Converting Creatures from Other Campaign Settings

[freyar]

3HD Medium Construct (Incorporeal) is good.

I agree to switch to Con, but my point is that the original ability doesn't hurt the victim (ok, infusion does, but not what we're calling blood drain). So I'm not sure I like the idea of doing Con damage/drain. The living construct idea is nice.

Wouldn't that just be Change Shape rather than Alternate Form, if it takes Ex abilities (Change Shape doesn't explicitly restrict from taking on class-based Ex abilities).

 

[Cleon]

3HD Medium Construct (Incorporeal) is good.

I agree to switch to Con, but my point is that the original ability doesn't hurt the victim (ok, infusion does, but not what we're calling blood drain). So I'm not sure I like the idea of doing Con damage/drain. The living construct idea is nice.

Well I'll agree it doesn't hurt, but that could just be because its anaesthetised. It keeps talking about the "stolen hit points" it acquires with its touch attack. As written, it implies it steals the HPs the victim has already lost from their wound but I don't think that makes much sense.

Should we give the victim some kind of save to notice they're feeling weaker? Either a difficult Will save or some kind of skill check. Either way it'll probably need a hefty racial bonus. I'd prefer a skill check.

So, something like:

Blood Drain (Su): A transient golem using Mimic Shape (see below) can make an incorporeal touch attack against any creature with an unhealed wound. It can also Blood Drain with any natural attacks it gains from its mimicked shape. The wound instantly closes and stops bleeding (which stops any continuing damage from a wounding weapon or the like), but the creature takes 1 point of Constitution damage and the golem's Con increases by 1 (up to the Constitution of the creature it mimicked). This touch is completely painless, and it requires a [DC X Spot or Autohypnosis?] check for the victim to notice the loss. Another character who closely examines the victim can notice their anemia with a DC X Heal check.
​

DC equal to the golem's HD+Cha+15? It should be hard to detect and, since it's a skill check rather than a save, I'd rather it scale to HD rather than half HD.

Wouldn't that just be Change Shape rather than Alternate Form, if it takes Ex abilities (Change Shape doesn't explicitly restrict from taking on class-based Ex abilities).

Erm, the Change Self description appears to disagree with you:

The creature loses the natural weapons and movement modes of its original form, as well as any extraordinary special attacks of its original form not derived from class levels (such as the barbarian's rage class feature).

How's this for an outline of Mimic Shape:

Mimic Shape (Su): A transient golem that successfully uses its infusion attack can assume a solid form that copies its victim's shape. The transformation is a full-round action during which the golem is both helpless and vulnerable to physical attacks, so it usually flees to a secluded spot before using Mimic Shape. The transient golem must use Mimic Shape within an hour of making an Infusion attack.

Mimic Shape functions like the Change Shape special ability with the following additions.

• The transient golem loses its Incorporeal subtype as it becomes solid pseudoflesh.
• The transient golem gains a Constitution equal to the Con damage it inflicted with its infusion attack and becomes a living construct, so is vulnerable to fatigue, exhaustion and death from massive damage. It applies its Con modifier to its hit point score and heals wounds as if it were a living creature (including being affected by cure and inflict wound spells).
• The transient golem gains the physical ability scores of the creature it mimicked. Its Constitution score may start out lower than the mimicked creature but can be increased using its Blood Drain special attack (see above) until it matches the mimicked creature.
• The transient golem gains any Extraordinary class-based abilities of the mimicked creature as well as the Extraordinary racial abilities normally acquired with Change Shape.
• The transient golem gains the skills, feats and alignment? of the mimicked creature. Its rank in a mimicked skill can not exceed the golem's Hit Dice.
• The transient golem gains most of the memories of the mimicked creature. If it fails a DC X Will save it even believes it is the creature it is mimicking.
• A transient golem loses 1 point of Constitution for every day it maintains a mimicked shape. It can regain this Con using Blood Drain. Should its Constitution ever drop to zero the golem evaporates back into its Incorporeal form and loses all the changes gained by Mimic Shape.

What do you think?

 

[freyar]

Well I'll agree it doesn't hurt, but that could just be because its anaesthetised. It keeps talking about the "stolen hit points" it acquires with its touch attack. As written, it implies it steals the HPs the victim has already lost from their wound but I don't think that makes much sense.

This is why I keep saying that it doesn't damage the victim. But I can go along with a little Con damage, I guess.

Should we give the victim some kind of save to notice they're feeling weaker? Either a difficult Will save or some kind of skill check. Either way it'll probably need a hefty racial bonus. I'd prefer a skill check.

So, something like:

Blood Drain (Su): A transient golem using Mimic Shape (see below) can make an incorporeal touch attack against any creature with an unhealed wound. It can also Blood Drain with any natural attacks it gains from its mimicked shape. The wound instantly closes and stops bleeding (which stops any continuing damage from a wounding weapon or the like), but the creature takes 1 point of Constitution damage and the golem's Con increases by 1 (up to the Constitution of the creature it mimicked). This touch is completely painless, and it requires a [DC X Spot or Autohypnosis?] check for the victim to notice the loss. Another character who closely examines the victim can notice their anemia with a DC X Heal check.
​

DC equal to the golem's HD+Cha+15? It should be hard to detect and, since it's a skill check rather than a save, I'd rather it scale to HD rather than half HD.

I can't decide if I'd rather have a flat DC for a skill check. Hmm.

Erm, the Change Self description appears to disagree with you:

Actually, the SRD change shape says "The creature gains the natural weapons, movement modes, and extraordinary special attacks of its new form." I don't see where it says it does not gain the class-based extraordinary special attacks. That said, we probably do want it to gain the physical abilities of the new shape, which is like alternate form instead.

How's this for an outline of Mimic Shape:

Mimic Shape (Su): A transient golem that successfully uses its infusion attack can assume a solid form that copies its victim's shape. The transformation is a full-round action during which the golem is both helpless and vulnerable to physical attacks, so it usually flees to a secluded spot before using Mimic Shape. The transient golem must use Mimic Shape within an hour of making an Infusion attack.

Mimic Shape functions like the Change Shape special ability with the following additions.

• The transient golem loses its Incorporeal subtype as it becomes solid pseudoflesh.
• The transient golem gains a Constitution equal to the Con damage it inflicted with its infusion attack and becomes a living construct, so is vulnerable to fatigue, exhaustion and death from massive damage. It applies its Con modifier to its hit point score and heals wounds as if it were a living creature (including being affected by cure and inflict wound spells).
• The transient golem gains the physical ability scores of the creature it mimicked. Its Constitution score may start out lower than the mimicked creature but can be increased using its Blood Drain special attack (see above) until it matches the mimicked creature.
• The transient golem gains any Extraordinary class-based abilities of the mimicked creature as well as the Extraordinary racial abilities normally acquired with Change Shape.
• The transient golem gains the skills, feats and alignment? of the mimicked creature. Its rank in a mimicked skill can not exceed the golem's Hit Dice.
• The transient golem gains most of the memories of the mimicked creature. If it fails a DC X Will save it even believes it is the creature it is mimicking.
• A transient golem loses 1 point of Constitution for every day it maintains a mimicked shape. It can regain this Con using Blood Drain. Should its Constitution ever drop to zero the golem evaporates back into its Incorporeal form and loses all the changes gained by Mimic Shape.

What do you think?

It seems quite long. And I think we need to work out the infusion bit first before we finish this.

I dunno, I'd still like to see if we can get a bit closer to either alternate form or change shape.

 

[Shade]

Wow.

OK, I'm really not comfortable with adding yet another ability to the alternate form/change shape/polymorph/shapechange family of abilities. Let's try to pick one of those, and just note the necessary exceptions in other abilities where needed.

It's attack almost reminds me of a belker's smoke claws...in fact, the more I reread the original description, it sounds like its semi-corporeal, like the belker, the vampiric mist, or phiuhl.

The living construct idea makes good sense to account for the blood drain/feeding.

Why only 3 HD? These things seem more powerful (although there is so much text I may have missed where it explicitly noted 3 HD).

 

[Cleon]

Why only 3 HD? These things seem more powerful (although there is so much text I may have missed where it explicitly noted 3 HD).

Oh blast, I misread it the first time, it says "Level/Hit Dice: Nil". I must have glanced at the stats and misread the "Move: 3" as being the Hit Dice. Presumably it assumes the level/HD of the creature it's copying, but the whole wording is rather vague.

You know, it's sounding more and more like a template.

Anyhow, I'd be game to leave the Mimic Shape power for a bit so we can digest the pros and cons of the different approaches.

I'm not 100% decided on them healing naturally or having a cap con equal to the copied creature. Maybe they can go to Con+4 or gain some excess temporary hit points if they "overfeed".

Also, I forgot to note that a transient golem can opt to give up a Mimic Shape. I'll add that in to my previous post.

Here's some ideas I've had for the other special abilities:

Discorporate Extremity (Ex): A transient golem in a mimic shape can turn one of its extremities incorporeal (head, arm, leg, tail, et cetera). It can discorporate an extremity and/or solidify one in the same round as a free action, but only once per round. Since the rest of the Mimicked body remains solid it is unable to walk through walls and the like, but it can use the incorporeal extremity to look or reach inside a sealed vessel or make an incorporeal touch attack.

Infusion (Su): An incorporeal transient golem can attempt to enter the body of a living, corporeal creature in order to steal its life-force and copy its mind and body. First, the golem must succeed at an incorporeal touch attack to enter an orifice on its victim - a creature in a hermetically sealed suit is thus immune to this attack. If this attack misses, the golem can simply try again the next round. If it hits, on the next round the victim must succeed at a DC X Will save or the transient golem enters their mind and nervous system, causing excruciating agony (-4 to attacks, skills and ability checks) for 1d4+1 rounds. If the victim fails this Will save they must succeed at a DC X Fortitude save the following (third) round or take Y Con damage as the golem saps their life-force. If the victim succeeds at either of these saving throws the transient golem is expelled from their body and can not use its Infusion attack against that creature again until 24 hours have passed.

I'd also like to base the "Crystal Ball" on the SRD Lich's phylactery, as I said earlier. We can leave arguing about that until later.

 

[freyar]

Where are we getting the idea that it can look inside sealed vessels, etc? I didn't see that (though I could have missed it in the wall of text). I think I'd rather it can just use its incorporeal touch attack when corporeal.

If it's really incorporeal instead of gaseous, I don't think a sealed suit should protect a victim. I need to think about the rest of the infusion ability; modeling it on malevolence in some way might work. In particular, I'm not sure I like the touch attack requirement.

 

[Cleon]

Where are we getting the idea that it can look inside sealed vessels, etc? I didn't see that (though I could have missed it in the wall of text). I think I'd rather it can just use its incorporeal touch attack when corporeal.

Its not explicitly in the text, it's an obvious consequence of being able to turn partly insubstantial. It doesn't mention a limit on what parts, so it should be able to turn its head incorporeal and stick it in a box.

If it's really incorporeal instead of gaseous, I don't think a sealed suit should protect a victim. I need to think about the rest of the infusion ability; modeling it on malevolence in some way might work. In particular, I'm not sure I like the touch attack requirement.

Yes, I agree it's contradictory but it does say it will "enter any orifice of a living creature that is accessible to air", ergo an airtight suit should prevent it.

Maybe it has to manifest as "semi-sentient air and water" when attacking a material creature?

It's not the only contradiction in the text. In one place it says a cat-mimic transient golem scratches victims to drain their blood (since it needs an open wound to use its drain blood attack), and elsewhere it says it can just "reach into a living creature to steal more energy".

The "Impossible to attack in natural form" is a better match to incorporeal than the 3E gaseous form, but then again in AD&D gaseous creatures were immune to weapons and most spells too.

We'll just have to pick one and run with it.

 

[Shade]

Let's put it to a vote.

I'm for gaseous.

 

[freyar]

I'm fond of gaseous, but I could go either way as long as we're consistent about it. Just because the original text had problems making sense doesn't mean we can't make sense!

 

[Cleon]

I'm fond of gaseous, but I could go either way as long as we're consistent about it. Just because the original text had problems making sense doesn't mean we can't make sense!

I prefer incorporeal for them, with them manifesting in a gaseous form to make an attack.

Here's another idea, perhaps the "insubstantial state" is effectively a Hazard, which transforms into a creature with some kind of template if it successfully attacks. In mist form it has very few vulnerabilities or attacks, so can easily be written up as something like:

Transient Golem (CR X)
A transient golem is a strange entity that appears as a whisp of mist, a DC20 Spot check will notice it is actually a being with vaguely humanoid features rather than a natural feature. When in fog or mists these entities are effectively invisible. Transient golems fly at 10 feet with a perfect maneuverability and can sense any living creature within 60 feet (as per the detect animals or plants spell, except it detects any living creature).

Transient golems are naturally incorporeal/gaseous (see gaseous form} [to be decided] and are immune to all forms of damage and magic apart from spells with the Abjuration descriptor which can block or banish the golem. A transient golem's life-force is contained in a crystal phylactery (see Manifest Transient Golem Template, below), any effect that would destroy, imprison or banish the golem instead sends it back to its phylactery. Abjuration spells always have their full effect a transient golem regardless of their descriptors, e.g. a dispel evil spell will banish the golem back to its phylactery, even though it is not Evil, and a golem can not touch a creature under a protection from good spell, even though it is neither Good nor summoned. A transient golem resists Abjuration effects as if it has 13 Hit Dice, 16 in all its attributes and +7 Fort, Ref and Will save.

Transient Golems attack living creatures by manifesting part of their body as a tendril of mist and trying to insert it into an orifice of their intended target. [we can copy most of the previous Infusion attack for this.] If the attack is successful, the golem flees and, sometime within the next hour, it can solidify its body into a copy of the creature it attacked (see Manifest Transient Golem Template, below).