I am not new to DMing, but I yet I have never encountered this exact scenario before and would LOVE some advice or information I simply missed when reading the module. I a running a modified version of the Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign for my party. The issue I am running into right now is that my party of 4 adventurers is supposed to go to the Sahuagin Fortress in The Final Enemy chapter of the Ghosts of Saltmarsh module, and are expected to be about level 8-10 when they go there. I have written in various ways for them to get help from between 1 and 5 armies depending on how they play. The problem is that the book has written in 360 enemies in this fortress with 68 of those enemies all being focused in one area. I have three ways I was planning to run this encounter but I'm not sure which one I like the most, so I turn it to my fellow DMs to lend me some advice.
Idea 1.) I like this one the least and that is using minion rules where I give all the enemies 1HP but seems VERY underwhelming for the party as they DO have multiple AoEs between them and will likely accomplish this battle on their own. It also still leaves the issue of 68 enemy turns and moves at once.
Idea 2.) I was already only going to let up to 20 soldiers at a time enter the bttle with them with each player having a horn that they can blow to call in reinforcements. This prevents overwhelming the combat with even more numbers and still allows the party to have their armies help. Then from there, have the enemies and the allows roll 1d20 for each unit and, on a roll of 10 or lower they miss, on a roll of 1 or higher they kill one unit of the other side. This probably feels like the best option but is still VERY time consuming and doesn't feel like the most efficient option.
Idea 3.) Group enemies in groups of 4(17x4=68 which is the exact number of enemies) and the allied troops in groups of 2 and simply combine the health of each group of troops together into essentially one unit that simply deals more damage. The allied troops are stronger than the enemies, so having them fight 2-4 not only keeps the overwhelming odds and let's me use the reinforcements idea I have, but also actually levels the playing field for each fight.
What does everyone else think?? I know the book doesn't actually have the players needing to do this combat due to victory points, but I sort of don't like the idea of the players not getting a hand in the whole battle and it means I have to predetermined battles ahead of time, but this is a VERY unpredictable party. So much so that the moment they got to their first town as soon as we started the game they want to leave before speaking to ANYONE in town even knowing that I only had one week to prepare the campaign and so did not have anything outside this town prepared.
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A swift breeze in the night? Or a thief leaving your pockets much more light? Am I a shadow or a blight? Perhaps I'm a different form of might.
Do you have access to the ‘24 DMG? There’s a section in there about mobs.
Alternatively, you don’t have the PCs in the mass combat — D&D just isn’t built for it. No matter how weak the enemies are, when you start getting into those big numbers, the characters will be overwhelmed by the action economy. There’s so many things trying to hit them that, statistically, they just get swamped. Instead, I’d suggest the friendly armies fight the unfriendly ones in the background. The PCs go fight the boss. You can even throw in some narration about how the army battle is going.
Here are my thoughts on this obviously feel free to take them or leave them as you wish.
There are several approaches:
1. Your third idea of grouping enemies together is definately an option, you can run them as swarms or similar creatures. I know a couple of dnd shows have done this in the past to relatively decent success.
2. Have the leaders of this enemy force fight the party with a narrative description of the fight in the background.
3. There are methods of allowing for combat between large forces but they don't use the dnd ruleset. It's just not designed to be able to handle that many enemies. An example of this that I have used in the past is Strongholds and Followers but there are plenty of different options online.
4. As Xalthu mentioned there are sections in both the 24 and 14 dmg about how mobs can work in terms of how likely creatures are to hit etc. Looking at that could give you a decent idea
I LOVE that idea about the low-ranking enemies fighting the player party, thanks you guys. That actually means I can just run that portion of this combat entirely ahead of time and let the players first focus on the bigger enemies. If the mob combat ends with enemies left, that still only means the party versus like 10 or so Total enemies. With the strongest of those being CR5 against the level 8-10 party, I think they could handle that. If the allies are the ones that survive the mob combat, then the party has help finishing up. If the party finishes off the boss wave before the mob combat ends, they just join into the fray. I like it. Keeps all the rules the same, and let's their allies be just as impact full. Thanks guys, I REALLY appreciate you.
Side note, I do not have either DMG. I recently moved and didn't have the space to bring my D&D stuff so I had to leave my books and dice in my storage unit in my previous state.
I will let yall know how it goes with this combat. It will be about a month and a half before we get to it.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
A swift breeze in the night? Or a thief leaving your pockets much more light? Am I a shadow or a blight? Perhaps I'm a different form of might.
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I am not new to DMing, but I yet I have never encountered this exact scenario before and would LOVE some advice or information I simply missed when reading the module. I a running a modified version of the Ghosts of Saltmarsh campaign for my party. The issue I am running into right now is that my party of 4 adventurers is supposed to go to the Sahuagin Fortress in The Final Enemy chapter of the Ghosts of Saltmarsh module, and are expected to be about level 8-10 when they go there. I have written in various ways for them to get help from between 1 and 5 armies depending on how they play. The problem is that the book has written in 360 enemies in this fortress with 68 of those enemies all being focused in one area. I have three ways I was planning to run this encounter but I'm not sure which one I like the most, so I turn it to my fellow DMs to lend me some advice.
Idea 1.) I like this one the least and that is using minion rules where I give all the enemies 1HP but seems VERY underwhelming for the party as they DO have multiple AoEs between them and will likely accomplish this battle on their own. It also still leaves the issue of 68 enemy turns and moves at once.
Idea 2.) I was already only going to let up to 20 soldiers at a time enter the bttle with them with each player having a horn that they can blow to call in reinforcements. This prevents overwhelming the combat with even more numbers and still allows the party to have their armies help. Then from there, have the enemies and the allows roll 1d20 for each unit and, on a roll of 10 or lower they miss, on a roll of 1 or higher they kill one unit of the other side. This probably feels like the best option but is still VERY time consuming and doesn't feel like the most efficient option.
Idea 3.) Group enemies in groups of 4(17x4=68 which is the exact number of enemies) and the allied troops in groups of 2 and simply combine the health of each group of troops together into essentially one unit that simply deals more damage. The allied troops are stronger than the enemies, so having them fight 2-4 not only keeps the overwhelming odds and let's me use the reinforcements idea I have, but also actually levels the playing field for each fight.
What does everyone else think?? I know the book doesn't actually have the players needing to do this combat due to victory points, but I sort of don't like the idea of the players not getting a hand in the whole battle and it means I have to predetermined battles ahead of time, but this is a VERY unpredictable party. So much so that the moment they got to their first town as soon as we started the game they want to leave before speaking to ANYONE in town even knowing that I only had one week to prepare the campaign and so did not have anything outside this town prepared.
A swift breeze in the night? Or a thief leaving your pockets much more light? Am I a shadow or a blight? Perhaps I'm a different form of might.
Do you have access to the ‘24 DMG? There’s a section in there about mobs.
Alternatively, you don’t have the PCs in the mass combat — D&D just isn’t built for it. No matter how weak the enemies are, when you start getting into those big numbers, the characters will be overwhelmed by the action economy. There’s so many things trying to hit them that, statistically, they just get swamped.
Instead, I’d suggest the friendly armies fight the unfriendly ones in the background. The PCs go fight the boss. You can even throw in some narration about how the army battle is going.
Here are my thoughts on this obviously feel free to take them or leave them as you wish.
There are several approaches:
1. Your third idea of grouping enemies together is definately an option, you can run them as swarms or similar creatures. I know a couple of dnd shows have done this in the past to relatively decent success.
2. Have the leaders of this enemy force fight the party with a narrative description of the fight in the background.
3. There are methods of allowing for combat between large forces but they don't use the dnd ruleset. It's just not designed to be able to handle that many enemies. An example of this that I have used in the past is Strongholds and Followers but there are plenty of different options online.
4. As Xalthu mentioned there are sections in both the 24 and 14 dmg about how mobs can work in terms of how likely creatures are to hit etc. Looking at that could give you a decent idea
I LOVE that idea about the low-ranking enemies fighting the player party, thanks you guys. That actually means I can just run that portion of this combat entirely ahead of time and let the players first focus on the bigger enemies. If the mob combat ends with enemies left, that still only means the party versus like 10 or so Total enemies. With the strongest of those being CR5 against the level 8-10 party, I think they could handle that. If the allies are the ones that survive the mob combat, then the party has help finishing up. If the party finishes off the boss wave before the mob combat ends, they just join into the fray. I like it. Keeps all the rules the same, and let's their allies be just as impact full. Thanks guys, I REALLY appreciate you.
Side note, I do not have either DMG. I recently moved and didn't have the space to bring my D&D stuff so I had to leave my books and dice in my storage unit in my previous state.
I will let yall know how it goes with this combat. It will be about a month and a half before we get to it.
A swift breeze in the night? Or a thief leaving your pockets much more light? Am I a shadow or a blight? Perhaps I'm a different form of might.