At the end of our Kingmaker campaign, the 17th level party came up against a foe with an AC of 51. They had attack bonuses of 30 or so, which meant that the Big Bad was unhittable except on natural 20s. The solution? Cast greater dispel magic, which gave the cleric about a 40% chance of dispelling each important spell and reducing the foe’s AC by 9 and to a level where the group could hit it.

This was not a good moment in the campaign. Here we are, at the climax of several months role-playing, and the game comes down to whether the cleric can roll well or not on their dispel magic spell. The skills of the fighters and rogues in the group are completely irrelevant.

It infuriates me. There’s an idea in 3E that some foes should be nearly impossible until the special trick is found. I’m fine with that – I should be running a module tonight (Mordenkainen’s Fantastic Adventure) which uses such a tactic. However, the special trick in this case is something that is available in the room where the monster is fought – it just needs to be spotted and used by the group. Pathfinder and 3E resort so much to impossible unless you have the right spell. 

Structurally, reaching the final boss of an adventure should occur with you aware of their weaknesses and wielding the weapon that will take them down. In Kingmaker’s case, this was true: Greg’s paladin held Briar… he just couldn’t hit her because of her magic. Sigh.

Far more satisfying would be to meet the Big Bad midway through the adventure, to fight, and to be forced to retreat. Then, at the conclusion of the adventure, armed with what you need to defeat them, have the final combat. It’s a lot trickier to run, but so much better than encountering them for the first time in the final encounter, and being forced to run, then nothing else happening until you get the pieces you need to kill them.

Great villains work because you get to know them. Darth Vader is a great case in point: he kills Luke’s mentor, he almost kills Luke in the Death Star Trench, he captures Luke’s friends, Luke loses a hand in a duel with him, and – finally – Luke bests him in a duel and also redeems him. That’s the sort of villain that we need more of in RPGs.