[D&D 3.5e] That New Pit Fiend

[jgbrowning]

1) Mr. Fiend can fly and cast fireball at will. Your falchion is virtually useless. Hope you have alot of holy silvered arrows.
2) Mr. Fiend can teleport at will. Add this to your algorithm. If Fiend drops below 50% h.p., teleport away and return when regeneration restores h.p. 3 minutes later. Repeat ad infinitum.
3) Mr. Fiend can dispel magic at will - which will serious impare your Freedom of Action, Haste, and other protections. If you come in buffed up, smart Mr. Fiend (look at that intelligence) casts a dispel and teleports away. Regenerates, cast improved invisibility, teleports back in, casts dispel and rinces and repeats until your spells become depleted. Mr. Fiend isn't going to run out. Party spell casters will.
4) Mr. Fiend can suggestion and charm person at will - your Freedom of Action won't help much against that.
5) Mr. Fiend can use Improved Invisibility at will. Check out that move silently score. Who is going to catch who flat footed?
6) There is a reasonable chance that your rogue/fighter fled the pit fiends fear aura right off the bat.
7) Mr. Fiend can Blasphemy at will. There is no saving throw. Look it up. Quickened Blasphemies would be ugly.
8) Mr. Fiend has improved grab, constrict, and +36 grapple checks. Hope you have been buying escape artist. If you are grabbed, Mr. Fiend can power attack you into mush, fly away with you, or teleport to great height and drop you, or teleport into a dungeon or hostile environment (Hell?) drop you, and teleport out again.
9) Mr. Fiend can summon two Gelugon allies, who are together probably as dangerous as the Pit Fiend is. Many of your tactics require flanking and so forth. Why is a 25 int creature going to let himself be flanked given his allies and manueverablity? Caught in a position where he might be flanked next round, he blasphemes and moves away. Or he simply blasphemes every round and lets the Gelugon's chew you up.
10) Being a godlike smart fiend, Mr. Fiend undoubtably took the chance to Unhallow his location long before the party got there. He probably tied something nasty like Dispel Magic on it, so that any enemy that approaches him suffers a Dispel Magic before combat even really begins.

Thanks for the list. I'm glad to see others play their monsters like I do. (like i'd play my characters ) Although some of the above can be countered, some of them are very very nasty.

joe b.

 

[Lord Ben]

1) Mr. Fiend can fly and cast fireball at will. Your falchion is virtually useless. Hope you have alot of holy silvered arrows.

Or you could have a potion of fly or a mass fly spell. At 20th level (to make it harder to dispel) that's fairly difficult to get rid of. Fireball isn't tough at all at this level either. 10d6 just isn't a lot if you're well prepared and have items. It's tough, but not unbeatable.

 

[jgbrowning]

Here's some basic stats from a 12 Rog/4 Fighter..
Init: +12
HP: 128
AC: 34 (38 w/Haste)+Displacement

(on AC he deals an average of 58 points to me in a Full Attack action, with my displacement cut that to 29 on average)

Saves: 14/20/8

(60% chance of taking no damage from meteor swarm, he'd kill me with the Mass Hold Monster unless I had Freedom of Movement up going in, but worst case the cleric removes it on his next action, his poison/disease attack could prove troublesome)

Actually worst case is the cleric rolls badly and is held as well .

Second to worst case is cleric is grappled by mr. fiend, and you're held w/o access to freedom of movement.

joe b.

 

[Ferret]

They also lumped together the attack and damage(SIIS)

 

[ashockney]

Well, to be honest, I think your suggested character is meat to this pit fiend,

By himself, agreed.

but I'm not going to get into a "Well, he would do this, but then the character would do this arguement with you."

Nor am I. Just posting some basic stats to help set the "level" for those who've never run at this level.

I'm glad to see others play their monsters like I do.

Seconded. The problem was, out of the MM, after the party finally cuts through all the political, diplomatic, and henchmen of the BBEG...feh. It was a little disappointing. This guy...let's just say I don't think anyone will be disappointed, least of all the DM!

Actually worst case is the cleric rolls badly and is held as well .

"Ok, who'd we leave our scrolls of True Ressurection with? That one's going to cost us!"

 

[Quasqueton]

tail wagging the dog

The problem was, out of the MM, after the party finally cuts through all the political, diplomatic, and henchmen of the BBEG...feh. It was a little disappointing. This guy...let's just say I don't think anyone will be disappointed, least of all the DM!

So someone's idea of a BBEG at the climax of a 16th-level adventure is to use a CR16 creature right out of the MM?

A BBEG climax fight for a 16th-level party should be about CR20. And instead of looking through the MM or MM2 (or anything else) for a properly challenging monster, or even taking a standard CR16 pit fiend and advancing/increasing him to a proper level, someone relies on the WotC team to change the default and basic pit fiend into a more powerful creature?

As I said in an earlier post, the listed creatures in the MM are the weakest and most common of their species.

But now when you run a group of epic-level characters against this new pit fiend, the complaint will be "the pit fiend is not impressive against characters of his level."

Quasqueton

 

[jasamcarl]

I would like to make it simple for all of those who hold that Wotc is changing the nature of the game and does not trust DM judgment. For one, if DM judgement is so dang important, than that invalidates the entire point of CR, which is to set up an objective measurement of challenge based upon presumably wider playtesting than the individual DM was capable of conduction. Two, the definition of a CR 16 creature is simple; he is suppossed to on average consume 25% of a 16th level parties resources. After much feedback, many have found that some high-level beasts do not accomplish this end, so it is reasonable to bump up their power. Wotc's latest monster supps reflect this reality.

So assuming you wish to trust in the CR system at all, bumping up the challenge of some monsters to meet their CR seams perfectly reasonable. You can argue as to whether or not they have gone to far, but to opposse this on principle seems rather silly.

 

[ashockney]

After much feedback, many have found that some high-level beasts do not accomplish this end, so it is reasonable to bump up their power. Wotc's latest monster supps reflect this reality.

Bingo!

You nailed it far more directly than I've been able to in the last three pages.

And the point is, yes, I would like to be able to open the MM and pull out a creature and run it. I can do it at 1st level, 5th level, and 10th level. Why not 15th level and 20th level?

 

[Quasqueton]

Let's see, some consider the pit fiend to not be an actual CR16 challenge. Maybe it is just a CR14 as written.

Which is simpler and more "backwards compatible"?

- change the CR to the appropriate level

- alter the whole creature beyond what has come to be accepted as a standard creature in the game

Will they now weaken dragons to be more in line with their undervalued CR? Or will they bump up the CR number to reflect the actual challenge? From the example they've offered with the pit fiend, I expect dragons to loose hit dice and special abilities in revised edition.

Quasqueton

 

[Pants]

The Pit Fiends are right below the Dukes and the Archdevils in power and are a meager CR14? That's just not right. Although, I do think they may have gone a bit too far in pumping him up.