So far ENterplanetary DimENsions has been to some big places but they are all dwarfed by today’s entry: Immense Ingens!
Illustration by Matt Hilker.
The planet of Ingens is truly enormous, its mass greater than some suns. Local fauna and flora (even down to bacterium and creatures usually unseen by the naked eye) are as oversized as their world, dwarfing visitors and typically so big that no starship known is large enough to accommodate them. Low gravity on Ingens has not only affected the evolution of life here but nature itself—raindrops can be as big as a human’s fist, stems of pollen like seedheaded dandelions, and leaves the size of houses. Visitors to this gigantic place do so beneath the notice of its denizens, ignorantly crushed or sniffed at in curiosity if they make any impression at all.
Beasts bigger than the grandest metropolises lumber across the surface of Ingens, wading through rivers that for other creatures are seas and resting against the trunks of low-hanging trees even more enormous than they are. The incredible lifespans of these behemoths have not yet led to intelligent life, but enough visitors have been stranded there (by way of emergency crash landings, as a form of punishment, or while avoiding pursuit in exile) that there are civilizations to be found amongst the gargantuan world—or more accurately, inside of the gargantuans wandering across it.
Planar Traits. The entirety of Ingens is under the effects of low gravity. Otherwise the planet has the following planar traits and the Narrator should make use of the acid, brown mold, dense smoke, heavy precipitation, miring ground, and strong winds encounter elements. When it is possible to do so, noticing one of these encounter elements before it is too close to avoid requires a DC 14 Nature check.
Challenge 7 (2,900 XP); DC 15/14
Area Immediate (less than 1 hour)
A shadow moves across the landscape a little too quickly and you suddenly realize that’s not from a cloud—there’s an enormous limb that stretches up out of sight to block out the sky and it’s about to flatten you underfoot!
Burrow Down. Adventurers with a burrow speed can dig under the dirt to escape with an automatic success. Unless they are able to leave a tunnel behind them, anyone they drag behind them has to hold their breath with a Strength check at the end of each of their turns or begin to suffocate.
Dig In. Anyone with a shovel gains advantage on Athletics checks made to rapidly excavate a hiding place to survive the behemoth’s step.
Distant Destruction. Anyone with a passive Perception of 20 or higher hears the behemoth’s last footfall miles away, an odd thump that rolls across the landscape in a soft wave.
Looming Threat. Anyone with a passive Nature of 15 or higher senses that danger is near as the environment becomes unnaturally still.
Spell Solve. The use of stone shape or another spell that carves out a hole for the party to hide results in a critical success.
Possible Solutions
Attacking the behemoth and proving to be enough of an annoyance is not impossible, but it is difficult—its AC is 21, it automatically succeeds on saving throws, and it needs to take 200 damage in a single round to be convinced to step elsewhere. An attempt to dissuade the behemoth through pain that fails is a critical failure. Adventurers can make Athletics checks to create a space to safely ride out the behemoth’s footfall, or Constitution saving throws to Sprint away from the area quickly enough to avoid the devastation.
Critical Failure: The adventurers are crushed underfoot. Each takes 45 (10d8) bludgeoning damage and immediately begins to suffocate for 1d4 rounds before the behemoth steps again.
Failure: The party is exposed as the behemoth’s foot lands and stays there for 1d4+2 rounds. Each adventurer takes 10 (3d6) bludgeoning damage at the start of each round, and at the end of each of their turns they make a Strength saving throw or their breath is squeezed out of them and they begin to suffocate.
Success: The adventurers narrowly avoid being squished.
Critical Success: The party is safe from the behemoth’s foot and in the aftermath spot something unearthed by the colossal disturbance. Roll once on the Boons and Discoveries table.
AC 16 (natural armor)
HP 190 (20d10+80; bloodied 95)
Speed 20 ft., climb 20 ft.
Proficiency +4; Maneuver DC 18
Skills Perception +6, Survival +6 (+1d8)
Damage Immunities acid, cold, lightning, slashing
Condition Immunities blinded, charmed, deafened, fatigue, frightened, prone, strife, stunned
Senses blindsight 120 ft., passive Perception 16
Languages —
Challenge 10 (5,900 XP)
Amorphous. The limpocait can move through a space as narrow as 1 inch wide without squeezing.
Magic Resistance. The limpocait has advantage on saving throws made against spells and other magical effects.
Spider Climb. The limpocait can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make an ability check.
Unsettling Form. After this amorphous off-white blob is damaged by a creature, on its turn the limpocait’s jelly-like body transforms to match its attacker's form. If attacked by a humanoid it rises up with a torso that grows two limbs, if attacked by a giant spider it becomes a mass with eight tentacles, and so on. This transformation does not change the limpocait’s statistics but it is a startling psionic response that throws attackers off balance, and the attacker has disadvantage on attacks made against the limpocait until it uses Unsettling Form against another creature.
ACTIONS
Multiattack. The limpocait attacks twice with its slam.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8+4) magical bludgeoning damage plus 9 (2d8) force damage plus 9 (2d8) psychic damage.
If the target is a metal or stone object that isn't being worn or carried, a 1-foot cube of it is destroyed.
If the target is a metal or stone object being wielded by a creature, the creature makes a DC 18 Dexterity saving throw. On a failure, the weapon takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to damage rolls (destroyed if the penalty drops to −5).
If the target is a creature that is wearing metal armor or with a metal shield donned, it takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to the AC offered by its armor and shield. Armor reduced to an AC of 10 or a shield that drops to a +0 bonus is destroyed.
REACTIONS
Split. When a limpocait that is Medium or larger is subjected to psychic or slashing damage, it splits into two new limpocaits if it has at least 10 hit points. Each new limpocait has hit points equal to half the original limpocait's, rounded down. New limpocaits are one size smaller than the original limpocait.
Table: Ingens Parasites
Explorers encounter a parasite native to Ingens (unknowingly on the back of the behemoth it predominantly feeds upon).
AC 13 (natural armor)
HP 76 (8d12 + 24; bloodied 38)
Speed 40 ft., fly 50 ft.
Proficiency +2; Maneuver DC 13
Skills Acrobatics +3 (+1d6)
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 11
Languages —
Incredible Smell. The dire fly has advantage and gains a 1d8 expertise die on Perception checks that rely on smell.
ACTIONS
Digestive Spit. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 5 (1d4+3) acid damage.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8+3) bludgeoning damage.
BONUS ACTIONS
Aerial Dodge. The dire fly makes a DC 15 Acrobatics check, taking the Dodge action on a success.
REACTIONS
Zoom (Recharge 4–6). When an attack misses the dire fly while it is airborne, it flies up to 25 feet without provoking opportunity attacks.
ENterplanetary DimENsions has a good stock of 9 dimensions and planets already to give you an idea of what an entry needs to entail—should we be looking at some new exploration challenges? Monsters that feed upon the detritus of a world destroyed? Strange ephemera that applies to all adventuring upon it? All of the above and more?
Illustration by Matt Hilker.
The planet of Ingens is truly enormous, its mass greater than some suns. Local fauna and flora (even down to bacterium and creatures usually unseen by the naked eye) are as oversized as their world, dwarfing visitors and typically so big that no starship known is large enough to accommodate them. Low gravity on Ingens has not only affected the evolution of life here but nature itself—raindrops can be as big as a human’s fist, stems of pollen like seedheaded dandelions, and leaves the size of houses. Visitors to this gigantic place do so beneath the notice of its denizens, ignorantly crushed or sniffed at in curiosity if they make any impression at all.
Beasts bigger than the grandest metropolises lumber across the surface of Ingens, wading through rivers that for other creatures are seas and resting against the trunks of low-hanging trees even more enormous than they are. The incredible lifespans of these behemoths have not yet led to intelligent life, but enough visitors have been stranded there (by way of emergency crash landings, as a form of punishment, or while avoiding pursuit in exile) that there are civilizations to be found amongst the gargantuan world—or more accurately, inside of the gargantuans wandering across it.
Planar Traits. The entirety of Ingens is under the effects of low gravity. Otherwise the planet has the following planar traits and the Narrator should make use of the acid, brown mold, dense smoke, heavy precipitation, miring ground, and strong winds encounter elements. When it is possible to do so, noticing one of these encounter elements before it is too close to avoid requires a DC 14 Nature check.
Colossal Creatures
Megafauna on Ingens are simply too large to be treated as regular creatures, their brains and bodies too immense for normal magic to affect them like smaller monsters. Unless otherwise noted (such as ameobas, parasites, and so forth) a creature native to Ingens is treated as a Titanic object with the same statistics as adamantine that always succeeds on saving throws. These behemoths are not impossible to kill however, though any endeavor to do so is a quest that will take days of slaughtering before the creature can be slain—and surviving its natural defenses like limpocaits. Most visitors to this megaplanet simply struggle to survive in the shadows of the lumbering titans and the thought of killing one (considered sacred by many of those dwelling within) is simply an impossibility.Danger Underfoot
2nd tier (creatures)Challenge 7 (2,900 XP); DC 15/14
Area Immediate (less than 1 hour)
A shadow moves across the landscape a little too quickly and you suddenly realize that’s not from a cloud—there’s an enormous limb that stretches up out of sight to block out the sky and it’s about to flatten you underfoot!
Burrow Down. Adventurers with a burrow speed can dig under the dirt to escape with an automatic success. Unless they are able to leave a tunnel behind them, anyone they drag behind them has to hold their breath with a Strength check at the end of each of their turns or begin to suffocate.
Dig In. Anyone with a shovel gains advantage on Athletics checks made to rapidly excavate a hiding place to survive the behemoth’s step.
Distant Destruction. Anyone with a passive Perception of 20 or higher hears the behemoth’s last footfall miles away, an odd thump that rolls across the landscape in a soft wave.
Looming Threat. Anyone with a passive Nature of 15 or higher senses that danger is near as the environment becomes unnaturally still.
Spell Solve. The use of stone shape or another spell that carves out a hole for the party to hide results in a critical success.
Possible Solutions
Attacking the behemoth and proving to be enough of an annoyance is not impossible, but it is difficult—its AC is 21, it automatically succeeds on saving throws, and it needs to take 200 damage in a single round to be convinced to step elsewhere. An attempt to dissuade the behemoth through pain that fails is a critical failure. Adventurers can make Athletics checks to create a space to safely ride out the behemoth’s footfall, or Constitution saving throws to Sprint away from the area quickly enough to avoid the devastation.
Critical Failure: The adventurers are crushed underfoot. Each takes 45 (10d8) bludgeoning damage and immediately begins to suffocate for 1d4 rounds before the behemoth steps again.
Failure: The party is exposed as the behemoth’s foot lands and stays there for 1d4+2 rounds. Each adventurer takes 10 (3d6) bludgeoning damage at the start of each round, and at the end of each of their turns they make a Strength saving throw or their breath is squeezed out of them and they begin to suffocate.
Success: The adventurers narrowly avoid being squished.
Critical Success: The party is safe from the behemoth’s foot and in the aftermath spot something unearthed by the colossal disturbance. Roll once on the Boons and Discoveries table.
Limpocait Challenge 10
Large monstrosity 5,900 XPAC 16 (natural armor)
HP 190 (20d10+80; bloodied 95)
Speed 20 ft., climb 20 ft.
STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
22 (+6) | 5 (–3) | 18 (+4) | 1 (–5) | 14 (+2) | 1 (–5) |
Skills Perception +6, Survival +6 (+1d8)
Damage Immunities acid, cold, lightning, slashing
Condition Immunities blinded, charmed, deafened, fatigue, frightened, prone, strife, stunned
Senses blindsight 120 ft., passive Perception 16
Languages —
Challenge 10 (5,900 XP)
Amorphous. The limpocait can move through a space as narrow as 1 inch wide without squeezing.
Magic Resistance. The limpocait has advantage on saving throws made against spells and other magical effects.
Spider Climb. The limpocait can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make an ability check.
Unsettling Form. After this amorphous off-white blob is damaged by a creature, on its turn the limpocait’s jelly-like body transforms to match its attacker's form. If attacked by a humanoid it rises up with a torso that grows two limbs, if attacked by a giant spider it becomes a mass with eight tentacles, and so on. This transformation does not change the limpocait’s statistics but it is a startling psionic response that throws attackers off balance, and the attacker has disadvantage on attacks made against the limpocait until it uses Unsettling Form against another creature.
ACTIONS
Multiattack. The limpocait attacks twice with its slam.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8+4) magical bludgeoning damage plus 9 (2d8) force damage plus 9 (2d8) psychic damage.
If the target is a metal or stone object that isn't being worn or carried, a 1-foot cube of it is destroyed.
If the target is a metal or stone object being wielded by a creature, the creature makes a DC 18 Dexterity saving throw. On a failure, the weapon takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to damage rolls (destroyed if the penalty drops to −5).
If the target is a creature that is wearing metal armor or with a metal shield donned, it takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to the AC offered by its armor and shield. Armor reduced to an AC of 10 or a shield that drops to a +0 bonus is destroyed.
REACTIONS
Split. When a limpocait that is Medium or larger is subjected to psychic or slashing damage, it splits into two new limpocaits if it has at least 10 hit points. Each new limpocait has hit points equal to half the original limpocait's, rounded down. New limpocaits are one size smaller than the original limpocait.
Large Lifeforms
Eons of unnaturally low gravity have led to the smallest creatures among the native lifeforms of Ingens (amoeba and bacterium; oozes) being Small-sized at the littlest—nothing living and natural to this megaplanet is Tiny-sized. What some explorers might mistake to be the largest monsters roaming the landscape are usually the opposite, only diminutive parasites on the backs of creatures of a size too vast to comprehend. Narrators can populate the planet with standard creatures like beasts and monstrosities reskinned using the descriptions on Table: Ingens Parasites.Table: Ingens Parasites
d6 | Description |
1 | Ridges of bone extend from the creature’s mottled brown-green hide before spreading out into menacing spiked fins. |
2 | On either side of the gray-blue monster’s mouth are proboscis that quiver and drool a foul-smelling ichor. |
3 | This black-carapaced creature is covered in wavy ridges and glossy plates that clatter as it shambles forward. |
4 | Whisker-like hairs jut out from this monster’s head and limbs, waving strangely as if sensing for something. |
5 | The long and languid tendrils spooling out from this creature’s mouth are sinister, but the way they whip along the ground as it moves makes their purpose unclear. |
6 | This monster moves in an ungainly way, its crooked limbs ending in wicked barbs that scratch out hooked marks wherever it treads. |
Explorers encounter a parasite native to Ingens (unknowingly on the back of the behemoth it predominantly feeds upon).
Prodigious Pistils
Juices and pulp from the massive produce of plants native to Ingens are too corrosive to consume, but the pollen plucked from flowers (most as tall as a human if not bigger) is perfectly edible and each morning condensation creates head-sized water droplets suitable for drinking. Even so this makes it difficult to provision on Ingens, and any Supply found in nature on Ingens is halved (minimum 1 Supply).Mounted Messengers
The societies living within or on the titanic creatures that rule Ingens are in sparse contact with one another, offering help to heal each other’s dwellings and trading supplies. Their messengers fly between them on the backs of dire flies, guided from one locale to another and corralled to the entrances of homed creatures by a concentrated sugar sap made out of pollen from the planet’s flora.Dire Fly Challenge 3
Huge beast 700 XPAC 13 (natural armor)
HP 76 (8d12 + 24; bloodied 38)
Speed 40 ft., fly 50 ft.
STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
17 (+3) | 12 (+1) | 17 (+3) | 2 (–4) | 12 (+1) | 3 (–4) |
Skills Acrobatics +3 (+1d6)
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 11
Languages —
Incredible Smell. The dire fly has advantage and gains a 1d8 expertise die on Perception checks that rely on smell.
ACTIONS
Digestive Spit. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 5 (1d4+3) acid damage.
Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d8+3) bludgeoning damage.
BONUS ACTIONS
Aerial Dodge. The dire fly makes a DC 15 Acrobatics check, taking the Dodge action on a success.
REACTIONS
Zoom (Recharge 4–6). When an attack misses the dire fly while it is airborne, it flies up to 25 feet without provoking opportunity attacks.
Subcutaneous Settlements
It’s practically impossible to survive on the surface of this megaplanet for very long, and people who want more from life than to constantly flee from being stepped on instead live inside of the long-live country-sized behemoths Ingens is best known for. Doing so is no small feat however, and each of these societies is careful about how and how much they harm their homed creature. For this reason druids are highly respected and prized on this world, their connection with nature an essential element to any settlement dependent upon a living behemoth. Everything that can be safely harvested for subsistence or crafting (such as blood, bone, flesh) is gathered and shared, sometimes through trade or simply as a matter of course. It’s not unknown for the denizens of homed creatures to go to war against one another should their behemoths come into conflict, and honor guards are stationed near vulnerable parts of the body—usually the equivalent of the brain or heart—to prevent murderous sabotage and the catastrophic fallout that soon follows.BUT WHAT ABOUT DISRUPTED DARAKOA?
The next entry in this series (the dimension of Wheel) is already done and I am VERY EXCITED to post it, but before designing the thing after that I want to know: what do the Narrators and players of Level Up want to see in the writeup for a disrupted planet? There are some ideas already queued up and your suggestions will guide what makes it in and what doesn’t.ENterplanetary DimENsions has a good stock of 9 dimensions and planets already to give you an idea of what an entry needs to entail—should we be looking at some new exploration challenges? Monsters that feed upon the detritus of a world destroyed? Strange ephemera that applies to all adventuring upon it? All of the above and more?