Fighting High level monsters/ Deities

[tennesay]

Yesterday our group had what can be described as a boss rush. This time we fought Tiamat. I was wondering if other people fight have had certain difficulties in fighting really really high level monsters?

Our group was composed of 2 rangers, 1 fighter and a warlock. We had no leader. 1 ranger was a revenant undying beast ranger, 1 was a dwarf battlerager and the other ranger was a long range 55 ranger. The warlock was kinda normal with really low defenses. The problem facing tiamat was that most of our character's baring the ranged ranger needed like a 16 or higher just to hit tiamat because her stupid defenses were too high. All of her defenses were over 50 even the NADs. Sure the optimized super ranged ranger could hit pretty often but the rest of the party especially the beast master ranger / barbarian multiclass struggled. Was this because we had no leader or because of the gap in the growth of Monster defenses to player attack bonuses.
We were all level 30 and basically free reign over item choice starting with 18's in all stats. I personally am going to either super optimize my super teleporting warlock (28 squares and twice per each teleport) or find ways to stack damage on miss or damage that requires no rolls because it was slightly ridiculous.

 

[chitzk0i]

Tiamat is one of the hardest solos in the game. She's getting five attacks to your four and any dazing or stunning you might pull off only affects one head, so it's almost like you're fighting five monsters with solo-level damage and defenses.

Part of it is because you have no leader, though. You're basically intended to have some kind of ongoing group to-hit bonus to make solos easier. If everyone looks for powers and items to reduce defenses, you may be able to compensate, but I don't know for sure. You could always get someone to multiclass leader t pick up something like Lead the Attack. That would help with accuracy.

 

[DracoSuave]

We had no leader.

And that, good sir, is the source of all your misery and pain.

All the rangers in the world can't help you if you can't score a hit and you can't bounce back from damage.

 

[tennesay]

We were sort of lucky that the long ranged ranger was halfway broken optimized and didn't need the really high hit rolls the rest of us needed. Though I do wonder how he could shift back about 8 squares every turn though.

As for my beast ranger, despite my problems hitting Tiamat I could never die, my pet was far out of range and I took the revenant paragon path that said I didn't fall unconcious until I die which happens to be almost never.

The battlerager dwarf actually never had his HP drop below 200 ever.
The warlock was the punching bag of the match with incredibly low ac I believe 39 ( without punisher of the gods to boost it). Also he got dominated twice. And nearly died.

I feel that the fight also dragged because physically Tiamat didn't do alot of actual damage herself but rapes people soley because of her auras and ongoing damage to be a threat. Of course that works against everyone who doesn't have resist all 5 or 9 and becomes insubstantial when in the negatives but at that point it is irrelevant.

My only question is without any sort of DM control what prevents a sniper war with ranged 65 rogues and 55 rangers against bosses who have no chance of catching up?

 

[Jhaelen]

My only question is without any sort of DM control what prevents a sniper war with ranged 65 rogues and 55 rangers against bosses who have no chance of catching up?

Nothing. That's why you have a DM.

Just ask yourself a simple question: If you were Tiamat (or any other 'boss'), would you hang around in a place where you could get involved in a 'sniper war'?

 

[D3nt3]

Our group was composed of 2 rangers, 1 fighter and a warlock.

You guys had 3 striker and 1 defender and you were trying Tiamat? I wonder how all of you did not die in first rounds.

Tiamat doesn't care if you are level 30 he is "Tiamat Level 35 Solo Brute"

I hope you fought him just for fun.


edit: I'm sorry, when I say him I mean her.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I guess I'm not sure what the question is overall.

PCs lose several points in to-hit going up to level 30 vs monsters. Then on top of that a level 35 monster is overleveled by 5 levels, so its another 2 points. Its a solo, which is another 2 points. So by RAW you should be hitting on something around about a 16. IF you had a leader that character could probably pull you all up several points per round, but I'd expect even then you're going to be hitting maybe 50/50. This is all entirely to be expected and pretty much the way the game is designed. When you go against epic solo baddies you do pretty much need to have a leader in the group or a couple PCs that minor in leader.

Overall though I guess I'm not really seeing what was the problem with this encounter. The party, short one character by standard encounter design, took on THE single baddest creature in the game that has a stat block (maybe Demogorgon is tougher, hard to say, but Tiamat is the highest level stat block there is at level 35). The party won this, by the book impossible, encounter and not one character died. I'd call it a rousing success.

Now, if the encounter was boring or over long I'd have to blame that on encounter design, not the monster itself. Tiamat should have some VERY interesting terrain, at least a few minions, maybe some traps, etc. As she's designed to be a capstone level 30 encounter you can be sure there should be dynamic terrain, lots of outrageous stunting opportunities, etc. Probably also subgoals and whatnot built into the encounter to make it more interesting than a straight monster beat-down.

As for snipers it simply all depends on terrain. If the party can engineer a fight in featureless plain and dish out lethal damage at 55 squares then good for them. Most epic level top boss monsters have godlike intelligence and wisdom, so good luck getting them to oblige you. Overall archery is pretty potent in 4e but to get to that level with it you've got to sacrifice pretty much all meaningful melee combat ability, so a super optimized sniper better hope he can always keep the range. Its a smart move to have a character like that in a party, but they sure won't be able to deal with most encounters on their own. Also note that there ARE monsters that can deal with you, like the aformentioned Demogorgon who can close to 50 squares on his turn and teleport you right in front of him, where said sniper will be in sheep dip.

 

[D3nt3]

If I was your DM I would kill that annoying ranger in the first round.

 

[KarinsDad]

If I was your DM I would kill that annoying ranger in the first round.

This. Screw the defender.

 

[Colosimus]

dominate the fighter, your problems are over, go squish some squishie lil lock <3, or annoying ranger