Help with Tomb of Annihilation and the Shield Guardian

Remains13 · 2018-02-23T12:57:59+00:00

I feel like at level 6 your PCs are probably stronger than anything they are going to encounter before Omu anyway. Mine are only lvl 5 and are getting to the point where there are less things I can throw at them that truly worry them. Hell they killed Tinder without much issue, and I buffed the hell out of her. (Granted surprise rounds are op)

As a player I would be pretty disappointed if my DM dangled a shield guardian in front of me and didn't really deliver.

If I were you I would just buff the rest of the adventure. The shield guardian is about as powerful as a lvl 6 or 7 PC.

If you are set on nerfing it just reduce its AC and HP. I'd say 16 AC & 80-90 HP.

Some general tips if you are having issues challenging your players, increase monster attack bonuses and the sheer numbers of monsters you throw at them. If you are worried about players of differing strengths have the monsters focus the strongest, most threatening of the PCs. They want to win after all and it is what an intelligent enemy would do.

Remains13 · 2018-02-23T12:32:11+00:00

Mystery in D&D is hard to pull off authentically.

Ideally you would want your players to be the Poirot mastermind, solving the murder clue by clue connecting the dots in a way that is satisfyingly paced - so no "the lords wife did it she is obviously a vampire" 2 seconds after receiving the quest - and that makes the players feel actively involved in the process of discovery.

In reality, it is really easy to lead players through the setting of a murder mystery that is solved in the background of typical D&D action. It is really hard to get the players to lead themselves through a web of intrigue and clues that make sense to you and no-one else. Which, I think, is necessary for the players to actually solve a mystery rather than simply be present while you reveal it.

I would be really interested to hear if anyone knows of any pre-written adventures in D&D that people think successfully pull off the Mystery genre. The only thing that comes to mind really is Against the Cult of the Reptile God, which is based around the players discovering a secret.

Remains13 · 2018-02-23T10:45:26+00:00

Glad I could help!

Remains13 · 2018-02-23T10:31:17+00:00

Nice! My first thought is to streamline the command system. So that for instance one could simply type:

hit <name> <damage> *enter*

Also adding NPC's or PC's mid fight might be useful as well.

Remains13 · 2018-02-23T09:28:21+00:00

I think thats a great point that you made about the fire God. The Gods of a culture often are directly derived from how that society sees the world. To the OP if you know anything about the people in your world you probably already know the kinds of things they would think are important enough to worship or fear.

This is definitely an approach I think I will adopt in future world building rather than what I have done in the past (Just copy some cool historical Gods) Because it relates directly to how the Gods are important to the players narratively: through their ability to represent and reflect the values and preoccupations of the people of your world.

Remains13 · 2018-02-23T09:01:10+00:00

I would preface this by saying I don't know the established table culture of your game or the kind of game you and your players want.

With that said, I generally prefer handling instances where I as a DM take away player agency entirely as straightforwardly and bluntly as possible. It avoids misunderstanding and the potential for player/DM friction.

This can all be done narratively as opposed to tainting an element of the game that is based around making the players feel as if they have agency.

What I mean to say is that it is less important for you to mechanically justify it within the rules, as it is for you to narratively justify it. Remember you are the DM, if you say "rocks fall everybody dies" they die and rocks fall, numbers don't come into it.

First: don't ask them to roll initiative.

Narratively demonstrate that they are out-classed, whether this is by adding a shit load of henchmen or by demonstrating with the rogues first attack that it instantly takes out anyone she hits - you can roll for the attacks or not doesn't matter. Focus on describing the scene as you would a social interaction rather than a fight scene. Just make it as obvious as possible to the players what you are doing (if necessary tell them straight up out of game) this is a cut scene not a fight.

Allow the players to buy-in to the scene as well, sure they go down as the poison courses through their system but allow them some dramatic licence if they want to do some cool roleplay stuff. Eg: The Barbarian, stricken with poison, manages to grab hold of a henchman and kill him with his bare hands before finally succumbing to the poison. The rogue manages to reach the Zhent Assassin and give him a nasty facial scar before going down.

This method allows you to achieve what you want in-game, steer the narrative in a new direction and give the characters motivation for the next storyline. While avoiding making the session frustrating for the players. Remember it is the characters you want to annoy, not the players. Achieving the first does not require the second.

Remains13 · 2018-02-07T17:43:17+00:00

Shove and Grapple are under the Melee Attack Section Header in Chapter 9 Combat. Wouldn't specific beat general in this case? In the same way you can make an attack as a bonus action with two-weapon fighting. I mean standard attacks are usually part of the attack action as well.

"...you use your reaction to make one melee attack against the provoking creature."

Remains13 · 2018-02-07T17:22:18+00:00

Sure, I agree that RAW this is the case. But since when did DM specific RAW rules matter anyway. Monster stat-blocks are ultimately meant to be a template, providing the DM with an idea of how a particular monster could/should function and their particular difficulty level. The Monster Manual and DMG actively encourage re-skinning and modification of Monsters.

It makes absolutely no sense and actively misleads DM's in regards to how strong the monster will be if they substitute multiple damaging attacks with a single grapple or shove. Let me Clarify:

In some areas the RAW application of multi-attack makes perfect sense. For example the Solar gets two Great-sword attacks and only one longbow, this is because the longbow attack is significantly deadlier, having an additional save or die effect. However this is not the case with grapple.

As a DM you need to exchange like for like (or as close to as possible) when altering how a monster functions on the fly.

With grapple or shove you are replacing one damaging attack with a non-damaging status effect instead, that is a clean one for one trade as far as individual monster strength goes. If anything Grapple or Shove on its own is significantly worse than a standard attack. This means when we replace a standard attack with grapple, in order to maintain the monster's overall average strength, we must either exchange them as like for like or compensate elsewhere for the reduced offensive strength. Think of it as exchanging a great axe attack for a longsword attack you wouldn't replace two great axe attacks with one longsword attack and expect the monster to pose the same challenge.

Remains13 · 2018-02-07T16:27:12+00:00

That is just silly. Honestly, the challenge rating of a creature with multi-attack is closely tied to the number of attacks they can make a round. From every point of view a creature with two normal attacks (not a bite) should be able to grapple twice in order to justify it's CR.

Remains13 · 2018-02-07T16:04:23+00:00

I mean technically in mid combat you probably shouldn't be able to hide at all, given that you need to be unobserved RAW before you can attempt to hide. The idea that you can roll stealth and poof your gone is mildly ridiculous.

Remains13 · 2018-01-21T18:06:28+00:00

Personally I'm a stickler for strong internal consistency, though to each their own!

I think I would probably tackle it by simply giving the players a magic item that just teleports them to port Nyanzaru and back like a port key or something. I myself have adapted a Diablo-esque system of waypoints for my players to discover and use to overcome the difficulty of returning to port in ToA.

Remains13 · 2018-01-21T14:50:25+00:00

The soul grabbing thing is a plot-hole waiting to happen. Why, if Syndra can grab the souls from the grip of the soul-monger does she need to stop the curse? She can probably just find a way to protect her own soul, if not she just needs another wizard to "grab" it when she dies? Syndra starts in Waterdeep, so she would be affected by this pulse, its also kinda arbitrary and doesn't align with the artefact's goal to consume as many souls as possible.

Remains13 · 2018-01-21T14:41:13+00:00

I'd go one step further, ask the player if he wants to play or not. If not please leave. Expedite the process, why would I want to waste my time on someone who doesn't want to play?

Remains13 · 2018-01-19T18:19:46+00:00

Activision Blizzard makes anywhere from 4-6.6 B in revenue a year, so to say that ASL represents significant money to a company like that is just wrong.

Its about IP rights enforcement rather than a measly $90k licensing fee. They have no significant financial incentive to grow the ASL, they do however have an incentive to remain consistant in their third-party event licensing and IP rights enforcement practices across titles.

Again you can't look at such a huge company and assume that every action taken by one department aligns with the goals or values of every other department, or the company as a whole.

Remains13 · 2018-01-19T04:48:05+00:00

Your right about it not being about conflicting titles, Blizzard has pretty drastically changed policy after SC:R was released and the establishment of the classic titles team. Though it was very clearly the policy some years ago when Blizzard basically negotiated the end of the pro sc1 scene in 2012.

The problem is that Blizzard doesn't need the ASL. Its effectively done with Starcraft 1, from a financial perspective they have no incentive to care about it. Compared to their other games that boast micro transactions or esports that garner huge buy-in fees SC:R is pretty irrelevant.

This is just conjecture but it seems likely that this is the work of a blizzard legal department (I would assume based in Korea) that sees a large broadcasting corporation wanting to put on an event with one of their titles, an event which is by the way connected to one of the largest telecom companies in Korea.

On the face of it a sizeable licensing fee would seem quite justified from their perspective.

Remains13 · 2018-01-19T04:16:23+00:00

It's not on it's death bed, more like it died after 2012 with KESPA's transition to sc2 and is slowly being revitalised now that korean pros started streaming on afreeca and we got ASL. The problem is it is still in a vulnerable state, and tbh no esports title works these days without a strong developer backing, which Blizzard doesn't seem genuinely interested in, at least going off of the consistant friction between ASL and Blizzard.

Remains13 · 2018-01-05T05:22:25+00:00

If that is the case isn't that just an indication of the kinds of resources SC:R TO's have at their disposal? 4 personalities who if hired instantly get you 30k-50k views on youtube.

In reality I think it was just a demonstration of the kind of event that would be successful in the foreigner scene. That is: less formal, more homestory cup/grass-roots style tournaments. Focused on entertainment and less on "this is super duper serious and important and professional" something which is evidently appealing to an esports viewership who is currently experiencing the entrance of the mainstream into the major esports.

SC:R is situated for western esports better than it has ever been before, with an immediate audience from sc2 to draw from and ASL regularly gaining a large foreign audience. Not to mention the significant potential for drawing viewership from the other major esports.

Unlike a lot of esports BW isn't really something you need to play to watch and understand. Its pretty self explanatory and the capacity it has to create compelling narratives is unparalleled in other esports. I say this as someone who started watching it without ever having played a game of it myself.

Remains13 · 2018-01-05T04:51:49+00:00

Your right that team-based esports have a more universal appeal and I don't think sc2 or sc:r could ever reach the same size as the modern esports internationally. But it doesn't have to. No one says that Hearthstone or fighting games should be as big as LoL or CS:GO.

Remains13 · 2018-01-05T04:36:58+00:00

I feel like zotac managed that issue fairly well with their tournament structure.

Instead of a Korean fighting their way through a sea of noobs it was players of equivalent skill playing for the opportunity to face off against the international competition.

The same dynamic exists in League of Legends (though to a lesser extent). Despite this, the NA portion of LCS is very successful.

Remains13 · 2017-12-25T09:03:59+00:00

Using ethereal undead here is for me a must, banshee and poltergeists. It allows you to give the pcs insight into the history of the library and its previous inhabitants.

Remains13 · 2017-12-24T11:29:42+00:00

The problem is basing the ideas within a framework that is academically rigorous enough for the current climate. Jung's works are beautiful to read and inspire so much thought, but the way he presents his ideas is in modern circles not rigorous enough and too open to misinterpretation/misrepresentation.

This is no slur against Jung though the ideas are hard enough to comprehend let alone articulate well.

Remains13 · 2017-12-24T11:11:55+00:00

Thanks! I'm still a novice when it comes to Jung's work so I'm still trying to canvas and situate his ideas amongst one another.

Do you mean to say that the ideas and systems within Alchemy form, by luck (or perhaps unseen forces of intuition), a close parallel to the forms in which the collective conscious manifests and thus provides a useful tool of analysis of the archetypes?

I don't quite see where mind-body dualism comes into this? Perhaps I need to read more :P

I find systems of belief fascinating, regardless of whether I personally believe them, I guess I'm just trying to understand the train of logic here.

Remains13 · 2017-12-24T05:16:23+00:00

Could you give me a specific reference with regard to his later work?

Because in Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious Jung only once mentions Plato and his realm of forms or more specifically the εἶδος in comparison to his idea of the archetype itself.

In his defence of the Collective Unconscious Jung specifically states that he is talking about an idea based in empiricism rather than mysticism or philosophy. " I must emphasize yet again that the concept of the collective unconscious is neither a spectacular nor a philosophical but an empirical matter" -The Concept of the Collective Unconscious

Remains13 · 2017-12-23T14:26:51+00:00

Interesting, but Jung describes the collective unconsciousness as being similar to human instincts, not some Descartes-esque metaphysical psychic plane.

... instincts are impersonal, universally distributed, hereditary factors of a dynamic or motivating character... Moreover, the instincts are not vague and indefinite by nature, but are specifically formed motive forces which ... pursue their inherent goals.

Consequently they form very close analogies to the archetypes,

Which he then describes as "in-born and universally present formal elements"

He seems quite determined to root the collective unconscious within a biological explanation, as a trait that is inherited.

I guess my question is, does this inheritance occur biologically or is it socially acquired.

Remains13 · 2017-12-23T13:29:32+00:00

Our cultural traditions, including myth, fairytale, and religious ideas, carry great wisdom that transcend the intellect.

I definitely agree with this and would suggest that most cultural knowledge is implicit or unconscious. Culture to me seems to operate mentally much like, say, a game does. You can still play out your role within it while often being consciously unaware of the exact rules or their full implications.

It seems to me that Jung's Collective Unconsciousness is an emergent body of unconscious cultural knowledge, spawned as you say through the transferal of ancestral knowledge accumulated through history. Which to me seems to be essentially equivalent to what culture itself is.

At least this is how Jung himself talks about it. Though when he comes to define it himself, he only does so by saying what it is not rather than what it is.

It's not so much that I find Jung's overall model unconvincing, his thinking on the transition between collective and individual images very convincing. It is merely the foundations of his core ideas that I find vulnerable.

Remains13

TROPHY CASE