Spelljammer Converting Spelljammer creatures

[Cleon]

In addition to throwing the victim into the Negative Energy Plane?

Guess.

 

[freyar]

Ummm, I'm going to say that just seems like a bit too much. Besides, most characters will take negative levels in the Negative Energy Plane anyway.

 

[Cleon]

Ummm, I'm going to say that just seems like a bit too much. Besides, most characters will take negative levels in the Negative Energy Plane anyway.

Yeah, but only 1 per round and they get a DC 25 Fort save to prevent it.

I remember the good old days when it was instant life-force destruction!

Hmm, that suggests that if its "touch" does something harmful, it ought to be energy drain rather than negative energy damage.

It is causing the victim to make contact with an energy level draining plane, after all...

 

[freyar]

I think I'm happy with just sending the victim to a negative dominant plane. That's a fairly nasty consequence.

 

[Cleon]

I think I'm happy with just sending the victim to a negative dominant plane. That's a fairly nasty consequence.

So what are you after giving them? Something like:

Void Field (Su): Portons form a natural conduit to the Negative Energy Plane. Any creature or object that touches a porton must succeed at a DC X Will save or be instantly gated to the Negative Energy Plane (at the DM's discretion, the destination could be any plane with the major negative-dominant trait). A porton can expose another creature or object to its void field by making a successful touch attack.​

We need to add something about how this interacts with weapon attacks. Either they damage the porton before the save, or they must make the save to damage porton.

Post-Hit: Weapon attacks that hit the porton (including ranged attacks) do their damage to they porton before they must resolve the Will save against the weapon being gated away.

Pre-Hit: Weapon attacks that hit the porton (including ranged attacks) must succeed at this Will save or the weapon is gated away before it actually does any damage.​

I'm thinking we should also say it's an ongoing thing:

A creature or object that continues to contact a porton (because it's grappling or impaling the porton, for example) must succeed at this Will save on each subsequent round of contact or be sucked into the Negative Energy Plane.​

What thinks ye?

 

[freyar]

That's what I was looking for, yes. I'd go for the "post-hit" option, and I'd be happy with the "ongoing" paragraph.

 

[Cleon]

That's what I was looking for, yes. I'd go for the "post-hit" option, and I'd be happy with the "ongoing" paragraph.

So you fancy:

Void Field (Su): Portons form a natural conduit to the Negative Energy Plane. Any creature or object that touches a porton must succeed at a DC 22 Will save or be instantly gated to the Negative Energy Plane (at the DM's discretion, the destination could be any plane with the major negative-dominant trait). Weapon attacks that hit the porton (including ranged attacks) do their damage to the porton before they must resolve the Will save against the weapon being gated away. The save DC is Charisma-based.

A creature or object that continues to contact a porton (because it's grappling or impaling the porton, for example) must succeed at this Will save on each subsequent round of contact or be sucked into the Negative Energy Plane.

A porton can expose another creature or object to its void field by making a successful touch attack.​

I split it into three paragraphs for the sake of clarity, and added a Cha-based save DC.

Incidentally, do you think DC 22 is OK? A Porton has a very mediocre Charisma, but I think its oodles of Hit Dice mean the Void Field save is hard enough. The consequences of failure are nasty enough I don't think the save ought to be that high.

 

[freyar]

I agree completely with your logic on the save. The consequences are pretty drastic, so it shouldn't be too terribly likely. Anyway, looks good.

The SQ line should include "incorporeal traits," shouldn't it? And did we decide to let incorporeality cover this, or did we want to do more with it?

Portons cannot be struck by any physical form of attack. They are effectively immaterial, and so can only be harmed by magic. Magical attacks against portons must be direct; in other words, the magic must pour damaging energy into the creatures. They cannot be harmed by any physical manifestation of a spell; thus ice storm and other spells that cause their damage through some physical manifestation do them no damage. Energy spells like lightning bolt, fireball, magic missile, etc. do harm them, as long as these dweomers can overcome the creatures’ innate magical resistance. Portons are totally immune to all mind-affecting and death magic, and to poison. Slow, haste, and similar spells are also totally ineffective. Since portons have no normal senses, darkness, blindness, silence, etc. are useless against them.

 

[Cleon]

I agree completely with your logic on the save. The consequences are pretty drastic, so it shouldn't be too terribly likely. Anyway, looks good.

The SQ line should include "incorporeal traits," shouldn't it? And did we decide to let incorporeality cover this, or did we want to do more with it?

Well some of that could be explained by regular incorporeality, but the "cannot be harmed by any physical manifestation of a spell" suggests a specialized form of Immunity to Magic, e.g.:

Immunity to Material Magic (Ex): A porton ignores damage or obstruction caused by the material manifestation of spells, although energy damage and force effects from spells affect it normally. For example, an ice storm spell (3d6 bludgeoning and 2d6 cold) only does cold damage to a porton, and a black tentacles cannot grapple a porton.

 

[Cleon]

I agree completely with your logic on the save. The consequences are pretty drastic, so it shouldn't be too terribly likely. Anyway, looks good.

Oh, and I'd better get around to updating the Porton Working Draft with Void Field.