I'm a player in a CoT campaign and my group just killed the Outcast King. The GM is doing his first campaign but we all have a good grasp of the rules.
Due to some special circumstances, we ended up with 6 players last night and even then the Outcast King was ridiculous if it wasn't for the paladin on board. The encounter wasn't modified beside an additionnal lemure from what I understood.
One of the PCs was destroyed in a single round from full hp to -12( A rogue/inquisitor with 33 hps)
-Tentacle attack + grab = Tentacle damage +Constrict damage
-Drop as a free action, the grappled is now adjacent to the King.
-Tentacle attack + grab = Tentacle damage +Constrict damage
-Drop grapple as a free action
-Two swords, one bite and one beard later..
We really didn't get what happened with the desig of this monster.
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I think I put this in the thread for PC deaths.
They walloped the Outkast King.
The monk did the most damage. I think the paladin was out of smites, though I may be wrong.
The worst that happened was the disease from wading through the nastiness. Only the bard and npc got hurt. The monk and paladin were immune.
First of all, I think that for a monster to grab then drop, then grab again that monster needs to be rather "tactically minded" (I would say "being played cheesily" TBH), and Mr. Outcast has int 5 and is insane. Also, as far as I can see the King hasn't got Improved Grapple or grab, so his tentacles should provoke attacks of opportunity, something which will easily kill him if he has 2-3 PCs adjacent.
Also, I would rule that to use the beard attack, he needs to be holding onto the target (ie, end his turn with the target grappled, thus giving Mr King the grappled condition), but that's just me.
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Ditto on the grab drop tactic I was surprised to hear that. I've never seen any GM or player drop something after it grabs.
Certainly not regrab the target in the same round.
Also, unless he's like a behir and has auto-constrict *which he doesn't*, he has to maintain the grapple and can only constrict the PC on the next round.
I suggest taking another look at the grab and constrict rules.
Actually, I can see how one could interpret the constrict-rules as working immediately, as the PRD only states "when it makes a successful grapple check" and you could call the CM-roll to establish a grapple as a "grapple check". But the Behir clears this up.
And I have no problem with a monster cheesing with combat maneuvers as long as that fits the party's style of play (the fighter in my group is a reach-tripper, so we think it's ok for the monsters to be cheesy once in a while too), but it should fit the monster and the King is no tactical genius.
Also, as far as I can see the King hasn't got Improved Grapple or grab, so his tentacles should provoke attacks of opportunity, something which will easily kill him if he has 2-3 PCs adjacent.
I don't have the module, but I very much doubt that a creature would have Constrict but not Grab.
It seems perfectly reasonable that he should have grab, as the Otyugh he's based on has it, but in his stat block there is no grab in the tentacle attack. I think this is an error, and will probably play with him as if he had grab, since this allows him to hold enemies in his tentacles while hitting with the swords (with a modified CMB of -4 he still has a good chance of grappling one of my casters).
I don't think the King would generate AoO since he's got a 15ft reach with the tentacles. I do agree that abusing the grapple and drop as a free action is a bit much for an insane 5 int monster.
The beard affects the target if both tentacles hit but I don't how the beard has a 15ft reach.. makes sense for a bearded devil when it hits with claws but otherwise it's just silly.
The grapple and drop in this case permitted the King to drag a PC within his reach for other attacks(15ft vs 10ft) as a free action which kind of makes sense in a way. Doing it with both tentacles is pushing it tho..
The Outcast King doesn't have grab in the stats found on d20pfsrd but then he's listed as having a +4 bonus on grapple in the book from what the GM told me. He's apparently also listed as having Two-weapon fighting but with an 'unusable' added to it.. yet retains the bonuses from the feat.
This type of monster with typos are found a bit too often in some of the APs and there really is no excuse to make mistakes on such low CR mobs.. not that many numbers to juggle and it's the damn final boss! There are two such cases in the Kingmaker second book that need to be rebuilt from scratch or they don't make any sense whatsoever.
Not sure how fair it is to say that one of the base creatures has a certain ability so the King should have it to. ( He doesn't have the diseased bite of an Otyugh and doesn't have the teleport ability of a Barbazu - 5 int vs 6 int).. I guess having constrict is a clue.
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The behir is indeed a good clue on how constrict works. It seems to happen quite a bit that reading certain special abilities from monsters clear up the rules on certain things.. shouldn't happen so often imo.
Thanks!
Actually,..
Constriction damage does indeed kick in as soon as the CMB check to grab the target is successful.
http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/paizoPublishing/pathfinder/ pathfinderRPG/rules/archives/grabAndConstrict&page=1&source=search# 0
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He wouldn't provoke.
"If a creature with this special attack hits with the indicated attack, it deals normal damage and attempts to start a grapple as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity." 301 Bestiary
He gets a +4 from having the grab ability.
"Creatures with the grab special attack receive a +4 bonus on combat manuever checks made to start and maintain a grapple." pg 301 Bestiary
If the Outcast King has Grab (which I guess he's supposed to have as the +4 is included in the book) then what I mentioned in my first post is completely legitimate and the design is as ridiculous as I thought.
Compared to other CR 6 creatures this thing is a beast just waiting to one-shot PCs especially considering the infernal wound ability..
well, all I can say is that in the case of my party, they came in, stayed on the platform, and fired off a few shots at him, forcing him to approach the stairs. The fighter then went down to the bottom of the stairs, making himself the only legitimate target. The Outcast king makes his 4 attacks against the fighter - all 4 miss. The party proceeds to unleash holy hell on him, destroying him in the same round.
perhaps I'm just bad at running the monsters, or the PCs are good at tactics, but my experience was the opposite. i felt he didn't even pose a remotely legitimate threat to them, and i blame it mostly on the platform, which gives the PCs a HUGE advantage in the encounter if properly utilized.
The DM printed out the map but the most forward part was considered on the same level as the water I guess. The character was grabbed just after the first flight of stairs.
The King died pretty fast with a paladin in melee.. but the way it was handled in the game I'm in he could grab pretty much anyone who went past the first 2 squares in the room and if it ends up not being the fighter it's pretty much over(if one of the tentacles hits anyway)
perhaps I'm just bad at running the monsters, or the PCs are good at tactics, but my experience was the opposite. i felt he didn't even pose a remotely legitimate threat to them, and i blame it mostly on the platform, which gives the PCs a HUGE advantage in the encounter if properly utilized.
I think it's pretty common for a single monster with many attacks to be an all-or-nothing kind of threat, i.e. if it hits with all its attacks, you're dead and if it misses, it's dead.
I removed a post that used unacceptable language.
Just to add some flavor, I'll explain how our group's fight with the King yesterday went:
Round 1: Cleric, Rogue and Bard/Fighter bust in, doing some damage to the lemures. Sorcerer blasts OK with Ray of Exhaustion, but he is only fatigued.
Round 2: OK grapples bard with tentacles (both cleric and bard has reach and stood on the landing, I though he would rather safe it from 15ft away to avoid attacks). Cleric and rogue finish off lemures. Sorcerer blasts OK with Ray of Enfeeblement for... 8(!!!) str damage. (for those counting, OK now has -5 to all attack and damage rolls)
Round 3: Cleric and rogue do nothing, bard escapes grapple, OK hits with nothing on his full attack against the bard except a grab. Sorcerer does 23 damage with a (electric) scorching ray.
Round 4: OK downed by elemental ray from the sorcerer and a lucky blow from the cleric.
In short: If OK is debuffed in any significant way, he is useless, since his best attack is +8 and in addition, as long as the front line dudes kan keep him occupied, a ranged assault will crush him (I have no ranger, but I imagine an evil outsider-hating ranged ranger would DESTROY him).
Our outcast king expereince was a trouncing.
We had a barbarian/sorceress (who became a dragon disciple later on in the campaign)
an evil outsider hunting elven ranger.
a druid
and a paladin.
from the get go this was an outcast king killing party.
first round OK got hit with a ray of enfeeblement and an entangle spell.
after that it was pie really for the pally and the evil outsider ranger to take him down.
it was one of those 'holy cow' that worked so amazingly well, moments.