As promised, here's the list of monster info gleaned from the CR0-12 critters in the files MonstersA-F. All of these guys have one or more references in their statblocks to a 4th+ level spell, and therefore technically doesn't exist in the strictest E6 sense. Some of them (usu. marked as "in description" somehow) are reference spells that the creature is immune to, unaffected by: these things can probably just be edited out of the statblock. Others refer to healing/recovery details, and could also be edited out-- but they also likely indicate that critter is way of of E6's league. [sblock]
A .
aboleth (refs at least 7 spells)
acherai (insanity)
archons (Subtype refs gr tport)
avoral (fear, dim door, trueseeing)
B-C .
barghest (charm monst, crushin despair, dim door; plus wish, resurrection, etc in "feed" description)
barghest, gr (mass bull str, mass enlarge person)
blink dog (dim door)
D-De .
demons--
- babau (gr tport)
- bebelith (plane shift)
- hezrou (gr tport, blasphemy, chaos hammer, unholy blight)
- quasit (commune)
- retriever (discern location)
- succubus (charm monster, ethereal jaunt, gr tport)
- vrock (telekinesis, gr tport)
derro (confusion, miracle,wish in madness description)
devils--
- hamatula (gr tport, orders wrath, unholy blight)
- barbazu (gr tport)
- bone (gr tport, dim anchor, wall ice)
- erinyes (charm monst, gr tport, unholy blight, trueseeing)
- imp (commune)
devourer (confusion, control undead, lsr planar ally, true seeing; plus several in "spell deflection" description)
Di-Do .
none
Dr-Dw .
dragons--
- none at points where I chopped.
dryad (tree stride)
E-F .
earth elemental (refs move earth in "earthglide" ability)
ethereal filcher (refs ethereal jaunt in "ethereal jaunt" Su)
ethereal marauder (ditto)
formian--
- taskmaster (dominate monster)
- myrmarch (charm monst, gr. tport, dictum, orders wrath)[/sblock]Looking over this (incomplete) sample, you can see that a few abilities are recurring (for ex, greater teleport, and maybe trueseeing and charm monster) and might be candidates for their own special abilities entries.
Really, though,I think this simply shows that it's a case by case thing. So, I'll suggest at this point that we continue on with the monster file edits, simply chopping at CR12, but still noting ones with lots of SLAs or other mentions of 4th+ level spell references.
When we're done, I'll generate a master list like this one (ie, finish the one sblocked above), so we can see where the biggest half dozen or so commonalities are and turn those into special abilities. After those powers are added to one of the "special abilities" files, monsters with only one other ability can have it in-lined (unless it's especially complex, or references something that references something else, etc). And the rest we can just chuck, or relegate to the "critters that are a too tough or complicated to include in this SRD, but we'll mention anyway because they're cool" pile. Unless that would eliminate someone's favorite badguy and make them cry, in which case we can talk about it.
