RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Here's another one:
High level characters are often famous
If your PCs have saved the kingdom a few times, routed the approaching army, and looted the lost tomb and returned with riches, guess what? Most people will have heard of them. People will tell stories about them.
This leads to some consequences:
Positive: They can expect minor/major celebrity status. Free meals and room and board, just because the innkeeper wants the prestige of having them stay at his inn. Audiences with nobility and royalty just for the asking. Honorary titles and degrees. That sort of stuff.
Negative: Bad guys have also heard of them. They may get challenged to fights by people itching to prove themselves. Canny bad guys will study their known battle tactics and prepare countermeasures. I've more than once put together a "perfect" assassination squad chosen specifically to target the PCs' weaknesses - overused this can get very tiresome, but it can be a huge wake up call when used sparingly. Don't be afraid to play your NPCs smart when appropriate.
RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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ring of counterspellsHuh, I totally forgot that item. Hm, getting two of them onto an important opponent should be doable (with a Hand of Glory if there is an important second ring).
Also contingency with GDM to counterspell an incoming GDM works great. Exact match works automatically.
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High level characters are often famous
If your PCs have saved the kingdom a few times, routed the approaching army, and looted the lost tomb and returned with riches, guess what? Most people will have heard of them. People will tell stories about them.
This can also lead to people pretending to be them. Good people, bad people, and so on. Lots of examples of this in film/comic/TV history, but the one that comes to mind is the movie Kick-A%%.
Organizations and orders can form based off the heroes. "The Order of the Red Dragon", for example, could draw inspiration from the dragon disciple PC. Which would be cool for the heroes, until one o two of these organizations start going down the wrong path, or applying their dirty tricks on a large scale. Things get even worse when the local population thinks that the PC's approve of the bloody tactics.
Countries could claim them. Some would call it "sponsoring", if them were adding gold to player coffers, but a cheaper method would to hire town criers, heralds, and bards to spread the word about the King's "newest band of heroes". Every wrong they right then get attributed to the king.
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Both sides strip buffs if they are able. No real way to stop save to go with simple buffs like haste. Keep buffing a person up. Or have a counterspell caster present to counter dispels or key spells. Or have an enemy focused on killing the opponent caster. If he's spending all his time defending himself, no time to cast dispels.
That's what I usually do. Or build the opponent so strong he doesn't need buffs. The PCs need to debuff him to slow him down.
Good tactics, the only problem being that casters are normally "boss encounters" in AP's and thus they often are supposed to fight alone against the party. Which is in my power to change and I do that, but it still is how AP's are mostly written.
As I said, there are certain conventions which my players have started to catch on to after running three AP's to conclusion. ^^
ring of counterspellsHuh, I totally forgot that item. Hm, getting two of them onto an important opponent should be doable (with a Hand of Glory if there is an important second ring).
You're right about the APs. I usually change encounters in APs. Most of them make no sense. Why an enemy would fight a group of four or five unknown enemies alone is beyond me. It makes even less sense when the NPC knows they're powerful PCs. I usually have my NPCs flee immediately and mass into one big encounter.
I'm not sure if I should pose a question, since this has the potential for derailment of this interesting topic, but here goes: How do you deal with groups which habitually throw targeted greater dispel magic's on the important NPC opponents? I know that this costs them actions, but a lot of an NPC's defenses tend to come from stuff like temporary buffs. Rebuffing in combat is a waste, given how fast high-level encounters go.
Check out spell turning.
-Matt
Also contingency with GDM to counterspell an incoming GDM works great. Exact match works automatically.
Check out the text of contingency. This tactic does not actually work.
-Matt
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This one caught me with my pants down because I was suffering from food poisoning when I was running a game.
Carmen Sandiego ain't got S#!t on me!
Higher level adventurers mobility options are spectacular. Plane Shift, greater teleport, air ships, carpets of flying. Keep in mind that the wizard if he hears about a guy in some town leagues away who he knows about, might just zot his behind over there, have a chat and zot back.
Distances don't present barriers. Situations do. If he has to go somewhere and deal with a problem (IE: If I go back to Galifry, they'll make me do presidential stuff) its a better barrier then 'its really far away.'
You're right about the APs. I usually change encounters in APs. Most of them make no sense. Why an enemy would fight a group of four or five unknown enemies alone is beyond me. It makes even less sense when the NPC knows they're powerful PCs. I usually have my NPCs flee immediately and mass into one big encounter.
Yeah, AP's need a lot of modification, that's for sure. What Paizo believes are challenging high-level encounters seldomly turn out to be so, even after upping them and combining them. ^^
Check out spell turning.
Definitely a good spell for that, but the Ring of Counterspelling seems to be the best idea for the moment. :)
Thought... has anyone played through the APs using only the iconics? I've never really given it much thought, but my impression has always been the APs are designed for the players who don't access the forums or optimize much beyond a mentality of, "Hey, Power Attack is pretty good, I should pick that up eventually" or something to that effect.
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Actually, Power Attack is pretty good. ^^
Actually, Power Attack is pretty good. ^^
Yes, but Power Attack is one of those things people tend to pick up ASAP (depending on their character) where as I've seen players who didn't pick it up until 9th level 'because they had a spare feat'. Then only rarely used it because their attack bonus wasn't really high enough to accept the penalty unless they were attacking something easy to hit.
This thread has been absolutely incredible so far. I am definitely dotting this. I am prepping to run a Mythic power campaign that is intended to hit 20th level, and may be little beyond, and this thread has been wonderfully helpful in stiching alot of my late game ideas together.
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Everything is by design...
If you're running a game (whether it's an AP or not) that calls for random encounters, don't make them random. Pre-prep the encounters a head of time (such as prepping 4 shadows for an encounter that calls for 2d6 shadows) and makes little notes about the encounters so you can quickly familiarize yourself with the 'random' encounter tactics.
As someone who played in Kingmaker with their tons of random encounters, I can't tell you how boring and frustrating it is for the GM to roll a random encounter, then have to wait as the GM looks up the stats for the monsters to throw at us. Often, it takes twice as much time to set up the random encounter, as it does to kill the blasted thing. Meanwhile, the Players are sitting around the table, waiting on the GM who spends 20 minutes building an encounter, only for it to be over in 2 rounds.
...You don't have to threaten the characters to THREATEN the characters...
Maybe a bit more on the dark side but something to use as needed.
Assuming the high level characters have developed stories, backgrounds and some RP outside of dungeon crawls they have spouses, kids, towns, businesses, etc.... These are all plot tools the GM can use to provide a challenge or reign in out of control characters.
This is a big one that fits into a bigger umbrella, and I like to call:
A Character is a Character, Not a Stack of Numbers
High level characters (especially spellcasters) have access to phenomenal powers. They can create demiplanes, travel across the world, create contingencies to whisk them away from harm, and be nearly impossible to locate. They can conjure angels, demons, and everything inbetween. They can bend the minds of others to their will. They have access to thousands and thousands of gold pieces. But, they should still be (demi-)humans. They started somewhere, with friends, family, associates, and goals beyond "level up". Along their journey they (should) have gained more friends and allies, and perhaps even lovers. All of are levers that can be used to keep PCs grounded in their character, rather than in a set of numbers. Let me explain what I mean.I often hear optimization people claiming that a high level spellcaster spends every night sleeping on their fast time demiplane, has contingencies to teleport them away from any attack, and keeps dozens of spells going at all times. The question that pops in my head is 'where do these characters fit the rest of their lives in?'
A character that spends all their time on a fast time demiplane is aging twice as fast as everyone else around them. Many people (including friends and lovers) aren't going to want to be a part of that, and many characters probably don't want to be a part of that. It doesn't matter that most campaigns are going to end long before a PC dies of old
I have 5 people in my gaming group that grew up playing D&D through all the different versions (except 4E). Most of them have adopted this exact mentality. They've been burned by GMs in the past so now they think any one, any place, or any thing mentioned in a backstory is inevitably going to be threatened, killed, or destroyed at some point in the campaign. So many of them have adopted backstories of something like, "Franklin's entire family, including all relatives, and his village, and his land and everything connected to him in any way was destroyed by orcs in a terrible slaughter. He is the only survivor and has no connections to anyone other than himself"
They do this, because they got tired of crafting intricate backstories with loved ones, or children and spouses, just so the GM would come along and murder anyone and everyone connected to them. Sure, they saved the day, and the world is safe, but their home, their village and anyone they've ever met outside of the party is now dead or worse.
So be careful about over-exploiting their backgrounds or you will start having jaded players.
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Even the gods are jealous
It's a tale as old as Forgotten Realms' Avatar series and Dragonlance's Chronicles trilogy, but remains a staple of fantasy and shouldn't be ignored by GMs. At some point the gods will take note of the heroes' accomplishments and either request their aid to shape the world or take action to remove them from the playing field. Like any other ultra-powerful entities, a GM should be extremely careful when throwing this kind of plot into the mix. But hey, by the time they're level 15 the PCs should be accustomed to taking down and propping up civilizations; gods are just the logical next step.
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RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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Also contingency with GDM to counterspell an incoming GDM works great. Exact match works automatically.Check out the text of contingency. This tactic does not actually work.
-Matt
You're correct; good catch. Contingency can't trigger an effect that resolves prior to the triggering effect.
dot
Dotting for reference. Much good stuff in here.
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It's Okay to Put the Map Away
Flying, Teleportation and just insane movement speeds mean that 2d maps are often not as useful as they used to be. Start transitioning from tactical battles to narrative battles.
As a GM get comfortable with adjudicating.
As a player ASK Questions.
Objecting to the grippli magus because you want to have a humanity-centered game, and having a kitchen-sink party of things that don't look remotely human - that's reasonable.
But Paizo has done a pretty good job of containing the inevitable power creep. Inevitable because more books with more options WILL give you more finely-tailored combinations. Paizo did well because the new stuff didn't make much of the old stuff obsolete.
I totally agree, if you have your heart set on a certain flavor of campaign. However, in my case it was that the GM looked at the grippli, and saw they had a climb speed and darkvision. Apparently that is too difficult for him to deal with. I believe his phobia of anything non-core was basically the issue.
Just wanted to say thanks to you all for the hints, because I have been looking for a thread like this for awhile.
...You don't have to threaten the characters to THREATEN the characters...
Maybe a bit more on the dark side but something to use as needed.
Assuming the high level characters have developed stories, backgrounds and some RP outside of dungeon crawls they have spouses, kids, towns, businesses, etc.... These are all plot tools the GM can use to provide a challenge or reign in out of control characters.
This is a big one that fits into a bigger umbrella, and I like to call:
A Character is a Character, Not a Stack of Numbers
High level characters (especially spellcasters) have access to phenomenal powers. They can create demiplanes, travel across the world, create contingencies to whisk them away from harm, and be nearly impossible to locate. They can conjure angels, demons, and everything inbetween. They can bend the minds of others to their will. They have access to thousands and thousands of gold pieces. But, they should still be (demi-)humans. They started somewhere, with friends, family, associates, and goals beyond "level up". Along their journey they (should) have gained more friends and allies, and perhaps even lovers. All of are levers that can be used to keep PCs grounded in their character, rather than in a set of numbers. Let me explain what I mean.I often hear optimization people claiming that a high level spellcaster spends every night sleeping on their fast time demiplane, has contingencies to teleport them away from any attack, and keeps dozens of spells going at all times. The question that pops in my head is 'where do these characters fit the rest of their lives in?'
A character that spends all their time on a fast time demiplane is aging twice as fast as everyone else around them. Many people (including friends and lovers) aren't going to want to be a part of that, and many characters probably don't want to be a part of that. It doesn't matter that most campaigns are going to end long before a PC dies of old
True. You have to use this subplot judiciously.
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Time is Fluid
If your party jumps way ahead in a plot that was supposed to be time sensitive, to the point where it is functionally no longer achieving its purpose (e.g. no longer forcing them to take multiple encounters, allowing 15 minute work day), feel free to advance the timeline. Maybe the other side makes a breakthrough that speeds them up or maybe they were farther ahead than the party realized. In either case play up that it was the party's quick thinking (which let them get ahead in the first place) that is allowing them to stop the bad guy at all: if they had taken things by the numbers his plot would have gone off!
This doesn't mean every situation needs to come down to the timer with 10 seconds left on it, but I see many GMs that get afraid of making changes to react to the party.
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More needs to be said on how the world is defined.
Is it like the Forgotten Realms where practically every other tavern has a drunk archmage miscasting a fireball in the local tavern? Or is it like Eberron or Golarion, where Queen Galfrey is an imposing mover and shaker even though she's "only" a 15th level Paladin?
I'll second this. Making a decision early on about what kind of world you want will help guide a lot of the decisions you make and types of encounters you have at high levels.
If you decide that the highest level NPC is 12th level, then you know you need to come up with a good explanation as to where the high level monsters or bad guys come from and what their context is. Perhaps they were locked away in prisons by the previous mighty empire and are now being freed due to the collapse of the empire and the lack of maintenance on the wards that imprisoned them. Maybe the world has never had high level monsters and now, all of a sudden, monsters are invading from other dimensions or planes and the players have to fight them off.
On the other hand, if you decide that the world is like Forgotten Realms, with lots of high level NPCs, then you'll need to figure out (or at least have an explanation for or idea about) what they are doing while the PCs are gaining in power and how they will react to them.
The nice thing about this, especially if you start at level 1, is that you don't necessarily have to figure this out all at once. You just need to make a decision on the kind of world you want and can build as you go. It just occurred to me that having a basic outline of the kind of world you want and some of the basic details could be really useful to start with and give you something to refer to and build the campaign from.
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Lots of good advice so far!
My own two coppers
Use Shortcuts (at least when Awesomeness is not at stake)
Don't be afraid to use shortcuts, 'cut scenes', and so forth when the party isn't strongly invested in the action of the moment. This can go from checking minimum damage vs. hp ('no dice needed, he's dead'), to calling fights, to hand-waiving travel encounters. All depending on the mood you want.
Another shortcut is finding ways to shorten dice-counting. Here's a dice cheat sheet for some common rolls that let you speed combat, without just "taking average". It's created from taking the full spectrum of possible rolls and breaking that into sections and averaging those, so it retains the actual distribution (just a bit smaller). Mix and match as needed (5 hits with Bane/Holy arrows? You can use a 10d6 roll + 5d8, or use five 1d8+2d6 rolls.)
Apologies for the thread Necromancy, but I need to Dot this.
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Grant every PC the Leadership feat for free at level 7 but require them to work to actually gain a cohort or followers. (See this blog for why)
Also let players build and control some NPCs for you. Accept and encourage player input for worldbuilding.
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Grant every PC the Leadership feat for free at level 7 but require them to work to actually gain a cohort or followers. (See this blog for why)
Also let players build and control some NPCs for you. Accept and encourage player input for worldbuilding.
I like that essay. It fixes some issues;
- If everyone gets Leadership, everyone wants Charisma.
- Only one cohort per adventure helps maintain sanity. Leftover cohorts can mind the store.
- Less imbalance issues than when only one PC takes Leadership. Balance between PCs is the important balance, after all.
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Don't Paralyze the Players
Not the paralyzed condition, nothing against that, go right ahead and use it. Don't leave the players paralyzed and incapable of acting.
This often happens when the players can't get enough information to feel comfortable deciding on a course of action. Now for some players, you don't need much. For others, you need a lot. It can also happen when players are terrified of the consequences of acting.
People have already discussed being careful about overuse of threats to the family, friends, and so on. I won't cover that.
Make sure the party can find out enough information to decide what to do. That might be in the context of figuring out if they can win (not will win, but can win) an encounter before they decide to commit to it. It might be giving them enough information to understand the events going on and how they might be addressed.
Don't hide all information behind huge Knowledge checks; if the party needs it, make sure there's a way they can get it. It doesn't necessarily take a brilliant sage... it could take someone specialized in the relevant field. And just set the Knowledge DCs intelligently - if they need the information, make the DC relatively low, or ensure there's another source. And don't feel bad about suggesting things to the players - their characters may be smarter than they are, and the characters definitely know more about the world than the players do. There's a lot of general world knowledge that just never percolates out to the players, but any character, especially a high level one, would know.
Examples:
In one of the two high-level games I'm playing in, we just committed to a fight, which is going to be a 4-way mess. We know our own capabilities (I hope). We know (out of character) the power level of one guy on side 2, but not who else will be on side 2. We know essentially nothing about side 3 (and apparently cannot find out; the information just doesn't exist or something), and we don't know the composition of side 4, or the capabilities of the individual members who may or may not show up/
In the other, we're investigating multiple plots. Some are bad for the world, some are probably not... but we can't really find out anything. Many of them are connected, but we can't fathom how. And every method of investigation we seem to try just goes nowhere. I'm at the point where I think my character will just do something substantially unwise rather than trying to understand matters any further. (Of course, I have no way to know if the hornet's nests I may unwisely kick are ones I can survive kicking or not.)
Time Pressure, During the Adventure
It's good to have there be time pressure on any given adventure. This is one of those things that keeps the party from doing the 15-minute adventuring day and hitting every encounter with full resources. But the pressure needs to let up between adventures.
One game that I'm in has so much time pressure going on that we regularly comment how it seems like someone comes crying for help the instant we get back from putting out the last fire. It's not quite that bad, but we rarely get to do any crafting, and we've had times when we commissioned some magical equipment and leveled twice before it was ready. If the players need an item (and these were just stat items) to get their practical WBL up to par, they should be able to get that between adventures... and not go on several more adventures while waiting.
Even aside from those mechanical effects, we find it hard to pursue individual, non-combat, time-consuming goals. We're afraid to split the party, not just because one of us might get ambushed by a group that's a fair fight for the whole party, but because if we get a call and need to jump into action, we don't have the resources to bring the entire party together, then get to the adventure location, all in one day (at least not without one character devoting all his high-level slots to that).
Obviously you shouldn't give the party clear indications how long it will be until the next adventure in general (unless they know what that adventure will be and it makes sense). But don't make every adventure come up suddenly, and in full crisis mode. Let it be something where the party can have time to re-assemble.
Dot.
Me, too. Great ideas!
Here's some idle thoughts of mine that are based on my own preference and gaming style, which sometimes clashes with the assumptions of Pathfinder...so take them with a grain of salt:
-Let the PCs stomp through lower-level battles once in a while. It allows them to show off their prowess compared to the rest of the world, and it makes for some nice contrast when the PCs face something that will truly challenge them.
-Give cheat sheets. A one- or two-page document that lists common tactics and powers in plain English can be really helpful.
-Losing doesn't always mean dying. The PCs are tough to kill at these levels. Important NPCs, home towns, and other things dear to them are not. Putting those at risk can be as entertaining as making the PCs fight for their lives.
-Don't block high-level powers too often. You can design a place that is teleport-proof once or twice, but it gets really irritating when every encounter neutralizes those powers. If you don't want the PCs to use a spell or ability, don't let them have it in the first place.
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Lots of good advise up-thread.
My contribution is mostly non-combat oriented and aimed at making sure that higher level of play feels more high level:
Don’t forget your PCs’ roots.
While little Magdelaina, Chicken Farmer Rufus’ youngest daughter may have gone on to become the deadly Indigo Whisperer, don’t let the beginning of her story fall by the wayside.
There are a variety of ways you can remind characters of their roots & histories to compare and contrast where their character started and where they have ended up. Here are a few of my favorites:
Former childhood heroes asking for advice / aid....These are all very good. Unfortunately, they are also very hard to pull of well.
Not that hard.
Anyway Gregor comes in, turns into a Huge sized 4 armed gargoyle and buffs up, dueling in the air with the dragon. The thing dies and plummets toward the center of town where a little girl is trapped. If Gregor doesn't do something fast. His familiar hits him with a Bull's Strength while he cast's Ant Haul on the enlarged Faerie Dragon and together they JUST BARELY manage to pull it out of a nose dive and save the little girl. He then lands and tosses aside the rubble, whisking the girl to safety and a cleric.
Later on Sheriff Hemlock comes with some men and the other PCs to find me at the tavern. My PC has a habit of being kicked out of places for his magic and temper, so as soon as he sees the authorities he begins gathering his gear. Hemlock says "there's someone we wanted you to meet." In comes the little girl who bounds up and throws a big hug around Gregor. "Thanks Mister! My leg feels all better now! I can even do this!" and she spins around. "When I grow up, I wanna be like you and fly and beat up stinky dragons! Raarr!" and with that she dashes off to her grateful parents.
"Tell Gregor," I say in character in a thick Russian accent, "tell Gregor the girl's name?" Without missing a beat my GM says as Hemlock "Her name? Oh, Saraphina. She's been asking to meet you all afternoon. You're her HERO Gregor!"
I haven't gotten the chance to run a LOT of high level stuff, but after a certain level you just need to make sure that the PCs are active participants in MUCH larger scales. Their foes threaten whole realms or worlds; their heroic action can save or doom entire towns; people look up to them.
Great thread.
Dotting...
Awesome. Dot!
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Might as well throw a few more of my insights into this.
Wondrous beats Mechanical
By high levels, the party is going to be swimming in cloaks of resistance, +1 rings of protection, natural armor amulets and other similar 'standard tier' crap that every NPC carries around. These items aren't exciting.
Hell I've seen a paladin giving the cloaks of resistance away to people in need because the party had so many (it seems like every NPC in the NPC Codex carries one).
Magic items that have character though become more important once the party has its compliment of belts, ac boosters and the like. They start turning their nose up at a weapon that just has another plus. But if the sword makes butter, or if the ring lets them make a wooden bridge at will, or if the boots inexplicably leave behind glowing foot prints, they start to care even if the mechanical benefit isn't as large.
I'd argue once the party gets a good amount of weapons and support equipment, start giving them more toys from the wondrous item list.
By Azura! By Azura! By Azura!
As others have said, high level people attract attention. This can included competent people, or would be heroes. It also includes crazy whackjobs, and coat-tail riders.
The party might be sufficiently morally grey that it takes direct solutions to these people, but the lawful good paladin might have trouble contending with the well-meaning but incompetent and stupid fellow who mimics him constantly (Commander Shepard, you're my hero! I even dress like you!)
Poorer relations might start asking for hand outs also. The good part of this? It contributes to plots and makes a hero feel like he's a 'big dude' because he's got people leeching off of him.
Its in the sewer.. Don't we have people for this? OR That CR is below my opportunity cost.
Let the player be the guy hiring adventurers.
Put them in a situation where they have to contend with a bigger issue, but have a smaller objective that is 1.) Distasteful and 2.) Time consuming.
For example. You have to get you and your friends to the Tower of Fireants to stop the evil Fire-Ant god's minions from summoning the truck sized fire-ant demons. You also need to recover a useful bit of statuary from a dungeon in a town. You know its probably guarded by a low tier mummy and some dark folk or something, you could power stomp them, but while you tear through them (and spend the time crawling in the sewers), those fire ants will be rampaging.
So hire some lower level adventurers. Toss like 6,000 at them, which to you is just another pair of +1 boxer shorts of resistance but to them is big cash, and go and beat up some Fire-Ants for the good of the realm.
This has three perks. 1.) It lets heroes feel heroic and accomplish goals in a way that shows they're big guys now. 2.) It builds up the fundamental verisimilitude next time they question why the 15th level wizard patron they have doesn't just blast the crap out of the were-rats in the old monastery he hired them to fight; and 3.) It creates a realistic explanation on where other heroes and adventurers come from.
I love this thread! Dont die on me now!
Anyway, I personally go by the idea that the players aren't the only high levels in a world. I try to make my players feel a bit down to earth and have their previous action scale their fame. However they will be known as comptent and powerful, but there is others out there that could do their job regardless or if not the lack of interest of the players can doom villages and the like.
It might be that the 10th level party thinks wiping out a goblin camp is nothing and a waste of time, but to the nearby villages this is just as a likely threat as any. In a situation like this you could narrate the fighters rather than fight them and put more focus on the NPCs of the village and how they praise/shun the heroes after their actions ( or lack thereof )
Might sound a bit contradicting the two above, but the case is that some jobs can be a gateway to another job for their challenge, and if they dont take it someone else will rival their position as heroes and they might lose benefits due to their inactivity. And sometimes there is noone else around and those CR6 monsters will wipe out this village and the survivors will add to the players rumours as "fake" heroes. etc.
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I love this thread! Dont die on me now!
Anyway, I personally go by the idea that the players aren't the only high levels in a world. I try to make my players feel a bit down to earth and have their previous action scale their fame. However they will be known as comptent and powerful, but there is others out there that could do their job regardless or if not the lack of interest of the players can doom villages and the like.
It might be that the 10th level party thinks wiping out a goblin camp is nothing and a waste of time, but to the nearby villages this is just as a likely threat as any. In a situation like this you could narrate the fighters rather than fight them and put more focus on the NPCs of the village and how they praise/shun the heroes after their actions ( or lack thereof )
Might sound a bit contradicting the two above, but the case is that some jobs can be a gateway to another job for their challenge, and if they dont take it someone else will rival their position as heroes and they might lose benefits due to their inactivity. And sometimes there is noone else around and those CR6 monsters will wipe out this village and the survivors will add to the players rumours as "fake" heroes. etc.
I think I mentioned this before, but I love the 'accidental savior' bit for high level adventurers.
Like they walk into a town, want to get some beers and roast pork after having to deal with Elgad the Unmaking of Life on the Negative Energy Plane, and a bunch of yobbos show up to cause trouble in the town. So with their beers in hand, eating their delicious food, they proceed to decapitate the Great Bandit Army(tm), not because they set out to do so, just because the Great Bandit Army(tm) made the mistake of being noticed by them.
And then they sit down, happy that their beer and food is now free, and apparently there's a party going on about those jerks they beat up.
They weren't there to do it, but the party feels 1.) Cool for overcoming the baddies and 2.) Like total badasses because they can justifiably say 'he didn't know who he was messing with.'
I had a group of 14th level adventurers stumble across a Rakshasa slaver and his 'elite' guard as they were traveling back from an adventure (they would've been a boss encounter for an 9th level party at a Encounter Level of 12 or so). The last thing to go through the Rakshasa's head, before the paladin's holy sword, was to realize who he was fighting and despair.
The pally really liked knowing the Rakshasa basically went '(Paladin name)?! Its impossible! NO!!!'
The heroes looked around, freed the slaves as a matter of course, escorted them to safety and kept on heading to their next objective viewing the whole affair as a tiny little interruption, but to the actual NPCs and city, they just destroyed a major threat.
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Dotting to keep up with this thread. This is pretty excellent stuff.
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D-O-T
CLASS LEVELS
Advancing the HD of a monster is one way to go . . . another way is to give them class levels. An advanced black dragon is one thing, a black dragon hiding in its swamp with levels of rogue and assassin can all but guarantee its first hit will take out a PC. By high levels, players are used to killing the bad guys pretty quickly and if they're close to full resources, they don't sweat much. One shot a PC on the first attack and they'll sit up and pay attention! This is just one example, there are many others
SYNERGISTIC MINIONS
Start placing minions with BBEGs that really go together. A red dragon lairing in an active volcano looks pretty neat, but, yawn, been done before. Provide that red dragon with a few iron golem guards and things get more interesting. Swim around in the lava for a few rounds while PCs bang away on golems. Rise from the lava and breathe . . . on the golems. It's like a heal spell for them. Dive back under the lava. Repeat. Give the dragon levels of monk for multi-attacked flurry of blows when they finally destroy the golems. This, too, is just one example, just browse through the Bestiary and more will become apparent to you.
THE PLANES
Remember when you graduated 8th grade? You were top of the heap. Then you went into 9th grade and you were the bottom of the totem pole all over again? The planes are like that. On the Prime Material they may be hot stuff, but on the outer planes they should feel, while not quite like 1st level again, but maybe like 4th or 5th ("yeah, I've got some cool stuff, but there's still a lot that can turn me into a fine pink mist").
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"Weak" encounters drain resources
Others have touched on ways to make sure the PCs aren't able to do one encounter per rest, so I won't go into that. What I've found is when you have multiple encounters, you don't need all of them to be hard. Encounters that are APL+0 often see PCs use higher level spell slots and resources to finish quickly. APL-1 or even -2 can be great for expending AoE spells. Several of these encounters can quickly drain some of the over-the-top power of the PCs in preparation for the big fights.
If your players are really smart and conserve their precious resources, then have a "pre-BBEG." Something that can definitely be considered a threat that will make the PCs want to use their big guns. A powerful demon, or dragon, or similar creature is a good way to do this. Then, after that fight, the BBEG can make his presence known.
More is more
Instead of one big enemy that is APL+3, why not a pair that are each APL+1? A pair of CR 19 dragons is a much more interesting battle than a single CR 21.
Oh, the memories...
Remember that one monster that was a horrifically difficult fight for your party earlier in their career? The one they only managed to kill by the wizard desperately firing off his crossbow and rolling a nat 20? Now that the PCs are several levels higher than that monster, have them encounter 2-3 of those guys. The memory of how hard the monster was will likely cause them to take the battle much more seriously, even if individually the monsters pose little threat to them now.
Dotting.
This is an awesome thread indeed! :)
Dot!