Monsters as riddles: Ideas needed

[Ravilah]

Okay, my players are about to enter a magical swamp and face a covey of hags. Now this covey is a bit special, since the party needs them to help raise a tower out of the swamp, so just trying to kill them is out of the question. Now the hags are the fey, we-love-giving-adventurers-weird-riddles-for-our-own-amusement types, and each one will send the party to fight a different creature. My idea is that I'd like each monster to be kind of like a riddle, meaning that there is some kind of trick to defeating each one. They do this kind of thing in video games all the time (only deflected rays from its own eyes can harm it, or it is vulnerable only when it glows magenta). My desire to do this is in small part because my players know the monster manual so well, and can't help but use their knowledge when combating things. This time, they will have to figure out something new to take them down.

Thanks!

 

[Voadam]

Ravenloft Denizens of Darkness/Dread has racial vampires with special weaknesses and powers different from standard. Dwarven ones must be killed by impaling on stalactites instead of wooden stakes for instance. Worth checking out for special weaknesses with appropriate to creature flavor that is not found in the MM. Also d20 Modern srd has some weakness/allergy rules at the end of its creature section you might want to use.

 

[Ravilah]

Good, good. Any one else?

 

[Tatsukun]

How about just doing it with Buffs? The Hags could buff the monsters up with things like Energy protection or Stoneskin. Make sure they 'forget' one thing, so the monster has a weakness.

If you don't plan on the Hags ever fighting the PCs, go ahead and make them uber, so the buffs will have caster level 18 or so. That'll keep the PCs from dispelling everything right off.


-Tatsu

 

[Tonguez]

They do this kind of thing in video games all the time (only deflected rays from its own eyes can harm it, or it is vulnerable only when it glows magenta).

I'd say use this. Most such monsters follow a pattern and the trick is simply following the pattern. So perhaps have an Otyugh who swims around under the much attacking with with tentacles but every third turn the tentacles come down and the monster rises up out of the water to take a breath (at which point the PCs can attack)

I used Bowser (King Koopa from the Mario) once as a half dragon giant turtle with an impervious shell. The only thing that could penetrate his shell DR was a pair of returning silver hammers

or perhaps have a situation where killing the monster isn't the objective - instead you have to trap it or make it go to a particular place.

Dagon from Conan the Destroyer is another option (and could apply to Constructs or other supernatural creatures) - the only way to stop it is to pull out the horn (as with Dagon) or similar (eg destroy the activation crystal, insert a chromium rod into its chest cavity etc)

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

In MM III, & Eberron they have a Template called Living Spell.

I decided to apply it to a Spectral Hand spell.

The living spectral hand spell is the size of a medium creature, and is incorporeal. Characters slamed or engulfed by the living spell take 1d4 dmg and a normal sized spectral hand appears with hp equal those the character lost.

The new spectral hand will then attack the character it came from. On a succesful touch attack by the hand, the character will loose 1d4 hp and another spectral hand will appear.

An observant character will notice that the "new" spectral hands match the character's own hands.

On a successfull concentration check (or constitution check, DC 10 +1 for each hand) a character can take control of the hands created from their hp and use them to attack the living spectral hand spell.

 

[the Jester]

Weird DR is another good way to go. Maybe one of the specific monsters the pcs must overcome has DR 30/salt or glass; to defeat it, the pcs must use a salt or glass (or other surprising material) sword that they recover along the way, thinking it is just a museum piece.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

Have the it glow magenta as you said for a brief moment on each of it's turns, when this happens it's DR is no longer 15/-. The PCs will have to ready actions and make a succesful dex check DC 10 to hit it when it's vulnerable.

 

[Runesong42]

One thing I did was take a page from the Final Fantasy series of games. When dealing with some BBEG's, you would have to attack parts of the enemy to disable them in order to affect the larger enemy. One common theme is orbs, or crystals, or what have you on either side of the boss -- one heals the boss, one dishes out strong magical attacks, and then the Boss does its 5 or 6 things. Or, 4 orbs create a field around the boss and they have to be disabled before the boss can be damaged. Or, the boss protects itself with magic-bouncing shields and you have to cast spells off your own magic-bouncing shields to hurt him.

As for lesser monsters, you could do the whole cinematic stand-between-two-monsters-with-ranged-attacks-and-dodge-out-of-the-way-as-they-both-attack-causing-each-monster-to-hit-one-another-and-destroy-one-another tactic.

Or, you could simply take stats from one monster and apply it to another. For example (and my favourite example), give kobolds the Regeneration ability and Fire Resistance 20. 'Trollbolds' can be fun all day, as most PCs are used to killing such feeble creatures by the hundreds... but having the same 6 or so regenerating and keep hounding the PC's is great fun. Give zombies the same powers as one of the oozes/slime/jellies, and let them hurl acid blobs from 100' away. Just go crazy, and give your players stuff they don't expect.