D&D General That Which Cannot Be Fought

[doctorbadwolf]

Have you ever used beings in your games that the PCs simply cannot hope to survive a fight with, or that they can't even try to fight?

Things like titans so big you're less than a bug to them, gods, etc?

Did you do so as a way to remind the PCs that they are still mere mortals, or was there a way to overcome the being that was more than just combat?

Example of the last one would be something like Shadow of The Collosus, wherein you have to solve an environment in order to defeat the creature.

 

[el-remmen]

Speaking of Colossi, there is a big undead animated kaiju one in Castle Amber. Killing it with weapons is basically impossible, but finding a way to administer to its face the powder that causes it to fall apart is the trick. I have run this module multiple times (though not in decades, so the deets might be wrong).

 

[Stalker0]

I do have a few "ultimate creatures" in my campaigns, that are basically unkillable by normal means.

In my current game, when the gods waged their battle against the Primordials, they pooled their power to forge the first great weapon....Victory, the literal personification of success. Victory cannot lose, he cannot fail any check, any contest he will win.

Victory defeated the primordials in every engagement, but there was an issue. As the true aspects of creation, the Primordials were incapable of dying. So while Victory always won, inevitably the primordials came back. Eventually one of the gods was killed by one, and the gods blamed Victory. Enraged, Victory killed one of his creators. The gods realizing their weapon had gone rogue, imprisoned destiny in a realm of "eternal challenge". Victory battered through every obstacle put before him, but the gods had put a literal endless line of challenges in his path, imprisoning him for eternity.

For their second weapon, the gods pooled together their will and forged "Destiny". Destiny was built to impose a singular edict: "ALL THINGS MUST HAVE AN END". Within Destiny's presence, the primordials were rendered mortal, and the tide of the war turned.

Destiny has been a force in many of my campaigns, and my players interact with her on occasion. In the most recent one, Victory has escaped his prison, and is now threatening all of reality. Now savvy to the gods tricks, their prison will not work anymore. All of the gods and the greatest champions of the multiverse are currently in a grand battle against Victory, trying to buy the precious minutes needed so that the party and Destiny can secure the key McGuffins needed to stop Victory once and for all.....three special mirrors of opposition that together will create a second Victory, one capable of engaging him in combat....and providing..... an Eternal DRAW!!!


So that's my example. The party will knows that victory and destiny are concepts behind meer "combat". They cannot be killed in that way, you have to use special tactics and McGuffins to do the job.

 

[Richards]

Not yet, but in my current campaign the PCs are being trained as dreamwalkers so they can enter the dreams of those who have succumbed to the dream sickness that's starting to sweep across the continent. The victims of this sickness enter a kind of stasis and their minds are imprisoned in their dreams. There will be some dreams where no matter what the PCs do (initially, at least), even if they overcome the foe tormenting the victim in his or her dream, the dream merely "resets" and the foe is back to full power. While that's likely to be a bit frustrating at first, I fully intend for the PCs (over the course of the campaign) to learn the reasons why some of these dream foes are so powerful, and they'll also learn the secret to eventually overcoming them.

But the only effects of being slain in dream battle against these powerful foes is for the PC to be ejected from the victim's dream, so no real harm done (other than to their pride).

Johnathan

 

[toucanbuzz]

Yep. In my current campaign, I'm working on a mythical fey creature the size of a castle that gets unleashed on a PC kingdom. It's beyond mortal weapons, and I haven't decided if this should be decided by mass combat (we're using Paizo's rules at the moment) or turning the creature's body into a dungeon (disable enough parts and it retreats or even ceases to function).

Ultimately, "unbeatable" creatures are more like a puzzle in my games. Not every puzzle, however, will have a solution that results in a PC win.

 

[Shiroiken]

I've occasionally used gods, but never intentially in a situation where the players were meaningfully expected to face them in combat. Although back in the day a player had a high level 1E magic-user PC claim he could take a god, so I had one show up from Legends and Lore. It was a pretty weak one, and even so he humiliated the character soundly (I was merciful and chose not to kill him, but did take half his magic items in "tribute").

 

[Xetheral]

Have you ever used beings in your games that the PCs simply cannot hope to survive a fight with, or that they can't even try to fight?

Things like titans so big you're less than a bug to them, gods, etc?

Did you do so as a way to remind the PCs that they are still mere mortals, or was there a way to overcome the being that was more than just combat?

Example of the last one would be something like Shadow of The Collosus, wherein you have to solve an environment in order to defeat the creature.

Yes, my homebrew world is full of "bigger fish" NPCs and some of them are so "big" as to be practically unbeatable in combat. That doesn't mean the PCs can't choose to oppose such creatures, but victory (if any) isn't going to be through traditional combat.

(I imagine the strategies with the highest likelihood of success would be political machinations, an environmental kill, or else a "Let's You and Him Fight" scenario, but in none of my sandbox campaigns have the PCs opted to try.)

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I do have a few "ultimate creatures" in my campaigns, that are basically unkillable by normal means.

In my current game, when the gods waged their battle against the Primordials, they pooled their power to forge the first great weapon....Victory, the literal personification of success. Victory cannot lose, he cannot fail any check, any contest he will win.

Victory defeated the primordials in every engagement, but there was an issue. As the true aspects of creation, the Primordials were incapable of dying. So while Victory always won, inevitably the primordials came back. Eventually one of the gods was killed by one, and the gods blamed Victory. Enraged, Victory killed one of his creators. The gods realizing their weapon had gone rogue, imprisoned destiny in a realm of "eternal challenge". Victory battered through every obstacle put before him, but the gods had put a literal endless line of challenges in his path, imprisoning him for eternity.

For their second weapon, the gods pooled together their will and forged "Destiny". Destiny was built to impose a singular edict: "ALL THINGS MUST HAVE AN END". Within Destiny's presence, the primordials were rendered mortal, and the tide of the war turned.

Destiny has been a force in many of my campaigns, and my players interact with her on occasion. In the most recent one, Victory has escaped his prison, and is now threatening all of reality. Now savvy to the gods tricks, their prison will not work anymore. All of the gods and the greatest champions of the multiverse are currently in a grand battle against Victory, trying to buy the precious minutes needed so that the party and Destiny can secure the key McGuffins needed to stop Victory once and for all.....three special mirrors of opposition that together will create a second Victory, one capable of engaging him in combat....and providing..... an Eternal DRAW!!!


So that's my example. The party will knows that victory and destiny are concepts behind meer "combat". They cannot be killed in that way, you have to use special tactics and McGuffins to do the job.

That is rad as hell.

Yep. In my current campaign, I'm working on a mythical fey creature the size of a castle that gets unleashed on a PC kingdom. It's beyond mortal weapons, and I haven't decided if this should be decided by mass combat (we're using Paizo's rules at the moment) or turning the creature's body into a dungeon (disable enough parts and it retreats or even ceases to function).

Ultimately, "unbeatable" creatures are more like a puzzle in my games. Not every puzzle, however, will have a solution that results in a PC win.

Hell yeah. I love that. Monster as puzzle is something I’ve been iterating on for my own TTRPG.

 

[Steampunkette]

Vestiges.

In the Ashen Lands, Vestiges are unique entities or, more often, compilations of entities bound together and reduced to less than the sum of their parts. The Wasteland, Trauma, and Time all work together to "Flanderize" these entities and distill them into a single aspect.

The Chained King, for example, is a King who is imprisoned. Literally wrapped in chains. What's his name? No one knows. What was he king of? No one knows. It's not written anywhere, it's not known by anyone.

Let's say you go to the Wasteland (A Plane where the mistakes of the Gods are left to wither away next to failed mortal imaginings, hopes, and dreams) and you find the Chained King. You head through the castle, there, and find him in the prison tower. You shatter the door. You burst into his cell, you break his bonds...

He remains trapped. Straining against nothing in his attempt to escape. Because he is the Chained King. The chains will reform over time. Because he is the Chained King.

This is all he can ever be. He can be no more. He can be no less.

Destroy him, utterly. And he will still be the Chained King.

Most of the Vestiges, though, aren't as passive as he is. The Inferno, the condemned and vengeful souls of all who have been put to the torch, will try to burn you to ash before they can be destroyed. Ikkugskaldr, the Ice Singer, will try to consume you because she is Hunger incarnate. And the Wishing King will seek to set you aside.

These things can never, truly, be beaten. They're simply too conceptual for it. And they're far more likely to destroy you in their stride than be destroyed.

 

[Imaculata]

The ultimate antagonist in my campaign is called Hydra; a huge and powerful creature from beyond time and space. It is a sight too terrible to behold. Huge tentacles reaching down from the darkness that covers the cavernous roof of the Eternal Depths, where those that died at sea ultimately go. It speaks directly into the minds of mortals, and reminds them their souls are but a tasty snack to this god-like creature.

Although my players want to defeat this evil, I honestly don't know how they can succeed at this task.