Ether Mist

[dren]

Hi everyone,

I am creating a powerful monster and I was hoping that some of posters could help me determine some of it's attributes. I am unsure of what HD, CR and type this thing should be. I pretty sure that I won't be assigning skills or feats. Everything marked with an asterisk (*) are the main items I am wondering about.

Anyway, thanks for any help. And I hope you like it.

dren
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Ether Mist

Large Sized Outsider *
Hit Dice: 20d10 (150 hp) *
Initiative: +2
Speed: Fly 50 ft (perfect)
AC: 42 (+30 natural, +2 Dex), 12 touch, 40 flat-footed
Base Attack/Grapple: +19 / +0 (Does not grapple)
Attack: Automatic Hit (40-AC dmg)
Full Attack: Automatic Hit (40-AC dmg)
Space/Reach: 15 ft by 15 ft
Special Attacks: Automatic Damage, Double Damage
Special Qualities: Astral Jaunt, Immunities, Dmg Reduction 20/Adamantite, SR 40
Saves: Fort: -, Ref: +14, Wis: - *
Abilities: Str 28, Dex: 14, Con: -, Int: 10, Wis: 10, Cha: 1
Environment: Deep Ethereal
Organization: Solitary
Challenge Rating: 20
Treasure: None
Alignment: Always Neutral
Advancement: 21-32 (Huge)

A large deeply coloured mist.

They are approximately 30 feet in radius and 10 feet high. Their origin is somewhere in the deep ethereal. They come to the prime worlds when summoned by spellcasters using a Monster Summoning VIII or greater spell. Spellcasters must either know the entities real name or sacrifice a single magical item worth at least 75,000 gp.

Its colour determines purpose: Grey - guards an item for ten years; Red - Executioner, summoned to execute one creature.

Ether Mist has never communicated with any creature. If they have a weakness, it is unknown to scholars.

Combat
An ether mist doesn’t attack, as the general understanding, anytime creatures are in its radius, they are crushed.

Automatic Hit: An Ether Mist automatically hits all creatures in their midst. They inflict 40 - Victim’s Touch AC every round.

Double Damage: Creatures who take damage, must save vs a Fort DC 25, or take double damage. This applies to only one creature per round.

Astral Jaunt: Ether Mist can enter the astral plane as a free action. Any creature in the mist at this time must make a Will DC 23 or be transported to the ethereal plane at the same time. Note: creatures transported do not take damage in the ethereal.

 

[nameless]

I'm not sure I see what you're trying to do. If it's a gaseous creature, having a strength of 28 and 30 natural armor doesn't make sense to me. It sounds more like an Ooze [Extraplanar] than an Outsider, to me. Maybe even something incorporeal that does physical [force] attacks.

Mechanically, here are the things that are wrong:

The DR is too high. 15 is the highest value that's supposed to be allowed for creatures that aren't gods. And adamantine is generally reserved for things with extremely tough skin. A good, strong DR for something like this would be 15/silver and slashing.

The SR is too high. 20 + CR (or 20+HD) are both just not feasible. A good baseline is 12+CR, which would ideally make this a SR 32 critter.

The AC should probably be a deflection bonus, not a natural armor bonus.

The automatic hit mechanic is counterintuitive. It makes quick, unarmored guys take less damage than Sherman Tanks. Instead of touch AC, have it look at flat-footed AC. You might want to make this a type of swarm, and then it would do automatic damage to anything it envelops, and there are already rules spelled out for that type of thing.

15/15 ft face isn't large, it's huge.

20 outsider HD give a BAB of +20, not +19. There is a -1 size penalty for Large that brings it down to 19, which also applies to AC. Huge is a -2 penalty.

This isn't even close to 20 CR. The tarrasque is 20 CR, and this thing doesn't even compare. The tarrasque is arguably less than 20 CR, even, because it has no intelligence or magical abilities, and "beating" it might not even involve combat. But in a fight, the tarrasque is way deadlier.

 

[Ferret]

Looks ok, but the thing is HP and saves are derived from HD so you can't just give arbitrary values to those.

The HP from that HD is 110, if you want 150ish hp you wan't hit dice around 28. The saves are all good AFAIR so thats half the hitdice + 2 + stat mod....fort +22(30), reflex +24(32) Will +22(30) number in paranthesis are for the other Hit dice. also if something won't/can't grapple it greapple score is --, not +0.

I would also suggest that they deal really nast poison like 4d8 con damage prim and secondary. Rather then the 40-AC, perhaps 60-HD but ac should regulate how much you take. Anbd maybe a grapple check to do that?

Also do you know the standard idea to advancment up to double HD at regular size then triple at one size up.