SadisticFishing
2008-10-22, 12:48 AM
Okay, that title is a bit more melodramatic than I needed, but hey, whatever.
So I'm DMing a 4e game. Lots of fun, took a while to get used to so many monsters in combat, et cetera. But since 4e doesn't have the same "build your own NPCs" that 3e did, I find myself homebrewing a few things. Once every few levels the group will meet something that is not in the MM, and they have no idea what to expect. It's fun, and not hard at all to balance, really.
But now for the fun part - I was recently rereading my copy of Vector Prime (great book, it was my first Star Wars book and it got me hooked - though I'd suggest starting with Heir to the Empire), and it struck me how AWESOME the Yuuzhan Vong would be as bad guys. I thought "but I can't take something directly, out of a book, can I?" But then I looked down - at the Monster Manual.
Few tidbits on the Yuuzhan Vong (MINOR spoilers): they come from another galaxy, they are a very war loving society, with self mutilation and pain being two major parts of their culture. Caste system, always honor their Gods, ritual sacrifice, et cetera. They absolutely HATE machinery, especially droids, and everything they use is bio-engineered. They are also completely absent in the Force. They can't be read, noticed or... well, anything. It just ignores them.
Now how could I represent that these guys are so disconnected from regular reality? I plan on having them hate magic, and use a lot of the same things as the books (Vonduum Crab armor, Ooglish Maskers, Amphistaffs [amphistaffs are snake-like animals that the Yuuzhan Vong weird as weapons, they harden and soften as necessary, so kinda like a Spiked Chain + a quarterstaff... except they have poisoned bites]), but I have no idea how to show that they are not at ALL normal. Something simple, one thing that all of them can have in common, similar to the Force immunity... But can't be the same, as immunity to magic would be very, very boring.
Thoughts? Ideas? Just something to show that they're from the Far Realm - possibly even farther.
Thanks in advance for the help!
So I'm DMing a 4e game. Lots of fun, took a while to get used to so many monsters in combat, et cetera. But since 4e doesn't have the same "build your own NPCs" that 3e did, I find myself homebrewing a few things. Once every few levels the group will meet something that is not in the MM, and they have no idea what to expect. It's fun, and not hard at all to balance, really.
But now for the fun part - I was recently rereading my copy of Vector Prime (great book, it was my first Star Wars book and it got me hooked - though I'd suggest starting with Heir to the Empire), and it struck me how AWESOME the Yuuzhan Vong would be as bad guys. I thought "but I can't take something directly, out of a book, can I?" But then I looked down - at the Monster Manual.
Few tidbits on the Yuuzhan Vong (MINOR spoilers): they come from another galaxy, they are a very war loving society, with self mutilation and pain being two major parts of their culture. Caste system, always honor their Gods, ritual sacrifice, et cetera. They absolutely HATE machinery, especially droids, and everything they use is bio-engineered. They are also completely absent in the Force. They can't be read, noticed or... well, anything. It just ignores them.
Now how could I represent that these guys are so disconnected from regular reality? I plan on having them hate magic, and use a lot of the same things as the books (Vonduum Crab armor, Ooglish Maskers, Amphistaffs [amphistaffs are snake-like animals that the Yuuzhan Vong weird as weapons, they harden and soften as necessary, so kinda like a Spiked Chain + a quarterstaff... except they have poisoned bites]), but I have no idea how to show that they are not at ALL normal. Something simple, one thing that all of them can have in common, similar to the Force immunity... But can't be the same, as immunity to magic would be very, very boring.
Thoughts? Ideas? Just something to show that they're from the Far Realm - possibly even farther.
Thanks in advance for the help!