How to beat 2 specific monsters with a wizard?

[gooddragon1]

If you were playing a not terribly optimized but decent wizard with mainly material out of the SRD, how would you beat a colossus (iron, stone, or flesh) and how would you beat a force dragon? Both assume you have level near or at the CR of the monster in wizard levels. No specific Slay vs force dragon epic level spells please.

[NNescio]

If you were playing a not terribly optimized but decent wizard with mainly material out of the SRD, how would you beat a colossus (iron, stone, or flesh) and how would you beat a force dragon? Both assume you have level near or at the CR of the monster in wizard levels. No specific Slay vs force dragon epic level spells please.

1) Fly -> Shrink Item -> Lead Cannonballs. Doesn't need an optimized build. Instantaneous Conjurations will probably still work, as their effects are explicitly nonmagical. That said, Magic Immunity can still be interpreted ("immune to all spells") to block such spells as well.

(To others: Note that Magic Immunity is different from Spell Immunity. It is not unbeatable SR.)

[gooddragon1]

1) Fly -> Shrink Item -> Lead Cannonballs. Doesn't need an optimized build. Instantaneous Conjurations will probably still work, as their effects are explicitly nonmagical. That said, Magic Immunity can still be interpreted ("immune to all spells") to block such spells as well.

(To others: Note that Magic Immunity is different from Spell Immunity. It is not unbeatable SR.)

Sounds reasonable I guess, thanks.

[NNescio]

You're welcome.

Here's the follow-up, which was somehow lost from my above message.


2) How old is the force dragon? In any case, the standard (non-epic) anti-dragon spells are those that target Ref and Dex, with Shivering Touch (Reached, if required) being the most infamous example. Force Dragons do have higher Touch ACs though, but that's not something a Wizard can't handle.

Dispels are also effective against the Force Dragon's buffs, since they have a low caster level for their CR.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Use Gate to summon up something nasty enough to rip the colossi apart with physical damage?

[Psyren]

Force Dragons don't appear to be immune to level drain, so pump your CL (or get a supernatural effect, e.g. via Dweomerkeeper) and nuke the crap out of it.

[tyckspoon]

Force Dragons don't appear to be immune to level drain, so pump your CL (or get a supernatural effect, e.g. via Dweomerkeeper) and nuke the crap out of it.

This. Invest a bit in CL/overcoming SR and smack it around with Enervation/Energy Drain until it gets weak enough to land a kill spell. Dragons are meant to be customized, and epic dragons have a lot of feats/spells/money to be customized with so any particular dragon may not be susceptible, but the default chassis of a Force Dragon is not well defended against touch attacks and status conditions. Take advantage of that.


For the Colossus: Gate in something else to take care of it for you. Abominations are Outsiders; any of the more melee-centered ones should be able to do the job. Grab a Hecatoncheires if you want to be certain of it; they'll take out an Iron Colossus in 2 rounds.

Not abusing Gate: They don't have energy immunity and only the Flesh Colossus has a ranged attack as standard. Buy a bag full of acid flasks/alchemist's fire, fly over it high enough to be outside the range of the AMF, and throw/drop them down. Might take a while if your DM doesn't let you effectively drop the whole bunch at once, but it's unresisted damage that they have no means of fixing. You'll get there.

[Diefje]

...

Not abusing Gate: They don't have energy immunity and only the Flesh Colossus has a ranged attack as standard. Buy a bag full of acid flasks/alchemist's fire, fly over it high enough to be outside the range of the AMF, and throw/drop them down. Might take a while if your DM doesn't let you effectively drop the whole bunch at once, but it's unresisted damage that they have no means of fixing. You'll get there.
I was gonna say some environmental hazzard (acid pool, lava stream, deep ocean), and get it to fall in (collapse the bridge, avalance). But this is neat too, and not location dependant.

[Flickerdart]

I was gonna say some environmental hazzard (acid pool, lava stream, deep ocean), and get it to fall in (collapse the bridge, avalance). But this is neat too, and not location dependant.
Enormous supermonsters are surprisingly good swimmers, so an ocean won't do. Even lava (20d6, avg. 70 per round) will not act quickly enough to kill a Colossus before it can just climb out.

[Randomguy]

To kill a colossus, cast fire immunity on yourself, teleport to a volcano and use teleport object repeatedly to get the contents of the volcano onto the colossus.

EDIT: Alternatively, knock a dragon (or any really powerful creature) unconscious and cast modify memories (asleep=willing) on it so that it thinks the two of you were friends for your entire life. Repeat until you have a small army of dragons. Make them attack the colossus.

[ericgrau]

I think there's a PrC to convert some of your spells into (Su) abilities. Craft your own flesh colossus, inhabit it yourself, and cast your Sus through the AMF with impunity. A colossus' Sus get through its own AMF as a specific exception to the normal rules.

Picking the right spells to Su is another issue, but at least worst case scenario you can have a giant monster battle backup plan.

Given epic WBL a collosus is surprisingly cheap to craft. Which brings to mind an alternate way to beat one colossus: craft 2 collosuses of your own and sick them on the enemy one.