MM excerpt: phane

[baberg]

So he's hitting, on average, 15ish per shot. From the PHB crunch we got yesterday a Fighter of level 26 will have around 170ish HP. Seems a bit underpowered, but I guess we should also take into account that this Phane is a lot harder to damage since he's insubstantial.

 

[Saitou]

Very.

It'll be interesting though to see how readily available countermeasures for things like insubtantial creatures are at that level...

"Running away" is still a valid tactic in Epic Tier, I would hope.

 

[GSHamster]

So he's hitting, on average, 15ish per shot. From the PHB crunch we got yesterday a Fighter of level 26 will have around 170ish HP. Seems a bit underpowered, but I guess we should also take into account that this Phane is a lot harder to damage since he's insubstantial.

I think his job is to slow and stun the PCs, and let his brutes do the actual killing.

 

[A'koss]

So he's hitting, on average, 15ish per shot. From the PHB crunch we got yesterday a Fighter of level 26 will have around 170ish HP. Seems a bit underpowered, but I guess we should also take into account that this Phane is a lot harder to damage since he's insubstantial.

Keep in mind as well that PCs are going to encounter him with several other allies who might be geared more towards damage output...

 

[Ipissimus]

-sighs- And the Nightwalkers are back. I can hear my group's jokes already.

 

[I'm A Banana]

The Abominations from the Epic Level Handbook are all sorts of cool, so lets see some comparison.

Fluff/Description: The new one is very practical; it matches the illustration from the ELH pretty nicely, though I admit to being more partial to the earlier, more evocative writing style, with the multiple forms and the "two or more emerald eyes." I think the eyes gave it an especially creepy kick, glowing out from the form. "Misty Cat Centaur" is a little "??" Still, I like that 4e is being a bit more grounded with the description, at least it adds some standardization to the critters.

Level: Original is CR 25 (about Level 25 Solo), this baby is a level 26 Elite, roughly on par.

Numbers: As we might've guessed, they're mostly lower -- lower AC, lower HP. Higher Defenses/Saves, that's kind of neat.

Abilities: Here's where things get most interesting. The old Phane had a rather confusing cocktail of "Stop!"-based abilities, and 4e is very much about removing the "Save Or Don't Have Any Fun" effects. The most interesting of these include the ability to "steal the future" from enemies that it keeps in stasis, and the ability to summon an "alternate parallel time duplicate"

I see the new phane has none of these interesting abilities, but gets some abilities to stun, slow, and weaken...kind of evocative, I guess, but....meh....

Verdict: Eh...seems kind of dull in comparison to the original. What this bad boy needs is (a) an ability to "steal time" from the PC's, and (b) an ability to summon an evil mirror cowboy universe version of a PC. It also needs to make that cosmetic effect something slightly more evocative than "I look old for a few rounds." Proposals include:

• Give it an ability, perhaps at a recharge to steal actions from the PC's. On a successful attack, it grabs, say, a standard action: the PC can't use it on their turn, but on the next turn, the Phane gains an extra action. Or perhaps it steals action points. Or perhaps it takes minor actions and combines them into bigger actions. This might mean making it a Solo monster?
• Give it an ability to "stop time," from a fluff standpoint, not a combat standpoint. When given five minutes, it can put a captured victim into stasis. These are how they feed -- victims in this stasis age unnaturally fast, years in days, and when they die of old age, they fall back "into time," though the whole thing seems instant from their POV. Because not participating is not fun, don't let it be a combat ability.
• The "Parallel Past Time Duplicate" is basically a quick template -- any creature -2 levels, weirds you out when you kill it if you *are* it? Sounds like the perfect thing to throw into the mix alongside the Phane itself.

Overall, the mechanics look much better than 3e, but it looks shallower. All of its abilities are variations on "damage + status." That can work, but if that's all you have, it's a little dull. Compared to the ELH version, it's missing some of its most interesting abilities. Though these abilities weren't implemented very well, I'm sure they could've been reworked, and it would've left the phane significantly more inspiring to me as an adversary because it could do something different. With that much stuff it could do, though, it might be better off being a solo challenge. Given its reputation in the ELH, I'm pretty comfortable with that.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

Does it mean you have to get 2 successful saves against any of the effects it inflicts on you?

One to get rid of the initial effect, and another to get rid of the aftereffect? That makes it even nastier, even taking into consideration a 26th level PC gets some bonuses to saves based on items and other abilities.

 

[Dragonblade]

It's the return of one of the Abominations from the Epic Level Handbook.

I really hope they have Atropals in MM1, because those were cool.

I've always loved Winter Wights myself. Nasty epic monsters those were. I hope they make an appearance in 4e.

 

[malcolm_n]

Okay, this is the 3rd type of monster stats I've seen from wizards... How are stats determined? Are they base 4 like the devil from D&D Day last year? Are they some new formula Which apparently grants +20 at 24? If they don't mesh at all, why even say the creature has stats unless as a placeholder?

 

[mach1.9pants]

Any linkage? I cannot find it...

Edit: d'oh the excerpts page is not in date order http://wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4ex/20080418b