Should I punish my players with a high CR encounter

[rkarnes]

I am running a Pathfinder campaign. My four players have just reached level 4. I wrote early on in my design notes that the party had 7-days to stop a group from releasing a demon. I have had NPCs tell the party that it is time sensitive, and they have been told that the bad-guys want to release a demon.

The problem is, the monster I had in mind is a Chernobue: Qlippoth, Chernobue - Pathfinder_OGC

Which is grossly overpowered for them.

I have already told them that the demon's name is "Chernobue". I was simply going to make this monster a unique monster with the name "Chernobue". Now I'm considering using a lower-level demon and naming it "Chernobue".

They failed. They didn't react fast enough? Should I release a horrible demon to burn the village?

 

[SkredlitheOgre]

I am running a Pathfinder campaign. My four players have just reached level 4. I wrote early on in my design notes that the party had 7-days to stop a group from releasing a demon. I have had NPCs tell the party that it is time sensitive, and they have been told that the bad-guys want to release a demon.

The problem is, the monster I had in mind is a Chernobue: Qlippoth, Chernobue - Pathfinder_OGC

Which is grossly overpowered for them.

I have already told them that the demon's name is "Chernobue". I was simply going to make this monster a unique monster with the name "Chernobue". Now I'm considering using a lower-level demon and naming it "Chernobue".

They failed. They didn't react fast enough? Should I release a horrible demon to burn the village?

They failed, so you should release the demon. The great part is that their characters have no idea what a "Chernobue" is. You can still use the same monster, but you could just bring it down in power a little bit. Say the cultists used lemon juice instead of lime juice (or whatever seems appropriate). You can reduce the DR, take away the tentacle attacks, reduce DCs on Special Attacks or Spell-like abilities, or reduce the HP on the monster by, say 40 or 50 (or however much you want).

To me, in this case, you want to give the party a chance to make up for not taking care of the problem in time, so give them a challenge, but not overwhelmingly so. Unless they scoffed at the warnings and ignored the "this is time sensitive" stuff. Then let a full Chernobue loose.

 

[El Mahdi]

Go ahead and release the Demon. It's not punishing them, it's just providing a narrative to which the Players are making decisions and responding to. Releasing the Demon isn't necessarily the end either. There can be survivors. The PC's may go after the Demon for Revenge or out of Guilt. Or the PC's may feel motivated to try and put things right.

It's just generating more adventure seeds and more possible paths for the story.

 

[rkarnes]

I am a pretty experienced DM, but I have avoided fights in which the party has no chance of success. This is basically what a straight up fight with this monster would be. I would be ecstatic if they found some way of stopping the demon's rampage, but more realistically it is a "run away" situation.

"Run away" is not something my group is used to. I am thinking about keeping its defenses the same, including its DR, SR, and immunities, but I am thinking about pre-rolling its damage for each character so that I will give each character a turn to react with 1-3 hit points before the demon knocks them unconscious.

Also, the Chernobue has an ability called "horrific appearance";

Creatures that succumb to a chernobue’s horrific appearance become paralyzed with disgust for 2d6 rounds; a paralyzed creature gets a new save each round to recover from the effect, provided he is no longer aware of the chernobue or within 30 feet of it.[Will DC 20 negates]

I am thinking about using this as a way to thin the herd and encourage the players to run. Or should I just drop it totally so that they have a chance to beat him.

 

[rkarnes]

Or maybe I can put it on a timer. Maybe things happen just before dawn, and the sun begins peaking over the horizon just a few minutes before the Chernabue attacks;

Light Vulnerability (Ex)

A chernobue within an area of bright light takes 1 point of Constitution damage per minute it remains in the area.

This would set up an automatic deus ex machina but without the frustrating "high-level npc ally" effect.

 

[billd91]

Foreshadowed consequences aren't punishments (though your players will probably complain about them as such). Just give them an even break if they encounter it and let them run for the hills without being too merciless.

 

[BriarMonkey]

Allow the abyssal spawn to be released into the world.

Now, put yourself into the position of the spawn. What would it do? It has an above average intelligence (13), so it will not act totally random and stupidly, it will act to further its own plans. And depending on when and where, it will also act to preserve itself (due to the Con drain of sunlight).

Also, is this akin to a summoning or a gateing? I ask because if it's summoned, then it's only a representation of the creature that is brought forth, not the actual creature. Thus, any harm or death is not permament - just a nuisance because the actual creature is still in it's home plane. If it is a gate effect, then it's the actual creature that has been brought forth - so death is a very real issue for the creature.

So, with all that, the spawn is brought forth. It will rampage at night (to mitigate weaknesses, and leverage its darkvision), devouring and slaughtering all that it wills. Threats will be dealt with as quickly as possible, and without mercy. Those not considered a threat will be snacked upon at its leisure (thanks to its horrific appearance and poison). If it must, it will go about during the day, but it will make heavy use of its at will darkness ability.

Now, while it moves fairly quickly (40'), it will probably revel in the fact that it's been loosed to wreak havoc. It probably won't be picky. That means others can flee and escape. It also means that the PCs need to flee.

Once the spawn has devoured its current location's inhabitants, it will move on. This then allows for a very real, ongoing, threat to develop in the world. One that the PCs can train up to and plan for. They shouldn't try to face the thing at 4th level - and if they do, then they probably need to learn that there are fouler things in the world than orcs.

You have the makings for a memorable and very tense adventure line there. Go for it.

 

[Crothian]

Release the demon but not have them be there for it if you fear a TPK. Have them off being distracted then they come over a hill and see the village destroyed, almost everyone dead. You could have them run into a few older kids with lots of youngins that describe the men and women of the village trying to kill the beast and give time for the children to escape.

Now they are faced with the first problem of making sure the kids do get to safety and then dealing with the demon.

 

[delericho]

They failed. They didn't react fast enough? Should I release a horrible demon to burn the village?

Release the spawn. Maybe have the village burned, or perhaps have the demon distracted by sweeter meats elsewhere (perhaps have the demon take out some of the PCs' potential higher-level allies, so that the later stages of the campaign are that much harder).

Ideally, you want three things:

1) You need to make it clear that there are real consequences for failure. So absolutely do not wimp out.

2) At the same time, you don't want this to totally derail your campaign. So if it's a TPK in the making, you should almost certainly do something to rebalance things.

3) You should err in favour of doing whatever makes for the most interesting story.

 

[Shoe]

Allow the abyssal spawn to be released into the world.

Now, put yourself into the position of the spawn. What would it do? It has an above average intelligence (13), so it will not act totally random and stupidly, it will act to further its own plans. And depending on when and where, it will also act to preserve itself (due to the Con drain of sunlight).

Also, is this akin to a summoning or a gateing? I ask because if it's summoned, then it's only a representation of the creature that is brought forth, not the actual creature. Thus, any harm or death is not permament - just a nuisance because the actual creature is still in it's home plane. If it is a gate effect, then it's the actual creature that has been brought forth - so death is a very real issue for the creature.

So, with all that, the spawn is brought forth. It will rampage at night (to mitigate weaknesses, and leverage its darkvision), devouring and slaughtering all that it wills. Threats will be dealt with as quickly as possible, and without mercy. Those not considered a threat will be snacked upon at its leisure (thanks to its horrific appearance and poison). If it must, it will go about during the day, but it will make heavy use of its at will darkness ability.

Now, while it moves fairly quickly (40'), it will probably revel in the fact that it's been loosed to wreak havoc. It probably won't be picky. That means others can flee and escape. It also means that the PCs need to flee.

Once the spawn has devoured its current location's inhabitants, it will move on. This then allows for a very real, ongoing, threat to develop in the world. One that the PCs can train up to and plan for. They shouldn't try to face the thing at 4th level - and if they do, then they probably need to learn that there are fouler things in the world than orcs.

You have the makings for a memorable and very tense adventure line there. Go for it.

Best answer thus far. After this point, come up with some evil plans for the demon to execute. Why did the cult summon him? Have stopping the evil plot to mitigate the damage be the rest of the campaign. This is a great opportunity to have the demon "disappear" and return at the end of an evil plot they are foiling around the appropriate level.