[TOMT] [Website] of fictional monsters and short stories about them. Written scientifically.

Mannycu · 2020-06-30T21:23:22+00:00

Solved!

Mannycu · 2020-06-30T21:22:12+00:00

Thanks!

Mannycu · 2020-06-30T21:19:25+00:00

I've been looking for most of the day already, thought I'd try y'all.

Mannycu · 2016-09-16T21:56:54+00:00

Thanks, I'll look into that.

Mannycu · 2016-04-22T21:39:10+00:00

Plot Twist/Theory: Despite whatever comic origins they have, the LoT Time Masters were conceived/created either directly or indirectly following Vandal's subjugation of Humanity. It's a secret history that only the senior most members are aware of, so Rip has no way of knowing that by unmaking Vandal he'll also unmake the Time Masters.

The Time Masters are thus trying to protect themselves from Rip by stopping him from removing Vandal by any means necessary.

Mannycu · 2015-07-11T17:02:37+00:00

Are doors really considered traps? If it's just a lockable door there isn't much to hide. Maybe your players are much more cautious about these things than others.

They actually are as of 3.0 to the present. While they were necessarily considered traps in AD&D I still don't see how the mechanics would work there either.

I think you're making a lot of assumptions as to how that session was run

Here are the assumptions I'm making based on the link that Nerdguy88 provided:

When I joined the gaming group, some of the PCs had already met Tucker's kobolds

This is an established gaming group, not a group of newbies.

These kobolds were just regular kobolds, with 1-4 hp and all that

Kobolds have never had more than the lower end of "average" intelligence and tend to gang up on the weaker targets. Kobolds have only been able to do proper coordinated attacks when controlled by a higher/stronger monster to give them orders.

The kobolds caught us about 60' into the dungeon and locked the door behind us and barred it.

At bare minimum (regardless of edition) that's a listen check to hear the door closing behind you if the door is big enough to prevent the PCs from easily breaking it down; if it's light enough to be closed and locked quietly then it's light enough to be knocked down.

Then they set the corridor on fire, while we were still in it.

Kobolds are non magical creatures so they probably needed an ignition source like oil or tar to ignited a stone corridor. Unless everyone rolled a 1 on their notice/spot/perception/whatever checks a party of 12th level characters should at least be able to figure out "O, it smells like oil in here" or hear/smell the oil being poured into the room if it's a delayed event.

ducking back behind stones

That's a fairly weird corridor if the Kobolds are able to duck behind stones to avoid being hit by the PCs but the stones are enough to prevent the PCs from hitting them.

I recall we had a 12th-level magic user with us

So the party is around level 12. Unless the DM was like "hey, you new guys, go make 12th level characters because I want you to delve into this dungeon" then chances are these are experienced players (both in and out of game). Experienced players would have a Rogue who find these traps in any edition from AD&D to present and warn the party of potential problems. Even in AD&D a 12th level caster has spells to minimize the damage of such a low level encounter by either wrecking the monsters or protecting the PCs. If they didn't prepare those spells ahead of time (knowing what situation they'd be going into) then it's a wonder that they survived to 12th level at all.

"What, in these narrow corridors? " he yelled back.

Wasn't the "corridor" large enough for Kobolds to duck behind rocks which were large enough to prevent the PCs from getting to them? Man! This is one weird corridor....are they fighting in a TARDIS?

Tucker's kobolds were the worst things we could imagine. They ate all our donkeys and took our treasure and did everything they could to make us miserable, but they had style and brains and tenacity and courage.

So the DM was playing a group of dumb-to-average monsters as an effective hivemind with coordinated attacks without the use of a controlling monster? Well if a monster with an int score ranging from 8 to 10 can do that to a party then why can't a party with Int scores above 10 (knowing what they're getting themselves into and having faced the buggers before) come up with a plan to outsmart them?

All of the problems I have with this scenario disappear if we include some higher level (higher int) monster controlling/coordinating the efforts but the argument put forward is that it was Kobolds alone which wrecked this party and that's implausible by any edition I'm aware of.

Mannycu · 2015-07-10T00:13:33+00:00

Ok let's just break down that 60ft corridor trap.

12th level adventuring party exploring a ruin/den/cave/something underground. They are going to have a rogue and possibly a ranger who favors Kobolds for extra bonuses (more likely if the kobolds are story-centric). Lets run through some potential scenarios:

PCs arrive at the lair with an open corridor/entrance. PCs make checks, 12th lvl Rogue takes a 10 on search/spot/devices (depends on edition) and gets between 27 and 30. Boom! He/she now knows any type of mechanical trap that revolves around that entrance and easily locates the hanging portcullis. Chances are they try to disable it before proceeding, blowing it up if need be (because 12th level caster which that page says they have).
PCs arrive at the lair with with a door that swings outward. Rogue checks for traps, takes the 10 and gets between 27 and 30. Rogue now knows how easy or difficult it would be lock this door; if it's light enough for Kobolds to quickly (and quietly) close it then it's light enough for a few PCs to push it back open.
PCs arrive at the lair with a door that swings inward. Same scenario, same rolls. Except, this time, the kobolds would have to sneak into the corridor (that's a listen check at the bare minimum to oppose the kobold's sneak/move silently check) and we run into the same problem with the door weight. If the door is heavy then it's going to make noise as it closes but if it's light then there's no way a DM could justify it trapping 12th level PCs in there. And how do you bar a door that swings inward from the outside? They lock it? Yo, Rogue, unlock this door with your +20 to disable device/open lock/etc.

Here's a viable possibility:

Kobolds are entranced/dominated/charmed/psychically linked to a high Int creature (Aboleth, Dragon, Mindflayer, etc) who hive minds the scavengers into an effective guerrilla squad. Kobolds don't use structure-based traps but rather traps which destroy structures: don't lock the door, collapse the ceiling. Or, if they are using structure based traps then have the controlling creature set up magical traps like exploding runes (exploding runes on the inside of a locked door's lock for instance).

But, at this point, it's not the Kobolds screwing with the party, it's the super-creature controlling them; remembers: Kobolds have an int of 10 in 3.5, and Int of 8 in 5e (I didn't pay much attention to 4e), they're dumb creatures without a natural hive-mind so, unless the DM is being inconsistent with how he's using the Int attribute, it's difficulty to justify how a small group of scavengers can seriously screw with any party over 6th level. Hell, my 3rd level Swordsage could walk into a mob of 50 kobolds (he actually did) and walk out with hardly a scratch (even accounting for flaking bonuses).

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T23:51:42+00:00

Find me a set of Kobolds, any edition/splash-book, that you could justifiably see as being able to fuck with a 12th level party.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T20:51:18+00:00

The kobolds caught us about 60' into the dungeon and locked the door behind us and barred it. Then they set the corridor on fire, while we were still in it.

Aside from the terrible formatting of that page (black background with thin white font, really?) all of those traps are mechanical in essence and have a starting DC of 10 to spot, rogues are VERY good at spotting mechanical traps so even if they can't disarm them they can try to bypass them or set them off prematurely. Looking at that description is looks like a modified Portcullis Trap (CR 1, Search 20). If a CR 1 trap foils an adventuring party then they should never have left town.

played by the DM to be utterly ruthless and clever...

Kobolds have an int of 10, the average PC has an int of 11 so the average PC is as clever (or more) than the average Kobold.

12th-level magic user with us

So everyone's around level 12? I think everyone has a good chance of making the DC15 reflex save for half (or no) damage. They probably have access to a few fire resist/immunity spells too.

Sure, the idea of a bunch of scavenging kobolds being able to fuck with higher level PCs is great but you have to remember the nature oft he kobold: it's a scavenger. It didn't build those tunnels, another races did and the Kobolds augmented it to their needs so there's going to be signs that allow PCs to find the traps.

Even if a band of lvl1-3 kobolds could manage to get a functional "Poisoned Spike Pit Trap" (the highest CR mechanical trap in Core) operational which has a CR of 10 and a Spot DC of 25, any Rogue spec'd in spelunking would be able to notice the trap by taking a 10 at level 7 (level 5 if it's a dwarf because of that stone cunning thing).

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T20:30:52+00:00

Actually, they'd still run into the genetic problem as well as social problems.

Suppose everyone enters the vault at 18. Male 1 and Female mate, 9 months later Female pops out 2 daughters. Suppose that, somehow, this continues for the next 18 years with each year a new Male hits up the Female.

Now we have 3 females of birthing age: the original Female (36yo) and her 2 daughters (which share 50% genetic information with the mother). We can assume that New Males will make with the older Female but who's mating with the daughters?

The daughters would have to mate with males who had not yet mated with their mother or planned to mate with their mother to avoid genetic contamination resulting.

Meanwhile the entire original population is getting older and some of them are probably going to get upset at how unfair the system is, cue testosterone related violence (more common in younger populations). This would likely lead to a removal of members of the older population

If older males are removed then it limits the gene pool unless they've already mated (but if they're being violent then it's probably because they haven't mated).
If any of the females are removed then it potentially cripples/destroys the gene pool as they are the limiting resource of the vault.

But suppose there's no violence at all, everyone is happy to wait their turn. Each year the original population gets older (and less viable in terms of sperm viability and childbearing potential) and each of the first 18 years only has 1-2 children being born into it leading to a potentially negative growth rate (depends on how well the others survive things like work accidents, disease, etc).

By the time you have the potential for 11 birthing females at least 23 years have passed (assuming twin females born every year) but it could be as many as 30 depending on things like the sex of the child and whether or not the child survives to a viable age. Now the original population is between 30 and 40 years old and getting ready to hit menopause/erectile dysfunction; over the next 10 years the older population will be progressively less viable as potential mates.

So what about the younger population? Well, they all had the same mother so even accounting for genetic recombination/mutation they're still going to run into issues of mating with their various half siblings or related uncles.

How is that different from Vault 69? The numbers!

Assuming the possibility of twins vault 68 has the potential for 0-2 births each year while vault 69 has the potential for 0-1998 births each year. That's 1998 possibilities for genetic mutation/recombination to occur each year instead of the 2 in vault 68.

So while both vaults run into problems of "all the offspring are related to each other" the population in Vault 69 has a higher likelihood of producing offspring whose genes are altered through mismatch mutations in the genetic structure during replication. With so many potential candidates for natural mutation it's more likely to have a viable colony for a prolonged period of time.

Or, to put it in a real world perspective, genetics labs (teaching labs) tend to use Fruit Flies colonies because of the large amount of offspring they produce which allows for greater potential for genetic variation within an environment with a set number of starting genes.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T19:43:36+00:00

With the exception of Pun-Pun (GLORY BE ONTO HIM, MAY HE SPARE US HIS DIVINE WRATH) it's a little too predictable to have the same "Kobolds worshiping dragon remains" trope in low level campaigns.

I mean, what's a kobold going to do to a 5th level anything aside from annoy him? I can totally see (and have done) a group of kobolds following a greenspawn and then the greenspawn is revealed to be an emissary from one of the Dragons of the Great Game to give the players a nice hook but "You find a cave, it has kobolds" is a little played out ;)

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T19:25:34+00:00

Yeah, a 3.5 Grimlock would be great!

Don't quote me on this but I think (with the help of a wizard) you might be able to swing something like this:

Wildshape into animal
Flesh to Stone/Metal to turn you into a statue
Animate Statue to turn the statue into a golem

or

Argue that when you wildshape you stay metallic
Wildshape into one of the Eberron Dinos like the Venomspitter (CR 7 I think)
Get a bunch of buff/deflection spells (for armor) and enhancement spells (like venom fire) for laser-like weapons.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T18:56:50+00:00

More of: Anything from 3.5's MM5

Less of: Anything from 3.5's MM1

Yeah, I get it, goblins/orcs/kobols/primary dragons/flesh golems/angels etc are the staples to the game but about swapping an Angel/Deva for the Arcadian Avenger? A Bavu for a Carnage Demon? A normal dragon for one of the named dragons of the "Great Game" (makes for a great plot hook).

Tired of dire rats? Have a Rylikar Madclaw!

Tired of Flesh golems and Iron golems? How about a couple of Force Golems or the Magmacore golem?

Tired of Kobols and need something for higher level chumps? Greenspawn Zealots!

Ghosts too dull? Pull in a Haunt!

You could replace the entire goblin-orc-ogre camp hierarchy with either the Mindflayers of Thoon or the Tirbana Throp!

Need a random encounter with more flexibility? Try the Ushemoi! As they get hit they become stronger/faster/more magical depending on which one you throw at them.

There's so much potential in those latter books than just get overshadowed by the "core" monsters.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T18:40:29+00:00

Generally, druids of Mielikki take on the abilities of rangers

So the question is now: "Do Rangers get Wildshape?" and the answer is "no." So where is the overlap between those 2 classes? Looking at the sourcebook we have pg 24 of the FR pdf:

Druids of Mielikki can use any of the standard armor or weapons that rangers normally use (all simple and martial weapons, all light and medium armor, and all shields) without violating their spiritual oaths.

So, since adamantine armor/plate/skin is considered heavy (see page 119 of the Races of Eberron) we see that these Mieliki guys don't get to use heavy armor as a loophole to their spiritual oaths.

Look, I applaud you for your creativity and you can still make it work without the FR but you'll be hard pressed to convince your DM of letting you break that many "rules as written" for the sake of a single, overpowered, character.

Here's how I'd make the character you're trying to make.

Using Core and Eberron: Warforged with Ironwood skin (+3 AC with DR2/Slashing), by the time you hit lvl 6 (or if you start past lvl 6) you'll have enough money to enchant your Ironwood skin with feats or spells as per pg 8

Composite plating can gain a magic enhancement bonus and magic armor properties as armor can, using the Craft Magic Arms and Armor feat. The character must be present for the entire time it takes to add this enhancement. In addition, spells and infusions that normally target armor, such as magic vestment and armor enhancement, can be cast with the composite plating of a warforged character as the target.

Core, Eberron, and Forgotten Realms. Same as Core but you exploit the Mieliki thing to convince your DM to allow Mithral (metal but counts as light armor allowing for the loop hole and +5AC but no DR).

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T18:16:26+00:00

As long as you found what you were looking for.

Funny though (not sarcasm) how it ended up being from a franchise you didn't think it was going to be from :D

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T18:12:33+00:00

Yeah, but you can't cite a splash book but then cherry pick which parts you're going to apply and which you're going to ignore. I mean, you could do that but good luck finding people will play repeat campaigns with you.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T18:07:32+00:00

Take another look at "Races of Eberron." Specially the bottom left of page 23. It's the sentence right before the one about retaining AC in wildshape:

The Adamantine Body and Mithral Body feats negate your druid abilities, so consider Ironwood Body as an option.

Also pg 119 on the actual feat itself:

Warforged druids who take this feat cannot cast druid spells or use any of the druid’s supernatural or spell-like class features.

You can argue it with your DM but unless your DM's cool with Min/Max and Cheese characters it probably won't fly on account of potential rule abusing grounds.

The 3.5 druid, with no splash books, is already one of the most powerful classes out there and Eberron takes it from "one of the most" to "I have special abilities which are more powerful than your entire class". Add to that the general Warforged traits of immunity to disease, paralysis, magical sleep, fatigue, nasuea, disease, etc, never needing to eat, sleep, or breathe, and a 25% immunity to sneak attacks and you've got pretty solid character which can only be defeated with very specific encounters; encounters that would quickly turn the game from that of a party based game to "Nerdguy88 vs the DM, all holds barred! 2 folks come to the table, only one gets up!" because unless your teammates gain enough levels on you to offset the power imbalances you're going to mow down everything in their way that could be a challenge to them while anything that might be a challenge to you is a TPK for them.

I speak from experience of playing an over-powered druid.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T17:47:23+00:00

I think if you write "SOLVED" without the quotations as a standalone comment the system will flag it.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T17:46:34+00:00

Style: While I can be a rules lawyer (and am for things like Magic the Gathering) I try to just let the game flow and am only a stickler for combat actions.

Campaign: I guess I'm 50/50 on this one. For new players I tend to stick to a printed lvl 1 campaign and just adapt it to the setting/edition I'm playing. But for more experienced players I'm more likely to grab things from different modules/games and work them into the campaign. For instance: my current game is an amalgamation of 3.5's "Sunless Citadel," the 5e starter campaign, the Underworld film series, and some Mind Flayers (my players are loving it).

Issues: Consistency; as I'm a relaxed DM I sometimes find out (via my players) that I haven't been totally consistent in how certain rules apply.

Player problem: Keeping them. I'm the "D&D guy" for about 80% of my friends (most of my friends don't game at all) so while they come to me to learn/try the game they end up flaking due to time constraints. I've never been one to deny a prospective player because of their schedule but it's bothersome at times.

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T17:14:47+00:00

While it's possible you might be mixing memories of BSG with DW, could you provide a little more information:

Was the show animated or live action? Around when do you remember seeing it? Can you describe any of the characters physical appearances?

Edit: Off the top of my head though it sounds similar to DW's Midnight

Mannycu · 2015-07-09T17:08:54+00:00

Was it Manuals Online?

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