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View Full Version : Need a CR Check on this Creature



Crow
2011-01-07, 11:10 AM
This is what I have tenatively named a "Venom Spirit" for our homebrew campaign. The DR is high, but the group is expected to have silver weaponry available at this point, and have been told so...I guess it's more fluff than anything. Yes, I know Fey generally use Cold Iron DR...again, fluff for this campaign only.

Large Fey (evil, incorporeal)
HD: 6d6+6
Speed: 30ft, Climb 30ft, Fly (perfect) 30ft.
Space/Reach: 5ft/10ft
AC: 18 (-1 size, +5 dex, +4 deflection)
Attack: Claw +7 (poison)
Full Attack: 4 Claws +7 (poison)
Special Attacks: Poison, Poison Spray (60ft. cone)
Special Qualities: Incorporeal, DR 30/silver, SR 16, Spell-Like abilities
Feats: Ability Focus (poison), Iron Will, Great Fortitude
Attributes: Str--, Dex20, Con13, Int14, Wis13, Cha18
Saves: Fort +5 Reflex +10 Will +9

Spell Like abilities: Summon Swarm 2/day (spiders only)

Poison: Save DC 16 (constitution-based) rolled randomly each round (1d6);
1-STR
2-DEX
3-CON
4-INT
5-WIS
6-CHA
1d4 initial, 2d4 secondary

Poison Spray: 60ft. Cone (random poison selected as above), usuable once every 1d4 rounds

This gleaming creature vaguely resmembles two humanoids fused back-to back, with pale, geenish, luminescent skin. The creature stands nearly 9ft tall, with a the face of a black-eyed female elf on the "front" of it's bald head, and the face of a blue-eyed male elf on the "back". Each of it's four long arms reaches nearly to the ground and ends in a set of vicious-looking black claws. It's four legs resemble those of two humanoids, back to back, each standing on it's toes.


So anyways, I apolagize for my atrocious-looking stat block. Does anybody have a good ballpark of where this creature should be, CR-wise. I was thinking CR6 maybe? I am considering bumping the poison DC to 17...maybe.

Keld Denar
2011-01-07, 11:32 AM
I'd say a solid 4. Shadows are CR3, by comparison, and they are a rather strong CR3 as is. I don't see this thing as much stronger than a shadow, given thier similar incorporial nature. At least there is a save vs this guy's poison.

Even with the DR (which you stated you'll be handing out weapons to bypass), this guy has a scant 46 HP by standard monster averages (unless you max his HD). That'd be 2-3 solid hits from a big 2-handed weapon.

Enterti
2011-01-07, 12:04 PM
I would say that they are a solid CR 6. The DR while easily bypassed in your campaign is still high enough to warrant an increase in CR and the incorporealness pushes it beyond most low level parties ability to deal with due to the fact that they ill need magic weaponry to even have a 50% chance of dealing damage. Now as always CR is a guideline only and if you are giving them tools that perfectly counter this things defensive abilities then you can throw it at them earlier. For instance if you gave the party melee character a silvered ghost touch weapon then they could easily deal with it at LV 4 or 5

Gullintanni
2011-01-07, 12:26 PM
I would say that they are a solid CR 6. The DR while easily bypassed in your campaign is still high enough to warrant an increase in CR and the incorporealness pushes it beyond most low level parties ability to deal with due to the fact that they ill need magic weaponry to even have a 50% chance of dealing damage. Now as always CR is a guideline only and if you are giving them tools that perfectly counter this things defensive abilities then you can throw it at them earlier. For instance if you gave the party melee character a silvered ghost touch weapon then they could easily deal with it at LV 4 or 5

Your spirit also has special attacks and multiple move speeds. If I was running this encounter, this thing would climb up the walls, charm the fighter, loose a swarm or two and then start spitting poison on everyone (literally everyone).

In order to defend against this creature, your party needs silvered ghost touch arrows, ranged magic (50%+SR), respectable fortitude saves, respectable will saves and area of effect attacks to deal with swarms.

At least a 5. Probably a 6.

EDIT: You also forgot to include the creature's Dex in its AC. It should have an 18 AC.

Dead_Jester
2011-01-07, 12:31 PM
I have to with the 5, probably 6. Even with silvered weapons, this thing has SR, a great attack routine that can inflict poison four times per round and is incorporeal.

With so much poison going left and right, the dc is fine. And even there, I'd at least reduce the Con damage to be in line with the mental stats, if not less, or else this guy, on average, kill a normal caster in 1 round easy if it uses Con poison.

Myth
2011-01-07, 01:09 PM
I'd have said more but 4 or maximum 5 depending on terrain and logistics. A Barbarian in my undead game is swinging his plain +2 sword and absolutely splattered a Wraith and cut a modifid Banshee to half HP. Incorporealness is overrated unless you attack from afar and duck behind a wall.

Even then spells like Combust or Magic Missile will take it down easily. Not to mention turning. When the party has flight available to them some of it's main advantages diminish.

Keld Denar
2011-01-07, 01:12 PM
Its incorporial, but not undead, so turning wouldn't do much. Also, SR16 is pretty beast for a CR4. If a level 2-3 party was encountering this, a typical wizard casting a Magic Missile would fail ~60-70% of the time.

That said, I still don't think it would be much higher than a high 4 or VERY low 5.

Gullintanni
2011-01-07, 01:16 PM
I'd have said more but 4 or maximum 5 depending on terrain and logistics. A Barbarian in my undead game is swinging his plain +2 sword and absolutely splattered a Wraith and cut a modifid Banshee to half HP. Incorporealness is overrated unless you attack from afar and duck behind a wall.

Even then spells like Combust or Magic Missile will take it down easily. Not to mention turning. When the party has flight available to them some of it's main advantages diminish.

This thing's not undead so no turning, and it has SR, and can Poison from afar, while using SLA's to force said Barbarian to donate his sword to the Fey in question. Even considering the sword, unless your +2 sword is also Silvered, you're not going to hurt this monster. It has enough health to withstand magic missiles while it poisons the Mage into oblivion, what with the terrible Fort Save.

If you play this monster to it's strengths (and given it's intelligence, you should), I could see this being a solid threat to a party of at least 5th level.

Myth
2011-01-07, 01:21 PM
This thing's not undead so no turning, and it has SR, and can Poison from afar, while using SLA's to force said Barbarian to donate his sword to the Fey in question. Even considering the sword, unless your +2 sword is also Silvered, you're not going to hurt this monster. It has enough health to withstand magic missiles while it poisons the Mage into oblivion, what with the terrible Fort Save.

If you play this monster to it's strengths (and given it's intelligence, you should), I could see this being a solid threat to a party of at least 5th level.

doh! I missed the SR. I stand corrected (the party was supposed to have silver weapons anyway)

Keld Denar
2011-01-07, 01:22 PM
Ah, but CR isn't a measure of the creature in its perfect environment. That's EL. EL is a function of number and strength of foes, favorable vs unfavorable conditions, and a host of other factors. A Fire Giant is always CR10, which, in neutral conditions is EL10. A Fire Giant in a 50' wide swimming pool of lava hurling molten boulders at PCs walking on a 1' wide bridge that causes balance checks every round is probably EL12. A half-health Fire Giant encountered in the tundra during a snow storm is only about EL 6-7. All three cases, the giant is still CR10.

There is a difference.

mootoall
2011-01-07, 01:28 PM
Whoa, just did a double-take to make sure I was on the RPG forum :smallwink: Anyway, besides that little nitpick, I'd say this was around CR 5 or 6 too. Incorporealness plus actually decent feat selection, a lot of natural attacks and truly deadly CON poison cover a lot of its offensive needs. Despite the fact you've given them silvered weapons, they still have that DR, and it's hard to do considerably more than 30 damage at fourth level ...

Gullintanni
2011-01-07, 01:31 PM
Ah, but CR isn't a measure of the creature in its perfect environment. That's EL. EL is a function of number and strength of foes, favorable vs unfavorable conditions, and a host of other factors. A Fire Giant is always CR10, which, in neutral conditions is EL10. A Fire Giant in a 50' wide swimming pool of lava hurling molten boulders at PCs walking on a 1' wide bridge that causes balance checks every round is probably EL12. A half-health Fire Giant encountered in the tundra during a snow storm is only about EL 6-7. All three cases, the giant is still CR10.

There is a difference.

That's a fair enough assessment, the problem (as i see it) is that this creature's perfect environment is anywhere where there's a surface to climb. A wall...a tree...anything vertical really. I'd say that unless this thing is fighting in the plains, a vertical plane is probably a reliable enough variable to be a factor in CR.

Volcanoes are far less common than trees. I'm willing to believe that the average neutral environment includes something climbable within a reasonable distance. And I'm aware that THIS party has silver weapons already, but that's independent of the monster's own strengths. Does the average party carry magical silver weapons (ghost touch optional) at level 5 without prior knowledge of their quarry?

A level 5 party has access to limited divination and research options. It's unlikely that they'd be able to conclusively determine that they'd be fighting this exact monster absent something embedded in the plot. Even then, Fey are typically weak against Cold-Iron. If the party prepared to fight Fey, knowing that they'd be up against Fey, they'd have prepared inadequately for THIS fight in particular. That's dangerous in and of itself.

This creature has mobility options, offensive options, non-standard defenses and SLAs. It's not particularly durable, but it's still pretty dangerous IMHO.

Ingus
2011-01-07, 01:40 PM
I'm judging this monster a 6-7CR. This basically because of its poison and charm monster, which sinergizes very well with incorporealness, high DR, hig SR, adequate AC and the swarm thing.
Just to point out, the save against charm monster would be 19, by the rules. A 4th level party can't handle it.

Saph
2011-01-07, 01:41 PM
Notes on the statblock:

• Multiattack doesn't actually do anything here. It reduces the penalty on secondary attacks, but since this thing only seems to have one attack type, it won't have any effect. You could change the feat to Ability Focus (poison) if you want to raise the Poison DC by +2. The creature should have a third feat slot, too.

• Attack bonus should be four +7 incorporeal touches by my calculation. (+3 for Fey attack bonus, +5 Dex, -1 size).

• If it's incorporeal it should probably have a fly speed too, though I guess you could change that - it's just a bit odd that it walks/climbs without any weight.

• Need saving throws: I think they'd be Fort +5 Reflex +10 Will +7.

Regarding CR: I think I'd put it at about CR 5, about equivalent to two Shadows, providing the party have advance warning about the need for silver weapons.

Gullintanni
2011-01-07, 01:48 PM
Regarding CR: I think I'd put it at about CR 5, about equivalent to two Shadows, providing the party have advance warning about the need for silver weapons.

This doesn't actually influence the CR calculation. In the same way that CR bases itself on Neutral terrain, CR compares itself with the average party. At level 6, the party doesn't have a ton of WBL to throw around. Given the average party, there will probably be a few enchanted weapons, none of which will be silver, and a few silver weapons, none of which will be enchanted.

Advanced knowledge of the creature's weakness doesn't decrease the CR, it just decreases the difficulty of the encounter. That being said, if the DM handed the players that information, the DM may rule that this particular CR 6 encounter yields experience equivalent to that of a CR 5 encounter.

Remember that part of combat sometimes means researching the opponents weaknesses, which is supposed to require spending party resources (Divinations, Augury). Given that CR is a calculation of the resources demanded of a party to try and defeat a given opponent, I'd say nonstandard vulnerabilities merits an increase to CR.

Saph
2011-01-07, 01:50 PM
This doesn't actually influence the CR calculation. In the same way that CR bases itself on Neutral terrain, CR compares itself with the average party. At level 6, the party doesn't have a ton of WBL to throw around. Given the average party, there will probably be a few enchanted weapons, none of which will be silver, and a few silver weapons, none of which will be enchanted.

Advanced knowledge of the creature's weakness doesn't decrease the CR, it just decreases the difficulty of the encounter.

I don't think Crow's all that deeply concerned about the exact distinction between CR and EL. :smalltongue: I get the impression he wants to know how tough it'll be for HIS party.

Gullintanni
2011-01-07, 01:51 PM
I don't think Crow's all that deeply concerned about the exact distinction between CR and EL. :smalltongue: I get the impression he wants to know how tough it'll be for HIS party.

Fair enough. In that case, objectively, CR 6. For this encounter, treat as CR 5.:smalltongue:

Crow
2011-01-07, 01:52 PM
Notes on the statblock:

• Multiattack doesn't actually do anything here. It reduces the penalty on secondary attacks, but since this thing only seems to have one attack type, it won't have any effect. You could change the feat to Ability Focus (poison) if you want to raise the Poison DC by +2. The creature should have a third feat slot, too.

Maybe I'm thinking Multi-weapon Fighting? D20srd is websensed and I'm away from my books. The thing has the capability to hold weapons in it's claws. I am still unsure of what the third feat should be, ability focus may be the way to go.


• Attack bonus should be four +7 incorporeal touches by my calculation. (+3 for Fey attack bonus, +5 Dex, -1 size).

I thought Fey got 2/3 BAB...and I forgot about the size, thanks.


• If it's incorporeal it should probably have a fly speed too, though I guess you could change that - it's just a bit odd that it walks/climbs without any weight.

Visualizing this thing climbing is more creepy than visualizing it fly. =)


• Need saving throws: I think they'd be Fort +5 Reflex +10 Will +7.

Regarding CR: I think I'd put it at about CR 5, about equivalent to two Shadows, providing the party have advance warning about the need for silver weapons.

Thanks.

And thanks to Gullintanni for pointing out my mis-calculated AC.

Saph
2011-01-07, 01:53 PM
Yeah, the very high DR makes it a bit odd. DR 10/material is much more common for this sort of level. DR 30/silver vs 4th-5th level PCs makes it effectively invulnerable to non-silver weapons.


Visualizing this thing climbing is more creepy than visualizing it fly. =)

Cool. One important thing to settle on in advance, though: can it move through the walls and floor? It makes a BIG difference in combat, since fully incorporeal flyers can do a lot of really, really annoying tactical maneuvers by popping in and out of the surrounding terrain.

Myth
2011-01-07, 02:54 PM
Just remember that after they beat it, the magical folk will be able to Polymorph into it. Be prepared for them to have DR 30/silver from the next encounter onward. Might diminish the scaryness of your average bear.

Saph
2011-01-07, 02:58 PM
Polymorph doesn't allow you incorporeal form. You need Shapechange for that, which is a bit above their party level.

Godskook
2011-01-07, 03:54 PM
I'd say at least CR 6, possibly CR 7, but arguable. Sure, a low level party, with enough fore-warning and luck could down one, but at ECL 3, the party wizard has about 3d4 + 6 HP, compared to the 4d6+8, +4d4 Con that this critter is capable of dishing out in a single round.

Actually, I'm thinking this guy is disproportionately designed. He's got the HD, AC, AB and saves like he's a CR 4 or 5, but he's got the poison, spell-likes, incorporeal, and DR like he's a CR 10 or so(Seriously, 1d4 con per attack is like owning a wounding weapon, and a PC wouldn't get one till he was ECL 11-12).

Crow
2011-01-07, 04:15 PM
What if I scale back all the poisons to 1d3 initial, 1d6 secondary?

Godskook
2011-01-07, 04:27 PM
What if I scale back all the poisons to 1d3 initial, 1d6 secondary?

If you did that and made the poison's targeted score random, maybe. But I'm still going with disproportionate design, which means you either need to scale back heavily on what you want this creature to be able to do, or you need to bump his HD+CR up to where you slotted his abilities.

Besides, you're still talking 4d3 con per round(save again later for another 4d6). With hit-and-run tactics, this guy could easily, as written, take down ECL 10 parties if they weren't prepared for him.

Crow
2011-01-07, 04:30 PM
If you did that and made the poison's targeted score random, maybe. But I'm still going with disproportionate design, which means you either need to scale back heavily on what you want this creature to be able to do, or you need to bump his HD+CR up to where you slotted his abilities.

Besides, you're still talking 4d3 con per round(save again later for another 4d6). With hit-and-run tactics, this guy could easily, as written, take down ECL 10 parties if they weren't prepared for him.

I actually quite like the random poison determination. I'm going to take that...very chaotic.

woodenbandman
2011-01-07, 04:58 PM
Few things:

1: it's incorporeal, it uses its dexterity for attack rolls anyway, so ditch weapon finesse. As previously mentioned, multiattack is also superfluous, as it has only one set of natural attacks.
2: The poison's correct DC is 17 (half HD + charisma mod)
3: The party can't damage this unless they have silver ghost touch weapons (again, incorporeal).
4: This thing will literally always hit everyone, seeing as how it is incorporeal and thus ignores all forms of non force-based armor.

Against a typical low-level party, the wizard will likely be unprepared save for a few magic missiles that he might have in reserve. 50% chance of spell resistance working, and 50% chance for incorporeal to cancel the spell anyway = :( The fighter will probably be charmed, and the rogue will be covered in a swarm. Given the nature of this monster's defense, and the fact that it can drop a single person in a round of full attacks if it gets lucky on the poison, I'd put this monster at a CR of 6, but it will be far more challenging if they aren't prepared for this sort of creature.

Keld Denar
2011-01-07, 05:03 PM
3: The party can't damage this unless they have silver ghost touch weapons (again, incorporeal).

Not quite. Any +1 silver weapon would work. It would just have a 50% damage immunity vs the weapon (its not a real miss chance, although it is very similar). Ghost Touch would only eliminate the 50% damage immunity. PCs could still get lucky and drop the thing in 1-2 rounds, depending on how many PCs hit.

Enterti
2011-01-08, 02:10 AM
I just remembered that Incorporeal creatures are capable of flight, so if this thing plays at its 14 int it will just poison strafe the party over and over. further Incorporeal creatures forgo listen checks, and thus it will almost always have the surprise round
Incorporeal Subtype(from the SRD)


An incorporeal creature has no physical body. It can be harmed only by other incorporeal creatures, magic weapons or creatures that strike as magic weapons, and spells, spell-like abilities, or supernatural abilities. It is immune to all nonmagical attack forms. Even when hit by spells or magic weapons, it has a 50% chance to ignore any damage from a corporeal source (except for positive energy, negative energy, force effects such as magic missile, or attacks made with ghost touch weapons). Although it is not a magical attack, holy water can affect incorporeal undead, but a hit with holy water has a 50% chance of not affecting an incorporeal creature.

An incorporeal creature has no natural armor bonus but has a deflection bonus equal to its Charisma bonus (always at least +1, even if the creature’s Charisma score does not normally provide a bonus).

An incorporeal creature can enter or pass through solid objects, but must remain adjacent to the object’s exterior, and so cannot pass entirely through an object whose space is larger than its own. It can sense the presence of creatures or objects within a square adjacent to its current location, but enemies have total concealment (50% miss chance) from an incorporeal creature that is inside an object. In order to see farther from the object it is in and attack normally, the incorporeal creature must emerge. An incorporeal creature inside an object has total cover, but when it attacks a creature outside the object it only has cover, so a creature outside with a readied action could strike at it as it attacks. An incorporeal creature cannot pass through a force effect.

An incorporeal creature’s attacks pass through (ignore) natural armor, armor, and shields, although deflection bonuses and force effects (such as mage armor) work normally against it. Incorporeal creatures pass through and operate in water as easily as they do in air. Incorporeal creatures cannot fall or take falling damage. Incorporeal creatures cannot make trip or grapple attacks, nor can they be tripped or grappled. In fact, they cannot take any physical action that would move or manipulate an opponent or its equipment, nor are they subject to such actions. Incorporeal creatures have no weight and do not set off traps that are triggered by weight.

An incorporeal creature moves silently and cannot be heard with Listen checks if it doesn’t wish to be. It has no Strength score, so its Dexterity modifier applies to both its melee attacks and its ranged attacks. Nonvisual senses, such as scent and blindsight, are either ineffective or only partly effective with regard to incorporeal creatures. Incorporeal creatures have an innate sense of direction and can move at full speed even when they cannot see.
The flight is a bit of an extrapolation of the text but it is supported by the fact that every incorporeal creature I have seen has a flight speed of X(perfect)