So the party meets Rowyn. They start talking, and she offers them a job with the Lotus Dragon. They begin debating the possibility of taking her offer. The duskblade decides he's had enough of talking and attacks her. He beats her on initiative (by a lot) and channels a shocking grasp through his rapier. He crits her. 27 points of damage. Down she goes, without ever having acted. End of discussion.
Fortunately they kept her alive, so I can still have her seek bloody revenge in Sea Wyvern's Wake.
So the party meets Rowyn. They start talking, and she offers them a job with the Lotus Dragon. They begin debating the possibility of taking her offer. The duskblade decides he's had enough of talking and attacks her. He beats her on initiative (by a lot) and channels a shocking grasp through his rapier. He crits her. 27 points of damage. Down she goes, without ever having acted. End of discussion.
Fortunately they kept her alive, so I can still have her seek bloody revenge in Sea Wyvern's Wake.
Things like this happen, part and parcel of being a DM, it can be frustrating indeed!
I've noticed a lot of people have Duskblades in the party these days? How do DM's find them? are they as "broken" as people claim them to be?
So the party meets Rowyn. They start talking, and she offers them a job with the Lotus Dragon. They begin debating the possibility of taking her offer. The duskblade decides he's had enough of talking and attacks her. He beats her on initiative (by a lot) and channels a shocking grasp through his rapier. He crits her. 27 points of damage. Down she goes, without ever having acted. End of discussion.
She lasted longer against my players, but not by much. She rolled a natural 1 for initiative, and the party (having poisoned their weapons with urchin venom) nauseated her on the first or second hit. She managed to get her potion of gaseous form out on her first action, but an attack of opportunity in the second round dropped her before she could drink it.
(The party had suffered badly from urchin venom in a previous encounter, so they got a good feeling of justice/revenge.)
I've noticed a lot of people have Duskblades in the party these days? How do DM's find them? are they as "broken" as people claim them to be?
I don't think so. The one in this party certainly doesn't seem like the most powerful character.
Rowyn didn't last too long with my group either. Because of my group's composition, they do really well against one BBEG, but a large number of mooks can really give them trouble. I figure as long as I know that, I can use it to plan future encounters.
El Skootro
Rowyn and Guttugger synergize extremely well; unless one or the other is downed fast, or their ability to flank is nullified, they can do terrifying amounts of damage to a party, up to and including a TPK. However, the size of Rowyns room as written makes this difficult (previous threads have covered this).
Regardless, a lucky crit can change a lot of things. Look at it this way, in my game, a lucky DOUBLE crit with a scorching ray by the Spirit Naga in Here There Be Monsters nearly killed the Ice Troll Fighter in my party. The "unkillable" troll went down under one spell. Course, said spell did do, after crits multiplier, and fire vunerability (cold subtype), about 24d6 damage, and I rolled well. I did about 100 damage, and the troll only had 98hp at the time.
Against Rowyn, my group stopped her dead by crowding her, and when things went bad, the attacks of opportunity for the potion downed her. Simple as that. Sometimes it's good tactics, sometimes it's luck, sometimes it's both.
Note though, at higher levels, good tactics carry more weight for PCs, and luck carries more weight for monsters.
It makes me want to have her be a tsochar from Lord of Madness. The parasite could slither away once the host is dead and pop up later to face the PC's in another body. I shall have to give 'Rowyn' a very memorable battle cry or catchphrase so the players will click on and realise they have fought this person before (only in another skin). ;)
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My group dropped the earth elemental gem on the Rowyn and stepped back to let it do the job. Gut got dropped fairly early and I figured that I icould make this more interesting by having Rowyn go ahead and escape with her gaseous form. The group didn't count on that. Since somehow my guys made a b-line for her most of the complex was untouched so I had her round up her lackeys to make a last stand. Our psycher dropped several with one of his energy blasts. Let's just say that Rowyn beat feet pretty quick. She was pretty much unscathed and I have plans for having her drop in on the group before she stows away on the ship.
It's always interesting to see what your group does. There always seems to be somthing that they pull that you just didn't count on and you have to scramble to keep up. Still it keeps ya on your toes.
I put two bugbear zombies in the room with her to counterbalance a large party (7). I also expanded her quarters considerably to give her room to maneuver. My party still took her out in about three rounds, because she let them in the room to bargain with her and when negotiations went sour, they got the drop on her. She was quickly cornered, failed her tumble check, and was unable to get out and drink her potion before she was killed outright. In retrospect, I think it's a bit of a mistake to have her bargain after her guild has been basically taken down. She's bargaining from a position of weakness, and the PCs know it because they've already cleared a substantial number of her minions from the dungeon. She's better off using the negotiations as a bluff to get the drop on the PCs. If you really want her to negotiate, make sure to put a healthy amount of meatshields between her and the PCs while she does it.
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rowyn went down fast because of that darn elemental gem ,but she did escape and made it to the sea wyvern to cause some trouble
So the party meets Rowyn. They start talking, and she offers them a job with the Lotus Dragon. They begin debating the possibility of taking her offer. The duskblade decides he's had enough of talking and attacks her. He beats her on initiative (by a lot) and channels a shocking grasp through his rapier. He crits her. 27 points of damage. Down she goes, without ever having acted. End of discussion.
Fortunately they kept her alive, so I can still have her seek bloody revenge in Sea Wyvern's Wake.
God, I have the same issue with the Rhagodessa. I had this fun way of running him - was gonna have his grab a PC, and then run out of the hold onto the deck and running around, climbing and all that. However, the PCs all hit, the Rhagodessa rolled 3 on an attack, and 4 on an AoO, and than there was a crit from a crossbow (for 19 damage), he was out before I could say 'Make an opposed strength check.'
But, them are the breaks.
My folks almost got TPK'ed what with sneak attacks and her abilities. In the end, it was between her and one last PC who got in a lucky shot - before this they had mobbed her (which was a mistake because she and guttugger were able to sneak attack one PC per round). Also, a couple of lucky rolls (or unlucky on her part) prevented the below ability from working.
Note - as she was talking with the PC's I added (it's perform/dance right?...):
Fascinate (Sp): By simply twisting her body sensuously, Rowyn can cause one or more creatures to become fascinated. Each creature to be fascinated must be within 90 feet, able to see her, and able to pay attention. She must also be able to see the creature. The distraction of a nearby combat or other dangers prevents the ability from working. Her Perform check (+10) result is the DC for each affected creature’s Will save against the effect.