How do you play NPCs with access to the GATE spell?

[Dark Dragon]

I'm DMing a high-level party (level 19). Yesterday the group battled three wizards (levels 10, 15, 18) of a merchand family. The wizards and the party were both low on spells due to a previous fight.

The wiz18 had a scroll with a Gate spell. He was good in Knowledge (the planes). He was losing the fight (some of his children were killed by the PCs), his home and wealth...so he decided to bring it to an end, no matter the cost (even his own life).

He cast Gate (on the defense, no problem for him). He called a White Slaad (a 24HD monster with 440 hp and insane attack power, CR 21...see ELH for stats)...
The slaad first blew up a summoned huge earth elemental with an Implosion then it killed the paladin in 2 rounds (the paladin had about 150 hp). Then it turned on the Animal Growthed, WSed druid and his summoned ally, an AGed Tyrannosaurus. The druid had about 200 hp and was down to 50 in 2 rounds. Due to its very good saves, fast healing and AC of 40, the PC wizards were unable to get the slaad down (the wizzies had only a few good spells left).
The last hope was a Polymorph any Object cast by one of the PC wizards. Save DC was 27 (Fort.). The slaad has a Fort. save of 27...
I rolled a 1.
The slaad became a glas statue and was shattered by the PCs...The battle was won.

If I would have rolled up a better save for the slaad, the party would have been killed.

Now my questions: How do you use the Gate spell for your NPCs? Do you allow them to call extrem powerful creatures (as I did)? How do you calculate the ECL of the battle with a called (not summoned!) monster?

Gate has a HD cap: Caster level HD x2 for a single monster, or caster level HD for two or more monsters...

 

[Li Shenron]

Tough subject.

If you are asking only about NPCs, I think that the DM should plan the use of Gate as part of the encounter since the start of it. If the Wiz is 20th level and can therefore call a 40HD outsider, the DM who intends to let him cast Gate IS planning an encounter with a Wiz20 and the outsider. For the same reason, the DM may instead plan that the Wiz only calls a e.g. 20HD outsider if he wants the party to face that kind of challenge instead, no matter if the Wiz could do better.

Often it is said that - for the purpose of xp - summoned monsters are part of the caster CR, and therefore don't give extra experience. I don't remember if that applies to calling spells in general, but in your case it definitely should not be included, and defeating the Slaad should give xp on its own. I mean, you cannot seriously say that the xp of a STRONGER creature are included in the caster's CR! Ok, there is the fact that the duration is still limited, so maybe they could just get out of sight for 2 minutes and the Slaad is gone.

At the same time, as you said they had to be very lucky to defeat it. I think that in these circumstance CR is not that meaningful anymore... they needed a save-or-die spell and hope the DM rolled a 1. IMHO the DM has to come up with some specific xp assignment.

 

[Piratecat]

Could the party have gated something in as well?

 

[ForceUser]

Well, that's a pretty terrifying monster, but then, a 19th-level party should have access to some terrifying power itself. A party cleric or wizard could have gated in their own champion to counter the white slaadi, or they could have cast wish or miracle or imprisonment or maze to deal with it.

That's a tough break for the party, for sure. But that's what can happen when the bad guys have access to 9th-level spells. From what you've described, I don't see that you've committed an error. Perhaps the party, upon seeing the slaadi, should have realized they were outmatched and fled to fight another day.

 

[ruleslawyer]

Two options, IMHO:

1. You use this rather OTT spell as written, in which case the only way to make it reasonable is to employ the array of post hoc role-playing rationalizations that most DMs seem to use to keep it in line. Namely, your NPC mage has debated the reasonableness of calling a white slaad (a powerful chaotic creature quite possibly prone to random acts of vengeance) to his aid, given that it might spend its time hatching schemes to take revenge on him once the gate spell ends and it returns to its home plane. In that case, the mage is more likely to call something that he need not so sorely fear vengeance from: A CR 14 or 15 demon or slaad might fit the bill.

2. You ditch the spell altogether and use something a bit more playable; call outsider and portal to another plane from Arcana Unearthed, which split gate into two spells, work nicely as an alternative IMHO.

Just my 2 cents...

 

[Dark Dragon]

Could the party have gated something in as well?

No, not at that point of the battle. IIRC, the two party wizards don't have Gate in their spellbooks. And even if, they wouldn't memorize it. One wizard is very fond of Shapechange and Meteor Swarm, the other likes Mordenkainen's Disjunction (house ruled) and Meteor Swarm as well. And the loss of 1000 XP hurts them more than losing a fight (I suppose... :\ ). The party cleric is a Ftr 4 / Clr 11 / Dis 4 and has no access to Gate.

Well, the party has a Cubic Gate, but it is quite unreliable...

 

[ForceUser]

No, not at that point of the battle. IIRC, the two party wizards don't have Gate in their spellbooks.

!!!!!

Well, what do they expect? They should learn from this encounter and go right out and find some gate scrolls to scribe into their spellbooks. Meteor swarm is all well and good, but they should now be asking themselves "How many meteor swarms does it take to kill a white slaadi?" I suspect they won't like the answer...

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

What's the matter with their feet? Forget how to run? If they were seriously depleted, maybe discretion would have been the better part of valor.

A party that has managed to reach those levels (assuming they earned them and didn't start there) should darn well know how dangerous things can be, and should not just assume that they can triumph over whatever comes their way. There is a big difference between a DM throwing an ogre at people that have never played the game before and throwing a big-bad at a near-epic party. 20th level encounters are always balanced on a razor's edge in the best of circumstances -- so much can go wrong so quickly that player's shouldn't rely on a 'Oh, he won't throw anything at us that we can't kill' philosophy.

"How many meteor swarms does it take to kill a white slaadi?" I suspect they won't like the answer...

Three, right?

 

[Dark Dragon]

Tough subject.

If you are asking only about NPCs, I think that the DM should plan the use of Gate as part of the encounter since the start of it. If the Wiz is 20th level and can therefore call a 40HD outsider, the DM who intends to let him cast Gate IS planning an encounter with a Wiz20 and the outsider. For the same reason, the DM may instead plan that the Wiz only calls a e.g. 20HD outsider if he wants the party to face that kind of challenge instead, no matter if the Wiz could do better.

Well, indeed I planned that the wizard will try to call the slaad as his last option and when being cornered. I knew that it could be tough, but I hoped that the party will rely on its power to counter spells and learned tactics against enemy spellcasters. The wiz18 was not flying, he was not invisible (these spells have run out earlier), but still he had some good protections (Shield, Stoneskin, Mirror Image, to name some). But the party has split up: the two wizards and the druid had to fight against the three enemy mages for two rounds without assistance from the paladin and the cleric. Surprised by the still strong power of the enemies, the party made perhaps one error (but I'm not sure if it was really an error): they didn't focus on the strongest enemy but they tried to bring all three enemies down simultaneously.

Well, that's a pretty terrifying monster, but then, a 19th-level party should have access to some terrifying power itself. A party cleric or wizard could have gated in their own champion to counter the white slaadi, or they could have cast wish or miracle or imprisonment or maze to deal with it.

That's a tough break for the party, for sure. But that's what can happen when the bad guys have access to 9th-level spells. From what you've described, I don't see that you've committed an error. Perhaps the party, upon seeing the slaadi, should have realized they were outmatched and fled to fight another day.

One ally of the party Mazed the slaad, but it had INT 26, and escaped the Maze after only two rounds.

 

[Piratecat]

Although I'm not familiar with the white slaad, dismissal and banishment are always nice options as well. Part of the challenge of DMing high lvl spellcaster NPCs is that while it hurts PCs to spend xp for things like the calling function of gate, spending xp is mostly irrelevant for NPCs. As a DM I always have to watch myself to make sure I'm being fair.