I agree. The Grell should be listed as a CR 6. The only thing that support that it's a CR3 is its hp. I played with 6 players, all level 2 last saturday. Two PCs killed, one got below zero. I had to make Fario and Fellian come to the rescue to save the day. But with two PC-deaths, they will get cash problems so I will have to make a sidequest which they later can do for the Wee Jas temple. Something evil:)
Marduk
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Group 1: 5 players, 1 grell. A very tough fight, dropped several to minus points and paralyzed others. One was left standing and she killed the monster (had a monstrous Fortitude save in rage).
Group 2: 5 players + Fario & Fellian. According to the notes in the module from Dungeon #97, I upped the ante and introduced a second grell. Several paralyzations, one in negative Hitpoints.
Both groups spread out and were thus able to counter the reach of the grell. It also helped, that both groups were already at 3rd level when they encountered this tough monster.
This was the encounter that we ended with last Thursday when my group played. I fudged it. I only attacked 1x/round...
group of 6 players... 4 paralyzed, 1 unconscious, 1 badly injured. This fight would have been over on round 2 with a TPK had a I used it to its full capacity...
So yeah, it is listed low, I played it lower and they got less experience for it.
Easy TPK here though.
Sean Mahoney
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My group had much better success. Though there were only four of them, they were all 3rd-level by the time they ran into the grell.
I had assumed the grell would wait just above the edge of the second level and would drop silently on the group as it passed below (reasonable - I don't know, but on the spur of the moment it seemed a good plan).
The group was super paranoid that something was on the balconey (afterall why was the area boarded up?). So they sent the human rogue to the stairs to scout it out. He made it up and down with out being heard and reported back to the group.
The group then decieded to send the rogue back up the stairs to move in for a sneak attack (dagger at 20 ft. range if I remember correctly) and move the archer (a half-elf with DEX 17) towards the north end of the west balconey while the goliath barbarian/druid and the human wizard hung back closer to the entrance and made noice like they were searching the walls nearby.
Both the rogue and the archer hit with their surprise attacks and while the rogue did a measely 3 hps, the archer rolled a critical and rolled around 15 hps of damage.
Everyone but the druid/barbarian beat the grell in initiative. The rogue choose to throw again, missed and retreated back to the cover of the stairwell. The archer used his Rapid Fire feat and hit the grell one more time for almost 10 hps. The wizard readied and magic missile for to target the grell as soon as it was visable. The grell move to attack the archer and the wizard's magic missile flew, 6 hps later the grell was down and no one had suffered a point of damage.
Kind of depressing as a DM (I really like grells) but yeah for the players. Two rooms later the rogue died on a crit from the invisible pulvirizer so it all works out in the end.
My group had much better success. Though there were only four of them, they were all 3rd-level by the time they ran into the grell.
I had assumed the grell would wait just above the edge of the second level and would drop silently on the group as it passed below (reasonable - I don't know, but on the spur of the moment it seemed a good plan).
The group was super paranoid that something was on the balconey (afterall why was the area boarded up?). So they sent the human rogue to the stairs to scout it out. He made it up and down with out being heard and reported back to the group.
The group then decieded to send the rogue back up the stairs to move in for a sneak attack (dagger at 20 ft. range if I remember correctly) and move the archer (a half-elf with DEX 17) towards the north end of the west balconey while the goliath barbarian/druid and the human wizard hung back closer to the entrance and made noice like they were searching the walls nearby.
Both the rogue and the archer hit with their surprise attacks and while the rogue did a measely 3 hps, the archer rolled a critical and rolled around 15 hps of damage.
Everyone but the druid/barbarian beat the grell in initiative. The rogue choose to throw again, missed and retreated back to the cover of the stairwell. The archer used his Rapid Fire feat and hit the grell one more time for almost 10 hps. The wizard readied and magic missile for to target the grell as soon as it was visable. The grell move to attack the archer and the wizard's magic missile flew, 6 hps later the grell was down and no one had suffered a point of damage.
Kind of depressing as a DM (I really like grells) but yeah for the players. Two rooms later the rogue died on a crit from the invisible pulvirizer so it all works out in the end.
I would not be depressed. It was a clever tactic by your group. If you read through the thread of PC kills here:
http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/dungeon/shackledCity/howManyCharacterD eathsInYourAdventurePath
you have to shake your head at the stupidity of some of the players. I get a higher degree of enjoyment from a clever playing group, than from killing off dumb characters. So again congrats to your group.
By the way my PCs so far never went to the Grell. They captured one Skulk and immediately went down the elevator. They killed the Stone Spike and the polymorphed Oytugh without problem and are now ready to take on Kazmojen.
my players moved away from the grell and fought while retrieving in several different directions so that the non-grell-targetted PCs could always fire something nasty at the aberration. this way the grell could do only a move and one attack with it's paralytic tentacle in one round. even so the fight was huge fun as many of the PCs (being 2nd level) fell and the palading finished the beast of with a thrown bastard sword (-4 on attack) combined with a heroic smite evil (+4 attack and +2 damage in this case) that came out to be a critical. it was very good i tell you :)