Demon Spell Resistance

[Rahula008]

I am currently running a campain with a succubus as the party's arch-nemesis. The players all started as 3rd level characters, 32pts for stats, 2500gp for equipment. The initial dungeons I tosses lots of cryptic clues about the hidden menace sort of thing. Its been lots of fun. The characters are all 6th or 7th level now. The players are power gamers to the last so I have to stay on my toes to keep them chalenged without resorting to cheating (which I refuse to do). So.....

Q. Is the spell resistance of a 9HD succubus still 18? It seems counter intuitive that spell resistance wouldn't increase with HD. The Half-Fiend Template indicates that a Half-Fiend has spell resistance equal to its HD+10(max 35). I've looked and the Tanar'ri don't follow this pattern. I only own the three basic 3.5 core rules.

 

[Hedgemage]

I'm pretty sure that when you advance a creature that it doesn't improve its Spell Resistance. What I would suggest is looking into giving your evil villan some gear or spells that would help, since she would be better outfitted than the standard succubus.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

By the base rules, SR doesn't increase with hit dice. This yields demons and devils that are much less resistant when advanced than other demons/devils of similar CR. In some ways, this is good. Advancing things like Erinyes and barbazu by hit dice and class level can get really heinous quite quickly. (An Erinyes blackguard/monk, for instance would potentially be a very challenging opponent).

I think there are feats in savage species and draconomicon if you want to increase the creatures' spell resistance with their hit dice. They get feats from hit die advancement so just give them those feats.

That said, if you're the dm of a home game who doesn't need to get your adventures approved by anyone else, the formula for spell resistance appears to be SR=CR+8 for demons and SR=CR+12 for devils. Calculate the CR realistically then apply spell resistance and you probably won't raise any eyebrows at the table.

 

[starwed]

Every race which grants spell resistance and is statted up as if for a PC increases SR with HD.

There's no explicit rule for it, but the pattern is very clear.

 

[Nail]

For demons (all but the succubus, interestingly enough), SR is related to CR like this:

SR = CR+8

For dragons, it's CR+11 (IIRC).

Outside of RAW, you might want to stick to a formula like that. So when you advance a demon, figure its CR, then give it an appropriate SR.

 

[Cheiromancer]

For outsiders the guideline for advancement is +2 HD = +1 CR. So if you increase SR by +1 for every two levels it would probably work out OK.

 

[Seeten]

Check out Nail, mackin' the Succubus pics!

 

[Nail]

Actually I've got lots mor........

...<ahem>.....

Sorry. Move along, move along.

 

[shilsen]

For demons (all but the succubus, interestingly enough), SR is related to CR like this:

SR = CR+8

For dragons, it's CR+11 (IIRC).

Outside of RAW, you might want to stick to a formula like that. So when you advance a demon, figure its CR, then give it an appropriate SR.

That's precisely what I used when advancing outsiders IMC, and it worked quite well.