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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Robert Ranting" data-source="post: 3953565" data-attributes="member: 28906">The Two Deaths of a Loresong FaenI would say that both of my character deaths have been quite memorable.  The only things that have ever managed to kill one of my characters are an Undead Half-Field Colossal Green Dragon with the Tempest breath and Quickened breath feats and a conjoined twin pair of Balors.  Both deaths happened to the same character in the first Arcana Evolved campaign I was in (1st-21st level in two years), and in both cases, he was resurrected afterward.The first death was the culmination of a long adventure where we were exploring a fortress built by the Crystal Weavers (Spellweavers from MM2).  We were about 12th or 13th level by the end of it, and in the final chamber we encountered what was described to us as an undead Dramojh (the long-vanquished BBEGs of the setting).  My character, a loresong faen magister (think gnome wizard), had recently gained access to a spell that essentially was a beefed up version of Searing Light combined with a Positive Energy "ray of enfeeblement" effect that reduced the strength score of an undead who fails his save by 2 points, as an exception to the usual immunity of undead to such effects.  Well, I managed to beat the dragon on initiative, quickened the spell, and then cast it a second time, dealing a 24d8 damage and sapping four points of Strength from the creature.  Understandably angry at that point, it began to focus all it's attention on me.  First, it attempted to catch me in a heightened web spell and then used his breath weapon on me.  I nimbly avoided the web and took half from the breath weapon, and stood in mocking defiance.  The other six party members charged into melee or fired arrows at it from a distance, but it ignored them. The next round, I blasted him two more times with diminished versions of the spell (no Str damage).  He full attacked.  They party's Champion of Love, who I had rebuffed and mocked throughout the campaign, leaped in the way with a hero point to save me, and dropped, bleeding, at my feet.  The rest of the party full-attacked.  The third round, I blasted him once more, and expended the last of my quickened spells to try and save the champion. As I kneeled, cradling her head in my arms, the dragon hit us both with a quickened breath and then full-attacked the party "cleric", slaying three of the seven party members in one round.  Yet even before the smoldering and bleeding corpses could hit the ground, the Wolverine totem warrior of the party leaped on the dragon's back and ripped it apart with his teeth and claws in a display that would make his totem (or the x-man of that name) proud.  Fortunately, the dragon's hoard was such that the party was able to resurrect all three of us, and the campaign continued...We were 15th level when we finally caught up with the BBEGs attempting to perform some nasty ritual (Shackled City AP).  We barged into the ritual chamber and found ourselves facing off against a Balor with what looked like a stunted and deformed head and wings of a second Balor attached to his shoulder. The Balor(s) had been the result of a summoning attempt gone awry,  While one was fully functional and focused on melee, its "twin" was still able to use it's spell-like abilities as if it were a seperate creature.  Once we killed the "main" Balor however, the "twin" became fully summoned and was able to go into melee (although it was at that point a perfectly normal Balor).  In any case, my character acted before it in the first round of combat and managed to cast a quickened wall of force that effectively put a low ceiling on the cavern we fought him in to keep him within the fighters' reach, and followed that up with a Crystal Eruption spell (Complete Book of Eldritch Might), which proceeded to do 15d6 impact damage per round for 15 rounds in an AoE, no SR, reflex save half, any who fail are knocked prone .   Well, when the Balor's turn came up, he took the damage, and managed to make the concentration check to implode my character, but botched the second check and failed to get anyone else in the party.  Since the crystal eruption is not dismissable, the DM ruled that it continued to the end of its duration after my death, so it created a neat battlefield for the remaining members of the party to engage him (or them) in.  While not as dramatic as my first death, there is still a sense of pride in the fact that only two advanced CR 20+ creatures ever managed to put an end to one of my characters.To date, none of my core D&D characters have ever died, just that little faen magister, but I haven't played any of them nearly as long either.Robert "Shrewd Tactics and Broken Spells" Ranting</blockquote>

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