final Boss Help

[Nosta]

First time DM Here. My first campaign is about to come to an end soon and I need help finding a worthy boss for my players to face off against.

The Players pc are as followed
Rogue level 18
Paladin Level 18
and crusader level 18

the main threat is the rogue as he out puts large sums of damage every turn and is a poison expert
the Paladin has very high Ac
and the crusader is a white raven master

I need a foe that will not go down in the first 3 turns
any ideas
if more info is needed ask

all books and dragon mags allowed

[DrMotives]

Lots of stuff is immune or resistant to poison. But what you really want is a Big Bad with a bunch of lackeys hanging around in the boss fight. The weaker mobs will do a lot more to stretch the fight out than a bigger badder Big Bad. Otherwise, if this is a final boss, you should have some sort of plot or theme going, and we can't suggest anything without getting into what sort of campaign you've been running. Have they been dealing with devil worshipers? Then a big devil comes up. An evil kingdom? Then it's the evil king. We really can't give you much without more to go on.

[FocusWolf413]

You need a way to challenge each party member. Give the guy armor with 75-100 percent fortification and dr (for the rogue), give him touch attacks/no roll attacks (for the pally), and make sure he's at range and surrounded by mooks (for the crusader). See if you can outmatch their maneuverability.

One idea that works pretty well for that is a monk, perhaps a devil of some kind. They're annoyingly hard to take out. You need to make sure that its dex, con, and wis or int (with carmendine monk, I think) are good. Devils are prime choices because they're naturally lawful, have dr, high intelligence, and would naturally have a lot of minions. Support its monk abilities with its natural spellcasting. You might want to switch up the list a bit. Make sure you tweak stuff here and there. You might want to make the monk a full bab class, as it should be.

You should also consider taking a level of swordsage and picking up shadow blade. That'll help his damage.

Maybe you can put him in a cavern in a Kobold warren. An untouchable monk with ten mid-low level Kobold warriors, six mid-low level kobold sorcs, a mid level sorcerer, and a mid level cleric would be great.

[PallentisLunam]

Like the good doctor said picking a final boss is very dependent on the campaign you've been playing but if you don't mind picking with an eye to counter your players I have a few suggestions.

VS the rogue you should go with something that can't be sneak attacked and is immune to poison (usually comes as a package anyways). Possible choices include a construct, an elemental, an ooze, a plant, or an undead (least optimal because there's a spell to sneak attack them). You could even use a swarm although technically they can still be poisoned, doesn't make alot of sense though if the poison is injury based.

VS the paladin don't target his AC, or at least not his full AC. Go after his touch AC or his saves or best of all something that just hits without any roll. Possible choices include casters and casters and casters plus a good variety of monster special abilities.

VS the crusader.... umm well I don't actually have the ToB so I can't exactly tell you how to counter him but maybe the playground can help me out?

Anyways this is all cart before the horse without knowing what kind of campaign you're running.

Edit: Also pair him with flavor appropriate minions so that the party can't just focus the big bad

[AlanBruce]

I'm assuming there's no dips in those builds? We are looking at straight up rogue, paladin and crusader 18? Very well.

Giving the boss a type that makes them immune to SA, crits and poison is an obvious one, but chances are your rogue has wand chambers and more than a few wands to counter plants, constructs and undead.

Oddly enough, I have yet to see a spell that allows you to crit/SA elementals.

Paladin most likely has a mount. If he doesn't, he's probably a smite focused kind of guy. Maybe using Charging Smite instead of a mount for max damage. Seen those guys in play. They can be scary efficient.

The crusader has his stances and maneuvers, which will draw aggro towards him and make the boss's mobility difficult if he chooses to engage them in melee.

So what to send? As stated before, it's campaign dependent, but let's assume a mix and match here.

Have you looked at FC 2? They have a devil there called a Dogai- an assassin devil. By now, the party may be ready to face rogues- some if not all may be wearing armor with full fortification enhancements to prevent just that.

So we take the Dogai and you can do a few things:

Use the elite array and add racial modifiers as appropriate, or...

Roll his stats like a PC. This will net you a stronger Dogai with 14 outsider HD, but still not a threat to an 18th level party.

So we add in a few class levels, such as beguiler (since the Dogai gets bonuses to intelligence) and, given his class skills as both devil and beguiler, entry into Unseen Seer, which gives him extra SA and a few extra divination spells.

So we have a blindsight, precision damage dealer, spell and spell like ability casting outsider with insane stealth skills and appropriate wealth worthy for a boss.

Give the guy a weapon with high crit range and the Greater Dispelling ability, in case the party is buffed up. If enough levels of beguiler are tacked on, have him spam GDM against items the PCs. have, all while using his Fog Cloud SLA.

Of course, alone, he might get crushed. So send in mooks.

Grimlock barbarians. who have blindisght as well can wade into a fog cloud without any kind of hindrance. Have a few with barbarian levels riding Destrachans, for added fun.

The crusader can lock those down while the paladin, if he manages to see the Dogai, will attempt to charge and smite, maybe add power attack into the mix for good measure while using his swift for Rhino's Rush...

As a boss, swapping feats into an existing monster is not out of place. One feat comes into mind- Elusive Target.

So we have the heroes trapped in a fog cloud with blind enemies annoying them and giving flanking position while the party gets a miss chance from concealment as the Dogai uses his Move Silently to stab and dispel them.

Add in Craven for added fun. When the mooks are taken out in the area and the group manages to get rid of the fog cloud, have the Dogai recast it and hide within it. If the party manages to glitter him or sense him in some way, have the guy use DD to leave to another area of the dungeon and call extra allies.

[Endarire]

You could be a full caster with approximately 18 class levels. It's simple and effective.

For example, be a Wizard18 or Druid18 (or the equivalent). Buff your minions and yourself before hand. Use crowd controlling abilities mid-fight. Use disjunction on their gear (because this is the final battle). Snuggle up with Treantmonk (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=394.0) and Lycanthromancer (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=4209.0) for ideas!

[(Un)Inspired]

You could be a full caster with approximately 18 class levels. It's simple and effective.

For example, be a Wizard18 or Druid18 (or the equivalent). Buff your minions and yourself before hand. Use crowd controlling abilities mid-fight. Use disjunction on their gear (because this is the final battle). Snuggle up with Treantmonk (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=394.0) and Lycanthromancer (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=4209.0) for ideas!

This. Just build a wizard or a sorcerer with teleport, celerity and craft contingent spell. In fact add in Iot7V. Let them do their worst.

[Val666]

Use a high level Binder with Zceryll to summon "adds" or maybe the adds are multiple mid-high level Binders woth Zceryll. A Construct Boss/Add will be good against the rogue and toss some spellcaster(s). A wizard or sorcerer could be great, they got..magic :v.