D&D 5E Anticlimactic Boss Fights

[UngeheuerLich]

You can rule what you want,

Thanks. Now I am relieved. I thought I was going to be punished by WotC Ninjas.

 

[NotAYakk]

I mean, I'd just have the BBEG run for it if the players have built a fortress and are nearly unkillable within it.

Retreat and regroup.

 

[Quickleaf]

For those of you suggesting that the beholder should be allowed to “fire blind”, I think that’s an easy solution but one that can potentially lead to players saying “That’s not fair! Why can’t I ‘fire blind’ with my spells that require line of sight too?”

“You can, if you select ray spells like ray of frost & ray of enfeeblement. Did you select those spells?”

I know that’s a very legalistic / tongue in cheek answer (why are beholder’s Eye Rays called rays but don’t conform to common text shared by “ray of” spells? Geee), so that would be my wink wink response…

…but I think that sort of player objection really is more a play style & house rule conversation.

For example, if you have players who believe “the monsters can do what their stats say, and only what their stats say, not subject to on the fly GM whims”, then that’s something the GM needs to know and have a conversation about. Personally, if players told me that, I’d let them know I’m probably not the right GM for them.

Similarly, if a group of players expect PCs and monsters to conform to the same design rules, that’s something the GM really needs to know. Because the only time in D&D’s history where that was true was 3e, which suggests to me that that group might be better served playing 3e or Pathfinder.

Or another example would be a player wanting to run a blind PC spellcaster - does your group prefer that player need to sort thru which spell descriptions omit “a creature you can see”? Or do they prefer to give that PC some leeway? Or do they prefer for ALL casters to have some leeway when it comes to D&D’s legalese spell descriptions?

When I run for a group hasn’t had those conversations (eg. one-shots with new folks), I will often answer the “why can’t my spellcaster do xyz?” questions with “If you upcast it by so-and-so levels, I’ll allow it.” That’s a great multipurpose tool to have in your GM toolbox to keep things moving forward and defuse certain player types.

 

[DarkCrisis]

3rd ed.

Big Finale Castle.

PCs are going to face a Death Knight. I have been excited to run this combat for a week.

They roll into his chambers. The DK on his throne. I prepare to Power Word Kill one of them....

DK loses goes last in combat

First up, the Mage. Who casts Polymorph Other.

I'm not scared. DK has like 90% Magic Immunity plus really good saving throws.

Roll horribly and it gets passed the DKs magic immunity. Completely botch the saving throw as well.

Mage: "Porpoise"

POOF my DK boss fight is turned into a dolphin.

I still think about that 20 years later.

Yes DMs get scars.

 

[Umbran]

In short, if vision isn't blocked, then you have line of sight.

It isn't shooting into blindness. It is shooting into darkness.

"A heavily obscured area--such as darkness, opaque fog, or dense foliage--blocks vision entirely."

It literally uses that phrase - blocks vision entirely. So, no line of sight into Darkness.

 

[cbwjm]

I'd allow any spell that has an attack roll to be fired into darkness, probably also some spells like disintegrate as well since they're rays but with a save instead of an attack roll, probably to take critical hits out of the equation.

 

[Stormonu]

It isn't shooting into blindness. It is shooting into darkness.

"A heavily obscured area--such as darkness, opaque fog, or dense foliage--blocks vision entirely."

It literally uses that phrase - blocks vision entirely. So, no line of sight into Darkness.

You knew it was coming...

I magic missile the darkness!

 

[pukunui]

To be honest, I wasn't really looking for solutions for the specific scenario I posted. It's done and dusted. I was more just trying to start a conversation (and maybe garner some sympathy). Thanks for everyone who's posted, though! I do appreciate it.

Were the players disappointed? If I'd come up with the perfect combo to take down a major foe, I'd think it was awesome.

The one playing the darkness + Devil's Sight hexblade was pleased with himself, but the other two players agreed it was a bit anticlimactic. One of them suggested just handwaving the rest of the fight, but as I mentioned, I ultimately chose to have Halaster intervene. While his intervention brought down the darkness spell and got the PCs to stop turtling, it didn't really help the beholder overly much.

The warlock player kept insisting that if it hadn't been for that tactic, they'd have been TPKed early on, but I'm not sure, and I think that the fact that they won anyway even with Halaster's interference suggests they probably would have been fine.

 

[MarkB]

The one playing the darkness + Devil's Sight hexblade was pleased with himself, but the other two players agreed it was a bit anticlimactic. One of them suggested just handwaving the rest of the fight, but as I mentioned, I ultimately chose to have Halaster intervene. While his intervention brought down the darkness spell and got the PCs to stop turtling, it didn't really help the beholder overly much.

Yeah, while it sounds like a neat quick victory when summarised, I can see that it would get tedious just playing out the whittling down of HPs over several rounds.

I can think of one example in my own experience. When running Rime of the Frostmaiden I was frequently bamboozled by one player's use of Tasha's Mind Whip. You never appreciate the action economy so much as when you lose most of it.

In particular, when confronting the Chardalyn Dragon, it got tagged several rounds in a row and was basically just hanging in the air waiting for its breath weapon to recharge instead of using hit-and-run tactics to its best advantage. It did manage to close and focus fire on the character, but by that time it was sufficiently wounded that he lasted longer than it did.

 

[pukunui]

Yeah, while it sounds like a neat quick victory when summarised, I can see that it would get tedious just playing out the whittling down of HPs over several rounds.

Yeah, I think the fight lasted close to a full 10 rounds, and it was mostly just the warlock sniping at the beholder while the cleric maintained concentration on dawn from within the darkness. The barbarian couldn't do much because he was frightened and slowed by the beholder and couldn't make the saves until close to the very end.

I didn't include this in the OP because it wasn't particularly relevant to the point I was trying to make, but it was worth playing the fight out till the end because the barbarian did eventually manage to shake off the beholder's fear and slow effects. He then chucked a necklace of fireballs bead that killed the beholder. This was important because he happened to be possessed by the ghost of a paladin who had been killed by the beholder and needed to strike the killing blow in order to find rest, and prior to this point in the fight, it wasn't looking like the barbarian was going to be able to land that killing blow because only the warlock was doing damage and the beholder was 30 feet up in the air.

In the end, that moment made up for the slog of the preceding few rounds.

In particular, when confronting the Chardalyn Dragon, it got tagged several rounds in a row and was basically just hanging in the air waiting for its breath weapon to recharge instead of using hit-and-run tactics to its best advantage. It did manage to close and focus fire on the character, but by that time it was sufficiently wounded that he lasted longer than it did.

That reminds me of the first time I ran Legacy of the Crystal Shard. The PCs were facing off against the ice witch in Icingdeath's glacial lair, and when she animated Icingdeath's skeleton, the bard cast Tasha's hideous laughter on it. I couldn't find anywhere that said that skeletons were immune to that kind of spell, so it spent most of the fight prone on the floor silently shaking with mirth. In retrospect, it's quite funny, but I remember being rather annoyed by it at the time.