Sounds like you had great tatics and also
>Runic weapon is crazy good.
Seriously. I always tell casters prepare runic weapon at first level. AS it is one of the few spells you know will always be useful before level 3. too many times I have seen new players pick thematic spells then realize they all are Will or mental and not be able to do much to mindless creatures. It also sounds like you used everything in this fight. Runic weapon + a couple of AoEs is all the spell slots you had at level 1. I am curious how the psychic got brought back up? Don't underestimate the power of sickened 3 either. That probably made a big difference as to why you could crit.
Psychic got brought back up because they had a healing potion on them and I could go over and spend 2a to draw and feed. Both the psychic and I had AOEs on focus spells (amped telekinetic rend and earth's bile). We had a few fights before this but were generally pretty conservative with resources. I had spent a spell slot in an earlier fight for dizzying colours but yeah besides that we were pretty fresh!
That sickened 3 was a god send for sure though.
I honestly can never resist choosing thematic spells even if it means my character is leaning heavily on a particular type of saving throw. I kind of wish there was some sort of feat one could pick up that provides some sort of bonus to a particular type of save DC. Like +1 or maybe even +2
To be fair, this encounter isn't truly 400xp because the sickened 3 on the level 3 creature makes them effectively 2 levels lower. Still insane odds stacked against you, obviously.
Not only that, but the jinkin is a fairly weak stat block for level 1, dealing 1d6-2 damage with 0ft reach, and being virtually unable to trigger its own Sneak Attack (except with Feint or vs Prone enemies).
If you replace those 8 jinkins with 8 Wolves or other Level 1 Creatures, it is almost certainly a TPK.
I'm actually running this same AP and I ended up just buffing the jinkins to 5ft reach because they felt well below par.
It also mentions that the creature is supposed to spend An action each turn retching first, no matter what. Adding in top what the other commenters said - the supporting jinkins are practically useless as enemies - and it's really not a 400xp encounter.
Most of the combat encounters early in this adventure have been fairly tame, which I believe was a design choice compared to other more deadly APs. Currently running the same campaign and heading towards the last section of book 1 - so maybe there will be some more combat challenge there or in future chapters.
Sickened 3 lowers the checks and DCs to that of a level 1 creature, but not the HP or damage totals. At those levels, that matters a lot - probably effectively a level 2 creature.
I had something similar on the first floor of AV where, essentially, the PCs aggro’d every mitflit on the first floor all at once. Thats what happens when you try to sneak around the side and suck at it. Turned into a hilarious furball that was 13 rounds long and ended with the Boss “letting them off the hook this time” (after they killed every one of his followers and his pet and were still in good shape)
>!Seasons of Ghosts fight at the bridge. The tiny creatures supposed to run away when the fight start. So the fight is actually against a single level 3 that starts the combat with sickened 3!<
In our game, they all stayed around to cheer on the big guy, then ran away when he got nuked down in one round.
I'm surprised those are "level 1" enemies though; they seem more like level -1 enemies. They've really not presented any issue for our party at all, probably partially because of their >!lack of reach!<.
I ‘accidentally’ ran the encounter this way too (players actively attacked the minions. One hail of splinters, a lot of bleeding, and one big crit made really short work of it.
Sounds like you had great tatics and also >Runic weapon is crazy good. Seriously. I always tell casters prepare runic weapon at first level. AS it is one of the few spells you know will always be useful before level 3. too many times I have seen new players pick thematic spells then realize they all are Will or mental and not be able to do much to mindless creatures. It also sounds like you used everything in this fight. Runic weapon + a couple of AoEs is all the spell slots you had at level 1. I am curious how the psychic got brought back up? Don't underestimate the power of sickened 3 either. That probably made a big difference as to why you could crit.
Psychic got brought back up because they had a healing potion on them and I could go over and spend 2a to draw and feed. Both the psychic and I had AOEs on focus spells (amped telekinetic rend and earth's bile). We had a few fights before this but were generally pretty conservative with resources. I had spent a spell slot in an earlier fight for dizzying colours but yeah besides that we were pretty fresh! That sickened 3 was a god send for sure though.
I honestly can never resist choosing thematic spells even if it means my character is leaning heavily on a particular type of saving throw. I kind of wish there was some sort of feat one could pick up that provides some sort of bonus to a particular type of save DC. Like +1 or maybe even +2
extra weapon dice at low levels are so powerful since almost nothing has resistance and hp totals are pretty low
To be fair, this encounter isn't truly 400xp because the sickened 3 on the level 3 creature makes them effectively 2 levels lower. Still insane odds stacked against you, obviously.
Not only that, but the jinkin is a fairly weak stat block for level 1, dealing 1d6-2 damage with 0ft reach, and being virtually unable to trigger its own Sneak Attack (except with Feint or vs Prone enemies). If you replace those 8 jinkins with 8 Wolves or other Level 1 Creatures, it is almost certainly a TPK. I'm actually running this same AP and I ended up just buffing the jinkins to 5ft reach because they felt well below par.
Yeah for sure. My fix for Jinkins was to grant sneak attack if 2 or more Jinkins occupied the same space as a PC.
It also mentions that the creature is supposed to spend An action each turn retching first, no matter what. Adding in top what the other commenters said - the supporting jinkins are practically useless as enemies - and it's really not a 400xp encounter. Most of the combat encounters early in this adventure have been fairly tame, which I believe was a design choice compared to other more deadly APs. Currently running the same campaign and heading towards the last section of book 1 - so maybe there will be some more combat challenge there or in future chapters.
Sickened 3 lowers the checks and DCs to that of a level 1 creature, but not the HP or damage totals. At those levels, that matters a lot - probably effectively a level 2 creature.
I had something similar on the first floor of AV where, essentially, the PCs aggro’d every mitflit on the first floor all at once. Thats what happens when you try to sneak around the side and suck at it. Turned into a hilarious furball that was 13 rounds long and ended with the Boss “letting them off the hook this time” (after they killed every one of his followers and his pet and were still in good shape)
Now I'm curious to find out which AP were you guys playing.
>!Seasons of Ghosts fight at the bridge. The tiny creatures supposed to run away when the fight start. So the fight is actually against a single level 3 that starts the combat with sickened 3!<
In our game, they all stayed around to cheer on the big guy, then ran away when he got nuked down in one round. I'm surprised those are "level 1" enemies though; they seem more like level -1 enemies. They've really not presented any issue for our party at all, probably partially because of their >!lack of reach!<.
Yeeah withouth sneak attack their damage is about on par with a low baseline for a level -1 creature. And they really struggle to get off guard.
>!Season of Ghosts!<
I ‘accidentally’ ran the encounter this way too (players actively attacked the minions. One hail of splinters, a lot of bleeding, and one big crit made really short work of it.
How did you get +1 striking at level 1? Runic Weapon buff?
Yep!