Post/Author/DateTime	Post
reepicheep 03-04-06, 10:28 AM	Bloodbath Wight Medium Undead HD: 16d12 (104 hp) Initiative: +3 Speed: 30 ft (6 squares) AC: 19 (+3 dex, +6 natural) Base Attack/Grapple: +8/+13 Attack: Claw +14 melee Full Attack: 2 claws +14 melee Damage: Claw (1d6+5 plus energy drain/ 19-20) Face/Reach: 5ft/5ft Special Attacks: Augmented critical, Avasculating glare, Create spawn, Energy drain, Rend Special Qualities: Blood scent, Darkvision 60ft, Undead traits Saves: Fort +5, Ref +8, Will +13 Abilities: Str 21, Dex 16, Con -, Int 11, Wis 16, Cha 15 Skills: Climb +24, Hide +22, Jump +24, Spot +20 Feats: Cleave, Great Cleave, Improved natural attack, Power Attack, Weapon focus (claw) Environment: Graveyards and Necropolis Cities Organization: Solitairy, Pack (2-8), Hunt (6-12 with 3-7 wights and 2-6 Skeletal wolves) CR: 13 Treasure: None Alignment: Always chaotic evil Advancement: 17-29 (medium) LA: +7 The limp, pale skin of this putrid figure is stretched tightly across its harsh and angular bones. The veins that show through the surface of the creatures flesh are marked out only as black, cracked lines. In contrast to the dirty white of the beasts skin, blood drenches its figure, especially its vicious looking claws. Its skull stands out because of the two dark eyes that burn out like a pair of charred lumps of coal. With a fearful howl it leaps towards you with its claws outstretched. Bloodbath Wights are the most violent of the Wight family, even more so than even their most depraved common cousins. They love the sight and feel of blood even though it acts as a powerful poison against them (dealing 1d6 Str damage on consumption with no save). Even though they love violence they do have the ability to organize others of their kind and indeed species, but always in the name of the hunt! Combat Bloodbath Wights fly into combat for sheer pleasure through violence. If possible they prefer to ambush foes and open combat with its avasculating gaze on its most dangerous opponent hopefully neutralising it for a round whilst it deals with under armoured opponents with claws and rend! Augmented Critical (Ex): A Bloodbath Wight is so well practiced in the art of delivering death with its carefully honed clawsthat it doubles its critical range to 19-20. Avasculating Glare (Su): A number of times per day equal to half its Hit Dice (8/day for a standard Bloodbath Wight) the Wight can emit a ray from its eyes that causes the target's body to violently purge its own blood and other vital fluids through its skin. He must succeed on a ranged touch attack to reduce the target to half its current Hit Points (rounded down) and stun it for 1 round. On a succesful Fort save, DC 20 (10+1/2 HD+Cha modifier), the target is not stunned. Blood Scent (Ex): A Bloodbath Wight can literally sniff out any source of fresh living blood. As a standard action a Bloodbath Wight may sniff for blood, revealing the currrent position of all hidden and invisible living creatures within 60 ft. Strong smells block this ability. Create Spawn (Su): Any creature killed by a Bloodbath Wight's natural attacks but not stunned by its Avasculating gaze rises 1d4 rounds after death as a normal Wight whereas any creature that has been stunned by the Bloodbath Wight's Avasculating gaze and then killed by any means within the next 24 hours rises 1d4 rounds later as a new Bloodbath Wight. Spawn are under the command of the Bloodbath Wight that created them and remain enslaved until its destruction. Spawn possess none of the abilities they had in life. Energy Drain (Su): Living Creatures hit by a Bloodbath Wight's natural attacks takes 2 negative levels. It takes a DC 20 Fort save (10+1/2 HD+Cha modifier) to resist negative levels. A bloodbath Wight gains 5 temporary hit points per negative level bestowed in this way. Rend (Ex): If a Bloodbath Wight hits with both its claw atacks it latches onto its opponents body and begins to rip and tear at its flesh dealing an additional 2d6+7 points of damage. What d'y'all think? Be kind now!
dok 03-04-06, 11:51 AM	Base Attack/Grapple: +8/+13 Attack: Claw +14 melee Full Attack: 2 claws +14 melee BAB +8, Strength +5. Where's the last +1 on the melee attack coming from? You don't have Weapon Focus, it's not a Small creature... Looks like it should be +13 across the board. I have several issues with Avasculating Gaze (Sp). First, why do you call it a gaze when it doesn't follow any of the rules for a Gaze Attack (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#gazeAttacks)? Call it "avasculating glare" or just "Avasculation", but don't use the word "gaze" unless the attack actually works like a Gaze attack. Next, why is it (Sp)? What spell is it based on? At the end of the description, you list the saving throw DC as 10 + 1/2 HD + charisma, which is the formula used for Su and Ex abilites. This is probably a typo, and an easy fix. Next... A number of times per day equal to half its Hit Dice (8/day for a standard Bloodbath Wight)... is a clunky, akward mechanic. Notice how no other creatures work this way? I'd suggest changing it to a flat "4 times/day", and then make a note that if the creature is advanced by racial HD, it gains one or two additional uses per +1 CR advanced. Moving on...He must succeed on a ranged touch attack to reduce the target to half its current Hit Points (rounded down) and stun it for 1 round. On a succesful Fort save, DC 20 (10+1/2 HD+Cha modifier), the target is not stunned. This is a terrible way to handle this ability. It means a 20th level character (who should be in no danger from a CR 8 monster) loses half their hit points (in the neighborhood of 100 or so) regardless of their saving throw, and face a Death-from-massive-damage saving throw. It also means that while a 20th level PC has a 5% chance of dying as a result of this attack, a 1st level commoner cannot die from this attack. Harm got changed in 3.5 because of this very same scaling problem. "Half hit points" is a terrible, terrible mechanic. It means this creature deals 2 points of damage to a Summoned Celestial Dog with this attack, but 145 points of damage to a Balor, with the exact same ability!! This attack should either deal a range of damage (8d6, or 6d8, or 5d10) or a fixed amount of damage (25 points) or a range of abiltiy damage (1d6 consitution, or 3d6 con, or 4d4 con), and it should allow a saving throw for half damage, as well as avoiding the Stun effect. Lastly, you forgot to include the DC adjustment for Ability focus; it should be 22, not 20. You've made Create Spawn (Su) more complicated than it needs to be. Because of the horrible mechanic used for the Avasculation attack, you couldn't say "creatures killed by the Avasculation rise as Bloodbath Wights", because the attack couldn't actually kill anyone with more than 1 hit point. But if you follow my suggestion and change the attack to one that deals a fixed range of damage, then all you need to do is say "if killed by Avasculation". I'm not crazy about how you handled Energy Drain (Su). For one thing, I don't like the "1d4 negative levels"; if you want it to inflict 4 levels, OK. If you want it to inflict 2 levels, OK. But making it random makes it difficult to accurately assess the CR of this creauture. I will point out, though, that since this creature has two claw attacks, using 1d4 means it can inflict as many as 8 negative levels in a single round, which is far too powerful for an alleged CR 8 creature. Since each natural attack inflicts negative levels, and this creature has two attacks a round, I'd suggst making the energy drain be a single negative level per hit. If you look at most other energy-draining creatures, they have only a single attack. The Spectre (CR 7) has one attack that inflicts 2 negative levels. Your creature having two attacks that inflict 1 negative level each seems balanced. It takes a DC 18 Fort save (10+1/2 HD+Con modifier) to resist negative levels. OK, two points here. First, the saving throw DC for negative levels caused by energy drain (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#energyDrainAndNegat iveLevels) is always Charisma-based, not Constitution-based, so the DC would be 20. Second, what do you mean "resist negative levels"? Are you talking about saving throw to remove these levels, 24 hours after they have been inflicted? Or does this creature's energy drain work like the wraith's ability drain (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/wraith.htm), where creatures struck are allowed an immediate saving throw to avoid the effect? A bloodbath Wight gains 10 temporary hit points per negative level bestowed in this way. Nope. Energy Drain (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#energyDrainAndNegat iveLevels) doesn't work that way. Creatures gain 5 temporary hit point per negative level, (10 on a critical hit) and that's non-negotaible. One error, and one question on Rend (Ex). First, the error: since Rend uses both claws, it deals x1.5 strength damage; it should be 2d6+7. The question: does the Rend count as a natural attack for inflicting negative levels? It shouldn't, but if you meant for it to, you should make a note. If not, you don't have to change anything. Advancement: 17-29 (medium) Just a quick note on Advancement. It's not a hard-and-fast rule, but Monster advancement usually goes "base HD +1 to 150% base HD, (same size category); 150% base HD to x3 base HD (one size bigger)" If you want to cut off advancement at "medium", you should cap it at 150% HD, or 24 HD for this creature.
reepicheep 03-04-06, 03:54 PM	OK, some good points, rectified, but some I don't agree with. Avasculate is a spell in the Libris Mortis but I increased the DC and described the effect rather than the spell because LM is non-core. I do see what your saying but half hp is what the spell says and I intend to keep it and when you say 1/2 HD times per day is a clumsy mechanic but don't seem to have a problem with saying 1 more per CR enhancement which depends on type class or amount of HD added. Say what! :confused:
dok 03-04-06, 04:36 PM	Avasculate is a spell in the Libris Mortis but I increased the DC and described the effect rather than the spell because LM is non-core. I do see what your saying but half hp is what the spell says and I intend to keep it... 1.) If it's a Spell-like ability (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#spellLikeAbilities) , than the DC is 10 + spell level + charisma modifer. (which gives a DC of 21 with ability focus) You don't need to describe the spell if it's non-core, but you should list the spell's effective level. "Treat this as a 7th level spell effect". Look at the Mind Flayer's Mind Blast Spell-like Ability to see how it would be worded and handled. and when you say 1/2 HD times per day is a clumsy mechanic but don't seem to have a problem with saying 1 more per CR enhancement which depends on type class or amount of HD added. Say what! :confused: 1.) "1/2 HD times per day" or even "once per day for every two hit dice" is a lot clunkier than "4 times per day". See which one is quicker to read, and easier to understand? 2.) Please read my comments more carefully before responding. Oh, why bother, I'll repeat them here, with the additional emphasis for the point you missed the first time around: if the creature is advanced by racial HD, it gains one or two additional uses per +1 CR advanced. That means templates and class levels won't give additional uses, only adding racial HD, at a rate of +1 use/4 HD. And using Challenge Rating as a guide for when to give additional uses is a lot more balanced than using Hit Dice, because as you noticed, not all hit dice give the same CR adjustment. 3.) You also missed the point I put in between those two remarks: no other special ability works like this! Dragons don't have a number of breath weapons based on HD, monsters don't gain additional uses of spell-like abilities when they add racial Hit Dice or class levels. I do see what your saying but half hp is what the spell says and I intend to keep it So even though it's a bad idea, based on a broken spell that is horribly inconsistent with every other effect in the game, you intend to keep it. And your reasons for this are what exactly? I'm not trying to mock you; I seriously want to understand how even though you can see that the mechanic is badly written, inconsistent, and doesn't work with any of the existing rules, you still want to go that way.
reepicheep 03-04-06, 04:43 PM	OK i think maybe whats broken isn't the spell but my explanation and the CR for this beastie. It's a level 7 spell so it should be CR 13 at least. Here is my reasoning and so confuscious say! P.S.You should read the feats again, I removed ability focus and added weapon focus so :P
reepicheep 03-09-06, 02:10 AM	:bump: :rimshot: :bump:
Pennarin 03-09-06, 09:24 AM	reepicheep, as long as you keep an open mind to the feedback comments of others then this monster is on its way to look as good as any produced by WotC :tiphat: dok, good work on the marvelous analysis, you are quite the surgeon! Can I steal you? :D