Yeenoghu writeup

[James Jacobs]

Yeenoghu's tactics are poorly worded, alas. He can cast bull's strength at will, with each casting lasting for 20 minutes. It's fair to assume that once every 20 mintues or so he takes the time to renew this spell, so that in effect he's always got bull's strength active. So in theory, he won't need to take an action at the start of combat to cast the spell... it's already going by the time he rolls initiative.

 

[Dog Moon]

Oh and he'd have a lot more than "+5 scale mail, triple flail" as his items.

Right. If his first action is to always cast Bull's Strength, spend the 16k to purchase a Belt of Giant's Str +4. He's a Demon Lord. He SHOULD be able to afford it, considering he's CR 20 and all.

 

[DaveMage]

He was CR 22 in the BoVD, so I don't have too much of a problem with CR 20 in the new version.

Edit: It will be interesting to do a lord by lord comparison of the BoVD version vs. the FC1 version when it's out.

 

[replicant2]

My guess is that while he has a 24 Int, the guy doin g the write does not......

Laugh point.

You do make a good point though--how can anyone reasonably simulate the tactics of a supra-intelligent being?

 

[catsclaw227]

Yeenoghu's tactics are poorly worded, alas. He can cast bull's strength at will, with each casting lasting for 20 minutes. It's fair to assume that once every 20 mintues or so he takes the time to renew this spell, so that in effect he's always got bull's strength active. So in theory, he won't need to take an action at the start of combat to cast the spell... it's already going by the time he rolls initiative.

As I read more thoroughly, I noticed that and that's what I meant when I stated he'd already be buffed up.

James -- why the lack of additional items?

 

[A'koss]

You do make a good point though--how can anyone reasonably simulate the tactics of a supra-intelligent being?

This has always been a thorny as a DM. Not only about portraying beings and creatures which are both far wiser and far more intelligent than you are but differentiating between them. How do the tactics of a 42 Int, 39 Wis creature differ from one who "only" has a 24 Int, 22 Wis?

Join the party over in the 666+ post "Hordes of the Abyss" thread:

Ooog. Okay, thanks Delta. Beaten to undeath already I see... :\

 

[Haffrung Helleyes]

Int and Wis

I agree about it being tough to run NPCs with very high (20 or higher) INT or WIS..

It would be nice if the books gave some guidelines in this regard to DMs. Actually, guidelines for low INT critters would also be useful, since they tend to be more common.

For example, what's the ramification of being an INT 6 ogre? Does an Ogre move in such a way as to avoid AoO's, and to flank? Is an Ogre smart enough to preferentially attack spellcasters, or to ready an action?

Ken

 

[Land Outcast]

On intelligence: we could actually produce a new thread here to make a table for the use of the EN community...

On Yeenoghu: WTF!!!!!!!! Where are his items?????????? The Abyss. You kill to survive, to eat, to rise in rank, to breath. You kill. And none of Yeenoghu's kills had a pair of Gauntlets of Ogre Power?... this could turn into a rant

 

[James Jacobs]

As I read more thoroughly, I noticed that and that's what I meant when I stated he'd already be buffed up.

James -- why the lack of additional items?

The demon lords have vast amounts of wealth. It's not an efficient use of space to list all of their treasure, especially since the stat blocks are not intended to be the End-All incarnations of the demon lords. A CR 20 Yeenoghu's treasure pales in comparasion to a CR 36 Yeenoghu. Also, adding treasure to a statblock messes with the raw stats; the example of how Yeenoghu's bull strength alters his base Strength is a good example.

So instead, for the demon lords I just listed the items that they are closely identified with. For the most part, this boiled down to weapons (such as the Wand of Orcus or a wavy-bladed bastard sword or a triple-headed flail) or armor (in the case of demon lords that are generally illustrated as wearing armor, such as Kostchtchie and Yeenoghu). To think of it another way, if you utilize these stat blocks as powerful off-plane manifestations or avatars (which is how I personally think of them), these magic items are the ones they bring with.

I certainly recommend giving the demon lords more gear, tailored to your campaign, as heartially as I recommend advancing their Hit Dice to whatever point works best for you (my preference, as seen in the Demonomicon of Iggwilv articles in Dragon, is to stat them out at the CR 25–32 range).

 

[catsclaw227]

I certainly recommend giving the demon lords more gear, tailored to your campaign, as heartially as I recommend advancing their Hit Dice to whatever point works best for you (my preference, as seen in the Demonomicon of Iggwilv articles in Dragon, is to stat them out at the CR 25–32 range).

Excellent. Obviously, I didn't think this was the end-all list of their treasure, but I did think that they'd have a larger amount of more specific specialty items tailored to their tactics, history and "ecology".