What source are the demilich stats in Scarwall taken from?

What source are the demilich stats in Scarwall taken from?

Tome of Horrors III.

The epic level version is in the SRD... but that's too bad-ass to inflict on 13th-level characters. Heck... the ToH II version is maybe too bad-ass to inflict on 13th-level characters... hence the "Handle with Care" sidebar.

The epic level version is in the SRD... but that's too bad-ass to inflict on 13th-level characters. Heck... the ToH II version is maybe too bad-ass to inflict on 13th-level characters... hence the "Handle with Care" sidebar.

I'm a player, so I don't know what the sidebar said, but I came here specifically to complain about this encounter. It's awful.

Designing the encounter so that a basically unkillable monster can instakill a character a round is just poor. Designing it so that there's no way to raise the character without killing the unkillable monster, finishing the entire rest of the chapter and then finding a True Resurrection somehow makes me think that it's not just bad, it's bad on purpose. Removing the part of the instant death monster ability that is affected by death ward makes me pretty sure whoever wrote this encounter was just being a dick.

Dying in the second round of the first fight of the week then finding out I get to sit out for a chapter (at least) or start over with a new character isn't good fun, so as a player, this module sucks. Playing D&D shouldn't generally involve playing for 10 minutes then saying "uh, ok, call me if you need me for next month, I'm going to the gym."

I have to admit My players although they liked the rest of the adventure path immensely found the Demilich to be the only part they really didn't enjoy.

Difficult monsters are difficult for a reason. To be fair, your DM should have read the module in advance and known about this, along with seeing the side bar. If he knew how much you guys hated instant death effects, he could have toned parts down.

Blame the module all you want, but the ability to adjust encounters on the fly is up to the DM, not the book. No module works for every group.

Not every encounter is supposed to be easy, or even just a little challenging. To maintain verisimilitude the party should face stuff the mage can defeat in unarmed melee combat now and again, and the entire party should be stomped on by now and again.

Yes, we play a game, but that's no reason to make it all sunshine and roses just to keep your precious little character alive.

Your character dies?

Roll another.

Simple.

Agreed. My group plays Paizo because of early games like Age of Worms. We *expect* challenging. A monster like this that makes you wary, sit back, and plan, is a good monster.

Foreshadowing is recommended though, especially if it turns up in the Chosen. Emphasize the danger.

Dying in the second round of the first fight of the week then finding out I get to sit out for a chapter (at least) or start over with a new character isn't good fun, so as a player, this module sucks. Playing D&D shouldn't generally involve playing for 10 minutes then saying "uh, ok, call me if you need me for next month, I'm going to the gym."

To be fair, I don't think that Eikl is claiming that he's sad because his character is dead and he has to make another. He is referring to a much more practical and real issue: if your character is dead, you don't get to play.

The occasional lethal encounter is great for verisimilitude, but it leaves the player without anything to do until his DM allows him to reenter with another character or his character is raised. Given the length of 3.5 combats (in real time) and the DM's acknowledged concern with "reality," this can often be a significant amount of time in which the player is, in fact, not playing. This is not fun.

Is it something that players occasionally have to live with, when dice, poor planning, or misfortune become involved in the game? Yes.

Should an encounter, particularly one tied directly into the plot (as opposed to the Raskova encounter in 7DttG), be intentionally written as an unavoidably lethal encounter? No.

I'm not saying this encounter is unavoidably lethal (I haven't read it in some time), but that is the crux of Eikl's argument.

O

Generally, we try to make sure that encounters aren't super deadly. For various reasons I'm not gonna go into here to avoid spoilers for folk who haven't read the adventure, this particular encounter is unusual in that regard; it's a TOUGH encounter, but the adventure itself is built to foreshadow and arm PCs with it. Yet it's still really tough, and that's why we put in a big sidebar to warn GMs about it; they know their players better than we do, after all, and should adjust as necessary.

pretty sure whoever wrote this encounter was just being a dick.

I've been called worse...by my players.

Eikl wrote:

pretty sure whoever wrote this encounter was just being a dick.

I've been called worse...by my players.

Don't players say the sweetest things?

Ah, but did you deserve it?

He probably did.

Generally, we try to make sure that encounters aren't super deadly. For various reasons I'm not gonna go into here to avoid spoilers for folk who haven't read the adventure, this particular encounter is unusual in that regard; it's a TOUGH encounter, but the adventure itself is built to foreshadow and arm PCs with it. Yet it's still really tough, and that's why we put in a big sidebar to warn GMs about it; they know their players better than we do, after all, and should adjust as necessary.

As the Eikl's DM I do have to voice a beef with the Demilich stat block as presented in the adventure. In both the epic level version and the ToH II version, there's a clause that "A potential victim protected by a death ward spell is not immune to trap the soul, but receives a +5 bonus on its Fortitude saving throw and is effective against the level loss on a successful save." At the time, I was just comparing the effect to the Trap the Soul spell (Conjuration [Summoning]) and I ruled that Death Ward had no effect.

I don't know if omitting that was intentional, but after Eikl got back from the gym, I ruled that it applied in this situation since it appears in both original sources. (side note: with that addition, the druid was basically immune to the demilich's soul trapping (couldn't fail the save except on a 1, and the Luck domain PFRPG cleric had a luck aura up, so even natural 1s weren't automatic failures)).

Generally, my players tend to be on the very powerful side. I've had to boost Kyuss, Karzoug and Demogorgon the equivalent of 5 CR or so to prevent the fights being entirely one-sided in the PCs favor. It's less so in Curse of the Crimson Throne since we're more or less PFRPG-core.

He probably did.

QFT.

I expect the omission was unintentional. I didn't intentionally remove it, and if the editors had done so, I think it would possibly affect the CR, so I think you ruled correctly if you put it back in.

As the Eikl's DM I do have to voice a beef with the Demilich stat block as presented in the adventure. In both the epic level version and the ToH II version, there's a clause that "A potential victim protected by a death ward spell is not immune to trap the soul, but receives a +5 bonus on its Fortitude saving throw and is effective against the level loss on a successful save." At the time, I was just comparing the effect to the Trap the Soul spell (Conjuration [Summoning]) and I ruled that Death Ward had no effect.

I don't know if omitting that was intentional, but after Eikl got back from the gym, I ruled that it applied in this situation since it appears in both original sources. (side note: with that addition, the druid was basically immune to the demilich's soul trapping (couldn't fail the save except on a 1, and the Luck domain PFRPG cleric had a luck aura up, so even natural 1s weren't automatic failures)).

The ommision was intentional, and in fact was my attempt to make the demilich a little less unfair. Making the demilich's ability able to punch through death ward is lame, in my opinion, especially in the case of something as powerful as this. For the version of the demilich we presented in Scarwall, I removed that line to make it so that death ward works just fine and provides total protection against the attack.

The ommision was intentional, and in fact was my attempt to make the demilich a little less unfair. Making the demilich's ability able to punch through death ward is lame, in my opinion, especially in the case of something as powerful as this. For the version of the demilich we presented in Scarwall, I removed that line to make it so that death ward works just fine and provides total protection against the attack.

I can see how it'd prevent the negative levels on a successful save, but the demilich's Trap the Soul ability is based on a spell that isn't [Death]. I'm pretty sure Death Ward wouldn't have an effect against a Trap the Soul spell, so that's how I ruled Death Ward against the (Su) ability.

At least to my reading, removing that line makes the Trap the Soul (Su) ability *more* powerful, not less.

The occasional lethal encounter is great for verisimilitude, but it leaves the player without anything to do until his DM allows him to reenter with another character or his character is raised. Given the length of 3.5 combats (in real time) and the DM's acknowledged concern with "reality," this can often be a significant amount of time in which the player is, in fact, not playing. This is not fun.

Bingo. In this particular case, after getting eaten by the now-specifically-bypasses-death-ward-entirely souped up demilich (as opposed to a mere normal demilich we were way more prepared for), getting freed after killing it with frustrated metagamey cheese ("This is broken, just set off my Fire Seeds and kill it, they bypass SR"), the dungeon itself ate my character's soul so he couldn't be Resurrected without defeating all the other load bearing bosses. Instant kill is irritating and but tolerable, but combining it with the enforced sit-out-all-chapter game mechanic is directly anti-fun.

The ommision was intentional, and in fact was my attempt to make the demilich a little less unfair. Making the demilich's ability able to punch through death ward is lame, in my opinion, especially in the case of something as powerful as this. For the version of the demilich we presented in Scarwall, I removed that line to make it so that death ward works just fine and provides total protection against the attack.

You should probably have been more clear about that. As printed, your version of the demilich totally ignores all death wards, scarabs of protection and the plot-device protection against a failed death save effect.

You should probably have been more clear about that. As printed, your version of the demilich totally ignores all death wards, scarabs of protection and the plot-device protection against a failed death save effect.

Except, you know, his Wail of the Banshee effect. I'm pretty sure death wards and scarabs work against that. I'd expect said effect to kill more people than the one target/round Trap the Soul.

I do agree it is interesting Trap the Soul doesn't have the Death subtype, and that by removing the "+5 to fort saves against this with death protection up", it's actually making the demilich harder. My guess is the designers misread Trap the Soul as having the death subtype...that or they just did want him to be a killer. :D

I'm fine either way.

Death ward can certainly block the demilich's wail of the banshee, and will also block the negative levels that one gains if you make your save against the trap the soul effect. But we should have indicated that the entire effect is a death effect, since this effect does not duplicate the spell of the same name. The spell doesn't kill a character; you break the soul trap, the character emerges alive. The fact that the demilich version DOES destroy the victim's body in a way that is pretty much identical to that caused by destruction says to me that this version of the attack IS a death effect, and that it SHOULD be blocked by death ward. It's a case where something felt so obvious that it got omitted, unfortunately. It's certainly a case where the individual GM should step in and apply common sense to the encounter, I think...

Consider this official clarification for the ability: A demilich's trap the soul attack is a death effect.

Daigle wrote:

He probably did.

QFT.

I expect the omission was unintentional. I didn't intentionally remove it, and if the editors had done so, I think it would possibly affect the CR, so I think you ruled correctly if you put it back in.

Sorry I was reading the posts about this backwards as if the omission removed the ability for death ward to protect against it rather than created it. When I wrote the thing, I just went with how it was in the source book. I meant it the other way in that if something was removed, it was probably not to make it harder, as James has explained above.

Sorry for the thread necromancy,

But the new Pathfinder paladin (as compared to the 3.5 paladin) completely takes the threat out of the demi lich. Smite evil alone. Plus its low hitpoints still leave it vulnerable to a cleric's channel energy, save made or not.

I am running crimson throne with Pathfinder rules. The demilich battle was three rounds with one PC death out of six. The Cleric and Paladin were the only effective ones. If there was no paladin in the party, this encounter still would have proved challenging. Smite overriding DR is key. The level paladin required at this point of the AP makes the Demilich moot.

Sorry for the thread necromancy,

But the new Pathfinder paladin (as compared to the 3.5 paladin) completely takes the threat out of the demi lich. Smite evil alone. Plus its low hitpoints still leave it vulnerable to a cleric's channel energy, save made or not.

If you are using the Pathfinder rules (e.g. Paladin's smite evil, or Cleric's channel positive energy), you'll probably want to also use Pathfinder's Bestiary 3's version of the Demilich (e.g. channel resistance +5, and 142 HPs).