Converting Greyhawk monsters

[freyar]

OK, fair enough. Flavor text it is! How about a +4 Hide bonus in sandy areas and +12 when buried?

 

[Cleon]

OK, fair enough. Flavor text it is! How about a +4 Hide bonus in sandy areas and +12 when buried?

So we'll just add the following?

Skills: A monarch scorpion gains a +4 racial bonus on Hide checks when in beach or desert areas. Further, a monarch scorpion can cover itself with sand, gaining a +12 cover bonus on Hide checks.

If you want to specify an action cost, we could make it:

Skills: A monarch scorpion gains a +4 racial bonus on Hide checks when in beach or desert areas. Further, a monarch scorpion can cover itself with sand (a full-round action [?]), gaining a +12 cover bonus on Hide checks.

 

[freyar]

Either is fine. I'd be ok with making the "burying action" be a few full-round actions, like 2 to 4, if you prefer.

 

[Cleon]

Either is fine. I'd be ok with making the "burying action" be a few full-round actions, like 2 to 4, if you prefer.

I'm fine with one full-round action. So shall I add the "burying action" version to the Working Draft?

 

[freyar]

Sure, go ahead!

Are we ready for skills and feats?

 

[Cleon]

Sure, go ahead!

Updating Monarch Scorpion Working Draft.

I realized we've already got a +4 racial bonus to Hide from the Monstrous Scorpion, so I modified the skills entry to:

Skills: A monarch scorpion has a +4 racial bonus on Climb, Hide, and Spot checks.

*A monarch scorpion gains a +8 racial bonus on Hide checks when in beach or desert areas. Further, a monarch scorpion can cover itself with sand (a full-round action), gaining a +12 cover bonus on Hide checks.

Are we ready for skills and feats?

Looks that way!

 

[freyar]

How about 7 ranks in Listen and 4 in Spot?

This seems like a good opportunity to use some psionic feats. How about Wounding Attack or Rapid Metabolism? Power Attack or Reckless Offense might make sense.

 

[Cleon]

How about 7 ranks in Listen and 4 in Spot?

This seems like a good opportunity to use some psionic feats. How about Wounding Attack or Rapid Metabolism? Power Attack or Reckless Offense might make sense.

If it's going to use its Psi-Like Abilities in melee, some ranks in Concentration and possibly the Combat Manifestation feat would be in order.

Also, shouldn't we reserve the Psionic feats to the psionic variant? i.e. it has Combat Casting if it uses SLAs or Combat Manifestation if it uses PLAs.

As for possible Psionic Feats, Wounding Attack is OK I guess, but I also like Opportunity Power and Psionic Fist.

 

[freyar]

Oh, yeah, you're right, I was forgetting about Concentration. We might as well put all 11 ranks in that.

Combat Casting/Manifestation will work for one feat. As for psionic feats, you're right, we should save those for the underbar psionic version. For the non-psionic version, Multiattack might be good (I think we decided two of the same kind of natural attack counted as two natural attacks for the prereq), and Endurance might make sense for a desert critter. Or Power Attack if we want an offensive feat, since it's certainly smart enough to use it. For psionic feats, I don't think Opportunity Power works, since that's for powers, not psi-ilke abilities. Psionic Fist is good, though. Hmm, how about this?

Non-psionic: Combat Casting, Multiattack, Power Attack
Psionic: Combat Manifestation, Multiattack, Psionic Fist

EDIT: Also, I think there are a couple of typos: Psionics (Sp) should give a caster level, rather than a manifester level. And the Psi-like Abilities in the underbar should be (Ps), not (Sp).

 

[Cleon]

Oh, yeah, you're right, I was forgetting about Concentration. We might as well put all 11 ranks in that.

I guess that could work. Regular Monstrous Scorpions don't have any ranks in Listen or Spot, after all.

It'd give it a hefty modifier of +15, or +19 if it used Combat Casting. That's enough for it to automatically cast defensively any spell up to 5th level, which ought to be plenty.

Combat Casting/Manifestation will work for one feat. As for psionic feats, you're right, we should save those for the underbar psionic version. For the non-psionic version, Multiattack might be good (I think we decided two of the same kind of natural attack counted as two natural attacks for the prereq), and Endurance might make sense for a desert critter. Or Power Attack if we want an offensive feat, since it's certainly smart enough to use it. For psionic feats, I don't think Opportunity Power works, since that's for powers, not psi-ilke abilities. Psionic Fist is good, though. Hmm, how about this?

Non-psionic: Combat Casting, Multiattack, Power Attack
Psionic: Combat Manifestation, Multiattack, Psionic Fist

I thought we'd put that Multiattack question to rest long ago.

There are monsters in the SRD that have bite/claw/claw routines and Multiattack, like the Krenshar or Ghoul.

It's definitely rules legal.

EDIT: Also, I think there are a couple of typos: Psionics (Sp) should give a caster level, rather than a manifester level. And the Psi-like Abilities in the underbar should be (Ps), not (Sp).

Easy enough to fix.

Updating Monarch Scorpion Working Draft.