Well, my players managed to defeat Zyrxog with no loss of life.
The key ingredients were:
Haste
Spider Climb
A half-ogre war-hulk with a ring of feather falling
In short:
The party entered the chamber via the pool room, so started 40' above the floor. Zyrxog lost initiative. The Half ogre spider climbed up the ceiling (40' per round with haste on). Zyrzog got one mind blast off, by the half ogre rolled 19+buffs and saved. Half ogre then spider-climbed directly over Zyrxog and dropped onto him and grappled. Zyrxog was levitating, not flying, and could not simply dodge.
We also ruled that a mind-flayer must point its head to use the mind blast (it is a cone effect).
Zyrxog retreived the material components for "grease" from his pouch in the second round, but next round the half-ogre established a pin, and it was all over. (29 strength + armour spikes).
And that, kids, is how you deal with a mind flayer.
I chose to remove the secret door into the pool room. This forced the PCs to take the long spiral hallway into Zyrxog's lair. They tried sneaking in, of course, but the 2 octopins got the jump on them as soon as they entered. While fighting those beasties, Zyrzog, who was in the pool room, and who had been watching their every move since they first entered his hide out (I assumed that he had constant mental contact with all of his thralls - so he was alerted as soon as the PCs reached the drow area) - floated out 40' overhead via levitation (fully buffed) and began hitting them with mindblasts and maximized lighting bolts (using his rod). The party ranger made his save, them got off a lucky crit - else it could have been a TPK. I think it's very anticlimatic if the Big Evil Guy at the end of an adventure doesn't live up to his reputation. As DM, you have to do whatever it takes to make it challenging - even if it means cheating!
As DM, you have to do whatever it takes to make it challenging - even if it means cheating!
Oh, it was suitably heroic. When Zyrxog did the mind blst and took out half the party, everyone became very glum. The half ogre only just - just made his save: 19 + buffs.
BTW: the rod was a rod of empower, not a rod of maximize.
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My players were not so fortunate. All of them but one failed their save against the Mind Blast. The one still conscious surrendered and turned over most of the party's treasure as ransom.
Zyrxog then marked the party as his agents and sent them to eliminate Loris Raknian (to protect his reputation primarily, and to retrieve the Apostolic Scrolls - having discovered Raknian's ultimate plan and, being a Mind Flayer, having a strong distaste for undead infesting his tasty town of thralls).
First try at this encounter: all six PCs failed the mind blast save and were shredded by octopins. The player said, "I wasn't prepped for that, please let's try it again." Second try at this encounter: four PCs killed by octopins, the rest by Zyrxog. We did a tactical analysis and saw that, short of a long series of lucky rolls, this was always going to be the outcome. The PCs just could not do this with what they had available.
The player digested that and said "I have to minmax, don't I?" We skipped the encounter and went on to the next module, but the damage had been done. The player now knew it was essential to minmax, and did so; and we never had another interesting fight the whole game long, in my opinion. The PCs nuked everything they met. I got to see all of the spells and abilities that he might otherwise have refrained from using, as they're too gross. Around halfway through module 11 we called it quits.
In retrospect I wish I had not run it as written. At the time I was still wedded to "stick to the module." But it was a gross violation of my player's trust in my ability to run a fun game, and I paid for it bigtime for the next 6 modules. Luckily he was willing to forgive and forget for Pathfinder.
Mileage varies, of course. Some groups don't mind wildly too-difficult encounters. Mine, alas, did.
Mary
As DM, you have to do whatever it takes to make it challenging - even if it means cheating!...BTW: the rod was a rod of empower, not a rod of maximize.
The rod is where the cheating comes in, of course, since the mind flayer as published had neither of the related feats, thus should not have been able to activate the rod in any case, no matter which sort it was!
Anyone else notice that? Didn't stop me from letting him use the thing.
Kang
PS.
The player now knew it was essential to minmax, and did so; and we never had another interesting fight the whole game long, in my opinion. The PCs nuked everything they met.
This statement makes me wonder just how necessary it truly was for them to min/max. Any chance you goofed on your tactical analysis? Most of my players aren't familiar enough with the rules to do more than the most rudimentary min/maxing, but they made it through intact, though it was their greatest challenge to date by far. The only break I gave the players was to have Zyrxog retreat to renew his buffs at a time that would just happen to allow some PC's to recover from being stunned before he returned. The fact I don't fully understand why some gamers treat 'min/maxing' like a dirty word or something that is necessarily mutually exclusive from 'proper roleplaying' aside, I'm truly sorry to hear you weren't able to strike some sort of balance even over the course of the next 7 adventures. Better luck in your next campaign!
The player now knew it was essential to minmax, and did so; and we never had another interesting fight the whole game long, in my opinion. The PCs nuked everything they met.This statement makes me wonder just how necessary it truly was for them to min/max. Any chance you goofed on your tactical analysis? Most of my players aren't familiar enough with the rules to do more than the most rudimentary min/maxing, but they made it through intact, though it was their greatest challenge to date by far.
Can you describe how the fight went?
I can't give details of our analysis anymore, but we found that with Zyrxog's SR the PCs could not affect him with spells, that with his AC plus backing spells plus displacement plus levitation they could not affect him with weapons, and that they tended to fail the saves both against mind blast and against the octopin's *slow* attack. If I recall correctly, we never managed to do more than about 15 points to Z. in several replays.
Many accounts of the fight involve the use of *spell immunity* to stop the mind blast, but this contradicts the rules and my player knew that. And, unfortunately, several campaigns previously we had house-ruled that *glitterdust* is not no-SR, because the spell was so obnoxiously overused. The PCs had not specialized in no-SR spells or anti-SR feats, never having seen SR in the previous modules. So the party, which was fairly caster heavy, was in a very bad position. The octopins killed the fighters and the casters could do nothing.
The player tried various things--summoning, wall climbing, missile fire, casting--but essentially Z. had the means to shut them down too quickly.
Most writeups I've seen involve the GM quietly making things easier. I had foolishly promised the player not to do that. I won't be making such a promise ever again, because the outcome of this fight ruined my campaign.
Pathfinder is going a lot better for us. I did not promise to run it as written--it would have died in session 3 if I had--and we're enjoying it a lot.
Mary
The rod is where the cheating comes in, of course, since the mind flayer as published had neither of the related feats, thus should not have been able to activate the rod in any case, no matter which sort it was!
Anyone else notice that? Didn't stop me from letting him use the thing.
Hi Kang,
From memory, the description entry for Meta-magic Rod says' otherwise. A sorcerer (or other spontaneous caster) can use one, but it requires a full-round action to activate and cast the empowered spell. No feats are required. I beleive that's the whole idea of a meta-magic rod in the first place.
However, I do think many people forget to apply the full-round action, as I did myself (until my players reminded me).
Ghost
Can you describe how the fight went?
Most of the PC's were stunned most of the time, but somehow at least one of them would make their save every time, and do their best to fend off Zyrxog to keep him from eating anyone's brain before they snapped out of it. When they weren't stunned, they tried to avert their eyes every round from the octopins' slowing gaze and had fairly good luck succeeding, or at making their saves when it didn't work. When they were slowed, they could still ready attacks or "partial" charges to go off when Zyrxog used his mind blast.
Fairly quickly, there was only one octopin left (they learned about these critters the hard way the first time they met them and made sure to try keep their distance and try to take them out with spring attack, etc., before too many got a chance to full attack them. So I don't think any of them got rended even once during this battle. I had the last remaining octopin hang back at times, saving its hit points and life to move in and attack anyone who managed to score a hit on Zyrxog, figuring Z was overconfident enough to want all the fun for himself and wouldn't want to endanger his last pet/bodyguard needlessly in case he needed it more later (call that going easy on them if you like; maybe you're right, but I figured it would suit the flayer's superiority complex to not think he needed much help. Besides, if the octopin killed a PC, Zyrxog would have one less living brain to consume, right?) PC's who weren't stunned were smart enough to keep moving so as to avoid full attacks from the octopin, and to ready actions to attack so as to disrupt Z's mind blasts a few times. That helped. We don't really have much arcane firepower, so not too many actions were wasted in futile probing of his SR, and they rolled percentile dice well enough to get around his displacement on several occasions, chipping away at his hit points slowly but steadily. Aside from having Xyrxog hold his last octopin in reserve, the only real favor I did the PC's was to have him retreat to his quarters with the octopin (they'd been fighting in the scrying room and the large octopin room, not downstairs) to recast his expired buffs once he finally managed to stun everyone in one shot. This was right at the beginning of the 3rd and final session that this battle spanned. By this time Z was starting to run out of spells - no more of his higher-level spells remained, but I was still certain a TPK was in the works. I figured they were goners, so I wanted to try and at least prolong the agony for them. So before retreating, I had him use suggestion to get the fighter to toss his sword down into the tadpole pool so that it would receive a "powerful blessing". Then he laughed at them, informing them (telepathically) that they weren't yet terrified enough for their minds to be as delicious as we planned on making them, but that by the time they reached his sanctum (if they dared, and survived), that this problem would be solved. I sort of figured they might follow the ramp down, not too eager to go after him so soon after getting their butts kicked all over the entire past 2 sessions. Maybe the fighter would pick up the berserker sword to use in the meantime along the way, and they'd at least get to fight the vrock before certainly dying at Zyrxog's feet. If the party fighter took out a few of his buddies with the cursed sword, at least that'd deny Zyrxog a kill or 2, right? So finally the party all snapped out of being stunned and the fighter threw away his sword as requested. Someone else gave him a spare scimitar to use, and since everyone was now armed again they didn't follow the ramp, but rather used ropes and rings of feather falling to go straight down after him. They made sure to spread out so they couldn't easily all be taken out with a single mind blast or spell and resumed their earlier tactics. I was astonished when the one remaining PC who wasn't stunned managed to score the death blow on the illithid. Everyone had low hit points, but nobody died.
Sure, I could have had him take out a PC or 2 when he finally got them all stunned, but I figured a creature as intelligent as he was, arrogant though he may have been, would not relish the idea of risking his life by lingering in melee without his magical protection just to kill off his enemies a little bit sooner. A TPK seemed like an absolute certainty at that point, so from a DM's metagame standpoint it was more about trying not to do the TPK in the first 10 minutes of the session than it was about throwing the fight to avoid it altogether. Since retreating and rebuffing seemed to be in-character for the mind flayer, especially given the alignment-based advantage he would enjoy below once he succeeded in luring them there. I didn't think of it as going easy on them; I really thought it would merely prolong their inevitable demise and put The Fear into my players, letting the BBEG savor their PC's juicy brains all the more. But I sure am happy with the way it all came out in the end!
I guess the party had a few lucky rolls, but they didn't really seem to be rolling too unreasonably well. The things that really made a big difference were their deciding to ready actions to disrupt the mind blasts with melee attacks, and averting their eyes from the octopin. My discovering the Mind Blast DC was too high by +2 (IIRC) right before that final session also made a huge difference! I'm sure the fight would have been much easier in ther first 2 sessions of the battle if I'd noticed that from the start - many times when PC's got stunned, they had only missed their save by 1 or 2, so it would have had to have made at least some difference.
...the mind flayer as published had neither of the related feats, thus should not have been able to activate the rod...Hi Kang,
From memory, the description entry for Meta-magic Rod says' otherwise. A sorcerer (or other spontaneous caster) can use one, but it requires a full-round action to activate and cast the empowered spell. No feats are required. I beleive that's the whole idea of a meta-magic rod in the first place...
Er... Your memory is absolutely correct, of course. Not sure what I was thinking when I wrote that. Must have gotten it mixed up with something from a while back in my group's other DM's campaign, or maybe from one of the campaigns I played in with another group before my son was born and I had to cut back to one D&D night per week. Or maybe I was thinking about a bizarre interpretation of the metamagic rod rules I read about a few years back that the text seems to support but would be ridiculous if true, only I got it twisted around somehow. I certainly mixed myself up somehow or other there! I knew this one too, honest; not that I'd expect anyone to believe it now...
Thanks for calling me on it - it's a reminder of how I need to brush up on my rules knowledge once in a while. Hope I didn't lead anyone else down the garden path with that comment...
Kang
Readying actions to disrupt the mind blast is a really nice tactic, but the mind flayer's mind blast is glossed as a supernatural ability, and the rules are clear that these can't be interrupted.
That was my problem with this fight as a whole. A lot of the tactics many groups use are illegal by the rules, but if you stick to the rules it's just way too hard. Spell immunity via the mind blast is another good but illegal solution. So is counterspelling.
We had the same problem in SCAP, where group after group avoided a TPK by summoning "a monster that could overcome the villain's SR" but in v3.5 those monsters have the wrong attack type to do it. I knew that (I was the player in that one) so I didn't bother trying. While the fight was not a TPK it was game-destroyingly hard.
(I guess the valuable lesson I learned from that is that for some groups, a fight doesn't have to be TPK to be too hard. In SCAP the player's morale never recovered. In AoW the player decided on a long-term strategy that basically sucked the fun out of the game. Live and learn.)
Mary
*SPOILERS*
The AP as written is a meat grinder. I had cheat and mysteriously slow down the Ebon Aspect at the end of TFoE to give them time to rest, and it was still nearly a TPK. Ditto for the mind flayer and octopins--if we weren't using action points (basically giving everyone a +1d6 bonus to the mind blast saves) and Monte Cook's incredibly broken Brandish Magical Might (add ability mod to spell penetration AND get free counterspelling attempts), then Z and his pets would easily have killed them all no matter what they did. Ditto for the demon at the end of GoW. Basically, the BBEG at the end of each of those three adventures is so absurdly overpowered, and so ridiculously under-CR'ed, that you almost have to allow them to win by divine fiat. As written, they pretty much die automatically, if they're anything like the power level of my group (4 PCs: one prestige paladin, one air bloodline sorcerer, one unfettered, and one cleric).
The froghemoth at the end of Champion's Belt killed a few PCs, but they didn't mind somehow, because at least they could damage the thing, and knew they COULD kill it--and knew they died because they approached it too closely, too soon. It was their mistake that killed them. And in Spire of Long Shadows, they died in droves from appropriate-CR encounters, and no one griped. But the Ebon Aspect, Zyrzog, and oculus demon made them throw up their hands after a couple of rounds and say, "OK, so we all die with no chance to hit or anything... do we have to play the rest of it out and add insult to injury?"
But the Ebon Aspect, Zyrzog, and oculus demon made them throw up their hands after a couple of rounds and say, "OK, so we all die with no chance to hit or anything... do we have to play the rest of it out and add insult to injury?"
Yeah. This is incredibly bad when it happens--much worse than a TPK due to bad dice or bad planning.
In SCAP the player's morale basically broke, and never fully recovered, after the unbeatable BBG in #4. Oddly, the PCs actually *won* that fight, but the damage was still done.
In AoW, with a different player, the player reacted by optimizing the PCs to the point that nothing was ever an interesting challenge again. He says it was still somewhat fun; I know that for me as a GM it was not. I curse the day I ran HoHR as written.
It's easier if the GM and players are accepting of fudging, but nothing will make my player rebel faster than becoming aware that I'm playing the NPCs stupidly, or worse, breaking the rules. It's okay for me to change the scenario in advance, but once he knows that the foe is AC30/SR28 I do *not* get to let him hit, let his spells work, etc. just to save the situation. He will look in the book and tell me, "No, we can't do that, it says right here" even if it's the death of his PCs. I love him dearly as a player and wouldn't want him to change, but this means that too-hard fights are a big mistake for us.
Mary
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Readying actions to disrupt the mind blast is a really nice tactic, but the mind flayer's mind blast is glossed as a supernatural ability, and the rules are clear that these can't be interrupted.
That was my problem with this fight as a whole. A lot of the tactics many groups use are illegal by the rules, but if you stick to the rules it's just way too hard. Spell immunity via the mind blast is another good but illegal solution. So is counterspelling.
We had the same problem in SCAP, where group after group avoided a TPK by summoning "a monster that could overcome the villain's SR" but in v3.5 those monsters have the wrong attack type to do it. I knew that (I was the player in that one) so I didn't bother trying. While the fight was not a TPK it was game-destroyingly hard.
(I guess the valuable lesson I learned from that is that for some groups, a fight doesn't have to be TPK to be too hard. In SCAP the player's morale never recovered. In AoW the player decided on a long-term strategy that basically sucked the fun out of the game. Live and learn.)
Mary
I've yet to run this, and I need to familiarise myself with the psionic rules, but would this have played differently using the variant mind flayer from the Expanded Psionics Handbook?
The core MM illithid was always intended as a stop-gap, with all its abilities described as supernatural, but doesn't the revised version change these to psi-like abilities? And if so, do these incur AoO, and require Concentration checks for damage taken/defensive manifesting? (Like I say, I can't remember).
If so, it may be that the scenario writer assumed DMs would be using these rules, and that Z would have to carry out a very cautious fighting withdrawal, to avoid getting into melee. And that arcane or divine spell immunities or resistance bonuses would apply vs psionic attacks (which I believe is the default case). Using the 'Psionics are Different' approach drastically increases the lethality of psionic foes, and may have contributed to the frustration you felt.
Yeah. This is incredibly bad when it happens--much worse than a TPK due to bad dice or bad planning.
Absolutely agree 100%--unless of course you give them more than enough hints in advance to let them know they'll all die if they try it.
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I'm in the middle of prepping for the second half of HOHR after a 5-month break. This includes prepping the encounter with the BBEG, but I've substituted many of the baddies with yuan-ti to fit the theme of my campaign better.
The drow goons are now pureblood rangers, the cleric is now a halfblood bard, I subbed the M4 goons for a mob of Yuan-ti Wretchlings and an advanced ti-khana fleshraker, and Zyrxog is now an Abomination cleric of Mersshaulk (one of the movers and shakers behind the AoW in my campaign).
The cleric levels make Z a more able melee guy and he can now wear armour, so the encounter will probably have a different feel than the published one. It should be interesting to see how the battle plays out without the mind blast...
BTW has anyone else noticed the high number of full-caster BBEGs in this AP?
Well, I too find Zyrxog a quite powerful BBEG, but hey - the party knows they will face a mindflayer, and they know it is a powerful one (high mindblast DC). If they don't prepare, and don't agree on tactics before, they deserve dying. It will still be a very tough fight when prepared, but not a guaranteed TPK - at least IMO and IMC.
Keep in mind that the save DC for his mindblast is miscalculated. It should be at DC 20 (+6 CHA, 4th level effect). Also, Zyrxog's biggest weakness is that he has no means to dispel (I even consider giving him a scoll of dispel magic).
I think it is absolutely ok to give the players some hints or rolls on Spellcraft and Knowledge (Dungeoneering) at to what to stock before further venturing into his lair:
Defense:
- Scrolls of globe of invulnerability (prevents spells and spell-like abilities of levels 1-4 from working, and the mindblast is a spell-like ability that functions as a level 4 spell).
- scrolls or potions of owl's wisdom
- the best cloaks of resistance one can buy (IMO, the most essential magic item in the whole adventure path)
- Froms the splats: conviction, panacea
- scrolls of resist energy (they can guess he's a caster from his rod)
Offense:
- lots of scrolls or spells prepared that circumvent SR: Melf's acid arrow, Evard's black tentacles, glitterdust, grease (on his rod), silence, summoned monsters (preferable flying, celestial ones), web, heck even acid splash
- prepare dispel magic! A lot! (Note: No SR) Once displacement is down, he is much easier to hit.
- ranged weaponry: flame arrow, aberration bane arrows, javelins and tanglefoot bags all certainly help
- haste and fly as always, freedom of movement as well to counter the slow effect.
- from the splats: orb spells (and lesser ones), but there are many more. a scroll of reciprocal gyre is just mean.
With some of these (and above all, scrolls of globe of invulnerability, dispel magic and ranged weapons), he is still tough but certainly killable. It will be sweet victory indeed if they prepare wisely, and then come to understand that their preparation was key to success.
Don't forget terrain i.e. there are two ways into that room, the obvious one then there's the balcony. My PC's came in via the balcony above, which meant Z never got to mind-blast the whole party. They could also have come in via both entrances, or even got lucky on init and split up enough to not all be in the blast area. In other words, it's not a forgone conclusion that the mindflayer will mind-blast any more than about half the party, and at least one of those should make the save.
Once a fighter-type can get to him (via fly) and grapple, it's basically all over. This was how it happened for me, and I didn't fudge anything or break any rules as written (my players didn't even think to use spell immunity or suchlike).
So yes, the adventure series can be a meat-grinder, but in my game it was tough going but despite loads of potentially fatal fights my players always pulled off some amazing trick to win through, with only one PC death early on and a few animal companion deaths. And they were not min-maxed, in fact one PC (the Cleric/Rogue) was actually pretty lame in fights compared to the rest.
- Scrolls of globe of invulnerability (prevents spells and spell-like abilities of levels 1-4 from working, and the mindblast is a spell-like ability that functions as a level 4 spell).
If only this were true! But the MM is very clear that it's a supernatural ability. In retrospect I wish I'd ignored the rules here, except that the player was the one who pointed it out.
Mary
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I've yet to run this, and I need to familiarise myself with the psionic rules, but would this have played differently using the variant mind flayer from the Expanded Psionics Handbook?
My group is heading into HHR this week, so I'd be really curious to know the answer to this question. I don't have the XPH, but I could probably borrow a copy if switching over to the Psionics version of Z would make him more survivable.
Anyone know how it would play out differently?
If only this were true! But the MM is very clear that it's a supernatural ability. In retrospect I wish I'd ignored the rules here, except that the player was the one who pointed it out.
Mary
Hm, in the MM I am just now holding in my hands, it is true. It says: Mind Blast (Sp): blabla. maybe there was a revision or errata? My MM is 3.5 and has ISBN 9 780786 928934. In the wizards errata, there does not appear an entry. So it would be nice to know whether you or I have the "newer" respectively "correct" MM.
Hm. So in either case, I feel sorry for your case; because you suffered a loss of confidence in your campaign to either wacky wizards editing or superpower paizo madness; both of which isn't really your fault.
If only this were true! But the MM is very clear that it's a supernatural ability. In retrospect I wish I'd ignored the rules here, except that the player was the one who pointed it out.
Mary
Hm, in the MM I am just now holding in my hands, it is true. It says: Mind Blast (Sp): blabla. maybe there was a revision or errata?
No. I'm just wrong. I don't know where I got this. Sorry for the misinformation.
Mary
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No. I'm just wrong. I don't know where I got this. Sorry for the misinformation.
That's alright, we'll just deduct it from all the positive contributions you've made to the community. I'm pretty sure you're still a significant net positive.
I think Globe of Invulnerability is probably overkill here. Expecting 8th level characters to spend 1650g on a consumable seems pretty stupid, especially when a smart badguy would just bug out, let the duration run and then come back in for the kill.
Interrupts sounds pretty good, though. Have to see how it goes, when my only ranged-effective character has a terrible will save. She's starting to get really pissed off about fear effects.
Oh, now that I think about that, minor threadjack: when a character enters a fear aura and fails their will save, they run away for the full duration, not just until they're outside the aura effect, correct?
Were it not for the "fate point" system that I had set up for this campaign, this fight would have been over in the second round, when the mind flayer mind blasted the entire party and everyone failed their saves.
This campaign has some ridiculously tough fights in it. I honestly don't know how anyone gets through alive.
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Bumping this thread for more info; has anyone run this encounter using the Expanded Psionics Handbook rules, or supplemental rules in Complete Psionic?
I've yet to experience the 3.5 psionic rules, and haven't sat down to examine this chapter in detail. Do the writers use the newer rules, or assume the MM default stats?
Using ExPsHB, does it play harder or easier than the tales related so far?
Snorter, search the archives, there was definitely a fair bit of discussion about a Psionic Z a year or two ago. I beleive there's even a suggested set of stats somewhere.
I wasn't familiar with the psionics rules back then, but I do remember that adding Psion levels instead of Sorcerer levels 1:1 makes him insanely too powerful. Knowing the psionics rules now, I'd agree - a small number of Psion levels added on top of the usual psionic mindflayer is probably OK (and limit him to using only half his power points in any given encounter, as per the suggestion in the expanded psionics handbook). Of course, this is not a given, the PC's might get lucky and kill him quickly, but still, it's likely psionics gives him more even defenses to use (a number being swift / immediate type actions).
p.s. I recently ran an adventure with a psionic mindflayer in it - the party ninja just happened to scout his lair while ethereal, then materialise and stab him with drow poison - I rolled a very poor fort save, so it died before even getting to act. So you never really know for sure just how things will turn out...
This campaign has some ridiculously tough fights in it. I honestly don't know how anyone gets through alive.
It really depends on how smart and experienced your players are, and how luck tends to fall. I'm not a dumb or inexperienced DM, and roll everything in the open, but my players completed the whole campaign with only the death of one PC (around 4th level), a follower, an NPC, and a number of animal companions. While one player was a bit lazy, generally the players were good character builders, good at sizing up a situation, and well prepared as well as good at thinking on their feet. We also had some great role-play. And fate just tended to fall into the players hands from time to time - some lucky rolls at key moments turned the tide, e.g. choosing call lightning on the Frogemoth, rolling "attack caster" when confused and with a big longbow in the fighter's hand, etc etc. I also helped them with some useful options in building their characters as they went through mid and high levels, as without a strong character build it's even tougher. A couple of times where things went wrong, the PC's bailed and came back better prepared - the early PC death taught them not to fight on despite the odds, and other events through the course of the game reinforced that. My players learned a lot by the end of it, even the lazy guy was really much more onto it by the end, and we all had a lot of fun. It's possible I wasn't completely ruthless in my tactics a few times, but hey, I tended to make their opponent's tactics better than those published in the adventures, so I feel I challenged them without making it a complete meat-grinder (which no-one would have enjoyed, especially not me).
So anyway, I guess I'm saying YMMV - one person's ridiculously tough fight can be fairly easy to another, and exciting but do-able to another. Especially at mid levels and up, a lot depends on having well built PC's with a key strength in each, good party balance, and good choice of spells. PHB-only can be a bit restrictive, especially when they are up against large number of monsters that are tougher than typical MM ones (except the Titan - he's a menace).
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It's all a matter how many characters make up the party and how powerful they are. If you're running Age of Worms for 4 players, with standard ability scores (4d6 or 28 point buy), using only the core books, then expect an extremely difficult campaign with several potential TPK's. If however, you're like me and you're running a game for 6 players (and 1 cohort), with 5d6 ability scores, with access to every D&D book out there, then expect to make encounters more difficult to actually provide a decent challenge for your players. In my case, I finally drew a line and allowed my players to use only the Core books, the Complete series, the Race series, the PH2, and the Spell Compendium. While unbalanced books such as the Book of 9 Swords weren't going to make things too easy, other books such as the Spell Compendium, which has spells such as delay death and mass conviction, have saved several characters' lives. While the fight against Zyrzog was memorable and lasted several rounds, I was unable to kill any of my players (and I really tried).
Yeah... They didn't have those books. 5D6 ability scores? By Pelor, my players would kill for ability scores like that.
We're still on the cusp of Wormcrawl Fissure, my regular game having been delayed since the end of last summer, but I still remember fights that easily wiped the floor with my players:
The Mother Worm, The Titan, Swords of Kyuss (pretty much any encounter with them), All of Spire of Long Shadows, The Apostle of Kyuss at the end of Champion's Games, Froghemoth, Zyxog, Telakin, Hextor and Vecnan Temples of Three Faces of Evil, and the scarab beetle swarms in Whispering Cairn. Its been TPK's since day one.
How to defeat Zyrxog, Plan the First:
Orb of Force. Job done.
How to defeat Zyrxog, Plan the Second:
Summoned air elemental to grapple him down to floor level, where more summons (dire apes, giant crocodiles and so on) can grapple/rend/poison etc to their furry little heart's content while the party deals with the mind blast and octopins.
My party used the second option. Or at least, most of them sprawled on the floor with mind blast, the druid hung back and got the job done. I killed him in the end though, as both the player and I agreed that the tactic of summoning something with a massive grapple check to tie up the spellcasters was quickly becoming tedious.
Punchline: the druid was replaced by a radiant servant of pelor right before the champion's games. I'm just starting to get kills again and we're most of the way through Spire!
How to defeat Zyrxog, Plan the First:
Orb of Force. Job done.
How to defeat Zyrxog, Plan the Second:
Summoned air elemental to grapple him down to floor level, where more summons (dire apes, giant crocodiles and so on) can grapple/rend/poison etc to their furry little heart's content while the party deals with the mind blast and octopins.
My party used the second option. Or at least, most of them sprawled on the floor with mind blast, the druid hung back and got the job done. I killed him in the end though, as both the player and I agreed that the tactic of summoning something with a massive grapple check to tie up the spellcasters was quickly becoming tedious.
Punchline: the druid was replaced by a radiant servant of pelor right before the champion's games. I'm just starting to get kills again and we're most of the way through Spire!
I don't want to critizise you, honestly. But as I am a DM preparing for this very encounter for the next session, I'd like to point out some things to fellow DMs.
a) The orb spells are good - since touch AC is low and SR is a nonconcern. But displacement makes it a 50/50 deal (which is ok for sorcs, not so ok for wizards).b) Summoning non-evil creatures does not work for the hallow effect.
I think that the best tactics on behalf of the PCs is,
a) prepare solid defense (see my other posts here), and
b) wear down Zyrxogs defense first (dispel magic for levitate, displacement, shield and energy resistance)
That certainly is a change in pace to most other encounters. So, meta-meta-gamingly spoken: I think that this encounter isn't that deadly for Zyrxogs abilities, but because it requires the players to have a plan which must not be the normal kill-it-before-it-kills-us.
I'm aching to run this encounter, I can tell you, and certainly will run it down for your reading pleasure. As the party consists of 5 adequatly optimized and well rounded PCs of 8th level with 32-point-buy, I have not changed much (except for adding a cloak of charisma+2, changing cloak of resistance+2 to vest, and removing necklace of fireballs).
Oh, I'd like to share another idea that my wizard employed when back in the times I was a player in the AoW: Grease on the rod > lost reflex save > down into the pool it went :)
That certainly is a change in pace to most other encounters. So, meta-meta-gamingly spoken: I think that this encounter isn't that deadly for Zyrxogs abilities, but because it requires the players to have a plan which must not be the normal kill-it-before-it-kills-us.
That's the difficult part about creating encounters in general: a difficult fight can be made much easier with clever PC tactics, and an easy fight can be made much more difficult with clever NPC tactics.
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Yeah... They didn't have those books. 5D6 ability scores? By Pelor, my players would kill for ability scores like that.
Before the campaign began, I asked myself, "If my players are going to save the world, shouldn't their ability scores be somewhat better than the average NPC which has the elite ability array (15,14,13,12,10,8)?" Using method 8 in the DMG (high-powered characters), I ended up with characters with ability modifiers that added up from +10 to +14. On top of that I allowed every character to choose a background trait, gave them all an extra skill point every level, and I've been using fate points since the beginning, awarding them for important accomplishments such as defeating Ilthane or burying the Land skeletons. Lots of bonuses, but when the fights start, I take my gloves off and try my hardest to kill them. They're about to enter the Spire of Long Shadows and so far I've had 7 character deaths and 1 near-TPK (Battletemple of Hextor with 3 deaths). Other PC killers were Grallak Kur the grimlock, the advanced Octopin in Zyrxog's lab, and the advanced wind warriors in Icosiol's Tomb. Against Zyrxog, they spread out so he could never mind blast more than 2 characters and overwhelmed him with range attacks. I was unlucky with my displacement rolls and he eventually went down after wasting a suggestion on the elven ranger/scout to drop his bow, not realising that the elf happened to have an extra magic bow. Oops!
Finally! Yesterday my group went into Zyrxog's lair. One death, several near-so, but overall, they prevailed well. Good times!
Party composition: Paladin, Ranger (archery), Favored Soul of Kord, Sorcerer, Bard6/Rogue2. (32 point buy, normal treasure, all level 8)
Preparations: Due to good Knowledge (Dungeoneering) and Spellcraft rolls, as well as experiencing Zyrxog's mindblast in the doppelgangner's den, they stocked up on scrolls and potions of owl's wisdom, three scrolls of panacea, and one scroll of globe of invulnerability. The favored soul had chosen mass conviction as spell known.
Getting to Zyrxog: I couldn't believe it! Was it fear, or unbelievable luck - I don't know, but they beat the drow without breaking into sweat! Very good ideas here, of the sort I like to see it in action: Silence and antitoxins to surpass the fungi, drow ambush went down very fast due to freedom of movement and crits, bard first saved against suggestion and then rolled well on diplomacy vs. the spirit naga, and then they buffed in the dark behind silence vs the drow (detect evil works wonder...). I changed one of the drow for a large monstrous spider, but to no effect. The priestess was humiliated with glitterdust (no SR, failed save - winner). Then the bard/rogue evaded the glyph, and due to freedom of movement on the frontliners, the first octopins went down pretty fast. My expectancies were high, but the stone brain survived only one round - two-handed hasted full power attack on behalf of the favored soul was more than enough. Hasted and such, they proceeded fast, left the advanced octopin's tank undisturbed, and - here it comes - choose all to go through the stone door to the right. They appeared on the balcony, and were greeted warmly...
Zyrxog: Since he knew they were coming, he had readied a mind blast, stunning ranger and sorcerer. Then beating all of them on initiative, he opened strong with an empowered lightning bolt for 48 points of damage... sorcerer dead (So much for the plan of casting globe of invulnerability), ranger in the negatives, all others wounded; except the bard/rogue, who evaded. They were shocked; such firepower they had not witnessed before.
Favored soul cast panacea on the ranger, then took time to heal and cast resist energy (electricity). Meanwhile, Zyrxog had fun with readied lightning bolts against anyone who left cover... The bard/rogue saved again with evasion! Surely, this was his lucky day. They cleverly used cover in the scrying room, but for many rounds were unable to do considerable damage: Displacement drove the ranger mad, and it took them a while to figure out they had one potion of fly. After what seemed like ages, the paladin was finally able to drink it and fly out to Zyrxog, who by then had only lost 25 points of damage or so. Cursed Paladin's saves! Neither Mind blast nor suggestion worked on him, so scorching ray warmed him up a bit. Meanwhile, the favored soul had been stunned, unable to release a dispel magic... The paladin's smites were wasted due to displacement, and just when another scorching ray reduced him to 0 (sic!) hit points, the bard's chant of fortitude gave him the opportunity to lay on hands... And then, what never should have been happend did happen: Zyrxog rolled a natural 1 on his save vs. fascinate! No! 6 rounds later, they were well restored, even the favored souls stun was over by then - and another mighty dispel later (displacement gone), a critical hit by the paladin finished the evildoer off. [Forgot about the ring of counterspell - hear me fello DMs, write it in dark bold letters on your notes! - anyway, Zyrxog had 2 HP left and was just about to die, so no harm done here]
In retrospect, the balcony is a great way to attack Zyrxog: You don't pass by the museum and its dangers, and you don't have to deal with the two octopins at the other entrance.
What I learned from this encounter in retrospect:
- Had Zyrxog the ability to dispel magic, this encounter would have resulted in one or two more deaths
- Fascinate doesn't work this way! No time-saver next time...
- Paladins are, despite their inferior damage output, a force to be reckoned with - I don't remember the paladin to ever fail a save...
- Displacement rocks!