Unflinching Evil

Sangalor wrote:

Gorbacz wrote:

Death ward and kill it with fire.

Fire is cool if you have someone with that ability. Our sorcerer has that, but only in the form of a fireball - which might grill us as well.

Didn't you say you had a fire oracle?

Correct :-) I did not mention it because he only used the firestorm ability so far. Except for that he limits himself primarily to healing and does the damage using his cohort. So while you are right, chances fire gets used in a room with treasure, especially potentially destroying that treasure in the process (he is very, how should I say, determined on preserving all treasure, even if it means carrying 18000 copper pieces and being encumbered *eye-roll*), are almost non-existent.

Please understand: I am not saying that this is an unbeatable opponent. I also admit that our party is not the best optimized one, even though we have been pretty effective in our tactics. Others parties - particularly those with archer paladins - will finish this thing off easily.
I am just looking at it from our perspective and - in hindsight - at other party compositions we had. And I do not see us beat this opponent at CR-appropriate levels.

so an evil GM would let the demi-lich protect his treasure consisting of expensive paintings and similar easily flammable material?

No fireballs, and even a burning arrow missing its target might burn the whole treasure down.

Just a reminder: Greater Bestow Curse needs an alternative to the 25% of acting normally. This needs to be errataed.

so an evil GM would let the demi-lich protect his treasure consisting of expensive paintings and similar easily flammable material?

No fireballs, and even a burning arrow missing its target might burn the whole treasure down.

...

In case this is addressed at my posts: Energy damage such as intense fire will not only burn and destroy paintings, but destroy scrolls, armor, potions, staffs, melt metal etc. So yes, an arrow with some 1d6 fire damage will not be a (real) problem. But a fireball with 10d6 will.

Another example would be to launch a fireball inside a building where the rooms are not large enough to not be touched by it: It would at least weaken its structure, if not even setting it on fire then, potentially bringing the whole structure down on the up-to-now proud caster :-P

Some other critters with constant true seeing include the CR 8 erinyes, the CR 13 glabrezu, and the CR 14 nalfeshnee. So PCs should definitely expect that ability to be in play by level 12.

Just a reminder: Greater Bestow Curse needs an alternative to the 25% of acting normally. This needs to be errataed.

Reference the original spell, and it becomes clear it's a modification of this:

Each turn, the target has a 50% chance to act normally; otherwise, it takes no action.

No errata required. It's brief, but you have all the information you need to use the ability. It doesn't reiterate the minimum ability score of 1 either.

Some other critters with constant true seeing include the CR 8 erinyes, the CR 13 glabrezu, and the CR 14 nalfeshnee. So PCs should definitely expect that ability to be in play by level 12.

That would be metagame knowledge in our case. So far we have not encountered those kinds of enemies, so our characters would be taken by surprise.

Death ward and kill it with fire.

Note the demilich's immunity to magic.

It better be supernatural/non-spell resistance allowing fire.

@ Russ, okay if that was the intention. I already forgot the minimum 1 part. I'm in favor of saving space, but I hope the assumed knowledge isn't too big.

So if that is a spelllike ability, does that mean it will come out as spell in any splatbook anytime soon? Would be lvl 6 spell (according to saves) for wizards, and as bestow curse is 1 lower for witches, it would be 5 for them.
That would be quite awesome, hope I can convince my GM with that logic.

Actually if the monster is used as desctibed in MM it's somewhat less dangerous.

It lies in torpor, so it might me detected as undead without being disturbed. And thus the party can prepare.

If it gets disturbed, it wails and goes back to torpor if the party stops disturbing ir or flees. which again allows for the party to come again better prepared provided that they don't die from the wail.

This thing is completely shut down by an Antimagic Field, available to any level 11 sorcerer or wizard or via a scroll. Loot the treasures at will while the fighters Power Attack it to dust.

Other counters besides the obvious Death Ward include Silence to counter the Wail of the Banshee. A simple Wall of Force blocks line of effect for the devour soul since the thing can't Dimension Door or Teleport.

There are ways around its heinousness.

This thing is completely shut down by an Antimagic Field, available to any level 11 sorcerer or wizard or via a scroll. Loot the treasures at will while the fighters Power Attack it to dust.

Other counters besides the obvious Death Ward include Silence to counter the Wail of the Banshee. A simple Wall of Force blocks line of effect for the devour soul since the thing can't Dimension Door or Teleport.

There are ways around its heinousness.

Great ideas abound, in your post and others. But it all kind of assumes that you are either forwarned about this kind of monster, identify it right at the start, or one of your casters default first notion is to create an antimagic field which will render most of their own abilities useless. Now this may be something some groups do, but it has never happened in my years of role playing.

Also, in some scenarios it would be pretty terrifying and even harder.

But again, I am looking at it from a level 12 group that is not specialized against undead, is not optimized and does not have any information about this kind of critter. A single failed save will kill anyone in my group.
And I see encounters with that kind of creature end deadly even with level 14 or 15 groups.

Gururamalamaswami wrote:

This thing is completely shut down by an Antimagic Field, available to any level 11 sorcerer or wizard or via a scroll. Loot the treasures at will while the fighters Power Attack it to dust.

Other counters besides the obvious Death Ward include Silence to counter the Wail of the Banshee. A simple Wall of Force blocks line of effect for the devour soul since the thing can't Dimension Door or Teleport.

There are ways around its heinousness.

Great ideas abound, in your post and others. But it all kind of assumes that you are either forwarned about this kind of monster, identify it right at the start, or one of your casters default first notion is to create an antimagic field which will render most of their own abilities useless. Now this may be something some groups do, but it has never happened in my years of role playing.

Also, in some scenarios it would be pretty terrifying and even harder.
** spoiler omitted **

But again, I am looking at it from a level 12 group that is not specialized against undead, is not optimized and does not have any information about this kind of critter. A single failed save will kill anyone in my group.
And I see encounters with that kind of creature end deadly even with level 14 or 15 groups.

Don't forget it's immune to any spells with SR. So fireball is totally useless against it. Good luck finding non-SR spells that do fire that are generally useful enough to have prepped/known ...

I'm wondering really how effective Wail of the Banshee is. 20' range isn't much when your party might include an archer, a divine spellcaster and an arcane spellcaster. Granted, immunity to magic

DR 20/-. The divine and arcane spellcasters are crippled by the immunity to magic, and the archer (who cannot have vorpal because it's melee only) is dealing with DR 20 that she can't overcome. Assuming level 16, +5 bow, and Deadly Aim, the archer is doing a whopping 1d8+4 or so per arrow. Sure, Clustered Shots takes care of that, but the feat is a) non-Core and b) overpowered and ridiculous and not allowed in any games I play in (my DM very emphatically said no, in fact). It'll take awhile to get through 140+ hp at that rate.

In other words, you can't kill it before it gets in range to do its Wail of the Banshee. Or it can just hang back about 300 feet and Trap the Soul on people until they all fail if it starts at long range. There's no provision that if you make the save, you're immune for 24 hours or anything like that, so it can do it over and over and over again. Eventually people will roll 1s.

I'm wondering really how effective Wail of the Banshee is. 20' range isn't much when your party might include an archer, a divine spellcaster and an arcane spellcaster. Granted, immunity to magic

** spoiler omitted **

Maybe I am reading something the wrong way, but wail of the banshee states close range and 40ft radius spread. So that means at the CL of that thing it's 75ft range in a diameter of 80ft.

@Melissa: Yes, you are right there. The immunity to magic makes it even harder :-P

Sure, Clustered Shots takes care of that, but the feat is a) non-Core and b) overpowered and ridiculous and not allowed in any games I play in (my DM very emphatically said no, in fact). It'll take awhile to get through 140+ hp at that rate.

Too bad your DM has banned Clustered Shot. It can hardly be seen as overpowered if it is required for an archer to deal damage at higher level. That would be like calling Spell Focus overpowered.

Melissa Litwin wrote:

Sure, Clustered Shots takes care of that, but the feat is a) non-Core and b) overpowered and ridiculous and not allowed in any games I play in (my DM very emphatically said no, in fact). It'll take awhile to get through 140+ hp at that rate.

Too bad your DM has banned Clustered Shot. It can hardly be seen as overpowered if it is required for an archer to deal damage at higher level. That would be like calling Spell Focus overpowered.

Oh, yeah that is bad. Unless special class features (smite) or weapon bonuses (holy etc.) are involved, archers will take too long against that thing :-/

By the way, I am curious: Are monsters created considering only CRB is used? Or is it assumed that other materials and thus classes, feats etc. are available?

Canoy wrote:

I'm wondering really how effective Wail of the Banshee is. 20' range isn't much when your party might include an archer, a divine spellcaster and an arcane spellcaster. Granted, immunity to magic

** spoiler omitted **

Maybe I am reading something the wrong way, but wail of the banshee states close range and 40ft radius spread. So that means at the CL of that thing it's 75ft range in a diameter of 80ft.

If you're out in the open, then you might not be affected. But that would mean your group is split REALLY wide. Usually my group sticks more closely together than that.
Also, treasure rarely lies around in an open field, and rooms that are this large even more rare. So usually this thing would get the entire group. :-/

@Melissa: Yes, you are right there. The immunity to magic makes it even harder :-P

@Canoy: You are right, I overlooked the 20ft radius spread limitation mentioned in the stats entry. So it is not quite that bad. Still, it's a 40ft diameter that is covered by it. Given it will be most likely be encountered indoors, it will most likely get the entire party since most rooms I have seen in APs are smaller.

Melissa Litwin wrote:

Sure, Clustered Shots takes care of that, but the feat is a) non-Core and b) overpowered and ridiculous and not allowed in any games I play in (my DM very emphatically said no, in fact). It'll take awhile to get through 140+ hp at that rate.

Too bad your DM has banned Clustered Shot. It can hardly be seen as overpowered if it is required for an archer to deal damage at higher level. That would be like calling Spell Focus overpowered.

No it's not required. Get a +5 weapon, like a melee person does, and carry 20-40 bludgeoning and slashing arrows on top of the 100-200 regular ones. That overcomes pretty much everything but DR/-. Before you can afford the +3, buy 20 cold iron and silver arrows. They're cheap. Adamantine arrows are really expensive, so you probably don't bother, but if you're super worried about that then 20 of those as well. Oil of bless weapon also at those levels before you get +5.

Clustered Shots says archers don't worry about DR, period, and that's just wrong. You use one arrow to eat the DR in a round and then don't worry about it again. That's too good for a feat.

On topic: I think this is a CR 16 or 17. I'd say 17, because if it can throw 9th level spells at will it seems only fair to give the party a chance to throw 9th level spells back. Also it has a nasty ability that if the party has to run, requires a wish or miracle to fix. It'd be best if the party actually has access to those. I could see raising its AC and HP a little if the CR does go up. Even the save DCs by 1 or 2. But it doesn't need additional defensive abilities or offensive abilities.

Sangalor:

Knowledge DC 29 (considering the demi-lich as rare) is needed to tell the players what it can do.

Once the skull wails and starts to sit down again the players may decide what to do about it it's clearly visible and identifiable.

I just finished running book 5 of Curse of the crimson throne a couple of months ago (I run that game bi-weekly) And my guys had no problem with it at all and I even skipped the part in its tactics where it is supposed to take a round to fully awaken.

The barbarian in the group ran up and smacked the demi-lich with his great axe power attacking it as well and did 10 points to it after DR was applied, then he moved away from it use spring attack and start to cast enlarge person on himself when his turn came round again, and yes he is also a wizard.

But what killed this thing was when the Phalanx fighter in the group dropped his tower shield then two handed his weapon a non magical non masterwork bardiche power attacked the demi-lich as well and did about 12 points of DR, then the demi-lich 5 foot stepped out of the reach of the fighter only for the fighter to use step up and strike and hit again doing about 12 points again then it tried to use greater bestow curse on the fighter only to fail it concentration check, then the fighter full rounded it and killed it.

I just finished running book 5 of Curse of the crimson throne a couple of months ago (I run that game bi-weekly) And my guys had no problem with it at all and I even skipped the part in its tactics where it is supposed to take a round to fully awaken.

The barbarian in the group ran up and smacked the demi-lich with his great axe power attacking it as well and did 10 points to it after DR was applied, then he moved away from it use spring attack and start to cast enlarge person on himself when his turn came round again, and yes he is also a wizard.

But what killed this thing was when the Phalanx fighter in the group dropped his tower shield then two handed his weapon a non magical non masterwork bardiche power attacked the demi-lich as well and did about 12 points of DR, then the demi-lich 5 foot stepped out of the reach of the fighter only for the fighter to use step up and strike and hit again doing about 12 points again then it tried to use greater bestow curse on the fighter only to fail it concentration check, then the fighter full rounded it and killed it.

Why'd it try to use greater bestow curse? No one's flying, have it fly out of reach (eat the AoOs) then cast Wail of the Banshee. It'll kill someone most likely and it's out of full round attack range. Using suboptimal tactics doesn't make the monster less scary or less under-CR'ed.

An alchemist with fire bombs is going to have a heyday with this thing. And seriously, if the demilich is sprung on the party by surprise (i.e. no foreshadowing, etc.) then that would be worth a raise in CR.

I still think too many of you are giving it too much credit. I've read too many posts about BBEG like Karzoug, Kyuss, Dragotha, and even freaking Demogorgon going down like lambs to the PCs. My point here being that players pull surprises out of the bag all too often. There are just so many ways around this things strengths that I can't see raising that CR above the 14 mark. Yes it's a badass 14 but I still see it as 14.

I'm an old school Gygaxian DM (even coined that term before seeing it in a Mona article) and I cry foul.
You tried to recreate a TPK monster from THE TPK dungeon.
You succeeded. Yay?
Outside of Tomb of Horrors, how serviceable is this monster?
No, really. It needs almost the exact encounter setup to work.
Alone. Tight space. Visible. Known finale monster against tournament-level players. Rookies need not apply.
(And, what? No ghost to start with?)

A monster built to seriously challenge a 14th level party is not CR 14.
By game parameters, it must be higher. Anybody going by "CR 14" will be misled.
9th level spell at will, and a very good one: CR 17 minimum.
Even if you have to buff up its other stats to make up the difference.

It saddens me there's no time to change this iconic monster into something more useful before it goes to print.

No monster should NEED extensive coaching for proper DM usage.
This does.

There are too many IF statements re: how to defeat it, relying on player knowledge and non-standard preparation, even more than PC knowledge and normal 'fighting undead' preparation.
The Knowledge DC to know enough IC is too high.
And it doesn't exactly give time in game to adapt. It can wipe out several PCs per round.

And, yes, it has 'weaknesses', but...
Torpor: Not a weakness unless the party can actually see it (good Stealth, can hide under things, treasure or body can be in another room, NPC monster servant could wake it up, etc.) and then they have to know what it is capable of.
No SR/non-magical fire: Rare. There are many, but how many are prepared or carried by 14th level parties? How many can they get off when Wails are blasting each round?
Anti-Magic Shell: Legitimate weakness, and underused IMO, but not many arcane casters want this, and other than through domains, divine get it too late. Either own the scroll or die?
Grapple: Funny, but not exactly a 'weakness' when it has such strong Supernatural attacks.

Posters have listed PCs that can be effective against it, but what about the majority who aren't? Which is most anybody else, including casters not ready for a demi-lich and melee sword & board or TWF warriors.
(Though I can imagine the Bard who was teased for taking Shatter having a field day. If he lived...)

I don't like this 'trick' monster, where one PC (and his or her saves) can make or break a TPK encounter. Or one scroll of Anti-Magic could shut it down instantly if the party knew what it was facing (which many of the arguments for it being CR 14 rely on).
Too many paths lead to TPK or easy win, not enough lead to a 'challenging win'.

Will I still buy Bestiary 3? Yes, with the assumption this is a glitch from trying too hard to recreate Acerak. (spelling?)
I have to cross my fingers that the demi-lich template works better...

Note: I'm hesitant to post this as I don't think I've ever posted anything anti-Paizo/PF before, and don't like the precedent.
But I have to, even if it's too late to fix anything.

Yes, with the assumption this is a glitch from trying too hard to recreate Acerak. (spelling?)

I have to cross my fingers that the demi-lich template works better...

First off, what demilich template? There is none. A demilich is what you see in this blog. The full bestiary does mention "awakened" demiliches, but that's essentially the same monster with the ability to cast spells added on top. Not really a template.

Secondly, I would have been fine with them go even further with an Acererak clone. As in going full tilt and saying "This is the list of things that can actually affect a demilich. Anything else has no effect."

I guess that any servant disturbing the demi-lich would be wailed to oblivion IMO.

The monster has intelligence score, but it's written so that it's sole aim is to return to torpor a.s.a.p. or to chase away / obliterate anything in sight and then go back to rest if the disturbance was not halted by the "waŕning" wail. A fierce will to exist and to be left alone. More like an aggressive sleepwalker with a good knowledge of it's surroundings and hard to fool by standard golem-hunting tricks, but still more like a static guardian than an active hunter.

Awakened demi-liches, that seem to be doing what most of you are describing are CR 16+

This has me thankful yet again that I did not buy the tome of horrors. Bestiary 2 is choked full of repeats from the ToH and its looking like B3 is going to be the same.

FYI both this and the Tome's Demilich has me a little sad. Those things last I knew were to be liches who have moved on to a whole new level of power.

One at will ninth level spell doesn't suggest a higher CR. While it has protections those are static, and thus able to avoid even if the party is surprised. A higher CR would suggest that it should be able to protect itself a bit better. Like wise having one bad ass spell is good, but spell immuntiy trumps it. Then what does the demi-lich do...well it dies again that's what.

This has me thankful yet again that I did not buy the tome of horrors. Bestiary 2 is choked full of repeats from the ToH and its looking like B3 is going to be the same.

I suppose if you count a couple of dozen out of OVER SEVEN HUNDRED monsters, yeah. A few of the ToH versions are substantially different, as well. Hell, if I was going to not buy book because of a small amount of overlap/variant monsters, I'd probably choose not to buy Bestiary 2/3. After all, combined, they cost more and have less total monsters than the ToH. That, and you can pick up the PDFs for $10 each.

Luckily for Paizo I'm a sucker when it comes to really big monster books.

Rolen wrote:

I just finished running book 5 of Curse of the crimson throne a couple of months ago (I run that game bi-weekly) And my guys had no problem with it at all and I even skipped the part in its tactics where it is supposed to take a round to fully awaken.

The barbarian in the group ran up and smacked the demi-lich with his great axe power attacking it as well and did 10 points to it after DR was applied, then he moved away from it use spring attack and start to cast enlarge person on himself when his turn came round again, and yes he is also a wizard.

But what killed this thing was when the Phalanx fighter in the group dropped his tower shield then two handed his weapon a non magical non masterwork bardiche power attacked the demi-lich as well and did about 12 points of DR, then the demi-lich 5 foot stepped out of the reach of the fighter only for the fighter to use step up and strike and hit again doing about 12 points again then it tried to use greater bestow curse on the fighter only to fail it concentration check, then the fighter full rounded it and killed it.

Why'd it try to use greater bestow curse? No one's flying, have it fly out of reach (eat the AoOs) then cast Wail of the Banshee. It'll kill someone most likely and it's out of full round attack range. Using suboptimal tactics doesn't make the monster less scary or less under-

CR'ed.

The reason it used greater bestow curse was because it's tactics says that it uses it when someone is able to damage it easily. I find if you change that tactics for the monsters too much the fights almost always become deadly especially with my die rolls.

Melissa Litwin wrote:

Rolen wrote:

I just finished running book 5 of Curse of the crimson throne a couple of months ago (I run that game bi-weekly) And my guys had no problem with it at all and I even skipped the part in its tactics where it is supposed to take a round to fully awaken.

The barbarian in the group ran up and smacked the demi-lich with his great axe power attacking it as well and did 10 points to it after DR was applied, then he moved away from it use spring attack and start to cast enlarge person on himself when his turn came round again, and yes he is also a wizard.

But what killed this thing was when the Phalanx fighter in the group dropped his tower shield then two handed his weapon a non magical non masterwork bardiche power attacked the demi-lich as well and did about 12 points of DR, then the demi-lich 5 foot stepped out of the reach of the fighter only for the fighter to use step up and strike and hit again doing about 12 points again then it tried to use greater bestow curse on the fighter only to fail it concentration check, then the fighter full rounded it and killed it.

Why'd it try to use greater bestow curse? No one's flying, have it fly out of reach (eat the AoOs) then cast Wail of the Banshee. It'll kill someone most likely and it's out of full round attack range. Using suboptimal tactics doesn't make the monster less scary or less under-

CR'ed.

The reason it used greater bestow curse was because it's tactics says that it uses it when someone is able to damage it easily. I find if you change that tactics for the monsters too much the fights almost always become deadly especially with my die rolls.

Oh, I figured you probably ran it as written and I don't fault you for it. But I've also found that a lot of times mod writers will deliberately undercut the power of an encounter by forcing poor tactics on a monster that really should know better. A demilich is really smart and really wise- it knows better. That's why I consider the fight you ran to be a data point that gets put in the "screwy data points" pile, not the "standard party fighting this monster" pile.