[PF] Fighting a pit fiend at level 10

[rezplz]

So, I'm DMing a campaign and I warned my players in advance that this is a campaign that will require a lot of subtlety, and diplomacy. They... have so far been skipping out on subtlety and diplomacy entirely, instead opting to go balls-to-the-wall, sometimes with disastrous results.

I have TPK'ed this party twice so far, then brought the original party back as undead slaves, only to allow them the chance to break free from the control. (Some of them were pretty attached to their characters, so I thought this would give them another chance while being a wake-up-call).

When an army, including a few devils (bone and bearded variety) advanced on an elven resistance that helped them break free from control and return to life, they decided to... well... stand and fight. Despite the enemy army having a tricked out bard in addition to a bunch of other goodies, they kinda wiped out the enemy army. Which means, if nothing else, they're very combat effective. And decided to leave 4 survivors to work as messengers.

I have previously told these characters that the main country is being controlled by devils, with a pit fiend at the head. As you all should know, pit fiends have greater scrying and all devils have greater teleport at will. The players have routinely been scryed on throughout the session, and they know this. Since pit fiends are highly intelligent, prideful, and (in my opinion) genre savvy I can only see this going one way. A death-strike assault by all the devils in the country.

I have previously statted out the devils enforcing the control to be as follows:

1 pit fiend
2 Ice devils
10 bone devils (5 have been killed throughout the campaign, leaving 5)
15 bearded devils (5 of these were killed alone with the rest of the army, leaving 10)
And naturally, all these devils would use their summon ability to get reinforcements before leaving.

I decided to drop the hint to these guys. (Devils. Pit fiend. Scrying. Greater teleport. They're gonna be pissed off). And... they've gotten cocky, I think. They intend to fight.


Party build-up is as follows:
Paladin dual-wielding a revolver and regular pistols in his off hand. Against devils and undead, he's previously been able to pump out 100 damage in a round. Easily the best damage dealer, especially for this fight.

Paladin with 3 level-dip in ranger going for kukris and critical hits. (Newbie)

A sniper gunslinger using a double hackbutt.

A sorcerer who insisted he focus in damage spells despite all advice otherwise, with only a few utility spells. Gun-paladin and myself convinced him that... maybe... just maybe teleport would be a very useful spell to learn instead of permanency for now. (semi-newbie)

A trip fighter using a spiked chain

And a psion. This is a new character and he hasn't been able to make it for a couple sessions, but this guy knows what he's doing. Problem is, I have no idea really what his psion will be focused in until he shows up today.


At their disposal, they have the following NPCs.
A level 10 half-elf Cleric with the domains protection and strength.
A level 8 druid focusing in summons and swarms (Previously a PC, player didn't want to deal with the book keeping)
And a level 8 assassin-diplomaciser.




I'm wondering, do these guys have any chance of living? I'm thinking of giving them a few rounds advance warning through a contact of theirs, which would let the cleric cast resist energy or align weapon. But even with a few rounds of buff time... I just know they're going to get slaughtered. The pit fiend would probably take out the paladin first, which would take out all of their damage potential and screw them over for good.


Do you have any advice? If it's possible for them to pull this off, I'd love it because it would be pretty damn impressive. I just don't see it being possible and I'd rather avoid another TPK.

[Legendairy]

Wont blasphemy kill them all in the first round?

[Silva Stormrage]

Wont blasphemy kill them all in the first round?

Yes, yes it will. They have 0 chance of surviving if the Pit Fiend is played intelligently.

One option is that the pit fiend enslaves them and forces them to do his bidding and make up for the damages they dealt to him.

[demigodus]

Wont blasphemy kill them all in the first round?

range of 40ft. If the party knows ahead of time that the pitfiend is coming, they can just make sure to be spread out. Also, while you are at it, cast Silence on the dps paladin. If he is immune to blasphemy, the pitfiend can't just kill him off with blasphemy on round 1.

Also, what level is the party?

[Johel]

range of 40ft. If the party knows ahead of time that the pitfiend is coming, they can just make sure to be spread out. Also, while you are at it, cast Silence on the dps paladin. If he is immune to blasphemy, the pitfiend can't just kill him off with blasphemy on round 1.

Also, what level is the party?

The party, as per the title, is level 10.
And unless they can always stay 80 feets apart from each other, they are screwed.

Scrying is not even necessary.
1 Bone Devil, flying and invisible, watching over the party.
He can even switch with one of his buddies if needed.
Once the party is in the open or once ONE of the heroes is alone, the Devil use Greater Teleport to go the the Pit Fiend and report.

5 rounds later, His Diabolic Lordship laughs in a sinister way and casts :
Invisibility, Greater Teleport 30 ft above, Unholy Aura, Blasphemy, Greater Teleport OUT.
If he wants to be nice or just "play" with his victims :
Invisibility, Greater Teleport 200 ft above, Unholy Aura, Greater Dispel Magic, Mass Hold Monster, Greater Teleport OUT.
If all else fails :
Invisibility, Greater Teleport 200 ft above, Unholy Aura, Greater Dispel Magic, FIREBALLS !!!!!!!

He can put any of those in any order he wishes.
And each time, the victims barely got 1 round to try something before he just vanish.
He doesn't even need to keep pressing the attack : he can just wait a few HOURS and come back.
After a few days like that, the adventurers will just go mad.

[rezplz]

The party is all level 10. The NPC cleric is intelligent enough to tell them to spread out. The sorcerer is also a necropolitan template, as he opted to remain undead. So the sorcerer has a massively high hit point total, and will be immune to death effects which I believe blasphemy counts under. The silence is a great idea.

But regardless, the pit fiend's blasphemy is only a caster level 18, so they would only be paralyzed, rather than killed. Still a game ender really, but slightly less bad.

[Silva Stormrage]

The party, as per the title, is level 10.
And unless they can always stay 80 feets apart from each other, they are screwed.

Scrying is not even necessary.
1 Bone Devil, flying and invisible, watching over the party.
He can even switch with one of his buddies if needed.
Once the party is in the open or once ONE of the heroes is alone, the Devil use Greater Teleport to go the the Pit Fiend and report.

5 rounds later, His Diabolic Lordship laughs in a sinister way and casts :
Invisibility, Greater Teleport 30 ft above, Unholy Aura, Blasphemy, Greater Teleport OUT.
If he wants to be nice or just "play" with his victims :
Invisibility, Greater Teleport 200 ft above, Unholy Aura, Greater Dispel Magic, Mass Hold Monster, Greater Teleport OUT.
If all else fails :
Invisibility, Greater Teleport 200 ft above, Unholy Aura, Greater Dispel Magic, FIREBALLS !!!!!!!

He can put any of those in any order he wishes.
And each time, the victims barely got 1 round to try something before he just vanish.
He doesn't even need to keep pressing the attack : he can just wait a few HOURS and come back.
After a few days like that, the adventurers will just go mad.

Or the pit fiend could just sit 1120 ft away and chuck fireballs at them until they all die... I mean literally they can't do anything to stop it no spell has that kind of range at level 10.

[Johel]

Or the pit fiend could just sit 1120 ft away and chuck fireballs at them until they all die... I mean literally they can't do anything to stop it no spell has that kind of range at level 10.

... or that, yes.

Really, the moment they are deemed troublesome by the Pit Fiend, it's only a question of him finding 2 minutes out of a busy day to kill them.

The DM could tone it down by having the Pit Fiend just dispatching the lesser devils.
You know... what with the Pit Fiend being to busy enjoy the suffering of mortals to take care of the rabble.

[Averis Vol]

i don't think he wants to tone it down, i think he's trying to show them what happens when you opt for damage in a subtlety/diplomacy game.

to the OP, if the pitfiend has been spying on them then he knows the cleric is smart, so naturally the cleric should be his first target. then the sorcerer, being hte second highest threat, then he can pick of the insignificant characters at his leisure.

[Marnath]

i don't think he wants to tone it down, i think he's trying to show them what happens when you opt for damage in a subtlety/diplomacy game.

to the OP, if the pitfiend has been spying on them then he knows the cleric is smart, so naturally the cleric should be his first target. then the dual-wielding paladin, being hte second highest threat, then he can pick of the insignificant characters at his leisure.

Fixed that for you. The guy who can and has dealt 100 damage a round in the past should be the highest priority target after the cleric.

[Mari01]

Blasphemy is not a death effect. The sorcerer should be afraid too.

[Averis Vol]

Fixed that for you. The guy who can and has dealt 100 damage a round in the past should be the highest priority target after the cleric.

yea but whats the range on those guns eh? the sorcerer can way out range him, and in the end he will be a much bigger threat. but that's a better course of action if he really is the bigger threat, i was just thinking at a range level. plus would any of them even be able to spot him if he was hundreds of feet in the air? thats a jacked up spot check.

[rezplz]

.... I can't believe it. Those magnificent bastards pulled it off.

With a warning, the NPC cleric was able to put up resist energy on 2 people, and protection from energy on a third. The sorcerer also knew protection from energy and was able to get the rest of the party covered.

The party had previously obtained a few special abilities through some plot, that I gave to them when they pulled some spectacularly cool stuff. They could rage for one round/day, teleport 10 ft 1/day, and most importantly, stabilize and come back at 1 hp 1/day. This last one came to be key multiple times in this combat.

Perhaps the most important ability that I had almost forgotten is that one of my characters from a previous game kinda became a memetic badass (Cavelier/barbarian/fighter) with kukri/shield, two weapon fighting) of sorts - so much that he's now a minor diety in the worlds we play in. The players also were able to choose one special ability, and one of them chose the ability to summon him once per year.

First round of combat, pit fiend popped blasphemy. He could only get 3 people in the area - the psion got paralyzed, the gun-paladin had silence on him, and the gunslinger miraculously passed the save. Then they unloaded on the pit fiend, taking him down to half hp in the first round, and their summoned avatar hit him a couple times for some damage.

The ice devils then attacked the paladin, slowing him while the pit fiend flew up. Their summoned avatar attracted the attention of the pit fiend, taking a meteor swarm and quickened fireball, but his armor had an enchantment to bring him back to life 1/day (determination). The gunslinger was absolutely surrounded on all sides, but had an ability to shoot without provoking - so he continued sniping the pit fiend. The NPC cleric finally got to the psion and removed the paralysis, and the psion unleashed area of effect chaos on all the weaker devils.

Throughout this, the rest of the party is holding the weaker devils at bay, and the NPC cleric is occupied by running back and forth doing nothing but breath of life to bring people back to life. Everyone died at least once, getting lucky rolls with their ability to stabilize 1/day and be back at 1 hp. Meanwhile almost everything I rolled on my d20s were less than 10.

The gun-paladin, while slowed, used his swift teleport to get one last pop off at the pit fiend, and while he was flying up, even though he was out of touch range for the sniper, the gunslinger barely got off a lucky nat 20 with a double hackbutt - exploding the pit fiends head.

They still had the rest of the devils to contend with. The sniper, while surrounded on literally every side, continued to pop off devils left and right. The paladin was at 1/4 effectiveness from being slowed, but still got some good shots off, including a critical.

Around this time the trip fighter got off of work and showed up, and took control of his character - since he actually knew what he was doing with his character, he proceeded to start slaughtering the things around the sniper, who at this point had already died and come back once, and was at 1 hp.



It was an insane combination of huge luck, intelligent preperation, their summoned avatar playing the tank, and me being so impressed by how they described their actions that I allowed things or gave out bonuses on stabilizing checks that I probably shouldn't have.



Only problem I have is what to throw at them now since they've taken out the biggest threat I had in mind for them.

[Johel]

Pit Fiend should just have teleported out the instant Blasphemy was a fail, as suggested if he was a smart Pit Fiend.
Likewise, the minions should have done the same :
Anything that can wield a sword competently and pass a DC 25 on his will save is clearly prepared for the fight.
Having a GOD on the field is another hint that something is going wrong.
Being Lawful Evil doesn't mean you have to take insane risks if you can avoid it so... a smart Devil would have retreated to strategise.

He had Greater Dispel Magic, casted at CL 18, to dispel anything annoying like a Dimensional Anchor.
Once that was out of the way, he could just get out anytime he would have wanted.

He would have been in no hurry to press the fight :

He didn't need to sleep, some of them did.
He got at-will magical abilities.
They were limited by their mere mortal powers and whatever gear they had.
That summoned god wouldn't have lasted all day long.


Any Devil who escaped the slaughter ?
Or they all fought to their last breath stupidely bravely ?

[Legendairy]

Ok barring some crazy house rules/items and gods on the field, No they should not have had a chance. A pit fiend has a nice intelligent score and Greater Teleport at will and he can scry and has been doing so. Why didnt he port in dispel the biggest threat then port out? Or why didnt he just wait til they were asleep port in beat on whoever was on watch with say Blasphemy or any number of his SLA or just grapple him and do that delicious fire damage and grapple and claw damage with a way of having silence up? Too many options for a smart character he should have never lost even with the crazy home brew items and abilities he should have come in got beat on then bailed and re vamped his strategy. I also didnt see that he summoned a second pit fiend?

[Zale]

Only problem I have is what to throw at them now since they've taken out the biggest threat I had in mind for them.

He has.. a clonebrother.

[Adindra]

He wasn't on his home plane when he died so wouldn't he just go back a little bit miffed and a little bit wiser ready and rearin for revenge? (along with the knowledge of exactly what they can do and what he can do to beat that)

[rezplz]

The honest answer as to why I didn't play him better is that I'm frankly not used to big battles and was a bit overwhelmed - and even with the touch attacks I didn't expect him to fall in a few rounds. The round before I was planning on having him teleport away and rethink the strategy the paladin and gunslinger got a critical each in addition to the rest of their attacks hitting.


The explanation that I'm going to use, however, is that because they were working with a contract, these devils feared losing more than death after the embarrassment previously handed to the army.

However, due to this contract (this is something that I've had previously established in-game) the devils have been on this plane for so long that the contract has bound them to this world, making it their home plane. So they legitimately died.

However, the PCs were under the impression that there would be nothing left in the capitol to stop them from taking it over. After making the city theirs, they ran into the head cleric that was working under the devils, who I have prepared as a level 18 - and it took them long enough to run into him that he's had time to prepare. And cast gate. And after knowing just how the last group was defeated, the pit fiend has been buffed with scintillating scales, and I intend to more fully use the intelligent tactics provided here so far, rather than waiting a few rounds before he teleports away.

[Steward]

I'm not very good at organizing battles either, but I really think I would have remembered that one of the players could summon a god.

"OK, me and my friend are going boxing. He's about 6'1'' and 150 lbs, I'm 5'9'' and 200 lbs. I play varsity football, he's on the swim team. Oh, yeah, and he's going to have access to a M1 Abrams main battle tank."

:wink:


The explanation that I'm going to use, however, is that because they were working with a contract, these devils feared losing more than death after the embarrassment previously handed to the army.

That's reasonable. You really don't have a problem here. You kind of underestimated the battle a bit, but you rolled with the punches and kept the campaign going even though something unexpected happen, and without making up something that seems completely arbitrary and unfair to deny the players' their satisfaction. That's the hallmark of a talented DM in my book!

[rezplz]

Haha touche sir! It was an ability that I gave him in the very beginnings of a battle, and he stated he intended to use it in the final battle of the whole campaign, which would be fighting the avatar of the god currently controlling the whole world (and the devils working for him under contract from asmodeous (spelling... How does it work??)). I kind of wasn't expecting him to bust it out early, and as such it didn't even come to mind.

Why thank you for the compliment though. As a lurker on these forums for a long time, I've had quite a bit of time to read stories of horror DMs and good DMs. And, even though I'm not always the best at battle tactics, my strength has always been in improvising and I've been trying to make this campaign as sandbox-y as possible. I've killed the party due to their own mistakes and appropriate consequences, but when they pull off crazy stuff I see no reason to reward them appropriately. Even with all of their powerful homebrew abilities they've earned (They pulled crazy stuff to earn all of that) and me not doing the tactics quite like I should, it took a lot of luck, an unnatural amount of natural 20s, and sheer baddassery to pull off. I just wouldn't feel right denying them of their rewards.

(They leveled up. Twice. And will soon control the main country in this battle for the world once they finish off this cleric.)



Anywho, now I have plenty of time to prepare. I ended the last session on a cliffhanger. The party knew the head cleric was holed up in the main church in the city, and the party decided to send in the trip fighter by himself, alone. I don't really know why. The cliffhanger ended just as the pit fiend's invisibility deactivated.

I'm almost worried that putting scintillating scales on the pit fiend is too much though. Touch attacks were really the only reason they were able to kill the last pit fiend, and they can't summon the avatar of the god again. I don't think the sorcerer has dispel magic, so even if it was cast by a low-level wizard they'd have no way to get rid of it. : \ That and, it being a wizard spell and all, I don't know how much sense it would be for a wizard to just... happen to be in the church and decide to continue to fight against the PCs after they showed up at the city, with the head of a pit fiend in tow. Especially if he's a lower level.