Post/Author/DateTime	Post
_m_ 12-07-06, 11:44 PM	I was going to hijack the kobold thread, but that would be mean, so: Most horendous way in which you have seen a pc die, most hardcore moster that has killed a pc (not one that was killed with no casualties, we dont care how many times you DIDNT die) weakest monster that has killed a pc. most rediculously funny / amusing / pointless way youve seen a pc die. you dont have to answer them all (or any actually, its somewhat voluntary in fact)
Britt 12-07-06, 11:52 PM	Fiendish Kraken of Legend. Our party never had to fight it, but we spent a ton of time trying to figure out how, just in case. It was one of the hardest to figure out a way to beat, as well.
Jay_Ibero_911 12-07-06, 11:55 PM	Well...Dune Stalkers from MM2 are rediculous...save or die every round and even if you save you are stunned...My only LG PC death was in an interactive and cause by 3 Vasuthants advanced to large size...at APL 8...likely would have been a TPK if not for the paladin with the divine feat making him immune to the ability damage effects of the creatures...made an all day sucker out of my fighter/monk...Then of course in one mod a friend's Pixie Cohort got vaporized by a maximizde breath weapon...
_m_ 12-07-06, 11:57 PM	Well...Dune Stalkers from MM2 are rediculous...save or die every round and even if you save you are stunned...My only LG PC death was in an interactive and cause by 3 Vasuthants advanced to large size...at APL 8...likely would have been a TPK if not for the paladin with the divine feat making him immune to the ability damage effects of the creatures...made an all day sucker out of my fighter/monk...Then of course in one mod a friend's Pixie Cohort got vaporized by a maximizde breath weapon... we saw a level 8 ranger go down in 1 round to a twin suprise charge from: an elite displacer beast, and ... a VERY elite advanced displacer beast. 1 apl up, and it was an UUBER elite advanced displacer beast. funny.
Britt 12-08-06, 12:01 AM	I know those displacer beasts, if that's one of the ones I edited. You should have seen the playtest version :)
_m_ 12-08-06, 12:08 AM	I know those displacer beasts, if that's one of the ones I edited. You should have seen the playtest version :) lol i can imagine. we had 350 hp to get through at apl 6. i would not like to have seen the playtest, especially given the last playtest i played had our whole party so close to extinction that its a wonder the characters didnt simply die of surprise when they finished it.
Lomiat 12-08-06, 12:16 AM	Ridiculous death: In the World Game Day mod, the archer PC walked away from one of the Dread Guards With Big Axe, needlessly provoking an AoO, which, of course, proceeded to crit. Dead archer. Weakest monster to kill a PC: Our table was TPK'd by a bunch of kobolds. We fought them at a choke-point in a tunnel, so I had my cleric order a retreat. Half the party immediately retreated, but the two fighters in the front (only one of which threatened the kobolds) decided to stay in melee a little longer. The next round, the front fighter dropped. The second-rank fighter started dragging him back to the larger room where the rest of us had retreated (we had a table of 4 or 5 PCs). The kobolds kept plinking away and dropped that fighter about 10 feet from the room. Heroically, my cleric and the other PC rushed to aid our fallen comrades and were, of course, killed. Hardcore: APL 4) A giant in armor with 21+ AC, 80+ hitpoints, attacks at +18 /+13 for 3d6+13 a swing. Our DM was averaging something like 25 HPs per swing. This at an APL when our fighter had 30-something. The fighter dropped. AC 26 wasn't nearly good enough. APL 6) Some kind of huge, half-dragon, grappling water serpent in a combat (surprise!) with the PCs on a small boat with little room to move or ability to reach the baddie. First round: druid starts summoning 3 hippogriffs; serpent flies over and knocks the druid's companion well into negatives, and given that the companion was the dire bat upon which the halfling druid was flying, the druid was rather lucky to concentrate to finish the spell. Second round, 3 hippogriffs appear, attempt to attack, and are all killed as they move into the serpent's reach. Combat Reflexes strikes again! Our party tries to stay at a distance, but we're on a boat and slower than the flying serpent anyway. The cleric who cast Shield Other on my rogue takes 15+ points of damage (only half of the total, remember) when the serpent breaths its line of energy. Add this to the 30 or so the cleric takes. Then the cleric charges into combat to aid the bard (player's wife), gets hit, and dies. APL 8) Highfolk battle interactive. Apparently, we were making the APL 8 ogres and trolls look bad. Our DM called for a "special" monster, and in the next wave of baddies, a bugbear joined the ranks of the trolls and ogres. Our barbarian/scout charged the bugbear, missed, and then heard something like, "Does a 37 hit? Does a 34 hit? Take 34 damage. Do you cast spells? No. Okay. Take 34 more damage." He was dead, and the Bugbear of Legend took his final attack on him just for good measure. Then it went after two casters, promptly mashing both, averaging something like 45 HPs a swing.
Lomiat 12-08-06, 12:20 AM	I know those displacer beasts, if that's one of the ones I edited. You should have seen the playtest version :) The displacer beasts weren't scary in our run through the mod, but our party watched as an advanced behir took its AoO on the charging Wildrunner (the scariest melee character in the entire region), proceeded to grapple him like a rag doll, then rake him into such tiny shreds, it was a wonder Delay Death had anything to target. This was, of course, after my wizard had told the entire party to "stay back. I'll deal with this." (which, of course, he did--but that's a different story) At any rate, the Wildrunner, Cuz, has now learned the "don't charge anything larger than a Coke can" rule, refering to the fact that a Coke can on a battle mat is effectively a huge creature...
ShinAkuma2 12-08-06, 12:24 AM	The weakest TPK I've ever seen was 2 Monks, a cleric, and a two-weapon fighter vs some Goblins at an APL2 mod. They murdered us. It turned out the DM accidentally ran gnomes instead (they're adjacent in the MM), which are a tiny bit stronger, but still...We were pathetic. The DM allowed us a redo with riding dogs...We survived that time. The nastiest death I've ever seen was against a Corpse Collector. I won't spoil the mod it's in or even the situation you're up against, but I will say that it was ridiculously hard, and one of the best front-liners I've seen went down hard, but by gum, he nearly took the CC down with him. I was next in line, if not for the glorious soft cover rules.
DuctShuiTengu 12-08-06, 12:31 AM	Nastiest Death: Illithid Monk. There's just something terribly wrong about flurried brain-sucking. Hardcore Monster: Vampire Blackguard Spirited Charging and smiting good while mounted on a Nightmare. And I had to go and be the one who'd reduced his mount to single-digits via arrows prior to his init. :elf: Funny/Weakest: orc barbarian gets sick and dies after being bit by dire badger. Last words (prior to raise dead) quoted as "Don't worry, I'm good at Fort saves. Weakest to happen to me: Level 1 Orc Barbarian with a Scythe. My char was level 5 at the time. DM: Right, so this orc will run around the rest of the party to get to you, since you're the one who keeps shooting his boss the mage. *rolls to hit* ... nat 20. Oh well, he probably won't confi- ... that's an 18 on the die. Does a 24 confirm? Me: Squishy archer here. :elf: The number you were looking for was 21. DM: Oh... well, hopefully he won't roll too high on damage *rolls*. 7... 5... 6... 3. 57 total? Me: Yeah... That's plenty. DM: you're down? Me: If by "down" you mean lying on the ground in two pieces. Rediculously pointless: Toss up Contestant #1: TPK by burning building while trying to rescue a cat. Contestant #2: first death of aforementioned elfy archer. First combat of mod forces us all into melee. My char loses about half his hitpoints. Post combat, cleric asks if anyone needs healing. I speak up as do two other PCs. Other PCs get healing. Cleric asks if there's anyone else. I again remind that I'm still badly hurt. Cleric anounces that since there's no-one else who needs healing (I again protest and am ignored), we should keep going. Second combat. 4 huge skeleton/golem things. I roll a 1 on init. The rest of the party charges the one on the end. The remaining 3 charge me. I get lucky and only get hit by one of them the first round. Rest of the party :censored:-foots around with remaining one critter, while I full defense and pray, and miraculously survive for another 4 rounds before being dropped to -12. Combat ends with rest of the party nuking the critters the following round. :tantrum::censored::rant::censored: :rant::censored::hoppingma:censored: :headexplo
Reska 12-08-06, 01:29 AM	My most embarrasing death? Killed by a table leg. An Animated Table Leg. Boom...Crit...-15. Dead.
Gwumph 12-08-06, 03:35 AM	So for me, some evil mod writer decided to add a fiendish template to an assassin vine. At APL 4 gave the vine the Dash feat (so it can now charge 20 feet) and doubled it’s reach to 30 feet. Also vine did 1D8+13 points damage and then automatically constricted for same damage again. That’s enough to drop a lv 4 tank in 1 round let alone a lv 4 squishy Party was 50 feet away and felt reasonably secure. Little did they know the party spellcaster was going die in less than 6 seconds and the rest running for their lives. That monster was a TPKer since it had a reasonable chance of killing a lv 4 character in a single attack, making an attack of opportunity, killing with is AoO. In 2 rounds that vine could kill or disable four lv 4 PC’s without breaking a sweat. Nasty nasty monster!!!
paigeoliver 12-08-06, 04:45 AM	I was playing a rather unscrupulous character in a module where we had a box of starmetal that we were supposed to deliver to someone and NOT OPEN*****. We were in the Inn and I was the one carrying the starmetal. I wanted to open the box, the other characters at the very least wanted to do it in a room that they were not in. So I said I would go down and get another room. I went down to the ground level, walked out the door, got on my horse and immediately headed for home. No one else in the party even owned a horse, and my character had lied to the party about both her name and homeland, so the GM ruled that they weren't going to be able to catch me. So I opened the box at home, several kingdoms away from the normal setting of the module, and a blue slaad jumped out of the box and killed me in front of my whole family. And then my family sold the box of starmetal to buy the reincarnate scroll!! ***** By the way. The BOX THAT SHOULD NOT BE OPENED is probably the most tired and overused plot in Living Greyhawk. While not frustrating like the next most overused plot (mysteries that have no reason for the characters to WANT to be involved), it is still done way too much. If you were thinking about writing a "don't open the box" module, then you should really reconsider it. "Delivering the magic box" modules often have this giant gaping plot hole in that either the sender or receiver of the box is almost always a high level spellcaster capable of just teleporting the box there in the first place.
wooti 12-08-06, 08:43 AM	So for me, some evil mod writer decided to add a fiendish template to an assassin vine. At APL 4 gave the vine the Dash feat (so it can now charge 20 feet) and doubled it’s reach to 30 feet. Also vine did 1D8+13 points damage and then automatically constricted for same damage again. That’s enough to drop a lv 4 tank in 1 round let alone a lv 4 squishy Party was 50 feet away and felt reasonably secure. Little did they know the party spellcaster was going die in less than 6 seconds and the rest running for their lives. That monster was a TPKer since it had a reasonable chance of killing a lv 4 character in a single attack, making an attack of opportunity, killing with is AoO. In 2 rounds that vine could kill or disable four lv 4 PC’s without breaking a sweat. Nasty nasty monster!!! Please be careful about giving away too much infomation, this mod is still active. (You are right the vine is just not right, and you should have seen the surprize I got running it at apl 8 when I played at apl 2, it just gets worse at higher apls)
paigeoliver 12-08-06, 08:56 AM	Hee, hee. I one-hitted that vine with a spirited charge character in the first round. The GM was rather disappointed. :P
trollbill 12-08-06, 09:31 AM	So for me, some evil mod writer decided to add a fiendish template to an assassin vine. At APL 4 gave the vine the Dash feat (so it can now charge 20 feet) and doubled it’s reach to 30 feet. Also vine did 1D8+13 points damage and then automatically constricted for same damage again. That’s enough to drop a lv 4 tank in 1 round let alone a lv 4 squishy Party was 50 feet away and felt reasonably secure. Little did they know the party spellcaster was going die in less than 6 seconds and the rest running for their lives. That monster was a TPKer since it had a reasonable chance of killing a lv 4 character in a single attack, making an attack of opportunity, killing with is AoO. In 2 rounds that vine could kill or disable four lv 4 PC’s without breaking a sweat. Nasty nasty monster!!! Could be worse. It could have had Combat Reflexes.
jstorrie 12-08-06, 10:52 AM	APL2 during Zeif interactive - party of four 1s and 2s walks into room filled with eighteen hostile slavers carrying merciful spiked chains. Nearly all carted off to a horrible slavey fate, when one of the other (APL14) parties accidentally splits its encounter up with a wall of force, sending a mind flayer wandering down through our area, who proceeds to mindblast the whole room because he doesn't have time to deal with 'inconsequential fleshbags.'
Japangirl 12-08-06, 01:42 PM	Weakest Death I've seen: Dwarf fighter with 20 con is getting nuked by a sorceror. He's a badlands dwarf though, so he doesn't take a lot of damage from the burning hands spells, but he finally does go unconscious. He makes the stabilize roll. The sorc walks over and BOOM coup de'grace in front of the horrified eyes of the two of us still up. He does a whopping 2d4-2 points of damage, for three whole points of damage. The dwarf dies in the round we finally make a deal, bleeding out because of the coup de'grace. Worst monster: APL 4, vampire with 4 fighter levels. It didn't help that the DM ran it wrong and every attack was doing the level drain (he had two a round but I'm not sure how), or that our fighter was an idiot without silvered weapons or silversheen. Only not a TPK because the cleric cast obscuring mist so we could run away. We had trouble with the displacer beasts at my table, but I was playing my wizard that mod. The one with 23 int (grey elf, +2 headband, +1 level bump) and about 3-4 glitterdusts as lvl 2 spells prepped. Blinded displacer beasts standing right next to a cleric going full defensive with ring of blades up aren't nearly as scary.
tvknight415 12-08-06, 01:51 PM	I don't quite know what category these should fall into, but I'll list the memorable ones... On the elemental plane of fire, fighting an Ancient Red Dragon with lots of buffs and some class levels, hiding in a pool of molten silver. Paladin/sorcerer is flying, has true strike on, divine sacrifice, full power attack, and smite. Goes charging in and rolls a nat 1. Dragon goes next. I didn't think I could go from almost full to negative triple digits in one round - I was wrong (Buhlman, you naught naughty DM you!). The stupid snake familiar biting and the player rolling nothing but low single digits on fort saves. 3 bites = 13 con points, and PC only had con 12. The PC at the table I was running whom we all discovered was dead at the end of the combat because he wouldn't bother to tell any of the other players how deep into negatives he was.
copper_wyrmling 12-08-06, 08:45 PM	Most pointless death: L14 sorcerer dying due to a "falling ice shards" trap due to some ludicrously high damage rolls by the GM. Most hardcore monster I've seen kill a PC: hmmm, probably the animated stone hand with hardness 10, reach, Improved Grab and Constrict, a very high grapple check, and 60-70 hit points iirc, at APL 4, with the "keep squeezing for a round after the target goes limp" tactics written into the module... (yes, I know the author didn't intend that to work the way it did, but that's how our GM ran it). I actually playtested the fiendish assassin vine encounter at APL 8. We *told* the author to tone it down... And as a GM, I killed a PC with the aforementioned gargantuan behirs - that would probably come under "stupid deaths", though, the four-levels-below-APL warmage decided to stay on the ground while the rest of the party went mass-flying so that she could cast her once / day maximized empowered fireball :rolleyes: When I played it, our spellsword also learned the hard way not to charge those things - we'd all been happily flying above the battlefield and shooting them with spells, until he got bored and decided to melee. One charge and subsequent full-attack from the behir later, a very stunned spellsword with 3 HP left (out of 200 or so) was teleported back up into the sky and given a stern lecture by the three sorcerers in the group ;)
JohnduBois 12-08-06, 10:36 PM	most hardcore moster that has killed a pc (not one that was killed with no casualties, we dont care how many times you DIDNT die) Five words: Ghost Hydra with Warrior levels.
Calinon 12-08-06, 11:43 PM	At a battle interactive, the battle was basically won. There was a single war machine left, and for some reason the occupants wouldn't consider surrender. Those of us two and three tables over were done, we were just bored and chatting when the DM in control of the war machine (we wouldn't make it even remotely close before the group attacking the machine broke it), for no reason (other than spite?), hit one of the people that hadn't done antying for a good fifteen minutes, killing him outright. He then stood up, shouted a cheer about killing the fellow's cahracter and declared the battle interactive over. The DM was one of the triad. I almost quit LG right there. Go Zeif.
Gwumph 12-09-06, 04:59 AM	I thought since there have been several assassin vine encounters i various mods, unless you played the mod you wouldn't know what i am talking about. Back to Copper call on most pointless death. We just had the same: 5th level cleric playing at APL 4 died from opening a door that was trapped. A couple to many needle's critied and they were also poisoned. PC lost over 50 hit points from that trap. Dumb Dumb way to die
Ramacass 12-09-06, 08:38 AM	I thought since there have been several assassin vine encounters i various mods, unless you played the mod you wouldn't know what i am talking about. Back to Copper call on most pointless death. We just had the same: 5th level cleric playing at APL 4 died from opening a door that was trapped. A couple to many needle's critied and they were also poisoned. PC lost over 50 hit points from that trap. Dumb Dumb way to die Pointless ok. Dumb:mad: I dont remember gwumph offering to open that door
Gwumph 12-09-06, 10:27 AM	LOL Sorry Rama You misunderstood me, I meant Dumb as in stupid on behalf of Lady luck, not that dumb as in Northstar did something wrong. It was a ****** way to die with no fault to Northstar. BTW Gwumph has opened his fair share of doors in his time, and been nailed by traps too. Just never as bad as Northstar got nailed.
Cynric 12-10-06, 03:52 AM	Please be careful about giving away too much infomation, this mod is still active. (You are right the vine is just not right, and you should have seen the surprize I got running it at apl 8 when I played at apl 2, it just gets worse at higher apls) If it is the mod I think you are talking about you should have seen the Playtest table that ran at APL 2. We survived, but only cos we said hell no!!!!! Steven
Gwumph 12-10-06, 08:59 AM	You are probably thinking about the right one. So my question is how does a monster that overpowered, that TPK capable, make it in the final mod. There have been 2 submissions in this thread so far, saying they recomended toning the vine, yet the vine was still an uber-killer in the mod.
Lomiat 12-10-06, 09:29 AM	You are probably thinking about the right one. So my question is how does a monster that overpowered, that TPK capable, make it in the final mod. There have been 2 submissions in this thread so far, saying they recomended toning the vine, yet the vine was still an uber-killer in the mod. Because even a dwarf that starts at distance can outrun it. Because archers exist, and though piercing damage might not affect a vine all that much, elemental damage does. Because Tumble is a class skill that allows PCs to ignore attacks of opportunity as they move into position. Because the vine in the particular mod needn't be confronted if players have other ideas; I mean, c'mon, it's not giving much away to say that the Assassin Vine, there, wasn't exactly the big, bad, evil mastermind behind the whole thing. It's a freaking plant. It could put out quite a bit of damage, yes, but I honestly don't remember our table having any difficulty with it since we fought the encounter intelligently. The table I DMed through the encounter nearly suffered a PC death (only one, by the way), but a number of judges at that con had already determined that the vine was statted incorrectly for a certain APL, so I adjusted damage for proper advancement, and the PC lived. Fighting an assassin vine, it's like fighting an ooze.... Why bother?
clannagh 12-10-06, 06:13 PM	Because even a dwarf that starts at distance can outrun it. Because archers exist, and though piercing damage might not affect a vine all that much, elemental damage does. Because Tumble is a class skill that allows PCs to ignore attacks of opportunity as they move into position. Because the vine in the particular mod needn't be confronted if players have other ideas; I mean, c'mon, it's not giving much away to say that the Assassin Vine, there, wasn't exactly the big, bad, evil mastermind behind the whole thing. It's a freaking plant. It could put out quite a bit of damage, yes, but I honestly don't remember our table having any difficulty with it since we fought the encounter intelligently. The table I DMed through the encounter nearly suffered a PC death (only one, by the way), but a number of judges at that con had already determined that the vine was statted incorrectly for a certain APL, so I adjusted damage for proper advancement, and the PC lived. Fighting an assassin vine, it's like fighting an ooze.... Why bother? I have played and Dmed that mod. It expires in 4 weeks but is still current so I will try not to add any extra spoilers that havent already been given away above. The first time (when i played in it APL6) it was virtually a permanent death TPK .. one PC out of six survived. Discussions with a friend of the mod writer later on revealed the table GM (who felt at APL6 the encounter was weak) was being very liberal with the monsters abilities - positioning it in cover rather than in the open as specified in the mod, allowing it to entangle an area the size of a football field (just wrong) and allowing it to move and hide at the mod "spot DC" plus distance penalty when the writer apparently had intended (but not clearly stated) it could only hide at the star tof the combat and only if the party were unaware of it. The GM was also allowing it to carry several unconcsious bodies at once in its "other vines" and still attack with its main attack (not mormally an ability of these things). He also insisted that the monster had consumed the bodies of the party entirely thus negating the free or half price raise deads most of the party had as favors and making the deaths permanent. Basically the "dodgy version" of teh monster worked like this .. entangled party can't see the thing on spot rolls of 30 for 4 or 5 rounds then it would sudenly appear from nowhere grapple a new party member, disappear the next round for another 4 or 5rounds period before popping up out of nowhere and grappling someone new, The second time I GMed it and played it "according to the book" and the party just flattened the thing without giving it a chance.
clannagh 12-10-06, 06:15 PM	Because even a dwarf that starts at distance can outrun it. Because archers exist, and though piercing damage might not affect a vine all that much, elemental damage does. Because Tumble is a class skill that allows PCs to ignore attacks of opportunity as they move into position. Because the vine in the particular mod needn't be confronted if players have other ideas; I mean, c'mon, it's not giving much away to say that the Assassin Vine, there, wasn't exactly the big, bad, evil mastermind behind the whole thing. It's a freaking plant. It could put out quite a bit of damage, yes, but I honestly don't remember our table having any difficulty with it since we fought the encounter intelligently. The table I DMed through the encounter nearly suffered a PC death (only one, by the way), but a number of judges at that con had already determined that the vine was statted incorrectly for a certain APL, so I adjusted damage for proper advancement, and the PC lived. Fighting an assassin vine, it's like fighting an ooze.... Why bother? I have played and Dmed that mod. It expires in 4 weeks but is still current so I will try not to add any extra spoilers that havent already been given away above. The first time (when i played in it APL6) it was virtually a permanent death TPK .. one PC out of six survived. The other 5 were permanently dead with no resurrection or raise dead allowed. Discussions with a friend of the mod writer later on revealed the table GM (who felt at APL6 the encounter was weak) was being very liberal with the monsters abilities - positioning it in cover rather than in the open as specified in the mod, allowing it to entangle an area the size of a football field (just wrong) and allowing it to move and hide at the mod "spot DC" plus distance penalty when the writer apparently had intended (but not clearly stated) it could only hide at the start of the combat and only if the party were unaware of it. The GM was also allowing it to carry several unconcsious bodies (nearly everyone grabbed had burnt a favor that stabilised that at -9) at once in its "other vines" and still attack with its main attack (not normally an ability of these things). He also insisted that the monster had consumed the bodies of the party entirely thus negating the free or half price raise deads most of the party had as favors and making the deaths permanent. Basically the "dodgy version" of the monster worked like this .. entangled party can't see the thing on spot rolls of 30 for 4 or 5 rounds then it would sudenly appear from nowhere grapple a new party member, disappear the next round for another 4 or 5rounds period before popping up out of nowhere and grappling someone new, The second time I GMed it and played it "according to the book" and the party just flattened the thing without giving it a chance.
copper_wyrmling 12-10-06, 08:05 PM	I have a strong suspicion that we're not all talking about the same scenario - because the one I'm thinking of was a regional (and I know that some but not all of the people talking about it on this thread are in fact from my old region), you *did* need to confront the vine (as in, part of your mission was "kill the evil vine"), and the vine was templated. The template ensured that most magical attacks and most energy damage were useless or severely hampered against the vine, at least at APL 8, where I playtested it. We asked the author to tone it down, and as I understand it, he did - the released version *was* easier than the original. I've fought another gargantuan assassin vine, without the template. It was *much* easier, despite being in close quarters.
garyjohnson 12-10-06, 08:11 PM	So my question is how does a monster that overpowered, that TPK capable, make it in the final mod. 1. Some monsters seem under-CRed when they gain a template, and playtesting doesn't always identify that they're under-CRed. 2. Grapple monsters that advance by HD tend to be more dangerous than they appear, because advancing by HD gives them a lot of BAB compared to advancing by class level for the same amount of additional CR. For example, a plant gains 4 HD/+1 CR, which gives it +3 BAB - three times the return of taking 1 fighter level (+1 CR, +1 BAB). 3. Grapple monsters that increase in size when advancing become even more dangerous, because they gain +8 to their grapple checks (+4 Size, +4 Str) to their grapple checks for +1 CR. 4. After the scenario was published, the FAQ made grapple monsters more dangerous by stating that they can use iterative attacks once grappling to do additional damage if they have enough BAB. There's little the author can do about rules changes that occur after the writing and playtesting period is complete. For what it's worth, both my characters have great respect for assassin vines - the one time each of my characters encountered an assassin vine, one of the party died. Cheers, Gary Johnson
Lomiat 12-10-06, 11:02 PM	Oooh! I've played a couple of mods with assassin vines, but I didn't play the one with the templated, "evil" (supposedly fiendish) assassin vine. But... seriously, what monster runs around mating with plants? "I will make a fiendish assassin vine offspring to rule the plants of the forest, to subjugate them to my will. Mwaaahaaahaaa!" There's always fire if you want to subjugate plants; you wouldn't have to find a way to figure out... um... what goes where, shall we say? Some templates are just stupid. Mechanically, they may offer a lot. And I know this is D&D, where logic is out the extra-dimensional portal, but still... fiendish assassin vines? Outsiders and plants? That's a new, disturbing use for polymorph...
Britt 12-10-06, 11:08 PM	But... seriously, what monster runs around mating with plants? Morginstaler, Red Dragon of the Rift. Can half-dragon be applied to plants? :)
copper_wyrmling 12-11-06, 12:26 AM	Morginstaler, Red Dragon of the Rift. Can half-dragon be applied to plants? :) This can't be the first time the BK Triad has asked that question ;) My innocent teenage wild mage was quite shocked when she met the results of some of Morginstaler's previous relationships... (*grumbles about BK Triad, absurdly fertile red dragons, and not being able to play her favorite character for AGES because she was on maternity leave*) And in defence of the fiendish assassin vine, it did make sense in the context of the mod - it wasn't inherited in precisely the usual way, obviously. Knowing the author, I'm pretty sure he had an idea and came up with the closest thing in the rules that would fit it, rather than building a cheesy monster and then trying to contrive a backstory - which led to a cool storyline, but the template synergized with the base monster in ways that he hadn't really foreseen. Playtesting caught some of it, but evidently not all.
gomeztoo 12-11-06, 11:23 AM	This can't be the first time the BK Triad has asked that question ;) My innocent teenage wild mage was quite shocked when she met the results of some of Morginstaler's previous relationships... (*grumbles about BK Triad, absurdly fertile red dragons, and not being able to play her favorite character for AGES because she was on maternity leave*). At least *your* pregnancy hasn't been estimated to 18 months... Once the babe is born, you'll have to introduce Nes to the father though. Maybe she can talk some sense into him (and get some child support - the kid will have to study, right?).
Japangirl 12-11-06, 05:04 PM	I'm not sure introducing the kid to the CE epic red dragon is such a good idea. He doesn't much care about the welfare of his children as long as he doesn't have to hear them whine about an adventuring party beating them up (killing them is A-OK).
Britt 12-11-06, 05:08 PM	Hey, there is no mention of pregnancy or children on that AR. I don't know where you're getting all that from...;)
copper_wyrmling 12-11-06, 05:28 PM	Hey, there is no mention of pregnancy or children on that AR. I don't know where you're getting all that from...;) You're absolutely right - all it mentions explicitly is a certain period of, ahem, non-adventuring activity. Everyone I know who got that has interpreted it the same way, though. It was a nice example of how to write an AR entry that was entirely PG-rated while conveying the intended message ;) And gomeztoo, please don't have Nesalia suggest that to Azrien ;) She would think it was a wonderful idea, and promptly teleport herself and Nes to the Rift Canyon to implement it. I'm not sure how Morgie would react to a copper dragon disciple and one of his former girlfriends (who currently appears to have some bizarre mix of silver / copper / red draconic heritage) turning up on his doorstep. And to everyone else, I'm sorry, I think I must have acquired ranks in Thread Derailment recently (and the mention of my wild mage counts as a masterwork tool). My apologies :weep: So getting back to the original point of the thread, I've actually seen very few PC deaths. There was a monster in a Year 5 Iuz mod, a weretiger with warshaper levels, who only failed to kill any PCs on our table because of *extreme* DM softballing. He was awfully nasty. I watched a barbarian get ripped to shreds by a gargantuan chimera at APL 12 (death averted by the favor of a greater god, which put him from -50 back to -9 and stable) - my cleric had Delay Death prepped, but she was out of Close range of the barbarian, holding off the other two gargantuan chimeras (don't let anyone ever tell you that AC is unimportant at high APLs: monsters can have Power Attack too). I watched a high-level fighter charge an angel of decay (Libris Mortis monster) and go from almost 200 HP down to 2 HP in one full attack, and then deep into negatives on the next round (that time I did get Delay Death off in time, though). Most horrific death? That would probably be the L2 archer who was unfortunate enough to play a module with a full vampire at APL 4 with no warnings in the blurb, and the GM skipped us through all the investigation that was supposed to give us clues, due to time constraints, so that we were largely unprepared for the final encounter. One slam = instant unrecoverable no-save death. Most horrific near-death? Probably the two PCs who almost got their brains eaten by modified spawns of Kyuss - in both cases, the Int-drain was stopped with a Heal-check when they were down to Int 1. One of those cases also involved the funniest rescue scene I've ever been privileged to witness - the Int-6 half-orc barbarian first got hit by the brain-eating worms, then failed a fear save, and ran away down the hall. The rest of the party quickly killed the spawn of Kyuss and then went after the barbarian, but realized quickly that they weren't going to catch him (cursed barbarian bonus to move speed that stacks with Haste...) The grey elf wizard cast a spell to make himself go faster (maybe Fly? can't remember), rocketed down the hallway after the barbarian, removed his beloved +6 Headband of Intellect, and forced it onto the barbarian's head - giving him another two rounds to live while the clerics caught up :)
Cynric 12-11-06, 08:55 PM	Most horrific death? That would probably be the L2 archer who was unfortunate enough to play a module with a full vampire at APL 4 with no warnings in the blurb, and the GM skipped us through all the investigation that was supposed to give us clues, due to time constraints, so that we were largely unprepared for the final encounter. One slam = instant unrecoverable no-save death. Gee I kinda remember that encounter, considering it was my archer that died. Yay, what do I win?:D
Japangirl 12-11-06, 09:11 PM	In the interest of continuing the thread, the best rescue that I personally have been involved in was very complicated, to be sure. We had a bear-form druid (druid/nature's warrior), rogue, fighter/tanky type, wizard, and ranger. The druid had a really high spot check and so he went first down the hall. We told him "Roar twice if you see invisible people", expecting nothing to come of it, but better safe than sorry and bears can't talk. Well, he peeked into the room and was told "You see a few invisible things over here, and a big invisible thing over there, and another one over there". He promptly went "Rwar rwar. RWAR RWAR!" and faerie fired one of the groups. There were two ogres and a coven of hags in the room, one of which had a force cage effect available once per day. The fighter got force caged right away. The wizard got strength drained down to 1 Str in the first round, and the ranger failed his will save but made his fort save against the hag's evil eye and was dazed for the next three days. Seeing that this is going all sorts of bad, the druid grabbed the archer and put him next to the wizard as I (the rogue) ran over there as well. Druid then shifted to person form and took full cover behind his tower shield to cast Lesser Restoration on the wizard so the wizard could cast a teleportation spell to get us all out of there. One of the hags (a large one with reach, I think an Annis Hag) sundered the tower shield as the spell finished casting, frocing the druid to make a concentration check to get the spell off which succeeded, the wizard's ready went off, and we four escaped, leaving the fighter in his force cage. In town, we bought two scrolls of Dimension Door and hoped the fighter was being toyed with and not already dead. We also bought a restoration for the archer so he wasn't still dazed. We went back to the manor house this was all happening in, the fighter was still alive, the wizard used the first two rounds of combat to get the fighter out of the cube, and we proceded to kill the encounter. And then we made a deal with the vampire who came out of the shadows with four ghoul rogues because we were beat up, pretty much out of spells, and in the BK where favors from undeads are useful.
solbergb 12-11-06, 10:04 PM	Most of the really messy death stories involved animal companions, mounts and such. I've also seen very few actual deaths at the table in LG and pretty much all of them weren't the monster so much as PC decisions gone horribly wrong. As in: 5 hit point invisible stalker above 15ish hitpoint gnome who doesn't think he can reliably cast defensively, so he moves to "take the hit" and then cast the finishing spell. Stalker crits, he dies. After he died, gnome remembered he had a wand of fireballs. Doh. Level 2 fighter with 2000gp and "tank" playstyle engages lycantrhope-ogre in close combat, striking an important blow before being eviscerated by a blow that would not have hit him had he spent his cash on armor before starting play. The party raised him, but he found his 2000gp converted into mastework platemail before he woke up. Chaotic members decide to "Trust the nice slaad" (including Death Slaad). Lawful party members make a deal with a priest of a god of trickery/lies in the other room. Party member who looks up to nobles can't bring herself to take a side with party or with the (noble) priest of the trickery/lies god and can't bring herself to betray her party either so she stalls until the "slaad" situation resolves. Chaotic party members "Strike a deal" with the slaad to help out against the priest. Needless to say what follows did not go well, especially for the lawful folks hung out to dry by NPC's treachery and PC's trustfulness. "Lets do planar binding" (instead of casting hero's feast) and convincing other characters to chip in for cost. Summoned critter is immediately turned against party by first trap. Party then suffers greatly from multiple poison and fear effects through the rest of the mod. We really should have had multiple deaths in that module. The DM was kind to us because we were all so braindead at the end of a very very long midnight madness. Core special "We're almost done. We'll just send Burke ahead to scout as usual in the last room". (Party still had Detect Thoughts prepped, which would have revealed the nasties before exposing Burke to something he didn't yet have the ability to escape from on his own) Party retreats from bad situation. Sorcerer's turn comes up. Sorcerer runs back into untenable situation so he can hit somebody with a scorching ray. Cleric runs back in to rescue him. Bad guys separate the rest of the party from the two of them via a big summoned fire elemental. Although to the sorcs credit he DID almost kill everything on his side of the fire elemental before going down. We only had to hit the one survivor with an acid vial once we decoyed the elemental away... We should have had a death to that APL4 vampire too, but we'd whittled it down to a few hp before it dominated our barbarian, and as the barb was chasing her brother out of the room, our level 1 archer said "Hey DM, if I roll two 20s can I "stake" it?" He then proceeded to roll back to back 20s on an openrpg die-roller in front of all of us. The table agreed that it worked after the DM polled each of us privately. I don't think it would have worked if the vamp wasn't mostly dead. The archer was fully expecting to awake as a vampire spawn after attempting that maneuver.
clannagh 12-11-06, 11:06 PM	We should have had a death to that APL4 vampire too, but we'd whittled it down to a few hp before it dominated our barbarian, and as the barb was chasing her brother out of the room, our level 1 archer said "Hey DM, if I roll two 20s can I "stake" it?" He then proceeded to roll back to back 20s on an openrpg die-roller in front of all of us. The table agreed that it worked after the DM polled each of us privately. I don't think it would have worked if the vamp wasn't mostly dead. The archer was fully expecting to awake as a vampire spawn after attempting that maneuver. It may be a result of too much time in perrenland but characters that do not invest the 50gc in a protection from Evil potion as cheap insurance against domination do not get any sympathy on my tables :)
Japangirl 12-11-06, 11:56 PM	The problem with that vamp isn't that it dominates people. The problem is the 2 level drain on level 2-6 characters :).
solbergb 12-12-06, 11:59 AM	It may be a result of too much time in perrenland but characters that do not invest the 50gc in a protection from Evil potion as cheap insurance against domination do not get any sympathy on my tables :) The shops were closed :) We had to rob the silver shop just to get a silver dagger. We had some garlic and I think one holy symbol between us. We were pretty much in a horror movie. The only upside was that the vampire thought our barbarian was the cleric and didn't try to dominate her for a long time, because she was the only one with a holy symbol. On the plus side, we had a lot of holy water because we stocked up after an earlier encounter. It isn't an accident that all the chars from that module now seem to be festooned with silvered, magic weapons, holy symbols and carry potion of prot evil.
Lupo 12-12-06, 12:06 PM	<snip> It isn't an accident that all the chars from that module now seem to be festooned with silvered, magic weapons, holy symbols and carry potion of prot evil. and a near addiction to mediterranian food with lots of garlic???? :P just out of curiosity, i know that perrenland is an oerth parallelism to swizerland, is there any region modelled after italy or even better sardinia or corsica? or transylvania for a vampire's save heaven :D ciao martin m.
solbergb 12-12-06, 12:33 PM	That character ran into two full vampires before he was level 5. His very first magic weapon was silvered. Which has actually come in handy a couple times when we ran into other weird stuff with silver DR, because it is the first weapon he reaches for when he doesn't know what to use.
UMiskatonic 12-12-06, 12:58 PM	Well, I've got seven LG characters, and I've been killed six times, once permanently. I've seen three kinds of deaths. 1) Just unlucky. My rogue/shadowdancer missed the spot and listen checks, and rolled really poorly on initiative. These are not things I'm bad at. As a result, I got to see the rest of the party retreat out of the ambush, leaving me (and only me) within range of three xorns, a big xorn, and an ogre mage. Likewise, my master thrower wanna-be became a wererat, turned evil, and then resisted three successive break enchantment saves as a rogue1/ftr 1. Authorities had to execute him. Generally, I'm okay with these. This stuff happens. 2) Bad judging. Standing on a featureless grass plain, with no terrain and cover is one thing. Having four large creatures show up 50 feet away with no warning and surprise/pounce us is another. 3) Bad play. I've lost characters to the bad play of others. This one really irritates me. The sorceror who fireballed the fire-immune creatures with good SR might have made a mistake, but then to scorching ray them the next round? That's a crime. Likewise, I was once told "Oh, I memorized Stalwart Pact, I just didn't cast it on anybody, I didn't have any time", despite the fact that our characters had just spent 7 hours on horseback riding through Ket, and the judge had asked "What preparations are you making?"
solbergb 12-12-06, 03:11 PM	2) Bad judging. Standing on a featureless grass plain, with no terrain and cover is one thing. Having four large creatures show up 50 feet away with no warning and surprise/pounce us is another. Our local player response to this sort of thing is merciless mocking. (well, first a gentle reminder that we have +38 spot checks in the party and most animals can't get above a 30 even if they roll 20 at 50'). This usually at least gets the monsters backed up a bit. Sometimes the judge who did it will say "look, you'll win easily, we're short on time, lets just not fuss with distances" and it'll slide by. But mostly we've succeeded in convincing all local judges to pay attention to the actual encoutner distance rules, and the idea that if terrain isn't in the mod it is an autosurprise died around year 3 in my parts. I've seen it in other regions. I accept it if my char is oblivious and resist it if my char has good sensory abilities. I paid good attributes, skill points, equipment, etc for those abilities. I'm fine if monsters defeat them. I'm not ok if the judge ignores them. So far I've never needed a sr dm ruling. The judges know they're doing wrong. Pointing it out and moving the encounter out of autosurprise-fullattack range is sufficient to satisfy me.
gomeztoo 12-12-06, 04:21 PM	Nesalia died once, hit by a barrage of arrows. It was a bit of a dumb death: she could have bridged the distance to the archer in 2 rounds, but since the rest of the party clamored that she shouldn't move oo far ahead of the healers, she held back... and got three rounds of full attacks on her - 111 hp damage in 3 rounds. She could have raged, but then more arrows migth have hit (AC 32 didn't cut it), and she could have dropped prone, but then likely someone else would have gone down. So I took a calculated risk that she could 'take' the damage, and she didn't (by 2 hp). Once she was dead on the floor did the rest of the party decide that, haste, fly, and actually moving forward FAST perhaps were the better option... Ah well, she got better... and actually doesn't really realize that she died.
Maesto 12-13-06, 09:35 AM	Ok, I've got a bunch of things to throw in here. Most of them have occured when I'm DMing... some people now refuse to have me DM them (including a fairly blatent statement about such on a GMs list). The worst case of death I've seen was from a year 5 mod. Teleported into little itty bitty cells at APL 8, which all contained ghasts. Now ghasts are pathetic. Except when it's dark and you can't see, you're in a 2x3 room by yourself, and you're a wizard (or an archer, for that matter). Two PC deaths, and I was recovered in the nick of time on -9. I ran that mod at APL 10; the wights were completely pathetic. Ghasts would've been much nastier. Then there was the spawn of kyuss... bad bad bad bad bad. As a player, the most narrowly avoided death was from the evil vine people are talking about. I was the archer doing all the damage, except that party members weren't retreating like they should've been, so I said "I've probably got enough hitpoints/AC/grapple to take it on" (enlarged, bull strengthed, greased), so I took my attacks (almost killing it). One hit, DM rolled a 20 I think, straight to -9. If it was -10 or more, a favour would kick in to plop me on -9. No favours to help from -9 though. No way any cleric was coming in for me. I rolled my stabilise. As the playtest table, we recommended that the SR be dropped artificially; it was ridiculuously high. Copper_wyrmling mentioned some shards. There was a trap in a regional mod (don't know if it's gone yet) that essentially was "you break down the wall of ice without searching for traps? duh duh duh!". At APL 12, everybody got hit for 2d8(?) ice shards, with +20(?) to hit each, doing 1d10(?) damage or something. The only party I ever ran through this module triggered the trap, and while most people said "meh, a bit of damage", the sorceror got hit by 15 or so of the things, killing him outright (with about average damage rolls, I think). I ran one current module at APL 8 for a party who were woefully underprepared and just played plain dumb for a fair bit of the mod. Furthermore, there was a clause saying "will coup-de-grace if they get the opportunity". 5 PC deaths in the one mod, 'coz there was no cold iron or silver weapons in the party. Furthermore, somebody charged 400 feet ahead of the party and proceeded to die, strangely enough. The best death I have ever DMed, however, had to be a level 3 character playing at APL 12. The party ran into a nasty combination of race and class with an incubus and friends. The incubus, after instilling fear into the hearts of two of the party members (massive damage fort saves when you only have 55 hitpoints are scary things), decided to seduce one of the party members (male, mind you). The level 3 cleric had been going on about how "hot and sexy" he was, and proceeded to make out with the incubus until he died a round or two later. Cheerio, Jolyon
Alpha_Nerd 12-13-06, 01:00 PM	Lets see, worst death? level 2 orc greataxe crit, pretty standard but unfortunate level 4, shimmied down a rope into a well to row a boat to the shore of the huge cavern underneath it. Was suprised by 4 skum and died in 2 rounds level 10? the aformentioned weretiger warshaper did 60 to me in a round when I had 40 hitpoints left level 11 I think burnt a favor to pull myself off a cadaver collector only to be respiked next round level 12 disentegrated after sucking up a cone of cold interactive at a con queso a couple years ago, we were storming a city and everything was going great. at my table we had only a wizard left, he decides to go out kamikaze style and sudden maximize fireballs the room. I roll a 3 on the reflex save, which I needlike a 7 to pass. Remind the GM that we need to make fort saves for massive damage, then proceed to roll a 1 when I pass on a two. those are the only ones I can think of at the moment. My least favorite death was the fireball because not only was I keeping honest but I just died because of bad rolls. As far as the hardest monster I'd say Swamp Thing, a year 1 BK mod I think? was by far the worst encounter ever. APL 4 had a troll, a druid, a wizard, 3 fiendish crocodiles, and some other crap. It was bad
Lord Yod 12-13-06, 02:24 PM	The worst case of death I've seen was from a year 5 mod. Teleported into little itty bitty cells at APL 8, which all contained ghasts. Now ghasts are pathetic. Except when it's dark and you can't see, you're in a 2x3 room by yourself, and you're a wizard (or an archer, for that matter). Two PC deaths, and I was recovered in the nick of time on -9. I ran that mod at APL 10; the wights were completely pathetic. Ghasts would've been much nastier. Then there was the spawn of kyuss... bad bad bad bad bad. Heck, even at APL 2 that mod was nasty. No teleport trap, only one ghast... but he's in a 5-foot corridor. Our 6-PC party had 5 people paralyzed at separate times; the tank was paralyzed, put into negs, dragged for healing, charged back in, paralyzed, put into negs, dragged for healing, charged back in, and FINALLY killed the thing. (The fight took *literally* 2 hours)
the truthseeker 12-14-06, 01:06 AM	Ravenloft :P Josh and a near addiction to mediterranian food with lots of garlic???? :P just out of curiosity, i know that perrenland is an oerth parallelism to swizerland, is there any region modelled after italy or even better sardinia or corsica? or transylvania for a vampire's save heaven :D ciao martin m.
Japangirl 12-14-06, 01:22 AM	Sorry about respiking you :(.
Dr.Cornelius 12-17-06, 11:37 PM	How's this for a convergence of overpowered encounter, poor DM and terrible play: Random APL 4 party at a convention: Tank, Barbarian, Archer, Monk and Swashbuckler. Notice anything missing? What should the players or DM do at this point? Pack it in and admit that the party is unlikely to succeed without any spellcasting? Of course we soldiered on... So the party is walking in the open and is hit with a trap that knocks 25% of the HP off three members. Next round three flying monsters appear and hit the party with massive ranged attacks. After two rounds the party has taken well over 50% damage and done only minor damage to the fliers. At this point it is obvious that the party is completely outclassed and a TPK is all but inevitable. The monsters land and go into melee. Since the BBGs are elemental typed, the Monk and Swashbuckler are nearly useless. After being mauled with full attacks and doing less than 10 damage in return the Monk and Swashbuckler flee. Tank and Barbarian hang in melee while Archer puts up some damage, but eventually Tank and Barbarian drop. Monsters engage Archer in melee and by some miracle the fighters both stabilize at around -8. Now here is where the DM softplayed the module - instead of finishing off the Archer, the monsters pull out of melee, grab the plot item the party was transporting and fly off. I was surprised that the DM pulled his punches, but at that point it was obvious to all that the encounter was over. Or was it? The DM asks the Archer what he is going to do next. The Archer's answer is noncommittal - something like wait for the Monk and Swashbuckler to return. At this point the DM commits the worst act of judging I have witnessed in decades - he decides that since the Archer is not healing the two negative-but-stabilized fighters, the mod's harsh environment rules kick in and everyone must start making fortitude saves to avoid taking cold damage. Now these rolls are trivial for the Archer and the two who fled, but are effectively save-or-die rolls for the two downed characters. Barbarian rolled a "1" and that was it. Permanent death - after the encounter was effectively over. One last thing - did I mention that the Archer was played by A TEN-YEAR-OLD? It is bad enough to be randomly paired with weak players and an untenable class mix in a tough module, but to have the DM drop a permanent death based on a ten year old's inability to choose the appropriate course of action is asinine. The DM did not even have the good sense to try to lead the child in the right direction with a suggestion like "your companions are severely wounded - do you want to heal them?" This experience left a really bad taste in my mouth. About half of my LG adventures have been good RPG, but too many times the modules are either laughably easy or insanely hard, the judges are unprepared or arbitrary and the players are grossly incompetent (and its not just the ten year olds). LG has a lot of potential, but is in dire need of some quality control.
LGMoses 12-18-06, 01:28 AM	I'm new and I've only had one player death while I was running so far. It was in an intro mod for my region and an orc critted on a barbarian PC dropping him from 9 to -12. Just unlucky. I had just finished telling the player about how nasty falchion's were and WHAM! Also, the player had been in a hurry and pretty much speeding the module along. He had something he needed to do so he just grabbed everyone by the nose and ran for it. He also made the mistake of choosing the biggest mini to represent him and I think subconsciously that makes me want to make the kobolds sling at him more. :rolleyes: BTW, do u have to do the rolls to see if you can find the spell in your region for raise dead? Common sense is telling me yes but there are so many things common sense doesn't apply on these days....
Lupo 12-18-06, 09:47 AM	How's this for a convergence of overpowered encounter, poor DM and terrible play: Random APL 4 party at a convention: Tank, Barbarian, Archer, Monk and Swashbuckler. Notice anything missing? What should the players or DM do at this point? Pack it in and admit that the party is unlikely to succeed without any spellcasting? Of course we soldiered on... So the party is walking in the open and is hit with a trap that knocks 25% of the HP off three members. Next round three flying monsters appear and hit the party with massive ranged attacks. After two rounds the party has taken well over 50% damage and done only minor damage to the fliers. At this point it is obvious that the party is completely outclassed and a TPK is all but inevitable. The monsters land and go into melee. Since the BBGs are elemental typed, the Monk and Swashbuckler are nearly useless. After being mauled with full attacks and doing less than 10 damage in return the Monk and Swashbuckler flee. Tank and Barbarian hang in melee while Archer puts up some damage, but eventually Tank and Barbarian drop. Monsters engage Archer in melee and by some miracle the fighters both stabilize at around -8. Now here is where the DM softplayed the module - instead of finishing off the Archer, the monsters pull out of melee, grab the plot item the party was transporting and fly off. I was surprised that the DM pulled his punches, but at that point it was obvious to all that the encounter was over. Or was it? The DM asks the Archer what he is going to do next. The Archer's answer is noncommittal - something like wait for the Monk and Swashbuckler to return. At this point the DM commits the worst act of judging I have witnessed in decades - he decides that since the Archer is not healing the two negative-but-stabilized fighters, the mod's harsh environment rules kick in and everyone must start making fortitude saves to avoid taking cold damage. Now these rolls are trivial for the Archer and the two who fled, but are effectively save-or-die rolls for the two downed characters. Barbarian rolled a "1" and that was it. Permanent death - after the encounter was effectively over. One last thing - did I mention that the Archer was played by A TEN-YEAR-OLD? It is bad enough to be randomly paired with weak players and an untenable class mix in a tough module, but to have the DM drop a permanent death based on a ten year old's inability to choose the appropriate course of action is asinine. The DM did not even have the good sense to try to lead the child in the right direction with a suggestion like "your companions are severely wounded - do you want to heal them?" This experience left a really bad taste in my mouth. About half of my LG adventures have been good RPG, but too many times the modules are either laughably easy or insanely hard, the judges are unprepared or arbitrary and the players are grossly incompetent (and its not just the ten year olds). LG has a lot of potential, but is in dire need of some quality control. thatg ix the reason to have MULTIPLE characters at least in the APL 2 to APL 6 range! this is Living Greyhawk, where you can have as many characters as you can manage. right now i have 2 charcters at level 4, one at level 3 and one at level 2! (ok, the intention was to have at least one of them level 6 by now), but due to exactly what you have described - table composition that DEMANDED a character switch for having at least three out of four iconic roles at the table, they are somehow closer altogether. so don't be shy to A) switch characters AND ask others to consider character switching as well and B) try to play at least with a "strong" party considering the APL calculation. if you insist on playing high or even up with a deficit party, what you get is what you deserve. ciao martin m.
solbergb 12-18-06, 12:02 PM	Heh, well, if it had been my monk or my wife's swashbuckler at the table they could have hurt the elemental. The former had 18 str, the latter power attack. Most archers can work a wand of clw, which is pretty much still worthwhile healing at that APL. Bad players can screw anything up. At APL4 the party described isn't actually that bad, but you can't play it the same way you'd play a balanced party. I question a trap immediately followed by an encounter though. That should stack for EL if there is no chance to recover from the trap, not be considered two separate encounters. The judge's actions were aslo stupid. If the stabilized guys were abandoned then yes, the harsh environment would matter. But normally the roll is made in an hour, not in rounds, and harsh environment just shortens that to tens of minutes or minutes...still time for the archer to realize he needs to do something.
_m_ 12-18-06, 05:14 PM	Sorry about respiking you :(. /giggle hey has anyone else noticed the abundant number of swirling vortex style things in lgh? as far as i can tell, they all either do something cool, or basically kill you. heads or tails?
Dr.Cornelius 12-19-06, 04:29 AM	that is the reason to have MULTIPLE characters at least in the APL 2 to APL 6 range! this is Living Greyhawk, where you can have as many characters as you can manage. right now i have 2 charcters at level 4, one at level 3 and one at level 2! (ok, the intention was to have at least one of them level 6 by now) Lupo - not all of us have infinite free time to invest in a portfolio of LG characters. It takes around twelve adventures (50+ hours of real time over several months) to advance a character to play "on level" APL 4. That's a significant investment for those of us with jobs and lives outside gaming.
Lupo 12-19-06, 04:56 AM	Lupo - not all of us have infinite free time to invest in a portfolio of LG characters. It takes around twelve adventures (50+ hours of real time over several months) to advance a character to play "on level" APL 4. That's a significant investment for those of us with jobs and lives outside gaming. :) if i would have as much free time and resources as you think, i would have multiple characters at every level ;) ok, i admitt, i have - beside my home region - easy access to one region from the same metaregion (meaning cons and games once or twice per month), and a more or less easy access to three others regions (one totally different meta-region). to have several characters in the range of level 2 to 3 isn't so challening, two intros and one other adventure brings one to level two, you need some more four to five adventures till level 3. ok, then it takes some more time from that point onwards. and there were "special adventures" that demanded new characters anyway. one of my level 4 characters has started with "mad god's key" i hope the circle will sanction some more of this type:) my level 3 character is the bright desert character (you will find lots of bright desert characters around that now are in the early mid levels, so my character is way behind). ciao martin m.
ShinAkuma2 12-19-06, 12:33 PM	It can also be hard to keep multiple characters when you don't travel outside of your region...There are only so many Core/Regional/Metaregional mods available.
trollbill 12-19-06, 01:30 PM	It can also be hard to keep multiple characters when you don't travel outside of your region...There are only so many Core/Regional/Metaregional mods available. Not that hard. My group only started in May and most of us are out of TUs on their main characters (around 6th level) and are around 3rd with their secondarys and only 1 of use has played out of the state. And there are a lot of year 5 mods we won't get to see. Between mods that eat extra TUs, crafting and meta-orgs, it really isn't that difficult to run out with plenty of play opportunities left. Now trying to keep more than 2 going with any regularity might be a problem, but two shouldn't be.
LachlarlanIII 12-19-06, 02:02 PM	Worst: At APL 8 or 10 the party was trapped in a collapsing demiplane. A greater elemental is blocking the only exit. We have mere rounds to kill the beast and escape before a perma-TPK happens. Our lvl 12 armor fighter walks up the the thing and gets hit once, one time, and decides to retreat. I, playing an 8th lvl BDF, decide to charge in and begin hacking the thing to peices. After three rounds, with the demiplane getting smaller and smaller, I finally die. We had a lvl 12 fighter, and a lvl 11 fighter and I was the only person attacking the monster for 3 rounds! At that point I pretty much said "I hope you guys can get out without me hitting it anymore." Most Rediculous/Funny: Playing Swamp Things I fall into the river. I proceed to roll less than 5 for the DC 5 climb check to get out of the water for 3 consecutive rounds. At that point I was swarmed by crocodiles and died.
solbergb 12-19-06, 03:06 PM	Worst: At APL 8 or 10 the party was trapped in a collapsing demiplane. A greater elemental is blocking the only exit. We have mere rounds to kill the beast and escape before a perma-TPK happens. The funny thing about that...you didn't actually have to fight the elemental. Running past him worked. We found this out by accident after he ripped big chunks out of most of us and sundered the only weapon that was really hurting him much.
LachlarlanIII 12-19-06, 03:22 PM	The way the DM described it made it sound like fighting was the only option. And now that you mention it, the elemental was huge, so we could have just run between its legs. Oh well.
Japangirl 12-19-06, 03:50 PM	Hmm, at the APL I played that at, which was APL 8, it wasn't huge yet. It was only large, so I was the only one (as a halfling rogue) who could maybe get out. I was standing next to it and getting ready to attempt to tumble through it as I frantically assisted our fighter to hit. Two more rounds and i was out of there, but then it finally died. Lachlarlan, if you are who I think you are, I was at your table (are you Plakk?). Stupid elementals who are immune to sneak attacks and have hardness higher than my max damage.
LachlarlanIII 12-19-06, 04:13 PM	Yes that's me. Stupid "fighters" not lifting their swords to help me while I was still alive!
solbergb 12-19-06, 04:27 PM	The way the DM described it made it sould like fighting was the only option. Yeah, it kinda sounded like that. I was even working out plans to shift it with inexorable progress of dawn. But when I got around to its back, it wasn't actually blocking entry into the exit gate, beyond taking the odd AOO. One of those mods where I kinda wish I read it to be sure how the encounter was set up. I think we actually killed the elemental but I know my monk exited with about 2 hitpoints (with permission of the party to try in order to see if just escaping was an option).
solbergb 12-19-06, 04:29 PM	Not that hard. My group only started in May and most of us are out of TUs on their main characters (around 6th level) Once you burn through the backlog of unplayed modules and are "caught up" the regionals, metaregionals and core can support 2-3 characters and that's about it if you don't travel. My wife usually burns out 2 chars a year with others played in bits and pieces. I do about 3, but I travel. Once you get a char past level 8 or so, you almost have to have a second one to play the 2--6 and 2-8 capped content.
_m_ 12-19-06, 05:04 PM	Once you burn through the backlog of unplayed modules and are "caught up" the regionals, metaregionals and core can support 2-3 characters and that's about it if you don't travel. My wife usually burns out 2 chars a year with others played in bits and pieces. I do about 3, but I travel. Once you get a char past level 8 or so, you almost have to have a second one to play the 2--6 and 2-8 capped content. my area only has a very few number of mid to high range toons. the lower end )around 6 is fine) but alot of the younger players cant decide what they want to play, so i end up stuck playing an infuriating number of intros. at last count i have 5 lvl 2's, 3 lvl 3's, a 4, a 5. its kind of getting anoying. still, refreshed TU's shortly, so il swing back in with my main :D
Haro 12-19-06, 06:07 PM	Once you burn through the backlog of unplayed modules and are "caught up" the regionals, metaregionals and core can support 2-3 characters and that's about it if you don't travel. My wife usually burns out 2 chars a year with others played in bits and pieces. I do about 3, but I travel. Once you get a char past level 8 or so, you almost have to have a second one to play the 2--6 and 2-8 capped content. Of course, that was once the case but with all the adaptables available for LG play, I can't see how my 4 PCs (14/9/6/4) are going to cover everything. I do have another region close by though and that makes a difference... 3 PCs wouldn't be able to keep up with all the play opportunities considering RHoD takes one out of consideration for regional/metaregional and core play. Joe
CrystalBlue 12-21-06, 01:11 PM	First my death. The only one (I'm a lucky person) was in a core mod. Can't remember the name, but it was with the swamp monster, and you having to put a dagger into a pond to make it go away. We didn't figure that out, as we were all inept. Afterwards, we had to fight the thing. I believe my monk 6 took a full attack from the thing. I went down to -14. It was fun. Had to get a reincarnate and ended up a wood-elf, so I 'meh'ed it. Though, at the time, I was ******. >.< And all of my characters (12,10,8,5,4,1) are played every year. It helps that my folcean lyrist dumped her TU's on the Highfolk bardic college. I think that was around 44 TUs. Plus, my cleric has, like, 5 metaorgs on him, so he's dumping around 8 to 10 each year. It all adds some nice flavor and let's me play every thing I can (core, Highfolk, Shieldlands, Iuz). I love living in LaCrosse. A short 10 minute drive to the Shieldlands, and Conflict sounds like it's becoming a duel-con now, so more fun times!
CrystalBlue 12-22-06, 03:52 PM	Oh, and the hardest monster ever? I wanna say the Huge Paragon Psudonatural Ooze of Legend (I don't know if those are the right templates). It was in a 15x15 well...in a 20x20 stairwell. Combat Reflexes, +30 grapple check, and acidic so it ate away your armor and weapons right away. And DR 15/Adamantine (WTF?! O.O). I want to say this was at APL 6 or 8. We got out, only because the judge was very leniant and told us we'd just all lose our items and make it out alive. Can't remember if it was a Core or Highfolk...I want to say Highfolk.
wagnert 12-26-06, 04:09 PM	All my deaths have been in regional/metaregional mods. My primary character (13th level - year 1) died 3 times. He made 4th level three times. 1. An insane giant goat charges into town while the party is visiting various shops. The rest of the party is between my character and the goat, but on the side of the street. I roll to go first in initiative. I shoot a crossbow and get a great damage roll, but it's still up. It goes next and charges me, hitting for triple damage (42 hp damage). I had 22, thus going to -20. Happily, the halfling cleric in town gratiously raised me for free as thanks for my efforts in stopping the attack. 2. We are being hemmed in by a couple monsters. I try to tumble past one of them, but my tumble check comes to 14! It attacks and hits for triple damage (yes 42 hp damage) again dropping me to -20. Used a favor to get raised from a temple in the area. 3. Party of six is retrieving books, but encounter a Kraken. A couple party members try to fight it, but get grappled. Two more go in to rescue them, but get grappled also. I try to fire crossbow underwater, trying to keep away, but underestimate it's speed and get grappled anyway. Last party member immediately retreats at maximum speed and escapes, while the rest of us die from grapple damage. This did lead to an exciting special mission, where the survivor, my character's brother, and several other friends raided the Kraken's lair and retrived all the skulls in the lair. Several divination spells later, correct skull located and resurrection was done. We had several encounters handled diplomatically avoiding fighting, and some encounters we had to fight. We traded items to pursuade a Water Naga to lure the Kraken away from it's lair so we could loot it's lair (my character's magic items) and recover bodies (bones, skulls only removed). I also have multiple characters (12, 9, 5, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1) and most are clerics or other divine classes. I have several from my home region, one from region to my east, one from region to my south, one from the bright lands, plus my level 1's and 2's from the three regions noted.
budleiser 12-26-06, 06:51 PM	Oh my gosh I'm so jealous of everyone. You all seem to have a character that has died. I remember the stone hand mentioned earlier. (Or it was a different mod) we used over cap to buy alchemical items and throw them from a distance. ;) I'm in the P.O.U. are our mods just a lot easier than everyone else? It could be we have a solid play group and a lot of game days so most people are good players here. I was sad no one died at WIPOU interactives should kill lots of people don't ya think? The only time Klein has come close to dieing was playing above his APL and walked into the room before the wizard fireballed. Dumbest death:The only TPK I have seen was when I was running a mod. Level1's versus several monsters with AC19. Sadly enough the party would have done FINE if the monk built to grapple actually you know, grappled!? Thereby bypassing the AC. And if people would have flanked with the ROGUE. But no instead half of the party work their way toward the spellcaster. By the time they reach the spellcaster he is out of spells. You know because its APL 2!
rockondon 12-27-06, 01:22 AM	I had a funny encounter with that assassin vine too. My char was a cleric of kelanen and I knew that the vine likes to grapple. I also knew that my travel domain grants me freedom of movement making me immune to the vine's best attack. So I waltz in taunting the thing (not easy against, basically, a rope) and cocky (far more effective - what GM doesn't dish out the hits to cocky characters?) and accordingly I'm rolling against an impossibly high grapple check a second later to which I excitedly reply: "I use my domain power - FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT! TAKE THAT, GM!" "gee, too bad it only works against MAGICAL EFFECTS! TAKE THAT NOOB!" so I took it. Because I'm a noob. A few modules later that character was fighting some demons I wasn't familiar with. I moved into a flanking position on one, hit it pretty hard, then it hit me pretty hard, then the other demon which was quite far away teleported into a flanking position on me, hit me with sneak attack which killed me, and that day I learned how nasty babau's can be.
Simpi 12-27-06, 02:15 AM	This did lead to an exciting special mission, where the survivor, my character's brother, and several other friends raided the Kraken's lair and retrived all the skulls in the lair. Several divination spells later, correct skull located and resurrection was done. We had several encounters handled diplomatically avoiding fighting, and some encounters we had to fight. We traded items to pursuade a Water Naga to lure the Kraken away from it's lair so we could loot it's lair (my character's magic items) and recover bodies (bones, skulls only removed). Ummm.....unless rules were different on Y1-2, that is not possible (and hence those PCs would be permanently dead) as all character deaths must be resolved at the table and I and based on what I have seen several Triads talkings, it appears that any such special mission which would return long dead PCs into campaign would not be sanctioned. Heck, if there were no "deaths must be resolved at the table" rule, what would prevent some suitably high level cleric PCs simply resurrecting long dead adventurers in regional interactives when people come and say "I have (insert name) finger. Here is some cash, resurrect him because he died years ago in COR3-01 Hidden Fortress." Sampo Haarlaa Naerie Triad
trollbill 12-27-06, 10:34 AM	The only time I lost a character in LG so far was in an intro mod, first time I had played the character. I was trying an experimental spellcasting-only halfling with no non-magical combat abilities. Even though the rest of the party consisted of 4 fighters, they couldn't keep the enemy off me. I went to -3 hp and the battle was so furious no one could stop to bind me and I failed to stabilize. When I died, we had 1 guy left still standing and fighting. He eventually won and managed to save everyone else. I don't play LG characters that don't at least have some meager combat prowess now. I was sad no one died at WIPOU interactives should kill lots of people don't ya think? No thanks to you. Here I am, my 5th-level sorcerer is paralyzed and grappled by an advanced huge grell. You come flying in on your bat from a high level table to save the day with a deadly flying lance charge...and you rolled a 1 (which I'm guessing was the only thing you would have missed on). :P You'd think between cranial rats that seemed to think I was the only valid target on the map, the 15+ level assassin who decided to take time out from chasing the high level characters from table to table in order to sneak attack me with a poisoned weapon, and the huge grell that was hoving over the top of me before I even got my first initiative in the encounter, I should have been dead. In the end, the only thing that saved me (other than inumberable castings of false life) was the fact our battles took so long (Encounter 1, alone, took over 30 rounds of combat to complete), they called time before the grell could shred me.
budleiser 12-27-06, 09:24 PM	The only time I lost a character in LG so far was in an intro mod, first time I had played the character. I was trying an experimental spellcasting-only halfling with no non-magical combat abilities. Even though the rest of the party consisted of 4 fighters, they couldn't keep the enemy off me. I went to -3 hp and the battle was so furious no one could stop to bind me and I failed to stabilize. When I died, we had 1 guy left still standing and fighting. He eventually won and managed to save everyone else. I don't play LG characters that don't at least have some meager combat prowess now. No thanks to you. Here I am, my 5th-level sorcerer is paralyzed and grappled by an advanced huge grell. You come flying in on your bat from a high level table to save the day with a deadly flying lance charge...and you rolled a 1 (which I'm guessing was the only thing you would have missed on). :P You'd think between cranial rats that seemed to think I was the only valid target on the map, the 15+ level assassin who decided to take time out from chasing the high level characters from table to table in order to sneak attack me with a poisoned weapon, and the huge grell that was hoving over the top of me before I even got my first initiative in the encounter, I should have been dead. In the end, the only thing that saved me (other than inumberable castings of false life) was the fact our battles took so long (Encounter 1, alone, took over 30 rounds of combat to complete), they called time before the grell could shred me. What sucks to boot was just before that I got pulled aside to roll fort saves vs one of those assassins. My fort save is insane and I rolled a 1 and the guy just stared and blinked. I took a megahit to STR which worried me as I was trying to save a table. But oh my god that 1 was the worst EVER! I finally get to leave my boring table (I should have played up) to go help another table. The DM has me roll a init but before the start of the round so who knows if rolling high gets me in faster or rolling low. I have a +5 to init and again roll low! Then I charge the grell from across the map, the DM says she gets an AOO and the table yells RIDE BY! LOL and I roll a 1! Sighhh. It was this one shot glorious chance to be a hero for the entire table. And I fail.
Bogjob 12-29-06, 10:41 AM	My fighter/ rogue 3/4 who upon being surrounded by 4 ghasts (that I mistook for ghouls) decided to hang in there fully defensive and wait for the party to catch up. 12 sve or be paralyzed laters I was a statue who got a round of coup de graces before my mates caught up to see my head rolling across the corridor. If only I had done a full withdrawal I would probably have made it, I lost 6000 odd xp and the cost of a raise :weep:
Sutro 12-30-06, 01:06 AM	Dumbest death I've ever seen was during an intro mod. I'm playing an absolute uber-cork gnome fighter. I mean, I'm in an intro mod and managing to sport an AC well into the 20s. (obviously, I can't hit worth a darn, though :) ) But I'm holding some ghouls at bay at least, when the gnome illusionist comes up... and includes me in his color spray. As a direct result, one of the other characters got coup d'graced after everybody else was unconscious (except me, who was still dazed.) He was moving over to finish off the illusionist when I came to and bopped him with my warhammer to kill it. Why couldn't the color spray have lasted just one more round?
copper_wyrmling 12-30-06, 02:22 AM	Oh my gosh I'm so jealous of everyone. You all seem to have a character that has died. I remember the stone hand mentioned earlier. (Or it was a different mod) we used over cap to buy alchemical items and throw them from a distance. ;) Shouldn't have worked... energy damage doesn't ignore hardness, and they have hardness 10, so the 1d6 does absolutely nothing :weep: Nothing much can hurt those things at APL 4 except a power-attacking fighter (or someone who's gotten very lucky with adamantine access), and power-attacking fighters need to be standing next to their target, which probably means they have one round before they get grappled. And none of my PCs have died yet, but I think I'm playing the climactic final module of a regional arc tomorrow with a four-person party with no spellcasting, so eh, wish me luck ;)
Japangirl 12-30-06, 12:44 PM	We killed the hand with lots and lots and lots of magic missiles and spiritual weapons. Force effects do go through hardness :).
LGMoses 12-30-06, 11:56 PM	Ummm.....unless rules were different on Y1-2, that is not possible (and hence those PCs would be permanently dead) as all character deaths must be resolved at the table and I and based on what I have seen several Triads talkings, it appears that any such special mission which would return long dead PCs into campaign would not be sanctioned. Heck, if there were no "deaths must be resolved at the table" rule, what would prevent some suitably high level cleric PCs simply resurrecting long dead adventurers in regional interactives when people come and say "I have (insert name) finger. Here is some cash, resurrect him because he died years ago in COR3-01 Hidden Fortress." Sampo Haarlaa Naerie Triad and in year 597 Greyhawk will be flooded by adventurers....
copper_wyrmling 12-31-06, 02:47 AM	We killed the hand with lots and lots and lots of magic missiles and spiritual weapons. Force effects do go through hardness :). Not by the FAQ, Japangirl... sorry. See p.52, the paragraph beginning "Hardness applies to force attacks". I kind of wish the FAQ wasn't LG-legal (although there are a lot of rules in it that I think are good, genuinely clarifying a grey area), or at least that there was a delay time between the FAQ release and its rulings becoming LG-legal.
Japangirl 12-31-06, 03:44 PM	Not by the FAQ, Japangirl... sorry. See p.52, the paragraph beginning "Hardness applies to force attacks". I kind of wish the FAQ wasn't LG-legal (although there are a lot of rules in it that I think are good, genuinely clarifying a grey area), or at least that there was a delay time between the FAQ release and its rulings becoming LG-legal. I'm really really glad none of us knew that then . . . we'd have failed then. No one could have done anything at that point. Oops.
Howie23 12-31-06, 04:26 PM	Not by the FAQ, Japangirl... sorry. See p.52, the paragraph beginning "Hardness applies to force attacks". For those looking for it, this is on page 56 of the most recent FAQ (12/20/06). David
copper_wyrmling 12-31-06, 07:23 PM	For those looking for it, this is on page 56 of the most recent FAQ (12/20/06). David Ah sorry, my copy must be a little out of date (I think the one on my computer is an October release). Thanks for picking it up.
Howie23 12-31-06, 08:26 PM	Thanks for picking it up. Happy to assist. It's good info that is oft overlooked, I think. David
Genghis Cohen 01-01-07, 02:17 PM	The worst death that I had was when my Druid was wild shaped into an owl, and doing his shift of watch in SHE5-03 A Prophets Voice. A Bugbear Assasin got into the room, and snuck attack me with whatever the assasin death effect is. I rolled a 1. I used a favor to reroll. I rolled a 3. The worst death/hardest monster that I've seen for others was in the final encounter of KEO5-06 A Tale of Two Lions. We had a party of six plus my animal companion. We faced the evil regent and three monsters. One of the monsters was a Rust Dragon. Let me repeat this in case it slipped past you: RUST DRAGON. What's the one thing in LG worse than death? Losing your equipment. When the tanks are fighting the monsters in their underwear with clubs and improvised weapons, bad things happen. The combat took over two hours. It wasn't a TPK because my Druid was able to escape after everyone else in the party was dead. The AR does allow for up to three (but only three) destroyed items to be replaced at no cost by the King, and the mod provided for free True Resurrections, Resurrections, and Raise Deads.
Gilbear 01-01-07, 11:23 PM	I have been playing since year 2. My primary had 2 deaths: 1 at APL 4 to a Tendriculus 1 at APL 8 in a Geoff BI where a Deepwood sniper human hating hobgoblin, shot and crited by character. My secondary was eaten Under the Veil, so unrecoverable.
Reylance 01-02-07, 11:35 AM	One of the monsters was a Rust Dragon. Let me repeat this in case it slipped past you: RUST DRAGON. A module I wrote had rust locusts, but that was a classic, so it's okay.
LachlarlanIII 01-02-07, 01:34 PM	I'm really really glad none of us knew that then . . . we'd have failed then. No one could have done anything at that point. Oops. Wasn't I at your table with my Adamantine Greatsword?
Japangirl 01-02-07, 07:14 PM	The Hand and Eye mod? I don't think so. There was someone getting crushed to death by the hand, but he went unconscious, got dropped, and the cleric cast an obscuring mist to pick him up and run. I'm pretty sure no one had any adamantine weapons when I played.
Haro 01-02-07, 07:27 PM	I recently ran a now retired NMR module that climaxed with a battle against a Shadow Demon with Fiend of Blasphemy (BoVD) prestige class levels. The battle took place in a Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum with other funky effects. In short, only an oversight on my behalf stopped a pc death (recoverable) and another pc death (permanent - magic jar on another plane). This was against a strong party with a good grasp of tactics. One of those broken monsters with a broken prestige class on top. Thank God I played it at a lower APL... Joe
solbergb 01-02-07, 08:16 PM	Shouldn't have worked... energy damage doesn't ignore hardness, and they have hardness 10, so the 1d6 does absolutely nothing At the time the mod was written, playtested and 6 months or so after it came out, energy and force DID ignore hardness, as said in the Skip-FAQ. Then the Andy-FAQ rewrote those sections and reversed the Skip-FAQ. (for a few months both contradictory entries remained, letting judges decide. Then Andy did some editing) Making that encounter a lot harder. (magic missiles and spiritual weapons don't work either, even though they're 100% effective against DR/adamantine. Seriously, Andy was smoking crack when he made spells affected by animated object hardness. Why they made it hardness and not just DR/adamantine is another issue. Vs inanimate, I got no objection with his ruling)
PaulH 01-03-07, 07:15 PM	Hi My main only died once - to some form of swarm with Spell Resistance in an Onwal 'special'. Having some levels of Warmage - thought I'd do reargurd action, Burning Hands, run away type of thing. GM declared SR. I failed (twice). Other lowly Dwarf (playing up APL) dragged my unconcious bleeding body to place of safety, where two other characters (one a druid, both in safe place), didn't know to delay actions. Might have been saved with Cure Minor, but dropped to -10 at end round. On positive side, rest of party paid for raise dead for myself & our main cleric, who also died that encounter. Cheers Paul H
viceregal 01-17-07, 01:29 AM	Hand and Eye - we had a young guy run ahead of the rest into the room (againt advice) and it instants away from being grappled to death when the ultimate overide kicked in ... his mother had arrived to pick him up and he had to go!!!! Annoying death - suprise round (no rolls), remorhaz x 2 .... hit and swallowed and dead before cut out (the other swallowed one *just* survived) Classic cinema - party has to go to place x - we arrive (with pregnant female npc) are told where to go and to be sure not to cross the field of shadows at night as it was very dangereous ... followed by block text must go now run accross the field etc. Party is running across the field when the shadows rock up - naturally the gods of random chaos targetted to 6 str mage who equally naturally got a 6 on his roll. One of the party members (a monk) carries the girl accross while the rest of the party stop to rescue the downed wizard. Well by the time we finished we had every party memeber bar one down and linked to another one (eg PC dives onto the nearest downed PC with a grappling hook tied to a rope which was also tied to him to pull him out as well (they did not realise that you couldn't get back a shadow drained char etc) and the now 2 Str barbarian was getting ready to drag out the entire rest of the party all linked to each other. I (dm'ing) then went and asked the senior dm what to do who *then* mentioned the errata that had come out saying it was only supposed to be scare them not kill them! I asked him how to fix it and he said to let them roll 1d6 and get that much str back. Everyone but the wizard chose to roll for themselves and got 1,2 or 3 - I rolled a 6 for the wiz! All combats from there on were not good! Assassin Vine - we were evil on that one - my shaman cast binding winds, it failed the save, and the DM called the fight! I think the saddest death I came across was not mine but belonged to anotehr - he ended up on fire and rather than spend a round putting the fire out decided that instead he would roll into the pool of water to put it out properly (which was also going to take one round). Worked fine except that only one (the *other* one) pool was water - the other was an illusion under which was a pool of lava .... *not* the best was to put out fires or deal with low hit points! Cause of death ... a desire for realistic role playing! That's enough typing for now! :)
rockondon 01-17-07, 01:57 AM	a good friend of mine won't shut up about how his one character died: an intro mod, he made a level 1 fighter with a scythe. On the first combat, he won initiative, rolled a crit (which is 4x for a scythe) and does 52 damage the first time he ever swung his new scythe, bisecting his opponent. Next in initiative comes the bad guy (bad guys plural until just recently). Bad guy also rolls a critical, doing 20+ damage and killing his char. His life was short, but glorious.
Jay_Ibero_911 01-17-07, 02:17 AM	a good friend of mine won't shut up about how his one character died: an intro mod, he made a level 1 fighter with a scythe. On the first combat, he won initiative, rolled a crit (which is 4x for a scythe) and does 52 damage the first time he ever swung his new scythe, bisecting his opponent. Next in initiative comes the bad guy (bad guys plural until just recently). Bad guy also rolls a critical, doing 20+ damage and killing his char. His life was short, but glorious. That may be one of the single greatest events in an intro mod ever....
Lord Yod 01-17-07, 02:43 AM	That may be one of the single greatest events in an intro mod ever.... My thoughts exactly. :D
Gwumph 01-17-07, 03:39 AM	LOL He can always say he Crit on every attack he ever made!!:)
gomeztoo 01-17-07, 07:19 AM	I'm really really glad none of us knew that then . . . we'd have failed then. No one could have done anything at that point. Oops. Same here. Our lawyer/cleric was grappled, and slowly being squeezed to lawyer-pulp. The ranger was trying to heep him sligkty less squasy using a wand of cure light wounds, the wizard was helpless, the barbarian was being run over by the eye, and I was emptying my magic missile wand into the thing. If that ahdn't worked, we would probably have chopped it to bits eventually, but liekly with one less lawyer... ehr... cleric in the party.
_m_ 01-17-07, 06:52 PM	His life was short, but glorious. *cheer*. thats one kick @ss quote.
Cardinal Teplin 01-18-07, 10:42 AM	Hardest monster? probably a cross between either the half-golem monk with vast strength and DR5/adamantine - in an intro mod against 1st characters with _no_ equipment.... ... and the dreamstealer monk. Incorporeal touch flurry! The closest near death experience was quite recent - being charged by 4 keen-scythe-weidling high level redcaps, who all decided to go for me. Complete with crits, that was 605hp in the first round, before I got to act.
bhale187 01-18-07, 11:04 AM	Hardest monster? probably a cross between either the half-golem monk with vast strength and DR5/adamantine - in an intro mod against 1st characters with _no_ equipment.... ... and the dreamstealer monk. Incorporeal touch flurry! The closest near death experience was quite recent - being charged by 4 keen-scythe-weidling high level redcaps, who all decided to go for me. Complete with crits, that was 605hp in the first round, before I got to act. 605 damage in teh first round is a near death experience......:OMG!
Cardinal Teplin 01-18-07, 05:45 PM	Meh, fortunately I was largely immune to their weapons and uncritable, so I only took 286 subdual damage instead (plus about 36 hp of real damage from various elemental bonuses of the weapons. The character is a meat sheild, it's his job to get hit. <shrug>
_m_ 01-18-07, 07:07 PM	Meh, fortunately I was largely immune to their weapons and uncritable, so I only took 286 subdual damage instead (plus about 36 hp of real damage from various elemental bonuses of the weapons. The character is a meat sheild, it's his job to get hit. <shrug> and here i was thinking: mmmmm... delay death...
Japangirl 01-18-07, 08:00 PM	Meh, fortunately I was largely immune to their weapons and uncritable, so I only took 286 subdual damage instead (plus about 36 hp of real damage from various elemental bonuses of the weapons. The character is a meat sheild, it's his job to get hit. <shrug> Please please tell me how you were immune to the weapons! I want to know so maybe one day I may be worthy to grovel at your feet, oh master of tankiness.
cetiken 01-18-07, 08:28 PM	Morginstaler, Red Dragon of the Rift. Can half-dragon be applied to plants? :) Wow. I had exactly the same thought.
_m_ 01-18-07, 08:35 PM	Please please tell me how you were immune to the weapons! I want to know so maybe one day I may be worthy to grovel at your feet, oh master of tankiness. well, 1 warshaper makes u imune to crits...
solbergb 01-18-07, 09:22 PM	My guess would be master of many forms in troll form. But there are probably other ways.
Some_call_me_Tim 01-19-07, 05:20 PM	Worst was the huge pyro-hydra hiding in the sand with writer fiat of no spot check allowed. DM put our backs to the wall and wouldn't let us run. Killed half the party and ended the module on the first encounter. :surrender As for the assassin vine, it was a non-starter for my table--gotta love plant domain, let's see your radiant servant rebuke plants.
Camden 01-19-07, 09:27 PM	Worst was the huge pyro-hydra hiding in the sand with writer fiat of no spot check allowed. DM put our backs to the wall and wouldn't let us run. Killed half the party and ended the module on the first encounter. :surrender As for the assassin vine, it was a non-starter for my table--gotta love plant domain, let's see your radiant servant rebuke plants. Known lovingly as the 'Snorkling(sp?) Hydra'... There was a Spot Check as 1 table I ran made it, and narrowly missed the 33d6 breath weapon. The 2nd table weren't so lucky and 3 fell over in the first round and it just went downhill from there :(
bhale187 01-19-07, 11:07 PM	Worst was the huge pyro-hydra hiding in the sand with writer fiat of no spot check allowed. DM put our backs to the wall and wouldn't let us run. Killed half the party and ended the module on the first encounter. :surrender As for the assassin vine, it was a non-starter for my table--gotta love plant domain, let's see your radiant servant rebuke plants. Radiant servant of Atroa, master plant rebuker :D
blood_kite 01-19-07, 11:15 PM	Please please tell me how you were immune to the weapons! I want to know so maybe one day I may be worthy to grovel at your feet, oh master of tankiness. High level Master of Many Forms as a tendriculus? Plant type makes you immune to crits. Their regeneration is negated by bludgeon or acid. Huge makes you an excellent road block.
Some_call_me_Tim 01-20-07, 07:23 PM	Known lovingly as the 'Snorkling(sp?) Hydra'... There was a Spot Check as 1 table I ran made it, and narrowly missed the 33d6 breath weapon. Then you didn't run it as the author wrote it; he said you specifically had to say you were looking for them. Yeah, I ALWAYS look for snorkeling hydras buried in the sand. :rolleye2: Don't get me wrong, I think you were right to ignore that silliness, as it goes against the core rules, but the author was trying to auto-surprise the party. Some judges ran it correctly and others followed what the author wrote. Unfortunately, my table was one of the latter and got hosed.
Japangirl 01-21-07, 03:58 AM	Oh! I have a new worst combat! But it's a current module, so I can't talk about it yet. Suffice to say the BK grows broken characters for a REASON.
Lomiat 01-21-07, 10:54 AM	Oh! I have a new worst combat! But it's a current module, so I can't talk about it yet. Suffice to say the BK grows broken characters for a REASON. Have you played the extended option of a certain Year 6 IUZ mod yet? That one's pretty nasty, too. If your BK combat's more challenging than that one, me shudders to think...
Cardinal Teplin 01-21-07, 11:08 AM	High level Master of Many Forms as a tendriculus? Plant type makes you immune to crits. Their regeneration is negated by bludgeon or acid. Huge makes you an excellent road block. That's it, yes. Good guess! Master of Many forms doesn't do great damage, but they are very flexible and practically indestruble. Of course if they'd had clubs instead of scythes...
Japangirl 01-21-07, 01:44 PM	Have you played the extended option of a certain Year 6 IUZ mod yet? That one's pretty nasty, too. If your BK combat's more challenging than that one, me shudders to think... I have, it may be the same mod we're talking about, and the second combat was way way worse than the extended option IMO if it's the same one.
Camden 01-21-07, 06:02 PM	Then you didn't run it as the author wrote it; he said you specifically had to say you were looking for them. Yeah, I ALWAYS look for snorkeling hydras buried in the sand. :rolleye2: Don't get me wrong, I think you were right to ignore that silliness, as it goes against the core rules, but the author was trying to auto-surprise the party. Some judges ran it correctly and others followed what the author wrote. Unfortunately, my table was one of the latter and got hosed. I don't think I did. The first party had the high level Ranger scout 40' ahead, who said "I'm looking for Ether creatures and anythiing else that is out of the ordinary for the terrain. I've run into enough of those things in the desert's before" His stupidly high Know:Nature as well as he said he was looking for Ether Creaures gave him the spot check imho. The 2nd Table, just aimlesly walked over the bridge, no scout, no one with spot, even after being told the mod is kinda harsh... Just checked the Mod as well and it's a DC16+APL to spot them if specficcaly looking for them. I think the interpretation is 'Looking for them' can be kinda loose if they say "Anything out of the ordinary, these are the skills I have"... But as you say, always look for those Hyrda's, no matter where I am, Under the Sea, on the Moon...;)
Haro 01-21-07, 06:04 PM	I have, it may be the same mod we're talking about, and the second combat was way way worse than the extended option IMO if it's the same one. That was the most enjoyable/toughest mod from a combat sense I've played in a while. The battles were a little gimmicky but wow, don't do it on the third day of a con! I walked past two tables running it in the final session of the con it premiered at. All three tables were standing up with arms folded, worried looks on their face. Priceless! Joe
rockondon 01-21-07, 06:58 PM	Just checked the Mod as well and it's a DC16+APL to spot them if specficcaly looking for them. that sounds poorly written to me. As I understand it, if you are "specifically looking for something" its a search check. Active effort to see something is a search, and no effort should be a spot. PCs should always be given spot checks. Even if the hydra was invisible they should have a spot check.
Japangirl 01-21-07, 07:02 PM	That was the most enjoyable/toughest mod from a combat sense I've played in a while. The battles were a little gimmicky but wow, don't do it on the third day of a con! I walked past two tables running it in the final session of the con it premiered at. All three tables were standing up with arms folded, worried looks on their face. Priceless! Joe What really really annoyed me was that it was designed to challenge a specific APL 14/16 group that plays in my area (retired now), all of whom are wonderfully fun to play with but also really really powergamey. That means that with my 12.5-round-up-to-13-add-1-for-six-players table, the fact that not only we survived but no one died is a minor miracle. If that had been my normal table, instead of one with two (TWO!!) clerics, we never would have made it.
Southernskies 01-22-07, 08:49 AM	So for me, some evil mod writer decided to add a fiendish template to an assassin vine. At APL 4 gave the vine the Dash feat (so it can now charge 20 feet) and doubled it’s reach to 30 feet. Also vine did 1D8+13 points damage and then automatically constricted for same damage again. That’s enough to drop a lv 4 tank in 1 round let alone a lv 4 squishy Party was 50 feet away and felt reasonably secure. Little did they know the party spellcaster was going die in less than 6 seconds and the rest running for their lives. That monster was a TPKer since it had a reasonable chance of killing a lv 4 character in a single attack, making an attack of opportunity, killing with is AoO. In 2 rounds that vine could kill or disable four lv 4 PC’s without breaking a sweat. Nasty nasty monster!!! I slot0'd that one (might have even playtested it; can't remember). As a strategist, I told the party "it can't move, so we'll just shoot it full of arrows from here". After it did a run action towards us for 40 feet, we beat a hasty retreat and relied on mounted archery to kill it. That was not by far the worst encounter I have seen in the region (you should have seen the playtest of Regicide...)
Gwumph 01-22-07, 09:33 AM	that arrow tactic would have only worked if you had a tonne of magic arrows. It had DR-5/magic and around 80 hitpoints So for most parties the missle weapon the thing to death wasn't really an option (otherwise the goblins would have done it)
CrystalBlue 01-22-07, 10:20 AM	Saddest Death: Just last Friday. My level 6 character picked a fight with an 18th level character...and lost. ^.^ Yay! I don't wanna play D&D anymore...
Some_call_me_Tim 01-22-07, 11:13 AM	I don't think I did. The first party had the high level Ranger scout 40' ahead, who said "I'm looking for Ether creatures and anythiing else that is out of the ordinary for the terrain. I've run into enough of those things in the desert's before" His stupidly high Know:Nature as well as he said he was looking for Ether Creaures gave him the spot check imho.Kudos to the Ranger for specifically saying that. It sounds like you ran as written, I just assumed very few tables specifically said they looked. Silly us, we landed on the other side of the river, what do we see? "Miles and miles of endless sand." Okay, we mount up. "You are ambushed by a Hydra that was hiding in the sand. Let's see you are all clustered together in this 15 foot circle." :blink: "The hydra has surprise and breathes on the party, getting you all." :evillaugh It's no wonder two players gave up Living Greyhawk after that. Bad module, poor judge, the lowest ebb of LG that I've experienced. The 2nd Table, just aimlesly walked over the bridge, no scout, no one with spot, even after being told the mod is kinda harsh...Bridge? What bridge? Our judge dumped us on the other side of the river without a means to retreat, save swimming (like we are gonna out-swim a hydra). That was another point about why the encounter was so bad--absolutely no description of the terrain or exact timing. It was left up to the judge to decide. If the judge wanted to stack the deck further against the party he could. Just checked the Mod as well and it's a DC16+APL to spot them if specficcaly looking for them. I think the interpretation is 'Looking for them' can be kinda loose if they say "Anything out of the ordinary, these are the skills I have"... that sounds poorly written to me. As I understand it, if you are "specifically looking for something" its a search check. Active effort to see something is a search, and no effort should be a spot. PCs should always be given spot checks. Even if the hydra was invisible they should have a spot check.See, I've always interpreted spot much like rockon. You always get a free spot check to see things in a reactive manner. I didn't expect this module to be any different. The judge said the module could override the core rules. :mad: Okay, but where did this spot check come from; DC16+APL to spot something with a -7!!! hide modifier?! Yeah, a +31 circumstance bonus sound reasonable. :ahem: Don't even mention that the judge allowed the buried snorkeling hydra to stand up and crawl out of the sand as a free action.
_m_ 01-22-07, 05:29 PM	Saddest Death: Just last Friday. My level 6 character picked a fight with an 18th level character...and lost. ^.^ Yay! I don't wanna play D&D anymore... where did you find a lvl 18?
Japangirl 01-22-07, 06:52 PM	Just checked the Mod as well and it's a DC16+APL to spot them if specficcaly looking for them. I think the interpretation is 'Looking for them' can be kinda loose if they say "Anything out of the ordinary, these are the skills I have"... Haven't played this mod, don't know if I can/will. But I do know the hydra would be seen. Druid with +24ish to spot and Quick Reconnoiter will do that for a party (the feat gives a free action spot and listen check every round). So he's always looking for invisible people. He's even found them on occasion!
Lomiat 01-22-07, 07:37 PM	Haven't played this mod, don't know if I can/will. But I do know the hydra would be seen. Druid with +24ish to spot and Quick Reconnoiter will do that for a party (the feat gives a free action spot and listen check every round). So he's always looking for invisible people. He's even found them on occasion! What's the best Spot check anyone's seen on a character? I know of two candidates from my games in the Shield Lands. 1) A now-retired Druid (17th level at the time), was making DC 40+ spot checks regularly as her party tried to track down the assassin that rolled his Nat 1 on his Death Attack against the Initiate of the Seven-fold Veil. He rolled well on his Init, and one Dim Door later, there was a chase through the streets of Greyhawk. (He managed to lose them, but after the mod, the Initiate of the Seven-fold Veil had to start Greater Scrying until he could eke out his vengeance... er, extract information from the poor assassin.) 2) 12th level half-elf ranger in the Shield Lands was making DC 50+ spot checks (with good rolls!) in a recent mod. I think he has both Eyes of the Eagle and Hawkfeather armor. His Spot check is something like a +35? Just curious how much this helps people, too, because one build I've considered is the elf druid who takes the Wild Shaping feat to gain +8 to Spot checks for an hour/level. Thought it might be fun, and I figured Druid spells and an animal companion would make up for a lot of other weaknesses (such as hit points, strength, charisma, lack of metal armor and AC, and... um... stuff!).
Camden 01-22-07, 07:49 PM	Kudos to the Ranger for specifically saying that. It sounds like you ran as written, I just assumed very few tables specifically said they looked. Silly us, we landed on the other side of the river, what do we see? "Miles and miles of endless sand." Okay, we mount up. "You are ambushed by a Hydra that was hiding in the sand. Let's see you are all clustered together in this 15 foot circle." :blink: "The hydra has surprise and breathes on the party, getting you all." :evillaugh It's no wonder two players gave up Living Greyhawk after that. Bad module, poor judge, the lowest ebb of LG that I've experienced. Bridge? What bridge? Our judge dumped us on the other side of the river without a means to retreat, save swimming (like we are gonna out-swim a hydra). That was another point about why the encounter was so bad--absolutely no description of the terrain or exact timing. It was left up to the judge to decide. If the judge wanted to stack the deck further against the party he could. See, I've always interpreted spot much like rockon. You always get a free spot check to see things in a reactive manner. I didn't expect this module to be any different. The judge said the module could override the core rules. :mad: Okay, but where did this spot check come from; DC16+APL to spot something with a -7!!! hide modifier?! Yeah, a +31 circumstance bonus sound reasonable. :ahem: Don't even mention that the judge allowed the buried snorkeling hydra to stand up and crawl out of the sand as a free action. Yeah the Ranger was slightly paranoid... Well the box text mentions the River Artonsamay, fields on your side, sand on the other, and the river. It mentions nothing about the flow of the river, how deep it is or anything else that will start making PC's roll varying DC's (from table variation) for Swim checks, and me knowing whats on the otherside thought it would be really unfair (as in worth another EL added in if it is a fast moving/deep river that the party have de-armoured to get across, or can't retreat back over) so i said there was a bridge (not strictly by the module, but if you don't tell me what 'stats' the river has, how can it effect the party...) The Hydra could hide in the sand because it was being possesed by an ether<thing> that possess creatures, and allows them to phase between ethereal and material plane (hence the Hydra was in etheral form under then sand, then steps out, fades in, along with some EtherNaughts/Hulks/spitters and says "Hello" with extreme prejudice ;) Table 1 (that made the Spot check) Surprise round Me : You spot something real weird that shouldn't be here you reckon Ranger: Um, ok...Like what ? Me : An ethereal type hydra rising out of the sand, and it's got 11 heads Ranger. Am I going first ? I pull back as far as I can <tough fight> Table 2 : (them that didn't) Me : Ok surprise round, None of you saw anything, and now suddenly you see an Ethereal Hydra rise from the sand, and becoming solid. <Iniatives rolled> Me : Ok I'm going on 16, anyone beat me ? (I think 1 Character did, doesn't really do alot) Ok so can this group of people please make refex saves, and if you failed please take 148 points of damage. Now this thing will charge... Personally I think the fight in the Elevator is worse in this mod. Confined space (as the party go down The Advanced EtherHulks, and EtherNaughts (and some Spitters) phase in and cover the entire room with reach and start a poundfest... Oh and the Mod has retired now. EndGame Cor3-12...
_m_ 01-22-07, 07:54 PM	What's the best Spot check anyone's seen on a character? I know of two candidates from my games in the Shield Lands. 1) A now-retired Druid (17th level at the time), was making DC 40+ spot checks regularly as her party tried to track down the assassin that rolled his Nat 1 on his Death Attack against the Initiate of the Seven-fold Veil. He rolled well on his Init, and one Dim Door later, there was a chase through the streets of Greyhawk. (He managed to lose them, but after the mod, the Initiate of the Seven-fold Veil had to start Greater Scrying until he could eke out his vengeance... er, extract information from the poor assassin.) 2) 12th level half-elf ranger in the Shield Lands was making DC 50+ spot checks (with good rolls!) in a recent mod. I think he has both Eyes of the Eagle and Hawkfeather armor. His Spot check is something like a +35? Just curious how much this helps people, too, because one build I've considered is the elf druid who takes the Wild Shaping feat to gain +8 to Spot checks for an hour/level. Thought it might be fun, and I figured Druid spells and an animal companion would make up for a lot of other weaknesses (such as hit points, strength, charisma, lack of metal armor and AC, and... um... stuff!). i dunno about spot, but i have a lvl 1 gnome with no equipment with a +15 to listen...
Lomiat 01-22-07, 08:34 PM	i dunno about spot, but i have a lvl 1 gnome with no equipment with a +15 to listen... Big ears?
_m_ 01-22-07, 10:11 PM	Big ears? indeed. tiny little guy go stuck half way into a baelfull polymorph: elephant. either that or he just has... liek... good bonuses.
Some_call_me_Tim 01-22-07, 11:11 PM	The Hydra could hide in the sand because it was being possesed by an ether<thing> that possess creatures, and allows them to phase between ethereal and material plane (hence the Hydra was in etheral form under then sand, then steps out, fades in, along with some EtherNaughts/Hulks/spitters and says "Hello" with extreme prejudice ;) However, the particular creature entry for etherleech doesn't say it can fade a creature it possesses, only itself. In fact, that is how it gains possession, by "fading into their ethereal body." Even if we grant it that it can fade the the creature it possesses, it still takes 1d3 rounds to complete.
Lomiat 01-22-07, 11:38 PM	indeed. tiny little guy go stuck half way into a baelfull polymorph: elephant. either that or he just has... liek... good bonuses. Oh! I get it. It's a puzzle: Gnome wizard 1, 2 ranks Listen, +3 WIS, +2 racial, +2 Alertness (from familiar), +3 Listen from Bat familiar, +3 Skill Focus (Listen) = +15 I don't think a druid could make it, could it? Druid 1, 4 ranks Listen, +4 WIS, +3 skill focus (listen), +2 racial modifier = +13 Going Arcane Heirophant? Or Arcane Disciple? Or Mystic Theurge?
viceregal 01-23-07, 01:30 AM	Haven't played this mod, don't know if I can/will. But I do know the hydra would be seen. Druid with +24ish to spot and Quick Reconnoiter will do that for a party (the feat gives a free action spot and listen check every round). So he's always looking for invisible people. He's even found them on occasion! Not all DM's play it that way - I have a lvl 12 char with +30 to spot, +25 to listen (plus blindsight 30' etc from listening lorecall) and quick reconnoiter - I suggest at the begining of the module (when there is nothing hanging on the decision) that the best way to deal with it is to just have a take 10 every round (thus auto detecting on a spot 40 or listen 35) and let me roll reactively as well when everyone else has to ... sometimes they are fine with that others insist on me asking anytime I want it to work (what I call the d&d version of are we there yet!) and just rolling reactively if I don't. I have learned not to argue the toss with the DM past a 'so nothing on the spot of listen?' when we get semi auto suprised as there is usually something in the mod designed to defeat them ... just so long as the *DM* knows how the herd of elephants got that close!!!!! It still works fine in combat no matter which DM you have. :) Warren
Japangirl 01-23-07, 01:35 AM	Well, that druid just tells DMs that he's always spotting and listening, gives his modifiers, and lets DMs roll for surprise rounds if they want or else he'll roll it when DMs ask for it. But taking 10? I'm not so sure you can do that on spot or listen checks . . . if you can, that'd be sweet.
Mommy was an Orc 01-23-07, 10:35 AM	Well, that druid just tells DMs that he's always spotting and listening, gives his modifiers, and lets DMs roll for surprise rounds if they want or else he'll roll it when DMs ask for it. But taking 10? I'm not so sure you can do that on spot or listen checks . . . if you can, that'd be sweet. When your character is not being threatened or distracted, you may choose to take 10 on any skill except UMD...Hide, Move Silently, Search, Listen, and Spot are all great skills for this if you're a skill monkey.
cycloptic_squirrel 01-23-07, 03:36 PM	Oh! I get it. It's a puzzle: How about a marshal with motivate wisdom: +4 ranks, +3 WIS, +3 CHA, +2 racial, +3 skill focus (listen) = +15 I'm trying to get it without blowing a feat, but I'm not getting anywhere.
Lomiat 01-23-07, 04:52 PM	How about a marshal with motivate wisdom: +4 ranks, +3 WIS, +3 CHA, +2 racial, +3 skill focus (listen) = +15 I'm trying to get it without blowing a feat, but I'm not getting anywhere. Yeah, I thought about that, but I didn't think the marshal got Listen as a class skill... Then I looked at the class... But, seriously? A marshal with a positive Wisdom score? Nawww.....
Cardinal Teplin 01-23-07, 06:16 PM	The mod specifies that you don't get a spot roll unless you are specifically looking for it. So quick reconnaitre and taking 10 don't help, because they aren't specific. Or so our judge said. However, he didn't let the hydra crawl out of the hole big enough for him to hide in as a free action, which probably saved our bacon. My 14th level primary has a spot modifier of +36, most of the time, with a possible maximum of +46. That's 17 ranks in spot +4 wisdom bonus +2 for the alertness feat +8 for the hawk's vision feat (all day buff) +5 for raptor's sight (all day buff spell) Plus: all distance penalities are halved From here there are choices. In gnome form he has lifesight, low light vision, and can use a telescope to halve the range. In hawk form he gets a further +8 to spot, for a total bonus of +44 Various other forms can give him tremoursense, blindsight, scent, darkvision, the ability to see both ethereal and invisible creatures, and so on. He usually memorises embrace the wild, giving him a further +2 to spot, and scent no matter what form he is in. But only for an hour and a half per casting. So at maximum, either +38, distance penalties effectively quartered as a gnome, ... or spot of +46 as a hawk. Quick reconnoitre is a possibility for next level, but I'm still not sure whether to go for that or improved trip. I'm sure it's theoretically possible to go higher. I'll take another rank in spot when I get to 15th level, for example. But it's the highest I've seen in a character that's actually played.
_m_ 01-23-07, 07:37 PM	Oh! I get it. It's a puzzle: Gnome wizard 1, 2 ranks Listen, +3 WIS, +2 racial, +2 Alertness (from familiar), +3 Listen from Bat familiar, +3 Skill Focus (Listen) = +15 I don't think a druid could make it, could it? Druid 1, 4 ranks Listen, +4 WIS, +3 skill focus (listen), +2 racial modifier = +13 Going Arcane Heirophant? Or Arcane Disciple? Or Mystic Theurge? arcane disciple shadowcraft mage, well done. i think i changed him a bit b4 the first game, dropped the skill focus. but yeah, well done. you get the bonus points for today *grin*
clannagh 01-23-07, 10:33 PM	When your character is not being threatened or distracted, you may choose to take 10 on any skill except UMD...Hide, Move Silently, Search, Listen, and Spot are all great skills for this if you're a skill monkey. now what about disguise ? This is an opposed roll which the PHB states should be rolled secretly by the DM and takes D3*10 minutes I believe. Take 20 is clearly out becasue of the recent FAQ ruling clarifying you cannot take 20 on opposed checks. What are peoples opinions on take 10 on disguise ? If take 10 is feasible, how long would it take to prepare the disguise ?
Mommy was an Orc 01-23-07, 10:47 PM	now what about disguise ? What are peoples opinions on take 10 on disguise ? If take 10 is feasible, how long would it take to prepare the disguise ? Use Magic Device specifically states in the special area that you cannot take 10 with the skill. It is the only skill that states this. Every other skill you can take 10 on(without penalty, mind you - there is no XP penalty to taking 10 despite what some mods think) provided you are not distracted or threatened. It takes the same time as normal - you are in essence asking the DM to roll a 10 in secret.
clannagh 01-23-07, 10:51 PM	Use Magic Device specifically states in the special area that you cannot take 10 with the skill. It is the only skill that states this. Every other skill you can take 10 on(without penalty, mind you - there is no XP penalty to taking 10 despite what some mods think) provided you are not distracted or threatened. It takes the same time as normal - you are in essence asking the DM to roll a 10 in secret. so just D3*10 minutes total at the start of the day and you take 10 all day ... that makes things a lot simpler :)
Mommy was an Orc 01-24-07, 12:42 AM	so just D3*10 minutes total at the start of the day and you take 10 all day ... that makes things a lot simpler :) Well, in one sense. It depends on who you're facing off against - if you think you're going to be going up against a lot of things with poor Spot checks, taking 10 heavily favors you. If on the other hand, you're facing something with a better Spot than your Disguise, you definitely don't want to take 10.
LGMoses 01-24-07, 12:57 AM	Well, in one sense. It depends on who you're facing off against - if you think you're going to be going up against a lot of things with poor Spot checks, taking 10 heavily favors you. If on the other hand, you're facing something with a better Spot than your Disguise, you definitely don't want to take 10. speaking of taking 10. Would it be safe to assume that pc's are taking 10 when they are on watch and such?
Mommy was an Orc 01-24-07, 01:11 AM	speaking of taking 10. Would it be safe to assume that pc's are taking 10 when they are on watch and such? Unless a PC says he's taking 10, he's not. In general, unless you're tweaked for Spot/Listen, you want to roll in such situations(you average 10.5 and sometimes you'll roll really, really well)
RanielK 01-25-07, 03:18 PM	Most ridiculous death would be Folly. A gamer draged his girlfriend along. The group couldn't solve the puzzle and her first level character got a single negative level. OOOOOOOOh, you should have seen the look on her face! He was so dead draging her into this "fun" activity. I only spent an hour dropping as many IC hints as I could to get them to figure it out. They had everything except turning on the big switches marked in Common "on" and "off". So no solve for them. They were convinced the switches would blow them up, even after I had the crazy cleric of Zagyg turn the switches on and off for five minutes straight (muttering crazily "ON, OFF, ON, OFF" for the whole five minutes while pantimiming moving a big ole switch). Now, if I've ever seen pointless death, that was it!:eek: Course, the look on the druid's face when I pulled the "Folly switch" on his dire bear, for a dire chipmunk, was priceless too!
Golorious 01-25-07, 05:29 PM	During a surprise round I charged a Huge Advanced Behir that unfortunately wasn't surprised like I thought. It did a number on me with its Bite/improved grab and 11 rakes. So one AoO did about 144 damage. Leaving me at -50. Luckily it didn't power attack was the first words out of the DM's mouth before he started to roll the damage. This turned into a long line of wizards giving my barbarian lessons on about what not to charge. Earlier in the day I had done something similar but nowhere near so deadly. I love Iuz Meta-regionals. :)
LGMoses 01-25-07, 11:25 PM	can ur character Tell if someone is flat-footed? Can ur character TELL if someone has the combat reflexes feat?
magebeast 01-26-07, 01:31 AM	can ur character Tell if someone is flat-footed? Can ur character TELL if someone has the combat reflexes feat? I would imagine at best you can only tell if someone has or has not acted yet. There's nothing that tells you if they have the class features necessary not to be caught flat footed. I know for certain you can't tell if someone has combat reflexes. There's no way to judge whether or not someone has the lightning fast reflexes required to take more than one attack of opportunity a round until they do it.
blood_kite 01-26-07, 03:31 PM	can ur character Tell if someone is flat-footed? Can ur character TELL if someone has the combat reflexes feat? I would say for some creatures you might be able to tell if they have acted the first round of combat and are simply delaying, others it might not be readily apparent. As an example, we ran into a pair of zombies being controlled by a third person. One character did fairly well on initiative and attempted to charge past the motionless zombies to attack their assumed controller. The zombies dropped him with their attacks of opportunity. We all agreed with the DM that since the zombies had won initiative but didn't have orders, they would have just stood there like statues. Some things like mindless undead and constructs might be hard to tell if they are flat-footed.
Gaelforcwynd 01-26-07, 05:02 PM	I was going to hijack the kobold thread, but that would be mean, so: Most horendous way in which you have seen a pc die, most hardcore moster that has killed a pc (not one that was killed with no casualties, we dont care how many times you DIDNT die) weakest monster that has killed a pc. most rediculously funny / amusing / pointless way youve seen a pc die. you dont have to answer them all (or any actually, its somewhat voluntary in fact) I was just thinking, if you're unhappy with a PrC choice or some other level based decision you've made, is it possible to take a level in something else after being restored from having been level drained?
solbergb 01-27-07, 01:10 AM	When I ran Lord Robliar, attempting to subvert a Paladin to the Dark Side in some roleplay after the session, I nearly talked him into getting level drained by repeated deaths to level 1, and then starting over as a LN fighter so he could serve the Great Robilar while still being a Living Greyhawk legal character. He would have had the honor of being killed 6 or 7 times by the blade of an epic fighter. What a great backstory :) It all worked out. I kill him, he uses his equipment for a raise. Lather, rinse, repeat, it comes out about right actually for starting character cash, without Lord Robilar having to do much other than deign to attack a few times and arrange for a minion to prep sufficient raise dead spells after pawning the equipment for enough diamond dust. But he realized he'd lose his owl mount, which he really liked, so we settled on a less drastic solution, involving a L15 conversion to Blackguard should he still wish to serve Robilar when he becomes level 15, and should Robilar still be alive then, etc. We'll see if he feels the same way in 8 levels. I gave him my contact information so we could roleplay his character's retirement to evil if he wants to :)
rockondon 01-27-07, 02:43 AM	We had one nasty encounter tonight. Our party, mainly 4th lvl characters, played up for an APL 6. We fought something with DR 10/- a 20ft reach a ton of hit points and a bunch of other truly ignorant abilities. After finishing my dog (an appetizer) it killed another PC and seeing how our attacks were largely ineffective we're like...um they're toast how about we go somewhere else now.
_m_ 01-29-07, 05:12 PM	most dangerous recent mod i was in was an apl 12, with a 14 fighter, a 12 or 13 monk, a 12 non combat based rogue, and a 10 wiz (with an 8 barb cohort). no healer at all, hi damage fights. it was bloody nasty. we had 2 of the characters running purely on temporary hitpoints on several occasions. even the blink dog was on -13 of actual hp at one stage. still... we lived... so *grin*
Rerednaw 01-30-07, 10:16 AM	Hardest Monster? At APL 4? Probably a clay golem. Only one character could fight him at a time due to dungeon environment. Most low level parties also cannot handle the DR, the magic immunity, the raw (2d10+7) damage, etc. Worst death? APL2. TPK. Us: 2 barbarians, raging. 1 archer and myself (level 1 sorceror, just one AR away from 2) this was a special session run so I could play in an APL 4 adventure and only be 2 levels down. Them: 1 ftr/rogue and 4 level 1 grunts (rogues or warriors). Party wipe in 4 rounds. Barbarians hit the leather clad mobs once. Archer hit once. I burned through my sleep spells (only one failed his save) and my magic missile scrolls. I could have ran but didn't want to abandon my teammates. Melee mobs consistently hit us and made their will saves. Tactics were pretty good but nothing can overcome bad dice rolls.
LGMoses 01-30-07, 02:32 PM	Tactics were pretty good but nothing can overcome bad dice rolls. amen to that. My dice actually roll to help the players a bit. I once rolled straight 2's for 3 rounds for the bad guys. What should have been a harrowing combat was just like running a lawnmower over a bunch of goblins.
_m_ 01-30-07, 05:00 PM	amen to that. My dice actually roll to help the players a bit. I once rolled straight 2's for 3 rounds for the bad guys. What should have been a harrowing combat was just like running a lawnmower over a bunch of goblins. you should see clannagh! theres a reason his archer hits on a +20something with all its shots... his d20 only has 1's 2's and 3's on it. and im pretty sure his d8 has a 0 on it somehow.
Some_call_me_Tim 01-30-07, 05:33 PM	Tactics were pretty good but nothing can overcome bad dice rolls.Sure there is a tactic that can overcome bad dice rolls. The most underused tactic in the game--RUN. :D
clannagh 01-30-07, 05:47 PM	amen to that. My dice actually roll to help the players a bit. I once rolled straight 2's for 3 rounds for the bad guys. What should have been a harrowing combat was just like running a lawnmower over a bunch of goblins. hehe the local group actually got a very distorted view of the "uberness" of archers and ranged mages because i never managed better than a 2 on initiative for monsters for 6 months straight and they fried everything before it got to hit them :)
Haro 01-30-07, 05:59 PM	During a surprise round I charged a Huge Advanced Behir that unfortunately wasn't surprised like I thought. It did a number on me with its Bite/improved grab and 11 rakes. So one AoO did about 144 damage. Leaving me at -50. Luckily it didn't power attack was the first words out of the DM's mouth before he started to roll the damage. This turned into a long line of wizards giving my barbarian lessons on about what not to charge. Earlier in the day I had done something similar but nowhere near so deadly. I love Iuz Meta-regionals. :) That was a great encounter! There are a dozen or so references in various threads over the past six months about when I ran that mod for four sorcerors (two female) and one fighter. Suffice to say, the sorceror/barbarian did exactly what you did, except from the safety of a mass fly spell. He was bored of watching everyone else do ranged damage... :-) Joe
Rerednaw 01-31-07, 01:06 PM	Sure there is a tactic that can overcome bad dice rolls. The most underused tactic in the game--RUN. :D When we were down to two our characters refused to abandon their comrades. Heroic...to the last...
LGMoses 01-31-07, 08:26 PM	Sure there is a tactic that can overcome bad dice rolls. The most underused tactic in the game--RUN. :D yeah, noone really considers running that much. Weren't their like, morale checks or something in 2e?
gomeztoo 02-01-07, 08:19 AM	Sometimes players don't realize running is the only (realistic) option, because they assume every encounter can be won (due to the APL system). From a discussion of the Onnwal mailinglist (as far as I can remember): In the now retired Onnwal module "The Hills are Alive" there is an encounter with an overwhelming force of barbarians, shadow dragons (I have been told), and what not coming up to the PCs. The initial reaction on certain death approaching should be to run, right? At least, that is what the scenario assumes the PCs do. But at least one partiy didn't, feeling that they could probably take the 'first wave' or something. They were TPKed iirc... There was an outcry because players simply couldn't grasp the idea that when an entire army targets you as battle practice, you should get the heck out of there.
smerwin29 02-01-07, 08:50 AM	I say the following as a writer and editor. We have to remember, if we do put in an encounter where the PCs are supposed to be overwhelmed, to give them both plenty of clues and plenty of warning. And also give them time to run. And explicitly state these things in the adventure text so DMs can't confuse the issue and "accidentally" TPK the party.
Some_call_me_Tim 02-01-07, 11:04 AM	When we were down to two our characters refused to abandon their comrades. Heroic...to the last...You see, bad tactics. :P Seriously, I have seen more character deaths and near-deaths as a result of "leave no one behind" tactics. It may be in-character but that doesn't mean fighting to the death is a good tactic. I myself was involved in a battle where we had two PCs killed trying to save a third who was reckless. I figured I had enough hp to take a breath or two from the dragon we were fighting. The sorcerer wanted to "help out." Dragon breathed--dead sorcerer. Another character went after the sorcerer--another death. Now, I had the problem of trying to drag three bodies out of the dungeon and only a handful of hp left. Bad tactics--If everyone had continued to flee as was the plan all along, we would have only had one death. Yet we ended up with three because of 'heroics.' and lost the character we were trying to save permanently. If the other two weren't trying to be heroic we could have recovered the first body, raise dead, no problem.
clannagh 02-01-07, 05:22 PM	Sometimes players don't realize running is the only (realistic) option, because they assume every encounter can be won (due to the APL system). From a discussion of the Onnwal mailinglist (as far as I can remember): In the now retired Onnwal module "The Hills are Alive" there is an encounter with an overwhelming force of barbarians, shadow dragons (I have been told), and what not coming up to the PCs. The initial reaction on certain death approaching should be to run, right? At least, that is what the scenario assumes the PCs do. But at least one partiy didn't, feeling that they could probably take the 'first wave' or something. They were TPKed iirc... There was an outcry because players simply couldn't grasp the idea that when an entire army targets you as battle practice, you should get the heck out of there. sometimes its bad metagaming .. "running from apparently overwhelming encounters in past mods has lost us XP and loot so this time we will not be tricked by the sneaky mod writer"
Sieylianna 02-01-07, 07:23 PM	Seriously, I have seen more character deaths and near-deaths as a result of "leave no one behind" tactics. It may be in-character but that doesn't mean fighting to the death is a good tactic. Every time that I've seen multiple deaths in an encounter as a player it has been because one person went down (frequently because they did something stupid) and other PCs died trying to save them. This is particularly true with creatures that paralyze (ghouls, ghasts) or grapple their foes. Ed
clannagh 02-01-07, 07:31 PM	Every time that I've seen multiple deaths in an encounter as a player it has been because one person went down (frequently because they did something stupid) and other PCs died trying to save them. This is particularly true with creatures that paralyze (ghouls, ghasts) or grapple their foes. Ed You gotta love the newer players (playing up to APL4 or higher) with excess faith in full plate and tower shields running up to the bullete and attempting to whack it with their 18 HP level 2 and going down with AoO before they even reach it :)
copper_wyrmling 02-01-07, 07:40 PM	I have a new Hard Monster (not Hardest, but Hard) for this thread... - At APL 12, 24HD advanced dread wraith in a small room in magical darkness where light spells don't work and both mundane means of escape and teleportation are blocked That is, for every attack you roll two miss chances, one for concealment and one for incorporeality; its touch AC is around 27; and its Con-drain can be avoided only by a DC 31 Fort save. We thought it had killed somebody, but then our archer rechecked the disfavor that had reduced his Con by 1, and realized that he'd read it wrong and it had actually run out the previous scenario. So the archer was on Con 1 and delay-death'ed for most of the combat. We eventually killed it by buffing the cleric's turning abilities as high as we could and then hoping... we got our L11 cleric up to effective level 20 with a +15 bonus on the turning check, and fortunately that was just enough to stick the Greater Turning (if we'd left out any one of those buffs, or if she hadn't had Improved Turning, she would've failed). That's the first encounter I've seen where to my knowledge, running was really not an option.
clannagh 02-01-07, 07:49 PM	I have a new Hard Monster (not Hardest, but Hard) for this thread... - At APL 12, 24HD advanced dread wraith in a small room in a permanent Darkness field where you need to make a DC = huge caster level check to get any light spell to work, under an undispellable dimensional lock, with all known exits barred by rockslides That is, for every attack you roll two miss chances, one for concealment and one for incorporeality; its touch AC is around 27; and its Con-drain can be avoided only by a DC 31 Fort save. We thought it had killed somebody, but then our archer rechecked the disfavor that had reduced his Con by 1, and realized that he'd read it wrong and it had actually run out the previous scenario. So the archer was on Con 1 and delay-death'ed for most of the combat. We eventually killed it by buffing the cleric's turning abilities as high as we could and then hoping... we got our L11 cleric up to effective level 20 with a +15 bonus on the turning check, and fortunately that was just enough to stick the Greater Turning (if we'd left out any one of those buffs, or if she hadn't had Improved Turning, she would've failed). That's the first encounter I've seen where to my knowledge, running was really not an option. We wouldn't have TPK'ed in that particular fight because we had at least one PC with Death Ward memorized, but there was still another combat after that before you had a chance to run or rest... this is a current mod so people take care on comments that hint at which mod it actually is .. in particular spoliers that hint at party compostion could be really bad to be honest our APL8 party would have been TPKed if we hadnt had a Radiant Servant plus Alvin Basically the other 4 party members (all well built and well played combat characters including some level 10's) were useless and stumbled around the party survived by Alvin (who was severely nobbled but could still see) doing the funky shadowness stuff to get around and pointing the Radiant Servant in the right direction.
_m_ 02-01-07, 07:55 PM	I have a new Hard Monster (not Hardest, but Hard) for this thread... - At APL 12, 24HD advanced dread wraith in a small room in a permanent Darkness field where you need to make a DC = huge caster level check to get any light spell to work, under an undispellable dimensional lock, with all known exits barred by rockslides That is, for every attack you roll two miss chances, one for concealment and one for incorporeality; its touch AC is around 27; and its Con-drain can be avoided only by a DC 31 Fort save. We thought it had killed somebody, but then our archer rechecked the disfavor that had reduced his Con by 1, and realized that he'd read it wrong and it had actually run out the previous scenario. So the archer was on Con 1 and delay-death'ed for most of the combat. We eventually killed it by buffing the cleric's turning abilities as high as we could and then hoping... we got our L11 cleric up to effective level 20 with a +15 bonus on the turning check, and fortunately that was just enough to stick the Greater Turning (if we'd left out any one of those buffs, or if she hadn't had Improved Turning, she would've failed). That's the first encounter I've seen where to my knowledge, running was really not an option. We wouldn't have TPK'ed in that particular fight because we had at least one PC with Death Ward memorized, but there was still another combat after that before you had a chance to run or rest... we only played that one at 8. same environmental conditions, (but one of us could see). but we had princess. alvin: "princess, go BOOM now" princess: "BOOM" alvin: "ugh! dont just SAY boom, silly girl, actually GO boom!" princess: "oh... oh ok. *BOOM*" "wraith thing: "crap" simple *grin* we had a fight against a 36+ HD huge blood golem, (magic imunity) in a room you couldnt escape from with absolutely no healers, and a party of a wizard with no dex (so no orb spells to bypass spell imune), a trap finding diplomonkey rogue (non combatant, due to DR 10), a fighter monk (avg 4 dmg due to DR) and a pious templar who couldnt rage because if he did he couldnt use his helm of glorious recovery. ... and the blood golem kept whirlwinding. ... and our highest ac was 31 ... and the moster had over +30 to hit ... and it had somewhere between 300 and 400 hp. ... and 15 foot reach (thank god we got initiative on it.) now THAT was a hard fight. good funt though.
copper_wyrmling 02-01-07, 08:25 PM	we only played that one at 8. same environmental conditions, (but one of us could see). but we had princess. alvin: "princess, go BOOM now" princess: "BOOM" alvin: "ugh! dont just SAY boom, silly girl, actually GO boom!" princess: "oh... oh ok. *BOOM*" "wraith thing: "crap" simple *grin* we had a fight against a 36+ HD huge blood golem, (magic imunity) in a room you couldnt escape from with absolutely no healers, and a party of a wizard with no dex (so no orb spells to bypass spell imune), a trap finding diplomonkey rogue (non combatant, due to DR 10), a fighter monk (avg 4 dmg due to DR) and a pious templar who couldnt rage because if he did he couldnt use his helm of glorious recovery. ... and the blood golem kept whirlwinding. ... and our highest ac was 31 ... and the moster had over +30 to hit ... and it had somewhere between 300 and 400 hp. ... and 15 foot reach (thank god we got initiative on it.) now THAT was a hard fight. good funt though. The problem with incorporeal encounters is the whole +1 CR / 4 HD thing; I would venture to guess that your wraith didn't have APL+12 hit dice ;) Of course, at APL 12 I guess you're kind of expected to have a phylactery of undead turning + lyre of the restful soul + cloak of charisma +6 + sceptre of obedience... yeah... Some encounters just don't scale well between APLs. For example, I'm pretty sure I know the second encounter you mentioned, and at APL 16 it was fun, but not scary - we had two of the beasties plus a cornugon (horned devil). That was the fight where Yolande's Zealot Pact triggered and she got to do ~300 damage / round until she ran out of bad guys :) She was so happy. But yeah, Yolande and Maesto both had AC 41, and the blood golems still hit us on every single swing :weep: Fortunately they don't do huge damage, at least by APL 16 standards.
bitznarf 02-01-07, 08:34 PM	now THAT was a hard fight. good funt though. :eek: and here I thought most hardcore moster that has killed a pc (not one that was killed with no casualties, we dont care how many times you DIDNT die) :P
solbergb 02-01-07, 09:01 PM	Yeah. I wasn't going to mention the sea-cat that decided to attack my sister's cleric (ac14 hitpoints 13 vs a monster that had dropped our 39hp tank to low negatives in one full attack. Luckily for her it rolled a nat one on the first attack and didn't get to rend. Everyone else at the table was SURE she was gonna die). But all these other close calls got mentioned.... After she was lying down and bleeding out the player said said "I guess I should have stepped back after hitting it last round." the rest of us "Yes. Yeah." But you know..you don't want to run other people's characters and the damage she did before getting eviscerated DID help.
bitznarf 02-01-07, 09:14 PM	Yeah. I wasn't going to mention the sea-cat that decided to attack my sister's cleric (ac14 hitpoints 13 vs a monster that had dropped our 39hp tank to low negatives in one full attack. Ah yes, sea cats. I judged that one for my local group (presuming the same mod of course). Claw, claw, rend, and you're at -9 because I rolled 2 one's on my rend dice. No fudging either. Then they tripped it, causing it to miss with one claw on the next full attack sequence.
_m_ 02-01-07, 09:31 PM	:eek: and here I thought :P touché. maybe i should edit it to add someone dying *grin*
Lupo 02-02-07, 02:38 AM	The problem with incorporeal encounters is the whole +1 CR / 4 HD thing; I would venture to guess that your wraith didn't have APL+12 hit dice ;) Of course, at APL 12 I guess you're kind of expected to have a phylactery of undead turning + lyre of the restful soul + cloak of charisma +6 + sceptre of obedience... yeah... hm, i am seriously shocked :eek: my cleric 13 has none of the nice toys :blush: phylactery of undead turnig: just checked, can be crafted (add to list of to craft asap) but has then to be swapped with circlet of persuasion. lyre of the restful soul: non-standard item, no access. cloak of charisma +6: my cleric is wearing a +4 one, might upgrade it some day. sceptre of obedience: non-standard item is suppose?? and my cleric isn't a radiant servant of mighty cheese, so turning is not so effective anyway :(. ciao martin m. ps: seem to be another istance of "regional flavor" :rolleyes:.
copper_wyrmling 02-02-07, 03:20 AM	hm, i am seriously shocked :eek: my cleric 13 has none of the nice toys :blush: phylactery of undead turnig: just checked, can be crafted (add to list of to craft asap) but has then to be swapped with circlet of persuasion. lyre of the restful soul: non-standard item, no access. cloak of charisma +6: my cleric is wearing a +4 one, might upgrade it some day. sceptre of obedience: non-standard item is suppose?? and my cleric isn't a radiant servant of mighty cheese, so turning is not so effective anyway :(. ciao martin m. ps: seem to be another istance of "regional flavor" :rolleyes:. I was being sarcastic Martin (complaining about how much gear you needed to be able to deal with the encounter) ;) We did in fact have all those items, but they were spread out over the party - the L14 sorcerer had a (crafted) +6 cloak, the bard had a sceptre of obedience (either A&EG or MH, adds +5 competence bonus to charisma-based checks when held, and yes that one was from a regional mod), I can't remember who had the lyre but it was from a Core, and the cleric had a phylactery of undead turning (from a Core). My sorcerer spent a full-round action and drew an attack of opportunity (which caused a one-off death ward favor to activate :weep:) to relocate the +6 cloak from the other sorcerer to the cleric who was standing beside her ;) That was after she spent her first round activating the lyre of the restful soul. Undoubtedly the two most effective nonspellcasting actions she has ever taken ;) Our cleric wasn't a Radiant Servant either (cleric of Rudd with the Luck and Destiny domains), but she had the Disciple of the Sun feat (spend two turn attempts to make it a greater turning), Improved Turning, and Extra Turning. We were extremely lucky - the two sorcerers could've done a combined total of about 50 damage / round with metamagicked magic missiles (we were having a lot of trouble hitting with orbs of force), but that would've given it three rounds to kill people, and if it had been spring-attacking out of the ground (forcing us to ready actions) it would've cut us down to an average total of about 35 damage / round. It was a very mean encounter.
gomeztoo 02-02-07, 07:14 AM	Ah yes, sea cats. I judged that one for my local group (presuming the same mod of course). Claw, claw, rend, and you're at -9 because I rolled 2 one's on my rend dice. When I ran it, the only reason PCs didn't die (though did go into negatives) was because the boat they were in was giving cover, and after it slaughtered the animal companion dragged it off to eat it. The druid at the last moment decided to grant it its meal and not attack - otherwise she would have been dead for sure. The only thing that managed to hit the sea cat were magic missiles. The PCs in melee had sucky BAB or were unconscious, and the ones that were out of it had to shoot in melee at a critter that had cover from being half emersed.
solbergb 02-02-07, 12:29 PM	We killed it with the death of 1000 cuts. Dribs and drabs of damage from various 1st level characters, and my L3 favored soul and his dog. Our sorceress was stunning it about every other round with color spray which helped immensily, and both me and the dog had high enough AC to make rends unlikely, but everyone else was at severe risk most of the fight. A lot of the damage we did was while it was stunned (-2 to AC and flatfooted)
Rerednaw 02-02-07, 01:14 PM	deleted...
Bold 02-03-07, 02:29 PM	a bugbear joined the ranks of the trolls and ogres. Our barbarian/scout charged the bugbear [of Legend] "He's crazy! Ha, that's so 'Bramblethorn'. Oh, wait... Uh oh, that's not gonna be... Everybody, RUN!" One of the cruelest, most unavoidable melee deaths I've seen was a Fire Giant on a Cauchemar at APL10, doing a Spirited Charge against the wizard (per the tactics). If the Fire Giant hit at all it would be an insta-kill for a typical wizard (+30 to hit, 7d6+69 damage), so the DM tried to "pull the punch" by Power Attacking for full, in the hopes that he'd miss (+18 to hit, 7d6+141 damage). He didn't miss. The wizard took around 160hp of damage in the very first encounter (just the "obligatory thug encounter") before he even had a chance to act. Of course, this was a situation where the enemy winning initiative changed the entire combat. I later ran that mod for another table that got the drop on him, and they killed the Cauchemar before the Fire Giant came up in the initiative order. There was another, more challenging encounter at the end of the mod, which featured a party vs. party battle against a couple of fire giants, plus a wizard, cleric, and rogue. It would've been tough just with that lineup, but they had been buffing for a number of rounds prior to combat. That fight was an ugly failure, but a glorious death in battle. :D
Gyro_LC 02-03-07, 04:56 PM	Two spell turrets knocking out maximized CL 10 fireballs that overlapped with no surprise round, at APL 8. A sorcerer opened a door and was immediately critted by the entropic reaper waiting on the other side.
Japangirl 02-04-07, 02:26 AM	On an off-note, I have a (certed on an AR) disabled spell turret with force cage, finger of death, disintegrate, and something else that I can re-enable to put on my ship of Dread Pirate goodness.
Crazy Boro 02-04-07, 02:49 AM	The worst death that I think could have happened was in a y4 Keoland mod. Unfortunately I'm not too sure about it since I played the "high APL" track (8-12). The low one (2-6) involved getting turned into candy by what was said on the AR. One of the entries describes "Death by Chocolate" and says that you can never eat chocalate again since it brings about bad memories of "chocolate rambo bunnies with missing ears". I'd have to say that being killed by chocalate bunnies would be quite embarrasing for an adventurer. :D
smerwin29 02-04-07, 09:54 AM	Yeah, or getting "petrified" by the rock-candy cockatrices. My halfling PC freed the paladin who was coated in rock candy the only way he knew how . . . MMMMMMMMMM, rock candy.
RedKnightofKet 02-04-07, 01:38 PM	My INT 6 Wood elf played that same module. You should see the looks he gets when he tells people about the time he killed some chocolate bunnies, marshmallow chickens, and took out an oven with an AoO. :D:P
Mortepierre 02-05-07, 07:40 AM	Ah yes, sea cats. I judged that one for my local group (presuming the same mod of course). Claw, claw, rend, and you're at -9 because I rolled 2 one's on my rend dice. No fudging either. Then they tripped it, causing it to miss with one claw on the next full attack sequence. You know, I never understood the logic of tripping an aquatic creature in water. What does it do? Turn it over on its back? How can you be prone while floating? I know that, rules-wise, you can do it but it's one of those instances where you have to roll your eyes at the illogic of it all...
solbergb 02-05-07, 08:46 AM	It's not in water. Its standing on the ground, half in and half out of water, in that scenario. Tripping is plauisble although not easy as it is size large and strong. If it was immersed in water and using its swim speed, no, you can't trip it.
Reylance 02-05-07, 04:55 PM	"He's crazy! Ha, that's so 'Bramblethorn'. Oh, wait... Uh oh, that's not gonna be... Everybody, RUN!" One of the cruelest, most unavoidable melee deaths I've seen was a Fire Giant on a Cauchemar at APL10, doing a Spirited Charge against the wizard (per the tactics). If the Fire Giant hit at all it would be an insta-kill for a typical wizard (+30 to hit, 7d6+69 damage), so the DM tried to "pull the punch" by Power Attacking for full, in the hopes that he'd miss (+18 to hit, 7d6+141 damage). He didn't miss. The wizard took around 160hp of damage in the very first encounter (just the "obligatory thug encounter") before he even had a chance to act. Of course, this was a situation where the enemy winning initiative changed the entire combat. I later ran that mod for another table that got the drop on him, and they killed the Cauchemar before the Fire Giant came up in the initiative order. There was another, more challenging encounter at the end of the mod, which featured a party vs. party battle against a couple of fire giants, plus a wizard, cleric, and rogue. It would've been tough just with that lineup, but they had been buffing for a number of rounds prior to combat. That fight was an ugly failure, but a glorious death in battle. :D "If the PCs can do it..." :D I never rolled well enough on the two initiatives to get off the charge before some PC did something to block the charge (wall spell, solid fog, Evard's, etc.). Sadly, the triad changed their mind and later removed spirited charge.
Daverius 02-06-07, 05:27 PM	This was an interesting death: 2 wraiths and a bunch of ghouls. Party was an archer, fighter, barb/monk/ranger etc, cleric, and a druid/rogue. 1st round: Cleric turns 1 wraith a few of the ghouls. We were able to wipe out the remaining ones, however the other wraith concnetrated on the cleric and dropped her to a con of 8 or something before we were able to kill it. No arcane casters, or ghost touch weapons so it was a lot of bad die rolls....darn miss chances! Alittle later...second wraith returns while we are getting ready for the next encounter....kills cleric. We kill the wraith and just about wrap up the last encounter....cleric rises back up as a wraith....we had to kill her as well.
dkay807 02-08-07, 05:58 PM	Hardest Monster - Marc Yudsen offers to run the mod he wrote, Citadel of the Storm King at APL 18. I, playing a 17th level Dwarven Defender am playing with the Gryphon's Wrath adventuring company of Geoff. This CY595 mod was the final module in the Geoff 5-year storyline, where we went to take on the eldest of the Sakhut - an Eldritch Giant with too many Monk levels because Marc Yudson decided Monk was a non-associated class for an Eldritch Giant. Now let's see - 500+ HP, Holding a Rod of Absorption in one hand and another strange rod in the other (which turned out to be some sort of gargoyle cleric in the shape of a rod with an AC of 50 that has no discernible anatomy - stupid, right?). He has two rings of counterspells and a hand of glory with another ring of counterspells, all of which are carrying Greater Dispel Magic (keep in mind Eldritch Giants can cast that as a free action at will). He has 8 attacks that deal 60 damage at a MINIMUM before power attack and his attack bonus is... yes. His stunning fist DC is in the high 40's and he has some weird ability that let's him do an AoE stunning fist. He also has sun school so that he can dimension door to the casters and stunning fist them all (eldritch giants have dimension door at will as well I believe). His AC is only 48 but that's ok because he has Karmic Strike up with an insane dex, so hitting him only kills you. As soon as two Greater Dispels are thrown at him, he spends a round recharging his rings. No party has enough Greater Dispels to actuall debuff him. Meanwhile, the gargoyle rod in his hand (remember that?) is casting Heal and DMM Quicken Heal on him every round. Destroying that thing took us forever and we couldn't touch him until it was destroyed. Don't ask us how we defeated him - but we did after 5 hours spent in one combat. Worst Death - Intro mod in Tusmit, some jerk in our party charges an elephant during a parade, causing it to go wild and kill a number of slaves belonging to the Pasha. We were all hung. Boxed text TPK in an intro mod - amazing, eh? The guys in Tusmit made T-shirts at their next con making fun of us because of that. That joke lasted for a while :)
rockondon 02-11-07, 01:11 PM	lately, the hardest monsters around here have been the PCs themselves. last night 5 PCs were in an APL 2 mod (I believe at least a couple PCs were 3rd or 4th level) where you had to help out a village - clean out their water source, fix their boats and fishing nets, gather firewood, repair their homes (preferably by using diplomacy to get the villagers to help you). They were doing a horrible job of it - they never thought about getting the villagers to help, they weren't using their spells to aid themselves, etc. Suddenly, there is an encounter across the water. Well the PCs didn't get around to fixing any boats so they swam, it was during high tide. After 23 rounds of swim and constitution checks they were dead...of drowning...themselves...tpk...wtf. last week an APL 8 party were in combat with some large grappling something or other, and the tank in the party was grappled and had already taken serious damage but was still above zero. The wizard casts deep slumber, but since the tank had fewer HD, he was affected first. He failed his save and passed out. The beastie was unaffected. The warmage, mistakenly thinking that the tank was essentially 'out of combat', casted scorching ray. The GM rolls percentiles, determines the tank was the one hit. "roll damage" He rolled high, and brought his own party member down to -14 hit points. HOORAY FOR TEAMWORK!!!!
magebeast 02-11-07, 02:20 PM	The warmage, mistakenly thinking that the tank was essentially 'out of combat', casted scorching ray. The GM rolls percentiles, determines the tank was the one hit. "roll damage" He rolled high, and brought his own party member down to -14 hit points. HOORAY FOR TEAMWORK!!!! This seems like one of those cases where while the player may not understand what's going on, the PC would probably realize that he had a chance of hitting the tank with his scorching ray.
Rerednaw 02-14-07, 05:26 PM	Hardest Monster - Marc Yudsen offers to run the mod he wrote, Citadel of the Storm King at APL 18. I, playing a 17th level Dwarven Defender am playing with the Gryphon's Wrath adventuring company of Geoff. This CY595 mod was the final module in the Geoff 5-year storyline, where we went to take on the eldest of the Sakhut - an Eldritch Giant with too many Monk levels because Marc Yudson decided Monk was a non-associated class for an Eldritch Giant. Now let's see - 500+ HP, Holding a Rod of Absorption in one hand and another strange rod in the other (which turned out to be some sort of gargoyle cleric in the shape of a rod with an AC of 50 that has no discernible anatomy - stupid, right?). He has two rings of counterspells and a hand of glory with another ring of counterspells, all of which are carrying Greater Dispel Magic (keep in mind Eldritch Giants can cast that as a free action at will)... Just out of curiousity... Casting Silence on a tank/monk and having him fight defensively around the Giant didn't work?
ZX670 02-14-07, 05:43 PM	If it was immersed in water and using its swim speed, no, you can't trip it. Actually, I believe you can trip things that are submerged as well as things in the air with an active fly spell. It's not because it says you can, but I don't think it says anywhere that you can't do so, either.
clannagh 02-14-07, 06:04 PM	Actually, I believe you can trip things that are submerged as well as things in the air with an active fly spell. It's not because it says you can, but I don't think it says anywhere that you can't do so, either. Flying is specifically dealt with in the rules and it states you are causing the creature to "stall" (and presumably start to fall to the ground though it doesnt specifically say this). Note that creatures with "good" or "perfect" fly can hover and hence do not stall. tripping these creatures would presumably only cause them to stop in mid air, not fall.
ZX670 02-14-07, 07:15 PM	Flying is specifically dealt with in the rules and it states you are causing the creature to "stall" (and presumably start to fall to the ground though it doesnt specifically say this). Note that creatures with "good" or "perfect" fly can hover and hence do not stall. tripping these creatures would presumably only cause them to stop in mid air, not fall. Kinda makes sense if you think about it. Without having your feet on the ground for leverage, it's basically your raw strength opposing the pull of whatever weapon your enemy is using to trip you. In mid-air, it'd almost be like having a rope tied around your waist and someone yanking it from behind you as you are trying to go the other way, thus 'stalling' you. This same lack of leverage is present underwater as well, and it would be more like disorientation for a split second. If you've ever had a wave crash on your head sweeping you underwater will know what this is like.
solbergb 02-14-07, 08:54 PM	Flying is specifically dealt with in the rules and it states you are causing the creature to "stall" (and presumably start to fall to the ground though it doesnt specifically say this). Note that creatures with "good" or "perfect" fly can hover and hence do not stall. tripping these creatures would presumably only cause them to stop in mid air, not fall. Actually according to the FAQ, tripping does nothing to good/perfect fliers. If you have a swim speed, you are essentially flying at "perfect" with respect to 3-d maneuverability, which is why I say you can't trip someone with a swim speed in water. Someone WITHOUT a swim speed, sure, especially if he's standing on the bottom of the ocean.
_m_ 03-20-07, 04:53 AM	1v1 at apl 8 against a lvl 10 blood magus. ouch. greater shadow at apl2. also ouch.
Gwumph 03-20-07, 06:14 AM	m long time no see..... Where have u been hiding?
_m_ 03-21-07, 03:58 AM	moved cities, and my pc blew up in a giant fireball, so i havent been able to get on much of late. and OH how ive missed you all :D
tlotig 03-21-07, 07:35 AM	and a near addiction to mediterranian food with lots of garlic???? :P just out of curiosity, i know that perrenland is an oerth parallelism to swizerland, is there any region modelled after italy or even better sardinia or corsica? or transylvania for a vampire's save heaven :D ciao martin m. Heheh a fair question, have a look at how many high level perrenland characters have magical silver weapons *grin*
Rerednaw 03-21-07, 01:47 PM	Got another one. Brand new player. New to D&D, new to LG. Her first mod. Seacat grapples her character, drags her into the water. Drowned.
blood_kite 03-22-07, 12:16 PM	This one probably falls under 'Monster inappropriate for APL'. Intro mod. Ragamuffin possessed creatures. Not hard? 1st level characters vs. AC 22+ HP 30+ creature that we don't want to kill, so -4 to attacks. Next fight. Ragamuffin archers in trees with partial cover while party is in open. AC 26+ and party members flat-footed while climbing tree.
solbergb 03-22-07, 12:25 PM	Got another one. Brand new player. New to D&D, new to LG. Her first mod. Seacat grapples her character, drags her into the water. Drowned. That's kind of weird. Seacats are rendmonsters not grapplemonsters. It should have just ripped her in half.
Lupo 03-22-07, 01:02 PM	That's kind of weird. Seacats are rendmonsters not grapplemonsters. It should have just ripped her in half. yea, that would have done her much better with a level 1 character :rant: the first LG table i dm-ed run into traditionalist orcs, the ones with the great axes . . . . guess how the players were looking at me after the first crit . . . .:rolleyes: level 1 characters are just in danger at APL 2 tables, that is what intro mods are for. ciao martin m. ps: yes, some intro mods are equally or even more challenging than some APL 2 adventures. but that is part of the DM's job, getting the right module for the right table.
Rerednaw 03-22-07, 01:04 PM	That's kind of weird. Seacats are rendmonsters not grapplemonsters. It should have just ripped her in half. Yes but this way the kittycat got to get a fully tummy away from the pesky party members. And it was an intro module. :D
Eric Anondson 03-22-07, 07:03 PM	ps: yes, some intro mods are equally or even more challenging than some APL 2 adventures. but that is part of the DM's job, getting the right module for the right table.The very first adventure I wrote was an intro. I was a novice, I admit. Well, I put in a losel who was trained to use the orc shotput as the ultimate bad guy. Advanced with 2 levels in barbarian (its favored class). Tactics were to rage and charge, hurling an orc shotput. OMG! Deaths abounding even without critting! 2d6 19-20/x3. I was going for flavor, pure and simple. I felt it made sense that expendable Iuzian grunts might be given a one-shot weapon while they charged into combat to die miserably. Iuz bred losels for such fighting, but they didn't work out so well. Losels are cowards without fierce commanders whipping them to battle. The mod's idea was that PCs were told to investigate a manor in recently reclaimed land (this is the Shield Lands), reports said it was occupied by stranded orcs. In fact a losel family that had escaped retreating Iuzian forces and set up in the manor as its new home. Feeling they were trapped in their new home, the losels were in no mood to be evicted. A few normal losels with a single self-established new chief (the losel with levels). But the combination of the barbarian levels on a 1/2 CR beast with a one-shot weapon that does huge damage that is even more advantageous for NPCs doomed to die than PCs. I put that down to another lesson learned. I really felt bad about all the first level PCs that were killed by the barbarian tossed shotput... Folks consoled me saying things like "hey, they were only 1st level characters with little emotional attachment built yet", or "now folks are introduced to the fact that life in the Shield Lands is deadly dangerous, and care needs to be taken." *shrug* A re-write of the adventure put in a greataxe in place of the shotput and Power Attack in place of the exotic proficiency. Not sure if it was an improvement, fewer crits and reduced chance to hit from Power Attacking, but the extra damage from Power Attack was still ugly. Glad to have that retired. 3HD Power Attacking, raging orc is not appropriate for a party of first level characters.
Reylance 03-26-07, 02:34 PM	1. A creature with a nasty ability with a Constitution-based DC. 2. Advancing, or a template that adds to a creature's Constitution. Attention authors, Triad members, Circle reviewers: THESE TWO THINGS SHOULD NOT GO TOGETHER. Or rather, they can go together, but consider that the CR increase for 2. considers the additional power from the improvement (both extra hit points and whatever abilities the template adds), but does not include the CR increase for 1. Similar arguments apply for special abilities that improve with a creature's size and advancing the size.
awroe 03-26-07, 02:53 PM	my pc blew up in a giant fireball, so i havent been able to get on much of late Is that a contender for Worst Death? :)
solbergb 03-26-07, 03:48 PM	have to be sparse on details because mod is still in play but... big tough melee creatures advanced with fighter+barb levels, weapons and heavy armor backed by a warchanter..... there is a fair chance the entire party might not be present too. 100% legal. Similar to PC cheese. But...ouch. Yes, this caused a death, although mostly because the two characters that could have prevented it didn't arrive until a round after one of them hit four times for an average of 57 a hit....(overcoming both stoneskin and a stalwart pact)
Japangirl 03-26-07, 10:40 PM	have to be sparse on details because mod is still in play but... big tough melee creatures advanced with fighter+barb levels, weapons and heavy armor backed by a warchanter..... there is a fair chance the entire party might not be present too. 100% legal. Similar to PC cheese. But...ouch. Yes, this caused a death, although mostly because the two characters that could have prevented it didn't arrive until a round after one of them hit four times for an average of 57 a hit....(overcoming both stoneskin and a stalwart pact) *Shudder* Yeah, our archer died in that combat as well. We lost initiative, and he got critted in the surprise round for about 20-40 points over his -10 point. The cleric with Delay Death couldn't use it because of being flatfooted. At that point, we ran away, though we did bring the archer's body back with us.
solbergb 03-27-07, 12:22 PM	in our case the guy who died stuck a greater curse (con = 1) on one of them (which is why he was in full attack range) and someone else finished it off, so we'd had one dead before we lost a party member, and my battlefield control sorc got into the game and things started going better. but it was one of the scarier things I've seen in LG, yes.
AOSOL 03-29-07, 12:24 PM	The absolutely stupidest encounter I've ever fought in was when I playing in a APL 6 game with a table of 4 very powerful PCs and myself were pitted against a 10th level orc barbarian/frenzy berserker with a STR sitting at 38 and potions and magical protections on him than you can shake a stick at. The judge who ran us is notorious for just adding to the encounter and trying to screw PCs so that only made the encounter worse. I was scouting ahead of the party so we could get a better idea. Apparently he knew where I was and had drink his cocktail of magical manliness that consisted on haste, fly, bear endurance among other things. (DM) you cross over a hill and you see a single orc with his massive greatsword barely buried into the ground. He notices you Bladric and then lifts a potion to his throat and quaffed it and vanishes from sight. (Me) How the hell did he notice me? I rolled a friggin' max hide check of 37 and 32 on my Move silently, I have camouflage up, I have cover from rumble and shrubbery and I'm wearing my Pomarj marked leather armor! (DM) You can hear his blood curdling scream and charges you and "swings like he means it". (regional slang for power attacking for the house) He hits. (Me) Okay Nick, sense you seem to have omni presence in this area and can notice me even though it would be like trying to hear a whisper a mile away, and my current AC with cover is 32, what damage did you do? (DM) Bladric, can I barrow some d6? I forgot mine today? (Me) how long did you have to prepare for this mod? 3 weeks? (DM) can I? (Me) It's cardinal never to let the DM butcher you with your own dice, but I'm make an exception this once. (DM) thanks, (rolls 4d6) you take 56. are you dead? (Me) NOPE! Still in triple digits! Of coarse I dead I'm a 5th elven ranger. You've been our DM for 19 games for already. (DM) Sorry about that. (Me) how can you be? you power attacked for the house and some how noticed me 150 ft away. Besides you never rolled a spot check. You'd need a skill bonus of at least +17 to even start. (DM) everyone else roll INIT. I sat contemplating the numbers I've just received and quickly wrote up a character based on what happened. The frieze B. was fried by our caster which were all hiding, waiting for my report. Soon after the combat. (Me) Did I meet the pre-reqs for contemplative of Grummush sense I meet his aspect apparently. (Dm) what do you mean? (Me) You either made up the numbers or we fought a orc with divine ranking because there is no way you could have spotted me. (DM) I rolled a 20 though (Me) how did you ever base the herald level judge test? auto success 20s don't apply for skill checks. (DM) where does it say that? (Me) In the rules obviously. The rest of the table quickly pointed out that I was right. (DM) Well, Okay, we have to do the encounter over again. (Me) This time you better not add things. We completed the game with flying colors and the DM soon stop playing entirely. Thank goodness:rolleyes:
katrick 03-31-07, 01:26 PM	Quickest TPK: Kaleidoscopic Doom drops Wiz Save or die, Cornugon with Spiked chain 20ft reach drops Paladin, Dragon Transmogrifies Breath Weapon, Ranger attempt to attack Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil oops, And that was the surprise round! Initiate then moves onto Cleric oops, I figure Orc Barb with 270 Hps and 34 STR can take a round or two, 1 AoO and a full attack later, we didn't even get to attack anything. oh yeah the wiz Forcecaged the Dragon.(doesn't stop Breath) Though we heard of a table that Dim Doored into the Dragon got shunted AoO'd Breathed on and then dismembered. Worst Death: Beholder, Finger of Death, Flesh to Stone, Disintigrate, in one round, bye bye now 13th Sorc.(Gotta love Moraddin) Funniest Death: Fighter awakes at night and wearing only his sheild attacks the Vrock, same char got eaten by the Bear of Legend(that apparantly tells you to help it and is an avatar of sorts)oh well the Kirk can buy another one. Best Kill: Twin Disintigrate on a Dragon(still available), only use of Raging Spell before DC.
katrick 04-04-07, 03:07 PM	Dreadwraiths have no Con, so Limited Wish take -7 to the next save, Quicken True Strike, Disintigrate DC 23 + the -7 =30! 30d6 what Dreadwraith. oops bad typing. Spell Reflection on the Twin Disintigrate! I can't make my own DC!! Thanks be to Zagyg this time, almost out of decent cert's. Funniest NPC deathish: Guards of Greyhawk city: "what happened here, who killed these bodies". Sorceror: Sleight of Hand, Disintigrate: "what bodies?" Katrick
Eric Anondson 04-04-07, 04:40 PM	Funniest NPC deathish: Guards of Greyhawk city: "what happened here, who killed these bodies". Sorceror: Sleight of Hand, Disintigrate: "what bodies?"Sleight of Hand a green ray? :twitch: *shrug*
JamesMaissen 04-06-07, 02:29 PM	Dreadwraiths have no Con, so Limited Wish take -7 to the next save, Quicken True Strike, Disintigrate DC 23 + the -7 =30! 30d6 what Dreadwraith. The one that you didn't make the 50% incorporeal damage immunity roll on? And even then.. it probably survives your 2 round combination using up a 7th, 6th and 5th level slot. -James
katrick 04-06-07, 06:34 PM	Did i mention no Con? ie CRAP FORT SAVES 2 rounds is nothing Hell 90 AR's we can dance with the 303 devils under the Pale moonlight.(pardon the pun) Sleight of hand ME, Bluff the Rogue "Oh look, Turosh Mak!" Shazamm! Limited WISH doesn't reqiure a 50% miss chance nor does Transdimensional Disintigrate both 7ths.(Oops I'd better check out whats happening on Acheron: Plane Shift, Thank you for the FORK.) I wrote it as options for wizards who can Quicken a True Strike (cancelling the miss chance) and then do a normal Disintigrate it was a three way write. Am I honestly the only Sorc with 106 Hp before spells? Is it true that the whole world is sold on PRC's and are missing the real fun? OOOhhh thats right i missed out on Clone what a GYP!!(like a Wizard could afford it anyway?) Katrick Thanx Solberg
solbergb 04-06-07, 07:55 PM	nitpick. Overland flight is personal. Nyeah :) This is the worst death/hardest monster thread. Bragging about your PC is for another thread :)
katrick 04-06-07, 08:04 PM	not bragging ! just a long winded rant! late night (nightshift\dayshift\what day is it now\what was sleep anyway)typing out loud*** its sunup here what time is it there? Oooops i have been using the whole party Overland Flight for at last a level now Crap Crap Crappity Crap (cheat) Katrick THANK JORAMY I RETIRED YESTERDAY!! p.s. what thread, just kidding
Timlagor 04-06-07, 09:47 PM	Quicken a True Strike (cancelling the miss chance) and then do a normal Disintigrate it was a three way write. What miss chance?
solbergb 04-09-07, 11:57 AM	rant on he's confusing incorporeal damage immunity with the kind of miss chance truestrike helps with (concealment). If WOTC in 3.0 rules had just called incorporeal damage immunity what it is rather than calling it "incorporeal miss chance" than people wouldn't still be making this mistake 7 years later. rant off don't get me started on "incorporeal touch attack"
dkay807 04-09-07, 03:00 PM	Dreadwraiths have no Con, so Limited Wish take -7 to the next save, Quicken True Strike, Disintigrate DC 23 + the -7 =30! 30d6 what Dreadwraith. oops bad typing. Spell Reflection on the Twin Disintigrate! I can't make my own DC!! Thanks be to Zagyg this time, almost out of decent cert's. Funniest NPC deathish: Guards of Greyhawk city: "what happened here, who killed these bodies". Sorceror: Sleight of Hand, Disintigrate: "what bodies?" Katrick If by "Spell Reflection" you mean "Spell Turning" or some other ability or spell that duplicates "Spell Turning" (such as Mind Over Magic), then the twinned disintegrate should not have been reflected - it is an "effect: ray" spell, not a "targetted" spell and thus, is unaffected by Spell Turning. yet another reason why Spell Turning abilities are horribly overrated. And no, True Strike does not help against the 50% miss chance granted by incorporealness.
Timlagor 04-10-07, 12:56 PM	And no, True Strike does not help against the 50% miss chance granted by incorporealness. There is no miss chance granted by being incorporeal.
Japangirl 04-10-07, 01:28 PM	There is no miss chance granted by being incorporeal. ?? "Even when hit by spells or magic weapons, it has a 50% chance to ignore any damage from a corporeal source (except for positive energy, negative energy, force effects such as magic missile, or attacks made with ghost touch weapons)." SRD. While this is technically not a miss chance, you do still have a 50% chance not to do damage when using magical weapons or magical attacks. Your statement is entirely correct but confusing nonetheless so I thought I'd clarify it.
JamesMaissen 04-10-07, 03:06 PM	?? "Even when hit by spells or magic weapons, it has a 50% chance to ignore any damage from a corporeal source (except for positive energy, negative energy, force effects such as magic missile, or attacks made with ghost touch weapons)." SRD. While this is technically not a miss chance, you do still have a 50% chance not to do damage when using magical weapons or magical attacks. Your statement is entirely correct but confusing nonetheless so I thought I'd clarify it. That's the point and what Brad was 'ranting' about. If nothing else you hit and do no damage so you 'learn' what ACs can hit the thing rather than with a miss chance. It's one of those things that suffers from bad naming, which is a problem that D&D currently suffers from (hopefully whenever they come up with a new edition it will have a more formalized and precise naming system). Besides getting back to the disintegrate suped up over two rounds even if it misses the FORT save it only takes 105 or so damage on average, which for the slots expanded and over two rounds isn't all that impressive (nor is it likely to destroy it alone). For the slots and time you are talking about metamagic'd magic missles can do better damage without the damage immunity chance, chance to miss on a 1, or chance it can make the fort save. Disintegrate while flashy isn't all that great a spell for dealing damage. It's great for removing walls of force and 10ft cubes of material, but not so great for destroying things. -James
JamesMaissen 04-10-07, 03:15 PM	Double post
solbergb 04-10-07, 03:49 PM	Yeah, and dread wraiths aren't exactly easy to hit with touch attacks anyway. Touch AC = AC. Which is prob why the poster mentioned truestrike.
katrick 04-11-07, 01:34 PM	bugger! so the Empowered Orb of Force and the Empowered Scorching rays dont Turn either? Incidentally Do the Emp Scorching rays go through Lsr Globe as they are "effectively" only a second? We went a few rounds before backtracking the Spell Turning +33 with the True Strike. the 50% doesnt affect the Limited Wish though as it's not targeted? Disintigrate is the last great Undead killer: no Con crap Fort save Yesterday, 4 party members go to aid a fallen comrade (one at a time) all fail the miss chance for his Displacement( no healing) Dragon swoops breathes, 5 deaths,sixth party member kills dragon with min damage 5th level Magic Missile Guess you just had to be there! katrick
solbergb 04-11-07, 04:08 PM	emp scorching rays don't go through globe. Only spells 4th level or higher (heightened scorching ray can work) for lesser or 5th for greater will work unless they were cast before the globe was created.