Converting "Real World" Animals and Vermin

[Cleon]

Wow, that's remarkably boring. Should we give them a weak slam and some natural armor to get them to CR 1/6?

I'm thinking they'd be more likely to have high Dex (14-15?) to give them their AC rather than natural armour, so they have better reflexes to retreat into their tubes. Maybe even Improved Initiative as a bonus feat - fan worms can dart back into their tubes with lightning speed.

I'd vote against a slam attack, as real-world Sabella have no offensive ability.

Many Sabella have poisonous flesh to discourage predators. Maybe we could expand that to become a poisonous slime on their tentacles, which they get a melee touch attack that inflicts a mild but painful toxin, and have the same effect on anything that touches them in turn, with a greater effect to anything that eats them?

 

[Shade]

These guys are set dressing, aren't they?

I suppose they could become the "gas spores" of the bristle worms, looking like something scarier.

The poison idea is doable.

I wonder if this could be extrapolated into something deadlier when they reach "gigantic" sizes?

"A feeding peacock worm…has a fan of radiating tentacles fringed with fine filaments to sieve food particles from the water currents."

Maybe a dessication effect similar to a toned-down horrid wilting with a touch attack, as nutrients are sucked from a creature's body?

 

[freyar]

I like the poison flesh, though still fairly weak. I guess if the PCs have nothing else to eat for miles and miles....

The tentacle idea is interesting. Maybe even something like blood drain.

 

[Cleon]

These guys are set dressing, aren't they?

I suppose they could become the "gas spores" of the bristle worms, looking like something scarier.

The poison idea is doable.

I wonder if this could be extrapolated into something deadlier when they reach "gigantic" sizes?

"A feeding peacock worm…has a fan of radiating tentacles fringed with fine filaments to sieve food particles from the water currents."

Maybe a dessication effect similar to a toned-down horrid wilting with a touch attack, as nutrients are sucked from a creature's body?

Don't care for the dessication effect. Fan worms don't suck the juices out of their food via their tentacles, they just swallow them. Horrid wilting touch seems a bit too fantastic and effective an attack, even if toned down.

Instead of that, how about a Colossal Carnivorous Sabella? A fan worm so titanic than human-sized objects are "small particles" to sieze from the water currents. It could have 40 to 60 foot long tentacles, then careless folk could mistake its entangling tendrils for the harmless Terebella, the next worm in the article, making the latter the gas spore of the worm world.

We could also stat up a regular "mostly harmless" giant Sabella, with or without poisonous flesh.

 

[demiurge1138]

No to wilting, but the colossal version is kind of cool.

 

[Cleon]

No to wilting, but the colossal version is kind of cool.

Shall we do both then? Just to get us off the seafloor, I'll start with some proposed rough stats for the regular poison-fleshed giant Sabella.

Medium Vermin
Hit Dice: 2d8 (9 hp) [That suggests the Colossal version is 32 Hit Dice!]
Initiative: +2
Speed: 0 (immobile)
Armor Class: 12 (+2 Dex), touch 12, flat-footed 10
Base Attack: +1/+1
Attack: Tentacles +3 touch (poison) or slam +1 melee (1d3)
Full: Tentacles +3 touch (poison) and slam -4 melee (1d3)
Space/Reach: 5 ft./5 ft. (10 ft. with tentacles)
Special Attacks: Poison tentacles
Special Qualities: Armoured tube, accelerated healing, darkvision 60 ft., tremorsense 60 ft., vermin traits
Saves: +1
Abilities: Str 10, Dex 15, Con 11, Int —, Wis 11, Cha 5
Advancement: 3-4 HD (Large)

I'm thinking if a Sabella retreats into its Armoured Tube it can't use its slam attack but can still flail out with its venomous tentacles and gets DR X/— and maybe an armour bonus. I'd give it the better of its Str or Dex bonus to its Poison Tentacles touch attack.

Does that look about right?

 

[freyar]

I thought we were not going with the slam and that the poison was not the result of the tentacle but if something eats it (or hits with a bite attack), right?

I like the Colossal idea.

 

[Cleon]

I thought we were not going with the slam and that the poison was not the result of the tentacle but if something eats it (or hits with a bite attack), right?

I like the Colossal idea.

I thought I'd rough out a "Deadly" version of the giant peacock worm, which actually poses some (small) threat to PCs. The regular giant Sabella will have no attacks & mildly toxic flesh. I don't mind dropping the slam, but it needs some means to harm adventurers, in the great tradition of "D&Dized" giant animals. Stinging or poisonous tentacles seemed a biologically inaccurate but thematically appropriate solution. Maybe its grandma had a fling with a sea anemone?

 

[Shade]

We can probably skip the smaller version (we have enough worms in that size range already!) and jump right to the "titanic" version.

 

[freyar]

Straight to Colossal with a little oomph works for me.