Help adjusting an encounter

>>53404200
if they are stupid enough to enter combat with a foe they have no chance of defeating, let them die to it.

or barely escape with their lives. wounded. crippled.

if there is a cliff too high for them to jump off, and they insist on jumping off it, do you modify gravity for them?

>>53404200
If 4/7 are knocked into the negatives, then that's probably a good time for the beholder to flee.

>>53404200
Have you tried just straight-up telling them: "hey, this isn't a video game. The Beholder is way too strong for you. I'm not gonna stop you, but this is like a squad of bicycle cops trying to fight an aircraft carrier. Your characters realize that this is a very bad idea."

And don't have an NPC say that or something, just tell it to their faces before the start of the session, or they won't take the warning seriously.

If they're about to bite it, have the Beholder pause before suddenly fleeing. Cue loud, ominous footsteps.

Tell the players that they have a few brief moments before the REAL owner of the lair shows up (a dragon?) And that if the Beholder (which was kicking their ass) ran in terror, they should, too.

>>53404200

>due to a series of bad decisions

By them or by you? Why are you looking to fudge stats instead of not putting them in TPK situations? Or has your party chaotic-stupided themselves into a progressively more suicidal situation? There's only so much leash you should give to your players before you have to let at least a few chickens roost.

Anyway, as advice goes, I'd say take a look at Volo's Guide if you haven't already, and see if the entry on beholders doesn't give you some inspiration on how to handle this. Maybe throw them against a Death Kiss with some assorted baddies to give them a seriously challenging encounter and then intimate to them clearly that it was only a pale imitation of the actual monster, wink wink, nudge nudge. If they still don't take the hint and insist on going forward, kill them.

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>>53404200
These creatures are meant to be strong. You do not adjust game balance just to make it so your players "win." This just reinforces bad and dangerous behavior while taking away the importance of the creatures you are using.

Environment, items, and other creatures are valid options to augment or at least warn the players. I sure as hell ain't running at a monster if it one shots something that I perceive stronger than myself. Just be careful to not make it seem like a cutscene insta-death thing that they will just brush off.

Also look up how beholders view each other. That might give you some ideas. Making the players the intervening third party can make things a bit interesting and give you options instead of just burning them on arrival.

>>53404200
If you don't want a TPK no matter how much your players deserve it, why did you put a TPK source into the game in the first place?

>>53404200
>seven level 6 adventurers
They've got this. I've killed a beholder once with a level 7 party, and he had help.

>>53404200
>And they are bent on fighting it. I don't want to force them to run away, so I was wondering what stats I should adjust to make the fight a bit less hyper-lethal.
Don't. If they want to get themselves killed, you should kill them. If you make the fight less lethal when they full well know what they're facing, you're actively making the game worse.

>>53404684

Your DM was over-generous.

>>53404691
>If you make the fight less lethal when they full well know what they're facing, you're actively making the game worse.
Not necessarily. There's a good chance that OP's players are the kind to be disappointed if the fight is too easy, yet throw an even longer lasting bitch fit if anything happens to their characters.

>>53404784
>throw an even longer lasting bitch fit if anything happens to their characters.
The PCs aren't invincible, and they're not guaranteed to win. The sooner the players learn this, the better. If your players are the sort who won't get over it, you're better off ridding yourself of them anyway.

>>53404200
Have a wight show up to scare away the Beholder!

>>53404794
Good point.

Beholders aren't inherently lethal. Almost all their powers inconvenience targets; sleep, charm, etc.

Beholders are intelligent, why might a beholder want to leave some victims alive?

Why is it in the area? Charm Monster lasts 1d/level, perhaps it charms the PCs and tells them to work for it. Charmed PCs then need to be rescued by the un-charmed PCs.

Or it charms the PCs, then tells them to go fight another enemy it dislikes more than the PCs. (Probably another beholder, hah.)

Or maybe it just particularly likes the taste of elf meat. Everyone gets knocked out, then wake up in the food pens. They get eaten one per day until they escape.

Go wild. Any weird plot hook you've ever wanted to inflict on your players, now is the time. They can't accuse you of railroading, because they walked into it.

Don't weaken the beholder, make its non-lethal behavior make sense in context.

>>53404200
Let them encounter a bunch of petrified statues and dismembered corpses, rubble-strewn hallways where the bloodstained walls have had holes blasted out of them. Let them witness the despair, defeat and death of other adventurers that came before them.

Then let them also die if they so choose.

>>53404813
not OP but I love this approach. might use it in another one-shot I'm doing.

>>53404813
Damn anon, excellent reply 10/10