Optimize or Die, Playgrounders! [E6 Balor Challenge Thread]

[Another_Poet]

I think I already wrote instructions for that somewhere in the Arcanist Build section. Essentially, use Arcane Mastery to take 10 to dispel checks. While not permitted to autofail dispel, you can voluntarily lower the caster level to 5 (minimum for level 3 spells) and take 10 for a total of 15, which automatically fails against level 7 explosive runes (Dispel DC 18).

Thanks, I'll update the list.

Point buy for this? Im assuming 28, but want to be sure.

32 is fine.

i thought you needed to kill the balor to win.

You need to decisively defeat it or otherwise render it "never again a threat." I have ruled that getting it on a different plane does not count, because frankly I am skeptical in believing that a demon prince won't find a way to come back for revenge. Other methods of defeating it without killing it, such as converting it to your willing thrall or freezing it in carbonite, are viable.

[Tyndmyr]

For me either. It's really the 35 or so feats that does it for me. I just assumed it, since it's what I'm used to.

Oddly enough, while building the characters actually on the sheets, my first thought is "damn, I wish I had more feats".

[Cespenar]

This may sound somewhat stupid, and perhaps already discussed somewhere else, but can you attack with your main hand weapon, then change hands, wield that same weapon in your off-hand and continue your full attack routine?

[jseah]

Warlock 6
- With Summon Swarm Invocation
- Has Dark Speech (feat from BoVD)

CE Old Age Human Cleric 6
- Has a Candle of Invocation
- Cloak of Charisma +4
- Base 18 Cha + 2 Age
- Max ranks in Spellcraft

Artificer 6
- Crafts a scroll of Dimensional Anchor
- Crafts 3 wands of CL8 Magic Missile
- Crafts 1 wand of Assay Spell Resistance
- Crafts 3 wands of True Casting
- 35 toughness feats (important!)

Monk 6
- Has Vow of Peace and Poverty

Tactics:
Warlock 6 summons a swarm of bats and uses Dark Speech to make them a hivemind. Dimunitive swarm = 5000 flying creatures = +97 Intelligence & Charisma = 101 Cha = Casts as a 84th level sorceror.

Monk 6 builds a bonfire. Cleric 6 casts Eagle's Splendour on himself. Artificer uses Item Alteration to convert the Cloak of Charisma's bonus to a morale bonus. Cleric 6 now has a charisma of 28.

Cleric 6 casts Magic Circle Against Evil focused inwards. Draws a Calling Diagram, taking 20 on the check for autosuccess.
Artificer 6 casts Dimensional Anchor from scroll on the Diagram. Cleric 6 burns the Candle of Invocation in the bonfire and gates the Balor into the circle.

Balor cannot use SR or Dimensional Travel to get out.
Cha check: (assuming this still applies from Lesser Planar Binding)
Balor has
+8 from charisma
-5 from Calling Diagram
= +3

DC of Cha check = 15 + 1/2 CL + cha mod
CL of Candle = 17
Cha mod = 9
DC = 32
This means the Balor autofails the cha check.

I'm not attempting to compel or control the Balor, there is no opposed cha check.

Everyone leaves the area except for Artificer 6.
He empties all 3 MM wands into the balor with the help of Assay Spell Resistance and True Casting to pierce the SR of the Balor.
3 x 50 charges = 150 castings
4d4+4 dmg = 8 minimum dmg = 1200 dmg minimum -> Balor dies
Artificer tanks the Death Throes via his 35 toughness feats (+105hp before levels)

[JeminiZero]

Tactics:
Warlock 6 summons a swarm of bats and uses Dark Speech to make them a hivemind. Dimunitive swarm = 5000 flying creatures = +97 Intelligence & Charisma = 101 Cha = Casts as a 84th level sorceror.

This sounded utterly broken to me so I checked BoVD:

The words of the Dark Speech can create a hivemind. Up to one hundred vermin or animals (none of which can have more than 1 HD) form an evil hivemind

[Cespenar]

Wait, I just thought of another idea.

Four Master Throwers, with TWF, Rapid Shot, Palm Throw and Wounding Shuriken for 10 attacks times four people = 40 constitution damage. Scrolls of Wraithstrike for near-guaranteed hits.

Anything wrong with this? It seems too easy, so something must be wrong.

[JeminiZero]

Wriathstrike only applies to melee attacks.

[Adumbration]

This sounded utterly broken to me so I checked BoVD:

There is, unfortunately, an updated version of the feat in Elder Evils, and it holds no such restrictions.

[Another_Poet]

This may sound somewhat stupid, and perhaps already discussed somewhere else, but can you attack with your main hand weapon, then change hands, wield that same weapon in your off-hand and continue your full attack routine?

It's not stupid, but no, you cannot.

[jseah]

^Edited post.

Cha check DC was miscalculated. Is actually 32. Not that it makes a difference (balor autofails by 1 by +Cha mod alone)

Cleric 6 was mistakenly named Cleric5/Marshal1 in certain areas. (it used to be a marshal dip, but since I'm not negotiating, I don't need opposed cha checks and don't need marshal)

[monkey3]

monkey3's I-Team and the Van
Status: Pending; How does your Necron have Animate Dead to get the bullette? Remember scrolls are not available.

To quote from my submission:
1) Necron: Wizard 5 / Mindbender 1
Feats Mindsight, Arcane Disciple (Undeath domain)
Items: Burrowing Saddle,
Skills: Ride (cc)

Arcane Disciple (Undeath domain) gives me Desecrate and Animate Dead as divine spells.

I only filled in what was needed for the challenge. If the gang were meant to fight other gangs, they would need more spells and powers (energy ray/ball is good to kill them one by one while staying underground with impunity. We don't need to sleep)

[Eronai_Jantig]

Out of curiosity how are you doing the judging? As in will your throughout the day periodically update the first post to tell us who did not win or whatever? And how are you determining 1st place? By who posted first? I don't expect to win first place, I'm hoping for an honorable mention, but I love my "Behind the DM screen" views of these things :)

[dextercorvia]

I forgot to mention that my guys have Mindblank up. It must have slipped my mind. This should prevent the Balor from being able to detect them ahead of time, and just leave. (Although, a Balor fleeing from 3 6th level characters should count as a win.)

[Eronai_Jantig]

Soooo....any update?

[Another_Poet]

Haven't forgotten you guys but I have to go to an IRL challenge right now - the GM from our Ravenloft group agreed to let me pit my 7th level wizard (on his own) against Strahd and 2 walking suits of armour in an exhibition match.

Winners hopefully announced Friday!!!

ap

[Eronai_Jantig]

Haven't forgotten you guys but I have to go to an IRL challenge right now - the GM from our Ravenloft group agreed to let me pit my 7th level wizard (on his own) against Strahd and 2 walking suits of armour in an exhibition match.

Winners hopefully announced Friday!!!

ap

Cool, thanks, and good luck :)

[Tyndmyr]

I forgot to mention that my guys have Mindblank up. It must have slipped my mind. This should prevent the Balor from being able to detect them ahead of time, and just leave. (Although, a Balor fleeing from 3 6th level characters should count as a win.)

I would presume the Balor fleeing isn't a likely scenario, given that the challenge springs from WLD, in which the Balor is a prisoner. Especially fleeing from a level 6 party before combat even happens, that seems like it'd be against the whole spirit of the challenge.

[dextercorvia]

I would presume the Balor fleeing isn't a likely scenario, given that the challenge springs from WLD, in which the Balor is a prisoner. Especially fleeing from a level 6 party before combat even happens, that seems like it'd be against the whole spirit of the challenge.

True. But, you never can be too careful when you are planning to permanently enslave a Balor at 6th level. Mindblank seemed worth mentioning.

[Tyndmyr]

Oh, its always a good idea. Just in case.

[Adumbration]

Bumpity-bumpity bump, waiting for results.

[DwarvenExodus]

Quick Question - What does The Good, The Bad And The Ugly have to do with E6?

Also,

[Boci]

Quick Question - What does The Good, The Bad And The Ugly have to do with E6?

Everyone is making E6 characters who have as much XP as a level 20 character.

Also,

Err, no. There has been no thread necromancery here at all. Please, check the last date before posting your fancy pic.

[Swordguy]

Quick Question - What does The Good, The Bad And The Ugly have to do with E6?

Also,

Thread necromancy?! The last post was two days ago!

[Daremonai]

Thread necromancy?! The last post was two days ago!

The first post was only a little over a week ago...

Slightly on topic - I knew that 3.5 was full of loopholes and such, but some of what you're doing on this thread is unbelievable (though my DM would assuredly ban me from all games and probably driven out of town if I even thought of using any of it)

[Swordguy]

Slightly on topic - I knew that 3.5 was full of loopholes and such, but some of what you're doing on this thread is unbelievable (though my DM would assuredly ban me from all games and probably driven out of town if I even thought of using any of it)

Heh, welcome to GITP and CharOp. The viewpoint (commonly, but not universally held on these forums) that this is the intended method of play and vociferous arguments that it's the right way to play (and if you don't, you're hurting your group and thus by inference playing 'wrong') are a large reason why I post very seldom anymore.

While we're waiting on Another Poet to announce the winners, which ones did you prefer?

[Boci]

Heh, welcome to GITP and CharOp. The viewpoint (commonly, but not universally held on these forums) that this is the intended method of play and vociferous arguments that it's the right way to play (and if you don't, you're hurting your group and thus by inference playing 'wrong') are a large reason why I post very seldom anymore.

WTF? How many people have you seen saying the builds on this thread are the right way to play D&D? The T is there for a reason you know.

[Human Paragon 3]

I knew that 3.5 was full of loopholes and such, but some of what you're doing on this thread is unbelievable (though my DM would assuredly ban me from all games and probably driven out of town if I even thought of using any of it)

Can we use that for the brochure?

[Swordguy]

WTF? How many people have you seen saying the builds on this thread are the right way to play D&D? The T is there for a reason you know.

I have no desire to debate the point. Thusly, I'll state my position once and back out until the winner of the thread is announced. If you disagree, you are welcome to have the last word. I am...passionate...about my gaming beliefs, and don't feel like picking up another infraction for arguing my point strongly enough that a mod might feel I'm flaming or trolling.

Warning: longer than I intended when I started typing

Spoiler

Show

Over the last several years I've posted here, I have witnessed, on a multitude of occasions, posters attacked by other posters for arguing against deliberate optimization of character. Now, when I say "optimization", I do NOT mean "picking something good for the character". I mean optimization such as much of what is found in this thread - taking deliberate advantage of loopholes and poorly-designed rules to create characters that, while extremely competent in their intended roles, are utterly beyond what the game was intended to support at a given level. Whether that is through Ubercharging, Power Attack abuse, Xtreme Spellcasting (9th level spells at 6th level, let's say), Tippyverse Wizards, CoDzilla, or Diplomancy - to give a representative but by no means exhaustive list - the obsessive need to maximize the numbers on a character sheet and reduce any possibility of risk or failure to as close to 0% as possible is abhorrent to me as a gamer.

What is worse is the reaction that certain members of the Playground have displayed when a person posts a character build that is deliberately not optimized. There is a display from the general GiTP population that if you do not optimize your character, you gimp your group mechanically (say, by playing a Fighter or Monk). For quite some time, people were accused of playing the game "wrong" by doing this, until the mods started really enforcing the "don't disparage other people's gaming proclivities" rule. Now it's just heavily inferred that you're actively hurting your group by not optimizing to the best of the internet's ability.

I, for one, dislike the arms race that this engenders between players, and between the players and the DM. The heavy CharOp that this forum is known for puts the focus on what I feel is the unimportant part of the game. As long as your numbers are good enough to give you a reasonable chance of success on your normal actions (40-55% or thereabouts), I feel that the mechanics don't further matter.

So, when I say something like:

"the viewpoint (commonly, but not universally held on these forums) that this is the intended method of play"

please understand that the "this" refers to heavy CharOp in general. I know the designers. I'm related to one. I've spoken with them several times on this very topic. The sort of play that the GitP Groupmind (and every forum has a Groupmind, by the way - nothing wrong with that) espouses in general is NOT, and never way, the intended method of play. It frustrates and enrages me when I see people put down for their choice to play a monk, or fighter, or single-class rogue. It is a totally valid opinion that they want to play a Fighter, not a Warblade. They may not want to "just refluff" everything. They may not want to deal with the extra complexity. They may just care more about what they roleplay than what their numbers are. But those ideas, by and large and for whatever reason, are anathema here.

Thus, I comment less often. I am tired of spitting into the wind on this topic. This is a d20-focused, CharOp-heavy forum, and will not change. The characters posted in this thread are in that vein; character builds designed to break the game wide open, balance-wise. A Balor is not an encounter to be fought like any other encounter at 6th level. It is designed to be a plot point, a cutscene, or the focus of some massive quest to" bring it down to your level". Hell, the E6 guide even explicitly states this, using the similarly-CR'd Titan as an example. If the majority of this forum was not focused on CharOp, I believe you'd see a large number of responses NOT focusing on numbers and instead trying to set up game situations where the Balors abilities are weakened or negated. Instead of trying to beat it via math, they'd be trying to beat it by extralinear thinking.

In short, it's just the way the Playground is. For example, I know that you, Boci, enjoy the act of CharOp. You've said precisely that in the past. I think that many of the people who post here do, and they indulge that enjoyment in this forum. I do not condemn it - I just accept that this is the wave of the future in gaming thought and go my merry way, lurking much of the time and posting when something unique pops up. Who am I to "forbid" somebody from taking part in an activity they enjoy? If other people want to play in such a way as to achieve 100% risk avoidance and make the outcome of adventuring a foregone conclusion unless the DM engages them back in the CharOp arms race, then more power to them. I'll simply not take part.

[Daremonai]

I've been reading the forums for a while now, and there does generally seem to be an undercurrent of "you must be at least this optimised to play" - but the group I play with don't really subscribe to that rule of thought, and that's how we like it - particularly our woefully unlucky monk.

On the other hand, I do enjoy the kind of theoretical rulesmongering that fills this thread - if nothing else, it's a massive exercise in lateral thinking, maths and memory.

To answer your question Swordguy, the artificer with the wands of True Casting, Magic Missile et.al. is my favourite so far - how else could you make non-improved Toughness worth the feat slot(s)?

[Tyndmyr]

The first post was only a little over a week ago...

Slightly on topic - I knew that 3.5 was full of loopholes and such, but some of what you're doing on this thread is unbelievable (though my DM would assuredly ban me from all games and probably driven out of town if I even thought of using any of it)

Depends on the game. I've played in games where my single classed barbarian, walking around naked with a +1 weapon did the majority of a 9 person party's damage. People apparently used builds like sorc 2/wiz 2/bard 1/monk 2. For that game, I was optimized, despite doing absolutely nothing but adding new levels of barbarian every level.

In another game I played, I was the god wizard, accompanied by invisible flying assassins, an early entry MT abusing WoC, using tricks such as invisible solid fog and breaking WBL with wall of iron. Everyone optimized, it was expected.

In short, the amount of optimization appropriate depends on the game. For an optimization challenge to take down a balor with an E6 party, a fair amount of optimization is appropriate.