Special Conversion Thread: Finishing off the oozes

[freyar]

If we guess that Medium is about 5 ft and these are 32x smaller, that gives us 2-3 inches.

 

[Shade]

Sounds good.

Shall we tackle the Silatics next, since there's some interest in them?

 

[freyar]

Sure!

 

[Shade]

Silatic, Platinum
CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Space
FREQUENCY: Rare
ORGANIZATION: Solitary
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Any
DIET: See below
INTELLIGENCE: Low (5)
TREASURE: L (x10)
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
NO. APPEARING: 1
ARMOR CLASS: 3
MOVEMENT: 6
HIT DICE: 10+1
THAC0: 11
NO. OF ATTACKS: 2
DAMAGE/ATTACK: 1d6+7
SPECIAL ATTACKS: See below
SPECIAL DEFENSES: +1 or better weapons to hit
MAGIC RESISTANCE: 30%
SIZE: M (6')
MORALE: Steady (12)
LEVEL/XP VALUE: 4,000

Silatic, Gold
CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Space
FREQUENCY: Rare
ORGANIZATION: Solitary
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Any
DIET: See below
INTELLIGENCE: Low (5)
TREASURE: M (x10)
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
NO. APPEARING: 1
ARMOR CLASS: 9
MOVEMENT: 12
HIT DICE: 9+1
THAC0: 11
NO. OF ATTACKS: 3
DAMAGE/ATTACK: 1d6+4
SPECIAL ATTACKS: See below
SPECIAL DEFENSES: +1 or better weapons to hit
MAGIC RESISTANCE: 30%
SIZE: M (6')
MORALE: Steady (12)
LEVEL/XP VALUE: 3,000

Silatic, Iron
CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Space
FREQUENCY: Rare
ORGANIZATION: Solitary
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Any
DIET: See below
INTELLIGENCE: Low (5)
TREASURE: J (x10)
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
NO. APPEARING: 1
ARMOR CLASS: 5
MOVEMENT: 6
HIT DICE: 6+1
THAC0: 15
NO. OF ATTACKS: 3
DAMAGE/ATTACK: 1d6+7
SPECIAL ATTACKS: See below
SPECIAL DEFENSES: +1 or better weapons to hit
MAGIC RESISTANCE: 75%
SIZE: M (6')
MORALE: Steady (12)
LEVEL/XP VALUE: 975

Silatics are amorphous blobs, 5-7' in diameter, that eat metal. Continuously shifting and quivering, they use their two pseudopods to test substances for edibility. The silatic's diet consists solely of the metal they are made of. For example, a platinum silatic eats only platinum. Silatics innately detect the metal they eat within a 100' range.

Silatics hide well, for they can stretch as thin as 1" thick. They need no air to survive and prefer wildspace to planets. In wildspace they are almost graceful, fanning their thinned bodies to move slowly. As soon as gravity takes hold, though, gracefulness disappears; their pseudopods pull them along the ground.

Combat: The silatic's two pseudopods administer bludgeoning damage of 1d6+4. Each adult silatic's pseudopod can extend to 50'. They attack only if disturbed while eating or prevented from feeding. Usually, one pseudopod remains attached to the food while the other attacks an opponent. If injured, the silatic detaches from the food source and attacks the offender with both pseudopods.

There are three known types of silatics: gold, platinum, and iron. (A fourth, silver, is rumored.) Each has a special attack.

Iron: +3 bonus to damage; high magic resistance.
Gold: Moves faster than other silatics, gaining one extra attack per round.
Platinum: +3 bonus to damage; also, the platinum silatic coats its pseudopod with acid.

If it hits, the character takes an additional 2d8 damage (save vs. poison for half damage). A silatic eats by attaching a pseudopod to its meal, excreting a liquid that dissolves the metal, and absorbing it through the skin. IT takes three rounds to administer the liquid and three to absorb the liquefied metal. The liquid is harmless to living beings. Metal of the silatic's type saves vs. acid at -5. Metal not of the silatic's type saves at -2.

If a silatic senses metal within a wooden-hulled ship, it first tries to sneak aboard. If this fails, it batters a hold in the ship near the metal inside. Against metal ships, a silatic inflicts 1 hull point per turn; against wood, it inflicts normal damage.

Habitat/Society: Silatics are solitary, avoiding other beings by hiding in "uninhabitable" places. Silatics of the same type exhibit instant hostility and fight to the death.

Gravs and most space miners kill silatics on sight. Residents of inhabited worlds hunt down silatics relentlessly. Once a gold silatic got into the gold reserves of a major city, reproduced, and soon dozens were oozing around, searching for more gold to devour. The entire city's economy collapsed because gold became too scarce--all because of one hungry silatic.

Ecology: Silatics have no spelljamming ability. To move from world to world, they stow away on ships, often on the outer hull.

When a silatic absorbs enough metal (around 100 lbs), it seeks out an uninhabited area and splits in two. The two new silatics, each 3-1/2' wide, are dazed and instinctively move in opposite directions. Five hours after splitting, they regain their senses and search for food. If the reproduction occurs in a confined space, the two silatics fight to the death upon regaining their senses.

If a silatic is killed, only the metal eaten in the last week can be recovered (usually 1d10 lbs. per Hit Die). All other material dissolves into a jelly-like substance.

From MC9 (1991).

 

[freyar]

Ooh, these seem fun. Shall we do them separately, and do we want to fill in the rumored fourth silatic?

 

[Shade]

We can probably work on them in tandem a bit, as so little changes between types. We should probably nail down all the special abilities first, then work on Homebrewing based on Hit Dice and so forth.

Yeah, we can do the silver's if you'd like.

 

[freyar]

Sure, we can add something to spelljammer lore!

The first common trait I see is the pseudopod attack. Each silatic has two, and they seem to do 1d6+1-1/2 Str bludgeoning and 2d8 acid damage each (or maybe the acid should be poison?). Want to stick with those numbers?

 

[Big Mac]

Shall we tackle the Silatics next, since there's some interest in them?

Yay! At last something I actually have some sort of knowledge about!

The following Beyond the Moons pages might be helpful:
Monsters in Spelljammer (from Chapter 5 of the forthcoming SJ monster conversion book)
Monster Skills and Feats

I would like to eventually see the Silatics done as separate monsters, but there are so many similar things that I think that parallel conversions might help.

Looking at the blurb, it says they don't spelljam. So I don't think that these creatures should get BtM's Natural Spelljammer (Su). I see them swimming slowly across wildspace over periods of years.

The blurb says: "In wildspace they are almost graceful, fanning their thinned bodies to move slowly." So it would be nice for them to have the Tactical Rating (Su) while in space. As soon as they hit gravity, that SU becomes useless and they would fall to the deck of a ship (or the surface of a planet) and become the more blob like creatures that people fight.

Sure, we can add something to spelljammer lore!

The first common trait I see is the pseudopod attack. Each silatic has two, and they seem to do 1d6+1-1/2 Str bludgeoning and 2d8 acid damage each (or maybe the acid should be poison?). Want to stick with those numbers?

Don't forget that these guys are obsessed with eating the metal they are made from. They only attack with both pseudopods if actually damaged. Otherwise they will do one attack and carry on eating. I'm a bit doubtful of the 1d6 + 4 damage quoted in the original blurb as all three silactics have different damage listed in the stats above the blurb. Does your 1d6+1-1/2 Str equasion work for all three types? (I'm assuming you will design Str scores to make the equasion work.)

The blurb says: "A silatic eats by attaching a pseudopod to its meal, excreting a liquid that dissolves the metal, and absorbing it through the skin. It takes three rounds to administer the liquid and three to absorb the liquefied metal. The liquid is harmless to living beings." So I'm not too sold on the "2d8 acid damage". I think that instead these guys should do 2d8 acid damage to metal only.

EDIT: My mistake - Platinum Silactics (but not the others) do make acid attcks.

Alternatively they could do double damage or critical hits to any metalic cretures.

You might also want to give them an ability similar to sunder that lets them grab and start to eat metal weapons, (instead of acid damage against living creatures).

I actually think it would be more fun if instead of being disolved alive, a heavily armored knight ended up practically naked and bashing the silactic with rocks, chairs and anything else they couldn't eat before his eyes. I think this is an area where these creatures really feel different to other oozes.

EDIT: If you are actually thinking about making the legendary silver silactic, I wonder if it might be worth making a Silactic Template that allows you to use various metals to create new variants. That way DMs could make creatures that eat any sort of metal that is important in their campaigns. (A Dragonmetal Silactic on Krynn would be something that could be a "doomsday weapon".)

 

[Big Mac]

I've been thinking about the "replacement" for the Silactic's acid.

How about we change this:

Acid (Ex)
The creature secretes a digestive acid that dissolves organic material and metal quickly, but does not affect stone. Any melee hit or constrict attack deals acid damage, and the opponent’s armor and clothing dissolve and become useless immediately unless they succeed on DC 21 Reflex saves. A metal or wooden weapon that strikes a black pudding also dissolves immediately unless it succeeds on a DC 21 Reflex save. The save DCs are Constitution-based.

The pudding’s acidic touch deals 21 points of damage per round to wooden or metal objects, but the ooze must remain in contact with the object for 1 full round to deal this damage.

Into something more like this:

Digest Metal (Ex)
The creature secretes a digestive fluid that dissolves metal quickly as if it was acid, but does not affect organic material or stone. Any melee hit or constrict attack deals acid damage, and the opponent’s armor dissolves and become useless immediately unless they succeed on DC 21 Reflex saves. A metal weapon that strikes a silactic also dissolves immediately unless it succeeds on a DC 21 Reflex save. The save DCs are Constitution-based.

The silactic’s acidic touch deals 21 points of damage per round to metal objects, but the ooze must remain in contact with the object for 1 full round to deal this damage.

EDIT: I've just noticed that the Platinum Silactic does get an acid attack. Maybe we just need a non-acid attack for the other types of Silactic.

We could give the Platinum Silactic an acid attack that is more like the Black Pudding and give the other two Silactic's a more watered down Digest Metal ability. (Unless the Black Pudding acid attack is too much. If that is the case, I'd stick with giving them all Digest Metal and go with freyar's idea for something that only the Platinum Silactic does.)

I think that each creature could probably get a different DC for the saving throws. I'm not sure what the numbers should be, but given that the Platinum Silactic has the highest XP value (and HD) and can disolve non-metal objects, I'd be inclined to make that highest. The Gold Silactic could have a slightly lower DC and the Iron Silactic should have a much lower DC.

 

[Shade]

Digest Metal looks good.

Before I forget, I think only the gold is supposed to have two attacks, despite the stat block stating the iron has two as well, since the text indicates "Gold: Moves faster than other silatics, gaining one extra attack per round".