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All that matters is the boss monster CR+2 or 3 is going to have a higher DC than the PC wizard.
If you're fighting a pit fiend at level 20, that's an even encounter. I think that is moderate.
So the boss is going to be the Pit Fiend's boss, probably CR+2 to 4 devil. Their DC will be really high and hard to counter.
What the actual heck is this fixation with level
+2-4 boss fights, people?A level 20 wizard armed with stoneskin can still make your martials scream bloody murder with a heightened stoneskin. Resist 15-20 to all their damage will make them CRY. That plus heightened invisibility, fly, and energy aegis (maybe blink too) and your martials will be begging you for a dispel.
That's not a level +2 fight but it still could be lethal.
Besides. Even against a level + 2 boss, you have a...45 percent chance to dispel (roll 12+)? That's totally fine.
Because lower level fights aren't usually that hard.
Hardest fights in PF2 are a Boss CR+2 or 3 with allies.
Level 20 characters are brutal. An equal level enemy is like a speed bump you could use no spells on your martials likely kill alone.
The fight that matters is the level 20 enemy's boss with his bodyguards.
All that matters is the boss monster CR+2 or 3 is going to have a higher DC than the PC wizard.
If you're fighting a pit fiend at level 20, that's an even encounter. I think that is moderate.
So the boss is going to be the Pit Fiend's boss, probably CR+2 to 4 devil. Their DC will be really high and hard to counter.
What the actual heck is this fixation with level
+2-4 boss fights, people?A level 20 wizard armed with stoneskin can still make your martials scream bloody murder with a heightened stoneskin. Resist 15-20 to all their damage will make them CRY. That plus heightened invisibility, fly, and energy aegis (maybe blink too) and your martials will be begging you for a dispel.
That's not a level +2 fight but it still could be lethal.
Besides. Even against a level + 2 boss, you have a...45 percent chance to dispel (roll 12+)? That's totally fine.
Because lower level fights aren't usually that hard.
Hardest fights in PF2 are a Boss CR+2 or 3 with allies.
Level 20 characters are brutal. An equal level enemy is like a speed bump you could use no spells on your martials likely kill alone.
The fight that matters is the level 20 enemy's boss with his bodyguards.
I must beg to differ. Once again, my party of ranger, fighter, kineticist, and cleric has been TPK'd by 6 dread wraiths. At level 13. I remember vividly murdering a party of champion, barbarian, and fighter (yes, 3 PCs) with 3 ice devils and 2 liches at level 15, and that was only a severe encounter (wall of ice is MEAN). I've accidentally slaughtered high level parties with squads of linnorms before as well.
Level 20 PCs can be steamrollered by level-appropriate (generally severe/extreme, but not always) encounters - usually NOT against upper level monsters, but against squads of lower level ones that synergize well.
Or lower-level ones with disjunction. Really, just cast disjunction on the fighter's armor...
I don't know how you're playing or how your group is constructed. 6 dread wraiths at level 13 doesn't seem like a big problem. CR-4. Your party would have to play pretty badly for that to destroy them.
Dispel Magic still won't help you against 6 dread wraiths.
The hardest encounters for us are CR+2 bosses with help where you have to worry about a powerful monster that can hammer your defenses while moderate monsters are doing enough to pressure your defenses.
I'd have to see how your group operates as to why they went down to six dread wraiths at level 13. I can only imagine some real bad dice rolls.
They were elite. Which helped.
I sincerely doubt most parties sans blaster caster could handle them, actually. Resist 10 all (unless you have ghost touch, which you probably don't) is nothing to sneeze at, especially when they all have opportunity attacks, immunity to precision damage, 10 foot reach, and inflict escalating levels of drained on a DC 30 Fort save every attack. Have fun casting. Or being a rogue/flurry ranger. You deal what, 3d6+dex mod+weapon specialization per attack, and your flaming/frost/whatever runes get turned off? So yeah your rogue gets to deal Dex mod + weapon spec damage after damage reduction per attack. That's almost 8 whole damage! Cute.
Flurry ranger at least gets one attack through without reduction per round due to combining. For another 3d6+mod+weapon specialization. That's 26 damage, plus another 8 per swing that connects, max of 42 if they all hit. They only have 900 hp total.
Oh, and positive damage/being good aligned is illegal. Have fun.
Why is positive damage/good aligned illegal? That seriously hurts the cleric.
That would make that encounter a good deal tougher. I certainly wouldn't want a ranger filling one of those slots as that class gets weaker as you level.
Fighter should be fine.
Kineticist not particularly good against undead, but should be fine as you level.
I could see that group losing. No wall spells. No heal. Even with a blaster caster, they probably die.
The cleric couldn't use sunburst.
Why exactly is being good and using positive energy illegal? Blood lords campaign? If anyone of them were undead, they'd be immune to the negative energy damage of the dread wraiths and top out at drained 4. Could probably walk away from the fight if undead.
I'd have to see how that was set up.
If the cleric can't blast undead, doubt another blaster caster works either. Undead is one of the few undead types casters are good at blasting.
All that matters is the boss monster CR+2 or 3 is going to have a higher DC than the PC wizard.
If you're fighting a pit fiend at level 20, that's an even encounter. I think that is moderate.
So the boss is going to be the Pit Fiend's boss, probably CR+2 to 4 devil. Their DC will be really high and hard to counter.
What the actual heck is this fixation with level
+2-4 boss fights, people?A level 20 wizard armed with stoneskin can still make your martials scream bloody murder with a heightened stoneskin. Resist 15-20 to all their damage will make them CRY. That plus heightened invisibility, fly, and energy aegis (maybe blink too) and your martials will be begging you for a dispel.
That's not a level +2 fight but it still could be lethal.
Besides. Even against a level + 2 boss, you have a...45 percent chance to dispel (roll 12+)? That's totally fine.
Because lower level fights aren't usually that hard.
Hardest fights in PF2 are a Boss CR+2 or 3 with allies.
Level 20 characters are brutal. An equal level enemy is like a speed bump you could use no spells on your martials likely kill alone.
The fight that matters is the level 20 enemy's boss with his bodyguards.
I must beg to differ. Once again, my party of ranger, fighter, kineticist, and cleric has been TPK'd by 6 dread wraiths. At level 13. I remember vividly murdering a party of champion, barbarian, and fighter (yes, 3 PCs) with 3 ice devils and 2 liches at level 15, and that was only a severe encounter (wall of ice is MEAN). I've accidentally slaughtered high level parties with squads of linnorms before as well.
Level 20 PCs can be steamrollered by level-appropriate (generally severe/extreme, but not always) encounters - usually NOT against upper level monsters, but against squads of lower level ones that synergize well.
Or lower-level ones with disjunction. Really, just cast disjunction on the fighter's armor...
It would be an AC and save penalty of 3.
The weapon would be worse given the martials require striking runes. So if you were able to disjunction successfully all their weapons, then it would be like putting a caster against magic immune monsters. Not going to be fun for them.
Not sure why you would design an encounter this way as the likelihood it would be enjoyable for the group would be pretty low. If you're fighting some able to crush a level 17 plus weapon that easily with disjunction, he's also like to smash any casters present with a huge AOE or worse spell given their far lower Fort and Reflex saves and smaller hit point pools.
This isn't PF1 where casters have good defensive spells to resist this. They would just destroy the whole party with martials and casters both being rendered useless.
6 elite dread wraiths is a moderate encounter for a level 13 group, but severe for a level 12 group. The kineticist and cleric have magic damage, and the only precision damage is maybe the Ranger. DC 30 is a bit rough but that drain caps at Drained 4 (48 dmg at level 12).
You have a cleric which should be able to keep all of you topped up. Also I am surprised nobody had Bottled Sunlight: A very useful item all martials should have if they expect to fight undead and cave dwellers.
Rangers are a bit of weak higher level class. The Hunt Prey action tax coupled with relatively low damage makes the ranger not so great.
One of the reasons we stopped using one handed weapons or two weapon fighting was because of resist all and the high hit points of enemies. It puts any fighting style other than two-handed weapons at a disadvantage for martial combat.
It's not much talked about, but if you're not a champion using a shield or a rogue or similar precision class, might as well not even bother using anything other than a big weapon. Too hard to pound through the combination of physical resistance and high hit points at high level.
With all the talk of martials are gods, it's really only certain martials that are very good. It's generally big two-handed weapon martials with damage boosting abilities or something like a rogue.
The main martial classes that can pound through anything are two-weapon fighters and barbs. Rogue is good if precision works.
In regards to dread wraiths, you want big two-handed weapon martials with casters with AoE, preferably heals or sunburst from primal or divine casters. Sunburst slaughters undead. AoE Heal is amazing against undead as it heals the PCs and harms undead at the same time.
We have had people move away from the ranger class due to the Hunt Prety action tax being not so fun at higher levels where groups can pulverize enemies fairly quickly.
Oh yeah unless you use the bigger weapons its...6 elite dread wraiths is a moderate encounter for a level 13 group, but severe for a level 12 group. The kineticist and cleric have magic damage, and the only precision damage is maybe the Ranger. DC 30 is a bit rough but that drain caps at Drained 4 (48 dmg at level 12).
You have a cleric which should be able to keep all of you topped up. Also I am surprised nobody had Bottled Sunlight: A very useful item all martials should have if they expect to fight undead and cave dwellers.
Rangers are a bit of weak higher level class. The Hunt Prey action tax coupled with relatively low damage makes the ranger not so great.
One of the reasons we stopped using one handed weapons or two weapon fighting was because of resist all and the high hit points of enemies. It puts any fighting style other than two-handed weapons at a disadvantage for martial combat.
It's not much talked about, but if you're not a champion using a shield or a rogue or similar precision class, might as well not even bother using anything other than a big weapon. Too hard to pound through the combination of physical resistance and high hit points at high level.
With all the talk of martials are gods, it's really only certain martials that are very good. It's generally big two-handed weapon martials with damage boosting abilities or something like a rogue.
The main martial classes that can pound through anything are two-weapon fighters and barbs. Rogue is good if precision works.
In regards to dread wraiths, you want big two-handed weapon martials with casters with AoE, preferably heals or sunburst from primal or divine casters. Sunburst slaughters undead. AoE Heal is amazing against undead as it heals the PCs and harms undead at the same time.
We have had people move away from the ranger class due to the Hunt Prety action tax being not so fun at higher levels where groups can pulverize enemies fairly quickly.
Haha.
This would be the one time where the player rolls RK.
DM answers: "You're going to die."
They were elite. Which helped.
I sincerely doubt most parties sans blaster caster could handle them, actually. Resist 10 all (unless you have ghost touch, which you probably don't) is nothing to sneeze at, especially when they all have opportunity attacks, immunity to precision damage, 10 foot reach, and inflict escalating levels of drained on a DC 30 Fort save every attack. Have fun casting. Or being a rogue/flurry ranger. You deal what, 3d6+dex mod+weapon specialization per attack, and your flaming/frost/whatever runes get turned off? So yeah your rogue gets to deal Dex mod + weapon spec damage after damage reduction per attack. That's almost 8 whole damage! Cute.
Flurry ranger at least gets one attack through without reduction per round due to combining. For another 3d6+mod+weapon specialization. That's 26 damage, plus another 8 per swing that connects, max of 42 if they all hit. They only have 900 hp total. You might crit on 14s, but still only one of those per round, so that's a total of 60. IF everything hits.
Our party comp was fire kineticist, flurry ranger, sword-and-board fighter, and cleric. Cleric died first, because yes of course cleric died first.
Oh, and positive damage/being good aligned is illegal. Have fun.
Yes Resist 10 all is a problem for your party. Damage runes on your weapons are basically useless.
The ranger loses to the immunity precision.So you don't have a big hitter.
My players always take Ghost Touch runes or have an old weapon with Ghost Touch available (because I play Incoporeal strictly though that is probably not the issue here). If you weren't ready for it I can see how that encounter went south.
What the players should do tactically is surround their cleric to protect them, which is harder to do as these wraiths have reach, and go heal every round.
I think the sword and board fighter is too defensive for that party. I'd be going for a more offensive option.
Rangers are a bit of weak higher level class. The Hunt Prey action tax coupled with relatively low damage makes the ranger not so great.
True, mostly playable and middle of the road. But they never really go boom the way certain martials can.
One of the reasons we stopped using one handed weapons or two weapon fighting was because of resist all and the high hit points of enemies. It puts any fighting style other than two-handed weapons at a disadvantage for martial combat.
Twin Takedown, and Double Slice help two weapon martials versus resistance. My sword and board fighters all have Double Slice. I don't know if this one did.
Yeah. Double slice and twin takedown do have the combined damage against resistance if both hit. I don't like the small weapons for the other attacks.
A full cleric would have made this encounter much easier. But Calliope basically gave the group a cleric with one armed tied behind his back and his shoelaces tied together. You're fighting undead, but you can't use any of your best abilities against undead.
It would be like tossing a wizard in and tell him he can't use any blast spells.
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From my experience in these boards, lower level enemies are vastly overlooked. But when I look at actual TPKs, they have their fare share of PC deaths.
From my experience as a GM, higher level bosses look scarier than they are. I've seen so many players complaining at bosses that were just road bumps to the party. High numbers look scary.
The only levels where higher level bosses are really dangerous are the first 4. After that, things tend to even out.
I may be biased because we don't usually use the encounter rating system. The toughest designed fights we have are usually bosses CR+2 or more with minions of a challenging CR.
The hardest encounters are creatures with powerful ranged attacks and mobility in a space big enough to use both to high efficiency.
After that it is strong martial creatures with caster support built much like a PC party.
Then everything gets nebulous within the mass of encounters we can beat without much worth talking about.
Single target bosses, even tough ones get pretty easy at high level. I don't use them too often alone as finishing encounters.
Finally got Secrets of Magic and has some interesting things that could help prepared casters:
- Custom Staff: always good but for prepared can help a lot and easier to craft just preparing the crafting spells compared to a repertoire which you would need retrain, craft, then retrain again.
- Grimoire: I think if their frequency was refreshed on refocus would help a lot because only works for prepared.
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Geb where the blood lords AP is set (and its player's guide mentions) has positive energy be illegal
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Interestingly people also say that ignoring it is the way. Cautiously. But it still works almost everywhere in the campaign.
Well, unless characters are extreme sticklers for law of course.
I do Evil, but I do it Good. Not gonna catch me using Vitality, no sir.
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I may be biased because we don't usually use the encounter rating system. The toughest designed fights we have are usually bosses CR+2 or more with minions of a challenging CR.
The hardest encounters are creatures with powerful ranged attacks and mobility in a space big enough to use both to high efficiency.
After that it is strong martial creatures with caster support built much like a PC party.
Then everything gets nebulous within the mass of encounters we can beat without much worth talking about.
Single target bosses, even tough ones get pretty easy at high level. I don't use them too often alone as finishing encounters.
I don't think anyone can be unbiased when it comes to tough encounters. Sure, not following the encounter guidelines colors your point of view, but as much as having a GM who only cares about the big boss battles and play previous fights stupidly, a GM who doesn't read the monsters abilities and forgets a lot of things for complex monsters, a GM who plays any monster as if they were tactical geniuses, etc...
What I see, is that a lot of people focus on boss battles when reports show that even non boss battles can lead to character deaths. I can't make statistics but at least it proves that non boss battles also need to be taken care of with the right abilities and that focusing only on boss battles may lead the party to an unexpected demise.
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And again I'm not trying to be inflammatory. Just pointing out that certain monsters can be very scary in large numbers especially.
For just about any group there are going to be some encounters that are significantly more difficult or easier than are "normal" encounters of the same CR.
One of the jobs of the GM is to recognize the strengths and especially weaknesses of a group and design encounters appropriately. Fortunately, this is relatively easy (just toss in the elite or weak template, add or subtract one from the CR, etc) so it is generally easy even with published material
So, lots of scary monsters can be fairly trivial for the group with significant amounts of appropriate AoE damage (however arrived at).
Or the melee fighter may be almost useless if there is a ranged opponent and the encounter makes it nearly impossible for the fighter to actually REACH said opponent.
No group can effectively cover ALL the bases. CR is a best guess approximation for a mythical average party that actually works pretty well most of the time (far better than in PF1 or in other versions of D&D I've played).
And, of course, there are various monsters with an incorrect CR. Or monsters which can go from difficult to easy when incapcitation applies.
My point wasn't really about RK. We have like 4 conversations going here at once
My point is that Deriven keeps saying "oh yeah you don't need a caster and big up level solo monsters are all that matters."
I'm pushing back on that with an example of martials who died horribly to a bunch of level - 3 monsters. Sans a solid caster that can blast you are dead. And it's telling that one minute Deriven is saying "hah, slotted blasting, my martials just shred everything" and "why the heck would you waste healing by using it to damage undead" and the next is saying that it's patently obvious that without a solid blaster OF COURSE this party is doomed.
We HAD a kineticist. They deal the same damage as focus spells. The "focus spells and martials" setup would have died hideously to this encounter.
Definitely not going after Deriven personally! But it's just a little weird and inconsistent to one minute be saying spell slots are worthless and martials will tear everything apart, and then the next advocating for mega blasts.
** spoiler omitted **
And again I'm not trying to be inflammatory. Just pointing out that certain monsters can be very scary in large numbers especially.
If you're paying attention Deriven is actually saying you don't need a *Wizard* he's generally complimentary of other casters aside from the Witch.
Also I am surprised nobody had Bottled Sunlight: A very useful item all martials should have if they expect to fight undead and cave dwellers.
You like Bottled Sunlight? Really? The action economy is horrible. Unless you Activate it in advance (in which case you have 1 hour to use the Bomb) you can't quick draw or quick bomber a Bottled Sunlight, and against things like Wraiths the maximum positive damage bit barely compensates for the fact that it's d4s. Against cave dwellers the only thing you'd be doing is the 1d4 per tier fire damage... you wouldn't even be doing Splash damage, as the Splash is positive. You're far better off sticking with Ghost Charges for Undead and maybe some Alchemist's Fire for the odd thing with regeneration.
Also I am surprised nobody had Bottled Sunlight: A very useful item all martials should have if they expect to fight undead and cave dwellers.You like Bottled Sunlight? Really? The action economy is horrible. Unless you Activate it in advance (in which case you have 1 hour to use the Bomb) you can't quick draw or quick bomber a Bottled Sunlight, and against things like Wraiths the maximum positive damage bit barely compensates for the fact that it's d4s. Against cave dwellers the only thing you'd be doing is the 1d4 per tier fire damage... you wouldn't even be doing Splash damage, as the Splash is positive. You're far better off sticking with Ghost Charges for Undead and maybe some Alchemist's Fire for the odd thing with regeneration.Also it deals positive damage. Which is, as mentioned, illegal.
(For the record, ghost charges are also illegal in Geb and enfeebling does nothing to dread wraiths even if they weren't. They're not hitting you with their str mod... but I do appreciate the suggestions even if they don't work here!)
Since when do PCs strictly follow the law? Bust out the good stuff whenever you don't think Johnny Law is watching.
I was mostly just expressing my surprise at Temperans' approval of Bottled Sunlight, a Bomb I find sadly sub-par. (Love the flavour of it though.)
Were I a Bomber in Geb, and reached 12th level, I would likely try to grab the Lodestone Bomb formula for public fights like that. Maybe Pressure Bombs too... they have the Force trait even though they do Bludgeoning Damage. Not sure how that would work against Resist All... there are folks that claim Undead are immune to Antipode Oil because it has the Poison trait, even though the damage it does is Fire or Cold, not Poison.
Blood Lords, GM ruled that...They were elite. Which helped.
I sincerely doubt most parties sans blaster caster could handle them, actually. Resist 10 all (unless you have ghost touch, which you probably don't) is nothing to sneeze at, especially when they all have opportunity attacks, immunity to precision damage, 10 foot reach, and inflict escalating levels of drained on a DC 30 Fort save every attack. Have fun casting. Or being a rogue/flurry ranger. You deal what, 3d6+dex mod+weapon specialization per attack, and your flaming/frost/whatever runes get turned off? So yeah your rogue gets to deal Dex mod + weapon spec damage after damage reduction per attack. That's almost 8 whole damage! Cute.
Flurry ranger at least gets one attack through without reduction per round due to combining. For another 3d6+mod+weapon specialization. That's 26 damage, plus another 8 per swing that connects, max of 42 if they all hit. They only have 900 hp total.
Oh, and positive damage/being good aligned is illegal. Have fun.
Why is positive damage/good aligned illegal? That seriously hurts the cleric.
That would make that encounter a good deal tougher. I certainly wouldn't want a ranger filling one of those slots as that class gets weaker as you level.
Fighter should be fine.
Kineticist not particularly good against undead, but should be fine as you level.
I could see that group losing. No wall spells. No heal. Even with a blaster caster, they probably die.
The cleric couldn't use sunburst.
Why exactly is being good and using positive energy illegal? Blood lords campaign? If anyone of them were undead, they'd be immune to the negative energy damage of the dread wraiths and top out at drained 4. Could probably walk away from the fight if undead.
I'd have to see how that was set up.
If the cleric can't blast undead, doubt another blaster caster works either. Undead is one of the few undead types casters are good at blasting.
Why exactly is the cleric provoking in round 1 and taking that many hits? His initiative got beat and somehow he gets hit a bunch of times because they haven't built up their AC?
There's no scouting, no detection.
The ranger should at least have a high perception and seen these things right?
You make it sound like Dread Wraiths automatically avoid detection and show up around the party with them standing around walking into everything.
Who is playing that way?
Oh yeah unless you use the bigger weapons its tougher. No doubt.Dread wraiths are just specially difficult for anyone unless you have very specific things. Which from the looks of it that party specially lacked even if you had rolled a successful recall knowledge.
My point wasn't really about RK. We have like 4 conversations going here at once
My point is that Deriven keeps saying "oh yeah you don't need a caster and big up level solo monsters are all that matters."
I'm pushing back on that with an example of martials who died horribly to a bunch of level - 3 monsters. Sans a solid caster that can blast you are dead. And it's telling that one minute Deriven is saying "hah, slotted blasting, my martials just shred everything" and "why the heck would you waste healing by using it to damage undead" and the next is saying that it's patently obvious that without a solid blaster OF COURSE this party is doomed.
We HAD a kineticist. They deal the same damage as focus spells. The "focus spells and martials" setup would have died hideously to this encounter.
Definitely not going after Deriven personally! But it's just a little weird and inconsistent to one minute be saying spell slots are worthless and martials will tear everything apart, and then the next advocating for mega blasts.
** spoiler omitted **
And again I'm not trying to be inflammatory. Just pointing out that certain monsters can be very scary in large numbers especially.
I never once said you don't need a caster, so I'd appreciate you not putting words in my mouth.
What I said is you don't need a wizard and many other casters would be superior in many situations. The cleric, if you didn't hamstring him, would be better at killing dread wraiths than a wizard by a good amount. In that particular situation versus undead, a divine or primal caster is better than a wizard because a wizard doesn't have heal or sunburst, two of the best undead killing spells in the game.
So you don't have to attempt to tell falsehoods to try to win an argument because I've never and never would say you don't need casters.
The only thing I'm indicating is martials start attacking without waiting for the casters. They have abilities like Sudden Charge and built up movement so they can move 90 plus feet on average in a single round to combat, even higher as they get more items. They move in and start hammering. They won't wait for RK checks or worry about weaknesses. Just bring the hammer fast and hard.
This works a lot of the time. When it doesn't work, then the caster help becomes necessary.
Your dread wraith scenario is set up for that group to fail. You seem to have DMed it where the ranger's master or legendary perception didn't alert him to the dread wraiths to begin with so the party did not scout. And apparently you also set it up so the cleric, who has substandard armor class, is standing within reach of all six dread wraiths waitng to get AoOed and hasn't taken any abilities to move out of range without getting Aooed out of any of the six.
I'm sorry, man. I don't play this way. We don't walk up and wait to get surrounded. I'm not sure who you're playing with that does this.
Ranger may be a weak damage dealer, but if you have one in the group they are usually the main scout and trapfinder. A flurry ranger should have the rogue archetype with sneak attack and likely mobility. They should be focused on Str, Dex, Con, and Wisdom for stat increases which means at level 13 each of those should be 14 plus with stat boost, likely higher.
Even your cleric should have archetype feats to boost AC, especially if a cloistered cleric.
I'm not at all sure how your group is built. It sounds like they were built badly.
Oh yeah unless you use the bigger weapons its tougher. No doubt.Dread wraiths are just specially difficult for anyone unless you have very specific things. Which from the looks of it that party specially lacked even if you had rolled a successful recall knowledge.
My point wasn't really about RK. We have like 4 conversations going here at once
My point is that Deriven keeps saying "oh yeah you don't need a caster and big up level solo monsters are all that matters."
I'm pushing back on that with an example of martials who died horribly to a bunch of level - 3 monsters. Sans a solid caster that can blast you are dead. And it's telling that one minute Deriven is saying "hah, slotted blasting, my martials just shred everything" and "why the heck would you waste healing by using it to damage undead" and the next is saying that it's patently obvious that without a solid blaster OF COURSE this party is doomed.
We HAD a kineticist. They deal the same damage as focus spells. The "focus spells and martials" setup would have died hideously to this encounter.
Definitely not going after Deriven personally! But it's just a little weird and inconsistent to one minute be saying spell slots are worthless and martials will tear everything apart, and then the next advocating for mega blasts.
** spoiler omitted **
And again I'm not trying to be inflammatory. Just pointing out that certain monsters can be very scary in large numbers especially.
Also in Blood Lords you're supposed to allow the Undead Archetype for the players which means if they're undead, the dread wraths can't even damage them other than to drain them to 4. After that, the undead PCs in your party just kind of stand there taking no damage from the negative energy attacks of the dread wraiths.
But apparently this party has no undead archetypes in the group even though Bloodlords recommends free undead archetype for that campaign.
What I'm about to say is all
** spoiler omitted **...
Then I guess your DM set you up to fail because I would not do this as a DM.
If the PCs are undead, they would be immune to negative damage. I'm not making a change until I know fully how that change works.
As far as the, "If my DM totally leverages the encounters to TPK us, then ties our hands behind our back and makes a rule change that they don't know the full extent of, you can be killed" then I guess you have a point.
As a DM I can set up my players to completely fail and screw them over leading to a TPK.
I've made mistakes on encounters before and killed the party. So hopefully this was a mistake by your DM and not a deliberate effort to TPK you.
This isn't a good example of lower level monsters being challenging. It's an example of a DM setting up a group to completely fail even when the module has put them in a position to succeed by accounting for the idea they might be undead and thus completely immune to dread wrath damage. This may be intended, so the can survive something like this.
I don't know. I haven't read blood lords. From what I know of it, our party would be built differently and would have accounted for being evil or neutral in an campaign dealing with a lot of undead such as having ghost touch runes, death ward, and taking ancestry feats meant to resist undead effects.
Your DM made some arbitrary change to negative energy damage with a module constructed with creatures using a lot of negative energy damage which the module designers likely accounted for at least a few party members being immune.
It sounds like a very poorly prepared for the adventure they were in. In an undead campaign, positive damage runes and ghost touch would be high priority runes.
What I'm about to say is all
** spoiler omitted **...
So your GM screwed you. None of this is on the encounter, this is 100% on your GM badly implementing a terrible rule for that campaign and for you as players by being more worried about breaking the law than surviving. If it's an undead-focused game you pack stuff that wrecks undead and deal with any legal consequences if they come up. After all, being arrested is better than being dead.
What I'm about to say is all
** spoiler omitted **...
Then I guess your DM set you up to fail because I would not do this as a DM.
If the PCs are undead, they would be immune to negative damage. I'm not making a change until I know fully how that change works.
As far as the, "If my DM totally leverages the encounters to TPK us, then ties our hands behind our back and makes a rule change that they don't know the full extent of, you can be killed" then I guess you have a point.
As a DM I can set up my players to completely fail and screw them over leading to a TPK.
I've made mistakes on encounters before and killed the party. So hopefully this was a mistake by your DM and not a deliberate effort to TPK you.
This isn't a good example of lower level monsters being challenging. It's an example of a DM setting up a group to completely fail even when the module has put them in a position to succeed by accounting for the idea they might be undead and thus completely immune to dread wrath damage. This may be intended, so the can survive something like this.
I don't know. I haven't read blood lords. From what I know of it, our party would be built differently and would have accounted for being evil or neutral in an campaign dealing with a lot of undead such as having ghost touch runes, death ward, and taking ancestry feats meant to resist undead effects.
Your DM made some arbitrary change to negative energy damage with a module constructed with creatures using a lot of negative energy damage which the module designers likely accounted for at least a few party members being immune.
It sounds like a very poorly prepared for the adventure they were in. In an undead campaign, positive damage runes and ghost touch would be high priority runes.
We were not poorly prepared. We literally did not have access to positive runes. They're illegal.
And again. If you wander into Geb, this can totally happen to you. It's not...
How do you not have a ghost touch rune if you're prepared?
Why did your DM make a change he doesn't know the full extent of? They may make undead resistant to void damage in the new edition. He makes you take full damage?
Why doesn't anyone have negative energy resist items?
Your cleric walks in there with no death ward or ghost touch spells and six dread wraiths pop up and kill them in one round before he goes?
It all sounds really strange. I'd have to see the set up. It sounds purposefully meant to kill you.
If you're not followers of Geb and you go there, you won't care about following the laws to let the undead jack you.
But once again the module set it up so you could all be undead and immune to negative energy damage, maybe for encounters like this since they outlawed positive energy. Seems that was how they made PCs work in this type of campaign without access to the usual types of undead defenses.
You say you were prepared, yet you couldn't win initiative against the wraiths? Cleric get an unlucky roll? Maxed out wisdom with Expert perception and hopefully build with Sentinel to boost armor options. Even a cleric at that level should have a pretty decent AC so a lot of the attacks missed them. Touch AC doesn't exist any more.
It's so hard to see the cleric getting taken out in one round unless they were horribly built and rolled terrible initiative. A level 13 cleric should have a 20 wisdom with expert perception and probably a good chance of +2 init to profession for a 13+4 +5 +2 +24 initiative. This versus the +21 init or stealth of the dread wraiths.
Their AC with Medium Armor and a 14 dex and a shield with at least a +1 armor rune.
13+4+6=33 with shield raised 35. That's a 45 percent miss chance on the first attack by the dread wraiths assuming flank, maybe a 35% miss chance if no shield raised and flanked.
They crushed him in one round? Must have been some lucky roles.
I'm trying to think about this encounter with a moderately well built cleric. I'm surprised no one one had negative energy resist rings or something. DM seems to have hand-waved the undead archetype and given it no resistance to void damage.
Oh well, odd encounter.
Deriven I think you might be piling it on too hard.
But also, I wonder what the GM's though process was. But we should probably end the derail.
I'm trying to understand how the encounter works and why a CR+3 party was so easily crushed in an undead campaign where you should be highly prepared to fight and deal with undead enemies.
It's not making great sense. Seems like the DM really tried hard to kill that group.
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Geb has a faction that works as a secret police to stamp out positive energy use by any means necessary, it's not just a case of lol don't follow the laws
It's so hard to see the cleric getting taken out in one round unless they were horribly built and rolled terrible initiative. A level 13 cleric should have a 20 wisdom with expert perception and probably a good chance of +2 init to profession for a 13+4 +5 +2 +24 initiative. This versus the +21 init or stealth of the dread wraiths.Cleric rolled poorly. It happens. And provoked 6 opp attacks from casting because they were not aware those things had them. They'd just watched our entire previous combat.
Really, the level of "oh your GM just hates you" is quite remarkable. We play combat-as-war. PC deaths happen. The GM and players are expected to use decent tactics. If we kill them before they can blink, that's how it goes. Same goes for the other way around.
If your GM doesn't use halfway decent tactics, that's totally their prerogative, and I'm all for playing in a way that maximizes player fun regardless of how that happens. But we don't pull punches in combat.
And that many large creatures were somehow perfectly positioned around the cleric to provoke 6 AoOs with 10 foot reach. Ok.
I'm sorry. It isn't making sense, even playing combat as war.
I'm the one bringing up the DM problem because your DM did the following:
1. Made undead archetype meaningless for countering negative damage in a campaign where this is important.
2. Positioned the large dread wraiths perfectly around the party to all get reach Aoo attacks on the cleric, which all hit?
3. This cleric doesn't have any negative energy resistance items at all.
4. No one in the party has negative energy resistance items or ghost touch runes in an undead focused campaign.
They wander around fighting undead taking negative energy damage and healing through it with what spell since heal is outlawed?
Is your DM allowing harm to heal your PCs, while still making them get hurt by negative energy damage?
So yes, I question that DM. It sounds to me like a DM hit job, but it could just be a group of players not particularly well prepared for the type of campaign they're running in and got hit by the buzzsaw.
Or just unlucky rolls.
The biggest problem I have is an arbitrary rule change eliminating the biggest advantage of the undead archetype in that type of campaign while also dealing with the laws of Geb with no positive spells.
That campaign was set up for the undead archetype knowing this archetype would make characters unable to use positive energy able to survive undead attacks more easily.
That's piling on disadvantages while giving nothing to counter them even when the module provides a clear means for the PCs to survive by being undead themselves.
Then you use this as an example of PCs getting wasted by lower level monsters because the DM removed their main advantage being the undead archetype, then they are forced to follow the laws of Geb using no positive energy?
If this is the case, couldn't the cleric have used harm like heal against the undead? If they completely changed undead being harmed by void damage, how was your DM making the harm spell work at that point?
How does the harm spell work now? You can damage undead now with harm doing void damage? Do we know that for certain?
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Why exactly is the cleric provoking in round 1 and taking that many hits? His initiative got beat and somehow he gets hit a bunch of times because they haven't built up their AC?
There's no scouting, no detection.
The ranger should at least have a high perception and seen these things right?
You make it sound like Dread Wraiths automatically avoid detection and show up around the party with them standing around walking into everything.
Who is playing that way?
In my experience, too many GMs, especially, but not only, in PFS.
Also, I would never do real scouting in PF2 : far too likely to be detected, which would put the opponents on alert and let THEM prepare adequately. And a real risk of turning scouting into an encounter far too severe for the poor scout.
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I mean I wouldn't even necessarily call the example a huge outlier. A bit extreme, but sometimes you just get ambushed with no forewarning or opportunity to prepare. That's just how PF2 is written sometimes.
The wraiths did wind up perfectly positioned. The module gives them some prep time.
And yep, harm could heal the undead PCs. That's actually what it does sans houserules, too, is my reading.
Here's the quote from the module, by the way. Yeah that's how it works, unfortunately:
** spoiler omitted **
And unfortunately you don't get prep.
But really, I've derailed the thread enough with off-topic stories of a campaign I'm playing. Carry on!
Doesn't indicate they show up perfectly surrounding the cleric in range.
Seems the biggest issue your DM deciding your undead status didn't apply making you immune to dread wraith attacks, which the module may well have expected the DM to account for at that point in the module.
If you're undead, six elite dread wraiths even after a battle is a fairly easy encounter, very handlable.
Your DM made a decision I would not have made. If I'm running blood lords and the PCs can be undead and they do the undead archetype, they are going to get the main benefit of it which immunity to negative damage, especially so if they are already limited to not using the best abilities of the cleric.
Now I'd like to see what they're doing with void damage. If they truly are making undead take damage from it and making harm a very weird spell now.