Pimp My Bandits

[Palanan]

In our next game session, the PCs will be sent to deal with a gang of small-time bandits that they’ve been hearing about for some time. I’d like to present them with a tough, memorable encounter, and I’d like the bandits to be both physically challenging and (somewhat) intelligent in their tactics.

The PCs have just reached second level, and they include a TWF ranger, a TWF rogue, and a kensai magus. They have an NPC who can provide support with a crossbow, and for this mission they’ll also have a young cleric who can provide some very limited healing and divine support.

This is a Pathfinder game, but in terms of bandit builds I’m open to official 3.5 as well as Paizo content. How many bandits would make a solid challenge for this group, and what can I do to make them interesting?

[Gildedragon]

Get a sorcerer, prestidigitation them clean and into some nice revealing clothes, take them to a seedy street
Wait what? That not what ya meant?

Bandits are an enchanter, a rogue, and a barbarian
They use Cause Fear and Intimidate to terrify targets... Otherwise Sleep and CdG

Or a band of awakened skeleton rogues

Or imps using illusions to seem like they're bigger sorts

[The_Jette]

Get a sorcerer, prestidigitation them clean and into some nice revealing clothes, take them to a seedy street
Wait what? That not what ya meant?

Bandits are an enchanter, a rogue, and a barbarian
They use Cause Fear and Intimidate to terrify targets... Otherwise Sleep and CdG

Or a band of awakened skeleton rogues

Or imps using illusions to seem like they're bigger sorts

And, the sorcerer uses mirror image in order to make it appear that there are more of them than there really are. Throw in another wizard, and you've got ten or more enemies where really there are only three. It makes keeping track of their numbers really hard when going off just rumors.

[Gildedragon]

Oooh.
If they have a typical attack area: a bunch of arrow/bolt traps to make it seem there's rogues in the shrubberies

[The_Jette]

Then they'll randomly fire one of them off during "negotiations" with the people they're robbing, and the bandit "face" can "berate" the "insubordinate member." It'd really throw off the common folk.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by The_Jette
And, the sorcerer uses mirror image in order to make it appear that there are more of them than there really are. Throw in another wizard, and you've got ten or more enemies where really there are only three.

I appreciate the suggestion, but I might hold onto this idea for later on. The PCs have just hit second level, and this combo might steamroll them outright.

Also, the bandits aren’t so heavily magical—they're pretty small-time thugs for the most part. I should’ve specified non-magical bandits.

Originally Posted by Gildedragon
Bandits are an enchanter, a rogue, and a barbarian
They use Cause Fear and Intimidate to terrify targets... Otherwise Sleep and CdG

Rogue and barbarian could definitely work.

I’m thinking a third-level rogue as the bandit chief, the barbarian as his lieutenant, and assorted riffraff for the other thugs. Any suggestions on feats or builds for any of these?

[daremetoidareyo]

A partially charged wand of benign transposition is perfect for a group like this. Especially with strategically placed guard dogs and archers swapping places to have a few additional rounds of arrow shots

[The_Jette]

Trained attack dogs are especially awesome at low levels. If there's a Druid or Ranger in the group, there's the potential of having as-of-yet unturned allies just waiting to be picked. Otherwise, trip attacks are the hard part to get around for the party. I'd say, a good raiding party could be 4 warriors with two of them using trained attack dogs. That should be a pretty good encounter. Get a few of those groups out through a valley, or forested area even, and you've got yourself a level 1-3 campaign. Just make sure that the Bandit Leader has a few magical trinkets that he couldn't figure out a use for, or wasn't aware that they were magical.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by The_Jette
I'd say, a good raiding party could be 4 warriors with two of them using trained attack dogs. That should be a pretty good encounter.

Attack dogs are perfect. What level would you suggest for the warriors? And do you know any good statblocks for trained attack dogs?

Originally Posted by The_Jette
If there's a Druid or Ranger in the group, there's the potential of having as-of-yet unturned allies just waiting to be picked.

...not quite sure I understand about the unturned allies. This sounds promising, but I can't work out what you mean.

Originally Posted by daremetoidareyo
Especially with strategically placed guard dogs and archers swapping places to have a few additional rounds of arrow shots….

Definitely some kind of dogs. Can you explain what you mean about the archers swapping places?

[daremetoidareyo]

Benign transposition is a 1st level spell from a splat book that allows two allies to swap positions. If archers are plinking at attackers, a rogue could umd a wand to replace them with trained dogs. The dogs are now up front, making trip attacks while archers are further away making more ranged attack rolls while the pcs get tripped time and time again.

[The_Jette]

Attack dogs are perfect. What level would you suggest for the warriors? And do you know any good statblocks for trained attack dogs?



...not quite sure I understand about the unturned allies. This sounds promising, but I can't work out what you mean.

Here's some quick stats for dogs: http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Dog They don't get a free trip attack like wolves. But, they can still make one by way of their bite attack, by giving up one round of damage.

For a low level group of bandits, they should be just level 1. You can differentiate them by giving them different weapons, but try to keep it in the simple range. A spear. A couple of hammers. One of them should have a crossbow for a ranged attack every other round, but shortbows also work, since the damage is much smaller. You don't want to kill off your party. Give them tactics, but only basic ones. Flank the fighter, but don't target the caster first. If one or two goes down, give the remaining a will save or flee.

[gorfnab]

Here's some quick stats for dogs: http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Dog They don't get a free trip attack like wolves. But, they can still make one by way of their bite attack, by giving up one round of damage.

I highly recommend staying away from dandwiki. If you're lucky it's taken from actual WOTC sources, however much of it is either homebrew and/or poorly written/edited.
War trained riding dogs do get the wolf like trip attack option. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/dogRiding.htm

[Calthropstu]

I highly recommend staying away from dandwiki. If you're lucky it's taken from actual WOTC sources, however much of it is either homebrew and/or poorly written/edited.
War trained riding dogs do get the wolf like trip attack option. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/dogRiding.htm

Pathfinder has better stats for dogs, and no conversion needed.
http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/bestiary/dog.html

(op said this was a pathfinder game, so pf options are probably preferrable)

[Florian]

- 1x Bard/Sorcercer w. fire magic feat (leader)
- 1x Mesmerist
- 2x Warrior (1x w. combat reflexes and longspear, 1x w. Net)
- 2x Riding Dog

[The_Jette]

I highly recommend staying away from dandwiki. If you're lucky it's taken from actual WOTC sources, however much of it is either homebrew and/or poorly written/edited.
War trained riding dogs do get the wolf like trip attack option. http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/dogRiding.htm

I only linked it because it was from the SRD area. I tend to stay away from there as much as possible.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Florian
- 1x Mesmerist

A mesmerist could be really interesting. Any suggestions on a build?

[Mendicant]

I appreciate the suggestion, but I might hold onto this idea for later on. The PCs have just hit second level, and this combo might steamroll them outright.

Also, the bandits aren’t so heavily magical—they're pretty small-time thugs for the most part. I should’ve specified non-magical bandits.

What about purely non-magical "mirror images," IE dummies? They'd be scattered back in the woodline, with a few archers mixed in who use the dummies to confuse their targets and hopefully draw some fire. Possibly have them "take cover" by pulling ropes.

[SirNibbles]

Bandits should be trying to rob people, not kill them, and so they should be optimised for this. Why? The authorities are much more concerned about murders than robbers, and so they would send higher level enforcers to take care the job.

There are two main ways of stealing:
1. Picking out a mark ahead of time and setting up an opportunity to steal from that mark.
2. Staking out a location where a mark carrying valuables may pass by.

For the first option, you need a scout to find a mark. This scout can either be a direct member of the bandits or someone who is paid to find marks. A scout might be a beggar who walks through the streets, listening for conversations. Perhaps a merchant gives the bandits information about his rival's shipments.

For the latter option, you just need basic knowledge of where people travel. You know that people travel along X road so you stake it out and wait for a cash cow to come stumbling along. This may require several days of waiting, so the bandits would need some sort of hidden shelter near their point of attack. If the attacks are always in the same place, it could become easy for the authorities to catch them, so they would have to relocate often.

The next thing you need to do is immobilise the enemy. Once the enemy is unable to move, it is easy to take their stuff and run away. You can make them want to stop or you can forcibly stop them.

What if things go wrong? Then you need one of two things:
1. The one who will use words to make everything better. (Bluff, Intimidate, Diplomacy)
2. The one who will use swords to make everything better.

Roles
Scout- Hengeyokai (Sparrow): Easily fly around town to gather information; see enemies/marks approaching from far away. Note that in 3.5 the Hengeyokai race no longer has a +1 LA and instead has a convenient +0 LA.
Immobiliser- Any Race, Beguiler/Sorcerer/Wizard: Spells like Sleep are great against most enemies. Sticky Floor is a good area control spell that lasts hours/level so you can cast it well before your targets arrive. If you don't want powerful magic, you may want to avoid Sorcerer and Wizard.
Enforcer- Goliath Barbarian: If Sleep and other similar options fail, you can always ask nicely for them to give up their stuff. If they don't, you can very nicely attack them.g

For the Hengeyokai, I'd load up on Int (at least 14) so you qualify for the feat Master Linguist (Races of Eberron, page 109) at first level. This gives you 5 languages at first level (plus one more at 2nd level), plus any you may choose to buy with the Speak Language skill. A spy listening in on conversations will surely benefit from being able to speak as many languages as possible.

For the Immobiliser, Precocious Apprentice to be able to cast spells like Blindness/Deafness, Knock, Invisibility, and so forth may be useful. Knock would be especially useful for opening locked chests that the bandits steal.

For the Enforcer, just pick up a big stick and Power Attack. Don't forget to load up Intimidate ranks. I'd also go with the Whirling Frenzy ACF.

[Florian]

A mesmerist could be really interesting. Any suggestions on a build?

I´ve posted a suggestion to an entire group setup on your parallel thread.

I´d advise you to actually not use a "build" in the sense you´d do for optimizing a character. Enemies intended for one battle only can go all out and spend all their resources on that one fight, a luxury PCs normally don´t get.