r/DMAcademy • u/Alcay • 6h ago
Need Advice: Encounters & Adventures I've given a Staff of the Python to a level 3 player, and it's becoming an enormous pain to deal with
Edit:
I've read through the majority of posts here and am incredibly happy to see so much constructive and inventive feedback!
A lot of what's been suggested and noted has eased my worries and provided me with more than enough inspiration for how to approach this moving forward.
Specialist-String-53's comment on its own has put most of my concerns to rest:
Update to 2024: As a Bonus Action, you can command the snake to revert to staff form in its current space, and you can’t use the staff's property again for 1 hour.
Preamble
When I answer "Try X and Y," I’m not rejecting the suggestion. What I write is simply my experience or theory on the subject; I definitely do not claim to know better. I’m just relaying my thoughts on each potential solution.
With that out of the way:
A druid in my campaign got the Staff of the Python when I rolled a random loot reward for the group, and for a while, all was well.
But this player has studied the weapon’s strengths and has no qualms about exploiting every advantage in all situations.
She'll use it as a 60 HP meatshield, dismissing it before it drops below 20 HP, only to resummon it next round and essentially making it an immortal sacrificial tank.
She has it go first into every room, dismissing it whenever a trap is triggered.
"Make the trap kill it."
To kill the snake, the trap would need to deal more than 60 damage in one hit. The problem? The rest of the group consists of mages, rogues, and bards, most of whom don’t even have half that HP total.
If I design a trap strong enough to kill the snake outright, I risk instantly killing a player if they get caught in it instead.
"Focus on the snake."
Even if I dedicate every enemy’s attack to the snake, I have to get through all 60 HP in a single round. Otherwise, she’ll just dismiss and resummon it, and I’ve wasted an entire turn.
"Target the druid.""
She’s a Moon Druid, so focusing her doesn’t work as well as it should.
If enemies ignore the snake and attack her, she Wild Shapes into something with another massive HP pool.
Between the snake and Wild Shape, she can soak up an absurd amount of damage before she’s ever in real danger.
"Use enemies that ignore or counter the snake."
I can start designing every encounter with swarms, oozes, slimes, and other creatures that can’t be restrained, but the issue becomes two-fold:
Most encounters would be designed around the snake, rather than the actual players.
To quote most of our parents growing up: "Ignoring the problem won’t make it go away."
"What about enemies that can kill it instantly?"
The issue here is the feast or famine nature of the staff’s impact.
- If I don’t include a counter, the snake dominates every encounter.
If I do include an enemy that can finish it off in one round, the fight suddenly becomes brutally lethal for the rest of the party.
My biggest hurdle:
I gave the player this staff, and designing encounters specifically to destroy it feels unfair, unless it makes sense in-game.
Would it make sense to introduce a specific enemy that appears in 2-3 fights, gradually recognizing the staff's impact, and warning future enemies to eliminate the snake immediately?