help with celestials

[PhoenixAdept]

Hello,
I lurk alot around here and you guys are very informative and helpful, I have gotten a lot of ideas from here. I was hoping someone can help me with this.
In the campaign I am designing a major npc will be a paragon solar 1/2 fire elemental. He is the leader of the angellic horde, divine general of the army of heaven. I planned on making him level 20 in fighter, monk, paladin, telepath and sorceror - he already castes as a level 20 cleric. He is perhaps the most powerful non god figure in my world. At this point he has no divine rank, he serves a god of war, justice and protection. I am sure there is a prestige class I would like to use but I do not know which. At this point does he need stats? Can he effectively face a true diety of any level? Can he defat or overthrow his god? Should dieties have class levels? How many are too many? Does any of this really matter? In another world of mine the lowest level of gods needed 100 class levels, should that be different with the epic level hand book and dieties and demigods? Does anyone combine the two in diety creation. I have a lot of questions, I want my campaign to be very epic level and need serious help, any thoughts or suggestions would be helpful.
I will very likely have more questions to come, I hope it's ok.

Thanks,
POPE.

 

[jmucchiello]

At this point does he need stats? Can he effectively face a true diety of any level? Can he defat or overthrow his god? Should dieties have class levels? How many are too many? Does any of this really matter?

It's your game. You tell us. Does he need stats? IOW, will you ever need to run a combat between him and the players where if you were winging it they would know you were winging while the waited? Are other "true" (whatever that means) deities quaking in their boots when he knocks on the door for tea? Do your deities need class levels in your campaign?

 

[DanMcS]

Yrch. Um, as a general rule, I wouldn't bother statting an NPC unless his stats were going to become important. Unless you ever see him taking part in a battle he has a chance of losing, why bother statting him? A whole group of 20th level PCs would never take him.

On the other hand, if your 'very epic' campaign starts to approach the point that you can see the PCs or one of their statted enemies fighting this guy, /then/ you can spend the effort to stat him. Before that, your effort would be better spent describing his motivations and personality.

 

[PhoenixAdept]

Re: Re: help with celestials

It's your game. You tell us. Does he need stats? IOW, will you ever need to run a combat between him and the players where if you were winging it they would know you were winging while the waited? Are other "true" (whatever that means) deities quaking in their boots when he knocks on the door for tea? Do your deities need class levels in your campaign?

I am working on the stats now, mostly as comparison to pc's, who will be of epic level. I was mostly wondering if he should be able to do battle with gods or Infernal overlords (Which will be equal to gods). By true gods meant actual dieties, not just very high powered celestials. Like I said he is thegeneral of the celestial army.
Right now now he would be allied with the pc's, I a working on a group of semi divine dragon sorcerors as the major foes, leaders of an empire. But that is another question.

 

[Epametheus]

The typical D&Dg god is a 20 HD outsider with 20 class levels, so times with 40 class levels (20 in two different classes). For example, a lesser diety of music would probably be a 20 HD outsider with 20 levels of bard thrown in.

Since your Solar isn't actually a god, he'll generally be more than a match for a weak god, but a Greater Power would probably school him.

That has more to due with the fact that some divine abilities are impressively unfair (I think there are at least a few that amount to "death with no save") than to satistical advantage on the part of the god.

On the other hand, a really high-end creature made with the EPH can be horribly unfair too.

At one point I wrote up something a lot like your solar for the sheer hell of it. It was a 39 HD pit fiend with 20 fighter, wizard, and sorcerer levels (20 in each class), and 10 levels each in Mystic (good for horribly pumping up wizard spell slots), Loremaster, Weapon Master, and Eldritch Master (so that ol' Magraravich could cast Heal, among other things). Between his staggering number of epic feats, his absurdly high stats (hooray for epic items), and his sheer volume of hit dice (over 3000 HP), the old boy could could easily go toe-to-toe with a wargod and kill it.

So I guess the D&Dg gods don't scale to the EPH once the EPH is taken far enough. So yeah, if you use the EPH for your Solar, he'll probably be able to take on gods and win.

I guess the real question is: why do you need to stat your dieties? It's probably better to just say that they are, and to not try to assign any numbers to them. As I believe has already been said elsewhere, "if you stat it, they'll find a way to kill it."

Edit: Oh, the PCs are Epic. I guess it IS relevant then. For stating your gods, it's a matter of determining just what you want the gods to be. A demigod may well not be that far above a mortal. A greater power probably has at least 100 levels simply in the appropriate core class, let alone in additional classes. You're also a bit freer to give gods absurd stats -- a really lame god should have a 40 or so in their "core" stat. A really strong one probably has 60's in its dump stats. Hmm... Stat 'em as a PC, and then apply a multiplier across the board to all of the stats? x2 for demi gods, x4 for lesser, x5 for intermediate, x6 for greaters? Possibly even more for the greaters? If you want to go through the trouble, use both D&Dg and the EPH to stat your gods. They'll probably be somewhat respectable then.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hi all!

The above character I work out to be (approx.) CR 180...which is more powerful than any Greater God detailed in Deities & Demigods.

If you plan to use the character physically I would make sure the PCs were about 90th-level (and it would still be a tough battle for them, no guarantee of victory).