[PF] 1st level party vs Guardian Phantom Armor

[Zejety]

Hi,

I'm a novice Pathfinder DM and I'm currently running a bit of a haunted house encounter for a 1st level party. The boss fight is supposed to be a Guardian Phantom Armor (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/undead/phantom-armor/phantom-armor-guardian).
However, I am having second thought about this seeing howit can potentially deal 11 damage in one strike (nothing to sniff at for a 1st level party) and has a pretty high AC.

The fight happens on the second floor right next to a ledge that leads to a fall down to the 1st floor so bull rushing may be an option (although not enough damage to win the fight outright).

The party consists of:
- Barbarian (probably the most decently optimized with a strong Power Attack and that feat that allows the first power attack to ignore the attack penalty)
- Paladin (no Smite uses left)
- Bard (Dirge Bard)
- Gunslinger (mysterious Stranger)

The Barbarian and Paladin already took a bit of a beating and the Barbarian is currently suffering from light Dex damage.

I suppose their best chances are a hit by the Barbarian or clever maneuver usage. The letter has the problem of provoking AoOs though. I also just realized that the Gunslinger also has a nice chance to hit since he targets touch AC.

I am also planning to have the Armor start the fight passively by guarding a door and not actively charging at the group.


Do you think this is a fair challenge? I should also note that there is nothing preventing the group from simply leaving and coming back later.

[Greenish]

Doesn't seem too bad, especially if the party can engage at their leisure.

[Spore]

It's pretty much a coin toss on 1st level sadly. There is only a couple d20s between horribly loosing some group members and massacring the monster in one hit. It's touch AC is pitiful and it will die once the Gunslinger has taken her action sensibly.

I would honestly reduce the armor (broken condition cuts AC bonus to +4) and give it more Dex (16 should suffice). This way you'd have AC 18 and touch AC 13.

[Firest Kathon]

Instead of reducing the armor (or in addition to it), I would rather give the weapon the broken (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/conditions#TOC-Broken) condition to make it less deadly. In my personal opinion, a "boss" encounter should rather have high defenses and take some time to whittle down instead of having an overpowering offense (of course, the offense should be good enough to be dangerous over time).

[Zejety]

Thanks for your opinions.
Giving the weapon the broken condition sounds like a good idea. Logically, it would be smarter for the Armor to attack with its Slam attacks then but who says it's smart enough to realize that? :P
The mw sword makes for a nice bit of treasure and breaking it is a bit of a shame but it's not like that can't be repaired and may actually be a nice plot hook seeing how two of the PCs are a Blacksmith's apprentices.

[Fax Celestis]

Thanks for your opinions.
Giving the weapon the broken condition sounds like a good idea. Logically, it would be smarter for the Armor to attack with its Slam attacks then but who says it's smart enough to realize that? :P
The mw sword makes for a nice bit of treasure and breaking it is a bit of a shame but it's not like that can't be repaired and may actually be a nice plot hook seeing how two of the PCs are a Blacksmith's apprentices.

Int 7 makes that a little implausible but having a good backstory that gets revealed to the PCs (its the ghost of a knight!), lowering its intelligence arbitrarily to, say, 4, or making the sword "awaken" a little bit further down as a dormant intelligent item that held control over the guardian all have at least plausible explanations.

[nedz]

You could lose the sword completely so that it can only make Slam attacks.

The combat is a more swingy with the sword — only 1 attack per round for more damage and with a 10% crit threat range. That said a sword blow is more likely to just drop a PC rather than kill them outright.

[Zejety]

Alright, so I went with the Broken sword option and the encounter was alright maybe even a bit too easy because I rolled badly.
Nevertheless, if the Sword had not been broken, there would have been a confirmed critical in round one which may have downed the Paladin.

Here's a brief rundown of the fight:

Surprise round:
The Paladin senses evil emanating from the armor in the hallway but nobody makes their perception check to confirm that it is animated. The Gunslinger gives it a cautionary headshot with his pistol, dealing low damage but making the armor move and reveal its nature. The Bard succeeds on his Knowledge check. Since the players are newcomers I explain the implications of strong armor and ways to fight high AC targets.

Round 1:
The Gunslinger reloads and fires again. A miss.
The Armor approaches the Paladin and hits him for medium damage (the aforementioned almost confirmed critical).
The Paladin and Bard hit back but miss. The Paladin block the way to the ranged party members though!.
With the way blocked, the Barbarian takes a detour (they layout is circular) in order to get into range next round while staying out of the Armor's movement range.

Round 2:
The Gunslinger misses again.
The Armor runs towards the Barbarian because he unknowingly approaches the door that it is tasked to guard. The Paladin misses his AoO (I later realized I could have used disengage anyway).
Being a dwarf, the Paladin cannot catch up and attack on the same turn. The Bard fires another arrow just to miss again.
The Barbarian hulks out and disarms the Armor, the sword dropping down a level and out of reach.

Round 3:
The Gunslinger rolls another 3.
The Armor slams twice but misses both attacks.
The Paladin uses another disarm to get rid of the Armor's shield. (may have been a wrong ruling but we argued that it can't be strapped as securely on an empty armor)
The Bard accepts that his arrows won't do much and does pretty much nothing.
The Barbarian power attacks it to pieces. (+9 damage before the STR bonus from Rage is quite decent to say the least; btw. this is correct, isn't it? He has a Str modifer of +4 and fights with a two-handed weapon and Power Attack so 4*1,5+3)


So all in all the combat was probably a bit unexiting for some players (notably the Bard) but probably balanced. I also think that it still did well in conserving the atmosphere and it worked okay as the finale for the dungeon.

[Spore]

+9 for a Power Attack is the correct amount.