Deicide

[Erith]

My group is level 30. We have a warlock, a paladin type warrior that somehow gets full cleric casting (I don't honestly know his class progression), maybe a rogue, and me. I am grey-elf wizard/mage of the arcane order/archmage/ultimate magus (sorceror), of which only the mage of the arcane order and ultimate magus are maxed out. The warlock is the leader of a good sized country, the fighter-type heads an order of paladins, and I of course am a regent of the order.

We are set to up against a greater deity with 40 class levels. All that I can gather is that he will be at most a half-caster, his saves will be "good luck," and that my dm is not against ignoring prc prereqs.

My dm is expecting this to be a long, epic battle. I imagine he would be annoyed if we were to wipe the floor with him, and nobody wants him to wipe the floor with us. The problem is, at this level of play, I don't see many alternatives. Either he goes down in 2 or so rounds, or we have a tpk.

I have 4 or 5 feats to play around with, and I could most likely rework skill points if I need to. Money is not an issue, and my dm okayed shooting for 4.5 million gold or so. I'm a little overwhelmed by that number, and wouldn't mind some advice on how to use it.

Assuming obvious cheese (chain gating, wish abuse, deific ice assassins) are out, as well as most other gamebreakers, is this doable?

[arguskos]

Sans a massive amount of cheese? No, I'm not sure it is. Greater Deities have such absurd defenses they're nigh-impossible to breach without crazy cheese and they typically have at least a few salient divine abilities that just ruin your day (Life or Death comes to mind, as does Alter Reality).

I don't play much on those levels though. If you have access to Epic Spellcasting, you win, but that's cheap and fail. If the god is built like a level 40 character with divine ranks and all the benefits thereof, I think ya'll are shafted.

[TripperdeCleric]

Well let me try and explain your situation and to as why it is like that.

You should quit the game and explain to your dm that he has thrown a level 1 character vs a level 20 3.0 cleric against you that has 3 level 18 cohorts.


You cant win against this situation.

If he is taking all your cheese away your a starving mouse.

Honestly the only thing you can do is pull something ridiculous..play a priest of the opossite alignment..summon mass creaturesand call for your gods assistance and see if he lets it go through...otherwise you are going to waste 6 hours of your life to die.

[Maerok]

Sans a massive amount of cheese? No, I'm not sure it is. Greater Deities have such absurd defenses they're nigh-impossible to breach without crazy cheese and they typically have at least a few salient divine abilities that just ruin your day (Life or Death comes to mind, as does Alter Reality).

I don't play much on those levels though. If you have access to Epic Spellcasting, you win, but that's cheap and fail. If the god is built like a level 40 character with divine ranks and all the benefits thereof, I think ya'll are shafted.

Well shouldn't any self-respecting deity of that magnitude have Epic Spellcasting and all sorts of arcane torments laid out ahead of time? I've always thought that whoever gets E.S. first wins.

[Abd al-Azrad]

Things to remember:

Greater deities always roll 20s. So, yes, they won't fail a save, and pretty much are always rolling a full attack routine of confirmed crits. Assume Spell Resistance is unbeatable, so you'll basically be relying on no save, no SR attacks. Their AC should be hittable for your party, if you properly buff, but I suspect summons will be entirely useless. And, finally, as mentioned above, they can Wish at will (Alter Reality), hit you with stupendous amounts of damage with Divine Blast or kill you outright with Life or Death, etc.

Do you have any means to defeat these things? It's pretty tough to kill a god. I'm betting if you can just turn the match into a slugfest you may have a chance, buffing and healing the crap out of your fighters, but there's no real reason for a greater god to fight like that.

[Tinydwarfman]

Become a necropolitan and retrain into one level of Tainted Scholar. Done. :smallbiggrin:

If you want to go further, Magic9mushroom has some tasty builds that combine tainted scholar with Beholder Mage and the like.

If you have epic spellcasting, you win, but I'm assuming that's out, or said god would also have it.

If the god is smart, you can't win by conventional means, so you're pretty much screwed. If you do somehow manage to go first, or at least locate him, make sure he never gets a turn Planar Shepherd/timestop abuse is your friend.

[hamishspence]

Greater deities always roll 20s. So, yes, they won't fail a save, and pretty much are always rolling a full attack routine of confirmed crits.

Isn't there a rule that confirmation rolls, still need to be rolled, even by a Greater Deity?

If so, if the player has somehow gotten a sufficiently high AC, the deity won't be automatically critting every time.

[arguskos]

Isn't there a rule that confirmation rolls, still need to be rolled, even by a Greater Deity?

If so, if the player has somehow gotten a sufficiently high AC, the deity won't be automatically critting every time.
Considering melee-happy Greater Gods frequently have all their in the hundreds, you'd need to be AC focused to withstand a full-attack, and then you can't DO anything back.

Even if the god cannot reliably hit you (a rarity at best), they can just blast you out of reality thanks to Divine Blast, Life or Death, Alter Reality, etc.

Fighting a god sans some truly absurd hax (or the Immortal's Handbook) is pretty much a one-way ticket to death.

[TripperdeCleric]

See if the Dm will allow you to create a ritual that will allow you to pull your diety to earth for a certain amount of time....tell him its the only chance and will make for a great super battle.


Now..what you do is set it up like this

Ritual of Sacrifice
This ritual requires 7 hours of preparation and 1 our to activate.

Ritual goes as follows....

You need 1 Dragons Heart
2 Orc Eyes
and everyone in the city dies


But to fix that last part...you could evacuate everyone except for yourself to the edge of the city and activate ritual...then they reenter and have fun while you sit there twiddling your thumbs.

[Abd al-Azrad]

Re: hamishpence


Considering melee-happy Greater Gods frequently have all their in the hundreds, you'd need to be AC focused to withstand a full-attack, and then you can't DO anything back.

Full attack routine, all crits. Recall they also don't miss on a natural 1.

Re: TripperDeCleric

I think this is going well into what everyone's saying. A 30th-level party can kill a greater god, yes, but they need unconventional weapons and tactics to do so. Whatever your methods are, if the DM is limiting the party to standard non-epic, non-cheap resources, this battle is unwinnable.

[TripperdeCleric]

Yep exactly what I said in my first post..but this has gone beyond that to try and find a way...there actually is no way of winning with what the DM has given you.

[arguskos]

Well, given whatever you want, it's a piece of cake. There really isn't a "middle ground" assuming the DM is using ACTUAL divine rules. If you have everything on hand, the universe ends thanks to overuse of Epic Spellcasting and Divine Ice Assassins and whatever. If you don't, the god squashes you like an itty-bitty-bug and giggles to himself. There's... really not an inbetween.

Now, if the DM is NOT using the divine rules, and is just making a crazy powerful character, then it's totally possible, but we'd need to know more about the god's build to determine what to look out for and where to attack it.

[Lycanthromancer]

Yep exactly what I said in my first post..but this has gone beyond that to try and find a way...there actually is no way of winning with what the DM has given you.Don't be so negative.

If it has stats, it can (and will) die.

What you do is get a scroll of genesis (or cast it yourself). Make sure it has the flowing time trait (1 round of real time equals 1 year of demiplane time), and use planar binding to call an efreeti.

Use your wishes to pull in simulacrums of the efreeti under your control. Use the new simulacrum to grant the same wishes. And again. And again. And again.

You should continue this for a few hours, at least, and if you make a wish to all of the new efreet that pop up simultaneously, you should get an escalating number every single round. You can then do the same to pull in simulacrums of a few hundred thousand solars, if not more (all of which have the Flyby Attack feat, just in case).

Then start wishing for ring gates (as you can wish for any magic item you like, since there's no cap on GP value on magic items, and spell-like wishes have no XP cost). At least a few thousand.

Next, set up one of each pair of ring gates on the wall of a VERY HUGE room, with the end-gates being held by solars, which go with your party when they head out to commit deicide (you should remain behind to coordinate your forces...and not be killed.

Keep in mind that an efreet can cast three wishes with one standard action, according to the fact that "3 wishes" is a single Supernatural ability (which is a single standard action to pull off), so they can cast up to 3 8th level spells each round via wishes.

Now, when you encounter this god, just have all of your hundreds of thousands of efreet delay action to move up to the ring gates and grant your three wishes, and have your handy-dandy solars conveniently point the ring gates at the god (while on their turns they hit it with miracles). Have the wishes and miracles emulate SR: No/Save: No spells, such as Melf's acid arrow and orb of force/fire/etc. When your efreet are down to their last wish (and when your solars are down to their last spells), have them pull a quick plane shift to your demiplane, where they rest up, then head back again before the end of the round, only to delay action as they enter initiative, and do the exact same thing again.

Now you have an infinite number of touch attacks flying toward the god simultaneously. Even if only one out of 20 hit, and they all deal minimum damage, that's still infinite damage all at once.

If somehow he can avoid ranged touch attacks, there are other spells of 8th level or lower that he can't block, so search up a few to try in lieu of orb of whatever, and watch him die.

Now have fun.

[arguskos]

Lycan, did you check the bottom of the OP? Where it said such things were explicitly banned?

Now, normally, yeah, you're all kinds of on the money. In this case? No dice. :smallwink:

Quoth the OP:

Assuming obvious cheese (chain gating, wish abuse, deific ice assassins) are out, as well as most other gamebreakers, is this doable?

[Lycanthromancer]

Lycan, did you check the bottom of the OP? Where it said such things were explicitly banned?

Now, normally, yeah, you're all kinds of on the money. In this case? No dice. :smallwink:

Quoth the OP:Hey, that didn't break the game.

Just the god.

And not a single instance of gate was involved.

[arguskos]

Hey, that didn't break the game.

Just the god.

And not a single instance of gate was involved.
While I do like the class involved with the ring gate silliness, I am fairly certain that it defeats the point of what the OP wanted, and I am just as certain that you know this, and are being silly for kicks (to be fair, it IS amusing). :smalltongue:

[Lycanthromancer]

Fine then. Make a supplication of a VERY valuable gem.

...which just happens to be a trap the soul gem. :smallbiggrin:

[The Glyphstone]

That' work except:



Deities of rank 6 or higher are immune to effects that imprison or banish them. Such effects include banishment, binding, dimensional anchor, dismissal, imprisonment, repulsion, soul bind, temporal stasis, trap the soul, and turning and rebuking.


Divine ranks are hax, really.

[Godskook]

Ask what the DC is to steal divine ranks with Sleight of Hand.

[Lycanthromancer]

Ask what the DC is to steal divine ranks with Sleight of Hand.You steal it with Diplomacy.

Retrain into a diplomancer, then make checks to fanaticize his clerics at all of his churches, and then the populace at large, and turn them away from worshiping him. He'll be begging for scraps on a street corner before too long.

[Erith]

What of our various organizations? They are some of the more powerful in the world. I, for example, have thousands of at the least mid level mages beneath me. I understand that they wouldn't be able to do anything directly against the god, but what can an army of casters do to boost us?

Or what about apotheosis on our part? I imagine even dr 0 or 1 would give us at least a slightly better chance. I could probably swing that with my dm.

[Tinydwarfman]

What of our various organizations? They are some of the more powerful in the world. I, for example, have thousands of at the least mid level mages beneath me. I understand that they wouldn't be able to do anything directly against the god, but what can an army of casters do to boost us?

Or what about apotheosis on our part? I imagine even dr 0 or 1 would give us at least a slightly better chance. I could probably swing that with my dm.

Working under you is quite different from worship. A CEO is not a deity. They would have to worship you as a god.

Also: thousands of mid level mages makes for some crazy good spellcraft DC mitigation. You sure you can't use epic magic?

[Godskook]

Or what about apotheosis on our part? I imagine even dr 0 or 1 would give us at least a slightly better chance. I could probably swing that with my dm.

Fanaticism is a DC 50 to DC 150 check, and at L30, a trained and charismatic character should be pooping at least a +50 on his check(Such as the party's Sorc. A +10 Cha, +33 ranks, +6 Synergy) Start optimizing and discussing legitimate ways to do it on entire cities at once.

DC 90 is the turning point DC, as it is reasonable to assume that the average person is indifferent to another person they've never met. If you can make that check, your DM *SHOULD* give you a few divine ranks.

Get a +140, and you can start 'provoking' the god into coming after you directly by walking into his churches and converting about half his followers, on average.

Overall, you should make a diplomacy check against your DM, and get your IC work to give you guys a few ranks and strip the god in question of a few of his. At that point, it starts getting more reasonable, and also has a nice plot to it as well, as you guy scramble on retraining quests and hunts for items that would improve your check.

[magic9mushroom]

If you want to go further, Magic9mushroom has some tasty builds that combine tainted scholar with Beholder Mage and the like.

Which fall squarely into "breaking the game".

Basically, whether you can kill a deity comes down to how well the DM optimised them and how well the DM allows you to optimise. If the latter does not exceed the former by a large margin, you're in big trouble.

That said, read up on the very long list of deity immunities, and remember not to try any of them.

[Erith]

Working under you is quite different from worship. A CEO is not a deity. They would have to worship you as a god.

Honestly, I was thinking more along the lines of some kind of ritual. Between the paladins praying to their god to sponsor us and the casters supplying the raw power for the ascension, maybe we could work something out. I'm also pretty sure the warlock would force his citizens to worship him as a god even if all he got was a nice hat.


Also: thousands of mid level mages makes for some crazy good spellcraft DC mitigation. You sure you can't use epic magic?

Not regularly, but I'll ask about a 1 or 2 off ritual.

[Godskook]

Wait, you have allied gods to call on?

[Lycanthromancer]

Wait, you have allied gods to call on?"I choose you, Pazuzu!"

"Pika!"

[Noodles2375]

If you haven't already, check out the SRD on deities:

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineRanksAndPowers.htm

In particular check out portfolio sense:
Portfolio Sense
"...Greater deities automatically sense any event that involves their portfolios, regardless of the number of people involved. In addition, their senses extend one week into the past and one week into the future for every divine rank they have. When a deity senses an event, it merely knows that the event is occurring and where it is. The deity receives no sensory information about the event. Once a deity notices an event, it can use its remote sensing power to perceive the event."

And also Salient Divine Abilities:
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divin/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#salientDivineAbilities

I think an attempted deicide would fall under the category of "affecting their portfolio". It is likely that the deity can detect your attempt in advance and prepare perfectly for it. Specifically, if the deity has competently picked the Life and Death salient divine ability, it can see your deicide attempt a minimum of 16 weeks in advance, and snuff out your life forces one by one with no save and no ability to track the origin of the death effect. Heck, even simply using the less powerful Hand of Death is probably sufficient.

Or they can summon 20x 20HD spectres to ambush you.

Or spam you with absurdly metamagic'd orbs from their huge number of 10+ levle spell slots.

Or the whole party could be TPK'd by a full attack from an Alter Size'd deity's using annihilating strike. Fort Save DC = 32 + damage dealt.

This doesn't even take into account their team of avatars who all have DR=8-10.

With Salient Divine Abilities plus class features they can really do just about anything. The person who said that it is like putting a level one character against a level 20 plus a team of level 18's is exactly right.

[Bibliomancer]

The other thing that you could try (that doesn't even tangentially involve the ELH and thus might be allowed by a sane DM) would be to use guerilla tactics.

1) Use aforementioned ritual to become demigods.

2) Hide your followers in a friendly Outer Plane oppoed to said god. If you have to join a pantheon like the Seldarine for protection and risk getting treated as flunkies for the next eon, so be it.

3) Hunt out and destroy as many avatars and major artifacts of his that you can find, and if even confronted directly retreat to your divine realm (you should share one, since deities are slightly more powerful on their home turf) or a hidden demiplane [or the Far Realms, in a pinch].

4) Once the god's attention has been drawn to you,* find a place where you can set up a divine-related ambush with another ritual. Say...the astral plane, on the corpse of the deity's dead father.

5) Once he's hopping mad, have him chase you to that place, where you can (hopefully) convince the DM to reduce his power level to something approximating yours.

6) ???

7) Proceed with battle.

This at least gives the DM a face-saving excuse to nerf this deity, and will hopefully possess enough originality/unexpectedness to get him to agree with it.

*Don't bother trying to wipe out his followers. A greater deity would have followers on many of the infinite prime material worlds, and thus would be nearly impossible to excise from the subconscious of the multiverse.

[Lysander]

Here's a question. What is your opponent the god of? What psychological tactics can you take based on his portfolio? Because maybe (if your DM is charitable) you can make this a contest of something other than brute force.

Look at Arachne and Athena. They had a weaving contest, not a fist fight. I mean, Athena still won of course but you get my point. Make it a fiddling contest with the devil instead of a swordfight.

Maybe you can guilt him into a "fair" fight without any non-mortal magic. Or make him just use a gang of avatars to fight you. Maybe you can duel it out in a rap battle instead. I don't know. It all depends on what he's like.

[Erith]

Wait, you have allied gods to call on?

Less call on, more "since we have done so much through our careers to further your cause, would you mind granting us a favor? We'll supply the power we just need your blessing."

[Abd al-Azrad]

You know, I never really sat down and thought through how hard Gods actually are to kill. I've always been, "Oh, only AC 80, only 500 hit points, I can one-shot that no problem! UBERCHARGE!" They really do not play fair, though.

Okay. I'm gonna try to be constructive.

-Gods do not just get killed. It doesn't happen. Each literary, or in-game reference to deicide has been steeped in epic storytelling. To imagine that you can just walk into an arena with one and expect victory is hubris to the highest degree, and hubris is something you just can't fall prey to in a battle like this.

-Gods are very specific. In D&D, we use something approximating, say, the Greek pantheon, where each god is something of an exemplar of particular human traits (the god of Battle, the god of Beauty, the god of BS). That said, each time you take a human trait to an extreme (as gods are wont to do) you get weakness somewhere. It's the deific version of min-maxing, and it means there's a min somewhere in the equation.

-Gods are very focused. Yes, they would probably notice someone planning to kill them weeks in advance, if the plan was just to 'port into their home and deliver some epic smackdown. But would a god of Battle foresee danger if offered a well-abjured divine trap as a gift? And even if he did, if you make your attack skillful enough, truly representative of a paragon of war... would he resent you, or be impressed?

I guess what I'm getting at is, I think a group of mortals could defeat a god if they out-thought their enemy. Which requires info. What's this god enemy of yours? Who is (s)he? What is (s)he like? Portfolio? You'll never win a straight fight, but why on Earth is this game about a straight fight with a god? Gods aren't frakin' random encounters, after all! To treat this as a one-shot battle is to do a disservice both to the god, whose presence and abilities are completely ignored for the sake of expediency, and to the party, whose brilliant and epic defeat of a god is overshadowed by the fact that they did it by brute force and luck! This could literally be one of the most amazing moments of your party's career, and it feels like the game it just taking you there as a random martial challenge.

If you can play on the god's necessary weaknesses, you might be able to box them into a no-win scenario which would at least require them to acknowledge that you could have otherwise beaten them.

You know... if they weren't a god.

[Lycanthromancer]

You know, I never really sat down and thought through how hard Gods actually are to kill. I've always been, "Oh, only AC 80, only 500 hit points, I can one-shot that no problem! UBERCHARGE!" They really do not play fair, though.

Okay. I'm gonna try to be constructive.

-Gods do not just get killed. It doesn't happen. Each literary, or in-game reference to deicide has been steeped in epic storytelling. To imagine that you can just walk into an arena with one and expect victory is hubris to the highest degree, and hubris is something you just can't fall prey to in a battle like this.

-Gods are very specific. In D&D, we use something approximating, say, the Greek pantheon, where each god is something of an exemplar of particular human traits (the god of Battle, the god of Beauty, the god of BS). That said, each time you take a human trait to an extreme (as gods are wont to do) you get weakness somewhere. It's the deific version of min-maxing, and it means there's a min somewhere in the equation.

-Gods are very focused. Yes, they would probably notice someone planning to kill them weeks in advance, if the plan was just to 'port into their home and deliver some epic smackdown. But would a god of Battle foresee danger if offered a well-abjured divine trap as a gift? And even if he did, if you make your attack skillful enough, truly representative of a paragon of war... would he resent you, or be impressed?

I guess what I'm getting at is, I think a group of mortals could defeat a god if they out-thought their enemy. Which requires info. What's this god enemy of yours? Who is (s)he? What is (s)he like? Portfolio? You'll never win a straight fight, but why on Earth is this game about a straight fight with a god? Gods aren't freakin' random encounters, after all! If you can play on the god's necessary weaknesses, you might be able to box them into a no-win scenario which would at least require them to acknowledge that you could have otherwise beaten them.

You know... if they weren't a god.He's Pun Pun. God of...well...nothing and everything.

They're doomed.

[Abd al-Azrad]

He's Pun Pun. God of...well...nothing and everything.

They're doomed.

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that if a 5th-level character could pull off a Pun-Pun, the Gods would have done it first? It's not like it's even particularly hard.

[Lycanthromancer]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that if a 5th-level character could pull off a Pun-Pun, the Gods would have done it first? It's not like it's even particularly hard.But it's not like any of them are particularly smart, either. I mean, I can easily get a higher Int score than any of the ones with actual stats.

[Abd al-Azrad]

But it's not like any of them are particularly smart, either. I mean, I can easily get a higher Int score than any of the ones with actual stats.

Come on! The god that created the Sarrukh? That dude must have at least played around with the power he was giving that lizard.

"Oh, look, you have a power that is somehow greater than any of mine! How did I even make this?"

[arguskos]

Come on! The god that created the Sarrukh? That dude must have at least played around with the power he was giving that lizard.

"Oh, look, you have a power that is somehow greater than any of mine! How did I even make this?"
The World Serpent is never given stats. :smalltongue: That means it can't be killed, and thus, has the power to create the Sarrukh!

[Abd al-Azrad]

The World Serpent is never given stats. :smalltongue: That means it can't be killed, and thus, has the power to create the Sarrukh!

Really... wouldn't that imply...

The World Serpent
Rank NI Greater Deity
HD: Unlimited
Also known as... Pun-Pun.

He was the first of them. Dun dun DUUUUUNN!!!

[D_Lord]

Get an Elder Evil on your side. You will Have to be evil well, but these guys can kill gods. Some of them can have a god hit them with every trick, it's got and the Elder Evil will laugh it off. Or just worsph one, lots of new evil feats, and some of them give a lot of power vs Divene powers.

[arguskos]

Really... wouldn't that imply...

The World Serpent
Rank NI Greater Deity
HD: Unlimited
Also known as... Pun-Pun.

He was the first of them. Dun dun DUUUUUNN!!!
OHSHIIII-------!!! Guys, we solved D&D! Hey, wait, there's someone at my door--

*crashes*

*screams*

The meat creature Arguskos has been removed for his own safety. Go back to your business. This has been a Mechanus Warning Squad.

[Norn-Eater]

Hey everyone, long time lurker, first time poster.

I realize this is probably moot, seeing as no-one's posted in a month and your game is probably already over, but seeing as this is the first problem I might have some kind of solution for, here goes;

Firstly, I noticed that no-one has mentioned the Book of Vile Darkness. There is a (9th level?) spell which creates a storm of "Violet Rain", a super-special-awesome evil weather pattern the effects of which I think they state best:

Once Violet Rain begins to fall, all connections with divine agencies is severed for 24 hours. Divine spell-casters have no access to spells, Divine spell effects are suppressed, and divinely infused magic items cease to function.

This should take care of any free domain spell-casting, ridiculous items, and (depending on the DM) stuff like Life-and-Death or Alter Reality

Secondly, good old anti-magic fields should still trip up any supernatural abilities and spellcasting the god worked up; while they may have thought to bring five mordiken's disjunctions (SP) for every Anti-magic field spell you can cast (20% success rate), if you really have thousands of followers, you can borrow a hundred to keep them up over the entire area. While riding flying mounts and casting in three dimensions to prevent a flying escape.

Now that it's basically a slug-fest, without Divine spells/abilities, supernatural or spell-like abilites, or fancy items, you basically just have to throw waves and waves of mid-high level goons at him and wait until enough of them crit to take him down to maybe ~-100 health. Then pour 50 tons of concrete around the body, air-lift him outside of the storm, an use a Wish (or three) to make sure he stays dead.

Your main problem is just getting him there without him knowing what you are doing; try to avoid saying his name, and if your DM is nice, you could have your strategy meetings in a violet-rain area to prevent spying. Other than that, it looks like a few 9th level spells, a hundred flying wizards, a thousand or so level 15 Spiked-chain fighters with +5 weapons, and a few dozen tons of cement are all you need to kill any god you encounter.

[Noodles2375]

I don't think anything in the description of Violet Rain implies that it stops salient divine abilities. Would this stop SLA's? Deities can use Plane Shift and Greater Teleport @ will as SLA's so you'd need someway to block their extraplanar movement to lock them in an area with the Violet Rain first before you can take down their spell slots.

Also I don't think AMF works here because:
"Two or more antimagic fields sharing any of the same space have no effect on each other. Certain spells, such as wall of force, prismatic sphere, and prismatic wall, remain unaffected by antimagic field (see the individual spell descriptions). Artifacts and deities are unaffected by mortal magic such as this."

From the anti-magic field entry in the SRD.

A bold try though :)

[herrhauptmann]

Firstly, I noticed that no-one has mentioned the Book of Vile Darkness. There is a (9th level?) spell which creates a storm of "Violet Rain", a super-special-awesome evil weather pattern the effects of which I think they state best:

Once Violet Rain begins to fall, all connections with divine agencies is severed for 24 hours. Divine spell-casters have no access to spells, Divine spell effects are suppressed, and divinely infused magic items cease to function.

Figured that spell was more along the lines of making a mortal cleric cry as his connection to god is snipped. So the only things he's got left are a medium BAB, d8 HD, and any items that were crafted by a wizard or other arcane person.

For the OP, if you can beg a favor of a patron god, even a lesser one, perhaps the following could work. This lesser god does not directly interfere in the battle, his whole being is spent on nullifying the powers of the greater god. So your divine rank 10 god is exerting his full power on the rank 18 god, he essentially reduces the rank 18 god to a mere rank 8. That alone should stop the greater god from using the vast majority of his salient abilities. It should for instance stop the insta-crit for max damage that greater gods get.
On the other hand, if your party loses, the rank 10 god is going to get squished by the rank 18. Even if the party hasn't yet lost, the rank 10 god is exerting his whole being on the rank 18, so he has also lost his own salient abilities for the duration of the fight.
And the rank 10 will know this. So if you do suggest it, be sure to include a method to keep the rank 10 safe through the battle, or the 18 will summon up a few pit fiends or something to crush him.

[Scarey Nerd]

Long story short: You can't kill a God. It's only possible if you are gods or at least demigods as well. If you have no cheese, normal weapons etc, then you can only win through challenging the God, generally relying on their pride/arrogance. As mentioned before, Gods don't settle differences with combat. Athene and Arachne, Athene and Poseidon, Hermes and Zeus, they all settle problems with contests, bets etc. You will have to appeal to that nature to defeat them. To give an example, say Heironeous was the God after you. You could claim that it would be dishonourable to fight mere mortals, and that it would not be fair. Perhaps a game of logic or riddles, or perhaps a test of athleticism.

As far as I can see, that's your only chance.

[Amiel]

Pray that the deity overlooks you. Hide in a corner, cower, slobber incessantly to detract attention.

The chance and probability of survivability will depend on the deity's divine rank, but remember that a deity's SDAs are never subject to spell resistance and are immune to antimagic effects;

Even with a poor Dex, it may have Supreme Initiative, which'll mean it will always go first. It can then lay the smack down with Mass Divine Blast or Divine Blast, or it can affect Mass Life and Death.
If you are still a mortal when this absolute hurt commences, you are gone forever. There are no saves to avoid the above effects. A 30th level character is still considered mortal.

If the deity deems you to be good sport, she or he can cause a Divine Splendor effect. You die immediately as its deific presence exerts itself upon your area. There is also no save.

The battle will be highly dependent on the SDAs, domains chosen and ability score allocation. Survivability will also depend on the deity creation rules used.

Remember, that even with cheese, it is not going to overly adversely affect the deity; the deity, especially those who have at will spell-like abilities will only ever consider even wish-granting efreet distractions at best. Their Alter Reality SDA is a lot worse.

[RagnaroksChosen]

Could a Sphere of annilation kill a god?

[Sydonai]

Could a Sphere of annilation kill a god?

No, not even Voidstone, Lolth uses her power in one book to protect her "chosen" from getting zapped by a "GIANT" block of Voidstone, instant destruction with no chance of rez to anyone else.

[RagnaroksChosen]

No, not even Voidstone, Lolth uses her power in one book to protect her "chosen" from getting zapped by a "GIANT" block of Voidstone, instant destruction with no chance of rez to anyone else.

that may be the case in the story i am talking about VIA RAW.

[Closak]

Would attaining Divine Rank 0 prior to the battle protect you against the Instant Kill VS Mortals?

Because that can be arranged.

[Lysander]

What your group really really needs to do is find gods that oppose the enemy deity and convince them to make you all proxies for duration of the battle. Being a Rank 1 god still probably isn't enough to triumph, but it can't hurt.

[Erith]

Assuming for the sake of argument that "no save, you just die" are out, what would a good old forcecage+dimensional anchor do? The dimensional anchor would of course be cast with assay spell resistance, and there is no way, as far as I am aware, around a forcecage. Yes, we still have to deal with his defenses and ranged attacks, but I know for fact that my dm relies heavily on melee combatants.

Edit: Unfortunately bovd and elder evils are out (one of us started an order of paladins)

[satorian]

They will do nothing against Alter Reality and immunity to dimensional anchor.

[Starbuck_II]

No, not even Voidstone, Lolth uses her power in one book to protect her "chosen" from getting zapped by a "GIANT" block of Voidstone, instant destruction with no chance of rez to anyone else.

No, that just means she can protect others, not herself.

[jseah]

Actually killing the god if you can get within 20 ft of him is easy.

Retrain skill points to Use Psionic Device and cast Affinity Field twice from an item (psicrown), shared with your familiar.

When you get within 20ft, hit either you or your familiar for any amount of damage. Everything within 20ft takes an infinite damage loop and keels over dead. Including you btw.

Contact Other Plane future prediction shenanigans (to counter Portfolio Sense by making a contingent future) and an action loop to have enough to get within 20ft should be enough to get the nuke there.

Being an outsider of some sort so you stop being a mortal to avoid insta-gib is a must.

[Lycanthromancer]

Actually killing the god if you can get within 20 ft of him is easy.

Retrain skill points to Use Psionic Device and cast Affinity Field twice from an item (psicrown), shared with your familiar.

When you get within 20ft, hit either you or your familiar for any amount of damage. Everything within 20ft takes an infinite damage loop and keels over dead. Including you btw.

Contact Other Plane future prediction shenanigans (to counter Portfolio Sense by making a contingent future) and an action loop to have enough to get within 20ft should be enough to get the nuke there.

Being an outsider of some sort so you stop being a mortal to avoid insta-gib is a must.Unfortunately, affinity field is "Fort negates," and gods roll 20s on all d20 rolls.

What you do is pump up your attack roll as high as you can, with a couple of rerolls (in the case of a nat 1), then use telekinesis to fire a 1,500,000 lb boulder at it (using shrink item, of course. Enjoy the thousands of d6s in damage, goober.

[SilverStar]

Unfortunately, affinity field is "Fort negates," and gods roll 20s on all d20 rolls.

What you do is pump up your attack roll as high as you can, with a couple of rerolls (in the case of a nat 1), then use telekinesis to fire a 1,500,000 lb boulder at it (using shrink item, of course. Enjoy the thousands of d6s in damage, goober.

Till the deity in question Epic Dodges it.

It's not impossible to kill a god... it's damned hard, easier if its DvR is low.... but your biggest worry should be portfolio sense, cause they see that stuff weeks before you thought of it.

[Amiel]

Assuming for the sake of argument that "no save, you just die" are out, what would a good old forcecage+dimensional anchor do? The dimensional anchor would of course be cast with assay spell resistance, and there is no way, as far as I am aware, around a forcecage. Yes, we still have to deal with his defenses and ranged attacks, but I know for fact that my dm relies heavily on melee combatants.

Edit: Unfortunately bovd and elder evils are out (one of us started an order of paladins)

Nothing; additionally, a deity's SDAs are immune to antimagic effects and never subject to spell resistance. Almost all deities will have Divine Shield, the greater deity would already have enacted its Divine Shield with its superior initiative; it's a free action to activate FYI. A Divine Shield stops all damage save that dealt by Divine Blast. A mortal, unless it is also a deity, will not be able to penetrate the deity's Divine Shield. Ever. I mean the mortal can conceivably deal damage to its DS, but all of it will be absorbed by the Shield; of which the deity can just raise another. Additionally, "the deity can adjust the shield so that it does not block damage the deity ignores anyway."

If the deity lacks access to Mass Divine Blast, it could always Divine Blast. This SDA ignores all damage resistance and immunity, only a Divine Shield can counter it. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Of course, the deity would have first altered reality.

A deity's spell-like abilities and spells are also going to work within an antimagic field.

To effectively challenge or kill the deity, I would actually urge you to think laterally. Kill off the deity's worshippers, clerics and transcendent personnel. This, of course, assumes that the deity is empowered through veneration. There are many deities who are not. Good luck.

Also, "A deity is not subject to energy drain, ability drain, or ability damage[...]Deities of rank 6 or higher are immune to effects that imprison or banish them. Such effects include banishment, binding, dimensional anchor, dismissal, imprisonment, repulsion, soul bind, temporal stasis, trap the soul, and turning and rebuking."

Forcecage counts as an imprisonment effect, ergo the deity is immune.

[Noodles2375]

Even if Forcecage isn't an imprisonment effect and the DM rules that it can imprison them, they still get to planeshift or greater teleport each round.

Alternatively, from the Divine Blast SRD entry:
"Notes

The ray destroys a WALL OF FORECE, prismatic wall, or prismatic sphere it hits (all layers in a prismatic effect are destroyed). The ray itself is unaffected and can strike a target behind the wall of force or prismatic effect. "

There is no reason for a deity to be of correct size to be caught in a forcecage. Since most of them take Alter Size, they can go between fine and colossal as a free action each round.

Salient Divine Abilities are insanely powerful.