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RS14
2009-05-20, 03:24 PM
Floating Eye




e


Medium Aberration
Hit Dice 3d8 (Average HP) (13)
Speed Fly (perfect) 10 ft. (2 squares)
Initiative: -4
Armor Class 6; touch 6; flat-footed 6 (10 - 4 Dex)
Base Attack/Grapple* +2/+2
Attack
Full-Attack
Space 5 ft.; Reach 0 ft.
Special Attacks Paralyzing Gaze
Special Qualities Low Light Vision, Darkvision 180ft, Silent
Saves** Fort +1 Ref -3 Will +5
Abilities Str 6, Dex 2, Con 10, Int 8, Wis 14, Cha 14
Skills*** Spot +12, Move Silent +12
Feats Ability Focus (Gaze), Closed Mind
Environment Shallow Underground
Organization Solitary, Board (1 e and 2 x), Pack (1 e and 2d4 d)
Challenge Rating 1
Treasure See text
Alignment Neutral Neutral
Advancement by 4-5 (Medium), 6-9 (Large)

Paralyzing Gaze (Su):
Any creature within 5ft of the eye is subject to its gaze attack. DC15, Charisma based. The gaze paralyzes for 2d12 rounds.

Combat

In combat, a floating eye prefers to ambush foes, often in tight, winding passages. It appears perfectly harmless until they approach too close, when it will activate its gaze and begin to paralyze its them.
If attacked with ranged weapons or spells, the eye will retreat to the best of its ability.

Treasure:
Certain components of the corpse of a floating eye may be consumed by a single individual, who gains the benefit of the Wild Talent feat.

*: A floating eye cannot initiate a grapple.
**: A floating eye has a +2 bonus to saves against powers, thanks to the Closed Mind feat.
***: A floating eye has a +4 racial bonus to spot checks and a +16 racial bonus to move silent checks.

Lore:

DC11: This is a floating eye. It can use a gaze to freeze an attacker.
DC16: It is perfectly safe to attack from range, and its corpse is considered valuable.
DC21: Consuming the corpse of a floating eye grants basic psionic ability.

Trodon
2009-05-20, 03:30 PM
ooh this is cool

DrakebloodIV
2009-05-20, 03:40 PM
Personally I think that consuming the eye should allow the user to have true seeing for a short amount of time.

DracoDei
2009-05-20, 06:14 PM
What are the multicolored e, x, and d about?

What does this thing look like?

What was your inspiration?

Eldan
2009-05-20, 07:02 PM
I'm pretty sure the "e" indicates the creature's roguelike origins, where creatures are represented by ASCII codes. I think flying eyes were blue es.

Gorgondantess
2009-05-20, 07:38 PM
I'm pretty sure the "e" indicates the creature's roguelike origins, where creatures are represented by ASCII codes. I think flying eyes were blue es.

Damn straight. Ahhh, rogue, how many times have I torn out my hair over you? Let me count the ways.
I have had no end of annoyance over floating eyes. I advise you up the save DC a lot, all things considered- you want your players to feel the pain that so many roguelike players have felt. Specifically, opening a door to find a floating eye and titan. Ouch....

Djinn_in_Tonic
2009-05-20, 08:01 PM
For a creature with a DC 15 Paralysis attack for 2d12 rounds, CR 1/4 seems a little low. Perhaps a solid 1 might be better (high hp, good paralysis). It would just need backup to be a threat. Or environmental hazards, I suppose.

John Campbell
2009-05-20, 08:06 PM
Misses the key defining characteristic of the floating eye, I think, which is that the gaze attack is a purely reactionary power... it's triggered only by making a melee attack against the eye. That's how they're not completely broken in nethack, despite it not even giving you a save against the paralysis... they're completely harmless unless you walk up to one and smack it. If a floating eye causes your death, you have no one to blame but yourself.

They're nevertheless one of the leading causes of death among nethackers.

(I switched them to safety orange on my nethack install after the time I got killed because I didn't notice that in the middle of the horde of o Mordor orcs was an e.)

Gorgondantess
2009-05-20, 08:14 PM
Misses the key defining characteristic of the floating eye, I think, which is that the gaze attack is a purely reactionary power... it's triggered only by making a melee attack against the eye. That's how they're not completely broken in nethack, despite it not even giving you a save against the paralysis... they're completely harmless unless you walk up to one and smack it. If a floating eye causes your death, you have no one to blame but yourself.

They're nevertheless one of the leading causes of death among nethackers.

(I switched them to safety orange on my nethack install after the time I got killed because I didn't notice that in the middle of the horde of o Mordor orcs was an e.)

You're probably playing a weird edition of nethack; mine has floating eyes paralyze you right off, from a range. Same with my version of Linley's dungeon crawl stone soup.

John Campbell
2009-05-20, 08:25 PM
You're probably playing a weird edition of nethack; mine has floating eyes paralyze you right off, from a range. Same with my version of Linley's dungeon crawl stone soup.

No; it's 3.4.3 with no unusual options set, bog-standard except that I set floating eye color to bright orange. Floating eyes paralyze only if you melee them with a non-reach weapon while not blinded.

RS14
2009-05-20, 08:35 PM
You're probably playing a weird edition of nethack; mine has floating eyes paralyze you right off, from a range. Same with my version of Linley's dungeon crawl stone soup.

No, he's right about floating eyes in vanilla NetHack.

I chose to make it a standard gaze attack because 1) In D&D, unlike Roguelikes, it is not really possible to accidentally hit one, short of not knowing what it is, and 2) because even at melee range, a character can choose to avoid its gaze by closing or averting his eyes, and so is only at risk if they look at it.


What are the multicolored e, x, and d about?

What does this thing look like?

What was your inspiration?

It was inspired by too many hours playing NetHack and SporkHack.

e - A floating eye
x - A grid bug
d - A jackal

And it basically looks like a giant, floating eye. It's aptly named. :smallbiggrin:

Edit: Forgot to respond to this.

For a creature with a DC 15 Paralysis attack for 2d12 rounds, CR 1/4 seems a little low. Perhaps a solid 1 might be better (high hp, good paralysis). It would just need backup to be a threat. Or environmental hazards, I suppose.

I decided I agree with you, particularly after looking at the Shrieker, which fills a similar ecological role.

DanielLC
2009-05-20, 08:52 PM
These were briefly mentioned in Order of the ASCII (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/GuestStrips.html).