Help with an upcoming fight.

[Lorddenorstrus]

Party is a 15th lvl Warblade. a 13th lvl Unarmed Swordsage (He paid off a level adjustment putting him behind us for right now.) a 15th lvl Dragonfire Adept.. and me the guy who is not very good at playing spellcasters forced into trying to not suck at it. I made a Mystic Theurge character using Ur Priest and Wizard. So I have 9th lvl Divine spells and 6th level arcane atm.

The warblade and swordsage are basically itemless at the moment because they tried to take on a party of 4 adventurers idiotically while me and the Dfa were investigating a nearby city that had a regime change. They got killed and stripped. I brought them back -_-. But we're in a bad spot, now the aforementioned party is basically tailing us forcing us into a fight. We have an unknown amount of prep time at the moment but I'm going to guess about a day or two at most. The enemy consists of a Cleric, a Saint Paladin, An Arcane caster unsure sorc or wizard and Martial. He had a greatsword and was described as a 'fighter' so ranging from PHB to ToB classes and everything else I don't know.

We started at lvl 14 (DM choice he wanted to run a certain campaign apparently, nobody here has practice beyond lvl 10 other than me.. I once played a Warblade to 16..) so not really a ton of practice on our characters yet. I know the Arcane caster hit one of our idjits with a Split Maximized enfeebling ray.. and he Celeritied into a Forcecage on the other.. So they appear decently optimized. Probably more so than our party frankly. I'm the only one who frequents boards like this to touch on the subject. (I went very low optimized to sadly past making sure we had access to both arcane and divine I didn't grab metamagic feats or anything. I was hoping to let the martials stay in the spotlight)

Can anyone offer advice on what our best chance of killing them might be? Even if we get them low they might just try to teleport away. So I'm currently stumped on what our best options will be. I at first debated using Forbiddance to zone the area to fight in but nobody has the same alignment as me so our party would be taking 6d6 per round and the enemy depending on if any are neutral would range from the 6 or 12. Also the second they walk into it they might just try to walk around the zone because of the damage.

[EvulOne]

If you have the Invisibility spell you can cast that on the two gearless people, and set up an ambush. Have them grapple the enemy spell casters while you use whatever spells you have that can shut down melee types on the remaining enemies.

[Dagroth]

Are all your party members evil? If so, Unholy Storm could help.

Fabricate weapons & armor, then Greater Magic Vestment & Greater Magic Weapon will help a lot. At the very least, you can by RAW cast Greater Magic Vestment on clothing.

Your CL for Wizard is 11 or 12, so your Dispels probably aren't the best. Since they've got 2 full casters, you're out-gunned pretty heavily. Miracle is an option... but then again, I don't think an Ur-Priest should be able to petition a God for help... unless you're "stealing spells" from a Good Deity and you ask for help from an Evil one.

Implosion, starting on the Arcane caster is a solid opener I would think.

I don't have a lot of experience with high level Cleric Spells myself, unfortunately.

[nintendoh]

Kill the warblade and put his body in the road. Booby trap it with a glyph spell that does paralysis and. Hope it catches a caster. Send the swordsage to full on one **** the cleric to prevent rezzing and spend then entire fight summoning critters that do int damage. If you make the bad guys, or good guys retarded you win.

[nintendoh]

Ps the bleeped word was
S
H
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[Venger]

Sounds like you're in a bit of a jam.

Since the other party members are lagging pretty significantly behind, see if your gm will allow any typical wblmancy to reequip them in a timely fashion. the game is written with the understanding everyone will have access to standard gear, and doing what is (from the sounds of it ) a very difficult or overwhelming encounter naked is just not doable, even to well-built characters, which it sounds like your party members are not.

once that's accounted for, think about useful all-day buffs. since your gm sounds like he's playing for keeps, I would strongly advise spreading around some protective spells against typical metamagic fodder, such as negative levels and ability damage. that's handily taken care of via death ward and sheltered vitality respectively so your party's bsfs don't get incapacitated by a metamagicked ray of stupidity or three.

the handbook (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=420.msg8434#msg8434) does a decent job priming you on the basics of the upper echelons on the cleric list.

as ever with PCs, try to use action economy to your advantage. Whip out some summons. they may just be meat shields, but they can lock up big sections of the battlefield with their reach, and even if the caster isn't pulling punches, it still really sucks to get grappled by a giant monstrous scorpion or what have you.

use the planar binding line to recruit some monsters to give you a hand. ur-priest gives you a lot of powerful tools, so use them to your full advantage.

[SimonMoon6]

If you have the Invisibility spell you can cast that on the two gearless people, and set up an ambush. Have them grapple the enemy spell casters while you use whatever spells you have that can shut down melee types on the remaining enemies.

If you're going that route, don't forget to cast Silence on the gearless warrior guys. There's nothing better than completely neutralizing a spellcaster's ability to cast spells.

Unfortunately, any advice is potentially pointless as at this level as the amount of possible optimization varies greatly. Any decent high-level character could have "see invisible" up at all times, and might have Silent Spell and/or Still Spell. But with 9th level divine spells, you have a lot of options for information gathering. Find out when they're coming, what they are capable of, etc. Use those divination spells. Afraid that they'll teleport away? Use dimensional anchor on at least one of them.

But superior optimization and preparedness will always win.

[Lorddenorstrus]

Yeah I was thinking ambush was our best bet. I need the Unarmed SS to charge in and hopefully one shot the Arcane Caster. I expect him to attempt Celerity but I know the spell as well and can counterspell it. Blocking his action. What I'm trying to figure out is the best way to catch them unaware right now. I'm going to assume they either through items or persisted cleric spell have Truesight. So I'm not so keen to use invisibility and depend on it completely. I need to guarantee it's becomes 4v3 so we can be in a good spot. Also, I could just Polymorph our Martials though to compensate for their now very lacking stats. Good or bad idea?

[Dagroth]

Depends on what race the Swordsage paid off the LA of. If he's an Outsider, you've got a pretty good number of options.

[Lorddenorstrus]

Depends on what race the Swordsage paid off the LA of. If he's an Outsider, you've got a pretty good number of options.

He chose Feral and the Dragon Mags Half Ogre / Half Minotaur combo to only cost LA 1. Racially he stacked this all on a generic human.

[SimonMoon6]

And if you're going for ambush, don't forget "scry and die" tactics, which work quite well when you know who you're up against.

Use scrying to find out where they are (and possibly when they might be vulnerable). Buff everybody. Teleport in. Instant ambush.

And for buffs, you can compensate for lack of equipment with: Bull's Strength (etc), Greater Magic Weapon (etc), and so forth.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Can anyone offer advice on what our best chance of killing them might be? Even if we get them low they might just try to teleport away. So I'm currently stumped on what our best options will be. I at first debated using Forbiddance to zone the area to fight in but nobody has the same alignment as me so our party would be taking 6d6 per round and the enemy depending on if any are neutral would range from the 6 or 12. Also the second they walk into it they might just try to walk around the zone because of the damage.

Forbiddance does not work like that. It does damage once, when they enter, and then doesn't do damage again unless they leave and re-enter the area. You can also give them a password to bypass the damage.
It's a good plan though if your group doesn't depend on teleportation. Lots of spells get impossible to escape if you can't teleport.

As for spells to use, i'd suggest starting off with Chain Dispel(PHB2) (not just enemies, get their gear too).
Then follow up with Implosion or a Cl-boosted (Greater Consumptive Field(SpC)) Blasphemy/Dictum/Word of Chaos (depending on your/their alignment). You can protect your party with Greater Spell Immunity if necessary.

Another good combo is Energy Immunity:Fire(SpC) for your side, then Chain Dispel and Celerity into Erupt(SK) for CL*10 fire damage, fort half, in a 100ft/CL radius. That should kill at least the wizard even if he saves. Depending on your CL it might kill anything that doesn't have Mettle or immunity to fire.

Haboob(Sand) + Forcecage will kill pretty much anything not regenerating/immune to damage or capable of teleporting. No save, no SR, just dead.

Wall of Sand(SpC) is not much BFC by itself, but it stops any spells with verbal components (like Dimension Door) and suffocates. No save, no SR. It also stops command-word-activated items.
You can combine it with Forcecage or another method to hold somebody in there and/or dump AoE damage like Vortex of Teeth(SpC) on top.

Wall of Thorns needs a minimum Str of 20 to even move in (on a natural 20). It's a good method to trap non-flying enemies. Combines well with all manner of AoE damage or stuff like Wall of Sand, particularly against casters or dex-based melee.

Mudslide(SW) + Transmute Mud to Rock can bury them in solid stone. Anyone not capable of (LoS/LoE free) teleportation suffocates.

Call Avalanche(Frost) buries enemies in snow on a failed save. Follow up with Blood Snow(Frost) for Con drain and nauseated on a failed fort save every round.

Some of those are druid spells, but you can emulate them with Miracle.

[Beheld]

Plane shift to another Plane, Gate all four of them in, ordering them to take off all their items and gear, then hold still while you coup de grace them.

Coup de grace them. Gate in a Barghest either that day or tomorrow. Feed their corpses to it. Divide up loot.

[Karl Aegis]

You've already proven that killing each other doesn't really DO anything by raising the guys they already killed. There is a good chance a higher level adventuring party will get resurrected by someone anyway even if you killed their entire party. Apologize to them and hope they are willing to talk. Preferably through some sort of spellcasting service so you aren't talking to adventurers face to face.

[Venger]

You've already proven that killing each other doesn't really DO anything by raising the guys they already killed. There is a good chance a higher level adventuring party will get resurrected by someone anyway even if you killed their entire party. Apologize to them and hope they are willing to talk. Preferably through some sort of spellcasting service so you aren't talking to adventurers face to face.

There are plenty of ways to prevent enemies from being brought back: the purify water trick, smoky confinement, thinaun, bind to hell, etc.

[sleepyphoenixx]

You've already proven that killing each other doesn't really DO anything by raising the guys they already killed. There is a good chance a higher level adventuring party will get resurrected by someone anyway even if you killed their entire party. Apologize to them and hope they are willing to talk. Preferably through some sort of spellcasting service so you aren't talking to adventurers face to face.

Of course killing them does something. As proven - it lets you loot all their cool stuff.
If they get resurrected and come after you again they're either free XP because they're undergeared or they're even more loot (and still good XP).

As Venger said, there's more ways to prevent somebody from being rezzed than you can shake a stick at if you really want to (though Bind to Hell works only if you worship Levistus).
That's more reserved for existential threats or enemies you beat by the skin of your teeth though - at least if you're good, because most ways of rez-prevention (the really secure ones) are evil.

Hell, OP is an Ur-Priest. He's evil. There's nothing stopping him from just burning their souls as material components for a spell.
If you want to be efficient about it there's also no reason he can't kill them and then animate the Cleric and arcane caster as undead (Corpse Creature and Spectral Mage template, respectively).
Not only does he get loot, he also gets two pet spellcasters. The pala and fighter guy aren't worth a Create Greater Undead, but he can still get them with Animate Dread Warrior(UE) if you feel like adding a few meatshield minions.
Sending NPCs with class levels against an evil cleric/wizard is just asking to get them undeadified.

Not to mention that one of the enemy party is a Saint Paladin. As in, exalted lawful good. They're probably all good.
OP's an Ur-Priest - evil by default. I don't think "Sorry about the trouble, can we talk it out?" is going to cut it to defuse this situation.

[Dagroth]

Plus, the Saint Paladin wouldn't have killed the other two party members if they weren't at least somewhat evil. If they were just CN, then the Paladin would've probably advocated defeating the two and turning them over to the authorities (there's a nearby city, after all).

[Lorddenorstrus]

We got wrecked. TPK. Plus side I got to complain the DM shouldn't be throwing 2 optimized casters at a party with one non optimized caster. He wasn't playing fair. We're starting over but if this again becomes a thing it'll probably be another failed group I've joined that I become forced to DM. Always due to an inept DM making the game no fun and unplayable.

[Beheld]

We got wrecked. TPK. Plus side I got to complain the DM shouldn't be throwing 2 optimized casters at a party with one non optimized caster. He wasn't playing fair. We're starting over but if this again becomes a thing it'll probably be another failed group I've joined that I become forced to DM. Always due to an inept DM making the game no fun and unplayable.

I feel those feels, when you just start DMing because you can't find a good game.

I'm lucky, I started DMing, and two-three of my players have started DMing their own campaigns :D Just DM for a year and train them, and then let them DM again :D

[Lazymancer]

We got wrecked. TPK.
Any chance of story?

[Lorddenorstrus]

Any chance of story?

We tried to set an Ambush up but got denied the ambush round. Apparently they knew we hiding. I think it's DM bull**** considering we all found decent spots to hide in. The enemy arcane caster used greater celerity and some 8th lvl Petrification spell with apparently no save that hit 2 of us. I only got one action and I used it to do a summons which apparently got counterspelled, and their Cleric used a forbiddance to stop escapes. Nothing really to say past that it was just plain unfair. I'm only going to give this DM one more chance before I take over. There should be no joy in over optimizing an enemy group to intentionally cause TPKs. If any DM enjoys that they're just a prick and shouldn't be DMing.

[Venger]

We tried to set an Ambush up but got denied the ambush round. Apparently they knew we hiding. I think it's DM bull**** considering we all found decent spots to hide in. The enemy arcane caster used greater celerity and some 8th lvl Petrification spell with apparently no save that hit 2 of us. I only got one action and I used it to do a summons which apparently got counterspelled, and their Cleric used a forbiddance to stop escapes. Nothing really to say past that it was just plain unfair. I'm only going to give this DM one more chance before I take over. There should be no joy in over optimizing an enemy group to intentionally cause TPKs. If any DM enjoys that they're just a prick and shouldn't be DMing.

That sucks. It's unfortunate that our suspicions seem to have been correct. There is no such spell. Your GM is cheating. As you said, you'd likely be better writing this one off as a loss.

[Lorddenorstrus]

That sucks. It's unfortunate that our suspicions seem to have been correct. There is no such spell. Your GM is cheating. As you said, you'd likely be better writing this one off as a loss.

I just want to actually play for once. I have more experience running games then actually playing in them. It gets tough to not just toss a DM PC in lately because I'm never getting to play. The groups I run for nobody has any interest in DMing or tbh could pull it off decently. When I find other groups to join I see this bs all the time. The only DM I know who is half decent at running games runs a ridiculous fumble table that makes playing any martial suicide. Force everyone on full casters much. Which sucks becase I like Gishes. Because non magical martial is usually bad. And I'm an awful full caster player so far..

[Zancloufer]

We tried to set an Ambush up but got denied the ambush round. Apparently they knew we hiding. I think it's DM bull**** considering we all found decent spots to hide in. The enemy arcane caster used greater celerity and some 8th lvl Petrification spell with apparently no save that hit 2 of us. I only got one action and I used it to do a summons which apparently got counterspelled, and their Cleric used a forbiddance to stop escapes. Nothing really to say past that it was just plain unfair. I'm only going to give this DM one more chance before I take over. There should be no joy in over optimizing an enemy group to intentionally cause TPKs. If any DM enjoys that they're just a prick and shouldn't be DMing.

If you didn't protect against scrying it is possible for them to figure out where you where.

Not sure what kind of spell is an AoE no save just suck, might want to ask your DM about that.

You need an action readied to counterspell, so if the enemy caster Celerty>Spell they wouldn't have been able to counter spell.

Forbiddence takes 6 ROUNDS to cast. 6 FULL ROUNDS. Impossible to just drop that on you.

So that is about 3/4 BS. Maybe ask him about the rules and see if he is playing a different game as that was simultaneously insanely unfair and not rules friendly.

[Rerednaw]

Hurm. Sounds like "Rocks Fall you Die" DMing. So many ways for a DM to screw the PCs over. Unless that's the kind of campaign everyone wanted, just sounds like major unfun to me.

IDK why the DM bothered with those spells since for all we know he could have just Timestopped and gated in about half a dozen solars or balors.

As for Forbiddance...must have had some weird house rule version of Quicken (since u cannot quicken it) or perhaps it was via Rapid Spell. Or again maybe it was a Time Stop.

The problem is aside from a poor DMing, the DM knows exactly what kind of PCs his NPCs are facing. He knows their abilities and weaknesses. Unless he was being objective, the entire encounter was a Kobayashi Maru.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Nobody uses readied actions to counterspell.
You can counterspell as a free action with Battlemagic Perception (HoB) or as an immediate action with Divine Defiance (FC2), so that's possible.

Forbiddance could have been cast with Rapid Spell for a 1 round casting time. I doubt it, but it's also possible.
He could have just used Dimensional Lock instead of fiating it though, so it's not a real issue.

You can't actually cast Celerity when you're flat-footed and Foresight is a 9th level spell, so they would have had to roll initiative as normal.
I don't know if that actually happened or not, but it could have. Or maybe he just had a scroll of Foresight or the Mark of Stars feat, unlikely as it is.

So it's possible that most of it was rules-legal (except that no-save petrification spell. That doesn't exist afaik). Which is baffling since no-save just-die combos already exist. There's no need to make one up.

It's still a **** move as a DM though to curbstomp your party like that. This isn't just bad luck with rolls after all.
Not to mention the ridiculous metagaming to have the perfect counter to the parties abilities, despite never having fought half of them before.

[Beheld]

Actually, if the DM is already going this bull****, there's no reason he couldn't use the Irresistable Spell metamagic, without the errata because the errata is "3rd party" which would just mean Flesh to Stone+any kind of metamagic reduction at all gets you it at 8th level.

Not sure if "hit two of us" was in a single casting, but could be Arcane Thesis, Chained, Invisible, Sanctum, Irresistable Flesh to Stone.

[Lorddenorstrus]

Actually, if the DM is already going this bull****, there's no reason he couldn't use the Irresistable Spell metamagic, without the errata because the errata is "3rd party" which would just mean Flesh to Stone+any kind of metamagic reduction at all gets you it at 8th level.

Not sure if "hit two of us" was in a single casting, but could be Arcane Thesis, Chained, Invisible, Sanctum, Irresistable Flesh to Stone.

Yeah just a little unfair considering I took no meta magic feats at all.. Intentionally because my other 3 party members would be considerably weaker than a caster. So I even told the DM I wanted them to be able to take the spotlight I'd self neerf and play on the weak side to make it more fair. If he used all that.. still under those conditions I see that as just being a royal ****.

[DGIF2015]

We tried to set an Ambush up but got denied the ambush round. Apparently they knew we hiding. I think it's DM bull**** considering we all found decent spots to hide in. The enemy arcane caster used greater celerity and some 8th lvl Petrification spell with apparently no save that hit 2 of us. I only got one action and I used it to do a summons which apparently got counterspelled, and their Cleric used a forbiddance to stop escapes. Nothing really to say past that it was just plain unfair. I'm only going to give this DM one more chance before I take over. There should be no joy in over optimizing an enemy group to intentionally cause TPKs. If any DM enjoys that they're just a prick and shouldn't be DMing.


OK......I'm glad I was clued in on this thread. I was the DM in this game. After taking some time to calm down, I decided to clear the air here.

THIS IS ALL A LIE.

Combat NEVER even started.

The NPCs summoned monsters to scout since the story they went with random evil sacked this little village out of the blue right after they asked questions about the NPCs in their own base of operations, hoping the NPCs would rush in blindly.....the party was hiding in small shacks.

After the party noticed they were spotted, they escaped.

I have no idea what was to be gained by lying to you all. (he claims it was to vent) In the end, I guess it doesn't mean much but I don't like getting slandered even anonymously.

[TheBrassDuke]

It would be libeled in this case.

[DGIF2015]

It would be libeled in this case.

Very True lol

[ZamielVanWeber]

Also I could totally do that exact he described but it would require third party. Advanced Bestiary had a +1 CR template that causes all spells that take longer than 1 action to take 1 action. Whoops. Almost feels like +5 LA is worth that alone (comes with other goodies too).