[3.5] Thoon

[AslanCross]

Thoon is Thoon, and THOON IS ALL!

*ahem*

Does anyone have any experience running the Mind Flayers of Thoon in Monster Manual V? Any advice on running them?

To those who haven't run them but are familiar with them, are there any issues that you can foresee?

The only issue I can see is that the Thoon Disciples, for their CR, have a pretty low caster level (Lv 4) and as such, only have Lv 2 spells---pretty useless at the point the party is expected to face them. I thought giving them Ur-Priest levels would give them worthwhile spells---maybe even Crusader 1/Ur-Priest 4? (Of course, qualifying for Ur-Priest is another matter)

[Aharon]

Weren't a lot of the monsters in the book weaker types of already existing monsters? (That dragon template is in it, too, isn't it?)

If you want them to be actual menaces, is there anything against just using normal mindflayer stats but the Thoon fluff?

I think that would be less work for you than to give them class levels :smallsmile:

[The Mentalist]

The really interesting Thoon (Thoon is all!) fluff are the minions and creations that have no analogue among the other MMs.

[HunterOfJello]

Psionic Mind Flayers from the Expanded Psionics Handbook are my favorite. However, they seemed to be stronger than CR 8.

[arguskos]

Thoon is Thoon, and THOON IS ALL!

*ahem*

Does anyone have any experience running the Mind Flayers of Thoon in Monster Manual V? Any advice on running them?

To those who haven't run them but are familiar with them, are there any issues that you can foresee?

The only issue I can see is that the Thoon Disciples, for their CR, have a pretty low caster level (Lv 4) and as such, only have Lv 2 spells---pretty useless at the point the party is expected to face them. I thought giving them Ur-Priest levels would give them worthwhile spells---maybe even Crusader 1/Ur-Priest 4? (Of course, qualifying for Ur-Priest is another matter)
I've run them before. What I did was I played up the "this **** is WACK" angle. For instance, the PCs were off on a mission, came back to town, and found that it was entirely empty, with brainless corpses scattered around haphazardly, like they were killed in the course of their normal routine. The party freaked out, not realizing what was going on, and tracked the killers back to a series of caverns nearby. The deeper caves were nigh-organic in nature, with fleshy walls and wet, almost fluid, air. They were guarded by constructs of Thoon, and later mind flayer servants of thoon. There was an omnipresent yet almost silent voice chanting "Thoon... Thoon... Thoon" in the background constantly that grew louder the deeper into the caverns they got. Eventually, they punched into the inner sanctum and encountered a madcrafter of thoon who spawned a pair of dudes and then attacked. It was a very creepy and awesome encounter (one guy got eaten by it; it killed him with a crit on its bite, and I fluffed it as he was eaten in one gulp; everyone just freaked out when this thing ate a guy).

The Thoon Disciples aren't amazing, that's true. I had them mostly self-buff instead of doing anything offensive with spells. That makes them pretty capable as front-line warriors. I also drew up an Illithid Body Tamer (PrC from... Underdark? I think that was the source) of Thoon statblock to serve as an elite warrior of sorts.


Weren't a lot of the monsters in the book weaker types of already existing monsters? (That dragon template is in it, too, isn't it?)

If you want them to be actual menaces, is there anything against just using normal mindflayer stats but the Thoon fluff?

I think that would be less work for you than to give them class levels :smallsmile:
Most of the thoon stuff has unique abilities and features. They're much better than it appears. Perhaps reading over them again might be a good call, since it's easy to get confused between MMIV (the one you're thinking of really, since lots of monsters in that book are just classed critters from other books) and MMV (full of delicious victory). :smallsmile:


The really interesting Thoon (Thoon is all!) fluff are the minions and creations that have no analogue among the other MMs.
Agreed. My personal favorite is the Thoon Stormcloud and the Toon Scyther. They're both very interesting and mechanically competent constructs. Hell, I use those two as my go-to constructs when I need something tough that isn't a golem and isn't a walking TPK.

[AslanCross]

Weren't a lot of the monsters in the book weaker types of already existing monsters? (That dragon template is in it, too, isn't it?)

If you want them to be actual menaces, is there anything against just using normal mindflayer stats but the Thoon fluff?

I think that would be less work for you than to give them class levels :smallsmile:

What Arguskos said. MMV is actually mostly original stuff; there aren't really any monsters that are just rehashes with class levels. The Thoon Elder Brain is the only 'weaker' version of an earlier monster (since the original Elder Brain is an epic-level monstrosity).

The normal mind flayers are actually even weaker, being squishy and almost completely dependent on their targets getting stunned by their mind blast before they can even try brain extraction.

The Thoon Disciples are CR 10 4th- level Mind Flayer Clerics that are supposed to be heavily-armed illithids that are good at melee, but their self-buffs are underwhelming due to being only CL 4. They are, however, much tougher than the standard Mind Flayers and are likely to actually succeed on a brain extraction.


The really interesting Thoon (Thoon is all!) fluff are the minions and creations that have no analogue among the other MMs.

Amen. I really love the Scythers, Soldiers and Stormclouds.


Psionic Mind Flayers from the Expanded Psionics Handbook are my favorite. However, they seemed to be stronger than CR 8.

Since I use Psionics, I will likely be using the psionic mind flayers. However, a Thoon Disciple would still be rather pathetic in melee, even with Psion manifestation.

Actually, I consider them to be a proper CR 8, since the default mind flayers really cannot effectively do what they're notorious for (eating brains) with their awful grapple checks--unless their targets are stunned.


I've run them before. What I did was I played up the "this **** is WACK" angle. For instance, the PCs were off on a mission, came back to town, and found that it was entirely empty, with brainless corpses scattered around haphazardly, like they were killed in the course of their normal routine. The party freaked out, not realizing what was going on, and tracked the killers back to a series of caverns nearby. The deeper caves were nigh-organic in nature, with fleshy walls and wet, almost fluid, air. They were guarded by constructs of Thoon, and later mind flayer servants of thoon. There was an omnipresent yet almost silent voice chanting "Thoon... Thoon... Thoon" in the background constantly that grew louder the deeper into the caverns they got. Eventually, they punched into the inner sanctum and encountered a madcrafter of thoon who spawned a pair of dudes and then attacked. It was a very creepy and awesome encounter (one guy got eaten by it; it killed him with a crit on its bite, and I fluffed it as he was eaten in one gulp; everyone just freaked out when this thing ate a guy).

The Thoon Disciples aren't amazing, that's true. I had them mostly self-buff instead of doing anything offensive with spells. That makes them pretty capable as front-line warriors. I also drew up an Illithid Body Tamer (PrC from... Underdark? I think that was the source) of Thoon statblock to serve as an elite warrior of sorts.

Thanks for the input. That sounds like an amazing and horrific encounter.
Since I'm not planning on going past level 10 in this campaign, I actually want the Thoon Disciple to be the mastermind in this case, so I'd like them to actually be able to do what their entry says (self-buff and wade into melee). Having buffs that last only 4 rounds isn't impressive at all. :smallsigh: At least this way, the buffs they can cast are spells that actually matter.

My more or less final design for the Thoon Disciple is Expert 1/Crusader 1/Ur-Priest 4. Since they're all non-associated, the final CR just goes up by 1, but it's overall a more credible CR 11 threat.

[Zhalath]

Of what I recall from my friend's copy of MM V, the Thoon cultists are crazier than most of those crazy mindflayers. Actually, what I was thinking is that you could actually throw harder-than-normal encounters at your party, but have them act in bizarre and non-optimal ways, like throwing arbitrary spells and abilities around, even at inanimate objects, or switching targets a lot. Play up the insanity. It's fun.

[AslanCross]

The craziness is there, but the purposefulness of Quintessence-gathering is also important. They're totally sold on gathering quintessence, but it can be found almost anywhere. One might even see a Thoon cultist going through anything from cemeteries to garbage piles looking for it--muttering "Thoon..." over and over again while he's at it.

[arguskos]

Thanks for the input. That sounds like an amazing and horrific encounter.
Since I'm not planning on going past level 10 in this campaign, I actually want the Thoon Disciple to be the mastermind in this case, so I'd like them to actually be able to do what their entry says (self-buff and wade into melee). Having buffs that last only 4 rounds isn't impressive at all. :smallsigh: At least this way, the buffs they can cast are spells that actually matter.
Easy to handle! Just shuffle feats around, perhaps give them a flaw or two or an extra DM-granted feat or two and pick spells veeeery selectively. What about a DMM (Extended) Sadism or Masochism? That'd be some scary stuff. What about giving it Evil Devotion? That's a nice, if minor, buff, and one most PCs won't be able to overcome easily. Use feats creatively and you don't have to rebuild at all.


My more or less final design for the Thoon Disciple is Expert 1/Crusader 1/Ur-Priest 4. Since they're all non-associated, the final CR just goes up by 1, but it's overall a more credible CR 11 threat.
I personally dislike this build. Instead, I suggest the following: a Shadow Flayer Barbarian (Pounce) 1/Illithid Body Tamer 3. That works out to be what, CR 10? 11? You have to shuffle one or two feats around, but it'll be a very scary meleer with waaaaay too many attacks.

Alternatively, you could just change the feats and spell selection on the Disciple around to get Extend Spell and DMM(Extend) and some minute/level buffs to get around the issue of low caster level. Ur-Priest is never something you want to actually throw at people, due to power issues.

[AslanCross]

Well, the most powerful Ur-Priest spell it gets here is a 4-round-long divine power, so I don't really see anything overwhelming about it. PCs fighting against it are already around Lv 10 by the time they fight it.

I also strongly, strongly dislike flaws. No amount of window dressing can take away the feeling of "lol I can suk at things il nevr do to b awsum @ things I do all teh tym!"

[arguskos]

Well, the most powerful Ur-Priest spell it gets here is a 4-round-long divine power, so I don't really see anything overwhelming about it. PCs fighting against it are already around Lv 10 by the time they fight it.
Eeeeeeh, I still dislike opening the can of worms that is Ur-Priest. Once that comes out, so do the other big guns, and so do player requests. Better to take something else and buff it up through clever spell/feat selection.


I also strongly, strongly dislike flaws. No amount of window dressing can take away the feeling of "lol I can suk at things il nevr do to b awsum @ things I do all teh tym!"
You're also the DM. Just give it one extra feat, say that a lifetime of quintessence usage granted it a bit more power or something. The point was not flaw use, but more that you can increase power by changing feats far easier than a total class level rebuild.

[Callos_DeTerran]

Something very important, don't try to change the name of the cult to something else, even if it'd fit your campaign world better. I tried, and it just doesn't have the same ring as 'Thoon is Thoon!'

Also, I like the constructs that give pithy little sayings when they change modes. It rewards players who pay attention to what their enemies are saying, plus they are interesting combatants.

[EvilJames]

If the characters have any familiarity with mind flayers at all, be sure to play up how different these flayers are in behavior for added unsettlingness. For example someone above mentioned them just leaving brainless bodies in the street where as regular flayers would likely hide the bodies so that no ones realizes it was them. Normal flayers are sinister alien, and calculating. Thoons sinister, alien and crazy. (somewhat calculating as well but more just driven)

[AslanCross]

Thanks for all the replies, everyone. I'll see what I can do about the Disciples so that I don't have to resort to using Ur-Priest.

Apart from the fluff suggestions, are there any tactical suggestions that anyone has? I know the Scythers and Stormclouds are meant to work well with each other due to the Stormcloud's intelligence and telepathy, and its tremorsense works when it's stealthily commanding the area.

[golem1972]

I dropped the cleric levels and replaced them with psion levels (using psionic Illithid).

I made the constructs into living constructs and gave them decent Con scores. I added the Shardsoul Slayer as one of the constructs.

Infiltrators became a template (based on the Mockery Drone) that I added to humanoids with class levels. Thralls were also leveled, I built them similar to the hobgoblins in the same book. Once a thrall wakes up, it's short lived unless you find a way to constantly damage it.

Infiltrators and thralls were a big part of the campaign and were able to match the EL's I wanted.

Of course, the players really loved it when the Thoons decided to let their pet Kythons loose.

I completely forgot about the Body Tamer, will have to keep that in mind for next time.

[The Glyphstone]

Great Modthulhu: Thread necromancy.