Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 9455458" data-attributes="member: 6750502"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/zJiHrN8.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" /> Fishing CatchesNote: I realize that the posts for this review can be quite long, so I’ll be breaking them up into smaller readable chunks. This won’t affect the daily posting rate, as I already wrote drafts for every chapter in this book, but it does mean I may post 2 times a day instead of once.This is the lengthiest chapter in WSDWYCBF, detailing 240 different types of Fish as well as submerged Junk that can be caught. In lieu of a full stat block barring Combat Catches, fish use a consolidated list of traits: Level determines their overall difficulty in catching via a Catch DC which is 10 + Level (fractionals are DC 8 to 10) and the Experienced Points reward to a party upon a successful catch; Weight is randomly rolled with an average in parenthesis; and the fish’s Market Value. In comparison to monsters of equivalent CR, fish give out a tenth of the Experience Points. For example, a CR 8 monster gives out 3,900 experience, but a Level 8 fish gives out 390. As for Market Value, fish at the lower tiers are individually not very expensive, starting at 2 copper at Level ⅛ to 40 gold at Level 5. It’s by late Tier 2 that fishes can be very lucrative on an individual basis, with 100 gold at Level 7, 450 gold at Level 11, all the way up to 21,000 gold at Level 20.On its own, fishing isn’t enough to replace the experience and treasure won from traditional adventures, and as it requires successive Activities to take place during long rests it is more of a side activity. The only real concern I’d have is players asking if they can have their PCs fish off-screen during significant periods of downtime to accumulate gold and experience. But given the involved nature of this mini-game, it doesn’t look to be made for that, in much the same manner that declaring your PC goes delving during Downtime doesn’t necessarily get them offscreen gold and experience. It would get boring after one month alone, having a single player roll dozens of Survival checks for that.While a Fishing Encounter is typically a simple dice roll when triggered, there are several ways the book keeps things from getting monotonous. Lunkers are special types of fish that require multiple successful rolls to catch, and have a multiplier for the XP and Market Value based on the amount of successes and total dice rolls allowed. Some fish have Fishing Encounter Actions they can use, usually only once for that Encounter, to impose complications on the angler.Another thing readers might notice is that the Catch DC increases quite a bit. A 5th level fish is a respectable DC 15 which isn’t out of bounds of most PCs, but Tier 3 onwards the target number gets very large. Add onto this the penalties from Fishing Ordeals and some fish that can utilize special moves and Lunkers requiring multiple rolls, this stacks the odds further against players.WSDWYCBF alleviates this via several ways. I already mentioned the possibility of training for expertise in Fishing Styles and Fishing Techniques that can aid rolls, but the Equipment chapter later on has magic items that grant static +1 to +3 bonuses for various kinds of checks. As these items have gold piece values, can be crafted using the new rules for said sub-system later on, and can be bought from merchants detailed in sample regions later in this book, PCs who want them won’t be completely reliant on DM Fiat. This makes the higher Catch DCs much less punishing for PCs, but it also forces characters who want to be good at fishing at higher levels to really specialize in it.For reasons of brevity, I will not be covering every single fish here. Instead I will be highlighting ones which are particularly interesting and notable. Most fish detailed are of the Beast type, but some more exotic creatures have other types like Aberration, Elemental, and Fiend.The Battlerock Blowfish is a creature that lives along rocky coastlines, puffing up with poisonous spikes to deter predators. Anglers who handle the fish without gloves risk becoming Poisoned for an hour if they fail a Dexterity save.The Blind Glassfish is a psionic creature with translucent keratin flesh, using a crystalline organ in its head to sense its surroundings via psionics. This grants it unmatched hearing and can sense even magical energies this way.The Blinker Eel developed the ability to cast Dimension Door as a defense mechanism, forcing an angler to reroll a successful Catch and allowing the eel to escape on a failed roll.Clicking Olm is a salamander that emits a magical aura to blind nearby creatures, causing most would-be predators to avoid it. An angler who catches the creature can safely extract a portion of Fish Parts each day from the creature without killing it via the Merciful Carving ability, but a greedy angler who does so anyway suffers 10 Fishing Ordeals. A lot like the goose that lays the golden egg. There’s two other fish in the book that have Merciful Carving, so while it may sound like they can generate a lot of gold over time it isn’t very much for their Tiers of play.The size-changing Dollfish biologically transfers itself into smaller life forms spat out of its body in order to evade predators, meaning that its Market Value decreases for each failed Fishing Check. While this is a neat ability from a gamist perspective, I can see many players opting to ask if they can harvest the now-dead bodies left behind to make up for losses.The Dragonkoi can teach an angler who releases it a Fishing Technique called Altered Fortune, where up to 3 times per long rest an angler can reroll a failed Fishing Check. Killing it imposes 10 Fishing Ordeals on the angler, as it’s believed to have mystical properties.The Flashbang Mussel will emit a blinding flash on anglers, causing them and adjacent creatures within 5 feet to be blinded for 1 minute on a failed Wisdom save. Flashbang Mussels can also be used as items that do the same thing, but with a higher DC to resist. As the duration doesn’t allow a new saving throw every round and has to be waited out, it’s a really potent technique.Fortunefish have scales that create the optical illusion of words, causing many people to use their scales for divination purposes. Successfully carving Fish Parts from a Fortunefish allows someone to roll a d20, record that result, and replace any attack, save, or ability check they make with that result until the next dawn.The Greater Void Shark is not a Combat Catch, oddly enough. To anglers who hook it, it will instead offer boundless knowledge for its freedom albeit at a potential cost. The angler then makes a Wisdom save, and if they fail they fall unconscious for 24 hours and suffer 10 Fishing Ordeals, but on a success they gain proficiency with Survival or expertise if already proficient.The Hope Minnow is considered a sign of good luck by many, for it survives in the most dangerous environments despite its tiny, weak frame. An angler who releases it after being caught causes the next fish caught within the next 24 hours to double in Market Value.The dolphin-like Nowei-Nowei is a friendly animal that often swims near coastal communities, and land-dwellers enjoy its presence. An angler who releases the fish after it is caught causes the animal to retrieve sunken items as a gift, letting the angler roll 5 times on the Junk Table which are automatically found and caught.The Rift Maw is actually a tear in reality studded with teeth and a long tongue of some unfathomable creature. If it is “caught,” the angler instead rolls two times on the Fishing Table, adding 45 to any result of 45 and lower. The fish caught this way is strange and altered, using the Market Value of the Rift Maw instead of its base value.The Screaming Scallop developed a self-destructive defensive technique that discourages predators from cracking others open in the future. If its shell is opened as an action, it releases a scream that is clearly audible for up to 300 feet, deafening creatures for 1 minute on a failed Constitution save. The scallop dies after emitting this scream, so it’s technically a one-use consumable.The Spicesquid emits a powdery substance that is edible and can be used as a flavoring for various meals. If caught and trained as a Companion, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4BOZcDMw_A" target="_blank">you can knock it up another notch with Supreme Spice once per day.</a> It’s a consumable worth 100 gold pieces that can be applied to any source of food. It removes an additional Fishing Ordeal and heals 1d8+1 hit points or adds that in addition if the food that already magically heals, such as Hero’s feast.The Angler is a magical type of anglerfish that is actually sentient. It views fishers as sporting competition and enjoys pitting its skills against them. If someone manages to successfully catch it, the Angler offers a magical orb that can be used to contact the fish once while in a Deep Ocean environment, granting the effects of a Legend Lore spell but without requiring material components. Should someone kill and carve it, the Fish Parts are worth double its Market Value (the fish is 21k gold by default, 42k when so doubled).While they’re statted out in the back of the book, I feel it pertinent to discuss Combat Catches and Companions here.Companions are basically harmless CR 0 creatures that PCs can adopt as pets. A Companion can bond to a single character after a successful check is made, the specific check in question depending on the Companion’s prerequisites. They understand the languages of creatures they are bound to, and while so bound are Safe From Death. This means that whenever they’re reduced to 0 hit points, they somehow escape the dangerous situation and return during the next long rest. Several Companion creatures in this book can be obtained via random Fishing Table results or as the result of side-quests in the region-based chapters. Companions all share the same stat block, although their size and type can vary. Generally speaking they don’t really provide anything substantial to a PC like a familiar or animal companion would; they’re more for flavor if anything.<img src="https://i.imgur.com/dq2diM0.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />As for Combat Catches, these detail 19 fish that will fight back once caught, forcing the angler and their companions to roll initiative and thus kill/subdue it. An awful lot of these new monsters are pretty high level, with 6 being Tier 3 (CR 14 to 16), 4 being Tier 4 (17 to 25), and 5 are Tier 2 (6 to 10). Only 4 fit within Tier 1, at CR 1 to 4.The Combat Catches include the following:Boot Mimic: it’s a Mimic…that looks like a boot!Blind Dragonfish: blind serpent that is a CR 17 Beast and not a Dragon but has a poisonous Miasma Breath weapon.Centurion Snapper: aggressive CR 16 Beast whose slam attacks can knock targets unconscious on a failed Strength save.Champion Pebble Penguin: CR 10 Beast that is naturally telepathic, can make a sliding attack as a bonus action, and can shoot magical ice at range.Elemental Whale: CR 17 good-aligned elemental that wields the weather and elements as weapons, has various attacks and abilities that involve elemental battlefield control style stuff.Everfall River Snake: just a boring old CR 1 Beast that’s a big eel.Eyeless Bilge Hunter: CR 3 Beast with blindsight that can survive and move around on land up to 1 hour.Gaping Voidfish: CR 16 Beast with a huge mouth that can swallow and grapple Medium size and smaller creatures.Guardian Trifish: CR 16 Beast that has Magic Resistance, resistance to nonmagical physical damage, immune to Charm and Frightened conditions and can bite up to 3 times per action.Pelagic Orb: a phenomenon of unknown origins that causes a swarm of mundane fish to swim together as a violent orb, a CR 14 swarm of Small Beasts that can shoot magical Eldritch Blasts as well as bite.Phobos: CR 20 Aberration that is a physical manifestation of fear, has various attacks that impose the Frightened condition and regains hit points when damaging Frightened creatures.Primordial Chaosfish: CR 25 Fiend that switchs between six elemnetal forms with their own resistances, vulnerabilities, damage types, summoned elementals, and movement speeds.Rattlehydra: CR 14 Monstrosity that is basically a hydra that spits poison and can grapple and constrict targets like a snake.Shocking Asp: CR 8 Beast that is a big snake that can emit an electrical AoE field.Teratorma: CR 16 Aberration that looks like a mass of composed fin and teeth motivated by endless hunger, has a bite attack and regains hit points from damaging creatures with blood.Titan Snapping Turtle: CR 6 Beast, basically a big tough turtle with a long-reach bite attack.Typhoon Shark: CR 10 Beast with Magic Resistance and can generate AoE cyclones as a rechargeable attack.Venomserpent: CR 4 Beast that has blindsight and a poisonous bite attack.Wyvern Shark: CR 9 Beast that can fly in the air for 1 turn and whose bite attacks are so traumatic they continue dealing necrotic damage unless magically healed or a successful DC 15 Medicine check.</blockquote>

Verification