Special Conversion Thread: Finishing off the oozes

[Cleon]

Hmmm...

I'm almost thinking it would be easier to simply grant the imorph a +1 enhancement bonus to natural armor, a +1 racial bonus on saving throws, and a +1 racial bonus on attack rolls each round until it matches the morphed creature.

Thus, an imorph mimicking a troll would gain...

1st round: No natural armor (they are already the same), +1 attack, +1 Fort and Ref (Will is already superior to troll's)
2nd round: +1 attack, +1 Fort and Ref
3rd round: +1 attack, +1 Fort and Ref
4th round: +1 attack, +1 Fort (Reflex is now the same)

The trick is determining when it would take on the troll's attack modes and speed. We could just subtract the imorph's HD from the victim's to determine the number of round before full transformation occurs. Of course, that would make it gain the full troll abilities in one round, so my above example would be unnecessary.

I'm thinking imorphs should be able to take any shape, but only gain natural attacks and Ex abilities. So an imorph white dragon might gain claw, bite, wing buffets, and tail attacks, as well as icewalking, but wouldn't gain a breath weapon, spells, or SLAs.

We could but a HD cap of the creature it can mimic. Maybe double (or triple) the imorph's HD?

While I agree with treating the attacks & save bonuses as a racial bonus, I'd make the progression faster - although not AC, for reasons I've already given.

Maybe +3 attack, +2 armour and +1 saves per round.

A HD cap on the creature it can mimic makes sense but I'm not sure if it's worth bothering with since it may never take effect in play. They don't get extra HP, so it's highly unlikely they'd live long enough to imorph into a monster of over 10-15 HD, let alone a PC of such a high level (10-15th!).

Might as well throw the poor critter a bone and not give it an Imorphing HD cap, it'd have the advantage of making the power description less complicated.

As for copying natural attacks & Ex abilities, it depends how close you want to be to the source material. The original description says the monster does not adopt the mimicked creatures special abilities or attack forms, it just uses its own tentacle attacks although they look like weapons appropriate to the duplicated creature (the example is a pair of tentacle-attacks that appear to be a sword and a shield).

That still leaves the question of reach though, does an imorph tentacle pretending to be a longspear gain a 10' melee range?

 

[Cleon]

So no type limitation on shapes? Sounds fair. I definitely agree on natural attacks and Ex only.

I'd prefer it if they could only imitate natural, living creatures, so no Constructs, Elementals, Outsiders or Undead. Still haven't decided about Fey, Plants & Oozes, but I'd be game for saying it can copy them too. All the other types (Aberration, Animal, Dragon, Giant, Humanoid, Magical Beast, Monstrous Humanoid & Vermin) should be fair game.

 

[Cleon]

Here's my first shot at a write-up for the Imorphism power. I think it covers everything.

Imorphism (Su):
When engaged in melee an imorph begins to emulate its opponent, altering both its appearance and some of its combat abilities. If faced with more than one attacker, the imorph will select one at random to emulate. An imorph can emulate any living animal life with a defined shape that is within one size category of its own, thus a typical imorph can mimic any Aberration, Animal, Dragon, Fey, Giant, Humanoid, Magical Beast, Monstrous Humanoid & Vermin of Small to Large size.

At the end of each melee round of imorphism, the imorph's attack modifier, grapple check and armour class changes three points towards that of its emulated opponent, while its saving throws modifier changes by one point towards the emulated foe. At the same time, the imorph gradually changes shape until it appears identical to its opponent. The emulation is complete when the imorph has matched its foes primary attack, grapple, AC (including touch & flat-footed), Fort, Ref and Will saves, whereupon the creature instantly gains its foes movement rates, Size and reach. The hit points and other attributes of the imorph remain unchanged.

An imorph only assumes the external likeness of its opponent. Although it will grow appendages that mimic its opponent's weapons and limbs, they still attack with two tentacles for the listed damage, even though one tentacle may look like an arm wielding a sword and the other an arm holding a shield. The imorph can gain reach with its tentacle attacks if it completely emulates a creature of sufficient size, or one wielding a reach weapon.

The imorphism bonus or penalty to its scores is considered a racial adjustment for its attack, grapple, flat-footed AC and saves and a dodge bonus/penalty for its touch AC adjustment, if any. An imorph emulates its foes flat-footed AC before its touch AC, its full AC may include both a racial bonus from flat-footed AC and a dodge bonus from touch AC in order to match its emulated opponent.

If the original 'model' dies during melee, or retreats, the imorph will immediately start to alter in order to emulate another opponent. When the melee is over, or when the imorph is down to 8 hits or fewer, it will revert to its original form by the reverse process, changing attacks and AC by 3 point each per round and saving throws by 1 point per round.

 

[Shade]

That looks pretty good. While I agree with not emulating constructs or undead, I think they should be able to imitate outsiders. With elementals I'm can go either way.

 

[freyar]

I'm with Shade on the Outsiders. I don't care much about elementals, I guess.

I think we need to specify when in the round the change happens. At the end of the imorph's turn, I guess. It can start the first round it's engaged in melee (counting attempted attacks either by the imorph or the target), maybe.

 

[Cleon]

I'm with Shade on the Outsiders. I don't care much about elementals, I guess.

I think we need to specify when in the round the change happens. At the end of the imorph's turn, I guess. It can start the first round it's engaged in melee (counting attempted attacks either by the imorph or the target), maybe.

I'd nix the Outsiders and Elementals. In D&D (or AD&D) changing into either of those Types is an upper-tier ability, requiring the Shapechange spell, a high-level Druid or the like. It just seems inappropriate for a creature whose shapeshifting power level seems equivalent to AD&D Polymorph Self and some buff spells.

I think the power description of how its AC changes could use some work, how about:

The imorphism bonus or penalty to its scores is considered a racial adjustment for its attack, grapple, flat-footed AC and saves and a dodge bonus/penalty for its touch AC adjustment, if any. Its full AC may include both a racial bonus from flat-footed AC and a dodge bonus from touch AC in order to match its emulated opponent's. An imorph applies the AC adjustment from its imorphism power to its flat-footed AC before its touch AC, with any surplus points carrying over from flat-footed to touch AC until both completely match its emulated foe's.

Here's an example of how it works.

An imorph seeks to emulate a creature with AC 22 (flat-footed 19, touch 13).
In its first round of melee it has not yet applied any to adjustment, so its:
AC 15 (flat-footed 15, touch 10)(+5 natural)
In its second round of melee it ahs changed its AC by 3 points, applying all three points as a racial bonus to its flat-footed AC, so now its.
AC 18 (flat-footed 18, touch 10)(+5 natural plus +3 racial)
In the third round of melee it's changed its AC by 3 points again, the first point increases its flat-footed AC to match its foe. the other two points spill over into touch AC.
AC 21 (flat-footed 19, touch 12)(+5 natural plus +5 racial, +2 dodge)
In the fourth round of melee it could only change its AC by one point, since that's all it needed to match its opponent's touch AC.
AC 22 (flat-footed 19, touch 13)(+5 natural plus +5 racial, +3 dodge)

Now that still leaves us with a tricky corner case, what happens when the imorph is copying a creature which is worse in one or both of its AC stats.

I.e. a Huge, soft armourless creature with high Dex could be AC 13 (flat 8, touch 13). Does an AC 15 (flat-footed 15, touch 10) imorph retain its 5 points of natural armour and end up AC 18 (flat-footed 15, touch 13)? What about if its copying a touch but clumsy critter with AC 15 (flat 18, touch 7)? Does the imorph become AC 18 (flat 18, touch 10)?

To follow the description for complete emulation the imorph will need to apply penalties to its AC. How would this work? I'm thinking it would apply a mix of bonus & penalty - i.e. 2 points of bonus to one AC and one point of penalty to the other, or 2 penalty & 1 bonus if necessary - but writing explicit rules for this may be tricky.

E.g. an imorph copying a AC 17 (flat-footed 20, touch 7) may go.
Round 1 - AC 15 (flat-footed 15, touch 10)
Round 2 - AC 16 (flat-footed 17, touch 9) +2 racial, -1 dodge
Round 3 - AC 17 (flat-footed 19, touch 8) +2 racial, -1 dodge
Round 4 - AC 17 (flat-footed 20, touch 7) +1 racial, -1 dodge, AC emulation finished.

 

[Shade]

I'd nix the Outsiders and Elementals. In D&D (or AD&D) changing into either of those Types is an upper-tier ability, requiring the Shapechange spell, a high-level Druid or the like. It just seems inappropriate for a creature whose shapeshifting power level seems equivalent to AD&D Polymorph Self and some buff spells.

I think those limitations aren't necessary, since the imorph only mimics the attacks, not the special abilities. Most outsiders have a shape similar to mortal creatures, so I don't see why they couldn't imitate their arms and jaws. Constructs and undead, being unliving, might not "register on its radar", while elementals are often somewhat amorphous.

For the AC, I think that might be a tad too complex. How about just a flat racial bonus to AC, which would function for both touch and flat-footed as well? It may result in the imorph having a slightly higher touch or flat-footed AC than what it resembles, but that would help offset not gaining increased Dexterity. Thoughts?

 

[freyar]

If the imorphs can't do oozes, I'd say they can't do elementals, esp as elementals may not register as living in the normal sense, either. But I agree with Shade on Outsiders.

I also have to agree with Shade on the AC. The original text can't be clear about the flat-footed and touch ACs bc they didn't exist in 2e, so I think we should interpret this as simply as possible. It's a complicated enough critter.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

If we're letting the imorph copy outsiders, then I think it should be allowed to copy plants as well.

 

[Cleon]

If we're letting the imorph copy outsiders, then I think it should be allowed to copy plants as well.

More to the point, if it can copy Aberrations it makes sense if it can do Plants and Oozes as well, since they all have wildly different biologies to regular living monsters. As for Outsiders I don't think they all have a biology like most material plane creatures. But if Shade fancies including Outsiders, then I won't kick up any more fuss.

That would mean an imorph can duplicate anything except for Undead, Constructs or Elementals. Oh, and Swarms too I suppose, since it can only copy one creature.

As for the AC, feel free to make it a flat racial bonus. I can always save the more complicated form (and nixing imorphing outsiders) for use at home.