[d20 Modern] Evil Dead: Swallow This!
- Thread starter talien
- Start date
talien
Community Supporter
Evil Dead: Fistful of Boomstick Update
Vesion 1.4 is here! It took me about two weeks to beat Evil Dead: Fistful of Boomstick. Despite being a somewhat mediocre shooter, Bruce's voice acting more than makes up for it. That, and the humor rife throughout the game. Well worth the $20.
Updates include changes from the Playstation 2 game, "Evil Dead: Fistful of Boomstick":
* Skill Modifications: Craft (mechanical), Spellcraft, Use Magic Device
* New Feats: Backhand Slash, Chainsaw Impale, Duct-Tape Engineering, Over the Shoulder
* New Weapons: diamond chainsaw, dynamite, flamethrower, launcher, molotov cocktail, shovel, sickle, Williams gun
* Ammunition: armor piercing, explosive, incendiary, shrapnel
* Prosthetics: cap, hook, interchangeable, metal hand
* New Combat Rules: one-handed reloading, shotguns, shooting one-handed, shooting over the shoulder
* Spellcasting & Magic Device rules
* New Spells: close time/space rift, dispel runic lock, lightning, possess deadite, possess hellhound, reign of fire, runic lock, seismic wave, stun, summon hellhound, superhuman strength
* New Monsters: deadite guardian, deadite queen, deadite slavelord, deadite warrior, hellhound
* Links: Updated DVD and game listings
* About the Author: Updated web site links
* Open Game Content: Lots of updates
* Spoiler Warning: There's a spoiler warning now -- this game gives away the ending of all three movies and both games.
* Quotes: Some of the quotes have been updated from the new Evil Dead game. They were too good to pass up.
You can get it all at http://michael.tresca.net under the Freebies section.
Enjoy!
Vesion 1.4 is here! It took me about two weeks to beat Evil Dead: Fistful of Boomstick. Despite being a somewhat mediocre shooter, Bruce's voice acting more than makes up for it. That, and the humor rife throughout the game. Well worth the $20.
Updates include changes from the Playstation 2 game, "Evil Dead: Fistful of Boomstick":
* Skill Modifications: Craft (mechanical), Spellcraft, Use Magic Device
* New Feats: Backhand Slash, Chainsaw Impale, Duct-Tape Engineering, Over the Shoulder
* New Weapons: diamond chainsaw, dynamite, flamethrower, launcher, molotov cocktail, shovel, sickle, Williams gun
* Ammunition: armor piercing, explosive, incendiary, shrapnel
* Prosthetics: cap, hook, interchangeable, metal hand
* New Combat Rules: one-handed reloading, shotguns, shooting one-handed, shooting over the shoulder
* Spellcasting & Magic Device rules
* New Spells: close time/space rift, dispel runic lock, lightning, possess deadite, possess hellhound, reign of fire, runic lock, seismic wave, stun, summon hellhound, superhuman strength
* New Monsters: deadite guardian, deadite queen, deadite slavelord, deadite warrior, hellhound
* Links: Updated DVD and game listings
* About the Author: Updated web site links
* Open Game Content: Lots of updates
* Spoiler Warning: There's a spoiler warning now -- this game gives away the ending of all three movies and both games.
* Quotes: Some of the quotes have been updated from the new Evil Dead game. They were too good to pass up.
You can get it all at http://michael.tresca.net under the Freebies section.
Enjoy!
Alzrius
The EN World kitten
Okay, so I went through the new file, just because I love giving you a hard t-, I mean, because I love your work so much. Here are some things that I noted:
The Craft (mechanical) skill requires that you already have the Duct-Tape Engineering feat (which I address separately below). This means that a character with a Wisdom of 10 or above (in essence, any character with average Wisdom) will never be able to take this skill, since they can never take the prerequisite feat.
Likewise, the fact that you must first make a Knowledge skill check seems rather superfluous. It only adds to the confusion that is says, "You must make a Knowledge check of the appropriate type". The d20 Modern SRD doesn't have a mechanical subset for the Knowledge skill, so there will probably never be an "appropriate type" for anything related to Craft (mechanical). It seems like the knowledge of how to build something would be assumed to be possessed if you have that application of the Craft skill to begin with.
Also, in the PDF bookmark along the side of the document, there is an odd bookmark here, after Skills and before Skill Modifiers, just labelled "S". That doesn't seem right.
For Backhand Slash, it seems a tad bit more fair to just allow the character to be able to make an attack of opportunity at characters who approach their back in their reach when the character is wielding a slashing weapon. That regulates this ability a bit more than it is now.
Chainsaw Impale says that the impaled creature takes automatic damage each round. It is unclear if this is critical hit damage or not though, since you can only use this on a critical. Likewise, it says the creature is entangled as per a net. However, that I saw, nets are not listed in the weapons section of the d20 Modern SRD! Luckily, "entangled" was. It also seems odd that when the victim makes their strength check to remove the chainsaw, they take damage, but when you voluntarily remove it, it causes none.
Duct-Tape Engineering seems a little steep, since it is essentially charging a feat just to use Craft (mechanical). Likewise, that renders the Housewares feat somewhat obselete also, as people who can't take Duct-Tape Engineering (and this cant use Craft (mechanical)) will never take a feat that modifies that skill. Lastly, I know we've talked about that before, but I don't think its a good idea for a feat with a prerequisite that is "Wis less than 10", as that means characters who have an average Wis or better will never be able to take either of those feats (and by extension, that Craft (mechanical) skill either).
Your stats for the flamethrower seem to be different from those in the d20 Modern SRD - yours deals 1d6/shot, whereas the one in the SRD deals 3d6, for example.
The Prosthetics section talks about using your "off" hand if its your remaining hand. That seems like a mild contradiction to the d20 Modern rules, however, since the Combat section of the SRD says "Off-Hand Weapon: When a character deals damage with a weapon in his or her off hand, add only half of the character’s Strength bonus."
The section on double-barrel shotguns says you can fire both barrels at the same target in one attack. It doesn't say if this inflicts double-damage or what though.
The header for Suppressive Fire is in normal font in the same line as the last part of the text for Shooting over the Shoulder. It should be bolded and indented.
The section here talks about using a check to utilize these. However, only magic items require a check to use, and thats only if the person can't use the item normally. There doesn't seem to be a system laid out to use a skill check to cast spells, which is what the text seems to imply. The whole idea of "the opposite happening" when a check is failed by 10 or more is nebulous, and could be abused...(a player intentionally fails a check when casting Awaken Kandarian, and the deadites around him are all de-animated, for example).
Your version of Lightning seems like its a bit low for just Arcane 3...Arcane 3 is the level of the Lightning Bolt spell from the SRD, but yours goes up to 20d6 damage, and affects secondary targets.
Conversely, Possess Hellhound seems like it should be a lower level, since it only works on one creature, and a measly CR 3 creature at that.
Superhuman Strength doesn't seem to have much tangible benefit for the caster at all! Given that characters gain a +1 to Strength for every 20% grown, and the maximum is 50%, a character can only gain +2 from this at maximum, not much at all. Worse, the character's weight increases dramatically...the situation may be that a character gets burdened by his own increased weight that he suffers severe encumberance penalties, not having increased enough strength to offset them.
More of those odd, lonely letters are in the boomarking for this section.
All of the new monsters you listed above have AC instead of Defense.
Maybe its me, but Deadite Queens don't seem to live up to their CR 13, since their only heavy attack is their Breath Weapon.
Another of those odd, lonely letters in the link section of the bookmarking.
All that aside, its good to see an update for this! Keep up the great work!
talien said:
The Craft (mechanical) skill requires that you already have the Duct-Tape Engineering feat (which I address separately below). This means that a character with a Wisdom of 10 or above (in essence, any character with average Wisdom) will never be able to take this skill, since they can never take the prerequisite feat.
Likewise, the fact that you must first make a Knowledge skill check seems rather superfluous. It only adds to the confusion that is says, "You must make a Knowledge check of the appropriate type". The d20 Modern SRD doesn't have a mechanical subset for the Knowledge skill, so there will probably never be an "appropriate type" for anything related to Craft (mechanical). It seems like the knowledge of how to build something would be assumed to be possessed if you have that application of the Craft skill to begin with.
Also, in the PDF bookmark along the side of the document, there is an odd bookmark here, after Skills and before Skill Modifiers, just labelled "S". That doesn't seem right.
For Backhand Slash, it seems a tad bit more fair to just allow the character to be able to make an attack of opportunity at characters who approach their back in their reach when the character is wielding a slashing weapon. That regulates this ability a bit more than it is now.
Chainsaw Impale says that the impaled creature takes automatic damage each round. It is unclear if this is critical hit damage or not though, since you can only use this on a critical. Likewise, it says the creature is entangled as per a net. However, that I saw, nets are not listed in the weapons section of the d20 Modern SRD! Luckily, "entangled" was. It also seems odd that when the victim makes their strength check to remove the chainsaw, they take damage, but when you voluntarily remove it, it causes none.
Duct-Tape Engineering seems a little steep, since it is essentially charging a feat just to use Craft (mechanical). Likewise, that renders the Housewares feat somewhat obselete also, as people who can't take Duct-Tape Engineering (and this cant use Craft (mechanical)) will never take a feat that modifies that skill. Lastly, I know we've talked about that before, but I don't think its a good idea for a feat with a prerequisite that is "Wis less than 10", as that means characters who have an average Wis or better will never be able to take either of those feats (and by extension, that Craft (mechanical) skill either).
Your stats for the flamethrower seem to be different from those in the d20 Modern SRD - yours deals 1d6/shot, whereas the one in the SRD deals 3d6, for example.
The Prosthetics section talks about using your "off" hand if its your remaining hand. That seems like a mild contradiction to the d20 Modern rules, however, since the Combat section of the SRD says "Off-Hand Weapon: When a character deals damage with a weapon in his or her off hand, add only half of the character’s Strength bonus."
The section on double-barrel shotguns says you can fire both barrels at the same target in one attack. It doesn't say if this inflicts double-damage or what though.
The header for Suppressive Fire is in normal font in the same line as the last part of the text for Shooting over the Shoulder. It should be bolded and indented.
The section here talks about using a check to utilize these. However, only magic items require a check to use, and thats only if the person can't use the item normally. There doesn't seem to be a system laid out to use a skill check to cast spells, which is what the text seems to imply. The whole idea of "the opposite happening" when a check is failed by 10 or more is nebulous, and could be abused...(a player intentionally fails a check when casting Awaken Kandarian, and the deadites around him are all de-animated, for example).
Your version of Lightning seems like its a bit low for just Arcane 3...Arcane 3 is the level of the Lightning Bolt spell from the SRD, but yours goes up to 20d6 damage, and affects secondary targets.
Conversely, Possess Hellhound seems like it should be a lower level, since it only works on one creature, and a measly CR 3 creature at that.
Superhuman Strength doesn't seem to have much tangible benefit for the caster at all! Given that characters gain a +1 to Strength for every 20% grown, and the maximum is 50%, a character can only gain +2 from this at maximum, not much at all. Worse, the character's weight increases dramatically...the situation may be that a character gets burdened by his own increased weight that he suffers severe encumberance penalties, not having increased enough strength to offset them.
More of those odd, lonely letters are in the boomarking for this section.
All of the new monsters you listed above have AC instead of Defense.
Maybe its me, but Deadite Queens don't seem to live up to their CR 13, since their only heavy attack is their Breath Weapon.
Another of those odd, lonely letters in the link section of the bookmarking.
All that aside, its good to see an update for this! Keep up the great work!
Last edited:
kuroshidaku
First Post
One-hand reloading:
Shouldn't it be a dex check, not a reflex save? You're trying to do somethig rather than trying not to be hit
looks great
Shouldn't it be a dex check, not a reflex save? You're trying to do somethig rather than trying not to be hit
looks great
talien
Community Supporter
You'll laugh, but the majority of the inconsistencies here are due to lifting OGC from other sources that didn't necessarily match the d20 Modern SRD. So shame on me for not checking to see that it all combined smoothly. Then again, I got all excited and wanted to share it with everybody after beating the game.
On to the fixes:
I got rid of the Wisdom requirements all together and changed it to a minimum Madness Rating. It gets at what I was trying to emulate (you have to be crazy to do make of the stuff Ash creates), and fits in with the rest of the game system.
Agreed. In this case I give a bonus to the check based on your Madness Rating instead.
I checked my version and I couldn't find it. Weird.
Good point. Changed.
This is OGC from the Relics book from AEG. I wrote that feat (plug, plug) as Sword Punch, for the relic Sanguavore. Took out the net reference, clarified the damage going in and going out.
Changed all this to Madness Rating, as above.
Yeah, it's different because Ash's great-great-great-great-great-great grandsomething made it during colonial times.
More OGC from other sources. Fixed.
Fixed.
Fixed.
That's all I was able to update this morning. They're not uploaded yet -- the .pdf maker takes about 10 minutes on my computer and I'm about to run to work. I'll address the other fixes tonight.
On to the fixes:
I got rid of the Wisdom requirements all together and changed it to a minimum Madness Rating. It gets at what I was trying to emulate (you have to be crazy to do make of the stuff Ash creates), and fits in with the rest of the game system.
Agreed. In this case I give a bonus to the check based on your Madness Rating instead.
I checked my version and I couldn't find it. Weird.
Good point. Changed.
This is OGC from the Relics book from AEG. I wrote that feat (plug, plug) as Sword Punch, for the relic Sanguavore. Took out the net reference, clarified the damage going in and going out.
Changed all this to Madness Rating, as above.
Yeah, it's different because Ash's great-great-great-great-great-great grandsomething made it during colonial times.
More OGC from other sources. Fixed.
Fixed.
Fixed.
That's all I was able to update this morning. They're not uploaded yet -- the .pdf maker takes about 10 minutes on my computer and I'm about to run to work. I'll address the other fixes tonight.
talien
Community Supporter
Picking up where I left off this morning...
Yeah, this is a good point. The purpose of this is to let a player cast spells using a Spellcraft check, or read them from scrolls/spellbooks using the Use Magic Device check. Only the character doesn't have either of those, so he's likely to screw them up. The most obvious example is the "Klatuu" incident, but in the new PS2 game, Ash has the opportunity to cast a bunch of spells correctly and incorrectly. Casting them incorrectly is hysterical, "Monstro denotu...uh...ah crap."
I added further clarifications to explain how "untrained spellcasting" works.
You're right. Moved to 4th.
Yeah, moved down to 2. There's one thing to point out -- it kills the possessed creature afterwards. So it's more signifcant than simply temporarily possessing it. But it's still just one type of creature, so point taken.
This is funny, because it's taken directly from the enlarge spell. To emphasize the strength aspect, I changed it to +1 Strength/10% increase, so there's the potential to increase strength by up to +5. In the game, Ash literally gets huge (and also starts breathing heavy).
I'm starting to suspect this is a font issue, actually. I don't see them on my .doc or .pdf versions.
Grumble. I forgot about that. Fixed.
I was basing this off of a green dragon's CR, but green dragons are considerably tougher. Agreed, down to CR 10.
It was originally a Dex check, then I moved it to a Reflex save. But I see your point. Back to Dex check.
I tweaked a few other things after going back to the game. For example, it's apparently the ten year anniversary of Jenny's death in the latest game. Assuming she died the year after Ash met her (2002), that puts the game at somewhere around 2012 AD -- kind of weird.
Also, the spell is called "Extra Strength" even though it's labeled as Supernatural Strength elsewhere. It's supposed to give the strength of ten men. Therefore, I upped its level to 3 and it bestows +2 Str per 10% increase (up to +10, much more impressive).
I finally got the date when Ash ends up in Colonial Dearborn (1695). I also for some bizarre reason had Colonial Dearborn AFTER the Civil War. So I fixed that.
Changed the Stun spell to work like it does in the game. It's an area effect power centered on the caster.
Seismic Wave is considerably different, so I updated that spell too.
Thanks for the feedback guys!
Yeah, this is a good point. The purpose of this is to let a player cast spells using a Spellcraft check, or read them from scrolls/spellbooks using the Use Magic Device check. Only the character doesn't have either of those, so he's likely to screw them up. The most obvious example is the "Klatuu" incident, but in the new PS2 game, Ash has the opportunity to cast a bunch of spells correctly and incorrectly. Casting them incorrectly is hysterical, "Monstro denotu...uh...ah crap."
I added further clarifications to explain how "untrained spellcasting" works.
You're right. Moved to 4th.
Yeah, moved down to 2. There's one thing to point out -- it kills the possessed creature afterwards. So it's more signifcant than simply temporarily possessing it. But it's still just one type of creature, so point taken.
This is funny, because it's taken directly from the enlarge spell. To emphasize the strength aspect, I changed it to +1 Strength/10% increase, so there's the potential to increase strength by up to +5. In the game, Ash literally gets huge (and also starts breathing heavy).
I'm starting to suspect this is a font issue, actually. I don't see them on my .doc or .pdf versions.
Grumble. I forgot about that. Fixed.
I was basing this off of a green dragon's CR, but green dragons are considerably tougher. Agreed, down to CR 10.
It was originally a Dex check, then I moved it to a Reflex save. But I see your point. Back to Dex check.
I tweaked a few other things after going back to the game. For example, it's apparently the ten year anniversary of Jenny's death in the latest game. Assuming she died the year after Ash met her (2002), that puts the game at somewhere around 2012 AD -- kind of weird.
Also, the spell is called "Extra Strength" even though it's labeled as Supernatural Strength elsewhere. It's supposed to give the strength of ten men. Therefore, I upped its level to 3 and it bestows +2 Str per 10% increase (up to +10, much more impressive).
I finally got the date when Ash ends up in Colonial Dearborn (1695). I also for some bizarre reason had Colonial Dearborn AFTER the Civil War. So I fixed that.
Changed the Stun spell to work like it does in the game. It's an area effect power centered on the caster.
Seismic Wave is considerably different, so I updated that spell too.
Thanks for the feedback guys!
Alzrius
The EN World kitten
Talien, just a few minor things I wanted to point out this time:
For the Chainsaw Impale feat, the last sentence reads: "If you break your hold, your blade comes free and deals normal damage as it is removed." The thing isn't a blade, it's a chainsaw.
It also occurs to me that this feat only works when scoring a critical hit; however, most deadites, being undead, are immune to critical hits - ergo, this feat won't ever be useable on most Evil Dead opponents (the Swallow This feat won't help, since it only applies to coup de graces). That doesn't seem right, given the feel of the games/movies.
The spellcasting section specifies that you need to make a Spellcraft check to use verbal-only spells, or Use Magic Device to use magic items, but it doesn't give any way of figuring out what the DC's are to beat. That may be in the SRD, but if so, it really should be reprinted there.
For the Chainsaw Impale feat, the last sentence reads: "If you break your hold, your blade comes free and deals normal damage as it is removed." The thing isn't a blade, it's a chainsaw.
It also occurs to me that this feat only works when scoring a critical hit; however, most deadites, being undead, are immune to critical hits - ergo, this feat won't ever be useable on most Evil Dead opponents (the Swallow This feat won't help, since it only applies to coup de graces). That doesn't seem right, given the feel of the games/movies.
The spellcasting section specifies that you need to make a Spellcraft check to use verbal-only spells, or Use Magic Device to use magic items, but it doesn't give any way of figuring out what the DC's are to beat. That may be in the SRD, but if so, it really should be reprinted there.
Last edited:
Sir Osis of Liver
Explorer
I don't know how i missed this before, but i can't wait to try it out!
talien
Community Supporter
Evil Dead 1.5
Version 1.5 is up after reading The Evil Dead Companion. It's got some interesting nuggets of information that I added into Evil Dead: Swallow This!
* Fixed the Chainsaw Impale problem with undead and critical hits.
* Ash's hair turns white when he finally sees the Kandarian in all its ugly glory, so it gained the horrific appearance power of ghosts.
* Expanded the manifestation power of Kandarians to act as a grasping hand spell.
* Moved all deadites under once category, including Kandarians, and explained their weaknesses and powers as a group rather than repeating the text over and over. This now means that ALL deadites can spread the deadite curse on a successful melee attack vs. just zombies and Kandarians.
* The deadite curse extrapolates on what happens if the curse only affects a body part. This was in the Kandarian section but not listed for all deadites.
* Added in the fact that mini deadite twins are Diminutive sized but otherwise identical.
* Added a breath weapon to the deadite twin -- as you'll recall, that's something Evil Ash does as he climbs over the parapet at the end of Army of Darkness.
* Added the reference to Cheryl's death in Evil Dead in the timeline. That was Ash's sister!
* Added the reference to the deadites intentions on earth -- something that's explained in The Evil Dead Companion.
There's a whole mess of links at the end of The Evil Dead Companion that I'm going to investigate. I bet half of them are gone by now, but we'll see.
Version 1.5 is up after reading The Evil Dead Companion. It's got some interesting nuggets of information that I added into Evil Dead: Swallow This!
* Fixed the Chainsaw Impale problem with undead and critical hits.
* Ash's hair turns white when he finally sees the Kandarian in all its ugly glory, so it gained the horrific appearance power of ghosts.
* Expanded the manifestation power of Kandarians to act as a grasping hand spell.
* Moved all deadites under once category, including Kandarians, and explained their weaknesses and powers as a group rather than repeating the text over and over. This now means that ALL deadites can spread the deadite curse on a successful melee attack vs. just zombies and Kandarians.
* The deadite curse extrapolates on what happens if the curse only affects a body part. This was in the Kandarian section but not listed for all deadites.
* Added in the fact that mini deadite twins are Diminutive sized but otherwise identical.
* Added a breath weapon to the deadite twin -- as you'll recall, that's something Evil Ash does as he climbs over the parapet at the end of Army of Darkness.
* Added the reference to Cheryl's death in Evil Dead in the timeline. That was Ash's sister!
* Added the reference to the deadites intentions on earth -- something that's explained in The Evil Dead Companion.
There's a whole mess of links at the end of The Evil Dead Companion that I'm going to investigate. I bet half of them are gone by now, but we'll see.
Similar Threads
