#combat encounter

However,

Hear me out.

What if two farmers thought the other was stealing their sheep but it was

Have you ever come up with a general idea for an encounter, but aren’t sure how to flesh it out or weave it into the larger narrative? It’s been said time and time again that Dungeons and Dragons is built on three pillars of play: combat, social, and exploration. As long as you know the environment and how subjects might fight or socialize, you as the DM can improvise any encounter well enough to roll with the punches. 

Here is an example of my own DM notes for this weekend’s first encounter: It starts off explaining the environment and how it can be explored, and then my notes mention some monsters in the distance which can branch into a combat or social encounter (or a blend of the two). You don’t need to know the specifics of my campaign to understand my writing, but if you have questions - always feel free to ask!

The PCs are high up along the peaks of the Orc’s Crown. They follow wood-and-hemp bridges that connect plateaus of rock, and follow narrow trails up along cliff walls. Eventually, they’ll easily spot a large company of ogres wearing crude backpack mounts, carefully scaling a 120 ft. vertical rock surface. Currently the ogres about thirty feet high.

DC 10 Perception spots seven ogres in total, each carrying orcs on the mounts. They are all armed with primitive weapons.

DC 12 Insight reveals the company seems rushed and uninterested in observing their surroundings.

ENVIRONMENT

DC 12 Perception spots an old steel and hemp pulley system built into the rock wall. DC 14 INT check to learn how to use the machine; it requires a PC to stay at the floor to operate the controls. The elevator can fit up to two Medium sized targets and move 40 ft. per round, but moves faster with only one (60 ft./round)

PCs who climb the wall must pass a DC 10 STR check for every 20 ft. they climb. For every 10 ft. beyond the first, the DC increases by 1. Players can choose to try and beat a DC 13 CON check to increase their climb speed by 10 ft. for that turn. If they fail, they must pass a DC 15 DEX save to fall 10 ft., otherwise they fall to the floor and take 1d10 bludgeoning damage for each 10 ft. fallen.

SOCIAL

The orc company will be uninterested in talking, but they also want to avoid a fight which would weaken their numbers and waste their time. If the party is hostile, the orc company will attack the group until they die. A DC 18 Persuasion check could later convince an orc to parlay and talk with the party; the DC drops to 10 if there is only one orc alive to parlay.

If the company isn’t already hostile, they could tell the group the following.

They will openly admit their allegiance to Rogmesh, their clan leader. They are meeting Rogmesh at Oogugboo Summit, an innately magical mountain, to later escort her to Curlamog’s Lair to confront Ergoth.

They’ve learned that Ergoth has sent a tanarruk to kill Rogmesh’s tribe and take her to Curlamog’s Lair. 

COMBAT

2x Ogres

4x Orcs

Sneaking up on the company would be fairly easy with a Passive Perception of 9. If the company is attacked, most of the group will attempt to continue their climb to the top of the rock wall. Two ogres and four orcs will descend 30 ft. to attack the party and bide time for the rest of their group to escape.

The orcs will not stop fighting until they die, often speaking in their own language to each other about martyring themselves to protect Rogmesh. The ogres will not retreat from battle, but will move onto a weaker opponent if they are challenged by their melee target.

My ‘environment’ challenges usually translate into skill challenges, and typically I try to include solutions that require a combination of two or more abilities like STR and INT. For this particular encounter, I permit beefier characters to use their Strength and Constitution to brave the rock wall, and squishier characters to use their Intelligence to create a simpler route for themselves and others to follow. 

My ‘social’ challenge here is totally optional, as is the ‘combat’ challenge. Whatever my players decide to do, I can refer to these notes and see how the orcs and ogres would respond. If the social encounter goes well, the PCs could learn more secrets about the big players in the story... otherwise they could simply have a straightforward brawl or a mix of combat and social. 

The Cyclopes are monstrosities. souless copys of goliathes according to some, but that story has two tellings, the cityfolk claim the devils created them and failed to copy their own goliaths, humans tell of a terriable ritual by which soilders were not born of men and neccesity, but directly from a mother's womb, fathered by desperation in the form of dark magics. They can copy humans movements, learning to cook, build camps, and copy their specific fighting style. They capture people, and hold them by the back of their head, and holds their arms, slowly pulling. the screams and begging and calling for specific people, is seen as movement in their throut.

They are gaze cancels magic, their eye fluid is traficed as an anti-scrying potion, that works even on gods.

You see a ruin, and a woman, bloodied walking away from it. her arm was ripped off by the monster that took them, and shes moving with the featherfall effect. It wanted to eat us im sure! I have weak magics, i tried to tunnel under the prison, but it collapsed, the monster grabed my arm as i fell. it pulled me apart and then i rolled down that hill. my sister is still in that collapseing prison. Please, help her. (she starts passing out) there were wolves in this forest. Hopefully PCs used a potion or heal spell on her, and will cast something to hide her in a tree.

the fort is, a destroyed wall on a ramping courtyard, then a building complex, and a tower with prison bars. entering the fort, its all traps. half eaten animals, a muck litter any corner of this fort. and certain hallways are traped. (investigaation 15 to tell the most used/untrapped) while walking past two large doors, the cyclops will burst from one to the other taking someone with a grapple check. if not, then a snare or pitfall will deliver a PC to him. either way the PCs chase him. they start ascending the tower. that tower is clearly collapsing, with bricks falling (dex sv) and jumps to be made (athl) and dust cloud to push through (con sv) {idealy dol these out to whoevers best at each, taking note of who fails and is slowed down}

The clanking of ur armour and the chase as a whole alerts the top of this prison tower. a woman calls out. help! please! is anyone there! monster even, this tower is collapsing, please! ye see from the door way ur at now, leading across a bridge, to another (stable) tower, and up the stairs and around the corner in this tower, a womans hand flailing desperetly behind prison bars. she shout-whispers "i see the key. can u reach the key?" Hopfully one PC goes for the prisoner, one goes to out on the bridge, to save the third PC who is captured.

Cyclops 1 throws PC1 toward the open door of the opposite tower, DC10, dosnt fall into the scummy water barrel, catches the edge and pull self up. DC20, manages to bounce on wall and pull self to the roof of that tower, there to face the Cyclops on the high ground. Cyclops 1 will be running back accross the bridge to other players.

Player who runs up to the prison cell, suddenly standds before a large cell wall. The severed arm isnt flailing anymore, its being slurped up like spagetii! by the cyclops in the cell. this second cyclops pushes its hand on the prison bars, and in three of its strides, it will have rotated the wall of bars, so it will be on the outside, and you will be inside the cell. Can u think of anything u could do while the bars are pushing u.

HORRORS SHROUDED IN DARKNESS

Several globes of inky-black darkness silently float 30 ft. up from the ground towards the players. The orbs of blackness are grell under the effects of a darkness spell. The grell will descend upon their targets until they’re within 10 ft. of their prey. Then, the grell will launch their tentacle attack without disadvantage, and the target must beat the DC to resist the attack with disadvantage (the grell are unaffected by the darkness spell, while their targets most likely are.) If a target is grappled by this attack, the grell will float back up 30 ft. and continue to tear into the player with its beak. The longer the target is in its grip, the sooner the target will drop to 0 HP. Even if the target breaks free, it still suffers damage from the 30 ft. drop. 

*NOTE: The PHB doesn’t specifically state you can cast darkness on a target like an NPC, so the grell may need to be wearing something that’s affected by the darkness spell itself. Reward players for investigating what they can, even with the darkness spell in effect. (”Your high Insight roll garners enough evidence to suggest there’s a nonliving source for the magical darkness, but something living is also hiding with it inside the orb.”)