Help - Unbeatable PC, need suggestions.


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Bloodwort wrote:

To all my fellow GMs out there, I have a challenge.

.
(pssst.... Venomblade, you can stop reading right here! everyone else, continue on)
.

I am running a high-level game. All the PCs just hit level 16. One of them, a barbarian of great strength, has just taken the "come and get me" rage power.

How do I compete with this? It is unbelievably good. At level 16 he has four attacks a round. With combat reflexes and a high dexterity modifier this engine of destruction will have 12 attacks around. Nine of these will be at his highest attack bonus for the AoOs!!!

I had a similar problem at one point with our party barbarian who maxed out on cleave / greater cleave / power attack and was hitting for like 1d12 + 18 (or close there to). Pretty much if he could get within range he killed it. To make it worse he would NEVER pay attention to any attempt at party tactics (partially because everyone would want to sit there for 3 hours hours deciding on what to do and the barbarian got P.O'd about it and would just charge in).

ok so the barbarian has a problem, dude just rushes in and starts blasting everything in sight, no buffs from his party caster, no coordination from his teams mates, nada. So one day i simply ask, "let me see your character sheet". What was i looking for for? Skills like
"balance" (a 3.5 skill - was replaced with acrobatics under pathfinder), or to see which saving throw was the worse. In short i was looking for his Achilles Heel. Guess where i found it? WILL SAVE BABY!!

So in the encounter I threw a mob of bad guys at the party and let the Barbarian go nutz. Meanwhile in the far back of the mob was a different NPC Caster. She was a Yuanti Enchantress and mind blasted our poor barbarian, convincing him that he had been deceived and was ACTUALLY helping his enemies (his party members) to attack his friends (the hoarde of screaming foe coming after him). So the Barbarian turned to the party cleric and crit'd her (killing her out right), then to the party mage (same effect), the rogue he was never able to actually hit.

Finally to drive the point home to the player i dropped the enchantment and have the Yuanti (who was on an inaccessible ledge about 40ft up) chuckle and disappear into the darkness.

The next game session the barbarian told him he understood that his play style was a liability to the party and rerolled a paladin (better Will Saves!!) and less of the freaking out. Granted Pathfinder Barbarians don't simply flip out and loose it, but this was a great lesson for an other wise unruly player that TEAMWORK was a virtue.


CapGM wrote:
ice golems or some other baddie that explodes when they die

Oh i LOVE this one...skeletons with necromantic worms / maggots (rot grubs) inside. The skelly is destroied in 1 - 3 hits but there is the explosion and the grubs to deal with from each death. Not to mention that these effects are tearing up the rest of your party too.

NOTE: Skelly destruction via Channeling would not trigger the above effect as this encourages team work with the party cleric.


Enaris wrote:
If he's the type to charge in headfirst, have a night travel where several groups of enemies are carrying lanterns. Eventually, when he learns to charge the lanterns, have some will o wisps hanging out just off the edge of a cliff. Even if he survives, which he will, it's a long trek up against flying enemies.

I did one similar to this: 10'ft wide hallway about 50 ft long. We flipped up a table at one end of the hall, and threw caltrops down the length of the hall. Dropped in a few smoke sticks and lured in the pack of orcs by having the chase the party rogue down the hall (magic boots which prevent you from actually touching the floor, leaving tracks, stepping on caltrops... are really awesome things!). Once the rogue came diving over the table, the party archers started firing down the hall @ a -2 penalty due to the concealment. NOTE: Typically the concealment from the 6 smokesticks would have been more of a -4 or higher, but we argued that the corridor was only 10ft wide, and we could hear the orcs screaming from being impaled by the caltrops so we knew they were there!

A similar trick i used in a different encounter was in the swamp / forest with pit falls and quicksand between the party and the archers.

These type of tactics also work great on anything you are trying to dismount as well.


Daniel Moyer wrote:
Carbon D. Metric wrote:
Throw a group of Greater Shadows at them. This will negate the critical hits due to being incorporeal, will cause even his normal hits to be lessened by 50% unless he has some way to get around that, and on top of all that the barbarian will be taking 1d8+4 strength damage every time it gets hit with the creatures touch attack. Since the damage is rolled this bonus applies here, as it does not state otherwise like some other abilities.

This is how our DM makes the melee powerhouses twitch, nothing inspires awe like an orc barbarian running down the hallway yelling "RUN! GHOSTS!"

I'd be careful with this tactic though, incorporeals can be extremely nasty... attacking through the floor, attacking while sharing a space with a PC, etc.

Agreed, one of my custom monsters was a spiked hell hound called in howler. The part that made them so dangerous was they were incorporeal and would usually attack when the party was in narrow corridors as they would do a "move through" attack which basically meant they would jump from one side of the wall and into the other side hitting the party as they crossed through. If the party actually attacked the Howler (on the rare occasions when they came out in the open) they took 1/2 damage back as a form of negative energy "damage shield" (thus the "spiked" in the description) from the simply fact that they are negative energy beings.

For "easy mode" howlers, i set the damage shield as a flat 1d6 + str bonus of the attacker.


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Throw an Alchemist at him. Stack two-weapon fighting, rapid shot, and haste, now that's 40d6 fire damage vs. his touch ac. If he survives he mows down the Alchemist only to find out it was a Simulacrum.

LOVE that class.

Dark Archive

Logan 247365 wrote:

Throw an Alchemist at him. Stack two-weapon fighting, rapid shot, and haste, now that's 40d6 fire damage vs. his touch ac. If he survives he mows down the Alchemist only to find out it was a Simulacrum.

LOVE that class.

you forgot to add int, and possibly point blank shot to damage... and improved and possibly greater TWF.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Bloodwort wrote:

To all my fellow GMs out there, I have a challenge.

.
(pssst.... Venomblade, you can stop reading right here! everyone else, continue on)
.

I am running a high-level game. All the PCs just hit level 16. One of them, a barbarian of great strength, has just taken the "come and get me" rage power.

How do I compete with this? It is unbelievably good. At level 16 he has four attacks a round. With combat reflexes and a high dexterity modifier this engine of destruction will have 12 attacks around. Nine of these will be at his highest attack bonus for the AoOs!!!

Where are you getting these 12 attacks from? Combat Reflexes does not add to your base number of attacks, it just adds to the number of AOO opportunities one can take advantage of per round. Those opportunities have to exist first.


Use that Plus to hit him a cavalier on a really good mount and a reach weapon can do massive damage. I should know it dropped my barb in 3 hit & run attacks and even with my increased speed I couldn't follow the tengu on the epic axebeak.

Also another annoyance to the player out of character is making them question if the person there about to kill is needed alive it will cause them to hold back just a bit giving you the opportunity to do many nasty things.

A wizard using illusion magics on a rust monster to make it appear as something else leaves many a PC confused.

Good luck and happy gaming


LazarX wrote:
Bloodwort wrote:

To all my fellow GMs out there, I have a .....

Where are you getting these 12 attacks from? Combat Reflexes does not add to your base number of attacks, it just adds to the number of AOO opportunities one can take advantage of per round. Those opportunities have to exist first.

I believe it's the "Come and Get Me" rage power but I may be wrong I haven't really looked at it.


I'm unsure about the policy about necro threads, but this thead was about 9 mounts dead.

As for the topic, its really not all that offensive that the barbarian is so powerful, at that level he NEEDS to be if the encounters are played correctly. CR16 encounters are meant to be difficult. Enemies have access to powerful buffs, controls, special movement, massive damage of their own, divination that will let them know to use their abilities ect. Since the Barbarians role is to deal damage, he needs to be able do something should he actually get into combat against a worthy foe (not hordes of poorly made leveled NPCs) Most of what this build for is meant for clearing out hordes of mooks, but its not a particularly good build for taking out more intelligent and prepared foes. That's what the rest of the party is for. Heck, at high levels its quite fun for the casters to basically act like barbarian delivery systems. Delivery of a full attacking barbarian is more effective than a crappy blast spell after all.


Another solution is AC.

I suppose the barbarian has CAGM, power attack and reckless abandon.

Pit him against a NPC focused on defense: since the barbarian can be hit very easily (rage, reckless abandon and so on) your NPC can neglet your to hit (not damage) and focus on AC.
Your barbarian will not hit him much and will be hit easily: this would challenge him a bit, probably forcing him to stop using some or all of the aforementioned feats.

Lazlo.Arcadia wrote:


...

So the Barbarian turned to the party cleric and crit'd her (killing her out right), then to the party mage (same effect), the rogue he was never able to actually hit.

Finally to drive the point home to the player i dropped the enchantment and have the Yuanti (who was on an inaccessible ledge about 40ft up) chuckle and disappear into the darkness.

The next game session the barbarian told him he understood that his play style was a liability to the party and rerolled a paladin (better Will Saves!!) and less of the freaking out. Granted Pathfinder Barbarians don't simply flip out and loose it, but this was a great lesson for an other wise unruly player that TEAMWORK was a virtue.

Did the other players liked your idea?


swarm of baby rust monsters


There is a feat, stand still I believe, that stops movement when you make a successful AoO. 15' reach and you stop every time I hit you a fun little trick.


Reach weapons, disarm/trip specialists with reach weapons, ranged attackers, ranged touch attacks either spells or otherwise, crowd control spells targeting will saves, tanglefoot bags (yes he will make the save but they have a minimum effect), INTELLIGENT ENEMIES who do not attack him directly to give him free attacks in the first place, swarms.

If he does not have evasion large numbers of low power AOE effects can add up fast. Death by 1000 cuts sort of thing. 10 1st level mage types with 10 one shot wands of fireball will still do 25D6 to him after saves if setup properly for example. And thy will be worth no XP best of all.


Wyrd20 wrote:

Greater invisibility.

Doesn't 100% concealment negate AoO's?

Any amount of concealment negates AoO's...

So just tossing in a level 1 obscuring mist would do the trick... and add a 20% miss chance to boot.


1. Swarms
2. Will Saves
3. Poisons based on Will saves
4. Dominate and watch him tear his party to shreds
5. Fortification Enchantment
6. Flying Creatures with ranged attacks

Scarab Sages

200 Goblins with Crossbows (1d6 dmg) and a half-dozen trebuchets in a fortified position that's hard to reach. The goblin archers alone will do significant damage to him every round.

Just don't use actual dice - use an app like this: http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/

This widget will roll huge handfuls of dice for you and count the number of times your roll a 20.


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You are all wrong. There is 1 simple answer:

A woman.

Sovereign Court

Bloodwort wrote:


.
You know, I have to say that the Pathfinder community is pretty awesome. It's only been 20 minutes and you've already given me some fun ideas.

Keep them coming! This barbarian is going to be around a long time.


  • Incorporeal creatures
  • Vermin (Swarms even) with the Phase template
  • Touch attacks (ranged with Firearms)
  • Nets (entangle)
  • Whips (trip)
  • Target savings throws (traps, dominate, charm, breath weapons, etc)
  • Grapple & Pin
  • Run the party through Tomb of Horrors (adjusting CRs for party level)

Creative suggestions: Beholder with Phase template... or create "Ravager" as a pet for a recurring NPC.


  • Dire Tiger
  • Apply Construct Template
  • Apply Robot Template
  • Give it two revolvers (advanced firearms)
  • Give it a Scorpion Whip for a tail (trip with reach only)
  • Focus its feats on two-weapon fighting, grapple & trip
  • ???
  • Barbarian cries.


My friend, I do feel for you. But if a barbarian, who even with that ability and totally maxed is still just a tier 3 at MAX is breaking your game, I shudder to think of what will happen if a optimized Summoner or Wizard shows up.

Liberty's Edge

Have an NPC cast Grease on his weapon and under him aswell. Attack with magic, or with melee guys that can fly above the grease (air elemental). Bamf, no more melee guy.


- Eidolon/Monster big enough to do a swallow whole. grab -> swallow -> digest

- Forceful Hand, Grasping Hand

- Paladin or Inquisitor: no save and no AoO for 1 round

Litany of Sloth:

School enchantment (compulsion) [language dependent, mind-affecting]; Level antipaladin 1, inquisitor 1, paladin 1
Casting Time 1 swift action
Components V, S, DF
Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Target one creature
Duration 1 round
Saving Throw no; Spell Resistance yes
With a litany against the wages of sloth, you slow the target's defenses. The target cannot make attacks of opportunity or cast spells defensively.
While subject to this spell, the target cannot be the target of another spell that has the word "litany" in the title.

- will save... however if that Barbarian rolls 76%+ his friends might go down in one round? Be careful:

Confusion:

School enchantment (compulsion) [mind-affecting]; Level bard 3, sorcerer/wizard 4
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M/DF (three nutshells)
Range medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Targets all creatures in a 15-ft.-radius burst
Duration 1 round/level
Saving Throw Will negates; Spell Resistance yes
This spell causes confusion in the targets, making them unable to determine their actions. Roll on the following table at the start of each subject's turn each round to see what it does in that round.
d% Behavior
01–25 Act normally
26–50 Do nothing but babble incoherently
51–75 Deal 1d8 points of damage + Str modifier to self with item in hand
76–100 Attack nearest creature (for this purpose, a familiar counts as part of the subject's self)
A confused character who can't carry out the indicated action does nothing but babble incoherently. Attackers are not at any special advantage when attacking a confused character. Any confused character who is attacked automatically attacks its attackers on its next turn, as long as it is still confused when its turn comes. Note that a confused character will not make attacks of opportunity against any creature that it is not already devoted to attacking (either because of its most recent action or because it has just been attacked).


Steelfiredragon wrote:

send him Ageroth

a troll with the following templates
half fiend
half dragon(black)
large
advanced

Don't forget the 3 extra HD for Endurance and Die-Hard, that's a classic.

Also, Lightning Stance gives Total Concealment wich negates Attacks of Opportunity. So a mobile fighter, barbarian or duelist could give him a run for his money.

Tanglefoot bags will give him a -4 to hit and a -2 to damage and AC and technically stop charges if used as a readied action.

Humbly,
Yawar


He is a high str barbarian and still has a 26 dexerity?!?

What point buy are folks playing with?


This is the problem of high level games, and a very crunchy power-game endorsing system.

Look at what we hath wrought.

The counter is simply a salvo of rust lords, a number of oozes and some mind flayers. There are deeper problem though, in that there is no longer challenge without engineering the barbs death specifically.


Bloodwort wrote:

I seek suggestions on how to challenge this player. He will clearly mow through most fights but I'd like to challenge him every once in a while.

Suggestions please!

The best thing: Don't attack the barbarian.

Else:

- Spring attack
- Crane wing + single devastating attack
- Casters
- Ambushes with high init guys for surprise round + go first at first round


There's a post around here somewhere called "Tucker's kobolds" its all about challenging high level parties with superior tactics.

I can't post a link because I'm on my phone. But a google search should turn it up.

Its worth a read.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

How to kill the Barbarian: Lesson 1

The barbarian has horrible AC...and he knows is...and doesn't care. At lv 16 he's got 300+ hp and the cleric heals 150 at 50ft or so. A testement to how much the barbarian don't care if he is hit is the "Come and get me" rage power. He wants you to hit him! Hell if he is smart he should also have DR 11/-

Lesson 2

A quick way around his DR is to blast him with spells right? Wrong. Again he is lv 16 and the dude should have his armor enchanted with some fire resist say 30 points per hit...ya he don't care if you light him on fire. Alright so fire won't work how about frost? Nope. Did you think his mage buddy was going to let you but the big guy on ice? Admixture mages get some nice abilities, one is the ability to toss fireballs that do frost damage and the other is the ability to change the energy type of anything within 30ft of him. So now the barbarian goes from fire resist 30 to resist everything 30. I'm sure there is an exception but not one that will deal the damage you need.

Lesson 3

How about sneak attack? Not so much. Remember this guy is lv 16 and should have heavy fortification armor. you get 1 in 4...good luck.

Lesson 4

Remember he is a crazy barbarian. What are the chances he is true neutral? Not much. Ahhh so how about a paladin. Give him a bow and smite and watch what happens. Smite adds the paladin lv to damage and after 6 arrows thats quite a bit of damage. And the best part, smite bypasses all of his DR. Oh and paladins get the ability to have all of their allies smite too. Now Mr. Barbarian is faced with a mob of smite. I'm sure the mage can figure out what to do to stop the arrows but still not a bad move.

Lesson 5

Invisibility. Not going to work. Once again he is lv 16. High level mobs have see invisibility...so should he. And flying too. Large and lunge gives him a 15ft reach so mobs will need 20ft reach. He will still murder his enemies on his turn though unless they have a 25ft reach. Doable but difficult...and without any splatbooks or over CR mobs.

Lesson 6

What about natural elements? Does the honey badger give a s@%+? No, and neither does the barbarian. Once again...he is lv 16. Dude doesn't need food, water, air, and only 2 hours of sleep. Hot or cold weather? No, he still doesn't care. Your not going to get him to slip and fall, or drown, or any of that. You won't get him with a skill check.

Lesson 7

Combat maneuvers may have a little success...maybe. Hes got 12 from str and 8 from dex, 16 bab, base of 10. That is 46...or more. Good luck with that. Disarm will be worse. 56 or more. How about sunder? nope. Dude is carrying a min +8 sword and you need at least that to hurt it. Do you want to give your players a +8 sword as loot...no, i didn't think so.

Lesson 8

Will saves. His are not so good, he knows it...and so does the party. A DC 30 will save is going to give the cleric some trouble and so too the barbarian. He should have about +16-18 will save so 60-70% fail. not so good. Now the cleric can give him a reroll with a +2 bonus...and the barbarian can take a reroll himself (thanks to the luck blade). Still 50% isn't bad but failing 3 times is not anything to hope for.

At this point I should add, there is an armor enchantment that forces an enemy to reroll. awww, sadface.

Lesson 9

Other things to expect from a high level party. The barbarian will also likely have regen and displacement. Further, his min damage is something like 60 and twice that on a crit 30% of the time. Haste will give him 4 attacks and we already know he gets insane AoO's.

Lesson 10

By now you should know...the barbarian is a murder machine. He walks around with Sir Crafts-a-lot, the guy that foils all of your traps without trying, and what will soon become the right hand of god. Good luck killing this guy without resorting to auto DM facemelting.

Now the other party members are a different story. Ignore the barbarian or just keep him busy and smash the remainder of the party. Cleric can't heal if he is dead. Once the casters are out have your pally take down the barb. Wasn't there a rouge too? Oh well, he will be dead soon anyway. lol.

And now you know how to kill the Barbarian


The thread was a bit TL:DR it all, but if the problem is that he AoOs with every attack, all you need is a seriously heavy hitter. Sure, the massive smash dealt by the giant monster will trigger your attack of opportunity, but it still hurts you more than that attack of opportunity hurt it. Feats, oversized weapons, colossal creatures, potions of enlarge person, vicious weapons (sure, he can use them too... If he really wants to get hurt...). There really is no reason for any sensible opposition to multiattack him into its own death.


Lol, an optimizer as the one described will not have energy resistance on his armor, and I'm pretty sure energy admisture does not work as you think.

Now, how to challenge a barbarian?
Spells.
Things like maze will remove him from combat, not very funny but may serve if you want someone else to shine for a change. Bestow curse for having to roll twice and get the worst result. Calm emotions. Really, there are a lot of save or suck spells.

Spring attack.
If you can get to cover and spring attack with crane style to avoid an attack you can challenge him a bit. Master of many style, crane style and dragon style, 1.5 STR, power attack x3 can get through his DR: the barbarian have to chase him go get him.

Enemies with a single devastating attack.
I don't know what route to take.

Very high AC, displacement etc...
Make it so that very few of the barbarian attack will hit the enemy: a magus could work well I think.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Pit the barbarian against Ravingdork's Goblins*. He will learn some humility.

* Inspired by the aforementioned Tucker's Kobolds and the wonderful people on these forums.


All hail the Paizo boards! You guys are awesome.

First and foremost I wanted to say, "thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, and thank you" for all the wonderful suggestions.

Really, some of your ideas are great. Some are quite amusing. They're all fun.

For the record, I am familiar with Tucker's Kobolds. I read about them years ago and have read their story more than once.

The CHALLENGE I have is that we have an overpowered player in combination with an overpowered team of PCs and most of them are pretty smart players to boot.

Does a barbarian have poor will saves? Yes, until he starts raging.

He'll kill anything within reach within a round or two.

The party knows what his weaknesses are. That's why they normally cast True Seeing on him so eliminate pesky problems like invisibility or mirror image or concealment.

This level 16 barbarian and most of the party usually has mass fly, energy resist 30 (all of them) and fickle winds, and freedom of movement already cast if they know they are going into battle.

If I can surprise them, then things are fine and I get a few rounds before the buffs go up.

If the party knows they are going to fight, then the buffs make it almost impossible to slow down or impede these guys, especially the barbarian.

I definitely appreciate all the suggestions.

As I said in the beginning, the problem as the DM is to challenge the players, not kill them.

I like wave of exhaustion and maze but the maze spell just might be too mean. I still want everyone to have fun and if you're not in the fight, that's really frustrating.


I didn't read all the suggestions, but I'd like to add mounted cavalier with a lance. It's a reach weapon so the CAGM won't help and he does great damage while remaining mobile. Since it's one big attack, the DR won't help as much as vs many small attacks.


I'm not sure if this will work, but I haven't slept so it sounds good to me. Write some stuff on your lance in big letters. Something with a punch line. The lance weighs 10 pounds so you should be able to put explosive runes on the very end. You know they'll try to read it when you ride by and since the lance has reach, I think you'll be outside the aoe.
Like I said though, I'm tired and that might not work at all.


They're 16th level ... a maze on the bubba only delays him for a round at best unless the rest of the party fails a targeted dispel.

At this level, even a disjunction is on the table. You don't care if any items turn off ... you care about the automatic dispelling of that lovely mountain of buffs they've become accustomed to.


Two spells yet unmentioned:

Calm Emotions
Serenity

Want to be extra mean wait for when the drop in Constitution from the Rage ending prematurely (Calm Emotions) to result in low or fatal HP loss. Even if he succeeds on the save it will get his attention.

Other thoughts:

Tucker's Kobolds, Ravingdork's Goblins and 2E's module 'Isle of the Ape' are all good examples of what one might call "challenge by attrition". And those little guys (the kobolds, goblins etc.) aren't the only ones who can use such tactics, of course. I mention Isle of the Ape as even though many other published modules have elements of attrition to them there is a section devoted to advice for the DM specifically about using the attrition aspect of the module as a tool vs high level parties.

Turn off the magic: In addition to Disjunction there's Lesser Globe of Invulnerability, Globe of Invulnerability and Antimagic Field.
Maybe that Lich or Vampire using Antimagic Field was an Eldritch Knight (or whatever the PF equivalent is) and not the presumed relative lousy melee combatant Wizard/Sorcerer.

Or maybe the Vampire has Still, Silent etc. and assumes Gaseous Form flying out of reach of our melee artist supreme.

Prismatic Wall or Sphere

Once, while the DM, I had a PC use the following against giants, ogres, orcs etc., he was assaulting -> Wall of Stone (shaped to include an arrow slit) placed at a chokepoint then cast an Antilife Shell (no save, SR yes). Repulsion would do the trick too (allows both Will save and SR).

Reverse Gravity - May allow a Reflex save if he has something to grab (his hands are empty right?). Otherwise no save no SR. Indoors this could be up into a 'pit' on the ceiling containing any or all sorts of nastiness (from simple spikes to various creatures, or spell effects). Such as I did once, just inside a doorway, sending the invisible and stealthy Wiz/Rog up and thru an area of Glitterdust this way. He didn't seem to appreciate it though his foes rather enjoyed it. Note the Reverse Gravity is Dismissible, he can go up into nasty and drop right back down into nasty that wasn't there when he went 'up' if that's what the caster wants. Maybe he goes up and back down falling past/thru a flock of Shadows (two sets of unfriendly AoO's). And maybe one let's him have Dex or Dodge bonuses to his Touch AC while in an 'uncontrolled' fall, maybe. I'm thinking that would be awful nice of the DM.

Mimic's are fun. I let a Mimic disguised as a row boat get several PC's about halfway across an underground lake. Then he glued them to their (his) 'seats' and demanded a little tribute to finish the journey. Advance the Mimic and or add friend(s), enjoy. Do read up on True Seeing and think about what you'll do when True Seeing meets Mimic and its Mimic Object(Ex) ability. I'm very new to PF but it would surprise me if a whole other thread couldn't be devoted to that subject.

Kayerloth


You're all making this far too difficult ... this is not a MMO derived ruleset, if attacking him in melee kills your NPCs your NPCs just have to stop attacking him in melee. Switch to softer targets and let him run around getting standard action attacks all the time.

Except for very low int opponents, then he gets to shine ... and there is no problem with that.


I don't know if anyone mentioned it but ability drains, such as Wisdom damage from a Lamia, granted a Lamia is pretty easy to kill, sort of, but if they are invisible I believe they can't be attacked until after their first one. I took out a Fighter and a Barbarian in two rounds with ability drain, their wisdom went to zero and they stopped cold.


I love all the suggestions.

I just want to say I've done the army of little guys before. It's fun. The PCs definitely get to shine. I just want to avoid having too many bad guys on the map since combat can slow down too much.

Liberty's Edge

Ye-old Mirror of Opposition mounted upon an Anti-Paladins shield. That will give em a run for his money :D


A) Flesh to Stone

Failing that...

B) Firing Squad

Failing that...

C) Poisoned food

Failing that...

D) Becomes the "lucky" mortal Asmodeus randomly chooses to teleport into Rohvagug's prison.


“Dave, your character is way too good with this new power. To challenge you, I have to make encounters that will be too tough for the rest of the party. And it’s making a lot of extra work for me. Can you drop that power and pick a new one? Thanks!”

The Exchange

Young shadows.

Mirror images. Who cares how much damage you do if all your victims have 1 hp. (ie, have your barbarians party encounter a group with a permanent symbol of mirroring).

Portable hole + bag of holding. Sucks those within 10 to the astral plane...

Any environmental place where the characters start out fatigued / exhausted.


Lazlo.Arcadia wrote:


So in the encounter I threw a mob of bad guys at the party and let the Barbarian go nutz. Meanwhile in the far back of the mob was a different NPC Caster. She was a Yuanti Enchantress and mind blasted our poor barbarian, convincing him that he had been deceived and was ACTUALLY helping his enemies (his party members) to attack his friends (the hoarde of screaming foe coming after him). So the Barbarian turned to the party cleric and crit'd her (killing her out right),...

So your solution to a character being reckless is to kill the OTHER player characters.

That totally doesn't sound in any way like a dick move that would make me leave your game in a heartbeat.


I don't think the point is to kill the Barbarian. I think the point is to give the Barbarian pause.

Some other things that might give the Barbarian pause... Perhaps an important NPC (that the Barbarian actually cares about or that the party needs in order to be successful at their current mission) is enchanted to fight against the party and the Barbarian either has to hold back, or deal with the in-character consequences of an uncontrolled rage.

A Fjord Linnorm's breath weapon will slow the Barbarian down, as he'll have to make a full-round action to break free of the ice that binds him or move at half-speed, making him more vulnerable to ranged and charge attacks dealt to him by lesser foes.

Incorporeal foes are another good hedge, as are long ranged attacks. There's nothing that says he has to get within melee range in every fight.


Create an encounter of dopplegangers of the party, except that when the dopplegangers take damage, their PC counterparts take 2x's the damage.

It will probably force the PCs to retreat a couple of times until they can figure out how to kill them.


Rynjin wrote:
Lazlo.Arcadia wrote:


So in the encounter I threw a mob of bad guys at the party and let the Barbarian go nutz. Meanwhile in the far back of the mob was a different NPC Caster. She was a Yuanti Enchantress and mind blasted our poor barbarian, convincing him that he had been deceived and was ACTUALLY helping his enemies (his party members) to attack his friends (the hoarde of screaming foe coming after him). So the Barbarian turned to the party cleric and crit'd her (killing her out right),...

So your solution to a character being reckless is to kill the OTHER player characters.

That totally doesn't sound in any way like a dick move that would make me leave your game in a heartbeat.

Yep. Not at all. Nope.


Lazlo.Arcadia wrote:


So in the encounter I threw a mob of bad guys at the party and let the Barbarian go nutz. Meanwhile in the far back of the mob was a different NPC Caster. She was a Yuanti Enchantress and mind blasted our poor barbarian, convincing him that he had been deceived and was ACTUALLY helping his enemies (his party members) to attack his friends (the hoarde of screaming foe coming after him). So the Barbarian turned to the party cleric and crit'd her (killing her out right),...

Yep, Killed the cleric. That sure showed that barbarian.


at the end of page one, I had noticed that no one had yet pointed out that undead are immune to crits.
The skeletal ones also take minimum damage from slashing weapons.
And Barbarians are always lousy against mages

What is a high-CR, magical, skeletal monster?
Hint: Starts with "L" and ends with "ich"


dave.gillam wrote:

at the end of page one, I had noticed that no one had yet pointed out that undead are immune to crits.

The skeletal ones also take minimum damage from slashing weapons.
And Barbarians are always lousy against mages

What is a high-CR, magical, skeletal monster?
Hint: Starts with "L" and ends with "ich"

There are a few errors in what you have said above, so in trying to be helpful...

PF undead are not immune to crits unless they are Incorporal.

Skeleton undead tend to have DR 5/Bludgeoning, but do not otherwise take minimum damage.

Barbarians have a few options that can make them very effective against mages. (Superstitous and Spell Sunder at the very least.)

Hope that helps.

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