About CR and EXP ... and everything else

[Dwarfi]

After the match:
The evil cleric was slain instantly, the bard run for his life and the real challenge was the berserker and the dragonlady.
Our group had nothing to really stop the berserker and had to make a ceasfire with the dragon they fought with to get out of it. Especially after getting fooled by the dragons voice mimicry, that made them think hill giants were approaching.
At that point our cleric was entirely out of usefull spells, but the group was buffed as hell. Our barbarian had an AC of ~29 but just couldnt kill the berserker. Not the mention the dragon.

So it was fun for the group.

In the next stage they enter a cave, which is actually a 1-way teleporter to the extraplaner demiplane of Grodd. A giant goblin city- They land in the outer caves where no goblins are, but some shadow creatures. (As described earlier)
I will let them make a Roll: <10 =loose 1 HD permanently. Above and everything is fine.
What will cause some problems are the special conditions on this plane.
1. Its dark, so darkvision would be good. (3 humans+ 1 elf)
2. illumination effects have only have the effect
3. Illusion spells work at +1 CL
4. All kind of extraplaner travel doesnt work, that includes conjurations of monsters.

In the next step I will prepare some of the goblin generals, which they might meet.
They all fight against each other for the power.
1. Is already allied with another group of adventurers
2. Might be after the clerics of the city and a holy artifact in the temple

... I am open for ideas

[Pencil]

I`m wondering why they had such a hard time with the Frenzied... 
If you put some swarms in that will teach them that brute force is not always an option 

[Dwarfi]

The city of grodd is huge, (1k soldiers+citizens)
If they really attack the city they get slaughtered no matter what. ^^
So they need to be stealthy, maybe diplomatic and all that what they usually are not.

I added a couple of nasty encounters, a night hag, rust monsters, gel.cubes and oozes, dire shadow creatures. Should be enough to let them be entertained.

Also I think I will reduce the detect evil of the cleric, as the whole plane is evil and he can only detect evil by touching now.
Anti magic ring of the barbarian: Always wanted to get rid of it. --° Made in undermountain, its a miracle it still works outside. Lets say it looses its power as they are not on the same plane anymore.

Now I will have to pump up some special humanoid encounters.
A group of assasins/ fighters a mindflayer maybe... though the mindflayer doesnt look that intimidating to me.

[Dwarfi]

A quick question on EXP in our last fight.

Our group didnt win the fight, they actually had to flee. How does that affect the EXP they would get?
If they had killed all 4 enemys they would have gained ~2000EXP each.
But they killed only 1 enemy, one fled and survived, and then the PCs had to make a deal and run from the other too.

[ksbsnowowl]

DMG, page 36

You must decide when a challenge has been overcome. Usually, this is simple to do. Did the PCs defeat the enemy in battle? Then they met the challenge and earned experience points. Other times, it can be trickier. Suppose the PCs sneak past the sleeping minotaur to get into the magical vault—did they overcome the minotaur encounter? If their goal was to get into the vault and the minotaur was just a guardian, then the answer is probably yes. It’s up to you to make such judgments.

After that it states "for each creature defeated" calculate CR and resulting XP.  If the PC's ran away, there's no defeat, and no XP.

[Dwarfi]

Thanks, guess they wont like it XD

Another question: How do you actually handle loot ? Which items to choose, what to give away and how much...

Till now I simply gave them what was listed in the "posession" area below each NPC character desciption, which didnt really matter except for 1 battle where they got a lot of loot.
And now I am thinking about going another way, of more selected loot. Stuff that gives more little tactical options instead of just pushing the abilitys or saves.

[InnaBinder]

A quick question on EXP in our last fight.

Our group didnt win the fight, they actually had to flee. How does that affect the EXP they would get?
If they had killed all 4 enemys they would have gained ~2000EXP each.
But they killed only 1 enemy, one fled and survived, and then the PCs had to make a deal and run from the other too.

While ksbsnowowl's reading is valid, I would award XP for one killed enemy and 1/2 XP for the one that fled/striking the deal.  Decide which works for your group, or something other.

[ksbsnowowl]

A quick question on EXP in our last fight.

Our group didnt win the fight, they actually had to flee. How does that affect the EXP they would get?
If they had killed all 4 enemys they would have gained ~2000EXP each.
But they killed only 1 enemy, one fled and survived, and then the PCs had to make a deal and run from the other too.

While ksbsnowowl's reading is valid, I would award XP for one killed enemy and 1/2 XP for the one that fled/striking the deal.  Decide which works for your group, or something other.

Oh, I would absolutely give them XP for the one they killed, and even the one that ran away (depending upon the purpose of the encounter, getting the bad guy to flee IS defeating him).  Getting some smaller portion of XP for the others is reasonable, especially if one of the PC's really did a good job on Diplomacy or something to strike the cease-fire.  I would give them 1/4 to 1/2 XP for it.

That said, depending upon a specific situation, there could be times when the PC's get full XP for talking their way past the bad guys, and lesser amounts for killing them.  It all depends on what the "goal" of the encounter is.

[Dwarfi]

The purpose was to defeat them and get to the cave.
The ceasfire was thanks to my intervention as a DM. It was already very late, everyone was tired and they somehow didnt get the idea to just ran away rather then being killed (which I could have totally done at that point), not to mention a diplomacy check.
So I had to end the match there and offered them a ceasfire if they just run away and leave the dragon a magical item.
It was pretty messy. ^^

I think I will give them a small amount of EXP, but not much, maybe 500 total.

--- Anything about the loot question?

[InnaBinder]

What I typically do with loot is start by asking players, both at the start of the campaign and at story arc breaks, what particular items of treasure they want their characters to have, if any.  I make it clear that the "wish lists" will be partially, but never completely, fulfilled based on my discretion and the likelihood the encounters faced and shopkeepers at hand have treasure to match their desires.  I then augment their wish lists with specific items I think are either generally useful or interesting for the group or individual, and random vendor bait.

[Kremti]

Another question: How do you actually handle loot ? Which items to choose, what to give away and how much...

Till now I simply gave them what was listed in the "posession" area below each NPC character desciption, which didnt really matter except for 1 battle where they got a lot of loot.
And now I am thinking about going another way, of more selected loot. Stuff that gives more little tactical options instead of just pushing the abilitys or saves.

Well, first of all, you are aware that there's a guide line as to "how much stuff they should have" (Called Wealth by Level...there's a chart in DMG, I think).  So that shuold give you a rough idea of how much.

As for *what kind of items* question, what you might want to do is to just simply ask and chat with your players.  If they have specific ideas, great, try to incorporate in the loot you give'em.  If they have some rough ideas, well, go with that as well.  If they truely have no idea (Like my players...), often, giving them some interesting tactical items isn't straight forward, because they often miss their functionality and how useful they are, compared to plus-number items.  In such cases, I often have my monsters *use* those items in the combat, demonstrating how useful they are, and when the monsters are defeated...the players are more interested/excited about them, rather than they are just simply planted in the *pile of stuff*

-K

[ksbsnowowl]

What I typically do with loot is start by asking players, both at the start of the campaign and at story arc breaks, what particular items of treasure they want their characters to have, if any.  I make it clear that the "wish lists" will be partially, but never completely, fulfilled based on my discretion and the likelihood the encounters faced and shopkeepers at hand have treasure to match their desires.  I then augment their wish lists with specific items I think are either generally useful or interesting for the group or individual, and random vendor bait.

I do the same.

Also, the treasure tables have average treasure awards by Encounter Level.  These values won't be true of all encounters, and many will produce more treasure (the NPC wealth by level guidelines blow these treasure values by EL out of the water).

[Dwarfi]

I will be more carefull with giving away stuff. I would have to count everything they have together to see if its fitting or not. ^^°

Lets see: An encounter with 2xCR10+2xCR9 would make an EL ~13 that should make 13kGP value of loot. May it be loot or other stuff.

[Dwarfi]

I looked in the sunder-chapter in the PHB, but it wasnt directly mentioned:
How does sundering change if I disarm a character first and then hit the weapon lying on the ground ?

[Kremti]

I looked in the sunder-chapter in the PHB, but it wasnt directly mentioned:
How does sundering change if I disarm a character first and then hit the weapon lying on the ground ?

I believe (Not explicitly written, I don't think) that sundering is used to an object that is "in control" of someone/some creature (Attended object).  When you try to damage/break an unattended object like that, on the ground, it should be covered under the rule "Smashing an Object"

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/exploration.htm#smashinganObject

-K

[InnaBinder]

I looked in the sunder-chapter in the PHB, but it wasnt directly mentioned:
How does sundering change if I disarm a character first and then hit the weapon lying on the ground ?

I believe (Not explicitly written, I don't think) that sundering is used to an object that is "in control" of someone/some creature (Attended object).  When you try to damage/break an unattended object like that, on the ground, it should be covered under the rule "Smashing an Object"

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/exploration.htm#smashinganObject

-K

The link you posted says explicitly that "Smashing an Object" uses the sunder rules.

[Kremti]

The link you posted says explicitly that "Smashing an Object" uses the sunder rules.

Except, the Sundering rule says "You can use a melee attack with a slashing or bludgeoning weapon to strike a weapon or shield that your opponent is holding." (Bolding Mine)

So...

I maintain that the rule for breaking "unattended" weapons and armor falls under "Smashing an Object" rule.

-K

[veekie]

Smashing a weapon or shield with a slashing or bludgeoning weapon is accomplished by the sunder special attack. Smashing an object is a lot like sundering a weapon or shield, except that your attack roll is opposed by the object’s AC.

Looks straightforward enough, it just uses the Sunder rules, except you replace the opponent's attack roll with the object's AC.

[Dwarfi]

Alright, then it should go something like: 10 + size mod (med-sized weapon +0) + DEX mod of the creature wielding it, if on the ground DEX=0 (mod-5)
So the AC should be 5.

Time to eat an elder mountain hammer XD

[veekie]

With power attack, of course?