When mimics attack

[Little boy]

So I need a rough fight for my PC. We have 5 players at level 6. They are mostly casters that have a decent amount of melee abilities. They have stomped everything I have thrown against them in near comical fashion. I combined two encounters just the challenge them and they still really worry about dieing. So instead of just dumping monsters everywhere on them, I have decided to ambush them and try and think more tactically with the monster. So the plan is to have the party get stuck at an inn in the middle of no where and the place gets trashed
. the next day, they come down and find only 1 table and 5 chairs Not broken. The inn keeper is the only person up at the time. The chairs and table are mimics while the inn keeper is a doppelganger. (they have one hell of a price on their head at the moment) Do you think this will challenge them? They sit down for breakfast and get ambushed. They have taken on an encounter of this CR before without to much trouble, but this is a serious ambush.

[Fishyninja]

So I need a rough fight for my PC. We have 5 players at level 6. They are mostly casters that have a decent amount of melee abilities. They have stomped everything I have thrown against them in near comical fashion. I combined two encounters just the challenge them and they still really worry about dieing. So instead of just dumping monsters everywhere on them, I have decided to ambush them and try and think more tactically with the monster. So the plan is to have the party get stuck at an inn in the middle of no where and the place gets trashed
. the next day, they come down and find only 1 table and 5 chairs Not broken. The inn keeper is the only person up at the time. The chairs and table are mimics while the inn keeper is a doppelganger. (they have one hell of a price on their head at the moment) Do you think this will challenge them? They sit down for breakfast and get ambushed. They have taken on an encounter of this CR before without to much trouble, but this is a serious ambush.

I say go for it, I do not have any experience in DMing, but the good thing about ambushes and dice rolls, is that the odds can change dramatically, and if they do crush this encounter like they have been doing previously, you have more information to build on. My advice, is if you want to really challenge them, try to focus on their weaknesses and/or split them up (unless they are tanky), squishy spell casters being outnumbered always induces a panic in the groups I have played with.

[CursedRhubarb]

Could throw in a Rug of Smothering just for good measure for when the casters think it's safe to stay in the back. :D

But looks good.

[Gignere]

That is not going to challenge your group since they are level 6. Once PCs reach level 5 they reach a new power plateau and you can really throw crazy stuff at them and if your players know what they are doing can come out victorious although it will be a tough fight. I have thrown an aboleth within its lair at a party of level 6 and they still won the fight.

I think you need to either add class levels to the doppelgänger or maybe even throw a dragon at them that is polymorphed into human form. Go nuts.

[Professor Beard]

This is general, not specific to your fight. My guess as to why the PCs are running roushshod over your encounters is that they are spending lots of resources. Teach them to be careful with novas by increasing encounternumber, not difficulty.

Challenge them with longer adventure days and more time between rests. Let them blow up a fight, kill everything and, when they sit down to rest, another fight comes (eg, goblins/gnolls surprise them 15 min into their rest.) Then throw the mimic fight at them. Give a SR, then 3-4 more fights before the next rest.

Give them a rough couple of sessions where they end up hurting without a rest and you can start to back off.

Challenging them with encounter frequency also helps you challenge them without throwing an uber-CR fight at then and risking killing them.

Does this make sense?

[Gignere]

This is general, not specific to your fight. My guess as to why the PCs are running roushshod over your encounters is that they are spending lots of resources. Teach them to be careful with novas by increasing encounternumber, not difficulty.

Challenge them with longer adventure days and more time between rests. Let them blow up a fight, kill everything and, when they sit down to rest, another fight comes (eg, goblins/gnolls surprise them 15 min into their rest.) Then throw the mimic fight at them. Give a SR, then 3-4 more fights before the next rest.

Give them a rough couple of sessions where they end up hurting without a rest and you can start to back off.

Challenging them with encounter frequency also helps you challenge them without throwing an uber-CR fight at then and risking killing them.

Does this make sense?

Need to mix it up, higher frequency but once in a while a triple deadly high CR fight is very fun too.

[Kurt Kurageous]

What are you really trying to do here?

If you want to end the adventure, end the adventure. No need to TPK to do that.

If you want to build a memorable fight, then learn how to build a memorable fight.

I suggest you start reading at http://theangrygm.com

[Virfortis]

Never underestimate the power of being resistant to magic.

An anti-magic mimic would scare the hell out of most of my players.

[Sir cryosin]

Take the flail snail give it a breath weapon that is the spell Contagion. And give it a few more HP. Then describe it looking like a tarrasque. Muhahahahaha oh and don't tell my players about this they might run in these monsters. Thanks to a crazy wizard performing experiments with a trap Tarrasque under the city.