Stupid Warlock Tricks

[rgrekejin]

Hey all. The 3.5 campaign I'm DMing is drawing to a close, and the penultimate villain in my campaign is a Warlock 15/Hellfire Warlock 3. Other than just doing a stupid amount of damage, what can I do with her? I'm looking for some neat/unexpected tricks I can pull, probably by taking advantage of her Deceive Item ability to use various Staffs and Rods. Nothing that's too broken or likely to result in a TPK. The party facing her is at level 14, and consists of a Rogue, a Hellfire Warlock, a Radiant Servant of Pelor, a Wizard/Initiate of the Sevenfold Vale, and a Crusader. They're a pretty mid-op bunch, but they're not going to be able to prepare specifically for the encounter.

[Rethmar]

Does the warlock know they're coming? If so, prepare buffs. One of the PCs is the same class, so he or she would know how to defend themselves against that one in particular.

Maybe some minions too, otherwise your bbeg might get ganged up on quick.

[Honest Tiefling]

So...Do they tend to act within DnD tropes? I'm quite fond of the whole idea that the woman chained up is NOT the princess you are looking for. She can even offer over some of those rods as loot, and offer to help in the final battle against a duped minion or someone in on it who has an escape plan.

How much does she know about the party? If she has an idea of who to target, mind control sounds pretty flavorful, but might suck for that player. So mind control some Pelorites instead, who are obviously innocent. Or let the player kill their own party mates while controlled, depending on the player.

Drop in anti-magic field. Sure, it works on the Warlock's own abilities, but I imagine it still consumes oxygen if she can lure them into a tight space.

[(Un)Inspired]

Give him a staff with greater planar binding on it. He should be surrounded by marlilliths and balors at all times.

On his own he's gonna get trounced by that party.

How did you get his damage up to dangerous levels? I was under the impression that even with hellfire warlock they couldn't actually put out anything worth worrying about.

[Honest Tiefling]

If they have minions...Find a way to put flight and greater invisibility on all of them. That way, one of the invisible thingies throwing fire is the warlock. Everything else? Good luck guessing what they are, and where they are.

[(Un)Inspired]

If they have minions...Find a way to put flight and greater invisibility on all of them. That way, one of the invisible thingies throwing fire is the warlock. Everything else? Good luck guessing what they are, and where they are.

Oh yeah, good call.

Give him a couple scrolls of greater invisibility and greater mirror image.

[DoctorGlock]

Give him a staff with greater planar binding on it. He should be surrounded by marlilliths and balors at all times.

On his own he's gonna get trounced by that party.

How did you get his damage up to dangerous levels? I was under the impression that even with hellfire warlock they couldn't actually put out anything worth worrying about.

I assume either eldritch glaive or eldritch claws were used. Warlocks hit some nasty DPS with those. Of course, getting through the 7 veils is still impossible, and the cleric is a walking tank of spell defenses and counter magic...

Ain't Balors 20 HD and greater binding is only up to 18?

As to staves, get a staff of miracle for her. Problem solved. The XP cost shouldn't factor in if you make it without the ability to use the greater abilities and only use the spell duplication bit

[(Un)Inspired]

I assume either eldritch glaive or eldritch claws were used. Warlocks hit some nasty DPS with those. Of course, getting through the 7 veils is still impossible, and the cleric is a walking tank of spell defenses and counter magic...

Ain't Balors 20 HD and greater binding is only up to 18?

As to staves, get a staff of miracle for her. Problem solved. The XP cost shouldn't factor in if you make it without the ability to use the greater abilities and only use the spell duplication bit

Reserves of strength is the typical way to get around the 18 hit die limit but I guess that doesn't work on a magic item

[DoctorGlock]

Reserves of strength is the typical way to get around the 18 hit die limit but I guess that doesn't work on a magic item

Well, you can likely up the CL of the item if you craft it with reserves, but you probably don't get the uncapping. I'd actully want a proper ruling on that since I'm running an artificer with that hack right now

[rgrekejin]

Some more information that I didn't really expect to be relevant:

The Warlock uses Eldritch Claws to boost her damage.

The party has actually encountered her before (at level 8, a scenario that resulted in an intentional TPK for plot reasons). She's quite familiar with the party and their capabilities.

The party has ready access to flight, and multiple methods for defeating invisibility, so misdirection is probably not as good an option.

I'll give her some decent minions, but some items to help her crack the action economy a little would probably be quite helpful to deal with getting ganged up on too.

[DoctorGlock]

Some more information that I didn't really expect to be relevant:

The Warlock uses Eldritch Claws to boost her damage.

The party has actually encountered her before (at level 8, a scenario that resulted in an intentional TPK for plot reasons). She's quite familiar with the party and their capabilities.

The party has ready access to flight, and multiple methods for defeating invisibility, so misdirection is probably not as good an option.

I'll give her some decent minions, but some items to help her crack the action economy a little would probably be quite helpful to deal with getting ganged up on too.

DM plot powers: She fights them in a hall of mirrors surrounded by clones of herself. Boom, action economy solved

[(Un)Inspired]

Some more information that I didn't really expect to be relevant:

The Warlock uses Eldritch Claws to boost her damage.

The party has actually encountered her before (at level 8, a scenario that resulted in an intentional TPK for plot reasons). She's quite familiar with the party and their capabilities.

The party has ready access to flight, and multiple methods for defeating invisibility, so misdirection is probably not as good an option.

I'll give her some decent minions, but some items to help her crack the action economy a little would probably be quite helpful to deal with getting ganged up on too.

Have her fight them as an astral projection.

[Ermac]

Retributive Invisibility, then spam eldritch blasts, preferably while flying.

[Mr Adventurer]

Did you know that in... Cityscape, I think? There's a Warlock Invocation which is Geas. Geas! As a spell-like ability! So it has a standard action casting time!

There's also one of Suggestion.

[Hunor]

Is there any reason the warlock wouldn't have an army of undead mooks to effect the action economy/make them burn some resources (even just the turn attempts) on the way in?
Path of Shadow would allow you to abduct one of the low Will save party members, zap in, grab them zap out to somewhere favorable to the warlock.
Repelling blast to punish the low Reflex on the cleric, then shadow walk away.
I think the key is going to be having something around to even the action economy, while your BBEG bounce around with his various travel effects, never staying still long enough for the party to come to bear as a group.
Nightmares made real to shape the terrain to your advantage--it doesn't care that they made their will saves, you still have concealment from more than 5 feet away.
Add some Chilling Tentacles to that landscape to attack grapple checks.
And if they start dispelling things? Well, you are the one with the limitless casting options.
As for the opposing Hellfire Warlock, disable/steal/destroy whatever is saving them from the voluntary CON damage. (An acquired familiar might be able to pull off a switcheroo before they ever even get to the dungeon.)

[Troacctid]

Did you know that in... Cityscape, I think? There's a Warlock Invocation which is Geas. Geas! As a spell-like ability! So it has a standard action casting time!

There's also one of Suggestion.

You're probably thinking of the draconic invocation baleful geas from Dragon Magic. It's only available to Dragonfire Adepts. It also inherits the casting time of geas:


A spell-like ability takes the same amount of time to complete as the spell that it mimics (usually 1 standard action) unless otherwise stated.