Who on earth decided that having an intellect devourer and mind flayer up against a level 1-2 party was a balanced combat, after they've been dealing with Krentz and the Druegar? I have a level 5 party who are pretty wiped after clearing out the entire dungeon, just to be met with this bunch. But I also want the combat to feel...epic. It's a boss battle. I ended our last session just as they walked in the door. Nihiloor immediately got up and left, leaving his minions behind to deal with the adventurers. No ifs or buts, he gets up, floats across the room, leaves. That leaves Grum'shar and the intellect devourer. In the party is a cleric, ranger, bard, and I actually have an NPC barbarian (he was originally a PC, but I had to step in as a DM after we discovered that our DM was...well, an unsavoury character, to put it nicely. One of the PC's is in love with the barb, so the rest of the party wanted him to stay) I've already got them to roll init. Grumshar and the ID actually rolled pretty damn high, and the rest of the party rolled low. Grumshar's going first, followed by the ID, followed by Floon, then the rest of the party. The barb rolled terribly and is going near the end.
So here's my 'evil' plan. Grumshar is going to be a distraction. I've swapped out a couple of his spells, and given him one that can incapacitate. The barb is already pretty wounded after the Duergar (these are level 5 characters, I've been increasing the difficulty of the combat to match). I'm going to have Grumshar cast Tasha's hideous laughter on the barb first, to leave the path open for the ID, and Body Thief. if that doesn't work, then the ID will cast Devour, with Body thief happening on the next round (the only character able to take the ID out in the first round is the barb, I'll have him attack Grumshar instead if I need to). The plan is for the ID to devour the brain of the barb. Now, they're level 5. The barb is going to attack the cleric, who is the one in love with him (yes, this is where I get evil). However, the barb could easily kill her with one axe swing, so I'm going to have him try and choke her out. Homebrewing the rules for this slightly, obviously - it'll be an unarmed attack, doing 5 damage on hit, 5 damage on the clerics turn and 5 damage again on the barb's turn with contested strength rolls each time (unless the barb is damaged, where the cleric can roll with advantage and the barb with disadvantage) The cleric has revivify, but no diamond, (and even if she did, revivify wouldn't work). I want my new players to experience the horror of the ID without actually putting a player character at risk. If they know these things exist and what they can do, they'll be prepared for them when they come up later. Of course the barb is going to die. But I've been seeding story plots along the way. If they put two and two together (and if they don't, I'll outright have Floon suggest that the barb can't be left in the sewer and they should take him to a temple to be put to rest properly) they will remember that I have mentioned the temple of Selune, and that they know a cleric there who is actually the barb's foster-mother. I have her as a high-level cleric with 'True Resurrection'. Of course, there'll be a price to pay.... and it won't necessarily be gold....
I just wanted to pop this in here, to show a way of dealing with difficult combat, or twisting encounters in the book to suit your story. We're a very RP heavy group, and I cannot wait for the rp opportunity between the players when they realise their favourite character is dead...... (and yes, I am evil.)
Just remember that not all encounters require combat. Sometimes it is up to the DM to paint a picture of dire danger so that the party understands that maybe other means of resolution are required. Stealth, subterfuge, and even basic negotiation are possible.
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
Just a quick comment. You have an interesting story .. however, it doesn't seem to me that it is "a way of dealing with difficult combat".
You seem to have described what you will make happen rather than what is likely to happen. To get the results you are looking for you will likely have to fudge the initiative rolls so that the half-orc goes first and the ID goes before the barbarian. Otherwise your sequence of events doesn't work.
In addition, devour intellect requires a DC12 intelligence save and a roll of 3d6 to reduce intelligence. There is no guarantee that the barbarian will fail that or that the 3d6 will exceed the barbarian's intelligence. Alternatively, the barbarian needs to fail the DC12 wisdom save to become incapacitated by Tasha's and then they have to fail the intelligence contested check against the ID to for body thief. The ID has a +1 ... unless you have rolled stats the barbarian is looking at a -1 on their int and wis saves at worst which is still a reasonable chance to pass unless you increase the DC substantially or add some other factor to force a failure.
So the odds of the barbarian actually going down in the first round will be small unless you fudge all the dice rolls to make it happen.
The ID only has 21 hit points though they are resistant to BPS damage. However, a level 5 group with ranger/barb/cleric/bard with randomly rolled initiative is still very likely to make short work of an ID though it may depend on what spells and equipment the party still has available. Some of the plan appears to be based on the players not knowing the threat and risk represented by an ID so that they perhaps ignore it. You'll need to decide if that is reasonable for a fifth level character in your game world no matter what the players might know or not (meta gaming can work both ways - sometimes the characters will know things that the players don't and the DM should let them in on those things). Finally, the ID is pretty hideous looking so if only from that perspective, it might well look like the bigger threat from the player/character perspective even if they don't know what it can do.
Finally, I really don't understand why the ID would consider choking out the cleric. If the characters seem unaware of what an ID is or can do, then the ID might well decide to take over the barbarian and become him. The ID teleports into the empty skull replacing the brain, the ID has all the knowledge of the creature they inhabit, the ID can easily replace the barbarian - so if the players don't recognize the creature then from their perspective, the creature ran up to the barbarian and vanished. They won't know what is happening or what is going on. If the ID feels like Nihiloor is irritated with Grum'shar then they might even join in the fight to eradicate Grum'shar and the only witness who might know where the ID went. They would not want the characters interrogating Grumshar afterward.
On the other hand, if the ID thinks that Grum'shar can win the fight and that is what the ID wants to do (perhaps taking the party prisoner for his master) then he'd attack the cleric and perhaps use non-lethal damage to knock them out if the ID wants a prisoner and kill them otherwise. The entire choking scene really doesn't make much sense to me since hitting them non-lethally with the side of the axe would be faster and easier if that is the ID's goal.
TL;DR: For a level 5 party, even one depleted of resources, an apprentice wizard and an ID isn't much of a fight. In terms of "a way of dealing with a difficult combat", my personal opinion is that forcing a specific narrative and ignoring dice rolls is rarely if ever a good way to deal with a difficult combat. However, to obtain the results described, there is very little chance of it happening without fudging dice.
Interesting scenario! We've a similar scenario...and we're pondering the hypothetical situation of; - if the ID possessed the barbarian, - combat begins, with the ID controlling the barbarian and it's place in the initiative is that of the barbarian's, - the rest of the party recognised the danger and brought the barbarian down to 0 HP, causing the ID to have to exit the body; Where then would the ID fall in the initiative? As in, having used it's 'turn' when possessing the barbarian, would it then have another turn as the ID after being ejected, or would it retain it's place in initiative as per when was the barbarian? Or, would you have to roll the ID in initiative when combat begins, but it can only take its turn after/if being ejected? We're trying to get our head around it. At present, it seems as though the ID would get two 'turns' during combat if has used Body Thief. Thoughts?
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Who on earth decided that having an intellect devourer and mind flayer up against a level 1-2 party was a balanced combat, after they've been dealing with Krentz and the Druegar? I have a level 5 party who are pretty wiped after clearing out the entire dungeon, just to be met with this bunch. But I also want the combat to feel...epic. It's a boss battle. I ended our last session just as they walked in the door. Nihiloor immediately got up and left, leaving his minions behind to deal with the adventurers. No ifs or buts, he gets up, floats across the room, leaves. That leaves Grum'shar and the intellect devourer. In the party is a cleric, ranger, bard, and I actually have an NPC barbarian (he was originally a PC, but I had to step in as a DM after we discovered that our DM was...well, an unsavoury character, to put it nicely. One of the PC's is in love with the barb, so the rest of the party wanted him to stay) I've already got them to roll init. Grumshar and the ID actually rolled pretty damn high, and the rest of the party rolled low. Grumshar's going first, followed by the ID, followed by Floon, then the rest of the party. The barb rolled terribly and is going near the end.
So here's my 'evil' plan. Grumshar is going to be a distraction. I've swapped out a couple of his spells, and given him one that can incapacitate. The barb is already pretty wounded after the Duergar (these are level 5 characters, I've been increasing the difficulty of the combat to match). I'm going to have Grumshar cast Tasha's hideous laughter on the barb first, to leave the path open for the ID, and Body Thief. if that doesn't work, then the ID will cast Devour, with Body thief happening on the next round (the only character able to take the ID out in the first round is the barb, I'll have him attack Grumshar instead if I need to). The plan is for the ID to devour the brain of the barb. Now, they're level 5. The barb is going to attack the cleric, who is the one in love with him (yes, this is where I get evil). However, the barb could easily kill her with one axe swing, so I'm going to have him try and choke her out. Homebrewing the rules for this slightly, obviously - it'll be an unarmed attack, doing 5 damage on hit, 5 damage on the clerics turn and 5 damage again on the barb's turn with contested strength rolls each time (unless the barb is damaged, where the cleric can roll with advantage and the barb with disadvantage) The cleric has revivify, but no diamond, (and even if she did, revivify wouldn't work). I want my new players to experience the horror of the ID without actually putting a player character at risk. If they know these things exist and what they can do, they'll be prepared for them when they come up later. Of course the barb is going to die. But I've been seeding story plots along the way. If they put two and two together (and if they don't, I'll outright have Floon suggest that the barb can't be left in the sewer and they should take him to a temple to be put to rest properly) they will remember that I have mentioned the temple of Selune, and that they know a cleric there who is actually the barb's foster-mother. I have her as a high-level cleric with 'True Resurrection'. Of course, there'll be a price to pay.... and it won't necessarily be gold....
I just wanted to pop this in here, to show a way of dealing with difficult combat, or twisting encounters in the book to suit your story. We're a very RP heavy group, and I cannot wait for the rp opportunity between the players when they realise their favourite character is dead...... (and yes, I am evil.)
Just remember that not all encounters require combat. Sometimes it is up to the DM to paint a picture of dire danger so that the party understands that maybe other means of resolution are required. Stealth, subterfuge, and even basic negotiation are possible.
Absoloutely! Bit difficult when the bard runs in singing at the top of her lungs, though..... 😂
Just a quick comment. You have an interesting story .. however, it doesn't seem to me that it is "a way of dealing with difficult combat".
You seem to have described what you will make happen rather than what is likely to happen. To get the results you are looking for you will likely have to fudge the initiative rolls so that the half-orc goes first and the ID goes before the barbarian. Otherwise your sequence of events doesn't work.
In addition, devour intellect requires a DC12 intelligence save and a roll of 3d6 to reduce intelligence. There is no guarantee that the barbarian will fail that or that the 3d6 will exceed the barbarian's intelligence. Alternatively, the barbarian needs to fail the DC12 wisdom save to become incapacitated by Tasha's and then they have to fail the intelligence contested check against the ID to for body thief. The ID has a +1 ... unless you have rolled stats the barbarian is looking at a -1 on their int and wis saves at worst which is still a reasonable chance to pass unless you increase the DC substantially or add some other factor to force a failure.
So the odds of the barbarian actually going down in the first round will be small unless you fudge all the dice rolls to make it happen.
The ID only has 21 hit points though they are resistant to BPS damage. However, a level 5 group with ranger/barb/cleric/bard with randomly rolled initiative is still very likely to make short work of an ID though it may depend on what spells and equipment the party still has available. Some of the plan appears to be based on the players not knowing the threat and risk represented by an ID so that they perhaps ignore it. You'll need to decide if that is reasonable for a fifth level character in your game world no matter what the players might know or not (meta gaming can work both ways - sometimes the characters will know things that the players don't and the DM should let them in on those things). Finally, the ID is pretty hideous looking so if only from that perspective, it might well look like the bigger threat from the player/character perspective even if they don't know what it can do.
Finally, I really don't understand why the ID would consider choking out the cleric. If the characters seem unaware of what an ID is or can do, then the ID might well decide to take over the barbarian and become him. The ID teleports into the empty skull replacing the brain, the ID has all the knowledge of the creature they inhabit, the ID can easily replace the barbarian - so if the players don't recognize the creature then from their perspective, the creature ran up to the barbarian and vanished. They won't know what is happening or what is going on. If the ID feels like Nihiloor is irritated with Grum'shar then they might even join in the fight to eradicate Grum'shar and the only witness who might know where the ID went. They would not want the characters interrogating Grumshar afterward.
On the other hand, if the ID thinks that Grum'shar can win the fight and that is what the ID wants to do (perhaps taking the party prisoner for his master) then he'd attack the cleric and perhaps use non-lethal damage to knock them out if the ID wants a prisoner and kill them otherwise. The entire choking scene really doesn't make much sense to me since hitting them non-lethally with the side of the axe would be faster and easier if that is the ID's goal.
TL;DR: For a level 5 party, even one depleted of resources, an apprentice wizard and an ID isn't much of a fight. In terms of "a way of dealing with a difficult combat", my personal opinion is that forcing a specific narrative and ignoring dice rolls is rarely if ever a good way to deal with a difficult combat. However, to obtain the results described, there is very little chance of it happening without fudging dice.
Accidental double post ...
Interesting scenario!
We've a similar scenario...and we're pondering the hypothetical situation of;
- if the ID possessed the barbarian,
- combat begins, with the ID controlling the barbarian and it's place in the initiative is that of the barbarian's,
- the rest of the party recognised the danger and brought the barbarian down to 0 HP, causing the ID to have to exit the body;
Where then would the ID fall in the initiative? As in, having used it's 'turn' when possessing the barbarian, would it then have another turn as the ID after being ejected, or would it retain it's place in initiative as per when was the barbarian? Or, would you have to roll the ID in initiative when combat begins, but it can only take its turn after/if being ejected?
We're trying to get our head around it. At present, it seems as though the ID would get two 'turns' during combat if has used Body Thief.
Thoughts?