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TOPIC: Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever)

Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #25

I only oversaw 1/20th of combats, but I will point out a few things from the DM perspective (some of which have already been stated):

1) When I play a dumb monster, I attack whoever just did the most damage, or at first round, whoever's standing near the door. When I play a smart monster, I attack someone I can hurt - so, if several players have ACs I can barely touch, I'll go for the easiest target. I still don't try to focus on one target to wipe them out unless the module specifically says so. This is as instructed by TD. A smart monster won't melee attack someone a paladin is protecting (or they'll target the Paladin first); a dumb one will.

2) DMs don't know the current HP of party members (though the totals were written on some party cards). This protects players from DMs targeting the nearly-dead, but doesn't allow a DM to avoid killing a weak party member. Depending on the room, you might be able to stay alive by blending into the background. In my room, I did 2 attacks, and had no idea if attacking a player twice might kill them, but I had to pick a target, and quickly. I could pick the Barbarian every time, hoping they'd have the most HP, but that's just a guess, and too predictable.

3) In E3 R7, the special ability, I tried to pick out someone it would work on - if you were protected, it kept you out of the line of fire, but why would I randomly waste a monster's turn in a round (especially if that's the only thing the monster is doing)?

There were some issues with people claiming immunity that wasn't listed on the party card - so some failure(s) between the players, whatever app they were using, and the Coaches (like maybe they had a slotless token that they didn't have out on their mat, and the Coach didn't ask the group if they had any of those tokens).

If I accidentally named a player who was protected and listed on the card, I let it go and moved on. If I named a player who wasn't listed and they claimed immunity, I would ask who was vulnerable (because I could no longer rely on the party card to tell me).

I also asked who was immune to the other thing because it was not listed on the party card, and it was the easiest way to grab the party's attention and also learn who was immune (so I could target them with the third thing, so as to spread the damage around). One of the early runs, the whole party was immune (and for whatever reason, that token wasn't in my list of tokens to watch for), so I started to ask every group when the ability came up.
I came here to sing and collect tokens, and I'm alllll out of money.

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #26

Druegar wrote:

Matthew Hayward wrote: I noticed this year that the player with the lowest AC was getting attacked over, and over, and over in every room.

Did you report this at the end of your adventure?


No... I shall go stand in the cone of shame now :).

It didn't occur to me till later - it mainly happened on my late Saturday night run - where I was only familiar with the party's AC because I was strategizing with the Paladin on who to guard.

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #27

Rizzen wrote: Well I thought it was a good year for the paladin to get attacked however I have the lowest AC in our group so I fit into both categories of this tho I was focused down in grind at the very last minute..but I wasn't upset about it


Overhead responses from combat DM's on your AC:
"Paladin is your AC a typo?!"
"Paladin your AC is lower than the wizard!" (which wasn't even mediocre in our party)

This was a year my party (including Rizzen as our pally) stepped up from hardcore to nightmare for the 1st time.
We're all the kind of people who enjoy the game on a "meta" level. We like talking about the game year-round. We buy tokens. We enjoy crafting. We get together during the off-season if we can. We are a very skewed demographic that way. -Raven

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #28

Matt wrote:

Rizzen wrote: Well I thought it was a good year for the paladin to get attacked however I have the lowest AC in our group so I fit into both categories of this tho I was focused down in grind at the very last minute..but I wasn't upset about it


Overhead responses from combat DM's on your AC:
"Paladin is your AC a typo?!"
"Paladin your AC is lower than the wizard!" (which wasn't even mediocre in our party)

This was a year my party (including Rizzen as our pally) stepped up from hardcore to nightmare for the 1st time.


Lol - are you doing a retribution build at least?

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #29

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Matt wrote:

Rizzen wrote: Well I thought it was a good year for the paladin to get attacked however I have the lowest AC in our group so I fit into both categories of this tho I was focused down in grind at the very last minute..but I wasn't upset about it


Overhead responses from combat DM's on your AC:
"Paladin is your AC a typo?!"
"Paladin your AC is lower than the wizard!" (which wasn't even mediocre in our party)

This was a year my party (including Rizzen as our pally) stepped up from hardcore to nightmare for the 1st time.


Lol - are you doing a retribution build at least?


I had to let the DM know they probably *DID* hit the Paladin with their roll of 2-5 on NM several times this year. It was a blast.
First ever death in True Horde
"Well, with you guarding 2 players, that means you take 90. Are you dead?"
-Incognito

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #30

Singsalot wrote: I only oversaw 1/20th of combats, but I will point out a few things from the DM perspective (some of which have already been stated):

1) When I play a dumb monster, I attack whoever just did the most damage, or at first round, whoever's standing near the door. When I play a smart monster, I attack someone I can hurt - so, if several players have ACs I can barely touch, I'll go for the easiest target. I still don't try to focus on one target to wipe them out unless the module specifically says so. This is as instructed by TD. A smart monster won't melee attack someone a paladin is protecting (or they'll target the Paladin first); a dumb one will.

2) DMs don't know the current HP of party members (though the totals were written on some party cards). This protects players from DMs targeting the nearly-dead, but doesn't allow a DM to avoid killing a weak party member. Depending on the room, you might be able to stay alive by blending into the background. In my room, I did 2 attacks, and had no idea if attacking a player twice might kill them, but I had to pick a target, and quickly. I could pick the Barbarian every time, hoping they'd have the most HP, but that's just a guess, and too predictable.

3) In E3 R7, the special ability, I tried to pick out someone it would work on - if you were protected, it kept you out of the line of fire, but why would I randomly waste a monster's turn in a round (especially if that's the only thing the monster is doing)?

There were some issues with people claiming immunity that wasn't listed on the party card - so some failure(s) between the players, whatever app they were using, and the Coaches (like maybe they had a slotless token that they didn't have out on their mat, and the Coach didn't ask the group if they had any of those tokens).

If I accidentally named a player who was protected and listed on the card, I let it go and moved on. If I named a player who wasn't listed and they claimed immunity, I would ask who was vulnerable (because I could no longer rely on the party card to tell me).

I also asked who was immune to the other thing because it was not listed on the party card, and it was the easiest way to grab the party's attention and also learn who was immune (so I could target them with the third thing, so as to spread the damage around). One of the early runs, the whole party was immune (and for whatever reason, that token wasn't in my list of tokens to watch for), so I started to ask every group when the ability came up.


Even if the monster is smart, how would it have advance knowledge of who's immune? Seems like it ought to have to find this out by trial and error, just like players finding out they wasted their turn because a particular monster can't be damaged by Searing Light.
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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #31

David Zych wrote:

Singsalot wrote: I only oversaw 1/20th of combats, but I will point out a few things from the DM perspective (some of which have already been stated):

1) When I play a dumb monster, I attack whoever just did the most damage, or at first round, whoever's standing near the door. When I play a smart monster, I attack someone I can hurt - so, if several players have ACs I can barely touch, I'll go for the easiest target. I still don't try to focus on one target to wipe them out unless the module specifically says so. This is as instructed by TD. A smart monster won't melee attack someone a paladin is protecting (or they'll target the Paladin first); a dumb one will.

2) DMs don't know the current HP of party members (though the totals were written on some party cards). This protects players from DMs targeting the nearly-dead, but doesn't allow a DM to avoid killing a weak party member. Depending on the room, you might be able to stay alive by blending into the background. In my room, I did 2 attacks, and had no idea if attacking a player twice might kill them, but I had to pick a target, and quickly. I could pick the Barbarian every time, hoping they'd have the most HP, but that's just a guess, and too predictable.

3) In E3 R7, the special ability, I tried to pick out someone it would work on - if you were protected, it kept you out of the line of fire, but why would I randomly waste a monster's turn in a round (especially if that's the only thing the monster is doing)?

There were some issues with people claiming immunity that wasn't listed on the party card - so some failure(s) between the players, whatever app they were using, and the Coaches (like maybe they had a slotless token that they didn't have out on their mat, and the Coach didn't ask the group if they had any of those tokens).

If I accidentally named a player who was protected and listed on the card, I let it go and moved on. If I named a player who wasn't listed and they claimed immunity, I would ask who was vulnerable (because I could no longer rely on the party card to tell me).

I also asked who was immune to the other thing because it was not listed on the party card, and it was the easiest way to grab the party's attention and also learn who was immune (so I could target them with the third thing, so as to spread the damage around). One of the early runs, the whole party was immune (and for whatever reason, that token wasn't in my list of tokens to watch for), so I started to ask every group when the ability came up.


Even if the monster is smart, how would it have advance knowledge of who's immune? Seems like it ought to have to find this out by trial and error, just like players finding out they wasted their turn because a particular monster can't be damaged by Searing Light.


Maybe the monster has some sort of psychic sense?
First ever death in True Horde
"Well, with you guarding 2 players, that means you take 90. Are you dead?"
-Incognito

My token shop/trade thread: Wade's Wide World of Wonder 

My Current Paladin Build 

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #32

David Zych wrote:

Singsalot wrote: I only oversaw 1/20th of combats, but I will point out a few things from the DM perspective (some of which have already been stated):

1) When I play a dumb monster, I attack whoever just did the most damage, or at first round, whoever's standing near the door. When I play a smart monster, I attack someone I can hurt - so, if several players have ACs I can barely touch, I'll go for the easiest target. I still don't try to focus on one target to wipe them out unless the module specifically says so. This is as instructed by TD. A smart monster won't melee attack someone a paladin is protecting (or they'll target the Paladin first); a dumb one will.

2) DMs don't know the current HP of party members (though the totals were written on some party cards). This protects players from DMs targeting the nearly-dead, but doesn't allow a DM to avoid killing a weak party member. Depending on the room, you might be able to stay alive by blending into the background. In my room, I did 2 attacks, and had no idea if attacking a player twice might kill them, but I had to pick a target, and quickly. I could pick the Barbarian every time, hoping they'd have the most HP, but that's just a guess, and too predictable.

3) In E3 R7, the special ability, I tried to pick out someone it would work on - if you were protected, it kept you out of the line of fire, but why would I randomly waste a monster's turn in a round (especially if that's the only thing the monster is doing)?

There were some issues with people claiming immunity that wasn't listed on the party card - so some failure(s) between the players, whatever app they were using, and the Coaches (like maybe they had a slotless token that they didn't have out on their mat, and the Coach didn't ask the group if they had any of those tokens).

If I accidentally named a player who was protected and listed on the card, I let it go and moved on. If I named a player who wasn't listed and they claimed immunity, I would ask who was vulnerable (because I could no longer rely on the party card to tell me).

I also asked who was immune to the other thing because it was not listed on the party card, and it was the easiest way to grab the party's attention and also learn who was immune (so I could target them with the third thing, so as to spread the damage around). One of the early runs, the whole party was immune (and for whatever reason, that token wasn't in my list of tokens to watch for), so I started to ask every group when the ability came up.


Even if the monster is smart, how would it have advance knowledge of who's immune? Seems like it ought to have to find this out by trial and error, just like players finding out they wasted their turn because a particular monster can't be damaged by Searing Light.


Perhaps because we had fought him before and then chased him for 4 years?
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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #33

Milambus (Jake) wrote:

David Zych wrote:

Singsalot wrote: I only oversaw 1/20th of combats, but I will point out a few things from the DM perspective (some of which have already been stated):

1) When I play a dumb monster, I attack whoever just did the most damage, or at first round, whoever's standing near the door. When I play a smart monster, I attack someone I can hurt - so, if several players have ACs I can barely touch, I'll go for the easiest target. I still don't try to focus on one target to wipe them out unless the module specifically says so. This is as instructed by TD. A smart monster won't melee attack someone a paladin is protecting (or they'll target the Paladin first); a dumb one will.

2) DMs don't know the current HP of party members (though the totals were written on some party cards). This protects players from DMs targeting the nearly-dead, but doesn't allow a DM to avoid killing a weak party member. Depending on the room, you might be able to stay alive by blending into the background. In my room, I did 2 attacks, and had no idea if attacking a player twice might kill them, but I had to pick a target, and quickly. I could pick the Barbarian every time, hoping they'd have the most HP, but that's just a guess, and too predictable.

3) In E3 R7, the special ability, I tried to pick out someone it would work on - if you were protected, it kept you out of the line of fire, but why would I randomly waste a monster's turn in a round (especially if that's the only thing the monster is doing)?

There were some issues with people claiming immunity that wasn't listed on the party card - so some failure(s) between the players, whatever app they were using, and the Coaches (like maybe they had a slotless token that they didn't have out on their mat, and the Coach didn't ask the group if they had any of those tokens).

If I accidentally named a player who was protected and listed on the card, I let it go and moved on. If I named a player who wasn't listed and they claimed immunity, I would ask who was vulnerable (because I could no longer rely on the party card to tell me).

I also asked who was immune to the other thing because it was not listed on the party card, and it was the easiest way to grab the party's attention and also learn who was immune (so I could target them with the third thing, so as to spread the damage around). One of the early runs, the whole party was immune (and for whatever reason, that token wasn't in my list of tokens to watch for), so I started to ask every group when the ability came up.


Even if the monster is smart, how would it have advance knowledge of who's immune? Seems like it ought to have to find this out by trial and error, just like players finding out they wasted their turn because a particular monster can't be damaged by Searing Light.


Perhaps because we had fought him before and then chased him for 4 years?


Ok, I'll buy that explanation in the specific case of the mindflayer. :) Though it'd be cool for the DM to actually offer that reason when asking: "who's immune to psychic blast? The mindflayer knows your weaknesses because he's fought you before."

But "a smart monster" in general already knowing a specific party's strengths and weaknesses seems sketchy. Attack the wizard because wizards are typically easier to hit? Fine. Attack this specific character in this specific party because it says on the party card that their AC is low? Not so much IMO.
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Yes, my AC is lower than the Wizard's. No regrets!

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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #34

From observing DM's running combat in my rooms, for the most part the DMs will either attack the spell casters (if intelligent monster) or the "beefier" classes like Paladin and Barbarian. Most default to hitting the classes that tend to have the most HP to burn as they don't want to kill players.

Otherwise It tends to be interaction based - if the bard sings Baby Shark I can't guarantee that he's gonna live through the encounter. ;)
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Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #35

David Zych wrote: Even if the monster is smart, how would it have advance knowledge of who's immune? Seems like it ought to have to find this out by trial and error, just like players finding out they wasted their turn because a particular monster can't be damaged by Searing Light.


I mean, in most cases you're probably right, but the choices are as follows:

Have a specific order, targeting specific classes over others in each party, unfairly impacting a certain class or classes (in this case, probably the low-saves classes, which then lets 2nd and 3rd run parties use 3 tokens to provide the protection of 10 tokens)
Randomize targets, taking time away from the party by making it 2 rolls instead of 1
Intentionally target those who are immune, making the monster basically impotent
Intentionally target those who are vulnerable, making the monster at least a threat and putting monster victory on the cards, at least in raw mathematical terms

In this case, I rationalized it that the specific kind of attack allowed the monster to "feel" for a victim.
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Last edit: by Singsalot.

Clever Girl.... (perhaps too clever) 5 years 3 months ago #36

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Starting a few years ago, every room in every module has instructions for how the monster should pick its target(s). If you feel a DM was inappropriately targeting a player/class, please inform us immediately upon the conclusion of your adventure so we can make the necessary correction. Capisce?
Have you looked it up in the TDb?
Please post TDb corrections in this thread .
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