So my party is currently panicking as we've just walked into a boss battle about "3 sessions early" as my DM says.
To make things worse one of our fellow members is a twist villain/ henchman; she's kinda being mind controlled right now. She was our tank as a Vedalkin Paladin of Pelor.
So we're down a player so our current party consists of a Druid, bard, and warlock/bard MC. None of us are at full HP and spell slots are limited.
Our makeup is essentially ( we're all at lvl 8):
Druid: Caster/Mele
Warlock: Main caster
Bard: Healer
We've already established that all we have to do is kill the Mind Flayer and its thrall on our friend and about 20-30 NPCs will be dropped. So we're making killing him our one and only goal. We do have spells to detain people witch were planning on using on the NPCs and the Paladin. Plan #1 consist of just casting darkness on its head then firing at it with arrows and daggers coated in "instant kill poison" ( I put in quotations bc they have to make a con save and it seems like they can survive it if the role dictates) But we did kill the last baddie with it. One set of arrows is necrotic so we're hoping that helps. Anything coated is the poison becomes useless afterward so were against putting it on our "good weapons". We all know that getting too close to it is a huge NO so that's why we're throwing stuff.
Throwing is all the magic items we have if it'll help with any ideas:
Druid:
Short sword: triples the blow/damage;3 per LR
Corkscrew: EFFECTS UNKNOWN
Necrotic arrows: Adds 2d8 necrotic damage to bow attacks
Dog scroll: casts “Animal Familiar” to call a zombie hound
Scroll: One use of Hellish rebuke
Boot covers: Any sound made from below the user’s ankle in a (10-15? ft) radius is silent
Stone of far speech: Calls the other one; must be charged
Warlock/Bard:
Coin: Makes a duplicate of any small item in your other hand on heads; destroys it on tails
Chain whip: Thunder damage
Butterfly necklace: Makes 5-6 butterflies appear. OTHER EFFECTS UNKNOWN
Opal dagger: If thrown, and hits a target, can be returned to hand. Doing so causes 2d6 thunder damage to the target. 1 per LR
Rotten Ash Wand: +1 to attack roll for aimed and ranged spell attacks. 5 charges per LR. Roll d20 upon spending the 5th charge. On 1 it dissolves.
Stone of far speech: Calls the other one; must be charged
Black satchel (Night Hag Soul Bag): Collects the souls of defeated enemies
Bard:
Pushy wizard cloak: “Telekinesis” 1 per LR +1AC
Invisibility cloaks X2: Once per long rest
Shield: Fires darts in a 15 ft cone. Each creature in the cone must make a Dex saving throw If they fail they take 6d4 damage each. If they pass they take 3d4 damage.1 per LR
Flute: Chokes people. The target must make a Con saving throw once per turn to remain conscious. If they fail they take 2d8 damage and fall asleep for 5 minutes. If they succeed, they only take the damage. Requires playing (both hands, mouth, and concentration). 5 charges per LR. If the 5th charge is spent roll a d20. On a roll of 1, the flute dissolves.
Letter opener: 10/10 uses, opens things much like the Knock spell does, loudly { sage}
Slippery oil: Grants 1 hour of being able to move freely over difficult terrain. {sage}
Diamond temple tattoo: One use of disguise self { Sage and Maxie}
Silver Comb: Stops time briefly when run through your own hair; you able to move around but not interact with anything that isn’t already in your possession for two rounds freely. Anything that leaves your possession during this time halts mid-movement after leaving your possession; you feel nauseous afterward (roll next action with disadvantage).
Clock: Sublimates all gold within 50 feet when wound; the evaporated gold fills a 50-foot cube, centered on it, dealing 2d6 poison damage per turn.
Ring Box: Dampens entropy. When open, provides a barrier to necrotic magic and damage. Pauses the progress of recurring damage of any kind. 5 uses total now.
Hearthstone: teleports owner to the location they set
Ring: interferes with elemental and two other types of magic; reduces it by half, needs charges +2 Saving throws
EDIT:
We have established that our paladin is only under the effects of Dominate person and that breaking the concentration/ ending the spell will be easy do to our spell kits being good at breaking concentration.
This brings our odds to 70/30 with the paladin back on our side
Our DM may be kind but has established that our characters CAN die.
I think you've got this. As long as you guys are arround level 6, your items should get you there. Just avoid using spells with saves (or just assume it will succeed the save when choosing spells). And avoid letting it get close to you.
Just remember casting Darkness on the mind flayer is a risky strategy unless the party have the means of seeing through magical darkness. Darkvision will not do it. Devil's Sight will.
Exits blocked by the brainwashed NPCs; the only way out is the hearthstone witch is honed onto a location not too too far away from the temple we're out. Already burnt my 4th lvl slot on dimension door the last session.
Edit: We don't know if we're allowed to move more than one person with the stone.
We also don't wanna hurt the NPCs bc they're probably nobodies mixed with NPCs we've interacted with and we like about 99% of the NPCs
Umm, tear your Character sheets in half? The sheer power of the mind flayer is easily enough to challenge even a level 9 party, especially people without intelligence focus, high health, or very good melee attack. Your only chance is maybe telepathic, or hold person to restrain their ability for the somatic exponent of their spells
I think your odds of winning are actually even higher than 80%, it is just your odds of a PC dying is closer to 30%.
As I mentioned before. Just pick your spells assuming it will succeed any required saves (due to magic resistance), and stay out of range of its tentacles.
I feel like we're gonna be okay now that the plan has changed to breaking its concentration with one of the three: Polymorph/Sleep/Hideous Laughter (I'll have to check all the sheets for more)
Those spells would render it somewhat prone as well I believe; we know not to kill anything polymorphed. As long as it's still we can hit it with the instant kill poison which we have 8 doses of so multiple chances.
Other bost/ advantages: Bestow curse to lower its int/wiz, 2 people can cast bardic inspiration, lots of AOE spells from the druid, the bard has custom healing stuff
And yuppp we're staying far away from that thing (one charter even has a specific fear of Mind Flayers that was established a year ago and is coming into play now)
ok so here is my advice: RUN, they may not have a whole bunch of HP but they are vicious and dangerous! if you choose to fight it out fist thing you need to do is SPREAD OUT if you bunch up you are super dead, second is to keep your distance unless you are sure you can escape from some grapples and are find with making int saving throws. the mind flayer has 3 attacks: its tentacle attack witch on a hit you get auto grappled and need to make a int saving throw or get stunned next attack is extract brain, yep you read that right, if it has you grappled it tries to get its nom nom on and takes a bit old bite (note you have to be stuned and grappled for this attack to happen) and its a whopping TEN D TEN!!! and if it drops your HP to 0 its not knockout, it eats your brain and you die and last is the reason you want to spread out: mind blast, it is a 60 foot cone of HA NOW YOUR ALL STUNNED AND I GET TO HAVE LUNCH. I did a campaign with a few of these suckers and my group was level 15 and kind of OP and we almost died, only reason we won that fight is that my clerics divine intervention went though and we got some back up. so yeah if you want to fight: go all out, turn on all your best spells and ability's just burn them on, down him asap, otherwise just run.
Well then hopefully we get some Devine intervention when we snap our paladin out of her stupor. We are in a temple of her faith after all. And once we have her back she'll be cranking out the damage.
We did have some Devine intervention last game but it was more for a reward.This game I would've called my patron for help but our beloved lil Triton cleric severed that tie and honestly for the better since my patron is pissed at me.
Do mind flayers have any specific weaknesses??? Like at all? Any monsters with a CR of 5 or lower ( litterly anything in the manual) we can use our last use of polymorph to turn into that'll have any immunities?
Spreading out is a good idea. Polymorph is probably not a good idea since all the beast you can turn into will have low INT, and INT saves are a necessity in this fight.
Well in that case... Revenant. Resistant to psychic damage, immune to stunned, 136 HP, and recovers 10 HP each round. Decent damage and abilities. Get in close and grapple it, shove it, kick its ass.
So the plan didn't work as well as we thought. We weren't expecting the Ilithid to turn invisible but it did. So did two of us luckily. Dispelling the mind control on the paladin took a while too but when we got her back she stared magically taking a lot of damage for us... which sadly resulted in her death at the very end. We tried to help but she failed 3 death saves; we got to have a 'last goodbye' scene which was sweet.
But now the rain is cleared, the townsfolk are free, and everything is at peace.
Only advice I would of given was to run in the opposite direction as fast as your legs will carry you, and don't stop until the Mind Flayer dies of old age.
EDIT: Dear lord I didn't read the part with you saying you fought it. Sorry for the loss.
So my party is currently panicking as we've just walked into a boss battle about "3 sessions early" as my DM says.
To make things worse one of our fellow members is a twist villain/ henchman; she's kinda being mind controlled right now. She was our tank as a Vedalkin Paladin of Pelor.
So we're down a player so our current party consists of a Druid, bard, and warlock/bard MC. None of us are at full HP and spell slots are limited.
Our makeup is essentially ( we're all at lvl 8):
We've already established that all we have to do is kill the Mind Flayer and its thrall on our friend and about 20-30 NPCs will be dropped. So we're making killing him our one and only goal. We do have spells to detain people witch were planning on using on the NPCs and the Paladin. Plan #1 consist of
just casting darkness on its head thenfiring at it with arrows and daggers coated in "instant kill poison" ( I put in quotations bc they have to make a con save and it seems like they can survive it if the role dictates) But we did kill the last baddie with it. One set of arrows is necrotic so we're hoping that helps. Anything coated is the poison becomes useless afterward so were against putting it on our "good weapons". We all know that getting too close to it is a huge NO so that's why we're throwing stuff.Throwing is all the magic items we have if it'll help with any ideas:
Druid:
Warlock/Bard:
Bard:
EDIT:
We have established that our paladin is only under the effects of Dominate person and that breaking the concentration/ ending the spell will be easy do to our spell kits being good at breaking concentration.
This brings our odds to 70/30 with the paladin back on our side
Our DM may be kind but has established that our characters CAN die.
I think you've got this. As long as you guys are arround level 6, your items should get you there. Just avoid using spells with saves (or just assume it will succeed the save when choosing spells). And avoid letting it get close to you.
You can always retreat.
Just remember casting Darkness on the mind flayer is a risky strategy unless the party have the means of seeing through magical darkness. Darkvision will not do it. Devil's Sight will.
Exits blocked by the brainwashed NPCs; the only way out is the hearthstone witch is honed onto a location not too too far away from the temple we're out. Already burnt my 4th lvl slot on dimension door the last session.
Edit: We don't know if we're allowed to move more than one person with the stone.
We also don't wanna hurt the NPCs bc they're probably nobodies mixed with NPCs we've interacted with and we like about 99% of the NPCs
Umm, tear your Character sheets in half? The sheer power of the mind flayer is easily enough to challenge even a level 9 party, especially people without intelligence focus, high health, or very good melee attack. Your only chance is maybe telepathic, or hold person to restrain their ability for the somatic exponent of their spells
heheh get rickrolled xdddddd
I mean it's just one mind flayer and if you see our kit we do have a lot of things to use to our advantage.
With the current plan, my DM says we have a 60/40 odds.
Just got the info that the thrall on our friend isn't strong and that if we get her back next session odds go up to 70/30
New thing to find:
A 5e spell that "Allows you to make someone attack their friends"
EDIT: its dominate person; we're just gonna slap her in the face till she wakes up
I think your odds of winning are actually even higher than 80%, it is just your odds of a PC dying is closer to 30%.
As I mentioned before. Just pick your spells assuming it will succeed any required saves (due to magic resistance), and stay out of range of its tentacles.
I feel like we're gonna be okay now that the plan has changed to breaking its concentration with one of the three: Polymorph/Sleep/Hideous Laughter (I'll have to check all the sheets for more)
Those spells would render it somewhat prone as well I believe; we know not to kill anything polymorphed. As long as it's still we can hit it with the instant kill poison which we have 8 doses of so multiple chances.
Other bost/ advantages: Bestow curse to lower its int/wiz, 2 people can cast bardic inspiration, lots of AOE spells from the druid, the bard has custom healing stuff
And yuppp we're staying far away from that thing (one charter even has a specific fear of Mind Flayers that was established a year ago and is coming into play now)
ok so here is my advice: RUN, they may not have a whole bunch of HP but they are vicious and dangerous!
if you choose to fight it out fist thing you need to do is SPREAD OUT if you bunch up you are super dead, second is to keep your distance unless you are sure you can escape from some grapples and are find with making int saving throws.
the mind flayer has 3 attacks: its tentacle attack witch on a hit you get auto grappled and need to make a int saving throw or get stunned
next attack is extract brain, yep you read that right, if it has you grappled it tries to get its nom nom on and takes a bit old bite (note you have to be stuned and grappled for this attack to happen) and its a whopping TEN D TEN!!! and if it drops your HP to 0 its not knockout, it eats your brain and you die
and last is the reason you want to spread out: mind blast, it is a 60 foot cone of HA NOW YOUR ALL STUNNED AND I GET TO HAVE LUNCH.
I did a campaign with a few of these suckers and my group was level 15 and kind of OP and we almost died, only reason we won that fight is that my clerics divine intervention went though and we got some back up.
so yeah if you want to fight: go all out, turn on all your best spells and ability's just burn them on, down him asap, otherwise just run.
Well then hopefully we get some Devine intervention when we snap our paladin out of her stupor. We are in a temple of her faith after all. And once we have her back she'll be cranking out the damage.
We did have some Devine intervention last game but it was more for a reward.This game I would've called my patron for help but our beloved lil Triton cleric severed that tie and honestly for the better since my patron is pissed at me.
Do mind flayers have any specific weaknesses??? Like at all? Any monsters with a CR of 5 or lower ( litterly anything in the manual) we can use our last use of polymorph to turn into that'll have any immunities?
Spreading out is a good idea. Polymorph is probably not a good idea since all the beast you can turn into will have low INT, and INT saves are a necessity in this fight.
True but my game we have a 'jail broken' version of the spell per se and can turn into ( Anything on this list with a CR of 5 or lower: PDF of monsters by challenge rating --> https://media.wizards.com/2014/downloads/dnd/MM_MonstersCR.pdf )
So not only mindless beast
This is mostly like backup plan stuff anyways
Well in that case... Revenant. Resistant to psychic damage, immune to stunned, 136 HP, and recovers 10 HP each round. Decent damage and abilities. Get in close and grapple it, shove it, kick its ass.
WE SURVIVED ... well most of us
So the plan didn't work as well as we thought. We weren't expecting the Ilithid to turn invisible but it did. So did two of us luckily. Dispelling the mind control on the paladin took a while too but when we got her back she stared magically taking a lot of damage for us... which sadly resulted in her death at the very end. We tried to help but she failed 3 death saves; we got to have a 'last goodbye' scene which was sweet.
But now the rain is cleared, the townsfolk are free, and everything is at peace.
Only advice I would of given was to run in the opposite direction as fast as your legs will carry you, and don't stop until the Mind Flayer dies of old age.
EDIT: Dear lord I didn't read the part with you saying you fought it. Sorry for the loss.