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McDeath
2005-11-19, 02:26 AM
I'm a very inexperienced player and have never DMed. If this is wildly unbalanced or plain stupid, tell me and why. I submit this to your expert critique.

Hunger - A figure hooded and cloaked in grey hangs a foot above the ground; as you take it in it slowly turns its head from side to side as if smelling the air. Locking its hidden eyes on [nearest player], it drifts forward.

Hungers are very rare spirits, often formed from the spirit of one who has offended the gods, and found out after death why they can afford to be patient. Their spirit is broken and twisted, then flung out to wander the planes for eternity. Hungers constantly ache for what they do not possess: a body, and a soul. If they can, a Hunger will drain a being’s soul and possess them. However, it will never achieve completion and when the creature realises this it will go on a rampage, full of rage and pain.

A hunger may be formed from any sentient being, but it will have no memories of its past life, merely an awareness of a void in its soul. To determine the stats for a hunger, choose a base creature. The base creature loses all special abilities, qualities and actions.

CR: 3
Hunger – NE Medium Undead (Incorporeal)
-4 Dex, -2 Wis, 0 Con, -2 Int, -4 Str, 1 Cha
Languages: A Hunger cannot communicate.
AC: 14, touch 10, flat-footed 12
HP: 6,5d12 HD (52)
DR/8 all metal but cold iron, cold and fire resistance 8
Speed 20/ft round
BAB +4, touch +5
Special Actions: Soul Drain, Psychic Scream
SQ: Not Quite There, immunity to fear and awe, levitation 1 ft
Feats: None
Skills: None

Soul Drain
If a Hunger sees a helpless sentient being, it will immediately make a touch attack and if successful will begin to drain the target. For every round the Hunger is in contact the target loses takes a point of Cha, Int or Wis damage (DM’s choice). If the Hunger tales damage while Draining, it must take a Concentration check or the Drain is interrupted. If the target is reduced to zero Int/Wis/Char, the Hunger has weakened its soul and can now possess it. At the start of every round thereafter, the target must make a Will save with DC 12 or be possessed by the Hunger. What happens next is up to the DM.

Not Quite There
A Hunger is not entirely of this world; it fades in and out of existence. A Hunger has a 5% miss chance, which stacks with the miss chance for being incorporeal.

Psychic Scream
Once per minute, a Hunger may channel its pain and rage into a scream. Every sentient being in earshot (DM determines range) takes 1d6 + 2 damage, with a Will save DC 10 to resist being dazed for 1d3 rounds. The damage is doubled for psychically sensitive beings.

Thanks for the suggestions, have made changes.

toysailor
2005-11-19, 09:38 AM
"If the target takes 10 or more stat damage in this manner, the Hunger has weakened its soul and can now possess it"?

This means that a character with a 20 Int is as susceptible to the attack as one with a Int as a dump-stat. Maybe you should make it such that the character gets possessed when his stat drains to 1.

The Glyphstone
2005-11-19, 10:54 AM
Firstly, if it's an Undead type, it has no Constitution score and must have a Charisma score instead.

Not Quite There is confusing...it lists a fireball as potentially passing through, then says Magical attacks always hit...then specifies that magical fire attacks still need to check. I'd recommend making it a flat, say, 5%, 10%, or 15% miss chance for all attacks, including damage from magical sources.

And for Soul Drain, perhaps alter it so the target must merely be helpless instead of in the negatives...this would work quite well if the Psychic Scream did automatical damage, and allowed a save to resist paralysis for X rounds.

As for CR, right now it's only a 1 or 2 IMHO, maybe 3 tops. Doing a paltry 2d3 damage/round, with an incredibly Will save to negate it, means that any party will have no trouble at all (Fighters = lots of HP to soak, Wizards=low HP, but high Will saves to resist the damage)

dragonfly83h
2005-11-19, 11:08 AM
Psychic Scream once per round? :o a bit much, I would say. Perhaps once per minute is more appropriate. But then you could add "anyone who fails their save is stunned/dazed for 1 round."

In the monster manual. "anything that can tell the difference between itself and everything that isn't itself has a minimum Charisma score of 1." So it needs a charisma score.

To calculate its hit points, you should first decide how many Hit Dice it has. Looking at the BAB +4, and being an undead creature (wizard combat ability), it would have 8d12 hit dice. Too much? Lower the HD and increase it's ability scores.

McDeath
2005-11-20, 01:05 AM
Made the changes, thanks for the advice. balanced now? Recommended CR?

dragonfly83h
2005-11-20, 05:48 AM
not quite balanced yet - 8d12 hit dice and 96 hit points?

a monster does not have maximum hit dice, heck not even PCs are so lucky ;)

I would assume the monster rolls average hit points for each hit die, so that would give it 6.5x8 = 52 hp?

The ability adjustments are somewhat poor, but reasonable if you mean to create a spirit that is weak but difficult to kill.

With this, I would assgin CR 2 or 3

The Glyphstone
2005-11-20, 07:55 AM
Agreed. Monsters by default have average HP for their HD, unless it's a recurring villain or Really Important Enemy (RIE).

You can also make the stat block a bit similar by replacing the ability score adjustments with flat stats, or make this into a template (which involves selecting a base creature and making adjustments). Removing the bit about choosing a base creature's stats is the easier way - say that the transformation into a hunger makes them all the same, powerful ones just use the elite ability scores.

Str -4 Dex -4 Con - Int -2 Wis -2 Cha 1
Can also be read as:
Str -, Dex 6, Con -, Int 8, Wis 8, Cha 1

Remember, as an incorporeal creature, it has no Strength score. The type should be Undead, not Spirit.

Overall, it seems very weak. Even making touch attacks, it has a effective attack bonus of only +2, making the Soul Drain difficult to start. It's incredibly easy to hit with melee attacks, having an AC of only 9 (which includes the +1 deflection bonus from being incorporeal).

Lastly, the Not Really There should state that this 5% miss chance either stacks, or does not stack, with the 50% miss chance from being incorporeal.

Spuddly
2005-11-20, 08:14 AM
I think the name "Hunger" is a bit of a misnomer. If there was a monster called Hunger, I'd imagine that it would have something to do with starvation, and have effects similar to this:

Aura of Starvation: All living creatures within 60' of Hunger must make a a fortitude save of 25 or suffer the effects of starvation until they eat a hearty meal. Creatures that make their save are immune to this effect for the rest of the day.

Perhaps a different name would be appropriate?
Something like Craving Spirit, Longing Revenant, or Thirsting Soul. Or a combination of words like that.

McDeath
2005-11-20, 04:54 PM
My attempt with this was to create a creature that the PCs could drive off easily, but would keep following them as a source of strong emotion. They would then have to find a way to put it to ease its soul or get some magic item to kill it.