Monk wearing Zoziel's circlet dire charges K, hits every time, takes him down to around 100.
What is a Dire Charge? I'm guessing it's something that allows someone to use more than a single atack when charging, going by what you have written.
You PCs sound very 'ard :-)
What I do intend to do is rule that the Sphere of Annihilation is 'destroyed'(!) after hitting either Kyuss or one of his artifacts. After all, he is a God, and means that the Spere isn't open to (too much) abuse.
This whole AP (and the many tales told with regards to adventuring parties) seem to show how much easier scenarios and fights are for those PCs using additional feats, spells, classes/prestige classes from supplements, rather than just using the three core rule-books.
I have to wonder how PCs using just the three core rule-books fare in comparison, especially in the last few BBEG fights in the AP...
Also, I have to offer my congratulations to you, Arden, for completing the mammoth (and respectable) task of running the whole of the Age of Worms AP.
There are certainly plenty of spells and feats in supplemental books that can have a huge impact on the game. However, Kyuss would not be very difficult to defeat even using core rulebooks only. The biggest problems with the Kyuss battle are the sphere, and the degree to which he is weakened by various actions of the PCs. I haven't yet run this encounter, as my game is still at Gathering of Winds, but I'll give a few pointers that I think will make the final battle more difficult (and maybe more fun!).
1. The sphere is the only thing that can destroy the unlife vortex. Destroying the vortex deals a major blow to Kyuss, weakning himg greatly. This presents the characters with the option of waiting to use the sphere on a powerful Kyuss, or weakening him first, but not being able to actually use the sphere against him.
2. The sphere is destroyed after it touches Kyuss. Taking half his HP in one hit is good enough. It shouldn't be able to do it over and over again.
3. Kyuss has allies. In particular, he should be surrounding himself with broodfiends. Make one of them his familiar.
4. Antimagic shell :) I know I keep saying this, but it's a really great tactic.
5. Dimensional lock affects entire city. This will force characters to use Gate outside of the city, and they will likely have to choose "contractual service" due to the longer duration.
6. As another option, Kyuss's evil power might cause any summoned or conjured creatures to be evil. In this case, it would be impossible to summon celestials.
Just a few ideas.
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There are certainly plenty of spells and feats in supplemental books that can have a huge impact on the game. However, Kyuss would not be very difficult to defeat even using core rulebooks only. The biggest problems with the Kyuss battle are the sphere, and the degree to which he is weakened by various actions of the PCs. I haven't yet run this encounter, as my game is still at Gathering of Winds, but I'll give a few pointers that I think will make the final battle more difficult (and maybe more fun!).
1. The sphere is the only thing that can destroy the unlife vortex. Destroying the vortex deals a major blow to Kyuss, weakning himg greatly. This presents the characters with the option of waiting to use the sphere on a powerful Kyuss, or weakening him first, but not being able to actually use the sphere against him.
2. The sphere is destroyed after it touches Kyuss. Taking half his HP in one hit is good enough. It shouldn't be able to do it over and over again.
3. Kyuss has allies. In particular, he should be surrounding himself with broodfiends. Make one of them his familiar.
4. Antimagic shell :) I know I keep saying this, but it's a really great tactic.
5. Dimensional lock affects entire city. This will force characters to use Gate outside of the city, and they will likely have to choose "contractual service" due to the longer duration.
6. As another option, Kyuss's evil power might cause any summoned or conjured creatures to be evil. In this case, it would be impossible to summon celestials.
Just a few ideas.
I'm afraid 5 is not really an option, the Dimensional Lock specifically only affecty Kyuss and his associates, not the PCs. So you can't really prevent them from summoning. 6 may sound great, but is sheer arbitrary decision, for which your PCs will probably be less then thankful, especially since it cuts into the "things i can normally do", instead of beefing up the opposition, or tweaking the scenario.
I am only just about to start the whole affair, but am going to use the Dragotha fight as a "sounding board" for Kyuss. Depending on how well they do, i can scale the challenge in Dawn of a New Age up or down. Since you have obviously already concluded that the PCs will walk through the fight without a problem, here are some suggestions:
One good (or evil) tactic might be to keep Lashona around for the big showdown. It makes sense that she wants to "midwife" Kyuss, even going so far as to endanger herself to do so.
Another of the simplest things really would be to deny them the Sphere. Take it out of the picture, and their most potent attack vanishes. In case you want to keep it on hand, Lashonna might be tipped off about their newest capability, and get her own Talisman.
Additionally, if the PCs opted to destroy both the Unlife Vortex and battled despair, they probably spend a significant amount of time. So much time, in fact, that its not unreasonable to rush them to the Final Fight... that is, Kyuss is there, ready or not. No free round of damage. Or even worse: He is there, the worm tornado descends... how fast can you get to the top of the Ziggurat? Kyuss is not dying of old age - the contrary, in fact.
I also fully expect any Broodfiend, Kyuss Knight, or in fact anything the PCs have not killed while ascending the Ziggurat to rush at maximum movement into the battle as soon as the first blow is struck. Which may make things a bit more interesting... even if they are not much of a threat anymore, filling the playing field with your creatures can make the squishies think twice before going full offense. And if they intentionally create a completely "free-fire" zone, well... see the previous idea.
So changing the effect of summoning is arbitrary, but denying the PCs access to the sphere is not? I fail to see your reasoning, especially considering that most PCs will have been carrying the talisman for the last 11 adventures.
There's nothing wrong with making changes with the encounter as written if it will make the battle more fun for everyone.
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So changing the effect of summoning is arbitrary, but denying the PCs access to the sphere is not? I fail to see your reasoning, especially considering that most PCs will have been carrying the talisman for the last 11 adventures.
There's nothing wrong with making changes with the encounter as written if it will make the battle more fun for everyone.
Okay, i don't want to derail this thread too far, and this is more a "general DMing" question, than related to the topic at hand, so i'll only briefly reply.
Let me put it this way, then: It usually is immensely unpopular to remove capabilities the PCs have written down and integrated as parts of their character. It feels as if you cheat them out of something they earned.
The scenario is in your hands, however. The players don't know it, so you'll never disappoint them, or take away something they consider to have earned. Exceptions may apply, but usually its much better to alter the world then to "nerf" PC abilities.
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So changing the effect of summoning is arbitrary, but denying the PCs access to the sphere is not? I fail to see your reasoning, especially considering that most PCs will have been carrying the talisman for the last 11 adventures.
There's nothing wrong with making changes with the encounter as written if it will make the battle more fun for everyone.
Okay, i don't want to derail this thread too far, and this is more a "general DMing" question, than related to the topic at hand, so i'll only briefly reply.
Let me put it this way, then: It usually is immensely unpopular to remove capabilities the PCs have written down and integrated as parts of their character. It feels as if you cheat them out of something they earned.
The scenario is in your hands, however. The players don't know it, so you'll never disappoint them, or take away something they consider to have earned. Exceptions may apply, but usually its much better to alter the world then to "nerf" PC abilities.
Interesting new spell in The Complete Mage....steal summoning...I think Kyuss, or better, one of his spell casting lackeys, could use a couple of these if he knows that your party uses summoning as a usual tactic. 6th level, saving throw none, spell resistence no. Only downside is duration is concentration plus one round.
you mean like negating the death ward spell? Seems like the AP writers don't have a problem disallowing certain tactics once in a while, I don't see why you should.
I believe that the steal summoning spell was in BoVD (maybe under a different name). That's where I got the idea, actually.
I've read a couple of these threads about how easy Kyuss and Dragotha were to trounce given their high CRs in comparison to the level of the party. Almost every description I've read indicates that the party is either at full strength or nearly so. I can't figure out how these parties have managed to do so in the Tabernacle or the Spire without exhausting at least some resources to do so...
So my question is for the folks that have already run this battle and felt it was too easy for the PCs. Did you ask them if they felt cheated? Does every battle need to be 20 rounds to be climatic? While I don't want an NPC to walk in and kill something for me or have the major bad guy just roll over and take, a quick fight isn't a bad thing. If the players have really good tactics, shouldn't they be rewarded with a short fight? Plus artifacts tend to be battle changers, I mean they are artifacts after all.
Really it comes down to what your players would enjoy. I'm not even close to the battle yet but I'm guessing that my players will spend a few hours planning it, which will be where the real fun of the battle comes from. If the battle only takes two rounds, then so be it. I really don't think they will care at that point.
I've read a couple of these threads about how easy Kyuss and Dragotha were to trounce given their high CRs in comparison to the level of the party. Almost every description I've read indicates that the party is either at full strength or nearly so. I can't figure out how these parties have managed to do so in the Tabernacle or the Spire without exhausting at least some resources to do so...
Well, both of these adventures allow for the PC's to retreat, rest and regroup and there's really not alot the BBEG's can do to stop them, and there are limited resources for them to repop the Tabernacle/Spire with, although a creative DM could come up with something I'm sure.
Our DM made sure the NPCs reacted to our actions intelligently. Since we used the sphere on minions, Lashona prepared a counter-attack with blessed angels and wands of cancellation that took the sphere out of the picture pretty quickly. We had to defeat Kyuss the old-fashioned way, with plenty of beatings all around. I did manage to get the hand of Vecna to stun him for a round though, and that helped a lot.
I too would recommend beefing up the bad guys or altering magical conditions somewhat in the spire instead of taking away player abilities. It _seems_ less arbitrary to the players, though logically it isn't, of course.
My PCs will soon face Brazzemal and his two champion dragons in Kings of the Rift soon. Some of the fights in the adventure were easy, no question.
But I can assure you, defeating Dragotha (the most powerful undead in my game world), Lashonna (AoW's answer to Lex Luther), and Kyuss will not be easy in my campaign.
I completely disagree with the idea that a party would be at full and rested strength when they face Kyuss. BBEGs don't just sit and wait for enemies to come to them. They plan and work and strive to stay alive. Let's say that you are Kyuss. Now, you know it will take a few moments for you to enter into the material plane. What you need is interference or for those sports fans out there: a blocker. I guess that I like my BBEGs to not be cardboard cut-outs with an experience and gold price tag for the players to turn after combat. When they face something of this magnitude, they should expect time, location, strength, and history to be major factors in the prep and outcome.
Picture it this way. The group has struggled and fought to reach this point through so many challenges. Now, they stand at the last step before they face Kyuss when the director calls cut and says, "Let's take five for the day." ? ? ? No, adrenaline and so many other factors are kicking in and Kyuss is ready to see his carefully crafted plans, which he has had nothing better to do than think about, come to life. All I can say is that I pity the party in my game that says, "We need to find a place to rest now that we are ready to kill Kyuss." If you can make it to his doorstep, then you now have his complete and undivided attention. Get ready.
So... if our resources are depleted and we have no chance of beating Kyuss without resting before we visit his monolith, we should do so anyway and get creamed, for adrenalin's sake?
There's a line between lame over-preparedness and just plain suicide.
When your players have only Kyuss to kill, they went through Marelee (or whatever the name is), Lashonna, the Broodfiends, make the Spire tremble because the ritual is almost complete.
If they don't rush upstairs to see that Kyuss is emerging...well Manzorian et al. can't hold Kyuss in dimensional lock eternally and the AoW could become a reality...of course if your players are all out of spells and at half health, don't go that route. But have a bunch of Broodfiends, liches, vampires, Swords of Kyuss wanting for them at the top of the Spire...The mobs will permit Kyuss to exit the Monolith unoppossed.
Heh, yeah that's actually what ended up happening (see original post for this thread).
Kyuss, Lashonna, 3 broodfiends, and 3 elite Blessed Angels. At once. Even fully rested, we were hard-pressed, and rightly so.
Interesting, my group is currently on hiatus at Magepoint (arc 8 or so) but a cursory examination of the characters potential growth (and of our 5 PCs, 2 are VERY optimized, 2 are decently optimized, and the cleric is a freaking entropomancer) shows us being rather "pwnd" by Kyuss unless we make heavy use of both the artifacts provided and the debuffs of mucking around in Alhaster.
We use almost all the released WotC books, and our stats are flatly insane (the DM was terribly generous on die rolling) and while we seems to be chewing through most of the challenges to date, the urglarasta of challenge of champions was a bit of a... challenge. Dragotha statistically looks nearly impossible to beat, and Kyuss with all debuffs, all artifacts, and massive preperatory planning is going to be a nightmare.
But then, our DM knows how to manipulate spellcasting to excellent degree, and the combinations of timestop, blade barrier, gate, harm, and the like, plus a few choice readied actions will be quite nasty.