[3.5] Good Underwater Creatures

[Token Fembot]

I'm going to be running my first campaign soon, and for some reason I had the brilliant idea of having it take place almost entirely underwater. (Mostly using the Aquatic Races found in Unearthed Arcana, though we have quite a few homebrew races in the hopes of this not becoming completely "Forgotten Realms... but IN WATERRR!!")
We've mostly got everything worked out -- and I'm fairly good at coming up with ridiculous yet reasonable-sounding explanations for undersea "culture" at a second's notice -- however, I'd really like to be able to throw some weird sea monsters at them, but I'm not entirely sure where to look for the best ones. Anyone have any really good ideas?
The PCs will be starting at level 1 and, well... they are clueless about optimization. We're all fairly new at this, to be honest, and still figuring out what works and what doesn't. (Our current campaign, which is wrapping up for now, has a monk in it who, as far as I can tell, wasn't planning on multi-classing or PrCing at all. That PC also had a tendency to do idiotic things outside of character-building... but that's another story.) So I'm mostly looking for low-level creatures to toss at them, but having some higher-level monstrosities to hold back for later would be welcome, too! :smallamused:

(Similarly, if anyone has ever done anything like this, I'd appreciate any tips or horror stories or the like. :smallsmile:)

[SilverLeaf167]

Stormwrack is an obvious book for the monsters, and this campaign in general. It is entirely focused on marine environments.

[Token Fembot]

Stormwrack is an obvious book for the monsters, and this campaign in general. It is entirely focused on marine environments.

Really? Hm, I'm pretty sure one of us has that book somewhere, too -- we've got a mess of books and we've barely opened half of them. I'll look into it, thanks!

[under_score]

I figure a lot of plants can be imported to an aquatic environment with no actual change (just marking them as an "aquatic equivalent"). For example, early in my current campaign, the party encountered a water filled tunnel in the cavern complex they were exploring. As they were progressing through it, holding their breath, they were attacked by an Assassin Vine. It was just more of a weedy looking one.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Starting at 1st level? Clueless about optimization? Monstrous Crab (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fw/20040221a).

[Kol Korran]

well, other than Stormwrack (which i don't have) here are some thoughts.. -
- Sauhagin could be your low level humanoids. quite evil, tool users, and you can add a small shark as pet here and there..
- for beefier grunts check the aquatic version of ogres, gargoyles and trolls (trolls may be particularly troublesome, with no fire to burn their wounds).
- many plants can work well under water, as the above mentioned assasin vine. so can constrructs.
- meaner beasties might include the hydra (remember what i said about trolls?), chuuls, and "aquatic made" versions of creatures.
- for horror, you can have a floating and twisting gibbering mouther, and of course- the Aboleth! read Lords of Madness and base a campaign about ending a lingering Aboleth menace, taking slaves, masking their presence with pwoerfull illusions, scheming evil schemes... :smallwink:

[Lateral]

Starting at 1st level? Clueless about optimization? Monstrous Crab (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fw/20040221a).

SMITE EVIL! SMITE EVIL! *smites Furiou*

Aboleths are pretty cool, and so are whales. Once, my party fought a fiendish half-blue dragon Cachalot Whale with class levels. I didn't tell them what they were fighting, just that it was huge and could shoot lightning at them. It was awesome.

[hamishspence]

Fiend Folio has quite a few underwater creatures. Including oozes.

[Dralnu]

Unleash The Kraken!

(MM1)

EDIT: Oops, low-level. Well, I think Stormwrack would have you covered. There's a couple in the Monster Manuals, like aboleths and crabpeople.

Still, I think every sea-based campaign needs one kraken. You could start the low-level party on a large boat. Kraken attacks and demolishes the boat. There's no way the party can defeat it head-on, maybe creative usage of cannons to take out tentacles and have it retreat, but the drama in such a scene would be intense. Maybe the boat gets destroyed but the PCs live and are washed to the next plot point?

[Aeolius]

Similarly, if anyone has ever done anything like this, I'd appreciate any tips or horror stories or the like.

I would start by not looking at rulebooks at all.

- Discovery's "Blue Planet" series is available on iTunes (http://itunes.apple.com/us/tv-season/the-blue-planet/id308833888)
- Look over a few reference books. OCEAN (http://www.amazon.com/Ocean-American-Museum-Natural-History/dp/0756636922/ref=pd_sim_b_2) (DK Publishing) is a personal favorite
- Vist a few websites, like the Monterey Bay Aquarium (http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/) (great webcams!) and LiveAquaria (http://www.liveaquaria.com/)
- Take a trip to your local public aquarium or pet store that sells saltwater fish.

THEN break out the rulebooks! :)