Special Conversion Thread: Unicorns

[Shade]

Updated.

Here's the next one...

Brown Unicorn
CLIMATE: Tropical
TERRAIN: Desert
FREQUENCY: Rare
ORGANIZATION: Herd
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Day
DIET: Herbiv.
INTELLIGENCE: Very
TREASURE: Nil
ALIGNMENT: N
NO. APPEARING: 1-10
ARMOR CLASS: 3
MOVEMENT: 18
HIT DICE: 3+4
THAC0: 17
NO. OF ATTACKS: 3
DAMAGE/ATTACK: l-4/1-4/1-8
SPECIAL ATTACKS: See text
SPECIAL DEFENSES: See text
MAGIC RESISTANCE: Nil
SIZE: L
MORALE: Elite
XP VALUE: 650

Brown unicorns are unicorns with light brown body hair and dark-brown tails, horns, and eyes.

Combat: Brown unicorns communicate with each other mentally. They have magical (nonpsionic) telepathy (applicable only to all other brown unicorns within range) and ESP (which reaches all other beings, one person per round) out to a 60' radius; both powers operate continuously. They can cast a special sleep spell three times per day; this spell is exactly like the wizard spell but it affects at least one creature regardless of level. The spell works normally against creatures of 4+4 HD or less, but creatures of higher levels are allowed a saving throw vs. spells to avoid being put to sleep. Brown unicorns are never surprised, thanks to their mental talents, unless they are attacked at long range by missile fire.

Habitat/Society: Brown unicorns (“roanicorns”, as some call them) have a herd mentality. Each herd has one stallion and several mares. Stallions mark out their territories by placing a “mental barrier” along the borders of their territories. This beacon alerts other brown unicorns or psionically sensitive creatures that have crossed into the brown unicorn’s demesnes, but does not hinder them. Brown unicorns sometimes bury themselves in sand on especially hot desert days. They can be ridden by maidens of any human or demihuman race who are pure of heart.

Ecology: These gentle creatures are herbivores that live on desert flowers, cacti, and sparse desert grasses. They can go for up to four days without food or water.

A brown unicorn’s horn can be used to manufacture a special sleeping potion. Any character who drinks this potion is placed into suspended animation that is permanent until dispelled. A successful saving throw vs. poison negates this effect.

 

[freyar]

Seems pretty simple. Do we want to keep any of the regular unicorn's SLAs or just go with the (unique) sleep ability? Clearly telepathy 60 ft, maybe we can do something about "never being surprised" with a Su ability.

 

[Shade]

Per the article opening text, all the unicorns within should have the teleport ability to some extent. Other than that, I don't think we necessarily need to retain any standard unicorn SLAs.

 

[freyar]

Ok, here's the common ability text:

A unicorn can sense enemies at a 240-yard range, moving so silently that foes take a -6 penalty to be surprised. It can kick with its front hooves and thrust with its horn once per round, or it can charge into battle using its horn as a lance. To make this charge, there must be at least 30’ of distance between the unicorn and its opponent. Opponents struck by a charging unicorn suffer 3-36 hp damage from impaling. The horn always gains a +2 bonus to hit, regardless of how it is used. Unicorns may not attack with their front hooves in the round they charge.

Once each day, a unicorn can cast a limited teleport spell that will take it and any rider it has up to 360 yards away in an instant. Unicorns cannot be magically charmed or held. They are immune to death spells and make all their saving throws against spells and spell-like powers as if they were wizards of the 11th level. Unicorns are immune to poison.

So maybe dimension door for the lowest level of teleportation?

Sensing enemies could be the normal unicorn's detect evil, but maybe we want to do something special for the roanicorns, since they're a little short on other fronts. Maybe something to go along with the "psionic fence."

 

[Shade]

Sounds good. We might look through the psionic powers for inspiration. In fact, we might consider a psionic variant underbar.

Let's figure out ability scores.

Its Intelligence is two points higher than a standard unicorn. While it has one less Hit Die, the "+" afterwards is the same, which we could extrapolate to similar Con. Str might be a tad lower, as all its damage is less. Its AC and speed are both worse than a standard unicorn, so we might be able to justify a bit less Dex. Wis and Cha are probably similar.

So how about Str 18, Dex 15, Con 21, Int 12, Wis 21, Cha 24 (compared to the unicorn's Str 20, Dex 17, Con 21, Int 10, Wis 21, Cha 24)?

 

[freyar]

Looks good! Leave natural armor the same at +6.

A psionic underbar would be fun.

 

[Cleon]

Sounds good. We might look through the psionic powers for inspiration. In fact, we might consider a psionic variant underbar.

Let's figure out ability scores.

Its Intelligence is two points higher than a standard unicorn. While it has one less Hit Die, the "+" afterwards is the same, which we could extrapolate to similar Con. Str might be a tad lower, as all its damage is less. Its AC and speed are both worse than a standard unicorn, so we might be able to justify a bit less Dex. Wis and Cha are probably similar.

So how about Str 18, Dex 15, Con 21, Int 12, Wis 21, Cha 24 (compared to the unicorn's Str 20, Dex 17, Con 21, Int 10, Wis 21, Cha 24)?

I was thinking the + afterwards being the same despite its lower HD is evidence for a higher Con, since its getting more bonus hits per dice.

I'd rather drop the NA to +5 and make its ability scores Str 19, Dex 17, Con 22, Int 12, Wis 21, Cha 24.

I'm not that set on the idea, though.

 

[Cleon]

Seems pretty simple. Do we want to keep any of the regular unicorn's SLAs or just go with the (unique) sleep ability? Clearly telepathy 60 ft, maybe we can do something about "never being surprised" with a Su ability.

I was thinking they continuously detect minds within a 60 ft. radius, so are always alerted if an unshielded mind enters that area - hence they can be surprised by missile fire if it from outside their thoughtsense range. I'd limit this to "rough direction and number of conscious creatures with Intelligence scores of 1 or higher", so they can't use it as a targeting sense (or maybe they can with a 50% miss chance).

Or we could give them touchsight as a continuous Psi-Like Ability, which is basically blindsight 60 ft.

As for the "Psionic Fence", it reads like some large-area variant of the alarm spell.

 

[freyar]

I could go either way on the abilities, I guess.

Yeah, a 60 ft mental detection is along the lines of what I'm thinking, too.

I actually think the fence doesn't alert the brown unicorn, just intruders/visitors. At least, that's how it reads to me.

 

[Shade]

I think "brown unicorns continuously detect thoughts to a range of 60 feet" will probably suffice. (And read thoughts for the psionic variant).

I actually think the fence doesn't alert the brown unicorn, just intruders/visitors. At least, that's how it reads to me.

That's how I read it as well. Just like my dog's "marks" don't alert her when another dog is in our yard.