Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Maladaar 11-19-04, 05:07 PM	I was thinking of using the Vicious Venue's Hanging Tree (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/vv/20030518a) , but with a twist. I was thinking of having it have two or three good hanging ropes. Attacking with the rope (as per a lasso) and attempt to hang any PC it manages to successfully attack (as per grapple? for successful hanging). If I did that I was wondering what type of damage would be dealt (as per suffocation? or perhaps 1d2 Con points per round?) I am not looking to outright kill the PCs, just scare the heck out of them. Any thoughts or suggestions (preferably constructive ones) would be appreciated.
Dash Branaghan 11-19-04, 05:22 PM	The suffocation rules would be better suited to this type of tree. If you want to have real fun, see the undead treant from 2ed for more joy. Have the tree "hang" its meat for a couple of days before devouring. IIRC, the undead treant was covered in the Ravenloft supplement when they used the three ring binders, and I'm not sure if it existed in the hardcover WoTC MM. If you're interested in seeing the original 2ed version, just email me and I will be happy to dig it up and send you the information on it for you to convert. Dash
Maladaar 11-19-04, 05:25 PM	Believe it or not, I have that 3-ring binder supplement from Ravenloft! :D This is a quickie thing I am throwing together, I have been a bad DM and haven't prepped a lot of stuff for this week. So do you think ranged touch attack to snare for suffocation? I am not sure if this really falls under grapple rules. Will check for replies when I get home, in about 45 minutes. Anything would be helpful.
9mm of Mercy 11-19-04, 05:26 PM	Thing is, the whole Hanging thing was more about neck-snappery than suffocation. Up the CR and have it autocatically make a coup-de-gras on a successful crit. Rope snakes around neck, crick-crack, new corpses for the collection.
Maladaar 11-19-04, 07:50 PM	Neck snappery from a drop. I have more in mind of being lifted from the ground, which is less likely to do an immediate neck break. As I said, I am not looking to kill the group quickly, just make them suffer.
ThatDarnCat 11-20-04, 01:23 AM	I like the lasso idea for snagging unsuspecting, or suspecting, PCs. You might want to give the 'rope' an AC and hit point value so that a grappled PC can attempt to cut himself free once in the noose. Since 'killing' the tree wouldn't necessarily release the trapped characters from the nooses, you could have any trapped PCs continue to take suffocation damage even efter the tree is defeated.
9mm of Mercy 11-20-04, 03:37 AM	Neck snappery from a drop. I have more in mind of being lifted from the ground, which is less likely to do an immediate neck break. As I said, I am not looking to kill the group quickly, just make them suffer. A suppose a tree wouldn't be able to move it's limbs fast enough to generate enough force to snap a neck... Magically animated rope could be nice and fast, but not strong enough I don't think. Still, I get the coolest mental image of some evil, skeletal tree with a mouth and glowing eyes wrap a noose around some mages neck and flick one mighty branch. Snap! Wizard is lifted off the ground, slowly reeled in a starts to sway in the breezes. Eyes still open.
Maladaar 11-20-04, 07:29 AM	I ran the encounter yesterday. I used an animated tree as per the description under the Treant. Group is riding down a trail through a forested mountain over a period of two days. They notice that the forest is going from lush vegetation to more and more wilted/dead vegeation. About mid-day they come around a bend and see the tree, with 6 hangman nooses on it. The thing is there is currently a body hanging from one of the ropes and it is still twitching. In comes the paladin to the rescue. The paladin dismounts and rushes forward, once within range the tree attacks and snags him, lifting him off of the ground. Gotta love the heroics of a paladin as a semi-evil DM. :devil: I did give the rope an AC and hit points. There were no casualties, but it scared the poo out of him when it happened. I do like the idea of an undead treant and plan on using it as my campaign is taking an unexpected undead/disease ridden turn (at least unexpected by the PCs). :D Would like to work on developing the undead treant. I will look up the old one from 2e. Is there a generic undead template? Maybe in the libris mortis?
Astra 11-20-04, 08:07 AM	not exactly undead, but since you said campaign was going undead/disease, you could use a blightspawned treant (from the unapproachable east)
Maladaar 11-20-04, 08:15 AM	not exactly undead Which one? The one I used yesterday was just an animated tree, but I would like to use an undead treant, although I am going to have them run into a normal treant first. I have Unapproachable East, so I will look at the blightspawned treant. If the blightspawned is created through some sort of "disease" that would work to. Basically I have clerics of two gods becoming allies. One is a god of undead, the other is a god of disease. So anything undead or blighted (diseased) would fit the bill. Actually both might be better.
ShadowDragon8685 11-20-04, 08:41 AM	Now THAT has nice shades of Warcraft III. The Blight of the Dead, when it was infecting the Night Elf trees. :) Can we have the stats for that animated hangman tree?
Maladaar 11-20-04, 08:51 AM	Never played Warcraft III. I have played Warcraft and Warcraft II. I originally was going with a campaign against the god of undead, but then thought what havoc might run amok if there was an alliance with the god of disease. Rampant disease equals lots of dead and dying, lots of dead could equal an increased number of undead! Semi-evil DM jackpot!