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Anarion
2010-08-08, 02:58 PM
Hi all, I'm here looking for inventive tactics.

I'm currently part of a 6-man level 2 party and we know we're going to have to fight a large-size animated metal statue (CR 3 stats here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/animatedObject.htm)).

I'm at a loss how to beat something with hardness 10 and 52 hp using level 2 characters. But I'm confident that people here will have some out of the box ideas for dealing with it.:smallwink:

Party composition is paladin, druid, rogue, shugenja (water focused I think), and two sorcerers. If a particular spell is absolutely critical, I might be able to wrangle the DM for a scroll.

The Glyphstone
2010-08-08, 03:05 PM
Acid and Sonic damage ignore hardness, so pile on as much of that as you can.

Jair Barik
2010-08-08, 03:10 PM
Alternatively hide all your metal belongings go catch yourselves a rust monster and then pit it against lunch the animated object. Looks like a case of a monster under CRed given its hardness so perhas you would be better off searching for an alternate means of getting past it (sneaking etc.)

Anarion
2010-08-08, 03:16 PM
Unfortunately, it's guarding a tablet that has information for getting deeper into the ruins we're exploring without dying. And by guarding I mean it's literally holding the tablet in its hands. Although now that you mention sneaking, maybe we can exploit that -5 will save somehow...

Eldan
2010-08-08, 03:18 PM
How big is it? If it's small, you could try to bull rush it off something.

Or just lure it away with three characters and have the fourth one read the tablet.

Jair Barik
2010-08-08, 03:21 PM
Rember though that as a construct most of the useful things that give a will save will be mind effecting and thus useless against it. Information on the terrain? I have a mage build sitting around that turns invisible and drops heavy blocks of metal on people from a great height. Your too low level to do that but depending on terrain you could exploit falling object damage if the statue could be lured into a drop zone.

Snake-Aes
2010-08-08, 03:25 PM
Acid and Sonic damage ignore hardness, so pile on as much of that as you can.

That's much more convoluted than it sounds. Objects take reduced damage from energy attacks: Electricity and Fire do half damage, Cold deals one quarter damage. All before hardness.
Acid and Sonic "deal damage just like they would to a creature", which does not mean it ignores hardness.




Mind you, there are a few acid/sonic spells that specifically mention ignoring hardness, so there's no reason to believe that acid and sonic energies automatically do so.

Anarion
2010-08-08, 03:28 PM
@Eldan: It's a large statue. I'd guess it weighs half a ton maybe. Luring it might work if we could have the rogue sneak close enough to read the tablet. Thanks for the idea. Hopefully we can outrun it after that.

@Jair: We are 1 floor underground in some ruins. The statue is in a big chamber. I don't think it would stand still if we lured it to the ladder where we climbed down.

WinWin
2010-08-08, 03:37 PM
A net might help. Entangling it would make it easier to control.

Grease would slow it down. Lamp oil might work in a pinch. It would make a surface slippery and harder balance/climb.

Tripping it might be easy. With a whip you could do it without provoking and attack of opportunity.

Once it it prone, everyone can try and grapple it at once. Strongest party member first, everyone aid another after that. It should not be too hard to get the tablet off it.

Otherwise, try and lure it to the ladder and then drop rocks on it until it stops moving.

The Druid, Shugenja and Sorceres probably have a few good tricks. The Rogue might be able to use sleight of hand in combat while the Paladin distracts it.

Good luck with the challenge.

Lord Loss
2010-08-08, 03:37 PM
Lure it to the ladder, have a rust monster or extra heavy object at the top.

All but 1 party member at top to snipe dude/ push heavy object. Meatshield at the bottom, luring the creature. They get to ladder, he climbs up, stuff falls down tah-da!

Alternatively, the rogue could run up to the guy read or swipe the tablet and then flee.

Eldariel
2010-08-08, 03:52 PM
You could try and Enlarge someone and have 'em Grapple it to try and pin it > take the tablet. An alternative to Sleight of Hand. If you have someone with a nice base strength, you can probably beat or at least match its Grapple-check. Actually destroying it seems impossible without an adamantine item of some sort, or someone with an obscenely high Strength (an Orc Barbarian two-handing Greatsword could smash it quite easily burning a rage, especially with Power Attack and Enlarge Person, but I'm guessing you don't have one handy).

Darrin
2010-08-08, 04:32 PM
I'm at a loss how to beat something with hardness 10 and 52 hp using level 2 characters. But I'm confident that people here will have some out of the box ideas for dealing with it.:smallwink:


Constructs/animated objects are usually mindless, so a big weakness is generally invisibility and illusion-based spells. A minor image of a 10' x 10' stone wall can completely immobilize mindless creature, because it autofails the Will save to detect, and unless given specific instructions to test for illusions, it isn't smart enough to make a disbelieve attempt.

For a large metal construct... sovereign glue + rust monster wand (Complete Scoundrel p. 120, 160 GP) should reduce a large metal statue to dust in about 8-10 minutes. Rust Cubes are in the same book, and while the 1d6 damage that ignores hardness is nice, it's not all that cost effective at 100 GP per cube. A rusting weapon (+1 enhancement, Shining South) would cost about 8300 GP, but might disintegrate the whole thing after 5 hits.

Human Paragon 3
2010-08-08, 04:49 PM
A large animated object has a touch AC of 9 and a dex of 10.

A Net is a touch attack, and if it's successful, imposes a -4 penalty to Dex. Have the party surround it and attack it with 3 large nets. Even without proficiency you should be able to hit AC 9.

Once it's dex is reduced to 0, it cannot move. I may be wrong about this, but even if a Net doesn't work, a Lassou should, or a combination of the 2. Or a net, a lassou and a tanglefoot bag.

Snake-Aes
2010-08-08, 04:52 PM
A large animated object has a touch AC of 9 and a dex of 10.

A Net is a touch attack, and if it's successful, imposes a -4 penalty to Dex. Have the party surround it and attack it with 3 large nets. Even without proficiency you should be able to hit AC 9.

Once it's dex is reduced to 0, it cannot move. I may be wrong about this, but even if a Net doesn't work, a Lassou should, or a combination of the 2. Or a net, a lassou and a tanglefoot bag.

A net causes entanglement, a condition that causes -4 to dex. You can't Entangling an entangled creature doesn't make it "entangleder"

Human Paragon 3
2010-08-08, 05:01 PM
Ah, sorry, it's 3 lassous I was thinking of.

Or 2 lassous and a ray of clumsiness!

Evard
2010-08-08, 05:02 PM
Hmmmm

Step 1: Obtain 1 (or more) rust monsters
Step 2: Dig a big hole
Step 3: Hide the hole, and lead the Animated Object into it (have a board that you know where its at and run across it and when the heavier construct gets on it...)
Step 4: Drop your new pets into the hole
Step 5: ?
Step 6: profit!

Oddly enough I think a party of monks could do this easily.. No hindrance from getting rid of all the metal and running from the Construct... wow