ToA Finale Questions [*SPOILERS!*]

[PeteNutButter]

So my party "finished" ToA tonight, by finished I mean we destroyed the Soulmonger and the evil floaty space baby "Atropal." Then Acerack came out, while the party was almost completely depleted of resources, and cast Power Word Kill on me. The party promptly ran.

The whole thing seems like a player nightmare, much akin to it's predecessor the Tomb of Horrors, except this final fight is WAY harder than the ToH final fight. You fight a super deadly fight over a deadly lava pit that the Soulmonger throws you in for 110 damage, and then if you somehow beat that you fight a CR 23 super lich... with a party that is around level 10.

My question is: Has anyone won this fight? How did it go?

I feel like a heavy ranged team might have a shot at it, or one with ready access to flying. We were short players with 3 out of 4 melee and the fourth an under-leveled under-geared ranger.

[HolyDraconus]

So my party "finished" ToA tonight, by finished I mean we destroyed the Soulmonger and the evil floaty space baby "Atropal." Then Acerack came out, while the party was almost completely depleted of resources, and cast Power Word Kill on me. The party promptly ran.

The whole thing seems like a player nightmare, much akin to it's predecessor the Tomb of Horrors, except this final fight is WAY harder than the ToH final fight. You fight a super deadly fight over a deadly lava pit that the Soulmonger throws you in for 110 damage, and then if you somehow beat that you fight a CR 23 super lich... with a party that is around level 10.

My question is: Has anyone won this fight? How did it go?

I feel like a heavy ranged team might have a shot at it, or one with ready access to flying. We were short players with 3 out of 4 melee and the fourth an under-leveled under-geared ranger.

you messed up actually. The curse ends upon the destruction of the soulmonger.
Your mission from the get go is to blow that up and beat feet out of there, and you was told by several npcs on the way there that killing the evil baby will summon his master. You was never supposed to fight Ace. The fact the DM didn't wipe your group there shows how kind they are, since its designed as such without some serious planning. The easiest (and safest) way to cheese that fight is to pick one of the support beams and focus fire from 120+ ft away. Evil Baby is too big to reach you that far, and the tentacles can't either. And you can just ignore the baby. With a group of 4 doing this, should take 4 turns at that level provided everyone hits. For backstory, yes, Ace is hella pissed. The point he gets summoned is after he just got thru offing a demigod and some hags, only to have to show up and beat down some fools who destroyed his pet project.

[Kintar]

Unless you were in his group or something, I think it’s a little harsh and disingenuous to say that he messed up. The HC is plagued with ideas that in theory are great but in actual practice really fail and if his group also happens to be an AL game, then he doesn’t even get the benefit of having a dm home brew some reasonable, and in my opinion, necessary fixes to make the later portions of the adventure fun and make sense.

Spoiler...I mean in my opinion, it’s completely unreasonable to just say that a party should know that the death curse is instantly reversed by only destroying the machine and that the party shouldn’t also utterly destroy the evil baby thing. It’s not like they were traveling with someone who had it and, like Marty McFlyin back to the future, was instantly healed and back to normal. And by the whole campaign having the silly day time limit pushing the pcs to go quick, thereby not allowing most groups to fully explore chult and thereby supporting the lower level upon completion of baby killing, and thus being totally underpowered to battle Acerak is just weak sauce. I mean, their dm would have accomplished the same effect by saying “after you defeat the baby and go to rush out of the temple, Johnny, you’re running and rocks fall you died, sorry but now the curse is lifted so when you get back to port you can be res’ed.

[HolyDraconus]

Unless you were in his group or something, I think it’s a little harsh and disingenuous to say that he messed up. The HC is plagued with ideas that in theory are great but in actual practice really fail and if his group also happens to be an AL game, then he doesn’t even get the benefit of having a dm home brew some reasonable, and in my opinion, necessary fixes to make the later portions of the adventure fun and make sense.

Spoiler...I mean in my opinion, it’s completely unreasonable to just say that a party should know that the death curse is instantly reversed by only destroying the machine and that the party shouldn’t also utterly destroy the evil baby thing. It’s not like they were traveling with someone who had it and, like Marty McFlyin back to the future, was instantly healed and back to normal. And by the whole campaign having the silly day time limit pushing the pcs to go quick, thereby not allowing most groups to fully explore chult and thereby supporting the lower level upon completion of baby killing, and thus being totally underpowered to battle Acerak is just weak sauce. I mean, their dm would have accomplished the same effect by saying “after you defeat the baby and go to rush out of the temple, Johnny, you’re running and rocks fall you died, sorry but now the curse is lifted so when you get back to port you can be res’ed.
... they was though.
As far back as the port the party has the chance to learn where exactly the thing is and what exactly is the target. Halfway thru the book several named npcs also confirm that info. And literally in the last few levels of the tomb of trolling they are outright told what their objective is. And was told that the evil baby is NOT the target. If this comes off as harsh, sorry. But to say they had no idea isn't fair to their DM. Hell, the npc that creates the time limit at the start even tells you, and she knows far little, that it's an ARTIFACT. Evil Baby does not conform with all other known artifacts. So it's clearly not the target. And again, for reiteration, literally moments before fighting the thing the party is told, by dolls no less, that the soulmonger is NOT the evil baby. I can't say that enough. As a whole, this book needs a very kind DM to avoid a complete party wipe. The fight with Ace though? Is avoidable, if the party actually paid attention. I mean seriously, upon the soulmonger being destroyed the party is given explicit text of souls returning to their rightful places. So while I am sorry I sounded harsh, I'm not sad that a party was wiped by Ace. This party tho, ran far far away, and the DM let them.

[PeteNutButter]

... they was though.
As far back as the port the party has the chance to learn where exactly the thing is and what exactly is the target. Halfway thru the book several named npcs also confirm that info. And literally in the last few levels of the tomb of trolling they are outright told what their objective is. And was told that the evil baby is NOT the target. If this comes off as harsh, sorry. But to say they had no idea isn't fair to their DM. Hell, the npc that creates the time limit at the start even tells you, and she knows far little, that it's an ARTIFACT. Evil Baby does not conform with all other known artifacts. So it's clearly not the target. And again, for reiteration, literally moments before fighting the thing the party is told, by dolls no less, that the soulmonger is NOT the evil baby. I can't say that enough. As a whole, this book needs a very kind DM to avoid a complete party wipe. The fight with Ace though? Is avoidable, if the party actually paid attention. I mean seriously, upon the soulmonger being destroyed the party is given explicit text of souls returning to their rightful places. So while I am sorry I sounded harsh, I'm not sad that a party was wiped by Ace. This party tho, ran far far away, and the DM let them.

It was AL, and we were all totally aware that the soulmonger was destroyed, and the mission complete. That's what we did first. I destroyed the supports. BUT:

There was no warning or hint to suggest that killing the evil baby will instantly aggro Acerack. As a player I considered it was a possibility, but thought maybe the destruction of all that would either weaken Acerack to make it a winnable fight or that the whole Acerack thing was a Red Herring. Think about how dumb it is that he'd hide and watch us destroy this thing he has been working on for however long, and only after we succeed murder us. That's just ridiculous, and is like the pinnacle of bad fiction.

Furthermore, since even if we did have an idea that killing the baby would aggro Acerack, I was playing a LG paladin that had the spirit of Shagamambi or whatever (I called it Shag-ur-mommy) that gave me the quirk of "never show mercy to evil." It would have been completely out of character to walk away, and not super murder that thing.

Finally since Acerack killed me as soon as he showed up. The rest of the party grabbed my body and ran. I was the one that destroyed the soulmonger AND killed the evil baby, so the DM figured Acerack had enacted his vengeance and had better things to do than chase some lowbies through his dungeon. All things considered, maybe he was being nice, but since it was AL it didn't really matter. It would have just been a gold tax for raise dead at that point, when gold is already pretty useless.

As a DM, I try not to kill PCs unless they do dumb things or just have crap luck. Completing the campaign as requested is like the opposite of that. So unless there were some very obvious hints that my party somehow missed, like "Don't kill the evil baby or Acerack will show up and auto-murder you no-save," it seems like a poorly written finale...

The more I think about it, the more salty I get about it. If I were to really break down my gripes with it, it goes against both of my main appeals to D&D. I play D&D because I am both a combat optimizer and into the narrative of the storytelling. My character is a super tank, with +10 to every save and insane AC etc. None of that helps me against a spell that auto-kills people under 100 hp. Even if I had a higher hp total somehow, there is no way I'd still have that much hp left after the baby/monger fight. Acerack is and always was a DM F*** You card. So I can get that, but it is no different than, "A rock falls and you die."

But then there is the narrative aspect. It's a cluster and makes no sense that he'd wait there. So anti-climactic. It's like if at the end of Return of the Jedi the emperor just pointed at Luke and instantly killed him after the Vader fight. It's lame because it's post-resolution. Vader was defeated just like the soulmonger was destroyed. You don't kill your protagonists after the climax. You do it during or not at all. Or if they know going in that the climax will likely cause them to die, then they can die afterwards as a sacrifice. You don't just have the end of LoTR be Aragorn and all the hobbits slipping off the top of Minas Tirith the next day because it was icy.

BAH! ok /endrant.

[HolyDraconus]

It was AL, and we were all totally aware that the soulmonger was destroyed, and the mission complete. That's what we did first. I destroyed the supports. BUT:

There was no warning or hint to suggest that killing the evil baby will instantly aggro Acerack. As a player I considered it was a possibility, but thought maybe the destruction of all that would either weaken Acerack to make it a winnable fight or that the whole Acerack thing was a Red Herring. Think about how dumb it is that he'd hide and watch us destroy this thing he has been working on for however long, and only after we succeed murder us. That's just ridiculous, and is like the pinnacle of bad fiction.

Furthermore, since even if we did have an idea that killing the baby would aggro Acerack, I was playing a LG paladin that had the spirit of Shagamambi or whatever (I called it Shag-ur-mommy) that gave me the quirk of "never show mercy to evil." It would have been completely out of character to walk away, and not super murder that thing.

Finally since Acerack killed me as soon as he showed up. The rest of the party grabbed my body and ran. I was the one that destroyed the soulmonger AND killed the evil baby, so the DM figured Acerack had enacted his vengeance and had better things to do than chase some lowbies through his dungeon. All things considered, maybe he was being nice, but since it was AL it didn't really matter. It would have just been a gold tax for raise dead at that point, when gold is already pretty useless.

As a DM, I try not to kill PCs unless they do dumb things or just have crap luck. Completing the campaign as requested is like the opposite of that. So unless there were some very obvious hints that my party somehow missed, like "Don't kill the evil baby or Acerack will show up and auto-murder you no-save," it seems like a poorly written finale...

The more I think about it, the more salty I get about it. If I were to really break down my gripes with it, it goes against both of my main appeals to D&D. I play D&D because I am both a combat optimizer and into the narrative of the storytelling. My character is a super tank, with +10 to every save and insane AC etc. None of that helps me against a spell that auto-kills people under 100 hp. Even if I had a higher hp total somehow, there is no way I'd still have that much hp left after the baby/monger fight. Acerack is and always was a DM F*** You card. So I can get that, but it is no different than, "A rock falls and you die."

But then there is the narrative aspect. It's a cluster and makes no sense that he'd wait there. So anti-climactic. It's like if at the end of Return of the Jedi the emperor just pointed at Luke and instantly killed him after the Vader fight. It's lame because it's post-resolution. Vader was defeated just like the soulmonger was destroyed. You don't kill your protagonists after the climax. You do it during or not at all. Or if they know going in that the climax will likely cause them to die, then they can die afterwards as a sacrifice. You don't just have the end of LoTR be Aragorn and all the hobbits slipping off the top of Minas Tirith the next day because it was icy.

BAH! ok /endrant.you're right. The fight is a big FU. It's why my group renamed it to the tomb of trolling, cause that's all he does. However, you should have met a spirit that outright told you upon seeing the atropal that Ace will come if it's destroyed, and the creepy dolls right outside the gate say the same thing. It's a good campaign but honestly it needs some work. Ace being that powerful though makes sense. He blocked GODS from interfering with his work in their backyard. And there is, currently, no method of locating or destroying his phlactery. Period. Including divine. Plus,
He was summoned after HE just finished fighting a demigod with friends (and he killed them) so he was still set to kill. The fight is similar to the fight with Tiamat: you shouldn't have a chance of winning unless you was designed from the start to fight it.Come to think of it, the whole point of the Soulmonger was so he could create a new death god in faerun, for lulz.
Anywho, it goes with the theme of the book. The very first trap to the tomb should of alerted you to how rediculous it was going to be, but let's not forget that 2 npcs were capable of helping you steamroll that dude, as long as you don't take his magic items.

[PeteNutButter]

you're right. The fight is a big FU. It's why my group renamed it to the tomb of trolling, cause that's all he does. However, you should have met a spirit that outright told you upon seeing the atropal that Ace will come if it's destroyed, and the creepy dolls right outside the gate say the same thing. It's a good campaign but honestly it needs some work. Ace being that powerful though makes sense. He blocked GODS from interfering with his work in their backyard. And there is, currently, no method of locating or destroying his phlactery. Period. Including divine. Plus,
He was summoned after HE just finished fighting a demigod with friends (and he killed them) so he was still set to kill. The fight is similar to the fight with Tiamat: you shouldn't have a chance of winning unless you was designed from the start to fight it.Come to think of it, the whole point of the Soulmonger was so he could create a new death god in faerun, for lulz.
Anywho, it goes with the theme of the book. The very first trap to the tomb should of alerted you to how rediculous it was going to be, but let's not forget that 2 npcs were capable of helping you steamroll that dude, as long as you don't take his magic items.

Having played the tomb of horrors, I knew what I was getting into. It was troll city in both, but I felt ToA was a little more "balanced." I think we either missed or didn't get the hints.

I'm totally fine with not beating Acerack. The fight before him was a good climax. There should be some deus ex machina written right in to save the party. I get that there is room for a cool big bad in the world that you shouldn't be able to beat. But there should also be "big goods" out there that can teleport in once you lift the death curse and slow him down while you run or something.

[HolyDraconus]

Having played the tomb of horrors, I knew what I was getting into. It was troll city in both, but I felt ToA was a little more "balanced." I think we either missed or didn't get the hints.

I'm totally fine with not beating Acerack. The fight before him was a good climax. There should be some deus ex machina written right in to save the party. I get that there is room for a cool big bad in the world that you shouldn't be able to beat. But there should also be "big goods" out there that can teleport in once you lift the death curse and slow him down while you run or something.

In homebrew there is... but alas...AL

[Boxybrown]

Bro if you were going to kill the baby why did you fight struts at the same time or am I reading that wrong.

[Malifice]

Having played the tomb of horrors, I knew what I was getting into. It was troll city.

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