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If my players see this, don't worry. You are both OK in my book, and I want you to finish our short Conquest of the Bloodsworn Vale mini campaign with your characters. I will not have to deal with your characters beyond this mini campaign. Just looking for ways to make things better till then. Both of you are welcome at my next campaign.
I have an oracle of bones player but I guess this thread can be useful for DMs with necromancers, undead lord clerics, ext.
It may be helpful to also mention another huge factor in my mini campaign is
another player useing a sorcerer with 2 level dip of oracle for the blasted heavens mystery of awesome display revelation on her color spray x 14/day. So far, many of the enemies are totally trivialized by this, save the plant creatures I though in. I don't mind it so much because she will encounter better will save enemies in the future along with other fair challenges for her. Throwing undead against her is not a good answer given the oracle of bones.
I am looking for advice on how to better handle what I feel has become problematic.
Concerns:
-Too many actions/undead minions
-Free action economy to tell undead what to do, even if directing different instructions to several minions
-shield wall of minions (also many terrain bushes/trees make it hard to engage via ranged attacks) or even get close to engage with melee. Think I need to begin placing PCs closer to the enemy from now on
-free 0gp minions, usually, this spell has expensive material components but through the use of the blood money spell, that cost is now a joke. Yes, there is still a cost, the precious few known spells, also a joke cost given how good it is, especially for an undead making and employing pc. I need to get my hands in the source book and try to figure out what Paizo had in mind when releasing it, the players source of just the PFd20.com site or whatever it is accurately spelled as, is not sufficient.
One piece of advice I want to share now is that you should not let PCs keep the equipment of those they slay and animate unless that gear is paid for out of the money the PC would have had to equip themself.
Also, I think when animating undead, you only get racial hit dice, not class levels. So animating a bugbear(3 racial hitdice) 6th level ranger only gives you a 3 hd undead. Thus is especially useful to help try to challenge that awesome display color spray.
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If the pcs have high hit dice undead, they are probably too big to fit into buildings and dungeons, so they are eliminated there.
If the pcs have medium sized undead, they are probably low hit points so area of effects such as breath weapons and fireballs shoulb easily eliminate them.
Definitely let the players know that blood money or any other shortcut does not eliminate the black onyx requirement for animate dead in your campaign.
throw the clergy at them?
i mean they are making a mockery of pharasma and the usual balance of life and death, and they are traipsing avross the contryside with a parade of undead.
also im pretty sure you're supposed to count the monster's gear as part of their treasure for WBL purposes anyway (because even if the object isnt useful for the party, it can be liquidated to buy other things).
Hide from Undead pretty much nerfs a necromancer's army.
Also, fighting fire with fire is always possible. An enemy cleric or oracle that can take over your player's undead army would be a lot of fun.
If my players see this, don't worry. You are both OK in my book, and I want you to finish our short Conquest of the Bloodsworn Vale mini campaign with your characters. I will not have to deal with your characters beyond this mini campaign. Just looking for ways to make things better till then. Both of you are welcome at my next campaign.
I have an oracle of bones player but I guess this thread can be useful for DMs with necromancers, undead lord clerics, ext.
It may be helpful to also mention another huge factor in my mini campaign is
another player useing a sorcerer with 2 level dip of oracle for the blasted heavens mystery of awesome display revelation on her color spray x 14/day. So far, many of the enemies are totally trivialized by this, save the plant creatures I though in. I don't mind it so much because she will encounter better will save enemies in the future along with other fair challenges for her. Throwing undead against her is not a good answer given the oracle of bones.I am looking for advice on how to better handle what I feel has become problematic.
Concerns:
-Too many actions/undead minions
Like summoners, necromancers that create a horde are kind of obnoxious. Look up some "squad rules" and have the undead move and attack as a squad.
-Free action economy to tell undead what to do, even if directing different instructions to several minions
The PC can't speak more than 6 second. It doesn't matter if speaking is a free action, a round is six seconds.
-shield wall of minions (also many terrain bushes/trees make it hard to engage via ranged attacks) or even get close to engage with melee. Think I need to begin placing PCs closer to the enemy from now on
I'm pretty sure you can walk through a horde. But if not, you either need more mobile enemies (flying or Acrobatics and forest walk), or use blasting magic to catch a bunch of zombies in an AoE. Add extra NPCs to encounters. Say a cleric with Channel Energy/Turn Undead. Or a blasting wizard. Use the NPC Codex as a source so you don't have to spend time drawing them up.
-free 0gp minions, usually, this spell has expensive material components but through the use of the blood money spell, that cost is now a joke. Yes, there is still a cost, the precious few known spells, also a joke cost given how good it is, especially for an undead making and employing pc. I need to get my hands in the source book and try to figure out what Paizo had in mind when releasing it, the players source of just the PFd20.com site or whatever it is accurately spelled as, is not sufficient.
Ban stupid broken spell.
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Thanks people. I hope to.find mire advice when I return.
Can you please expand what you said about black onyx requirement? Still not sure what you mean.
I was plann.ing for ATF agents from alkenstar to track down the gunslinger, sending some clerics/pal against them in another encounter would be fair as long as each only got one encounter specifically targeting them. The good will saves would also be helpful. Now it gets me wondering what sort of beef would the other PCs have to justify an encounter for them. One us a oread monk, the other a gnome heaven mystery sorcerer. Any suggestions? Maybe kobolds for the gnome or a fanatic that wants the night sky blacked out of the stars. Maybe another student who got jealous of the oread getting the valedictorian of his class. Now he has to prove his kung fu is better than the oread's kung fu.
if they're openly traveling with a troupe of undead it is completely reasonable that they would run afoul of several churches... start planning some encounters with paladins/clerics/inquisitors and see if they don't realize that always having an army of corpses might be a poor idea. and as was mentioned a BBEG that can steal control of some of the army should be a wake up call too.
Necromancers are too powerful, their hordes of undead are problematic, and X,Y, and Z spell needs to be banned, also I love Pharasma.
Just kidding, guys, but seriously...
While it is certainly true that blatant displays of undeath are likely to excite the natives, this needn't always be the case. There are better ways to manage your undead hordes so that the lynch mobs don't put the pitchfork and torch to the party. My necromancer has tact and common sense, hence survives.
Hordes of undead are indeed difficult for player and GM to manage, but are also poor use of the power at hand. Far better (and easier to manage, track, and hide when necessary) are fewer stronger creations with more HD, special attacks, movement modes, etc. Maybe suggest this?
Also blood money has it's own cost-hit points and STR. Are you using encumbrance rules? Suddenly, your "dump stat" matters...
Don't shy away from necromancers, played right they can be plenty fun without breaking the game, GMed right they'll never get away with it if they try.
Good thing scrolls of lesser restoration are cheap AND he could have it on his list and strength damage does not effect encumbrance.
I don't know about that since it is lowering your strength score until it is healed. It does not specifically state that carrying capacity is effected by ability damage, but nor does it spell it out as doing so for ability drain.
Perhaps someone FAQed it.
In my games both effect carrying capacity, and will continue to do so until paizo says otherwise.
If the necromancer has DONE something to merit a specific response targeting only them, then here are some suggestions:
- Channel Energy: positive for damage, negative for reversing the minion's control
- Chill Touch, Disrupt Undead and other minor anti-undead effects built into traps, spells, and magic items
- AoE spells work great against clustered minions when employed by PCs; why not use them ON the PCs?
- Ghouls, ravens, vultures. Consider that these and other creatures are carrion consumers
- Shatter for skeletons; some kind of rot for zombies. Destroy their physical forms
- Entangle, Web, or other movement hindrances
- Fire; it is the great equalizer against the supernatural
- Maneuvers are a good way to deal with individual undead. Trip or Sunder their natural attacks
- Grease or other spells that provoke Ref saves
- Raise Dead cast on an undead destroys it (or it did in older editions; I don't know about PF)
- "Protection from Undead", a unique form of Protection From Evil
- Hide From Undead, high level sorcerers with Undead bloodline and other abilities that let enemies blend with or be ignored by undead
That's all I've got off the top of my head. You must have your own reasons for targeting a PC so specifically but I try not to use such tactics unless by a recurring villain. As for targeting the other characters I think we'd need more info on the campaign.
We are facing some groups of dead creatures on my campaign. We dont have any cleric or paladin in the party, but our Alchemist, equiped with holy water is terrific at beating them. He kills at least 1 creature per vial and his splash damage goes up to an average of 5~6 to all near ones. And if you change the water with bombs, you have similar effect, or even better. We are lvl 4 atm.
Hope this helps.
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Please advise, How do you challenge undead, using PCs
Please advise: How do you challenge undead? using PCs!
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Thanks for all the extra feedback everyone.
We are playing the 3.5 module Conquest of the Bloodsworn Vale. It uses a small fort as a base. The commander made it known when the oracle showed up that he.could keep undead outside the fort. Even supplied them with some barbed wire to make a pen. I wanted to give players the freedom to play stuff that was banned in society and this is what I got. I really ment the freedom to be about useing old 3.5 material but all the.players never played that and never bothered researching any of if. I thought it would.be a nice change for a. Commander to not be a holy uppity type and take what.ever.help he.could get to finish his job of making a new road through the vale, one he has fallen behind schedule on. Figured he could deal with the undead later if it bacame.a.problem. The player has been very conciancious of not bringing undead to the fort and not making any out of the dead workers/soldiers.
I am not trying to punish the player. Just finding the undead to be a drag, taking extra time to roll out all the actions. The fact that even the weaker undead still get an attack ea h means.the group has about two e as many attacks a turn and with so many monsters based around being fair to hit ACs even for 3/4 bab, that means so many extra hits every battle. Add that the arrows they took off the living are poisoned to make someone dazed and now the villains don't even get to take a.turn sometimes. I think the player foolishly kept all the poison arrows without paying for them out of his equipment which should have been paid for by selling that loot of.poison arrows along with the gear like weapons and armor the undead are useing. Going to make sure he does not.get away with that. Also doubting he bothers to keep track of the ammunition and just shoots the poisoned stuff like if it was both free and unlimited. Also bit of a pain to deal with the damage reduction as he can create skeletons or zombies either way according to.what dr is good at the moment.
The spell itself just seems too good, getting all these hitdice of bodies/actions. I cannot help but feel it was designed for no. Bad guys to challenge players, not meant for players to use themselves .
I am a bit worried about what to send after the party knowing if will later be reanimated and used by them. Any recommendations what.to send against them that.can challenge a min/maxed party at 6th level and WBL? Something that will not bite me in the ass soon after when it is reanimated? Any types of.creatures cannot be.made info undead would be nice t hear about!
I am going to make it a point to throw in more NPC spell casters, something the mod usually does not use as it is Mostly about exploring the wilderness. Any advice what races to use? 3.5 races are game but it think casters would mean no racial adjustments are important.
Again, thanks everyone!
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First, talk to the player. Mention your concerns. Tell him why you need to curb his character (but phrase it in terms of derailing the campaign or hogging the spotlight or whatever). Ask for suggestions. He might surprise you.
If this does not work, you can try some or all of the following. You know your player better, so you need to determine which will fly.
To be sure the undead are OK, do this:
1) Audit his undead. He has a limit. Note how it is designed -- lots of little or a few big.
2) Audit party WBL, specifically acquired loot. Make sure that loot is counted against it. Make mention if he and his forces have twice as much as the next biggest number. Also modify future treasure to bring WBL back to sane levels. Plus or minus a little is OK, but more than 50% has serious effects.
3) If poisoned arrows are an issue, three solutions. 3A) Poison applied to arrows becomes ineffective after a time. 3B) Note audit of character how many arrows are available. Keep track for a few sessions. Audit poison arrows again and compare number shown vs. number expected. Off by one or two, no issue. Off by a lot, GM Fiat all used. 3C) Undead do not have poison class feature. Working with poisoned weapons required careful direction. Insufficient care causes poison to be applied TO undead. Might have no affect on them, but it is no longer on the arrow.
To counter them, do this:
1) Hallow spell. Bless spell.
2) Attack in 3D. Fly. Burrow. Swim.
3) Difficult terrain. Sinkholes. Quicksand.
To deal with the slowdown:
1) Limit "Free Action Talking" to one command per type/unit, and no more than 5.
2) Require all planned undead attack and damage rolls to be rolled during the other player's turns. On his turn, he tells you what ACs were hit, and you inform him how many hits. Easier if you tell him ACs after first round. Requires much of his static actions be done before his turn so as to not waste other people's time.
3) Require that all undead roll d20s at the same time. If he does not have enough, he has to double up the rolls by applying a roll to multiple like undead. Reduces number of dice rolled per turn.
4) Have undead minions do average damage unless crit threat. Speeds up math.
5) Co-opt the other players into handling some of the undead attacks. He still is the general, but they do the actual rolling. Causes other players to become part of the action rather than thumb twiddlers.
/cevah