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Belial_the_Leveler
2013-10-22, 09:53 PM
What the title says. I'd like to know what the CR for the following is. Whether it is an accurate representation of the source material or not is another story.


TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE
Size/Type: Medium Humanoid (Evil)
Hit Dice: 20d4+40 (130 hp)
Initiative: +9
Speed: 30 ft.(6 squares)
Armor Class: 25 (+5 Dex, +10 defense)
Attack: unarmed +12, ranged +15, wand +21 (+24 for dark arts)
Space/Reach: 5 ft./5 ft.
Special Attacks: magic powers (see below)
Special Qualities: Immortality, Flight, Rapid Action
Saves: Fort +13, Ref +22, Will +24
Abilities: Str 14, Dex 20, Con 14, Int 28, Wis 5, Cha 20
Skills: Perception, Spellcraft, Knowledge: Arcana, Knowledge: Nobility, Knowledge: Charms, Knowledge: Dark Arts, Knowledge: Artifice, Knowledge: Potion-Making, Knowledge: Transfiguration, Bluff, Intimidate, Stealth. (all maxed)
Feats: Persuasive, Force of Personality, Iron Will, Improved Initiative, Weapon Focus: Wand, Greater Weapon Focus: Wand, School Focus: Dark Arts, Greater School Focus: Dark Arts, Artifice, Potion-Making, Wandless Magic.

Rapid Action [Ex]
Tom Marvolo Riddle has a number of actions per turn equal to the average of his dexterity modifier and his intelligence modifier (i.e. 7). Those can be move, standard, swift or immediate actions. He can take immediate actions when flat-footed or surprised, but not when unaware, dazed or otherwise prevented from taking actions at all. If he attempts full-round actions he gives up all his other actions that turn.

Immortality
Tom Marvolo Riddle is functionally immortal and anchored to the material plane. Any effect that would remove him from the material plane without killing him fails. Any effect that would kill him results into him becoming a ghost immune to all further harm with only Possession as a means of interacting with the world. A certain potion can be used to remake his body, as well as a "clone", "miracle" or "wish" DnD spell. If he'd any higher wisdom, he'd have arranged for said potion to be ready in a safe location but alas he's too arrogant for that.
His immortality can only be removed by destroying the anchors keeping him bound to the material plane (good luck with that).

Flight [Su]
Tom Marvolo Riddle can fly a total of 1600 feet per round, divided as he chooses between his actions. That's an effective speed of roughly 200 miles per hour.

Potion-Making [Su]
Tom Marvolo Riddle can create potions that replicate the effects of any spell of 9th level or less, except for effects that access other planes of existence, including bringing the truly dead back to life. He need not spend XP for his potion-making and while he is still limited to the crafting time of magic items depending on the price of a single dose, he may brew as many doses simultaneously as would fit in the cauldron he employs.

Artifice [Su]
Tom Marvolo Riddle can create any magic item that might exist in the Potterverse plus others of his own invention. Magical items he crafts can be crafted as artifacts, having only very specific methods of destruction. In that case, he pays the normal GP and crafting time. They can also be crafted as lesser, normally vulnerable version. In that case he only requires the crafting time, not any resource expenditure.

Lesser Magic [Su]
As a full-round action, replicate the effects of any spell of 3rd level or less at a CL equal to HD. Saving throws and SR as normal. By using a wand, you may perform lesser magic as any rapid action, but only for spell effects that exist in the Potterverse. In this case, the caster level is equal to your Knowledge modifier for that form of magic, and the spell effect becomes a medium-range Ray. The ray's attack roll replaces the spell's saving throw, if any.

Greater Magic [Sp]
By using a wand you may, as any rapid action, perform one of the following effects. Lasting effects are dismissible as another rapid action.
Animate Objects: as per the Animate Objects spell cast by a caster of your HD. May be cast as a contingency on an object - limit of one contingency per object.
(Dis)Apparation: 500-mile-radius personal Greater Teleport.
Anti (Dis)Apparation: Similar to an Unhallow with a Dimensional Anchor tied to it, except only the anchoring effect applies and you may make the conditions for it working however convoluted or complex you want.
Conjuring: As per Polymorph Any Object, limited to objects and nonintelligent creatures. The original "object" can be any liquid or gas, including normal air.
Cursing: As per Bestow Greater Curse, medium-range ray. Attack Roll replaces saving throw.
Domination: As per Dominate Monster, medium-range ray (normal will save applies). No maximum duration, orders transmitted telepathically when within range, the target may use the caster's skills if higher.
Disillusionment: Touch attack, makes the target blend with the environment and under total concealment until dismissed. This is a transmutation effect rather than illusion.
Fiendfire: Creates a fire of any shape and size up to colossal for 1 minute/level. Damage dealt per round twice that of normal fires of the same size. Fiendfire effects can move or fly on their own initiative with a speed of 100 ft with average maneuverability, as if they were animated objects. Fiendfire deals at least 1 lethal damage per die regardless of the affected creatures' or objects' defenses, even to normally indestructible targets like artifacts.
Shielding: Creates effects similar to a resilient sphere, forcecage or wall of force. Such barriers have 100 hp and 20 hardness. May be keyed to allow effects to pass through and move with the target, similar to the effects of a Force Cube. Magical attacks against the barrier deal 20 damage per spell level instead of their normal effect if that would be beneficial to the attacker.
Killing: Medium-range ray. Deals 100 untyped damage and 10 constitution drain, no save or SR. Ignores defenses and barriers that would stop, suppress, counter, deflect or redirect that are less than divine powers or epic magic. Dodging, miss chances, interception with physical objects, portals or creatures still works.
Transfiguration: As per Polymorph Any Object.
Vanishing: Makes a nonsentient creature or nonsentient nonartifact object of gargantuan size or less within medium range to cease to exist. Magical objects or those held by sentient creatures may make a will save to resist and SR applies. Vanishing can be reversed via conjuring.
Necromancy: Creates a zombie out of a corpse and permanently puts it under the caster's control as if by a permanent-duration control undead. May be cast as a contingency on an area or creature; no maximum limit on the number of such contingencies.

Emperor Tippy
2013-10-22, 10:10 PM
If Epic Spellcasting isn't in play, CR 28-30 seems about right.

If Epic Spellcasting is in play, CR 24 or so.

At least by the WotC CR scale.

Belial_the_Leveler
2013-10-22, 10:20 PM
What about fairly optimized parties rather than WotC's very suboptimal "iconic" PCs? I mean, he may have a major advantage 'cause Potterverse wizards aren't limited to casting every 6 seconds but he also has a major weakness in that the vast majority of his magic is dependent upon his wand. And a wand can be disarmed and/or shattered.


Besides, he has the foresight and common sense of a demented lemming. His tactics and ability to employ his abilities sensibly are rather abysmal (hence the 5 wisdom). Case in point, he could have disillusioned+silenced himself then sneaked behind any target and shot them point-blank. Or he could have raised an animated/dominated/undead army of sufficiently large size and drowned most enemies via numbers but never did. "Cause he had this weird urge to prove he was the greatest wizard ever by personally killing people in fair fights without taking precautions.
(which only proved his abysmal wisdom score, IMHO)

Emperor Tippy
2013-10-22, 10:39 PM
What about fairly optimized parties rather than WotC's very suboptimal "iconic" PCs? I mean, he may have a major advantage 'cause Potterverse wizards aren't limited to casting every 6 seconds but he also has a major weakness in that the vast majority of his magic is dependent upon his wand. And a wand can be disarmed and/or shattered.
In canon that actually isn't true. Voldemort can do even high end magic without a wand.



Or he could have raised an animated/dominated/undead army of sufficiently large size and drowned most enemies via numbers but never did. "Cause he had this weird urge to prove he was the greatest wizard ever by personally killing people in fair fights without taking precautions.
(which only proved his abysmal wisdom score, IMHO)
That one doesn't actually work all that well. Dumbledore whipped up (when tanked up on poison and half dead from the curse on the resurrection stone) a firestorm large enough to incinerate a football stadium. Voldemort and Dumbledore were both capable of soloing pretty much any number of lesser wizards, each was the only real combat threat to the other. Also, armies of undead really tend to suck in the Potterverse. They can't teleport.

But as you said to ignore how accurately the OP Voldemort is to canon, onto your first question in this post.

At what I consider decent optimization this is a good fight for a level 16 character (somewhat dependent upon how Voldemort is played, but that holds for canon competence levels for V).

So about CR 16-17 seems about right for actual CR in a decent op game.

Flame of Anor
2013-10-22, 10:49 PM
'Cause he had this weird urge to prove he was the greatest wizard ever by personally killing people in fair fights without taking precautions. (which only proved his abysmal wisdom score, IMHO)

No, I think he was just taking Lawful Evil to the extreme. You have to admit that Voldemort is cool. Terrible, yes, but cool.

Ortesk
2013-10-22, 10:53 PM
all in all, maybe cr 21 or so if group is clueless. Personally i would throw him as he sits as a cr of 14 or so

Story
2013-10-23, 12:28 AM
Can Greater Magic be used as an immediate action? If so, he's nearly invincible.

Anyway, seems like rocket tag taken to the extreme. Either you disable him before he even knows you're there or you'll have a very tough time fighting him at all.

Belial_the_Leveler
2013-10-23, 02:51 AM
Yes, Greater Magic can be used in Rapid actions and Voldemort has 7 of those per round. Potterverse wizards can cast real fast - fast enough to teleport away from incoming attacks or raise defensive magic on the spot, or conjure multiple effects with a few flicks of their wand.


On the other hand they rarely have stat-boosting items on them, tend to have average human constitutions and thus really low HP for their level and their high-end magic can't do stuff like Wish, Gate, Resurrection or Shapechange.

Tjallen
2013-10-23, 04:49 PM
So if you don't have miss chance up he will almost instagib you if he wins initiative, and if not he disappears with an immediate action, and comes back on his turn and instagibs you 5 times for 100 damage + 10con and teleports out again... Probably while being invisible...
Well, that sounds fun to deal with.

Belial_the_Leveler
2013-10-23, 09:38 PM
He's the (second?) most powerful wizard from a world where wizards have unlimited spells/day that can be cast as fast as they can speak. So yes, he's totally badass.


I still think Dumbledore was better though, if only for the kind of Xanatos gambits he could pull off. I mean, throw off a death eater after his overhearing half the prophesy instead of capturing him so Tom would make a huge mistake on incomplete info? Manipulating his own death into serving his plans? Manipulating Harry Potter into willingly sacrificing himself and surviving so that Tom would become mortal and lose his power? Awesome.
Yeah, he was growing a tad bit old and had his moments of senility and stuff but he was still awesome.

Humble Master
2013-10-23, 09:52 PM
I would like to point out that your rendition of Voldemort can create potions that replicate any 9th level spell (excluding ones that access other planes of existence and resurrection) with no XP cost. Considering he would probably not be restricted by money, Voldemort could easily be toting around dozens of potions of Time Stop/Shapechange and enough potions of Persisted (insert buff spell name here) to turn an army of commoners into an army of god-killing monstrosities.
Also, her gets 7 actions per round which, when combined with a Time Stop, enables him to basically screw over the action economy.

Edit: He can brew potions simultaneously as long as he has a big enough caldron. Potions are described as being 1 ounce of liquid. There are 128 ounces in a gallon and 1 gallon is about the size of a milk jug. I'm fairly certain Voldemort could create even bigger cauldrons if he wanted to. But basically, this guy will be able to make 100+ 9th level potions simultaneously.

JoshuaZ
2013-10-23, 10:07 PM
In canon that actually isn't true. Voldemort can do even high end magic without a wand.



Other than possessing people, what examples are there of him doing high end magic without a wand?

Crake
2013-10-23, 10:17 PM
He's the (second?) most powerful wizard from a world where wizards have unlimited spells/day that can be cast as fast as they can speak. So yes, he's totally badass.

7 "rapid actions" per round is still pretty redonk. That's 7 spells in 6 seconds, which I don't think can/has been done.

And even so, you're still limited to a single immediate per round, so unless you're breaking that limit via fiat, that's still a thing. Also if this is for some sort of crossover between vancian magic and potterverse magic, I'd argue that he shouldn't have spellcraft, at least for vancian casters, since their methods of casting spells are quite different, and he shouldn't be able to recognise vancian magic being cast. If both are common in the universe though, then that's fine.

I'd agree with the others, a sufficiently optimized party of about 16 could probably take him. Once you hit 17 and 9th level spells though, the fight would probably get a fair bit easier.

Also, Voldemort's whole "can't be moved off the material plane" thing would mean he cant teleport, since that takes you to the astral plane, however momentarily, so maybe change that to "cant be involuntarily moved off the material plane"?

If you were to add in the ability to dispel magic though, I think that'd up the CR a bit

Story
2013-10-24, 05:55 PM
If you were to add in the ability to dispel magic though, I think that'd up the CR a bit

He can already dispel magic via emulating a 3rd level spell. He's just not particularly good at dispelling.

Anyway, my concern is not that a party of high level casters can't take him because I'm sure there are ways. My concern is that this is rocket tag in the extreme. Any time you have the outcome of the fight literally being decided before you even roll for initiative, that's bad design. I don't think this can be assigned a meaningful CR.

Fable Wright
2013-10-24, 08:02 PM
7 "rapid actions" per round is still pretty redonk. That's 7 spells in 6 seconds, which I don't think can/has been done.

Seventh level Beholder Mage.

But, on topic, being able to Avada Kedavra people 7 times per round and do 70 Con drain resistable only by miss chance, AMF, and armor class is absurd. As is the fact we're looking at Beholder Mage for comparable abilities.

The Glyphstone
2013-10-24, 08:06 PM
Seventh level Beholder Mage.

But, on topic, being able to Avada Kedavra people 7 times per round and do 70 Con drain resistable only by miss chance, AMF, and armor class is absurd. As is the fact we're looking at Beholder Mage for comparable abilities.

I think he means done in-universe. 7 spells/6 seconds is faster than any observed casting in the HP setting - even their 'nonverbal' casting seems to just be 'speaking' in their head or subvocalizing, not literally speed-of-thought.

And yeah, when your balance mark is Beholder Mage, something is off.

Artillery
2013-10-24, 08:54 PM
I know this is a minor thing but, how does 20d4+40 equal 130 hp? With max rolls it would be 120.

TuggyNE
2013-10-24, 09:03 PM
I know this is a minor thing but, how does 20d4+40 equal 130 hp? With max rolls it would be 120.

Average rolls would be 90 or 91 (depending on whether first HD is maxed).

Pickford
2013-10-24, 10:29 PM
Belial_the_Leveler:
What the title says. I'd like to know what the CR for the following is. Whether it is an accurate representation of the source material or not is another story.

Dangerous, but not particularly dangerous (to another caster), he's entirely vulnerable to Flesh to Stone (as it does not actually kill the subject, and targets Fortitude), Imprisonment same deal, though a will save would be tougher, with <100 HP Powerwords Stun and Blind and Kill are all insta-wins. (Note, the target doesn't even have to 'hear' the powerwords, so one could kill him from 65 ft. away at 17th level)

Also, since all his abilities appear to be dependent on holding a wand...any regular mundane capable of sundering said item (i.e. ranged sunder or melee) could neuter him with 1 readied action. (i.e. Tom tries to do anything, sunder the wand...wands are incredibly weak items and thus easily destroyed)

One could easily get it to a 32-34 DC (so, -13 becomes a 19-22 DC...which is almost as good as it gets).

As a side note, is not surprised identical to unaware? (That is to say, if it happens in the surprise round, isn't that the same thing? This would seem to make the Rapid Action text nonsensical)

So...scary offensively, yes, but he's no Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil.

Emperor_Tippy:

That one doesn't actually work all that well. Dumbledore whipped up (when tanked up on poison and half dead from the curse on the resurrection stone) a firestorm large enough to incinerate a football stadium. Voldemort and Dumbledore were both capable of soloing pretty much any number of lesser wizards, each was the only real combat threat to the other. Also, armies of undead really tend to suck in the Potterverse. They can't teleport.

To be fair...nobody, as far as I can recall, ever used a gun in the stories. A gun would have easily killed any of the Wizards (who relied exclusively on normal reflexes in both using and blocking opposing spells and were routinely shown to be incapable of throwing up a defense to a slow-moving spell effect numerous times).

137beth
2013-10-24, 11:16 PM
1. First, since he can create items, and he gets extra actions from having a higher dexterity and intelligence, I think in a D&D-verse you could expect him to have +6 enhancement to both, +5 inherent to each from wishes, and more if either epic magic items or custom items with different types of ability bonuses are allowed. At a minimum, that is 12 rapid actions with items, not 7.
2.
(Dis)Apparation: 500-mile-radius personal Greater Teleport.
Why is this personal? There's side-along apparation...

3. As to the whole rocket-tag thing, I always thought that wizards in the potterverse avoided rocket-tag with legalamency. If you can cast 12 spells in a round with no verbal components, that doesn't help if your opponent read your thoughts last turn and readied a counterspell to all of them (except, of course, in that your opponent is slightly distracted maintaining legalamency). As you currently have it written, though, V has no way of reading someone's thoughts in less than three rounds. Of course unless he has a way to bypass mind blank, that probably wouldn't matter, which would give D&D characters an edge against him. Still wouldn't be enough, though--a D&D character can avoid having their every move predicted by V via mind blank, but they can't act fast enough without serious action-economy breaking to take advantage of it.


Hmm, how would V fair against a team of casters with celerity+forsight?

EDIT:

To be fair...nobody, as far as I can recall, ever used a gun in the stories. A gun would have easily killed any of the Wizards (who relied exclusively on normal reflexes in both using and blocking opposing spells and were routinely shown to be incapable of throwing up a defense to a slow-moving spell effect numerous times).

Nope--unless the gun-user was an occulament, it could be blocked (by a skilled wizard, that is; less skilled wizards would be vulnerable to guns). Also guns might not work in areas of "high magic".

Pickford
2013-10-24, 11:29 PM
EDIT:

Nope--unless the gun-user was an occulament, it could be blocked (by a skilled wizard, that is; less skilled wizards would be vulnerable to guns). Also guns might not work in areas of "high magic".

Are we talking in the Harry Potter universe, or in D&D now?

HP, the wizard would be dead based on everything written.

D&D...probably also dead. (based on d20 modern rules)

Story
2013-10-25, 12:08 AM
Nope--unless the gun-user was an occulament, it could be blocked (by a skilled wizard, that is; less skilled wizards would be vulnerable to guns). Also guns might not work in areas of "high magic".

Except that legilmancy required you to know where the target is and intentionally read their mind. And for all but the most skilled users, it also required direct eye contact. It's not Mindsight or telepathy.

In fact, Rowling is on record as saying that a muggle with a gun could probably kill most Potterverse wizards.

Emperor Tippy
2013-10-25, 12:15 AM
In fact, Rowling is on record as saying that a muggle with a gun could probably kill most Potterverse wizards.

No, she isn't. No one has ever actually sourced that "quote".

Pickford
2013-10-25, 11:18 AM
No, she isn't. No one has ever actually sourced that "quote".

I think the first part of Story's post:


Except that legilmancy required you to know where the target is and intentionally read their mind. And for all but the most skilled users, it also required direct eye contact.

is the relevant part. If the rules of the universe are structured such that defense is basically all about good luck, there's essentially no way for a wizard to survive an encounter with modern weapons. (If you notice, Wizards tend to favor not using cover/concealment at all, and survival vs modern weapons is 100% reliant on those two factors)

Belial_the_Leveler
2013-10-25, 12:27 PM
1) Raise a defensive spell before entering the fight.
2) Disillusion yourself before entering the fight.
3) Fly a mile up on your disillusioned broom.
4) Apparate into your target city.
5) Start casting uncontrolled Fiendfire spells on the buildings beneath once every couple of seconds.
6) Watch the entire city of London or New York or whatever burn to the ground since Fiendfire can't be put out with any nonmagical and most magical means.

A single strong Potterverse wizard with a tiny bit of knowledge of the muggle world and a map could practically destroy any muggle country in the world in a couple of hours. Simply burn down the couple hundred the power-plants it has; you won't need more than a minute for each. Once you do that, any modern country is a goner. Without power, communications, government, industry and trade simply fail. And the population will starve to death as they can't even prepare food. And while the muggles are running around like headless chickens, you can spend a couple of days using blasting spells on major bridges and highways like Voldemort did on the bridge of London.




The reason Potterverse wizards don't do that against each other is that they have defenses against this. Their whole houses can be folded up in nondimensional spaces and warded against entry or even discovery by other wizards. They only have limited central government and they can multiply food, create water and conjure supplies. They can travel to other countries or other large distances in moments and can repair most destroyed stuff (unless you burn them with Fiendfire). Thus Potterverse wizards are not accustomed to real-word military or terrorist attacks because such attacks are totally ineffective in their world. And they don't use invisibility or personal concealment in a fight because, unless you're using some major artifact like the True Cloak of Invisibility, there are multiple spells that can reveal your presence.




Now consider - there are at least thirty million wizards in the Potterverse. How fast could they conquer the world if they really wanted to?

Story
2013-10-25, 01:24 PM
Now consider - there are at least thirty million wizards in the Potterverse. How fast could they conquer the world if they really wanted to?

To be fair, most of those wizards are totally incompetent. It's stated in HBP that many wizards can't even do a simple Shield spell.

The Glyphstone
2013-10-25, 01:31 PM
Heh, Voldemort the Lawn Ornament.