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This might be a bit of a narrow thread. And anyone in my game who might be on this forum, should immediately close this thread right now. Else I shall be quite cross.
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Alright. The question I have for you folks out there is basically this. I'm working on developing what is essentially a daily encounter (party is mostly fresh and ready), that I plan to provide them with all their necessary dangerous nutritional requirements in one big climactic event.
The details: The enemy of the party is currently working on attempting to contain a minor godling for their insidious purposes. To affect this, they have found a location keyed in with the godling's initial creation. This area has a dimensional anchor effect that coats it, which they plan to use to contain her (while also limiting their escape options) but the anchor doesn't stop summons (or gates).
They've enlisted a paladin, who they bluffed into believing he was serving the Big Good deity of the world by containing said god. Also, as the entire area is infused to the gills with evil energy, detect evil isn't really useful for narrowing down inspection of people. The paladin's presence however has resulted in our bad guys, who are mostly fiendish, having to disguise themselves as clerics of a good deity (meaning that some of the bigger scarier fiends are out), and no gating in pals, or teleporting away.
The encounter will occur in the containment room, which is about 360' by 360' area, with some sections having given way to a lava pool about 80 feet below (uncomfortably hot, but not actively damaging).
Now, Before I get into the baddies..the PCs are composed of the following.
All 14th level
Cleric , anti-undead and healing focus, spellcasting focused. Has holy word memorized and holy smites. Sun and Weather domains.
Paladin , melee focused, armed with a +2 holy, neutral outsider bane longsword.
Barbarian , armed with a keen falchion which through barbarian falderal he can get up to a +5 equivalency for DR bypassing purposes. Also he has a shocking glaive +1 as a back up. Superstitious rage power.
Wizard Admixture school. Sits heavy on the bone shatters and evocation spells. Has permanenced arcane sight and see invis. Wearing a roboe of the archmage, spell pen and greater spell pen. (Has SR, Robe of Archmagi)
Rogue Scout type. Armed with lawful outsider bane elven curve blade. Has a wonderous item that lets him true see for a few rounds a day. Has SR (drow). Rogue tricks boost his AC and rob AoOs from those he hits.
Bard Reach fighter, through various banners, feats and items, is capable of giving a +6 to hit and damage for allies in 30, and +3/+4 for those outside.
Summoner Usually the dimension door taxi (no go in the dimensionally anchored area). Loves bralani azatas and huge elementals. Tends to not bother with the eidolon, instead calling in a lot of outside help (I was planning on not limiting his ability to pull stuff), has summon eidolon spell, and has enhanced summoning (natch).
The planned opposition (who know the heroes are coming):
The ‘Bosses’:
14th level Wizard (admixture). An evocation specialist with ray specializations and an enjoyment for enervate and prismatic spells. Doesn’t worry about dying, has clone back ups. Invisible.
14th level dwarven Ranger (non-evil), with boon companion allosaurus, two-handed weapon specialization. Favored enemy types are not represented in the party. Starts hidden.
2 Handmaiden Devils (CR 14), disguised as clerics with aid of alter self, will drop if necessary.
2 12 headed pyrohydras.
The complications:
12th level Wizard (enchanter), big on dominates and support enchantments. Disguised as the ‘big good,’ the paladin (below) thinks he’s working for. Will likely cast invisibility first off.
3 Erinyes Monk 6s (zen archers) (CR 13 each) who will play keep away and flurry with their bows at soft targets as they present themselves.
1 paladin, 11th level (in the front line) (CR 10), mostly to cause the party some amount of confusion or difficulty vis-à-vis attempting to not kill the schlub. He’s armed with a holy merciful greatsword. Doesn't want to kill the party.
Juvenile Blue Dragon (capable of alter self chicanery), operating against her will due to hypnotic suggestions. Not evil aligned. (CR 10) Doesn't want to get hurt. Is motivated by fear of her controllers (the boss of the two wizards above).
Trio of Scheming Fencers (CR 10).
The meat:
15 or so bog-standard standard Erinyes (CR 8), whose only reasonable methods for causing harm is entangles or unholy blights.
Now my questions are..
Am I being way too hard for this (its meant to be an epic encounter, so I pegged as being like ECL 22 round abouts), or am I perhaps being too easy?
Any removals?
Tweaks?
Suggestions?
Thanks in advance guys.
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Most of the erinyes are disguised as clerics. Admittedly, its going to be tricky for the facade to remain once unholy blights start getting slung.
Also keep in mind, Erinyes look like angels insofar as being winged humanoids.
The dragon again will also be one of those 'its blue, you dingbat' moments for the PCs to use against the pally.
So if they can convince the Paladin he is working for the wrong side, it is really a party of 8?
Right, but I mean, in this fight, they can steal one man from the other team to join them, if they can convince him he has been doing wrong.
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I don't usually like to follow up a post of mine with a post of mine, but I figured I'd give a bit of an AAR.
I changed out a lot of the bog-standard erinyes for 2 hamatulas and a flock of lemures.
The fight took about 3-4 rounds total, and about 2-3 hours to resolve.
Round 1 had the paladin making a heroic plea based on the removal of some illusion spells, and after winning a diplomacy vs bluff duel with the disguised Handmaiden Devil, the NPC paladin flipped to the allied side.
Round 1:
The paladin PC ate a ton of arrows, a bite from a lead bladed viridium mouthed allosaur animal companion, blue dragon lightning and unpleasant spell effects. The enemy mage got faerie fired. One of the hydras got dead thanks to a summoned earth elemental and a bone shatter spell. The bard nearly got wrecked by unholy blight, blue dragon lightning, a fireball spell, and being disintergrated. The bard did 'disarm' the allosaur thanks to the critical hits deck and getting a lucky pull for disabling bite attacks.
Round 2:
The allosaurus fell. The lemures ceased to be. The summoner sussed out the phrasing to turn off the blue dragon's 'programming' and get it to go non-hostile, he switched out the elementals for bralani and proceeded to rip into the bog-standard erinyes and vaporize the hamatulas (bralani and their scimitars are absolutely terrifying against guys with DR/good). Paladin ran around. Enemy mages continued to cause trouble with fireballs on the still packed PCs. Bard ran away to cower in a corner since he was at single digit hp. Enemy Ranger got shut down by the rogue. PC mage succeeded in boneshattering the remaining pyrohydra, exhausting it.
Round 3: Hydra got mopped up. Barbarian knocked himself unconscious trying to kill the ranger (crit fumble deck). Summoner switched out bralani for lillend azatas to heal the bard. Rogue, thanks to his tricks was at a ridiculously high AC against the ranger. Ranger tried to step away and light a smokestick for cover, thanks to step up, he didn't get away from the rogue. As situation was devolving due to story issues (the god containment thing was getting dodgy), the mage ran out into the open. Handmaiden Devil attempts to charm the rogue, rogue, chortling about slippery mind, makes the save anyway. Everyone gets shot by arrows.
Round 4: Enemy Ranger hits the dirt when the lillends are moved to assist the rogue. NPC Paladin and Dragon get attacked, blue dragon reciprocates by flying over and whacking the enemy mage (other enemy mage dead due to untimely arrival of outside enemy). One handmaiden devil moves forward, attempts to charm the most heavilly armed member of the party (the pc paladin), PC paladin gives her the finger, being immune to charm compulsion effects. Mage enacts his plan to defeat the containent ritual, by casting anti-magic field on himself and then advises the other players to re-enact Ender's Game and cover him as they charge at the containment spell.
Round 5: Bolloxed by the anti-magic spell, enemy mage focuses on the NPCpaladin and the dragon, cold ice striking them. They survive, the NPC paladin knocks her out with his merciful greatsword. Mage eats many, many, many composite longbow shots from surviving Erinyes. Lillends out for bralani again. Monk-Erinyes dispatch most of the bralani by burning chi. Paladin holy smites a handmaiden devil.
Round 6: Mage rushes over, disrupts containment. Dimensional anchor effect on field disappears. Devils bug out. Handmaiden Devil #2 gets totaled by the PC paladin and is killed before she can withdraw. Ranger gets coup de gras'd as he auto-stablized.
End effect:
PC Party: Heavily injured paladin, bard, cleric, mage and barbarian. Uninjured summoner. Beaten, bloodied and feeling quite satisfied.
Enemies: In retreat. Ranger dead. Animal companion dead. One mage dead. One unconscious (and kept that way as she's known user of clones). Both pyrohydras dead. Most fiends, survived.
All in all, it actually worked for providing a challenging encounter. Having the rogue spot the ranger, and then charge him though rendered him moot. The gravity bow and lead blade enchantments were ridiculously good force multipliers on the enemies.
Locking the heroes in a corner while they dealt with the pyrohydras caused them concern because they 1.) Couldn't leave with the hydras there and 2.) Couldn't kill the hydras before the mages started enfilading them.
The summoner really, really, made it an easier fight for the PCs (Earth elemental line backers, back up healers, and bralani strike troops.)