"Tactics in Action"--maybe I'm just getting too old, but this sounded boring as hell.

[dvvega]

Going over the battle, I noticed the following things ...

Mistakes that I thought were made:

1. Revivify will not save a beheaded person.

2. Fortunate Fate is a disgustingly overpowered spell - it combines Contingency with Heal. Since it is a single 7th level Divine spell, it allows multiple castings from the single character wtihout expending resources. Since the Medic is non-violent they can just cast Fortunate Fate on everyone and laugh. Granted Contingency lasts for days, however combining two 6th level spells into a 7th (even if you reduce the duration) is not balanced IMHO.

3. It is unclear if the Moment of Prescience was activated before the roll was made or not. The way the text was written it indicates the Player added it after the roll, not before (as requried by the spell).


Just those 3 points would have made 3 characters dead (fighter, barbarian, wizard).

... This would have caused the requisit casualties for the encounter and voila! Al is OK.


Things I don't See as Bad:

1. They had fought demons before, especially a Balor so they should know a fair amount of stuff.

2. The Power Word Stun was the only thing they "knew" with a simple knowledge roll, however I don't see that as being a bad thing in the global scheme of the encounter.


Overall, some mistakes were made and that led to the Balor's downfall. As well as some lucky rolls for the Players and unlucky ones for the DM.

D

 

[VirgilCaine]

Going over the battle, I noticed the following things ...

Mistakes that I thought were made:
...

Just those 3 points would have made 3 characters dead (fighter, barbarian, wizard).

... This would have caused the requisit casualties for the encounter and voila! Al is OK.

...Overall, some mistakes were made and that led to the Balor's downfall. As well as some lucky rolls for the Players and unlucky ones for the DM.

D

I THOUGHT THESE PEOPLE WERE PAID TO KNOW THIS STUFF?

No wonder the products coming in the mail are from Mongoose (Good ones that I researched, from the Encyclopedia Arcane--not crap). But that's beside the point.


This is a disgusting display of ignorance on the part of the gamers and DM in this instance.

 

[Psionicist]

I just had to create a thread about this (sort of): http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=143657

 

[domino]

That's not even tactics.

Now, if they had lured him into some trap they made with say, cold iron chains, and bound him, and such, or fallen back through a small tunnel, so he can't fly, and spread caltrops over everything, or ANYTHING other than "Buff and smash," that would have been tactics.

 

[Felon]

2. Fortunate Fate is a disgustingly overpowered spell - it combines Contingency with Heal. Since it is a single 7th level Divine spell, it allows multiple castings from the single character wtihout expending resources. Since the Medic is non-violent they can just cast Fortunate Fate on everyone and laugh. Granted Contingency lasts for days, however combining two 6th level spells into a 7th (even if you reduce the duration) is not balanced IMHO.

I looked in MoF, and it says "Clr 7 (Tymora)", which I guess means only priests of Tymora can have access to it. I suppose exclusivity is considered some kind of balancing factor, althuogh I personally agree with you.

Overall, some mistakes were made and that led to the Balor's downfall. As well as some lucky rolls for the Players and unlucky ones for the DM.

Moreover, the DM is trying to play the balor for "fun", by trying different things every round rather than getting repetitive with tricks that would actually work (like Implosion). Meanwhile, the players powergamed for all they're worth. The wizard certainly didn't feel any compulsion to stop firing quickened True-Strike manyshots (although if he's actually a full-fledged wizard, how good can those Manyshots be, firing all of 2 arrows?)

 

[Nyeshet]

The Balor has INT 24, not INT 12

It was more luck than tactics. Also, I think the DM poorly ran the event in favor of the players. Not that that is necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps he thought the players needed a bit of an edge considering the ~4 level difference in encounter level. Somethings I didn't like / thought were off:

1) A Knowledge check grants knowledge of all the spell-like abilities of the Balor, and a Greater Spell Immunity is used to negate most of them. I can see a Knowledge check of 40 - 45 (note he says it approached 45, not that it was) granting quite a lot, but that seems a bit much. Myself, I would have considered rolling a d4. I would have told them about the Unholy Aura, Teleportation (self), and Blasphemy, and 1d4 other at will powers. Once per day powers are not likely as well known as at will powers, after all.

2) The Balor never summoned another demon. The ability to summon other demons is part of the reason balors have the CR they do.

3) Teleport only as a means of escape. It is clear in the tactics description accompanying the Balor in the SRD that the Balor uses Teleport for battlefield manueverability, not just a swift means of escape. The Balor should have been teleporting every second or third round, behind the party and a bit to the left or right side (to make things less predictable). After being wounded by the Manyshot, he should have appeared every other round or so such that there would have been a less clear shot (probably not an issue anyway, with Precise Shot, but appearing directly behind the archer would have made another archery attack less likely, and allowed for an AoO if the archer actually tried for another shot).

4) Flying only to move back faster?! The Balor should have taken to the air immediately, the round immediately after it appeared. Flight is worth more than a pair of nice wings! They should have been used!

5) Quickened Telekinesis. The Balor spends one of its rare feats upon this ability, and yet I see it not once used in battle. Combining this with Teleport and Fly could have made a much more dangerous encounter.

6) Powerword Stun was perhaps the worst choice spell the Balor could have used at that time. It is excellent to deal with weaker foes and foes that have taken damage in prior rounds, but the Balor seemingly uses it early on, and against a foe that had taken little if any damage. A Dwarven combative of high level is likely to have at least a Con of 18 or 20 (and likely more, after buff spells) - enough to effectively double its hp and place it near or beyond the 150 hp mark. Unless the dwarf was particularly wounded it would not have been serious effected - if at all - by Powerword Stun. A Balor has Int 24. It should know this. Personally, I would have tried Insanity upon whichever looked to have the lowest Will save. Were he not raging, the Barbarian would be an excellent choice. It might still be a good choice, especially if the Bbn turns on its allies in its confusion.

7) Where was the whip? When things started looking dicy, the Balor used its sword instead of its whip. This time it worked (sort of; it should have worked better, but Revivify was misinterpretted), but what about its whip? The damage would have been potentially nice, and the opposed Strength check would likely have gone the way of the Balor.

- - -

Sigh. Anyway, the Balor was run as if it had an Int of 12 instead of 24. It ignored many of its signature and exemplary abilities, it practiced poor tactics, and its foes were unusually lucky. And this is not even taking into account the fact that several spells used by the party should not have worked as they did or when they did.

All in all, this was not a good example of a high level significant challenge. It could have been, but it was not.

 

[SweeneyTodd]

Yeah, that sounds pretty boring to me. A lot of people would be really satisfied by correctly guessing the right buffs to walk all over an opponent, though. Although if that part is the real challenge, why play out the fight?

 

[burnrate]

I thought the same thing when I read the article Felon. It was a dull metgame experience that I wouldn't be interested in myself. I know the scout-buff-teleport-kill series is a common practice but it sort of blows the whole thing if there is no percieved risk. These guys did have a cakewalk with the balor doing effectively nothing for several rounds.

After the first failed spell he should have gated in assistance and gone toe to toe with these guys. Instead we got a lesson in how to read more sourcebooks than your DM.

 

[tetsujin28]

What can I say? I liked it. But I've been playing wargames since before D&D came out. Don't like the way the DM played the Bal[rog]or (admittedly, dumb)? Do it differently.

 

[Plane Sailing]

If I had been playing the Balor, then at the very least I would have used the quickened telekinesis every round - starting off with a telekinetic disarm of that wizards bow (I very much doubt that the wizard would be able to match the Balors telekinetic grapple check).

To be fair to the DM, implosion is only usable once per day. To get back on his case again, why on earth didn't he use the DC27 dominate monster? Grab the barbarian or the dwarf and get them hacking at their erstwhile friends? He should certainly have done all this while flying too, IMO.

It also reinforces my opinion about spells from sources outside the basic PHB