I remember seeing someone describe a BBEG’s monologue as the DM saying farewell to the character. And yeah, pretty much.
Disintegrate is a terrible opener. It’s save or suck, meaning that they will expend a legendary resistance, at best. Polymorph effectively does the same thing, but better in every way. The bbeg would resist the spell and simply continue monologuing
This is entirely based on the assumption that they’re playing 5E. I don’t think any other game has legendary resistances
Yeah, I did assume 5e. Still holds true, depending on your teammates in 3.5 and pathfinder, but you right
What? Polymorph might disable the target, but if its a single target boss fight, what does that help? Whether you kill the transformation or wait for the spell to time out, the result is the same
I guess their assumption is anything cast right away will have Legendary Resistance used if the save is failed and the spell is sufficiently debilitating, so better to use Polymorph since it’s lower level but strong enough to warrant using LR.
Disintegrate does x damage. You know what does more than x damage? 3 other characters holding their attack and spell actions after you bap the lizard sitting in a cage, after killing all of their henchmen. But they’ll resist it anyway, so it’s effectively less magic spent for the same result
If your BBEG doesn’t have at least one counterspell (or someone who does on their team) your casters are always gonna go in guns blazing lol
…someone will probbaly die
I would caution players to think of the logical endpoint of zealously interrupting villians with combat.
Players: “Stop you thugs or face the wrath of-”
DM: “They attack you, sounds like they get a surprise round”
That sounds unreasonable. If you’re stepping up to known thugs to threaten them with violence, violence is expected by the party. There should be no surprise here.
By the rules of the game you can’t surprise someone who is aware of your presence, so you’re correct.
That also means you don’t automatically get to interrupt a monologue by blasting the bbeg in the face mid-sentence. You need to roll initiative to see if you are able to act before they can respond.
I like this. I mean, the fact that the rules assist the narrative, but they’re not the narrative themselves.
For the desintegrate situation, I’d love for the GM to go something like:
“As you speak the final words of your incantation, Wizard, a thin green ray begins to form on your fingertip. The villain merely smirks, clicking his fingers. A wave of crimson energy smothers your hand, and your spell snuffs out like a candle. He brushes a piece of dust from his shoulder. 'Impatience. Such a childish trait. As I was saying…'”
The GM wouldn’t even explain what happened, just continue his narrative, and at some point the party would find that one of the nearby minions in hiding had a counterspell ready, for example.
Yeah, absolutely. There are plenty of RAW ways to allow a bbeg to monologue, at least to some degree.
Of course it’s also entirely within the GM’s power to just tell the players to let it happen, but it definitely feels better when there’s some kind of in game reason why.
PC’s really are the worst
Talking is (not) a free action sounds like it could be a fun mechanic if everyone agrees to it.
Let the big bad talk, but players get to write down an attempted action and roll for successful sneak for as long as he’s yapping.
Or you could have the players find their journal with the plans written down after killing them.
