Monster idea - Animated Gate

[bennyhobo]

My players are going to run into a statue garden. I want them to stay in the garden a fight a couple animated statues. I don't want them to just run to the other end and open the gate. So rather than say it's magically locked or something, I thought maybe I could make the gate a monster.

The party is level 3, 4 or 5 players. I'd like it to be an encounter with the gate and probably 2-4 statues.

Since the gate is stationary, I'm thinking it should have some kind of aura, and/or an attack with reach. But probably no ranged attacks. And I don't want the statues to activate until the gate is touched. So, maybe a power that can recharge which allows the gate to animate 1d4 of statues in the garden.

Anyone have any ideas for how I should put it together?

Thanks!!

 

[Thatwackyned]

I like the idea of the Gate as a monster.

I'ld have the Gate have two enterances. The one the players enter and locks shut right after. The other Exit would have an Animated Metal Head attached that comes alive when touched.

The Gate Fence should be Animated Spears 3 feet apart, that attack anything that comes within range. 1[W]+5 and pushes the target back 3 squares. As a At Will Imidiate Interupt - Any creature leaving a threatened square is knocked prone.

This should stop anyone from jumping over the Gate and stay with in the gound.

The Gate Head should have:

At Will Animate 2 Statues recharge 1d4 on 3 and 4.
At Will Animate Command - Allows an Animated Stature to shift 1 Square and make a basic attack.

That's what I think, sorry about not creating the power correctly.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Turn the gate into a mimic.

 

[Ebylon]

Whatever you do, let one of the PCs walk into the gate first, and let it make an attack against them, knocking them back even if it doesn't deal damage (call it the pc diving away). Then have that gate and the previous gate lock shut until the Gatemonster is defeated.

For effect, have the gate look like a monster's open jaws or something.

 

[wcpfish]

Another idea....and this would work with the gate as a monster or as simply a "magical gate". Have the gate feature a carved design in it where there are obvious components "missing". The carved warrior has a sword but no shield. The carved king has no crown, etc. The "pieces" can be claimed by defeating the various statues that correspond to these parts.

If the gate is merely magical then inserting each statue component into the right area will simply open it. If you want to stick with the "gate as monster" idea then placing all the components animates the gate and it bellows "you have defeated my minions but now you face me ...boosted by the stength of their failure!" or something else suitably "villainy".

Hope these ideas help!

Also (shilling my own product here...) my Urban Adversaries 4e monster supplement (available on this site, rpgnow and drivethrustuff) has a Sweetsleep Vine which is a bit higher level than what you're looking for now but might work further down the line in your campaign as an ideal "statiionary guardian" -type monster.

William C. Pfaff
aka WCPFish
www.escapevelocitygaming.com

 

[bennyhobo]

Good ideas. Thanks! The party is being dogged by a mysterious evil force right now. They don't know who or what it is, only that it keeps sending creatures after them to try and kill them and steal a powerful magical item that they found but aren't able to use. The encounter before this had them escaping a bathhouse after a bunch of critters crawled up from the sewer. This statue garden is at the entrance to the bath house, set up by the proprietor to make the place look classy.

So the whole encounter needs to have the feeling of being hastily arranged by the unknown evil force. They weren't supposed to escape the previous attack, so the bad guy is making a last ditch effort to kill them while they're still in this area that he's already attuned his energies toward.

With that set-up, making an elaborate puzzle isn't going to work. Though I wish it would work, because I dig that mix of puzzle and combat. Hopefully I can fit that in some other way later in the campaign.

I'm probably going to make something based on Thatwackyned's idea, merged with the "Thing in the Portal" monster from the Keep on the Shadowfell. Though I think that's technically called a Hazard, not a monster.

Anyone else have ideas?