Tucker's Kobolds and Pathfinder

[Requia ☣]

I'll be starting high level campaign Saturday (hopefully).  I'm looking at doing a Tucker's Kobolds style mission for the opening.  One of the things from that I want to have them do is shooting crossbows through murder holes.

The catch here is that Pathfinder tends to lend itself to fairly high AC values, and most of the low level monsters have very low attack bonuses, (A kobold for example has a +3 for ranged attacks).  So the question is, how do I get low level monsters to actually hit the PCs on something other than a natural 20?

[Sister Fracture]

Rogue levels.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I'll be starting high level campaign Saturday (hopefully). 

Boing.  Bad move.  But anyway...

What worked in 1st ed doesn't work now.

Don't have them engage in melee.  Have them trigger command-detonated traps, nets, etc.

[Don Coyote]

I'll be starting high level campaign Saturday (hopefully). 

Boing.  Bad move.  But anyway...

What worked in 1st ed doesn't work now.

Don't have them engage in melee.  Have them trigger command-detonated traps, nets, etc.

Google IED training.

[Luna]

That.

If you're married to the idea of crossbows through murder holes, let the little bastards rig up a series of crossbows, fired in batches from a couple safe vantage points.  

Here's a cheery thought, guaranteed to warm the hearts of your party.  That sheen on the floor?  When the flint arrowheads start sparking off the floor and walls, the oil ignites...

[Telarus]

I agree. Turn it into some crazy kobold mechanism and give it an attack bonus appropriate for the encounter.

[Requia ☣]

I have, if anybody is interested, decided to combine the being shot at through murder holes bit with the bit where the wererats release something nasty from a cage (haven't decided what yet).

They still won't do much, but they'll count more as a bonus than an actual encounter.

[Luna]

I have, if anybody is interested, decided to combine the being shot at through murder holes bit with the bit where the wererats release something nasty from a cage (haven't decided what yet).

They still won't do much, but they'll count more as a bonus than an actual encounter.

Giant mutant rat.  (Build your own, whatever will make a real challenge for your players, with the added hail of crossbow bolts for spice.)  Play it up, huge, mangy, ugly, drooling critter.  When the party brings it down and searches it (they always search it), they find a collar, with the name "Fluffy" lovingly worked into the leather.

[LMNO]

Have them do this.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

The only rationalle for kobolds surviving as a species is:

1.  Low ceilings, and

2.  SCIENCE.  Don't think of them as warriors, think of them as combat engineers.

[Luna]

The only rationalle for kobolds surviving as a species is:

1.  Low ceilings, and

2.  SCIENCE.  Don't think of them as warriors, think of them as combat engineers.

There is nothing, NOTHING as entertaining as the look on your plate-mail wearing burly-man realizing that he's gotta strip to his skivvies if he wants to follow the li'l buggers down the hole. 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

The only rationalle for kobolds surviving as a species is:

1.  Low ceilings, and

2.  SCIENCE.  Don't think of them as warriors, think of them as combat engineers.

There is nothing, NOTHING as entertaining as the look on your plate-mail wearing burly-man realizing that he's gotta strip to his skivvies if he wants to follow the li'l buggers down the hole. 

Or the look on the wizard's face as the kobold on the other side of the ventilation fan throws a bag of broken glass into it.

[LMNO]

So, you should think about Kobolds not as "creatures that attack the PCs", but as "creatures that activate death machines that attack the PCs"?


I would think that while a kobold hitting you with a sword wouldn't do much, a kobold dropping half a ton of active volcano on your head would?

[Richter]

So instead of a game where everyone lines up in easily flankable rows to havea stand-up fight against squishable hateable little baddies, you're proposing that players get dragged through tiny caverns being maliciously tricked with deadly intent at every corner?

PERFECT.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

So, you should think about Kobolds not as "creatures that attack the PCs", but as "creatures that activate death machines that attack the PCs"?


I would think that while a kobold hitting you with a sword wouldn't do much, a kobold dropping half a ton of active volcano on your head would?

Dragon biting you:  Hurts.

Kobold dropping an avil on you from the top of the tower that's over their lair?  Hurts more.

Also, the boss should be a sorc (dragon bloodline) into dragon disciple.  If he's high enough level to cast 4th level spells, BLACK TENTACLES.  No shit.

Any full out kobold tribe is going to have assloads of sorcs.