Who (or what) could take down Cthulhu?

[Wardog]

What people / entities / organizations / do you think would be able to take down the Big C?

For the sake of ths discussion, we won't consider other Mythos entities (as I'm sure several are substantially more powerful), The Real Ghostbusters (given that they already have (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e24tkBx4mNQ&feature=PlayList&p=732762E7F3DE0A11&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=53), or blatently unfair opponents like Chuck Noris or Squirrel Girl.

[Linkavitch]

The Sexy Shoeless God of War could!:smallamused:

Hmm. Superman, maybe? Or Doomsday, after he's fought him two or three times?

[Prime32]

Anything I suggest would probably have to be "blatantly unfair" just to avoid going mad instantly. :smalltongue:

[Xallace]

You might also want to include that they way Cthulu was originally taken down is not valid in this argument, seeing as we know it would work.
That way being a steamboat to the face.

So I'm thinking about Godzilla or Supercharged Godzilla? Won't kill Cthulu, but then again little can, could at least put him to sleep until his face regenerates again.
Godzilla riding a steamboat to the face.

[GoC]

Cthulhu has no stats or feats. All we know is his size and that humans often go insane upon seeing him.
More or less any comparison is meaningless.

[hamishspence]

Cthulhu is described as reconstituting moments after the steamboat to the face in the original story :smallamused:

[chiasaur11]

Reed Richards probably could.

Man killed a sleeping nigh omnipotent god of evil once before (Simonson run on FF, issue 340, 2 issues after the Death's Head cameo, four issues before the FF fight robo-Stalin). No reason he can't do it again. Probably the Doctor could pull it off, and maybe, assuming a lot of luck, Doctor McNinja could do it well enough to send big C back to sleepy-bye.

[Hannibal87]

Cthulhu is described as reconstituting moments after the steamboat to the face in the original story :smallamused:The point, of course, being that the Stars Weren't Right After All. So, if we allow being put back to sleep as "defeat", than all one has to do is put out a star or two. :smalleek: This might be less difficult than it sounds - after all, we know from Star Trek: Generations that by the 24th century any mad scientist will be able to put together a sun-killing missile in his garage.

But actually killing Cthulhu? The Galactic Empire might be able to manage it, if they had a Death Star handy, and anybody else with similar powers to create Earth-shattering kabooms. Doing the deed without writing off the planet as collateral damage,however, might be a bit trickier.

[Kane]

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/major-anderson-ft-sumter_Dir/steamship-marion.jpg

Didn't he get nailed by one in one of the Lovecraft stories?

Damn, horribly ninja'd. Sorry.

If Discworld is to be believed, clubs and swords would work pretty well. Anything but magic, really.

[Lupy]

2:30 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwBK31tC5QM)

:smallbiggrin: Sorry.

[chiasaur11]

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/major-anderson-ft-sumter_Dir/steamship-marion.jpg

Didn't he get nailed by one in one of the Lovecraft stories?

Damn, horribly ninja'd. Sorry.

If Discworld is to be believed, clubs and swords would work pretty well. Anything but magic, really.

Esme Weatherwax would have him whimpering softly inside of a couple of minutes. Sam Vimes would manage to cuff him.

Man, looks like some cosmic horror is overrated.

[T-O-E]

Aquaman could. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=110181)

[DraPrime]

Dr. Mcninja could beat Cthulhu. I don't think there's anyone that he can't beat. Except for soul-powered tennis robots.

[Gorgondantess]

Depends on what you mean by "take down".
Destroy? Sure, that's perfectly possible. A steamboat did it.
However, you can never permanently kill Big C. Nuke him, Chuck Norris rounhouse kick to the face, whatever you do, he'll just reform 15 minutes later. Cthulhu is invincible. Only a god could kill him. And by god, I don't mean wussified deity, I mean in a christian sense all-powerful omnipotent can do anything without even trying god. But, hey, that's no fair. So, nothing. Cthulhu will just keep coming back.

[Llama231]

Practically any Science Fiction organization could probably destroy it.
Anything that could take out something that large and stop regeneration should work.

Oh, and epic level wizard in DnD. Easily.

[GoC]

Depends on what you mean by "take down".
Destroy? Sure, that's perfectly possible. A steamboat did it.
However, you can never permanently kill Big C. Nuke him, Chuck Norris rounhouse kick to the face, whatever you do, he'll just reform 15 minutes later. Cthulhu is invincible. Only a god could kill him. And by god, I don't mean wussified deity, I mean in a christian sense all-powerful omnipotent can do anything without even trying god. But, hey, that's no fair. So, nothing. Cthulhu will just keep coming back.

Prove it.:smalltongue:

[chiasaur11]

Depends on what you mean by "take down".
Destroy? Sure, that's perfectly possible. A steamboat did it.
However, you can never permanently kill Big C. Nuke him, Chuck Norris rounhouse kick to the face, whatever you do, he'll just reform 15 minutes later. Cthulhu is invincible. Only a god could kill him. And by god, I don't mean wussified deity, I mean in a christian sense all-powerful omnipotent can do anything without even trying god. But, hey, that's no fair. So, nothing. Cthulhu will just keep coming back.

Black Hole could deal with it.

Also: Grey Knights are pretty much built from the ground up to deal with this kind of issue. They could probably do it if enough of them were thrown at the problem.

[SITB]

Depends on what you mean by "take down".
Destroy? Sure, that's perfectly possible. A steamboat did it.
However, you can never permanently kill Big C. Nuke him, Chuck Norris rounhouse kick to the face, whatever you do, he'll just reform 15 minutes later. Cthulhu is invincible. Only a god could kill him. And by god, I don't mean wussified deity, I mean in a christian sense all-powerful omnipotent can do anything without even trying god. But, hey, that's no fair. So, nothing. Cthulhu will just keep coming back.

What? No, Cthulhu isn't a god in the Christian sense of the word; that honor belongs to Azathoth. Cthulhu is explicitly stated to be a mere high priest of one of the Outer Gods and powerful enough to be considered a god (in the Greek sense of the word) by any lesser beings who don't know any better.

As for who can defeat Cthulhu, any being/race which can destroy stars. Blow up a few suns and there, the stars will never be right.

[Selrahc]

Cthulhu was a high priest, not a god. His power and strength were indeterminate, but he wasn't supposed to be one of the biggest things in the mythos. He achieved his importance later on, when his story was latched on to as a centrepiece of canon.

Since he was grievously wounded by a steamship, enough to force him to retreat, then it is pretty likely that he wasn't supposed to be unstoppable by physical force. Anything that can exert significantly more power than a steamship would therefore have a good run at killing him.

Although, I read the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier the other day and loved the Bertie Wooster fights the cult of Cthulhu short story. Brilliant idea. Forbidden knowledge being countered by absolute ignorance.

[Fifty-Eyed Fred]

Aquaman could. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=110181)

Hey, I was gonna post that.

Nukes? Double nukes?

[Gorgondantess]

Practically any Science Fiction organization could probably destroy it.
Anything that could take out something that large and stop regeneration should work.

Oh, and epic level wizard in DnD. Easily.

Ehem.
"Vengeful gaze of God!"
Cthulhu is annihilated, then reforms 15 minutes later.

Cthulhu does not regenerate. He just reforms. He can be pounded into nothing, but he'll still reform.


Black Hole could deal with it.
Not necessarily. If Cthulhu met up with a black hole, he'd just warp into another dimension. The guy has power over space-time.



As for who can defeat Cthulhu, any being/race which can destroy stars. Blow up a few suns and there, the stars will never be right.

That doesn't defeat him, it just makes him sleep longer. He's still kicking, and he still has power- even when the stars weren't right, he had influence.

[kpenguin]

Just blow up and/or move around some stars.

[darkblade]

Yuki Nagato. Really it would basically go like this.

"Cthulhu, your presence posses a risk towards the stability of Haruhi Suzumiya. If you do not leave this reality at once I shall be forced to sever you intertwined data connection to this world."

At which point she would proceed to basically delete him with her 1337 reality haxor SQL powers.

As awesome a character as she is she is seriously broken.

[Selrahc]

Cthulhu does not regenerate. He just reforms. He can be pounded into nothing, but he'll still reform.

When did that ever happen? What are you basing it on?

[SITB]

Aquaman could. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=110181)

Ehhh, given that Cthulhu is asleep under the sea rather than being a some sort of terrestrial marine creature I would wager that this won't work (Cthulhu being, y'know, extra-terrestrial creature and as such not under Aquaman's jurisdiction).

On the other hand, Deep Ones would probably land under Aquaman's power.

EDIT:


Yuki Nagato. Really it would basically go like this.

"Cthulhu, your presence posses a risk towards the stability of Haruhi Suzumiya. If you do not leave this reality at once I shall be forced to sever you intertwined data connection to this world."

At which point she would proceed to basically delete him with her 1337 reality haxor SQL powers.

As awesome a character as she is she is seriously broken.

Isn't the Data Entity just a sufficiently advanced alien? Which means that the being as a whole is comparable to Cthulhu and the rest of the Old Ones?

And regarding the blowing up the stars argument: If Cthuhlu won't awaken at all I consider it a net win for the being that caused the stars to die; by the virtue that Cthulhu forfeited the fight even if without his acknowledgment.

[GoC]

Ehem.
"Vengeful gaze of God!"
Cthulhu is annihilated, then reforms 15 minutes later.

Cthulhu does not regenerate. He just reforms. He can be pounded into nothing, but he'll still reform.
Planeshift him into a private demiplane and freeze him in time. He is now for all intents and purposes "dead". And certainly "taken down" or "defeated".


Not necessarily. If Cthulhu met up with a black hole, he'd just warp into another dimension. The guy has power over space-time.
Prove that he can warp to another dimension and withstand a black hole.

[Gorgondantess]

When did that ever happen? What are you basing it on?

The Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying game, which I've been DMing for several years.

[Ravens_cry]

The Ghostbusters beat Cthulhu. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e24tkBx4mNQ)

[GoC]

The Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying game, which I've been DMing for several years.

Canon?:smallconfused:

[Gorgondantess]

Planeshift him into a private demiplane and freeze him in time. He is now for all intents and purposes "dead". And certainly "taken down" or "defeated".
And how would that work on Cthulhu? He's gotta have massive saves and SR.



Prove that he can warp to another dimension and withstand a black hole.
In the Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying book, Cthulhu is listed as having "all spells". Among the index of sample spells in the back of the book, one of them involves escaping into another dimension.


Canon?:smallconfused:

As close as you can get to it; Lovecraft was extremely vague.

[GoC]

And how would that work on Cthulhu? He's gotta have massive saves and SR.

In the Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying book, Cthulhu is listed as having "all spells". Among the index of sample spells in the back of the book, one of them involves escaping into another dimension.

As close as you can get to it; Lovecraft was extremely vague.
You source is a role playing game? Sorry. That's not a valid source.

[Roland St. Jude]

What? No, Cthulhu isn't a god in the Christian sense of the word; that honor belongs to Azathoth. Cthulhu is explicitly stated to be a mere high priest of one of the Outer Gods and powerful enough to be considered a god (in the Greek sense of the word) by any lesser beings who don't know any better...


Cthulhu was a high priest, not a god...

That's not at all what Gorgondantess said. The assertion was not that Cthulhu was a god but that only a god could destroy Chtulu. And for that matter, not just any deity could kill Cthulhu, but only all-powerful god such as from a monotheistic setting.

And on that note,
Sheriff of Moddingham: Please avoid real world religion discussion and references as they are Inappropriate Topics on this Forum

[Fan]

You source is a role playing game? Sorry. That's not a valid source.
Why not? It's all the we really have to go by aside from the mentions that he has in the books, and each time he's never truly presented, as he always goes back to sleep rather then awakening the great old ones.:smallconfused:
If your close personal friends with Cthulhu though, and can disprove a registered source then go ahead and say so.

[GoC]

Why not? It's all the we really have to go by aside from the mentions that he has in the books, and each time he's never truly presented, as he always goes back to sleep rather then awakening the great old ones.:smallconfused:
Why not? Because it wasn't declared canon by Lovecraft or the OP?:smallconfused:
So I'm saying it's impossible to compare him to anything due to lack of information.

[Dervag]

Depends on what you mean by "take down".
Destroy? Sure, that's perfectly possible. A steamboat did it.
However, you can never permanently kill Big C. Nuke him, Chuck Norris rounhouse kick to the face, whatever you do, he'll just reform 15 minutes later. Cthulhu is invincible. Only a god could kill him. And by god, I don't mean wussified deity, I mean in a christian sense all-powerful omnipotent can do anything without even trying god. But, hey, that's no fair. So, nothing. Cthulhu will just keep coming back.Debatable.

We know that on the power scale of early 20th century human civilization, Cthulhu is transcendent. His telepathic influence can warp minds even when he's in a state of sleep functionally equivalent to death; if he ever wakes up humanity vanishes like roaches when the house gets fumigated.

But we don't know whether that gives him an absolute ability to recover from all injuries, including stuff more destructive than being hit upside the head by a steamship.
__________


The Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying game, which I've been DMing for several years.The canonical status of that picture of him has to be secondary to the one we see in Lovecraft itself (if not necessarily to Derleth and such). And Lovecraft portrays Cthulhu as a powerful being, but not one with absolute power (even an absolute power to recover from physical damage). He is, in some sense, a mortal (sort of) relative to the real deities of the Lovecraftian mythos. He's just a BIG mortal, much bigger than we are. He's even much bigger than some things that are already much bigger than us (like, say, the Mi-Go). But he's still subject to limits.

So as far as I'm concerned, if you can't kill Cthulhu it just means you need to invent a bigger gun. You may not be able to do it, but it's not outside the realm of things that can conceivably happen in the multiverse.

[hamishspence]

d20 Cthulhu might be a better source- it would give us a guideline as to his power compared with, say, Zeus, Horus, Thor, etc.

Deities & Demigods also has a benchmark deity for a monotheistic system.

Sticking with Lovecraft, entities like Yog Sothoth or Shub Niggurath or Nyalathothep seem more active.

[SITB]

To actually add to the people who can defeat Cthulhu:

1)The powerhouses of Disgaea-verse (given that one of the middle-ly powerful guys destroys a world in a temper tantrum...) Namely: Badass 'freaking Overlord Zetta (ZETTA BEEEEAAAM!), Overlord Baal and possibly, Revya in the bad ending of the Demon path.

EDIT: The following beings listed below are only the charcters form the series Shin Megami Tensei, no actual relation to the belief of them in the real world, skip this please if you tthink it will offend you.


2) The movers and shakers of Shin Megami Tensei, which are:

A) God - Explicitly named YHVH.

B)Lucifer.

C) Shin Megami Tensei Nocturen spoilers:
The main character, AKA the Demi-Fiend, who was specifically created by Lucifer in order to lead the secomd rebellion and kill God. Permanently.

[Gorgondantess]

Why not? Because it wasn't declared canon by Lovecraft or the OP?:smallconfused:
So I'm saying it's impossible to compare him to anything due to lack of information.

Listen. Lovecraft never gave any direct information- the whole point was that we're not supposed to know just what Cthulhu can do. The only thing that does give direct information is the Roleplaying game; if we can't use that, then this whole argument is completely pointless because there isn't any clear depiction of what Cthulhu can do aside from the roleplaying game, so everything is just speculation, which is even less canonical than the game.

[GoC]

if we can't use that, then this whole argument is completely pointless because there isn't any clear depiction of what Cthulhu can do aside from the roleplaying game, so everything is just speculation, which is even less canonical than the game.
My point exactly.
I'm saying that a comparison is impossible. Now if the OP changes to "The version of Cthulhu in X" (there are quite a few depictions of him in various media) then we can start getting somewhere.

[Fan]

Well, we could just use Love craft's description of what happens when he awakens, and the Great old ones emerge from their slumber. The race of humanity dies off like so many vermin exterminated by his mighty hand.
IA IA, R'YLEH, CTHULHU FGTHAN!
The white text means I'm not serious.

[Ravens_cry]

Well, we could just use Love craft's description of what happens when he awakens, and the Great old ones emerge from their slumber. The race of humanity dies off like so many vermin exterminated by his mighty hand.
IA IA, R'YLEH, CTHULHU FGTHAN!
The white text means I'm not serious.
Just cross the streams.
*hums Ghostbusters theme*

[hamishspence]

besides d20, and older D&D editions, what other settings provide stats for both the Lovecraftian entities, and various traditional pantheons?

[Kane]

I think I recall seeing a t-shirt with a picture of Cthulhu holding the world on the front, and the caption, "It's not like that. He really doesn't care to much about our dimension."

On the back was a picture of Cthulhu chest deep in water, and clutching his wounded head, and a steamboat sailing away, with the caption "Except for steamships. He feakin' hates steamships."

[Selrahc]

That's not at all what Gorgondantess said. The assertion was not that Cthulhu was a god but that only a god could destroy Chtulu. And for that matter, not just any deity could kill Cthulhu, but only all-powerful god such as from a monotheistic setting.

I wasn't attempting to refute his statement. My first post was a simple attempt to answer the opening post, without reference to any of the other posts in the thread.(Although I gave them a quick once over to make sure I wasn't just parroting what everyone else was saying.)

The fact that I happened to be the post directly after someone making a statement about gods was purest happenstance. Because as you've pointed out, I didn't really address what he was saying.



if we can't use that, then this whole argument is completely pointless because there isn't any clear depiction of what Cthulhu can do aside from the roleplaying game, so everything is just speculation, which is even less canonical than the game.

Well in freeform speculation we at least have the virtue of not facing restraints. The makers of the roleplaying game had to come up with a system that could be played, we're just talking about random fights.

[hamishspence]

even freeform needs benchmark levels. For example, if planet-killing appears easy in one setting but very difficult in another, we'd tend to say that the first setting is usually better at planet-killing- it controls energy better, its more likely to win in a contest of straight firepower.

Here, we might be asking- how powerful is Cthulhu usually portrayed as- how does it compare with other entities, and therefore, would those other entities overshadow Cthulhu in a fight?

[Faulty]

An Elder GOOD!

[Selrahc]

even freeform needs benchmark levels. For example, if planet-killing appears easy in one setting but very difficult in another, we'd tend to say that the first setting is usually better at planet-killing- it controls energy better, its more likely to win in a contest of straight firepower.


If you aren't looking at the evidence, then you aren't speculating properly in my view.



Here, we might be asking- how powerful is Cthulhu usually portrayed as- how does it compare with other entities, and therefore, would those other entities overshadow Cthulhu in a fight?

As to what Cthulhu normally fights.. well the only evidence we have is the "fight" with the steamship. In which he is phased, but not killed.

We do know that gods in that setting are generally outside reality, but we also know that Cthulhu isn't a god and that lesser lovecraftian beings can be defeated by physical means. The fact that the steam ship did anytthing at all, I think is evidence that Cthulhu isn't that powerful in the setting.

[Ravens_cry]

Beat a God with a God. I believe Q could take on Cthulhu.

[hamishspence]

Cthulhu is handled more as a demigod in d20- a Hercules/Asclepius/Nike tier being, not a Zeus/Thor/Horus tier one.

Q is a very high tier "deity" probably at the Greater Deity end of the scale- so yes.

[Fan]

Thinking about it... I guess maybe Kefka could take him in his end game, I'm a god mode, and MAYBE the Fantastic Four... Not so sure on the last one but they have dealt with Love craftian beings before.

[GoC]

besides d20, and older D&D editions, what other settings provide stats for both the Lovecraftian entities, and various traditional pantheons?
Stats? None that I know of. However there are plenty of depictions of him in films, books, ect.


Here, we might be asking- how powerful is Cthulhu usually portrayed as- how does it compare with other entities, and therefore, would those other entities overshadow Cthulhu in a fight?
He is normally thought of as completely invincible by his fans. I believe that answers your question.:smallwink:

[hamishspence]

and how do these films,books, etc portray him? and if said authors have protrayed other more famous entities, is there a rough power level?

Would, for example, the Gods as per Clash of the Titans be significantly more powerful, but demigodlings like Hercules significantly less powerful?

Having something to compare him with, in the context of a particular media, would be helpful in judging.

[GoC]

and how do these films,books, etc portray him? and if said authors have protrayed other more famous entities, is there a rough power level?

Would, for example, the Gods as per Clash of the Titans be significantly more powerful, but demigodlings like Hercules significantly less powerful?

Having something to compare him with, in the context of a particular media, would be helpful in judging.

Like I said he's depicted as completely invincible. In this bit of media (http://www.macguff.fr/goomi/unspeakable/) Death of Discworld, The Hulk and Superman are both depicted as being totaly unthreatening compared to him.

[hamishspence]

I think this may be a case of flanderization. Since the Cthulhu mythos has more powerful entities (the outer gods), which aren't portrayed as utterly invincible, I think the various Cthulhu RPGs are probably closer to the original portrayal, and maybe fairer.

[GoC]

I think this may be a case of flanderization. Since the Cthulhu mythos has more powerful entities (the outer gods), which aren't portrayed as utterly invincible, I think the various Cthulhu RPGs are probably closer to the original portrayal, and maybe fairer.

But they add considerably to his abilities. "Able to cast every spell at will" is functionally equivalent to invincible.

[hamishspence]

not when its only one spell per round though. D&D deities are pretty high powered with Alter Reality, but there is still a scale of low to high power. Forgotten Realms Mystra, for example, would dwarf Cthulhu in magical talent.

[rankrath]

2:30 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwBK31tC5QM)

:smallbiggrin: Sorry.

bah. 3:06 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwBK31tC5QM)

If he can take on congress, he can take on Cthulhu.

[chiasaur11]

Thinking about it... I guess maybe Kefka could take him in his end game, I'm a god mode, and MAYBE the Fantastic Four... Not so sure on the last one but they have dealt with Love craftian beings before.

The FF deal with Lovecraftian entities on a daily basis.

Atomic Robo is fighting this kind of thing right now, actually. Or rather, he did, back in his college days. Today's robo is probably even better at this kind of thing.

[Prime32]

He is normally thought of as completely invincible by his fans. I believe that answers your question.:smallwink:*is holding back urge to mention Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann*

[Fifty-Eyed Fred]

Nukes can destroy him! They just have to be massive.

Double nukes? Don't even get me started on double nukes...

[Decoy Lockbox]

Did anyone notice that some of the voice actors in that ghostbusters clip were the same ones from the old Garfield cartoon? Like, the guy who did Garfield is voicing Peter, and the guy who did John Arbuckle is voicing Ray.

How about Pun-Pun? Nothing says "death" quite like an interdimensional haymaker.

[chiasaur11]

Did anyone notice that some of the voice actors in that ghostbusters clip were the same ones from the old Garfield cartoon? Like, the guy who did Garfield is voicing Peter, and the guy who did John Arbuckle is voicing Ray.

How about Pun-Pun? Nothing says "death" quite like an interdimensional haymaker.

Well, he is a bit overpowered. Still, that would be a sure win.

And interdimensional haymaker makes me think of the TTGL. Another sure candidate for Cthulhu Clobbering.

[Drascin]

Depends on what you mean by "take down".
Destroy? Sure, that's perfectly possible. A steamboat did it.
However, you can never permanently kill Big C. Nuke him, Chuck Norris rounhouse kick to the face, whatever you do, he'll just reform 15 minutes later. Cthulhu is invincible. Only a god could kill him. And by god, I don't mean wussified deity, I mean in a christian sense all-powerful omnipotent can do anything without even trying god.

So, Haruhi? :smallbiggrin:

But, anyway, Lovecraft never even portrayed Cthulhu as particularly powerful among the Mythos. He was just the one with the most publicity among humans, maybe because he was High Priest. But nowhere near top dog.

I'm pretty sure there are a couple characters from Touhou who could kill him permanently with relative easiness. Flandre's power is explicitly mentioned as destruction of anything, and she's already totally bonkers so the only thing Cthulhu's aura of madness would do is piss her off more. Of course, with her more pissed off, chances are she'd destroy the world anyway afterwards, so we wouldn't have advanced much.

And Yukari... well, Yukari is just hax. She gets in there, and there has, in fact, never been a Cthulhu except in fictional tales. Simple as that.

[GoC]

not when its only one spell per round though. D&D deities are pretty high powered with Alter Reality, but there is still a scale of low to high power. Forgotten Realms Mystra, for example, would dwarf Cthulhu in magical talent.

Cthulhu casts shapechange to get Choker abilities. He then casts a series of spells (Delay Death, Mindblank, ect). He is now invincible.
Actually let's just take out the middleman. Cthulhu gets the Choker actions and then spends each round casting this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/timelessBody.htm). He is now invincible.

[chiasaur11]

Cthulhu casts shapechange to get Choker abilities. He then casts a series of spells (Delay Death, Mindblank, ect). He is now invincible.
Actually let's just take out the middleman. Cthulhu gets the Choker actions and then spends each round casting this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/timelessBody.htm). He is now invincible.

Lets not go there.

Kobolds and Squirrels don't like it when you go there.

And when Kobolds don't like what you're doing, one's head tends to explode.

[SITB]

So, Haruhi? :smallbiggrin:

Isn't Haruhi like, a less powerful (and mad) version of Azathoth combined with traces of Nyarlathotep *******-like tendencies? You'll need one of the big boys (AKA Nyarlathotep, Azathoth, Yog-Sothoth...) to cahllenge her.

Cthulhu man claim for power is simply his popularity as the Mythos icon, rather then actual power.

[chiasaur11]

Isn't Haruhi like, a less powerful (and mad) version of Azathoth combined with traces of Nyarlathotep *******-like tendencies? You'll need one of the big boys (AKA Nyarlathotep, Azathoth, Yog-Sothoth...) to cahllenge her.

Cthulhu man claim for power is simply his popularity as the Mythos icon, rather then actual power.

Which fortunately means lots of high quality entertainment where he's beaten by small children, private ghost hunters, and other individuals.

The whole invincibility bit is selective canon at its finest.

[GoC]

Lets not go there.

Kobolds and Squirrels don't like it when you go there.

And when Kobolds don't like what you're doing, one's head tends to explode.

Just saying...

[SITB]

Which fortunately means lots of high quality entertainment where he's beaten by small children, private ghost hunters, and other individuals.

The whole invincibility bit is selective canon at its finest.

To be fair, the Mythos was never meant for environments where HOT BLOOD trumps everything and where humanity is the supreme model of all ass kicking. It was meant to underscore how completely irrelevant and inferior humans are; describing in detail the Great Old One's\Outer God's power would ruin the mystique of the Mythos.

Besides, Haruhi is like a small less malevolent Outer God on her own; I certainly wouldn't want to live in a universe where the closet analogue to Nyarlathotep outright states that she thinks of (normal) humans as inferior being and subconsciously enforce events to dance to her own whims. It's like having Nyarly show up tell you you suck and then starts screwing around with reality because he thinks it's amusing. Kinda like Persona 2: Innocent Sin.

[Dervag]

Isn't Haruhi like, a less powerful (and mad) version of Azathoth combined with traces of Nyarlathotep *******-like tendencies? You'll need one of the big boys (AKA Nyarlathotep, Azathoth, Yog-Sothoth...) to cahllenge her.

Cthulhu man claim for power is simply his popularity as the Mythos icon, rather then actual power.Well, he's overwhelmingly powerful compared to the world as we know it (and I mean all of the world). It's just that he's not the biggest thing in his setting- but that's because his setting is all about vast, impersonal entities that make your head explode from just looking at them.

[Jalor]

I got into a MASSIVE debate about this a while ago, and we eventually came to the conclusion that Goku, after going Super Saiyan 3, could defeat Cthulhu. I don't watch the show, but apparently Goku can move between dimensions with little-to-no effort. He could therefore chase down a fleeing Cthulhu. Also, pretty much everyone I ask agrees that Goku could blow up the entire solar system, taking Cthulhu with it.

[Ravens_cry]

Did anyone notice that some of the voice actors in that ghostbusters clip were the same ones from the old Garfield cartoon? Like, the guy who did Garfield is voicing Peter, and the guy who did John Arbuckle is voicing Ray.

Even funnier, in the live action Garfield movie, Garfield was voice by Bill Murray.

[Wardog]

My point exactly.
I'm saying that a comparison is impossible. Now if the OP changes to "The version of Cthulhu in X" (there are quite a few depictions of him in various media) then we can start getting somewhere.

My original idea was "as represented in H.P. Lovecraft's works, and other stories generaly considered canonical", and I wasn't thinking of RPG material at all.

But having thought about it/read the responses here, I've remembered how "fuzzy" the concept of "canon" is when it comes to Lovecraft/Cthulhu Mythos.

So I suppose the best thing to do might be to split this into several "parallel" questions, based on e.g.

* Cthulhu as depicted in the original works of Lovecraft
* Cthulhu as depicted in other stories generaly considered canonical
* RPG Cthulhu
* Any other version you want to suggest.


Now, as for who could take him down, I've just thought of a couple of guys who might be able to: Doom Guy and Quake Guy. Given that the former destroyed Hell, while the later telefragged Shub-Niggurath.

:smallbiggrin:

[chiasaur11]

Of course!

Doomguy!

There's nothing wrong with Cthulhu he can't fix...

WITH HIS HANDS!

[Llama231]

Ehem.
"Vengeful gaze of God!"
Cthulhu is annihilated, then reforms 15 minutes later.

Cthulhu does not regenerate. He just reforms. He can be pounded into nothing, but he'll still reform.


Not necessarily. If Cthulhu met up with a black hole, he'd just warp into another dimension. The guy has power over space-time.



That doesn't defeat him, it just makes him sleep longer. He's still kicking, and he still has power- even when the stars weren't right, he had influence.

VGG? BORING.
Anti Osmium bomb for brute force.:smallwink: Got it! Eschew Materials feat + Major Creation.

There's no book value listed for either Osmium or it's antimatter counterpart. Just summon Anti-Osmium to the limit of your casting ability in contact with the critter. (Point of order: given an Earth-equivalent density, and assuming it has the DR of rock at all points, it takes a 17th level caster to summon enough Anti-Osmium to fragment the planet. Imagine what a 50th could do.)

Osmium is 22,610 kg/cubic meter. A 50th level caster summons 50 cubic feet, or a cube 3.7 feet to a side. This converts over to be roughly 15.25 cubic meters, for a final density of 344,802 kg. 1 gram of antimatter produces roughly a 43 kiloton reaction (doubling once the matter is added into the equation, so the detonation of 1g of AM in contact with 1g of matter is 86kt). We have 344,802,500 grams of anti-osmium, for a total yield of 29,653,015,000,000 kilotons. (these are metric tons of 1,000kg each, for a total of 29,653,015,000,000,000 kiloGRAMS of TNT) 1 lb of TNT does 3d6 damage, or, converting over, 0.454 kg of TNT does 3d6 damage. So, dividing 29,653,015,000,000,000 by 0.454 yields 65,315,011,013,215,859 increments of 3d6. So, multiply by three, and get 195,945,033,039,647,577d6 damage.

Congratulations, you've just done 195 quadrillion damage minimum. Your average damage is 685,807,615,638,766,519 hp.

685 quadrillion hp damage. That ought to blow through most DR. And it's not fire damage (even though TNT is usually thought of that way). It's just plain old force damage.

Still, the whole reforming and dimension junk could be problematic, but plane shift and other inter dimensional travel spells could follow it, so that is useless. As for the madness, I believe that there are quite a few spells that stop that easily. For the offense, imprisonment would put it out of the picture for a while, and unless it is immune, mind-affecting would work quite well. Actually, I have a bunch of wizard cheese from the forum, so I will just post some of it. Sadly, I have lost the links, so NONE OF THESE ARE MINE.
Something else just as invincible.
Edits:
-Switched to Crystal Troll/Emerald Dragon
-Added note that this is merely a thought experiment
-Crafting without XP via pain extractor
-Quirks with the Antimagic/Null-Psi fields
-Use Half-Scrag to qualify for half-golem grafts
-Re-added Stained Glass half golem graft, how to reduce graft attrition. Added how to protect graft from sundering.
-Changed Stained Glass to Clay to protect against Trollbane Goo.
-Changed to Winged War Troll to get round type pyramid problems
-Added Will boosting gear to Advanced Enhancement list to help against Disjunction

Its widely known that the simplest Ikea Tarrasque stacks fire and acid immunity on top of a troll. So that got me thinking: what if some villain finds a way to reliably mass produce such Ikea Tarrasques into an indestructable army? Note that this is merely a thought experiment on how such a villain can build an unstoppable army to further whatever purposes thay may have. I do not intend to send the Emerald Legion against any PCs. I will not take responsibility if your PCs throw dice at you, if you send it against them.

Background
-We start with an Evil Cabal Mind Flayers who want to breed an invincible super soldier to further their nefarious purposes (whatever those may be).
-We need at least 3 Mind Flayers in the Cabal to perform the Voidmind ritual, but there can be more as needed.
-At least 1 or more of these Mind Flayers should be a full psion.
-At least 1 needs to be able to animate zombies (Wizard, Cleric/Archivist, Dread Necromancer, Warlock etc)
-They need a safe and reasonably large headquarters to carry out all their production.
-These Mind Flayers would need some means of mass-producing their own custom magical items without burning experience points. There are 2 possible ways to accomplish this
--One member of the cabal can be Legendary Artisan++ Artificer who can craft without XP cost
--Use Pain Extractor/Liquid Pain from BoVD: By permanently reducing the constitution of a victim by 1, you can extract a vial of liquid pain that can be used to offset enchantment costs by 3 XP.
-Our Mind Flayers need to have access to Winged War Trolls. These should ideally be available as is. In the event they are not, the Winged and War Troll description states that they can also be obtained by magical experimentation with the more widely available normal trolls as a base, although it doesn't give details. We assume such experimentation is not beyond the abilities of an Evil Mind Flayer Cabal.

Step 0: Preparation
-Firstly the Cabal needs to craft the following items, without XP cost. The Create Food traps have to be made earlier on, but the rest don't have to crafted until after your Troll farms are up and running. Then you have a few warm bodies to feed to your pain extractor.
--Several Tippy-esque Create Food Traps
--A few magical items that confer 'Spark of Life' while worn (amulets, rings etc).
--A set of Will save boosting gear that grants will save +13 (Wisdom +6, Enhancement +5, Luck +5, Insight +5).
--A few Visards of Semuanya (roll twice for will save)
--Mass produce Clay Half-Golem grafts for Tentacles at 12000 gp + 240 XP (Tentacles count as limbs).
--Mass produce Trollbane Alchemical Goo (Dungeonscape pg 37, stops regeneration for 1 hit when applied to slashing/piercing weapon, 30 gp with DC 25 Craft Alchemy check).
-Next, the Cabal captures or breeds Winged War Trolls, to start a Winged War Troll farm.

Step 1: Breeding
-Now kill several male Winged War Trolls and raise them as zombies. We use zombies rather than skeletons, as zombies retain the appropriate reproductive organs.
-Place the 'Spark of Life' magic gear on the zombie male Winged War Trolls. This lets them 'come to life'. Their offspring will then have the Gheden template (child of mindless undead) applied to them.
-Have the semi-living zombie Winged War Trolls males mate with the normal Winged War Troll females
-Notably, you only need a few males to mate with many many females. So you only need a few pieces of 'Spark of Life' gear.
-The net result should be a bunch of Winged Gheden War Trolls.

Step 2a: Basic Enhancements
-Our Mind Flayer Cabal now performs the Voidmind ritual on the offspring. You need 3 Mind Flayers to perform the ritual, and it is highly recommended that at least 1 is a full psion.
-This ritual grants them additional immunities, spell resistance and ensures the absolute loyalty of the offspring to the cabal.
-Next the Cabal equips each voidmind with Will resistance boosting gear, and the Visard of Semuanya.
-Finally, using the Trollbane Alchemical Goo to stop temporarily regeneration, the Cabal dismembers one limb and immediately replaces it with a Clay Half Golem graft.
-Upon successful grafting, the offspring gains slashing/piercing immunity which protect it from Trollbane goo, and renders further grafts impossible.
-The offspring must make a will save or become a construct (lose their Con, and hence regeneration) which makes unfit for combat, although they can still serve as slaves.
-To minimize the chances of failure, we tack on sufficient Will save boosting gear so that they only fail on a 1. We also give them the Visard of Semuanya so that they can roll twice and take the better of the two (1/day per Visard, so you need as many of these as your production per day). You should suffer only 0.25% attrition rate.
-Note that we choose the limb to be replaced to be the Voidmind tentacle. This is because the tentacles can be retracted into the offspring's head to protect it from sundering.
-Clay Half Golem is CR +3, Gheden is CR +0, Winged and Voidmind is CR +1. War Troll has a base CR of 12, so the resulting Winged Gheden Voidmind Half-Clay Golem War Trolls have a CR of 17.
-To save me typing all that all over again, we will henceforth refer to these monsters as the Emerald Legion. This name has historic roots, as earlier versions of the super soldier relied on Emerald Dragon cross-breeding to obtain the desired templates, but that disallowed Half-Clay Golem template application.

Step 2b: Advanced Enhancements
The Emerald Legion still has a few weaknesses, which we can try and overcome with the following gear:
-Necklace of Adaptation to prevent suffocation by environment (9k market price)
-Ring of Sustenance so that the Legion spends less time feeding/sleeping and more time stomping through cities. (2.2k market price)
-Spellblade weapons (6000 gp each) to protect against the following:
--Dispel magic
--Greater Dispel Magic
-We might be able to cram both of the above into one weapon by enchanting a double weapon (e.g. Quarterstaff), and using it as a 2-hander for damage.
-Items to Boost Will Saves:
--Wisdom +6 (36k GP)
--Enhancement +5 (25k GP)
--Luck +5 (50k GP)
--Insight +5 (50k GP)
-A custom magic item that creates silence as a continuous effect (2 SL x 3 CL x 2000 gp x 2) = 24k gp market price. Holy Word counts as a Sonic attack and is negated by Silence.
-A +1 armor/buckler with 'Proof against Transmutation' enhancement (protects against Polymorph/Petrification, enhancement value 6, 36k gp market price)
-A +1 armor/buckler with 'Soulfire' enhancement (protects against Death effects, enhancement value 5, 25k gp market price)
-One slot has to be armor, and the other had to be a buckler, although it doesn't matter which is where.

Step 3: World Domination
-By default most things will bounce harmlessly off the Legions many immunities.
-Send the Legion against fortified cities. Watch and laugh as the Legion shrugs off everything thrown at them, fly over the city walls and slaughter the opposing soldier within.
-There are a few things that can hurt the Legion as noted below.
-In such instances, the Mind Flayer masters will be instantly aware of any damage done to their voidmind minions. The Psion Mind Flayer master can use his Psionic's through the Voidmind's body to help fight/destroy these enhanced threats.
-Also, against cities that would likely pack high level mages that would normally be able to neutralize the legion, the Mind Flayer cabal might employ the Null-Psi field berserk trick (see below).
-As the Legion brings down cities, they will gain XP and advance by class levels. Some of these higher level soldiers may be assigned to be the personal guards of the Cabal.

Emerald Legion: Strengths
-Unlike normal Trolls, only acid damage is lethal for War Trolls, all other damage is non-lethal.
-With the Gheden template, they are immune to non-lethal damage (and death from massive damage), so any damage that does not ignore regeneration, is ignored entirely (including holy water which is a Gheden weakness, and spells which normally bypass Clay Golem magic immunity).
-He also has SR 22 to help fend off anti-Clay Golem spells.
-With the Voidmind template they are immune to acid damage, what would otherwise be their one weakness. In fact with Half-Clay Golem, he is healed by magical acid.
-In short, without stopping their regeneration, they cannot be brought down by HP damage, not even hotter-than-normal-fire damage like divine fire and hellfire, which was a problem for half Gold Dragon normal trolls.
-In instances where attacks do bypass their regeneration, they still have Slashing/Piercing immunity, 10/admantine & bludgeoning and 5/magic DR.
-Additionally they are immune to magic, sleep, paralysis, stunning, mind affecting, ability damage/drain and energy drain.
-Furthermore, if they extend their Voidmind tentacle, that provides an extra attack with improved grab and constrict.
-One previous weakness was Trollbane Alchemical goo, which stopped regeneration. However it had to be applied to Slashing/Piercing weapons. Half-Clay Golem counters this by giving them immunity to Slashing/Piercing damage.
-Immunity to Slashing/Piercing also helps protect against Vorpal weapons.
-With the Gheden templates, its aging upon maturity is slowed to 1/4, although it is by no means immortal.
-Finally, if assisted by its Mind Flayer Psion master, the Voidmind can serve as a conduit and manifest its master's powers. This permits them to do stuff like teleport a squad into the middle of an enemy fortress.

Emerald Legion: Weaknesses
They are still vulnerable to the following:
-Drowning/Suffocation (Although given their flight and high strength, they are unlikely to drown.)
-Their Magic Immunity protects them from spells and SLAs, but they can still be affected by Su abilities (and to a lesser extent Ex abilities). All the listed effects below have to be supernatural.
--Supernatural Death effects
--Supernatural Polymorphing/Petrification
--Supernatural Holy Word spells
--Supernatural Graymantle stop its regeneration
-Emerald Legionnaires with the advanced enhancement gear listed above, are immune to most of the above (except supernatural Graymantle), but their equipment can destroyed by Sundering and Disjunction.
-Against Disjuntion, the best we can do is boost Will saves to minimize the chances of Disjunction succeeding.
-Equipment can also be temporarily disabled by a targetted dispel, so we use Spellblade weapons to help protect against normal and greater dispel magic. But non-spell Dispels might still take effect (e.g. Dispel Psionics, Voracious Dispelling/Devour Magic).

Antimagic/Null-Psionics Field
This is an interesting exception, being both a strength and a weakness. While in the field, the Legion becomes immune to all the above weaknesses except for Drowning/Suffocation (since its Necklace of Adaptation would stop working). However, at the same time, the link to their Mind Flayer masters is a Supernatural ability, and so is severed and they regain free will.

Thats not always advantageous for the enemies of the Legion. Being half undead trolls means they are evil and will attack relentlessly even without their Master's influence. And while within the field they are virtually impossible to kill. So, using the field on them won't stop them from wailing on you, and makes them much harder to kill.

Oddly enough, a Mind Flayer Psion Master can manifest Null-Psionics field through the voidmind, intentionally severing the link, making the Legionnaire far more tougher. He can also dismiss his own Null-Psi field and regain control of the Legionnaire. In this way, the Null-Psi field serves as a "Frenzy" button. So the Mind Flayers can e.g. teleport an Emerald Legion squad into the middle of a fortress, activate Null Psi-field, wait until the screams stop, and then dismiss Null-Psi to regain control of the squad.

There is one item that creates a permanent Antimagic field- Antimagic Shackles (132k GP). Should a Legionnaire manage to obtain one while free of his master's influence, he could voluntarily put them on himself, thereby freeing himself permanently from the control of the Cabal. (Yes, shackles set them free).

Feats
With 12 Giant HD, each Emerald Legionaire starts with 5 feats. It is arguable whether the Mind Flayer Cabal can assign feats for their Voidmind minions. But if they can, here are a few useful ones:
-Power Attack: With their high strength and physical invulnerability, they are best off using 2 handed weapons, this is an obvious choice.
-Brutal Throw: lets them throw stuff using their ludicrous strength bonus to hit, rather than use their piddling Dex score. Bring along a stack of darts if they need some kind of ranged attack, although the maximum range is still just 100 ft.
-Far Shot/Distant Shot: Tack these onto Brutal Throw, and you can stand just over the horizon, and chuck boulders at city walls.

Other Notes
-By RAW, Grafts have no statistics of their own and can't be attacked or damaged separately from the creature to which they are grafted. So in theory, enemies shouldn't be able to Sunder the half Golem grafts. But we put it on the retractable tentacle anyway just in case.


Generic Wizard Tanking Example:
While within a Time-Stop (Extended via a metamagic rod), a simple 5th level spell (Wall of Stone) domed around the wizard can invalidate the need to worry about Antimagic Fields, casting while silenced or grappled, Energy Balls, Energy Bolts, Mordenkainen's Disjunctions, Crystal Shards, Ectoplasmic Cocoons, and a huge number of other spells, powers, tactics, and effects. Building a WoS inside of a Prismatic Sphere protects the WoS from taking any kind of damage until the Sphere is taken care of (and unless your psion has a Rod of Cancellation handy, he ain't taking it down). The Ring Gates I mentioned earlier could just as easily be held by some summonables, rather than glued to the foreheads of some really nasty CR 27 dragons (which I also did via Time-Stop). And guess what? Many of my summoned creatures have some very high-level casting abilities - and you'd better believe that an army of them is coming for you.

The only way to get in is to Metamorphosis into a creature that can burrow (which is why I'd plan on casting Wall of Iron to push over and stand on), or to teleport in (which is why I'd cast Dimensional Anchor on the walls).

I could have my familiar running around in an Antimagic Field effect. All it would have to do would be to run within 10 feet of you. Then the aforesaid dragons would likely eat you alive. If that didn't work, I'd make a Knowledge: Psionics check, likely figuring out that it was your psicrown that was giving you invulnerability, and have my dragons use their entire attack routines to sunder it (and any other equipment you were carrying, just in case).

Assuming that you managed to kill my familiar, and survived the Summoned/Gated creatures, then found ways around my turtle-shell, AND somehow got to me, I used my free time in my temporal plastic bubble to cast Shapechange, which means that I'm now an incorporeal undead, so you'll likely not be able to hurt me. And if you get past the 50% miss-chance imposed by incorporeality, I also used a Limited Wish to get a Contingencied Dimension-Door to transport me 5' underground, if something actually can damage me; since I'm incorporeal, I can exist within solid matter, so that's specifically allowed. Good luck getting to me there.

Also, to counteract your Schism effect, I have about 5 10th-level Simulacrums running around, trying to hit you with Forcecages and such (and unlike yours, they have no duration, have a full complement of spells as 10th-level casters, and don't drain any of my current resources). They were in my Bag of Holding, which I dumped out as a move-action on one of my plastic-bubble rounds, or perhaps on a later round; it doesn't matter that much.

And, assuming that you somehow managed to survive, have taken down all of my defenses, and then *killed* me, remember that it wasn't actually *me.* You've been fighting my Astral Projection this whole time, which has instantaneously returned to my real body (which is in my Bag of Holding, inert and in stasis). What this means is that I can learn from my mistakes and try to kill you all over again. By that time, you're likely down to 1/2 your power points or less, assuming that I haven't killed you after my familiar's AMF, my MKDs or my dragons' sunders and MKDs (or AMFs) take out your Timeless Body. Stat damage/drain is horrible, especially to either a manifesting stat (Int) or one of your weaker stats (Con or Cha), not to mention innumerable save-or-dies that target your rather weak Fortitude save (and that's not even including the spells that make you suffer without a single save - such as Otto's Irresistable Dance or Maze).

And to keep you and that pesky psicrystal from galavanting about with teleportation spells, my dragons and I have hit you with a half dozen Dimensional Anchor spells - touch attack, no save. You ain't going anywhere.

And, assuming you killed me AGAIN somehow (as I Extended Time-Stopped before teleporting out of the bag, and put up my defenses again), note that I had at least one Clone in my Bag of Holding (which is now me, and I could have more - note that all it costs is, at most, 1500 gp, and that I can have as many of these as I like, up to my gp limit), and that it's about to be teleporting out to keep up the barrage of spells that I've been flinging at you.

And before you start yelling about how I'm chewing through my spell-slots like mad, note that I've perhaps only actually casted a few spells from slots. The rest have been through my chock-full Rods of Absorption, and perhaps a few scrolls (and I can have tons of these, if I wanted them). Thus, I've only used a fraction of my resources thus far.

We are, at most, 15 rounds or so in. You've hardly been able to touch me, very likely, and if you have, I'm still in the running.


Ikea Tarrasque
This, is the new and improved Ikea Tarrasque Version 2.0, adapted so that anyone at home can have their very own Ikea Tarrasque.

Unfortunately, due to the good people at WoTC removing some of the brokenness that was inherant in 3.0, I can no longer make a creature that is immune to all damage.

I did make something damn close though. *;D


This is a template combination that can be added to any Animal, Beast, Giant, Humanoid Creature, Magical Beast, or Monstrous Humanoid that makes it immune to weapons of all types, and nearly all spells.

Lernean Multi-Headed Half Clay Golem.

Cost? +7 Challenge Rating, or +7 Level Adjustment and 2 Racial Hitdie.


The Base Creature gains the Construct Subtype

Add 2 hitdie to the original total,

Gain an extra head

+2 to Listen, Search and Spot

Gain Improved Initiative and Combat Reflexes as bonus feats.

Stats are adjusted as follows: Str +8, Dex -2, Con (removed), Int -6, Wis +0, Cha -6.

It automatically Berserks in battle, adding +4 to Strength, and -2 to AC.

All damage it deals is wounding damage that can only be healed with a healing spell of level 6 or higher.

After being in combat for 1 round, it may Haste for 3 rounds. This is only useable once per day.

It is Immune to any affect that targets its body thanks to the Lernaean subtype, and the only vulnerable part of it is its heads.

There are a few ways to kill this beast, but it is difficult.

Firstly, a successful Death effect or a Disintegrate effect will kill it outright.

Secondly, removing one of it's head with a slashing weapon, and then applying 5 points of either fire or acid damage to the stump before it regrows will kill it once all it's head are gone.

Thirdly, an unsuccessful Death effect or Disintegrate effect that deals enough damage to it will remove one of it's heads, at which point you need to deal 5 points of either fire or acid damage.

But you will have a few problems doing so.

Firstly, thanks to the Half-Clay Golem template it is Immune to slashing and piercing damage. This means that the only way to even hurt it is with a Death effect or a Disintegrate effect.

Secondly, also thanks to the Half-Clay Golem template, it is also has the following abilities.

Immunity to any spell or spell-like ability that allows spell resistance.

Acid now Heals it 1 point of damage for every 3 points of damage it would have done, instead of harming it.

Immunity to all mind effects.

Immunity to poison, sleep effects, paralysis, stunning, disease, death effects, and necromancy effects.

A Disintegrate spell slows it for 1d6 rounds and deals 1d12 points of damage.

A Move Earth spell drives it back 120 feet and deals 3d12 points of damage to it.

An Earthquake spell cast directly at it stops it from moving on it's next turn, and deals 5d10 points of damage.


So, in order to stop it, you need to deal hitpoint damage either with multiple Disintegrate spells, Move Earth spells, or Earthquake spells.

Unfortunately, even Wish doesn't work against this beast, as Wish allows Spell Resistance.

In any case dealing damage equal to half the original hitpoint total, then deal 5 points of fire damage to the stump within 1d4 rounds, or two heads grow from the stump, each with the original hitpoint total.

I say good luck to you. This is difficult, but not impossible.
There are two things I would like to see here.

Firstly, can anyone prove to me that this template stacking doesn't work, or that it won't work the way I am suggesting?

Secondly, I would like to see what beasts other people can come up with using this template.

EDIT: Just changed the size restrictions. There are none, but the larger the creature, the more heads it CAN have, and hence the higher level adjustment and challenge rating. If you leave it with only 1 head though, that doesn't change.

More heads equals more Racial Hitdie.

For each extra head, add +2 Racial Hitdie, and +2 to Listen, Search and Spot.

Restrictions on extra heads(From base creature)

Medium Size or Smaller: Up to 1 extra head
Large Size: Up to 3 extra heads
Huge Size: Up to 11 extra heads
Gargantuan Size: Up to 19 extra heads
Colossal Size: Up to 29 extra heads.

CR/LA Adjustments for extra heads

1 Head: As above
2-4 Heads: +1
5-7 Heads: +2
8-10 Heads: +3
11-15 Heads: +4
16-20 Heads: +5
21-25 Heads: +6
26-29 Heads: +7


The Crab
Awesome. Fearsome. Bow before the crab.

PSEUDONATURAL PARAGON ADVANCED HUGE MONSTROUS CRAB (CR 33)
N Huge Outsider (extraplanar, aquatic, augmented vermin)
Init +13; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision, scent, Listen +42, Spot +37
Languages Aquan
AC 83 (Size -2, Dex +13, Luck +15, Insight +12, +35 Natural), touch 48, flat-footed 70
hp 544 (16 HD)
Immune mind-affecting effects
Resist fire 10, cold 10, electricity 35, acid 35
DR 15/epic
SR 80
Fort +34, Ref +28, Will +28
Spd 180 ft. (36 squares)
Melee epic tentacle +78 (2d8+46) or
Melee epic claw +78 (2d6+46) or
Melee 5 epic tentacles +78 (2d8+46) and
Melee 2 epic claws +78 (2d6+46)
Space 15 ft.; Reach 15 ft.
Base Atk +12; Grp +82
Atk Options constrict 4d6+46, improved grab, rotting constriction
Abilities Str 63, Dex 36, Con 39, Int 18, Wis 36, Cha 17
SQ amphibious, fast healing 20, constant insight, spell-like abilities, alternate form
Feats ToughnessB, Combat Reflexes, Improved Grapple, Power Attack, Awesome Blow, Multiattack, Improved Multiattack
Skills Balance +42, Climb +55, Hide +27, Jump +55, Listen +42, Move Silently +31, Spot +37, Tumble +42

Amphibious (Ex): Although an advanced Huge monstrous crab is aquatic, it can survive indefinitely on land.

Constrict (Ex): An advanced Huge monstrous crab deals damage equal to twice its normal claw damage plus its Strength bonus on a successful grapple check.

Improved Grab (Ex): To use this ability, an advanced Huge monstrous crab must hit with a claw or tentacle attack. It can then attempt to start a grapple with a +13 bonus as a free action without provoking attacks of opportunity. If it wins the grapple check, it establishes a hold and can constrict.

Rotting Constriction (Ex)
Once the creature has hold of an opponent, each successful grapple check it makes during subsequent rounds permanently drains 2d4 points of Constitution. At the same time, the creature regains 10 lost hit points.

Constant Insight (Su)
The creature makes all its attacks with a +15 insight bonus. The creature is not affected by the miss chance that applies to attacks against a concealed target. This bonus is included in the statistics above.

Spell-Like Abilities (Sp)
At will—blur, dimension door, shield, unhallow. Caster level 35th.
3/day—greater dispel, see invisibility, haste. Caster level 15th.

The DCs are Charisma-based.

Alternate Form (Su)
At will, a pseudonatural creature can take the form of a grotesque, tentacled mass (or another appropriately gruesome form), but all its abilities remain unchanged despite the alien appearance. Changing shape is a standard action. Other creatures receive a -1 morale penalty on their attack rolls against pseudonatural creatures in this alternate form.

En garde.


Plus, there is always Pun-Pun.

Yep, that's me, never making up my own stuff, only using what everybody else has done.:smalltongue:

[Prime32]

Who (or what) could take down Cthulhu?
Hawkgirl (http://dcanimated.wikia.com/wiki/The_Terror_Beyond) could

[chiasaur11]

X-Com pulled this gig in Terror From The Deep.

They won, but it was a bit pyrrhic a victory.

[The_JJ]

Re: Blowing up stars.

Probably already been answered, but you'd have to go back in time to X years before you need him dead, where X equals stars distance from Earth measured in lightyears.

Compensating for blueshifting/redshifting of course... or does that not matter (:smalltongue:) with light? It's been to long since I opened a physics textbook.


That said... Steve Irwin could do it.

[Kris Strife]

I'm gonna add in Freakazoid. He's already completely insane and probably strong enough to keep from being eaten...

[Finn Solomon]

Death of the Endless, my dependable standby for vs threads.

Of course, if that doesn't work, there's always the Saint of Killers.

[Ravens_cry]

Death of the Endless, my dependable standby for vs threads.

Of course, if that doesn't work, there's always the Saint of Killers.



That is not dead which can eternal lie.
And with strange aeons even death may die.

Yeah, sorry, as much as I love the anthropomorphic personifications, especially a certain one who speaks in small caps and likes cats, Death explicitly can not kill Cthulhu.

[Kris Strife]

Yeah, sorry, as much as I love the anthropomorphic personifications, especially a certain one who speaks in small caps and likes cats, Death explicitly can not kill Cthulhu.

And you can't sharpen a scythe on sunlight. And you can't kill
Death. He didn't let that stop him either. Of course, since his granddaughter is dating the anthropomorphic personification of Time, he might be able to get some back up. :p

[Ravens_cry]

And you can't sharpen a scythe on sunlight. And you can't kill
Death. He didn't let that stop him either. Of course, since his granddaughter is dating the anthropomorphic personification of Time, he might be able to get some back up. :p
Given the fact how damn loose the canon for Cthulhu is, a couplet from a fake book is as close to gospel as we are going to get. I am not saying someone of Deaths calibre couldn't put Cthulhu back to sleep, and handedly too. But kill in the sense of end permanently and for all eternity? Not happening.
[edit] Oh.
Teatime had a plan for killing Death. We can never know if it would have worked, but considering how close he came with the Hogfather, another anthropomorphic personification, it wouldn't surprise me if it could have. Especially considering how, as you pointed out, Death as a mortal was able to.

[GoC]

IIRC Discworld Death can kill/destroy concepts. Thus he could also kill Cthulhu.

[Vonotar]

I can't recall Discworld Death killing anything (auditors aside, though I suppose they don't really die)
Sure he cuts the spirit away from [B]already dead things, but I can't see him killing Cthulhu, it'd go against his own rules.
No doubt he would make Susan do it.

[Selrahc]

Death of the Endless doesn't kill people either. In fact shes even less threatening than that old soppy cat lover from Discworld. At least hes had a few fight scenes.

[chiasaur11]

I can't recall Discworld Death killing anything (auditors aside, though I suppose they don't really die)
Sure he cuts the spirit away from [B]already dead things, but I can't see him killing Cthulhu, it'd go against his own rules.
No doubt he would make Susan do it.

Remember replacement Death?

Music with rocks in it?

Death killed them both. Combine that with the fact even at the end of the universe he's still alive, Cthulhu's "Sit in the corner until the scary man in the black robes goes away" plan is seeming less than optimal.

[Vonotar]

Remember replacement Death?

Music with rocks in it?

Death killed them both.

Hmm, I suppose he did at that. In which case I'll revise my position, Death might be able to kill Cthulhu, but I don't think he would.

[Fan]

Well, I would say that Death would at least wake Cthulhu up, which would wake Azathoth up, which would end the CONCEPT of the universe. Pyhrric Victory at best.

[chiasaur11]

Well, I would say that Death would at least wake Cthulhu up, which would wake Azathoth up, which would end the CONCEPT of the universe. Pyhrric Victory at best.

They need to call in Azreal, Death of Universes to settle that bit up. And Death's boss has shown a certain amount of sympathy for old Bill.

Combine that with the fact Death survives the end of the universe and the birth of the next one, and Bill Door wins.

[Blue Paladin]

That said... Steve Irwin could do it.Mind (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/118.html) you (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/168.html), he's (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/202.html) a (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/204.html) bit (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/271.html) stroppy (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/635.html)...

[Fan]

Except there is no universe, or anything. The very CONCEPT of any sort of universe existing is ended. Nothing survives. No not even then.

[thorgrim29]

Mind (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/118.html) you (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/168.html), he's (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/202.html) a (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/204.html) bit (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/271.html) stroppy (http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/635.html)...



Wow, that is pure genius, though the seine pun was a bit painful...
On topic, well to kill Chtulhu you’d need something bigger and badder then he is, like, say, a nuke, or Mr Croup and Mister Vandamar. Harry Dresden could probably do it in a few dozen years (he was literally born for this kind of thing after all, and his sanity is pretty strong as long as he doesn’t try to See big C). Other then that, no clue.

[UltraDude]

Huh... thinking on it, Yuri Volte Hyuga from Shadow Hearts is called a Godslayer for a reason, since he fights a cosmic superbeing at the end of the first game. Dunno just how Messiah stacks up against Cthulu and other Mythos beings, but Yuri's Seraphic Radiance/Dark Seraphim powers can do some crazy things. As for going mad... Shadow Hearts has sanity points, and only the vampires have more than Yuri.

[Mr. Mud]

1.) Pun Pun?
2.) Pun Pun variants?
3.) ???
4.) Profits? :smallconfused::smalltongue:.

[Raguzert]

Hmm, lots of "never lose" heroes, like batman, goku ect. Though I hope they do not put him against wolverine, seeing them jumping behind a stand and them wolverine get up, smilling and smoking should never be repeated...

[Deepblue706]

Conan the Barbarian would find a way. Didn't he even fight a few "Elder Evils", somewhere?

[WalkingTarget]

Conan the Barbarian would find a way. Didn't he even fight a few "Elder Evils", somewhere?

Well, several Robert E. Howard creations were in the general Mythos canon, even during Lovecraft's lifetime when it was still largely just a loose association of shared references.

The big problem with using anything from Lovecraft in a vs. thread is that the philosophy involved is simultaneously incredibly important to his writings and is incompatible with that from a lot of other bodies of work. Cthulhu comes from an author who kept pushing the idea that humanity is utterly uninteresting on a cosmic level and can't even begin to truly understand the universe (where actually gaining that understanding is harmful to the individual). Most authors I'm familiar with, if they address the issue at all, go the other way and assign some importance to humanity.

Whether your protagonist of choice goes mad upon encountering Cthulhu (or some other Lovecraftian entity) or not is largely going to be an arbitrary decision. In Lovecraft, humans simply aren't wired to be able to handle the existence of the Old Ones without breaking in some way. In a lot of other settings, humanity is made of sterner stuff. Similarly, humanity isn't capable of really doing any lasting harm to him in his home setting. Extrapolating him into, say, a superhero comic (or hell, even the modern day when we have nuclear weapons) who's to say what may or may not do something to him?

Of course, adding in RPG rulebooks and/or other, later authors' take on him might open all sorts of options.

[Seraph]

Prove it.:smalltongue:

Call of Cthulhu RPG, special rules say that if Cthulhu is targeted by a nuclear weapon he regenerates 24 hours later and is now radioactive.

[chiasaur11]

Call of Cthulhu RPG, special rules say that if Cthulhu is targeted by a nuclear weapon he regenerates 24 hours later and is now radioactive.

I thought that was GURPS.

[GoC]

Call of Cthulhu RPG, special rules say that if Cthulhu is targeted by a nuclear weapon he regenerates 24 hours later and is now radioactive.

Only a valid source in one of the OPs scenarios.

[Collin152]

I could do it. Cthulhu? Easy!
I could destroy the entire universe--no, the very concept of a universe with my thoughts!
Course, I can't reduce the scale of destruction by much; no matter what I do, we all die. But Cthulhu will too.

[Wardog]

But actually killing Cthulhu? The Galactic Empire might be able to manage it, if they had a Death Star handy, and anybody else with similar powers to create Earth-shattering kabooms. Doing the deed without writing off the planet as collateral damage,however, might be a bit trickier.

You might not need quite that much firepower.

An orbital strike powerful enough to reduce R'yhle to liquid rock might be enough to kill or incapacitate him. IIRC, the Imperium on Man could achieve that quite easily with a lance strike.

And even if he reforms from that, he'll presumably be dispersed throughout several billion tons of now-solidified lava. He won't be going anywhere in a hurry after that.

(Well, either that or he'll now be some sort of unstoppable titanic rock monster...)



As for sillier examples, Superman (based on the latest film) could presumably dig up R'yhle and chuck it into space. (And I remember someone on another thread once suggested that Silverage Superman could just move the stars so they were no longer right :smallbiggrin: )

[hamishspence]

"Take down" may be distinct from "Kill permanently" Why does:

"In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming"

happen in the first place? Because, long ago, he was comprehensively defeated.

[WalkingTarget]

"Take down" may be distinct from "Kill permanently" Why does:

"In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming"

happen in the first place? Because, long ago, he was comprehensively defeated.

Depends on who you ask.

Lovecraft gives us

...the Great Old Ones who lived ages before there were any men, and who came to the young world out of the sky. Those Old Ones were gone now, inside the earth and under the sea; but their dead bodies had told their secrets in dreams to the first men...
and

When the stars were right, They could plunge from world to world through the sky; but when the stars were wrong, They could not live. But although They no longer lived, They would never really die.
from "The Call of Cthulhu" and this from "At the Mountains of Madness"

Another race - a land race of beings shaped like octopi and probably corresponding to fabulous prehuman spawn of Cthulhu - soon began filtering down from cosmic infinity and precipitated a -monstrous war which for a time drove the Old Ones wholly back to the sea - a colossal blow in view of the increasing land settlements. Later peace was made, and the new lands were given to the Cthulhu spawn whilst the Old Ones held the sea and the older lands. ... Then suddenly the lands of the Pacific sank again, taking with them the frightful stone city of R’lyeh and all the cosmic octopi, so that the Old Ones were again supreme on the planet except for one shadowy fear about which they did not like to speak.

The Great Old Ones (distinct from the "Old Ones" in the latter story) are never mentioned as being defeated in some way. Their "stars are right" limitation isn't explained by Lovecraft.

Many other writers have added explanations that go on about something imposed on them by others, the Elder Gods in many cases, but that falls into only some of the OP's options.

[hamishspence]

it was in The Shadow Over Innsmouth collection- an essay at the start of the book, which discussed they being driven into hiding- The Elder Sign being part of it.

[WalkingTarget]

it was in The Shadow Over Innsmouth collection- an essay at the start of the book, which discussed they being driven into hiding- The Elder Sign being part of it.

Ah, but who wrote the essay? I doubt it was Lovecraft.

The "Elder Sign" is mentioned briefly in "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath" (as a motion some farmers made when asked about the Gods) and there is a mention of some stones with marks on them being left on the island that Obed Marsh visited when he found out about the Deep Ones after the islanders had been wiped out in "Shadow" but they aren't given that name. I'm having trouble thinking of any other references to similar things in his body of work. Most of that significance was added by later writers (you can probably thank August Derleth for any "cosmic struggle" aspect in any later work, the RPG included).

Edit - Ah, near the end of "Shadow" we get a line that "The Deep Ones could never be destroyed, even though the palaeogean magic of the forgotten Old Ones might sometimes check them," but saying that the Old Ones (the barrel-shaped aliens from "Mountains") could "sometimes check" the Deep Ones is a far cry from saying that this has any bearing on the Great Old Ones like Cthulhu.

[hamishspence]

Good point. I'd say though that the various game versions of him are a good place to start- for evidence that, powerful as he is, he has limitations.

Same applies to other Lovecraftion entities.

[Ravens_cry]

"Take down" may be distinct from "Kill permanently" Why does:

"In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming"

happen in the first place? Because, long ago, he was comprehensively defeated.
But not ended. Even when dead, he is not dead, merely dreaming. Of course 'take down' is differant from 'kill permanently'. A steamship to the noggin might put him pack to sleep, as might four proton packs to a roller-coaster.
That's the best any mortal can do, can even hope for, to put Cthulhu back to sleep. The whole idea of the Cthulhu Mythos is that victory is always temporary. That someday, when the stars are right, there will be none to stop him,and the Final Night Shall Fall. And it shall be an Ending to which all Mans works are as nothing.

[chiasaur11]

But not ended. Even when dead, he is not dead, merely dreaming. Of course 'take down' is differant from 'kill permanently'. A steamship to the noggin might put him pack to sleep, as might four proton packs to a roller-coaster.
That's the best any mortal can do, can even hope for, to put Cthulhu back to sleep. The whole idea of the Cthulhu Mythos is that victory is always temporary. That someday, when the stars are right, there will be none to stop him,and the Final Night Shall Fall. And it shall be an Ending to which all Mans works are as nothing.

And then... nothing. The universe ceases to exist. Those with the wisdom and ability to do so escape to attempt to attain godhood elsewhere. The majority merely die screaming in torment.

And then DEATH sits around until a paperclip pops up.

[Mr. Mud]

MitD, if OotS keeps progressing the way it has been, of late. :smalltongue:

[FoE]

Squirrel Girl. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main.SquirrelGirl)

[chiasaur11]

Squirrel Girl. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main.SquirrelGirl)

Well, as the first post said, that one's a gimmee.

[Stormthorn]

aquaman
------

[Ravens_cry]

aquaman
------
LIES!
That was Futurama fan-art, nothing more.
Nothing more!:smalleek:
For it to be otherwise would sunder the very walls of creation, and all reality would come crashing down in a silent, eternal, ruin. It can not be so, it must not be so!

[Innis Cabal]

But not ended. Even when dead, he is not dead, merely dreaming. Of course 'take down' is differant from 'kill permanently'. A steamship to the noggin might put him pack to sleep, as might four proton packs to a roller-coaster.
That's the best any mortal can do, can even hope for, to put Cthulhu back to sleep. The whole idea of the Cthulhu Mythos is that victory is always temporary. That someday, when the stars are right, there will be none to stop him,and the Final Night Shall Fall. And it shall be an Ending to which all Mans works are as nothing.

Bolded for the important bits

We need a non-mortal non-male.


Anyone got one of those around?

[Xuincherguixe]

Depends what Cthulhu. He kind of varies. A lot.


Also. I take "Stars are Right" to mean a certain amount of time passing, and the actual stars not being that important. But that's just my take on it.

[littlebottom]

ill tell you! its ingenious!

CTHULHU! cthulhu is the only thing that can kill cthulhu!

so if we want any chance of surviving if he arises, we must create a second cthulhu! but obviously we cannot create things such as this that are living organisms yet... so we will have to make a mechanical cthulhu. and call him MECTHULHU!

(see what i did there?)

obviously, the mechanical cthulhu will have to have a off switch which can only be activated in some strange way, so that we can leave it to fight and kill normal cthulhu, but then not turn on us afterwards... but we can iron out those details as the time comes :smallbiggrin:
oh and i claim all rights to the name mecthulhu, wheather spelt mecthulhu, mechthulhu or otherwise :smallwink:

[chiasaur11]

Bolded for the important bits

We need a non-mortal non-male.


Anyone got one of those around?

Well, Hercules is an immortal with god and monster killing credentials.

So's The Mighty THOR. And, for that matter, I'd but good money on Beta Ray Bill. The power of a god, from a civilization so advanced it makes ours look sick, and he's a hideous monstrosity of super science, the only group Lovecraft ever let do damage to mythos deity types.

[Realms of Chaos]

Despite the oddness of the arguement, here is my opinion on the situation.

Important Point 1: For some reason, it is accepted (on this thread) that calling upon a god is unfair for the purpose of this arguement. This I understand.

Important Point 2: It must be understood that from a certain point of view, the entire line about a high priest of the elder gods waiting for the stars to be right may be interpretted as a prophecy.
If it is indeed a prophecy, then it is possible that it simply isn't beatable, that even if you came up with a hypothetical figure who could defeat Cthulhu, that an elder god would stack the odds against you (or just wipe you from existance).
This however enters the entire philosophical debate of free will vs. destiny.

If destiny exists: We are hosed. The world and everyone living on it are all doomed. Beyond that, however, the prophecy stops protecting Cthulhu, making it possible for Transformers from Cybertron to arrive the next day and destroy him.
If Free Will Exists: It is possible to change our fate and save ourselves, though the other Lovecraftian gods might not like it. From now on, I will be making this assumption.

Important Point 3: For some reason, we are trying to force Cthulhu into the format of a d20 game in order to see if he can be beaten. This makes no sense. I know very well that he has been statted up several times in the past but nothing about this seems canonical. No matter how flavorful the creature is made, it is made by a bunch of people who have no idea what Cthulhu would be like in real life.
If the game developers statting up Cthulhu were channeling H.P Lovecraft through a Ouija board or were partially insane due to Lovecraftian dreams, that might get those stats a bit of credibility (though not much).

Important Point 4: Cthulhu is a figure with very vague powers. It seems that we have two camps of posters on this thread. The first looks at the vagueness and sees a lack of power. The second looks at the vagueness and sees near omnipotence.

For example, though we have seen Cthulhu loose his head before, we've never seen him get dissasembled molecule by molecule by an atom bomb. The first camp says he dies and the second says that not only does he regenerate but that it somehow takes the same amount of time.

The sad fact is that assuming Cthulhu has a power is equally unfair as assuming Cthulhu doesn't have that power. If you want to make a point on who you think could beat Cthulhu, it is important to state which powers you are assuming Cthulhu has or doesn't have.

Here is an example:

Premises:

R'lyeh (or whatever it was called) is where Cthulhu must rest until the stars are right.
R'lyeh is the name of the island where Cthulhu sleeps (rather than some sub-dimension where his consciousness lies).
Other than raising and sinking below the water, R'lyeh itself has no special properties (other than perhaps some geometrically impossible land formations).
If Cthulhu is "slain", he returns to R'kyeh (as demonstrated in the story).
Whatever mighty powers Cthulhu might have, he requires conscious thought (except for spreading dreams) in order to use them (AKA: he can't teleport while he sleeps or while his body reforms after death.
Cthulhu, despite his small wings, doesn't fly.
He also doesn't teleport.
Other gods are unlikely to intercede in any combat involving Cthulhu
Predetermination does not exist.


I think that superman can take care of Cthulhu indefinitely (though probably not kill him and keep him dead).
As we have seen in Superman's most recent movie, Superman can lift up entire islands.
The plan is to swim underwater, pick up R'lyeh, and hurls it into space with Cthulhu sleeping inside. Superman never even has to see Cthulhu's face for this plan to work.

If Cthulhu breathes: Cthulhu suffocates repeately, returning to R'lyeh (in space) whenever he revives, making it impossible for Cthulhu to reach Earth.
If Cthulhu doesn't breathe: Cthulhu lives; see below.

If R'lyeh flies into a star/black hole: R'lyeh is destroyed, meaning that Cthulhu has nowhere to return to. Furthermore, Cthulhu is killed over and over again for the life of the star (or effectively forever, in the case of a black hole).
If Cthulhu doesn't breathe: Cthulhu lives; see below.

If Cthulhu and R'lyeh don't fly into a star or black hole and Cthulhu doesn't die from the vacuum conditions/lack of air, he will try returning to earth, as was "prophesized", when "the stars are right".
When he gets to earth, Cthulhu, lacking more than vestigial wings, must deal with re-entry and an impact on earth, both of which are stronger than a steamboat and result in Cthulhu's death, meaning that he must return to R'lyeh before starting the cycle over and over again.

Looking at the above premises, you'll see that it is a very unlikely situation that I have painted but if I have correctly guessed the limitations of Cthulhu's power (and superman existed), Cthulhu could be dealt with.

[Evil DM Mark3]

A powerful Solar, Lunar or Sidreal exalted or a brotherhood of powerful Dragonblooded. When you look at the Primordials, Cuthulu is not that impressive.

[Wardog]

I've thought of something else that might be able to take him down, and which has pretty horrific implications of its own:

The Tyrannids.

All they have to do is sic a bio-titan on him (or two, or as many as they need).


... And then they incorporate his DNA into their own...

:smalleek:

[Geddoe]

Superman
TTGL
Dark Schneider
Thanos(esp with infinity gauntlet)
Any sufficiently high level d&d adventurer(I don't think they are the type that would go mad over a giant illithid with wings and some extra bits)
Channelers from Wheel of Time(nothing can withstand balefire except heart stone, and it unmakes you from existence)
Berserker(F/SN, has 12 lives and can't be killed by the same attack after dying to it once)
Saint of Killers

Just to name a few.

[hamishspence]

Within the Mythos, the crinoid, winged, vegetable star-headed Elder Things, AKA The Old Ones (one of the various races going by that name in the Mythos, anyway) have survived invasions by:

The half-fungus, half-crustaceon Mi-Go
The fabulous, pre-human star-spawn of Cthulhu
The ten foot, cone shaped Great Race of Yith, masters of time travel
The flying polyps (which drove the Great Race to flee into the future)
Their own rebellious minions, the shaggoths/shoggoths.
Until finally being defeated by the shoggoths after their skills went into decline.

While they might not be able to defeat Cthulhu and his star-spawn, the Elder Things at their height proved to be their match (or at least, good enough for their war to end in a peace treaty rather than them being exterminated)

[RdMarquis]

The more powerful demons and other characters from the Nippon Ichi strategy RPGs. For example, Babylon is an old man stereotype ("I can't keep up with you kids", "Zzzz...What'd I miss", etc.) in the body of a gargantuan dragon. He accidentally destroys a few planets in a senile daze. Overlord Zetta is implied to be even more powerful, and Overlord Baal was so destructive that another demon lord had to seal him away.

There characters also seem to be aware that they are in a game and occassionally mess around with the with the system. Dunno what that means, but being able to exercise that much control over the world they live in has to count for something. :smallsmile:

[chiasaur11]

Just a thought, but a couple of old Bungie FPSs were about fighting 'Thulu alikes.

Or rather, nuking them before they can wake up. Seemed to work out okay.

[hustlertwo]

Really? Five pages and no one mentions it? I guess I have to: The Tick. He is specifically stated by the creator as having 'drama power' which means he is exactly as strong as needed to overcome any foe or situation. Ergo, if his mission is to kill Cthulhu, he must succeed. And if he wanted not only to kill Cthulhu, but prevent him from ever returning, presumably he would become so strong as to bypass the limitations of time, space, and being a fictional character in order to punch H.P. Lovecraft in the face, knocking the very idea of Cthulhu from his brain forever and thus forcing Cthulhu into permanent non-existence.

Also, insanity isn't much of an issue for The Tick. It might actually be an improvement.

Oh, and I believe the first episode of the Penny Arcade games also dealt with this. And as with Team Fortress 2, one of the keys to victory was weaponized urine.

[Zaydos]

While they might not be able to defeat Cthulhu and his star-spawn, the Elder Things at their height proved to be their match (or at least, good enough for their war to end in a peace treaty rather than them being exterminated)
With energy weapons the Elder Things were able to push back Cthulhu and kill his spawn. His spawn were fundamentally smaller weaker versions of himself and were definitely able to be killed. Cthulhu's ultimate defeat though was caused by his kingdom sinking (which is weird since later authors would make him a being with power over water). Then again the Great Old Ones as a group was more a Derleth thing, with Lovecraft they were just any being bad nasty thing from before mankind. Unlike the Outer Gods, though, they were defined as made of matter and therefore able to die. Plus the Necronomicon even in setting is not fully reliable, written by someone who was crazed and writing in riddles.
Honestly speaking I'd say Godzilla vs Cthulhu would be interesting; Cthulhu is well Cthulhu, but Godzilla has an energy blast that if the Elder Being's little wands to control shoggoths along with said shoggoths were enough to fight him and his forces should prove at least marginally effective. Whether Godzilla would win or not is uncertain but it would be a fairly even match.
Also in his defense he was sleep-walking when he got hit by the speed-boat because the stars weren't quite right yet.

[warty goblin]

Within the Mythos, the crinoid, winged, vegetable star-headed Elder Things, AKA The Old Ones (one of the various races going by that name in the Mythos, anyway) have survived invasions by:

The half-fungus, half-crustaceon Mi-Go
The fabulous, pre-human star-spawn of Cthulhu
The ten foot, cone shaped Great Race of Yith, masters of time travel
The flying polyps (which drove the Great Race to flee into the future)
Their own rebellious minions, the shaggoths/shoggoths.
Until finally being defeated by the shoggoths after their skills went into decline.

While they might not be able to defeat Cthulhu and his star-spawn, the Elder Things at their height proved to be their match (or at least, good enough for their war to end in a peace treaty rather than them being exterminated)

Although it's stated in At the Mountains of Madness that the octopus like Cthulhu-spawn are completely aquatic, and thus the radial Elder Things, who were not limited to the waters, clearly enjoyed a significant advantage over their opposition.

[Zevox]

Skateboarding God with a shotgun. But he dies trying. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vB1Wnbhlzrs) :smallbiggrin:

Zevox

[Bhu]

Granted you'd also have to kill his daughter Cthylla as she is supposed to resurrect him should he ever actually permanently die...

[Setra]

How about Tohno Shiki?

Edit:
To Clarify, he has the ability to see 'lines of death' and 'spots of death', for lack of a better word. If he stabs something's 'spot of death' it.. doesn't just die, it's GONE... the soul, body, whatever is destroyed completely and totally.

Not to mention as someone who can see the 'true form of death', he might not go insane just by looking at him... on the other hand he has a bad habit of going insane in his own game....

[Cracklord]

Does C'thulhu get help from his friends? Because If Azazoth or Yog Sathoth are on his side, then no one. Ever.

[Illiterate Scribe]

http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/3735/boss2wx.png

May I borrow your dream projection conduit?

'This is Cthulhu, steamboats make me cry! Over'

If he has a back he can die. And even that might not be necessary.

[SITB]

How about Tohno Shiki?

Edit:
To Clarify, he has the ability to see 'lines of death' and 'spots of death', for lack of a better word. If he stabs something's 'spot of death' it.. doesn't just die, it's GONE... the soul, body, whatever is destroyed completely and totally.

Not to mention as someone who can see the 'true form of death', he might not go insane just by looking at him... on the other hand he has a bad habit of going insane in his own game....

Probably not, given that he can't kill Type ORT which is like a wildlike Great Old One.

Though, on that note, if the Types banded togther and decided that Cthulhu was also responsable for the death of Gaia they could probably kill him.Or at least make him discoparate.

[Setra]

Probably not, given that he can't kill Type ORT which is like a wildlike Great Old One.

Though, on that note, if theTypes banded togther and decided that Cthulhu was also responsable for the death of Gaia they could probably kill him.
What about the Shiki from Kara no Kyoukai? I haven't read it but I've heard that one is even more powerful.

[nosignal]

Just blow up and/or move around some stars.

So... Planet Express?

[Faulty]

I thought part of what made Cthulhu et al. so scary was that they couldn't be killed, only stopped for a small while until they inevitably wreck humanity.

[SITB]

What about the Shiki from Kara no Kyoukai? I haven't read it but I've heard that one is even more powerful.

Man, the Nasuverse canon is a deep and murky bog that no one should go and find concerete proof, bah. In ORT's (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/ORT) articale it's stated that he can withstand the Mystic eyes because he doesn't have the Gaia concept of death.

In the Mystic eyes article Shiki boasts she can even kill God if he exists, so yeah...

On the other hand if I remember correctly Kara no Kyoukai came before Notes so it could be that Notes continuity trumps Kara no Kyoukai.

[WalkingTarget]

I thought part of what made Cthulhu et al. so scary was that they couldn't be killed, only stopped for a small while until they inevitably wreck humanity.

One of the conceits of Lovecraft's work is that humanity is a poor, deluded race that can't even begin to understand the true nature of things; that the "laws of nature" that we hold so dear are at best local phenomena that are inapplicable to the cosmos in general. True understanding comes with the cost of one's sanity as the human mind can't cope with reality. We are utterly insignificant and the beings that really know what's going on couldn't care less about us. We're a footnote in an appendix somewhere that will probably be deleted in the next edition.

If we're including characters from settings with a less pessimistic view on things, who's to say what will work?

[paddyfool]

With reference to the Superman suggestion, how about Bizarro instead? (Because we all know that Superman would sneak a peek and fail his sanity check).

Bizarro no go swim; bizarro hate water!
Bizarro no see ancient city under waves
Bizarro bored by city; bizarro no go investigate
Bizarro no see face of ancient undersea deity;
Bizarro go sane.
Sanity hurts
Bizarro hurls Cthulhu into the sun in a cold, calculating fury, and flies off into a universe that suddenly makes all too much sense.

[Zaydos]

Although it's stated in At the Mountains of Madness that the octopus like Cthulhu-spawn are completely aquatic, and thus the radial Elder Things, who were not limited to the waters, clearly enjoyed a significant advantage over their opposition.
Then why does it say: "the new lands were given to the Cthulhu spawn whilst the Old Ones held the sea and the older lands"
Cthulhu and his spawn were defeated by their land sinking; they were terrestrial not aquatic. Although if you just switch waters to land then it still works.

Honestly speaking Cthulhu was created before lasers and nukes. The Elder Things used energy weapons that shot beams of light which sounds like lasers. If Lovecraft had made Cthulhu in the 50s someone would have tried to nuke R'lyeh to destroy Cthulhu, the city would seem to be destroyed or some such but the protagonist would say that he knew better and that it had only been sent back to the sea for he could still feel Cthulhu clawing at his brain. That's not to say Cthulhu was immortal, but only beyond the power of mortal men to permanently destroy; Cthulhu was made to trump the best humans could imagine honestly doing, not to be completely invulnerable. Cthulhu as he was originally made could probably have been nuked out of existence, because that amount of destructive force would have been unbelievable when Lovecraft first started writing. Even Superheroes would have been unbelievable, the best you would have had was John Carter of Mars (who somehow would have won) from the 1910s, Tarzan (another character from Edgar Rice Burroughs), and Conan who did sometimes face old ones but even Conan wouldn't have been able to kill Cthulhu but would have killed one or two of his spawn and sealed him away. The power level of both fantasy heroes and superheroes is a lot more than in the 1930s. In the 1930s Cthulhu was the next best thing to a god, but now he's fair game for any epic party. Then again Conan wasn't epic level just high level, even Tolkien's low magic Lord of the Rings upped the power level of fantasy.

Although now I want to see Sigurd (from the Volsunga Saga) or Bodvar Bjarki or Beowulf against Cthulhu they'd probably "win" in their own narrative (and wouldn't exist in Lovecraft's) but would be left mad and broken (like anyone who opposes Cthulhu should be). Then again they'd not kill him only delay him.

[Mystic Muse]

the jester dude from DMC3.

if that guy isn't insane already I don't want to know what he'll do when he becomes insane.

[Berserk Monk]

The Dai Gurren Brigade. They can almost literally pull anything out of their asses and they piloted a mech the size of a galaxy.

[kyuubigan]

Mr. Majestic from Wildstorm could probably find a way to pull it off. I mean, the guy managed to move the Earth under his own power.

Note: In case you don't know, Mr. Majestic could probably beat Superman in a straight fight without really trying.

[Willis888]

First, lets assume that Cthulhu is a sentient idea and that it would require several galaxies-worth of atoms to physically represent the data contained in the concept "Cthulhu". Any physical manifestation that would fit on an Earth-scaled island is like a tiny, pixilated hologram of the "real" thing. The absence of a medium in which consciousness can exist, or the presence of a like-scaled dissonant consciousness would then be solutions to the problem of a Cthulhu.

The Grey Knights sole reason for existing is to deal with a simmilar kind of threat, although they can only 'win' temporary banishments at their current level of technology. They would need to be able to move vast quantities of matter so as to "draw" copies of the runes on their skin across the cosmos using gynormous clouds of dust and hydrogen, and scale up their rituals for blessing those runes - the stars would then never be right. Even then, it would only be a local victory - (more or less )permanent banishment from that one area of the multiverse.


If Erwin Schroedinger were reincarnated as an insane Lovecraftian sorcerer, he could defeat Cthulhu in a more total sense.

He would need to craft a series of metal plates that are grooved on the top like a vinyl record and with tuning forks on the underside. A spinning gyroscope placed on top of the disk causes a precise melody to be played according to the pattern of the grooves and the size and alignment of the forks. The entire contraption is placed into a box and never looked at again. The gyroscope will forever after be in a state of spinning and not spinning, so the signal will be eternal. The frequency is such that, when the stars are right they will resonate with, amplify, and broadcast the signal from within the box. The signal itself is a spell to create a lesser god - a self-aware idea that is the antithesis of the concept "Cthulhu". Like a seed sent to a random number generator returning exactly pi, the crafting of such an idea would require a fortuitous chain of highly unlikely events that only an insane sorcerer could put into motion.



Daemons from the Dragonlance setting might be able to mess with Cthulhu's ability to continue existing, and it might be the case that only by the whim of Chaos has Cthulhu ever existed at all.

[Nerocite]

Them fellers in Arkham Horrors.

Priests of the Drowned God. "What is dead can never die, but rises again, harder and stronger."

[leafman]

The gyroscope will forever after be in a state of spinning and not spinning, so the signal will be eternal.

You realize that is logically impossible to spin and not spin at the same time, right?

You can't pour the wine and not pour wine at the same time. (An example my logic Prof. likes to use. :smallwink:)

[Rutskarn]

I'm sure someone's already mentioned Steve Irwin.

[Stormthorn]

Azathoth.

Any off Cthulhu's bosses or peers amongst Lovecrafts pale and dismals stars.

[Mewtarthio]

That's not to say Cthulhu was immortal, but only beyond the power of mortal men to permanently destroy; Cthulhu was made to trump the best humans could imagine honestly doing, not to be completely invulnerable. Cthulhu as he was originally made could probably have been nuked out of existence, because that amount of destructive force would have been unbelievable when Lovecraft first started writing.

You mean like:

"You waste your time. No weapon forged can harm me."
"That was then; this is now!"


He would need to craft a series of metal plates that are grooved on the top like a vinyl record and with tuning forks on the underside. A spinning gyroscope placed on top of the disk causes a precise melody to be played according to the pattern of the grooves and the size and alignment of the forks. The entire contraption is placed into a box and never looked at again. The gyroscope will forever after be in a state of spinning and not spinning, so the signal will be eternal. The frequency is such that, when the stars are right they will resonate with, amplify, and broadcast the signal from within the box. The signal itself is a spell to create a lesser god - a self-aware idea that is the antithesis of the concept "Cthulhu". Like a seed sent to a random number generator returning exactly pi, the crafting of such an idea would require a fortuitous chain of highly unlikely events that only an insane sorcerer could put into motion.

That is... incredibly specific for a purely hypothetical plan.

[Willis888]

You realize that is logically impossible . . . ?

Yes :smallbiggrin:

[Avilan the Grey]

Not necessarily. If Cthulhu met up with a black hole, he'd just warp into another dimension. The guy has power over space-time.

So does black holes.

[Dervag]

You realize that is logically impossible to spin and not spin at the same time, right?

You can't pour the wine and not pour wine at the same time. (An example my logic Prof. likes to use. :smallwink:)Point of order:

Spin 1 particles can occupy a superposition of the "spin 1" (spinning clockwise), "spin 0" (not spinning), and "spin -1" (spinning counterclockwise) states at the same time.

We do not know what this combined "spin/not spin/spin other way" state "really looks like." We know that if you investigate it more closely, you will find the particle in one of the three possible states. Which state you find it in is chosen apparently at random, with predictable probability of each of the three results.

However, this doesn't allow you to broadcast a signal throughout the universe under the laws of quantum mechanics as we know them. Come to think of it, Cthulhu isn't allowed under the laws of quantum mechanics as we know them, either.

[chiasaur11]

Point of order:

Spin 1 particles can occupy a superposition of the "spin 1" (spinning clockwise), "spin 0" (not spinning), and "spin -1" (spinning counterclockwise) states at the same time.

We do not know what this combined "spin/not spin/spin other way" state "really looks like." We know that if you investigate it more closely, you will find the particle in one of the three possible states. Which state you find it in is chosen apparently at random, with predictable probability of each of the three results.

However, this doesn't allow you to broadcast a signal throughout the universe under the laws of quantum mechanics as we know them. Come to think of it, Cthulhu isn't allowed under the laws of quantum mechanics as we know them, either.

So, Quantum Mechanics defeat Cthulhu?

[Dr. Bath]

So, Quantum Mechanics defeat Cthulhu?

So Cthulhu is a catgirl?

[vrellum]

So Cthulhu is a catgirl?

No, it's quite the opposite. In Cthulhu mythos (at least the rpg) humans really don't anything about how the real world works and we begin to understand it, we are driven insane and usually meet with a messy end. So perhaps we are catgirls.

[chiasaur11]

No, it's quite the opposite. In Cthulhu mythos (at least the rpg) humans really don't anything about how the real world works and we begin to understand it, we are driven insane and usually meet with a messy end. So perhaps we are catgirls.

Or maybe the catgirls are aspects of Cthulhu.

Didn't think of that one, did you?

[warty goblin]

You realize that is logically impossible to spin and not spin at the same time, right?

You can't pour the wine and not pour wine at the same time. (An example my logic Prof. likes to use. :smallwink:)

Sure I can pour wine and not pour wine at the same time. This is very simple.

Let A be the set of all things that are pouring wine.

Let B be the set of all things that are not pouring wine.

Suppose I have a bottle of wine in each hand. With my right hand I pour wine, with my left I do not. Then my right hand is in A, and my left is in B? But where am I?
Well, I'm clearly in A, because my hand is pouring wine.
I'm clearly in B, because my hand is not pouring wine.
Thus I'm in the intersection of A and B, and both pouring and not pouring wine at the same time.

Naturally this should only be done to fulfill the terms of obscure prophesies or curses and similar. I mean you can't just be an accidental contradiction for kicks and giggles, now can you?

In related news, this is why basic examples of mutually exclusive sets should concern themselves with better defined cases. Even and odd numbers are prime candidates*.

*Test of math nerddom, did you catch the number pun in the above sentence?

[Niccolo Deval]

Tested it on Scribblenauts earlier.
-Kraken beats Cthulu straight up.
-God beats Cthulu if Cthulu has been slightly weakened.
-Death beats Cthulu. And everything else, incuding God, for that matter.
-On a side note, Cthulu beat Shoggoth. Haven't tried Hastur yet.

[Stormthorn]

Tested it on Scribblenauts earlier.
-Kraken beats Cthulu straight up.
-God beats Cthulu if Cthulu has been slightly weakened.
-Death beats Cthulu. And everything else, incuding God, for that matter.
-On a side note, Cthulu beat Shoggoth. Haven't tried Hastur yet.

I just got that and was playing it. God was one-shotted by some sort of huge shark at one point.


Zeus beats him.
Satan does not.
Dragon beats him.
Naga, and i assume Medusa, tie with him. They dont seem to hur thim but he gets turned to stone every few seconds so he cant reach em.
Grim reaper beats him.
Atom Bomb one shots him
Ogre owns him big time.
He beats Scribblenaut (summoned version)
He beats Lich
Hades beats him
Beats Me (summoned version)
Loses to you if you have a Death Ray
T-Rex beats him.
Hero can beat him.
A Paladin with Excalibur can beat him.
If you place himn between Everything and a Black Hole he will die.

As a side note, Zeus beats the Kraken and a superhero with Excalibur can beat Death itself.
But a normal person with Excalibur cannot beat Cthulhu.

Also, Blob can beat Cthulhu. As far as i can tell Blob has infinite health (blob VS 5 Deaths, Blob wins)

[Ganurath]

The Doctor would reveal that Cthulhu using Earth as a resting place protected it from the other, more active Elder Evils, who only got involved with Earth when invited by cultists. Thus, the Master seeks to destroy Cthulhu to curry favor with the Elder Evils and commit genocide against the Doctor's pet race. The Master succeeds, only to find out that he was sleeping there because he could: Humanity's existence is tied to the Applied Phlebtonium the Elder Evils depend on, so some other Elder Evil settles in to slowly draw on the sustenence of the planet, but not before smacking the Master a new sort of crazy.

[J.Gellert]

The Necrons could take down Cthulhu. Maybe even all his buddies as well.

As could any Uchiha, because of the power of plot.

[Avilan the Grey]

Cowthulu. Without a doubt.

[thorgrim29]

The Emprah (back when his power was OVER 9 THOUSAAAANNNNND!!!!) would bitch slap Chtulhu into the next millenium, probably has already. The Doctor would find a way to seal him back using Science! and fast talking, oh and running, lots of running. Speaking of over nine thousand, a lot of DBZ character probably could kill big C, from orbit. SG1 could prevent his awakening using Science! and fast talking (and blowing up a sun), though Jackson would die for a few episodes. Harry Dresden when he's fully grown into his power could probably do it (as long as he doesn't See him his sanity is solid enough I think)

[Nerocite]

The Heavy with Sasha could kill him.

[Arctic]

Steve Irwin!

http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/comics/irreg0118.jpg
Credit to Irregular Webcomic

[Green Bean]

I suppose most PCs from a Nobilis (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Nobilis) game would be able to make a go of it. Unless one of the PCs is Cthulhu. Then it'd be a little awkward around the gaming table.

[Stormthorn]

The Heavy with Sasha could kill him.

If a boat ramming into him only causes temporary harm....

[Dispozition]

The Heavy with Sasha could kill him.

WHAT SICK MAN SEND BABY OCTOPUS TO FIGHT?!

[Ossian]

Stormbringer, technically, could. But that would cause the end of all things. At least, if you go by the rules the soul eater has a damage which CAN harm Chtulhu, but most importantly has a MANA drain of 1d100 per hit (yes, you have to hit him first, who said it was gonna be easy).

Once Chtulhu's MANA drops to zero or below, he is toast and won't regenerate.
Then all the star progeny gets mad at you and ends all things. Good job.

O.