Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Noumenon" data-source="post: 4588472" data-attributes="member: 70102">That's just really cool.  I really want to play that monster now, which is the basic goal of a stat block, isn't it?  I also like<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">the color coding for flavor text</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">the way you list what abilities the monster doesn't have so we don't have to just notice they're missing</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">the suggested encounters</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">the way you mix little flavor bites in around the rules text, so you get introduced to the monster's stats and its flavor at once</li> </ul>I have read my share of adventure modules with new monsters, and none of them ever grabbed me like this.  At best it's a slow attraction that creeps over you as you read the text and mentally "get" what the author thought was cool about it.  This lets you get it right away.  More modules should do this, not only for new monsters but for their bosses.Now unrelated to the visual presentation, design stuff.  You didn't design this monster, though, did you?  You just added the presentation?<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Isn't summoning more associated with CR 5 monsters like devils?  </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">I really like the Induce Nightmares ability, which should really make a player feel haunted and off his balance from playing fatigued.  Very fun.  But does it interfere with a wizard's ability to memorize spells?  That's almost as powerful as the 5th-level spell Nightmare. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Terrifying Howl -- I like how this thing kind of has a mechanical resemblance to the krenshar, with its retractable face and the bloodseeker not having a face.  Mechanically, it would work better if it worked like the krenshar and caused the target to flee instead of paralyzing.  --Why? Because the bloodseeker's coolest abilities trigger off it having tasted your blood.  The only way those are ever going to see play is if it enters combat with you and survives.  That doesn't normally happen, unless the monsters play like cowards.  But with the fear ability, it can bite someone, then howl, and then you can have it allow them to escape.   At speed 30 it will snap at their heels, feeding on their fear, until they make it to town or up a tree or an elvish ranger pops up in the nick of time and drives the beast off. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">I just thought of another way it can bite someone and then come back later: the turning mechanic.  That's a great synergy with that rule. It makes me want to design more undead that benefit from surviving encounters. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">What's the FF 14 T 12 listed under the hit points? </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">I personally always note for undead that they are mindless and immune to critical hits, because otherwise I forget.  So this "friendly" stat block might want to stick that in somewhere. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">I don't think blindsight is especially needed because skeletons don't have eyes either and they don't need it.  Maybe just change the Relentless Tracker ability to "Can pinpoint the location of the last creature whose blood it tasted."  That way you don't kill all invisibility, but the target can't run and it can't hide.</li> </ul>I never would've gotten so into optimizing this monster if your picture hadn't hooked me on it!  I think in the end, with all those awesome abilities and the uniqueness, I would bump up its other stats and make it more like a CR... 5?</blockquote>

Verification