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Cuddly
2008-01-30, 11:14 PM
Mean & Green:
Trolls. I want smarter trolls with fewer HD/CR adjustment for their special trollish nature so I can give them more PC levels. In my campaign world, I want trolls to be tireless creatures that hunt their marks ruthlessly. I don't want the dumb, bloodthirsty brutes presented in the MM, but lean, dogged, clever hunters. I want the creatures to be the sort of things PCs fear when lost in the woods. The sort of creature when the druid rolls his knowledge: nature check (thinking of moving trolls over to fey), he suddenly grows very wary of every movement, every rustle in the bushes.

I'm looking for something of the Tucker's kobolds of Trolls, except there'd be a pair, rather than caverns of cowardly creatures sniping from murder holes. Something like Arnie in Predator- smeared in mud and rigging the forest with traps.

Any recommendations of how to tone them down? I'm thinking of changing regen to fast healing and making them immune to fatigue/exhaustion, halving their giant HD and converting to fey HD, getting rid of the claws, bite, rend (or at least greatly downgrading them), keeping the scent and 90 ft darkvision.

Raising the Dead:
How lethal would this be:
Wizard5/Pale Master6. 5 level 8 PCs (batman wizard, wannabe cleric-zilla, druid-zilla with (Siberian) tiger companion, damage spec'd fighter, and [probably] TWF rogue) find the necromancer in an ice cave, animating dire bear skeletons and the like. She opens with an Evard's Black Tentacles (scroll), followed by a Sudden Maximize Enervation on the party wizard (goodbye spells!). She then proceeds to continue animating skeletons (the rest of her feats would be Corpsecrafter, she specialized as the variant wizard who makes tougher undead, which means +4 str, +4 dex, and +4hp/HD) and casting necromantic debuffs. Passing up her 22HDs worth of undead to control is no problem- she had hide from undead cast on her before hand, so everything she raises targets the PCs.

The Cleric has the Travel domain (and low, dwarfish charisma), which, if he remembers to use, gets him out of the tentacles. The druid will be able to morph into something that can break the grapple check, as could the party fighter (who can also do fairly decent damage). They're all fairly good at working together; they recognize the value of buffing. The wizard is spec'd for necromancy and enchantment- things without life forces or minds are his bane. Otherwise, he's a (figurative) brute.

CASTLEMIKE
2008-01-30, 11:43 PM
The half troll template from the Fiend Folio is +4 LA with fast healing 5.

Prometheus
2008-01-31, 12:16 AM
As for the wizard encounter, it is a CR 11 for a party that should get a CR of about 8.5 as an average encounter. Now it is clear that this is some sort of boss, so you'd want it to be harder than 1 PC versus 4 of equivalent level. But keep in mind that a CR 12 is what should give them a 50-50 chance of winning. So here's the breakdown - if you sufficiently forewarn your party, and they are correctly optimized, they should be able to take it, if not, hope that they are the type to take it well. If you want to cover yourself, implement a secret weakness, something that non-RAW defeats or seriously weakens him if they discover it, examples: a) Something hidden or heavily guarded earlier in the dungeon b) All the torches in the room alight with an ghostly blue flame, which kills/weakens the him if they are blown out c) There is something in his past that can be discovered, and if it is mentioned, causes him to lose concentration for his next turn d) his strength is proportional to his creations, defeat them and he is wounded as a result e) the ice cave is vulnerable to an avalanche/collapse/meltdown if the right type of force is applied in the right way f) there is a helpful ally that they can enlist if they seek him/her out.

Half Troll is the way to go. Your only other option would be to homebrew something that is similar to a troll but not one.

CASTLEMIKE
2008-01-31, 12:33 AM
There is the UA/SRD Minor or Intermediate Bloodlines which are easily paid off since they use differerent paydown rules.

A single level of Dragon Shaman provides Fast Healing 1 and so does Divine Metamagic using Turning since there is a Cleric.

The Troll Blooded Feat from Dragon #319 might do the trick:

http://realmshelps.dandello.net/cgi-bin/feats.pl?Troll_Blooded,Dragon

Idea Man
2008-01-31, 01:12 AM
So, you don't want trolls, you want viscious, hit-and-run, murderous fey. Sounds like fun! :smallbiggrin: Redcaps are in MM3, I believe, but you might want to go with a homebrew. Note: fey are combat wussies; low BAB, d6 HD. There are a couple special abilities you can use to bolster them: unholy grace (cha bonus to saves/AC), and unholy toughness (cha bonus to HP).

Is he beatable, yeah, but he sounds like a glass cannon. If you don't have guardian for your mage, one lucky blow can turn him into chunky salsa. I'd recommend the summon undead spells (spell compendium, libris mortis[?]) for a nice quick support friend. I would also recommend a skeletal cyrohydra or white dragon, but that's just mean. :smallamused:

Cuddly
2008-01-31, 09:40 PM
So, you don't want trolls, you want viscious, hit-and-run, murderous fey. Sounds like fun! :smallbiggrin: Redcaps are in MM3, I believe, but you might want to go with a homebrew. Note: fey are combat wussies; low BAB, d6 HD. There are a couple special abilities you can use to bolster them: unholy grace (cha bonus to saves/AC), and unholy toughness (cha bonus to HP).

Precisely. I want things that look like trolls, but not the dumb as rock trolls Tolkien wrote about that are allergic to sunlight.


Is he beatable, yeah, but he sounds like a glass cannon. If you don't have guardian for your mage, one lucky blow can turn him into chunky salsa. I'd recommend the summon undead spells (spell compendium, libris mortis[?]) for a nice quick support friend. I would also recommend a skeletal cyrohydra or white dragon, but that's just mean. :smallamused:

The major thing would be the 22HD -2d6 (so 10 to 20 HD worth of beasties) of beefed up undead under her control when the PCs show up, followed by 1d6+3HD of undead animated every round until they can stop her. Since she's bringing forth mindless undead, her hide from undead spell (cast, from a potion, or a scroll, depending on how spell selection/banned schools go) renders her invisible to everything she summons, which, even though they may take her abover her 22HD cap, still only pose a threat to the PCs.

Summon undead she gets as an sp as one of the necromancer levels, which means she can summon some pretty nasty stuff. I don't think I want the encounter to be that hard, seeing as how her enervate(s) will leave the party casters mewling and pathetic.

Kilroy
2008-01-31, 10:47 PM
Feindish halftroll-hobgblins with a level af ranger. Depening on CR requirements. Something that mixed could look like anything and meet the premise