In need for ideas for earth elemental magic

[S@tanicoaldo]

So my players are facing a cabal of elemental mages who use earth as their element, they are about to face the big bad Archmagister of earth.

The last few foes they faced, each has a specific specialization.

Sand mage: Illusions and enchantment, he had dream's sand as an artifact.

Lava mage: Pure evocation and destruction spells but also responsible for making the land fertile and growing crops to feed the cabal.

Metal mage: The artificer and abjurer of the group, conjured weapons and armor to fight.

Mud mage: Used his powers to create golems to serve the cabal.

Cristal mage: Able to see the future and use Divination like spells.

Fossil mage: A Necromancer, able to call forth the dead, buried in the ground or otherwise.

Glass mage: Able to enchant and mesmerize his foes.

Salt mage: The trasmuter of the group.

Now I have to find a gimmick for the big bad and Im' out of ideas, at first the plan was for him to use all the villains powers combined, but I that sounds kind of boring now.

So I was thinking, could he be a gravity mage? I mean gravity is a force that attracts things to earth, so is not too far-fetched to think a powerful earth mage could c0ontrol it.

What you guys think?
And yes, I used to play a lot of mega men, what’s your point?

[redwizard007]

Stone mage: he throws up walls to split and impede the party, summons earth elementals, uses earthquake spells, Sonic spells could be reskinned as "the cracking of stone," etc.

Or, give him a similar theme, but put him behind a collection of watered down minibosses.

[S@tanicoaldo]

Stone mage: he throws up walls to split and impede the party, summons earth elementals, uses earthquake spells, Sonic spells could be reskinned as "the cracking of stone," etc.

Or, give him a similar theme, but put him behind a collection of watered down minibosses.

Bu that's what the minions of the cabal did, that's what it comes to your head when you think generic earth mage, and I want something epic for the big bad.

[DoomHat]

What would be the purist culmination of channeling elemental earth? Just strait telekinesis, perhaps? Rather then having to deal with mud and clay golems, the party has to deal with rings of huge boulders orbiting him and changing speeds. He can alter the terrain type at whim. He can divide the party from each other by throwing up sheer or spiked walls.

Besides that, if he's the supreme master of this cabal I see no reason why he shouldn't have at least some grasp of all the other magics. Make him feel like the ultimate culmination of everything they've faced!

[AceOfFools]

Think bigger.

Earthshaker: capable of conjuring earthquakes to level cites, and opening fissures that, if he's unlucky, become erupting volcanoes. The geography is hers to command.

Meteor mage: oh sure, the craters left by small meteors are only a few dozen yards across. Make her desperate enough, and she will smash this planet into a new ice age.

Avalanche walker: not only can she create rolling storms of earth that roll upill to bury entire cities, she walks unharmed through their center, protected by an ever moving shield that renders even catching a glimpse of her all bUT impossible.

Golem rider: for added re-fightability, let her posses and use all her powers through earth golems. What's more scary than an epic-level earth mage? One that hops into the body of a minion and keeps fighting every time she is killed.

[Waddacku]

Someone who controls the very field of battle itself, even merging with it. Good luck trying to fight a sapient, moving cave system. Or even a mountain.

[Jonagel]

Cool idea!

My thoughts:

Make the leader an earth elemental? If not, make it another magical earth being? Earth Genasai?

If not, make them an archmage who has tampered with powers that grant him/her certain earth related abilities (constant earth glide, stone skin, Regen so long as they are touching stone/earth).

[AceOfFools]

Cool idea!

My thoughts:

Make the leader an earth elemental? If not, make it another magical earth being? Earth Genasai?

If not, make them an archmage who has tampered with powers that grant him/her certain earth related abilities (constant earth glide, stone skin, Regen so long as they are touching stone/earth).

Oh, that's another good idea with strong roots in classical mythology: she can completely heal all damage and conditit ions at the start of her turn if she's touching the ground.

[Cluedrew]

Ideas:

• Start with a base of powers from the other mages, breadth of study seems to fit this character type more than a single cool trick. Although they might be better within their specialty, the master probably knows a few tricks from each.
• Add some "contamination" they have started to exhibit earth like qualities. Even if there is no mechanical effect, an earthy skin tone and eyes of rock might help. Feel free to add mechanical effects.
• The (Planet) Earth Mage: The special abilities are moving earth on a huge scale. Earthquakes, chasms, mountains, big sweeping changes to the battlefield. Possibly calling fire and water from within the earth, and the planets that grow on it (although that last one starts to get towards a druid instead of a mage).

You can take some of those, but I think they all fix together quite nicely.

[TeChameleon]

Hmm... well, here's a weird, out there idea... if you've watched Avatar: The Last Airbender, you might remember the Earth Kingdom secret police, the Dai Li. Their trademark schtick was that they had these stone glove-ish sort of things that they could fire off and use as long-range hands, or just rocket punches, or whatever.

What if your big bad had a whole flock of flying stone 'hands' that he could attack with, manipulate objects, initiate grapples... or use as the source square for casting a spell?

Toss in a re-skinned teleport effect for him vanishing into the earth and popping out elsewhere, maybe a wall of stone or three, and you'd have a highly mobile, feels-like-he-could-strike-from-anywhere boss fight that wouldn't necessitate a ton of extra work from the DM.

[Vogie]

The last few foes they faced, each has a specific specialization.
Sand mage: Illusions and enchantment, he had dream's sand as an artifact.
Lava mage: Pure evocation and destruction spells but also responsible for making the land fertile and growing crops to feed the cabal.
Metal mage: The artificer and abjurer of the group, conjured weapons and armor to fight.
Mud mage: Used his powers to create golems to serve the cabal.
Crystal mage: Able to see the future and use Divination like spells.
Fossil mage: A Necromancer, able to call forth the dead, buried in the ground or otherwise.
Glass mage: Able to enchant and mesmerize his foes.
Salt mage: The trasmuter of the group.

I could see the earth mage being able to:

• Spawn rolling boulders, perhaps the entire fight is during an avalanche
• Generate Earth and Rock elementals
• Generate a giant Labyrinth in on the battlefield
• Be able to Earth Glide at will, perhaps attempt to pull various party members into an underground dungeon

An alternate idea, if the Earth Mage is the penultimate or Final villain, you could channel a bit of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 and have the "Earth Mage" is actually based off Ego - the BBEG is not an archmage who controls chunks of the planet, but rather a Planet that creates an avatar posing as an Earth-powered archmage.

[Bulhakov]

Some of my ideas:
- standard "earth telekinetic", but go large! stone giants, walls, pits, avalanches, canyons
- standard "earth telekinetic", but go fast! a stone pebble travelling at the speed of sound is basically a bullet
- transformation! the leader can change all "earth" materials at will (e.g. stone to lava, or sand to iron)

[Friv]

Yeah, I'd go with "large-scale battlefield control". Set up tons of zones of different types of dangers that only affect the players, and use earth melding to skip between them easily. Earthquakes split the field, spikes rise out of the ground and collapse again, ground turns to mud and then hardens again to try and trap them inside, walls rise up and then collapse on top of people.