How have you handled the Tarrasque?

[Daftendirekt]

So, in our most recent one-shot, our DM had us make characters with monster races instead of normal PC races, going off of our CR instead of ECL. I had a 10th level Psion Illithilich, and there was also an Old-category red dragon and a beholder Hive Mother. DM didn't have much planned, so he decided to have the Tarrasque burst out of the mountain range near the peak we'd all been residing in.

We engage it, but it becomes quickly apparent that we're just too weak to do enough damage to it. The beholder and I are throwing debuffs at it, and a few get through, but there's just not enough damage being done. I had to roll extremely high to beat its SR (being only ML 10, with +4 from Power Penetration), so most of my stuff wasn't penetrating. Tiring of wasting all my power points on it, I throw out one of my illithid Charm Monsters. I get through its SR, aaaand... it rolls a 1 on its save. I now had the Tarrasque as my biggest, bestest friend. I decided to throw my +6 headband of intellect on it, so it wasn't a moron (int 3 without it), and convince it to charge towards nearby Thay and find "food". What I was really doing was getting it to destroy all the Red Wizards that we'd just learned the day before were planning to come kill us -- the dragon, the beholder, and I.

The session ended with us on Thaymount battling the Zulkirs' guards while the Tarrasque ravaged the city below, and we hope to pick up from there next week.

So, anyway, enough about me. I want to hear other stories of interesting encounters with the Tarrasque, whether successes, horrific failures, or anything in between!

[Erik von Nein]

As a 16th level psion, teleportaled into the sun, let the non-lethal damage soak up, then mind-seeded it into me.

[sambo.]

back in a 1ed encounter with the Tarrasque, i recall the party pally and party cavalier both dealt critical hit heavy lance charges on the first round (i kid you not, they both rolled nat 20s).

it just turned into a mop-up operation after that. we didn't actually KILL kill it as we didn't have the Wish spell that permanent Tarrasque killing required.

mind you, that pally had earlier (like, as a level 9'ish character) taken out Tiamat with a single lance charge later in teh campaign


(wheeeeeee, remember the awesome might of the 1ed Paladin!)

[TroubleBrewing]

We had a really awful DM about 5-6 years ago throw the Tarrasque at us at about level 12, mainly because his railroading wasn't having the desired effect. We saw it stalking through the valley of the town we'd come to visit, and we looked at it for a second, then turned around and just left.

[LordBlades]

I've fought tarrasque on quite a few occasions (5-6 times I think), both as written in the MM, and with various modifications.

The lowest level I've handled one was 12 or 13 IIRC. thing got 1-shotted by the party Frenzied Berserker, then we got a scroll if Wish, and killed it.

Funniest (IMHO) Tarrasque encounter was at lvl. 19 as a random encounter. We were busy with other, more important things, so we didn't really want to spend many resources with it. The party wizard just let it charge, then cast Gate in it's path. One express Tarrasque delivery to the elemental plane of water.

[Eldan]

The Tarrasque's weakness are it's low will save and low dexterity. Grease can seriously hinder it until you have something better ready. Walls of Force can seal it in, without any way for it to break out. Dominate Monster makes it your best buddy forever. Yes, it has +20 will. Your DCs should be over 30 by the time you fight it.

[EccentricCircle]

I ran a game where the plot revolved around an egomanicial Hunter trying to slay one of everything in the monster manual.
the players caught up with him as he was in the process of releasing the Tarrasque from centuries of imprisonment in the depths of the underdark.
unsuprisingly it wasn't keen on going back.
In the end they crashed a spelljammer into it, it rolled a natural one on its reflex save to avoid falling back into the abyss and a very powerful wizard put the ward around it.
of all the ways to end a campaign i've ever seen I think Crashing a Spelljammer into the most powerful thing in the monster manual has to be one of the most amusing for all concerned.

[Eldan]

Anyway...

Our way involved sending in the meatshields to "keep it busy" in one place for five rounds, while the wizard put it in a cube of six invisible walls of force, then teleported the fighter out.
After that, we only had to wait until it ran out of air.

[Heliomance]

Best way we ever handled it involved a somewhat permissive DM. The Tarrasque we fought was a far more beefed up thing, an unstoppable avatar of destruction, in some ways more construct than alive, perfectly happy to walk across the bottom of an ocean to find food. We lured it onto a demiplane, then cast antigenesis and ripped the demiplane apart around it. DM decided that the "cosmic damage" done by reality ripping itself apart around it bypassed its regeneration just fine.

[Pentachoron]

the most powerful thing in the monster manual

The Tarrasque isn't the most powerful thing in the monster manual. It's not even the most powerful thing in the T section.


Anyway, most common methods of handling it for me are either Alliping it, or Ubercharging it.

[Eldan]

Well, here's a short plane, expanded from the one above:

1. Optional: Time Stop
2. Improved Invisibility, Flight. The Tarrasque can now neither see nor reach you for the next few hours.
3. Reverse Gravity. It will get a reflex save to hold on if there's anything strong enough to hold a Tarrasque. I doubt it. At higher levels, the area should just about cover enough area to lift the Tarrasque ten feet off the ground and immobilize it for several rounds. If not, metamagic it.
4. Start casting walls of force around it. Six of these should enclose the tarrasque in a perfect, unbreakable cube, like a gigantic forcecage. Make permanent, if necessary.

[Angry Bob]

Idea: In the setting, the Tarrasque has been released before, and then stopped easily by such tactics.

Sidequest idea: The Tarrasque cometh! And this time, members of an apocalyptic druidic order have come with it to prevent you from doing the same sort of thing the heroes of old did.

[BenTheJester]

The Tarrasque's weakness are it's low will save and low dexterity. Grease can seriously hinder it until you have something better ready. Walls of Force can seal it in, without any way for it to break out. Dominate Monster makes it your best buddy forever. Yes, it has +20 will. Your DCs should be over 30 by the time you fight it.

The Tarrasque's biggest weakness is the 3rd dimension

[LordBlades]

The Tarrasque's biggest weakness is the 3rd dimension

+1. This and being completely unprotected vs. no-save-just-die/suck effects.

[Ricky S]

My friends tried to set up an all you can eat tarrasque resturant. It worked for about a week until it broke free and ate everyone. Then we recaught and dropped it into the middle of the ocean. I dont think we killed it and I am pretty sure my dm will bring it back into the campaign.

[LoneStarNorth]

My players failed to stop the BBEG from releasing the tarrasque a few weeks back. Rather than confront it immediately, as they'd already spent some resources on the BBEG himself, they teleported away and did some research. Knowledge (history), Knowledge (arcana), chatting with great wyrm dragons who actually remember the last time he got loose, etc etc. With all these sources added together, I just let them read the MM entry. They took note of his strengths and weaknesses and came up with a solid plan to stop him.

Then they teleported back to fight him. They offered me the Monster Manual back so I could run the encounter. I said it wouldn't be necessary and pulled out two pages of homebrew monster stats, size 8 font.

Then they wept.

After they realized that he had ten attacks and DR 50 that they couldn't overcome, that any spell that worked on him once wouldn't work a second time, and that when swallowed whole his stomach acid hits you repeatedly with dispel magic, they ran away to think it through a bit more.

I look forward to their second attempt.

[Ernir]

My players recently went planar-hopping to get some Allips to Wis-drain it to death.
Dazzling creativity.

[NineThePuma]

My players failed to stop the BBEG from releasing the tarrasque a few weeks back. Rather than confront it immediately, as they'd already spent some resources on the BBEG himself, they teleported away and did some research. Knowledge (history), Knowledge (arcana), chatting with great wyrm dragons who actually remember the last time he got loose, etc etc. With all these sources added together, I just let them read the MM entry. They took note of his strengths and weaknesses and came up with a solid plan to stop him.

Then they teleported back to fight him. They offered me the Monster Manual back so I could run the encounter. I said it wouldn't be necessary and pulled out two pages of homebrew monster stats, size 8 font.

Then they wept.

After they realized that he had ten attacks and DR 50 that they couldn't overcome, that any spell that worked on him once wouldn't work a second time, and that when swallowed whole his stomach acid hits you repeatedly with dispel magic, they ran away to think it through a bit more.

I look forward to their second attempt.

This made me laugh. And want to call you sadistically evil. But still, laughing.

EDIT: In my 'brewed campaign setting, there are actually TWO tarrasques. One is the TN protector of nature, summoned by the Over Diety when the Godzilla Threshold is crossed. It's given the Aquatic subtype and the Amphibious trait, the Weapon of Ragnarok Epic Destiny, and is generally an alright dude.

The SECOND is an Elder Evil from a parallel dimension that occasionally rips chunks of its flesh off and shoves them through rips in space-time to have them grow into spawn and try to destroy everything. This one is an Aberration, and CE. It is obviously intended to be the Final Ultimate Big Bad.

[Studoku]

Landing an airship on it.

Too tired to explain.

[Eldariel]

Last one ended up imploding on the Positive Energy Plane, I recall. The previous time it had its body snatched by True Mind Switch (the resulting Psion 20 Tarrasque was quite a bit more formidable, btw). And the time before it was left to comatose after an epic Knowledge-check to figure out it can be ability drained. That's all the encounters I remember with the vanilla brew in campaigns I've DMed/played in.

[Yukitsu]

I once threw the ground it was standing on in to space while it was standing on it.

[grimbold]

when fightng the tarrasque all you have to do is send your meleers to attack it, it can be taken it pretty easily by a level 13 fighter and level 13 barbarian

[mootoall]

Two funsies ways for a Totemist to do it. You pretty much auto-pass grapple checks against the Big T if you optimize them, OR you can use Wild Empathy with the Dread Carapace and some Handle Animal opti-fu to make it your buddy.

[Blas_de_Lezo]

Reverse Gravity. No save, no Spell Resistance. The Tarrasque floats in the air, harmless, then your party kills it shooting at distance.

[Comet]

of all the ways to end a campaign i've ever seen I think Crashing a Spelljammer into the most powerful thing in the monster manual has to be one of the most amusing for all concerned.

This is the best thing in the thread so far. Spelljammers and a tactic that reminds me of the Call of Cthulhu? Yes, please!

[Angry Bob]

This reminds of a discussion I had with a guy in my group. We were talking about applying the "hipster" or "douchebag" template to it.

"It's the hipster tarrasque! Roll initiative!"
<Rolls, combat begins>
"It charges the barbarian."
"I know it's got animal intelligence, but why not charge the wizard? You had those wolves gank me even when I was out of spells for the day."
"Irony."
...
"Okay, it's down. I use my scroll of wish."
...
"It's the hipster tarrasque again! Roll-"
"But I thought wish-"
"Yeah, wish works for the mainstream tarrasque, but for this one you need something more obscure. You've probably never heard of it."

[Eldan]

Actually, the hipster tarrasque died to wish before it was cool.

So, it's extinct.

[FelixG]

This made me laugh. And want to call you sadistically evil. But still, laughing.

EDIT: In my 'brewed campaign setting, there are actually TWO tarrasques. One is the TN protector of nature, summoned by the Over Diety when the Godzilla Threshold is crossed. It's given the Aquatic subtype and the Amphibious trait, the Weapon of Ragnarok Epic Destiny, and is generally an alright dude.

The SECOND is an Elder Evil from a parallel dimension that occasionally rips chunks of its flesh off and shoves them through rips in space-time to have them grow into spawn and try to destroy everything. This one is an Aberration, and CE. It is obviously intended to be the Final Ultimate Big Bad.

I cant seem to find the article to the Epic Destinies anymore, can you link me to it in a PM please?

[Turok117]

Funniest (IMHO) Tarrasque encounter was at lvl. 19 as a random encounter. We were busy with other, more important things, so we didn't really want to spend many resources with it. The party wizard just let it charge, then cast Gate in it's path. One express Tarrasque delivery to the elemental plane of water.

Oh, if my DM ever throws Mr T at me then I'm SO doing that.