I tried to make it a bit easier for them; I moved the "outside the lair" encounter to a watch encampment far from the waterfall so that they'd be cued to have an extended rest before taking on IT. Unfortunately, that encounter wasn't a clean sweep -- someone got away and warned the lair, which went to Defcon 1.
I put the first lair wave outside and decided that the second wave wouldn't attack until the lair was breached. There was a dirty trick there, though -- the skirmishers (stealth +12!) were hidden in a grove of trees near the left entrance and were under orders not to attack unless discovered or until the lair was breached. Also, I added the wyrmpriest to the first wave, putting him in a firing tower in the mouth of the cave, using him to bait the characters into the lair. As soon as anyone took interest in him, he ran back inside.
It worked perfectly. My initiative rolls were awesome. The wyrmpriest cast his +5 temporary hit point ritual, making the minions into total little beasts, and between those HP, the cover from the trees, and the +1 from the magic circle, they were very tough to clean up. They combined fire mostly on Jon's cleric, knocking him down before they party had even had a sniff of the lair and soaking up some serious healing. Clerics are the batteries of the party -- if they fall, the party is in big trouble.
Then the party split up, with Seth's warlord and Kristian's wizard charging into the lair after the wyrmpriest and the archer ranger staying outside to dink around with the minions. Wil's fighter and Jon's cleric were kind of stuck in no-man's-land for a couple of turns while they hustled to bail Seth out. In the end, they faced IT without their striker ever taking a shot on him, which hurt.
There was some bad luck too. Kristian had IT and his dragonshields lined up with a sleep spell but rolled 1,2,3 on his to-hits. A dragonshield critted on Seth at least once. Then, after a front line had stabilized within the lair, where there wasn't much room to maneuver, the skirms jumped out of cover, raced into the lair, and flanked everybody. Hammer and anvil. It was over quickly after that.
I tried to make it a bit easier for them; I moved the "outside the lair" encounter to a watch encampment far from the waterfall so that they'd be cued to have an extended rest before taking on IT. Unfortunately, that encounter wasn't a clean sweep -- someone got away and warned the lair, which went to Defcon 1.
I put the first lair wave outside and decided that the second wave wouldn't attack until the lair was breached. There was a dirty trick there, though -- the skirmishers (stealth +12!) were hidden in a grove of trees near the left entrance and were under orders not to attack unless discovered or until the lair was breached. Also, I added the wyrmpriest to the first wave, putting him in a firing tower in the mouth of the cave, using him to bait the characters into the lair. As soon as anyone took interest in him, he ran back inside.
It worked perfectly. My initiative rolls were awesome. The wyrmpriest cast his +5 temporary hit point ritual, making the minions into total little beasts, and between those HP, the cover from the trees, and the +1 from the magic circle, they were very tough to clean up. They combined fire mostly on Jon's cleric, knocking him down before they party had even had a sniff of the lair and soaking up some serious healing. Clerics are the batteries of the party -- if they fall, the party is in big trouble.
Then the party split up, with Seth's warlord and Kristian's wizard charging into the lair after the wyrmpriest and the archer ranger staying outside to dink around with the minions. Wil's fighter and Jon's cleric were kind of stuck in no-man's-land for a couple of turns while they hustled to bail Seth out. In the end, they faced IT without their striker ever taking a shot on him, which hurt.
There was some bad luck too. Kristian had IT and his dragonshields lined up with a sleep spell but rolled 1,2,3 on his to-hits. A dragonshield critted on Seth at least once. Then, after a front line had stabilized within the lair, where there wasn't much room to maneuver, the skirms jumped out of cover, raced into the lair, and flanked everybody. Hammer and anvil. It was over quickly after that.
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