In my version of ToEE/Princess of the Apocolypse, I have a party of 12 characters (7 PCs, with 5 henchmen/followers) which means they can railroad most default encounters in published material like Princess of the Apocolypse. Here is an upgraded version of Marlos the Maeder (male medusa) – WolrdAnvil Link. In my game, he ended up being the prophet who defended the Altar of the Elder Elemental Eye in the Fane of the Eye/Greater Temple. He was supported by a Greater Servant of the Eye (converted from the original AD&D version created by Greyhawk Grognard). Was an epic and engaging battle. I used zones to abstract the battle but still use miniatures. The two together were a near-perfect counter to the powerful group of level 7-9 PCs:
- The petrifying gaze forced the PCs to avert their eyes shutting down anything that required line of sight (like many spells, and one of my PCs has a powerful form of telekinesis which didn’t work either).
- My PC’s key damage is range attacks; this was shut down by the violet fungus curtain protecting the altar in the central combat zone where Marlos was.
- My PCs also have multiple radiant-based damage, which was ineffective and downright dangerous against the servant of the eye because of its radiant mirror trait.