The Immortals Handbook

[Upper_Krust]

Hiya mate!

I think you're greatly overestimating the mechanical efficiency of medieval crossbows.

Possibly, however I was just running the idea up the flagpole to see if anyone saluted it.

Modern crosbows would be hard-pressed to show such efficiency!

I'd halve the added damage and use a base d8: light 1d8+2 (standard), medium 1d8+5 (full round), heavy 1d10+7 (two rounds), or something like that.

Converting that into draw weight we get (approx.):

Light = 62 lbs
Medium = 125 lbs
Heavy = 250 lbs

What size are X-Bow Bolts? *Looks around the net* About 6 inches to 15 inches for bolts and 30 inches for arrows.

So perhaps 1d6 for 3 inch darts (Hand X-bow), 1d8 for 6 inch bolts (Light X-Bow) and 1d12 (or 2d6) for 15 inch bolts (Heavy X-Bow). With 2d8 base for arrows? Also 1d10 for Medium X-Bows (10 inch bolts?). Javelin would be 4d6.

With the release of the IH, there will be three sources for epic-level monsters: the ELH (60 monsters, CR 5 to 57; 4 templates),

Well half a dozen of those monsters were not actually epic and there were a lot of 'near-duplicates' (Lavawight-Winterwight; Shape of Fire/Shadow of the Void; Devastation Vermin - various; Primal Elementals)

Legends of Avadnu (11 monsters, CR 20 to 30; 2 templates),

I read your review of that, I'll probably buy it when the credit card business gets sorted very shortly.

and the IH itself (61 monsters, CR 20 to 2000; 9 templates).

Actually I just double checked its 60 monsters and 9 Templates.

There's not a whole lot out there. Maybe you can release a Bestiary II if the first is a success (after the other 3 PDFs, of course)?

That would be the plan, a lone epic/immortal bestiary could of course have many more pages. Although I think the numbers in the IH are pretty good and I think more than 100 pages for a pdf can be seen as unwieldy.

Regardless, thanks for the information.

Your welcome.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Well half a dozen of those monsters were not actually epic and there were a lot of 'near-duplicates' (Lavawight-Winterwight; Shape of Fire/Shadow of the Void; Devastation Vermin - various; Primal Elementals)

Of the monsters in the ELH, I use 35 out of 64*, or 55%. As long as I use at least 38 of your monsters it'll be more useful to me than the ELH.

I don't actually like any of the repeated monsters, so they're in the 'useless' part of the ELH for me.

Edit: I use 77% of the Legends of Avadnu monsters, but I'm more likely to use their templates on my own creatures than the ELH templates -- Bygone and Scion of Krug vs. Pseudonatural and Paragon?

* Including sample template creatures

 

[Anabstercorian]

I'd halve the added damage and use a base d8: light 1d8+2 (standard), medium 1d8+5 (full round), heavy 1d10+7 (two rounds), or something like that.

Converting that into draw weight we get (approx.):

Light = 62 lbs
Medium = 125 lbs
Heavy = 250 lbs

What size are X-Bow Bolts? *Looks around the net* About 6 inches to 15 inches for bolts and 30 inches for arrows.

So perhaps 1d6 for 3 inch darts (Hand X-bow), 1d8 for 6 inch bolts (Light X-Bow) and 1d12 (or 2d6) for 15 inch bolts (Heavy X-Bow). With 2d8 base for arrows? Also 1d10 for Medium X-Bows (10 inch bolts?). Javelin would be 4d6.

That sounds reasonable, more or less. Not realistic (nothing can really be realistic, given how many places you can hit someone without doing any real immediate damage) but certainly reasonable.

I'd say that you'd need some sort of rule that you can't leave the crossbow cocked for this to be balanced. The string would lose elasticity, or the bow would. That way you force someone using this to accept the difficulty inherent in reloading them as a cost of using them in combat, as well as making them even more of a 'wizard' weapon. The more you know about when and what you will be fighting, the handier they are.

 

[historian]

Hey S'mon and Krust!

Well Power Attack is your friend here. But obviously a 6' being can't kill a planet by hitting it, no matter how strong.

You've never seen me with my infinity gauntlet on. . In all seriousness, it is physically possible. A rules question though -- can you add more to your power attack than your base strength bonus? I think the answer is no, even if your BAB would allow it, but I'm not 100% certain.

I'm more interested in the scaling parameters themselves than actually playing such a character, but if the event is a logical possibility, my feeling is that it should be explainable within the context of the rules. This is one of the major reasons why Krust's IH project is so interesting.

That said, I must admit I'm more of a rues-lite player and DM. I just want everything to make sense. My feeling is that the IH will cover all of the bases on both fronts (I'll probably purchase the thing twice in any event to repay UK for all of the questions he has answered).

On that note S'mon, I recently read Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons." I'm normally not into this kind of book (my mother-in-law insisted that I read it) but the lead "bad guy" Janus, the leader of the Illuminati, is a compelling character -- I could provide a homebrew outline of stats if it would be helpful. I'm wondering what insights you and Krust would be willing to share on how to run a campaign of this sort (strategy big-time over force) and what thoughts you may have on up-scaling this "Janus" character (maybe even beyond greater god) without losing the flavor of subterfuge.

Thanks in advance guys.

 

[Anabstercorian]

A rules question though -- can you add more to your power attack than your base strength bonus? I think the answer is no, even if your BAB would allow it, but I'm not 100% certain.

You sure can add more to your power attack than your base strength bonus! What made you think you couldn't?

 

[Alzrius]

#1: Heroes fight and lose to Villain.
#2: Heroes come back stronger and win, damage the villain done is reset by the Dragonballs (Big wish stones).
#3: Villain comes back stronger or new villain is introduced and kicks the heroes @sses.
#4: Heroes come back stronger and win.
#5+: Repeat ad infinitum until people both the heroes and villains are wiping out galaxies.

To be fair, a significantly large number of good guy/bad guy shows use this method, just on a much smaller power scale.

I think its trump card is that the character design is so good and so outlandish that you tune in to see how ridiculous things can get and how they top the last fights.

I find it interesting to hear you say that, since DBZ is the IH of anime. Simply put, no other show deals (at least not as the main cast) with characters who have that level of power - most others that I've seen stop at characters who can crack a planet, if not before. I found it refreshing to see a show that pushed the envelope so much farther. The fact that it needed that many episodes to resolve the larger fights seemed only right because of that - you can't do justice to that much power in a single 24-minute episode.

 

[Fieari]

Well, FLCL (Furi Kuri, Fooly Kooly, whatever they're calling it now) had more powerful characters... Atomsk the Pirate King is an energy being so powerful that he "steals entire star systems." He effortlessly defeats war machines that would flatten the entire planet in the final episode, and that fight scene with guitar vs. guitar was awesome... DBZ levels of epicness with none of the simplemindedness.

FLCL is one of the weirdest anime I've seen, and one I have DEEP respect for. It's revealing of the plot works like this:

It displays situation A. To understand A, you must understand B, which is displayed next, but not explained. To understand B, you must understand C, which is displayed next, but not explained. To understand C... and so on. You can't understand ANY of what's going on until the very final piece is given to you, and then it all cascades downwards causing everything to make sense. At the same time, it's wonderfully allegorical and chock full of literary meaning. I love that show.

 

[S'mon]

You sure can add more to your power attack than your base strength bonus! What made you think you couldn't?

Per the PHB the only limiter is your Base Attack Bonus, and I think an ELH FAQ says that Epic Attack Bonus should be counted as BAB for this purpose.

Funnily enough, although I am the originator of the Worship Points System and am a big fan of deity-level play, I'm not at all a fan of galaxy-smashing or even planet-smashing antics, my model for deity play is myth like the Iliad where gods and mortal heroes contend on the same terms. I like god-PCs to very much have human concerns, not how many planets they can eat before breakfast. I much prefer Norse and Greek myth to Vedic or Buddhist, mostly for this reason. Likewise I love the idea of matching D&D-scaled gods and dragons against realistically-scaled technological weaponry and discovering that 1e AD&D Odin might make short work of a Panzer-IV but is heavily outclassed by an M1 Abrams.

 

[S'mon]

Oh BTW it's worth mentioning that Thrin's 1e stats listed in the IH page are his official GM-authorised stats, but the 3e stats stats for Thrin that Craig's planning to include in the published IH will be his own unofficial interpretation developed in line with the IH rules and to fit with the deity power levels in 3e D&DG, we've discussed Thrin's Level (I think he gets 80 levels total in 3e) but AFAIK he doesn't plan to have the whole stat block authorised by me pre-publication.
I would have to wait to see the stats before I decided whether those would be the stats I'd use for Thrin were he to appear in my campaign under 3e rules (which is not something I'm planning to happen in the near future, but it's always possible someone might attack him in Asgard or something!)
At the close of our 1e/2e campaign play, Thrin was a Lesser power with a good way to go before he made the next divine rank (Greater God, as per the 1e AD&D ranking system - no Intermediates back then); in combat ability he was superior to his patron Tyr, but still inferior to Odin and Thor (all 3 Greater Gods in 1e L&L), I'd expect his 3e stats to reflect that.

 

[S'mon]

BTW Thrin's 162% Magic Resistance included a big boost from the Sword of Thrin AIR, specifically the Akarian Emerald in its pommel. The Sword Of Thrin was a 13,000-year-old artifact initially wielded by the first Lord Thrin, the lieutenant of the elven commander Corethion in the Dark-Light wars that banished the demon-worshipping Dark Elves from the surface of Ea.