The Mantis God vs Cthulhu


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


I have a question, mainly theoretical for now, but hoping to include into my campaign.

Let's say the main baddie summoned Cthulhu and the PCs (who have ties with the Red Mantis Assassins) manage to summon The Mantis God (same CR)

Would they be equal to each other as far as combat goes? Mantis god has an incredible crit range and the ability to open portals to planes wherever he likes, but Cthulhu has all of those spells and abilities.

Also, I'm in excluding Cthulhu's wish for now.

Scarab Sages

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Fight? How do you know they wouldn't try to mate?

The Red Mantis would devour Cthulhu's head upon finishing, of course...but then Cthulhu's head would be right inside the Mantis Goddesss's!

I'd give 1d10 weeks at most before the nightmares finally destroy Achaekek, causing Her to devour Her OWN head as a sacrifice to Good Ol' Lou, causing him to manifest again.


Well, they're both male, so reproduction is out of the question. They could try though...

Does he always devour enemy's heads?


It depends on if the "akin to demi-gods" description of great old ones applies enough to bypass the regeneration effect of Achaekek.


So would you consider that the GM's ruling? In the description, it does say that there are fabled weapons and creatures that can harm him, and I'm assuming that Cthulhu falls into that category.


See if you can have the fight go down near a kaiju or tarrasque, just for good measure.


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Cthulhu hands down.

The Mantis god would be permanently staggered, except for the 5% of the time when he makes his save, and it ticks every round.

That means in a straight up slug-fest Cthulhu has a massive upper hand with his 6 attacks (which hit on 4's) to the Mantis God's 1.

In addition Cthulhu can summon 2d4 Starspawn as a standard action (2-8 CR 20's) who also have a decent chance at hitting the mantis god.

He could also use a mythic wish as an immediate action in conjunction with his implosion sla to do a nice 300 damage a round to the Manis god without rolling dice collapsing the bug into a singularity.

In addition he counts as a mythic Rank 10 creature which can grant spells to worshipers. His CR is Greater than that of Empyreal lords and Demon lord's both of whom are listed as Demigods on the pathfinder setting wiki so all of his stuff suppresses the Mantis God's regeneration.

Scarab Sages

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Does Achaekek have a tramp freighter available?


He can probably gate a few dozen in if he places the portal correctly.


I always thought Achaekek was a true god


It seems that statistically Achaekek wouldn't even be able to slow Cthulhu down. Having a very clever and thematic solution go like that is kinda lame, though, so it would probably be for the best to rule the encounter narratively.

Scarab Sages

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S. H. Hush wrote:
Well, they're both male, so reproduction is out of the question. They could try though...

Just being pedantic for a moment: Cthulhu is incapable of being classified as either male or female.

That's it - carry on.


@Entryhazard: Achaekek is specifically not a true deity, and is incapable of hurting those that are. It can only hurt things of Demigod status or lower (which Cthulhu is). That said, the Great Old Ones have this thing where they're not actually killable... XD


GM Rednal wrote:
@Entryhazard: Achaekek is specifically not a true deity, and is incapable of hurting those that are. It can only hurt things of Demigod status or lower (which Cthulhu is). That said, the Great Old Ones have this thing where they're not actually killable... XD

I meant in the sense of being above demigod status and thus not stattable


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens Subscriber

The head devouring is a reference to the mating habits of your typical Preying Mantis. The Female bites the head off of the male when they are finished.
Yes Achaekek is generally thought of as male, but being divine he can be whatever, and perhaps head biting is a Hobby? (He does enjoy a good killing after all)

Personally I'd say the result of such of fight is irrelevant as it would slaughter everyone in a several mile radius and result in campaign ending/world shattering aftermaths.

This is how I would run this scenario:
A Giant Mantis pops in as Proxy to Achaekek to inform the summoner that he is busy and to piss off (By way of the Mantis biting the summoners head off, possibly performing other services first as defined by Mantis mating ritual...) If the summoner was a worshiper of The Mantis God then he or she should feel doubly blessed by this miraculous intervention!
"Praise Achaekek!"
Cthulhu arrives and momentarily regards the folks standing around (and in doing so vivisects some and drives the rest insane)
"Praise Cthuluuhhnm AAARRRGGGG... uuuhhhhnnnn"
And there was much screaming and drooling and flailing of the severed appendages, and Cthulhu looked upon the world, and found it Sane and thus lacking. So it came that The Great Old Ones descended upon the world and partied until it dropped.


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Achaekek I believe is now considered a full deity in Pathfinder, which not stattable under current rules and CR 30+. So it's probably down to GM Fiat unless he is using the 3.5 stats.


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Achaekek's CR 30 statblock from Curse of the Crimson Throne is no longer canon - Achaekek's a true god, and so that CR 30 stat block doesn't represent him anymore.

James Jacobs has suggested using that stat block to represent an avatar, though.

I'll simply note that Cthulhu SHOULD beat that avatar, because Cthulhu's unkillable and has access to tools that the avatar doesn't (like mythic wish).

(And frankly, the avatar would probably struggle to satisfy Cthulhu's down-for-the-count condition.)

On the other hand, by default the true Achaekek simply wins - He Who Walks In Blood represents a power that brooks no opposition, and can only threatened by a demi-god under exceptional circumstances (like if Cthulhu deliberately lured Achaekek into a kill-trap in R'leyh, where they could fight as peers).


Entryhazard wrote:
I always thought Achaekek was a true god

I googled a lot of this, there is conflicting stuff from early Paizo (and pre-Pathfinder) products, but it seems clear he's a god now, and was a demigod in the early going. A statted CR30 demigod with an Int of 6 and no spell-like abilities, but insanely strong physical combat and debuff aura. Pre-Pathfinder rules, though.


If He Who walks In Blood is a true God now, I would rule that he shows up and reaps Cthulu in a suitably awesome way. Consorting with LE gods makes you all very naughty, but the threat something like Cthulu and his friends poses to the stability of the universe makes it a-okay.


The mantis is immune to death effects, so he won't be staggered (the staggered provision is for enemies immune to fear, not death effects).


DominusMegadeus wrote:
If He Who walks In Blood is a true God now, I would rule that he shows up and reaps Cthulu in a suitably awesome way. Consorting with LE gods makes you all very naughty, but the threat something like Cthulu and his friends poses to the stability of the universe makes it a-okay.

It's believed that Achaekek was created by the unknown deity responsible for him specifically to stop Rovagug-type scenarios from happening. Cthulhu would certainly be on his hit list if he were to ramp up the schedule on the apocalypse.


Makes sense to me.

While we're on the subject, I have the sneaking suspicion Asmodeus made him.

The way it holds true gods and rightful kings to be off-limits for killing is fitting with Asmodeus' view of mortals and societal structure.

It's Lawful Evil. Nuff said.

It lives in the first layer of Hell and the Archdevil ruling that layer is known to dislike having it there, but hasn't made a move against it. Obviously, as a demi-god, he's actually capable of being threatened, and yet he hasn't tried to rally the other Archdevils or even said anything to Asmodeus, who apparently has no issue with it.

And so I suspect that Achaekek was made by Asmodeus to put mortals attempting to emulate divinity in their place, capable of taking on anything besides a full deity and off-limits to the full deities themselves because of Asmodeus' contract of creation, or a similar agreement he secured by sealing Rovagug.

or maybe...

Spoiler:
it was Aroden lolololololololol


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related to DM's spoiler:
Achaekek is just Aroden in a bug suit confirmed

Grand Lodge

Is this going to be another bug hunt sir?


So let's say that Cthulhu appears, makes everyone think that they are going to die, then Achaekek shows up (let's say he's invincible to Cthulhu) and manages to Bull Rush Cthulhu into some plane that stops him from hurting anyone else.

(One of the gods would order him to do it as they don't really like anyone messing up their word.)

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