I was making a monster for some of my PC's to fight in a semi large battle coming up in a session or two. this monster's only goal is to stand there and provide flanking bonus to another enemy. currently i have it with 407 HP with DR 5/--. Its only attack is a slam that has +16 to hit and 1d8+6 damage. I am terrible at judging CR's for things and I think that its about a CR 9. I was just wondering if i could get an opinion on this from anyone so that I might scale it a bit to fit the needs of the encounter. Thank you very much.
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CR for a Meatshield
- Thread starter edwee
- Start date
FreeTheSlaves
Adventurer
Not enough info here.
It's got 4 times the durability of a Hill Giant, but does half the damage. CR9 is ok, but I would run the XP reward numbers to see if it would give significantly more or less than you'd expect.
It's got 4 times the durability of a Hill Giant, but does half the damage. CR9 is ok, but I would run the XP reward numbers to see if it would give significantly more or less than you'd expect.
well, really its supposed to be flanking a person who is near impossible to hit (AC of 46) for the other monster, (without making its strength a stupidly high number) the other monster is a CR 14-15(depending on a few last minute changes) and there will be a few other peons that will probably die in the first round due to some arrows of slaying. also, it has less than half of the hill giants damage, as it has no full attack. just the one slam.
Empirate
First Post
So you're designing a whole monster just to get a measly +2 to hit on one PC's awesome AC? That sounds like a terrible idea to me.
First of all, let me say that more meaningful attack bonuses are fantastically easy to get at the levels you're talking about. Stacking a few buff spells and the right equipment on your big bad goes a long way. Optimized Inspire Courage on a greater invisible or just well-hidden Bard ally can provide rather extreme bonuses.
But I'd prefer another approach: Why not just have the big bad use attack forms that don't target AC, or that use touch AC? Area effects, save-or-sucks, trip/disarm/sunder/grapple etc. all work nicely regardless of (non-touch) AC. Immobilization via Forcecage etc. just takes the PC out of the fight altogether, rendering him impotent.
Also, is the PC in question at all optimized in any other regard than AC? Many players make the mistake of increasing AC at all cost - meaning they bring very little offensive oomph to the table. If the PC is just hard to hit, but not particularly dangerous himself, an intelligent opponent should just leave him alone and attack the more fragile party members first.
First of all, let me say that more meaningful attack bonuses are fantastically easy to get at the levels you're talking about. Stacking a few buff spells and the right equipment on your big bad goes a long way. Optimized Inspire Courage on a greater invisible or just well-hidden Bard ally can provide rather extreme bonuses.
But I'd prefer another approach: Why not just have the big bad use attack forms that don't target AC, or that use touch AC? Area effects, save-or-sucks, trip/disarm/sunder/grapple etc. all work nicely regardless of (non-touch) AC. Immobilization via Forcecage etc. just takes the PC out of the fight altogether, rendering him impotent.
Also, is the PC in question at all optimized in any other regard than AC? Many players make the mistake of increasing AC at all cost - meaning they bring very little offensive oomph to the table. If the PC is just hard to hit, but not particularly dangerous himself, an intelligent opponent should just leave him alone and attack the more fragile party members first.
halfcore
First Post
I agree with Empirate. Simply designing a monster to be the ultimate flanker is a bit lame. You could boost the big bad a lot more just by having some buffs be active on it. Any kind of extended bless/aid/prayer spell or even recitation works. Bull's Strength would work too, but you don't want the strength to be too high, I suppose. Magic Weapon/Fang perhaps? Or give it some feats like Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus.
Playing around with weather conditions and terrain is fun too, but I don't know the specifics at this point.
Playing around with weather conditions and terrain is fun too, but I don't know the specifics at this point.
I wouldn't call the party optimized at all, however, they did just run into a LOT of money, turning them into a bit of a "glass cannon". I just wanted a low damage flanker beacuse I couldnt think of any way to increase attack bonuses without granting damage as well. also, the spell magic weapon wouldnt work due to that being an enhancement bonus and he already has a magic weapon. I also don't want to use too many terrible spells for this battle, because the enemy they're going to face is only a mini-boss, the Big end boss is a mage, with a whole bunch of save or suck spells. and i don't really want to bog them down like that. and for the sake of fun, I don't want to take any of the PC's out of the fight at all. so forcecage is a no-no.
Lastly, i would love for him to attack other people in the party, but he is a (modified) Huecuva, and the PC with stupid high AC is a paladin. When he learns about her being a paladin, he must attack her. instead of going for the more squishy players.
Lastly, i would love for him to attack other people in the party, but he is a (modified) Huecuva, and the PC with stupid high AC is a paladin. When he learns about her being a paladin, he must attack her. instead of going for the more squishy players.
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