Introduction
The PCs have all arrived in Sharn, the city of towers, for their own reasons and are enjoying a quiet drink in the Drunken Goblin tavern. They spy an ex-cyrian soldier enters the tavern and questions the barkeep. He is directed towards a brutish man sat drinking heavily with his companions. The encounter quickly turns to violence as the brutish man whips the bottle he is drinking from across the face of the cyrian. The PCs are dragged into a fight as the whole bar erupts into a mass melee.
Setup
This encounter is very similar to the bar fight encounter I posted a few weeks ago (found here). The only real differences are in the terrain features in the bar, and the read-aloud text. The whole encounter is reproduced here, with the necessary changes implemented.
Encounter 1: Causing Trouble
Encounter Level 3 (600 XP)
Setup
4 Angry Drunks (A)
1 Drunken Brawlers (D)
1 Professional Brawlers (P)
The PCs enter the Drunken Goblin tavern and attempt to sit down for a quiet drink; it does not take long before they are dragged into someone else’s fight however.
When the PCs enter the tavern read:
The Drunken Goblin tavern is a well furnished drinking hole situated midway up Alkir tower in Sharn, the patrons are mostly merchants and their body guards. Scattered around the bar are several locals who have drunk themselves into a stupor, alongside several others who are just drunk.
You find yourselves sat at a table with several other drinkers, most of whom seem to be visitors to Sharn, or adventurers.
Give the PCs a few moments to introduce themselves, and answer any of thier questions regarding the Drunken Goblin.
As you conclude your introductions your conversation is disrupted by the sound of the main doors being thrown open. A tall muscular man dressed in chainmail which bears the Cyrian crest barges through the crowds and up to a merchant who is sat drinking in the middle of the bar.
The Cyrian confronts the merchant grabbing him by the scruff of the neck, “Where is she?” he demands.
“She is safe, I sent her away with a wise and able scholar, shes probably in Karrnath by now” the merchant replies.
“You son of a goat herder, I’ll have your head.” Screams the Cryian as he draws his sword. As he does so, a burly figure steps up behind the Cyrian and smashes a bottle on the back of the Cyrian’s head. The Cyrian turns angrily and slashes at his attacker, drawing the ire of a lot of the patrons. The most drunk, and most experienced combatants join with the Cyrian’s attacker as the whole bar erupts into violence.
The majority of the bar patrons have seen this sort of fight break out before and are fully aware of the danger staying in the bar entails, most scamper away before anyone has chance to bring a weapon to bear against them.
The PCs should be allowed to position themselves however they like in the bar, then the brawlers should be set up in favourable positions around them.
The Cyrian falls to the brawler in the 2nd round of combat, the professional brawler then turns his attentions on anyone else in the bar, starting with whoever looks the toughest.
Features of the Area
The Drunken Goblin tavern has the following features:
Illumination: There are lanterns spaced around the inside of the tavern, along with two hanging chandeliers leaving the whole interior brightly lit.
Stairs: Two stairways lead to the upper levels, traveling up the stairs is considered to be difficult terrain, but there is no penalty for traveling down.
Walkways: These ledges are 15 feet from the ground. They circle the main bar area and allow ranged PCs to fire down without penalty. Several rooms are off these walkways, but the doors to them are locked.
Chandeliers (not marked on the map): The two main chandeliers hang down to around 10 feet above the main bar area; as a move action a PC can jump from a walkway, swing on a chandelier and drop off to a square anywhere in the bar area, with a DC 15 acrobatics check. Doing so provokes from enemies on the walkways, but not in the lower bar area.
Tables: The tables are well constructed and easy to turn over (DC 5 athletics), once overturned they provide cover to a PC hiding behind them.
Chairs: The chairs do not impede movement, but can be used as improvised weapons.
Bar (represented by a bookcase): The main bar area is flanked on one side by a 20 feet long, 5 feet wide bar, the bar provides cover to anyone stood behind it, and superior cover to anyone who drops prone behind it.
Tactics
The brawlers draw weapons and initiate combat immediately.
Angry Drunks: The angry drunks space out a little, to avoid area attacks, but keep close enough together to take advantage of their strength in numbers ability.
The angry drunks move in to engage the same PC (or PCs) as the professional brawler, trying to grant the more powerful professional brawler combat advantage if possible.
Drunken Brawlers: The drunken brawlers float around the edge of the combat, focusing on ranged attackers and spell casters, if engaged by more than one PC they fall back and try to separate their attackers.
Professional Brawler: The professional brawler picks the biggest and toughest looking PC, (probably a defender) and focuses on them until he knocks them unconscious. He spends his action point when he bloodies his foe, and attempts to bring them down as quickly as possible.
Scaling the Encounter
Make the following adjustments to the combat based on the number of PCs present.
Five PCs: Add another drunken brawler.
Six PCs: Add two more drunken brawlers.
Ending the Encounter
If the PCs are all knocked out by the brawlers they are robbed of a small amount of coins (10gp per PC) before their attackers are chased off by the arrival of the local watch.
After 20 rounds, or 2 minutes, the local watch arrives and breaks up the fight, they secure the building and begin their enquiries proceed to Encounter 2.
Experience Points
The PCs receive 150 experience points each for defeating the brawlers.
Statistic Blocks.
The statistic blocks for the brawlers can be found here
Combat Map
Leave a comment
Comments feed for this article