BBEG ideas... Viable?

[Honeko]

So I'm working on a BBEG Ulitharid. But I want "him" to be more evil looking than standard. So a Feral Half-Fiend Half-Dragon Ulitharid. Now here's where my issues come up. This character alone is epic, 12 Racial HD and LA +17. Even if I ruled that when combining templates just use the one with the highest LA, he'd still be epic as a Ulitharid has a Level Adjustment of +9. But then can I just ignore LA for a BBEG? And then go with the build I wanted of Wizard//Racial/Telepath?

Or am I looking at this wrong, and he's not an epic level challenge?

Stat Block(Using Elite Array):

Wizard 20//Racial 12/Telepath 8
Size and Type: Large Outsider(Native)
Hit Dice: 12d12+(48) plus 8d4+(32)
Speed: 40 ft, fly 80(Good)
AC: +16 Natural Armor
Attacks: 2 claw, 1 bite, 2 long tentacle, 4 short tentacle
Damage: claw 2d6, bite 1d8, long tentacle 1d8, short tentacle 1d8
Special Attacks: Improved Grab, Pounce, Rake, Rend, Breath Weapon 6d8 1/day(DC 16+Con), Smite Good 1/day, Extract, Improved Grab, mind blast, psionic powers
Spell-like Abilities: Darkness 3/day, Desecrate 1/day, Unholy Blight 1/day, Poison 3/day, Contagion 1/day, Blashemy 1/day, Unholy aura 3/day, unhallow 1/day, Horrid Wilting 1/day, Summon monster IX(Fiends Only) 1/day, Destruction 1/day, CL 20, DC Cha
Special Qualities: Darkvision 120Ft, Fast Healing 5, Low-light vision, Immunity to sleep and paralysis effects, Immunity to X energy, Immunity to poison, Resistance acid 10, cold 10, electricity 10, and fire 10, DR 10/magic, Natural Weapons = magic, Spell Resistance 30, Power Resistance 27, Telepathy 200ft.
Abilities: 14+16 Str, 12+2 Dex, 13+6 Con, 15+2 Int +4 from HD, 8+2 Wis, 10+4 Cha.
Skills: Skill points as an outsider (8+5)x(15) plus (2+5)x8
Psionic Powers: ML telepath 21
Challenge Rating: 21
Level Adjustment: +17

The campaign is a high powered 10th level game, I'm giving them enough points to have at least one 18 and two 16s, thus I may use a similar system to increase this guy's stats. Any comments/thoughts/suggestions/etc welcome.

Also, thoughts on his lieutenants... A Half-Succubus Half-Nymph Melee type(He did it), and a Rakshasa Sorcerer/rogue thingy. Plus his thralls.... No idea for them yet, then again, does he even need them?

Thanks.

Edit: Added CR and fixed ML.

[Silva Stormrage]

First off, for NPC's you ignore lvl adjustment. You use CR instead, for example the vampire template has + 8 lvl adjustment but only +2 cr. You would add two to its cr and ignore the lvl adjustment entirely.


Also when are you players going to fight this mind flayer? If they do it at level 10 they will die horribly but I assume you knew that.

For any more in depth comments I need to know his spell and power list. If you make him a blaster wizard and blaster psion he isn't too tough, but if you make him a batman wizard and an action economy breaking psion than he could probably mop the floor with most parties. Still though for a High Op campaign that might not be too much, usually a high op party can take on much higher cr encounters than normal.

Edit: Also telepath levels stack with Ulithid racial casting. He should have 21st level manifesting.

[Honeko]

Right CR.... Need to think like a DM again, not a player. But with everything his CR is still 21.

I'm going to be quite... sadistic... The first encounter of the campaign is this guy. Yes, if the party(4-5 players) chooses to engage they will not stand a chance, but it will be like an unwinnable battle in Final Fantasy. Two Rounds in he will send them away, which will give them a reason to hunt this guy down. As for the Real battle with this guy, I want it to be around level 15(Which would still be considered an Overpowered Encounter.)

As for spells and powers... His powers will be along the same lines as the ones he already has; powers that allow him to dominate lesser beings and bend them to his will. This will also include offensive buffs, if they won't bend they will break. His Spell list will be more of what he uses to punish his slaves and keep them in line; multi-round damage spells, quick bursts of pain, etc. This will also include defensive buffs, what better way to discourage rebellion then to be impossible to hit.

I hope that helps a bit more... I don't currently have a complete spell or power list. The Concept is fleshed out, the character is not.

[Lonely Tylenol]

I have my doubts that this is CR 21, since class levels count on a 1:1 basis (and there are twenty), and you have four templates that likely adjust CR, but I can't be certain. Regardless, that's how you would do it (normally base CR, which includes Racial Hit Dice, plus CR of class levels, 1:1 for PC classes and 2:1 for NPC classes, plus CR adjustment from templates).

[Taelas]

Yeah, definitely higher than CR 21, as a Ulitharid is CR12 by itself.

You're throwing Telepath 8 and Wizard 20 on top of that. I don't play Epic, so I can't judge CRs above 20 easily, but there's no way he's "just" 21. (I wouldn't go so far as to say he's CR40, though, even if that's what the CRs add up to.)

That's ignoring the templates completely, as none of them are really all that beneficial. They also, I'm sad to say, don't make much sense on a mind flayer. Mind flayers do not reproduce in ways that would generally allow the Half-Fiend or Half-Dragon templates. I'm not saying it's impossible; I just don't see how it'd occur.

Ulitharid is plenty scary on its own: It's nine feet tall, with 6 tentacles as opposed to 4, with the two "extras" almost as long as its body. They are also almost worshiped by other illithids. You could always make it an alhoon; mind flayers are normally discouraged by taking wizardry to its eventual conclusion, and even though yours has Psion levels, alhoon still makes sense for a 20th level wizard.

[Honeko]

Yeah, definitely higher than CR 21, as a Ulitharid is CR12 by itself.

You're throwing Telepath 8 and Wizard 20 on top of that. I don't play Epic, so I can't judge CRs above 20 easily, but there's no way he's "just" 21. (I wouldn't go so far as to say he's CR40, though, even if that's what the CRs add up to.)

Would Gestalt add the 28 associated class levels to CR or just 8? The CR 21 I got is before adding class levels to the CR. If 28 then CR would be 49, else 29.


That's ignoring the templates completely, as none of them are really all that beneficial. They also, I'm sad to say, don't make much sense on a mind flayer. Mind flayers do not reproduce in ways that would generally allow the Half-Fiend or Half-Dragon templates. I'm not saying it's impossible; I just don't see how it'd occur.

The templates chosen were to make the character look as evil as possible. I'm not married to the templates, they could easily be switched to others that would help more, or completely dropped. I'm just married to the Ulitharid. As for specifics, I don't remember reading that the body of the host changes much after the tadpole takes over, thus the host would be the Feral Half-Fiend Half-Dragon. So when the Ulitharid took over it gained the templates. Or you know, it could be an experiment. They do like to experiment just to see what happens.


Ulitharid is plenty scary on its own: It's nine feet tall, with 6 tentacles as opposed to 4, with the two "extras" almost as long as its body. They are also almost worshiped by other illithids. You could always make it an alhoon; mind flayers are normally discouraged by taking wizardry to its eventual conclusion, and even though yours has Psion levels, alhoon still makes sense for a 20th level wizard.

Simply put, I don't want a lich as the BBEG. My players may run into an Alhoon at a point before the final battle, but I don't want such a recurring BBEG. His lieutenants may be more recurring, but not to the point of a lich. The near worship thing is why I chose to use the Ulitharid over a normal Mind Flayer, though a Feral Half-Fiend Half Dragon Mind Flayer would be CR 17 before class levels.

Thanks for the ideas and help so far.

[Acanous]

If the enemy is Gestalt you take only one side of the progression, and multiply CR by 1.5 at the end of the calculation, IIRC.
So this guy is CR30.

You're tossing Level 15 characters at him. He's going to eat them all. All the party members. He'll eat them like cake. Even if there were fourty of them.
That's as many as four tens.
And that's terrible.

[Keneth]

So... a half fiend/half dragon somehow got itself infected with an illithid egg and spawned an ulitharid? You should really avoid using two half-whatever templates at the same time, a template assumes that there is a base creature so technically you can't have two (or more) half-anything on the same creature or it just gets ridiculous because the base creature doesn't get any part in it.

[JadePhoenix]

Starting a campaing like this seems like a bad idea, IMHO.
If you want to establish how cool and powerful your villain is (and sorry but he just looks like a big pile of templates stacked together for me), you should let the players feel their characters are cool and powerful before.
Have them destroy lots of mooks, use all their cool level 10 abilities, set up combos, get a few critical hits. Let them feel like the gods of battle they are supposed to be at level 10. Then throw your villain at them. Bonus points if the party has a dominated mook under them for yor villain to disintegrate/maze/somethign.
They will know from the start they won't win, they will be more likely to retreat and they will think mostly "that guy was badass, but we were already tired from all the awesomeness before, so we didn't stand a chance". That way it feels lesse like they are simply running away from your uber monstrosity of templates and more like they are taking decicions.
Bonus points if they actually achieve some way to disrupt your big bad's plans or whatever during this fight.

[BShammie]

The templates chosen were to make the character look as evil as possible. I'm not married to the templates, they could easily be switched to others that would help more, or completely dropped.
Well you said that you chose the templates so that the boss would just look a bit more evil?
Why don't you just drop the templates altogether then? Just describe him how you want to describe him, there isn't a need to stack templates onto a character this powerful.

Also, how exactly is it half-fiend AND half-dragon, while still being a Mind Flayer?
Two halves equal one whole.

[Keneth]

Also, how exactly is it half-fiend AND half-dragon, while still being a Mind Flayer?
Two halves equal one whole. The mind flayer isn't really the problem here since illithids reproduce by laying eggs inside the skulls of humanoids. In extremely rare cases this might also work on other creature types but as you and I both said, logically there can't be a half-dragon half-fiend creature (or any other base creature with two half templates). There can be a half-fiend dragon or a half-dragon fiend however but both outsiders and dragons are generally not at risk of being turned into mind flayers. :)

[Talakeal]

Is it a gestalt campaign, or just one gestalt enemy?

Frankly, if you made him a gestalt level 20 wizard / Ultrathid + Telepath 8 and then through the half fiendish OR half dragon template on him (both is excessive) I don't think he would be an impossible challenge for a decent level 15 party, although you might want to let them be 16 or 17 to make it a more fair fight.

Frankly the fact that he is an ultrathid + telepath 8 + half dragon doesn't make him much more dangerous than the wizard 20. He is a tier 1 full caster, he isn't going to be using his illithid powers, psionics, or attacking much, he is going to be casting spells. So all the other side really adds is a little bit of defense (and a level 20 wizard could shape change into an ultrathid or something stronger already, so those aren't too important).

If the party aren't gestalts I would just drop the wizard half and maybe give him a few more telepath levels.

[Honeko]

I guess technically the host would be a feral half-human, quarter-dragon, quarter-fiend. But I used the Template names to avoid confusion which seems not to have worked. Sorry. The sidebar in Savage Species mentions that multiple halves become quarters. Logically, then multiple quarters would be eighths, and so forth.

The templates were chosen mostly for looks but also a few nifty abilities.
The Feral for increased speed, AC, Str, and Fast Healing.
The Half-Dragon for the Increased Str, AC, and fly speed.
The Half-Fiend for mainly for the damage mitigation; DR, Resistance, etc, but increases to Str and Int pulled it ahead of Fiendish.
Str increases to pump his grapple check, AC boosts to fit in with the whole you can't hit me so get back in line thing.

This is the only Gestalt character in the campaign as of now. I want my players to come out of this battle much worse for wear, so they feel they truly accomplished something. The story I have planned will help to add to this feeling.

But with these new suggestions in mind, it seems that a Half-Fiend Ulitharid Telepath or Wizard would be a fairer/better choice. I'll have to give it more thought. Thanks all.

[Suddo]

I'd suggest doing something more like:
Sorc 4 / Telepath 3 / Cerebramancer 10
It will provide more synergy on his Charisma and make him not as crazy powerful. Wizard NPCs are always a hassle due to the fact they could scry on the party and memorize every spell that beats them. With a Sorc it will feel more believable that the PCs can even get near the opponent. If you are dead set on having Level 9 Arcane spells just slap some levels of Sorc, Master Specialist or Mindbender on there.

Also on the double "half" templates: I think the half-templates only show a large amount of that in their blood. Plus he could be a Half-Fiend & Half-Dragon polymorphed into a human like form and then turned into a Mind Flayer. After the polymorph wore off he assumed powers of both sides.
Though I would personally just make him a lich sense he already practices magic, something that is frowned upon in Mind Flayer societies, he would naturally lean towards this.

Edit: Oh half-dragon only gives Fly speed if you are large size or larger.
Edit #2: Reading more in your ideas this is definitely going to be an epic level fight.


Here is what I'd do:
Main dude:
Mind Flayer (+8 CR) Lich (+4 CR) Half Dragon (+4 CR)
Sorc 4 / Telepath 4 / Cerbramancer 10 / Wyrm Wizard 7
That makes him a level 21 Character with:
17th level Sorc magic
14th level Telepath manifestation
Half-Dragon and Lich Template
That makes him a 37 CR. Though at those levels a party will often be playing rocket tag. If you don't build him to play rocket tag you PCs could probably fight him, by himself with or maybe with a few mooks, at level 20. Note I gave him Wyrm Wizard to pick up Giant Size from the Wu-Jen Spell list this will make the last fight against him stupidly fun.
Edit: You technically can't be a spontaneous caster and enter into Wyrm Wizard but screw the rules.

For the fight (into his lair I'd assume) I'd have there be several things:
A couple of underlings: These can be lieutenants or even scientists.
A Skeletal (or undead) dragon, the one he made his pact with to gain Wyrm Wizard.
And lots of mooks: These will range from thralls to zombies. I'd throw powerful templates on all of these as a baseline but not make them all that crazy. Fights with them will involve terrain being on their side and them knowing where all the traps are.

[Keneth]

The sidebar in Savage Species mentions that multiple halves become quarters. Logically, then multiple quarters would be eighths, and so forth. Savage Species is outdated since it's 3.0, though I'm not sure if it matters. Also, the half-something templates were meant for direct descendants; as the blood dilutes, the abilities are progressively lost, half-fiends likely turn into fiendish creatures (though this is not necessarily the case) and fiendish humanoids eventually turn into tieflings. Moreover the transition into an illithid sheds off most features of the host, like reproductive organs, hair, horns, tails, etc. I don't think much of the templates would remain after the transformation. Either way I think it's a bad idea to stack such templates. If you want bigger stats on the creature, give it bigger stats, you don't need a template for that, just like NPCs don't all have the same stats, it stands to reason, monsters don't either, especially mind flayers that take existing bodies. Or you could always give it the "advanced" or "augmented" templates. If you want wings there's more "illithid friendly" ways to get those, like grafts and stuff, but wings are overall pretty pointless for spellcasters that can fly around without flapping a pair of membranes. Try to keep it simple and remember that fluff is just fluff, it doesn't have to be reflected in the stats. The boss looks as badass as you describe it, the fact that it has wings or horns doesn't really affect anything.

[Yora]

If the enemy is Gestalt you take only one side of the progression, and multiply CR by 1.5 at the end of the calculation, IIRC.
So this guy is CR30.
Plus templates. Which gets you to CR 38 I believe.

[Private]

Honestly, it seems that his most powerful aspect is going to be the fact that he is a level 20 Wizard. Unless you have a group of Power-gamers, I think the fight will already be fair enough with the Ulitharid template. You also have to remember that if they bring the fight to him, in his lair, it will probably be on his terms. This means traps, buffs, henchmen, etc. There is no reason to make your BBEG unbelievable to make him difficult. Remember that D&D still relies heavily on theatrics and description.

Now if you DO have a party of power gamers, throw them up against some tough stuff along the way and see how they fair, and you can adjust the BBEG as needed.

[Honeko]

Thank you all. I seem to still be thinking like a player. Trying to justify how this guy is possible within the rules. But I'm DM. I can do as I need to get this guy how I want him, and thus make this a memorable fight. Still he will not be a Lich, and he may end up just being Half-Fiend.


Or you could always give it the "advanced" or "augmented" templates.
Just as I'm curious... are you talking about subtypes here or templates I'm not aware of? Though I'm not aware of an advanced subtype either.