Test of Might v2.1

[Starbuck_II]

John: (think I have 1 more successful Chill touch)
John isn't likely to break a Grapple so he will fight his way out (-4 hit penalty applied)
1) John Kukri Attack - (1d20+8)[24] Kukri damage - (1d4+1)[5]
2) John Touch Attack - (1d20+7)[9] Vincent Fire damage - (1d6)[5]
Vincent 1/rd Negative energy - (1d8)[2] Chill Touch - (1d6)[3]
3) John Touch Attack - (1d20+2)[5] Vincent Fire damage - (1d6)[4]
Chill Touch - (1d6)[3]


Note: If the Chill touch fails in 2nd attack, then it can be used in 3rd.

[Keld Denar]

{table=head]-|A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M|N|O|P
1|o|o|o|o|o|o||||f|f|f|f|||
2|o|o|o|o|o|o|||f|f|f|f|f|f||
3|o|o|o|o|o|o|o|f|f|f|f|f|f|f|f
4|o|o|o|o|o|o|o|f|f|f|f|f|f|f|f|
5|o|o|o|o|o|o|||f|f|f|f|f|f||
6||o|o|o|o|||||f|f|f|f|||
7|||o|o|||||||f|f||||
8||||||||O|O|||||||
9||||||||GO|O|||||||
10||||||||||||||||
11|||||||||||J|||||
12||||||||||C|C|||||
13|||||||||V|C|C|||||
14||||||||||||||||
15||||||||||T||||||
16||||||||||||||||
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20||||||||||||||||
[/table]

First hit hits, the other 2 miss. The Kataklaion is still alive.

Init is:
Vincent
Tiki
Grantel
C
John
O - Attempts to pin with one bite, then attacks with its remaining bites + claws.
Opposed Grapple - (1d20+20)[27]
Bite2 - (1d20+12)[22]Bite2Dmg - (2d6+4)[12]
Bite2 - (1d20+12)[13]Bite2Dmg - (2d6+4)[14]
Claw1 - (1d20+10)[18]ClawDmg - (1d6+4)[9]
Claw2 - (1d20+10)[27]Claw2Dmg - (1d6+4)[8]

Regardless of grapple, the Gnawing Maws deal another Gnawing - (2d10)[9] damage + 1 con damage, which should total 2 con damage.

K attempts to pin John and constrict him.
Opposed Grapple - (1d20+12)[19]
Constrict Dmg - (2d6+1)[8]

Regardless of the outcome of this, malevolent tears continue to flow over your body, infusing you with their insideous madness. They begin to flow into your own eyes, stinging them and burning them. The pain is so intense, you close your eyes against it, and when you reopen them, the world is black around you. You have been struck Blind.

Make your opposed grapples, then back to the top of the round.

[Starbuck_II]

Assuming O and K survive their Reflex Negates (unless K got out of his original square, I know O is near his and still attacked every round)

Grentel (it would be +15 but still afraid):
Grentel Grapple - (1d20+13)[22]

For those attacks: Remember you get -4 penalty to attack while grappling with light weapon (like your natural attacks).

Did you forget or did you have that high of attack before (Bite +16 normally?).

John's grapple:
John Grapple - (1d20+8)[12]
I need to roll 11 or higher, that is like a 45-50% chance?

[Keld Denar]

Vincent's fire requires a save every round? Only O was in it.
If required:
RefSave - (1d20+9)[17]
Grentel is also considered to be in all squares as O, so would have to make a save vs that fire as well.

Grentel is pinned, and yes, I did take the -4. O normally has a +16 AB with primary, +14 with 2ndary due to Multiattack feat.

K takes fire damage from John's Fire.
FIRE - (1d6)[2]

John is not pinned, but is still stuck Blind.

[Starbuck_II]

For last round: Grentel Ref Negate - (1d20+7)[15] DC 17

Ohh, if the fire hurt Grentel last round: he would have had +4 Strength for his grapple checks this round (still fail but eh); I get +2 more DR.

[Keld Denar]

Fire negated once.

RefSave2 - (1d20+9)[17]
FIRE2 - (4d6)[19]

RefSave3 - (1d20+9)[28]
FIRE3 - (4d6)[19]

EDIT:
Fire negated 4 times total since Vincent cast it.

[Starbuck_II]

Grentel took:
Grentel Cold - (4d6)[19]

[Keld Denar]

I think Grentel still owes Vincent 2 more Reflex saves, IIRC, since the Oimozones grappled him the round after Vincent dropped.

Also, just added up the Kataklaion's HP, and it dies from John's stupid reflexive fire aura thing after it tries to grapple him. The tears still affect him though, since that happens before the grapple.

[Starbuck_II]

Vincent rolls his Stabilize checks
Vincent Stabilize - (1d00)[1]
Need 1-10.

Grentel is immune to fire/Cold while Raging. So he only needed to roll Ref once against it.
And he is also bleeding badly (near death).

Tiki:
Str Check 18
Tiki Str - (1d20+2)[18]
If succeed 5 foot step back. Then use Psi-like ability, Psionic Displacement.

If fail, Then use Psi-like ability, Psionic Displacement, but with manifest defensively:
manifest def - (1d20+4)[23], DC 20 required.

Grentel:
Uses Standard action use Healing Belt on self (since pinned doesn't stop that):
Healing - (4d8)[23]
I might survive better that way.

C's turn now.

[Keld Denar]

C does nothing notable, except pulse his Lethal Cold - (1d6)[4].

And I think you mucked up Vincents stabilize roll. 1d100, not 1d00.

[Starbuck_II]

So reroll Vincent's Stabilize roll (does it matter since he gets damaged again and still unconscious?)
Vincent Stablize - (1d100)[54]

Hopefully I stablize.

What is the area of effect for that aura? (how many spaces?)

John's turn:
He cures himself first with his Channeled touch (can't miss himself so no need for miss chance) (he choose not to apply fire since that would hurt:
John's healing - (1d8)[1]

Then he moves K-11 (since he knows where Mr. Cool is) and that would be 1/2 his speed (as he is blind). Haste wears off next round I think. Luckily Haste ends after this turn so he has enough speed to get over there.

(it was really hard to track duration because I had to find exact post I cast and the forums were laggy, but I knew was over soon).

[Keld Denar]

Init is:
Vincent
Tiki
Grantel
C
John

O - Full attacks with his natural attacks.
Bite1 - (1d20+12)[21]Bite1Dmg - (2d6+4)[7]
Bite2 - (1d20+12)[31]Bite2Dmg - (2d6+4)[10]
Bite3 - (1d20+12)[15]Bite3Dmg - (2d6+4)[10]
Claw1 - (1d20+10)[29]Claw1Dmg - (1d6+4)[7]
Claw2 - (1d20+10)[26]Claw2Dmg - (1d6+4)[6]

The Gnawing Maws deal another Gnawing - (2d20)[23] damage + 1 con damage, which should total 3 con damage.

[Keld Denar]

Crit confirm with Bite2
Confirm - (1d20+12)[16]

Wow, lucky!

[Keld Denar]

Man, totally messed up the Gnawing. Should be 2d10

Gnawing Maws - (2d10)[14]

Disregard the Gnawing Maws damage 2 posts up.

[Starbuck_II]

The DMG warns that ECL +4 is likely to have a PC or 2 dead (guess it was right).

Vincent stabilize:
Vincent Stabil - (1d100)[46]
Guess, Vincent dies this round if I fail. (I'm expecting Cold damage to kill him if he fails)

Tiki's turn: Now that Tiki's at deaths day he will reroll most of his arrows (assuming he rolls low.
Tiki attack - (1d20+9)[17] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[11]
Tiki attack - (1d20+9)[20] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[10]
Tiki attack - (1d20+9)[28] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[15]
Tiki attack - (1d20+9)[21] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[12]
Tiki attack - (1d20+9)[22] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[10]
Tiki attack - (1d20+4)[14] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[12]

All aimed at Mr. C. Taking him out will save Vincent (not that he won't eventually die from not stabilizing, but he has to try).

Come on Tiki, do it!

[Starbuck_II]

Tiki rerolls last and first attack:

Tiki attack - (1d20+9)[26] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[15]
Tiki attack - (1d20+4)[18] Tiki damage - (1d8+7)[15]

[Keld Denar]

All hits, but you targeted the wrong foe! The Cheimothnes still had a ton of health left.

That brings us to Cs turn. Aura of Lethal Cold - (1d6)[5]
5' down and full attack Tiki.
Sting1 - (1d20+19)[28]Miss - (1d100)[72]Sting1Dmg - (2d4+7)[13][roll=Cold1]1d6]
Sting2 - (1d20+19)[20]Miss - (1d100)[12]Sting2Dmg - (2d4+7)[10][roll=Cold2]1d6]
Sting3 - (1d20+19)[36]Miss - (1d100)[91]Sting3Dmg - (2d4+7)[12][roll=Cold3]1d6]
Sting4 - (1d20+19)[34]Miss - (1d100)[90]Sting4Dmg - (2d4+7)[10][roll=Cold4]1d6]
Claw1 - (1d20+17)[25]Miss - (1d100)[6]Claw1Dmg - (2d8+7)[15][roll=Cold5]1d6]
Claw2 - (1d20+17)[24]Miss - (1d100)[68]Claw2Dmg - (2d8+7)[13][roll=Cold6]1d6]

John is up after this. He's blind and deaf, so he doesn't know where the Cheimothnes is, since it moved.

[Keld Denar]

rerolling cold damage for the 3 hits:
Cold1 - (1d6)[4]
Cold2 - (1d6)[4]
Cold3 - (1d6)[5]

[Starbuck_II]

Tiki down then too: too bad evasion doesn't help.

So I'll have to roll stablizing checks next round.

Only John is left. Great!
John uses his touch to heal himself again (not like he can see or hear the enemy):
John healing - (1d8)[1]

Then he moves into where he thinks enemy square is (if he is right then he will bump into it and that way he can tell where it is)

But since you moved he lands in an empty square at K-12. He will attack O next I guess (assuming he doesn't move).

[Keld Denar]

Looks like we can pretty much call it from here. The Oimozon probably won't attack John, since it only has a few more hp left, but it still has its breath weapon. The Cheimothnes still has its Gate left, and could get 1-2 Kataklaions with a 50% chance. It would probably shred him in another couple rounds as well, provided his fire shield doesn't get him.

You did well though. I learned a lot about the monsters, and passed a long a TON of criticism along to Afroakuma, the creater of all these monsters. Hopefully, that will adjust the balance just a bit.

And it was kind of a low EL14 encounter. It started as:
1 Oimozones, CR 10
1 Cheimothnes, CR 8
4 Kataklaions, CR6 each, for EL10.
6 Polytrotos, CR2 each, for EL7ish.

So, even if you rounded everything up to CR10, that would be an EL14 encounter. Since you have the 8 and the 7 in there, its probably closer to 13.25 or so. I dunno, I'm not super good at calculating ELs.

Did you have fun?

[Starbuck_II]

Yeah, I did.

I learned a few things:

Berserker Strength variant is underpowered. The fact that they made it 5/level (always 1 below 1/2 life assuming Con 10) is surprising.

If they had made it 6 or 7/level: it would have actually activated before he was about dead and he could have done something about it.

Well, now I know in actual play.

I learned that John and Tiki were te Star MVPs: they lasted the longest.

Vincent should have buffed more with spells the party.

If Afros cool with a second new party (might mix/match the party) I'd play.

[Keld Denar]

Yea, Berzerker Rage is pretty bad, especailly considering a high Con.

Go ahead and throw together a new party. We could even do a 3/day type of thing, if you want. 3 APL+1-2 EL encounters in a row, to simulate a standard adventuring day, or do one big APL+4 EL encounter again. You already know most of the mid-low level guys, so maybe bump your APL up to 13-14 and I'll set a new encounter? How does that sound?

And I'm sure Afroakuma wouldn't have any problem with more playtesting. I've already given him about 10-20 points of insight, from the fact that most of the Lamenti are supposed to rival demons of relative power, yet most of them lack DR and elemental resistances. Also tweaked some of the feats and SLAs to make different ones more/less powerful, and clarified some vague issues, like how often an Oimozones can use its Wail ability, which I think is the thing that really turned the tide in that battle. I seriously though you were gonna pull through until that Wail knocked Grentel out of the fight. If you could have kept the heat off Tiki for 1 more round, he probably would have won the day for you.

[afroakuma]

Go ahead and throw together a new party. We could even do a 3/day type of thing, if you want. 3 APL+1-2 EL encounters in a row, to simulate a standard adventuring day, or do one big APL+4 EL encounter again. You already know most of the mid-low level guys, so maybe bump your APL up to 13-14 and I'll set a new encounter? How does that sound?

Or you could try him against some Inevitables or slaadi.

And I'm sure Afroakuma wouldn't have any problem with more playtesting.

Not at all.

I've already given him about 10-20 points of insight, from the fact that most of the Lamenti are supposed to rival demons of relative power, yet most of them lack DR and elemental resistances.

You did note that they all (as a race) have sonic resistance 20 and acid resistance 10, and are immune to many enchantments and most illusions?

I'm quite looking forward to seeing another trial.

[Starbuck_II]

Yeah, Wail sucked. Grentel isn't that buff in the Will area.

Only way around that would get that Con to Will save feat in PHB 2, but kinda hard as he'd need endurance as Prereq.

So ECL 13 party? Sure I could up my dudes.

You''ll probably see a few old faces (and a few new).

Against: Sure, 3 ECL +1/+2 are fine. ECL +4's are iffy ones that go both ways.

The biggest trouble was you were had time to summon/think under that fog cloud. I had no Gust of Wind to defeat it (Dispel magic might have worked too maybe).

[Keld Denar]

See, I was actually counting on the dispel or gust. Then the Polytrotos would have effectively killed your caster by nerfting his CL down to the point where you wouldn't have been able to affect anything with spells. And if you didn't, I'd have time to buff. Either way, its a win for the Lamenti. I came up with that idea after my last battle with Afroakuma's EL17 group. I killed them all in 1 round, so he rewinded to the point where they summoned and sped up the summoning speed so I couldn't interupt it. I didn't have to speed it up, since the fog + Polytrotos gave me effective enough cover to perform the summoning, which nabbed me the Tetromenos and a couple more Polytrotos.

[Starbuck_II]

Yeah, I heard about that Caster draining (from the main thread) so I made sure not to hit them.

But doing so made battle drag on longer.

You really, really like them eh? Using so many.

What is there range for draining?

[Keld Denar]

I like them because they put a damper on the usual wizards win tactics. My fight? I hit almost all of them with an Evards Black Tenticles so I could move on the the bigger, meaner stuff to fight. That was bad. Not only did the EBD not actually hurt them, but my wizard got -16 CLs. He was level 11 with a CL of 12, dropping him to -4. That...sucked...

Range on the draining is whatever range the spell is. They form a link through your spell energy and suck out your soul.

So yea, I kinda treat them like guard dogs for higher caste Lamenti. Most patrols go out bring a few, just because they scare casts bad enough that they don't want to use magic, or, if they do use magic, the Lamenti have a much stronger presence because the caster is so diminished.

And if they get slaughtered? They are the lowest form of Lamenti, making them fodder, like Dretchs and Imps and whatnot. If they are destroyed, you can always spawn more.

[Starbuck_II]

Sheesh, so does the caster effect effect all caster classes or just the caster class used on it.

That would be a important distinction.

Hey, that might be an actual use for maintaining the feat called Precious Apprentice: if you caster level drops below 3, you can use that spell.

[Keld Denar]

They are only strong against magic. They don't do anything against Psionics or Shadow Magic or your ToB Initiator Level. They are really quite vulnerable to a level 1 commoner with a torch, since nothing protects them from non-magical fire! Woe be the wizard or cleric who pops of an area spell against one of these puppies though.

[afroakuma]

Granted, some of your ToB attacks will be useless anyway, since it'll be nonlethal.