Spoilers
I was just reviewing the final encounter in KoTR where Brazzemal the Burning takes the side off the phylactery vault and comes after the PCs.
This is supposed to be a climactic battle to conclude the adventure, possibly complicated by treacherous allies (Vercinabex Tor, Gazzilfek), and the entry of the vault's undead guardians into the fray. It occurred to me, though, that there is an easy way for the PCs to avoid this climactic battle, and some groups will be likely to take it: grab the phylactery (hopefully with gloved hands!) and teleport to safety before smashing the thing.
In addition, Brazzemal, who has teleport, might use the same tactic to deliver the phylactery (his primary mission) to his master.
Either way, you have a short battle.
Now, many parties won't want to back down from a fight unless it's clear they're going to lose, but Brazzemal is a pretty intimidating foe. If they do teleport away, Brazzemal as written has no easy way to catch up with them unless they delay destruction of the phylactery. His locate object will point him in the right direction, and he might be able to find the characters in a day or two if they teleport someplace close, like Alhaster or Magepoint. If they teleport off to someplace like Kuluth Mar, it might take him a week to catch up. I'm thinking of giving Brazzemal scrying and having him stash a focal mirror for the spell in a cave near Kongen-Thulnir--it seems reasonable, since he's supposed to be generaling the effort to find the phylactery. This would give him the possibility (with reasonably good rolls) of following the PCs within a few rounds of their departure, especially if he can wound one of them and use the blood on his claws to increase the save DC. But it's not foolproof, both due to possibility of bad rolls and the fact that a 19th level caster could theoretically teleport beyond his range.
On Brazzemal's side, he might snatch the phylactery then keep fighting the PCs, hoping to earn extra brownie points with his boss for destroying the pesky adventurers. But, he can only fight for a few rounds before the wisdom damage from holding the phylactery starts to make him much more susceptible to will-save type spells. Alternatively, he might snatch the phylactery, teleport to the Tabernacle of Worms, then teleport right back to finish off the PCs before they can escape or recover.
How have you handled this, or plan to handle it?
My players confounded things for old Brazzie even further. One has a PRC called Singer of Concordance (Races of the Dragon) which lets the entire party shift to a demiplane designed for healing and protection, which also prevents enemies from finding them. The group grabbed the phylactery, then made a *very hasty retreat to the plane when Brazzemal appeared. The players smashed the phylactery, rested, and shifted back to the Prime Material.
Since they elected to evade the dragon siege rather the confront them, the players will now have to deal with Brazzemal, the Fang Dragon, and the named Blue along with about 20-30 other (much) younger dragons at Brazzemal's Aeire in the Wormcrawl Fissure this weekend. It's going to be a massive throwdown, but the players will have a few advantages (not the least of which is an airship), and will get to loot Brazzemal's hoard, which will be upped a bit to match the total EL for that encounter.
They won't get to use it, however ;)
I plan on letting the players get one good, long, loving look at the hoard before they see the whole thing disappear before their very eyes. Dragotha will have placed a contingency spell on the loot (one I homebrewed for uber-dragons in my games... Hoard Insurance); if the vault is breached by a non-dragon AND the hoard's designated owner is deceased, the entire contents teleport to a pre-designated location. In this case, Dragotha's hoard, giving the players a seriously personal desire to pummel Dragotha into little lichy bits.
When I ran this encounter, the PCs had discovered Gazzilfelk and had Vercinabex Tor as an NPC. When they got to the phylactery room, 3 things happened simultaneously:
1) Brazzemal tore through the wall and started to throw down.
2) Vercinabex Tor went nuts at the sight of the (mostly) empty vault and started to throw down also.
3) Gazzilfelk teleported in and grabbed the phylactery.
So the PCs not only had foes attacking from two sides, they had to somehow manage to keep Gazzilfelk from escaping. They managed it, but they were only one standard action away from losing Dragotha's phylactery.
I have read, but not run, the entire adventure path. My party is just at Prince Zeech's ball.
But why not just dimensionally anchor the phylactory?
Hoard Insurance! LOL! I suppose old Brazzy had to arrange with Lloyd's of Greyhawk, naming Dragotha as beneficiary? Do you suppose they had any trouble arranging it, seeing as the beneficiary has predeceased the insured?
Dimensional anchor on the phylactery. That's a good idea--and it seems quite reasonable the the Order of the Storm would have put such an effect in place to make theft of the phylactery even more difficult.
Thanks, Greg. Agreed that Brazzemal probably is going to fry the PCs if he can. Of course, if he returns to Dragotha empty-handed . . . well, I suppose it would be time to invent a "Kyuss Dragon" template to put alongside Dracoliches and Vampiric Dragons. (Yeesh--perhaps this is too much of a good thing!)
An update on Brazzemal:
The players fought a huge throwdown this weekend against Brazzemal and the assembled dragons who survived the dragon siege. They faced a total of thirty dragons, mostly juveniles and young adults, including Brazzemal, Vermirox, and Xyzanth. It was a chance for the players to both enjoy letting loose with all their high-level powers in a clash of the titans, and reveal some of their tactics that they could use against Dragotha.
In the interest of keeping this battle simple, the dragons were forced to make morale checks every time one of the big three was taken down. If they failed, they ran away. Here's what I learned:
*Knowledge + Shapechange = dangerous PCs. Three of my players changed into Concordant Killers from the MM4, which are "designed to combat powerful foes." They weren't kidding.
*I hate Extended Otto's Irresistible Dance. No save, touch attack (dragons have no touch AC), beat the SR, and with a good roll and a Rod of Metamagic you have Brazzemal doing nothing but provoking touch attacks for nine rounds. NINE ROUNDS while he should be picking paladin out of his teeth.
*Players talk too much. I imposed a gag order on the party, letting them only pass notes to each other when it wasn't their turn because they had telepathy cast on all of them beforehand. It made the entire combat probably an hour shorter ;)
Final result: 13 dead dragons, including the big three; the rest fled, and the players never required healing. They hid their airship inside Brazzemal's empty hoard chamber and used telelport + the locate object ability of Balakarde's connection to teleport near the locations of the Tripartite Soul. By the end of the night they had all the pieces and were ready to take on the Chapel of Worms... next time.