Converting Oriental Adventures creatures

[Cleon]

Beetle Swarm, Carnivorous
Tiny Vermin (Swarm)
Hit Dice: 9d8 (40 hp)
Initiative: +0
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares) [increased this just 'cause it felt right]
Armor Class: 13 (+2 size, +1 natural), touch 12, flat-footed 13
Base Attack/Grapple: +6/—
Attack: Swarm (2d6) [or (3d6)?]
Full Attack: Swarm (2d6) [or (3d6)?]
Space/Reach: 10 ft./0 ft.
Special Attacks: Distraction
Special Qualities: Darkvision 60 ft., half damage from slashing and piercing, swarm traits, vermin traits
Saves: Fort +6, Ref +3, Will +3
Abilities: Str 5, Dex 10, Con 11, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 2
Skills: —
Feats: —
Environment: Warm or temperate plains and forests or underground [?]
Organization: Solitary, mass (2–4 swarms) or colony (5–10 swarms)
Challenge Rating: 3 [or 4?]
Treasure: None
Alignment: Always neutral
Advancement: —
Level Adjustment: —

The ground seethes with hundreds of beetles as big as rats. They have large heads with the bladelike jaws of a meat eater.

Swarms of carnivorous tiny monstrous beetle often emit a sinister susurration from their thousands of legs rustling together. An excited carnivorous beetle swarm starts snapping its jaws, producing a constant crackling sound resembling a raging bonfire. An individual tiny carnivorous beetle can give a painful bite but is too small to endanger most humanoids (see below for statistics).

Combat
A carnivorous beetle swarm surrounds and attacks any living prey it encounters. A swarm deals 2d6 points of damage to any creature whose space it occupies at the end of its move.

Distraction (Ex): Any living creature that begins its turn with a carnivorous beetle swarm in its space must succeed on a DC 14 Fortitude save or be nauseated for 1 round. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Tiny Monstrous Beetle, Carnivorous
Tiny Vermin
Hit Dice: ½d8 (2 hp)
Initiative: +0
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
Armor Class: 13 (+2 size, +1 natural), touch 12, flat-footed 13
Base Attack/Grapple: +0/–11
Attack: Bite +2 melee (1d6–3)
Full Attack: Bite +2 melee (1d6–3)
Space/Reach: 2½ ft./0 ft.
Special Attacks: —
Special Qualities: Darkvision 60 ft., vermin traits
Saves: Fort +2, Ref +0, Will +0
Abilities: Str 5, Dex 10, Con 11, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 2
Skills: —
Feats: —
Environment: Warm or temperate plains and forests or underground [?]
Organization: Solitary, cluster (2–12) or hunger (10–100)
Challenge Rating: 1/8
Treasure: None
Alignment: Always neutral
Advancement: None
Level Adjustment: —

A sleek, elongated beetle roughly the size of a child's forearm. It has powerful legs and bladelike jaws.

A typical tiny carnivorous monstrous beetle is a wingless tiger beetle about a foot long. The commonest species is a glossy black or brown, but they come in as many colors and patterns as normal-sized tiger beetles. A swarm of monstrous carnivorous beetles (see above) is highly aggressive and hunts any living creature it senses.

Combat
Tiny carnivorous beetles tenaciously stalk and chase prey and will attack creatures up to several times their own size. These insects avoid larger creatures, snapping their jaws and running away if approached by something big enough to be a threat. They viciously bite opponents once in melee, becoming so stupidly savage they rarely flee losing fights.

Originally from OA2 - Night of the Seven Swords (1986)

 

[Cleon]

Hmm, if we were following the precedent of the Maelost worm smarms, then the weak one would be a "Beetle Swarm, Carnivorous" while the strong one would be "Beetle Swarm, Deadly" instead of an ordinary carnivorous beetle swarm.

What thinks thee?

 

[freyar]

I don't mind much either way about the names --- I'm not sure it matters if we stick to the same conventions as for Maelost. So you can choose!

Starting with the lower powered one: The original had 15hp. What do you think about 3HD and Con 12?

 

[Cleon]

I don't mind much either way about the names --- I'm not sure it matters if we stick to the same conventions as for Maelost. So you can choose!

Let's stick to the current Beetle and Carnivorous Beetle then, since that's the names used in the original text.

Starting with the lower powered one: The original had 15hp. What do you think about 3HD and Con 12?

Hmm… isn't the first question what Size to make them?

The Swarms are vulnerable to normal weapons in the original, which means they'd have to be Tiny by the 3E rules.

Happily, a SRD Giant Bombardier Beetle downscaled to Tiny has Constitution 12 according to reversed Improving Monsters.

Let's see, a Tiny-rescaled Giant Bombardier beetle would have Constitution 12 which fits the above,

It'd be handy rescaling all the stats of the SRD beetles:

Tiny Giant Bombardier Beetle: Str 5, Dex 14, Con 12, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 9
Tiny Giant Fire Beetle: Str 6, Dex 13, Con 11, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 7
Tiny Giant Stag Beetle: Str 7, Dex 16, Con 11, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 9
​

So shall we base the Abilities on those?

The Strength scores might be a tad high, especially for an "ordinary Tiny Giant Beetle does it need to be three points stronger than the Str 2 of a SRD Rat? Would consider tweaking that down.

Are we giving these any natural armor or will re rely on their Dex and Size bonuses for AC?

If we're aiming for Armor Class 13 based on the original's AC 7, we either want +1 natural armor or a +1 Dex modifier.

The Charisma scores seem way exaggerated. The SRD swarms all have Cha 2 or 4 apart from the Magical Beast Hellwasp's Cha 9.

Charisma 2 seems standard for ordinary Tiny Vermin, so I'd advocate that.

How about:

Beetle Swarm: Str 3, Dex 10 or 12?, Con 12, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 2; HD 3d8+3, hp 16
Carnivorous Beetle Swarm: Str 5, Dex 10 or 12?, Con 11, Int —, Wis 10, Cha 2; HD 9d8, hp 40
​

Incidentally, I'm leaning towards Dex 10, +1 natural armor since giving them a tough shell just feels righter than having them rely on agility.

 

[freyar]

Whew, these are pretty big beetles! Maybe they should be "monstrous beetle" swarms. Or is it possible the vulnerability damage was common to swarms back then even for really small critters, so these could be Fine swarms and just take damage differently?

I can go with those ability scores if we're sticking with Tiny.

They seem to have some vulnerability to fire.

 

[Cleon]

Whew, these are pretty big beetles! Maybe they should be "monstrous beetle" swarms. Or is it possible the vulnerability damage was common to swarms back then even for really small critters, so these could be Fine swarms and just take damage differently?

I can go with those ability scores if we're sticking with Tiny.

Well the text doesn't say how big these beetles are, but if we want to keep the original's vulnerability to regular weapon damage and poor Armor Class we can't make them smaller than Tiny since Fine and Diminutive swarms are immune to weapon damage and would have a +4 or +8 size adjustment to AC.

They seem to have some vulnerability to fire.

Yes, it should be easy enough to give them some SQ that triggers if they're affected by smoke or flame.

 

[freyar]

I was actually wondering if the vulnerability to regular weapons might have been more common for "Fine" or "Diminutive" swarms in 1e, in which case we should just make these Fine without the weapon vulnerability. If not, let's make them Tiny but call them "monstrous beetles" or something.

 

[Cleon]

I was actually wondering if the vulnerability to regular weapons might have been more common for "Fine" or "Diminutive" swarms in 1e, in which case we should just make these Fine without the weapon vulnerability. If not, let's make them Tiny but call them "monstrous beetles" or something.

Those sizes didn't exist in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons.

First Edition AD&D had Small, Man-sized and Large.
Second Edition AD&D had Tiny, Small, Man-sized, Large, Huge and Gargantuan.

I'm leaning towards making them Tiny to keep their vulnerability to normal weapon damage.

 

[Cleon]

Just realized an inconsistency with The Keeper of the Key Working Draft.

In the body text I mostly called it The Keeper of the Keys plural rather than the singular Key as the undead's named in OA2.

Just edited it so all the Keys are Key.

 

[Cleon]

Okay, just finished a first draft for the Beetle Swarm Working Draft and Carnivorous Beetle Swarm Working Draft.