The Flesh Alchemist's Convention: Monster Homebrew Competition Chat Thread

[Debihuman]

It's a contest but take your time J. I know you could pull out something stellar (pun intended). BTW, the full attack line only lists ONE Divine Might as a single attack with multiple iterative attacks. If it has 2 weapons then show it correctly. It should say 2 Divine Mights +30/+25/+20/+15 ranged. See for example, the Ettin.

Special attacks that have no description are difficult to suss out. I'm not sure if I would even know what kind of attack a "divine might" would be. I do not recommend treating natural weapons like manufactured weapons because it messes up with things like sunder. You would have to state in the description whether or not they can be sundered. I think if you narrowed your focus on what a cosmic angel is, it would help.

30 ft. land movement is LUMBERING for a creature of this size. It takes up 30 squares but can only move 30 squares. That's the equivalent of moving 5 ft. for a Medium sized creature. Stone giants move 30 ft. and they're supposed to be slow but they are also only Large. This is Huge. Sorry but I'm not getting why it's speed is hamstrung.

Debby

[Jormengand]

It's a contest but take your time J. I know you could pull out something stellar (pun intended). BTW, the full attack line only lists ONE Divine Might as a single attack with multiple iterative attacks. If it has 2 weapons then show it correctly. It should say 2 Divine Mights +30/+25/+20/+15 ranged. See for example, the Ettin.

Pssh, divine might is clearly a double weapon. A ranged double weapon. Uh, yeah.

Special attacks that have no description are difficult to suss out. I'm not sure if I would even know what kind of attack a "divine might" would be.

I imagine it as blasts of holy power coming from the Cosmic's hands.

I do not recommend treating natural weapons like manufactured weapons because it messes up with things like sunder. You would have to state in the description whether or not they can be sundered. I think if you narrowed your focus on what a cosmic angel is, it would help.

Mmm, maybe.

30 ft. land movement is LUMBERING for a creature of this size. It takes up 30 squares but can only move 30 squares. That's the equivalent of moving 5 ft. for a Medium sized creature. Stone giants move 30 ft. and they're supposed to be slow but they are also only Large. This is Huge. Sorry but I'm not getting why it's speed is hamstrung.

Debby

Well, if you flew everywhere all the time, wouldn't you be a bit shoddy at walking? Anyway, bear in mind that in real life, speed isn't directly proportional to size either - I mean, elephants are barely faster than cosmics and rhinos are by your measure as fast as armoured halflings. Baleen Whales move at a snail's pace. Even lions are no faster for their size than dwarves. The correlation between size and speed simply doesn't work the way you want it to.

[Debihuman]

Pssh, divine might is clearly a double weapon. A ranged double weapon. Uh, yeah.

LOL exactly.

I imagine it as blasts of holy power coming from the Cosmic's hands.

Then why isn't it a ray attack, which is kinda what I thought but then the stat block didn't support it.

Well, if you flew everywhere all the time, wouldn't you be a bit shoddy at walking? Anyway, bear in mind that in real life, speed isn't directly proportional to size either - I mean, elephants are barely faster than cosmics and rhinos are by your measure as fast as armoured halflings. Baleen Whales move at a snail's pace. Even lions are no faster for their size than dwarves. The correlation between size and speed simply doesn't work the way you want it to.

Not necessarily. Just because a creature can fly doesn't mean it can't walk. See other angels. Most of them have average land speeds and a few are faster than average. 30 ft. is average for a Medium creature while 50 ft. is average for Huge creature. See for example how speed affects Jump checks. The lion is of average speed, 40 ft. for a Large creature.

Here's the thing: I'm not complaining that your creature is slow and lumbering (because it's 20 feet slower than average), I want to know WHY is it so slow. Saying "because it can fly" is a tad silly because other angels can fly and that doesn't negatively affect their land speed. It's because you didn't consider the ecology of this. Not giving you the stink-eye here but I can see that this has conceptually evaded you.

Consider the following: What if there isn't room to fly? Ceilings, tree canopies, being in a cavern, etc. can all impede flight. Unrestricted flight presumes that the creature never goes indoors. Odds of this showing up in some temple or church is fairly slim because of its height, unless we're talking cathedral-like heights. So part of a good creature ecology will match the stat block or vice versa. This is where good description matters. Perhaps they are lame in some way that can't be healed except by their deity (punishment for some past transgression perhaps).

Form follows function.

For example, most cat-like creatures will have pounce and rake attacks just like a lion. This includes the sphinxes. Wemics got short shrift if you ask me since, despite being like lions, they didn't get rake and pounce attacks. Although in WotC's defense, these were supposed to be playable characters and the LA would have made that difficult. I just add those attacks back in. YMMV.

The key thing is that the stat block isn't just a set of numbers and abilities all thrown together like a Jackson Pollack painting. It should also have some ties to how this fictional creature would behave if it were "real" for the players and in this case, voters. That's just part and parcel of being a good DM. The more attention to the details the more gravitas your creature will have. It won't necessarily garner you votes, but I can guarantee lack of attention will cost you votes. A brilliant concept will always capture the imagination first. After that, it's just getting the numbers right, which is a lot easier.

A brilliant concept with crappy execution will still beat perfect stat blocks with less stellar concepts. Every time. A badly done stat block is a lot easier to fix than a half-cocked concept.

Debby

[Jormengand]

LOL exactly.

Though pathfinder has the weird sling-staff which actually is, from memory, a double ranged weapon.

Then why isn't it a ray attack, which is kinda what I thought but then the stat block didn't support it.

I dunno, I imagine it as more of a blast of divine power than a ray.

-Snip-

Debby

I get your point. I just don't imagine Cosmics moving that fast. They're meant to be towering avatars of good, not the mobile legions of heaven (Cometars), the simple emissaries of the gods (Astrals), the divine warriors (Planetars, who share the Cosmic's movement speed), the necessary swift assassins (Lunars) or the champions and commanders of the cause (Solars). They're almost the guardians of the gates of heaven; moving isn't their schtick.

[Debihuman]

So just say that they are slow in the description. That kinda resolves the issue.

[Temotei]

So, I didn't finish on time (obviously). I'll probably do the manticores more slowly for a while until I finish and post them in another thread if anyone is interested.

[ezkajii]

Voting thread is up!

[ezkajii]

Just one day left to vote y'all!

[Debihuman]

Next time bump ONLY the voting thread. It has been off pages for days. Contest has ended today unless you change it and quickly please.

[ezkajii]

Oops, sorry about that. I've extended the voting by an additional week and updated the voting thread accordingly.

[Elandris Kajar]

Will there be a third thread? Because then I might enter. I have some ideas.

[ezkajii]

I'll definitely run another iteration of the contest - anything you guys wanna see for the next one?

[Zaydos]

You might want to PM Xallace and remind 'em to vote.

[Xallace]

I got two separate notifications, thanks folks.

Ehhhhh I'll finish the dryads up sometime soon. I'd totally forgotten about them after getting stuck figuring out how exactly I wanted the size-changing power of to work.

[Jurai]

Constructs sounds cool.

[ezkajii]

Congratulations Debihuman and Xallace, tied for first place! Good hustle.

Onto brainstorming for the next contest!

[inuyasha]

Man I got so distracted and so much stuff was going on I totally forgot to contribute

Oh well maybe this time!

As for the idea, could we do one with crossbreeds?

[Elandris Kajar]

I vote constructs, or plants. I think of the former as a very under represented type with few unique examples and the latter has nothing in it. (Definitely zero near done ideas for each )

[Debihuman]

I kinda like the theme contests instead of all of us making the same Type of creature. Now, if we could just get more people to participate, that would be even more fun.

[Xallace]

It's getting on in summer... We could have a contest themed around the beach, or tropical locales.

[Zaydos]

I can think of ways to make non-construct creatures which would fit into a construct theme

I'd say Jungle or Ancient Ruins as a theme.

[inuyasha]

How about..."Weird Science"?

[Elandris Kajar]

I like it. Seconded.

[Jurai]

"We're just throwing out monsters and seeing what sticks to the wall!"

Cave Johnson, D&D 3.5 Homebrewer.

[Pelican]

How about..."Weird Science"?

Or, along the same lines, B movie monsters could be fun/have a lot of potential:

Spoiler

Show

Also, hi! I'm pretty new to homebrew in general, but this looks like it could be a fun learning experience, so color me interested.

[Xallace]

I can 100% get behind B-movie monsters.

[inuyasha]

B-movie monsters could be just as fun! Though I think perhaps be could open it up to just weird science, the reasoning being that some people may want to make Sharktopus, but other's might want to do something relating to Herbert West Reanimator (the book).

[Temotei]

B-movie monsters could be just as fun! Though I think perhaps be could open it up to just weird science, the reasoning being that some people may want to make Sharktopus, but other's might want to do something relating to Herbert West Reanimator (the book).

I figure a B-Movie theme would include monsters that could fit into those films, but are not necessarily from such a film. That would allow for inspiration from them, translations, and plenty of other ideas to be let into the contest while keeping with the theme.

[Jormengand]

Can we just stick with mad science? I feel science is cooler than whatever the hell "A monster that could appear in a B-movie" is supposed to mean.

[inuyasha]

I figure a B-Movie theme would include monsters that could fit into those films, but are not necessarily from such a film. That would allow for inspiration from them, translations, and plenty of other ideas to be let into the contest while keeping with the theme.

Well the whole "Sharktopus" and "Herbert West: Reanimator" thing was a metaphor, I don't think anybody would make those. But I think that it would be nice for those who may want to create a mildly more serious or less cheesy application of weird science than what B-Movie implies.