3.5 was edition I played the most. It was a reason why I quit RPGs for nearly a decade because I hated it so much.
Every time I see another meme about how amazing 3.5 Tarrasque is, I remmember how amogn actual 3.5 players Tarrasque was the biggest joke. It was always brought up as definite proof designers have no idea how to make good monster. It was laughably easy to beat. A wizard could casually solo it, the same abilities people now miss in 3.5 amounted to ribbons. It was a laughingstock, forums had 100+ pages discussions how to fix it and general consensus was it';s beyond saving. It was first proof in 3.5 if you cannot use magic you're only good to roll over and die.
I honestly don't know if everyone claiming 3.5 Tarrasque is such a horrifying monster are trying to rewrite history or unintentionally proving what a broken, unplayable pile of garbage 3.5 was, if it's biggest punching bag is actually dangerous in a different, better designed game.
Could you give examples? I never heard of it being easy to beat, and I would love a laugh at it being easily handled
The big one was its complete lack of mobility abilities or ranged attacks, so a party with overland flight could attack it pretty much with impunity. Iirc that was most commonly paired with shrinking a bunch of boulders, carrying them up with you, then dropping them right as the shrinking spell expired. This is all from memory 15 years ago though so details could be a bit sketchy.
the usual go to back in the day was to drown it, because it wasnt immune to that in any way. Simply gate it to the plane of water. There was a number of other work arounds like that too.
Killing it by banishing it to another dimension of reality sounds like the epic, high level stuff the Terrasque was made for
i mean, there were plenty of other ways, including things you could do at lower level, that was just the common go to because it required a single high level spell, and usually you fought big T at high level.
Yeah, I ran campaigns from first through 3.5, never really played 4th or 5th. I'm curious how 3.5 tarrasque is easy to beat with anything other than broken munchkin builds from conflicting source materials that no sane DM would allow, or would be reserved for epic level campaigns. Like sure, when you get to a point where you can casually cast things like hellball, then things like the tarrasque might be easy. But at that point you will be doing the tango with the outer realm creatures and Demi gods.
I remember the go to strategy being to summon an Alip, an incorporeal undead that can drain strength without needing a save.