playing KoD with a large group - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

playing KoD with a large group

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
iconherder
Jul 22, 2004 14:12:23 I'm going to try to keep this out of spoiler territory as it doesn't have to be terribly specific.

My question is basically, how do I scale encounters designed for a 4 player group? I have 8 people right now in my group. This is a first for most of us, as we're used to playing with a 4-5 person party. The DMG rules basically just say that a group with more than 4 people can handle harder encounter levels, but it doesn't really give me much more to go on.

If my group has 8 1st level chars, is the effective group level 2? I want to be sure I'm making the encounters hard enough to be entertaining, but I also want to avoid alot of PC death. (side note: I've decided that the various raise dead spells rarely work in Dragonlance, based on the fact that I've never seen one used in the core books)

I also want to make sure I'm awarding the proper level of XP.

I know I can increase the number of mobs for encounters where that makes sense, but on some encounters the point is to go up against one big bad guy. At that point I guess I can just add hit dice to a monster and/or character levels of whatever class would be appropriate? But how much to add?

So far, in the little Sylvan Key adventure, I just doubled the amount of thugs or bandits in any given encounter. The fight with the bandits at the end saw 3 of the 8 party members hit negative hit points (we're playing with the -10 variant rule) but they rallied and came out good in the end. So I think that was probably OK as far as difficulty, but when it came time to assign XP, I wasn't really sure what to do.
#2
green_cloaked_sorcerer
Jul 22, 2004 14:17:42 Multiply thugs x1.5, not x2.

For experience points: Figure the experience points for the party as usual, but instead of dividing by 4, divide by 8.

Pretty simple, am I right?
#3
iconherder
Jul 22, 2004 14:28:30 So that means the party's effective level stays the same, regardless of the number of characters?

If that's the case then yeah, I guess it is simple in that case.

I suppose using that same math I just beef up big bad guys to 1.5 x the CR the book lists?
#4
cam_banks
Jul 22, 2004 15:24:14 A party of eight characters should be considered to be of equivalent power when determining the challenge of any specific encounter as a party of four characters at +2 levels.

So, a party of eight 6th level characters can handle an encounter designed for a party of four 8th level characters.

Doubling the number of opponents in an encounter and adding +2 to the EL is more or less the same thing. Adding half again the number and adding +1 to the EL is also the same thing.

Cheers,
Cam
#5
shnik
Jul 22, 2004 15:54:17
Originally posted by Cam Banks

So, a party of eight 6th level characters can handle an encounter designed for a party of four 8th level characters.

Doubling the number of opponents in an encounter and adding +2 to the EL is more or less the same thing. Adding half again the number and adding +1 to the EL is also the same thing.

Cheers,
Cam

Two CR1 is only the equivalent of a CR2 however, so 8 1st-level characters are about the equivalent of 4 2nd-level PCs.
#6
iconherder
Jul 22, 2004 16:15:43 Sweet, that is exactly the information I needed! Thanks again guys!
#7
zombiegleemax
Jul 29, 2004 14:18:15 Are you finding it difficult to try and run a game that has many players? I had to run a Dragonlance game once a week for 6 hours for 4 months straight with a minimum of 7 people and at one time we had about 19 people playing. Fun? Yes. .Hard? Defiently, but it got people interested in reading the DL books as well as buying the DLCS and other things related to the world of Krynn, so all that hard work paid off. For most of the players it was their first consistent exposure to the D&D world and most of them still play in one campaign setting or another.
#8
iconherder
Jul 29, 2004 15:02:51 We've only run one session so far, we're playing once every other week. I'd be really interested in hearing your insights from 6 months of gaming with a group that size.

In our first session things went pretty well. There really weren't any more distractions than in our normal 4-5 group.
#9
zombiegleemax
Jul 29, 2004 15:05:04 What would you like to know Iconherder?
#10
iconherder
Jul 30, 2004 18:18:18 I'm not really sure yet.

So far I think my scaling of encounters is going OK, I'm trying to add character levels to boss-types and just increase numbers for smaller fights. Did you do something similar?

I'm also a little worried about giving each character the attention they deserve in terms of loot. Actually, scaling the loot is a whole other problem. I've had a tendency in the past to be really stingy with magic items with our little 4-5 player group. I don't really want to hamper them that way, but I'm real scared of overdoing the magic items. I did that in my first campaign and it was not pretty.

Were there any plot points that seemed odd with extra players in the party? Anything to look out for in that regard?

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 iconherder Jul 22, 2004 14:12:23	I'm going to try to keep this out of spoiler territory as it doesn't have to be terribly specific. My question is basically, how do I scale encounters designed for a 4 player group? I have 8 people right now in my group. This is a first for most of us, as we're used to playing with a 4-5 person party. The DMG rules basically just say that a group with more than 4 people can handle harder encounter levels, but it doesn't really give me much more to go on. If my group has 8 1st level chars, is the effective group level 2? I want to be sure I'm making the encounters hard enough to be entertaining, but I also want to avoid alot of PC death. (side note: I've decided that the various raise dead spells rarely work in Dragonlance, based on the fact that I've never seen one used in the core books) I also want to make sure I'm awarding the proper level of XP. I know I can increase the number of mobs for encounters where that makes sense, but on some encounters the point is to go up against one big bad guy. At that point I guess I can just add hit dice to a monster and/or character levels of whatever class would be appropriate? But how much to add? So far, in the little Sylvan Key adventure, I just doubled the amount of thugs or bandits in any given encounter. The fight with the bandits at the end saw 3 of the 8 party members hit negative hit points (we're playing with the -10 variant rule) but they rallied and came out good in the end. So I think that was probably OK as far as difficulty, but when it came time to assign XP, I wasn't really sure what to do.
#2 green_cloaked_sorcerer Jul 22, 2004 14:17:42	Multiply thugs x1.5, not x2. For experience points: Figure the experience points for the party as usual, but instead of dividing by 4, divide by 8. Pretty simple, am I right?
#3 iconherder Jul 22, 2004 14:28:30	So that means the party's effective level stays the same, regardless of the number of characters? If that's the case then yeah, I guess it is simple in that case. I suppose using that same math I just beef up big bad guys to 1.5 x the CR the book lists?
#4 cam_banks Jul 22, 2004 15:24:14	A party of eight characters should be considered to be of equivalent power when determining the challenge of any specific encounter as a party of four characters at +2 levels. So, a party of eight 6th level characters can handle an encounter designed for a party of four 8th level characters. Doubling the number of opponents in an encounter and adding +2 to the EL is more or less the same thing. Adding half again the number and adding +1 to the EL is also the same thing. Cheers, Cam
#5 shnik Jul 22, 2004 15:54:17	Originally posted by Cam Banks So, a party of eight 6th level characters can handle an encounter designed for a party of four 8th level characters. Doubling the number of opponents in an encounter and adding +2 to the EL is more or less the same thing. Adding half again the number and adding +1 to the EL is also the same thing. Cheers, Cam Two CR1 is only the equivalent of a CR2 however, so 8 1st-level characters are about the equivalent of 4 2nd-level PCs.
#6 iconherder Jul 22, 2004 16:15:43	Sweet, that is exactly the information I needed! Thanks again guys!
#7 zombiegleemax Jul 29, 2004 14:18:15	Are you finding it difficult to try and run a game that has many players? I had to run a Dragonlance game once a week for 6 hours for 4 months straight with a minimum of 7 people and at one time we had about 19 people playing. Fun? Yes. .Hard? Defiently, but it got people interested in reading the DL books as well as buying the DLCS and other things related to the world of Krynn, so all that hard work paid off. For most of the players it was their first consistent exposure to the D&D world and most of them still play in one campaign setting or another.
#8 iconherder Jul 29, 2004 15:02:51	We've only run one session so far, we're playing once every other week. I'd be really interested in hearing your insights from 6 months of gaming with a group that size. In our first session things went pretty well. There really weren't any more distractions than in our normal 4-5 group.
#9 zombiegleemax Jul 29, 2004 15:05:04	What would you like to know Iconherder?
#10 iconherder Jul 30, 2004 18:18:18	I'm not really sure yet. So far I think my scaling of encounters is going OK, I'm trying to add character levels to boss-types and just increase numbers for smaller fights. Did you do something similar? I'm also a little worried about giving each character the attention they deserve in terms of loot. Actually, scaling the loot is a whole other problem. I've had a tendency in the past to be really stingy with magic items with our little 4-5 player group. I don't really want to hamper them that way, but I'm real scared of overdoing the magic items. I did that in my first campaign and it was not pretty. Were there any plot points that seemed odd with extra players in the party? Anything to look out for in that regard?