Help me with a "Boss" encounter?

[BladeofObliviom]

Or three of them, I guess.

My Antagonist(s) for this arc of the campaign are a trio of Mind Flayers building themselves a power base in the City of Sigil.

Spoiler: Details

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They've already made themselves a lair and established a cashflow and food supply via an "investment business" (aka Loansharks abusing psychic powers to convince people to take bad deals for which the default penalty is brains), so now they're trying to get decent minions. Now, because they're smart enough to avoid relying heavily on mercenaries to protect their resources, and because they're mindflayers, they've chosen a somewhat ambitious recruitment method.

Elsewhere in the city, there is a mad Beholder "sculptor" who is a bit more cunning than most; it generally pretends to be a friendly creature, inviting victims in for a meal, then shows them some of its sculpture before begging them to model for a likeness. (Being a Beholder, it just uses Flesh to Stone once they take the position it wants rather than going through the effort of chiseling stone into the correct shape.) The Mind Flayers pay mid-level adventurers an advance fee (in addition to promising more pay when the job is done) to investigate a dungeon-like set of abandoned homes where this Beholder happens to live. Then, when these people are predictably defeated by a Beholder who isn't really a fair encounter at low level, the Mind Flayers have a servant approach the Beholder to purchase these "sculptures" and take them back to the Illithid lair. The Beholder loves that its sculptures are appreciated (as it believes that they're resold at a market somewhere).

Once they have these subdued adventurers, they use Stone-to-Flesh on them and take advantage of the disorientation and confusion to brainsuck them one-by-one. They proceed to turn these adventurers into Voidmind Creatures (MM3), generating utterly-loyal (as in, they cannot disobey), fairly strong, permanent minions. (As a side benefit, they can also usually recoup most of what they paid these adventurers in the first place.)

The Mind Flayers feel like this is a fairly low-risk plan; they pay a Beholder some jink to capture their slaves for them, but they don't put themselves in combat, don't risk wasting any of their current assets, and it's fairly difficult to tie them to the disappearances other than as the people trying to do something about it. And if some adventurer succeeds in killing the Beholder, hey! Pay them and shove them on their merry way, crisis averted.

The PCs are tenth level (low-to-mid optimization) going in and an example of the Mind Flayers getting a little cocky with their recruitment. I plan to lay enough pieces of this evidence near them that they'll be able to figure out what's going on, however, and I'd like to have an encounter ready should they choose to confront their employers.

Anyway, the problem here is that Mind Flayers can be kind of un-fun as opponents in a straight fight (lots of Save-or-Lose effects, and really kind of pushovers if you come prepared to deal with those) compounding all of the issues that come with a boss fight in 3.5 and Pathfinder. The fact that there are three of them (with possible Voidmind Adventurer support) somewhat evens out the action economy issue, but I want an EL 14 or 15 encounter to make a fairly difficult "boss fight" for a party of four PCs having gained a level or two from their current point.

This is a 3.P game (mostly Pathfinder, but I've told them that they can use 3.5 stuff so long as they run it by me first), and obviously I'm already using 3.5 content since there are Illithids and Beholders flying around.

The basic tools with which to construct this encounter are a variable number of adventurers of level 8 or lower with the Voidmind template, as well as a Trio of Illithids whom I am not averse to giving class levels to. There is also the option, since this would take place on enemy ground, of having the battlefield be an extra hazard, though probably using too many traps as the villains live here. They Mind Flayers will have time to prepare for the encounter unless the PCs attempt to scry and fry, as they'll have to fight their way through the voidminds guarding the doors.

What do you guys think? How many extra voidminds should I throw in, and of what kind? How many class levels should I give the Illithids, and what levels? Should they all be the same class, or should they specialize differently? What kinds of tactics should they use? Etc. Etc.

[Ephemeral_Being]

Forget the mind stun. Go for direct damage. It stops the battle from being a "save or die" fight.

Use the Psionic Mindflayers. Add the power Energy Missile to their list. Shoot a 9pp bolt (which is the maximum on the default Illithids, IIRC) from each of the three every round. Destroy weapons, staffs, wands. Anything that the party draws upon to use in a fight. Have them ready actions to destroy anything new that they pull out of their bags. Really make your party think. And then, just blast them. I think they have ten rounds of Psionic Powers, even using missiles with the maximum amount of PP. That's plenty.

Stick a few thralls in front of them as a defensive line, and you've got a pretty nice encounter. CR15 should net you the 3, CR7 Illithids and 9, level eight Thralls. If those are a mix of ranged fighters preparing to disrupt your party's spellcasting with readied actions, and a few front-line men to keep the party off the Illithids then you should be set.

[(Un)Inspired]

What's your party made up of? Do they have access to flight and teleportation? Summoning? These are the things to look out for if you want to put a wall of meat between your squids and your party.

I would put each of your mind flayers in the air. There's no reason not to give them psionic or magical flight. Give you void minded dudes range weapons to pound any flying PCs.

I support the energy missile plan.

[Brendanicus]

Ephemeral had a good idea with attacking equipment. The best way to annoy PC's is to hit them in the loot. :P

A bigger question to ask is where they will be fighting, and what kinds of things the environment can offer. It's always important to ensure that you have the environment be a factor in encounters, especially in big boss battle.

Maybe add in magical orbs that the Mind Flayers can use to fire deadly bolts of lightening, but covers the room in wonky spell effects if broken. Maybe their hideout is decrepit, and many of its walls/support beams can be shattered by barbarian minions. Maybe there are vats of strange goo that the PC's could end up falling inside. Maybe the Mind Flayers have a pet monster in addition to adventuring minions. Maybe one adventurer is a Kobold Rogue who hastily rigs the boss room with traps wile other minions fight the PC's outside it. Maybe the Mindflayers re-Flesh-to-Stone some of their own minions when they aren't needed, to cut down on food costs and the like. Such minions could be un-frozen mid-fight to screw with the PC's. Maybe one of the adventurers was a young Silver Dragon.

[Nibbens]

A bigger question to ask is where they will be fighting, and what kinds of things the environment can offer. It's always important to ensure that you have the environment be a factor in encounters, especially in big boss battle.

I agree with this. Environment is what makes it instead of "just another bossfight" to "the epic duel with the mindflayers atop the clocktower which adds all these gears and mechanisms as traps when the players get caught in them," etc.

[Brendanicus]

I agree with this. Environment is what makes it instead of "just another bossfight" to "the epic duel with the mindflayers atop the clocktower which adds all these gears and mechanisms as traps when the players get caught in them," etc.

Hell, my last session ended with the party fighting a half-fiend sorcerer while trying to escape being sucked into a rift in space-time. It was awesome!

[Keld Denar]

I've used voidmind trolls in my Night Below game as bodyguards for illithid. They are surprisingly resilient. Acid Immunity couples really well with troll regen. Most parties default to fire just because fire is most common

If you want to be mean, use the trolls in MMIII that are only vulnerable to acid and have a stun on attack. They can be disabled, but they can't be killed easily without death magic or such.

Also, voidmind advanced direwolves are pretty nasty, just in general. Advance them up to however many HD you need and apply the template. Trips AND tentacles!

[AlanBruce]

Also, voidmind advanced direwolves are pretty nasty, just in general. Advance them up to however many HD you need and apply the template. Trips AND tentacles!

I forget if the Voidmind Template gives the creature extra reach with tentacles, but this image came to mind…


And then I read the template and you onle get 1 tentacle attack, albeit 5ft. longer reach. Still, as a fluff image and description, it should work, although the template specifies the tentacle comes from the creature's head.

[Nibbens]

Hell, my last session ended with the party fighting a half-fiend sorcerer while trying to escape being sucked into a rift in space-time. It was awesome!

Nice! My players all seem to remember fighting a bunch of cave fishers in a hidden section of an abandoned quartz mine - with huge quartz crystals everywhere. (think Naica Crystal Cave without the un-survivable heat) When they finally slaughtered the Cave Fishers who were stalking them from the ledges above, hundreds of cave fishers started to swarm from a hole. It started an intense race to get the PCs to the rope that they had to use to get in the mine in the first place. They kept slipping down the rope because of all the heavy armor messing up their climb checks. One pc - after falling down to the bottom, slashed the leather straps on his magic armor to climb up the rope unimpeded.
After detonating a barrel of gunpowder in the cave to stop the horde, they were finally able to breathe easy and go back to town - a bit worse for wear, but safe.

Probably the best part was that over half of the encounter was unplanned and just sort of happened.

So yes, environment can do wonders to make any encounter more memorable.

[daremetoidareyo]

This is Sigil. Even the good folks of Sigil would agree that those Mindflayers don't necessarily need to be killed, they just need to be stopped. On top of that, it is ok to have BBEG that the PCs are incapable of killing yet: it totally forces creativity. Creativity makes the game super fun. How do the PCs stop this behavior if they can't win a direct confrontation? Let them discuss it a bit.

Spoiler: What I would do with a rogue/bard PC

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The mindflayer's plan totally fails if the PCs go public. An outfit that is forcing people into bad deals that lead to brain eating, run by three creatures that each need to eat at least a brain a week = huge city liability. A bard could ruin their outfit.

Further, maybe I'm a bit of a scumbag PC, but I would go to the beholder and tell him the absolute truth. Especially if I felt that my crew was capable of taking out the mind flayers with a beholder ally, I would suggest that we posse up and smash their putrid braineating faces. "What an insult to an artiste! Who the heck do they think they are to despoil what must be the most phenomenal art in the city? If you have any self respect as a creature of integrity, let alone, an ARTIST, who cannot let this dishonor stand!"
Depending on how many rays & hp the beholder uses up in the showdown with the illithids, the party can then turn on him and get rid of two mortalkillers that live in the town.


If I felt that my party couldn't beat the mind flayers in combat alongside a beholder ally, at a minimum, I just ruined their business. Did I mention that I did this all while using my disgusting disguise check, on top of which I used alter self? That is an important safety detail, sorry. Anyways, that leaves the mind flayer with 2 options: rebuild a new business model which will be much more sloppy to start, or move out of town. There is a bard in town, slandering their name (with the truth) who seems to be selectively performing near powerful establishments of law plus the mindflayers can't get anymore stonetoflesh cronies, and they had to kill a beholder and may have their own casualties to deal with. They gonna get hungry and desperate.


Then, if one were to polish the character's shear ironclad vessels of reproduction, they could approach the mindflayers to find out who this bard is and put a stop to him for a hefty sum, you know, if my PC has some sort of ability to block or alter detectable thoughts. Then...I don't know, milk it for a while, get so close, but need an extra dispensation for a scroll of dimensional anchor and maybe a wand of hold monster, as hold person didn't seem to work. Level up a little with my buddies and come back, using the scrolls that the flayers paid for to stomp them with our additional hit dice.

All you have to do is make sure the PCs have access to knowledge for how powerful the mindflayers are, then don't back down from them being tough. Creative PCs can use knowledge checks and underhanded scheming to get around the obstacle. Tell them out of character that the mindflayers are tough villains, at least as powerful as what they see in the MM, if not moreso, and let the characters make their own decisions. Even if the party is wiped out, your hands are clean, charging into battle recklessly doesn't solve every problem. Sometimes you need to set up an ambush. Sometimes you need to curry favor. Sometimes you need to turn one enemy against another. Assuming your PCs aren't all dumb barbarians, they can figure that out. This is a city, not a dungeon. The world is their oyster.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Use the Psionic Mind Flayer variant in XPH, which replaces their spell-like abilities with the psionic manifesting of a 9th level Psion (Telepath). Give each of them Psicrystal Affinity, Share Pain, and Vigor. Each one keeps Share Pain active on their psicrystal so they take half damage from all sources, and the psicrystal's Hardness 8 reduces every instance of damage it takes from Share Pain by that much, regardless of the original attack's type. They should each keep their psicrystal in a compartment on their person so opponents never have line of sight/effect to it and cannot target it directly or hit it with area effects. Each psicrystal can have a Healing Belt which it uses to heal its master during the fight as needed. They should share buffs with their psicrystals, namely Vigor. They can use Schism to help with action economy, and it's useful for refreshing Vigor frequently.

Their powers of choice should include Crystal Shard, Energy Stun, Energy Missile (via Expanded Knowledge) especially to target spell component pouches and divine foci, Time Hop to target weapons, Telekinetic Force/Thrust, Dispel Psionics which has funny wording on its augmentation, and of course give each one Psionic Freedom of Movement along with plenty of AC buffs. At least one should have Psionic True Seeing, and at least one should have Psionic Plane Shift.

[Brendanicus]

Nice! My players all seem to remember fighting a bunch of cave fishers in a hidden section of an abandoned quartz mine - with huge quartz crystals everywhere. (think Naica Crystal Cave without the un-survivable heat) When they finally slaughtered the Cave Fishers who were stalking them from the ledges above, hundreds of cave fishers started to swarm from a hole. It started an intense race to get the PCs to the rope that they had to use to get in the mine in the first place. They kept slipping down the rope because of all the heavy armor messing up their climb checks. One pc - after falling down to the bottom, slashed the leather straps on his magic armor to climb up the rope unimpeded.
After detonating a barrel of gunpowder in the cave to stop the horde, they were finally able to breathe easy and go back to town - a bit worse for wear, but safe.

Probably the best part was that over half of the encounter was unplanned and just sort of happened.

So yes, environment can do wonders to make any encounter more memorable.

That's awesome. The best encounters are ones that both use the environment and force the PC's to resort to a plan B.

[BladeofObliviom]

Wow, first off, thanks for all the feedback! I tried to break the quotes up by subject to respond more efficiently.

Spoiler: Party Composition

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What's your party made up of? Do they have access to flight and teleportation? Summoning? These are the things to look out for if you want to put a wall of meat between your squids and your party.

I would put each of your mind flayers in the air. There's no reason not to give them psionic or magical flight. Give you void minded dudes range weapons to pound any flying PCs.

I support the energy missile plan.

Ah, probably should have specified that! Sorry.

The first player is a Minotaur with two levels of fighter and two of Paladin. This is quite probably the least optimized character here, played by the player least likely to pursue clever problem-solving (which is just as well given that the character has 8 Int...). I decided to waive the Level Adjustment here, as six RHD hurts enough I think.

The second is a human rogue built mostly for mundane stealth and flanking, though she has some good roleplaying skills and decent social stats. Not a bard, but probably the next best thing.

The third is a half-orc sorcerer, though I don't remember his spells known. I remember he had a liking for illusions though. The player is also a good roleplayer and fond of cerebral solutions to problems, though the character is only good at bluffing skill-points-wise.

The fourth is a Cleric of...something. I don't recall his deity off the top of my head, but it was one of the standard PF deities. Desna, maybe? I haven't played much with him before, so I don't know how he approaches problems yet. He's dating player 2, though, and played in a game that player 3 DMed, so they're probably a more cerebral problem-solver based on what I've heard from them.

Spoiler: Direct Enemy Design/Tactics

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Forget the mind stun. Go for direct damage. It stops the battle from being a "save or die" fight.

Use the Psionic Mindflayers. Add the power Energy Missile to their list. Shoot a 9pp bolt (which is the maximum on the default Illithids, IIRC) from each of the three every round. Destroy weapons, staffs, wands. Anything that the party draws upon to use in a fight. Have them ready actions to destroy anything new that they pull out of their bags. Really make your party think. And then, just blast them. I think they have ten rounds of Psionic Powers, even using missiles with the maximum amount of PP. That's plenty.

Stick a few thralls in front of them as a defensive line, and you've got a pretty nice encounter. CR15 should net you the 3, CR7 Illithids and 9, level eight Thralls. If those are a mix of ranged fighters preparing to disrupt your party's spellcasting with readied actions, and a few front-line men to keep the party off the Illithids then you should be set.

Use the Psionic Mind Flayer variant in XPH, which replaces their spell-like abilities with the psionic manifesting of a 9th level Psion (Telepath). Give each of them Psicrystal Affinity, Share Pain, and Vigor. Each one keeps Share Pain active on their psicrystal so they take half damage from all sources, and the psicrystal's Hardness 8 reduces every instance of damage it takes from Share Pain by that much, regardless of the original attack's type. They should each keep their psicrystal in a compartment on their person so opponents never have line of sight/effect to it and cannot target it directly or hit it with area effects. Each psicrystal can have a Healing Belt which it uses to heal its master during the fight as needed. They should share buffs with their psicrystals, namely Vigor. They can use Schism to help with action economy, and it's useful for refreshing Vigor frequently.

Their powers of choice should include Crystal Shard, Energy Stun, Energy Missile (via Expanded Knowledge) especially to target spell component pouches and divine foci, Time Hop to target weapons, Telekinetic Force/Thrust, Dispel Psionics which has funny wording on its augmentation, and of course give each one Psionic Freedom of Movement along with plenty of AC buffs. At least one should have Psionic True Seeing, and at least one should have Psionic Plane Shift.

I was actually considering using the Psionic Mindflayers, mostly just for an excuse to utilize the Psionics rules, but this is an equally good reason. Direct Damage threats are generally more fun than getting stunlocked for 5d4 rounds as well, so having something to facilitate that is good. These are all good ideas for a challenging fight without resorting to save-or-lose, and I have little else to say about them.

Spoiler: Environment

Show

Ephemeral had a good idea with attacking equipment. The best way to annoy PC's is to hit them in the loot. :P

A bigger question to ask is where they will be fighting, and what kinds of things the environment can offer. It's always important to ensure that you have the environment be a factor in encounters, especially in big boss battle.

Maybe add in magical orbs that the Mind Flayers can use to fire deadly bolts of lightening, but covers the room in wonky spell effects if broken. Maybe their hideout is decrepit, and many of its walls/support beams can be shattered by barbarian minions. Maybe there are vats of strange goo that the PC's could end up falling inside. Maybe the Mind Flayers have a pet monster in addition to adventuring minions. Maybe one adventurer is a Kobold Rogue who hastily rigs the boss room with traps wile other minions fight the PC's outside it. Maybe the Mindflayers re-Flesh-to-Stone some of their own minions when they aren't needed, to cut down on food costs and the like. Such minions could be un-frozen mid-fight to screw with the PC's. Maybe one of the adventurers was a young Silver Dragon.

I agree with this. Environment is what makes it instead of "just another bossfight" to "the epic duel with the mindflayers atop the clocktower which adds all these gears and mechanisms as traps when the players get caught in them," etc.

Hell, my last session ended with the party fighting a half-fiend sorcerer while trying to escape being sucked into a rift in space-time. It was awesome!

Nice! My players all seem to remember fighting a bunch of cave fishers in a hidden section of an abandoned quartz mine - with huge quartz crystals everywhere. (think Naica Crystal Cave without the un-survivable heat) When they finally slaughtered the Cave Fishers who were stalking them from the ledges above, hundreds of cave fishers started to swarm from a hole. It started an intense race to get the PCs to the rope that they had to use to get in the mine in the first place. They kept slipping down the rope because of all the heavy armor messing up their climb checks. One pc - after falling down to the bottom, slashed the leather straps on his magic armor to climb up the rope unimpeded.
After detonating a barrel of gunpowder in the cave to stop the horde, they were finally able to breathe easy and go back to town - a bit worse for wear, but safe.

Probably the best part was that over half of the encounter was unplanned and just sort of happened.

So yes, environment can do wonders to make any encounter more memorable.

Alright, this is enough agreement that a good, memorable fight needs a good, memorable arena for me to reconsider just staging it in a private room past their lobby. Maybe they have an underground sanctum or something for privacy. I dunno really, even just having some placed tools for them might keep things interesting. Maybe even just Wall of Force traps to thwart attempts to charge them in melee.

I'd need to think about this one some more. Feel free to pitch further ideas!

Spoiler: Nonstandard Voidminds

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I've used voidmind trolls in my Night Below game as bodyguards for illithid. They are surprisingly resilient. Acid Immunity couples really well with troll regen. Most parties default to fire just because fire is most common

If you want to be mean, use the trolls in MMIII that are only vulnerable to acid and have a stun on attack. They can be disabled, but they can't be killed easily without death magic or such.

Also, voidmind advanced direwolves are pretty nasty, just in general. Advance them up to however many HD you need and apply the template. Trips AND tentacles!

[IMG]snip[/IMG]

I forget if the Voidmind Template gives the creature extra reach with tentacles, but this image came to mind…


And then I read the template and you onle get 1 tentacle attack, albeit 5ft. longer reach. Still, as a fluff image and description, it should work, although the template specifies the tentacle comes from the creature's head.

While grabbing a Direwolf or Troll via quest-scam is fairly unlikely, I do suppose that Illithids are not well-known for restricting their tentacles to just one pie at a time, and running concurrent plots would be both in-character and probably smart. It also means that even a successful use of Daremeto's plot down below might simply inconvenience rather than ruin them, since Mindflayers are well known for keeping contingency plans ready just in case.

The troll in particular, whilst probably not something I'd carelessly toss into an encounter, might make for an interesting threat if they survive to become a recurring villain. I wouldn't put it past Mindflayers to breed a nearly invulnerable thrall and use it to pursue revenge later on. Might make for an interesting monster that pretty much can't be beaten conventionally, a la Dead Space's Hunter boss. Slap an item of Death Ward on it and force the PCs to knock it off a ledge or trap it in concrete or something.

Spoiler: This IS Planescape, after all

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This is Sigil. Even the good folks of Sigil would agree that those Mindflayers don't necessarily need to be killed, they just need to be stopped. On top of that, it is ok to have BBEG that the PCs are incapable of killing yet: it totally forces creativity. Creativity makes the game super fun. How do the PCs stop this behavior if they can't win a direct confrontation? Let them discuss it a bit.

Spoiler: What I would do with a rogue/bard PC

Show

The mindflayer's plan totally fails if the PCs go public. An outfit that is forcing people into bad deals that lead to brain eating, run by three creatures that each need to eat at least a brain a week = huge city liability. A bard could ruin their outfit.

Further, maybe I'm a bit of a scumbag PC, but I would go to the beholder and tell him the absolute truth. Especially if I felt that my crew was capable of taking out the mind flayers with a beholder ally, I would suggest that we posse up and smash their putrid braineating faces. "What an insult to an artiste! Who the heck do they think they are to despoil what must be the most phenomenal art in the city? If you have any self respect as a creature of integrity, let alone, an ARTIST, who cannot let this dishonor stand!"
Depending on how many rays & hp the beholder uses up in the showdown with the illithids, the party can then turn on him and get rid of two mortalkillers that live in the town.


If I felt that my party couldn't beat the mind flayers in combat alongside a beholder ally, at a minimum, I just ruined their business. Did I mention that I did this all while using my disgusting disguise check, on top of which I used alter self? That is an important safety detail, sorry. Anyways, that leaves the mind flayer with 2 options: rebuild a new business model which will be much more sloppy to start, or move out of town. There is a bard in town, slandering their name (with the truth) who seems to be selectively performing near powerful establishments of law plus the mindflayers can't get anymore stonetoflesh cronies, and they had to kill a beholder and may have their own casualties to deal with. They gonna get hungry and desperate.


Then, if one were to polish the character's shear ironclad vessels of reproduction, they could approach the mindflayers to find out who this bard is and put a stop to him for a hefty sum, you know, if my PC has some sort of ability to block or alter detectable thoughts. Then...I don't know, milk it for a while, get so close, but need an extra dispensation for a scroll of dimensional anchor and maybe a wand of hold monster, as hold person didn't seem to work. Level up a little with my buddies and come back, using the scrolls that the flayers paid for to stomp them with our additional hit dice.

All you have to do is make sure the PCs have access to knowledge for how powerful the mindflayers are, then don't back down from them being tough. Creative PCs can use knowledge checks and underhanded scheming to get around the obstacle. Tell them out of character that the mindflayers are tough villains, at least as powerful as what they see in the MM, if not moreso, and let the characters make their own decisions. Even if the party is wiped out, your hands are clean, charging into battle recklessly doesn't solve every problem. Sometimes you need to set up an ambush. Sometimes you need to curry favor. Sometimes you need to turn one enemy against another. Assuming your PCs aren't all dumb barbarians, they can figure that out. This is a city, not a dungeon. The world is their oyster.

Heh. If my players are clever and approach the situation with care rather than simply busting the door down, they'll probably have a noticeably easier fight and some bonus xp for the trouble. It's worth noting that they operate mainly in the Hive Ward though, and going to authorities is unlikely to bear much fruit given how apathetic people there tend to be. It wouldn't be impossible to round up an angry mob or perhaps gather up some outraged NPC adventurers to help though.

I didn't think of the possibility of turning the Beholder against them, but you're right that convincing it of the truth (assuming the PCs figure out what's going on early enough for it to be relevant) would probably infuriate it to violence.

You also raise a good point that I could probably make them as powerful as I damn well please so long as I give the PCs fair warning, though. I've had bad experiences with making a boss too strong or too weak before which was really what prompted this question, though now that I think about it the PCs involved remember the nastiest fight I ever threw at them fondly even though they only won by the skin of their teeth and sheer dumb luck.


(In all probability the Mind Flayers would consider just planeshifting out and setting up elsewhere if a team of PCs and their Beholder Peon showed up at their doorstep though, since at that point the whole plan's basically gone FUBAR. Unless they felt absolutely sure they could win that fight, anyway.)

[Brendanicus]

I don't know too much about Sigil past its status of being the Lady of Pain's personal planer mish-mosh, so this might not work, but bear in mind that this showdown could easily take place on the street, provided that Sigil's non-deific law enforcement isn't too quick to respond/isn't too powerful.

If the illithids have a relatively small, crumbling hideout, a fun twist for the fight to take would to have one of the adventurer minions accidently blow up the hideout, making for a two-part fight. The first would be inside the HQ, but he second would be o the streets/rooftops/smoldering ruins of the base. obviously, give the players/mind flayers so they just don't all die unceremoniously.

As to why the base would blow up, maybe it's due to an enemy sorcerer preparing one too many Delayed Maximized Fireballs, or a trapmaking Rogue going overboard on last-resort traps. Voidmind creatures are mind-controlled, but that doesn't mean they can't misinterpret instructions unless explicitly walked through step by step.

Also, maybe throw in Invisibility or some sort of stealth for one of the Mind Flayers. The players could walk in expecting to just fight adventurers before the real boss battle, only to discover that it actually is the real boss battle! Plus, the idea of Mind Flayers attacking with unpredictable hit-and-run tactics compounded with any other enemies you want sounds delectable.

[Ephemeral_Being]

Mindflayers are intelligent creatures. Highly intelligent. They would absolutely have some kind of defensive mechanism or fortification in place.

The first thing that comes to mind are choke points. Bridges, over a chasm. Tight tunnels. But that's really obvious, and not all that unique.

I'm thinking that you use Energy Wall to build a labyrinth. Make the walls invisible. These Mindflayers would know the path that they could safely run through. But your party, unless they watched very closely, would likely walk through at least one or two of them. Strictly RAW, I'm not sure that's possible. But it'll be interesting. I would make them Sonic, and allow Listen checks to determine where these walls are. Have them emanate from a sort of speaker-ish systems along the walls and floor that could theoretically be clogged, or disrupted. Water would act as a dampener. Assorted webs, or goo too. You could theoretically find where the walls are by tracking... the destruction of objects. If you throw a small stone into a square with the energy, it would be destroyed. And I'm sure there are other things I'm missing. The walls don't prevent them from getting hit with magic. But ranged weapons/projectiles would be destroyed. Their Thralls could be positioned in the safe spots around the Labyrinth, as a block to an invading party. I can draw a picture of what I'm talking about if this doesn't make sense. The way I'm envisioning it is a labyrinth full of (conveniently) 5' square tiles. Each of which has a grate in the bottom. From these, a ring-styled Energy Wall spell with the energy radiation going inwards is generated. There's a 10' wide path through the maze, but you can't see which tiles generate sound, and which do not.

The biggest problem is going to be your party trying to find cover and heal in the middle of the maze. If they have a magical way to do that (Wall of Stone, for example) then there's no problem. But otherwise, this might take some additional thinking.

EDIT: Although, come to think of it, a Minotaur's racial ability might let him find the right way through. It depends on how you interpret "Natural Cunning," in regards to this kind of Maze. If that's the case, then this idea falls flat. When I was building my Mindflayer Underdark Campaign, I wasn't counting on having a Minotaur in the party. I was pulling from stuff I had already written for this post. I think I have another lair idea for Illithids around here somewhere. Give me a bit to find it.

[Brendanicus]

Mindflayers are intelligent creatures. Highly intelligent. They would absolutely have some kind of defensive mechanism or fortification in place.

The first thing that comes to mind are choke points. Bridges, over a chasm. Tight tunnels. But that's really obvious, and not all that unique.

This is a good concept. A very tight, slow beginning to the battle. Maybe the Mind Flayers have holes in the wall that they use to Mind Blast PC's or to have minions shoot out of. I'm picturing lots of cramped passageways, with Ranger minions posted with Rapid Shots readied. Make the PC's work to find their enemies just as much as they are fighting them at the same time.


Random idea: Wouldn't it be funny if halfway through the battle the Beholder showed up, utterly enraged, and started firing at all present in a bloodthirsty rage?

You know what would be funnier than that? Giving the Beholder a level in Barbarian.

[Nibbens]

You also raise a good point that I could probably make them as powerful as I damn well please so long as I give the PCs fair warning, though. I've had bad experiences with making a boss too strong or too weak before which was really what prompted this question, though now that I think about it the PCs involved remember the nastiest fight I ever threw at them fondly even though they only won by the skin of their teeth and sheer dumb luck.

Point of contention here. The only problem is that the PCs are heroes. You tell them "Hey, this guy is really powerful and can't be beat," and the players hear, "Hey, here's the next bad guy the DM wants us to get into open conflict with."

Be extremely careful here. I've heard of PCs totally missing all the warning signs and running headlong into the waiting jaws of death you "warned" them about.

I'd need to think about this one some more. Feel free to pitch further ideas!

Illithids can travel to the astral plane, right? How about have them walk through the front door of the illithid lair and right into a rift directly into the astral plane. Boom - the players are now in a amazingly new landscape and now have to deal with subjective gravity and lots of other environmental shenanigans that they have to deal with. (Seriously, a concentration check just to move is something they don't encounter often. lol) And of course, your Mind Flayers automatically make their movement checks every turn. lol.

[Brendanicus]

Make sure the fight is a two or three stage affair. That's something from video games D&D should totally use. It keeps things dynamic. If players keep using the same strategy for an entire long encounter, it gets boring.

Example of a 3-stage fight:

Spoiler

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Party enters the flooded lair of Grexarian the Black Dragon. The entrance to this lair involves jumping down a 30-foot wall, so while it's easy for a Medium-sized creature to get in, getting out takes a while unless you can fly. The lair is a cave, and past the entrance is a peninsula. On all sides of the peninsula is water. Grexarian keeps his lair in a clean pool of water in a back chamber of the cave, so PC's will not initially see loot.

Phase I: Diving in and out of the water like Jaws, Grexarian uses Flyby Attack to bull-rush players into the water. When a player is close to the edge of the water, Grexarian pops out to pull them in via grapple. Those who make it into the water are mauled to death by the dragon as they drown. Players who remain as far from water as possible eat acid breath/magic attacks. Grexarian also has a Scroll of Summon Monster Whatever to keep the players busy with hidden Earth Elemental minions while this is all going on.

Phase II: Once Grexarian is down to half or so health (or when he's only strong enough to resist 3 rounds of sustained combat with the PC's) he flees the lair, deciding to attack the village of peaceful, quest-giving elves instead. While fleeing, he calls loudly to the nearby tribe of worshiping Lizardfolk, beseeching them for aid. The party now has to chase down Grexarian through the swamp while avoiding Lizardfolk on their tail.

Phase III: If the party can't stop Grexarian before they reach the village, all hell breaks loose. Players will have to save townsfolk while stopping a rampaging party of lizardfolk and a flying black dragon. Perhaps Lizardfolk druids in particular create a real threat, as they will call loudly to Grexarian that they will heal him and provide buffs. Perhaps civilians are being threatened by lizardfolk berserkers. There's a lot of possibilities here. Maybe encourage the party to split in order to deal with these new threats.

That's just one example off the top of my head for a crazy encounter (actually, I might use this in a later session). Try something like that for the mind flayers.