Some monsters in DF Felltower - and in DF in genral - take a bit of killing.
Why is that? Why are there so many monsters you have to slog through?
In my experience, there are a few ways a monster can be tough:
- Offensive firepower
- Defensive prowess
- Damage absorption
In a little more detail:
- Offensive firepower means they can harm PCs. This can take a lot of forms, but generally is high damage (as PCs in DF Felltower tend to high DR . . . 8+ DR is common and 12+ DR is not rare at all.)
- Defensive prowess means the opponent has good Parry, Block, or Dodge.
- Damage absorption means the opponent is hard to hit, hard to hurt, or can repair or ignore hurts.
I find I need to make monsters either a glass cannon (high damage, low defenses), or hard to kill. There isn't really anything else to do to keep them worth spending the time on. Low damage, low defenses = fodder at best. Low damage, hard to kill = time killer. High damage, easy to kill = brief encounter, especially since actually landing a hit on PCs is hard. PCs, conversely, strongly emphasize reducing enemy defenses or swamping them. High damage, hard to kill = slog. The foes can take out PCs, but also need grinding to wipe out.
As a GM looking to make fights a challenge, not just an excuse to hand out XP and loot, means I need either the glass cannons or the slog foes to threaten PCs. I don't love this, but it seems to be how it goes. Every time I've used the other two quadrants of the diagram, it's just taken time and cost the PCs nothing . . . maybe a few FP they recover in a few minutes of game time as if the encounter never happened. The drive for PCs to make themselves incredibly hard to land a blow on - high defenses - and hard to hurt - high DR - and hard to deal with otherwise (high HP, HT, and Hard to Kill and Hard to Subdue and Fit and high Will) - means the only threats are those who can hit really hard and stick around when hit back.
I think that just means the style of a game centered on combat-as-challeneg pushes toward a slog.
I struggle with this sometimes, too. It's why my players and I don't tend to love megadungeons. I do sometimes use the combat-as-puzzle situation (figure out the weakness, etc.) or combat-as-delay (time-pressure to get past the battle to achieve some goal), but those also get stale when overused.
ReplyDeleteIt's an issue for sure. Combat as delay is something I don't use enough. Puzzle combats have a mixed effect in my games. In one, the players figured out it was a puzzle and acted accordingly. In another, they just piled on 1000+ points of damage and just wouldn't try anything except more damage. And in still others, where the monsters *weren't* puzzles, they were sure they must be. I find it hard to use them without players either mistaking them for something else, or starting to think all monsters are either HP to be worn down or all puzzles.
Delete" I find it hard to use them without players either mistaking them for something else, or starting to think all monsters are either HP to be worn down or all puzzles."
DeleteThis is where I find Passive Skill use shines. If it's a Puzzle Monster, I can check peoples Hidden Lore vs a 14 and then give the PCs a hint or two, even if it's just a "You've read of creatures like this, and they always have some weird weakness or vulnerability", that then signals "Hey! This is a Puzzle Beast".
Of course, if the Players aren't into Puzzles or just go off on completely wrong tangents, then it's just going to turn into an HP grind anyway... but that's why I like to leave some wiggle room in my Puzzle Beasts, or have multiple options that the Characters can fulfill.
Would you consider a swarm of easy-to-kill low-damage monsters like Horde Pygmies hard to kill and high damage in aggregate?
ReplyDeleteA hard-to-kill low-damage monster like a Ramex can also make players extremely nervous about pushing onward until it's dealt with. Nobody wants to get stabbed by a Ramex while they're in the middle of scaling a cliff or fighting some other monster.
They're more of nuisance, since Resist Poison and Missile Shield will make them no damage at all and ignorable. They're not as useful in a game where people will truck around with 8-12 DR 100% of the time. I find a better aggregate would be Demons from Between the Stars, because they can ignore DR with their low-damage attacks, and take some killing as a group even if they aren't that hard to kill as individuals.
DeleteThey've got enough skill to bypass 8-12 DR by targeting face or eyeslits and enough Dodge to remain a force-in-being for a while, and you can't put Missile Shield on everybody all the time (especially vs. Stealth-20) so they're likely going to have somebody to shoot at unless players do tricky stuff with illusions/wizard eye/etc. DF Adventurers also suggests that they go well with giant apes, which sounds fun.
DeleteBut sure, let's go with demons between the stars. What I want to know is whether you are saying that individual monsters have to be powerful, or the encounter as a whole?
The encounter as a whole, although it's harder to execute that way.
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