D&D (2024) Encounter Design For Party Lvl 7. BG3+

So here the party I'm dealing with as DM. Level 7.

2024 classes

Dragon Sorcerer lightning.
Light Cleric of Amaunator
Celestial Bladelock.
Glamour Bard.

Monk. 2014 version but I allow finesse weapons as monk weapons. He doesn't want to use 2024 monk. Likes champions.

They are getting close to max attuned items. Most of them aren't super relevant outside the bladelock using Hazirawn. Eg cleric has gauntlets of ogre power, Monk has Cacophony from BG3 (+1 quarterstaff,+1d4 thunder damage), spellcasters have +1 wand, amulet, rod.

The big bad is a CR 14 devourer with support in a desecrated area. Second big bad is a CR 10 or 11 Cleric of Shar.

Mooks die to fireball/lightning bolt/hunger of hadar/radiance of the dawn/spirit guardians. Chromatic Orb gets used when they can stack the odds in their favor ( eg bless, Innate sorcerery, paralyzed opponents).

Larger mixed groups get AoE. Survivors get hit with command/hold person. Monks also knocking stuff prone and stunning strike. Moderate damage plus large amounts of control. Hold Person, 3/5 can use command including as a bonus action via bard and twinned command from Sorcerer. Hold persons including twinned ones. Vicious Mockery and Warding flare.

Mostly there's not much I can do. Two combats involved darkness via Shar shadow locks (cr 2 DM specials 5th level locks), dark justicier (souped up gladiator), and a dark disciple with counterspell. I gave the Sharrans devil sight. Celestial Warlock and Light Cleric have daylight spell.

I'm using CR 1/2 to 2 "moooks) including spell casters and CR 5 and 6 leaders DM specials. Generally modified mages, priests, gladiators, half dragons often tweaked (more hp, attacks, AC, saves, immunity etc). Alot of sharrans have extra psychic danage, devil sight, dark blessing (charisma to all saves). Dark Justiciers are proficient in wisdom saves and charisma to their saves. One of them hurt a lot. Bonus action spear of night that can blind them on a failed con save (recharge 5/6).

A smattering of the dead 3 cultists have been used. A few banites, 2 bhaalists and BBEG Myrkul tie in. They're working with Sharran's for now. I'm also using terrain eg water, puts, traps.

Short of adding 4 casters to every fight with counterspell any ideas? They're brute forcing their way through so far. Minor mistakes but they're figuring things out fast. Wife's basically the tactics one (she's played a lot of BG3 MP with me so knows my tricks). The bard player she has been plotting with her as well. Monk player is experienced likes champions, Sorcerer and Light Cleric tend towards boom spells.

Story wise Stuff

Session 1 this adventure. PCs depart baldurs gate. Arrive in Twilights Hollow. Cleric of Selune is They discover a Selunite Paladin is dead, head Selunite Cleric is leading a funeral procession. Her soul is being tortured though. Evidence sends them to a nearby valley where the Paladin was defeated.. There's a hag there plus friends. They encounter the spirit of the Paladins squire. They learn her souk is in torment and there's catacombs under the village.

Session 2. They investigate the village locating an entrance under a farm. They encounter some bandit defenders and a disciple of Shar. Defeating them they rescue a victim who claims the head cleric of Selune is a follower of Shar.

Session 3. Pressing on they run into dark justicier of Shar. They return to town to confront the cleric. She has already left her temple however. She's encouraged the Selunites to prepare healing magic. She was raised in Selunes faith and the town. Last seen heading into inn they were staying at. Another hidden access to the catacombs and bandits they had heard about. They discovered peep holes into their bedrooms.

Leaving a sentry they go to bed. Sentry eliminates two Bhaalists via hold person spell+ true strike and a dagger. They go under the Inn and run into bandits, Banites, and learn the location of a temple. Investigating more they run into some shadow demons.

Session 4 setup. Confrontation with Shar cleric and Mykuls Devourer. They have heard Bhaal himself is heading towards Baldurs Gate. Well so is Myrkul and Shars involved as well. If they defeat the Devourer and destroy Mykuls item and free the Paladins soul they level up. If they raise the Paladin they will get an advantage later. Level 8 is Mykuls stuff, 9 Banite, 10-12 Shar and final confrontations.

Level 8 inspiration . Lost Boys movie with some of Cazadors Spawn.

The easiest way to increase the threat of a battle is by adding more monsters. Any encounter building guidelines you may be using don’t compare to your own experiences with your own players and their characters. All of the major crowd control abilities they have are relatively limited to a smaller number of monsters — the more you add, the harder it is to control.

I’d avoid trying to circumvent the abilities they like to use. Instead lean in on them. Add big brutes they can control. Add big packs of minions they can blow up. Run waves of monsters, one right after another.

Also run easier fights along the way. Too few GMs recognize the value in running an oscillation of easy battles and harder battles.

For big boss monsters, clarify that they’re just plain immune to this type of crowd control. State it before they even try. Tell them that all the other monsters in the battle are susceptible, but not the boss. You can do this with legendary resistances, plain immunities, or a trick like “this boss automatically succeeds on all saving throws until bloodied”. Tales of the Valiant Doom points are another option — several points, visible to your players, that let the boss “cheat” in various ways:

• getting another action on their turn
• ignoring spells or status effects
• piercing though resistances or immunities
• transferring damage to minions
• sucking health from minions

Stuff like that.

Hope those ideas help!

How are their concentration saves?

You could have a few archers/Eldrich Blasters in the next room, that rush in on round 2 and try to break the hold person.

Sanctuary on a stunned or held target also works nice.

mellored said:

How are their concentration saves?

You could have a few archers/Eldrich Blasters in the next room, that rush in on round 2 and try to break the hold person.

Sanctuary on a stunned or held target also works nice.

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Sorcerer is proficient, Bard, Cleric have warcaster, Warlock warcaster or Eldritch Mind.

I'll note that no one has Str saves.

So grapples, gust of wind, Ensnaring Stike can all be good. Add some platforms, and push.

Pick one PC, preferably one with lower hps and a lower AC. Concentrate all attacks on that one PC until it is dead, take AOOs if necessary to do this. After that PC goes down keep targeting it until it accumulates its 3 failed death saves.

Thematically this requires some thought (maybe they are offfended by the Cleric's religion, or the Warlock killed a demigod and is marked so all the cultists go after him.

Those kinds of tactics will make fights more difficult.

You can also go with Giant sized creatures and have them grapple PCs and use them as a club or throw them.

ECMO3 said:

Pick one PC, preferably one with lower hps and a lower AC. Concentrate all attacks on that one PC until it is dead, take AOOs if necessary to do this. After that PC goes down keep targeting it until it accumulates its 3 failed death saves.

Thematically this requires some thought (maybe they are offfended by the Cleric's religion, or the Warlock killed a demigod and is marked so all the cultists go after him.

Those kinds of tactics will make fights more difficult.

You can also go with Giant sized creatures and have them grapple PCs and use them as a club or throw them.

Click to expand...

Might make sense here. Out of gane the tge light cleric player is new and 13 years old playing with dad.

Zardnaar said:

The big bad is a CR 14 devourer with support in a desecrated area. Second big bad is a CR 10 or 11 Cleric of Shar.

I'm using CR 1/2 to 2 "moooks) including spell casters and CR 5 and 6 leaders DM specials. Generally modified mages, priests, gladiators, half dragons often tweaked (more hp, attacks, AC, saves, immunity etc).

Click to expand...

Just so I’m clear… Your upcoming/TBD climactic fight is going to be in a desecrated area and will include these enemies:

• Devourer (from an official 5e book)
• Cleric of Shar (CR10-11 homebrew)
• ?# of mooks (official NPCs with your own modifications)

And your concern is about the sheer spell power (especially stun-locking/shutting down) that the PCs can bring to bear? That it will make the climactic fight too easy?

Did I understand you right?

Quickleaf said:

Just so I’m clear… Your upcoming/TBD climactic fight is going to be in a desecrated area and will include these enemies:

• Devourer (from an official 5e book)
• Cleric of Shar (CR10-11 homebrew)
• ?# of mooks (official NPCs with your own modifications)

And your concern is about the sheer spell power (especially stun-locking/shutting down) that the PCs can bring to bear? That it will make the climactic fight too easy?

Did I understand you right?

Click to expand...

Cleric is somewhere else. Devourer and some Mook undead.