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Kraken
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PostPosted: 16-Oct-2006 12:01    Post subject: D&D plot idea Reply to topic Reply with quote

This is a random something I came up with.

Over the past few weeks, soldiers on patrol and individual wagons have been hid by raiders. Everyone is killed, and anything of value is taken - even the wagons themselves. The stripped deceased, who are full of arrow holes and sword slashes, are simply left in the road.

Thing is, aside from the wagon the only tracks that are out there are kobold tracks.

It turns out that the local kobold tribe has a new cheif. This kobold was adopted by a local bandit group, and eventually gained two ranks in "fighter" due to their training; this training included "handle animal."

When the bandit group was arrested, the kobold escaped back to his tribe and took it over. He has since used the strategies he learned from the bandits to make them successful raiders.

When he raids, he has three groups. The first group is archers. Instead of their usual short swords, they have clubs; the cost of the swords has been used to get them camoflague and extra ammunition. The other groups are the shock troopers; rather than carrying long-range weaponry, they have studded leather armor and a tin-pot helmet.

The archers open up on the target, taking it by surprise. The target then attempts to flee, but instead runs into the shock troopers. The armor helps make up for the kobolds' low hit points, meaning that the target (who is usually wounded already) is in for a harder fight.

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Nightmare
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PostPosted: 16-Oct-2006 14:01    Post subject: RE: D&D plot idea Reply to topic Reply with quote

I hear kobolds taste like chicken. Is it true?

They do make for excellent annoyance monsters. The ones my players ran into had a smart lizard man as chieftain. Shock troops? That's for orcs. My kobolds just get bows, crossbows or javelins for everyone. Splitting up into several groups they surround the next victims and start raining missiles on them, taking turns with shooting and running away. Outshooting or running down thirty kobolds is hard work when half of them are shooting you in the back.

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Sleeping Dragon
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PostPosted: 16-Oct-2006 16:25    Post subject: RE: D&D plot idea Reply to topic Reply with quote

Ahh, the kobolds.

These little bastards can be quite useful enemies.

They are small and with better armor they are harder to hit and they may be equipped with a little better weapon (3.0 Monster Manual shows them with half-spear and light crossbow, in 3.5 MM they have slings and spears (both small)). In a forest I would try some reach weapons (you know, they need something to attack mounted guards) and javelins. Crude slings and bows may be also easy to obtain.

MM also says that the kobolds are cowards, so the shock troops may run as soon as the PCs start to deal some serious damage, so the majority of these pests would probably try to attack with ranged weapons (as Nightmare already said). I would consider investing a few ranks to climb to allow them to use trees to their advantage. With so many large animals in the forest, the kobolds probably know how to get out of reach as soon as possible.

Another useful thingy may be their ability to make some simple traps (they even have racial bonus for that) so if they flee they probably do so on prepared route that will lead PCs to something unexpected (pit traps, nets, gins, ...). Again ranged weapons and long spears may be quite bad for PCs on a bottom of a hole (Rambo kobolds! Yay!). some stupid kobolds may be even stupid enough to spring some of their traps, but they are probably going to be rare (stupid ones don't survive for long).

If the chief kobold learned something from bandits it may be nice to give the kobolds some pet or ability to extract some weak poison from local sources. A dire skunk may protect the tribe from stealthy PCs for a while

Unlike goblins, who are not afraid of melee, if they have something that they think is a sufficient advantage in numbers, the kobolds would probably try to attack from hiding (cover bonus to AC, concealment, ...), and using hit-and-run tactics. They are smart, but not too much, so they probably won't use everything.

Soo many possibilities to annoy the PCs. If you'll find some of these useful than let me know, I'm always glad to see how the heroes deal with these situations.

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