Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Sulacu 02-03-08, 02:10 PM	So, at one time I thought about the idea of making a walking fortress, with a slight nod to Universe at War. Those enormous Hierarchy Habitat Walkers were awesome, and I haven't seen anyone try to make segmented creatures before. So, here goes, a home brew boss fight. Annihilator, Scourge of Mechanus This incredible engine of destruction is a creation of clockworks and thousands of tons of highly armored steel. The legend of this machine is intertwined with many counts of unexplained destruction. Entire fortresses would disappear off the map overnight and be replaced with scorched rubble, leaving behind not a single survivor to document its passing. As such, the wave of destruction was given the basic name 'Annihilation', and the name carried over to the massive construct that stood at the battlefront. An annihilator stands 150 feet tall from the ground to its top, consisting of a 100 feet large, shell like head that contains four ballista apertures and two siege weapon placements, with four massive legs, each over a hundred feet in length. The entire construct weighs about 20,000 metric tons, which is mostly steel. It derives power for its automotive and battle prowess from permanent apertures to the elemental planes harnassed in a magical reactor within its body. Main Body Size/Type: Colossal Construct Hit Dice: 84d10+1,760 (2,222 hp) Initiative: +6 Speed: 40 ft. (8 squares) Armor Class: 69 (-8 size, -3 Dex, +50 natural, +30 deflection), touch 19, flat-footed 69 Base Attack/Grapple: +63/+119 Attack: Ballista +52 ranged (3d8/×3) Full Attack: 6 ballistas +52 ranged (3d8/×3) Space/Reach: 120 ft./60 ft. Special Abilities: Out of reach, purify, seismic burst, siege placement (×2) Special Qualities: Armor Plating +20, construct traits, magic immunity, damage reduction 30/epic and adamantine Saves: Fort +28, Ref +25, Will +28 Abilities: Str 91, Dex 4, Con —, Int —, Wis 11, Cha 1 Skills: — Feats: — Environment: — Organization: One main body with four legs and two deflectors Challenge Rating: 47 Treasure: Lots Alignment: Always neutral Advancement: — Level Adjustment: — Leg Size/Type: Colossal Construct Hit Dice: 84d10+1,760 (2,222 hp) Initiative: +6 Speed: 40 ft. (8 squares) Armor Class: 78 (-8 size, +6 Dex, +50 natural, +30 deflection), touch 28, flat-footed 72 Base Attack/Grapple: +63/+119 Attack: Slam +80 melee (8d8+60 plus deathstomp) Full Attack: Slam +80 melee (8d8+60 plus deathstomp) Space/Reach: 60 ft./60 ft. Special Abilities: Deathstomp, Trample 24d8+180 Special Qualities: Armor Plating +20, construct traits, magic immunity, damage reduction 20/epic and adamantine Saves: Fort +28, Ref +34, Will +28 Abilities: Str 91, Dex 22, Con —, Int —, Wis 11, Cha 1 Skills: — Feats: — Environment: — Organization: One main body with four legs and two deflectors Challenge Rating: 47 Treasure: Lots Alignment: Always neutral Advancement: — Level Adjustment: — Deflector Size/Type: Medium Construct Hit Dice: 40d10+20 (240 hp) Initiative: +6 Speed: 40 ft. (8 squares) Armor Class: 75 (-5 Dex, +20 circumstance, +30 natural, +30 deflection), touch 45, flat-footed 75 Base Attack/Grapple: +15/+15 Attack: — Full Attack: — Space/Reach: 5 ft./0 ft. Special Abilities: Deflection shield Special Qualities: Construct traits, magic immunity, damage reduction 10/epic and adamantine Saves: Fort +13, Ref +13, Will +13 Abilities: Str 10, Dex —, Con —, Int —, Wis 11, Cha 1 Skills: — Feats: — Environment: — Organization: One main body with four legs and two deflectors Challenge Rating: 47 Treasure: Lots Alignment: Always neutral Advancement: — Level Adjustment: — Combat An annihilator has a central body that carries two deflectors and stands on four legs. Each leg has a space of 60 by 60 feet, creating a combined creature space consisting of four of such squares, defaulting to a 120 feet space, and a reach of 60 feet beyond that. An annihilator uses the Initiative score of its legs for its entire body. An annihilator's shape allows it to either clear or crush cliffs, ledges and buildings of approximately 60 feet high or lower that stand in its way. An annihilator is also actually a vehicle. It is piloted from within its main body by a pilot and a crew to operate the many different controls on board. The annihilator's main body functions as golem armor in that it safeguards its crew against enchantments, illusions and mind-affecting effects. An annihilator has a carrying capacity of 5,250,000 pounds. Attacking and Maneuverability: An annihilator's effectiveness depends upon the number of legs it has. If it has its usual four legs, an annihilator can usher two of its four legs to attack each round. If one of its legs is destroyed, the annihilator's main body loses 2 points of Dexterity and it can only usher one of its three remaining legs to attack each round. If two of its legs are destroyed, the annihilator loses its Dexterity score altogether, can no longer attack and falls prone and helpless on the ground. When an annihilator can walk, it can make a 90 degree turn in one round. Magic Immunity: An annihilator - that is to say, all parts of it - is immune to all magical and supernatural effects. Main Body An annihilator's main body is heaved high above the ground on its four legs. Its shape somewhat resembles the shell of some sort of crustacean, but it is clearly made of highly reinforced metal. Somewhat far back, the body has two siege weapon placements that are used to assault large groups of enemy soldiers or to reach buildings on elevated terrain. Combat An annihilator's main body lies far beyond the reach of most characters without a sufficient Jump skill or without any sort of grappling hook, and must be either brought down by destroying two of the construct's legs or by pelting it with ranged or siege weapons. An annihilator's main body has a strongly shielded upper deck that allows for several creatures to stand on top of it to either make ranged attacks, man the siege placements or cast spells. Everybody standing on its deck has a 50 % percentile chance to be unaffected as if immune by any enchantment, illusion or mind-affecting effect. If the percentile check - which can be considered a concealment check against spells and effects of these schools and with these descriptors - fails, then the creatures on deck are still entitled to a Will save. Creatures standing on deck of the Annihilator also gain a +30 deflection bonus to Armor Class against ranged attacks originating from outside the Annihilator's shielding. Armor Plating (Ex): The main body of an annihilator is covered by heavy layer of armoring. This grants it an effective +20 to its damage reduction/epic and adamantine (raising it to 30) and 20 bonus hit points per Hit Die. Out of Reach: The body of an annihilator is suspended by its legs at 60 feet above the ground. Only creatures of Gargantuan size or larger may make direct melee attacks against an annihilator's main body (or Huge creatures with a melee weapon that has reach). Any other creature needs to be able to Jump well enough to reach a height of 60 feet or cannot directly attack the annihilator's main body. Plasma (Ex): Some of the annihilator's most powerful attacks do plasma damage. This plasma is highly energetic substance that is formed from extremely concentrated combined essences innate to the Elemental Plane of Fire and the Elemental Plane of Earth. Its power is too primal to be reduced by resistance or even immunity to both acid and fire. Purify (Ex): An annihilator can release an enormous burst of biting fire from two large muzzles mounted to the front of an its body. This functions as a breath weapon spreading out in a 120 ft. cone, dealing 60d12 plasma damagewhich is irreducible by any resistance to fire. Creatures caught in the area of effect are entitled to a DC 52 Reflex save to halve the damage dealt. The DC is Constitution based. After the purify ability is used, the annihilator must wait 1d4 rounds before using it again. Seismic Burst (Ex): The annihilator can focus the deflection shield that covers its body in an outward burst. This burst deals 20d12 sonic damage, causes an earthquake effect that functions like the earthquake spell and stuns for 4d4 rounds everyone within 200 feet from the annihilator. A successful Fortitude save against DC 52 will halve the damage dealt and negate the stun effect. After using the seismic burst ability, the annihilator temporarily loses its shielding; all parts of the annihilator lose their deflection bonus for 2d4 rounds. Siege Placement: The annihilator has two siege placements, that each contain a Gargantuan catapult that is loaded with burning ammunition. These catapults each have 30 HD, a Strength of 30, an attack bonus of +15, 225 hit points, an AC of 20 (plus the annihilator body's deflection bonus when applicable) and a range increment of 100 ft. If the catapults are to be used, they must declare an attack against a square of Gargantuan size (AC 1). When the annihilator is moving, its catapults take a -10 circumstance penalty to attack rolls due to movement, limiting their effective range. A catapult's payload does 10d6 bludgeoning damage plus 10d6 fire damage to everything within 30 feet from the blast epicentre (Reflex DC 35 half). Each catapult requires a reloading time of 1d4 rounds after firing. Legs These monstrous limbs are also completely fashioned of heavily reinforced steel, thick, robust clockwork guiding their surprisingly sophisticated movement. A completely intact annihilator has four legsl. The legs have several heavily shielded joints that allow it to move its legs in order to move in any direction or anywhere that its legs can reach. Combat An annihilator's legs are its means of locomotion, as well as weapons to attack with. An annihilator can crush pretty much any creature that it steps on. When it has all its four legs, it can attack with two legs per round. If it has three, it can only attack with one leg per round. If it only has two, it falls prone and helpless. Two different legs cannot attack the same creature in one round; any of its legs only threatens a quarter of the annihilator's space and reach. If all opponents threatening the annihilator in melee are in one quadrant of the annihilator's space and reach, only the leg that threatens that quadrant can attack that round. Armor Plating (Ex): An annihilator's leg is covered by heavy layer of armoring. This grants it an effective +20 to its damage reduction/epic and adamantine (raising it to 30) and 20 bonus hit points per Hit Die. Deathstomp: With a successful slam attack made by one of the annihilator's legs, it may attempt to immediately crush the target for triple damage. A successful DC 58 Reflex save negates this effect. The save is Dexterity based. Trample: An annihilator can be forced to try and trample over a creature or horde of creatures. The result is a movement in a straight line where it tries to move into the square of its targets. The trample attempt deals 24d8+180 bludgeoning damage to anyone successfully trod underfoot. The Reflex save DC against this ability is 92 for creatures of Gargantuan or larger size, but creatures that are Huge or smaller are too small to effectively trample. Armies as a whole are considered Colossal creatures and can be trampled, whereby one soldier is killed for every 5 points of damage dealt (regardless of the soldiers' individual hit point total). Every creature so destroyed is considered to have taken full damage from the trample. Deflector These yellowy light-emitting nodes are situated within relatively small indentures within the main body's hull shape. Their position against the main body gives them a circumstance bonus to their Armor Class. They are visible with the naked eye, and can be individually damaged. One of the deflectors is on the left, and the other on the right of the annihilator's main body. The deflectors lack the rest of the annihilator's superior armoring and are quite vulnerable to prolonged attacks. Combat The deflectors lack the rest of the annihilator's superior armoring and are quite vulnerable to prolonged attacks. They get a +20 circumstance bonus to Armor Class due to their placement on the main body's hull. Deflection Shield (Su): The annihilator's deflectors supply its main body and legs with a +30 deflection bonus to Armor Class. If the annihilator loses one of these, the deflection bonus is unchanged, but when they are both destroyed it loses its deflection bonus to Armor Class entirely. In special, when the annihilator uses its seismic burst ability, the annihilator's deflection bonus is reduced to 0 for 2d4 rounds. So, now my inevitable question. Will this provide my party of 6 level 45 epic characters with a challenge? There's a Wizard/Cleric/Mystic Theurge/archmage, a Barbarian/Fighter/Legendary Dreadnaught, A monk/fighter/kensei, a Sorc/eldritch knight/archmage, an archivist/rogue/duelist and a cleric/favored soul/hierophant. On the players side, there is an army of low level people (ranging from 5 to 15 , with 4 level 30 generals), complete with a dozen siege weapons, all the military force of a major city that is under attack by Annihilator-kun, and a Great Wyrm Silver Dragon advanced to about CR 38-40, who was displeased with the BBEG's nonsense. Okay, on the Annihilator's side it is, in itself a fortress, 6 or so levels of inside architecture, complete with power core (to keep it from getting Sci-fi'y, the power source is a conflux of four steady apertures, each to one of the Elemental planes to draw power from them), a group of about 20 high-level (20-30) people inside. Then, on deck, enjoying the +30 deflection bonus from the Annihilator's shielding, stand four level 37 dudes, each with 17 levels in artificer, each one tasked with trying to keep one annihilator leg healthy by using repair spells. There are two level 40 full spellcasters flinging about spells from deck, and there's a level 40 pilot driving the thing deep inside the main body. Around the construct there's an army of lower level guys (5-15, pretty much same as the good guys army). Lastly, a Great Wyrm of THIS (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Lethus_Dragon_%28DnD_Creature%29) variety will be flying about, picking off annoying enemies. The terrain? Miles and miles of flats, with occasional mesas that can provide some protection. The Lethus Dragon is meant to scout ahead, and might make a few wingovers and kill a small batallion of lower level grunts before returning and relaying intel to the group. Then, they'll have about half an hour to prepare for the inevitable clash ahead. So, my question. Will this be too much? Too little? I wouldn't want to pit this in front of my crew without careful deliberation. Any comments would be really, really appreciated :P
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-03-08, 02:30 PM	My only question is one of feasibility. Most worlds don't have that many Epic Level (ie 21) characters, let alone 3 dozen 30th level characters to lead one army. Seems a little out of hand. High epic characters tend to be rare, you know.
Sulacu 02-03-08, 02:48 PM	My only question is one of feasibility. Most worlds don't have that many Epic Level (ie 21) characters, let alone 3 dozen 30th level characters to lead one army. Seems a little out of hand. High epic characters tend to be rare, you know. In this campaign, the subject of feasibility is quite a wee bit stretched. Considering the amount of Epic characters in a place like the City of Union, I don't think it would be too far off, despite the fact that this happens on a different plane entirely. The faction that controls the Annihilator, by the way, are called Neonates of Genoharad, who gained their epic level potency through abnormal means (siphoning off the lingering power of a dead god). I was hoping for comments on the setup of the battle :)
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-03-08, 03:09 PM	Well, I can't answer for exact numbers, since I don't know how optimized your players are, but I can point out some glaring weaknesses that I notice. 1. Magic Immunity only applies to Spells that allow SR (this might be good to houserule otherwise) 2. A single Ring of Universal ELemental Immunity (easily acquirable by this level) negates its most devastating attacks. 3. I'd say the Ac and Attack bonus look alright (maybe a little low, but not by much) Last L50 game I ran, max to hit was +116 and highest Ac was +109 and that's five levels over your group so you're pretty on target from what I can see. 4. The Out of Reach ability on the torso-- what is preventing a fighter from flying up to it and attacking? Why need he be Gargantuan size? 5. Does the thing die when the Main Body is destroyed? 6. I think its DR could be a little higher. A fighter can power through 20 without even Power Attacking at this level. 7. Does each piece act independently, or does it have to choose which action to take each round? 8. Its damage seems a tad bit low, assuming a L45 character has around 1K hp 9. Can the players enter the Annihilator? If so, that's alot of NPCs you have to stat out 10. The dragon (and I only skimmed it) looks a little weak. 11. If I could make a suggestion (if you want it to be stronger) either give it an antimagic field like a collosus or make its Purify ability deal something like Force or Plasma damage that can;t be reduced. All in all, sounds epic, just a hell of alot of work to run it. I like it, overall.
Sulacu 02-03-08, 03:38 PM	Well, I can't answer for exact numbers, since I don't know how optimized your players are, but I can point out some glaring weaknesses that I notice. 1. Magic Immunity only applies to Spells that allow SR (this might be good to houserule otherwise) I know most conjurations don't allow for SR, true. Should I give it energy resistance (as in to all five fire types?) as well? 2. A single Ring of Universal ELemental Immunity (easily acquirable by this level) negates its most devastating attacks. I did think about that at one point, but I think I gave up on that or simply forgot to implement it. It's especially funny that you mention plasma, because that was the name I used earlier.[/QUOTE] 3. I'd say the Ac and Attack bonus look alright (maybe a little low, but not by much) Last L50 game I ran, max to hit was +116 and highest Ac was +109 and that's five levels over your group so you're pretty on target from what I can see. The annihilator's Strength score used to be 90 before, but I thought I should have toned it down a little bit :P. I guess it can go back up, heh. Do you think I should buff the Deflectors and increase the deflection bonus to, say, 40 or 50? 4. The Out of Reach ability on the torso-- what is preventing a fighter from flying up to it and attacking? Why need he be Gargantuan size? Nothing. I surmised that the belly of the main body was resting 60 feet above the ground at least, and as such, a Gargantuan creature would be the smallest that could deal damage to it without jumping up. That is what the Out of Reach 'ability' was for, to state that. There's nothing preventing them from harpooning the thing and rapelling up, or for a really good jumper to jump on top. 5. Does the thing die when the Main Body is destroyed? When the main body is destroyed, it dies. When two of its four legs are destroyed, it does not die but is rendered immobile (falling prone, potentially crushing everything under it). 6. I think its DR could be a little higher. A fighter can power through 20 without even Power Attacking at this level. Should I raise it to 30? I could make the normal DR 20. (the Armor Plating +10 grants an extra 10) 7. Does each piece act independently, or does it have to choose which action to take each round? The Annihilator is a whole. Although the pieces are defined individually, they move like one creature. Two legs can attack every round (decreasing to one per round if one leg is destroyed). The main body and two of its legs are eligible to full actions each. The other two legs only have move actions. 8. Its damage seems a tad bit low, assuming a L45 character has around 1K hp Heh, well, it can always get higher, although, 24d8 on a successful deathstomp didn't seem all that low to me. 9. Can the players enter the Annihilator? If so, that's alot of NPCs you have to stat out It is possible to enter it, yes. If they do, I have stats handy for the main bad guys. 10. The dragon (and I only skimmed it) looks a little weak. Aww. With ultrablast cone (Will Half) it conjures up a steeper DC than the Annihilator, though. The fighters will be in a heap of trouble. Plus, it can still fly around. :) 11. If I could make a suggestion (if you want it to be stronger) either give it an antimagic field like a collosus or make its Purify ability deal something like Force or Plasma damage that can;t be reduced. Actually, giving it an antimagic field sounds like an excellent plan, although it would destroy the efficacy of the spellcasters on deck. I might give it a third shield generator though, to make its AC harder to bring down. Thanks for the suggestions so far :P
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-03-08, 03:58 PM	Well, how do your character's stats look? You should base its values around theirs-- i.e. the way you have it might be fine. Also, why not just make the Dr X/-? And do you allow custom epic spells? If so, the party becomes very difficult to defeat since even a L21 cleric can have a spell that casts Ture Resurrecton on the whole party as a free action. Tactics like Trap the Soul or Imprisonment are about the only way that I know of to coutner that. On the Magic Immunity, I'm not positive, but I think there are some other spells that bypass it that target ability scores, which will truly cripple this thing. (Unless Constructs are immune to those? I forget) Also, 24d8= 192 max. Not even 1/2 of most L45 character's hp. Let's see, Wizard: starting Con 10+5 Inherent +12 Item= 27 (+8) (8x45=360 +45d4 (139) Grand total of 499 hp, on a Wizard. A fighter should have almost 2000. And that's generous, since any wizard I palyed would have an 18 con to start, have hsi +12 be a Luck bonus, and have Intensified Bear's Endurance up at all times. For the dragon, you could use some of the Metabreath feats out of Draconomicon to pump up its breath. (Maximized, Empowered, Twinned= 1,728, have to wait an additonal 9 rounds to use it again-- oh wait, Intensified Time Stop!) Also, instead of an Antimagic FIeld, how about an Energy Transformation FIeld? (If you have Spell Compendium) One more thing, if you don't already have it, you should check out the Immortals Handbook Epic Bestiary Volume 1, it has alot of great epic monsters (levels 10-9721) especially in the Cr 40-100 range.
Sulacu 02-03-08, 04:12 PM	The party cleric has two epic spells, but none of them actually involve resurrection. One of them is a mass undeath to death kind of spell, and for the other he wanted a spell that could completely heal a single target regardless of whatever happened to him. So, I made this (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Complete_Restoration_%28DnD_Spell%29) for him. Most of my players aren't that much into optimization, so I don't want to overdo it for them. Luckily, constructs are quite immune to ability damage and drain, so that's not a factor. Also, the dragon's breath weapon is Psionic. Do feats like that work on a psionic 'breath weapon' as well? It doesn't actually breathe. It manifests a huge cone of ultrablast. I don't know what an Energy Transformation Field does, but it does sound like something I'd want to have. :P Lastly, I don't have the Immortal's Handbook, but standardly I do like making up monsters of my own. I took to the challenge of designing a multi-stage monster because I don't think it's been done too many times before.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-03-08, 04:15 PM	For the dragon, as long as it has to wait so many rounds before it can breath again, they should work; they amplify the breath itself, they're just based on metamagic (which, in turn, metapsionics are also based on) So what exactly is the breath? Some kind of pyschic scream that can't be heard by humans? Oh, and I'm not sure about ETF since I don't have my SC right now, but I think it works like an AMF but instead of just wasting the spell energy, it lets you either heal yourself or discharge the spells back or soemthing like that. I haven't read it in a while though.
Sulacu 02-03-08, 04:26 PM	Quite basically, the Lethus's breath weapon is one of these (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/ultrablast.htm), but then with a lot more damage. So yes, it's a shriek, but it can be picked up on by any creature. With an average of over 300 points of damage, it was meant to put a dent into anything that hasn't got a good will save. But as you said, it can always be more. Heh. To be a bit truthful, one of the folks I play with get annoyed when they get the impression I put them up against overbearing odds, so I've been tweaking like mad in order to keep him complacent. Since this is to be the last battle before confronting the final BBEG, he'll have to take it or leave it though, heh.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-03-08, 08:42 PM	This is just a prelude to the BBEG!:eek: What is he like?
Sulacu 02-03-08, 08:51 PM	Well, I'd hardly call it a prelude. This battle is supposed to be where everything comes together. And when the players win, the BBEG's attempt at instigating a full-out war will have been averted. Deep within the annihilator's nethers, there is an active portal that leads to his realm. Since there's a good chance that some of my players post here, I'll not reveal him, but I can say that he has five lieutenants. Five demiliches wrought from his brother's dead body. Head, two hands, two feet. Like the annihilator, they combine into one body. I used the abomination template for him. :O Though he is one body, he casts spells as if he were five, and all five have one instance of multispell, and triple Automatic Quicken Spell. It'll be a battle that'll make the players' hair stand on end.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-03-08, 10:22 PM	Nice. Once, I put my L50 party against a L55 Wizzard/Archmage Demilich and his L55 Warblade Deathknight. Total Party Kill. The lich opened with Celerity + Intensified Timestop and used no less than 30 buff spells, cast Duplicate, he and his Duplicate cast Time Duplicate, getting around 60 spells a round. Consequently, after the Cleric and the WIzard fell, the Fighter and the Knight pledged undying fealty t the lich and becmae Death Knights in his service, replacing all of the guardians they had killed on their way through his sanctum. Moral of the story: watch out for a TPK with your BBEG. Good luck!
Sulacu 02-04-08, 07:04 AM	Wow, you mean ECL 55, I take it? Or else that would be totally insurmountable. I plan to have my players gain a few more levels before they actually get to the BBEG himself. If I pride myself on anything, it's that my players have felt the squeeze of most important encounters, but it never turned into a TPK. But at the same time, the more difficult fights usually result in the deaths of two, three, four of them. Lots of wishes or true resurrections afterwards, of course. These fights are the first times I fear for it to happen, though, heh. I think I can speak plainly about the BBEG himself now, as the nosiest of my players probably already knows anyway. Basically, it's a manifestation of the dead god's remaining power. Gargantuan Outsider with 90 hit dice. AC 108, attack bonus of about +120, a ton of wizard and cleric spells and spell-like abilities and a few epic spells of my own design, including quickened casting variants of this one (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Primal_Calling_%28DnD_Spell%29) and this one (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Blood_of_the_Pale_Moon_%28DnD_Spell%29) complete with a +15 to DC. His name is 'The Masked One', which was his title when he was a living god. The reason for that is a big, macabre looking major artifact mask that he wears giving him huge buffs, like +12 to Int, Wis and Cha, +40 to Intimidate, Spot and Spellcraft checks, true seeing and an insight bonus to AC amongst a few others. For this fight I have 'scripted a few events', so to say, such as the intercession of an actual deity halfway through, both for plot and to keep it fun for the players.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-04-08, 08:27 AM	No I meant more like ECL 65.:D BUt my party was so unbelievably optimized that it was almost fair. If the Demilich hadn't cast Greater Ironguard, the fighter would have killed him in 1 round. (he averaged like 8000 damage, bypassed critical immunity, and critted on 12-20/x7, and got like 20 attacks a round and had 2 abilities that could double that.) Of course, we were using Orichalum weapons from the Immortals Handbook, which multiply your weapon damage based on what % Orichalum your weapon is, but it requires an obnoxious strength to wield. All in all, I think his base damage was something like: +117/+117/+113/+109/+105/+101 32d10 +179 12-20/x7 (Keep in mind, he was Dualwielding too) Anyways, that sounds like such an awesome fight you're running. Is that the end of your campaign, then? Are you retiring the characters after? If so, that sure is going out with a bang. Does the BBEG have Divine Rank at all?
Sulacu 02-04-08, 08:49 AM	Damn, it sounds like I really, and I mean really, need to get my hands on that Immortal's Handbook. Is it 3.0? 3.5? I was planning on going on a roving hunt in the last few weeks before 4E hits the shelves, because I'm pretty sure all 3 and 3.5 material will be going over the counter for a steep discount. I also try to give my players unique treasures throughout, like items they can use to fashion special magical items that exceed the usual limits. For instance, the power core of the Annihilator yields a concentrated omnimental essence. If my players pay a bit of attention, and are acting to their usual scrutiny, they can make something nifty out of it. One, they can put it in a shield for immunity to acid, cold, electricity and fire, two, in a weapon for +5d6 additional damage of those four types on every hit, if they have Craft Epic Magic Arms and Armor, or three, make an Orb of Primal Elemental summoning (summon Primal Elemental of type of your choice 1/day) if they use it as a material for Craft Epic Wondrous Item. Would that be balanced?
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-04-08, 09:07 AM	The Immortals Handbook is 3rd party 3.5. The website has alot of information, including where you can order it from. (I'm not sure if its in stores reliably) He also has alot of free material posted there that didn't make it into his book. www.immortalshandbook.com/index.htm And for your item, do they have either of those Craft feats? Would it be considered on Artifact or just a regular Epic Item? It sounds balanced to me; Primal Elementals aren't all that powerful, especially at 45th, so I don't see what the problem is. For the weapon, I'm assuming that's 5d6 that counts as either Fire, Cold, Acid, or Electricty, not 5d6 of each. (Although that would be bada$$) And for the shield, that's fine, since you could easily have a Ring of Universal Elemetnal Immunity at this point. WOuld these effects be Nonmagical though, since its kind of a special material? That would be interesting.
Sulacu 02-04-08, 09:43 AM	Heh, I was thinking 5d6 of each, but thinking about it, that does sounds a bit over the top. Maybe I should make it 4d6 or 3d6 of each, heh. On the other hand, 5d6 damage of a randomly chosen type of energy (rolling 1d4 at every hit: 1=acid damage, 2=cold damage, 3=electricity damage, 4=fire damage) would be pretty funky too. Well, the party wizard has both those feats, so he could make either the weapon, the shield or the orb. With items of this power, I would likely consider the resulting item a minor artifact for the sake of making sundering and destruction difficult. If the wizard decides to make the Orb, he has several feats that greatly strengthen summons, and I was thinking of allowing the orb to use the user's added Augmented Summoning feats (if he has some). In case of the shield, I had also thought that next to the immunities, allowing the user to specify one type of energy of either acid, cold, electricity or fire, so that it would cause 5d6 damage of its type to any creature hitting the wielder. Heh, god knows, whether item will be made, the party'll need all the help they can get since after entering to the BBEG's realm, there's no restocking or buying goods anymore. They'll be left to their own devices and those that they took with them.
ikki 02-05-08, 09:00 AM	hmm.. it still seems to have considerable weaknesses. Like rustmonsters.. bye bye tasty metal.. No way of getting around forcewalls.. feel free to box it up, and fill that box with say lava.. Okie, so it can annihilate a hundred rustmonsters turn, nothing says i cannot make the a motherof- 94 HD rustie. Origin of species should allow this. With a possessing fiend teleporting it, and extra-extended reach for the tentacles. Then copy it, like a dozen copies. Very useful to have both fiends and rusties as simulcras, they will be far more obedient. Neither is it very fast, so we have all the time in the world to prepare, box in and ..annihilate.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-05-08, 10:11 AM	It has the dragon helping it, which can easily disintegrate your wall of force. Plus, he said that his characters aren't big on optimizing.
Sulacu 02-05-08, 10:45 AM	Well, one is, but he is not very good at it :P. And the one playing the wizard doesn't think about it, but has ended up with a surprisingly good build. Also, having a few Blessed Books with 20 or so spells of every level written in them is going to do him just fine. And I'm a she, thanks. :dancin: Still, if any of my players will think about using rust monsters than that's fine by me, I'll take my hat off to them. All I do is supply the challenges, and how they choose to overcome them is their business. It's true that I put the dragon in in order to scout ahead for one wingover, then return to circle the annihilator and counteract potential threats with its spells. Needless to say, disintegrate and mage's disjunction are certainly on its list. Clearly, it'll have Improved Spell Capacity for some fat metamagics, like maximized, empowered horrid wilting or a widened antimagic field. Otherwise, I'll probably want to give him a fair bit of offensive conjurations, like incendiary cloud, because three of my players are very fond of their antimagic fields. Well, this evening we'll see...
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-05-08, 01:44 PM	And I'm a she, thanks. :eek: :embarrass Sorry! Anyways, with the dragon's spellcasting, you can pretty much cover all the bases; hell, you could even give him Epic Spellcasting. Make sure to let us know how it turns out :D oh, by the way, if you ever want to scare the hell out of your characters, use Permanent Damage. By far, the scariest epic monster I've ever seen is the Void Dragon from the Immortals Handbook, whose breath weapon PERMANENTLY ANNIHILATES 1d6 HD per Age Category. These HD can be restored at a rate of 1/ Wish (or Miracle but it costs 5000 XP to use it in this fashion) Bloody scary. Also, things that have Regeneration: All, in which case, they are more orless immune to any damage that doesn't pass their regeneration, and they heal to full health at the beginning of their turn.
Sulacu 02-05-08, 05:31 PM	Hahaha, now... That was a fun battle, sheesh. It drew out pretty long, and it drained most of the players' spell lists quite dry, but the players won out :P, although after defeating everybody that piled out of the annihilator's remains, only the dwarven fighter/dreadnaught was still standing; due to the advantage of being in an enclosed space, a huge, lingering buff to his Will save, and two extremely lucky saving throws, he managed to beat the wizard pilot on his own. Afterwards he used his stone of resurrection on the party cleric, who then in turn resurrected the rest. So, brief recounting. The surrounding armies fighting with eachother not withstanding, the annihilator and the dragon were a pretty dangerous force of cooperation throughout. Divine casters stationed on the bridge of the annihilator kept healing the lethus dragon, and the four artificers kept healing the annihilator's legs with repair spells. Changing the damage dealt by the purify ability in an irreducible sort really helped evening things out. Plus, I had given the Annihilator's main body and legs an Armor Plating +20 instead of +10, for 20 hp per hit die. (2,222 hp per part, funnily enough). The lethus dragon was the reason why the battle took so long, so I'm glad I added it in the scenario. With Improved Spell Capacity, Automatic Quicken ×3 and Multispell ×2 as feats. It popped up out of the shadow plane right in front of the troupe and made a wingover with some oldfashioned evocation (2 meteor storms and one Widened, Empowered, Maximized meteor storm, all three spells made to deal sonic damage with energy substitution) in its surprise round. Eight 40 ft. orbs dealing 3d6 maximized on impact and 9d6 maximized sonic, and six 80 ft. orbs doing the same. Thank god, four of the six player characters made the classic mistake of bunching up close by, and only one of the four had immunity to sonic damage. Lots of butthurt. The two party full-spellcasters each ate about 800 sonic damage and died (and were subsequently resurrected). Retaliation with time stop and lots of delayed blast fireballs, etc. etc. After about 7, 8 rounds or so, the dragon managed to shadow hop back to the Annihilator with only a few dozen hp left, which was absolutely hilarious. At first, the whole thing confused the party a bit, causing teamwork to go out of the window for a while. The party tank (the aforementioned dwarf) and the party speedo (monk/fighter/kensei) both went to try and hack away at one of the legs together, which was fine, but the party cleric, played by Mr somewhat-munchkinny-but-can't-optimize-worth-a-damn, was too chicken to approach too close and thus was too far out of range to heal them. What followed was half an hour of tugging and squaling, getting scorched to death and being revived, suffering several more wingovers and a bit of player frustration, but eventually they concocted a fantastic plan. All of them started to focus their attention on the dragon, and finally (after five or six failed attempts) managed to kill it off before it could shadowhop away. The brilliant part was this, though. The enemy head wizard was standing on deck radiating a massive epic anti-magic field arround the annihilator. The party wizard had a peculiar, epic spell developed about eight or so levels back for a subquest, in which they had to go into a microminiature world. This spell reduces an object to 1/1,000th its dimensions. So, eventually, the sorcerer says; 'hey, buttmonkey. See those giant mesas? Use your epic reduction on a few of those!' So, the wizard snuck out with teleportation circle to a remote, empty section of the giant battlefield, diminished two enormous 120 ft. high rocky mesas to 1 inch pebbles, giving the two resulting pebbles to the party tank, who hurled them one by one at the enemy head wizard. Pebbles hit the epic anti-magic field, become 100 ft. mesas again :D. So, a bit of houseruling later, I've come to a damage of 256d6 each, crushing anyone on deck (all four artificers, the head wizard and the grunts). About 1800 points of wtfpwn damage to the annihilator's main body. Well, with the death of the head wizard, the antimagic field dispersed. Mesas became pebbles again xD. Party monk had taken the chance and dimension door'd to the annihilator's ass end while it was working on standing back up from squished (prone) position, slung a grappling hook to its belly, climbed up the rope and had the rest of the party follow; the legs can't attack anything in the air, and they went up the back end to avoid the giant cone of death that comes from the front and all that. It was really well thought out. So, they snuck in, killed everyone inside and voila. :P
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-06-08, 09:42 AM	Wow, that sounds awesome. How were they reviving each other that fast, though?
Sulacu 02-06-08, 02:21 PM	In order to do some resurrecting in the field, the cleric had a really potent staff. Another one of my homebrew items. Staff of Intercession resurrection (1 full action) / 2 charges true resurrection (1 minute) / 3 charges and some verbal fluff at the end. He still managed to bleed 14 of the remaining 19 charges in that one battle. At the end of it, though, when he was brought back by mr dwarf, he used his own prepared resurrection spells to bring back his mates at his timely leisure. Although, the archivist/rogue/duelist never died, sneaky bastard he is, heh. He was rendered useless in the final battle inside, though, with this little gem (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Pyrrho%27s_Catatonia_%28DnD_Spell%29), leaving only the dwarf to take out the last enemy while the wizened sneaky sage was standing there being catatonic xP.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-07-08, 07:16 AM	So, did they make use of the elemental conjunction? Or is that next session? Also, how do you make it so casters don't utterly PWN your party? That demi lich I told you about opened with Celerity+ Time Stop, threw up a Greater Ironguard, an Effulgent Epuration, and an Epic Ward against Mage's Disjunction, and proceeded to let his Death Knight slaughter the party, blasting him with Negative Energy spells and using Revive Undead whenever it fell. Of course, I might be little too hard on my players when it comes to BBEGs. (and if you don't have Spell Compendium, that's where some of those are from.)
Crazyshadow4 02-07-08, 10:26 AM	im dead:weep: :weep: :weep: :weep:
rob_douglas 02-07-08, 02:37 PM	I think the real problem is Celerity. Anything that gives you extra actions is a serious problem. Sometimes, it just may be that the spells in Spell Compendium are not well balanced (Maw of Chaos), especially at Epic levels. Also, people should look at Reactive Counterspell themselves (which would annihiliate the demiliches timestop) or Ring of greater Counterspells tied to Time Stop. (the latter was introduced in Bastion of Broken Souls, and added in Arms and Equipment Guide. It was nerfed down to 6th level spells in Magic Item Compendium, but you might consider an greater, greater version). ROB
Sulacu 02-07-08, 02:52 PM	Heh, I suspected it; the wizard went for the Orb. The fighter already has pretty huge enchantments on their weapons and armor; usually, I put in one special minor artifact type item about every two major battle sequences. And, to be honest, the wizard deserved something good. I made it so that the holder of the orb is immune to acid, cold, electricity and fire, and that it could summon one primal elemental of any one kind per day. Also, the archivist has an epic dispelling effect which is reasonably potent. In order to keep the campaigns bearable I try to not think too hard about making ineffable combos, especially with time stop. But spamming spells with multispell is not above me. :O
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-07-08, 04:13 PM	Its only when you cast Time Stop and have 5+ multispells that it really gets out of hand.:D And the reason they lost that fight with the Demi Lich, was, A) The Wizard was erased from reality by a unlucky 1 on a save against a Force Setintel's (IH:EB) Fading Greataxe, B) the Cleric was chooped up by a Maskim (Devil-Lord ECL 55, chain swords, 16 sneak attacks/ round) who promptly teleorted away, leaving C) the Frenzied Berserker (who was an absolute terror in melee: 10000+/ round) to fight the demilich, who cast Greater Iron Guard, rendering him completely immune to the Berserker's Pure Orichalum Greatsword. After he entered the frenzy.:D And, Salacu, for that orb, does it summon 1 of each Primal, or just 1? Because, 1 of each doesn't seem bad at all, especially for a minor artififact.
Sulacu 02-07-08, 10:52 PM	Well, one of each sounds pretty good. I can still make it so, since the wizard still has to identify the exact properties of the item. Thought was either 1 of the chosen type or 1 of every type per day, the latter with the possibility of spreading said summons over multiple uses (although maximally 1 of each kind). I thought to make every summon last either for 30 minutes or until it dies. Well, mah party is in the BBEG's realm now. I plan on drawing out the campaign a bit further, since we're having so much fun. Since my players' melee type fighters tend to dominate a bit lately, I plan on throwing them off whack a bit. With a few of these (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Mirror_Golem_%28DnD_Creature%29). Of course, these Mirror Golems will be really, hugely advanced, to about 60 or more HD. Or maybe add the Paragon Template. Or a mix of the two. I created these creatures because they could really be the end of well optimized melee fighters. If they rush in without thinking, they'll kill themselves. Neither attack power, nor the magic-ness or epic-ness of weapons matters when attacking these.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-08-08, 01:23 PM	Nice. Those should scare them a little. :D Meleers tend to believe that damage can solve any problem; its nice to shock them every once in a while. Same dungeon with the Dmeilich, I put them up against a Force Golem, who has DR All/Enchanment Bonus, meaning that you can only deal as much damage as your weapon + per strike. My friend's jaw hit the floor when he attacked for, what he calculated to be, 18000 damage, only to find out that he dealt more like 90. Then there was the Minotaur Frenzied Berserker with Deathless Frenzy. That was fun too; 400,000 damage and he still wouldn't drop. Ah, the memories... :D I think that was my favorite campaign of all time. Those Mirror Golems look great though, it'll definately catch any unprepared meleers off-guard. Nice work.
Sulacu 02-08-08, 04:03 PM	Yuch, Frenzied Berserker is one of the few classes that I really, and I mean really, frown upon, as after deliberating it carefully it looks quite unbalancing. And it is not only because you can trade in one point of BAB for 4 points of damage; Especially if Barbarian Rage and Frenzy stacks and you take a +18 bonus to Strength, that's an effective 36 points of damage you get for free when you're both raging and frenzying. And then a lot of superstrong hulking martial types can get away with doing away with their full BAB and still hit. Plus, I tend to frown upon the Frenzied Berserker because it poses as much of a threat to friends as it does foes. In a former campaign where I wasn't the DM, one of the player characters was frenzied berserker and it was pretty annoying to some of the other players. He kept going bananas when he took damage from a fall, or got a firm kick up the ass. The guy playing him was an ass, too, though. I think he found it amusing to mess up the game and constantly ruin the experience for the rest. But after hacking a party member to death, he turned on my Wiz/Archivist/Mystic Theurge with a cleave. I got real annoyed at that point because that was the third or fourth time in two days, and I decided to take advantage of his sucky Will save. I activated a 1-round haste effect with the speed enhancement from my heavily enhanced mithral light shield, did a 5 foot-step out of range and then whipped everything I could think of out on it. First, I cast a quickened harm spell (I had Improved Spell Capacity and 2 Multispells), a quickened bestow curse for -6 Con, then I spitefully cast a mage's disjunction, completely ridding him of his vaunted magic items. None of them made their save, except for his puny amulet of natural armor. I even rolled lucky enough on my d% as to disjoin his vaunted artifact sword. He was butt ass naked, lost all his elemental resistance, and his Fortitude save had dropped like by 20 points. Then, thanks to my haste, I had one standard action left and cast time stop, gaining an additional three rounds. I hightailed it out to about fourty feet away, spammed him with a shiatload of delayed blast fireballs which I all made explode when the time stop ended. 3 normal ones for 60d6 damage, 2 empowered ones for 60d6 damage, and one empowered and maximized one for 180 damage. At the end of my last time-stop turn, I activated my shield's time buttress ability (Magic Item Compendium, ignore all damage dealt to you from one round per day) in order to survive the next round, then I cast my second time stop and cast as many hurtful conjuration and evocation area spells that would linger. Ice storm, incendiary cloud, acid fog. Then, I used a second instance of haste from my shield, skeedaddled up about 100 feet away, used reverse gravity on the 10 ft. cube in which he resided and the 12 or so 10 ft. cubes above. Since we were in a large cavernous grotto, he fell up for about 120 ft, where I pelted him with several heightened disintegration spells, some of which hit home pretty well. Then, I dismissed the reverse gravity spell, causing him to fall back down prone on his face, giving me another round to spell the hell out of him. In that round, I got him down to 70 or 80 hp of his like several thousand, and I used my last spell of the round for an old fashioned Power Word Kill. The rest of the party just made sure to stay away from all the area effects and looked on a bit nonplussedly. Mr. Frenzied Berserker's player was rather agasp that nobody helped him and left the table all disgruntled. Since then, I associate heavy shoes stomping up a staircase in frustration as a sign of victory and poetic justice. I rarely if ever string down combos, because I think it ruins the game, but he so had it coming, the little prack. Since it happened, though, they all find my Wiz/Archivist a real scary woman, forcing DC 40 to 45 saves on high level spells
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-08-08, 04:28 PM	Nice! Poetic Justice indeed. I find that a simple Force Cage works wonders though, unless he has like an Angelwing Razor or something. (Plus, its funny to watch him beat at the invisible walls in futility) FBs are so overpowered though. With Leap Attack, Shock Trooper, and Dire Charge, at FB level 10, he Power Attacks at an 8/1 Ratio, gets a full attack, and keeps his full BaB, since Shock Trooper lets him draw from his AC instead. God forbid if he has Combat Brute too, for 3x Power Attack damage on the next round. Plus, with Deathless Frenzy, he just becomes invincible unless you have Calm Emotions on hand. Add in Extend Rage and it just gets silly. Hell, just let the wizard make the whoile party Ethereal and send in the FB to kill all the enemies, throwing a Transdimensional Break Enchantemnt or Dispel if he happens to get Dominated or something. I'm about to let one of my players use FB in a 120th level build next week, but considering that the rest of the party have Divine Rank (15+) and he doesn't, I think its fair enough. Sorry for derailing your thread though.
Sulacu 02-08-08, 04:56 PM	Heh, I entertained the idea of a forcecage, but that would mean I couldn't kill him and I did want him to suffer :plotting:. I also entertained the thought of simply using imprisonment and forgetting all about the jerk. Let him rot below the earth. The only caster in our group with the freedom spell was me, after all xD. Good times. My character was easily the best caster in the group, though, despite the fact that she lagged behind on caster levels by joining two spellcasting classes for a long while. Plus, she is the only one who can Craft mostly anything. Her Archivist and Wizard specializations allow her to scribe mostly any scroll necessary, and she can Brew Potions, Craft Staffs, Magic Arms and Armor, Wondrous Items and Constructs. So, I supplied a lot of the people in my group with good items. It's a good thing he didn't crit something fierce on his cleave though, because if I had sustained triple damage, I'd have had quite the chance to be killed outright with the health I had left. Oh, don't worry about the thread. I'm actually quite pleased with the conversational topics, and I might also post the stats of my BBEG once I finish it up. Oh, wait a minute. How does that work? Gods and non-gods together, that is. I mean, Greater Deities have salient divine abilities that pretty much autokill any mortal, so... I entertained the thought of my Wizard/Archivist/Mystic Theurge build to gain a Divine Rank of 0 or 1 somewhere later, though. Probably 0, because we all know it's fun to be able to fumble at times.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-08-08, 05:35 PM	Sounds like you're good with casters then. Where's Archivist from though? I hear about all the time on the boards, but I've never seen it. (Complete Divine, maybe? That's a book I've been meaning to get for a few years now.) I'm not sure how the DvR/No DvR situation will work out; I've tried to get him to take at least 1, but he insists on taking another 20 class levels instead. (He can be rather thick-headed) I might just give him DvR 0 behind the scenes to deal with Life and Death or Divine Splendor. In all honesty though, the CR system pretty much falls apart past 70th level or so. I have a feeling that nearly every encounter is going to last about 1 round max, just based on the HP to Damage ratio I've seen in my NPC design. (Bordering on 1:10 at times, even after giving them d20 HD and DvR x HD as an HP boost), so I'm not really concerned about the FB's damage output. Whether he does 10,000 or 100,000 a round, he'll still kill nearly anything in 1 shot. Of course, the enemies can most likely 1-round him too.
BillTheManiac 02-08-08, 06:37 PM	It's Heroes of Horror.
Sulacu 02-08-08, 07:46 PM	Indeed. The Archivist class is intriguing because it's basically a Divine Wizard. Taking spells from tabletry and what not. They learn spells from the cleric spell list, but you can inscribe any divine spell you encounter in writ in your prayer book. Wizard/Archivist is the perfect combination for Mystic Theurge because both are Int based casters. I also prefer Int based casters because of the added number of skills and their effective modifiers (Decipher Script, Knowledge and Spellcraft especially). Still, I would consider 120th level to be a bit much. The CR system falls apart much earlier than 70th, depending on how your characters are built and how your villains are built. Still, if both sides are optimized to ridiculous heights, it is unlikely indeed that any battle will take more than 1 round eventually :P. I don't know about deities, though. Roleplaying them will be tricky and, to make a play at the first thing you posted on here, it's a matter of feasibility to have four greater deities 'adventure and dungeon crawl for XP and mad loot' xD. I would likely not considering going over DR 0, and if absolutely necessary, I'd not go further than a demigod rank.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-08-08, 08:26 PM	Well, looks like I'm off to buy Heroes of Horror then. (I've had my eye on that one for a while too) And, I've never actually "run" anything higher than 70 or so, although I've done lots of theoretical builds around 100 (and even an Overgod at 250 as a thought exercise) And I have the story completely worked out, (hell, I understand the main villain so well it scares me at times.) So that shouldn't be a problem. :D In all honesty though, I think the first encounter is going to be the end of them. It's a little something I call an Untrammeled Titan of Oblivion. Can Move anywhere in Creation as a Free Action, can duplicate Wish and Miracle (quickened) at will, and has the following abilities: Dual Actions Void Breath: 5000ft Cone (50d20 Permanent Damage) Standard Action Reflex Dc 124 for 1/2 Godblight: All Deities within 2,100 ft lose any Divine Bonus and instead gain a Divine Penalty wherever such would normally apply Retribution: Any damage fealt is dealt to the attacker as well And, the killer: Nonexistence: 75% of any effect automatically failing, immune to: Force Damage, Divine Damage, Critical Hits, Sneak Attacks, Alignment-based Effects, Permanent Damage, as well as any other immunity associated with a DvR 20 Deity. Did I mention he's backed up by 36 Paragon Hecatoncheires? Each wielding a +10 Brilliant Energy Speed Vorpal Greatsword in each hand. (One Mass Divine Blast should take care of them though) All in all, I have no idea what's gonna happen, we're just running it for the hell of it. It'll be fun either way; plus, the NPC with them has continuous undispellable Contingent Ressurection (deus ex machina) and can revive the others as needed. (until the plot takes him out of action :schemes: ) Its based off the plot of a novel I plan to write, and its just so damn epic that we figured "what the hell, lets run it". As for feasability, its not some uber dungeon crawl :D Its basically a frenzied, apocalyptic rush to obtain the one weapon that can harm the invading Overgod before he manifests in Creation. The sword just happens to be guarded by his most powerful followers though, culminating with the sword's wielder, who singlehandedly annihilated two entire pantheons of deities. Edit: Oh, and I meant that the system falls apart around 70 because until that point, you can still guestimate an approximate Cr for a creatures with a +/- 10 window of accuracy. Past 70, the window seems to be more like +/- 30, and after 100 or so it just gets pointless. There won't be any treausre or leveling though; treasure becuase their builds are basically perfect already, and leveling becuase 1 (or even 10) levels really doesn't matter at this point, especially since its just a one-session campaign. (just hopefully not a 1-encounter :D)
Sulacu 02-08-08, 09:45 PM	At that point I stop to be able to imagine what exactly such a monster can do, honestly :/. It would likely be too much for me to keep track of characters like that, let alone five or six, heh. When I'd optimize so much as to need to find new and special ways to make an encounter challenging, like permanent damage and anti-deity weapons and abilities, I'd rather tone down and try less hard, xD
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-09-08, 10:21 AM	Yeah :P The thing is though, is that by that level, everything has these blanket immunities, making nearly all normal forms of attack completely worthless. So, new methods are in order. Another problem is that you more less have to use Avergae Damage, since, I kid you not, one of my players does 32d12 a hit with his Orichalum Greathammers, and can reach 40+ attacks a round. No way I'm letting him roll that. I can't wait for the next Immortals Handbook though, which deals with making characters of that level (and much, much higher) with at least some degree of balance. Of course, it changes a lot of problematic rules, but its for the better I think, since the currents ones clearly break down by that point. Case in point, you know you've departed sanity when one of your character's Spell-lists has only one spell: Heightened (100th Level) Wish (might be a house rule, but effectively duplicates any spell of level 99 or lower. :eek: Talk about overwhelming options.) I just hope he writes out some actual applications; I'd rather not see him pull out the calculator and start muttering to himself *okay, so 20d6, empowered x50 is 500d6, now intesified is 6000, twinned is 12000, of of cours,e quickened...* yeah Anyways, you can get back to your regularly scheduled thread now. :D
Tshern 02-09-08, 12:17 PM	Still, I would consider 120th level to be a bit much. The CR system falls apart much earlier than 70th I kept saying that when I used like a minute or two to prepare myself and continued to beat the snot out of a Devastation beetle with my ECL Ur-Priest/Ruby Knight Vindicator. I'm relatively new to epic, but do the ELH monsters pose a reasonable threat to a slightly optimized group of appropriate CR?
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-09-08, 01:01 PM	Devastation Vermin are a complete joke. The Beatle is nothing but an overgrown Tarrasque without its more worthwhile special qualities. A straight 50 wizard can throw around 20th level spells no problem. He only needs a 60 or so Int to force a Will Save that the things can't make. (And for the price of a Headband of Intellect +12, you can have a Headband of Intellect +6 Enhnacncment, +6 Sacred +6 Luck +6 Insight etc) Plus its vaunted "25d10" isn't even a 1/4 of a 50th level charatcers hit points, even assuming it does max damage. The thing should be Cr 35 to actually require tactics to kill. The CRs in the Epic Book are hit and miss. Some creatures are way to weak, and others are stupidly overpowered. (A Xixecal, who actually does the correct damage for his size, with a Ring of FIre Immunity, is scary indeed. And that ring is easily affordable with his wealth.) However, I'm not sure what ECL you meant, but Ur-priest/RKV sounds like an incredibly cheesy build straight out of the CO boards, if you ask me. You get what you pay for. You honestly expected anything to be difficult against that? If I had players who optimized to that degree, you'd be facing something a hell-of-a-lot more deadly than a by-the-books Devastation Beatle.
Sulacu 02-09-08, 01:26 PM	Heh, it's good to see that the thread remains alive and well. Anyway, I think I just finished the template I'm going to use for my BBEG. Exemplar (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Exemplar_%28DnD_Template%29) And I'm going to slap it as inherited on a Gargantuan Nightwalker advanced to about 90 or so Hit Dice, complete with the artifact mask I spoke of earlier. Added to that, I'm going to give it quite a few extra abilities.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-09-08, 05:18 PM	Looks like a cross between Paragon and Quasi-deity. I take it it's tailored to give your BBEG the exact stats you want? Otherwise, (if it was me) I would just slap both the aforementioned templates on him and say "deal with it", but you may be a nicer DM than I am. It looks workable though. Just for frame of refernce, is it supposed to be weaker or stronger than Paragon? And also, why does its HD change to d8? Doesn;t that weaken your BBEG if he's a Nightcrawler to begin with?:confused: Its your game though, I'm sure you know what's best for your players. Also, (I learned this somewhere along the line) there's a certain pint at EPic where its really no longer neccessary to follow the rules when you make your BBEGs; you don't have to write up entire templates and prestiege classes just for them, you can just give them whatever abilities you feel they should have and your player's will never know the difference. (Unless you use that template for other creautures, then by all means, ignore that.) I used to do the same thing. I would see a stat too low and obsess about finding a way to raise it; then, one day, something just clicked an I thought, "I'll just give him a +33 Cosmic bonus to everything." And nothing went wrong. But, in any event, you should tailor the BBEG to your party. From what you've said, it doesn't sound like they optimize quite as much as mine (who in turn don;t optimize as much as MR. ECL 20 Devastation Beatle Hunter:mad: ) Whatever works though. Mae sure to post his stats when you're done, though. :D
Sulacu 02-09-08, 07:08 PM	Looks like a cross between Paragon and Quasi-deity. I take it it's tailored to give your BBEG the exact stats you want? Otherwise, (if it was me) I would just slap both the aforementioned templates on him and say "deal with it", but you may be a nicer DM than I am. It looks workable though. Just for frame of refernce, is it supposed to be weaker or stronger than Paragon? And also, why does its HD change to d8? Doesn;t that weaken your BBEG if he's a Nightcrawler to begin with?:confused: Nah, it's a nightwalker :P. I thought not. It may lose its d12 hitdie, but it gets maximum hit points for each hit die and it gets a constitution score. If I advance the Nightcrawler to like.. HD 90, it gets a Constitution score of 44 according to the template, which'll grant it 17 hit points per hit die, so it'll end up having 1,530 hp extra. Of course, some tweaking will be done, but I will do said tweaking to the base creature. The template exists mostly to give it some paragon like bonuses, as well as a number of effective sorcerer levels equal to the creature's adjusted CR. Then it still derives another shiatload of bonuses from the mask. Add in a steep profane bonus to AC and I think I basically have the whole BBEG together. I finished my Epic Mirror Golem, by the way: Greater Mirror Golem (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Mirror_Golem%2C_Greater_%28DnD_Creature% 29).
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-09-08, 07:31 PM	Okay, makes more sense now. I forgot, I use a houserule that gives all Nightshades Unholy Grace and Unholy Toughness (Charisma to Ac and HP) And that golem looks awesome. Did you ever consider making it a Mirror Colossus? That might get a little out of hand though. I like that Golemblade enchantment too (although I don't see what it has to do with golems). I'd use it in my game, but it would get out of hand so fast it wouldn't even be funny. (let's see, 32d10 become 32d20, doubled, is 64d20. Ouch!) In all honesty, I think it might be a little overpowered for a +6; I think a +6 would apply if it were only +2 damage increments. The doubling seems to be worth a little more. Even with the 25 Str requirement. For comparison, Pure Orichalum gives you a x12 to base damage and requires 115 Str to wield. I still think its awesome though.
Eldritch_Lord 02-09-08, 08:31 PM	I regards to the 36 paragon hecatonchieres, I felt I had to chime in with one of my interesting encounters. I had the same kind of EPIC epic setup going, and the enemy the party faced appeared to be a single, simple, jeweled skeleton--obviously just a demilich with a body to move it around, right? They walked up to it...and died. They were rezzed...and died. It kept screwing with them for 4-5 sessions and 16-17 rezzes. A basic demilich is CR 21, and these guys were ECL 70-ish. What was the trick? They finally figured it out and almost killed me. Jeweled bone = demilich, yes, but how many bones are there in the human body? 206. :devil: [/derail]
Sulacu 02-09-08, 08:35 PM	Okay, makes more sense now. I forgot, I use a houserule that gives all Nightshades Unholy Grace and Unholy Toughness (Charisma to Ac and HP) And that golem looks awesome. Did you ever consider making it a Mirror Colossus? That might get a little out of hand though. I like that Golemblade enchantment too (although I don't see what it has to do with golems). I'd use it in my game, but it would get out of hand so fast it wouldn't even be funny. (let's see, 32d10 become 32d20, doubled, is 64d20. Ouch!) In all honesty, I think it might be a little overpowered for a +6; I think a +6 would apply if it were only +2 damage increments. The doubling seems to be worth a little more. Even with the 25 Str requirement. For comparison, Pure Orichalum gives you a x12 to base damage and requires 115 Str to wield. I still think its awesome though. Actually, the golemblade enhancement description says that 1d12 becomes 2d8, not 1d20. :P So, 32d10 would become 64d8, and doubled to 128d8. I called it golemblade because it is a large, heavy weapon that is usually difficult to wield for any creature not tailored for it, like, say, a fighting golem. Plus, I liked the name of golemblade. Heavy metal blade. I don't think I would want to make a Mirror Colossus variant, because such giant size would counteract the mirror golem's effectiveness. It needs to be able to hop in and out of battle, and use enclosed spaces to disappear between. With 9 feet, it's already plenty large. Such a monster is going to be quite very dangerous with a room full of mirrored walls and surfaces. How big would you make the cost to warrant the enhancement's effect? +10? P.S. I happen to have an undead build ready for the BBEG's lieutenant, being a corpse of 5 stitched together demiliches.
Tshern 02-09-08, 09:29 PM	However, I'm not sure what ECL you meant, but Ur-priest/RKV sounds like an incredibly cheesy build straight out of the CO boards, if you ask me. You get what you pay for. You honestly expected anything to be difficult against that? If I had players who optimized to that degree, you'd be facing something a hell-of-a-lot more deadly than a by-the-books Devastation Beatle. I am from the CO-board for sure and it might explain it. The entire point of the game was to make a ridiculously powerful characters and see how far we could go before a greater deity stomps us. It was a lot of fun really, we played our RP-parts so darn well. But yes, cheesy is the word to describe our characters.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-09-08, 09:33 PM	Well, 128d8 is nearly as bad as 64d20:P And only 5 Demiliches? Not 206?:P (I'm sure they're higher than 21 though) I'd like to see that build though; sounds devious Okay, yeah, a Mirror Colossus is a bad idea. Sorry, I'll try to stick to good advice. :weep: What do you mean by this though? How big would you make the cost to warrant the enhancement's effect? +10? What I meant was, the ability should be worth +10 for the Increase and the doubling, or +6 for the increase and +6 for the doubling maybe. I don't know, I'm not the greatest with balance in that regard. And in regards to the name, I get it, but that just doesn't strike me as "magical". I mean, Orichalum does something similar but that's a material, your ability almost seems more like a crafting process (costing the equivlent of whatever you have it obviously). I guess what I'm trying to say is that, if I was designing it, I would have the ability derive from the inherent magic of the weapon and call it Trenchant or something. But hey, your game, your ability, call it whatever you want. I have Orichalaum to do that job for me. And, god forbid I ever need it, :eek:Neutronium:eek: (http://www.immortalshandbook.com/freestuff15.htm) And, Eldritch Lord, That's sadistic! 4-5 sessions! Like 20+ hours? That's hilarious. How did he go about killing them? Just spamming death spells and MDJ? That must have been one hell of a memorable fight. Anyways though, if someone doesn't Mass Divine Blast those Hecatoncheires, the party's done for. I hope my players realize that. They don't even get experience from the damn things, but 5% of 3,600 is more than enough critical to annihilate the party. Edit- @ Thsern Yet you were going up against standard monsters? What did you expect? :rofl: Optimized Characters require Optimized Monesters; Uber Cheesy Characters require Uber Cheesy Monsters, not Standard Devastation Beatles :D Edit 2- @Sulacu I see you entered the Mirror Golem on UK's Contest. That would be awesome if it won and got in the Bestiary. (There's so many good ideas over there I think he should just put out a bestiary for the ones on that thread. Good stuff all around)
Tshern 02-09-08, 10:38 PM	My DM wanted to see how well can we do against the stuff in the Epic Level Handbook. Eventually we figured we should not go any futher, because those Prismatic dragons were nasty. Very nasty.
Sulacu 02-10-08, 07:11 AM	Woh, is that stuff for real? That is too insane to be true. xD. I mean, you may be able to hold and wield it with in excess of 250 points of Strength, but no floor will exist that can carry you. Any attempt to craft such a weapon is doomed to failure by it sinking through the ground. The only way you'd be able to wield one would be in weightless environment. Of course you'll have to weigh more than your sword unless you want to swing yourself, so you'll have to wear nutronium armor as well. You'll weigh about 300 billion tons, which means that added to all that, drift and rock and whatever will start gravitating towards you. In my experience, epic becomes boring when it becomes too exaggerated, like starring in your own Dragonball Z episode. About the golemblade enchantment, I know what you mean. It doesn't really have to be an enchantment, but I wanted it to count as such as to bestow the weapon with additional hit points. I mean, if it is the equivalent of a +10 enhancement, a golemblade greatsword has a minimum of 120 hp. And that is a good thing, because they are large and heavy weapons, meaning they should not be easily sundered. Also, making it an enhancement serves to make it a bit more exclusive, else it'd likely be a lot cheaper and every Half-Minotaur and his mother will be walking around with golemblade greataxes. And yes, I put it in his contest :P. The mirror golem is one of my most rounded creations, or so I feel, so it was worth a try.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-10-08, 08:36 AM	Oh, don't get me wrong. Super-duper High Level Immortals Handbook play is about as cheesy at it gets. Say you're Medium size and somehow have 250 STR, okay. Well, in his system you get Virtual Size Categories for every 15 points of strength above what's normal for your size (10 for Med). So, you would actually weigh as much as a Mega-Medium creautre, which is 16 Size categories higher. (And probably weighs enough anywyas, but my IH is on loan, so I can't check) Either way though, the only time that will see use is in a game involving either Sidereals (Overgods), Demiurge (Super Overgods), Time Lords (Sentient Universes), or High Lords (Multiple Sentient Universes). ECL ranging from 200 to 2000 thereabout, I think. And at that point, your adventuring in space, or in different dimensions. (Not Planes, all of the Planar Sphere is one Dimesnion. I think there are 11 in total) Case in point, by the time you can really wield it, you'll have abilities like, I kid you not, "Infinite Strength", which reads, "Your Strength Score is, for all intents and purposes, Infinite". And that's a very weak Transcendental Ability. Even his system only works up to about level 200 or so before ripping itself apart, and even that requires player policing. After that, it just becomes theoretical and/or silly. Have a look around these boards for the thread "Pun Pun versus the Mortiverse" for a perfect example of just how stupidly cheesy Time Lords and the like are. (I think Mortiverse is 88 univverses, and has a CR so high that I don't even know what to call the number.) I mean, it can be fun to mess around at those levles, but I think it would be seriously hard to have a campaign. But come on, who doesn't to be able to say, "I use my Omnific Blast for 870d1000" at least once. :D Good luck on your entry too.
Sulacu 02-10-08, 10:01 AM	I don't see how strength can be infinite without breaking everything. Infinite strength means infinite attack and damage, right? I don't know how many cardinalities of infinity that Immortal's Handbook employs, but by that time you can simply cleave the multiverse in two and be done with it, right? Also, my Quintumvirate of Demiliches hit a snag. I don't really know how to stat it out, considering we're talking about five creatures making up one body. Luckily, I have plenty of time figuring that one out. Unlike with the annihilator, the Quintumvirate is equivalent to a medium creature and thus you can't choose what part of it to hit. I did think about the following. Demilich (head) controls the body and holds sovereignty over the demiliches (hands and feet). Cumulative +10 profane bonus to AC for every demilich attached. Cumulative fast healing 10 and regeneration 10/good and silver for every demilich attached. Cumulative +6 Int/Wis/Cha for every demilich attached (next to the head) One extra turn (with full actions) for every additional demilich attached (next to the head) Only demilich (head) can attack physically (with the entire body), but only given that it has both legs and at least 1 arm. Using those constraints, I think I should go about designing it.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-10-08, 10:49 AM	Looks good for the Demilich Quintumvirate. Maybe +10 Int/Wis/Cha per Demilich, since that's what the template gives? If you wanted to be really nasty, for its Regenration, make it Major Good and Silver, requiring a Holy Power weapon instead of just a Holy Weapon. But that's just a houserule I use. And, for the infinities question, you're still thinking inside the box. Its not a matter of cleaving the Universe in two (Hell, that's exactly what you're trying to do when you attack a Time Lord) I would worry more about cleaving the Omniverse in twain. (Which even they can't accomplish reliably) You have to remember, you're playing a Sentient Universe. Also, the "Infinite [Ability]" abilities are just a kind of "auto-succeed" if you will. Underneath the infinity, a Time Lord still has a Strength score or what not. (Usually in the high thousands, unless you're Mortiverse, who has a 30digit number wherever possible:eek: ) And the infinities cancel each other out, so if one TL has Infinite Strength, and another TL has Infinite Constitution, he still auto hits (Unless the TL has Infinite Dex as well) but the two are nullified and they use their base stats. I'm not entirely sure how it works though, since I missed the chance to buy the PDF of Ascension. I only know what I've seen on the boards. (But damnit I can't wait for the print copy to come out) It is silly though. I mean, what kind of adventures does a Time Lord go on? I mean, you can only "Stop the invading hosts of Nonexistence before they tear apart All Creation" so many times.
Sulacu 02-10-08, 11:35 AM	I don't know exactly what the template gives, but +10 per extra demilich is fine. That'll give it a massive Int 79, and I'll give all five liches about 40 caster levels. Demilich (head)'s feats and skills and abilities pertain to the whole body, and the four demiliches (hands and feet) will have their own seperate feats. All of them will have three Automatic Quickens and one instance of Multispell, giving the whole ten spells per round. Furthermore, I think I'm going to rule that everytime you lower the hit points of the quintumvirate to 0, one demilich detaches and can then be killed individually. At that point, the remainder of the quintumvirate once again gains full hp and the party has to do it again until only the head is left. And I don't know what quests a Time Lord goes on. I mean, Galactus himself has only one quest, which is devouring whole planets, and the quest isn't all that fun. :P
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-10-08, 11:50 AM	Nice. Is it just going to be the Demilich then or will he have servants too? And Galactus (http://www.immortalshandbook.com/freestuff16.htm) is only a Sidereal (Divine Rank 32) by IH standards, not a Time Lord. (Divine Rank 64+) :P
Sulacu 02-10-08, 12:11 PM	A creature that survived the previous big crunch, only DR 32 you say? My bad x.x :) Anyway, the Quintumvirate is going to be challenged in his own necropolis, which basically means he'll have an almost limitless supply of corpses to animate. So yes. A large army of heavily advanced undead is going to be there to make things difficult.
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-10-08, 12:19 PM	Any Atropals at all? Those would make the lesser undead a lot more dangerous.
Sulacu 02-10-08, 12:37 PM	Didn't think about that, to be honest, but adding two or so of those could really help, indeed. I also thought about making a gloom coven further down the road perhaps. The players really like the setting so it's possible that we will drag it out a long time, plus this shadow world that we've gone to is nice and gritty. When we reach the City of Crucible, a group of five or so Glooms advanced to about 50 HD will ambush them.
Eldritch_Lord 02-10-08, 12:46 PM	And, Eldritch Lord, That's sadistic! Thank you. :D 4-5 sessions! Like 20+ hours? Yep. Around 28 hours total, if I remember correctly. That's hilarious. How did he go about killing them? Just spamming death spells and MDJ? That must have been one hell of a memorable fight. Oh it was, it was....I've got the whole thing written down from the battle. Basically, to make a memorable boss fight, I keep as many abilities in reserve to be surprises. The first fight was simply a single widened disjunction from the head and 205 widened maximized empowered twinned energy admixed (acid) energy admixed (sonic) energy admixed (cold) energy admixed (electricity) fireballs from the others. All of the demiliches had Enhance Spell, ISC (10), and 3 Improved Metamagics, so that was easily doable for them and did upwards of 29000 damage, blowing through what little protection was left after the disjunction (though all the PCs had immunity to at least 2 energy types from templates) and KO'ing them in 1 round. For round 2, after the contingent resurrections and contingent teleports kicked in, they realized they were seriously outgunned. (Hey, they said they wanted to fight the most powerful creature in the multiverse....) They looked up the demilich's (they still thought it was just 1) immunities (many) and vulnerabilities (few), specced up on anti-undead spells and items, and headed out again. Predictably, they focused on offense and forgot some defenses. Like protection against disjunction and the fact that death ward doesn't matter after you're hit by one. One disjunction and 205 fingers of death later, it was back to the drawing board. DING DING DING! Round 3. They finally got immunity to disjunction and headed out again. They had been winning easily up to this point, so none of them had needed to nova. They looked up the best nova strategies, "surprised" the demiliches, unloaded a nova, and destroyed them...only to find out that all demiliches know astral projection. Death number 3. At this point, the party realized that destroying the baddies (now they knew there were multiple ones) would do no good if they didn't find and destroy the phylactery, so the casters brute-force divined the phylacteries' locations (yes, locations, plural :devil:), and nova-d and rested in a timeless plane until all were destroyed...only to be ambushed at the last spot by the BBEG. Death number 4. They headed out again, and were promptly nova-d by the BBEG. Death number 5. Mind you, the lich hasn't regained spells since death #1 at this point. Round 6. They find the BBEG, figure out it's astral projecting, go find the bodies, and prepare to take out the defenseless BBEG...only to have the projected form ambush and kill them from behind. Round 7. This time they took a timeout to plan and figure out what went wrong. (The BBEG regained spells here. :devil:) They summoned some solars to go with them (12, I believe) and found the BBEG again...only to find that there weren't a dozen or so demiliches like they thought but 206 baddies. The solars were easily wiped and the party died again. Round 8. They found the lich again, avoided the astral projection, found the body, and avoided an ambush until they could take out 5 of the demiliches. Then they died again. Round 9. Repeat of round 8--they finally figured out how to hide from the BBEG. Took out 5 more demiliches. The BBEG now has no toes. :weep: Round 10. Almost-repeat of round 9. However, one of the 7 they "destroyed" actually went invisible and split up from the rest. Remember that. Round 11. The demilich followed them to home base and nova-d them. Round 12. The PCs try for a war of attrition, hoping to wear down the spells until they could just kill them at leisure. They chased and were chased all over that world's equivalents to Mechanus and Acheron, but eventually they were cornered and killed. Round 14. They discovered, to their chagrin, that the demilich that escaped in round 10 had built a new phylactery and was using illusions to swap out with some of the others and let them rebuild theirs. Yay for timeless planes--by the time the PCs figured it out, the remaining 189 all had their phylacteries back. Death #14. Round 15. Thanks to attrition and guerrilla tactics, the PCs were able to wipe out the new phylacteries and kill another 106 demiliches, bringing them down to 83. This was the entire second-to-last session right here, and it was amazing. They still died, though. :D Round 16. After their huge defeat in the last round, the liches focused more on defense. With a few epic spells and items (few? okay, lots), their HP shot into the 1000s (around 1500) and it seemed like they'd never be defeated. One by two by two dozen, the demiliches dropped, until there were only 5 left, the party was down to 80-90 HP each, and both the BBEG and the party casters were down to 1st level spells, except for 1 epic spell each they were saving for an absolute last resort; they couldn't be sure if they would have a chance to regain spells, so they wanted to hold something in reserve just in case. The non-casters of course were just whittling away at the BBEG at this point, and the PCs were out of active contingent resurrections, so this was literally the last battle. The PCs dipped into their reserves, and pulled out every last wand and scroll, their staffs being long since used up at this point. Working together, they finally got the BBEG down to the last demilich, who still had >1000 HP. Unfortunately for them, the BBEG finally managed to trap the soul of 2 of the PCs. The PCs were literally down to their last wand, with no other charged or otherwise offensive items left, and it was a wand of dimension door. Right before he was trap the soul'd as well, the party cleric managed to get the wand to the wizard, then as his final act cast his only contingent resurrection on the wizard, and wizard used the wand to get out of the demilich's range. Finally, the piece de resistance: the wizard was out of options and double checked his character sheet...only to find that in all the excitement he'd forgotten that what he thought was an epic mage armor in reserve was in fact his vengeful gaze of god, researched for just this eventuality. With the demilich only 15 feet away and closing, he cast the vengeful gaze of god, killing the BBEG with only 3 or 4 HP to spare, and killing himself in the process. When he was resurrected, he regained spells, gated back to the Material Plane, and had the rest of them true resurrected. Then they ascended to be overdeities and the campaign ended. It was the most epic campaign we have ever done, and we haven't played epic since then because we don't think we could ever beat that. It's amazing what severely overmatched PCs can do with a bit of planning and perseverance. Hope you liked the story. :D
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-10-08, 05:57 PM	That.... that was AMAZING! That last fight sounds like the most memorable battle anyone could ever fight in this game. Unbelievable. I envy you. In other news, I ran my ECL 120 God-fortress today. It went more or less as I expected. I had to pull my punches alot, and consequently got annihilated when I did so, no happy medium. If anyone want's to hear more, I'll post the details, but suffice it to say, 1 character broke every damage record I've ever seen in my games-- by a factor of 10. With 1 round of attacks, the bar went from 18,000 to 189,000 damage. Suffice it to say, I ruled that the target's atoms were dissolved and that his Contingent Ressurection would not activate.
Sulacu 02-10-08, 06:39 PM	Heh, the stuff that the two of you are talking about just like that goes right over my head, but on the other hand, I did build another creature. This creature is not meant for my campaign, but rather just for fun. Big McLargeHuge (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Big_McLargeHuge_%28DnD_Creature%29)
Eldritch_Lord 02-10-08, 06:49 PM	That.... that was AMAZING! That last fight sounds like the most memorable battle anyone could ever fight in this game. Unbelievable. I envy you. :tie: Thank you, thank you. In other news, I ran my ECL 120 God-fortress today. It went more or less as I expected. I had to pull my punches alot, and consequently got annihilated when I did so, no happy medium. If anyone want's to hear more, I'll post the details, but suffice it to say, 1 character broke every damage record I've ever seen in my games-- by a factor of 10. With 1 round of attacks, the bar went from 18,000 to 189,000 damage. Suffice it to say, I ruled that the target's atoms were dissolved and that his Contingent Ressurection would not activate. Post it! If we don't have details, it didn't happen. :D
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-10-08, 08:02 PM	Nice work Sulacu. That might very well be the first Epic Giant I've ever seen. (The Mountain Giant in MM2 doesn't count). I like it. Now, for the re-cap (this'll be long) First, the party. 3 members 1. God of Swordsmanship and Champion of Creation- L100 DvR 9, Gestalt between a whole bunch of custom melee classes on one side and all Paladin on the other. Lots of Smite Damage and the like. 2. Anomaly of Fate- abomination who managed to aquire the sundered divinity of the previous pantheon, granting him DvR 20. 100HD, Quckened Wish, Miracle, and Reality Revision at will. (Can duplicate any spell with a level under 100:eek: ) Caster type. Keep in mind, those 2 were designed by me, more as NPCs and part of the story. The third was a character my frind made on his own just for this rush. 3. Destroyer- plain and simple, this guy was hell-on-wheels. Wielded and Unerring Pure Orichalum Greatsword (only can miss on a Natural 1), full power attacking and leap attacking, UNGODLY (and I mean that in every sense of the word) damage. Total destruction. He just couldn't move more than 30ft a round:D :P So, fight 1 Great Wyrm Void Dragon (Supposed CR 260, More like 160 if you ask me) From the IH, in case you're wondering. Highlights- Breathweapon- Permanently annihilates 20d6 HD, ignores Negative Energy Immunity. Abrogate- Anyone within 1000 ft has their most powerful ability nullified. (No save) Unknowing- anyone within 1000 ft takes a -72 penalty on EVERYTHING So... this went horrible. The thing flies 14,400 ft around. It could have crushed them easily. 26000 hp, Sr 270, they had no chance. I went super easy on them, didn't use the breath weapon and stayed in melee. They eventually knokced its Hps down. Not a good start at all. (didn't want to annihilate them on the first fight) Fight 2 A little NPC i made named Valmyrix, the Umbra of Discord Highlights- can use 140th CL Utterdark at will. Can Shadow Jump (and fly-by attack) 500,000 ft/day Deals double damage in areas of darkness Heals every damage point dealt. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! This would have been TPK right here. He just floated 10 miles away and kept jumping back and forth. Killed the DvR 20 right off the bat. (Sneak Attack 71d6 +71 vile, all opponents always flat-footed) So, I had to go easy once again and have him go melee. He lasted a few rounds, his 61% miss chance keeping him alive, allowing him to lash out with his Entropic Blast for 570 permanent damage to the party. In the end though, he fell and the DvR's Contingent Resurrection activated and they moved on. Fight 3- Hell yeah! This one was fun Like I told earlier, the Untrammeled Titan of Oblivion with 36 Paragon hecatoncheires. So, first off, the DvR 20's Divine Blast only half their health, so he had to cast Intensified TIme Stop and throw a whole bunch of meta-magicmagicked Delayed Blast Fireballs to finish the job. Then, VOID BREATH! 1000 Permanent damage to the whole party. and then, HAHAHAHAHAHA! Alter Reality-Undo Misfortune: All 36 Hecatoncheires spring back to life. So... a desperate battle commences, trying to bring down the TItan of Oblivion. They find out that they need to knock him down to -6200 hp and WIsh him dead. So they do that, with the Destroyer killing himself through the thing's retribution effect. So, thinking they've won they turn to disptch the Hecatoncheires. BAM! Contingent Resurrection. This ****** them off to no end, promting another Intensified Time Stop followed by 100 Delayed Banishments, of whihc only 5 passed SR, Miss CHance, and Save, suceeding in exiling the creautre back to the Cosmic Void. *WHEW!* Fight 4- Ra'Va'Grale the Godbane- Paragon Storm Giant 100HD Ur-priest/Balck Guard/ Godslayer (http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=925446&highlight=godslayer) with Anti-Divine Rank 9 (functions as DvR but isn;t inhibited by his abilities.) Starts off, uses Annihilating Strike on the ground, forcing both gos into a 100ft deep hole and proceeds to Smite the hell out of the DvR 9, killing him insantly. But then, OMFG UBERPWNAGE! The Destroyer (who is mortal) lets loose and "Reaps the Slaughterous Harvest" dealing 180,000 damage and pulverizing his atoms. :weep: :weep: Fight 5- Ah, here I got serious. The miniboss. 140 HD Dvr 9 AntiDvR 9, full Wizard and CLeric casting up to 80th level spells, 10 multipspells and 10 Improved Metamagics. Opens with an Artifact that drains the DvR 20's divinity and knocks him comatose. Then uses Imprisonment on the Destroyer. Leaving the DvR9, he gloats and hits him with Magic Missile... for 1500 Damage!!!! Dvr 9 goes to Disarm the orb, and succeeds in sundering it and returning the DvR 20 to the fight, who promtply Frees the Destroyer. At this time, the boss uses Greater Celerity + Timestop and casts a Ward vs Disjunction, Etherealness, Displacement, Greater Blink, and Greater Mirror Image, then using up the rest of his turns to cast Metamagicked Crushing Fist of Spite (BoVD) on the DvR 20, who dies instantly. In response, the Destroyer once more "Reaps the Slaughterous Harvest" and, after 15 attacks, finally magaes to get through all 4 miss chances and lanf a critcal hit, killing the miniboss. They then go on to the actual boss Fight 5- 150 Hd DvR 18 Virtual Barbarian and Balckguard levels, Deathless Frenzy. Battle begins. He charges, crits with his artifact blade and annihilates the DvR 9's soul permanently. He then power attacks the destroyer for some horrific amount of damage, which should have killed him. However, the Destroyer has 10 levels of FB and enters his own Deathless Frenzy. So the two duke it for a round, and then we decide to just determine who outlasts the other. Turns out his constitution was 2 points higher than my god's :weep: So, I exploded after 60 rounds having taken upwards of 15,000,000 damage. The Destroyer, of course, was Epic Healed by the DvR 20 1 round later, so they claimed victory. So, moral of the story, I guess: There's a good reason why abilities like "Epic Critical", "Ultrakeen", "Extreme Speed" and "Reaping the Slaughterous Harvest" are bad ideas. If not for that Destroyer, the party would have had no chance. As it was, I was pulling my punches severely, escpecially with the miniboss, who basically toyed with them. It was fun, but I'd be leery to play that high again. Sorry for writing so much though.:D
Sulacu 02-11-08, 09:01 AM	With the battle against my Quintumvirate comes closer, I have been thinking about how to make it more effective, and how to give my players a real good and long winding. So, in addition to thinking about stats and templates, I've been thinking about effective class levels to give it. We're basically talking about five integrated characters, each with about 40 class levels. This gives me the chance of combining class features like crazy. I have made several classes over the time that I have been playing, and I wonder if I should give the quintumvirate (or part of it) one or more of the following: Classes Deviant (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Deviant_%28DnD_Class%29): Not really useful in a fight, but emanations and what not make up for that. High Priest (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/High_Priest_%28DnD_Class%29): Divine caster with spontaneous domains Shaman (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Shaman_%28DnD_Class%29): What it says. Probably not a good idea since the quintumvirate is undead. x.x Prestige Classes Arcane Savant (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Arcane_Savant_%28DnD_Prestige_Class%29): Mystic Theurge, but then with prepared arcane and spontaneous arcane Cloaktower Watchman (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Cloaktower_Watchman_%28DnD_Prestige_Clas s%29): Spell duelist extraordinaire. Staffshaper (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Staffshaper_%28DnD_Prestige_Class%29): Self-Explanatory Tell me what you think. :P
Eldritch_Lord 02-11-08, 01:03 PM	@PrinceoftheVoid: Man, what an anti-climax! I thought your party's fight would blow mine out of the water, but you were still pulling punches. They must not be that optimized; I can't believe a bunch of 3 L100 GESTALT builds with divine ranks would have problems with anything short of more of the same. Particularly #2: Any spell under 100th level!? He should have won by himself! Ah, well. It was good reading anyway.
Sulacu 02-11-08, 02:36 PM	@PrinceoftheVoid: Man, what an anti-climax! I thought your party's fight would blow mine out of the water, but you were still pulling punches. They must not be that optimized; I can't believe a bunch of 3 L100 GESTALT builds with divine ranks would have problems with anything short of more of the same. Particularly #2: Any spell under 100th level!? He should have won by himself! Ah, well. It was good reading anyway. Oi pal, I enjoy your conversation and all, but this is still my thread, for my epic campaign stuff :P. New prestige class: Fleshcrafter (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Fleshcrafter_%28DnD_Prestige_Class%29)!
PrinceOfTheVoid 02-11-08, 07:41 PM	:( Sorry for derailing Won't happen again, promise. Sulacu, you're either one of the most creative people I've ever made the aquiantance of or you're a masochist. You really love game desgin, huh? If it was me, I wouldn't waste the time with the class write-ups for BBEGs and the like, but I'm lazy. (Not to say that my CS lacks detail, since I'm working on my second full length novel for it [check my sig for a few short samples]. It gets plenty of detail, just not DnD rules for everything.) The more power to you though, that just grounds everything even further in rules when you use it and adds to your campaign's depth. So when do we get to see the Demilich Quintumvirate?
Sulacu 02-11-08, 07:56 PM	Heh, I like giving people something to work with. I don't want things that I make to die with one usage, which is why I became a member of dandwiki and other places where I could submit my work. And it works out fine. :P So, every time I make something I hope that, after I'm done using it, other people find uses for it in my stead. That alone would be enough justification for me to design classes, creatures, templates and what not else. Oh, the demilich quintumvirate is not going to be very special statwise. I'll likely post it once I make it though.
Eldritch_Lord 02-11-08, 09:04 PM	Oi pal, I enjoy your conversation and all, but this is still my thread, for my epic campaign stuff :P. :allalone: Sorry. [/derail] Well, I'm looking to seeing this much-vaunted Quintumvirate in action.
Sulacu 03-05-08, 02:10 PM	Well, almost off the first page, this topic was. Anyway, I haven't finalized the stats of my quintumvirate yet, but I have been thinking about how to make him more dangerous. The first thought was epic ritual spells with additional spell slot contributors. If the head casts a spell, the limbs can assist all too easily. My first creation was the Sunfire Orb (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Sunfire_Orb_%28DnD_Spell%29), which I thought would come in handy quite a bit since quite a few members in the party didn't yet have fire immunity.
PrinceOfTheVoid 03-05-08, 02:27 PM	Maybe an ad-hoc factor to make it do Hellfire damage? Or would that be innappropriate? As far as I know, nothing short of a Divine Shield can resist that. (Although certain devils should probably be immune) Does he have a Ward against Disjunction? Make sure to Ward the Ward too. Not sure if I mentioned it, but I prefer my BBEG spellcasters too buff with Greater Ironguard and Effulgent Epuration, which at least forces the party to think a little if they want to harm it. Combine those with Demilich immunities and he's probably nigh-invincible. And if he's losing bad, you could always Gate in something with double his HD. That's always fun.
Sulacu 03-05-08, 02:43 PM	That would be inappropriate because the origin of the fire is the Elemental Plane of Fire, not Baator. But I did think about making half the damage irreducible. I thought I called it 'primal fire', or something. Either way, I'm thinking of making up a whole lot of epic spells so that all five members of the quintumvirate have like two unique epic spells they can use. Sadly, that takes a lot of time. :P
Eldritch_Lord 03-08-08, 01:57 PM	That would be inappropriate because the origin of the fire is the Elemental Plane of Fire, not Baator. But I did think about making half the damage irreducible. I thought I called it 'primal fire', or something. Either way, I'm thinking of making up a whole lot of epic spells so that all five members of the quintumvirate have like two unique epic spells they can use. Sadly, that takes a lot of time. :P I'm sure other Epic forumgoers would be happy to help you come up with some of those spells.