lacks something. Fjornath's attacks are not quite strong enough. Against a group of level 7s, you probably want a group of monsters/NPCs who have a combined CR of at least 14. It's also better to add some minions to this fight because even with Legendary Actions, one creature with 2 attacks still gets overwhelmed by a group of 6 PCs, many of whom have bonus actions and probably the Haste spell prepared. Minions need to be at least CR 2. Fjornath should also have some control spells or abilities that limit the usual tactics of the PCs to gum up their bonus action & action economy and/or prevent them from helping each other to some degree. Spells like Confusion, Wall of Thorns, and Storm Sphere are good examples. I would actually recommend changing the "Claw" Legendary Action to something like Grasping Vine without the concentration part.