Advice on BBEG

[PowerOverwhelming]

Long and short of it, he's a human that has 6 levels in Monk and 4 in Shadowdancer. Since he's able to use Shadow Jump I gave him the Dimensional Dervish line. In addition he has Improved Grapple, Greater Grapple and Rapid Grapple and a +1 CR template of Devil-bound from Hellcat. He took QQ/4 Winds Monk for the Elemental Fist, Gaseous Form and Barkskin. He has some glammered monk's robes and appears as a simple thug or traveler.

Long and short of it all of his AC comes from Wisdom, Dex and non-armor sources. For spying on the party he'll jump shadows and use invisibility as the rogue trick. Or sometimes just send his summoned shadow to spy on them.

My plan is to sort of keep it a mystery from the group whether he's a Vampire or not. Since he's creating undead spawn, teleporting, gaseous form and using magics. He has the soul of a Lawful Evil duke in a soul gem that he keeps with him. On himself is a permancy'd misdirection spell to conceal his alignment. His true alignment is Chaotic Evil.

The purpose of misdirecting to Lawful Evil is that he's trying to gain the trust of a group of lower level PCs. They're in an evil campaign. He's manipulating them with promises of gold, influence and vampirism.

Any other ideas? (Don't expect many people to read that long-winded post... but thanks to anyone that does)

[ngc7293]

First off He's not a Monk as long as he's CE.

[Deadmanwalking]

ngc7293 wrote:

First off He's not a Monk as long as he's CE.

This is actually incorrect. Monks keep all powers when they switch Alignment...they just can't gain any more levels of Monk. He's had 4 levels of Shadowdancr to change.

[wraithstrike]

Shadow Jump does not qualify for the Dervish Line feats. You need abundant step or to actually be able to cast dimension door as a spell or SLA. Something working similar to DD does not make it DD. Abundant Step is specifically called out. That is why it qualifies.

[DualJay]

wraithstrike wrote:

Shadow Jump does not qualify for the Dervish Line feats. You need abundant step or to actually be able to cast dimension door as a spell or SLA. Something working similar to DD does not make it DD. Abundant Step is specifically called out. That is why it qualifies.

BBEG's dont have to be strictly RAW.

[ngc7293]

Deadmanwalking wrote:

ngc7293 wrote:

First off He's not a Monk as long as he's CE.

This is actually incorrect. Monks keep all powers when they switch Alignment...they just can't gain any more levels of Monk. He's had 4 levels of Shadowdancr to change.

That's what I meant. As long as he is CE, he can't go up in Monk levels; he isn't a monk anymore.

DualJay wrote:

BBEG's dont have to be strictly RAW.

There's RAW and there is making things up. I think I was a player that found this thing out, I wouldn't not be happy that the GM had played with the rules this much. If he stayed within the rules to make the BBEG, that's fine.

[Kenjishinomouri]

DualJay wrote:

BBEG's dont have to be strictly RAW.

There's RAW and there is making things up. I think I was a player that found this thing out, I wouldn't not be happy that the GM had played with the rules this much. If he stayed within the rules to make the BBEG, that's fine.

Why would you be mad? Shadow jump is actually a very weak use of the Dimensional dervish feat.

[Corvino]

Sounds quite flavorful, but he's unlikely to be able to take on the entire party solo unless he's a significantly higher level than them. The grapple specialisation makes him pretty single-target when compared to a caster BBEG, and while he has good saves and AC his offense will be fairly limited.

For a sneaky character like this a small army of mooks seems appropriate though.

[Duboris]

Making a grappler a boss only works if the "Boss" takes place against a very particular player who you've geared to fight him against especially.

I have access to all of my player's stats, and characters, so as a result I like to run tests against them to see how well things go, as well as start the fights with surprise rounds should they actually get one and whatnot. Grapplers are nice, don't get me wrong, but frankly nothing says "Quick, cling tenaciously to my loins." like grappling someone in the party.

It's like being a jocky in dead space. Sure you land on someone and start to rip their hair out, but you've got 3 other people with guns that don't feel the same way about you. Hell, you can't even use deflect arrows while grappling.

My advice would be to use something isn't exactly dervish. Abundant step is lovely, but at that level you have access to the world of spring attack, which is something a monk can most definitely benefit from.

Another thing to primarily worry about is terrain, and circumstance. Throwing just an enemy as a boss is always a relentless mistake that does nothing more than get your character gimped in the first 4 turns, no matter how cool they are.

He needs mooks. Monk 3 Ninja 1s with Basic NPC gold respectively, and that's assuming you want to bring the CR down a little of the individual bbeg. Make sure the fight takes place in an area that doesn't easily allow light, and to make matters even better, try to make the fight 3 dimensional so there's plenty of places to lose sight of him. A monk's mobility is his best friend, and he can fall a lot farther than they can without taking as much damage.