One last thing; liches are supposed to be stronger than demiliches, except for a variant with soul gems that is roughly on par with them. Most liches do not want to become demiliches. That is not a particularly silly interaction, although it becomes one with the variant with the soul gems.
Answer: Yes and no and fully depends how where you take your lore from as there are practically 2 options you can go with and they are:
1) The Demilich is an evolved form of the lich being able strip a large portion their undead flesh away and become a freer being.
2) The Demilich is a weakened starving lich who goes into a sort of "dormant" state and waits for souls to come to power the Demilich.
So depending on where you look both are true so I don't really know the point of this post but whatever its interesting.
I was looking at the default demilich, which is what happens when a lich forgets that it needs to feed souls to its phylactery. This one is weaker than a lich.
The variant is the one that wanted to become a demilich and prepared to make the most of being a demilich. This one is a lich’s equal, and actually superior inside its lair.
You originally looked at the variant. Both are valid, though DnD lore is that the first is more common. Your last part was spot on. This is kind of leaving the scope of the thread though.
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This isn't really related to the battle between the Fighter and Wizard as it is a little showcase of the wizards capabilities when he has prep and although these are only a few strategies they are almost unparalleled in power and potency... Wish is listed a lot due to the fact it can bypass requirements. The strategies are as following:
Strategy: Pretty simple cast the "Ultimate Spell" most likely something like Wish, and just complete your goal just like that... while this not so much of a strategy as it is me showcasing that 9th level spells exist and the spells like Gate, and such are just that powerful to merit their own strategy it is still true as they are just that powerful.
Strategy: The point of this strategy is to one-shot any creature/object/thing in DnD existence (beside some deities maybe) by stacking glyphs/symbols in a isolated area like a secret room of your wizard tower or a place like the Demiplane where it makes a personal portal to a pocket dimension. By stacking multiple glyphs/symbols you are able to infinitely increase the damage output of the room so when you cast your choice of extraplanar traversal to access the pocket dimension made by Demiplane (or just cast demiplane again) you summon the portal directly beside your target with the trigger of the glyphs/symbols to be say someone either than you within a certain range. Doing this whatever is near the entrance of the portal will be essentially insta-killed and remember you don't have to just do pure damage you could also make the glyphs and symbols try to afflict conditions or have the glyphs cast many different spells there are just to many options and just having this build as just a one-shot attack doesn't show its full potential.
Strategy: Since in the lore/description the Beholders' dreams' alter reality... just make a Beholder with the True Polymorph, Simulacrum spell combo then control its dream's with Dream to alter reality as you see fit on a greater level than even wish as there is nothing that says the beholder's dreams' have limits to their power. Although since it is still is your simulacrum even without the dream altering spell you could probably still tell it to try to dream something beneficial. Of course there's something other things you could do using this strategy but ill leave it at this.
Strategy: Cast Simulacrum, then cast True Polymorph on your copy transforming it into a Adult Gold Dragon or a something else that you want to be. Then using the dragon's Change Shape into a humanoid or using Arcanist's Magic Aura's Mask option which reads as: "You choose a creature type and other spells and magical effects treat the target as if it were a creature of that type or of that alignment" to turn the target into a humanoid for all intents and purposes you can finally cast the Magic Jar spell possessing said creature. While possessing said creature lower your HP and cast the Clone spell then Power Word Kill yourself so you die as that creature and transport into the clone becoming finally the creature you wanted to be permanently with all your class levels, class features and spells becoming incredibly overpowered.
Mind you The Magnus Opus strategy works by RAW and honestly it while may seem convoluted it's quite streamline at least I think as these spells in there smaller interactions work together but when all combined form a streamline timeline of events with the only outlier being the Power Word Kill to make sure you die as that creature to permanentize the effects of the combo.
Now as for all of you out there who will say "it abuses the rules/it's not RAI," or "A DM shouldn't allow that," or whatever else you wanna say I'll say this 1. a level 20 spellcaster is already overpowered and breaks the game, 2. If I was the DM for a wizard who wants to do The Magnus Opus strategy I would congratulate their creativity and allow it, 3. remember a wizard has 20 Intelligence while the smartest people in our world would max out at like 16-17 intelligence, 4. Their are wizards in lore and such who aspire to do even greater things like straight up control all of magic and become the weave and such so one wizard becoming an adult/ancient (shadow) gold dragon or whatever shouldn't be the DM's highest concern... maybe...
Do tell if I missed something, messed something up, wrote something which is hard to read (wouldn't be surprised as this was an incredibly long post).
That fourth one is advanced. Requires prep, but oh man.
Answer: Yep quite... special but it works and that is what matters and it goes to show how certain spell combos can work out. Especially when you realize that if you breakdown the spells used for The Magnum Opus into their own strategies they are still incredibly powerful like:
1) The First strategy; True Polymorph, Simulacrum, Clone. With this you can make infinite permanent true polymorphed up to CR 20 creatures which all follow the wizard's orders and they same personalities.
2) The Second strategy; True Polymorph, and Power Word Kill is quite simple morph'em then drop'em with an instant kill.
2) The Third strategy; Arcanist's Magic Aura, with some other spells being Planar Binding, Magic Circle, and then a charm spell. With these spells you can turn a creature friendly (charm) then use Arcanist's Magic Aura (must be used on a willing creature) make the target be a celestial so you can Planar Binding, Magic Circle combo lock the target to stay as your subordinate. Though this is very strong and you can make any creature into your underling unless you get those very strong creatures it is mostly weaker than the first strategy.
The third one is very dm dependent on how good it is.
Answer: Yeah I could see that but as long as you control the beholder's dreams you should be able to control what occurs to a great extent. Additionally since you can make a beholder via True Polymorph, and Simulacrum that means the beholder will be on your side so even less control for the DM.
And mind you I'm on the side that thinks that DM's shouldn't try to "monkey paw" or mess up a player's Wish so I think this strategy should work without much room for error.
But they are not what I’d do with prep, a ninth level spell, and simulacrum. There is something more overpowered behind.
Answer: Hmm interesting... how would you have something more overpowered than The Magnus Opus and my other strategies?
Cast simulacrum normally. Have the simulacrum cast wish, using it to replicate simulacrum and create a simulacrum of you. The new one still has a ninth level spell slot to do the same thing again. All of them follow a chain of command that leads to you.
If you have prep time, I don’t know what beats that. Who wins, one gold dragon that happens to be a level 20 wizard, or a couple thousand (with the amount of prep time needed for the other one, there would be that many by now) level 20 wizards down one ninth level slot, one seventh level slot, and half their hp?
Also, the beholder one was on how much the beholder actually affects the area. They can dream things into existence, that is how they reproduce, but there are likely limits. It probably won’t be stronger than wish, and there is potential risk of a hostile beholder appearing unless you are controlling its dreams 24/7. If they can mess wish up, they can mess up the dreams of a beholder. Interesting tactic, but not reliable enough to be the first choice.
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Cast simulacrum normally. Have the simulacrum cast wish, using it to replicate simulacrum and create a simulacrum of you. The new one still has a ninth level spell slot to do the same thing again. All of them follow a chain of command that leads to you.
Answer: Oh you were talking about that... while that strategy still technically does work even with the errata of "If you cast this spell again, any duplicate you created with this spell is instantly destroyed" as it isn't "you" casting the spell repeatedly but your Simulacrum casting the spell but it still isn't the best.
The reason why It still isn't as strong as my strategies is because when you compare it to my True Polymorph, Simulacrum, Clone spell combo that makes infinite permanent up to CR 20 creatures of your choice compared to your bunch of simulacrums my strategy tend to just be better and since if I really wanted I could also use The Magnum Opus strategy to make an army of permanent spellcasting dragons.
And I'll remind you after my wizard does The Magnum Opus he can go and do the Wish, Simulacrum combo anyways but this time the simulacrums are going to be generally much stronger than the simulacrums you make since they are also going to be just wizards while mine would be wizard dragons or some other type of creature.
And just saying although I have said tis before but when you do The Magnum Opus strategy you can choose ANY CR 20 creature to transform into that means you can if you want you can become a Pit Fiend or whatever.
If you have prep time, I don’t know what beats that. Who wins, one gold dragon that happens to be a level 20 wizard, or a couple thousand (with the amount of prep time needed for the other one, there would be that many by now) level 20 wizards down one ninth level slot, one seventh level slot, and half their hp?
Answer: How about a permanent level 20 wizard Pit Fiend with an Antimagic Field spell up that is immune to like all spells and damage from non magical damage that can walk through your army as if walking through a park and mind you that same permanent level 20 wizard Pit Fiend is going to be accompanied by his own army of permanent up to CR 20 monsters (and remember my wizard could also just do the simulacrum wish strategy anyways).
So yeah I think my Invincible Pit Fiend is stronger than just basic wish simulacrum spam but of course there are many different forms other than the Pit Fiend my wizard could take that would make him even stronger.
Also, the beholder one was on how much the beholder actually affects the area. They can dream things into existence, that is how they reproduce, but there are likely limits. It probably won’t be stronger than wish, and there is potential risk of a hostile beholder appearing unless you are controlling its dreams 24/7. If they can mess wish up, they can mess up the dreams of a beholder. Interesting tactic, but not reliable enough to be the first choice.
Answer: That's why I said to just make the Beholder via Simulacrum and True Polymorph since that way you get to control when the creature sleeps and such.
PS: I was thinking of some other strategies and I though why not make a familiar via Find Familiar then True Polymorph that familiar into a dragon sized rock then cast True Polymorph again and turn your familiar into a young dragon or whatever making your familiar into a powerful creature that can act as an assistant to you.
Do tell if I missed something, messed something up or misunderstood something.
You messed up nothing there. Just combined the multiplication with the becoming a very strong creature. You didn’t actually say that you would do that before, but I did forget about the magic aura that lets you treat your cr 20 body as a humanoid and simulacrum it.
This may be the perfect way to break campaigns.
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You messed up nothing there. Just combined the multiplication with the becoming a very strong creature. You didn’t actually say that you would do that before, but I did forget about the magic aura that lets you treat your cr 20 body as a humanoid and simulacrum it.
Answer: Ah yes, Arcanist's Magic Aura is a very interesting and overlooked spell that has a very powerful ability to change ones creature type as such it is an incredibly unique spell not only for its effects but its interactions with spells.
This may be the perfect way to break campaigns.
Answer: Certainly, it is especially when the wizard can become a level 20 spellcaster with the body of a up to CR 20 creature along with an army of power simulacrums and permanent CR 20 creatures aswell.
So yeah the wizard is incredibility powerful to the point where I think the wizard could fight and win against both the Aspect of Bahamut, and the Aspect of Tiamat simultaneously along with their summons that they bring (like the 7 gold dragons that accompany Bahamut). I find that crazy that a wizard could do that on his own and even potentially one shot the aspects if they are close to a summoned Demiplane with store glyphs to deal an infinite amount of damage essentially. And this isn't even taking into account that due to the fact that if you say had set a trap and have all your simulacrums and CR 20 creatures ready you could quite literally subdue an aspect of bahamut or tiamat then using as many spells as you need (after restraining/imprisoning the aspect) torture the aspect into allowing you to cast Arcanist's Magic Aura on it to possess the aspect then become it.
Since Arcanist's Magic Aura only needs a willing creature so if you can "persuade" the creature into letting you cast the spell you can then fully posses that creature. And just saying if you charm a creature it makes it friendly to you and therefore willing.
There is more I could go into this on that subject of just straight up becoming a creature but ill leave it at that for now.
Anyways do tell if I messed up or missed something.
If that magic aura sure didn’t require a willing creature, it would break encounters when combined with hold person. Thankfully, it requires willing creatures.
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If that magic aura sure didn’t require a willing creature, it would break encounters when combined with hold person. Thankfully, it requires willing creatures.
Answer: Yes Arcanist's Magic Aura if used correctly is incredibly powerful and if it would be able to be cast on anyone it would become one of the best spells out there. Although in all honestly even though it would be incredibly powerful I feel that people would still overlook it since it looks underwhelming when compared to say a Fireball.
Oh yeah just saying but well... the wizard can become any creature he encounters or captures since True Polymorph transforms the creature into a different form that means even creatures like Aspect of Bahamut, and Aspect of Tiamat could be technically polymorphed into something without Charmed immunity...
Since by making the Aspects into a creature without immunity to the Charmed means you make them friendly towards you therefore a willing creature for our purposes that means we can cast Arcanist's Magic Aura on an Aspect of our choice (Tiamat or Bahamut). And by having an Aspect under the effect of the Arcanist's Magic Aura spell we can then complete the rest of The Magnum Opus's process becoming the aspect but with our class levels and such.
So quite literally the wizard could take the power of an dragon gods aspect... and guess what that means... since now your CR is 30 although realistically is should be higher since now not only do you have the base stats of one of the aspects but now you also are a level 20 wizard in addition but for the sake of the game ill keep it at CR 30 since we have nothing higher than CR 30 at the moment so even if we were past CR 30 it wouldn't change much (except for homebrew).
That means by having the wizard be CR 30 the wizard is now able to make creatures like the Tarrasque, Gold Greatwyrm, and Red Greatwyrm and out of those they are able to single handily rival and even defeat leaders of the nine hells.
This is all possible due to True Polymorph, Simulacrum, and Clone spells as I have shown in my previous posts. All though I could go farther in depth and such I think I'll end at the wizard becoming stronger than an aspect of a dragon god and having an infinite army of permanent over CR 20 creatures.
Anyways do tell if I missed something or messed up anything.
Very simply, the Wizard is an Illusionist. The Fighter attacks. The Fighter misses due to Illusory Self. The Wizard's Contingency activates. The Wizard teleports away. From that point forward. the Fighter never knows if he is fighting the actual Wizard. The Fighter doesn't even know what is real. The Fighter eventually is committed into Sunny Acres Retirement Home for the Mentally Unstable.
A wizard the fighter can’t beat has already been created. And that would count as a draw in my book, because the wizard just left instead of fighting. Neither did much to the other.
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If that magic aura sure didn’t require a willing creature, it would break encounters when combined with hold person. Thankfully, it requires willing creatures.
Answer: Yes Arcanist's Magic Aura if used correctly is incredibly powerful and if it would be able to be cast on anyone it would become one of the best spells out there. Although in all honestly even though it would be incredibly powerful I feel that people would still overlook it since it looks underwhelming when compared to say a Fireball.
Oh yeah just saying but well... the wizard can become any creature he encounters or captures since True Polymorph transforms the creature into a different form that means even creatures like Aspect of Bahamut, and Aspect of Tiamat could be technically polymorphed into something without Charmed immunity...
Since by making the Aspects into a creature without immunity to the Charmed means you make them friendly towards you therefore a willing creature for our purposes that means we can cast Arcanist's Magic Aura on an Aspect of our choice (Tiamat or Bahamut). And by having an Aspect under the effect of the Arcanist's Magic Aura spell we can then complete the rest of The Magnum Opus's process becoming the aspect but with our class levels and such.
So quite literally the wizard could take the power of an dragon gods aspect... and guess what that means... since now your CR is 30 although realistically is should be higher since now not only do you have the base stats of one of the aspects but now you also are a level 20 wizard in addition but for the sake of the game ill keep it at CR 30 since we have nothing higher than CR 30 at the moment so even if we were past CR 30 it wouldn't change much (except for homebrew).
That means by having the wizard be CR 30 the wizard is now able to make creatures like the Tarrasque, Gold Greatwyrm, and Red Greatwyrm and out of those they are able to single handily rival and even defeat leaders of the nine hells.
This is all possible due to True Polymorph, Simulacrum, and Clone spells as I have shown in my previous posts. All though I could go farther in depth and such I think I'll end at the wizard becoming stronger than an aspect of a dragon god and having an infinite army of permanent over CR 20 creatures.
Anyways do tell if I missed something or messed up anything.
Oh my gosh. That is, if you actually get through all five of the aspect’s legendary resistances. And they fail your DC19 unless magic items are involved saving throw with a +14(Tiamat) or +18(Bahamut) save modifier. (The save itself can be cheesed with the chronurgist, but auto succeed from legendary resistance probably beats setting the roll)
If you do that, you become a god. But if you pulled it off, the campaign broke long ago.
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A wizard the fighter can’t beat has already been created. And that would count as a draw in my book, because the wizard just left instead of fighting. Neither did much to the other.
Answer: Well yes and no…
Yes there is a wizard that can defeat the fighter and yes the wizard normally would just leave the battlefield once he got the chance returning later to win (since he would be prepared).
And No in that no the battle will not be a draw and If you really think it is I gotta say you missed a great portion of the entire debate this far.
These are just a few strategies the wizard may implore in the battle and the list goes as:
Wish for Simulacrum, Mirage Arcane or something else like those spells (assuming we are removing the ability to wish the fighter was just dead).
True Polymorph for Pit Fiend or something else like that (ie, immunity to nonmagical slashing, piercing, and bludgeoning damage). Shapechange also works well to do this as well.
Prismatic Wall for an almost entirely inescapable dome although it can also be made as an impenetrable defense aswell.
And remember there is the Polearm Master, War Caster mini-combo that can just instantly cast a spell against the fighter as he enters the wizards reach.
And the last I’ll add on list for the moment is the Rope Trick, Shield, Fire Bolt, strategy that with just the bare minimum resources can infinitely snipe the fighter till his death.
Play Chronurgist use Convergent Future and just win Initiative (Although while I do think this works it has the same problem as wish in that many people have their gripes about it so I choose to not argue it and just be like ok we won’t use it to just get better initiative).
Now that is all the spells/strategies I’ve wrote down but remember there is still more for the wizard to use to win. So what I am trying to say is that the wizard even if he doesn’t “run away” as you see it he can still fight and win relatively easily.
Oh my gosh. That is, if you actually get through all five of the aspect’s legendary resistances. And they fail your DC19 unless magic items are involved saving throw with a +14(Tiamat) or +18(Bahamut) save modifier. (The save itself can be cheesed with the chronurgist, but auto succeed from legendary resistance probably beats setting the roll)
Answer: It won’t be terribly hard to get an Aspect to use up its legendary resistances since remember not only does the wizard have an army of simulacrums but also an army of up to CR 20 creatures at this point.
This means the wizard’s simulacrums have enough spell slots (essentially infinite) to continue till the end of day and since the wizard have an army of incredibly powerful creatures you can use them to continuously try to restrain and push down an aspect or act as body guards/meat shields against damage.
If you do that you are almost guaranteed to blast through all of an aspects legendary resistances and since all the goal is, is to just get a Polymorph off that means you don’t need to cast the 9th level version of polymorph.
As such you can instead just spam the aspect with the Polymorph spell to make the wizard be able to cast a charm spell on the aspect and then cast Arcanist’s Magic Aura to make the aspect a humanoid to allow the rest of The Magnum Opus plan to complete as you let the aspect return to its true self but as it is still under the Arcanist’s Magic Aura spell you can become the creature via the method I have shown.
If you do that, you become a god. But if you pulled it off, the campaign broke long ago.
Answer: Well the aspect isn’t the actual dragon god but instead just like a copy of it although it is said in the books that the aspect holds a significant amount of the gods power. Significant means at least over 50% last time I checked so that means you also now have that power aswell.
But then you realize that, why take the power of just an aspect of a god when in Rise of Tiamat there is the stat block of actual Tiamat and although it could be argued it is weaker than the Aspect of Tiamat while being harder ti transform into. But that can all be ignored when you realize that if you transform into that Tiamat that means you took the body of an actual god if I’m getting my lord correct an that stat block is supposed to be the actual god Tiamat.
And while permanently becoming Tiamat with 20 levels of wizard is amazing it is actually a little harder to do so as this Tiamat stat block is immune to any spell below 6th level but that is meaningless when you have an infinite army of simulacrums and that each of those thousands of simulacrums can upcast Polymorph using a level 7 spell slot and bypassing that immunity as such that being the only true obstacle the rest of the plan is relatively simple and that is to just complete the rest of The Magnum Opus and become (now) a literal dragon god.
Although I could see a reason for wanting to be an aspect when compared to the real thing when you consider that the aspect is mythic and even though you won’t get mythic actions you could get the revive that comes with being a mythic creature. Additionally if you do become Tiamat and not he aspect you don’t get a breath weapon since the breathe weapon is only usable via legendary actions of which you won’t have.
Well What I’m trying to say is that yes you could become god (Tiamat) but weirdly enough being an aspect might just be better.
PS: Now you if you have Tiamat’s stat block at hand you might see the feature Discorporation that says the following:
“When Tiamat drops to 0 hit points or dies, her body is destroyed but her essence travels back to her domain in the Nine Hells, and she is unable to take physical form for a time”
As for how this affects our plan to hijack and become a “better” version of Tiamat it could destroy it or do nothing. As for how I see it this feature does nothing to our plan since after we take Tiamat’s body 1) Tiamat is no longer Tiamat and 2) her essence (soul) is no longer in her body but in the Magic Jar so all in all we are fine but I just wanted to get this out there to stop someone from throwing that point at me.
EDIT: Looking back Tiamat is actually way better than I thought even if you don’t get the breathe weapons the passive regeneration of 30 hp at the start of your turn is very strong since even if you are say knocked out and bleeding at 0 hp and it hits your turn you bounce right back up to 30 hp since it just says on the start of your turn. Additionally when I think about it the Limited magic immunity is still really strong as makes you almost immune to just weak creatures since you also as Tiamat have immunity to nonmagical weapon damage so you are almost impossible to take down. And then you start thinking lore wise and what powers you have lore wise and it just gets rediculous since you are well a god of chromatic dragons now so that is a thing… and that is not all lore wise but I’ll leave it at that
Anyways do tell if I missed something, messed up of misunderstood something.
A wizard the fighter can’t beat has already been created. And that would count as a draw in my book, because the wizard just left instead of fighting. Neither did much to the other.
I was being snarky with the idea that the wizard would just take his time driving the fighter insane. I thought that was obvious.
I'm also not trying to be overly selective in my wizard build or do anything like requiring weeks of prep.
But, no, this would not be s draw - not even close. Once the wizard avoids the fighter's first attack, the fighter is toast. I mean, just by wearing an Amulet of Proof against Detection and Location, the Illusionist can cause the fighter to waste all of his one-shots, action surges, etc. on illusions of the wizard. See Invisibility or True Sight won't help the fighter here (because of the Amulet*). Then, once the fighter has used up all his specials, the wizard can casually move in for the kill.
* Assume the fighter sees the "wizard." The "wizard" might be real or illusory. The fighter has True Sight. The wizard (the real one) has the amulet mentioned above. Whether the "wizard" is the real one or not, what the fighter sees with his normal vision is the "wizard" and he sees nothing with True Sight. So, because the fighter sees the same thing whether the "wizard" is the real thing or not, the fighter can never tell if he is looking at the real thing or not.
But if the wizard has magic items, why can’t the fighter have magic items? Also, a wizard no fighter can kill has already been created, it’s a chronurgist. The illusion wizard isn’t that bad, but if they have magic items, the fighter also has magic items. And then this ignites again as we come up with different combinations of magic items to determine which one is the best. But the chronurgist probably still wins.
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To deathknight, correct, you don’t become a god. You become something more powerful, with a body containing a large portion of the god’s power and full control over thousands of copies of that body. And the explanation for the Tiamat thing is that mythic actions are a more recent invention than the Tiamat stat block, so they didn’t have the mechanics to make Tiamat stronger. But the aspect was created after mythic traits were a thing, so they were used to create a truly legendary encounter.
I don’t know much about the Tiamat stat block, but I’d probably buff both it and the aspect. They somehow seem too weak. Compare the aspect to an ancient red dragon and see what I mean. Except I found it by comparing a greatwyrm to the ancient red dragon, finding it was too weak, then comparing my idea for a buffed greatwyrm and finding Tiamat’s aspect was now too weak. Fizban’s strongest content needs buffing in general.
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First of all (I still don’t know why I keep needing to say this) but magic items aren’t being used and If they were they add to many variables to add to safely find a standard we could use to compare.
As for the aspect vs real body of Tiamat I honestly think people forget that Tiamat has a like natural AC of 25, over 600 hp, 30 hp regeneration, 6th and below spell immunity, flight, a +9 base proficiency bonus that will buff everything you have, multiple heads for multiple reactions, and immunity to acid, cold, fire, lightning, poison and nonmagical weapon damage. So yeah Tiamat (even without the breathe weapons) could probably kill any creature 1v1 (maybe).
As for buffing high CR creatures yeah you could do it but at that point just increase the CR cap to like 40 or 50 while increasing the level cap past level 20 but that would just be removing what made 5th edition what it is.
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Answer: Yes and no and fully depends how where you take your lore from as there are practically 2 options you can go with and they are:
1) The Demilich is an evolved form of the lich being able strip a large portion their undead flesh away and become a freer being.
2) The Demilich is a weakened starving lich who goes into a sort of "dormant" state and waits for souls to come to power the Demilich.
So depending on where you look both are true so I don't really know the point of this post but whatever its interesting.
I was looking at the default demilich, which is what happens when a lich forgets that it needs to feed souls to its phylactery. This one is weaker than a lich.
The variant is the one that wanted to become a demilich and prepared to make the most of being a demilich. This one is a lich’s equal, and actually superior inside its lair.
You originally looked at the variant. Both are valid, though DnD lore is that the first is more common. Your last part was spot on. This is kind of leaving the scope of the thread though.
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This isn't really related to the battle between the Fighter and Wizard as it is a little showcase of the wizards capabilities when he has prep and although these are only a few strategies they are almost unparalleled in power and potency... Wish is listed a lot due to the fact it can bypass requirements. The strategies are as following:
1) The Ultimate Spell.
Main Spell/s Used: Wish
Spell/s that Could be Used: True Polymorph, Prismatic Wall, Gate, Invulnerability, and like any other 9th level spell.
Strategy: Pretty simple cast the "Ultimate Spell" most likely something like Wish, and just complete your goal just like that... while this not so much of a strategy as it is me showcasing that 9th level spells exist and the spells like Gate, and such are just that powerful to merit their own strategy it is still true as they are just that powerful.
2) The Room of Death/life.
Main Spell/s Used: Glyph of Warding/Symbol
Spell/s that Could be Used: Demiplane/Gate/Plane Shift, Wish
Strategy: The point of this strategy is to one-shot any creature/object/thing in DnD existence (beside some deities maybe) by stacking glyphs/symbols in a isolated area like a secret room of your wizard tower or a place like the Demiplane where it makes a personal portal to a pocket dimension. By stacking multiple glyphs/symbols you are able to infinitely increase the damage output of the room so when you cast your choice of extraplanar traversal to access the pocket dimension made by Demiplane (or just cast demiplane again) you summon the portal directly beside your target with the trigger of the glyphs/symbols to be say someone either than you within a certain range. Doing this whatever is near the entrance of the portal will be essentially insta-killed and remember you don't have to just do pure damage you could also make the glyphs and symbols try to afflict conditions or have the glyphs cast many different spells there are just to many options and just having this build as just a one-shot attack doesn't show its full potential.
3) The Beholder's Dream.
Main Spell/s Used: True Polymorph, and Simulacrum
Spell/s that Could be Used: Dream
Strategy: Since in the lore/description the Beholders' dreams' alter reality... just make a Beholder with the True Polymorph, Simulacrum spell combo then control its dream's with Dream to alter reality as you see fit on a greater level than even wish as there is nothing that says the beholder's dreams' have limits to their power. Although since it is still is your simulacrum even without the dream altering spell you could probably still tell it to try to dream something beneficial. Of course there's something other things you could do using this strategy but ill leave it at this.
4) The Magnum Opus: Apotheosis into a Dragon God.
Main Spell/s Used: True Polymorph, Simulacrum, Clone, Magic Jar, Power Word Kill and Arcanist's Magic Aura
Spell/s that Could be Used: Disintegrate, Wish
Strategy: Cast Simulacrum, then cast True Polymorph on your copy transforming it into a Adult Gold Dragon or a something else that you want to be. Then using the dragon's Change Shape into a humanoid or using Arcanist's Magic Aura's Mask option which reads as: "You choose a creature type and other spells and magical effects treat the target as if it were a creature of that type or of that alignment" to turn the target into a humanoid for all intents and purposes you can finally cast the Magic Jar spell possessing said creature. While possessing said creature lower your HP and cast the Clone spell then Power Word Kill yourself so you die as that creature and transport into the clone becoming finally the creature you wanted to be permanently with all your class levels, class features and spells becoming incredibly overpowered.
Mind you The Magnus Opus strategy works by RAW and honestly it while may seem convoluted it's quite streamline at least I think as these spells in there smaller interactions work together but when all combined form a streamline timeline of events with the only outlier being the Power Word Kill to make sure you die as that creature to permanentize the effects of the combo.
Now as for all of you out there who will say "it abuses the rules/it's not RAI," or "A DM shouldn't allow that," or whatever else you wanna say I'll say this 1. a level 20 spellcaster is already overpowered and breaks the game, 2. If I was the DM for a wizard who wants to do The Magnus Opus strategy I would congratulate their creativity and allow it, 3. remember a wizard has 20 Intelligence while the smartest people in our world would max out at like 16-17 intelligence, 4. Their are wizards in lore and such who aspire to do even greater things like straight up control all of magic and become the weave and such so one wizard becoming an adult/ancient (shadow) gold dragon or whatever shouldn't be the DM's highest concern... maybe...
Do tell if I missed something, messed something up, wrote something which is hard to read (wouldn't be surprised as this was an incredibly long post).
That fourth one is advanced. Requires prep, but oh man. The third one is very dm dependent on how good it is.
But they are not what I’d do with prep, a ninth level spell, and simulacrum. There is something more overpowered behind.
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Answer: Yep quite... special but it works and that is what matters and it goes to show how certain spell combos can work out. Especially when you realize that if you breakdown the spells used for The Magnum Opus into their own strategies they are still incredibly powerful like:
The Magnum Opus's main spells are: True Polymorph, Simulacrum, Clone, Magic Jar, Power Word Kill and Arcanist's Magic Aura
1) The First strategy; True Polymorph, Simulacrum, Clone. With this you can make infinite permanent true polymorphed up to CR 20 creatures which all follow the wizard's orders and they same personalities.
2) The Second strategy; True Polymorph, and Power Word Kill is quite simple morph'em then drop'em with an instant kill.
2) The Third strategy; Arcanist's Magic Aura, with some other spells being Planar Binding, Magic Circle, and then a charm spell. With these spells you can turn a creature friendly (charm) then use Arcanist's Magic Aura (must be used on a willing creature) make the target be a celestial so you can Planar Binding, Magic Circle combo lock the target to stay as your subordinate. Though this is very strong and you can make any creature into your underling unless you get those very strong creatures it is mostly weaker than the first strategy.
Answer: Yeah I could see that but as long as you control the beholder's dreams you should be able to control what occurs to a great extent. Additionally since you can make a beholder via True Polymorph, and Simulacrum that means the beholder will be on your side so even less control for the DM.
And mind you I'm on the side that thinks that DM's shouldn't try to "monkey paw" or mess up a player's Wish so I think this strategy should work without much room for error.
Answer: Hmm interesting... how would you have something more overpowered than The Magnus Opus and my other strategies?
Cast simulacrum normally. Have the simulacrum cast wish, using it to replicate simulacrum and create a simulacrum of you. The new one still has a ninth level spell slot to do the same thing again. All of them follow a chain of command that leads to you.
If you have prep time, I don’t know what beats that. Who wins, one gold dragon that happens to be a level 20 wizard, or a couple thousand (with the amount of prep time needed for the other one, there would be that many by now) level 20 wizards down one ninth level slot, one seventh level slot, and half their hp?
Also, the beholder one was on how much the beholder actually affects the area. They can dream things into existence, that is how they reproduce, but there are likely limits. It probably won’t be stronger than wish, and there is potential risk of a hostile beholder appearing unless you are controlling its dreams 24/7. If they can mess wish up, they can mess up the dreams of a beholder. Interesting tactic, but not reliable enough to be the first choice.
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Answer: Oh you were talking about that... while that strategy still technically does work even with the errata of "If you cast this spell again, any duplicate you created with this spell is instantly destroyed" as it isn't "you" casting the spell repeatedly but your Simulacrum casting the spell but it still isn't the best.
The reason why It still isn't as strong as my strategies is because when you compare it to my True Polymorph, Simulacrum, Clone spell combo that makes infinite permanent up to CR 20 creatures of your choice compared to your bunch of simulacrums my strategy tend to just be better and since if I really wanted I could also use The Magnum Opus strategy to make an army of permanent spellcasting dragons.
And I'll remind you after my wizard does The Magnum Opus he can go and do the Wish, Simulacrum combo anyways but this time the simulacrums are going to be generally much stronger than the simulacrums you make since they are also going to be just wizards while mine would be wizard dragons or some other type of creature.
And just saying although I have said tis before but when you do The Magnum Opus strategy you can choose ANY CR 20 creature to transform into that means you can if you want you can become a Pit Fiend or whatever.
Answer: How about a permanent level 20 wizard Pit Fiend with an Antimagic Field spell up that is immune to like all spells and damage from non magical damage that can walk through your army as if walking through a park and mind you that same permanent level 20 wizard Pit Fiend is going to be accompanied by his own army of permanent up to CR 20 monsters (and remember my wizard could also just do the simulacrum wish strategy anyways).
So yeah I think my Invincible Pit Fiend is stronger than just basic wish simulacrum spam but of course there are many different forms other than the Pit Fiend my wizard could take that would make him even stronger.
Answer: That's why I said to just make the Beholder via Simulacrum and True Polymorph since that way you get to control when the creature sleeps and such.
PS: I was thinking of some other strategies and I though why not make a familiar via Find Familiar then True Polymorph that familiar into a dragon sized rock then cast True Polymorph again and turn your familiar into a young dragon or whatever making your familiar into a powerful creature that can act as an assistant to you.
Do tell if I missed something, messed something up or misunderstood something.
You messed up nothing there. Just combined the multiplication with the becoming a very strong creature. You didn’t actually say that you would do that before, but I did forget about the magic aura that lets you treat your cr 20 body as a humanoid and simulacrum it.
This may be the perfect way to break campaigns.
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Answer: Ah yes, Arcanist's Magic Aura is a very interesting and overlooked spell that has a very powerful ability to change ones creature type as such it is an incredibly unique spell not only for its effects but its interactions with spells.
Answer: Certainly, it is especially when the wizard can become a level 20 spellcaster with the body of a up to CR 20 creature along with an army of power simulacrums and permanent CR 20 creatures aswell.
So yeah the wizard is incredibility powerful to the point where I think the wizard could fight and win against both the Aspect of Bahamut, and the Aspect of Tiamat simultaneously along with their summons that they bring (like the 7 gold dragons that accompany Bahamut). I find that crazy that a wizard could do that on his own and even potentially one shot the aspects if they are close to a summoned Demiplane with store glyphs to deal an infinite amount of damage essentially. And this isn't even taking into account that due to the fact that if you say had set a trap and have all your simulacrums and CR 20 creatures ready you could quite literally subdue an aspect of bahamut or tiamat then using as many spells as you need (after restraining/imprisoning the aspect) torture the aspect into allowing you to cast Arcanist's Magic Aura on it to possess the aspect then become it.
Since Arcanist's Magic Aura only needs a willing creature so if you can "persuade" the creature into letting you cast the spell you can then fully posses that creature. And just saying if you charm a creature it makes it friendly to you and therefore willing.
There is more I could go into this on that subject of just straight up becoming a creature but ill leave it at that for now.
Anyways do tell if I messed up or missed something.
If that magic aura sure didn’t require a willing creature, it would break encounters when combined with hold person. Thankfully, it requires willing creatures.
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Answer: Yes Arcanist's Magic Aura if used correctly is incredibly powerful and if it would be able to be cast on anyone it would become one of the best spells out there. Although in all honestly even though it would be incredibly powerful I feel that people would still overlook it since it looks underwhelming when compared to say a Fireball.
Oh yeah just saying but well... the wizard can become any creature he encounters or captures since True Polymorph transforms the creature into a different form that means even creatures like Aspect of Bahamut, and Aspect of Tiamat could be technically polymorphed into something without Charmed immunity...
Since by making the Aspects into a creature without immunity to the Charmed means you make them friendly towards you therefore a willing creature for our purposes that means we can cast Arcanist's Magic Aura on an Aspect of our choice (Tiamat or Bahamut). And by having an Aspect under the effect of the Arcanist's Magic Aura spell we can then complete the rest of The Magnum Opus's process becoming the aspect but with our class levels and such.
So quite literally the wizard could take the power of an dragon gods aspect... and guess what that means... since now your CR is 30 although realistically is should be higher since now not only do you have the base stats of one of the aspects but now you also are a level 20 wizard in addition but for the sake of the game ill keep it at CR 30 since we have nothing higher than CR 30 at the moment so even if we were past CR 30 it wouldn't change much (except for homebrew).
That means by having the wizard be CR 30 the wizard is now able to make creatures like the Tarrasque, Gold Greatwyrm, and Red Greatwyrm and out of those they are able to single handily rival and even defeat leaders of the nine hells.
This is all possible due to True Polymorph, Simulacrum, and Clone spells as I have shown in my previous posts. All though I could go farther in depth and such I think I'll end at the wizard becoming stronger than an aspect of a dragon god and having an infinite army of permanent over CR 20 creatures.
Anyways do tell if I missed something or messed up anything.
Very simply, the Wizard is an Illusionist. The Fighter attacks. The Fighter misses due to Illusory Self. The Wizard's Contingency activates. The Wizard teleports away. From that point forward. the Fighter never knows if he is fighting the actual Wizard. The Fighter doesn't even know what is real. The Fighter eventually is committed into Sunny Acres Retirement Home for the Mentally Unstable.
A wizard the fighter can’t beat has already been created. And that would count as a draw in my book, because the wizard just left instead of fighting. Neither did much to the other.
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Oh my gosh. That is, if you actually get through all five of the aspect’s legendary resistances. And they fail your DC19 unless magic items are involved saving throw with a +14(Tiamat) or +18(Bahamut) save modifier. (The save itself can be cheesed with the chronurgist, but auto succeed from legendary resistance probably beats setting the roll)
If you do that, you become a god. But if you pulled it off, the campaign broke long ago.
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Answer: Well yes and no…
Yes there is a wizard that can defeat the fighter and yes the wizard normally would just leave the battlefield once he got the chance returning later to win (since he would be prepared).
And No in that no the battle will not be a draw and If you really think it is I gotta say you missed a great portion of the entire debate this far.
These are just a few strategies the wizard may implore in the battle and the list goes as:
Resilient Sphere (Self), Animate Objects, Forcecage, Sickening Radiance, Wall of Force, Maze, Feeblemind, Draconic Transformation, Reverse Gravity, and more and more and more you get the idea but here’s some more spells/strategies anyway:
Wish for Simulacrum, Mirage Arcane or something else like those spells (assuming we are removing the ability to wish the fighter was just dead).
True Polymorph for Pit Fiend or something else like that (ie, immunity to nonmagical slashing, piercing, and bludgeoning damage). Shapechange also works well to do this as well.
Prismatic Wall for an almost entirely inescapable dome although it can also be made as an impenetrable defense aswell.
Invulnerability well it speaks for it’s self.
Time Stop same as above.
And remember there is the Polearm Master, War Caster mini-combo that can just instantly cast a spell against the fighter as he enters the wizards reach.
And the last I’ll add on list for the moment is the Rope Trick, Shield, Fire Bolt, strategy that with just the bare minimum resources can infinitely snipe the fighter till his death.
Play Chronurgist use Convergent Future and just win Initiative (Although while I do think this works it has the same problem as wish in that many people have their gripes about it so I choose to not argue it and just be like ok we won’t use it to just get better initiative).
Now that is all the spells/strategies I’ve wrote down but remember there is still more for the wizard to use to win. So what I am trying to say is that the wizard even if he doesn’t “run away” as you see it he can still fight and win relatively easily.
Answer: It won’t be terribly hard to get an Aspect to use up its legendary resistances since remember not only does the wizard have an army of simulacrums but also an army of up to CR 20 creatures at this point.
This means the wizard’s simulacrums have enough spell slots (essentially infinite) to continue till the end of day and since the wizard have an army of incredibly powerful creatures you can use them to continuously try to restrain and push down an aspect or act as body guards/meat shields against damage.
If you do that you are almost guaranteed to blast through all of an aspects legendary resistances and since all the goal is, is to just get a Polymorph off that means you don’t need to cast the 9th level version of polymorph.
As such you can instead just spam the aspect with the Polymorph spell to make the wizard be able to cast a charm spell on the aspect and then cast Arcanist’s Magic Aura to make the aspect a humanoid to allow the rest of The Magnum Opus plan to complete as you let the aspect return to its true self but as it is still under the Arcanist’s Magic Aura spell you can become the creature via the method I have shown.
Answer: Well the aspect isn’t the actual dragon god but instead just like a copy of it although it is said in the books that the aspect holds a significant amount of the gods power. Significant means at least over 50% last time I checked so that means you also now have that power aswell.
But then you realize that, why take the power of just an aspect of a god when in Rise of Tiamat there is the stat block of actual Tiamat and although it could be argued it is weaker than the Aspect of Tiamat while being harder ti transform into. But that can all be ignored when you realize that if you transform into that Tiamat that means you took the body of an actual god if I’m getting my lord correct an that stat block is supposed to be the actual god Tiamat.
And while permanently becoming Tiamat with 20 levels of wizard is amazing it is actually a little harder to do so as this Tiamat stat block is immune to any spell below 6th level but that is meaningless when you have an infinite army of simulacrums and that each of those thousands of simulacrums can upcast Polymorph using a level 7 spell slot and bypassing that immunity as such that being the only true obstacle the rest of the plan is relatively simple and that is to just complete the rest of The Magnum Opus and become (now) a literal dragon god.
Although I could see a reason for wanting to be an aspect when compared to the real thing when you consider that the aspect is mythic and even though you won’t get mythic actions you could get the revive that comes with being a mythic creature. Additionally if you do become Tiamat and not he aspect you don’t get a breath weapon since the breathe weapon is only usable via legendary actions of which you won’t have.
Well What I’m trying to say is that yes you could become god (Tiamat) but weirdly enough being an aspect might just be better.
PS: Now you if you have Tiamat’s stat block at hand you might see the feature Discorporation that says the following:
“When Tiamat drops to 0 hit points or dies, her body is destroyed but her essence travels back to her domain in the Nine Hells, and she is unable to take physical form for a time”
As for how this affects our plan to hijack and become a “better” version of Tiamat it could destroy it or do nothing. As for how I see it this feature does nothing to our plan since after we take Tiamat’s body 1) Tiamat is no longer Tiamat and 2) her essence (soul) is no longer in her body but in the Magic Jar so all in all we are fine but I just wanted to get this out there to stop someone from throwing that point at me.
EDIT: Looking back Tiamat is actually way better than I thought even if you don’t get the breathe weapons the passive regeneration of 30 hp at the start of your turn is very strong since even if you are say knocked out and bleeding at 0 hp and it hits your turn you bounce right back up to 30 hp since it just says on the start of your turn.
Additionally when I think about it the Limited magic immunity is still really strong as makes you almost immune to just weak creatures since you also as Tiamat have immunity to nonmagical weapon damage so you are almost impossible to take down.
And then you start thinking lore wise and what powers you have lore wise and it just gets rediculous since you are well a god of chromatic dragons now so that is a thing… and that is not all lore wise but I’ll leave it at that
Anyways do tell if I missed something, messed up of misunderstood something.
I was being snarky with the idea that the wizard would just take his time driving the fighter insane. I thought that was obvious.
I'm also not trying to be overly selective in my wizard build or do anything like requiring weeks of prep.
But, no, this would not be s draw - not even close. Once the wizard avoids the fighter's first attack, the fighter is toast. I mean, just by wearing an Amulet of Proof against Detection and Location, the Illusionist can cause the fighter to waste all of his one-shots, action surges, etc. on illusions of the wizard. See Invisibility or True Sight won't help the fighter here (because of the Amulet*). Then, once the fighter has used up all his specials, the wizard can casually move in for the kill.
* Assume the fighter sees the "wizard." The "wizard" might be real or illusory. The fighter has True Sight. The wizard (the real one) has the amulet mentioned above. Whether the "wizard" is the real one or not, what the fighter sees with his normal vision is the "wizard" and he sees nothing with True Sight. So, because the fighter sees the same thing whether the "wizard" is the real thing or not, the fighter can never tell if he is looking at the real thing or not.
But if the wizard has magic items, why can’t the fighter have magic items? Also, a wizard no fighter can kill has already been created, it’s a chronurgist. The illusion wizard isn’t that bad, but if they have magic items, the fighter also has magic items. And then this ignites again as we come up with different combinations of magic items to determine which one is the best. But the chronurgist probably still wins.
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To deathknight, correct, you don’t become a god. You become something more powerful, with a body containing a large portion of the god’s power and full control over thousands of copies of that body. And the explanation for the Tiamat thing is that mythic actions are a more recent invention than the Tiamat stat block, so they didn’t have the mechanics to make Tiamat stronger. But the aspect was created after mythic traits were a thing, so they were used to create a truly legendary encounter.
I don’t know much about the Tiamat stat block, but I’d probably buff both it and the aspect. They somehow seem too weak. Compare the aspect to an ancient red dragon and see what I mean. Except I found it by comparing a greatwyrm to the ancient red dragon, finding it was too weak, then comparing my idea for a buffed greatwyrm and finding Tiamat’s aspect was now too weak. Fizban’s strongest content needs buffing in general.
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First of all (I still don’t know why I keep needing to say this) but magic items aren’t being used and If they were they add to many variables to add to safely find a standard we could use to compare.
As for the aspect vs real body of Tiamat I honestly think people forget that Tiamat has a like natural AC of 25, over 600 hp, 30 hp regeneration, 6th and below spell immunity, flight, a +9 base proficiency bonus that will buff everything you have, multiple heads for multiple reactions, and immunity to acid, cold, fire, lightning, poison and nonmagical weapon damage. So yeah Tiamat (even without the breathe weapons) could probably kill any creature 1v1 (maybe).
As for buffing high CR creatures yeah you could do it but at that point just increase the CR cap to like 40 or 50 while increasing the level cap past level 20 but that would just be removing what made 5th edition what it is.