Phantom Fungus

[Wrath of the Swarm]

Yeech. Beholders. I've never run a game with those monsters, and I never will. I've gone so far as to remove them from modules entirely.

"They are a hateful, bloodthirsty, and poorly-conceived lot of vile fiends!"

 

[Asmo]

I have never used a Phantom Fungus in my game. I´ve never played in a game where it has been used either.
I must say that I really like the idea of adding one or two PF at the lower levels of Sunless Citadel, they would fit in perfectly.
If I ever run it again I will use it, absolutely!

Asmo

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

Yeech. Beholders. I've never run a game with those monsters, and I never will. I've gone so far as to remove them from modules entirely.

"They are a hateful, bloodthirsty, and poorly-conceived lot of vile fiends!"

Where do Beholders actually come from? I mean, do they have a source in some mythology, or was is Mr. G. that invented those beasts? I've yet to put a beholder in my adventures because I know my players couldn't survive the fight, not because I don't like the Eye Tyrants...

AR

 

[Orius]

Other than in the initial playtests, I can't remember ever seeing a phantom fungus in play. I can't remember ever seeing it in a product. I know as a designer and as a DM, I have never used it.

It's not that it's a bad monster. The illustration doesn't thrill me, but that's just personal taste--it's a fine illo. But something about it just says "don't use me, keep on looking..." whenever I'm looking through the MM for a monster to use. I don't know why for sure.

Do you feel this way too? Or have you used the monster? If so, how did you use it and did it work well?

I can tell you why the monster exists. We felt the game needed certain monsters in certain roles and niches. Specifically, we wanted a low-power monster that was invisible in its standard state, so that low level characters would get used to fighting invisible things now and again, and new players would see the value (and shortcomings) of invisibility early on. It also serves a role as a low-CR plant monster so druids have something to use their plant spells against.

I'm just curious, because that and the ethereal filcher may be the only two monsters (not counting animals) in the 3E Monster Manual that I've never used outside the initial 3E playtests.

Thanks for the interesting history.

Actually, as a DM, I have used both the phantom fungus and the ethereal filcher, once only, and in the same dungeon no less. I also use animals fairly regularly, stuff like bears, tigers, and so on.

The fungus was put in a room with stairs leading down to the next level. The PCs when into the room, poked around a bit, until the fungus attacked. They eventually beat it, but it confused them a little bit. Magical darkness and invisible attackers always work pretty well against them. This was an internet game, so if anyone's interested I can post excerpts from the chat log over in Story Hour.

The stalker was more interesting. I decided that it considered the entire dungeon its lair and it would keep popping up every so often (a flat 10% chance every 10 minutes), and steal some magic off them. It also made resting in the dungeon very annoying. Needless to say, they soon grew to hate it. Eventually, they cornered it in the room that the filcher had made into its lair. They killed it and took their stuff back. They also took the treasure the filcher had been guarding, which was another of my evil DM moments: every item it had was cursed.

 

[Orius]

More importantly, I mentally lumped it in with the flumph and the tirapheg: monsters that just weren't scary enough to make the cut.

I've used flumphs before. I once had an orc witch doctor with a trio of charmed flumph slaves which he sicced on the PCs. I did it purely for the shock value.

 

[Orius]

Well, I think you may be pointing at the problem right there: the creature was created to fill a metagame need. The phantom fungus is not a "neat" monster, nor is it iconic in any way, nor does it really have any particular storytelling appeal. It's there to teach low-level characters about invisibility.

Good point, but I didn't use it because of invisibility. When I wrote up the dungeon, I got a bunch of CR 2-4 monsters that I thought would make sense in a more or less abandoned dungeon. I never used the fungus before, it looked a little interesting to me, and so it went in. I like to use a lot of interesting and different monsters to keep my players on their toes.

The most disappointing encounter I ever ran was a grick. It has DR, so I thought it would make things a little difficult for the party. Unfortunatly, they took care of it handily with a single sleep spell from the sorcerer, and a coup de grace.

 

[Orius]

These oddball monsters would have made perfect fodder for Monster Hunters "Ecology" articles...too bad Dragon has lost interest in those types of articles.

Johnathan

Kind of a shame. Some Ecology articles to tend to be a bit dry and boring, but I've always enjoyed the ones with the Monster Hunters Association.

 

[I'm A Banana]

For my milage, I love the filchers. They're a lot of fun. Marauders are okay; they take hit-and-run to a new level, I think, and that's braggable.

But the Phantom Fungus........I dunno, I just don't see any grand conspiracy of tubers threatening the land, and if I did, I can't imagine it in more than one or two instances. It's just not a really spectacular villain, though it makes a passable random encounter. And IMXP, dungeons are designed around the villain, around the boss monster, around the main guy who took up residence and the allies he may have.

Add to that the fact that it can't do much more than "be invisible and be annoying," and, well.......eh.

 

[demiurge1138]

I've never actually used a phantom fungus, but I'm not averse to them; I remembering making them pack hunters, putting them on a random encounter table and then never rolling them.

I can also say I've never used either of the ethereals (the ethereal marauder looks cool, but I look at it like a weak phase spider). But I did use digesters; de-sillyed the description (I said they looked like raptors with anteater-like heads) and caused a little bit of terror with an ambush. They're off the wall, but no more so than a beholder.

Speaking of beholders, I'm almost positive that they are the product of Gygax and Arneson's fertile imagination, not from any myth or book.

Demiurge out.

 

[Nifft]

IMC, Phantom Fungi and Mycanoids (and other such Neutral plant-critters) are what you find on the other side of a Faerie mushroom-circle.

-- N