Suggestions for a one-shot.

[Seatbelt]

I want to run one of the Elder Gods/Evils as a one-shot for the group I had to bail on early in the semester. I've had a high level, fairly optimized party face off against Father Lymic. The party was ECL 14 and they worked him over such that I made up some thing about charging the portal so they could banish him and escape Ravenloft in order to tie up the mages and let him last a little longer.

The thing though is that I was generally unsatisfied with the encounters I had set up prior to the party reaching the mountain. That group didn't care as they were resurrecting some characters from a previous campaign and just wanted to be UBER POWERFUL.

I was hoping the playground might be able to suggest some approaches to this. The whole session shouldn't run more than 6 hours. There are 5ish players of various skill levels optimization wise. Combat heavy is fine but there is one player who likes to negotiate before the killing starts. So a social encounter suggestion would be awesome - I suck at those.

[The Rabbler]

you could always make a few fairly-optimized characters to pit against them. a diplomancer would prove an interesting encounter for negotiation, a well-built wizard with a lot of battlefield control could pose a nice challenge, a spiked-chain-wielding tripper build would give the melee a run for their money, and a dragonwrought kobold throwing around orb attacks could pile up some nice damage.

or you could send in a party of ToB characters. get two crusader/deepwardens to take the damage, a lightning mace warblade for some damage, and a normal swordsage or two for harassment.

that's all I got :smalltongue:.