Improvised Chases (System Neutral)

For gamers coming from a D&D background, chase scenes are often overlooked.  Many D&D players simply don't run chases, or when they do they resort to speed comparisons, or counting squares while taking potshots with ranged attacks or spells.  Many powerful control spells will outright end a chase by immobilizing one side or slowing them down.  In other words, when chases do come up they are dry and soulless affairs.

Granted, this might not be everyone's experience, but these are the solutions that make the most obvious use of the rules of the more recent editions of D&D.  I'm sure plenty of GM's ignore the square counting and go for a more skill-challenge type solution.  But skill challenges (as presented in 4E D&D) have their own set of problems, namely that the strict number of failures vs number of successes doesn't necessarily match the narrative description of the scene.  If a skill should end the challenge even if the requisite number of successes hasn't been reached, the GM will usually either fudge it and say that the players succeed, or you'll get frustrated players who don't feel like their specific actions mean anything more than "checking a box."

I know I never really had many chases in my games, but recently I've been sprinkling them in.  In general, I've been using a modified version of the Thriller Chase rules of the Gumshoe game "Night's Black Agents."  The framework works really well for virtually any system, ignoring of course the Gumshoe-specific rules.  The result is a narrative, fast-paced system for resolving chases with skill checks.

• First, create a chase track.  I like to have the PCs start at a value of 0, and track lead by going up or down on the track.  A good default is to cap the track at +/-5.  If one or more PC gets to 5, they win.  If all PCs get to -5, they lose.  This works regardless of whether they're pursuing or pursued (just inject whatever narrative description fits the scene).  
• Most importantly, describe a dynamic environment and let the PCs react to it.  Picture each round as a leg of the chase that takes place in a discrete scene.  Running through a busy city street, a pursuing NPC might make a check to convince guards/police (or upstanding citizens) to stop the PCs.  The key here is to not let the chase devolve into "I sprint," "ok, roll Athletics," etc.  That's the equivalent of fighting generic orcs in a featureless 30x30 room.  As a GM, you'll probably have to play the NPC as a proactive party, actively creating problems/opposition that the PCs are forced to react to.  
• Each "leg" or point of lead is a narrative unit; it doesn't have to equal a specific number of feet or squares.  The chase is broken up into units of "interesting scenes," and each scene should be summarized with a single skill check for all parties involved.
• As a baseline, a successful skill check will bring the PC up 1 step on the chase track.  A failure will drop them down 1 step.  Conversely, a success by the NPC (or group of NPCs) might bring all PCs down 1 step, and a failure bring all PCs up 1 step.  Depending on the narrative, multiple NPCs might only effect one or some PCs.  
• If the difficulty of a check is going to be harder than typical (i.e. the action is riskier), reward that by letting a success increase the lead by 2.  Don't get too generous with this option, and typically only use it if there is an easier alternative and the contrast between the options is noticeable.  A failure doesn't necessarily have to drop the PC down by 2, though.  Equally interesting is a penalty to their next skill check, or even a penalty to an ally's check.  Feel free to adjust the "pacing" of the track if the chase stalls or seems to look like it's going to be a back-and-forth for a long time.  
• The option of increasing/decreasing lead by multiple increments could also be used if the system has a "degrees of success" mechanic, even if it's as simple as a "crit" (natural 20) in a d20 system.  Things like succeeding with style in Fate, great/extraordinary successes in TOR, or getting a raise in Savage Worlds would apply here.
• If the system uses a resource-management mechanic (like Vancian spells), feel free to grant an auto-success for the expenditure of resources, or at least force the NPC to make a difficult skill check that can benefit the party (will increase their position), but won't set them back if the NPC succeeds.

These rules/guidelines don't necessarily have to represent an obvious chase.  In an Edge of the Empire game that I ran, I had the PCs racing to a base along a fortified ridge top so that they could grab a ship and escape the planet they were on.  Meanwhile, moving up the canyon below them was a battalion of Imperial walkers that would surely destroy the base if they got their first.  The PCs were being tracked by a large native cat-like creature, and had to contend with turrets and patrols on the way to the base (the PCs were a "third party" in this conflict; in other words, both groups were out to get them!).  Then once they were inside, they had to fight their way to the hangar as the walkers got there!  For some scenes (or "legs" of the chase) a quick combat encounter took the place of skill checks.

So give it a try next time you have to run a chase scene.  If it's completely on-the-fly, consider dropping the chase track down to +/-4, or even 3, because that will keep the number of scenes that you'll need to come up with to a minimum.  Note that a +/-3 could be resolved in as few as 2 "rounds," but if there's more back and forth it might take longer.  If you need to adjust the pace, make the next scene harder if the PCs are doing better that you anticipated, or easier if they're floundering (especially the latter!).  If it starts to get repetitive or you run out of scenes, better to end the chase in an exciting way (some sort of complication?) than slog through the chase track just for the sake of finishing it.  This isn't meant to be a hard-and-fast resolution system; it's more of a tool for the GM to ballpark their pacing.

Mazarbul Bestiary: Large Solo Black Dragon

After reading a series of articles about re-structuring the way solo monsters are handled in D&D 4E at The Angry DM (The D&D Boss Fight Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4), I began to think about how this concept might be applied to 13th Age.  In short, the Boss Fight system consists of splitting a solo monster stat block into 3 different stat blocks with 1/3 of the HP of an appropriate solo.  This splits the fight into 3 stages which keeps the fight dynamic and provides a better sense of progress.  Later-design (post MM3) sensibilities are also followed, such as increasing the action economy, spreading out solo actions, and giving them resistances to certain control conditions.

In 13th Age solo monsters don't really exist as their own discrete category.  Rather, a Large monster is designed to be as powerful as two same-level normal monsters, and a Huge monster is the equivalent of three same-level monsters.  In practice, I've found that they don't function that well if run as true solos, though I have heard of people using monsters several levels higher than the party as solos and having it work.

Another key to a good solo battle is a dynamic environment, which is covered in the D&D Boss Fight articles but also addressed directly within the monster design with the Worldbreaker system on the blog At-Will.  Consider the difference between a generic fight with a red dragon in its treasure hoard where it simply trades blows with the party (given that a major complaint about 4E solos is that they were just "sacks of hit points" leads me to believe that this is a common scenario) and the action-packed final sequence from The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (which, while arguably over-the-top, would make a pretty awesome RPG boss battle).

To kick things off I'll design a solo version of a Large Black Dragon, which is a Double-Strength Large  (yep, I'm stacking them) 6th Level wrecker in the core rulebook.  I've taken elements from both Boss Fight and Worldbreaker, though I've opted to keep things simple and avoid splitting the dragon up into 3 separate stat blocks when just 1 will do.  Mechanically, the Solo Speed trait does a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of making this Large creature function as two enemies without changing around the dragon's attacks too much, as it now acts on two different initiative slots.  While debilitating control effects are less of an issue in 13th Age compared with 4E, Draconic Toughness is still a good way of preventing the PCs from wrecking its action economy and turning it into a big sack of hit points to be beaten down with impunity.

Some notable changes from the published stat block are the replacement of ongoing damage from the dragon's main attack to a more narrative secondary effect that lets the dragon use its environment to its advantage.  The effect of having 3 stat blocks is replicated by the addition of two special trigger powers that separate the 3 stages of the battle.  While somewhat clunky, negating overflow damage on the dragon and the PC respites (both from Boss Fight) are written directly into these powers; this is probably less clunky than 3 stat blocks, though.  The first trigger power also increases the frequency of the secondary trigger on the dragon's main attacks (in later stages it's no longer toying around with the PCs, but trying to use the environment to wreck them), and the second trigger power swaps out the Draconic Grace trait with Acidify Environment.  By stage 3, the dragon is injured and desperate, bleeding and spitting acid just about everywhere.  It should probably be making judicious efforts to escape unless the PCs are hanging on by a thread.

As far as balance is concerned, the fact that this dragon is getting two free action trigger powers might make it seem more powerful than 2 regular large black dragons, but the PC respites probably balance this out, plus there's the fact that 2 dragons would have two chances of using Draconic Grace each round.  The solo is probably a little tougher than 2 core rulebook dragons, but not by as much as it would first appear.  The more hand-wavey, narrative trigger of the dragon's main attack also gives the GM more leeway to take it easy if the party is having a tough time, or really showcase the danger of the environment if they're doing too well.

Large Solo Black Dragon
Double Strength Large 6th Level Wrecker (Solo)
Initiative +13
Vulnerability: thunder

Traits

This dragon has all of the traits that a Large Black Dragon from pg. 220 of the core book has, including Escalator, Flight, Draconic Grace, Intermittent Breath, Water Breathing, and Resist Acid 16+.  It also has the following Traits:

Solo Superiority:  The Dragon has two initiative slots, one at its rolled initiative result and the other at its rolled initiative +10.  It can make saves at the end of both turns, but it only takes ongoing damage on its first turn (Initiative +10).

Draconic Toughness: All Saves that this dragon makes gain a +5 bonus.  The Dragon immediately rolls a Hard Save (Normal with the bonus) if subjected to the Stunned or Confused condition.  On a success, it's Weakened instead.

Claws, bite, or tail sweep +11 vs AC (2 attacks) - 18 damage
Natural 16+, or Natural Even Hit if ≤ 214 HP: the target is flung into a dangerous or inconvenient environmental hazard.  Choose an option from the Sample Environments section, or improvise your own to match your game's narrative.
Natural even miss: half damage if the target was a different enemy than the last one the dragon attacked, including if the attack made on the dragon's previous turn.
Special: the dragon gains a +4 bonus to AC vs opportunity attacks if it moves after making this attack, including if it uses its first action on its next turn to move.

C: Acid breath +11 vs PD (1d3 nearby enemies) - 20 acid damage, and 10 ongoing acid damage.
Miss: 10 acid damage.

[Special Trigger] Murky water flyby - When the dragon is reduced to 214 HP it disappears (remove it from play), ignoring any damage from the triggering attack that takes it below 214 HP.  Each PC can spend a Recovery and either regain a 1/battle power OR immediately roll to recharge a power.  After 1 round (during which the Escalation Die does not increase), all PCs make a DC 25 Perception check.  If they succeed, they can take an opportunity attack against the dragon.  If they fail, they take 4d6 damage.  Place the dragon anywhere nearby, and give it an additional use of Acid Breath.  Note that the trigger of its claws, bite, or tail sweep attack also changes at this point.

[Special Trigger] Wrath of the injured - When the dragon is reduced to 107 HP it immediately uses Acid breath as a free action, even if it normally would not have any more uses of it, and ignores any damage from the triggering attack that would take it lower than 107.  It also counts as Staggered, loses the Draconic Grace trait, and instead gains the Acidify Environment trait.  Each PC can spend a Recovery after the attack from an increase in morale at seeing the dragon visibly injured.

Acidify Environment: Any enemy that ends its turn adjacent to the dragon automatically takes 10 acid damage.  After one round of possessing this trait, any nearby unengaged enemies also automatically take 5 acid damage.

AC 22
PD 20             HP 320 (214, 107)
MD 18

Example Environments:
Deep Water with Mucky Bottom - The PC makes a DC 20 check to avoid becoming stuck in the muck and to swim to the edge of the deep water in 2 move actions.  If the check beats a DC 25 instead, the PC does this in a single move action.  If they fail, they're stuck underwater until the next turn.
Thrown against a Wall - The PC takes an additional 2d12 damage and is Prone.  Standing up can be done as part of a move action, but if you wants to move anywhere else you must succeed at a Normal Save (11+).  While prone you are Vulnerable to melee attacks, but ranged attacks made against you take a -2 penalty.
Thrown Behind an Obstacle - The PC is on the other side of a pit, a geyser, high on a ledge, thrown off a small cliff, etc.  Usually this will take a DC 25 skill check to overcome the environment in a way that makes narrative sense.  Depending on the environment, a failure should either result in 10 damage or cause the PC to take two move actions instead of one to get back in the fight.

Mazarbul Bestiary: Iron Sea Lobster Behemoth

This is the first article with the "Mazarbul Bestiary" tag.  This series is pretty self-explanatory; I'll provide unique monsters, enemies, or NPCs for the various game systems that I cover.  We'll kick things off with a custom creation for 13th Age.

I created the Iron Sea Lobster Behemoth to be a solo that isn't a solo.  The main body of the creature is a Huge 5th level creature, but it has two claws that act as 4th level spoilers, as well as 6 tentacles that act as a group of 5th level mooks.  So while it's mechanically multiple monsters, it's narratively just one.  This solves the action economy problems of solos in D&D 4E, but it's admittedly not an elegant solution for every large creature.  It works for a giant lobster because everybody's seen crabs walking around on the beach with missing claws, and it's feasible to say that even if the body is killed the claws might still reflexively attack (though I'd advise any GMs running this to just end the encounter when the body is killed, even if there are claws and/or tentacles left).  Plus the tentacles are supposed to evoke a Cthulu-esque vibe.  I certainly wouldn't use this option with a dragon, for example.

Iron Sea Lobster Behemoth Body
Huge 5th Level Troop               Initiative +7
Fear Aura 24 HP
Stomping Scuttle + 10 vs AC (3 attacks) - 18 damage
R Acidic Brine (1d4 nearby enemies in a group) +10 vs PD - 15 acid damage and 5 ongoing.

Resist 16+ Fire

AC 20
PD 19               HP 220
MD 15

Claws x2
4th Level Spoiler                 Initiative +8
Special: the claws can intercept independently
Grabbing Claw +9 vs AC - 14 damage
Natural Even Hit: The target is grabbed (-5 to disengage checks unless the target hits the claw with an attack first, and the target cannot make opportunity attacks or ranged attacks)

AC 21
PD 19             HP 56
MD -

Tentacles x6
5th Level Mook                  Initiative +8
Special: the tentacles can intercept independently
Stinging Grasp + 10 vs PD - 8 damage
16+: The target is also Dazed.

AC 20
PD 18            HP 18, 36, 54, 72, 80, 98
MD -


Building Battles
By default an Iron Sea Lobster Behemoth is most likely going to be encountered on the rocky shores east of the Sea Wall.  As a solo it's designed to work alone, and since it's a pretty mindless, hunger-driven monstrosity it's unlikely to have any allies.  Perhaps it could pop up as a 3rd party during a conflict (drawn by the sounds of battle, or by the scent of blood).  To increase the threat level have the encounter take place in shallow water (or have the tides rapidly flow in during the battle).  This way the claws can hold a PC underwater after they're grabbed, changing the tactical landscape to "lop off that claw before Bob dies!"  Also keep in mind the ability of the claws and tentacles to intercept melee PCs.  The lobster behemoth will do all it can to protect its soft underbelly, and that means keeping potential threats at a distance (or at least Dazed).  It will probably seek out the squishiest PC to make a meal of, softening them up with its acidic brine, but it won't foolishly consume an unconscious meal while being attacked (it may try to drag it underwater though!).

Icons
The Diabolist: While the origins of Iron Sea Lobster Behemoths are unknown (as is the case with most of the monsters that drag their hefty forms out of the Iron Sea), the tolerance that the creatures have for fire have led some to suspect that they're spawned in underwater Hellholes.  The Diabolist probably knows whether or not that's true, but she's not letting anyone else in on her secret.  Some whisper that that's because even though they're of demonic origin, she's failed to control them.
The High Druid: Her forces have been guarding the Dragon Empire (or perhaps more accurately, the Wild Wood) from anything that gets over the Sea Wall.  That includes these creatures, if one were to ever venture far enough from the sea to be a threat.  Oddly enough, smugglers have brought back rumors of druids and their agents going beyond the Sea Wall to take lobster behemoths out.  Such tales lend credence to the "demonic origins" theories, or at the very least suggest that they're not natural.  Or maybe the druids are harvesting body parts for some ritualistic reason...
The Lich King: Didn't expect his name on this list, did you?  He definitely animates skeletons, and exoskeletons are skeletons too.  He's the only icon to have exerted control over lobster behemoths, albeit after they were already dead.

Adventure Hooks
Sea Wall Ruins - A scholar from Horizon has been reading up on the history of the ruins along the Sea Wall, and has reason to believe a legendary weapon lies there, after its wielder was slain defending the doomed fortress.  What he didn't know was that the Iron Sea has recently eroded the shoreline right up to the walls of the fortress, which a lobster behemoth has claimed as its lair.
Quest for Caviar - A druid from the Blood Wood has put a call out to adventurers to collect lobster behemoth eggs.  Several groups have already been sent out, but none have returned yet.  Are the PCs hired by the druid to do what others could not, or by someone else who wants to see what the druid is up to?  Does the High Druid herself even approve of this quest?
Origin Story - A hellhole near the Iron Sea (perhaps the mapped one south of the Spider Wood) has started emanating a briny, sea-air smell.  Has it become flooded?  Is there a lobster behemoth spawning there?  Is the Lich King using this as a staging area for the creation of (exo)Skeleton minions?  What does the Crusader have to say about the prospect of hellholes beneath the surface of the Iron Sea itself?  These are the types of questions you'd have the luxury of asking if your pay grade was higher.  Too bad you're just the guy they hired to scout it out.
Retrieval - Imperial soldiers patrolling the area outside of the fort on Cape Thunder were attacked by a lobster behemoth.  One of them was killed, dragged underwater, and presumably eaten.  Sad as that was, he happened to be carrying something very valuable that his companions would like back.  They're sure as hell not going after the beast themselves, though.

Asteroid Mine Ambush

Introduction
This is the first article with the new "set-pieces" tag.  So what does this tag mean?  Episode 11 of the Order 66 Podcast (titled "The GM Holocron") promotes the idea of GMs keeping a campaign binder filled with various "set pieces," which are generic scenarios that you can inject into your game for when your players go off the rails, or if you tend towards a more improvisational style of GMing.  Each set piece has some enemies statted out that can be re-skinned to fit the current situation, as well as a dynamic environment with plenty of things for the PCs to interact with.  In short, it lets you add "planned" encounters to your game when you're winging it, preventing the boring or unbalanced stuff that a GM may come up with on-the-fly if they're put on the spot and can't think of anything interesting.

Because I've already expanded the scope of this blog since its inception (which was to cover D&D 4E), I'm planning on supporting multiple systems with this tag, and hopefully the set pieces will be generic enough that they can be injected into any game of similar genre.  But to kick things off, we'll keep in theme with Order 66 and do a Star Wars set piece.  Since a common problem that some players have with the system is making space combat exciting, the PCs will be piloting starfighters.

System
FFG's Star Wars: Edge of the Empire (or Age of Rebellion), though it can be pretty easily adapted to any space opera or sci-fi setting.

Scene
The PCs are in a facility that's part of an asteroid mining complex when it's attacked by some capital ships or warships.  There's a starfighter hangar attached, and the PCs need to fly fighters to the main hangar to either get to their own ship, or find a ship with hyperdrive capabilities and escape.

Complications
A defense array with many turrets will funnel the fighters below their scaffolding, forcing everyone to fly amongst pipes, support beams, and some geothermal vents.  This is where all the dogfighting is taking place.  A capital ship is bombarding the main hangar, so there's time pressure to get there before it's destroyed.  Optionally depending on the situation, the facility's inhabitants as well as the attackers are both adversaries to the PCs (I used this in game where the PCs were imprisoned in the facility)

Area
The mining complex is sited on a large asteroid at the edge of an asteroid field.  There are multiple buildings on its surface, but the two main ones that concern the PCs are the one that they're in (which contains a small fighter hangar), and the main hangar.  These buildings are at opposite ends of the defense system; flying above it would be suicide, so the PCs will have to maneuver through the support structures.  Going around the defense system will place them in the asteroid field (the turrets cover all of the clear space), which will not only take longer but may arguably be more dangerous.

Optionally, the PCs may have to fight their way through the starting building to get to the starfighter hangar.  This may be because the attackers boarded the facility already, or the defending inhabitants are simply adversaries of the PCs.  They'll have to make their way through a large warehouse room containing crates upon crates of whatever materials are being mined on the asteroid (the crates stop about 2/3 of the way to the hangar doors, at Medium range from them).  A large pipe has fallen from the ceiling due to a heavy hit from one of the capital ships, and is now on the ground across the warehouse venting hot steam (at Long range from the hangar doors).  A loader crane sits on one side of the room (near the wall left or right of where the PCs start from) just before the pipe, and at the other end of the room are the hangar doors (at Extreme range from the starting point), which can be opened via computer terminals on the walls to either side.

Once the PCs get into their fighters and exit the hangar, they'll need to make it to the main hangar.  While traversing under the defense system, PCs should be faced with at least 3 "checkpoints" where they'll need to make rolls.  The first should be Piloting checks (Normal or Hard) to test how well they're able to maneuver through the support structures (failure should result in a minor collision).  They should also move through an area of heavy dogfighting and be engaged by enemy fighters (with any maneuver requiring a Piloting check while dogfighting amongst the beams and pipes; add setback dice to this), and the third checkpoint should be moving through the geothermal vents (or broken piping that's venting flaming gas).  After making it through, they'll need to either deal with the capital ship, or make it in and out of the hangar before it's completely destroyed.  Remember to lead each "checkpoint" with some colorful narrative description to paint a vivid picture of how these fighters are forced to weave around all of these obstacles.

Once the PCs are in a ship and flying out of the main hangar, they should make a Piloting check as the capital ship blasts half of the exit apart.

Threats
In the facility, the PCs should see the silhouettes of a minion group on the other side of the steaming pipe.  They can sneak past them by using the crates for most of the way, or they might use the crane or computer terminals to their advantage somehow (reward creativity!).  If they stop the steam at one of the terminals, their enemies will know someone's present (but if they don't, they'll need to make Resilience, Coordination, or some other appropriate physical check to resist being scalded when they pass through).  If they give away their position a stronger foe joins the fight (this will probably happen once they leave the cover of the crates even if they successfully bypass the minions).

When I ran this, I used B2 super battle droids for the minions, and a droideka for the strong enemy.  Other options from the core rule book are Apprentice Bounty Hunters and either a Journeyman or Master hunter, Stormtroopers and a Stormtrooper Sergeant, or Pirate Crew and a Pirate Captain.  The Pirates in particular make good generic enemies that can be reskinned as almost anything.  Note that unless the group is very combat-capable, they should probably try to get past the strong enemy as quickly as possible as opposed to killing it.

For the starfighters, make sure that the opposing forces have different types (this is really easy if the attackers are Imperial, as they were when I ran this for my group, since you can simply use TIEs).  It's important that whatever is in the hangar available for the PCs is not hyperspace-capable (because that would defeat the purpose of getting to the main hangar).  CloakShapes and Headhunters are both good options, but I also threw in a double-seater Y-Wing without an astromech to make potentially engaging with a capital ship (I used Nebulon B's) less suicidal.  I've found that running starfighters in minion groups of 2 or 3 makes for more exciting starfighter combat.  Also remember that if the PCs opt to take the asteroid field, you'll want to spice it up by having a squadron of enemy fighters chase them in there.

Triumph
If attacking or being pursued while in the starfighters, blow up some support beams, a pipe, or an asteroid (or fly close to them if just Piloting) such that debris hits enemy ships, causing a minor collision.

In the warehouse, an action that might reasonably cause one of the crates to topple spills crushed ore somewhere really inconvenient for the enemies (perhaps even on top of one of the minions).

Despair
While Piloting, you suffer a major collision after being struck by debris or clipping a structure or asteroid.

If flying through the geothermal vents, the heat causes your cockpit to fog up, impairing vision.

Making the Most out of Knowledge Checks

Knowledge checks can often fall flat in tabletop RPGs, or at least this happens a lot in my games.  Either the GM has information that they'd planned on giving out anyways, in which case calling for a Knowledge check can be a formality (and a frustrating one if it's failed), or the player requests to roll a Knowledge check and, put on the spot, the GM can't think of anything particularly interesting or impactful on the fly.  While it can be cool to play the know-it-all, sometimes you just can't help feeling that you're not getting as much bang for your buck as players who have invested in more "active" skills.

I was skimming through Dungeon World today, and one of the GM Principles stuck with me: "ask [the PCs] questions and use the answers."  Combined with one of the three bullet points on the GM's Agenda, "Play to find out what happens," a GM can make Knowledge checks a lot more interesting and engaging by soliciting player involvement.

What this means is that when a PC asks to roll a Knowledge check and you don't already have something in mind, if they succeed you can ask them to tell you what their character knows about the subject.  If it ends up taking things in a completely different direction than you'd planned, well that's a great embodiment of "play to find out what happens."  As an "explorer" type player, I like to learn details about the fictional world even when I'm GMing, and (for me at least) these types of twists make GMing a lot more enjoyable.

All of the sudden players might be scrambling to pick up some Knowledge skills for the chance to influence the narrative.  There's a real, tangible benefit from the character's knowledge instead of some half-formed "fact" that often ends up being fairly pointless, if not entirely uninteresting, when the GM is forced to come up with something on the spot.  Obviously this could potentially be abusable by certain types of players, and the GM should counter that without devaluing the skill by building off of the player's suggestion to keep it in-line power-wise, and/or varying the difficulty based on the specificity of the information.  And ultimately, a roll should only be made where it's dramatically appropriate; players should know that they can't just knowledge-spam in an attempt to power-game (most players probably wouldn't go for that anyways).

Here are a few examples:

• The party finds an ancient religious text in some old ruins.  Instead of the GM answering a successful Knowledge check with "it's a history of X deity," they ask the player "it refers to X deity, what interesting fact or legend have you heard regarding them?"  If the fact is relevant to the current adventure in some way, all the better!
• When encountering a new type of creature a PC rolls a knowledge check to learn about any possible weaknesses.  With a success, the GM says "ok, you can tell me a little-known weakness of this creature."  This should be kept narratively interesting; answers like "uhhhh, it's vulnerable to swords because I'm carrying a sword" are pretty lame.  As a GM, you can build on that by saying "oh yes, there are tales from ancient Akaras that say the beast is vulnerable to swords.  Of course, all swords from that time were made from Akaran steel, so they felt no need to specify that an 'Akaran blade' was the beast's true weakness."  Instant story hook, and now when the PCs seek out an Akaran blade they'll have a tangible mechanical advantage against this creature.

You can take this idea even further by employing a variant of the "fail forward" philosophy.  That is to say, failure is not simply a dead end, but leads to a different approach that needs to be taken or a pseudo-success but with complications.  Say a PC fails their Knowledge check (or in a system like Edge of the Empire, perhaps they even succeeded with Threat or Despair).  You can provide one fact, and then ask the player to provide an additional fact.  Alternatively, you can have another player at the table provide one of the facts.  Then you roll randomly to determine which of those facts is true, and which is false.  The player will know that one of the facts is false (just not which one), but the character will probably think that both are true.  Acting on misinformation can provide interesting (and sometimes hilarious) results, but the player can't complain too much since they got something true out of the deal, too.  

Alternatively, the complication might be that the player provides just one fact and the GM rolls randomly to determine whether it's true or false.  This works especially well if nobody at the table can think of a second fact right away, and you want to keep the game moving at a fast pace.  It's worth noting that the "is it true?" technique shouldn't be used for all failed Knowledge checks, because it has the potential to become frustrating.  You definitely don't want PCs to be afraid to attempt Knowledge checks!  What's "too much" will vary group to group, but once every few sessions might be a good baseline to start at.

When the GM rolls randomly any die roll that offers a 50/50 result should do just fine, but in some games it might be interesting to make a special type of roll.  The Force Die in Edge of the Empire springs to mind (the GM notes one of the facts, and if a dark side result is rolled it's false, with perhaps more severe consequences if it's a double dark side pip).  The "degrees of truth" idea can also be used with the feat die in The One Ring, making the d12 roll potentially more interesting than a 50/50 roll using a d6 (if the Eye of Sauron or Gandalf rune are rolled, up the stakes).  

Adapting Ally Rolls to Other Systems

I recently posted an article on the Ally Roll table in The One Ring.  Interestingly, it was pretty similar to an improvised mass combat system I'd come up with for 13th Age, with inspiration from Dungeon World.  The concept itself has a lot of potential for general applicability, with the gist being that a single die roll is used to represent a group of allies fighting a group of enemies, with a scale of outcomes tied to the results.  These outcomes need not be written out as a table ahead of time, but they certainly can be.  At minimum your spectrum of outcomes should include bad stuff (allies losing ground) on low rolls, neutral results (or success with complications) on middle rolls, and good stuff (allies gain ground) on high rolls.  The One Ring makes it easy to include really bad stuff and really good stuff at the far ends of the spectrum due to the Eye of Sauron or Gandalf Rune being rolled, respectively, but this could easily be represented by lowest and highest numerical results as well (fumbles and crits, in d20 terminology).

What Die Type Should Be Used?

This question is, of course, system-dependent.  For The One Ring (TOR) the Feat Die (the special d12) was the obvious choice, and the precedent for the mechanic already exists in a published adventure.  A d20 might be appropriate in d20 systems, though I chose to instead opt for 2d6 with 13th Age (13A).  As it turns out, I have some further ideas for modifying the ally check which become more interesting with 2d6 compared with a d20, which I'll discuss later.  But what about a system with non-standard dice, like Edge of the Empire (EotE)?

The similarities between TOR's Feat Die and the Force, Challenge and Proficiency dice of EotE made using the Force Die or the red/yellow d12s pretty tempting.  Theoretically the blank face and the Triumph/Despair could stand in for the Eye of Sauron/Gandalf Rune, with Success/Failure and Advantage/Threat standing in for good or bad results (faces with both being neutral).  On the Force Die the applications of light/dark side pips should be pretty easy to guess.  The ultimate problem with such a system is that the results of the roll aren't easily or intuitively as modifiable as a numerical system.  This presents a couple of big problems, the first being that you can't "custom fit" the probabilities to account for the difficulty of the odds your allies are facing, and second being that bonuses or penalties (due to PC intervention, terrain, narrative changes, etc.) are tough to apply.  It's easy to just say "use a regular d12, or 2d6 just like the other examples!" but ideally you'd use a die or dice that are already used in the game, since not all players can be expected to have a set of standard RPG dice (ok, ok, so most probably have a couple of d6s from board games or whatever).  Thus the obvious choice becomes the d% dice.

You'd basically treat the Ally Roll like you would a roll on the critical injury table (again, you can pre-make a custom table or just wing it).  Off the top of my head, I'd probably break the results down into 1-5 very bad (Eye of Sauron), 6-40 bad, 41-70 neutral, 71-95 good, and 96-100 very good (Gandalf Rune).  The odds are stacked against the allies with the bad range having a 35% chance of being rolled, neutral a 30% chance, and good 25%.  The percentile roll provides a lot of granularity for adjusting based on the difficulty/conditions of the battle, and of course you need to leave PCs the opportunity to be the real heroes by making it an uphill fight.

Oh, and while we're at it I'll note that in the 2d6 system I employed for 13th Age the equivalents to an Eye or Gandalf would be double 1's or double 6's, respectively.  While this makes these results less likely to trigger than in the other examples, it also has the advantage of simplicity.  GMs can get around the reduced probabilities by interpreting those results with a heavier hand, but the probabilities are also a little more malleable when the roll is modified (see the "Game Specifics" section).

Allowing for Player Interaction

There can potentially be problems associated with running different sections of the battlefield with differing degrees of abstraction.  On the one hand, the PCs and their immediate foes will be operating on the scale of individual actions, individual Hit Points/Endurance/Wounds/etc., and individual initiative slots.  The allies all get lumped into a single roll which represents how both sides are faring in relation to each other, and the results are more often than not going to be much more narrative with much less bookkeeping.  While you can add some bookkeeping (see the unit strength idea that I presented in the original 13th Age post, which was the second link at the top of this article), my personal preference is to reduce that level of tracking and instead focus on the broad needs of the plot.  The PCs shouldn't care about too much detail, because in-game they have their own problems, and so they'll be perceiving their allies in broad strokes (besides, this keeps the game moving more quickly, with less time spent on the GM "fighting themselves").

But what happens when a PC wants to interfere?  This is best handled by a modification of the Ally Roll.  Here are 4 distinct examples.

1. A PC kills the foe he was fighting, and wants to effectively "join" the ally group.  Simple enough, just pick out a single opponent or two (or a mook/minion group, if the game supports that), pull them out of the ally roll and into a new personal combat with the PC, using PC scale actions, HP, etc.  If it makes sense that the enemy would already be a little wounded, go with whatever feels right.  To represent the loss of some enemy forces, you could grant a bonus to the Ally Roll (magnitude dependent on the strength of the foes that the PC "drew out").
2. A PC blankets the enemy forces with an area effect (grenade, fireball spell, etc.).  Depending on the size of the enemy group and their durability, this might result in bonuses to the Ally Roll, or perhaps even an automatic positive result.  This is most likely the case if your positive result reads that an enemy/enemies are wounded or slain, and it makes sense that the area attack would have wounded/killed some enemies.  If the PC spends his entire turn and what is probably a limited resource (grenade or daily-use spell), yeah the effect on the Ally Roll should probably be pretty huge.
3. A PC wants to use a skill to bolster the allied forces.  An obvious choice would be Leadership (EotE), Inspire (TOR), or a Cha check with applicable background (13A).  Again, if the PC is using their action to do this then the results should be pretty big.  For some systems that call is automatic (for example, in EotE using a skill is almost always an action), but for others it'll be up to GM discretion (13A and TOR).  GMs might even want to give players a choice of doing things quickly and getting a simple bonus, or spending their action/turn and getting a more significant bonus (a bigger numberical bonus, or perhaps even an automatic "good stuff" result depending on the nature of the action).  
4. A PC wants to command a specific ally to act upon something outside of their own conflict.  For example, commanding an allied archer to shoot the enemy Wizard, or ordering a rebel soldier to fire at the Moff at the computer terminal.  A successful check should allow that ally to be "pulled out" of the ally group for a turn or more, letting them act as an individual at the same scale as the PCs (this is basically example 1 in reverse).  The price you'll pay for this is that you'll probably add a penalty to the Ally Roll, since without that individual's aid the other allies will have a tougher time of it.  Perhaps with a really good roll (Great/Extraordinary success in TOR, Advantage/Triumph in EotE, or a Natural 16+ in 13A) this penalty can be reduced or eliminated.

Game Specifics

Ok, so with the general principle and some examples laid out, let's provide a summary of some baseline mechanics that a GM can draw upon.  Keep in mind that this stuff is still mostly theoretical, as I've minimally playtested it with 13th Age and The One Ring.  Not only that, but because there is so much variance in specific conditions this is designed to be modifiable and somewhat improvisational by the GM.

The One Ring - You'll be using the Feat Die for the Ally Roll, usually with a spread of Eye (really bad), 1-4 (bad), 5-7 (neutral), 8-10 (good), and Gandalf (really good).  Bonuses/Penalties to the Ally Roll should generally be between 1 and 4, with +/-2 and +/-4 being good starting points thanks to the Complications Table (pg. 48 LMB, GM Screen).  Keep in mind degrees of success, with a simple success on any PC's skill check to interfere providing a modest bonus, and Great or Extraordinary successes have better results.

13th Age - Use 2d6 for the Ally roll, with 6 or less being a bad roll, 7-9 as neutral, and 10 or more being a good result.  Optionally, double 1's can be very bad, and double 6's very good.  While simple numerical modifiers certainly work for bonuses or penalties (I'd use the range allowable by Backgrounds: 1-5), I really like the idea of successful skill checks adding a die to the pool to provide a functional "re-roll."  In other words, roll 3d6 and keep the highest 2 values.  Severe penalties could go the opposite way (roll 3d6 and keep the lowest 2 values).  This boosts the low probabilities of the double 1's/6's for very bad/good results, and in my opinion is a more satisfying impact for players than a straight modifier (a modifier can't save a horrific roll, but a re-roll very well could).  Optionally, a 16+ on the PC's roll can add the extra d6 in addition to a numerical modifier.  The base dice pool of 2d6 works really well here because re-rolling the entire Ally Roll comes across as a bit too powerful to me.

Edge of the Empire - Using a d% for the Ally Roll this system potentially offers the most granularity, but realistically things should probably be kept to intervals of 5%.  As I stated before, the baseline breakdown might be as follows: 1-5 (very bad), 6-40 (bad), 41-70 (neutral), 71-95 (good), and 96-100 (very good).  A bonus of 10% per success on a PC's skill roll seems about right, though with checks that have a goal other than simply boosting the Ally Roll, allowing Advantage to be spent to also boost the Ally Roll by 5% per Advantage seems reasonable.  Additionally, keep in mind that with EotE the minion rules already provide an easy way to adjudicate battles between small groups of allies and enemies, and so GMs should consider carefully when using these Ally Rolls is really appropriate.  Probably only with large squads that would result in unwieldy dice pools if treated as minions, or if the GM wants the combat to run especially quickly and doesn't want to deal with actual dice pools and minion tracking.

Miscellaneous Note on Cumulative Bonuses

Sometimes it makes sense for a bonus to an Ally Roll to last more than a single round.  For example, if you give the roll a penalty for one of the ally combatant being wounded or killed, then that penalty should probably stick around until the playing field is even with an enemy being wounded or killed.  If the Ally Roll gets a bonus because the enemy leader was taken down, that drop in enemy morale should probably last for the entire battle.  

Some player actions will result in advantages of variable duration.  If a PC rolled to inspire his allies, how long does that bonus to the Ally Roll last?  It could be just 1 round, it could be longer for a higher degree of success.  Maybe it simply lasts until a low roll comes up (bad or very bad) and the allies are demoralized again.  Go with what makes sense.  Some "tactical" rolls where a PC tries to direct allies to a better fighting position should obviously last as long as the allies hold that position.  You might even alter the outcome of a roll (on the fly, even if you're using a pre-made table) so that a bad result, which would normally wound or kill an ally, instead drives the group off of this position, nullifying the bonus.  

Ultimately, one last thing to keep in mind is to go with what makes sense in the moment.  This house rule isn't designed to be an in-depth new mechanic tacked onto the game, and doesn't need to strike a perfect balance.  Rather, it's designed to provide some structure for handling groups of allied combatants narratively.  It's for when "making it up as you go along" feels too arbitrary.  It's there as a baseline, to get your creative juices flowing, and to basically provide a status update on how those other guys are doing, especially during rounds where the PCs aren't direction involved with that side of the battle.  If you use it in a game, let me know how it goes.

Ally Rolls in The One Ring

It's funny what kinds of rules gems you can find buried in unexpected sources.  In the second adventure of Tales from Wilderland (Of Leaves and Stewed Hobbit) there is a scene where the PCs are supposed to make a stand in a defensible position (the ringfort) with a handful of allies.  Enemies swarm the ringfort, and the battle description contains a table that describes how the allies fare in battle.  This "Allies In Battle" table (pg. 34) keeps things moving quickly, preserving a narrative focus and making it unnecessary for either the Loremaster or the PCs to take control of extra characters.

In the play-by-post (PbP) game that I'm currently running the PCs ambushed a large orc camp backed up by 2 units of Elven cavalry, a handful of Barding archers led by the Barding PC, and a handful of Bardings disguised as orcs led by an exiled Dwarf PC who escaped a brutal captivity in the hands of orcs.  Obviously that's a LOT of individuals to keep track of, and the need to abstract the mechanics for the battle were even greater considering that Legolas himself led one of the Elven units, and I didn't want to open up a can of worms by statting him out.  Remembering that table from the short campaign that I ran for my regular gaming group (relevant posts under the TOR-C2 tag), I decided to adopt it for this battle.  

While the table from Tales from Wilderland offers specific results for the battle that it applies to, it was immediately apparent that the results could be tweaked on the fly to apply to virtually any combat, with any number of allies and enemies.  Here are the basics, in a nutshell:

The Loremaster rolls a Feat Die (the special d12; for those using regular dice, the 11 counts as an Eye of Sauron and the 12 is a Gandalf rune).  

• If the Eye is rolled something really bad happens.  For a smaller number of allies this will usually mean that one of them is slain.  For larger "units" this could mean that multiple individuals are slain, the leader is slain, etc.  Whatever is dramatically appropriate.
• On a roll of 1, 2, 3, or 4 the enemies are doing better than the allies.  This might be represented by one of the allies suffering a wound (or being slain for larger groups), one or more enemies slipping past them to attack a priority target (probably one of the PCs, even one in Rearward stance), or a change in the tactical landscape.  For example, if there are any modifiers in place due to the Complications table (pg. 48 of the LMB, or the GM screen), these can change to favor the enemy.  Additionally, a 1 should probably have worse effects than a 4 (in TfW bad stuff triggered if you rolled under the number of allies, but obviously this wouldn't work for larger groups).  
• On a roll of 5, 6, or 7 the allies hold their own, but don't necessarily gain any ground.  Nothing particularly interesting happens in this round, or if you'd prefer to narrate changes in the battle they should be net zero.
• A roll of 8, 9, or 10 mirrors 1-4 in that now the allies are doing better.  Depending on how many enemies are present and/or how fast the LM wants the pacing of the battle to be, this could mean that an enemy is Wounded, an enemy is slain, or the allies gain some sort of tactical advantage (there should always be a good narrative description for this, but it can be mechanically represented with that Complications table).
• If a Gandalf rune is rolled, the allies are doing extremely well.  Perhaps an unwounded enemy is instantly slain, multiple enemies are slain or flee, an important enemy (perhaps a leader) is slain, or in some circumstances the LM might allow one or more PCs to regain a point of Hope as the tides are turned (though this should be used very sparingly, and you should have a good reason for doing so!).  

Some Notes

These numbers are consistent with those from the table in TfW, with the results more generalized.  But these can easily be changed based on the details of the battle.  Are the allies severely outnumbered or in a rough spot?  Maybe the numeric results are broken down like this:  1-6 is bad, 7-8 is neutral, 9-10 is good.  In fact, it's worth pointing out that the originally published values are skewed toward the enemies (1-4 being bad vs. 8-10 being good), and I think this is important.  Since the allies are statistically in a position to lose the fight, it drives home the fact that it's ultimately up to the PCs.  They're the heroes, the stars of the show.  

Along those lines, it's a good idea to offer the possibility of adding modifiers to the roll.  These can absolutely be player-driven.  A successful Battle roll might allow a PC to direct his allies to higher ground, providing a +1 bonus to the Ally Roll.  A Great Success on an Inspire roll might give the allies a second wind, with a +2 modifier to the roll.  A Healing roll might allow a PC to bring wounded ally back into the fight.  Conversely, you can add a penalty to the roll to represent a new advantage gained by the enemy.  If a PC is knocked out and their opponent(s) join the fight agains the allies, that might be a -1 penalty.  The same logic obviously applies to reinforcements.  And if you're stuck on how to adjudicate an Eye result by a player taking a risky action, why not make the allies pay for it?

Finally, you can give the battle some tactical "texture" by having multiple groups of allies (as is the case in my PbP game), with each group getting its own Ally Roll.  This can give PCs an interesting choice to make as they need to decide which ally group to aid, if any, and it allows the victors from one group to affect another group, or the PCs and their foes.  It's perfectly reasonable for a good result on an Ally Roll to result in a combatant breaking off from that "unit" and joining the PCs with its own individual stat block (this is especially useful if one of the PCs is knocked out, as it can give that player an ally to control).

Highlighting Monster Abilities

Last night in my 13th Age session I made extensive use of Spoiler type monsters for the first time.  Specifically, an annoying flock of Harpies.  When I first read the Harpy stat block I thought "oh cool, Fiendish Song has an escalating series of effects for higher attack rolls!"  Then I realized that the chances of a single Harpy rolling a natural 16+ weren't necessarily very high if the thing only lasted 4 or 5 rounds.  This comes from a habit in other systems of using "debuffer" or "controller" type monsters as a single creature allied with (usually) some frontliners or skirmisher types.  But they usually got attacks that generated a given effect if they hit.  These Harpies usually just deal piddly damage until they get lucky enough to start messing with you.

I almost immediately decided to throw 4 Harpies into the encounter.  If Fiendish Song is getting rolled 4 times per round (often against multiple targets) then those extra effects for high rolls are bound to come up!  Ultimately I like to showcase the abilities that make a given monster unique, and in this case it's the ever-increasing nastiness of the song.  If those effects never go off it doesn't evoke the feeling of fighting Harpies nearly as strongly.

So use groups of monsters when they have difficult-to-trigger abilities.  This doesn't only go for Spoilers or Casters either.  The first time I used Lizardfolk (in my other group) I didn't use enough of them, and I rolled low.  The party had no idea how nasty it could be when a Lizardfolk lands a good enough blow to open its opponent up for a Bite attack, nor the carnage that ensues the round after the thing is able to clamp its jaws down onto you.  That's an important part of the Lizardfolk's fighting style in my mind, and evokes strong imagery.  Yeah they use weapons (albeit primitive ones), but those weapons are mainly for punching through their opponent's guard and getting into extreme close range so that it can use its natural weapons; a nasty vice-grip bite and a barrage of scratches once the foe is held down by the bite. 

Despite that being the Lizardfolk's schtick, I like that the combo is designed to come up infrequently in combat.  This allows the effects to be stronger than they otherwise would be, and it generates more drama.  Normally if the natural attack roll is high but not a crit it doesn't really matter; as long as you beat AC it's all the same.  This way it doesn't become monotonous or annoying.  On the contrary, it's memorable because it really challenges the PCs in an evocative way, and each subsequent die roll carries an added tension ("oh crap, I really hope he can't snap in close enough to bite me again!"). 

Grouping such enemies not only makes their abilities more likely to be triggered during a given fight, but it also creates more tactical opportunities.  Because Harpy talons are nastier when the target is affected by the song there's a synergy that's created and the other Harpies have a legitimate reason to focus-fire.  But that also creates an opportunity for the PCs because they need to swoop down to ground level to do so, making themselves vulnerable to melee attacks.  The tactical landscape changes for both sides.

Even the Lizardfolk present similar effects.  Focus-firing is always going to be a good idea if someone on your team has just landed a really big hit.  The Lizardfolk can all start mobbing the guy that's just been severely injured.  Because its random who becomes the target, players will also be less likely to feel "picked on."  Creating an incentive for the NPCs to move also increases the likelihood of the PCs getting opportunities to intercept or to bring specific talents into the spotlight (the Barbarian's Slayer, the Fighter's Threatening, and Paladin's Challenge all spring to mind). 

It can really be boiled down to the following:  tough triggers allow for more powerful effects, increasing numbers boosts the likelihood of those effects being triggered, and powerful effects tend to have a big impact on the tactical landscape (making fights more exciting and dynamic).  Fighting four Harpies and having players get Weakened a handful of times and Confused once during the battle is cooler than if the Harpies were able to just Hamper or Daze enemies more reliably (say, on a natural even hit). 

Social Combat

I just got done listening to the latest episode of the Order 66 Podcast - Social Engineering.  Jay Little was the guest speaker (I believe he's lead designer on Edge of the Empire) so you know you're getting good info.  Four main points were hit upon that I think bears repeating.

The first has to do with how social skills in Adversary stat blocks are handled.  A lot of them have ranks in the "influence skill group" (Charm, Coerce, Deceit, Leadership, and Negotiate), but generally speaking most players don't take too kindly to having NPCs roll checks like that since they influence the PC's response to the situation.  The solution is so obvious that I can't believe I didn't think of it before (especially since I'd considered Discipline and Cool to be kind of underplayed skills before now).  Basically, in most situations if the NPC is trying to Coerce, Deceive, or appeal to authority (Leadership) the GM should call upon the player to make a Discipline check (with difficulty equal to the NPCs ranks in the relevant skill).  Likewise the player would roll Cool if an NPC tries to Charm them or Negotiate with them.  This way the player is the one rolling the dice (actively participating), so they feel as though they're the one in control of the situation.  In other words, it puts the narrative spotlight on the heroes, which is perfect.

Second is something that I had thought of doing anyways, but it was nice to hear Jay Little himself suggest it.  That is to say, skill/ability pairings, as well as which skills oppose each other, are more suggestions than hard and fast rules.  If the Wookie wants to get in your face and flex those giant hairy arms he's free to make a Coerce check using Brawn instead of Willpower as the associated attribute.  Likewise sometimes it might make more sense for Negotiate to be opposed by the opponent's Negotiate instead of Cool.

Third, skill checks in Edge of the Empire generate a different narrative pace than binary skill checks in other systems.  That is to say, the scene is set up and actions are described in a D20 system (for example), and then the skill check comes in at the end to resolve how everything played out.  In Edge of the Empire, the skill check occupies the middle of a "scene."  There's a set-up with actions described, but after the dice are rolled there's more story.  What's more, those story elements are dependent not only on the die roll, but the approach taken (what skill is used).   Adjudication of success, failure, advantage, threat, triumph, and despair will potentially be very different depending on whether you used Coerce vs Charm, for example.  What skill you decide to use has more chances to affect the story going forward, often in multiple ways.

Finally, the most mind-blowing concept was the idea of social combat that works exactly the same as physical combat.  Because combat checks work exactly the same way as any other skill checks (unlike D20 systems where attacks, defenses, and skills all scale differently) this is absolutely possible.  You'd roll initiative as normal, but instead of working with Ranged Light, Ranged Heavy, Brawl, Melee, and Gunnery you'd use the influence skill group (Charm, Coerce, Deceit, Leadership, and Negotiate), and potentially other relevant skills based on the situation as "weapons."  Instead of inflicting wounds, successes (and potentially advantage) would deal strain.  The losers would be unlikely to pass out when exceeding their strain threshold, but it would represent the fact that they're pretty much spent.  If you want to get really creative you could even use your Willpower (as opposed to Brawn) as a "social Soak value," but without the equivalent of a base weapon damage this could potentially lead to really long, drawn out combats unless you come up with a system for assigning a base strain damage to your skill checks.  Personally while I think the Willpower = social Soak is a really cool concept, the added layer of complexity is probably not worth it. 

Rats In the Sewer, and New 13th Age Monsters

First thing's first, I downloaded an excellent fan-made adventure for D&D Next called Rats in the Sewer (I'd ask that any of my players who reads this NOT look at the adventure, which I plan on running at some point).  While I may run it for D&D Next, I was also thinking that it would work pretty well with 13th Age, since the simple-to-create-monsters in that system makes adventure conversions very easy. The adventure uses monsters from the Bestiary of the first D&D Next playtest packet, not all of which are currently available in the Escalation Edition of 13th Age.  So I figured I'd write up some stat blocks for them.

Fire Beetle  Level 1 Troop   Initiative +2
M  Bite +6 vs AC, 4 damage
AC 18   PD 15   MD 11   HP 26
Luminescent Glands:  Fire Beetles emit their own source of dim light.

Giant Centipede  Level 1 Mook   Initiative +3
M  Bite +5 vs AC, ongoing 3 poison damage
AC 16   PD 15   MD 11   HP 7 (to kill a single mook)

Grey Ooze   Level 2 Wrecker   Initiative +4
M Slam +7 vs AC, 8 acid damage; +4 damage and daze on a natural 16+
AC 15   PD 13   MD 10   HP 50
Resist 16+ cold and fire damage, Blindsight, can climb vertical surfaces at full speed

Gelatinous Cube   Large Level 3 Troop   Initiative +3
M Slam +8 vs AC, 20 acid damage and engulf (save ends) on a natural even hit
AC 18   PD 17   MD 13   HP 100
 Engulf:  Target takes 10 acid damage at the start of its turn; up to 3 creatures
Blindsight, Transparent (increase DC to spot it by +5)

Goblin King  Level 2 Leader   Initiative +6
M Short Sword +7 vs AC, 6 damage (9 if target is engaged with ally)
R Short Bow +7 vs AC, 6 damage, nearby allies can roll attacks twice against target and use better result
AC 18   PD 16   MD 13   HP 40
Disengage +5 (only needs to roll a 6+ to disengage)

Human Barbarian Warrior  Level 2 Wrecker   Init +5
M Longspear:  +7 vs AC, 7 damage + Reach Tricks
OR M Greataxe:  +6 vs AC, 10 damage
R Javelin +7 vs AC, 6 damage
AC 16   PD 17   MD 12   HP 40
Reach Tricks:  If equipped with Longspear, 1/battle succeed at a normal save to use reach to your advantage (attack enemy you're not engaged with, OA vs enemy who disengaged + moved, OA vs enemy who engages, etc). 

Comments and criticisms welcome.  13th Age is currently available for preorder.

EDIT:  Changed stat blocks so that damage expressions are in line with EE3; removed goblin warrior since Goblin Grunt is now a troop instead of a mook.

How Hard Should It Be?*

Another excellent article by Chris Perkins.  This week he tackles encounter balance, and specifically the question of whether a DM should throw over (or under) leveled encounters at his players.  For most of 4E's life I've adhered to the encounter-building guidelines in the DMG, and I'm starting to question the wisdom of that.  In my TOR game Grimwine's player has consistently refused to run away from combat (incidentally he's the only one who has almost died twice), and it's been bringing to mind the philosophy of "oh, the DM wouldn't put it here if we couldn't beat it."  Ultimately, I think that breaks immersion because the characters would be completely unaware of any encounter-balancing mechanics, and should behave with their own survival in mind, without constantly being the most powerful presences around.  Obviously with "all balanced encounters" being the norm a DM needs to be explicit up front about his intentions to populate the world with all manner of threats, some of which the PC's cannot reasonably expect to defeat.  It's also important that the DM always keep in mind alternative "outs," whether those be escape routes or motivations for the over-leveled threats that makes the PCs more valuable alive (captured) than dead.

Another interesting anecdote is that while all of the published 4E stuff is balanced for the party's level, there have been several combats in the published TOR adventures that assume the players will run away.

*That's what she said.

Leveling Up Monsters

In Chris Perkins' latest article (the same article that I linked to in my last post on NPCs) he mentions that the stat block for one of his NPCs is a level 9 Succubus leveled up to 25.  Now, the DMG specifically warns against leveling monsters up or down more than a few levels from the base stat block.  Though I'd never thought about this before reading about Chris' over-leveled Succubus, I think this is an example of the DMG being too conservative rather than Chris doing something crazy and unconventional.

Because the math for monster scaling is so simple and transparent in 4e all of the basic numbers (defenses, HP, attack bonuses, and damage) will add up with no problems.  That's part of why customizing monsters is so easy and painless in this edition (cuts down on prep time, too!).  So what's the problem perceived by the DMG authors?  Most likely, it's status effects and riders that are tacked onto powers, or other traits such as auras, conditional damage, and off-action attacks (or number of attacks).  Not surprisingly, monsters get more dangerous at higher levels than their raw base stats can account for, which makes sense because players get more access to feats, items, powers, and paragon path/epic destiny features.  Leveling an Epic monster down for Heroic PCs would make for a disproportionately challenging encounter (possibly impossible in some cases), and leveling a Heroic monster up to Epic might make for a cakewalk. 

For example, lets look at the Efreet Flamestrider, a level 23 Skirmisher.  I picked this guy at "random" since he was the highest level standard monster in the MV.  He has an aura that multiplies ongoing fire damage, a MBA that inflicts ongoing fire damage on a hit, and an at-will ranged attack that both immobilizes and deals ongoing fire damage (save ends both).  And of course there's the at-will 20 square teleport (even if it does require fire, which any DM will build into the encounter while using this creature).  Even leveled down, Heroic characters don't have enough ways to trigger saving throws to easily counter his ongoing damage and immobilization (and teleports will be much more rare as well).  Their healing ability is also more limited, so PCs within the aura can easily find themselves overwhelmed by raw damage.  Finally, Heroic PCs will be more dependent on status effects like immobilized, slowed and restrained because they probably won't yet have wide access to dominates, stuns, and blinds, meaning that the efreet's teleport makes him very tough to hinder.  Likewise, a level 1 Goblin Cutthroat with just straight damage and some minor shifting tricks won't be much of a problem for Epic tier PCs.

After pointing out the problems of over-leveling, I'm still not going to advise against doing it, at least assuming you're reasonably familiar with the system.  The thing is, after pointing out the problems with the efreet simple common sense (and possibly a quick comparison with the Goblin Cutthroat) can inform which further changes must be made.  It's clearly too powerful when leveled down without further adjustments, but what if we made the following changes on the fly:

• The ranged attack becomes a recharge or encounter power so it can't constantly immobilize PCs.
• The teleport becomes an encounter power so it can't constantly escape the common status effects and re-position itself.
• Either get rid of the aura, or get rid of the ongoing damage with the MBA.  Specifically, either have ongoing 5 damage and no aura, or have no inherent ongoing damage with the attack but have the aura inflict ongoing 5 damage if a creature is hit with a fire attack.  These 2 methods look identical, but keep in mind that with the latter option a ranged fire attack from a second monster can gain ongoing damage against PCs in an efreet's aura.  

BAM!  Your Efreet is now ready for Heroic tier play.  Similarly, you can level a Goblin Cutthroat up to epic and give him additional abilities based on a quick glance at several other epic creatures.  You can even just make stuff up pretty easily thanks to 4e's concise list of status effects; call his blade poisoned and have it inflict ongoing poison damage and possibly another status effect (blind and weakened seem thematically appropriate for poison).  Maybe give him an encounter or recharge power that stuns.  Rogues get to do stuff like that at higher levels, so it's not too big a stretch.

So now that I've demonstrated that you can level monsters across the entire spectrum of levels for just a little bit more work than with a more narrow level range, why should you?  It's mostly a matter of personal taste.  Do you want a specific monster for your adventure?  Use it regardless of its base level!  What if an off-level monster has a set of abilities that you really want to use for something else?  Level it down/up and re-flavor it, or tack its abilities onto an appropriate-level monster.  Are your PCs sick of fighting the same orcs over and over again?  Find a different monster with some interesting mechanics, level it as appropriate, and call it an orc!  Or, simply modify the existing orcs by giving them different abilities.  One of the great strengths of 4e is its modularity.  It's not only possible to mix and match elements from different monsters and different levels, but it's fairly easy as well!  So when you plan encounters, don't necessarily limit yourself to the pool of monsters in a given level range; branch out for more ideas and give the players something unexpected (especially important if your players also DM, and thus have access to the same monsters that you do).

"Filler" Encounters

In my previous post I talked about why it's important to give your combat encounters narrative significance, however big or small it may be.  This is largely because the complicated nature of 4e combat makes it a significant time investment, and "breaking away" from the story to fight some random battle can easily be perceived as a waste of time.  Just because the "default" 4e encounter doesn't lend itself to minor scuffles or "filler" encounters doesn't mean it can't be done, though.  Such encounters just need to be designed very deliberately.  Indeed, these types of encounters should be included from time to time because it's admittedly impossible to make every encounter relevant.

My focus here will be creating encounters that are resource-draining but tactically (and usually narratively) irrelevant.  Perhaps irrelevant is too strong a word, but in any case these are encounters that don't pose much of a threat and that are over very quickly.  There are several ways to evoke this feeling, the simplest probably being an at-level or lower encounter, designed more or less "normally."  The problem with this is that monsters that are too low level are a complete non-threat (PC attacks will virtually auto-hit them, and they'll be unable to hit the defenses of the PCs), and those that are a threat tend to have enough cumulative hit points to drag the encounter out to a decent length.  One way to keep combat short is to simply keep the at-level monsters, but use fewer of them.  If the PCs outnumber weak monsters 2:1 it shouldn't last more than a couple of rounds, but during that time the PCs should take some damage (which they'll need to spend surges to fix), and might even blow a daily if they misjudge the encounter's difficulty. 

Here are a few more ways to create quick and dirty "filler" battles:

1. Use terrain that gives the PCs a massive advantage.  Describe it so that it's really obvious that the PCs can use it to quickly dispatch monsters.  If you want to maintain the level of danger present in a standard encounter but make it happen much more quickly, have the monsters use this advantage first, but allow the PCs to quickly turn it against them.  This way the PCs take boatloads of damage in round 1 (or even a surprise round), and then end the fight quickly by subjecting the monsters to the same effects.  Some examples include pools of lava or acid that creatures can be pushed into, buckets of lava or acid that can be thrown, large and heavy objects that can be knocked onto creatures, or containers of explosive substances that can be ignited to create a nasty explosion.  
2. Use cowardly monsters.  After a couple of rounds, perhaps even before most of the monsters are bloodied, have them flee.  Maybe they'll lure the PCs into a trap or ambush, or perhaps they'll simply reinforce a later encounter.  Depending on the situation they might just run away, and sometimes the PCs may simply let them.  If the PCs insist on chasing them down, instead of rolling loads of dice to whittle away at their HP simply describe the situation narratively:  "knowing they're outgunned, the bandits use double moves to run full speed, and the party finishes them off with arrows, javelins, and spells."  It might be more interesting, however, to use creatures that can actually flee effectively (flight, fast speeds, invisibility, phasing, burrow speeds).  
3. Finally, use copious amounts of minions!  These guys were practically built for encounters like this.  You'll definitely need to tailor encounters to your party's capabilities, though; a party with strong AoE capabilities might be able to kill a dozen or more minions in 1 round, whereas parties lacking AoE would end up being in for a really long battle, which is the opposite of what you're going for!  Also keep in mind that if there's a disparity within the group, as there almost certainly will be, AoE-capable PCs will be the stars of the show for a while, whereas high-damage single-target strikers might feel quite useless.  Wizards with Enlarge Spell can be particularly problematic, as the areas they're capable of affecting can be quite large.

You can make the argument that easy encounters increase verisimilitude, as they give the impression of a dynamic, living world that exists beyond just the PCs and their current adventure.  The orcs that the PCs fought in Heroic tier may still be there in Paragon tier, and it's appropriate that the PCs have a much easier time in dealing with them.  You might also consider sprinkling impossibly difficult encounters into your campaign using the same argument, but if you elect to do this make sure that your players know about it ahead of time!  It's no fun to fight to the death just because "the DM wouldn't let us fight it if we couldn't beat it." 

Encounter Narrative

Because combat in 4e is very tactical (moreso than previous editions of the game), it also has a tendency to take pretty long in real time (though your mileage may vary).  This isn't always the case, but for tactically minded groups combat can almost be a game in and of itself (heck, it's one of the reasons why playtesting isn't as boring as it sounds in practice).  A hefty length of time and a different strategic mindset separate you from the "roleplaying" aspects of the game during combat, which is great for creating a varied play experience but it could also be a bit jarring for the pacing of the story.  For these reasons, the vast majority of major encounters should have some narrative significance.

In previous editions of D&D encounters with "wandering monsters" and dungeon crawls through miles of subterranean passages populated by all manner of random creatures were highly encouraged.  From what I understand, combat in earlier editions was much more swift in real-time, though I only have experience with 3rd edition (indeed, the longest combat encounter I've experienced was in that edition, though save-or-die spells could make encounters equally swift and arguably inconsequential).  If a fight ended up being uninteresting it didn't really matter, because it would probably be over quickly.  Because of that, an encounter didn't need to have any particular importance because you were back to the story (or the next encounter, in more of a hack 'n slash style campaign) in no time.  Because the default 4e encounter is assumed to be somewhat involved, this edition isn't quite as friendly toward that old style of play.

Ultimately, the take home message is that when designing an adventure, every encounter needs to have some kind of significance.  Some encounters can be justified by being exceptionally interesting in and of themselves; monsters with cool powers, traps, terrain, puzzles, or engaging tactics can all make an encounter interesting enough that it doesn't matter if it doesn't have a strong link to the story.  If you need "filler" encounters to give the players something to do as they make their way through the dungeon--an obstacle to their eventual goal--then they better be interesting.  But every encounter can't be over-the-top and exception, because if that becomes the norm then it's no longer very exceptional!  This is why most encounters should have a direct relevance to the adventure narrative. 

But what does that mean, exactly?  Obvious examples are encounters with the foes that the PCs set out to confront in the first place.  This can be as epic as a final "boss battle" with the BBEG (big bad evil guy), or as simple as tracking down the group of bandits that have been harassing the local merchant caravans.  Other ways to make combat relevant are to use the encounter to introduce NPCs (whether they're combatants or non-combatants, allies or enemies), to provide PCs with some kind of information, item or clue, to introduce a new conflict (perhaps a side quest), to foreshadow a future plot point, or to characterize an NPC (perhaps an NPC betrays the party, or maybe they die defending the party who will thereafter seek revenge).  A more intricate encounter might present 2 or more decision points where the choices that the PCs make affects the story.  Perhaps the choices are meant to reveal a character flaw, tempt, or highlight the chivalry of a PC.  Any time you give the player the means to help develop his/her character more fully is time well spent.  An encounter's relevance could also be as simple as providing a direct obstacle that stands between the party and their goal (i.e. they want to get into the Wizard's keep, but first they need to deal with his golems). 

From a pure mechanical standpoint, encounters exist to challenge the party and put a strain on their resources.  At its most basic, combat is the reason why characters have healing surges, encounter powers, and daily powers and any encounter will allow (or force, depending on how you look at it) the characters to use these resources.  It's up to the DM and the players to use these mechanics to tell a story, and as the one designing encounters the DM shoulders most of this load.  The story is what immerses the players in the world, and keeps them coming back for more.  While a delve style game where players simply move through the map and kill a random assortment of monsters is certainly valid, it's simply not enough for some players (or groups).  Those that care about story will enjoy the game much more if the story informs combat; an hour-long scuffle that turns out to be pointless can be an annoying distraction if it happens too much.

Playtesting

Sometimes an encounter will look great on paper (or in your mind) but when it comes time to actually play through it, it falls flat.  Sometimes this is a matter of certain monsters just not working as well together as you'd planned (or perhaps working too well together).  Sometimes the terrain just doesn't do what you expect it to.  Perhaps things would have worked out better with an extra terrain feature, or a different arrangement of features.  Perhaps the starting positions of the monsters should have been moved.  Or, maybe you're not sure how certain combinations of monsters and terrain will affect the difficulty.  How do you resolve these issues without turning your PCs into lab rats?  Playtest them yourself, of course!

Now I'm not advocating playtesting every single encounter that you ever put together.  Playtest encounters tend to run longer than real encounters since you need to keep track of everything, monsters and "PCs" alike.  I generally only playtest when I have time to kill, and when an encounter is more complex than normal.  Also, if you're a new DM, new to encounter-design, or simply returned from a fairly long hiatus playtesting your encounters can be a great way to see what works and what doesn't when the dice start flying. 

So how does one go about playtesting?  It's just as simple as it sounds.  Draw up your map and place all of your monsters down (or at least the ones that the PCs will be aware of just before the fight).  This is just the same as if you were running the encounter for a group.  The difference, of course, is that the "group" is controlled by you as well.  Using PCs that are similar to your party's characters works best, but it can also be fun to mix things up to see how other classes fare (or, if you're like me and rotate DMing duties, you can get some more in-combat practice with your own character).  You can also utilize playtesting as a player if you're trying to decide between 2 different classes or builds and want to test drive how they "feel."  This is how I learned that most essentials classes are not really for me, despite the fact that I appreciate what they add to the game (and in some cases was really excited to see how their mechanics worked in play).   

The most important thing to keep in mind is that you need to wear 2 different hats, and keep them separate.  What I mean by this is when a monster's turn comes up, play that monster as if you were DMing and have it act like it would act.  Don't refrain from attacking your "favorite" PC or move into position just so you can set up for a PCs power.  Likewise when it's a PC's turn have them utilize the tactics that they normally would in-game.  If your group is good at focus-firing and using the best tactics, play the "party" that way!  If your group has trouble operating as efficiently as it could if you were running everything, try to emulate that.  On the other hand, it could be interesting to see how differently things turn out depending on how much strategy is effectively used (by either side). 

The bottom line is that sometimes things work differently in play than they look on paper.  Conducting a test run (if you have time), is a great way to bring some of those differences to light, in addition to experimenting with different variables (monsters, terrain, PCs, tactics, etc.). 

Monster Roles, part 2

In part 1 I discussed the primary monster roles; here, I will move onto secondary roles. The secondary roles are standard, leader, minion, elite, and solo.

Standard

These are the bulk of monsters, and they also serve as a reference point for the other monster secondary roles. For example, 4-5 minions equals 1 standard, 1 Elite equals 2 standards, and 1 Solo equals 5 standards. An encounter composed of all standards will typically have the same number of monsters as the PCs, or see the PCs slightly outnumbered. Individually standard monsters aren't much of a threat to an adventuring party, but by working together they can become greater than the sum of their parts.

Leader

A leader monster is unique in that it is almost a tertiary role (albeit the only one in the game); leaders can be found among standards and elites, as well as any of the primary roles (though some are more likely to be leaders than others). They don't usually function very much different from a normal monster of their type, except that they have either a trait, power, or possibly both which directly helps their allies. These can consist of offensive or defensive buffs, granted attacks, granted movement, or healing. Not every encounter needs a leader, but it's a good way to mechanically represent the guy that's in charge to make him feel like he's in charge. Prepare to have standards, minions, or more rarely elites directly protect the leader if he gets into trouble, because he will be a priority target. Once he goes down, all of the other monsters get worse at what they do (depending on how significant his abilities were).

Minion

I'm of the opinion that minions were one of the best things to come out of 4e. Each minion has only 1 HP and their attacks are extremely simple (they have set damage instead of rolling for damage), so they require virtually no book-keeping on the part of the DM aside from removing their minis/tokens when they die and remembering their initiative order. They also allow you to run balanced encounters where the monsters vastly outnumber the PCs, which tend to be cinematic affairs with PCs mowing through their foes. Just because they're pushovers though, doesn't mean that they're not deadly. They're designed to swarm around PCs, threatening them with many OAs, blocking off squares, and causing high damage attacks to be wasted. Even if each of them attacks for relatively low damage, that damage can really start to add up! Besides, they have the normal defenses and attack rolls for their level so despite being easy to bring down, they're not necessarily any easier to hit. Best of all, they add tactical variety to the age old single target vs multi-target damage issue. Before their introduction into the game, single target attacks were obviously superior because injury doesn't impair a monster's ability to fight until it's knocked down to 0 HP. Therefore, it's in everyone's best interest to take single-target attacks (which deal higher damage per target) and to focus fire on a single enemy, bringing it down as fast as possible so that next round it isn't present to attack. Well, that's a bad idea when dealing with minions. AoE attacks are the way to go here, because you can wipe a whole swath of minions off the map with a single action. Focus firing on stronger enemies is still a very useful strategy, but now the game rewards the multi-target strategy as well (that's not to say that multi-target PCs are simple glorified minion poppers; multi-target attacks also allow you to spread status effects to more enemies, and to finish off severely injured enemies while simultaneously softening others up).

I would highly recommend that encounters featuring minions also featured them in waves. This way if the controller gets rid of all of the minions in round 1 there will be more to harass the PCs later. It's also important to balance having minions swarm PCs to overwhelm them (where they're vulnerable to AoEs), or to keep them safely spread out (where they're less likely to be as annoying). One of my favorite tactics is to use artillery minions that can focus fire on PCs while staying spread out at the same time. This shouldn't be the only way to use minions, but it's a good way to keep them around longer. Just remember that most PCs like clearing a half dozen enemies at once, even if you might be slightly disappointed that you didn't get to "use" them. Even minions that die right away have done their job, by putting a grin on the face of the player that single-handedly took them all out.

Minions tend to interact differently with PCs of different roles, so keep in mind your party makeup when designing encounters. Strikers hate minions, because any time they attack them is a waste of their high damage (the exception being the Sorcerer and Monk, who have plenty of AoE attacks in their repertoire). Defenders usually aren't fond of minions either, because the number of marks and/or punishments they can dole out are limited, and so they typically want to go after the toughest-looking soldier or brute and keep him busy while the other PCs finish everyone else off. Defenders also typically work with melee strikers to protect them as they slaughter priority targets, and minions can a) keep the defender from getting to those targets and/or the striker, or b) harass the striker despite the defender's presence, since he can't stop all of them. That said, a defender provides very effective area denial against minions, who can't afford to take a single OA because of their single HP. Controllers love minions, which shouldn't come as a surprise. They have the greatest selection of AoEs and multi-target attacks, in addition to zones and walls which are a hindrance to most monsters, but downright lethal to minions. The very threat of a controller's AoE may be enough to prevent minions from clumping together to focus fire. A Leader's opinion of minions often depends on their secondary role or the party make-up, since a leader's main job is to act as a force multiplier and make everyone else more efficient. If a leader can buff a controller's attack he may like minions just as much as that controller. An enabling leader, on the other hand, just wants to give the striker extra attacks, and he doesn't want to waste those on minions any more than the striker does.

Elite

Elites are relatively straightforward, in that they are beefed up monsters meant to count for 2 standard monsters. This alone makes them priority targets, since killing one eliminates 2 monsters from the field. Their high HP makes them able to endure roughly twice as many attacks, however, so it's much tougher for PCs to bring them down early. Because of this they can be "trap" priority targets, since it's often more efficient to take down weaker enemies first to reduce the amount of incoming attacks. Beware of controller PCs, however; each successful status effect applied to an elite reduces your side's effectiveness twice as much as it would a standard. Furthermore, elites are less likely to have effect-shaking abilities like solos (though they do get a saving throw bonus). The most important piece of advice on Elites, however, is to look it over before you use it!!! Many elites from earlier sources may have had double the HP of a standard, but only slightly higher offensive capabilities. An elite's attack should deal roughly twice as much damage as a standard monster of the same level and role, whether that comes from stronger attacks, the ability to attack multiple times per turn, or significantly more powerful recharge or encounter powers. Also keep in mind that elites get an action point, so they're able to front-load their offense very efficiently (use it early to really frighten the pants off the PCs!!!). Elites tend to be slightly more complicated to run, as they often have more "big hit" powers (recharge or encounter) and more traits. As a final note, don't be afraid to provoke OAs with your Elites; they can afford to take the hits, and if it gets them into a favorable position it may be a good move (also, movement makes a combat dynamic).

Solo

I'll lead off with a warning here - examine any solo monster carefully, and as a rule outright avoid the ones published before MM3 unless you personally tweak them. Because a solo counts as 5 standard monsters but is wrapped up in 1 body it has a significant impact on how an encounter plays out. First of all, AoE powers are reduced in effectiveness, as are powers and class features that trigger off of bloodying or killing enemies. Status effects, however, have the potential to completely shut down the encounter if the solo is improperly designed. Save penalties can often cancel out the solo's save bonus at high levels, allowing a controller PCs to remove five monsters from the fight with a single status effect. Newer solos get the ability to shake off the more powerful status effects more easily, somewhat ameliorating this weakness. Another potential pitfall is that a solo battle could turn into one where the PCs all crowd around the monsters and both sides exchange blows. Well-designed solos will be more resistant to this outcome, such as the new dragons that get a move + attack outside of their normal turn. And that brings us back to offense. A solo needs to have even more reliable offensive output than an elite. This is usually accomplished through one or more of the following: making multiple attacks per turn, making attacks in response to triggers (like being hit), having impressive "big guns" powers, and getting multiple turns in the initiative order. Solos also have 2 action points. A solo's stat block is usually much longer than that of a standard monster's, with a lot of different triggers, recharges, etc. to keep track of. Still, you're only running the one monster in place of 5, so it evens out.

Finally, my biggest piece of advice is not to take the term "solo" literally! A well-designed solo encounter will feature an at-level or level +1 solo, with a smattering of other monsters to ramp up the total encounter difficulty to level +3, 4, or even 5. A solo is most often the BBEG (Big, Bad, Evil Guy) that the party has been searching for, defeating many encounters with his lackeys before confronting him. BBEG's don't get where they are without being intelligent, and an intelligent creature will have his minions do some of his fighting for him! A solo can usually put off getting attacked for a few rounds while the PCs deal with his underlings (which they should do; it won't take very long to kill them, and killing them reduces the amount of attacks that the PCs need to endure. Imagine going for the solo for 5 rounds while suffering from not only his attacks, but also his minions for that whole time!). Have solos fight smart, and keep in mind that they got to be so powerful by surviving. They'll very rarely fight to the death unless absolutely forced to, which gives you a perfectly believable excuse for "calling the fight" early, especially if it ceases to be exciting. Solos have a LOT of HP, but if they know that they're not going to defeat the PCs they certainly aren't going to stand there while they whittle away at it. As with Elites, don't be afraid to provoke OAs with solos, especially early on.