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Obviously the way to kill the tarrasque is to simply force it to admit it was wrong
about anything
Have you seen my INT score? I'm never wrong' I'm too stupid to be wrong; I'm incapable of grasping the concept.
Besides, that's how you beat an Inevitable, not a tarrasque...
Enlarge Person reduces your AC, but I wouldn't call it an "attack".
My dex based magus would most certainly consider Enlarge Person an attack. For the same reason he considers Reduce Person a buff. A THF barbarian may view the spells differently.
If the recipient does not want the size increase, it is an attack.
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Stop being an ass. Andrew was responding to the claim that Big T is hard to imprison.
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If you execute the Tarrasque with one of the Final Blades, that might do it (GM willing). Of course, getting one to the other would be the tricky part.
Though, since they just bind the victim's soul for a potential length of time, that might just end up being another delaying tactic.
Is it rules as written that temporal statis allows a subject to continue benefiting from spell effects. The spell description says conditions continue but it doesnt mention spells remaining in play for ever...?
In which you have 24 hours of secrecy.
I agree if you allow players access to all spells and all items at will then the creature isnt a challenge. If you allow players to craft characters at high levels specifically for the challenge then the Tarrasque is easy.
I'm not sure most PCs would chose imprisonment as one of their 9th level spells though considering it is ususally a terrible spell that means you lose the defeated creatures equipment.
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If by that you mean 3 spells, a couple of feats and basic high level gear then yes it is very easy to dispose of because it does none of the things which high CR threats need to be actually threatening.Andrew is right, the Tarrasque is easy to kill, I mean if you can kill it, it is easy to kill, right, I mean if your AC is 57, or, you know, you are incorporeal, and you've prepared the right spells, abilities, and, um, all the other things you need
It is easy to kill it
Except, nobody really knows how to do that.
You're right, killing the tarrasque is easy. All it takes is a spell like phantasmal killer. or any other instant-kill death spell. And hoping it fails the fortitude save. Which by no means is certain. In fact with a +31 to fort saves, it's probably not going to happen.
So, what else can you try? Most damaging spells are flat out. It's immune to ray, line, and cone effects. It's also immune to magic missile. Worse yet, the magic missile or whatever ray, line, or cone effect you used is going to bounce back and hit you instead a third of the time.
Crowd control spells? Sure, so long as it's not a ray, cone, or line effect. Physical effects that rely on fortitude saves almost always wont work. Reflex saves likely wont work. Will saves, sure? They'll have a decent chance to work. But those wont generally kill it. Oh, what level are you? You also need to get past it's spell resistance.
So physical damage it is. Does your weapon have at least +6 worth of enchantments on it? If not you deal 15 points less damage with every attack. It's also healing 40 points every single round. Is the party able to deal 41 damage every round at minimum? Maybe, maybe not. But every time you fail to deal that much damage in a round, some of your hard work gets negated.
Let's say you get the tarrasque down to -34 hit points without a Death Attack. Guess what, it's not dead. In fact, it'll be back on it's feat the next round with 6 hit points. Killing it with a Death Attack gives you 3 rounds to figure out how to remove the threat. More if people can consistently deal 12 damage every round. But after a while the fatigue rules will start to kick in on whoever is ensuring it stays dead.
Better hope you didn't disintegrate it either, cause then you can't prevent it from coming back to life after 3 rounds.
THIS is what makes it so dangerous.
There's stronger things out there in the bestiaries. There's nastier threats the GM can pull out. The tarrasque is known for killing kingdoms every time it awakens because whatever you do, it just keeps coming back. Banishing it to another plane ends the threat, but is still a temporary solution. In-game, people who know of the tarrasque think it's dead, killed long ago.
But it's not dead. It's just hibernating after returning from where ever it was sent. The lovecraft quote is perfect for the tarrasque. For every campaign where the players manage to defeat the tarrasque, you need to remember that years, centuries, or maybe even eons later it WILL be back.
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Well, yeah. The unkillable kingdom destroying monster that's smart enough to use tactics and that goes after those who actually DO pose a threat to it first has a scary reputation. Especially since no matter what anyone has tried, it keeps coming back.
Okay now, step back and stop looking at the problem from a metagame perspective. Look at it from your wizard's perspective. Using the things you (the wizard) actually knows, or can learn about the tarrasque (which may not be much if it's not been seen in hundreds or a thousand years) how do you face this threat. It's already wiped out half the kingdom. There was a group of adventurers who claimed they killed it a few months back, but it's still out there. Argosox the Insane actually managed to get the damn thing with the sphere of annihilation last year. But the tarrasque is still tearing through the kingdom. Oh, and when last you faced it, your magic missile spell actually bounced off the damn thing's skin, striking you instead.
What does your wizard do?
And remember, this is using ONLY what your wizard could know. Not player knowledge of it's stat block. Not player knowledge of it's strengths and weaknesses. Just what your wizard can legitimately know or find out.
They used an Instant Fortress protected by the Lyre of Building to choke it out, severed the spine along the neck in two place, Decomposed corpse and waited 80 minutes. The segment severed limb rule of 1 hour can not be re attached coupled with the separation of the head and lungs. Regeneration defeated, Tarrasque defeated.
You know one fact for passing +1 for every 5 you beat the DC, not all its weaknesses and strengths. The tarrasque has a LOT of immunities and strengths. I would give the most known first the most obscure last. That said it should be reasonable to research how the tarrasque can be killed - via quest - not through a basic knowledge check.
Regarding mind blank stasis. Time ceases to flow for the creature but it doesn't say that happens for the spell effects. Is there any example of a creature in temporal stasis awakening with spell effects active? Just interested as that seems to be an assumption that is being made. To me if the spell is suspended then it isn't working. You seem to be suggesting the spell has been suspended and is yet still having its effect. That is contradictory to me.
I have just seen that all the points being raised here about animated dead and plane shifting have already been raised in an identical thread two years ago with an equally inconclusive result.
As the description of the way the Tarrasques regeneration works is contradictory it will come down to a GMs decision. As I believe it was always intended to.
Don't worry though because if your GMs know their players, those of you who are adamant that an animate dead spell stops it in its tracks will either never have to face the thing as your GM will know how much you gimmick not working will peeve you off. Or he will rule that it does work in which case you can sleep happily knowing you easily defeated a tarrasque.
Either way, other GMs will reach a reasonable assumption that the method of defeating the creature is part of a story arc that can involve one of the useful solutions suggested in the thread.
As we are all just mouthing words that have been said by other people I will happily call it a night. Sleep well.
Just regarding that example.
Interestingly the contingency isn't actually a raw use of the spell as the dispel magic shouldn't be able to distinguish between spells on his person but hey ho, he's a Runelord and the adventures writer can make what ever he likes happens to my mind! Interesting example though.
It's difficult to make hard and fast judgements regarding the stasis spell. In fact that example makes me more likely to think spells don't get maintained, only conditions, without some external source.
I'll raise it as a separate thread.
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While this may be the hype the reality is that any world with vaguely competent high level spell casters has little to nothing to fear from this big stupid brute.
What the Tarrasque has it seems is really good PR.
Who you callin stupid, bub? Them's fightin words, them is! Why, I oughtta.... Well, OK, I gotta give you that one. I ain't known for brains, that's for sure.
What's this "PR" you speak of?
Poison Resistance? Right-E-O, I got the best Poison Resistance ever: I'm immune!
Permanent Regeneration? Yeah, man, it's right there in my stat block.
Performance Rating? Why yes, I do have a great performance rating. I've killed thousands of adventurers vs. well, no deaths. Well, none that stuck. That's, well, like, 7,344 to 0. I'd say that's an amazing performance rating.
Prison Rep? Yeah, I'm the yard boss. That's me. Until I eat the walls and wander off.
Paladin Regurgitation? Nah, I keep em down.
Proliferation Rate? Nope, me and Mrs. Tarrasque use the rhythm method.
Pachycephalosaurus Rotisserie? How'd you know? I just bought that? Did you hack my Amazon account?
Puerto Rico? I don't even know what that is...
Pounce Range? You're right about that, too. I can pounce 150' and still C H O M P ! ! ! the daylights out of you!
Here, watch...
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If you want to make it hard to reawaken/call the Tarrasque, stick him in an water dominant, dead magic demiplane.
The Tarrasque can hibernate until someone manages to locate and free it without using magic. Though, as a plot device, it's still not a permanent solution.
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Well said Terquem.
I think it strains credibility when players insist one shot items like 9th level spell scrolls are freely available in even small cities despite wizards of the right level to cast them being relatively rare. Instead these are guidelines as specified in the core Rulebook to help the DM decide what items are available.
If the story requires a quest to find the scroll of imprisonment to defeat the Tarrasque, all to the good - that is adventure. If the wizard teleports to one of hundreds of small cities and buys one in about 2 hours thus completing the quest, then something is being lost from the game.
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When you have access to the entire multiverse, finding something as cheap as a 9th level scroll is simply a matter of time. Unless you are removing the outer planes and locations similar to the City of Brass. (In Reign of Winter, we actually have a planar merchant that hunts down the items we request. The GM gets to say how long it takes for him to come back and is a useful plot device, but it's a published example of PCs being able to access high level resources.)
Hehehehe, you silly adventurers. You forgot a very, very, very important point. You always do.
I have more magic items than you. I am higher on the Wealth-by-Level chart, and I have the Wisdom to know that I need to use them. Even better, I NEVER have to go shopping. Over the centuries, countless tasty treats have showed up on my doorstep and fed themselves to me, and those yummy snacks have always had a pile of magic items. Every one of those would-be tarrasque hunters was loaded with a veritable Christmas tree of magic items and I've taken my pick over the centuries.
OK, OK, I'm not so good with reading scrolls or using wands (except when I swallow them whole!!!) and I've never found a magic sword that's better than my own armored teeth, but I have tons of other useful tricks. Ever seen a tarrasque on a flying carpet? Weeeeeeeee!!!!
I have 217 rings of invisibility. I only ever wear one of them, of course; I had a jeweler in some village I ate weld the other 216 of them into a charm bracelet for Mrs. Tarrasque (right before I ate him). I have a +5 Cape of Free Will and a +6 Headband of Mental Superiority. I have a necklace of continuous Prismatic Sphere and wear a belt of continuous Dimensional Anchor.
If you can name a magic item you don't want me to have, I have it.
So bring it adventurers, come to me. I hunger!
Plane shift the big T to a dangerous plane of existence? (Negative energy plane for example). Well,he is not dead but he is not 'chomping' villages either.
Direct him to a "does a paladin fall" thread and wait for him to kill himself?
Direct him to a "does a paladin fall" thread and wait for him to kill himself?
It would not kill the Tarrasque, just make him wish for the good old days where he was merely banished to the Positive Material Plane.
I went to one of those threads once. But I misread the title. I thought it said "Does a paladin fill?".
17 paladins later, I still wasn't full, so the answer is no.
It's interesting how often this topic comes back. Almost as often as I come back...
Here's one of my favorites: Tarrasque dressup.
I think it strains credibility when players insist one shot items like 9th level spell scrolls are freely available in even small cities despite wizards of the right level to cast them being relatively rare. Instead these are guidelines as specified in the core Rulebook to help the DM decide what items are available.The only person making reference to level 9 spell scrolls is you with your reference to Rovagug cultists having access to freedom spells. Wizards get two free spells at level up and Sorcerers don't care about scrolls. You wouldn't use a scroll on him anyway, the DC would only be 23 although amusingly it would still have a 50/50 chance of affecting him if you got through the SR.
Not true quite true Andrew, as the freedom scroll was in response to the imprisonment spell scroll the PC wizard had miraculously found in his local cash and carry magic mart. Imprisonment is not a common spell pick for one of the six free spells you get because it results in tasty magic loot being buried underground.
The game doesn't make assumptions about magic item availability at level 17+. The game breaks down rather spectacularly after level 15. However players theorycrafting threads like his do frequently assume that every magic item every written is theirs by divine right.
It isn't homebrew - it is written in black and white in the core rule book that the settlement purchasing rules are guidelines to help DMs determine what is available. "Guidelines" not rules. Google the difference.
This used to be a perfectly good thread about how many adventurers I get to eat - why is it devolving into settlement building rules?
Where are the settlement eating rules, hmmmm???
Or, at least build your settlements with lots of frosting. And yummy dwarves. Frosted dwarves. Delish!
Hehehehe, you silly adventurers. You forgot a very, very, very important point. You always do.
I have more magic items than you. I am higher on the Wealth-by-Level chart, and I have the Wisdom to know that I need to use them. Even better, I NEVER have to go shopping. Over the centuries, countless tasty treats have showed up on my doorstep and fed themselves to me, and those yummy snacks have always had a pile of magic items. Every one of those would-be tarrasque hunters was loaded with a veritable Christmas tree of magic items and I've taken my pick over the centuries.
OK, OK, I'm not so good with reading scrolls or using wands (except when I swallow them whole!!!) and I've never found a magic sword that's better than my own armored teeth, but I have tons of other useful tricks. Ever seen a tarrasque on a flying carpet? Weeeeeeeee!!!!
I have 217 rings of invisibility. I only ever wear one of them, of course; I had a jeweler in some village I ate weld the other 216 of them into a charm bracelet for Mrs. Tarrasque (right before I ate him). I have a +5 Cape of Free Will and a +6 Headband of Mental Superiority. I have a necklace of continuous Prismatic Sphere and wear a belt of continuous Dimensional Anchor.
If you can name a magic item you don't want me to have, I have it.
So bring it adventurers, come to me. I hunger!
Now that is a scary thought!
Get on top of the Tarrasque, lay a bunch of portable holes on her. Have some flying creature start dropping bags of holding into the portable holes. Or was it the other way around. Well which ever way gets everything in a 10ft radius teleported to the astral plane do that.
Get on top of the Tarrasque, lay a bunch of portable holes on her. Have some flying creature start dropping bags of holding into the portable holes. Or was it the other way around. Well which ever way gets everything in a 10ft radius teleported to the astral plane do that.
On her? ON HER???
Now you're messing with Mrs. Tarrasque. I'm the nice one, she's the vicious one.
Once she regenerates those dimples you gave her, and ridiculous expense I might add, she's gonna... Damn, I can't bear to watch...
If there is a Mrs., does that mean we can be expecting a clutch of unkillable eggs soon?
The fact that there is a Mrs. makes me sad. Tarrasque mitosis is my favorite Tarrasque breeding method and Rovagug had to go and ruin it for me (unless Mr./Mrs. Tarrasque is a clone that just happens to be wearing a girdle of opposite gender, then all is right with the world again).