Im looking for possible PC Killer encounters most APs have one or two that are an extreme challenge how they are set up and have a good possibility of a TPK.
I have read the first three books and none jumped out at me but I have missed things before.
Hellion is pretty brutal, the double initiative kills.
So far, none of my PCs have died, so no foes were proven deadly.
Hetuath, the four-armed kasatha juju zombie fighter in Fires of Creation, did leave one unconscious and dying on the floor, but he was healed in time.
Kulgara, the chainsaw-wielding orc barbarian in Lords of Rust satisfyingly sent the overconfident fighter in the party running, after carving away most of his hit points in one round. The gunslinger and bloodrager teamed up in full battlefield control mode to take her down and they finished with just a few hp left themselves.
My party was unprepared for the Cloudkill spells of Furkas Xoud, the human ghost wizard technomancer in The Choking Tower. It would have taken out their NPC hireling except by sheer luck he was a few steps behind the party. The second time, one PC hid underwater in the bathtub in room F24, Ornate Bath Chamber, to avoid it.
The damaged annihilator robot in Valley of the Brain Collectors was a dangerous and memorable challenge, but the party had prepared for it.
My party avoided the worst challenges of the last two modules, until the battle against Unity's Avatar in the Godmind. They had come to the Godmind at 15th level by a non-canon path, and Unity manifested as a non-advanced solar angel augmented by Unity's own spell list. Combat lasted about 25 rounds, with the gunslinger keeping Unity confused via her Targeting deed, endlessly repeatable due to Signature Deed, while the rest of the party took down Unity's minions. They still have not yet faced the Overlord Robot.
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The fight with Unity's robot body in the last module killed half the party, and nearly killed three quarters of it. They shut down the other robots in the room, had a good plan to keep control of the battle...and then the Unity got a nat 20 with his vorpal weapon in the first round, and the bloodrager's head was gone.
The party was like "well that's not good, but we can still pull out of this..." and then the vigilante got vorpal-ed two rounds later. With the party down to half their members, they were going to grab the bodies and retreat so they could get their friends resurrected (which I was going to let them do, since Unity seemed like the type to just gloat at them as they fled)...but then they realized that Unity was actually pretty hurt. The psychic told the ranger to leave with the bodies and he'd be right behind him.
He was not.
He was, however, dropping the remainder of their cylex at his own feet, arcing a bit of lightning between himself and Unity, and staring Unity right in the robot eyes as everything blew up. Unity took a ton of damage, and the psychic survived with single-digit hp.
Upon hearing the explosion, the ranger booked it back into the room and managed to help finish Unity off.
And that's the second half of the reason I am no longer allowed to use vorpal weapons while playing Pathfinder. :-)
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The Blindheim early in book 1 can be nasty. As written it appears you need to save every round to avoid going blind for an hour. Poorly written monster.
Hethuath can be problematic because the juju zombie template adds so many different defenses. Doable for 2H warriors but horrible for many other builds. And if he respawns when the party is retreating from a hard day of exploring further down in the dungeon, it can be nasty.
Hellion is pretty angry, especially if the party doesn't bring adamantine weapons. I advise not letting his two turns bump into each other. Even if the party does stupid things like delay/ready in such a way that his initiatives end up next to each other. Taking two full turns in a row enables him to run around the party and then full attack squishies before anyone can do anything.
I'm on book 3 now. Only 2 deaths.
1-Kulgra chainsaw crit (BOOK2)
2-Warden Robot (BOOK3)
The dark folk in Hellion's lair will eviscerate anyone not ready for deeper darkness and who tries to fight anyway. They can usually be avoided, though.
Any fight with confusion (which Hellion has, also the yangethes from book 4), can turn from a throw-away fight into half the party dead.
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Hellions confusion spell made the grey ooze in the sacrificial dump pit far more dangerous. I wanted to have Hellion use the spell up before they encountered him, if he used that in his fight, it would have been a tpk.
Two of the four failed the save, the barbarian and the bard. The bard kept smacking himself and the barbarian would switch from babbling to acting normally. Fortunately, the ooze was not too dangerous and the party survived, though not without some pain and humility.
Otherwise, the blindhiem and the kathasa juju zombie were pretty tough, the barbarian wasted a crit which would have one shot the poor alien because they all failed the religion check and the picture did not look very undead. They wanted to capture the alien alive, he was not happy to hear his amazing damage had no effect.
The kathasa juju zombie were pretty tough, the barbarian wasted a crit which would have one shot the poor alien because they all failed the religion check and the picture did not look very undead. They wanted to capture the alien alive, he was not happy to hear his amazing damage had no effect.
Zombies are not immune to critical
Zombies are not immune to critical
The kathasa juju zombie were pretty tough, the barbarian wasted a crit which would have one shot the poor alien because they all failed the religion check and the picture did not look very undead. They wanted to capture the alien alive, he was not happy to hear his amazing damage had no effect.
But they are immune to subdual damage. (They were trying to capture it alive.)
Oh I see I missed that part.
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I realized I never wrote non lethal damage there, but Lord Fyre was correct.
After a few more books, Xoud was pretty tough between incorporeal, a ring of fire resist to ignore most of the parties lasers, and his ring of force fang to block magic missiles. The bard failed his saves vs phantasmal killer after a couple rounds and dropped dead. The thought harvester went down fast when the barbarian critted with a chainsaw so that helped the fight a bit.
Book 4 has the Mi-Go, while not exactly dangerous, they are obnoxious to fight. Immune or resistant to most energy types the party uses, flight, and darkness spells mixed with superior vision makes them truly difficult to hurt. It made my players completely skip the Fungal caves sections.
Tonight starts the broken annihilator fight, I suspect this could be dangerous.
This AP has been the deadliest I've ever run. 15 permanent PC deaths in a six person party and they're in the back 1/3rd of book 4.
In book 2 had a kineticist (pyro) suicide himself to kill Marrow, the leader of the Smilers. A Gunslinger (Techslinger) accidentally killed himself with grenades trying to take out the Rhu-Chalik. Kulgara killed a Barbarian and a Brawler with her suicide plasma grenade. Hellion literally ripped a Fighter (Cyber Soldier), and a Samurai in half.
In book 3 Xoud nuked a Necromancer and the Bloodrager with a Fireball after opening his Eversmoking Bottle. Xoud later took out an Oracle with Cloudkill. They tried to recruit Ilarris because they had successfully recruited Sanvil in book 1. She turned on them in the malfunctioning android foundry and using she Wand of Lightening Bolt fried the party's Alchemist and another Samurai.
Now in book 4 the Colour Out of Space disintegrated a Rogue, another Samurai, and a Cleric in an almost TPK. This most recent death was the Vigilante going down to the Pale Stranger.
They most recently almost died to the Shipmind, and again to the damaged Annihilator Robot. They start the Dominion Hive proper next week. I'm expecting more deaths.
This AP has been the deadliest I've ever run. 15 permanent PC deaths in a six person party and they're in the back 1/3rd of book 4.
... They start the Dominion Hive proper next week. I'm expecting more deaths.
They will be so dead. The ugothokras in the next room, M3 Incubator, were rough on my party and that party survived all the other threats that killed PCs in Bahamut's game.
My party avoided Marrow, leader of the Smilers, when they rescued Wiskifiss from the Smilers. Afterwards, Marrow called together a dozen Smilers and attacked Dinvaya's Clockwork Chapel where the party lived. But Boffin, the party's gadgeteer gunslinger, had stolen the Smiler's laser rifle turret and installed it at the Clockwork Chapel. Area control effects, such as web, from the magus and skald did the rest.
At 12th level they grappled the Rhu-Chalik and put it in a cage in a portable hole. They had ignored the Rhu-Chalik in Lords of Rust but returned for it after learning of the Dominion threat in Valley of the Brain Collectors.
Kulgara almost killed the fighter in one round, so the bloodrager Val and gadgeteer Boffin teamed up for continuous battlefield control that left the chainsaw-wielding orc unable to attack. The suicide grenade took the party down to single-digit hit points, but they were still on their feet.
Against Hellion, Boffin made a technology knowledge check and realized that Hellion was enhanced. She leaped on it to open a control panel and pull out the memory facets while it engaged the fighter. That debuffed its attacks enough to give them an advantage.
As for facing Xoud's Cloudkills, yes, that was rough and I described it last year in an earlier comment.
My party did not recruit Ilarris, but they thought that Seerath was a reincarnation of Casandalee and assumed she was friendly. That was very similar. Seerath played along until she had a good opportunity for a death attack. She was almost ready for a death attack against the magus when the magus renewed his Mirror Image spell and she realized she had too high a chance of attacking a decoy image. She switched to the bloodrager and hit with the death attack. I checked the NPC bloodrager's character sheet for defenses, and spotted Uncanny Dodge, which nullified the sneak attack against flatfooted necessary for the death attack. I had forgotten about that and was embarrassed at having outsmarted myself. I roleplayed that Seerath had never encountered a barbarian or bloodrager before.
My party had enough strange attacks, such as the skald's Lesser Spirit Totem enabled for everyone by Inspired Rage song, to defeat the Colour out of Space before it switched from feed attack to disintegrate attack. Hyrsek Caio had allied with the party and he expressed amazement at their tactics.
Boffin shot the guns out of the Pale Stranger's hands while two party members flanked him via a Burrow spell. Yep, the undead gunslinger was defeated in a gunfight.
They skipped the decomposing dropship and never encountered the Shipmind.
Their ally Isuma had warned them about the damaged Annihilator Robot. Boffin tried an autojack, but it failed. So the fighter Kheld's wizard cohort put up a wall of force to cripple the robot's attacks and movement yet leave Kheld an avenue of attack. Other party members had laser pistols. Lasers go through a wall of force but plasma beams don't.
For Bahamut's party next week, the ugothokras' flechette spray deals massive damage. It also carries viral infection that in Flesh Ripen mode does Con damage. We had enough high-Fortitude party members that made their saving throw that the skald could cast Remove Disease on the rest via spell kenning, but that was luck. That was the main reason the primalist bloodrager later took Renewed Vitality as her 12th-level rage power for resistance against ability damage (they were behind a level due to skipping many enounters in Valley of the Brain Collectors).
My players are masters of planning, teamwork, and battlefield control. They think out of the box so much I don't think the box is in the room anymore.
P.S. In last year's comment, I said that they had not battled the Overlord Robot yet. They ended up compromising with it by using the Divinity Drive to go to Androffa. My games get weird.
This AP has been the deadliest I've ever run. 15 permanent PC deaths in a six person party and they're in the back 1/3rd of book 4.
In book 2 had a kineticist (pyro) suicide himself to kill Marrow, the leader of the Smilers. A Gunslinger (Techslinger) accidentally killed himself with grenades trying to take out the Rhu-Chalik. Kulgara killed a Barbarian and a Brawler with her suicide plasma grenade. Hellion literally ripped a Fighter (Cyber Soldier), and a Samurai in half.
In book 3 Xoud nuked a Necromancer and the Bloodrager with a Fireball after opening his Eversmoking Bottle. Xoud later took out an Oracle with Cloudkill. They tried to recruit Ilarris because they had successfully recruited Sanvil in book 1. She turned on them in the malfunctioning android foundry and using she Wand of Lightening Bolt fried the party's Alchemist and another Samurai.
Now in book 4 the Colour Out of Space disintegrated a Rogue, another Samurai, and a Cleric in an almost TPK. This most recent death was the Vigilante going down to the Pale Stranger.
They most recently almost died to the Shipmind, and again to the damaged Annihilator Robot. They start the Dominion Hive proper next week. I'm expecting more deaths.
Do you have any house rules that make things more deadly or are they behind level because of 6 players? How are your stats generated?
Do you have any house rules that make things more deadly or are they behind level because of 6 players? How are your stats generated?This AP has been the deadliest I've ever run. 15 permanent PC deaths in a six person party and they're in the back 1/3rd of book 4.
In book 2 had a kineticist (pyro) suicide himself to kill Marrow, the leader of the Smilers. A Gunslinger (Techslinger) accidentally killed himself with grenades trying to take out the Rhu-Chalik. Kulgara killed a Barbarian and a Brawler with her suicide plasma grenade. Hellion literally ripped a Fighter (Cyber Soldier), and a Samurai in half.
In book 3 Xoud nuked a Necromancer and the Bloodrager with a Fireball after opening his Eversmoking Bottle. Xoud later took out an Oracle with Cloudkill. They tried to recruit Ilarris because they had successfully recruited Sanvil in book 1. She turned on them in the malfunctioning android foundry and using she Wand of Lightening Bolt fried the party's Alchemist and another Samurai.
Now in book 4 the Colour Out of Space disintegrated a Rogue, another Samurai, and a Cleric in an almost TPK. This most recent death was the Vigilante going down to the Pale Stranger.
They most recently almost died to the Shipmind, and again to the damaged Annihilator Robot. They start the Dominion Hive proper next week. I'm expecting more deaths.
I don't have any special house rules, and I've been adjusting encounters to they'll gain the proper amount of xp. They have 2 helper NPCs as well, Sanvil and Isuma. I have them generate stats 4d6 drop the lowest.
My deadliest encounters were Sanvil in book 1. If he gets the help of the Skulks or any mooks he can be really tough. I pulled a Duse Ex in favor of my players when they fought him because it was almost a TPK and had Kohnirr whom the party already saved saw Sanvil enter the caves but hesitated going in because what happened to him down there. But worked up the courage since one of the players is an adopted daughter. He came in and fireballed Sanvil and all the Skulks and the party Vigilante Coup de Grace'd Sanvil while he was unconscious in spite.
In book 2 the falling portcullis at Aldronards Grave trapped the Vigilante and a smiler got a maxed pistol crit on them while he was still trapped.
Finally maybe not deadly but very annoying as the party at that level has no access to restoration at that level took some decent Con damage from the wraith in the haunted wreck. When they finished him off I just dropped the Wil-o-Wisp encounter all together since they cleared the rest of the ship and it felt like a kick in the teeth at that point.
My deadliest encounters were Sanvil in book 1. If he gets the help of the Skulks or any mooks he can be really tough. I pulled a Duse Ex in favor of my players when they fought him because it was almost a TPK and had Kohnirr whom the party already saved saw Sanvil enter the caves but hesitated going in because what happened to him down there. But worked up the courage since one of the players is an adopted daughter. He came in and fireballed Sanvil and all the Skulks and the party Vigilante Coup de Grace'd Sanvil while he was unconscious in spite.
Really? On paper he doesn't seem all that dangerous.
My deadliest encounters were Sanvil in book 1. If he gets the help of the Skulks or any mooks he can be really tough. I pulled a Duse Ex in favor of my players when they fought him because it was almost a TPK and had Kohnirr whom the party already saved saw Sanvil enter the caves but hesitated going in because what happened to him down there. But worked up the courage since one of the players is an adopted daughter. He came in and fireballed Sanvil and all the Skulks and the party Vigilante Coup de Grace'd Sanvil while he was unconscious in spite.Really? On paper he doesn't seem all that dangerous.
So by himself he isn't too bad although Magus' are always pretty good at damage. What makes him tough is that he is smart and will never go it alone as the book suggests that he will try to make a deal either to get allies against the players or with the players. In this case he made a deal with the skulks to ambush the players as well as with one of the players who was evil and left the table so I made them an NPC so I had a 3rd level party of 5 vs. Sanvil, all 4 skulks and a 3rd level ex PC. The PC's were upset about the betrayal and were not willing to side with Sanvil. The party was also hit with this on their way out of the caves so were down some resources.
A previous time I ran book 1 the party followed up on a rumor of bandits outside of town and ran into a group of Ratfolk that Sanvil paid off to stop the party and that group actually captured him and put him under a quest to help rescue Kohnir. So I guess it matters what kind of help he has.
A previous time I ran book 1 the party followed up on a rumor of bandits outside of town and ran into a group of Ratfolk that Sanvil paid off to stop the party and that group actually captured him and put him under a quest to help rescue Kohnir. So I guess it matters what kind of help he has.
I think it may have had as much to do with the state of the PCs at that point. The combo of being low on resources and a traitor was what tipped the scales.
So far the deadliest encounter my PC's have faced is one of the final ones, Ophelia and her guards. I have a high-level party of gestalt characters, so I adjusted some things to make the fight a real challenge. Metweska was added since she had escaped the party earlier, and I gave Ophelia the Temporal Accelerator artifact (so this high level caster could cast up to 4 spells per round) while adjusting her spells a bit.
After a 5+ hour marathon of combat, the party was still standing, barely. I had managed to coup de grace the picaroon (it failed), knock unconscious the kineticist (he survived 3 harms in one round), severely level drained the cleric (14 negative levels and he still made most saves), took out the barbarian, and generally scared the **** out of the psychic warrior. Ophelia managed to cast every spell slot above 5th level and survived over a 1000 pts of damage (thank you quickened heal).
And to be safe, the party never did recover the Temporal Accelorator. Unity detonated a cranial bomb in Ophelia's head that just happened to destroy the artifact as well. Seems Unity was a bit miffed with Ophelia after granting her requested miracle . . . .