"Whomsoever draws one drop of my blood..."

[Douglas Muir 406]

"...he shall have whatever he wishes." That's taken from the webcomic Kill Six Billion Demons, which is excellent.

The speaker is the god-emperor Solomon David, one of seven former mortals who have attained divine status and who have divided the universe between them. The other demiurges have achieved their status in different ways -- treachery, cunning, the slow amassing of power over time. Solomon David got there by being the most supremely arrogant badass around. And now he periodically holds a tournament where the champion and victor can challenge him to personal combat. Beat him -- no, not beat him; just spill a single drop of his blood -- and you can have his godhood. He's so arrogantly confident that he doesn't believe anyone can do it. He's so arrogantly confident that he doesn't even use weapons or armor. (Okay, he's the greatest martial arts master in the universe, and also has a fragment of God embedded in his forehead.) In the K6BD universe, he is the test of the Starstone. No one has yet passed.

Okay, so: is there a way to translate this into PFRPG? With the right combination of spells, magic items, and maybe mythic ranks, can you give an NPC something like DR 30 against slashing and piercing damage? (We'll ignore bludgeoning and spell damage for now.) This doesn't have to be a permanent thing; at this level, combat is rocket tag, so a minute should be more than enough.

The tournament can be your standard Ruby Phoenix or whatever, but at the end a PC has the option of taking the prize or going double-or-nothing against the Divine Master. All you have to do is inflict 1 hp of slashing or piercing damage!

So, within RAW, how hard can we make this?

Doug M.

[Wonderstell]

Rogue Talent: Flensing Strike wrote:

Bleeding damage bypasses any damage reduction the creature might possess.

First of all, give him a (Cracked) Pearly White Spindle Ioun Stone to make him immune to bleed damage for 3,400 gp.

Which we'll implant in his forehead to keep the right aesthetic.

***

If DR 30 is to be enough against low-level creatures, you'd also need a way to make him immune to critical hits.
Consider a first level barbarian with a Greatsword and Power Attack.

+6 (2d6+9, 19-20/x2)

If that first-level barbarian crits (1/400, probably) he'll on average deal more than 30 dmg. And I do believe this god-emperor has been through more than 400 battles.

One level of Battle Host and the Fortified Armor Training feat would give you such immunity, or 20 levels of Aberrant Bloodline.

[the David]

I'd think step one would be getting a really high AC.
You can effectively get DR50 against a number of attacks per day. All you need is a character with 10 mythic tiers, the Guardian mythic path and to take Absorb Blow as your Guardian's Call. You can use mythic power (at least) 23 times per day at this point.
This apparently stacks with damage reduction, so getting as much as possible certainly helps. I'm sure there are other options for the Guardian mythic path that would help.
You can adjust the number of mythic tiers for the purpose of your game, but we're talking about gods here. A level 20 tier 10 character would have a CR of 24, so that does seem to be a decent power level for a god.

Edit: Silly me. The right answer is ofcourse that the best defense is a good offense. Just kill them before they hit you. High initiative is a good idea too, because you're essentially playing rocket tag.

[Rylar]

There can be an argument that half health is first blood.

[The Sideromancer]

You will also need a way of stopping ability, or more specifically Con damage. Wouldn't want some clever summoner fishing for grapples with blood drain. While you're at it, Con damage immunity might protect you from the expel blood spell, though it does require the caster beating SR (I'm not sure the fort save by itself matters, given I would expect at least 20 level 15 wizards willing to cast [evil] spells have tried).

On the topic of summoners, you had better decide if taking hits from a few lasers counts as having blood drawn. Otherwise, lantern archons will mess you up.

Also, Smite attacks ignore DR, so watch out for (anti)paladins, faith hunter inquisitors, and Champion of the Faith warpriests.

[Chemlak]

Make sure you come up with a way that Profession (Artist) can’t overcome with a trivial skill check.

[Mudfoot]

Douglas Muir 406 wrote:

"...the webcomic Kill Six Billion Demons, which is excellent."

It is indeed excellent. It is in fact truly extraordinary. My heartfelt thanks to you for mentioning it. Have a biscuit.

[Douglas Muir 406]

Mudfoot wrote:

It is indeed excellent. It is in fact truly extraordinary. My heartfelt thanks to you for mentioning it. Have a biscuit.

This is one of my favorite comics pages ever, not so much for the art (though the art is great) as for the way this character introduces himself. "Hello, deviant. Please join me for tea..." It gets even better a couple of chapters later when you learn a little bit more about this particular character's... issues.

And this one here -- where our heroine plane shifts without knowing what she's doing, and arrives in an extraplanar cantina full of demons -- is also very nice.

Doug M.