Special Conversion Thread: Moldvay's Undead

[demiurge1138]

Keep ray of doom, keep it at 2d6 plus sickened.

 

[freyar]

Keep ray of doom, keep it at 2d6 plus sickened.

That would be my vote, as well. Probably the original description was just sloppy language, but there's enough wiggle room to give her a little help. She's just not quite strong or interesting enough otherwise as a unique monster, I think.

 

[Shade]

Updated.

Environment: Temperate hills?

Organization: Solitary (with Black Annis' Cat) or covey (Black Annis and her cat plus 2 hags of any kind plus 1–8 ogres and 1–4 evil giants)?

Challenge Rating: x (A normal annis is CR 6; HD advancement alone should bring her to 7)

Treasure: x (A normal annis has standard)

 

[Cleon]

Updated.

Environment: Temperate hills?

Organization: Solitary (with Black Annis' Cat) or covey (Black Annis and her cat plus 2 hags of any kind plus 1–8 ogres and 1–4 evil giants)?

Challenge Rating: x (A normal annis is CR 6; HD advancement alone should bring her to 7)

Treasure: x (A normal annis has standard)

Your suggested Environment and Organization look good to me.

I'd think Challenge Rating at least 8. She's got a couple of effective 3/day SLA's (confusion and dispel magic) plus spell resistance, and her cat's presumably included in her CR.

As for treasure, I'd leave it at standard. If I remember my AD&D treasure tables, the original's type I, X is nothing special.

 

[demiurge1138]

The cat shouldn't be included in her CR. But if the cat's CR is 6, it'll make for a nice little EL 9 encounter with her and her cat if she's CR 8.

 

[freyar]

CR 8 is probably reasonable. I guess we shouldn't treat the cat as a familiar, so it should have a separate CR.

The rest of the suggestions seem right.

 

[Cleon]

The cat shouldn't be included in her CR. But if the cat's CR is 6, it'll make for a nice little EL 9 encounter with her and her cat if she's CR 8.

Well I thought that since the Organizations of both imply they're always together, their CR would take that into account. Maybe add a note that she's normally an EL9 because her cat's with her?

 

[freyar]

Well I thought that since the Organizations of both imply they're always together, their CR would take that into account. Maybe add a note that she's normally an EL9 because her cat's with her?

I feel like this is semantics, but Black Annis would be CR 8, but the encounter of them both would be EL 9. But that might be a helpful reminder for DMs. Of course, a wizard's familiar has no CR but is folded into the wizard's CR. That makes things nice and confusing here.

 

[Shade]

Updated.

Black Annis stands 10 feet all and weighs about x pounds. (An annis stands some 8 feet all and weighs about 325 pounds.)

 

[Cleon]

Updated.

Black Annis stands 10 feet all and weighs about x pounds. (An annis stands some 8 feet all and weighs about 325 pounds.)

Well if her proportions are identical to a regular Annis she works out around 640 pounds. However, Black Annis is no stronger than a regular Annis, which suggests she's either rather flabby compared to a regular annis or extremely gaunt. The latter seems appropriate considering her tomb-tainted quality, so I'm tempted to cut her weight to 500-575 pounds (equivalent to 100-120 lbs if she were 6' tall).

Either works OK for me, but somewhere in the 500-650 pounds range looks about right.