The recent conflict with mind flayers and TPK's brought about a discussion I had with my players last Friday, 8 days ago, with regards to the dangers of higher level monsters (which is being discussed on JB's page). I have less experience with throwing monsters of greater power at parties, not because I haven't done it but because that was more than 20 years ago. I haven't done it lately. Moreover, I'm a smarter DM now and the monsters have become clearer in my head. There are definitions for abilities that once upon a time were quite fuzzy.
Specifically, teleportation.
There's no explanation in the books of this ability. It doesn't say how often the monster can do it, or what kind of magic it is. I presently choose to interpret it as a "natural ability," like my ability to touch-type: something I can do as often as I wish, which is only limited by how much time it takes me.
This is a ridiculously powerful ability in the right hands. Anything that can be done AT WILL takes just one action point in my system to do ... and because I don't want the monster teleporting multiple times in a round, I do limit the ability to once a round.
It means, however, that it can pop up next to any player in any hex and attack immediately after ... or it can attack and them teleport to China, leaving the players with nothing to attack, until it pops right back onto the battle field the next round. "No error," right?
Given all the other things the nalfeshnee can do, it can cause fear, gate in another demon, telekinesis a character into a wall and then vanish ... and what do you do as a party? Go ahead. You're a group of 18th level characters, so it's only 30% resistant to magic — assuming you can get a spell off, which takes much longer in my game. What's your strategy?
Now tell me what you'd do with three of them.
The thing is ten-and-a-half feet tall, so the damage listed is ridiculous. It ought to be more like 2-16/1-10/1-10. And even if you do manage to hurt it, then it can just go off to its plane of existence, heal, and return in its own time to restart the fight on its terms. There has to be some policy in place that says plainly this thing can't show up on the Prime Material plane unless it's invited somehow ... but there are ways around that.
You need a spiritwrack spell, but that only handles one of them and you have to be able to put it in place at precisely the right moment ... then you have to count on overcoming the magic resistance and then the demon gets a saving throw. That's either an 8 if you count it as an illusionist/mage or an 11 if you count it as a fighter. All in all, not the best situation.
Most truly high level monsters are exactly as dangerous as this. It's one thing to fight a dragon when it acts like a complete moron, like Smaug, lashing out at its enemies like a drunken sailor on a bender. What about a smart dragon, that doesn't fill it's lair with columns for invisible halflings to hide behind and avoid getting roasted. What if any of the truly dangerous monsters listed actually use their exceptional or genius intelligences? What then?
My players explained that they were sure they'd figure it out when the time came.
Players are so dumb.
I always thought that Spiritwrack was just a great way to make an eternal enemy out of nothing less than a demon. Yikes. There's got to be a good option someplace.
ReplyDeleteMy parties always had a dimension lock or readied dispel magic to counter demonic teleportation, although the latter was only good for a round. I don't remember if they developed lock on their own, or if that was in UA or 2nd edition.
ReplyDeleteBack in the day, there was the Living City campaign. It was the forerunner of the current Adventurer's League using 2nd edition rules. I was part of the leadership of the High Level Extra-Planar campaign. After I announced that the demonic teleportation ability worked as you mentioned here (at will, doesn't take an action, &c.) the players lost their collective shit over it. My inbox was on fire for a month afterward. I dunno, it seemed reasonable to be given how it was written.
Baron,
ReplyDeleteThis is also the reason why I could never understand the player boast that they "killed a god." The Deities and Demigods book makes it clear all the gods also have this ability. Why would a god stand around and wait to be killed?
Makes as much sense as a Chinese spy balloon.
Ah, now this is a question! I mean, if the Nalfeshnee was encounter #3 in dungeon #8, and teleport was limited to "I get behind your frontline to attack the magic users", then sure, no problems.
ReplyDeleteBut a Nalfeshnee played as an entity that exists and interacts with the world, which is pursuing its goals and ambitions, and has agency and takes action outside of and unrelated to the player characters, played at its actual intelligence level, and enough time has passed for the demon to be settled and entrenched in the world with lairs, hideouts, allies, wealth and items... I mean, how could you kill it without huge casualties? I look forward to someone brave enough to take you up on the challenge of 'gaming out' such an encounter. As you said, tactically it would teleport away to heal, drink potions or swap out magic items, set traps/fires behind the party and just wait them out until buffs expire, put allies into ambush position, or just plain retreat if the party is strong enough to do more than half its health in damage in 1-2 rounds (but now that it knows that someone exists in the world who could harm it if fought head-on at full power, will the party ever be truly safe again?).
Spiritwrack may hold it in place but wizards who can cast 6th level spells are rare, and I can't help but feel in a world where creatures act with agency, in time demons would obtain a racial memory of common ways that they were banished which would result in them pro-actively hunting down and killing any non-evil wizards who obtain such knowledge to try and erase the knowledge of that spell from humanity in general.
And even if you kill it, I feel you've signed a long-term family line death warrant. Five generations later, when that same demon finally obtains freedom again in the world, it will take revenge on those who banished it, and in this case the closest thing to taking revenge on you is to take revenge on your descendants. "Here lies Edward VI... Edward I angered a demon"
I would enjoy reading more of your forays into the challenges of creating/modifying high-level creatures and the dangers of certain modifications to the rules here and there having the unintended consequences of making enemies overwhelmingly strong - the risk is very real if the dice are king and players have to live with the consequences - but I'll leave it here for now.
As near as I can think, Prof, a party has to think outside the combat box. Finding amulets to protect against the demon, or the Rumplestiltskin approach of knowing the demon's name, or an arrangement with the demon's boss ... or even a parley and exchange with the demon itself would seem to offer more practical solutions than a stand-up fight.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, we're talking about a party of more than 10th level, with equipment like wands, special cloaks and severe armour classes, able to wield many of the demon's skills through the use of blink and improved teleportation.
I mean, hell, the best option for the nalfeshnee is to teleport into the upper atmosphere and leave the player to burn up in reentry or suffocate, then teleport somewhere else. Why not?
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