NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celtavian" data-source="post: 5405914" data-attributes="member: 5834">reAre there any one round save or die spells in Pathfinder still? They eliminated most of them I believe. Power Word Kill still works for under 100 hit points. I know that.Most spells are hit point damage now I believe.To counter some of the save or die abilities I took an idea from 4E and applied it to Pathfinder for BBEG encounters. Some of the monster design ideas in 4E were very intelligent. I give the BBEG a huge number of hit points. Like way beyond what they could have if I built them with the rules. I feel that 4E's monster design when it came to BBEGs hit points took into account that the battle is often 4 or 5 on one. With five possible sources of damage directed at one source. Though 4E did fail to make BBEGs damage lethal enough to threaten parties with healing from healers and healing surges as well as multiple abilities that acted as healing surges. Damage output has to be high enough to make an encounter challenging as well as the ability to take damage. But back to the original subject.I now give BBEGs obscene hit points to make them  a sufficient challenge to a party buffed up and capable of dealing massive damage. Like ancient dragons I give 1000 plus hit points. BBEG evil liches we're talking 300 to 400 hit points. Huge legendary beasts 300 to 400 hit points even at CR 6 or 7. I really beef up hit points.Pathfinder does a better job than 4E of ensuring BBEGs can deal out lethal damage at a rate equal to or higher than the PCs. But they do a poor job of ensuring their BBEGs can take the damage coming against them from four or five possible sources.So combining 4Es hit point design for BBEGs and Pathfinder's damage design for BBEG, I now have BBEGs that make my players frightened. That's what I was shooting for. I want them to feel like they had a knock down, drag out, edge of death fight on their hands when they fight a BBEG. I don't want some lucky crits or simple death spells taking the BBEG out too quickly. Since they converted almost every death spell to damage, this BBEG design works even better.I think I've found the best possible design idea for BBEGs by combining 4E and Pathfinder BBEG design.</blockquote>

Verification