Killing the DMs villainous wizard.

[rmnimoc]

I've got a friend who came to me for advice on how to beat a Wizard of indeterminate level who: acts once in the initiative order for each person he's fighting, always acts in the initiative step before you, is immune to critical hits, is immune to the effects of antimagic fields, cannot die, and can cast wish as an immediate action.

The party has a fighter(18), a ranger(17), a sorcerer(16), and a cavalier(18).

Anyone got any ideas on how they can win this?

[The_Jette]

I've got a friend who came to me for advice on how to beat a Wizard of indeterminate level who: acts once in the initiative order for each person he's fighting, always acts in the initiative step before you, is immune to critical hits, is immune to the effects of antimagic fields, cannot die, and can cast wish as an immediate action.

The party has a fighter(18), a ranger(17), a sorcerer(16), and a cavalier(18).

Anyone got any ideas on how they can win this?

Find a new DM.

Seriously, though. Even Legendary abilities in 5th Edition, which were built to allow a single monster to break the chain of initiative so they're a threat against a party, has the enemy act at the end of your turn, not the beginning. Giving a Wizard of all things the ability to act once per turn before the person who's turn it is, is just asking for a TPK.

That being said, pretty much anything that forces a Fortitude save is a strong bet when it comes to Wizards. Unless they're really high level, in which case they have that shored up completely with contingency spells, and crafted items that boost up saves to arbitrary levels. Even at level 15, that Wizard would probably be able to destroy the party.

[Florian]

Each player should take a sock, fill it with a bar of soap, then proceed to whack the gm every time a wish comes up. Adjusting the rules a bit to create an interesting boss fight is ok, but this is a blatant video game ripoff and pure BS.

[legomaster00156]

It is clear that this is a GM's pet NPC, and he is clearly not acting within the rules of the game. You cannot win, because the GM will not let you win.

[Lazymancer]

how to beat a Wizard ... who ... cannot die
You don't.

[noob]

Possible solutions starting by the least reasonable and going to the most reasonable.
1:Turn in pun pun and make the wizard stop existing.
2:Retrain for taking martial study and iron heart surge out the bad GM
3:Ask the GM if you can beat the wizard with dust of sneezing and chocking.
4:Ask the gm which plot device you was supposed to get to win.
5:Show chtulu stats and the fact it is significantly weaker than this wizard and still an instant multiverse ending danger(It ends the multiverse in a few rounds)
6:Leave the room in which there is this gm

[haplot]

Erm? How about no matter where you are supposed to be, you are always next door to this wizard and always taking AoO every time he tries something?

Doubt it would work, but non lethal damage perhaps?

[Bucky]

Use his own initiative hax against him. Bait out his immediate action, then everyone delays their initiative while a non-person thing like the Ranger's animal companion beats him senseless. He doesn't get any turns and can't do anything.

[Thunder999]

You could approach under the effects of timestop to stop him reacting, you're undetectable while that's active, flesh to stone or similar save or don't technically die but become as good as dead is the follow up.
If you can get him to accept an item without identifying it (or just sufficiently disguise it) then the trigger object version of trap the soul has no spell resistance or save and doesn't technically kill.
Or you could not play with a GM who makes NPCs like that, it's the smarter move, though won't make for as good a story as succeeding with the above.

[Guizonde]

Each player should take a sock, fill it with a bar of soap, then proceed to whack the gm every time a wish comes up. Adjusting the rules a bit to create an interesting boss fight is ok, but this is a blatant video game ripoff and pure BS.

i'm partial to loading a shotgun with rock salt, but we share the same sentiment. this feels ripped out of the "bad gm's" and "dm red flags" thread. unfortunately, i've known people to do just that as a power-trip. pathetic, really.

[Buufreak]

I was going to sarcastically suggest douchey draco sorcerererer king based on title alone, but after reading the OP, yea... Just walk away. This is not a table anyone should be playing at.

[Albertus Magus]

I've got a friend who came to me for advice on how to beat a Wizard of indeterminate level who: acts once in the initiative order for each person he's fighting, always acts in the initiative step before you, is immune to critical hits, is immune to the effects of antimagic fields, cannot die, and can cast wish as an immediate action.

The party has a fighter(18), a ranger(17), a sorcerer(16), and a cavalier(18).

Anyone got any ideas on how they can win this?

Let's see - before the whole "give up" or "find a new DM" debate (which are all perfectly valid ways to approach this problem), we actually have some paths to victory.

1) Your target is "a Wizard", hence, a spellcaster. All typical ways of dealing with spellcasters apply - resource drain, false targets, protection vs scrying, insanity (especially amnesia, as it removes class-based spellcasting), travel in dead/wild magic zones...

2) Your target has an strange ability that allows it to "equal" the action economy of your party, except that he's still limited to 1 immediate action/turn (if not, please find that out...as that makes the encounter an order of magnitude more difficult)

3) Your target "always acts before you" - this is extremely difficult to overcome, but not impossible.

4) Your target is immune to critical hits - a minor detail; this merely rules out some HP-damage-focused approaches.

5) Your target is immune to the effects of antimagic fields - this looks like Aroden's Spellbane(Antimagic Field), a 9th-lvl spell that can selectively block some spells.

6) Your target "cannot die" - alright, so we merely have to use Trap the Soul, Stone to Flesh, Bestow Curse(->Inflict Insanity), or some other "nonlethal" ways to disable/defeat him.

7) Your target can cast Wish as immediate action. - That's mythic Wish; extremely expensive in Mythic Power, but also extremely powerful. Try to "bait it out"...


==============================

All in all, your enemy could be feasibly created as lvl 20 Wizard(Diviner, Foresight school) with some Mythic Tiers to gain access to Mythic spells; the weird "acts once for every party member" thing looks custom, as it is even more powerful than the "Agile" Mythic Template.

So you're looking at a CR 25-30 encounter, mechanically.

==============================

How do you "defeat" this?

1) Alternate approaches - do not let him pick the battleground, but instead catch him off-guard and on a field that isn't his area of expertise.
*Given that Spellcasters are extremely flexible and have access to vast amount of options, this seems difficult.

Possible options would be:
[Hide out within a high-lvl Vigilante's Safe House, which should provide protection from scrying & counterattack.]
[Use Dream/Nightmare to initiate mental assault/resource drain as constant annoyance; pay as many spellcasters you can find to keep up the dream/nightmare spam on him, this disrupts his rest & recovery of arcane spells]
Using Planar Ally / Planar Binding for outsiders who have Nightmare/Dream at will may also be very effective.

-Speak with your DM if designing an Occult ritual (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/occult-adventures/occult-rules/occult-rituals/) that works as Nightmare + Instigate Psychic Duel is possible. This would allow a long-range attack that completely changes the rules, removing his superior power and QUICKLY draining his resources, as he has to sacrifice spells/mythic power to generate manifestation points to use in such a duel.

2) Damage his reputation, spread rumours about him, cast him as "villain" in the eyes of the public and hopefully generate NPC adventuring parties who battle him/occupy his attention

3) Use mundane & magical disguises, hire actors to pretend they are you, seek safety in obscurity as much as possible...make it difficult for him to find a clear target.

4) Consult divine help [(Demi-)Gods, Witch Patrons, Great Old Ones, Archdevils, Demon lords, Empyrial lords, etc...] Whatever big league players you can ally with; talk to them and point them at this problem or ask them to empower you to take care of it, or to shroud you in secrecy so that you can quietly act against it... [Roleplaying approach; also may help the DM realize what he's doing and offer him a chance to "fix" the problem]

5) Consult other help - extremely old dragons, other intelligent, big-ass monsters/NPCs who may be bargained with - someone so powerful as your target must have some enemies. Promise to help them, do them a few favors and have them all gang up on your target wizard at once to get back at him.

6) Weather: Use Control Weather to send a few hurricanes at his home...

Perhaps these few ideas have inspired you how to approach this combat within the rules.

[Florian]

The problem doesn´t seem to be to try and stay within the boundaries of the rules, but rather that this is set up like a "puzzle fight", similar to some MMO raid boss.
This will probably be centered around:
- Chain up Ready Actions
- Delay to start a synchronized action
- Bait to trigger AoO.
Or a mix of all three.

[Calthropstu]

I am liking the trap the soul approach. Find his name, approach him with a "we cannot beat you. We have no choice but to continue your bidding." Wait until he gives you a fetch quest, use the fetched item as the trigger object for trap the soul.
Immediate actions cannot be used outside of combat, so the immediate wish fails.

[Tohsaka Rin]

-List of good ideas-


Not to diminish your efforts writing all that out, but if the DM is essentially cheating on a blatant level, what makes you think the DM won't continue to cheat, even in the face of Player tenacity and creativity?

Sometimes 'Just walk away' is the best option, because 'winning' isn't going to change the root cause of the problem. 'Talk to your DM' is usually the only potential way to 'win', where we define 'winning' as 'get the DM to just play a fair game, and not play just to stroke their own ego at the group's expense'.

Remember 'winning' is supposed to mean 'everyone all had a good time', and you can't 'lose' the game, if you refuse to play.

[Zanos]

You don't.
Nah, beating someone who's only power is not dying is easy, you just need 4 walls.


OP, are you sure that the party is actually supposed to fight this guy? I mean if a level 80 wizard showed up in that campaign I wouldn't ask for advice on how to beat him, I'd just leave him alone. Same with deities.

[EisenKreutzer]

I've got a friend who came to me for advice on how to beat a Wizard of indeterminate level who: acts once in the initiative order for each person he's fighting, always acts in the initiative step before you, is immune to critical hits, is immune to the effects of antimagic fields, cannot die, and can cast wish as an immediate action.

The party has a fighter(18), a ranger(17), a sorcerer(16), and a cavalier(18).

Anyone got any ideas on how they can win this?

Is thisa theoretical problem for them, or are they actually going to fight this wizard in an upcoming session?

[lbuttitta]

Other than incredible shenanigans on the player's part, this wizard isn't dying any time soon, and you probably won't even succeed with incredible shenanigans, since a DM who would introduce such a wizard into the game clearly would not accept that wizard's dying.

[Calthropstu]

Other than incredible shenanigans on the player's part, this wizard isn't dying any time soon, and you probably won't even succeed with incredible shenanigans, since a DM who would introduce such a wizard into the game clearly would not accept that wizard's dying.

Agreed, but when the gm has a meltdown and says "nope, doesn't work because I say so" it will be all the sweeter when the person everyone else has agreed to let gm cracks out his gm screen and simply starts running ignoring the previous gm's protests.

[Nupo]

If you think it has a chance of succeeding talk to the DM in an honest and straightforward manor. Or you could just go Kamikaze and get all your characters killed on purpose. Then start a new campaign.

Or you could just find a different DM.

[Lazymancer]

Nah, beating someone who's only power is not dying is easy, you just need 4 walls.
I'm assuming you meant six.

But we are talking about a wizard who is not dying easily, not just someone.

Either way, the real problem is obviously GM, not wizard. Even epic wizards are beatable (permanent AMF+adamantine manacle+something something), DMPCs aren't.

[rmnimoc]

Well the player seems to want to keep playing, so I doubt me telling him to get a new DM would have much effect. The wizard has been kidnapping the children of all the PCs for some reason, and they party is going to try to fight the wizard to get their kids back. I got a bit more info from the player, apparently they can seal away the wizard if they can somehow get his femur. I'm not entirely sure how they intend on stealing his leg, much less keeping it from the wizard, who can wish-spam, long enough to pull off their ritual, which apparently takes a full day.

[ATHATH]

Well the player seems to want to keep playing, so I doubt me telling him to get a new DM would have much effect. The wizard has been kidnapping the children of all the PCs for some reason, and they party is going to try to fight the wizard to get their kids back. I got a bit more info from the player, apparently they can seal away the wizard if they can somehow get his femur. I'm not entirely sure how they intend on stealing his leg, much less keeping it from the wizard, who can wish-spam, long enough to pull off their ritual, which apparently takes a full day.
Could the Clone spell work? Pick up some skin flakes and/or hairs that the Wizard left behind the last time that he went to town or something, cast Clone on that stuff, take the clone's femur, and cast the ritual on it.

If the Wizard regularly casts divinations about this kind of thing or the ritual now just affects the clone instead, you're probably done-for, but if not...

Hm... could you get the clone (or an Ice Assassin of the Wizard) to fight the Wizard for you? The level difference between the two won't matter much if you're already dealing with Wish-spam.

[atemu1234]

Is your DM Ed Greenwood?

[Godskook]

There's exactly one solution to this problem:

ROLEPLAY

This NPC can't be defeated by any reasonable PC effect, and if he exists, the DM won't *LET* him be defeated by any unreasonable PC effect. So the answer is to talk to the NPCs, and find one that has an effect that *WILL* let you defeat the Uber-Wizard.

Basically, go find the right McGuffin.

[archon_huskie]

Join the wizard and become his cohort