Spelljammer Converting Spelljammer creatures

[Arnwyn]

I think I'm comfortable with the acid at 1d8. PCs who are powerful enough to fight these things may have invested in additional defenses for their ships as well, so that'll work, IMO.

I agree that the 'base conversion' should follow the original monster (though I speak selfishly - I'm looking for a conversion to be specifically used in SJ) - and anyone can homebrew it to remove the gravitational collapse quality. (I wouldn't be adverse to adding a variant - like your 'Gas Giant Gossamer', which is also cool BTW - but I'm not sure what the convention is for these conversions here.)

 

[Cleon]

I think I'm comfortable with the acid at 1d8. PCs who are powerful enough to fight these things may have invested in additional defenses for their ships as well, so that'll work, IMO.

You're talking about 1d8 for the Deliquescence acid, right? If so both you and Freyar favour that damage, so I could add it to the Working Draft.

I agree that the 'base conversion' should follow the original monster (though I speak selfishly - I'm looking for a conversion to be specifically used in SJ) - and anyone can homebrew it to remove the gravitational collapse quality. (I wouldn't be adverse to adding a variant - like your 'Gas Giant Gossamer', which is also cool BTW - but I'm not sure what the convention is for these conversions here.)

The "Gas Giant" variant was a possible justification for a gravity-resistant Homebrew, I wasn't thinking of adding it to the conversion.

 

[freyar]

1d8 for the deliquescence damage was based on the fact that the standard gossamer deliquescence damage is equal to the sting damage. I'm not averse to going a die or two higher (2 or 3d8), but 20d8 seems a bit much.

That seems contrary to the original monster, so I prefer the current version, but there's no reason not to Homebrew it that way for an individual campaign. If necessary a DM could say it's a "Gas Giant Gossamer" that isn't susceptible to gravitational collapse, an unrelated monster that happens to have the same stats, or a Noble Gossamer that's been magically augmented to remove that vulnerability (by a cocaine wizard, presumably).

What's a cocaine wizard?

 

[Cleon]

1d8 for the deliquescence damage was based on the fact that the standard gossamer deliquescence damage is equal to the sting damage. I'm not averse to going a die or two higher (2 or 3d8), but 20d8 seems a bit much.

How about the previously proposed 2d12 acid?

What's a cocaine wizard?

It's a running gag on RPG.net's Monster Manual threads to explain the origins of some of the more outré D&D monsters.

When a "a wizard did it" doesn't explain why someone would think it was a good idea to create a particular monster, try "a wizard did it while out of their skull on narcotics".

 

[Arnwyn]

I'd still prefer 1d8 for the deliquescence damage for a few reasons:
- it'll have less of a chance of destroying ships (well, destroying the main/top deck and/or roof of enclosed ships)
- a puddle 300 ft. across is quite a large area, which means people would have to spend their actions to actually run to avoid further damage
- neither 1d8 nor 2d12 is all that harmful to PCs of a level that would reasonably fight such a creature, so (IMO) it doesn't matter which, and 1d8 will probably harm crew members 'enough' (2d12 might be too devastating to a crew)

But in the end, I'll go with whatever is thought to be best.

 

[freyar]

I think there are enough reasons to stick with 1d8 for the deliquesence. I'm happy enough with that.

 

[Cleon]

I think there are enough reasons to stick with 1d8 for the deliquesence. I'm happy enough with that.

Well since you and Arnwyn are agreed I might as well update the Noble Gossamer Working Draft with a 1d8 Deliquescence.

Are we making the duration 1d10 minutes like the standard? I'd have thought it'd take longer for such a large pool to lose its potency.

Come to think of it, weren't we going to make the Standard Gossamer's deliquescence last 1d10 rounds, considering the original gossamer's remains lost its acidic nature in one turn (= 10 rounds).

If we keep the Noble Gossamer's deliquescence at 1d10 minutes and change the standard version to 1d10 rounds that'd give them a respectable difference in duration.

 

[Arnwyn]

Hmm...

When doing the gossamer conversion, here is what was stated:

In AD&D 1 turn is 10 minutes but a round is a minute long so it's also 10 rounds.

So a direct conversion to Third Edition of the evaporation time would either be 10 minutes (the original duration of 1 turn) or 1 minute (the duration of 10 3E rounds).

How about making it 1d10 minutes and covering both?

Thinking of it... I'm okay with 1d10 rounds for the standard gossamer and 1d10 minutes for the noble. I think that's enough time for acid to hang around. (I'm also okay with upping the standard gossamer a bit more - would anyone consider 1d3 or 1d4 minutes?)

 

[Cleon]

Hmm...

When doing the gossamer conversion, here is what was stated:

In AD&D 1 turn is 10 minutes but a round is a minute long so it's also 10 rounds.

So a direct conversion to Third Edition of the evaporation time would either be 10 minutes (the original duration of 1 turn) or 1 minute (the duration of 10 3E rounds).

How about making it 1d10 minutes and covering both?

Thinking of it... I'm okay with 1d10 rounds for the standard gossamer and 1d10 minutes for the noble. I think that's enough time for acid to hang around. (I'm also okay with upping the standard gossamer a bit more - would anyone consider 1d3 or 1d4 minutes?)

Well after mulling it over I think that the germane point is that the AD&D standard gossamer's deliquescence acid lasted long enough to do damage 10 times (1/minute for 1 turn), while if we made it minutes in 3E it could do damage 10d10 times (1/round for 1d10 minutes), so it could do a lot more total damage to an object or immobile creature simply because it lasts longer.

Making it last 1d10 rounds, however, would mean it does less damage - an average of 55% of the damage to be exact, since that's the average ratio between 1d10 rounds and 10 rounds.

That seems too low, especially as things tend to have a lot more HPs in 3E, so I'd be OK increasing the duration a bit.

How about making it 1d10+10 rounds for the standard and 1d10+10 minutes for the noble? That's 15.5 on average. That's approximately 1d2 minutes for the standard gossamer, so is a bit lower than the 1d3 or 1d4 you proposed.

 

[freyar]

1d10+10 rounds and minutes work for me as the two durations.

Hoping to have a bit more time for conversions for the rest of the year (boy, feels weird to type that!).