Epic wizard war

[Lord Il Palazzo]

Uial, Ginorbol, Aira, Thajin and Z'd'nt, keep out. Here there be spoilers.

Short version: There are two epic level wizards (probably with a couple of prestige classes thrown in). Each has an army at his or her command. One is planning war against the other, but the other knows it. How should they prepare? Both wizards are NPCs in the campaign I'm running and I want to portray the impending war and both sides' preparations for it as believably as possible as my players become involved.

Long version spoilered for length:
In the campaign I'm running, there exist two epic level wizards (probably in the mid to high 20s). One is a very well known public figure (the leader of a major nation) who became immortal several thousand years ago by means that don't really matter here. Her immortallity functions by stopping her natural aging, negating all death-effects she receives (they would probably still stun her) and converting all damage she receives into non-lethal damage (so she could still be knocked out, captured or whatever). The other is her former friend and co-ruler who was exiled after a failed coup and became a lich living in hiding and plotting revenge.

It's about 2500 years later. Because the Immortal is a public figure, the Lich know she's still alive but doesn't know the mechanics of it. The Lich has built he small band of followers into a small nation in a series of caves underlying the continent, left over from an ancient civilization. She is planning an invasion of her homeland with a goal of overthrowing the immortal to take the throne back for herself. The Immortal has learned that her friend is still alive (but doesn't know she's a lich) and that she plans to invade.

If you were one of these wizards, how would you be preparing for the coming war? How should I depict the preparations (and eventually the confrontation) to my players? (One of the party is the Immortal's apprentice so the side they're on and the fact theat they'll be involved is pretty much set.) I feel like it's inevitable that the Immortal and the Lich will meet face to face and I'm kind of dreading it because at their levels whoever wins innitiative will probably win the fight and that's really anticlimactic. What defenses should each one prepare in case of such an encounter? I've never played in epic levels before so I'm not 100% sure of the thought processes that go into it.

[BowStreetRunner]

I think that if you want some inspiration for two such characters who have a history together, you would do well to go dig up a bunch of old X-Men comics and read up on the confrontations between Professor X and Magneto over the years. In order to be convincing, you are going to need to stage some scenes in which each manages to be one step ahead of the other, having expected whatever the other was plotting and prepared for it. Another good example is Dumbledore and Voldemort.

So for instance, if Wizard A uses scrying to watch the supply lines of Wizard B (because he expects the front lines troops to be protected against scrying, but the supply lines to be vulnerable), then Wizard B anticipates this and sets up some deceptions to entertain Wizard A - making it look like one thing is happening when in fact is something else entirely...

[Ravens_cry]

I am reminded, like so many cases, of a Sir Terry Pratchett quote.
' Not doing any magic at all was the chief task of wizards — not "not doing magic" because they couldn't do magic, but not doing magic when they could do and didn't. Any ignorant fool can fail to turn someone else into a frog. You have to be clever to refrain from doing it when you knew how easy it was. There were places in the world commemorating those times when wizards hadn't been quite as clever as that, and on many of them the grass would never grow again.'
[bolded for emphases]

[Silva Stormrage]

Honestly it somewhat depends on the type of mages each one is. Do either of them have a specialization? What epic spells do they know if epic spellcasting is allowed.

Also its less rocket tag than you think. It's going to be ludicrously hard for either side to actually KILL the other. Even if they have unblockable auto-hit infinite damage attacks the other wizard can just use celerity and teleport out of there, or contingencies. Personally, if I was the attacking wizard I wouldn't even start the attack until the other wizard is out of the way completely.

Plan of attacking Lich Wizard:
Requires: Mind Rape, Magic Aura, Trap the Soul, Planar Binding Greater (Plus Magic circle etc) + some kind of disguise.

Presteps: Start mind raping a couple of the officials in the government for added support later.

Part 1: Develop a trap with Trap the Soul. Trap the soul can be used with a trigger object such that if the immortal wizard accepts the item his soul is instantly sucked into a gem without a save or spell resistance he doesn't die so his death effect immunity shouldn't block it either. The lich should mindrape a commoner/nobleman/whoever would be likely to give the other wizard a gift that he is likely to touch. Mindrape the nobleman into thinking that he is honestly going to give the Leader Wizard a gift he made himself. In fact this gift is the trigger object with a contingency to teleport itself away to the Lich's base and a magic aura on it to conceal all magical effects on it. Have the item be whatever you need, a mini statue, a glass, etc etc.

Part 2: This is where the disguise comes in, put up your disguise (Polymorph any object, etc. Something that CAN'T be pierced with trueseeing) now the Lich can try to take control of the government disguised as the leader wizard. Honestly, it shouldn't be too difficult. With glibness and items you can buff disguise and bluff through the roof.

Part 3: Mindrape everyone you can, gaining all their knowledge and making them your loyal minions. Also make sure the item with the Leader Wizard's soul is well defended.


End result: No bloody battle, most of the common citizens don't even realize anything is wrong or different.


What the players can do about it, have a noble or a senator notice something wrong and have the players investigate. Its a bit more intrigue than straight up fighting than a war scenario. Also the players can attempt to free the Leader wizard who is trapped in order to expose the Lich Wizard.

[Chess435]

Like this, but with only two people:


Edit 3: Finally got it:

http://zs1.smbc-comics.com/comics/20090719.gif

[Ravens_cry]

Like this, but with only two people:

Edit: Can't get photo to work, so I'll just link the source. (http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/30xanatos.png)
Referral denied apparently, though I can guess from the image's file name what the image likely is. I find it helps download the image and upload it to a free image hosting website.

[Nizaris]

I'm going to have to agree with Silva on this. Unless the Lich plans to raze the entire area to the ground, the less overt the struggle the better. Epic spells can lay waste to an entire city pretty easily. The Immortal would be putting forbiddence across the entire city to prevent the enemy army from teleporting within the city walls and Epic Spell Reflection makes both of them immune to non-area, non-epic spells that would cause massive collatoral damage. If the Immortal has to face the Lich, it'll be on an open field far removed from any population. The Celarity and quickened AoE spells with contingent teleports and really who has the best balance of wards and offensive spells. Once the Immortal knows what the Lich is then it'll be flood the area with positive energy to vaporize undead and heal her citizens.

[Runestar]

Well, if we assume each wizard is always under the 'instant refuge', also formerly know as "Elminster's evasion - which says a lot", that pretty much takes away all the instant-kill effects.:smallbiggrin:

[Kelb_Panthera]

This kingdom is doomed. No matter how the two opposing military forces resolve their interactions, eventually it's going to come down to the immortal V the lich. When those two clash, the collateral damage will be mind-blowing, with or without epic spellcasting.

There will be no winners here, only survivors.

[Twilightwyrm]

Honestly it somewhat depends on the type of mages each one is. Do either of them have a specialization? What epic spells do they know if epic spellcasting is allowed.

Also its less rocket tag than you think. It's going to be ludicrously hard for either side to actually KILL the other. Even if they have unblockable auto-hit infinite damage attacks the other wizard can just use celerity and teleport out of there, or contingencies. Personally, if I was the attacking wizard I wouldn't even start the attack until the other wizard is out of the way completely.

Plan of attacking Lich Wizard:
Requires: Mind Rape, Magic Aura, Trap the Soul, Planar Binding Greater (Plus Magic circle etc) + some kind of disguise.

Presteps: Start mind raping a couple of the officials in the government for added support later.

Part 1: Develop a trap with Trap the Soul. Trap the soul can be used with a trigger object such that if the immortal wizard accepts the item his soul is instantly sucked into a gem without a save or spell resistance he doesn't die so his death effect immunity shouldn't block it either. The lich should mindrape a commoner/nobleman/whoever would be likely to give the other wizard a gift that he is likely to touch. Mindrape the nobleman into thinking that he is honestly going to give the Leader Wizard a gift he made himself. In fact this gift is the trigger object with a contingency to teleport itself away to the Lich's base and a magic aura on it to conceal all magical effects on it. Have the item be whatever you need, a mini statue, a glass, etc etc.

Part 2: This is where the disguise comes in, put up your disguise (Polymorph any object, etc. Something that CAN'T be pierced with trueseeing) now the Lich can try to take control of the government disguised as the leader wizard. Honestly, it shouldn't be too difficult. With glibness and items you can buff disguise and bluff through the roof.

Part 3: Mindrape everyone you can, gaining all their knowledge and making them your loyal minions. Also make sure the item with the Leader Wizard's soul is well defended.


End result: No bloody battle, most of the common citizens don't even realize anything is wrong or different.


What the players can do about it, have a noble or a senator notice something wrong and have the players investigate. Its a bit more intrigue than straight up fighting than a war scenario. Also the players can attempt to free the Leader wizard who is trapped in order to expose the Lich Wizard.

Doesn't this kind of assume the other wizard doesn't know the attack is coming, and therefore doesn't prepare for this sort of thing? Hell, doesn't this assume the other wizard doesn't do something very much like this to the Lich before. Or go into hiding. Or, you know, take the initiative and crush him, and wherever he happens to be located, into dust? I mean, the way people talk about the mighty power of the wizard around here, all this should be well within his ability, which I should add, might well be greater than that of the Lick (given the whole Lich Template thing).

[Silva Stormrage]

Doesn't this kind of assume the other wizard doesn't know the attack is coming, and therefore doesn't prepare for this sort of thing? Hell, doesn't this assume the other wizard doesn't do something very much like this to the Lich before. Or go into hiding. Or, you know, take the initiative and crush him, and wherever he happens to be located, into dust? I mean, the way people talk about the mighty power of the wizard around here, all this should be well within his ability, which I should add, might well be greater than that of the Lick (given the whole Lich Template thing).

Well its more of I suggested a route that is very hard to detect. The only way that you could really avoid this is if when the Leader Wizard started expecting that the Lich Wizard would attack he starts hiding on his demi plane and astral projecting himself everywhere and then never touched anyone ever.

To draw attention from the subtle way the Lich Wizard could build up a large demon force to make it seem like he wants to attack through a military.

Now I admit some divinations can detect this, contact another plane is certainly effective. However, any wizard going that far is also just going to be nigh immortal at this point. Astral Projecting himself everywhere with immunity to damage and spells.

[Zahhak]

I doubt there would be any real armies in the way we normally think of them in a fantasy setting. Even a low-magic world, the ability for one guy to blow up an entire platoon with a single fireball is going to be more then enough to prevent any real armies from being formed. Instead, you'd have a semi-organized force that acts primarily as a police/disaster response force, but doubles as an exterior guard force to fight off savage/monstrous humanoids, and any wild beasts. You'd also probably have a fairly experienced group of (my guess) fighter/wizard cross class to act as castle guards.

Your real combat force would primarily be adventuring parties. I imagine warfare being about a small group of well trained and experienced adventurers breaking into the enemy's castle and stealing/destroying critical resources (like gold, food, water, or swiping any enemy owned weapons), and also counters to those moves.

With the leaders of these armies being spell casters, this changes things a little. In a war were the leaders are politicians I'd figure that they themselves would stay out of things. They might get abducted and held for ransom, but they wouldn't go into combat. But with the leadership being PC classes, especially a high level PC class, I'd see them eventually wading in. With a history, I imagine that the war would would be a series of minor conflicts aimed at stealing/protecting/destroying spell components/magic items/magic item components, and eventually the heads of the organizations just go in and smack the crap out of each other.

I'm considering writing a thesis on fantasy warfare.

[Emperor Tippy]

Epic wizards don't deal in cities and kingdoms, they deal in worlds, planes, and multiverses.

Want to create a spell that makes casting fireball impossible across the entire planet? It takes a day and costs nothing.
Want to create a spell that animates the Earth as a giant T-Rex that wields Sol as a sword and obeys your every command without question? It takes a day and costs nothing.

If you are playing with epic magic then the scale you are operating on is incredibly huge. We are talking entire campaigns to kill a single epic magic using wizard and even then it's only possible with DM fiat.

Without epic magic, just limited to twenty levels of wizard, it's a massive undertaking to kill a competent and well played wizard. With epic magic it's the closest thing to impossible in D&D, it's easier to off gods.

[Phelix-Mu]

Your real combat force would primarily be adventuring parties. I imagine warfare being about a small group of well trained and experienced adventurers breaking into the enemy's castle and stealing/destroying critical resources (like gold, food, water, or swiping any enemy owned weapons), and also counters to those moves.


Alright, first post for me!

I largely agree with Zahhak about magocracies not engaging so much in the kind of army-building and fighting that occurred in any real-world medieval cultures. However, I think it worth mentioning that, due to scope of kingdom size and necessity of law enforcement, there are lots of things that a military can achieve that one, admittedly epic wizard will expend lots of resources to achieve.

Alignment and modus operandi of the Immortal are needed (funny how in the course of this thread she has turned into a man). If she is at all interested in protecting her civilians, she will have to take the fight away from her territory, and will likely devote many of her funds and higher-level npc resources to tracking down said the Lich. Offense is always the best defense, a truism that holds even in many fantasy-world-type situations.

Remember, though, that while "adventuring parties" for hire will exist, the go-to people for both the Immortal and the Lich will be high-level npcs directly loyal to them. Since the characters sound like they will be siding with the Immortal as part of the plot, the dm should limit the amount of high-level assistance that they can call on from other allies of the Immortal. Realistically, if the fight is anticipated, all her other minions should have their plates full.

A plethora of defensive options exist for an epic wizard, both for territory control and personal defense. Contingent summonings and items that port in allies abound. If the Immortal has been around for a couple thousand years, she may or may not have divine spellcaster friends, and the kind of extraplanar allies that tend to accompany high level clerics. Even if the two epic wizards could do 100% of the fighting themselves, they wouldn't get good marks as leaders if they haven't gotten a good helping of capable minions/allies over the years.

Really, more details are needed for specific strategies. Feats or school specialization, specific class makeup, powerful magic items owned, etc, all play a huge role in determining the kinds of strategies that each wizard will use. If you want to avoid the game-mechanics approach, look at the matter historically. People tend to use what has worked in the past; how did the Immortal come to power? Flash and bang? Subtle enchantments? Conjuring an army of allies? This will lead to likely game-mechanics to use, and we can then go on to best tactics/spells to use.

[Randomguy]

Epic wizards don't deal in cities and kingdoms, they deal in worlds, planes, and multiverses.

Want to create a spell that makes casting fireball impossible across the entire planet? It takes a day and costs nothing.
Want to create a spell that animates the Earth as a giant T-Rex that wields Sol as a sword and obeys your every command without question? It takes a day and costs nothing.

If you are playing with epic magic then the scale you are operating on is incredibly huge. We are talking entire campaigns to kill a single epic magic using wizard and even then it's only possible with DM fiat.

Without epic magic, just limited to twenty levels of wizard, it's a massive undertaking to kill a competent and well played wizard. With epic magic it's the closest thing to impossible in D&D, it's easier to off gods.

Quoted for the Truth. If you must make the wizards epic, ban the epic spellcasting feat three ways to Sunday.

Let's say there are four main forms of conquering a city (tell me if I missed any) : Invasion, Infiltration, diplomatic manipulation and blasting the city to ashes.
The lich probably wants to keep the city intact, so let's cross off the last one. So he'll probably do a combination of the other three: Raise an army of undead and planar bound demons and created constructs, start a series of stealth missions to take over, influence or replace powerful government officials.
For diplomatic manipulation, the lich will probably manipulate other nations (ones with fewer/no epic spellcasters) either by infiltrating them or using regular old diplomacy. In addition, framing an assassination or two on the Immortal's country will also be a tactic. In addition, starting a rebellion in the Immortal's country would probably be a good idea.

The Immortal will probably see all these things coming, and counteract them this way:
The army approach will be counteracted by raising his nations army as well as binding outsiders. Some protection against scry and die tactics as well as teleportation circle will also be necessary.
The infiltration method should have been counteracted pre-emptively by having all government officials learn and communicate only in a secret language, but this should have been supplanted by giving them all amulets of protection from evil (so no mind control) as well as a password system, with each official given a unique password and forced to autohypnosis it, and all meetings shall begin with government officials being forced to think their password and get hit by detect thoughts, being ordered to fail their saving throws. This will be preceded by a disjunction on the officials (after they've removed their magic items) to get rid of any spells that might be affecting them.

The diplomatic action method would be the hardest to counter: The Immortal would have to win over most nearby countries, and convince them to put in place the same defences against infiltration as hers.

[Phelix-Mu]

Epic Spellcasting is painfully world-unbalancing, but citing specific examples of how it can be abused is only a problem when it's players using it. The DM can basically just use it as a way to custom-create spells for the Immortal and the Lich that lie beyond the (already huge) scope of 1st-9th spellcasting. Indeed, it seems like whatever the Immortal did to gain her moniker was probably some kind of epic spell, since such effects are (happily) not achievable by spell alone. Creation cost and time are irrelevant unless they factor into the plot, and in such cases can provide powerful plot hooks. Like so:

Intelligence has revealed a specific assassination/attack plot by the Lich that will exploit some weakness of the Immortal. In order to correct said weakness, the Immortal must develop a new form of epic abjuration spell, and this will take x amount of time. To prevent the Lich from launching this attack before the epic spell is prepared, the party must run interference/guard the Immortal/defeat the Lich's minions....

Basically, a reverse Beat the Clock mission. In any case, as with all rule devices, the exact functioning of Epic Spellcasting within a specific campaign is down to the DM.

[tiercel]

I doubt there would be any real armies in the way we normally think of them in a fantasy setting. Even a low-magic world, the ability for one guy to blow up an entire platoon with a single fireball is going to be more then enough to prevent any real armies from being formed.

I agree that you wouldn't have classic pseudo-medieval armies, but disagree that there wouldn't be armies. Technological grenades/artillery/bombs/etc don't dispense with armies' infantry contingents, they alter how infantry operates. Likewise, magical AoEs being available/common just means warfare will be a more "modern-inspired" (cf Complete Warrior).

The question becomes how interested the lich invader is in actually waging war, modern-style or otherwise, given the collateral damage likely to result -- I suppose it depends on the motivation, wanting to capture the nation as intact as possible, or "if I can't have have it, no one will."

Of course, this comes down to how willing/devoted the nation is to their Immortal Leader; it makes a big difference if the lich has to convert / break the will of the populace as well as defeat her archrival, or whether there is already an undercurrent of resentment that could be used as part of a takeover bid.

If this is really more about revenge than about power per se, then more of a "I will destroy everything you love and worked for" approach might be the way the lich goes, whether it's by turning the Immortal's people against her or just systematically destroying those most loyal to or dependent upon their Eternal Ruler. The extent to which this would be accomplished by armies, or small elite groups of adventurers/monsters, or intrigue, or some combination of all three depends in part on the proclivities of your players as well as your DMing style.