Return of Creature by Poll - The Creature thus Far

[Shade]

It will definitely have the opportunity to do some melee hurtin' and crack some nuts!

 

[BOZ]

Ow!

 

[Shade]

We'll need to start looking at the special abilities and determining whether they need modifications, and which forms they will work in.

For example, I don't think it should be able to use opportunist while in swarm form. Any disagreements?

Knight Otu, I believe, recommeded a modification to the arcane fire ability in another thread. Could you repost it here? (If it was someone else's idea, I apologize).

 

[Knight Otu]

Earlier this thread, actually. In the More Special Abilities thread, however, I recommended a few more modifications. Here's the part from this thread, the other will be added shortly.

Opportunist and Precise Strike would likely only be available in coalesced form. In that form, it might have a natural rapier attack.

For arcane fire, it would be useful for the creature to have spell-like abilities. That way, we can use most of the text. Rename the ability to needle strike, dealing piercing damage, subject to DR?

 

[Knight Otu]

Here we go:

To go with the imagery I posted in the Creature so Far thread, I'd suggest two alterations to the abilities I voted on:
1 - Make Retribution melee attacks only.
2 - Make penetration to be "Any material" - adamantium, silver, cold iron, plus whatever custom material DR exists in the campaign world.

 

[Shade]

Cool, thanks.

So any support or opposition support for these ideas? Any other suggestions?

I agree with retribution for melee only and penetration as any special material. Precise strike really only makes sense in coalesced form.

Another idea I had for arcane fire would be a form of ranged retribution, where its arcane fire ability would only be powered by spells that target it, similar to spell turning.

 

[Shade]

The last poll determined that the creature gets iterative attacks. Vote now for how many.

 

[Shade]

Pitch your ideas for what form its natural weaponry should take, and we'll put 'em to a poll.

The ideas so far...

Gear-Chains: Can be used for trip/disarm attacks.

Sword-Arms: Function as rapiers.

Nearly-Completely Morphic Weapons: May form any light or one-handed manufactured weapon as its natural weapon.

Completely Morphic Weapons: May form any manufactured weapon as its natural weapon. Two-handed weapons may be formed by a combination of "arms".

 

[Mortis]

I favour the 'Nearly Completely Morphic Weaponry' and would steer clear of 2-handed weapons - although I wouldn't be adverse to oversized 1-handed weapons.

Regards
Mortis

 

[Conaill]

We should probably specify melee weapons in the "morphic" categories. I wouldn't want it to start morphing a crossbow...

For balance, we may also want to specify only weapons from the PHB weapons table. Otherwise, every wacked-out munchkin supplement will make this critter more powerful.

Also note that 2-handed weapons aren't really unblanaced in the "morphic" scenario. A critter with multiple natural attacks is a bit like a character optimized for Two Weapon Fighting. Multiple natural attacks are so effective that it would rarely pay off to give up one of them in exchange for using a 2-handed weapon.


So my vote is for:

Completely Morphic Weapons: May form any manufactured melee weapon from the PHB as its natural weapon. Two-handed weapons may be formed by a combination of "arms".