Grundle the Trundle's page

An update for all. My party members knew they could come shake me awake and decided not to. I took no damage or healing during the time I was asleep. No one brought up the perception checks and I didn't know about it but I will certainly keep that in mind if it comes up again.

For those saying that my strategy isn't great, I am aware. If everyone turns an about face to focus on me, that's precisely what I as a player want. Does it mean I have a high chance of going down, sure. But we are a 5 person party, meaning that if the enemies are blowing their actions on me, we have 12 actions that are almost unopposed to deal with them. Is it reckless, absolutely. Will it end poorly for my character at some point, undoubtedly. But I'm playing a reckless barbarian with a wish to die gloriously on the battlefield so if that happens, mission accomplished.

I've spoken to the player that piped up to remind the GM. They have said that the "boss" rule is some optional, variant rule and that now that he's seen it in action, thinks it is a dumb rule. He apologized for even bringing it up and said I have every right to be salty about the situation. I have also decided that if this comes up again and has just as awful results, I'm leaving the campaign. I find the ruling very unfun and TTRPGs are something I do for fun. If the game isn't fun, I can find something else to do with that time slot in my week.

I am having a hard time finding a source for a ruling. I am playing a character that heavily focuses on grappling (took the wrestler archetype and everything). My character's ideal strategy is to tumble through the front-line and use their high speed to make it into the back-line and grapple a caster or other high-value target. We go through an encounter and I find myself in a position to do that very thing. I get a nat 20 and critically succeed. While using the grapple maneuver, that means the target is restrained for a round. Another player reminds the GM that boss mobs (and this was the boss of this part of the Adventure Path) treat all status conditions as if they are one step lower (critical success becomes a success, success becomes failure, etc.) So instead of being restrained, they only become grabbed. They proceed to cast sleep on me and I fail the roll and am out of the combat for 5 rounds until someone wakes me up and everything is basically over.

This is the first time I have heard anything about "boss" mobs being able to shrug off status conditions. I am familiar with the **incapacitate** trait on abilities and how that interacts with higher level characters. The basic grapple action does not have this trait.

What I am trying to figure out is if this is a rule that is printed somewhere I cannot find or if it is a house rule designed to make boss encounters more threatening. The GM and other players at the table made it sound like it is an official rule, but I cannot find it anywhere. Any rules lawyers here able to provide a source?