Cataboligne demons' eye rays: wtf?!

[Shin Okada]

Yep. Daze is nasty. AFAIK there is almost no way to gain immunity against Dazed condition.

But as the frankthedm and others says, a monster's effectiveness depends largely on the composition of "monster party" and circumstance.

That CR 10 monster will be fine or even weak as a EL 10 encounter by itself, as it can use that power once per turn against a single target.

That monster may be instantly nuked by 10+level adventurer party if the encounter starts at 300 ft.

On the other hand, if a PC happen to meat a horde of that demon in a small room, with some beneficial terrain feature for those demons, it could be easily a TPK.

 

[Jhaelen]

And what is the party doing during the 20 rounds they are being pelted by the eye rays and making their saves?

Well, nothing, since they're dazed?!

(I'm not sure if you agreeing or not...)

Anyway, thanks for your opinions!

Thinking some more about it, I agree, there are probably quite a fewe other monster-combos that are equally nasty.
I guess, what mainly caused my wtf-moment regarding the Catabolignes was that in module they're used exactly in such a way as to almost ensure a tpk. I have no idea what the author was thinking...

(Then again I've been equally baffled about the final encounter in ''Fortress of the Yuan-Ti' which I consider (almost) unbeatable in it's 3e version).

 

[Runestar]

Can I voluntarily opt to fail my save so I am paralyzed (which can be circumvented more easily than daze, such as freedom of movement)? Treads into metagaming territory though.

Good point though on the dazelock. I kept thinking of it in terms of 1 single foe against a party, not thinking that if you had as many of them as PCs, then can effectively stunlock/dazelock the entire party. Since the duration is 1d6 rounds, that frees up a few rounds here and there for them to attack (or just throw in another minion).

 

[Shin Okada]

Hmm. Someone with good fort save and with Mettle class ability (at least Hexblade version of it) can possibly shrug it off, right?

It is not fair to expect such a PC in every party, though.

 

[coyote6]

Can I voluntarily opt to fail my save so I am paralyzed (which can be circumvented more easily than daze, such as freedom of movement)? Treads into metagaming territory though.

Quoth the SRD:

Voluntarily Giving up a Saving Throw
A creature can voluntarily forego a saving throw and willingly accept a spell’s result. Even a character with a special resistance to magic can suppress this quality.

So, yeah, you could voluntarily fail the save in order to avoid being dazed. I guess that would be real handy if you had a freedom of movement effect going.

 

[Shin Okada]

So, yeah, you could voluntarily fail the save in order to avoid being dazed. I guess that would be real handy if you had a freedom of movement effect going.

Or the PC is already immune to paralysis (say, undead, dragon etc.)

 

[milo]

Or the PC is a cleric with the liberation domain, at level 8 and higher activate the 30' aura and tell everyone to fail the save. Metagame for the win.

 

[Jhaelen]

So, yeah, you could voluntarily fail the save in order to avoid being dazed. I guess that would be real handy if you had a freedom of movement effect going.

Wow. Great find! Clearly a nice metagaming solution

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Can I voluntarily opt to fail my save so I am paralyzed (which can be circumvented more easily than daze, such as freedom of movement)? Treads into metagaming territory though.

I wouldn't even require the save in a case like this. If you're immune to the failed-save effect I would say you're automatically immune to the made-save effect. It's obviously a lesser version of whatever you're immune to, you have to be immune to it.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

I wouldn't even require the save in a case like this. If you're immune to the failed-save effect I would say you're automatically immune to the made-save effect. It's obviously a lesser version of whatever you're immune to, you have to be immune to it.

I wouldn't do that myself. Allowing to purposely fail a save is fine, though. It's just a funny coincidence in that case if you have FoM that the failed save effect is better for you. Normally being paralyzed is MUCH worse than dazed. And there are ways to cure daze, btw. IIRC, Healing Lorecall spell in Spell Compendium, which lasts 10 min/CL, would let the caster remove the dazed condition with any healing spell (even cure minor) if he had enough ranks in the Heal skill for that benefit. At least in my groups, Healing Lorecall's become a semi-staple spell for dealing with obscure, seldom encounter status problems.