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Ashdate
2007-09-05, 12:54 PM
I just wanted to thank the author of the "Shackled City" module for placing a seven-headed cytohydra against our party of level 6-7 players in his module. His 21d6 breath weapon, coupled with his Fast Healing 17, ensured that half our party died, and we didn't even kill it. To make matters worse, the terrain gave it a ridiculous advantage as well.

So, as we gather the bodies and lick our many, many wounds, I invite other players to post their encounter horror stories.

- Eddie

UserClone
2007-09-05, 01:10 PM
OK. In Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, there was a ghost/assasin who was completely invisible. He then proceeded to one-shot my 74-HP Barbarian with a death-attack on a Flatfooted, Incorporeal Touch attack. I rolled a 1 on my Fort Save. Fair? Probably not. Pissed? You bet I was, It was his first session.

Douglas
2007-09-05, 01:19 PM
The Immoth from Monster Manual II. It's stat block says CR 9. It casts spells as a 12th level Sorcerer. And has d8 hit dice, a poison attack, 50% immunity to piercing and slashing weapons, a natural fly speed, SR 23, and a special ability that lets it effectively quicken any of its spells a limited number of times by preparing them in advance as ice runes. Oh, and it's an elemental so it's immune to crits, stunning, etc.

I found out about it after going through the free adventure Into the Frozen Waste (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20030111a), where we defeated the Immoth BBEG only through absurd luck and a DM that played it waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay below his potential. If he hadn't gone extremely easy on us it would have been a guaranteed TPK.

Zim
2007-09-05, 01:20 PM
The Erinyes in Bal-hamatoogan (sorry for the mis-spelling) just about TPK's my party in the front foyer.

The illusionary wall kill zone in There is No Honour just about did the same. Many game designers need to remeber to take equipment and terrain into consideration when calculating CRs, and this leads to overpowered encounters.

The cryohydra isn't that bad a challenge, really. It has lots of HP, but no AC to speak of and fire vulnerability (cold subtype).

Townopolis
2007-09-05, 01:42 PM
Someone should mention Tucker's Kobolds here.

Moogle0119
2007-09-05, 02:03 PM
The Pleasure Devil from the Book of the Nine Hells. I believe its CR is like an 11 yet, it has DCs for its Spells in the high 20's. In a straight up combat fight this thing earns it CR with DR and fast healing. Yet when used against the party everyday in different forms and trying to trap their soul by impersonating friends and each other, while ambushing them when its convenient it became annoying. Ultimately this creature led to an entire campaign being ruined that had been going from level 3-10 for about a year. I hate that thing.

trajan
2007-09-05, 02:04 PM
That Damn Crab has come up more than once, both in advanced (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=48890) and regular (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fw/20040221a) varieties

Telonius
2007-09-05, 03:11 PM
I just wanted to thank the author of the "Shackled City" module for placing a seven-headed cytohydra against our party of level 6-7 players in his module. His 21d6 breath weapon, coupled with his Fast Healing 17, ensured that half our party died, and we didn't even kill it. To make matters worse, the terrain gave it a ridiculous advantage as well.

So, as we gather the bodies and lick our many, many wounds, I invite other players to post their encounter horror stories.

- Eddie


Oh gods, the hydra. I hated that thing. It was very nearly instant death for the whole party. The only reason we were still standing at the end was the fact that our Rogue was the one that found it, and he made his reflex save; and the fact that our wizard was a bit of a pyromaniac.

EDIT: Zim, the problem with that particular cryohydra was where they had it hiding. It was in a little extra cave at the bottom of a shaft that the adventurers had to go down to get to the next part of the dungeon. It could blast the entire party from its little hidey-hole without the party ever having a chance of spotting it.

Alveanerle
2007-09-05, 03:13 PM
Next session i plan to put my adventuring party (EL 7.5) against a cloaker lord - a lovely CR7 huge monster with spellcasting of a lvl9 sorc in addition to free-action area save-or-suck effects, 9 hit aberration hit dice and Con 20. Did i mention spell resistance, some neat innate supernatural and spell like abilities, and sharing damage with grappled opponent? Honey&Milk in its purest form.

Oh, and they've just met Ibrandlin, another excellent CR5 teddy bear. Suffice to say only by a mere luck and great dice streaks noone died in an encounter of CR 2.5 lower than party EL (10 gargantuan draconic hit dice coupled with neat pin ability,+18 4d6+12 bite, 4 claws, SR and fire subtype - its only weak points are low AC and low damage on breath weapon) :smallsmile:

Monsters of Faerun for the win!

The Vorpal Tribble
2007-09-05, 03:22 PM
Can't really say it was a horror story, but one of my favorite battles ever involved a CR 4 Tsochar from Lords of Madness and a group of five CR 7 players and a CR 5 NPC. It wasn't meant to be particularly tough, just something to freak them out a bit.

Granted, it had surprise on its side as it came ripping out of one of the other players, but it got best initiative and easily grappled the warlock. He then flew up into the air to try to dislodge it for some reason, so the players could never reach it. It tore the warlock to pieces and left him bleeding and unconscious. It then almost took out the NPC and another before the NPC's mount trampled it to death.

Anything with a fantastic grapple check and many limbs to make an attempt with (that deals strength damage and therefore lowers the possibility of dislodging) is tough, but if I had played it even sneakier it would have given them all a run for there money.

Alveanerle
2007-09-05, 03:29 PM
Ooo, VT! Since you're here, i'd like to inform you that Deathcap Myconids of yours seem to be perfectly balanced. My adventuring party just stumbled upon a branch of the caverns, with full myconid ecosystem and a shrine to zuggtmoy (sort of)*. All these clouds were... amusing :-D Also a perfect synergy between different upper echelon deathcaps.
A big salute to your imagination and creativity!

For those who don't know what a deathcap myconid is:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=32662

* the shrine was set up by a kobold favored soul of Zuggtmoy, who received orders to bring unholy spores to this area and plant them for the greater glory of the Big Z. He was also immune to all the spore effects :-D

ShneekeyTheLost
2007-09-05, 04:18 PM
Rust Monsters. "Hi, all your stuff is gone. Have a nice day."

Fax Celestis
2007-09-05, 04:46 PM
That Damn Crab has come up more than once, both in advanced (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=48890) and regular (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fw/20040221a) varieties

I hate That Damn Crab.

Corlindale
2007-09-05, 04:48 PM
Darkmantles can be really scary for lvl 1-2 parties, and I remember one near TPK when we entered a room with a couple of them dropping down on us in total Darkness. It's extremely hard to hurt them without any way to penetrate the darkness(and level 1-2 characters most likely doesn't have any means of doing so), and there is a very great risk of hurting your struggling allies instead. Couple that with the fact that most first level characters are made of paper and die in an instant, and things get pretty ugly.
Luckily we just barely managed to retreat, and shortly thereafter my wizard came up with the ultimate anti-darkmantle tactic: Grease, on the ceiling. Splat, splat, splat...

Alveanerle
2007-09-05, 04:54 PM
Darkmantles can be really scary for lvl 1-2 parties

For enhanced darkmantle love experience please check the half-stone-golem darkmantle somewhere in the WoTC site. If memory serves well it'd be 25HP, 1d4+15 constrict, immune to magic and an obscene DR/magic - all for a lovely CR4 or so :smallsmile:
A decent guardian for any mad wizard's laboratory.

Dementrius
2007-09-05, 07:26 PM
As if young adult gold dragons weren't hard enough on an evil party - this one had the vow of poverty feat. CR 14.

...and no treasure.

Fortunately I was the DM, so it wasn't all bad :smallbiggrin:

CASTLEMIKE
2007-09-05, 07:33 PM
The Head of Vecna. Watching players argue over who would get to have the powerful treasure head before taking turns killing their PCs to possess it.

Anxe
2007-09-05, 07:55 PM
A 8 year-old orc once knocked out one of my players. They were mopping up after taking out all the adult orcs and were commencing with slaughtering the children. The check under the beds and of course there is one under there. This orc has a mace. The one player, Stanton quickly stood back up to get out his sword. The Orc swings its mace right at Stanton's knees and rolls a crit for 9 damage. Stanton passed out and the rest of the party set the bed on fire to kill the bad-ass orc.

There was another time where 2 Feral Yowlers killed my party. These guys were playing a 7 person 5th level party. I figured they could handle 2 CR 5 monsters. Nope. The Yowlers killed two party members and got away without either one of them dying.

Chronos
2007-09-05, 08:25 PM
Since we're mentioning hydrata, I'll have to give a shout-out to the 3.0 learnean pyrohydra (CR starting at 8). It's basically like the current one, except without the clause about cold damage cauterizing the stumps, and you couldn't attack the body directly, only the heads. So the only way to actually kill one is with acid or save-or-die spells. And an 8th-level party doesn't have many options for save-or-die, and probably only carries acid if they anticipate some specific use for it.

Winged One
2007-09-05, 08:31 PM
As if young adult gold dragons weren't hard enough on an evil party - this one had the vow of poverty feat. CR 14.

...and no treasure.

Fortunately I was the DM, so it wasn't all bad :smallbiggrin:

Why do I get the feeling that you're actually a brain in a jar somewhere after that?

Anyway, pretty much all true dragons ever fall into this category.

Logic
2007-09-05, 08:44 PM
As if young adult gold dragons weren't hard enough on an evil party - this one had the vow of poverty feat. CR 14.

...and no treasure.

Fortunately I was the DM, so it wasn't all bad :smallbiggrin:

That is just plain cruel.

Arbitrarity
2007-09-05, 08:47 PM
Huh. VoP would seem to break good monsters, as it gives them "WBL" sorta, for a ECL (Their HD) character (max 20), and that's powerful. Compare to NPC's, who get lousy cash, compared to PC's, and then remember that most monsters HD exceeds their CR by a bit.

Hmmm.:smallconfused:

Dementrius
2007-09-05, 09:07 PM
Why do I get the feeling that you're actually a brain in a jar somewhere after that?

Anyway, pretty much all true dragons ever fall into this category.

I didn't say it was fair.

It's also not fair to play a batman wizard (with Shadow Weave Magic), a Half-Ogre CODzilla, a Diplomancer Bard and a Disciple of Dispater all in the same party. Level-appropriate CR's are a spot on the horizon at that point. You should see some of the stuff they've torn apart, it's awesome to watch really.

Leicontis
2007-09-05, 10:40 PM
First off, let me say that it's ridiculous that CR 1/3 goblins ride CR 2 worgs... Base book CR for ten of those is CR 9, and I had a CR 1 party beat it (with warning, preparation, terrain advantage, luck, and some crazy tactical tricks).

Quite some time later, the above party is about lvl 13 IIRC, and finds CR 14-15 a reasonable challenge. It was at about this time that I looked through the MM 3 and noticed the Astral Stalker. This beastie is CR 11 IIRC (in any case, it was 2 CRs below the party and 3-4 CRs below what they usually fought). However, it used its intelligence and knowledge of the party, in combination with a couple of seemingly minor abilities to set up a nasty ambush. It even used the party sorceress' tactics against her - she typically cast Greater Invisibility on herself to aid in blasting with impunity, and did so here. Unfortunately, Astral Stalkers have some sort of innate ability to see invisible, and a mouth dart with paralysis poison. The party sorceress was paralyzed, but was invisible, so the rest of the party didn't know where she was or what her status was.

Anyway, the lesson is that intellect and the ability to plan can contribute significantly to the combat abilities of a creature, making its CR much less clearly-defined.

MeklorIlavator
2007-09-05, 11:48 PM
The spawn of tiamat who can cast fireball a couple of times per day(I think it ws 3 or four). Our DM had 3 attack us at level 10/11, and the only reason no one died was due to a couple good rolls and me being able to dish out 10d6 healing a couple times per day. The Half damage really adds up when its 3 per turn.

TSGames
2007-09-06, 12:05 AM
How about the allip? I played in a level 10 party and the necromancer summoned these to overcome the toughest challenges. Seriously? Does a level 3 party even have ghost touch weapons? It doesn't really matter, everyone in the party will be so dumb that they'll be poking themselves with their swords for fun before they go unconscious. CR 3, Allip, you are not.

OneWinged4ngel
2007-09-06, 12:27 AM
Ah, the [Awesome] template. Always hidden. Anyways, dragons are probably the most notable offenders... they're extremely powerful if you take advantage of their true potential, and should probably be a few CRs higher, so... you're not getting the rewards you deserve from killin' em.


How about the allip? I played in a level 10 party and the necromancer summoned these to overcome the toughest challenges. Seriously? Does a level 3 party even have ghost touch weapons? It doesn't really matter, everyone in the party will be so dumb that they'll be poking themselves with their swords for fun before they go unconscious. CR 3, Allip, you are not.

A low level wizard can take out an allip pretty handily with, say, Light of Lunia killing it in a single turn (or the level 2 spell equivelent doing the job even better), and of course any artificer can provide a party with ghost touch weapons. Clerics can turn.

Nerd-o-rama
2007-09-06, 12:43 AM
On Allips:

Wizard: "I cast Magic Missile at the darkness!"
Allip: "****, I am the darkness" *takes 2d4+2 damage/round.*

OneWinged4ngel
2007-09-06, 12:51 AM
On Allips:

Wizard: "I cast Magic Missile at the darkness!"
Allip: "****, I am the darkness" *takes 2d4+2 damage/round.*

What kind of low level wizard uses Magic Missile? :smallconfused:

Light of Lunia (a level 1 spell) will do 8d6 damage to an Allip if all 4 touch attacks hit.

Still, not everyone's going to have that, and it takes 2 rounds to use anyways, so the Allip's still definitely pretty tough. And ability damage is scary. It's definitely easy to be left without an effective way to combat these things, but then again, look at that one ethereal swarm that's CR 5...

Viscount Einstrauss
2007-09-06, 12:51 AM
Hmm...

My players have been uppity ever since they reached level 4 and I allowed them to take an actual class. Perhaps a battle with three of That Damn Crab will teach them a lesson about how much I hate them all.

With a burning passion, I tell you. A burning passion.

Vonriel
2007-09-06, 01:08 AM
Hmm...

My players have been uppity ever since they reached level 4 and I allowed them to take an actual class. Perhaps a battle with three of That Damn Crab will teach them a lesson about how much I hate them all.

With a burning passion, I tell you. A burning passion.

Mommy, make the scary DM go away... :smalleek:

Kizara
2007-09-06, 02:00 AM
Howler.

Fast, annoying for a long time for a long range, and then when you actually manage to close the thing, unless you got a tweaked barbarian, you quickly discover what its like to be owned.

Good hp, many attacks (with quills) that give a stacking penalty, and high speed make it extremely dangerous.

I've gotten 2 TPKs using them as completely innocent random encounters, and was even nice enough to have the damn thing stop running around howling and attack the party.

The Hop Goblin
2007-09-06, 02:07 AM
One wrong move and I was eaten by a Grue.

CockroachTeaParty
2007-09-06, 02:08 AM
Back in 3.0, Ankhegs were CR 2, if I recall correctly. They could murder an unprepared 2nd level party 50% of the time, and if a poor level 1 party encountered one randomly, it was sad times. CR 3 in 3.5 is much better.

Swarms can be nasty for unprepared low level parties, especially if they don't have alchemical items or torches (sunrods don't work!).

Kurald Galain
2007-09-06, 02:30 AM
A dragon.

I played in a campaign once that ran for awhile. We had a cleverly played wizard that was careful enough to rarely even take a single point of damage. At one point we run into a dragon - who one-shotted said wizard in the first round. Perhaps this was DM revenge, actually.