Please HELP 50 year old gamer Defeat Vrock - Spoil - calling players & Developers

[bossanova]

Hello Forum, thank you for taking the time to read my message. I played Baldurs Gate when it first came out, having to load 6 CD ROMs into my Gateway. Hell, I played ADVENTURE on the Atari 2600 where your character was a square and dragons were ducks and you had to beat them with a magic arrow or maybe it was a magic sword or maybe an arrow…Ugg!

I was playing Pathfinder: Kingmaker and got to level 10 BUT I needed a break after leaving Vordakis Tomb even though I killed the creep.

Here I sit in PWotR at 5th level, I defended the town and beat the Minotaur without issue, I even defeated the Shadow Demon in the basement with not much fuss. I have tried at least 20 times to wipe the Vrock out of existence in the Market Square but I get slaughtered each and every time.

Difficulty I play at:
Critical Hits: Weak
Enemy Stat Adj: Slightly Stronger
Damage to Party: 1.0

Here is my party with primary weapons:
Main: Sylvan Trickster 4 / Sword Saint 1 - Cold Iron Masterwork Dueling Sword
Mercenary: Two Handed Fighter 4 / Base Cleric 1 - Cold Iron Heavy Flail of Weakness +1
Seela: Paladin 5 - Finnean as Long Sword
Lann: Zen Archer 5 - Wicked Longbow +2 w/ Cold Iron Ammo
Ember: Stigmatized Witch 5 - Light Crossbow of Oracle +2
Daeran: Oracle 4 / Sylvan Trickster 1 - “playoffs, don’t talk about playoffs, you kidding me”

Tactics:
- Protection from Evil Communal, Haste Communal, Summon Large Earth Elemental
- Divine Favor and Bulls Strength on Seela & Mercenary
- Lann seems to be able to take down the Vermlek and Dretch with help from Main when they advance.
- Seela and the Mercenary [sounds like a good TV show]…do not do squat tag in the asparagus bush…they run up to the Vrock and NEVER ever even hit the thing AT ALL…EVER…like if they each hit once or twice it would be useful but they never hit and in like two rounds the Vrock eats them for breakfast.
- Yeah…sure…about every 6th play though Ember can put the Vrock to sleep but it does not seem to matter. I do no damage to it and it wakes up and kills my whole party.
- I managed to save the magic 50 HP Bolt but I never get the Vrock down in HP where it would be effective to use.

This game is supposed to have a nonjudgmental dice rolling mechanic BUT I find this very hard to believe. It is almost as if the developers put in a hidden logarithmic snag to F me up because I am doing everything correctly.

PLEASE Help Me Beat this Vrock. Any and All Advice is much appreciated. What am i doing right? What am I doing wrong? Why are my fighters not hitting even with divine favor and bulls strength which puts them at like +3 more to hit besides their BAB and other bonuses?

Thank You

Frustrated and Upset Gamer

[Raikon]

My advice is to get daeran first, he hass a mass heal that helps a lot vs the spores debuff. Also Bless dispels it. I would put radiance on selah, and maybe give lann finnean, since finnean as a bow gets cold iron.

Selah can use smite evil to bypass his immunities, so Finnean is wasted on her. Otherwise try to focus on cold iron for anyone that you want to actually do damage.

[Conquista]

if you just want to win and don't mind reloading some times the cheesiest tactic against that encounter is to go sleep hex + coup de grace

oh and also for your melee hitting issue, at that level feats like weapon focus and outflank can help

debuffs like evil eye hex from ember or camellia or both can help reducing enemy ac

buffs like bless, bull strength, enlarge person, haste and so on can also help adding to your attack roll

and for performance your class dips also look weird

[Raikon]

enlarge person doesnt help with your attack roll, it gives u two stregnth, but also -1 AB for size. Otherwise i agree with everything conq said. Probably easiest for you to load scum sleep+ coup de grace.

[Conquista]

oh ya i missed some steps for the enlarge person thing, the idea for that is to get reach on whatever weapon you picked for weapon focus and to stand behind somebody else and still hit your target, so that you won't need to tank and can drop fighting defensively, which overall results in your enlarged party member to get an higher attack roll

[bossanova]

Thank you both for your comments. I will try the weapons Raikon suggested. My dips are based on "role playing" but I will go the rest of the way on my main with sword saint, taking the Aldori feat. I like to think that even if I made a party of 6 Halfling Druids that the developers would still allow me to beat every facet of the game one way or another. I do use smite evil and bless as well. i DID mange to put the Vrock to sleep BUT when I did a Coup it only did 20 damage AND the game ripped me off because when another character tried it would NOT let me stating something like "blindness and another factor". How do my difficulty settings rate with other gamers out here? What settings do the two of you use?

[Raikon]

I dont really edit the settings that much, I tend to just click on one of the difficulties and leave it at that. Most of the time unfair.

[Conquista]

coup de grace needs a skillcheck to succeed and the only settings i adjust are the ones for party experience sharing otherwise i also stick with what is predetermined by the difficulty level

[katzenkrimis]

I beat three of those things later in the game. Surely, that one by itself should be easy.

I think your team is the problem. Not enough heavies.

Dueling sword.
Two-handed fighter with a heavy flail.
Paladin with a longsword and shield? Or a greatsword?
Lann, longbow
Ember, crossbow.
Daeran, healing.


That team is like papier-mâché. I'd get smoked if I used that army composition.

The closest thing you have to a tank is Seelah, if she's using a shield, but I don't use her as a tank. I use her to deal damage with a two-handed glaive.

You need a couple of heavies on your front line.

--

I beat the three Vrocks using:

Fighter/Tower Shield, Trident - Barbarian Hulk/Heavy Shield, flail.

Seelah/Two-handed glaive - Woljif/Double-daggers

Lann/Finnean shortbow - Daeran/Crossbow.


It was an easy victory. After that, I replaced my two frontmen, just to try something new.

I'm currently using a Cavalier Knight of the Wall/Longsword, Heavy Shield -- Fighter/Tower Shield/Heavy Pick on my frontline.

Which, I think might be even stronger because those mounted cavs are deadly.

[bossanova]

OK...Thank you to all who replied. I defeated the Vrock with my scrappy party listed above. Ember put the Vrock to Sleep then my Mercenary Crit for like 35 damage using Coup De Grace but did not kill it. Lann hit the Vrock with Finnean as a long bow for another Crit and the Earth Elemental i summoned with a scroll did some damage to Vrock as well. This lowered their HP him down enough for Ember to use the Magic 50 HP Bolt to finish off.

BUT...BUT..

There is no Magic Shield to be found. I do not have words to describe how i feel at this point. Completely Miserable...Flabbergasted...Stunned...Extremely Upset

[4kBuddz]

Adventure on the 2600!! Thanks for taking another 50 year old who just started this game down Memory Lane. That dragon was always a duck!! Sorry I can't help you, yet.

[fox5s]

Uhhh.... don't use the Midnight Bolt on the Vrock. You need that. You may want to reload.

As long as you can down it before it kills someone, don't worry about the disease DoT (after combat it can't take you below your hit dice (level) in health. Just wait for it to wear off unless you really want to save hp (ie someone is nearly full and got the DoT).

You should have gotten a Cold Iron Battleaxe from the Pitaxian Wine Cellar. In most of my playthroughs, I'd hand it to Seelah or your Merc to use for a little while. x3 damage on crit really helps out the Coup de Grace kills (Coup de Grace auto-crits) and it should overcome most Demon Damage Reduction.

Presumably, after the initial Sleep attempt, you have Ember using Evil Eye on its AC or Attack Rolls. Also, if she succeeds at the Sleep, you can use Evil Eye to reduce its Saving throw for your Coup de Grace attempt while others are getting in position.

About your actual tactics, it looks like your buffs are all offensive. You need to load up someone to be fully defensive for enemies like that. Seelah is probably your best bet of your current comp. Use some potions/scrolls to get her Shield of Faith, Barkskin, Magic Vestments (both on shield and armor if you have enough castings) and (depending on the Max Dex of her armor) Cat's Grace. (You already said you are using Prot from Evil and Haste or I'd have included them as well.) (Note that Magic Vestments shouldn't stack if she already has magic armor/shield but it's bugged in our favor and stacks anyway.) She should also have Veil of Heaven that give her +2 AC vs Outsiders (like Demons). Make sure she is using Defensive Fighting for an extra 3 AC (I hope you have gotten 3 Mobility on everyone for the bonus AC when Fighting Defensively).

You should be able to get the Vrock to aim for her by holding back with the others (using the Delay action) if needed until its first round of attacks or other tactics (like starting the combat via Seelah charging or using the first ranged attack). With all that, Seelah should easily be able to hold it off until the rest of the party can slay it.

I hope this helps! ^^

Oh! On an unrelated note, for extra fun, you should head over to where that Necromancer was hanging out the first time you came to the Marketplace. :3