PDA

View Full Version : Nyx, the Primordial Night



Belial_the_Leveler
2009-07-09, 09:59 AM
http://i138.photobucket.com/albums/q243/Samion_/___Chaos_Queen____by_BloodRosesColl.jpg?t=12471260 81

Nyx, the Primordial Night
Titanic Primordial (Extraplanar, Chaos)
Hit Dice 111d12+5883 (7215 HP)
Speed 450 ft, Fly 3 miles (in daylight), Beyond Time and Space
Initiative: +25, always first
Armor Class 242; touch 201; flat-footed never (21 dexterity, 31 armor, 10 shield, 95 deflection, 24 insight, 51 charisma)
Base Attack/Grapple +111/+193
Attack Tentacle +180 melee touch (6d6+66, 15-20/3x, disintegrate, ignores magical protections, cancels magical effects, improved grab, rotting constriction)
Full-Attack 33 tentacles +18/+180 melee.
Space 120 ft.; Reach 120 ft.
Special Attacks see below
Special Qualities see below
Saves Fort +165 Ref +133 Will +149
Abilities Str 112, Dex 53, Con 116, Int 66, Wis 85, Cha 112
Skills all 114 ranks, +44 competence bonus
Feats silent spell, still spell, quicken spell, combat reflexes, improved initiative, improved counterspell, reactive counterspell, power attack, leap attack, dodge, mobility, elusive target, shock trooper
Epic Feats Epic Spellcasting, Epic Counterspell, ISC 17x, Innate spell: Quicken Miracle, Innate Spell: Twin Greater Celerity, Innate Spell: Time Stop, Multispell 10x
Bonus Feats Improved Grab, ISC 7x
Environment The darkness between the stars / beyond the end of the universe.
Challenge Rating 70 (in any timeless plane; otherwise practically omnipotent)
Treasure Power Primordial
Alignment Chaotic Scary

Combat:
If someone is stupid enough or suicidal enough to attack Nyx, they're retroactively erased from existence. If the battle takes place in a timeless plane so Nyx can't use her temporal powers, she will begin altering reality through her at will Miracle ability, extending her available subjective time via Time Stop. Should the enemies prove resilient to magic, she will employ powerful physical attacks while simultaneously removing their protections and countering their spells. Should the opposition prove too powerful, she will employ powerful Epic magic and call upon her children for aid.

Primordial Traits:
Being a Primordial, Nyx counts as an outsider. She is never hindered or adversely affected in any way by effects within her sphere of influence (Darkness, Shadow, Illusions) or time-based attacks and all effects that replicate or mimick them. She is immortal' no attack deals lethal damage to her and she does not need to sleep, eat, drink or breathe. She is a cosmic entity, never failing on a roll of 1 and not subject to antimagic, dispel magic and other effects that specifically don't work on deities.

Pact of Non-interference:
Of the four Primordials that were the beginning of everything, it was agreed that only Gaia, the incarnation of the physical world and Uranus, the incarnation of the Heavens would intervene to the affairs of the world through their creations and their children. Nyx, the incarnation of the darkness between the stars and Erebus, the incarnation of the Underworld would only watch over existence from their domains above and beneath it and only interfere to keep the world in balance.
Thus Nyx, despite being one of the most powerful beings in the Cosmos, is rarely seen by mortal and immortal alike. She only interves at times of great need to balance the universe and in living memory has only done so through her children. Should something threaten the balance of the world though, she is free to use her powers-with extreme prejudice.

Awareness of the Void (Cs)
Nyx knows all events that don't happen in broad daylight. She also remembers all deeds creatures that no longer exist have done in life. In worlds where time exists, this awareness extends infinitely to both past and future due to her being beyond time and space. (see below)
Used in reverse, this ability hides Nyx from the special senses and awareness of lesser creatures as long as she is not standing in broad daylight; unless they use the standard five senses or divination spells, such ceatures can never detect her, no matter what special senses and detection abilities they may posess.

Beyond Time and Space (Cs)
Nyx can travel from any point in any world or plane to any other point in any world or plane at will as a standard action similar to the Worldwalk spell.
In places where time exists, she can move forwards or backwards in time by using Time Hop or Time Regression; repeated uses of these abilities can effectively send her to any point in the past or future of said plane or enable her to replay her actions any number of times.
As a result, attempting to fight Nyx in any place that time exists it futile. Attempting to alter her past or future is also futile; she doesn't have such in any place where time has a meaning and she's immune to time-based attacks anyway.
Nyx rarely uses this ability to alter the history of a world due to a non-interference agreement she has with her brothers and sisters. Dealing with impretinent mortals or deities that attack first is acceptable.

Mother of Darkness (Cs)
All children Nyx has either on her own or with other entities are always creatures of deific power of at least 70 HD. Unlike her sister Gaia and her brother Uranus that gave birth to Titans and powers of the material world, the children of Nyx are usually incarnations of concepts and ideas with ties to the darkness of their mother. The most well-known children of Nyx are Aether (atmosphere), Hemera (day), Charon the Ferryman, Momus (blame), Ponos (toil), Moros (destiny), Thanatos (death), Hypnos (sleep), the Oneiroi (dreams), the Hesperides, the Keres and Fates, Nemesis (retribution), Apate (deception), Philotes (friendship), Geras (age), and Eris (strife).
Nyx is always aware of what happens to her children and may use any of her powers, spell-like abilities or spells on them regardless of distance or intervening boundaries.

Darker than the Darkness (Cs)
Nyx emanates an aura of impenetrable darkness as per an Utterdark spell and a Fog Cloud spell out to 11.100 feet. This aura does hinder evil creatures but does not hinder Nyx herself.
Nyx has total concealment in any conditions other than natural broad daylight and is warded by a nondetection effect DC 126 to overcome.

Might Primordial (Cs)
Nyx, having existed before the creation of the physical world, has no physical items on her person. However, her own cosmic power enhances her body, defences and attacks, something mortals and deities after her use items or artifacts to replicate; the supernatural powers she posesses below are a manifestation of this ability.

Grasp of the Void (Ex/Su)
Instead of normal attacks, Nyx can form and attack with up to 33 tentacles made out of her own shadow. A hit with a tentacle does 6d6+strength modifier damage and Nyx may immediately begin a grapple attempt as with the imrpoved grab feat. A successful grappel attempt deals 5 points of constitution drain as the creature slowly fades away, becoming one with the shadows. This part of the ability is extraordinary.
In addition, Nyx's tentacles attack as +11 speed, ghost touch, vorpal weapons of grief and ruin. They threaten disintegration, hit extradimensional targets and ignore protections like black blades of disaster and can cancel magical effects (but not items) like rods of cancellation. This part of the ability is supernatural.

Nigh Invulnerability (Ex/Su)
Nyx is naturally not subject to acid, electricity, cold, vacuum and mind-affecting effects. She has Fast Healing 20, evasion, a +55 luck bonus to saving throws, DR 35/artifact, Spell Resistance 555 and is not subject to critical hits. These are extraordinary abilities.
She benefits from universal energy immunity, starmantle, sublime revelry, transdimensional greater blink, ghostform, transmutation immunity, scinctillating scales and veil of undeath. These are supernatural abilities.

Power Overwhelming (Su)
Nyx's cosmic power enhances her with a +22 enhancement bonus to ability scores and natural armor, a +22 resistance bonus to saving throws, a bonus to her AC equal to her charisma modifier and a +44 competence bonus to all skill checks. It functions as a +22 imprevious vestment and a +6 tower shield of exceptional infinite deflection and great reflection.

Spells (Sp)
Nyx casts as a 55th level sorceress with an actual caster level of 66. All spells are spells known to her. DC is 66 + spell level. Slots as follows:
6/20/19/19/19/19/18/18/18/18/12/12/12/12/11/11/11/11/10/10/10/10/9/9/9/9/8/8/8/8/7/7/7/7
(levels 0-33)

Epic Spellcasting (Sp)
Nyx can cast 12 epic arcane spells per day and 12 epic divine spells per day. She can cast without aid any Epic Spell of spellcraft DC 200 or less and is assumed to know and have researched all spells she can cast.

DragonGhola
2009-07-09, 12:48 PM
This is really cool. Same with your Archangel. Have you ever seen the Immortal's Handbook series? That's the only way I can think of to kill this monstrosity. I may be willing to playtest against thus beast if you want people to. Again, awesome job.

Belial_the_Leveler
2009-07-09, 01:17 PM
I've seen the Immortals Handbook. What I like about it is that it addresses epic levels and a lot of work has been put into it. What I don't like about it is that it creates far too many new mechanics epic players have to remember. One could much more easily accept that the abilities of epic monsters are usually unique and don't fall into any exact rules-just like special abilities of nonepic monsters are handled. As for monster building, if you're careful, you can make a creature that is CR-appropriate using an existing basis.

For example, stats for Nyx are based on an Elder Titan (CR 30) that has had the Pseudonatural template applied to it (CR +10) and that uses one of the few epic progressions that work well at any level-dragon (CR +26 for 13 age categories).
That brings us to basic CR 66 and pretty good stats. Before we go on, we decide that she's going to have 5 special abilities appropriate for her level power-wise-so on par with the powers of some greater gods. For one such ability we sacrifice the SLAs she's supposed to get. For the other we give appropriate CR increases (+1 for each, +4 total). That brings us to CR 70.
Now we apply treasure. Nyx is a deity and too many item-based bling aren't flavor-appropriate. What is appropriate though is cosmic power that gives bonuses-sort of like a deity's bonus based on DvR. To decide the appropriate bonus we look at her CR and divide by 3-because items that give numerical bonuses have a max of CL/3. We get 23-but because bonuses are usually an even number we round down at 22. So, the items she's gonna have will give at most a +22 bonus or replicate at most level 22 spells. With that cap in mind, we add up to her appropriate treasure; ability and save boosts, enhancement bonus as weapons to attacks, some spells that are always active and caster level and spell DC boosts to bring her spells up to speed. Knowing all spells is replicated by a few million of effective treasure invested into replicating the effects of runestaves.
The next step is tailoring the stats and abilities to fit the character without changing the power level-that's why we do it after the numbers are pretty much decided. We assign flavor, cool names and make the abilities work together.
Finally, we do feats and skills. With that amount of intelligence, skills are easy; they're all maxed. Feats would be troublesome due to their number but there's an easy shortcut; find something you want and buy alot of it. In Nyx's case, as a deity she must have some way to alter reality-but we're out of special ability slots. So we take lots and lots of Improved Spell Capacity feats and Innate Spell; Quickened Miracle. She can now do quickened miracles at will. Because we can and it is fun, we also add Innate Spell; Twin Greater Celerity and several Multispells. We finish up with Epic Spellcasting, Epic Counterspell and their perequisites.
We polish up the build, find a nice image and post it. :smalltongue:

Zeta Kai
2009-07-09, 02:18 PM
BTW, that picture is the gothiest thing I've ever seen in my life. No joke.

Knaight
2009-07-09, 02:42 PM
Yeah, find an actual picture of Nyx. There are paintings, as Nyx was a major Greek goddess, similar to Gaia, or Uranus (and way beyond Zeus and pantheon).

Zeta Kai
2009-07-09, 05:00 PM
Yeah, find an actual picture of Nyx. There are paintings, as Nyx was a major Greek goddess, similar to Gaia, or Uranus (and way beyond Zeus and pantheon).

I'd hardly call her a major goddess. She is certainly in the mythology, but she is a fairly enigmatic & obscure figure, like her brother/mate Erebus & their father, the ur-deity Chaos. Even her wiki article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyx) says her appearances are sparse. She was important & assumed to be mighty, but for a Greek deity, she didn't show up a lot in the stories.

Now, for major Greek goddesses, let us compare her to Hera, Artemis, Aphrodite, or Athena. Those deities showed up in stories & myths all the time. It's like Marvel Comics: Uatu the Watcher & the Beyonder are some of the most power beings in the cosmos, but who gets on almost every issue's cover? Spiderman & Wolverine. Spidey & Logan may not be cosmically powerful, but they are the "major" heroes, whereas Uatu & the Big B are minor, at best.

Knaight
2009-07-09, 05:08 PM
I was using major as her place in the myths when she shows up. She doesn't show up very often, but when she does its major. And she was important enough for Renaissance painters to paint her, with paintings that are a little more impressive than the goth lady.

Belial_the_Leveler
2009-07-09, 05:29 PM
Don't forget the part about her being the only thing Zeus ever feared. Anyone who lives in a house at the end of the Universe is badass in my book.

@Knaight;
Link to said pictures?

The Rose Dragon
2009-07-09, 05:34 PM
Don't forget the part about her being the only thing Zeus ever feared. Anyone who lives in a house at the end of the Universe is badass in my book.

@Knaight;
Link to said pictures?

The only thing Zeus feared? What happened to his deathly fear of being deposed as he did to his father?

KIDS
2009-07-09, 05:42 PM
Very interesting! It's really an unbeatable monstrosity, though I believe that the amount of powers it gets is a bit overboard for a CR 70 creature. I mean, a +55 bonus to saves?

For comparison, a Hecatoncheires (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/abomination.htm#hecatoncheires) is a CR 59 creature and has way way way less abilities. Even with all deity stuff, I still find it a bit out of scale. Maybe something like CR 150 would be better.

Eldan
2009-07-09, 05:46 PM
That's pretty cool... I think it's about the first thing I see online that has a chance against that CR 250 something Lady of Pain someone made. And I still think giving Her Serenity stats was a stupid idea.

The Rose Dragon
2009-07-09, 05:49 PM
That's pretty cool... I think it's about the first thing I see online that has a chance against that CR 250 something Lady of Pain someone made. And I still think giving Her Serenity stats was a stupid idea.

I think Lady of Pain's stats should be: "If Lady of Pain wants you dead, you die, no save. If she wants you to suffer, you suffer unimaginably. If neither, be bloody grateful you avoided her attention for now."

PairO'Dice Lost
2009-07-09, 07:38 PM
For comparison, a Hecatoncheires (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/abomination.htm#hecatoncheires) is a CR 59 creature and has way way way less abilities. Even with all deity stuff, I still find it a bit out of scale. Maybe something like CR 150 would be better.

The Hecatoncheires is laughably under-CRed; there was a contest a while back on the WotC boards to see who could bring it down pre-epic, and they had to stop after one died the first four times--and this is with things like Wizard 15/Fatespinner 5 and Warblade 10/Eternal Blade 10, not crazy-optimized builds.


I think Lady of Pain's stats should be: "If Lady of Pain wants you dead, you die, no save. If she wants you to suffer, you suffer unimaginably. If neither, be bloody grateful you avoided her attention for now."

Not quite. It should be "If Her Serenity's shadow falls on you, you are obliterated from existence. If Her Serenity looks at you and wills it, you are trapped in an extradimensional maze for all eternity. If you say a prayer with any part of her name involved, you die a horrible, agonizing death.

Also, Her Serenity can summon dabus. All of them. At the same time. As a free action when it's not her turn."

Eldan
2009-07-09, 07:48 PM
Actually, I think that's about what her stats were. Therefore, CR 250.

Zeta Kai
2009-07-09, 08:35 PM
The Hecatoncheires is laughably under-CRed; there was a contest a while back on the WotC boards to see who could bring it down pre-epic, and they had to stop after one died the first four times--and this is with things like Wizard 15/Fatespinner 5 and Warblade 10/Eternal Blade 10, not crazy-optimized builds.

Don't you mean over-CRed?

PairO'Dice Lost
2009-07-09, 09:20 PM
Actually, I think that's about what her stats were. Therefore, CR 250.

If you can actually assign a CR to her, it's not high enough.


Don't you mean over-CRed?

:smallredface: Oops. I was thinking "over-CRed" and "under-powered" and got my wires crossed.

Belial_the_Leveler
2009-07-10, 08:16 PM
Unless a being is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, it has limits to its power. If it has limits to its power then it can have stats that dictate those limits.

On the subject of the Lady of Pain, we don't have any indication that she's omnipotent at all. Mortal creatures have been flayed by her shadow or mazed with a glance. So what? First, they were mortal. Any deity with Alter Reality and Life and Death or Divine Splendor could do that to them, no save no defence allowed. Secondly, we've never seen how often, at what range and through what barriers she can perform those abilites. Life and Death could slay any mortal creature anywhere in the Universe at will through any barrier or defence. And any two-copper deity of death has that ability. They're still not omnipotent.
As for her greatest feat so far, destroying a greater deity outright, so what? Karsus, an (admittedly powerful) mortal sorcerer destroyed the most powerful greater deity of his world... accidentally.

PairO'Dice Lost
2009-07-10, 11:22 PM
Unless a being is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient, it has limits to its power. If it has limits to its power then it can have stats that dictate those limits.

Problem is, we don't know what those limits are, so as soon as you put a CR to her you can make something that can kill her, even if it's just a copy with greater helpings of plot armor. You can't tell what it should take to kill her unless you know where she falls in the grand scheme of things.


On the subject of the Lady of Pain, we don't have any indication that she's omnipotent at all. Mortal creatures have been flayed by her shadow or mazed with a glance. So what? First, they were mortal. Any deity with Alter Reality and Life and Death or Divine Splendor could do that to them, no save no defence allowed. Secondly, we've never seen how often, at what range and through what barriers she can perform those abilites. Life and Death could slay any mortal creature anywhere in the Universe at will through any barrier or defence. And any two-copper deity of death has that ability. They're still not omnipotent.

She's not omnipotent, but close enough to it that no one has defeated her. Keep in mind also that she can bar any divine powers from Sigil (not to mention the various other anti-deific or -divine abilities that do that), so Life and Death actually has limits on its power whereas there is no force we know of that bars Her Serenity from using her shadow and maze abilities.


As for her greatest feat so far, destroying a greater deity outright, so what? Karsus, an (admittedly powerful) mortal sorcerer destroyed the most powerful greater deity of his world... accidentally.

Karsus screwed up, accidentally killed a greater deity by botching a spell after working on it for months or years, and was utterly annihilated in return. Her Serenity willed a greater deity to die and it did, no preparation required, no backlash. They're not quite in the same league.


The Lady of Pain isn't the most powerful being in the multiverse (at the very least the Lords of the Nine and some Demon Princes might give her a challenge), but we just don't have a frame of reference to quantify her power, so any number you assign to it is going to be wrong until and unless we have more information (which, given that official Planescape stuff hasn't been published in years, is unlikely at best).

Debihuman
2009-07-11, 01:41 AM
Unfortunately, I'm not that familiar with the Immortals Handbook so I've got a few questions when a special ability has (Cs) what kind of an ability it is?

If you gave her the psuedonatural template, she should have an alternate form (especially with all those tentacles).

Debby

Belial_the_Leveler
2009-07-11, 02:28 AM
@PairO'Dice Lost;
It is simple enough; just make the Lady of Pain a greater cosmic/divine power that is in her own domain; Sigil. Greater Powers that are in their domains are almost omnipotent, regardless of their actual stats;
1) Their domains are part of their portofolio, so they can sense all events that would happen several months in advance and be crazy prepared about them.
2) They can bar extradimensional entry to their domains so if their domains don't have a physical entry, they are impossible to enter without permission.
3) They can manipulate the use of magic of all other beings while retaining their own. E.g. they could ban the use of all evil spells then "enhance" transmutation, abjuration, conjuration and divination with corrupt spell, making those schools of magic evil-and thus banned to all others but themselves. So another deity could never buff, could not use time stop, could not call or summon allies and could not gather info with magic.
4) They can manipulate the Time trait. So, for example, they can add the Erratic time trait to their domain, making time slower in most locations but really, really, really fast where they are currently standing. I mean, 1 round = 1 year fast or more. When they want to move, they take 1 year of concentration where they are standing-that to all others will appear as a single action-to change the location of the fast time to the new place they want to go. That way, they can always take as many actions as they want in relation to others.

So, the Lady of Pain willing another deity dead? The other deity can't have Deathward active in her domain because of the magic ban. The Lady opens a Portal between their locations and shoots her entire array of spells as Necrotic Skull Bombs at him. No save, magical immunity doesn't work and with so many spells, enough overcome his divine immunity to kill him. Lady of Pain closes the gate and takes an 8-hour rest to replenish the spent spells.
To all others, that would appear as 1/1000 of her round, assuming she's changed the time trait so 1 round = 1 year for her. And with that much time dilation, she could do it to a thousand deities at the same round IF said deities are in her domain.


@Debihuman;
(Cs) abilities are Cosmic abilities. They function as Divine abilites.
As for her alternate form, she already is an incorporeal, formless being shrouded in darkness and mist that has a mass of black tentacles to attack with. She doesn't have a humanoid form at all; she only uses her reality-altering ability to appear as a humanoid so as not to scare lesser deities to death.

PairO'Dice Lost
2009-07-11, 10:55 AM
@PairO'Dice Lost;
It is simple enough; just make the Lady of Pain a greater cosmic/divine power that is in her own domain; Sigil. Greater Powers that are in their domains are almost omnipotent, regardless of their actual stats;

Believe me, I know how to play gods and powers right and how well their home turf helps them. That's the issue at hand, though--home turf. If you want to assign a CR to Lady of Pain + Sigil, that's going to be entirely different than any CR for just Her Serenity. Since we've only observed the former, we have no idea what the latter would be.

Could Her Serenity take out Asmodeus in Sigil? Most likely. Could Asmodeus take out Her Serenity in Baator? Most likely. Who would win if they were both in a third-party plane? No one knows.