Good counter for Solid Fog?

[Thurbane]

Hi, just seeking a quick bit of advice…last session, my players took on the BBEG and his inner circle of minions. The BBEG is a 12th level Cleric (with the Evil and Knowledge domains). Anyway, the party (Beguiler) managed to counter him fairly easily with a series of Solid Fog spells. He had a couple of Dispel Magics up his sleeve, and had cast a Freedom of Movement on himself so he wasn’t personally effected, but his minions were effectively trapped in a room, moving at only 5 feet per round (no SR, no save).

The PCs eventually retreated after taking out a couple of minions, but plan to return to the stronghold again pretty soon. The Cleric is an intelligent opponent, so I’m wondering what spells he might memorize to counter the Solid Fog tactics? Short of a bunch of Dispel Magics and Freedom of Movements, what else would be a good idea for him to take? He is pretty focused on Summoning spells, any creatures he could summon to help disperse the fog?

 

[Erywin]

Get a Wiz/Sorc/Druid minion to cast Gust of Wind?

 

[Thurbane]

Unfortunately his only minions left at the moment are some devils and human fighter types.

I should also point at that it is basically a core-only game, so only spells from the PHB...

 

[RangerWickett]

A bunch of cleric minions with the travel domain?

 

[Sollir Furryfoot]

Summon an air elemental and have it use its Whirlwind ability to disperse the cloud? Kind of some ad hoc ruling, but a Huge Air Elemental from Summon Nature's Ally VI would do the trick in my book. Also, it never hurts to have archer minions who ready an action to disrupt a spellcaster's casting. Blade Barrier, Harm, and Slay Living are nastier deterrents, especially if the cleric can somehow trick the PCs into getting all warriors to engage "him" at the front (him being a devil or ideally doppleganger decoy) before coming up from behind them with another contingent of forces. Hope that helps, good luck!

 

[frankthedm]

Which devils?

Most devils can improved teleport. Solid fog will inconvenience them, but if they want they can home in on the beguiler pretty well with a single action if the spell had verbal components, then move 5 feet more if their guess was off a little. Then it screams in infernal, making it very likely everyone knows what square it is in. Those who know infernal know it is telling it's brethren where to teleport to to surround the caster. "Victim is north/east/south/west of me!"

Do the devils have any fire based SLAs? (S)hapable effects can only be placed in the squares adjacent to themselves due to LOS rules for those, but a fireball or other effect will easily burn away the fog wherever the devils drop them.

Cleric decides if he is going to use the fog to maneuver away or if he is going to make use of it. If he feels it is worthwhile to fight he starts buffing, safe from a Targeted dispell for as long as the solid fog stays up. He may call some devils to him and most likely puts up some fire resist, though he should have already had that going with a Mass resist energy{SC} that his whole crew should have had if that spell is allowed. Any foe foolish enough to meet him in the fog eats a Harm and then is set upon by the devils that have been moving with the cleric.

NPC fighters start drinking their treasure. Pop them potions like they are crack vials and start wading into the fog.

 

[mvincent]

Summon an air elemental and have it use its Whirlwind ability to disperse the cloud?

That's a good idea (using Summon Monster V+)

Other options include an Air Mephit's (Summon Monster IV) Gust of wind ability, or a Babau's (Summon Monster VII) dispel magic ability.

 

[Erywin]

Other options include an Air Mephit's (Summon Monster IV) Gust of wind ability.

I think you just hit on a really good idea Lowish level and it gets the job done

 

[Thurbane]

Indeed, I like the mephit idea a lot!

Thanks all for the other suggestions, though.

The BBEG (12th level cleric) has two human fighters as minions, as well as a handful of bearded devils. The party has been raiding his stronghold over the course of a couple of weeks, and his seriously depleted the enemy (wiping out the hobgoblins and other opponents).

 

[frankthedm]

2 weeks is more than enough time to have made a humanbane weapon or 50 arrows of such. one per weapon if he was only upgrading them from +1's