Hypothetical Caster-Killer

[Jacob Saltband]

andreww wrote:

Casual Viking wrote:

Jacob Saltband wrote:

Why was no poison used?

Because, outside of dedicated poisoner builds, poison is a very expensive save vs. minor inconvenience.

Also delay poison is a level 2 spell which lasts hours per level.

So before I mentioned poison did you think of having Delay Poison up and running as a buff? No? didnt think so.

Cluster shot with different poisoned arrows all DC 17+ fort saves that damage STR. Those STR 7 caster are paralyzed. Or do a CON poison, even if you dont kill the caster with damage they die from con damage.

[Charon's Little Helper]

Jacob Saltband wrote:

andreww wrote:

Casual Viking wrote:

Jacob Saltband wrote:

Why was no poison used?

Because, outside of dedicated poisoner builds, poison is a very expensive save vs. minor inconvenience.

Also delay poison is a level 2 spell which lasts hours per level.

So before I mentioned poison did you think of having Delay Poison up and running as a buff? No? didnt think so.

But... it was up the instant you put a poisoned arrow to your bow. Schrodinger's Wizard 4-EVA!

[Bandw2]

Charon's Little Helper wrote:

Jacob Saltband wrote:

andreww wrote:

Casual Viking wrote:

Jacob Saltband wrote:

Why was no poison used?

Because, outside of dedicated poisoner builds, poison is a very expensive save vs. minor inconvenience.

Also delay poison is a level 2 spell which lasts hours per level.

So before I mentioned poison did you think of having Delay Poison up and running as a buff? No? didnt think so.

But... it was up the instant you put a poisoned arrow to your bow. Schrodinger's Wizard 4-EVA!

well scrolls of cure X are pretty common i would say, though delay poison would be the rarest.

[Jacob Saltband]

Omniscience got, casters will ALWAYS know what exact spells to have on hand.

[andreww]

MeanMutton wrote:

andreww wrote:

HWalsh wrote:

SURPRISE ROUND!

Your plan fails as you only get a single action during the surprise round barring a small number of limited abilities. So your surprise round is to burst out of hiding and yell "surprise". Then the casters beat all of your initiatives and you die horribly.

This also assumes they don't do anything as basic as send a tremor sensing earth elemental to scope out the room.

It also assumes neither the wizard nor the sorcerer can cast emergency force sphere. Either could easily have defensive strategist or if the wizard is a diviner you are screwed.

You can't use Emergency Force Sphere if you're flat-footed. A diviner is still flat-footed until his/her turn starts. So, yeah, first to go in initiative takes out the wizard.

Defensive Strategist is a trait which means you are not flat footed before you act. Good lukc beating a Diviner in the initiative battle.

[andreww]

Jacob Saltband wrote:

So before I mentioned poison did you think of having Delay Poison up and running as a buff? No? didnt think so.

Cluster shot with different poisoned arrows all DC 17+ fort saves that damage STR. Those STR 7 caster are paralyzed. Or do a CON poison, even if you dont kill the caster with damage they die from con damage.

It is a level 2 buff which lasts an hour per level. Extended at 12th level it lasts 24 hours. Every Oracle I have ever played invests in it because it is extremely effective. For one thing it makes you immune to Stinking Cloud and Cloudkill, two very common area control spells.

Given it lasts 24 hours with extend the Oracle can even cast it on every paty member and have their spell slots free.

Also, a DC17 fortitude save at level 12 is ajoke, even assuming you are able to hit which is unlikely. Arcane casters will be employing stuff like mirror image, divine casters will out AC you, all of them probably have fickle winds up as they arrive.

Your plan is terrible and the martial group is detined to fail simply because they do not have access to anything like the respources available to an equal level group of casters.

[andreww]

Jacob Saltband wrote:

Omniscience got, casters will ALWAYS know what exact spells to have on hand.

Most of my testing has been with Oracles and Sorcerers, schroedingers doesnt apply.

[Lab_Rat]

Jacob Saltband wrote:

andreww wrote:

Casual Viking wrote:

Jacob Saltband wrote:

Why was no poison used?

Because, outside of dedicated poisoner builds, poison is a very expensive save vs. minor inconvenience.

Also delay poison is a level 2 spell which lasts hours per level.

So before I mentioned poison did you think of having Delay Poison up and running as a buff? No? didnt think so.

Cluster shot with different poisoned arrows all DC 17+ fort saves that damage STR. Those STR 7 caster are paralyzed. Or do a CON poison, even if you dont kill the caster with damage they die from con damage.

I ran a 11th lvl diviner conjurer bloatmage through PFS Waking Rune Hardcore. I was rolling in with See Invis, false life, prot evil, delay poison, life bubble, fly, invis, freedom of movement, and a few others I can't remember off the top of my head.

[Rhedyn]

Caster uses summon spam! It's super effective!

You guys assume the casters don't clear out dungeons before entering them.

[Charon's Little Helper]

andreww wrote:

MeanMutton wrote:

andreww wrote:

HWalsh wrote:

SURPRISE ROUND!

Your plan fails as you only get a single action during the surprise round barring a small number of limited abilities. So your surprise round is to burst out of hiding and yell "surprise". Then the casters beat all of your initiatives and you die horribly.

This also assumes they don't do anything as basic as send a tremor sensing earth elemental to scope out the room.

It also assumes neither the wizard nor the sorcerer can cast emergency force sphere. Either could easily have defensive strategist or if the wizard is a diviner you are screwed.

You can't use Emergency Force Sphere if you're flat-footed. A diviner is still flat-footed until his/her turn starts. So, yeah, first to go in initiative takes out the wizard.

Defensive Strategist is a trait which means you are not flat footed before you act. Good luck beating a Diviner in the initiative battle.

Meh - a level 12 monk with Pummeling Style will take out the 120hp orb in a single round - no sweat. And Sohei (most monks) get the same initiative buff as a Diviner - only they use Dex as a primary stat, so by 12 they'd be up by 5 points or so.

[Charon's Little Helper]

Rhedyn wrote:

Caster uses summon spam! It's super effective!

You guys assume the casters don't clear out dungeons before entering them.

You're assuming that the martials have to have a straight up brawl with the casters.

Versus summon spam - just leave and come back in 2 min. I mentioned that tactic above for dealing with lots of buffs. Same thing.

Or use your protection potions and laugh in their faces - so long as none are true neutral. Or just stay stealthed for 2min. Most of the tactics mentioned involve jacked up stealth.

The monk group also has the option just fight defensively - only be hit on 20's, and have the Drunken Master Sensei heal them up with booze powered wholeness of body.

In every case - it's just a matter of minor inconvenience for the martials - and the casters wasting spells.

It seems that the general assumption is that martials are just going to play the dumb thug with a stick and not use tactics or really understand what's going on.

[Purple Dragon Knight]

1. Use the lead sheet as a table cloth, making sure it goes all the way to the floor.

2. Hide under the table.

3. Wrap the edges of the lead sheet under yourself. Lead sheet blocks both line of sight and line of effect right?

4. Around the last minute before they show up, drink a Blink potion, False Life potion, Aid potion, Protection from Evil potion, Activate ghost touch on your weapon, and at least one guy should ring all three bells from his Death Warden's Bandolier.

5. All martials are halfling fighter with eldritch knight archetype and with bat familiar (blindsight + medium size battleform to serve as flying mount); half of those have mounted feats with lance to make them really nasty via Spirited Charge feat; half of those went the way of Disruptive feat, Step Up, etc.

[chocobot]

Rhedyn wrote:

Caster uses summon spam! It's super effective!

You guys assume the casters don't clear out dungeons before entering them.

Martials use a time dragon, it's super effective! They get it to take them back before casters were born and murder their parents.

But no! Casters had already befriended their own time dragon and traveled back in time so they could give their parents contingencies that trigger upon being killed by time travelers (by magic jarring them and casting from inside their bodies). The contingencies teleport their sperm and eggs to their time dragon's lair where he can IVF surrogate mothers to make sure that they are in fact born.

But no! The martials had actually befriended the same Time Dragon at a later point in his life and he knew all about the plan so he snuck into his younger self's lair and switched all the vials so the casters ended up with terrible mental stats and could no longer cast spells.

This time dragon has one move left...

[LazarX]

I've never gotten the idea on threads like this. Every conceivable adventurer faces casters among other things as foes. Is the idea to develop something so specialised that he's useless against anything else?

[Purple Dragon Knight]

Yes! that is the point of this thread I believe! :)

[My Self]

Well, considering the caster party makeup, it'll be hard to specialize yourself so hard that you're useless against anything else. The party is of multiple alignments. There are 2 spontaneous casters, 4 prepared casters, 3 arcane and 3 divine. 3 of them have 3/4 BAB, at least 2 of them have easy access to or can get DR. Between the party, they can fly, burrow, walk on air, and probably pick up the ability to swim and climb walls. They can see invisibility, purge it, become invisible, become intangible, and teleport. You're probably dealing with a combination of humanoids, outsiders, undead, magical beasts, and animals. Multiple of them use weapons, one uses natural attacks. They'll be targeting AC, touch and regular, as well as some, if not all of your saves. Or perhaps even bypass your save entirely (cheapo). If you can specialize yourself so much that you can kill all these folks without being able to kill anything else, consider me amazed.

In short, you simply need to have very good saves, good AC, have plenty of damage, be mobile or able to hit mobile enemies, have good initiative, and just generally be versatile and powerful.

[CWheezy]

I'm willing to build a couple casters if you want to run this simulation

[Casual Viking]

Charon's Little Helper wrote:

Meh - a level 12 monk with Pummeling Style will take out the 120hp orb in a single round - no sweat. And Sohei (most monks) get the same initiative buff as a Diviner - only they use Dex as a primary stat, so by 12 they'd be up by 5 points or so.

I thought all the Monks were Tetori or Zen Archers? Because people talk about grappling, which is only possibly relevant if the grappler is a Tetori.