I've been finding this table to be just a little more cumbersome than I would have liked, and I don't think I'll need it in the future, but I think it's an awesome spell, and in some ways I think the fact that I don't want to use it in the future is a testament to how effective it was. Writing these up has helped me get a better sense of how to put together a stat block and how relatively dangerous a given creature is. Of course I won't know for sure until I put it to the test, but for now I'm pretty happy with this as an exercise. In the future I might just use the metamorphica to get ideas for special abilities and tweak the stats by intuition. I like in Cypher system how all enemies and NPCs have stats that can be generated from a single number, and then tweaked for effect. For the most part, I didn't touch the AC (armor class), AT (# of attacks), or DMG (damage) stats unless I rolled something which affected those stats, but in practice I might tweak them a bit.
As always, I'd love to hear what people think of the creatures, but even more than that, please let me know if you think the statblocks and abilities are reasonable or appropriate!
IMPORTANT: If you're going to be in the one-shot, DON'T READ THIS UNTIL AFTERWARDS! I may not even use any of these creatures (although I've grown attached to a few of them), but just to be safe...
Creatures (1d20) | Appearance | Thoughts/Behaviors | Statblock | Special Abilities / Additional Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
1. Aquorum | An amorphous blob. A prokaryote-like impossible organism, unstable in physical space. Clones sprout on its surface which explode on impact. | A simplistic organism that operates on the most basic a-logical equivalent of stimulus-response. | HD 1, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 2. | HDd6 anti-information explosion on contact. |
2. Impossible Impostor Crab | A hermit crab-like creature, wrapped in the discarded/dead absolute solid shell and claw/gauntlets of an impossible organism. | Behaves like an exaggerated hermit crab, full of jealousy and spite. | HD 1, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 3. | Immune to physical attacks. Double movement. Attack can induce anti-love or ennui. Not an impossible organism, but has somehow adapted to absolute solid. |
3. Magi-SLIME | A jade-colored, frosty-cold SLIME with a meridian metal core. | Behaves animal-like. Will try to flee, only fights if cornered. Its body is dangerously cold. | HD 2, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 2. | Half movement. Its meridian core is worth 500sp. Occasionally also contains a spell (if so, it can use the spell too...) |
4. DNEa | A double-helix shaped creature which writhes like a snake. | Will attempt to constrict its prey and inject a virus. | HD 2, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 5. | Can constrict its enemies. Its bite releases a virus (treat as poison) which won't heal naturally. If an infected creature dies, it will immediately turn into another DNEa. |
5. Cognetic of the Unknown | A creature levitating from its own electromagnetic field. Looks like neural tissue, but not in the shape of any known or plausible brain. | Aggressive creatures which roam in packs known as "fields", given their combined electromagnetism. | HD 3, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 4. | Immune to electricity. |
6. Shit-Shroom | An unassuming patch of bioluminescent fungi, which is actually an impossible organism feeding off a pile of excrement of another impossible organism. | Emits a strong, enticing, savory aroma. As prey approach, it releases gases which explode, spraying fecal matter. Can uproot and flee if necessary, but will generally not move unless it must. | HD 3, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 5. | On successful hit, the gas and fecal matter induce confusion. |
7. Creepy-Crawler | A creepy-crawly creature camouflaged as a large bundle of seaweed. | Waits for prey to step on it, then attempts to grapple them. Covered in sticky slime. | HD 4, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 5. | Its slime can slow a target (10 rounds to generate more slime). |
8. Void Elemental | A vantablack void orb with thorny tendrils. It is not clear if this is an organism, construct, or the platonic concept of null. | Suction cups on the trendrils create mini-black hole vacuums. | HD 4, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 6. | Immune to physical attack. Can cast Darkness (at will). |
9. Pseudo-Zapatotian | A thick vine with tentacle-like branches. Generally grows on trees and large fungi. | The vine reflexively dangles its resin-covered tentacle-branches over climbers. | HD 5, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 6. | Target of successful attack takes DMG-die -1 damage each turn until the DMG-die reaches < d4, from resin on the tentacle-branches. |
10. Kirboid | A transparent balloon-like creature with rudder-like fin-hands. | Will meander over to slow-moving or unaware creatures and swallow them whole. Can replace its normal attack with an attack / special ability of a digested creature (1d4 turns to digest). | HD 5, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 8. | Can swallow creatures whole (on nat 20 or hitting by >= 10). If punctured, summons a random creature or induces a temporary (or sometimes permanent) mutation on swallowed creature. |
11. Djinn | A dogu-like being of pure energy, softly humming. | Mysterious and inexplicable in its behavior. When it attacks, its tail punctures and injects painful, pure energy. | HD 6, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d8, CL 11. | Immune to normal attacks and wood. Can cast prismatic sphere (at will). |
12. Camelbug | An insectoid impossible organism covered in rubbery lumps. | The lumps carry reserves of liquid starfire. Prior to release it behaves manically and aggressively. After popping the lumps and releasing aerosolized liquid starfire, is more docile. | HD 6, AC 14, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 8. | Can cast incendiary cloud (at will). |
13. Spreading Shadow | An ethereal mass in the shadows, spreading shadow-pseudopods. Claws reach out to prey from the shadow. | The shadow is actually a pocket dimension. From within, it hums. The walls feel like fur or moss-covered chitin. The fur-like cilia push and pull at the objects within. | HD 7, AC 14, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 9. | Blurred (first defense always successful) |
14. Wild Blood Golem | A finned, quadrupedal marine-humanoid composed of necromantic blood. It is blue like the photo-negative of red. Blood-mist pours from its teeth. | Its negative color provides it some camouflage in water. It can walk on land but is better suited to swimming, or sliding in its blood-mist drool. | HD 7, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 10. | Immune to normal attacks. Haste (on self). |
15. Rebirther Bug | Insectoid machine, drips psycho-caustic fluids from its great, fanged maw. | Its fluids impregnate micromachines into its prey, converting the creature into a clone of itself. | HD 8, AC 14, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 13. | Impregnates (poison save). Chaos (at will, one at a time). |
16. Harbinger of the Anti-Mutants. | A baroque, marble and metallic, neon, psychedelic super-platonic polyhedron so dense as to be nearly indistinguishable from a sphere. Has four sets of wings made of a similar material as its body. Occasionally displays a holographic projection of a stretched humanoid face on its surface. | Its wings operate on a-logical, impossigenic mechanics, to "lift" through the paraverse. It will not attempt to injure a foe unless provoked, but will try to wipe its memory. The process seems to facilitate anti-mutation. | HD 8, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 12. | Memory wipe on successful hit (no damage). Possibility of inducing anti-mutation 1d4 days after memory wipe. Supernatural intelligence. Immune to physical attacks. |
17. Shit-Shroom Shambler | A shit-shroom which has grown over centuries or even millennia. A rot-covered, slimy, fungal shambler, covered in malformed lumps filled with liquid starfire, sores, and a hard, glowing, fungal shell. | A critical-mass of shit-shroom growth. Spews spores not just for reproduction, but as a dispersed neural network, allowing it to coordinate with other shit-shrooms. Its lumps can explode in a wall of liquid starfire to trap prey. All shamblers are part of one distributed network from another universe. | HD 9, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 12. | Causes disease on hit. Wall of (liquid star-)Fire (at will, one at a time). |
18. Acid Ant Swarm | Ant-like creatures with psychedelic swirling patterns on their back, dripping hallucinogenic fluids from their antennae over their entire body. | The acid ants swarm together, surfing along currents of their own psychedelic fluids. The swarm can reach the size of a tsunami. Their screams aerosolize the fluids. | HD 9, AC 14, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 11. | Psionic Scream (autohit 30', 1d6 DMG, magic save or slowed) |
19. The Give-and-Taking Tree | A giant coral- or tree-like creature with flowing colors and reflective flower-like appendages. | The flowing colors attract prey, and the reflective flowers create hostile duplicates of the observer. | HD 10, AC 12, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 13. | Phantasmal Force (at will, 1d6 at a time). |
20. Katamarinu | An elephantine, wolf-like creature with a narwhal-like horn, covered in bony thorn armour. | Its horn and thorny bone armour is covered in an adhesive fluid. Its pores release more fluid as more objects stick to, exponentiating its all-encompassing destructive capability. It drains the life and nutrients from the objects stuck to it. | HD 10, AC 16, AT 1, DMG 1d6, CL 13. | Move 180', drain CON 1d4 on successful hit |
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