Boogey Boogey Boogey! Help.

[Xarlen]

Ooo.

Hmm. I don't want to raise his CR too much. But I *do* plan on them seeing him down the street, smiling at them. Standing on a roof top, peering in the window. His teeth are yellow, tongue is black.

He likely has a glove of holding where he'll store a dagger, or steal stuff from a PC and frame them with it.

Heck! This sucker may not be an Undead at all, but an Embodiment of Fear. Sort've like a Wraith from Shadowrun.

 

[Celebrim]

In order to create a cool monster, you have to firmly set the monster in a mythological tradition. You have to understand why the monster is monstrous or at the least why it has such a hold over peoples imaginations.

For instance, a Dwarf is literal a dwarf, and Elves are a slightly rarer disorder called Williams Syndrome. People with Williams syndrome have pixie like facial features, childlike behavior, fragile constitutions, and an extraordinary gift for language and music. Sound familiar? Vampires began as plague spirits, but have metamorphised with a little help into spirits of sexual abandonment and betrayal. Ogres are sadly people with Downs Syndrome.

In the case of Boogeymen they are nothing less than serial killers, and are particular mythology around them suggests that encounters with a Boogeyman are the result of not obeying parents (or leaving them) and failures to respect social convention. This mythology extends into even modern slasher picks. The people that die in slasher movies, die because they leave home, fornicate, fail to follow the advice of elders, etc., etc.

So, in fairy tales, we see Boogeymen that are the embodiments of 'Don't talk to strangers', 'Don't eat too many sweets', 'Don't suck your thumb', 'Don't go out at night', 'Be seen but not heard', and whatever. You could create a perfectly decent Boogeyman out of modern prohibitions like 'Don't eat without washing your hands', 'Don't tell fibs', or 'Don't talk with your mouth full'.

If you want to create a Boogeyman of some depth and substance you have to find some sort of serial killer to base it on. Some general advice:

1) Most Boogeymen, like serial killers, are collectors, and usually what they collect is some grisly trophy or is otherwise disturbing (like paintings of all thier victims for instance).

2) Most Boogeymen are cowards and prey exclusively on the weak. They will try to issolate and terrify. They will always flee if strongly resisted, only to strike back whenever someone relaxes their guard.

3) Most Boogeymen of mythology can be easily defeated by some charm that becomes the equivalent of remembering to mind your parents. Without the secret of the charm, most Boogeymen are more or less invincible.

Like I said, the Kargatane article is very good. You can model an infinite variaty of unique boogeymen based off the sort of thing.

 

[Xarlen]

Yeah, I'm thinking I could go either the Ghoul route, or the Fey Route.

The article is good; I havn't read all of them, but here's what I'm thinking.

Blend in Shadows.
Shadow-Walk (Can travel through them).
40' speed (Though running full speed still appears like a leasurely walk).
Spell likes (Hold portal, Slow, Silence (Either a sphere, or like a 'shell' that sound just doesn't permit past the boundry), Major Illusion) (Any of these are potentials, suggestions?)
Fear Aura.
Paralyzing Touch (Will save, as aposed to Fort; Will representing the person's fear/mental capabilities).

Maybe having Fast Healing and Spider climb, but it really depends.

He needs atleast SOME combat prowess, else a party is going to make mense-meat out of this guy. I'm thinking he could have a base attack, and use various things (Via illusion) for that base attack. Like a flat +6 to attack, and a flat 1d6+2 damage, and that can Look like anything (A snake slithering out of his sleeve and striking someone, for instance, or using his dagger, or something).

The only problems I'm having *is* basing him off of those lessons, because if one did, he wouldn't exactly go after a party. Unless the party were say, protecting a child. Maybe stops his killing, which would seriously piss him off.

Any thoughts?

 

[Kai Lord]

Just another random idea, loosely based off the book "Watchers":

Make some off-hand metagame comment before you begin play that for this adventure someone's going to get lucky and get a special buddy because this adventure is going to be a little on the difficult side and they could use the extra help. Heh heh.

When play begins pick out a player and have him approached by the coolest, cuddliest pseudodragon you ever saw. It becomes bonded to the PC, and he's thrilled to have such a cool "pet."

Then have them take on some urgent mission that they think will be the real point of the adventure, so they head off in pursuit of whatever plot device you want.

But each time they stop at an inn for the night they get up the next morning and find out there was a grisly murder in the night where some of the patrons were brutally slaughtered and ripped apart.

This continues a few times, at several different inns. The second time it happens the PC's will really wonder what the heck is up. The third time, they should figure that it specifically has something to do with them.

As it turns out, the Pseudodragon was a powerful wizard's familiar. This wizard also created a horrible, invincible, blood-thirsty ape-like beast and kept it imprisoned. The beast was sort of a Frankenstein's monster that became deeply jealous the wizard fawned over the little dragon and gave almost no attention to him.

One night he broke from his cage and ripped the wizard apart. The pseudodragon escaped and the carnivorous monster has been chasing it ever since. It is very fast but cannot travel in the sunlight. It tracks by scent, but when it gets close the scent is overpowering and so it just bursts into whatever building the pseudodragon is in and slaughters the first people it meets.

Think up some special way to kill the thing, and play up the bond between the pseudodragon and its PC buddy. If he's nice enough to it it will give him a telepathic vision of back when they all lived in the wizard's tower so the PC understands the connection. Possibly the wizard was trying to do whatever it takes to kill the creature but he couldn't complete it and now the players know what to do, but then the creature finds them....

 

[Femerus the Gnecro]

Just another random idea, loosely based off the book "Watchers":

Make some off-hand metagame comment before you begin play that for this adventure someone's going to get lucky and get a special buddy because this adventure is going to be a little on the difficult side and they could use the extra help. Heh heh.

When play begins pick out a player and have him approached by the coolest, cuddliest pseudodragon you ever saw. It becomes bonded to the PC, and he's thrilled to have such a cool "pet."

Then have them take on some urgent mission that they think will be the real point of the adventure, so they head off in pursuit of whatever plot device you want.

But each time they stop at an inn for the night they get up the next morning and find out there was a grisly murder in the night where some of the patrons were brutally slaughtered and ripped apart.

This continues a few times, at several different inns. The second time it happens the PC's will really wonder what the heck is up. The third time, they should figure that it specifically has something to do with them.

As it turns out, the Pseudodragon was a powerful wizard's familiar. This wizard also created a horrible, invincible, blood-thirsty ape-like beast and kept it imprisoned. The beast was sort of a Frankenstein's monster that became deeply jealous the wizard fawned over the little dragon and gave almost no attention to him.

One night he broke from his cage and ripped the wizard apart. The pseudodragon escaped and the carnivorous monster has been chasing it ever since. It is very fast but cannot travel in the sunlight. It tracks by scent, but when it gets close the scent is overpowering and so it just bursts into whatever building the pseudodragon is in and slaughters the first people it meets.

Think up some special way to kill the thing, and play up the bond between the pseudodragon and its PC buddy. If he's nice enough to it it will give him a telepathic vision of back when they all lived in the wizard's tower so the PC understands the connection. Possibly the wizard was trying to do whatever it takes to kill the creature but he couldn't complete it and now the players know what to do, but then the creature finds them....

Better yet... make the pc's think that it's the pseudodragon that's doing all the killings and get 'em all freaked out, especially when it wants to sleep all cuddly-wuddly with its new master.

-F

 

[Rel]

Xarlen, I like Celebrim's "collector" idea.

If you really want to freak them out (and this IS a Halloween game, right?) have the Boogeyman pop out of the shadows near an isolated character. Have him paralyze the party member (the players always love it when the first words out of your mouth are, "Make a Will Save."). Then have him slice off a lock of the person's hair (or maybe an earlobe) while the character is powerless to resist. And then have him disappear into the darkness again. Add sinister chuckling as necessary.

Guaranteed to double the number of characters put on watch at night.

 

[Celebrim]

Well, a Boogeyman that goes after adults plays off adult sized fears. Even adults can be afraid. What sort of thing scares you?

However, I still think it is a mistake to play a boogeyman as a thug type monster. It is much better to use the huge mythological depth (and who isn't afraid of the boogeyman?) of the creature to play up the psychological aspect of terror. I'd very much want to introduce a horror character like the boogeyman to the characters indirectly or in a form that seems benign at first. Then let them witness what it does to victims. Let them become acquainted with someone. Let the acquaintance become the next victem. Perhaps at some point let them realize who and what the boogeyman has been all along (evil paradigm shift). Then let them realize that they have become the next victim.

As for powers, it need not be all that masterful at combat. The game doesn't have to be 'who can dish out the most damage in X rounds'. Give the Boogeyman fasting healing 15, and some suitable evasion abilities (uncanny dodge, evasion, iron will, hide in plain sight, passwall, shadow walk, ethereal jaunt, or the like), and even if it doesn't have alot of combat ability, it STILL is going to intimidate the characters in a way that Ogres and other thugs are not. If the party is suitably high level a few levels of sneak attack and improved critical won't hurt.

For instance, I have a 'boogeyman' type monster called 'The Spawn of Ugopoth', but also known commonly by names like 'The Well Woman'. Spawn of Ugopoth are oozing creatures that can appear in humanoid form, usually that of a comely human female. They are fond of secreting knives within their pliant flesh and extruding them when they need them. They can grow a third tentacle like arm from the middle of thier back, and they can flow through openings which would normally allow only diminutive objects. They also have the ability to unleash a geyser like gout of filth and water as a ranged bull rush attack.

They like to attack people in their bath, or to pretend to be drowning in a pond or well and lure the unwary to thier deaths. Victims often appear to have committed suicide.

Average spawn have the abilities of 6th level thieves, 18 DEX, and the weapon finesse (dagger) feat.

And of course, they work as assassines for a really really nasty outer planar creature called Ugopoth who prefers to be appeased with human sacrifice (preferably small children).

 

[Xarlen]

I don't plan on making him give a serious whooping, but I want to A) scare the bajesus out of them, and B) give them a little combat, but not like 'Bam, he dies within the second round'. Wow. That was Eventful. Likely giving him a more Defensive ability then a serious offensive.

But, at the same time, I don't want all this build up to a confrontation and he packs no punch, nor that if the players decide to just Stand UP to him, that he can't touch 'em.

Note, also, that this is a oneshot game. Online. I don't exactly have the situation to devulge into a slow, subtle plot over months. I'm in the Mood to do the game This Month, and likely have three sessions. I allready have pointed my serious campaign in a direction, and seeing as the party just came OUT of a murder mystery, and they're on the road, I don't want to divert their attention.

He's a sprinter, a chaser. For example, the PCs may chase him. Or one of them runs away. He could slip out of the shadows, stealing their weapon. Or stand at the end of an alley, while the shadows begin to bubble and churn, taking humanoid shape, almost lookling like ghouls. With this, he would whisper 'Run'. And the chase would begin.

I havn't thought of any good Mythological set up (Atleast, as a bogeyman). I was thinking 'Grinning Jack', his victims' faces carved into grins, not to mention his psychoticly cheerful taunting demeanor, or 'Dirty Jack', since he does look like a tall, dirty hobo.

And, BTW, those oozie things are Cool.

 

[Dingleberry]

If you end up making it undead, make sure you give it enough HD to prevent a 3rd-6th level cleric from turning him without a spectacular roll (especially if the cleric has the Sun domain). Turn Resistance is another route.