Sometimes you need to make a tactical retreat. If the GM starts realizing that every time he gives you a boss, you have to run away to prepare, maybe he'll realize he's throwing you too much of a challenge.
There shouldn't be an expectation that you can always beat whatever encounter you find, though. Learning when to run away is as much a part of the game as stomping monsters is.
How many people are in your party?
What classes do they play?
What class do you play?
Is everyone having a hard time?
Is everyone unhappy with with these encounters.
Help me to help you.
Tactics. If you can't go through the wall, go over, around or under the wall. Pounding your fist into the wall isn't going to get the job done.
Sorry, based on the info you have given us, I have to quote Ghostbusters: "That was your whole plan,"Get her!"???"
At low levels, you NEED to be prepared to retreat and regroup (heck, even at high levels, but lots of characters get cocky).
Why is it that so many groups of adventurers feel they are entitled to win by force of arms alone-or that they are entitled to win, just because they are the players?
I don't kill characters, stupid actions by players kill characters. If you rush in where angel's fear to tread, without thinking, without an escape plan, without the right spells prepared, you are going to be lucky if you survive.
This, with emphasis mine. I could not possibly agree any more. Why, oh why, oh why is it that players are unable to fathom a situation in which the best possible answer might be run away, or climb up a tree (in the case of wolves), etc. ad nauseum. Some of the best military units in history used tactical retreats to stay alive and fight another day, sometimes on a battle ground of their choosing. Unless you're locked in the room with said boss, retreat to a different area and get yourselves set up to deal with what the guy is throwing at you. Or just retreat and set up the battle ground so it's more favorable to you. Just because the battle started on that section of the grid-map doesn't mean that's where it has to end, kill or be killed. Sometimes you need to just Run Away!
I don't know what you mean by "large weapon". Do you mean a weapon sized for a Large character? In which case said boss was illegal; half-dragons aren't larger than their base.
Also, you can't wield a two-handed...
Most of the time correct. Do you remember the arguments involving Vestigal Arms and Synthesist Summoner Extra Arm player-monsters? If you have three hands, you can wield a tower shield and a two handed sword at the same time.
The most arms a Synthesist Summoner Extra Arm player-monster should have is 6. Duel wield two handers/bows (4 arms - the only realistic way to hold two bows with 4 hands is holding them sideways - one up near the chest, the other down near the belly), a shield (arm number 5), and a hand for potions/wands (arm number 6). Add on levels of Vivisectionist and wheeee.
**Edit** wielding an oversized weapon gives you a -4 to hit, so the paladins strength had to be a 38 for a +14.
How long has the GM been GMing?
The problem I'm having is that the dungeon goes well, until the boss. He has a perchance for these ridiculous bosses that we can't hope to beat. We had to fight a level 5 paladin, who was half dragon, using full plate and a tower shield, and had a large weapon. we are level 3. We had to roll a perfect 20 just to hit him, meanwhile he has +17 to hit and can nail us on a 6 or more for nearly 20-25 damage a pop. We should have died but he redid the boss mid battle. He is telling me that it was an epic fight and we should have been able to win because he was party level +4 and that is what the book said to use but I have no idea where he is getting those numbers. Is he right? If the number is EPL +4 then yes I suppose he would be but I don't think templates work that directly with class levels.
What do you want to get out of bringing this issue to the forum?
Talk to the GM.
It could be that he wants you to run away. Or maybe he's planning a (somewhat contrived) scenario where you lose to this guy and then something else happens. Or maybe he's miscalculating.
We can only agree or disagree with the situation as you've presented it, but the only way you're going to recover the fun in this game is by communicating with him, not us.
--
That said, EPL +4 is fine, just like EPL +10 is fine, if the players are smart enough to run away when it is called for. It also helps if the GM pays more attention to what's fun than to CR... CR is just a yardstick, but it is a poor replacement for a responsive, fun GM.
My players know that if they see a great wyrm dragon at 3rd level, it's their responsibility not to engage it like a gaggle of idiots. And they like playing in a world where not every challenge is set up for them specifically to tackle. Maybe this GM is trying to teach that kind of lesson, and simply failing? GMs are human too.
Anyway, think about what you want out of this, then talk to the guy in a constructive way.
Instead of asking us for help, I'd direct your GM to this thread, to have HIM ask us for help. We can be of more help to him with encounter design advice and vetting his stuff than anything else.
Everyone forgets the most powerful tactic in the game: aid another.
If I can't hit him or I can't get through his DR, I aid the guy who has the best chance of doing damage. If that's the wizard, I aid his AC so he doesn't get dropped as easily.
If you get into flanking position and aid your partner, that's +4 to hit. Each character can aid the same guy for another +2. With 9 possible squares to aid from, you could have your entire party aiding your best hitter. You could switch off who gets to be the hitter each round to keep the boss from focusing on a single character.
The problem I'm having is that the dungeon goes well, until the boss. He has a perchance for these ridiculous bosses that we can't hope to beat. We had to fight a level 5 paladin, who was half dragon, using full plate and a tower shield, and had a large weapon. we are level 3. We had to roll a perfect 20 just to hit him, meanwhile he has +17 to hit and can nail us on a 6 or more for nearly 20-25 damage a pop. We should have died but he redid the boss mid battle. He is telling me that it was an epic fight and we should have been able to win because he was party level +4 and that is what the book said to use but I have no idea where he is getting those numbers. Is he right? If the number is EPL +4 then yes I suppose he would be but I don't think templates work that directly with class levels.
1. Like previous posters stated, maybe there was something that your party missed that would give you people an equal footing vs this boss.
2. Most armor does not protect vs magical attacks or splash weapons.
Use spells to damage him, buff party members, heal wounded, etc.
Oil and fire works.
Acid as well.
Thunderstones and tangle bags exceptional.
3. A hand to hand combatant is good as far as his weapon and his reach.
Ranged attacks works well.
Rogues climb walls, perch on a ledge or something high, and fire arrows.
Mage and cleric case spells offensively once defensive ones are cast.
4. The most powerful characters are not melee, they are the magic-using classes...make sure the casters know they can do the most against a melee boss.
First lets discuss what is wrong RAW wise.
The DM should not have made it large. This would reduce the reach and weapon damage. The stat buy on that thing is over 40. That is quite a bit more treasure for a level 5 more than average. The damage of the hammer is that of a two handed weapon. He did not apply the penalty for using a tower shield. I do not see anything about free action healing.
My opinion is the DM fudged the rules almost at every turn to make the creature more powerfull. He is the DM it is his right. Since he fudged the rules using EPL is not an acurate way to calculate the encounter.
If he dropped you in a 30 foot room to fight this thing then he is a poor dm.
The fact that you beat it means he cheated so you could win.
pesonally this is closer to cr 7 or 8. the fact that the boss is large sized, its stats are extreme and it has a lot of magical gear. definately to tough for apl 3.
why are you fighting a paladin, he's lawful good, why does he want to kill you?
why is he a LG half BLUE dragon paladin, this seems weird.
you couldnt have talked your way through this? he's a paladin....
IF I HAD to defeat him...
4 people bum rush and grapple him. 4 on one, aid another grapple him, get him demobilized and coup de gras or SA him to heck n gone.
The problem is his stats are so far out there, disarming, tripping and grappling likely wont work.
looking at this write up I do not agree he's CR 6. For one he's given MAX HP (not average for his level/HD)
A magus with SOME spells might have been able to do some damage with touch spells as his touch ac is only 11....but as a half blue dragon your shocking grasp is confetti.
What o level spells did you have?
I dont see the fact that he's large calculated into his AC or the fact that his dex would be lower as well. That would bring his ac down to 27, but still wont help at level 4 and Tower shield gives you a -2 to hit when wielding it, so only +14 to hit. Not like that helps much at level 3 either.
I dont know your fighter but at level 3 with an 18 str and flanking he would be +9 to hit, assume he had weapon focus and a +1 weapon that's actually +11, the creatures AC should be 27 (barring any other mistakes the DM made) 27-11 is 16, fighter should be able to hit 16-20.
Level 3 rogue, flanking +1 weapon, +4 to hit. needs a 20, same with the magus.
Aid another on the fighter coming from the magus let's him hit 14-20.
sigh.
Nope, cant win this.
I can guarantee there are other problems with this boss build, I just cant see the paperwork, nor am I an expert.
It's certainly not beatable for a level 3 party. well at least not YOUR party.
that's the problem with the CR system...the book says you should be able to beat it!
yea the uber elite stat array would add a CR or two in and of it's self. this is looking like CR 9B.
B for broken.
It would be a swift action to lay on hands. The difference being how many turns a round he can do it. Plus he would needs a free hand so he would need to sheath his weapon(a move action that provokes) or drop his weapon that has issues to use it.
with his AC does it matter if he provokes? lol.
Ok, so maybe I need to spell it out sense it seems most of you are not getting the fact that we are level 3 and it was a half dragon.
Stats: str 26, dex 12, con 22, int 8, wis 14, cha 20
Starting number: 10
Natural armor (Half dragon) 4
Tower shield +1: 5
Full Plate +1: 10
Dex: 110+4+5+10+1= 30
HP: 10 base + 6 con + 1 fav class. + 1 toughness = 18 per level, level 5
he had: 90 hp (quoting the DM here, that is not an estimate)
Paladin level 5: BAB 5, Str: Natural 18 + 8 (Half dragon)= 26 (+8)
Weapon Focus: 1, +1 weapon, +1 divine favour (he cast it before we walked in, nothing we could have done already asked about stopping it and we can't dispel we don't even have level 2 magic at this point)5+8+1+1= +16 to hit (that I was off on that by one) for 3d6+10
Saves:
fort: 4+6+5= 15
refl: 1+1+5= 7
Will: 4+2+5= 11He made him a large character with a large sized hammer that delt out 3d6 damage with a 10ft reach. There was no monkey grip as he was large sized. Yes we were suppose to fight and kill it. No there was no other way out of it. Yes we are level 3, there are 2 rogues, 1 fighter, and a magus, and the magus had no spells left going into the fight save one shocking grasp and the half dragon was half blue dragon... He could also heal himself for 2d6 per round as a free action up to 7 times.
According to the rules 4 level 3 guys should be able to take that? I'm asking because he claims that is an encounter we should have been able to handle and I don't see how level 3 characters could deal with that. We were not suppose to run, we were not fighting somewhere we could get out of range, we were suppose to run in and kill him in melee. There was nowhere to go. It was a closed room that was 30x30 and he was 10x10. No where to climb nowhere to hide. At level 3 with 20 dex and a +1 scimitar I have 2+5+1= +8 to hit. Yes I had to roll a 20 when the boss has an AC of 30.
My issue is simple: is he right about the CR of this boss? Should 4 level 3 characters be able to kill that thing? I don't know how they calculate EPL with regards to character classes and templates like half dragon so I'm asking.
(We were told that we should be able to handle it. We were not suppose to run, nor were we suppose to lose, he claimed we all just didn't know how to play because it was a fight we should have won and I'm trying to figure out what kind of logic he used to make that call. Those are his stats from his sheet. The storyline was simple: he was a boss, we kill him. Not much to tell.)
Going to pick this apart and analyze this.
His basic stats so far, minus the half dragon template, are
STR 18
DEX 12
CON 16
INT 6
WIS 14
CHA 18
I don't know the race, so it is difficult to know the point buy, but I'm looking at a 51 point buy, not including the fact that you can't actually buy a stat as lower than 7. The only thing I could think of honestly was that he also added the Giant Template, which means his stats are actually more like this:
STR 14
DEX 14
CON 12
INT 6
WIS 14
CHA 18
Which, again not including that 6 Int, 34 point buy. With the Half Dragon + Giant Template, that would put his Level 5 (read, 5 Hit Dice) paladin at CR 7 IF he was using the elite array. Now, with a 6 in Int, he had to have used a race with a -2 to Int. The only races with a minus to Intelligence are:
the Nagaji (+2 Strength, +2 Charisma, and –2 Intelligence.)
the Suli (+2 Strength, +2 Charisma, and –2 Intelligence)
Vetala-Born Dhampir (+2 Dex, +2 Wis, -2 Int)
Orcs (+4 Strength, –2 Intelligence, –2 Wisdom, and –2 Charisma.)
Asura-Spawn Tieflings (+2 Dex, +2 Wis, –2 Int)
Demodand-Spawn Tieflings (+2 Con, +2 Wis, –2 Int)
Demon-Spawn Tieflings (+2 Str, +2 Cha, –2 Int)
Div-Spawn Tieflings (+2 Dex, +2 Cha,–2 Int)
Qlippoth-Spawn Tieflings (+2 Str, +2 Wis, –2 Int)
For ease's sake, I'm going to assume Nagaji since they have the stats a Paladin would like (Str and Cha) and it kinda fits with the dragon theme. So with that, the stats become:
STR 12
DEX 14
CON 12
INT 8
WIS 14
CHA 16
Or 22 Point Buy. Much more manageable but, as I've seen in adventure paths, enough to warrant an extra CR. I'm sure the other permutations above will get him around 20 Point Buy, but that is still enough to warrant a CR increase. So currently, you are dealing with a CR 8 creature ASSUMING Giant Template, Half Dragon Template, 22 point buy array, and the above list of races.
Now, for equipment. According to your post, he had a +1 full plate and a +1 tower shield as well as a +1 hammer. All of this combined, assuming double price for Masterwork but not double price for the magical enchantment, should run about:
4300 gold for the full plate
2780 gold Earth Breaker (This is one of the only two hammers that do the 2d6 needed for it to become 3d6 for being large, the other being the Dwarven Longhammer)
1360 gold tower shield
Total of 8440 Gold. According to page 454 on WPL for NPCs, at his CR (8 currently), he should only have 7,800 gold to work with. Now, it's not enough to bump him up a CR, but it is enough to obviously cause issues. Especially since he over spent on defense by a lot. In adventure paths, the 20 point array and increased equipment is enough to bump someone up 1 CR. As it stands, this paladin remains at CR 8.
Finally, though, you need to compare the above values to the values on the Bestiary chart on page 291 of the Bestiary 1 and see which CRs they fit. From a quick glance, he has the HP just above what you'd expect from a CR 7, the AC of a CR 15 (which is the big deal honestly), a +12 to hit (as someone pointed out) putting him at CR 6, and an average of 20 damage per round like a CR 5 (Assuming Power Attack). Of all the things listed, it's the AC that is the huge deal here. Adding the fact that he has great saves and can heal himself, I would peg this as a CR 8-9 and would not have thrown this at your party to fight.
That said, I also echo concerns as to why you are fighting a paladin? Can you give us detail on what caused this fight? Was it just the DM's whims, you're playing an evil campaign, or something completely different?
Urm ... have to echo the above sentiments - why were you FIGHTING a Paladin in the first place?
We were told that we should be able to handle it. We were not suppose to run, nor were we suppose to lose, he claimed we all just didn't know how to play because it was a fight we should have won and I'm trying to figure out what kind of logic he used to make that call. Those are his stats from his sheet. The storyline was simple: he was a boss, we kill him. Not much to tell.
Your GM is full of BS and does not know what he is doing if he claims you should have been able to handle it. Given the stats you quoted, it was an incredibly unfair fight.
As others have said, I'm curious as to why you were fighting a Paladin but I am far more curious to find out how he thought you could take on that monstosity (in every sense of the word) and win.
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As an aside, about people pointing out the "point buy". Its a monster, an enemy, perhaps a BBEG. If teh Gm handwaves it that he has an abnormally high str, then it has an abnormally high str strat. It's silly to suggest that a GM should be bound by point buy when stating out a monster.
Sure, you can call that silly.
But I say it's sillier that the GM throw away all the CR guidelines, and then justify throwing the Big Bad at them with arguments relating to CR.
If you want to ignore CR guidelines when creating your NPCs/monsters, don't think, or speak, or argue, or justify, in terms of CR.
A tanglefoot bag is a small sack filled with tar, resin, and other sticky substances. When you throw a tanglefoot bag at a creature (as a ranged touch attack with a range increment of 10 feet), the bag comes apart and goo bursts out, entangling the target and then becoming tough and resilient upon exposure to air. An entangled creature takes a –2 penalty on attack rolls and a –4 penalty to Dexterity and must make a DC 15 Reflex save or be glued to the floor, unable to move. Even on a successful save, it can move only at half speed. Huge or larger creatures are unaffected by a tanglefoot bag. A flying creature is not stuck to the floor, but it must make a DC 15 Reflex save or be unable to fly (assuming it uses its wings to fly) and fall to the ground. A tanglefoot bag does not function underwater.
So a touch attack - his touch AC should be 11 (+1 dex) so easy to hit - that gives him a -2 to hit and -4 to dex
So now he's +14 to hit and AC 28 (-4 dex = -2 AC) and there is no save against that - he can save to avoid getting stuck (which he will unless he rolls a 1) but he's now got some suck.
Then:
Acid
Source Core Rulebook
You can throw a flask of acid as a splash weapon with a range increment of 10 feet.
A direct hit deals 1d6 points of acid damage. Every creature within 5 feet of the point where the acid hits takes 1 point of acid damage from the splash.
So another touch attack - his touch ac should now be 9 (dex penalty) and that's 1d6 damage if you hit - no save - no DR (unless he has acid resistance).
Flasks of acid are 10g each - honestly those or alchemical fire are really handy for *everyone* to have a couple (or more) as they stop swarms and are great against 'uber armor'
Smokestick
Price 20 gp; Weight 1/2 lb.
This alchemically treated wooden stick instantly creates thick, opaque smoke when burned. The smoke fills a 10-foot cube (treat the effect as a fog cloud spell, except that a moderate or stronger wind dissipates the smoke in 1 round). The stick is consumed after 1 round, and the smoke dissipates naturally after 1 minute.
These fill a 10 foot square - and you can put them behind you so the smoke is in *your* square but not his - that gives you concealment and thus a miss chance for him - but he's not in the smoke so you can still hit him. A rogues best friend as when they have concealment they can sneak attack. The smoke lasts for 1 minute (10 rounds) so unless there is a wind you have some time.
Now:
Caltrops
Source Core Rulebook
Source WikipediaA caltrop is a four-pronged metal spike crafted so that one prong faces up no matter how the caltrop comes to rest. You scatter caltrops on the ground in the hope that your enemies step on them or are at least forced to slow down to avoid them. One 2-pound bag of caltrops covers an area 5 feet square.
Each time a creature moves into an area covered by caltrops (or spends a round fighting while standing in such an area), it runs the risk of stepping on one. Make an attack roll for the caltrops (base attack bonus +0) against the creature. For this attack, the creature's shield, armor, and deflection bonuses do not count. If the creature is wearing shoes or other footwear, it gets a +2 armor bonus to AC. If the attack succeeds, the creature has stepped on a caltrop. The caltrop deals 1 point of damage, and the creature's speed is reduced by half because its foot is wounded. This movement penalty lasts for 24 hours, until the creature is successfully treated with a DC 15 Heal check, or until it receives at least 1 point of magical healing. A charging or running creature must immediately stop if it steps on a caltrop. Any creature moving at half speed or slower can pick its way through a bed of caltrops with no trouble.
Caltrops may not work against unusual opponents.
Toss these on his square - now because of the tanglefoot you need to make an attack roll for AC 11 (10, -1 dex, +2 armor) and if they hit he's at half speed.
These are 1g per use.
Now flank him - and he's at AC 26.
His CMD is 10 +5 (bab) +8 (str) -1 (dex) so 22 - you are going to have a hard time with any combat maneuvers - however if you aid each other you might be able to get a trip or a disarm off. - remember flank adds to your CMB.
Assuming your fighter is level 3 with a 18 str - you are at +7 to hit - with flank +9 - so you should be able to trip or disarm him with a roll of 13 or better. Have someone aid your action and now you are at a 11 or better to disarm or trip.
Now we are in workable territory. Remove his weapon - get him on the ground. Now he's prone.
Prone is -4 AC and -4 to hit - so now he's at 22 AC and +12 to hit (assuming you didn't disarm him yet) - and his CMD is down to 18 - so you can disarm him even easier once he's on the ground. Getting up is an AoO and he *still has the penalties while he gets up* *and* you can trip or disarm on an AoO.
If more than one of you gets an AoO on him - you can also aid the other person's AoO.
In short - a bit of gold on equipment that (honestly) everyone should carry and some smart tactics *can* get this guy down.
That's without any spells.
Have your wizard toss a ray of enfeeblement on him and you can lower his CMB and CMD, to hit and damage with one spell... and that's a level 1 spell.
It's doable - assuming you went in with a plan and didn't roll a bunch of 1's on the dice (that's always my problem).
But I'll give you - this is a tough encounter - without taking a moment to think about how to get him down it can easily be a wash.
It does matter if he provokes. If he provokes without a weapon you can disarm his shield, sunder his stuff, or grapple him. Four people makine an attempting can make this fight harder for him.
PS why are evil people payign to raise someone? Seems like they would get new people to assist them.
It does matter if he provokes. If he provokes without a weapon you can disarm his shield, sunder his stuff, or grapple him. Four people makine an attempting can make this fight harder for him.
PS why are evil people payign to raise someone? Seems like they would get new people to assist them.
You can't disarm a tower shield, it's strapped to your arm. Sunder takes too long, and grapple only reduces his AC by 2, so you might as well just flank him or use Aid Another instead.
WOW! That seems like it was meant to put you all in your place. Does not sound fun.
Also, I'm not sure where he is getting APL +4 as epic, when it's not. APL +3 is epic. The paladin was CR 8 and you guys are level 3 so that's APL +5, which is beyond epic. I find that if it's your only planned encounter for the day, APL +4 is actually alright. But if you are slogging through encounters in a dungeon and THEN run into an APL +4, things will get hairy. I actually did some experimenting not too long ago, where I ran two APL +3 encounters. One was at the beginning of the day and the other was after four APL +0 encounters. Obviously, the second one ended up being much harder, while the first was challenging but nowhere near as back breaking. Pretty much proved to me that the APL guide takes lack of resources into account when determining difficulty, BUT, it also gave me new ways to handle one-two encounters in a day.
Also, there is a significant difference between the players coming across a higher than normal CR encounter and the DM throwing one at them as part of a mission. Truthfully, I never liked encounters where the whole point is to run and not overcome it. Mind you, when I say overcome, I don't mean drop its HP below zero. I mean using trickery or your wits to defeat it. Perhaps causing a cave-in to trap the beast or, my personal favorite from Dead Space, tricking it to chase you into a cryogenic chamber and freezing it. But simply setting up the players to fail and shoting down any attempts at overcoming the obstacle because you need to knock them down a couple of pegs isn't fun. But, if the players do decide that they want to take on the great wyrm at level 1, I don't kill them. No. There are far worse things than death that you can do to them. Death is too good for the likes of players :p.
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As an aside, about people pointing out the "point buy". Its a monster, an enemy, perhaps a BBEG. If teh Gm handwaves it that he has an abnormally high str, then it has an abnormally high str strat. It's silly to suggest that a GM should be bound by point buy when stating out a monster.Sure, you can call that silly.
But I say it's sillier that the GM throw away all the CR guidelines, and then justify throwing the Big Bad at them with arguments relating to CR.
If you want to ignore CR guidelines when creating your NPCs/monsters, don't think, or speak, or argue, or justify, in terms of CR.
Exactly. A GM is free to use very high stats for his adversaries, but NPC CR assumes something close to the standard heroic array, which is 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. An array of 18, 18, 16, 14, 12, 6 is considerably better than that - he has twice the net ability modifiers - and will increase the challenge. So will the increase to large size that grants reach and a better weapon damage die*, the increased wealth from the assumed amount (3.5K for a 5th level NPC), the fact that even with large size there should be no such thing as a one-handed 3d6 weapon, and the fact that the GM appears to have fudged size penalties, tower shield limitations, and the free hand limitation of Lay on Hands.
The GM can make these changes, but he needs to be aware that all together that is not a CR 6 encounter, and he can't tell his players "you should have been able to beat that, it was CR 6."
*The giant template grants +1 CR on its own, but since the natural armour wasn't increased I think this was supposed to be permanent Enlarge Person? That's worth over 2.5K if you want to file it under "NPC wealth/gear."
We were told that we should be able to handle it. We were not suppose to run, nor were we suppose to lose, he claimed we all just didn't know how to play because it was a fight we should have won and I'm trying to figure out what kind of logic he used to make that call. Those are his stats from his sheet. The storyline was simple: he was a boss, we kill him. Not much to tell.
He puts you in a situation where your only option is to confront an extremely dangerous enemy in melee, and tells you it's your fault? It's part of the GM's job to provide challenges appropriate to the party. He Dun Goofed.
Even if he'd calculated CR correctly, CR is a guideline and it's not fair to say that any party should always be able to defeat an "epic" encounter. In this case your party had 3 melee combatants and a magus whose only remaining spell was useless against the foe. Plus the enemy is in particularly favourable conditions. He's a melee fighter in a space that prohibits ranged combat and his reach allows him to threaten the entire space if you try to maneuver, and he's fighting his preferred foe, evil things. Under those conditions even a "standard" CR 6 half-dragon paladin 5 might not be something you could handle. You could have maybe pulled it off with really good tactics involving item use and aid another, especially if you knew what you were going to fight and had time to prepare. But I'd expect this to kill at least one PC no matter what, and bad rolls could easily mean TPK.
Ckorik had some good suggestions for using alchemical items in the future, but note that throwing a flask of whatever is a ranged attack and provokes an AoO from the half-dragon who is threatening the whole room. There's also a bit of misinformation in that post...
Prone is -4 AC and -4 to hit - so now he's at 22 AC and +12 to hit (assuming you didn't disarm him yet) - and his CMD is down to 18 - so you can disarm him even easier once he's on the ground. Getting up is an AoO and he *still has the penalties while he gets up* *and* you can trip or disarm on an AoO.
You can disarm on an AoO, but you cannot trip as an AoO when someone is standing up from prone. Also, unless someone in the party has Improved Trip/ Improved Disarm you'll provoke an AoO for trying and the damage dealt is subtracted from your trip attempt, so good luck with that. Maybe if you get him to take his AoO earlier in the round on someone who was maneuvering into flanking position? Maybe?
If more than one of you gets an AoO on him - you can also aid the other person's AoO.
Also not true, barring special abilities, since Aid Another is a standard action - you only get one per round, and if you used it to aid the trip you can't use it to Aid an AoO.
Have your wizard toss a ray of enfeeblement on him and you can lower his CMB and CMD, to hit and damage with one spell... and that's a level 1 spell.
Even assuming the Magus had this on a scroll (we know he didn't have it prepared), there's a Fort half which the half-dragon paladin was almost guaranteed to make with his +17, so you're probably looking at only a -1 penalty to things with this spell. Nice, but not a game-changer.
It does matter if he provokes. If he provokes without a weapon you can disarm his shield, sunder his stuff, or grapple him. Four people makine an attempting can make this fight harder for him.
Getting an AoO doesn't mean much if you don't hit with that AoO. Believe me, I almost failed a quest once because I missed an AoO. As mentioned previously, Aid Another doesn't work so well on an ally's AoO - using it would give the party one attack with a 50-50 chance of hitting per round. And you can't grapple as an AoO, it's a standard action, not an attack action.
I think sundering his "one handed" hafted weapon is not that rough. Easier than hitting his AC. The hardness would be 7 and HP15. If you put it down to heal himself they I would go for it. Reducing it to halve would give it a broken status and make it eaiser to break and harder to use.