Hope you all are doing well. I'm looking for a bit of guidance in designing boss fights for my party. See, back at level 8 they provoked a fight with a creature they really shouldn't have and ended up with a TPK. They rerolled new characters and moved onto the next couple of story arcs. Here's the catch, the antagonist of the campaign has been developed and managed control over a plague that allows him to bring people back from the dead under his complete thrall (think Lich King from Warcraft). Well, they died in an extremely undead infested area. So now their former characters have been brought back from the dead and serve as the five horseman for the antagonist. Each time they defeat one of these horseman they'll level up since by the time they reach this point in the campaign they'll be on the fast-track to the final fight with the antagonist.
In order to do their characters justice, I want to make sure that these fights are hard and not a pushover. I also want to make sure that these fights are unique to the characters and feel accurate as to how a powerful undead version of their character would be. However, at the level this all will be happening there is the obvious crazy power creep that happens. I've also been very liberal with the creation of homebrewed items and creation of feats. This is also an extremely high magic setting. I was hoping you all might have some suggestions for stat blocks for these fights, or if you know of some solid homebrew options I'd be up for that as well.
Here’s my take: don’t use monster stats. Use character sheets. The best way to make an encounter that could go either way is to literally make them evenly balanced by making them the same.
EDIT: Ignore me, I didn’t read close enough. Instead, I’d suggest using Giffyglyph’s monster maker for boss fights. It allows you to create super intricate boss fights with minimal effort, and it solves the issue that inevitably comes up when the players act 5 times for each time the boss acts.
This sounds like a lot of fun. I'd like to help. What level will the party be roughly when they fight these guys, and would you allow these horsemen to have minions?
Here’s my take: don’t use monster stats. Use character sheets. The best way to make an encounter that could go either way is to literally make them evenly balanced by making them the same.
EDIT: Ignore me, I didn’t read close enough. Instead, I’d suggest using Giffyglyph’s monster maker for boss fights. It allows you to create super intricate boss fights with minimal effort, and it solves the issue that inevitably comes up when the players act 5 times for each time the boss acts.
Ooh, handy too. Thank you for the recommendation, that'll be useful for actually building the stat block.
This sounds like a lot of fun. I'd like to help. What level will the party be roughly when they fight these guys, and would you allow these horsemen to have minions?
So, they'll be level 14 for the first fight, and then each time they defeat one of them the group will level up. The fights will take them from 15 to 20 since they're sort of the heads of this massive undead force that's taken large parts of the world by this point. They're going to be able to pick the order in which these fights happen since the objective will be to kill these five before taking on the antagonist of the campaign. Minions are totally fine. The artificer actually had a homunculus, so bonus points if he has a minion of some sort.
For the Human Artificer, if you want to be lazy, you could use The Lord of Blades from Eberron and modify it slightly to make it a human undead. It's CR 18 and has 20 levels in Artificer. To give them a minion that's representative of the homunculus, you could use a construct such as a Iron Golem or a Steel Predator.
For the Cleric, you could use a Drow Matron Mother (Legacy version has a full spell list for a level 20 cleric if you have access to it) and change a few things. Replace any abilities that summon or help demons with those that summon or help undead. Also as a Tempest Cleric, you want to give them some Lightning and Thunder spells so it can use it with the channel divinity that allows those spells to deal max damage.
Happy Friday!
Hope you all are doing well. I'm looking for a bit of guidance in designing boss fights for my party. See, back at level 8 they provoked a fight with a creature they really shouldn't have and ended up with a TPK. They rerolled new characters and moved onto the next couple of story arcs. Here's the catch, the antagonist of the campaign has been developed and managed control over a plague that allows him to bring people back from the dead under his complete thrall (think Lich King from Warcraft). Well, they died in an extremely undead infested area. So now their former characters have been brought back from the dead and serve as the five horseman for the antagonist. Each time they defeat one of these horseman they'll level up since by the time they reach this point in the campaign they'll be on the fast-track to the final fight with the antagonist.
In order to do their characters justice, I want to make sure that these fights are hard and not a pushover. I also want to make sure that these fights are unique to the characters and feel accurate as to how a powerful undead version of their character would be. However, at the level this all will be happening there is the obvious crazy power creep that happens. I've also been very liberal with the creation of homebrewed items and creation of feats. This is also an extremely high magic setting. I was hoping you all might have some suggestions for stat blocks for these fights, or if you know of some solid homebrew options I'd be up for that as well.
Their decedent characters are as follows:
I'm excited to hear from you all!
Here’s my take: don’t use monster stats. Use character sheets. The best way to make an encounter that could go either way is to literally make them evenly balanced by making them the same.
EDIT: Ignore me, I didn’t read close enough. Instead, I’d suggest using Giffyglyph’s monster maker for boss fights. It allows you to create super intricate boss fights with minimal effort, and it solves the issue that inevitably comes up when the players act 5 times for each time the boss acts.
"Ignorance is bliss, and you look absolutely miserable."
This sounds like a lot of fun. I'd like to help. What level will the party be roughly when they fight these guys, and would you allow these horsemen to have minions?
Ooh, handy too. Thank you for the recommendation, that'll be useful for actually building the stat block.
So, they'll be level 14 for the first fight, and then each time they defeat one of them the group will level up. The fights will take them from 15 to 20 since they're sort of the heads of this massive undead force that's taken large parts of the world by this point. They're going to be able to pick the order in which these fights happen since the objective will be to kill these five before taking on the antagonist of the campaign. Minions are totally fine. The artificer actually had a homunculus, so bonus points if he has a minion of some sort.
For the Human Artificer, if you want to be lazy, you could use The Lord of Blades from Eberron and modify it slightly to make it a human undead. It's CR 18 and has 20 levels in Artificer. To give them a minion that's representative of the homunculus, you could use a construct such as a Iron Golem or a Steel Predator.
For the Cleric, you could use a Drow Matron Mother (Legacy version has a full spell list for a level 20 cleric if you have access to it) and change a few things. Replace any abilities that summon or help demons with those that summon or help undead. Also as a Tempest Cleric, you want to give them some Lightning and Thunder spells so it can use it with the channel divinity that allows those spells to deal max damage.
These are some solid options, thank you!