By the will of the dice, my players have randomly encountered a Masan on their journeys.
By the will of the dice, my players have randomly encountered a Masan on their journeys. It's inception into the group was characteristically masterful - a snivelling, teary eyed little girl who lost her family in the night.
My players are barely second level. They have no magic weapons between them.
How can I be true and honest to the dice and to the monster's nature and power without guaranteeing a TPK my players don't even realise they're walking into
My players are barely second level. They have no magic weapons between them.
How can I be true and honest to the dice and to the monster's nature and power without guaranteeing a TPK my players don't even realise they're walking into
For some reason, despite their power, Masans are apparently cowardly and try to trick the players into a position of weakness. Use that to buy enough time for the players to notice its unnaturally long shadow and give themselves a chance. You could take bolder steps by having something else they encounter before it decides it's safe to feed recognize its nature and aid them, perhaps to put them in the helper's debt.
ReplyDeletedungeonofsigns.blogspot.com - Trust The Random Encounter table
ReplyDeleteAn additional thought: a cowardly creature like the Masan will probably not try to kill the whole party for the heck of it... Once it's got one it would probably be satisfied if the others ran, or it might try to isolate one and make off with him. So a TPK is more likely a result of the party unwisely pressing the attack than the inevitable result of rolling that encounter.
ReplyDeleteI like Joshua Macy's ideas. Another option is to make this Masan interested in having slaves for some reason - maybe to help it guarantee a flow of more victims?
ReplyDeleteIt went excellently, just as a follow up. One of the players found out that it had a long creepy shadow, and he was so spooked and quietly tried to alert the rest of them without the Masan wising up to the party figuring out something was wrong. They decided to camp at like 2 in the afternoon and awkwardly just sat around, and then for some daft reason they just SUNSET to the be time to just start accusing this unearthly child of all sorts of things. It deflects as much as it can, acts like a confused and upset child, then chides them in a demonic voice and lunges, tearing a chunk out of the interrogator. It scarpers into the night after the NPC retainer who freaked out and bolted into the darkness. They find the NPC's bloodless corpse at dawn. They're seriously spooked and I only had to make one attack roll.
ReplyDeleteOne of my players even had the idea of dousing a projectile in salt adhered with spittle, and sure enough I googled Masans and salt is mentioned in some stuff about them. So I let it make a cigarette burn at the point of contact.
That was EXCELLENT fun
Joshua Macy major props to you man for your suggestions
ReplyDeleteThanks, glad to hear it went well
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