Converting Greyhawk monsters

demiurge1138 · Jun 25, 2009

Wait a second. Doesn't this thing have short swords for hands? Why don't they dissolve in the acid that's constantly dripping from its pores?

Shade · Jun 25, 2009

That is an excellent question. I'm assuming that when they become incorporated, they supernaturally become immune like the creature itself.

Odd design, eh?

Leopold · Jun 25, 2009

or magical swords that are immune to acid?

demiurge1138 · Jun 25, 2009

Or swords of bone or stone.

freyar · Jun 25, 2009

Bone swords would be suitably gruesome and flavorful.

demiurge1138 · Jun 26, 2009

And they're porous, so the acid can ooze out of the swords to do damage! Kind of fragile, though. Perhaps they break on a natural 1?

freyar · Jun 26, 2009

If we think that agrees well enough with the original text, I'm all for it.

Cleon · Jun 26, 2009

Don't much care for the acid-oozing shortswords, it's a stretch to far from the ur-text, which gives no reason to think they're not regular metal blades. I'd assumed they keep the ooze's acid inside their skin, which is why it doesn't corrode their grafted shortswords, but when an attacker causes them to bleed it corrodes the weapon.

EDIT: Upon reflection, I prefer metal shortswords that are alchemically treated to be immune to gray ooze and grayman acid. :ENDEDIT

That does raise the question as to why the description only refers to the times it takes for their blood to corrode armour. Do they spray out blood upon an attacker? I think it's just a carry-over from AD&D, 3E SRD gray ooze's can dissolve weapons immediately, but there's no mention of them affecting armour.

So, I'm in favour of the greymen doing ongoing acid damage to any metal weapon that injures them and leave it at that. You'll notice that their acid only dissolves metal, not organic items. The grayman may alter the trapped gray ooze's acids somehow so it does not dissolve its body. Maybe this effect ends when the grayman is destroyed, and the ooze eats its way out ot the construct's body?

I do agree with immunity to acid, though possibly only until the grayman is "killed".

I'd vote against intelligence for the gray ooze. Just make it a regular gray ooze, and assume the Int 1 is intrinsic to the grayman.

Oh, and since it says their acid works half as fast as a gray ooze, I'd halve the acid damage to 8 points per round instead of the 11 points in the current version of our conversion.

Leopold · Jun 26, 2009

I like the bone swords idea myself. Kind of Deadpool type flavor. This would solve the reason why it doesn't disolve (it's part of the creature), and doesn't have to come up with why they have magical short swords created just for them. ONe less item for the PC to have as treasure.

I'd counter that if the PCs attempt to disarm them, if the creature rolls a Natrual 1 the weapon is destroyed per the Sunder feat.

As for the Gray ooze, we can mention something that it's an offshoot of the original designed for these creatures or based upon the original design and implanted that's why it interact with the host differently.

Now that brings up a good point. Why make this a just critter and not a template? After all look at the base creature, it's a humanoid with ooze implanted in it's chest. It's base gets converted to construct, it loses some abilities here and there, but in the end it's still a human warrior with a tempalte overlay. You could tack this onto an ogre and wreck worlds.

Shade · Jun 26, 2009

For awhile there, we veered into Wolverine movie territory, then back into Wolverine comics.

I do like the bone sword idea, but I think the "alchemical treatment" process common in golem creation is probably enough to explain why the grafted swords could survive the acid damage.

Cleon said:
Oh, and since it says their acid works half as fast as a gray ooze, I'd halve the acid damage to 8 points per round instead of the 11 points in the current version of our conversion.

The "ooze standard" for acid is ongoing damage equal to the save DC of their acid, hence 11.

I suppose we could add a -3 racial penalty to the save to represent the "diluting" of the ooze's acid passing through the greyman, which would bring the damage down to 8.