Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Amaril 04-09-07, 11:03 AM	I was prepping for the later encounters in the final venue for Whispers of the Vampire's Blade, and I had the idea of replacing all of the critters with Kythons (Book of Vile Darkness) of appropriate CR. (The PCs might even find a room filled with eggs.) As for the origins of Kythons, I figured since the Daelkyr War followed well after the Age of Demons that the Daelkyr altered remnant fiends to become Kythons, a reproducing and self-equipping army of vicious monsters. Suffice to say, the idea appeals to me greatly. However, I wonder if Kythons should be geographically limited to someplace such as the Demon Wastes or the Shadow Marches or if they should be randomly dispersed in pocket locations across Khorvaire.
Werebat 04-09-07, 08:31 PM	I was prepping for the later encounters in the final venue for Whispers of the Vampire's Blade, and I had the idea of replacing all of the critters with Kythons (Book of Vile Darkness) of appropriate CR. (The PCs might even find a room filled with eggs.) As for the origins of Kythons, I figured since the Daelkyr War followed well after the Age of Demons that the Daelkyr altered remnant fiends to become Kythons, a reproducing and self-equipping army of vicious monsters. Suffice to say, the idea appeals to me greatly. However, I wonder if Kythons should be geographically limited to someplace such as the Demon Wastes or the Shadow Marches or if they should be randomly dispersed in pocket locations across Khorvaire. Hmm, what you are saying works (are they really aberrations? If so, yeah, some mad insect-loving Daelkyr probably made them for fun). I used Kythons in my campaign as the model for "wild" Sheens, from the old Bruce Cordell articles on Sheens in Dragon. Give them the Effigy template and you're halfway there (improve them with +2 Deflection bonus to AC from a force field, +1d6 electrical damage per melee attack, and an Intelligence of 1 with accompanying feats to taste and you're almost all the way there). Not what you were asking, but Kythons are pretty cool. - Ron ^*^
Amaril 04-09-07, 08:35 PM	Hmm, what you are saying works (are they really aberrations? If so, yeah, some mad insect-loving Daelkyr probably made them for fun). Yep, they are, which makes them even more compelling to be associated with Daelkyr.
Romulus LoneWolf 04-09-07, 11:56 PM	Yeah, the Kythons are Aberrations with fiendish elements, which indeed makes them perfect as a creation of the Daelkyr. I, however, see them as a recent creation emergent from the depths of Khyber, a result of the Daelkyr experimenting with Fiends captured there.
Werebat 04-10-07, 07:05 AM	Yeah, the Kythons are Aberrations with fiendish elements, which indeed makes them perfect as a creation of the Daelkyr. I, however, see them as a recent creation emergent from the depths of Khyber, a result of the Daelkyr experimenting with Fiends captured there. That makes perfect sense. - Ron ^*^
Werebat 04-10-07, 07:06 AM	However, I wonder if Kythons should be geographically limited to someplace such as the Demon Wastes or the Shadow Marches or if they should be randomly dispersed in pocket locations across Khorvaire. It's up to you. If they originated from a Daelkyr lord tinkering with demons after having been locked in Khyber, I'd say they might be localized, although then again they might have had thousands of years to spread. It depends on what you want of them, really. You could set it up either way. - Ron ^*^
Amaril 04-12-07, 07:59 AM	Well, I ran the first encounter with an adult kython last night, and half of the party was nearly slaughtered. The only reason why they weren't killed was because I didn't let the kython finish its full attacks after the character dropped the first time. I even forgot to account for the poison from its bite. Bottom line, I think these creatures are not CR 5. It was much deadlier than the CR 5 creature that was presented in the module. I'm thinking another encounter with a Kython could decimate the party. The only thing that might factor into the party's advantage is that the dread necromancer PC, a new character whose player has no experience with this class or some of its spells, didn't take better advantage of summon undead. Once she summoned an owlbear skeleton, the encounter went a little bit better. That might be just the thing the party needs for these critters.
Werebat 04-12-07, 04:20 PM	Well, I ran the first encounter with an adult kython last night, and half of the party was nearly slaughtered. The only reason why they weren't killed was because I didn't let the kython finish its full attacks after the character dropped the first time. I even forgot to account for the poison from its bite. Bottom line, I think these creatures are not CR 5. It was much deadlier than the CR 5 creature that was presented in the module. I'm thinking another encounter with a Kython could decimate the party. The only thing that might factor into the party's advantage is that the dread necromancer PC, a new character whose player has no experience with this class or some of its spells, didn't take better advantage of summon undead. Once she summoned an owlbear skeleton, the encounter went a little bit better. That might be just the thing the party needs for these critters. Kython are from BoVD, their CR is probably borked just like many other things from that book. In particular BoVD presented poisons that are way over the top compared to any other D&D source I have ever seen. Tweak the CRs up a bit and see if that works. - Ron ^*^
KidChainsaw 04-13-07, 11:22 AM	I used them as the principal enemy in a relatively low level adventure (5th? if I remember right) and the kythons worked wonderfully. Keep in mind there are several different power levels of kython. I started out with the little bug monsters and worked my way up from there. By the time the PC's were dealing with the large kythoni they had a pretty good idea of what they were capable of and how to deal with them. As far as the CR is concerned, kythoni are a bit broken, but not unbeatable for their rating. My PC's did fairly well against them once they started using terrain to dictate the combat and puzzled out the right spells to use against them.