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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ebylon" data-source="post: 5213348" data-attributes="member: 90037">What exactly is the goal of the hostages being there? I understand hostage taking is bad kthx and all, but what mechanic are they going to serve for the fight? The PCs will surely be able to tell who's a cult member and who's not, unless all the hostages are also immobilized and forced to stand still, with the real cult members hidden amongst them. Sort of like the scene from Batman Begins where Ra's hides in the assembly of ninja and strikes out at Bruce. You could let the cultists roll stealth checks to make an attack on the PCs; if they beat the PCs' passive perception, maybe they make an attack but aren't singled out amongst the hostages, staying hidden.If that's what you're going for, you'd want the cultists to make their attack in a room before the hostage room, and have them retreat in... otherwise, how exactly are they going to 'hide' within the hostages unless there's dozens and dozens packed together? The PCs would just see them dart in.I'd almost suggest keeping the hostages out of the fight in general. Maybe they're the ultimate reward. One hostage is sacrificed per round of combat as a necessary component of the summoning ritual? If the players don't beat down Aric before they can stop the ritual, they've truly lost something in allowing the hostages to perish, and then have to suffer through fighting an Aric-possessed monster.As for Aric himself... make the 'bouncing' a standard at-will action if you want him to be able to do it at will, or an encounter that he can do x amount of times before being too strained to continue bouncing at will. Make all the cultists minions, or level 1 or 2 or something (easily dropped). If you use them in this part of the encounter, make all hostages minions (and if you do use hostages, make sure the cultists aren't minions as well, give them enough HP to survive a hit or two... or make them two-hit minions). When Aric possesses one of the cultists/hostages, they get whatever powers you want them to have to represent Aric's possession. Don't modify their HP.Whenever Aric's host dies, make Aric himself lose a chunk of health. Maybe he takes half of the cultist's HP in damage. If he possesses a hostage and it dies, make him take the equivalent of half of the cultist NPC's hp in damage as well. Then he's forced to randomly  transfer to the nearest cultist/hostage body.To give PCs a chance to do direct damage to Aric, try this. When he leaves a body (be it willingly or upon the host's death) let nearby characters (either adjacent to the body or burst 2 from it, your choice) make an Arcana or Religion (being flexible, as not every character has Arcana trained) check. If they succeed versus a DC of your choice, Aric's soul manifests itself in a square adjacent to his previous host's body. The PC has essentially 'grabbed' his soul and forced it to hang out in a corporeal form. Until Aric's next turn, or when he takes damage (whichever comes first) he is targettable. Give him some defensive stats, vulnerability to psychic or something, and give the PCs a chance to wail on him directly. Once he's taken x damage (or any at all,) or it's his turn again, he zaps into the body he was going for.If you want, I could take some time and try and actually stat up the whole encounter in Monster Builder for you? Or did I give you enough ideas?</blockquote>

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