unconventional monster fighting

[elonin]

What sorts of ideas does the hivemind have for taking out monsters? There is the classic of using a herd of cattle for trap finding (from temple of elemental evil).

My first one is from 2nd edition in which i used a teleport power (psion) to move the parties fighter right behind the ant queen we just found instead of fighting through the 30 ants in the room. Oh and using a decanter of endless water to drown out the lower levels of a dungeon. Kind of surprised it worked.

[xyianth]

I don't know if it is unconventional, but here is a way to kill most of the population of the world by level 3:

race: dragonborn(heart aspect) human
build: dragonfire adept 1/human paragon 2
feats: clinging breath[1], lingering breath[3], extend breath[bonus]

use endure exposure to grant immunity to anyone you want to keep alive, then breathe with extend applied enough times to cover the planet, lingering and clinging applied enough times to ensure it stays covered and anything not outright immune dies. You won't be able to breathe again for a few years, but the experience gained from that first nuke should let you gain levels in a build that doesn't have to. Just make sure you keep refereshing the endure exposure invocation on your allies, or they might get a little crispy. (You are immune to your own breath regardless)

You don't have to use this tactic to raze the planet of course, you could do it one town at a time if that is your preference.


There is also Hell's Trump Card, the mightiest soldier of hell:
race: imp(savage progression)
build: imp 7/warblade 1/truenamer 1
feats: brand of the nine hells[1], mark of cania[4]

use your invisibility(self) at-will, save against it using moment of perfect mind, recharge maneuvers, repeat.
each time you repeat the above, mark of cania gives you a cumulative untyped +1 bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls, saves, and checks. These bonuses remain until you hit a creature or they save against one of your abilities. Words of Nurturing requires a truespeak check to do damage to a target, it requires no attack roll and offers no save. It is a damage roll. You therefore make the truespeak check with an NI bonus (auto-success) and deal 1d6+NI damage to your target. Your target is anything you have line of sight to within 60'. You have +NI to spot and listen checks.

With the remaining 11 levels, acquire immunity to acid, nonlethal damage, and holy/blessed weapons to become outright immune to damage; pick up evasion and mettle and the other diamind mind save counter maneuvers so you are immune to anything that offers a save as well.


One of my favorite E6 tricks is something I call Clustercluck, the mad chicken bomber:

race: any
build: warlock 6
feats: tomb-tainted soul[1], corpsecrafter[3], destructive retribution[6]
invocations: eldritch spear, beguiling influence, see the unseen, the dead walk
items: 20+ sacks

Fill each sack with the bones of 24 chickens. (using beguiling influence to convince tavern owners to give/donate the bones from chicken dishes)
When you encounter an enemy, empty a sack on the ground as a move action; then use the dead walk to animate 24 chicken skeletons (1/4 HD each, CL 6)
Each chicken skeleton charges up to 40' towards your enemies, any that die explode for a 1d6 negative energy 5' radius explosion.
Don't concentrate on the dead walk, letting it expire at the end of your turn. All remaining chickens explode as above.
24d6 negative energy damage in a shape-able (sort of) area that heals you if you are caught in the radius.
Against undead, stand back and plink away with 3d6 eldritch spears. (heal with chicken explosions if necessary)
Obviously, this works great with chicken infested commoners nearby.


If you were referring more towards unconventional tactics that are not build specific: throwing quaal's feather tokens(tree) at things is always good for a laugh.

[Vhaidara]

You won't be able to breathe again for a few years, but the experience gained from that first nuke should let you gain levels in a build that doesn't have to.

Just pointing out that you would gain enough XP to be 1 short of leveling twice. Since, by the rules, you can only level once at a time.

[Florian]

I'm a bit wondering what the question is about. "Combat as War" tactics, creative plans and solutions to beat or circumvent an encounter.
Or creative us of the rules to beat or circumvent an encounter.
There's imho a world of difference between the two things.

[xyianth]

Just pointing out that you would gain enough XP to be 1 short of leveling twice. Since, by the rules, you can only level once at a time.

That would only be true if everything died at the same time. The way that trick works is that it creates a lingering cloud that deals 1d6 fire damage reflex for half each round for days. Things should be dying continually over the next week to allow you to level several times. The only way you would be limited is if you counted the entire planet as one encounter, at which point you wont level at all since at least one creature is going to be immune to fire somewhere. Regardless, it's more of a joke tactic anyway.

[Rubik]

An enveloping pit filled with quintessence. Open it under your foes and watch as they fall in, only to be trapped outside of time.

This guy (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=15474863#post15474863) hurls himself into and through his enemies like a Kool-Aid Man filled with gore.

Two words: The Assplomancer.

Rockburst targeting the Elemental Plane of Earth. Now you've just wiped out an entire elemental plane, sending the entirety of the multiverse outside of the energy and elemental planes into a spiral of self-destruction as all the earth on all the planes is suddenly gone.

Wightocalypse. Or worse, shadowpocalypse.


Just pointing out that you would gain enough XP to be 1 short of leveling twice. Since, by the rules, you can only level once at a time.Not really. Extend Breath would make a breath weapon last for quite awhile, but the area's a bit small for that.

[ben-zayb]

What sorts of ideas does the hivemind have for taking out monsters? There is the classic of using a herd of cattle for trap finding (from temple of elemental evil).One of the oldest tricks with hiveminds involves getting an absurd amount of effective Sorcerer spellcasting level. I think it was pointed out years ago somewhere on how/why it doesn't really work (something like cherrypicking between two different rulesets), but it's something to consider.




There is also Hell's Trump Card, the mightiest soldier of hell:
race: imp(savage progression)
build: imp 7/warblade 1/truenamer 1
feats: brand of the nine hells[1], mark of cania[4]

use your invisibility(self) at-will, save against it using moment of perfect mind, recharge maneuvers, repeat.
each time you repeat the above, mark of cania gives you a cumulative untyped +1 bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls, saves, and checks. These bonuses remain until you hit a creature or they save against one of your abilities. Words of Nurturing requires a truespeak check to do damage to a target, it requires no attack roll and offers no save. It is a damage roll. You therefore make the truespeak check with an NI bonus (auto-success) and deal 1d6+NI damage to your target. Your target is anything you have line of sight to within 60'. You have +NI to spot and listen checks.

With the remaining 11 levels, acquire immunity to acid, nonlethal damage, and holy/blessed weapons to become outright immune to damage; pick up evasion and mettle and the other diamind mind save counter maneuvers so you are immune to anything that offers a save as well.Yeah, it's pretty nifty. It's one of the cornerstones of my Lightning Imp (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=18470805&postcount=22) trick. Another great addition is Binder 1, for Ronove's NI damage Bull Rush (and arguably NI ft. of push distance too).

[Rubik]

Some of the tactics later on in this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?155518-Tucker-s-Kobolds-PEACH-3-5) can be adapted by PCs, especially when defending their home turf.

[Beheld]

I don't know if it is unconventional, but here is a way to kill most of the population of the world by level 3:

race: dragonborn(heart aspect) human
build: dragonfire adept 1/human paragon 2
feats: clinging breath[1], lingering breath[3], extend breath[bonus]

use endure exposure to grant immunity to anyone you want to keep alive, then breathe with extend applied enough times to cover the planet, lingering and clinging applied enough times to ensure it stays covered and anything not outright immune dies. You won't be able to breathe again for a few years, but the experience gained from that first nuke should let you gain levels in a build that doesn't have to. Just make sure you keep refereshing the endure exposure invocation on your allies, or they might get a little crispy. (You are immune to your own breath regardless)

You don't have to use this tactic to raze the planet of course, you could do it one town at a time if that is your preference.

You would still need line of effect, so the very act of breathing will create giant gaps behind walls and such. So pretty much everyone with more than 10-15 HP will live. Also not sure how you can say that everyone not immune would die, when ER 10 would protect against it completely. To say nothing of fast healing 5 or more, or planeshift. But like I said, the main problem is line of effect.

[Rubik]

You would still need line of effect, so the very act of breathing will create giant gaps behind walls and such. So pretty much everyone with more than 10-15 HP will live. Also not sure how you can say that everyone not immune would die, when ER 10 would protect against it completely. To say nothing of fast healing 5 or more, or planeshift. But like I said, the main problem is line of effect.If the breath weapon was a spread effect, that wouldn't be an issue. The problem is getting it to become a spread.

[Beheld]

If the breath weapon was a spread effect, that wouldn't be an issue. The problem is getting it to become a spread.

Certainly, but the breath is in fact either a cone or a line, since it is a supernatural ability, it is difficult to modify, the first thing I can think of might be the level 10 ability Cloud Breath.

[elonin]

Was thinking more about dirty tricks that aren't build specific, but I'm just starting a conversation :)

I couldn't find the extend breath feat, but the lingering breath and clinging breath feats each specify that they add a round to the duration but reducing the damage by 1/2 each round. From those two feats you get 2 extra rounds but are only getting 1/4 damage on the 3rd round.

I like the feather token idea. It's similar to the one about a sack of shrunk boulders that you toss at someone.

[xyianth]

First, just as a reminder the breathing thing is a joke tactic. Second, you can apply metabreath feats multiple times, clinging and lingering breath applied enough times means that a cloud of sticky breath weapon remains for days after breathing. Yes, line of effect blocks the damage, but it is a cloud of fire, most things that block line of effect would eventually burn down. When I said anything immune would live, that covers anything with effective immunity like ER 10 or fast healing 5 or whatever. Finally I said it killed most of the world's population. Unless you have a very different campaign world, most of the world's population consists of low level commoners. The tactic is decidedly less effective against residents of the elemental plane of fire for example.

The fact that there would be survivors is actually a good thing. I've used this tactic as the backstory for an E6 campaign where the survivors were forced underground because of the blanket of fire-fog that consumed the surface. Eventually the fog dissipated and the survivors/descendants could emerge and begin looking for clues as to how it happened and how to prevent it from happening again. Made for a fairly fun campaign.

[Beheld]

Yes, line of effect blocks the damage, but it is a cloud of fire, most things that block line of effect would eventually burn down.


Electricity and fire attacks deal half damage to most objects

[Table which shows that wood has hardness of 5]

Each object has hardness—a number that represents how well it resists damage. Whenever an object takes damage, subtract its hardness from the damage.

A 1 inch thick piece of wood will block line of effect for your breath weapon for infinity years.

[elonin]

Does hardness pertain to elemental damage? the 1" piece of wood example seems off. Cause if you use a lighter and hold it to a block of wood it'll catch before very long (certainly not taking years).

[Rubik]

Does hardness pertain to elemental damage? the 1" piece of wood example seems off. Cause if you use a lighter and hold it to a block of wood it'll catch before very long (certainly not taking years).Hardness affects all damage that doesn't explicitly bypass it, and it does so after the damage is halved from natural resistances to things like Cold and Electricity.

[elonin]

Thought hardness was basically like DR slash/pierce/blunt. Thanks for correcting me. I know we don't want to go back to the individual save tables to discover that paper doesn't save well against much of anything or that glass is good vs. acid but not much else, but suggesting that wood will not catch is a bit too simplified.