Fight Like Kobold: To Make Better D&D Encounters
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- Опубликовано: 13 сен 2024
- Fight Like Kobold: To Make Better D&D Encounters
In this video we look to kobolds for inspiration in creating more challenging D&D encounters. It's all about using conditions in the 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons game to make fights tactically harder for the players.
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Translated titles:
Luchar como kobold: para hacer mejores D&D encuentros
Kämpfe wie Kobold: bessere D&D Begegnungen
Se battre comme kobold: faire de meilleures rencontres D&D
Lutar como kobold: fazer melhores D&D encontros
Slåss som kobold: för att få bättre D&D möten (2-2-2-2-2)
Kämpa som Kobold: Att göra bättre D&D möten
I denna video tittar vi på kobolds för inspiration för att skapa mer utmanande D&D möten. Det handlar om att använda förhållanden i 5: e utgåva Dungeons and Dragons-spelet för att slåss taktiskt hårdare för spelarna.
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Wow, your guys production quality has taken a HUGE step up.
Good job guys.
You and your kobold buddies have stolen a shiny thing from a stuffy humie in sparkly armor and you decide to stash it at the hideout. A scout henchman returns, notifying you the stuffy humie and his weird assortment of buddies are coming to take it back. Your kobold pride is at stake, and you have the resources to make a stand. What do you do?
dreddbolt set all the traps
Grab everything valuable and hide it just outside of the lair. Leave a few lit torches inside to attract the humies and wait. After they enter the cave, collapse the entrance. Then, run away cackling. Repeat as necessary until the shiny humie strangles his DM and the universe ends.
Make nothing but paralysis based traps and then when the finally get the end have them realize the treasure was near the entrance and is now who knows where as the kobolds have moved the treasure to a unknown location
Another trick that I know video games typically pull when players face overwhelming odds is to limit the number of enemies that will engage a single player. You might have 20 enemies around you, but only 2-4 will attack a single player at once. This gives players the fear of facing large numbers, but makes them feel awesome when they manage to wipe out the whole group. It also tests the party's endurance.
I don't see enough about playable Kobolds. I'm imagining one way of it working could be similar to Ice Climbers in Super Smash Bros. by teaming up.
神影Kamikage kobolds actually have pack tactics and a couple other pluses to playing them (im actually playing a kobold druid)
Jaelke YT neat. I wasn't even sure if Kobolds were playable.
I think kobolds should always have some sort of trap prepared, be it something primitive and clumsy at low level or something elaborate and deadly at high levels. Kobolds without traps are just quirky looking goblins!
Stefan B sadly theydont have the stats in5e to support that
squattingheads I use crafting rules, assuming every kobold has proficiency and tools for making crafts. All that is then needed are numbers and time. What more stats do you want?
And don’t forget clever use of structures. The kobold sniper tower comes to mind. Go watch the animated spellbook episode on sleep to see what I mean
I once did an encounter for a 17th level party where they fought this boss who summoned shadows once per turn when she took damage. The entire room was covered in magical darkness, the warlock in the group took truesight as one of his mystic Aracanum so he could see, but no one else could. On top of that the shadows exploded when they were killed, and they could damage other shadows with the explosion setting off a terrifying chain reaction the first time the party killed one. The boss her self mean while was throwing out spells to frighten or mind control a party member. Of course once the fighter got to her and action surged well.....
well if i was dealing with magical darkness constantly... i would be going on a quest for truesight/trueseeing equipment.
Seems like too much focus on the fairly easily nullified disadvantage mechanics and not enough on NPC tactics and setups to me.
Orlunu what are some tactics you are interested in?
The thing is with 5e
A lot of tactics have been boiled down to advantage/ disadvantage. There's no flanking and low level monsters dont have special abilities to leverage.
I think their advice does count as enemy tactics and set ups. Thats what shoving, using tight spaces, and playing with ranges was for imo
JoeRingo118 sounds legit. Totally didn't think about the equipment.
(But I think orcs benefit from being more aggressive and using their enhanced mobility. Maybe give orcs a few levels of barbarian.)
Hobgoblins I can see using your maneuver constantly though.
While enemies can be used in any way you wish, I tentatively agree with C M from a lore perspective. Orcs are written more as brawlers. If we want what amounts to Hoplite tactics, we'd use Hobgoblins. They tend to be more regimented, at least as written in the Monster Manual. Plus, while most anyone can bully Goblins into working for them, it's fairly natural to assume they'd be working for their bigger "cousins".
Add a Bugbear that hides for the opening rounds of the battle, only to flank the PCs and disrupt their formation, and this encounter is pretty challenging.
We have a ton of vids on a different types of tactics- ruclips.net/user/results?search_query=encounter+tactics-+nerdarchy
We tend to do more micro-content where zoom in on certain aspects of the game.
-Nerdarchist Dave
Give a group of kobald's a magical dagger. When a creature impales itself with this dagger, it is transformed into a monstrous version of that creature. The players encounter a group of kobolds with one of these creatures. It savagely attacks the group while other kobolds assist but keep their distance. When the party manages to drop the monsterous creature, another kobold rushes to it, draws the dagger and plunges it into it's chest. It lets out a blood curdling scream which deepens into a roar as it's bones stretch and it's muscles bulge. ... Now the players must realize that they have to chose to continue to kill these monsters one after another, or try to avoid it while they slay the remaining kobolds.
they'll just as likely grab the dagger and use it on themselves... looking at you, barbarian.
I accidentally tpk'd a party of level 10 character with a single otyugh, grapple attacks, and 30ft of water...which was in a kobold dungeon as a matter of fact.
drowning tactics?
Great video guys!!!
Could always get into deeper subjects, and go related... but it's still pretty great.
AND since you asked, Dave, "How do I take the party down a notch and humble the Players?"
In a word, "Bees"...
To elaborate, I get smaller monsters or minions to work with, and employ LOTS of them... There's almost zero defense... and very quickly (depending on how I treat that narrative at the time) it's an intensity of "do or die"...
Trudging through swamp water?
Piranhas...
Gar fish
Gators or crocodilians (of various sizes, even small ones are a pain in the ass)...
Holed up in a jungle stonghold?
Ants... particularly "bullet ants" or "24-hour ants" (same ant, btw)...
Velvet Ant-wasps are a thing... easily employed...
Lots of different army ants employ formic acid as their primary toxin of choice, and some can even spray the stuff... (irl)...
Covering with vegetation?
Poison oak and ivy are fun for the "silly frat' boy BS"... BUT
Giant hogweed is readily painful as hell (3rd degree burns and blindness potentially permanent...
The "Wish you were dead tree" is another gift from the jungles...
AND hell, while we're at it, if you're ever in a Real Tobacco field and it starts to rain, RUN! That sh*t will kill you... as in (IRL) Dead.
Sure the environment is handy, with dubious passages that flood when it rains, whether or not they're under ground or just valley-ish parts of the forest floor. Vines may or may not be the parasitic kind that latch on to trees as if tied or rooted... good luck swinging. Jungle Canopies are WELL known for blotting out the daylight to the degree of it seeming like dusk or even midnight on the jungle floor at mid-day. Rock and mud slides... quick sand... various symbioses between thorn bushes and highly toxic molds, jellies, smuts, rusts, and even mushroom fungals... Giant termite nests and ant colonies can be fun... especially when you combine the potential of "collapsed footing" with the hundreds of thousands of stings in this action economy deal... (even mechanically figuring several stings to equivalate 1 HP damage)... sucks...
Steep ground is still passable, at half speed, no dex required, as long as you MAINTAIN at least three (3) points of contact/support AT ALL TIMES...
Treacherous bridges... narrow walkways... uneven gravel or broken slate/shale...
Comes down to it, it's all about establishing GOOD DESCRIPTIVE in your Narrative. I've preached that "Narrative is EVERYTHING." before. It's how we create the license to take agency in the game to damage or build tensions on the Party... or the Monsters... whatever serves in the story we are creating. These are just some of my own humble stewings on exactly what I'm generally describing, often cryptically... indirectly insinuating what the Players get to either figure out as I build this descriptive exposition, OR they can stumble upon "it" as I give them the exact nomenclature in the narrative. ;o)
Hmmm haven't tried it yet. But I think I'm going to use illusions and a hag's mimicry to get the party/npc's to make small mistakes.
We'll see if it works haha
Fun content, it helped me punch through some writers block for my home brew campaign keep it up.
Side note: Watched the occasional video from your channel before, nice job upping your editing and filming game really made a difference for me
I'm gonna be honest and say that as a player I'd be just pissed if I had to make every damn attack roll with disadvantage. The whole magical darkness thing is cool in terms of forcing players to explore and all that but it's simply not fun to miss all of your attacks. This is why I tend to use magical fog that makes it so you can't see anything that's more than 10 to 30 feet ahead of you. It still makes the place far more spooky but it doesn't make players annoyed and sick and tired of the dungeon.
Y'all always dish some tasty inpiration! Just when I needed it!
Happy to be of service.
-Nerdarchist Dave
I love videos like this which discuss monster strategy.
Multi-camera setup! I like!
Tall grass. Give enemies the ability to take Hide as a Bonus Action, and let them do it anywhere. Simply making the foes Small and green (or yellow, depending on the color of the grass) can justify it. Really useful for Goblins, who are both of those things.
Have the battlefield be broken up into corridors, that have various holes in the walls that Small creatures can fit into but Medium ones can't. Dungeons are good for this, but so are above ground ruins, with their crumbling masonry. Bonus points, ruined stone buildings that have open roofs also tend to play host to tall grass. Put the tall grass next to the holes in the walls, and small creatures can Hide, then slip in and out of the immediate area without being seen. Give the foes ranged weapons, like short bows, slings, or blow pipes.
Make the battlefield occur in a sunken structure, like a flooded building, wrecked ship, or some structures built by/for aquatic races. We can assume the PCs have water breathing spells or magic items, but they won't as often have anything that gives them free mobility. Their enemies, by contrast, probably WILL be native to the depths, like Sahagans, Tritons, or sea monsters. These foes not only have the ability to move easily, but they tend to be swimmers, allowing them to engage the PCs in three dimensions, while the PCs are accustomed to two dimensional thinking. Moreover, underwater locations will often have dim lighting or total darkness. You can't take torches into the water, and few such areas have natural light sources (unless you want them to). Meaning you either have to rely on Darkvision, happen to have the Light cantrip, or just consign yourself to fighting blind.
Hey, the twitchy camera got better. I still wish you wouldn't change the point of view for a single word and then go back, But it really is better now.
I like it, but I'd like them to do it for a whole sentence. I think that'll lessen how abrupt it feels.
Production value is better overall but the noise level on this video was fairly high, lot of white noise in the background. Not sure if mic gain was too high or what caused the problem but even a noise removal in a sound editing program like audacity even, can help reduce it. Best to cut it out as much as possible in recording though. Best of luck guys. Some good ideas.
Enjoyed, have a like.
One of the ways I humbled my PCs was to give them a false sense of strength. The session before I let them face 10-12 goblins in a dungeon and they murdered them. Why? Because I only used attacks and didn’t use nimble escape or redirect attack. Round two in the next session almost the same encounter except this time it was in a room with tables that the goblins flipped up to provide cover and they used all their abilities to make them more effective. Plus, I added a few abilities from 4e as well like tactical opportunity, tactical orders, bullying demeanor and goblin tactics.
The first encounter for my PCs was like shooting fish in a barrel. The second encounter they added an additional PC to make the group 6 PCs and they almost died. It helps that there was also a doppelgänger that disrupted the fight but that false sense of security changed things dramatically by playing stupid the first time and then playing smart (with the addition of cover) the second time.
Jordan Collette seems like a cheep tactic imo... especially since it out of character for the enemies. It isn't using weak enemies efficiently, but you as a DM deliberately scamming your players.
Locked closet that is 5 by 5 feet. Holds a gelatinous cube and a chest that is a mimic. Accidental TPK.
I'm a fan of minions being ran by an intelligent monster. I will pull a move from "The Patriot" and have the party wreck some kobolds that then flee around a corner where the ambush is waiting.
you guys jest need body mics and i think youll hit that really good quality mark
Wanna fight like Kobolds... check out Tucker's Kobolds in Dragon Magazine#127.
Use Tuckers Kobolds on the lazy veteran players to keep them alert at the table.
Have you thought about editing videos by adding some stat-blocks or at least pictures?
Talking heads are S O B O R I N G to watch :(
Tutamten depends on the video. We have been known to do that.
Nerdarchist Dave
Tutamten you're a talking head.
I find it actually much harder to scale down encounters to find something other for low level groups to fight than vermin and goblins, than to scale up encounters.
Want a goblin to challenge your lvl 20 party? Give it 25 levels of wizard, done!
Now, please explain to me how to introduce a really scary monster (like, what would be considered scary in an actual fantasy novel) to a low-level campaign with-out insta-party-kill, please?
Have it be something they can't fight and that that's the point. They need to run and escape from it. Think the Balrog scene in Lord of the Rings. Or perhaps have the same creature, reduce it's hp by half or more depending on what suits best, limit it's attacks to one or two rather than three or four or whatever it has. Make out that as the battle is going on, it appears weak as if it's already been injured from another battle or appears diseased and sickly, nearing it's natural end when you stumbled upon it. Things like that. And honestly if the party has the number advantage, like 4 to 1 then they're likely to win in such a case due to the action economy.
Have it be something which has no interest in them.
Have a big creature but its targetting a structure instead of the party. Make it a race against destruction
Any monster can be frightening if you describe it right. A simple zombie can be, if instead of saying, "A zombie rises from the water and attacks", you instead say, "a bloated, decaying figure with only a passing similarity to a human breaks through the surface of the water; the skin on the mouth has peeled back to reveal a bony grin, and from between those teeth issue a torrent of stagnant water and the fetid smell of death". To put the cap on it, make the PCs roll Constitution for the sickening smell; even if the DC is low, it will make the players have a visceral understanding of this shambling, waterlogged corpse's foul, primordial putrescence.
That's really the point of it. The players will be more wary of a monster if they engage with it in an immersive way. This is why presenting monsters with names can be a mistake, since naming something in turn quantifies it. A monster that is mysterious and unknown is far more frightening, especially if the players have to use their own imaginations, from incomplete information. If it's not labeled, it could be anything.
Even if the monster is actually weak, it will FEEL threatening to the players. In this case, the actual challenge may be secondary to the tension that the encounter contains.
As for actually adapting harder enemies for lower level encounters, one may opt to portray the creature as being not at its full strength or potential. A wounded monster would naturally have less health and weakened abilities. As would one suffering from poison, disease, or a debilitating curse. Or it might be maimed - missing a limb or having damaged eyes - that limit what it can do or lowering its mobility or AC (the monster may lack a shield it would otherwise wield, or be less evasive).
If you go for any of these, however, you must take care to emphasis in description that the monster is still a threat. Wounded animals are vicious, putting on threatening displays and fighting all the harder when cornered. They don't want to die, and are therefore willing to go all out if it means survival. The signs of wounds could just as easily imply strength as weakness, since the creature was obviously strong if it could survive such injuries.
A diseased or poisoned creature might have off-color, malodorous fluids gushing from its wounds or mouth; pair this up with periodic Constitution saving throws during the fight (which will probably, again, be low DC), and the players will fear that the creature is a walking biohazard. The harm they could get might be low or nothing, in that regard, but the players don't need to know that. All they have to know is that this horrid monster is getting up in their business, and that something is very wrong with it.
Then you have undead, who generally don't give a damn about injuries. They feel no pain, so coming pre-damaged changes little. A Wight is a CR 3 encounter normally, but one that has an arm missing and a hobbled leg is not useless. Especially since it's a thinking undead, and so can engage in tactics or threats. If the players know nothing about Wights - again, don't even call it a "Wight" - they don't know how dangerous it's supposed to be.
Nice new camera work but Ted's face still has a shadow. Thanks for the cool page.
Yea we forgot the our back lighting in this one grrr... We ever try to improve for you find folk.
-Nerdarchist Dave
When I went to amp up the game I throw a level 7 party at 7 werewolves and a CR 10 custom legendary monster. and nobody died :(
We have a warlock that always casts darkness making everybody else in the party basically useless so whenever he casts darkenss i cast shatter or simmilar aoe on his location.
Probably better to just talk to the player out of game about it and let them know it's a problem. Be mature about it.
A better solution would be to cast other obscurity spells, like fog cloud, on top of his darkness, so now he is blinded too. All of this is assuming that this player is continually placing their darkness directly on the party group. If they are also enshrouding the enemy group some of the time, that is what the darkness/devil sight combo is for, I don't see why you would target a player for using their characters.
A second note is, there are creatures that don't use sight, darkness would not hinder them.
The problem was not his playstile,that was ok with the darkness trick,but he was using it on mediocre fights and dissabling all of us.I talked to him and the entire group got pissed about it so he said that he wont use it so much.
Did you guys get new cameras? you guys look different...
Two more cameras. Soon we'll only do three camera shoots. It'll take few weeks for us to transition.
-Nerdarchist Dave
Favorite spells I give my baddies: Bless and Counterspell.
Four words:
Parish
Of
Lost
Souls
Still available on the site? Kobold ambushes, inventions, allies and spells.
Can you make a john Constantine dnd pc
Scot Carnage i believe they did recently.
Jeff Urbz just checked they didnt if they have made one that's comparable or basically the same woch would it be
Scot Carnage ruclips.net/video/uJ_lEVNTj7k/видео.html
Jeff Urbz that's not in there dndized folder thank you
Thanks for the assist.
-Nerdarchist Dave