Creating a Boss with an Exposed Weakness

[Malaqai]

Hey playgrounders! I'm trying to create a boss with an open chest cavity, exposing its still-beating heart. The creature itself is CR appropriate, but my party isn't necessarily very combat optimized, so I'd like to make sure that they can kill his boss even though he might otherwise be out of their league. Do you guys have any suggestions as to how to make this work?

Thanks!

[mr_odd]

Hey playgrounders! I'm trying to create a boss with an open chest cavity, exposing its still-beating heart. The creature itself is CR appropriate, but my party isn't necessarily very combat optimized, so I'd like to make sure that they can kill his boss even though he might otherwise be out of their league. Do you guys have any suggestions as to how to make this work?

Thanks!

You can make a -2 penalty for aiming at the weakness, but a successful hit has a negative damage reducer. (Increase the damage by 5 or 10 rather than decrease it.)

[Temotei]

Increase the threat range of all attacks by 1 or grant a +4 bonus on critical confirmation rolls?

Use a called shot system like mr_odd suggests, but if damage isn't a problem for the party, add in status conditions instead of additional damage (sickened, nauseated on a critical, maybe, or something).

Otherwise just lower the thing's natural armor AC or hit points for the simplest modification, though that'd be more boring than one of the above.

[ezkajii]

Maybe make it harder to hit the heart by adjusting its size modifier to AC; after all, it's a smaller target. A human heart would be Diminutive, so the heart should probably be three size categories smaller than the creature itself. Then remove the natural armor bonus to AC for targeting the heart as well. I would rule that all attacks on the heart are treated as critical hits.

[dascarletm]

You could also treat the heart as a separate creature that they can target. Give it a set amount of HP and if they kill the heart, they kill the boss.

[Jormengand]

Make it so they have to be able to hit a certain point on the monster from a certain direction, and then part of the monster's tactics can be turning its weak spot away from the damage dealers.

[Trasilor]

Hey playgrounders! I'm trying to create a boss with an open chest cavity, exposing its still-beating heart. The creature itself is CR appropriate, but my party isn't necessarily very combat optimized, so I'd like to make sure that they can kill his boss even though he might otherwise be out of their league. Do you guys have any suggestions as to how to make this work?

Thanks!

Why would an intelligent creature ever allow its weakness to be exposed? :smallconfused:

Other than that, I agree with dascarletm

[Knaight]

Why would an intelligent creature ever allow its weakness to be exposed? :smallconfused:

Other than that, I agree with dascarletm

Who says it's intelligent? Plus, it's not like people haven't routinely gone into battle with fairly small amounts of armor - exposed weaknesses are all over the place in those conditions.

As for modeling this, an option would be to improve critical hits - a x2 modifier becomes a x3 modifier, a x3 a x4, etc. Adding to the effect of precision damage would also work.

I'd also recommend giving it a susceptibility to piercing weapons, if it's anywhere near medium sized. They're the sort that can best exploit the weakness, and it's fairly easy to model (DR/piercing, lower constitution mod than normal to drop HP).