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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 7913125" data-attributes="member: 6801228">Since we have mostly moved from helping the OP to arguing with them that their way is wrong, I want to take a moment to offer a line of thought I haven't seen yet. Yes, you do not have to be bound by PC generation and rules when making NPCs and Monsters. But sometimes it is really, really good to follow them. Like, making an Ogre that wears armor and has the rage ability. Or noting that the Archmage has far more spells available than the list suggests, and swapping their spell list to be more appropriate to the challenge you want, because wizards can do that thing. As for how I would have solved the problem. Ritual Magic. I don't think there is a "symbol of charming" in the game yet, but I would have worked something like that, where the Mad Wizard built an enchanted sigil into the room that the "good party" was in and was utilizing that to empower his magic. I also like the idea of a recipe for an incense or potion that would have made the targets more vulnerable to the mage's power. But, I also would have had no issue in letting the players find and use these methods too. I actually do have a way for people to concentrate on two spells at once in my game, for example, and the players know how to achieve it. But that didn't reduce the "oh crap" moment when they realized that the one villain they were going to fight had the appropriate requirements to gain the ability themselves. And, to rant on a bit, I think that is a big proponent, for making sure that anything your NPCs can do your players can do. Especially for bigger abilities that are epic in scope, it allows you to drop hints about what the villain is capable of without it seeming like you are just making things up. For an example, I had a group of NPCs that had some completely made up abilities. They were goons who drank a potion and hulked out (gaining the basic Barbarian suite of abilities), but some of them ended up randomly combusting during the fight. Turns out there was some sick and twisted dark alchemy going on, and one of the players pocketed two of the potions. They could gain the same power, with the same risk, and they new exactly what had been done to make the potions, and could have even tried to gather the same "materials" and make it themselves. And now, if I choose to do something similiar in a later game, they are now aware this is a possibility, and they could see the hint and predict the moves of their enemy. Which makes them feel clever and raises the tension if they can't think of a good counter.</blockquote>

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