Kill the Justice League... as a D&D character

[Shai-Hulud]

Confirmed that it's a scenario, so that makes it easier.

Because it's hard to beat a guy who can poke out every molecule you're composed of before an electron can complete its orbit around a hydrogen atom.

[Alias]

I pick the Soulmonger, a magical object which slowly and permanently murders anyone previously brought back from the dead (which, as far as I'm aware, covers every single JLA member mentioned in the OP) as my artifact, and watch the JLA slowly (possibly very, very slowly - I'm unclear on the exact mechanics of the death curse) wither away while I do nothing in particular. Every other choice becomes tailored to protecting it and/or myself from detection, which isn't actually quite that hard, across editions (blanket immunities to scrying and/or psionics are not uncommon via items, while illusions should be manageable via class). And while it's undoubtedly a very evil object, every actual reperocussion that it carries is explicitly reversible once it's destroyed.

In the unlikely event that Hal Jordan's never died before these days (which I'm pretty sure is wrong) and someone's rule-lawyering hard for the ring's mortal harm defenses, something like a Mirror of Life Trapping should probably do the job (knowing everyone's true names also makes some of the more broken magic much more wieldy). 'A catoblepas' (explicitly unsaveable magic death stare to go with an already illusion-heavy build) would have been my lowest rent, slightly questionable answer to handling Superman specifically, but somehow "creature" isn't covered in the categories here.

[Postmania]

Well if HOMEBREW is allowed I could just write up an "I beat the JLA" spell. I was kind of assuming it had to be a published WoTC book. (And/or BoEF )

Heh, actually making a specific thing wouldn't count for me, I'd be pulling from the wide wide world of non-thread specific stuff which is ludicrously broken for my own fun and games. But of course that's not a thing now either

[Zagreus]

I pick the Soulmonger, a magical object which slowly and permanently murders anyone previously brought back from the dead (which, as far as I'm aware, covers every single JLA member mentioned in the OP) as my artifact, and watch the JLA slowly (possibly very, very slowly - I'm unclear on the exact mechanics of the death curse) wither away while I do nothing in particular. Every other choice becomes tailored to protecting it and/or myself from detection, which isn't actually quite that hard, across editions (blanket immunities to scrying and/or psionics are not uncommon via items, while illusions should be manageable via class). And while it's undoubtedly a very evil object, every actual reperocussion that it carries is explicitly reversible once it's destroyed.

In the unlikely event that Hal Jordan's never died before these days (which I'm pretty sure is wrong) and someone's rule-lawyering hard for the ring's mortal harm defenses, something like a Mirror of Life Trapping should probably do the job (knowing everyone's true names also makes some of the more broken magic much more wieldy). 'A catoblepas' (explicitly unsaveable magic death stare to go with an already illusion-heavy build) would have been my lowest rent, slightly questionable answer to handling Superman specifically, but somehow "creature" isn't covered in the categories here.

Very nice! The horse god neighs heartily!

[Zagreus]

Okay, got it figured. As long as this is not Kazan Arena, I can do this.

As a 20th-level Wizard I use dimension travel to come back to our universe. Use Geas spells on the DC staff and hierarchy. The geas is that they have to produce a special edition and kill all those characters.

So the storyline is, "Death of the Endless vs the JLA." Puny mortal comics executives and creators have no defense against Geas, so they're screwed. Even Barry Allen can't defeat Death of the Endless. JLA dies.

Dimension travel back to DCU, attend funerals, and wait for Q-Horse to show up, neigh, complement me on my horse-sense, and award me my prizes.

Hmm... if we're postulating an "actual JLA and DCU that are out there in an alternate universe" do the writers on "our Earth" actually create and control the events that they chronicle, or are they simply writing stories of the JLA's adventures because they are subconsciously tuning into the vibrational frequency of one of many "real" DCU dimensions that exist somewhere...

I'll let the forum decide!

[Shadowedeyes]

I pick the Soulmonger, a magical object which slowly and permanently murders anyone previously brought back from the dead (which, as far as I'm aware, covers every single JLA member mentioned in the OP) as my artifact, and watch the JLA slowly (possibly very, very slowly - I'm unclear on the exact mechanics of the death curse) wither away while I do nothing in particular. Every other choice becomes tailored to protecting it and/or myself from detection, which isn't actually quite that hard, across editions (blanket immunities to scrying and/or psionics are not uncommon via items, while illusions should be manageable via class). And while it's undoubtedly a very evil object, every actual reperocussion that it carries is explicitly reversible once it's destroyed.

In the unlikely event that Hal Jordan's never died before these days (which I'm pretty sure is wrong) and someone's rule-lawyering hard for the ring's mortal harm defenses, something like a Mirror of Life Trapping should probably do the job (knowing everyone's true names also makes some of the more broken magic much more wieldy). 'A catoblepas' (explicitly unsaveable magic death stare to go with an already illusion-heavy build) would have been my lowest rent, slightly questionable answer to handling Superman specifically, but somehow "creature" isn't covered in the categories here.

Very slowly. It drains away 1 hit point each day, and I have to expect that someone like Superman would have a ridiculous amount of hit points.

[Zagreus]

Very slowly. It drains away 1 hit point each day, and I have to expect that someone like Superman would have a ridiculous amount of hit points.

All the non-human "tanks" of the league would have a ton of HP (Superman, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Aquaman)

Presumably, Hal Jordan, Flash, Batman would have less.

[Shadowedeyes]

Even the human members could be argued to have "normal" HP amounts that a high level character would have I think, given the kind of threats they deal with. The tanks probably have a lot more though, yah.

[Alias]

Very slowly. It drains away 1 hit point each day, and I have to expect that someone like Superman would have a ridiculous amount of hit points.

I think that should just about be workable, actually. My bigger concern was that it'd carry some kind of fortitude save, which someone like Superman could reasonably be expected to pass indefinitely. Obviously, "someone like Superman" should also have literally more hp than the planet, but it's worth bearing in mind that D&D's consistently refused to scale that way (3.x might have posed a partial exception to that rule, but even then, Pathfinder arguably greatly streamlined the whole thing while reverting to type, despite making PCs more powerful; "hit points and hit dice are ultimately just abstractions", is the usual refrain here).

I'm unaware of any meaningful 5e touchstones, but the largest creatures in the game have always been hilariously understatted in this respect. Spelljammer gave us murderoids, dragons up to three million feet long with 50 or 58 hit dice (a net gain of 8 from the juvenile stage, where they were, at most, 2,600' in total), and the constellate, which mercifully didn't have an hp stat, but caused 2d12 or 2d20 damage per 1,000 square miles, among others. Draeden were something like 1,000' long per HD (101-200 in total); the rules were pretty muddy, but their strength score, per the first boxset, should have been enough to move moons around at the very least. Megaliths (Immortal level or greater living planets older than the universe - Earth was one of them) had roughly one HD per mile diameter, but their physicals were specifically beyond even the Immortals'. Pathfinder's kaiju stand-ins (and possibly an ~actual Godzilla?) top out at around 750 hp. There's actually no real shortage of further examples to draw on.

It's a manageable timeframe, is the gist of what I'm getting at here, although becoming more proactive is probably a must now (again, spells like wish, trap the soul, etc., all become much more broken with everyone's true names known; I'd argue even Wonder Woman doesn't generally seem to possess anything like genuine magic resistance, as defined by most editions of the game). Any lasting psychological damage to my loved ones should be covered by the "it was all a dream" option, which was always the more sensible route to take.

This being has been recently intrigued with the mortal phenomena of role-playing games and gives you the power of a 20th level D&D character of your choice (pick your edition, whichever you like).

[...]

Your race must be standard from a "Player's Handbook".

I'm increasingly convinced "20th level Immortal" (the default race of two seperate players' handbooks; throughly covered as an option throughout the BECMI era, including codification in the Rules Cyclopedia) should be a viable option here, incidentally.

[The MunchKING]

I pick the Soulmonger, a magical object which slowly and permanently murders anyone previously brought back from the dead (which, as far as I'm aware, covers every single JLA member mentioned in the OP) as my artifact, and watch the JLA slowly (possibly very, very slowly - I'm unclear on the exact mechanics of the death curse) wither away while I do nothing in particular. Every other choice becomes tailored to protecting it and/or myself from detection, which isn't actually quite that hard, across editions (blanket immunities to scrying and/or psionics are not uncommon via items, while illusions should be manageable via class).

So you're going to warp into the DC world carrying a 20 foot tall crystal, held up by giant adamantine braces, that shoot 30 feet long dark energy tentacles in every direction, and is hooked up to an undead god-fetus?

I mean I'm pretty sure that's going to be "noticeable" no matter what magic items you have to slap on it after you beam in. And the OP doesn't say anything about getting yourself a secret fortress to have all this set up in or anything.

[Alias]

I'll happily forego the undead god-fetus, which is entirely unrelated to the thing's basic function. A single invisibility spell generally covers literally everything else you mentioned, let alone the vast majority of illusions, and I want to say the tentacles are a function of the artifact actually being "on", which it wouldn't be, by default.

The OP mentions nothing about "popping up" in the first place, and provides plenty of other resources without handing me a fortress (a 20th level Pathfinder arcane caster has three different, largely stackable spells for creating his own demiplane, IIRC; other editions have generally had multiple variations on Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion, if we're bent on this one theme for whatever reason). The idea that the JLA (and these particular JLA members specifically) is automatically on top of every momentarily strange event on the planet is laughable, particularly when I'm not (and wouldn't suddenly show-up in, whatever the exact mechanics are here) anywhere remotely in the Anglosphere.

I did consider going more specific with it (it's in a whole bunch of podcasts which are very technically established, published parts of generic D&D canon, often looking slightly different), but ultimately I don't actually see any meaningful benefit to it at all.

[Zagreus]

I'm increasingly convinced "20th level Immortal" (the default race of two seperate players' handbooks; throughly covered as an option throughout the BECMI era, including codification in the Rules Cyclopedia) should be a viable option here, incidentally.

The neigh-god doesn't make you immortal, alas. He commends your cleverness for finding a loophole he didn't consider! Let's say he doesn't want to create a challenger to his own self by creating a 20th level immortal (!). He did take your family, after all. (Though the neigh-god is less diligent/concerned about artifacts. Whatever D&D artifact the player chooses is theirs. Even if it could potentially be used against the neigh-god itself)

Btw, a 20th level basic D&D character is totally viable (if, for example, one wanted to be a 20th level Elf for example as your PC and claim sweet fighter/magic-user abilities.)

Agreed re: hit points, though. They are an abstraction. Superman can, and does, go down in the books. Superman would have a reasonable number of HP, but not more HP than the planet. Possibly into the hundreds, largely due to a godly constitution score, but less than 1000, I'd think. Every edition interpreted hp slightly differently, YMMV. Though, he could also be interpreted to have some sort of fast healing, when exposed to sunlight. He can get beat to a withering husk by a nuke blowing up in his face and all of a sudden the sun shines on him and he's up and at 'em, again.

[Zagreus]

The OP mentions nothing about "popping up" in the first place, and provides plenty of other resources without handing me a fortress (a 20th level Pathfinder arcane caster has three different, largely stackable spells for creating his own demiplane, IIRC; other editions have generally had multiple variations on Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion, if we're bent on this one theme for whatever reason). The idea that the JLA (and these particular JLA members specifically) is automatically on top of every momentarily strange event on the planet is laughable, particularly when I'm not (and wouldn't suddenly show-up in, whatever the exact mechanics are here) anywhere remotely in the Anglosphere.

Yeah, you can pop up wherever/however you want, the horse god doesn't care. It should be a trival matter for a 20th level mage to hide his 20-foot-tall artifact. You don't get an auto-secret fortress, but a few spells should do ya, however you want. (You could just charm the residents of a real-life Earth castle and take it over if you wanted). I hear Schloss Neuschwanstein is lovely this time of the year

[Shellhead]

Aside from the looming saving throw issue, I think that a 20th level bard could wreak havoc with the JLA by spamming them with illusions and charm spells.

[Zagreus]

Of course, if you are relying on Polymorph effects, you may want confirmation by your Horse God that "incapacitating" is as good as "killing" for the sake of the challenge. Because BP isn't SUPPOSED to kill, and gives a big bonus to Saves against "he should TOTALLY DIE" arguments.

Well, if you baleful polymorph Superman into a bunny, there are a number of things you could do from that point, to eliminate said super-bunny. I leave it to you