Lemorian Golems (Hefty Spoilers for HTBM! Beware!)


Savage Tide Adventure Path


At the conclusion of Here There Be Monsters, I began to wonder about the Lemorian Golems. Would we be seeing more of them? It seems like something which will be common later on in the game, so I cannot help but wonder if they'll be fairly plentiful... say around Gaping Maw? Would it be worth it to invest in some extra miniatures of Demogorgon to paint up like statues?

~ Bryon ~


Was it just me or do these Golems seem WAY underpowered given the levels the PCs should be at? I think the stat block only has it having about 70 hit points (I don't have the modual in front of me). I really beefed it up, otherwise my players would mow right through it.


otoh as a golem immune to the backstab and similar attacks buccaneers and pirates rely upon ;)
Remains to be seen.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Blackdragon wrote:
Was it just me or do these Golems seem WAY underpowered given the levels the PCs should be at? I think the stat block only has it having about 70 hit points (I don't have the modual in front of me). I really beefed it up, otherwise my players would mow right through it.

Have you tried it out in combat yet? Because they have a pretty awesome armor class and enormous damage reduction...

But in any case, yeah... ther'll probably be more lemorian golems in the future of the Savage Tide.


Blackdragon wrote:
Was it just me or do these Golems seem WAY underpowered given the levels the PCs should be at? I think the stat block only has it having about 70 hit points (I don't have the modual in front of me). I really beefed it up, otherwise my players would mow right through it.

The thing is actually quite tough. Good AC, DR the players are unlikely to get around, construct traits and the ability to make a standard action during a full attack action. Plus it can grapple more than one person at once.

Anything which focuses on grapple is always too low a CR for the challenge, in my experience.

~ Bryon ~


My players are about to face this bad boy, and I'm worried it's going to trounce them!

The players will all be the correct level ( IMC I'm awarding story level advances that match the guidelines in the modules)

Who has run this so far? Results?


joshua johnson wrote:

My players are about to face this bad boy, and I'm worried it's going to trounce them!

The players will all be the correct level ( IMC I'm awarding story level advances that match the guidelines in the modules)

Who has run this so far? Results?

I had a 5-person group take him on, and he downed (unconcious) three, before the other two were able to kite him through the dungeon and take him out with ranged attacks. What really hurt was the bar-lguras, which kept abducting one player and re-appearing outside the dungeon, hanging off the ruin's spire and dropping the unlucky PC they had in their hands to splatter on the ground below (at least, that was the idea... curse you, feather fall!). It took a couple of them out of the fight for quite some time before the lemorian was even loose.


Well I screwed up when I ran him, so he ended up being not too difficult. The party sorcerer took to the air and rained rays of enfeeblement down on him until he had only a single point of strength left. At this point the thing couldn't really move and the rest of the party moved in and hacked and pummeled him down. I was thinking that unlike most golems he wasn't immune to magic, so in my mind as long as the sorcerer over came spell resistance the tactic was legit. However, I forgot that constructs are immune to ability drain and damage, so this tactic probably shouldn't have worked. Don't forget those construct traits when you run this bad boy.
He has the potential to be tough.

James Jacobs wrote:
Blackdragon wrote:
Was it just me or do these Golems seem WAY underpowered given the levels the PCs should be at? I think the stat block only has it having about 70 hit points (I don't have the modual in front of me). I really beefed it up, otherwise my players would mow right through it.

Have you tried it out in combat yet? Because they have a pretty awesome armor class and enormous damage reduction...

But in any case, yeah... ther'll probably be more lemorian golems in the future of the Savage Tide.


P.H. Dungeon wrote:

Well I screwed up when I ran him, so he ended up being not too difficult. The party sorcerer took to the air and rained rays of enfeeblement down on him until he had only a single point of strength left. At this point the thing couldn't really move and the rest of the party moved in and hacked and pummeled him down. I was thinking that unlike most golems he wasn't immune to magic, so in my mind as long as the sorcerer over came spell resistance the tactic was legit. However, I forgot that constructs are immune to ability drain and damage, so this tactic probably shouldn't have worked. Don't forget those construct traits when you run this bad boy.

He has the potential to be tough.

Yes and no. Ray of Enfeeblement is an ability penalty, not ability damage or ability drain, so constructs are not automatically immune to it. On the other hand, unlike ability damage multiple applications of ability penalties overlap rather than stack, so it is completely impossible to reduce the Lemorian Golem's strength to 1 unless you can somehow pummel it with a -24 strength penalty all at once. Assuming the 9th-level caster is using an Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement and gets a max result on the die, the absolute maximum possible strength penalty is -10.


Thanks for that I was wondering how that worked. However, the sorcerer did score a crit, which to my understanding doubles the effect of rays, which drained 10 strength with one hit.


Heh, I Ran this last night... I think the group I ran through it had the most UNIQUE way of taking it out.

While they were fighting Olangru the fight spilled out in the hallway. While the heavy hitters were battling it, a couple of the other characters freed Urol and then dragged the statue into huge the fire pit using the winch and chain he was on!

They figured that since his superior mobility was tearing apart the party they would enrage him and make him stand and fight by desecrating the statue to his deity. (?)

So during the final rounds of the fight while Olangru was decapitating the druid (probably because the rest were not helping in the fight) the Lemorian Golem was roasting in the pit!

Time for a quick check of the stats... no resistance to normal fire just SR... ...and Olangru is now dead ...hmmm

So just as it animates with a dual fury borne of the abyss... it melts to brine with a horrible howl. Hilarity ensues.

(Yes I could have had it animate early, but I want to reward the ingenuity and dumb luck of my intrepid crew of swashbucklers.)

The Exchange Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6

P.H. Dungeon wrote:
Thanks for that I was wondering how that worked. However, the sorcerer did score a crit, which to my understanding doubles the effect of rays, which drained 10 strength with one hit.

It doubles damage, as that poster had said. This includes hp damage, nonlethal damage, ability damage, ability drain, and negative levels, but does not include penalties. RoE applies a penalty, so it cannot be doubled, and even if it could you can't crit a golem.


Kobold Lord wrote:
Ray of Enfeeblement is an ability penalty, not ability damage or ability drain, [snup] unlike ability damage multiple applications of ability penalties overlap rather than stack, so it is completely impossible to reduce the Lemorian Golem's strength to 1 unless you can somehow pummel it with a -24 strength penalty all at once. Assuming the 9th-level caster is using an Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement and gets a max result on the die, the absolute maximum possible strength penalty is -10.

Is this quite correct? Ray of Enfeeblement has an un-named penalty. If the penalty was named, it wouldn't stack, but since it is not shouldn't it stack with itself?

There is no rule n DnD that says that a particular effect cannot stack with itself it it is possible to apply it several times. That is why we have named bonus/penalty types.

Or am I out on a limb on this?


Lord Alarik The Fool wrote:


So just as it animates with a dual fury borne of the abyss... it melts to brine with a horrible howl. Hilarity ensues.

These guys win a prize! Coolness.

A simple flask of oil or alchemists fire is a very good weapon against most golems. So are the various Orb of [Energy] spells from Complete Arcane / Spell Compendium.

In my Dragonstar game (DnD space setting by Fantasy Flight games) lasers do non-magical fire damage and blasters do non-magical electricity damage. Golems would be scrap very quickly, so to maintain the challenge I gave them Hardness rather than Damage Resistance. You can do this here too and say it only applies to non-magical energy damage, but that is a bit contrived.


Carl Cramér wrote:

Is this quite correct? Ray of Enfeeblement has an un-named penalty. If the penalty was named, it wouldn't stack, but since it is not shouldn't it stack with itself?

There is no rule n DnD that says that a particular effect cannot stack with itself it it is possible to apply it several times. That is why we have named bonus/penalty types.

Or am I out on a limb on this?

Let's check the SRD:

SRD wrote:

Stacking Effects

Spells that provide bonuses or penalties on attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and other attributes usually do not stack with themselves. More generally, two bonuses of the same type don’t stack even if they come from different spells (or from effects other than spells; see Bonus Types, above).

Different Bonus Names: The bonuses or penalties from two different spells stack if the modifiers are of different types. A bonus that isn’t named stacks with any bonus.

Same Effect More than Once in Different Strengths: In cases when two or more identical spells are operating in the same area or on the same target, but at different strengths, only the best one applies.

I read this to say that two Rays of Enfeeblement that are of differing strength overlap, and the rule where untyped bonuses always stack is not relevant because a penalty is not the same as a bonus. This is probably why penalties are rarely named.

Scarab Sages

Kobold Lord wrote:
...This is probably why penalties are rarely named.

Of course, its not really clear if a penalty is a "negative bonus" or something else entirely. That's a little too rules lawyerly for me, so I usually go with the spell effect approach.


I think I have to cede this point. The first paragraph of the SRD quoted gives the general case; the special case later on is that if they have different types, then they stack. My previous reading was the other way around; in general they stack, but not if of the same type.

I often find the SRD clearer than the PH in these cases.

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