Rules/Crunch of Eyros

[Abisashi]

When had she gone and confronted the other two? I didn't know that there was ever any direct confrontation between the big powers. Because if there was, let's face it, there'd only be one big power right now.

Well, we do have her as one of the people fighting Taufenacht 7,500 years ago. She's only gotten better since then, though I imagine Taufenacht was unable to bring his whole power to bear so she wasn't epic at the time. Maybe she's much harder to kill in her own lands? I think she should be getting some minor worship powers (she's not worshipped, exactly, but she's definitely held in reverence by a bunch of reasonably powerful druids and by the creatures of her lands.)

 

[Arkhandus]

It had been established earlier that Rrahask Sshasaar had clashed on a few occasions with some of the world's powerhouses, particularly Taufenacht, but possibly also Vildaxaranthus or Conquers Twice. Not that she had beaten them or anything, necessarily, but that she had fought them off and survived. As a non-epic druid, it has been due in large part to her immortality from the Perfect Timeless Body ritual, which while not rendering her unkillable, does make it take more than brute force to slay her truly. A single ex-druid with the Blighter prestige class (masters of the wild, dunno if it's in one of the Complete books or not) could wreak havoc by visiting the sacred marshes and withering the land, and sufficient harm to the land would likely shatter Rrahask's ritual bond to the place. So could simply finding the source of her ritual's power and stealing/destroying/banishing it, or somehow erasing Rrahask Sshasaar from time itself. :^D

The Venerable Mother's power does come in part from her veneration by the lizardfolk, druids, and Eyrians, and also from the Eyrian veneration of all Kohl'Tass lizardfolk in general. Maybe I'll come up with an aura of revenance for her to boost her diplomacy skill or something appropriate, and likely keeping low-intellect creatures (Int 2-) at bay. Not that her Wild Empathy ability isn't good enough at that already, but against a horde of attacking dinos under Vildaxaranthus' control, well.... :^D

Anyway, I finished my most recent editing of Rrahask Sshasaar, so now she loses some XP each time she's resurrected by her ritual power, and she's only immune to a few effects. She's now also only an 18th-level druid, so 20th-level as a character, though ECL 21.

 

[Rystil Arden]

I like the new mechanic (it is in line with some other things out there, but slightly more XP-efficient, which sounds right to me, its also a good explanation for her new level; she must have been defeated a few times down the years, losing a good amount of XP), but you should probably make a longer delay on her revival, lest she go down in the middle of a fight, then immediately teleport back the next round, etc (even liches and ghosts have to wait a few days, so at least make her wait a few hours so that she can't hop back into the same combat). Other than that, I think an aura of reverance as you sugest would be a cool addition to her power: perhaps it attempts to place a DC 17 Calm Emotions effect on everyone who enters. The good news is that now she is at the perfect power level to clash with Vil and survive, but she probably wouldn't be able to actually defeat him without a bit of help (the PCs?), particularly if Vil has his minions.

 

[Abisashi]

On a different topic, dragons should advance one age category for each ~950 years after achieving Great Wyrm. This puts Alsixnivis at Great wurm +6 2/3; I'll post him later today, and that'll be my epic NPC contribution.

I'm not sure why dragon BAB and saves don't use the slowed epic progression; it makes advanced dragons incredibly powerful.

 

[Arkhandus]

Actually I went back through the last two pages and checked out the three other statted powerhouses, and concluded that Rrahask Sshasaar was now a pushover for the likes of Vildaxaranthus, Conquers Twice, and Alsixnivius. Vil alone, with only 1 or 2 melee attacks per round, without even employing his Power Attack feat (which could add some 30 or 40 extra damage per hit, easy, and still hit Rrahask's AC), deal out 50-90 some damage per round, killing Rrahask in 1 or 2 rounds of focusing on her. If Rrahask cast Heal each round instead of attacking, except for perhaps a Quickened Flame Strike, she'd last maybe 10 rounds or so if lucky (that is, if she had prepared 4-8 Heals), and would only have a mild effect on Vildaxaranthus (along with all those Heals to keep herself in the fight, she could only prepare maybe half a dozen or fewer Quickened Flamestrikes, dealing maybe ~180 damage, and then only because half of Flamestrike is holy damage rather than fire). Even Shapechange likely wouldn't get her a form with high enough AC to avoid getting hit by Vil, and it only takes 2-3 hits for Vil to slay Rrahask.

So for now I've given Rrahask Sshasaar (in the existing post above) a few added defenses from Perfect Timeless Body. Damage Reduction 15/magic and cold iron, Fast Healing 2, and her Reverant Aura (which, while useless against anyone close to her level, at least suppresses fear effects). I'll probably take away/diminish one of these based on further comments, and that'll leave Rrahask in her final form. I'll also consider slowing her resurrection effect from PTB, though as it stands, if anything killed her it's likely that she'd have already wasted several spells against it, and would resurrect with only a partial spell slot inventory ready anyway. Can only waste so many mid- to high-level slots on Tree Stride, Wind Walk, and such, right?

 

[domino]

On a different topic, dragons should advance one age category for each ~950 years after achieving Great Wyrm. This puts Alsixnivis at Great wurm +6 2/3; I'll post him later today, and that'll be my epic NPC contribution.

I'm not sure why dragon BAB and saves don't use the slowed epic progression; it makes advanced dragons incredibly powerful.

Alsixnivis has already been done over, he's near the top of this page. There simply IS no category greater than Great Wyrm, on account of they die at that point. They aren't immortal, just really long lived. So, you might want to take a look at that one, which gives him a dragon only prestige class, that among other things, grants immortality, and make suggestions/changes to that.

But yeah, Rrahask is a pushover, but even when she was immune to damn near everything, she was still a pushover. She'd just keep coming back, to get beat down again. Her real strength isn't in her melee combat prowess, it's in her druid abilities, to fight against them with nature itself.

Also, you might want to look into the epic druid feats, that, among other things, lets druids wildshape into gargantuan creatures, and/or dragons. A gargantuan t-rex, with animal growth cast on it would be a definite threat to Vil.

 

[Rystil Arden]

A well-played druid can take out Vil without a problem. You do need to give Rrahask her magic items though. She should probably get her protection from those (like most PCs do).

On an unrelated note: although you are generally correct Domino, Abisashi made a contribution that made dragons immortal in Eyros. I still think the best way to represent it is using Dragon Ascendant because creating age categories above Great Wyrm is a pain in the arse (and breaks the established mould that Great Wyrm is the last age category).

 

[domino]

Ah. I had forgotten about that thing. Which does make sense, given the rarity of dragons in the world.

 

[Arkhandus]

Rrahask Sshasaar was Epic-level before, but I toned her down to 20th-level with the understanding that she keeps losing XP every few hundred/thousand years when she confronts someone powerful and wears them down through fighting, dying, coming back, fighting, dying, coming back, and relentlessly whittling away at them, whether it takes hours or days..... None of the Epic druid feats are terribly worthwhile though, at least not until around 27th or 30th level, which is about the earliest point that many of them are available (note the required ranks of Spellcraft, Knowledge Nature, and such that many of those feats have). So Rrahask relies on the Shapechange spell moreso than Wild Shape, when it comes to taking on a foe in melee. Throwing boulders as a giant or dragon works too though....

 

[domino]

Eh. I figure that when you're a nigh immortal Druidess with your life tied to an entire region of a planet, some allowances can be made, even if you don't meet all the prereqs for a feat.