DragonStryk72 wrote:Or you know, they could just stop him. Kore is already down points thanks to the GAP, and as was previously worked out, a 9th level paladin, meaning he has finite HP. Hand the Racist Axe to Forgath, use the culverts for cover til Kore closes, then move to flank. Forgath gets a whopping +8 per swing (enough to counter the tower shield's AC bonus), while Thaco, Complains, and Big Ears flank. You fight from the other side with Fumbles, Forgath, and Minmax. You have a healer on each side, and from that point, Kore's got nowhere to go, taking at least 8 attacks a rounds that are at +2 for flanking bonus, save for Forgath, who's sitting on a +10. Even if Fumbles just stands there, he's still helping the fight by providing flank. If no one else has this knowledge, Minmax does, because he's a minmaxer. If there's one thing he knows, it's how to stack a bunch of modifiers in a fight.
I don't get this "He can't be beaten in combat" thing, because he's not actually that good. He uses no real tactics, and just slogs through due to his AC. That's fine when you have backup with other party members, but at this point, he's not gonna be able to use the crossbows much longer, putting him into melee. If he attempts to attack with the crossbows while fighting in melee, he provokes an attack of opportunity for each instance of attack, so 2x8= He can be hit up to 16 times a round, without wasting any of the group's attacks for the round.
Failing all of that, they can just bum rush, overbear, and throw his stupid butt off the bridge. Without some other factor we are up to now unaware of, this fight should be Kore's ass.
lets set aside the issue of rules and numbers for the moment, and just look at what we've already seen in the story: the goblins already tried that & they couldn't even land a single hit on kore. meanwhile one shot from kore's ax was enough to shatter big ears' magic armor, or put thaco down to -8 hp. they only survived as long as they did by running around and outmaneuvering him. they try to lock ranks and kore's gonna go through them like a wheat thresher.
what good are 16 attacks per round when everything we've ever seen just glances off that armor? but really, it's more like 14 since big ears doesn't even have a usable weapon against kore. then subtract from that the turns spent healing after kore KOs 2 of them every round. and even that number is going to start dwindling pretty damn quickly.
even if we give minmax & fogarth the benefit of the doubt, say that they can survive more than one hit & actually penetrate the up till now impenetrable armor or kore, so what? are they really going to be able to do more damage than a rope through the damn spinal column? because that's the only bad thing we've ever seen happen to kore, and it was a mild inconvenience at best.
on one side of this proposed fight is kore, a living legend; everyone who knows his name is stone cold terrified & not embarrassed to admit it. on the other side is a geriatric monk, a semi-catatonic idiot, a crippled fighter who's already blown his daily rage-wad, minmax & fogarth (who've already faced one super-villain today, so no telling what kind of fighting shape they're in), and big ears who's weapon is actually worse than useless since as soon as he's dead it will belong to kore.
if they can't get that door open, our heroes' best reasonable option is to take a header off the bridge & hope that kore doesn't decide to bring them back to life after he gets down there to pick up the axe.
