My players seem unable to kill my bad guy... (if you're in my game, don't read)

If you're in my game, don't read please.

So here's the scenario, 18th level party, 1 wiz, 1 sorc, 1 rogue-fighter, 1 rogue, 1 ranger-druid. The bad guy is a 20th lvl wiz, 4 epic levels (as per FR), alhoon (undead illithid). The guy is astrally projecting from plane X, he knows the location of a color pool to the prime, he goes through it, creating a duplictate body complete with duplicate items. So, if the party kills him, they are only killing the astral body duplicate, no harm done to the baddy. Even if they somehow found his home plane, there's still the issue of the phylactry. he party fought this guy once, he killed everyone on the first round. Thank god for the caster's continegencies, they returned after porting out, semi reviving part of the party and defeated the bad guy, of course... just an astral body, so the guy is still totally unhurt...

Poor guys... so, how would you handle this? I've already been given one excellent suggestion on how to take this guy out, but I don't wish to post it just yet .

-Arravis

Well, just according to the numbers, you're challenging an 18th level party with a CR 27 threat (I think the lich template gives +3 CR). They shouldn't even be able to touch the bad guy. They don't have a chance.

Hah!

Have you no faith? There's always a way . And it's CR 35, since he's also an illithid .

Maybe, um . . . give them some clues that he's from Plane X? I mean, for all they know, he might just be a clone.

well...

Well, they have recently found a gate that leads to his home plane. Unfortunately, the big bad guy knows this, and what's to say he won't simply move to another plane?

Eyes bleeding must stop reading munchiness of DM and company!

Uhmmm, there's little to do. Do githyanki silver swords still sever the silver cord of an astral traveler? And do undead actually have a silver cord? If so, they could grab one and use it to kill the bad guy. Of course, they'll have to deal with the 'yankis afterwards, and they still have to destroy the phylactery.

Or, they could cast Polymorph Any Object and turn it into a turnip. Since it works on objects, it can work on undead too. If they can reach his body, find the phylactery, and destroy it before the spell wears out, they can kill him.

Or, they could cast a Wish or Miracle to get his phylactery.

Have you no faith? There's always a way . And it's CR 35, since he's also an illithid

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CR 35? Urk!

uh... If I found out that this was a CR 35 villain I'd tell the DM to go F himself and walk out. I'm sorry, but there *isn't* a way for a 18 lvl party to effectively take him out. He's practically double their CR! That's insane.

The point of playing isn't to slaughter the players.

~Derek

hey!

Hey, munchkiness is allowed of NPC's, not of players though...

The players are actually not that well equipped, and please don't tell me that you assume ALL 18th lvl parties are munchkin, cause that is not true.