Addictive Fey (3.5e Monster, PEACH)

[LOTRfan]

Last year I posted stats for Leprechauns/Clurichauns. This year, I bring you the Gancanaghs. Happy Saint Patrick's day, everybody. :smallsmile:

http://www.bellaterreno.com/art/images/sitegraphics/gancanagh_log_smoking.gif

Gancanagh
Medium Fey
Hit Dice: 6d6+6 (27 hp)
Initiative: +1
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
Armor Class: 15 (+1 Dex, +4 Deflection), touch 15, flat footed 14
Base Attack/Grapple: +3/+3
Attack: Club +3 melee (1d6)
Full Attack: Club +3 melee (1d6)
Special Attacks: Charming Song, Toxic Touch, Spell-like Abilities
Special Qualities: Darkvision 60 ft., Unearthly Grace
Saves: Fort +3, Ref +8, Will +4
Abilities: Str 11, Dex 12, Con 13, Int 10, Wis 9, Cha 18
Skills: Bluff +15, Diplomacy +13, Disguise +13, Hide +3, Intimidate +15, Move Silently +12, Perform (Sing) +13, Spot +8
Feats: Lightning Reflexes, Persuasive, Stealthy
Environment: Temperate Hills
Organization: Solitary, or 1 with 1-2 humanoids of 3rd level or lower
Challenge Rating: 4
Treasure: Standard
Alignment: Usually Chaotic Evil
Advancement: By Character Class
Level Adjustment: +2

An extremely attractive man with slight eleven characteristics can be seen just by the edge of the forest. His warm, confident singing is very alluring, and you soon find yourself walking closer to get a better look.

Gancanaghs are creatures often cursed by father and spouse alike, and in some cases are thought of as a form of incubus. Gancanaghs are not demons, however, instead being a form of faerie. They are well known by other Fey for their devilish charm and extremely selfish behavior. Gancanaghs resemble extremely attractive humanoid males with vaguely elf-like features. In many cases, they are confused as half-elves. Most have extremely pale skin and dark hair, though occasionally one with red hair is born. These fey are often seen carrying a small clay pipe, but as they do not smoke this item is just decorative in nature.

Gancanaghs live a very care-free and hedonistic lifestyle. These fey enjoy drinking, partying, and sex above all else, though they leave many dead lovers in their wake A gancanagh's flesh is infused with an extremely addicting toxin, one that leaves the gancanagh's unwitting victim with an extreme need for it if they are to survive. Unfortunately for them, a gancanagh cares very little about what happens to their partners after they finish their "activities," and rarely stay in the same place for more than a week or two. The men and women who have become addicted die painfully, their bodies shriveling as they pine for their lover. Particularly cruel gancanaghs are known to get multiple people in the same area addicted, and then force them to fight for his entertainment to decide which one he chooses as his partner.

Gancanaghs are (thankfully) very rare faeries, usually turning up amidst community-wide celebrations and then disappearing afterwards. A gancanagh weighs the same as a human of the same height would, and speaks both Common and Sylvan.

Combat
Gancanaghs rarely enter combat, preferring to use allies to actually fight for them. If cornered, they attempt to use their magical abilities to aid them in their escape.

Empowering Song (Su): Three times a day, as a standard action, a gancanagh can sing to gain +4 enhancement bonus to its Charisma-based skills , and any enchantment spells or spell-like abilities it performs are treated as having a caster level two levels higher than it actually is. This bonus last 1d4 rounds. All allies within 30 feet of the gancanagh gain a +2 enhancement bonus to their skill checks for the same duration. All foes within 30 of the gancanagh instead take a -1 penalty to all Will saves for the duration. A creature that successfully saves cannot be affected again by the same gancanagh's song for 24 hours. The save is Charisma-based.

[B]Spell-like Abilities: 3/day- Charm Person. 1/day- Hideous Laughter, Shillelagh, Hypnotism. Caster Level 4th.

Toxic Touch (Su): For this ability to take affect, another creature must be exposed to a gancanagh's bare skin for a prolonged period of time. Usually, this occurs through a kiss or another act of passion, but merely grappling a gancanagh for two consecutive rounds is enough for this as well. The other creature must make a Fortitude save (DC 17), or become permanently addicted to the gancanagh's touch. Those who become addicted must be touched by the gancanagh at least once per day, or otherwise they suffer 1 point of Constitution drain per day as their body thirsts for the toxin is infused in the gancanagh's skin. Those exposed to the gancanagh's touch have their Constitution score restored, but the drainage resumes the following day. A remove curse spell is the only way to remove the addiction, though it does not restore any points of Constitution already lost. This ability doesn't affect Constructs, Fey, or Undead.

Unearthly Grace (Su): A gancanagh adds its Deflection modifier to its Armor Class as a deflection bonus. This is already included in the gancanagh's statblock.

[Debihuman]

While you have a good grasp of the rules of monster design, you haven't quite grasped how to design for a balanced Challenge Rating. This is a total party killer for a 2nd level party. They'll never make their saves and nobody can cast remove curse.

What you should be designing for is a party that can cast remove curse so you'll be looking at CR 5 at minimum.

Only a killer DM sics a DC 20 save on a 2nd level party. Ugh. DC 13 is what you would typically aim for. Compare this to the Drayad (CR 3) whose charisma is 18. Your creature's Charisma should be 16 for CR 2.

There's no reason it should have a racial bonus to save for Toxic Touch. That just pushes up a DC that is already too high even higher. With charisma 16, the save is DC 15 which is still high.

This is at least LA +3. Charisma 22 gives it +12 racial bonus to charisma (which is worth at least LA +1 alone at least) and it has toxic touch which is easily worth another +1 LA or more since it is so powerful and I'd even add another for its Charming song since it adds so many more skill points and such. It needs severe scaling back to be appropriate for CR.

Before I forget, your creature's Charming Song has a number of issues. I'm gong to compare it to a harpy's captivating song so you'll see the problems more clearly


Captivating Song (Su): The most insidious ability of the harpy is its song. When a harpy sings, all creatures (other than harpies) within a 300-foot spread must succeed on a DC 16 Will save or become captivated. This is a sonic mind-affecting charm effect. A creature that successfully saves cannot be affected again by the same harpy’s song for 24 hours. The save DC is Charisma-based.

You'll note the harpy is CR 4 and has a 17 charisma even though it has 7 HD.

I think it is poor design to have to succeed on a skill check to use a special ability. Why make the DM roll for it? It just wastes times. If it fails, can it can just try again (See Perform skill for retries).

I really hate the "Once per encounter" since that is a holdover from 4th edition. 3.5 does not use that phrase. Also, you failed to say that creatures affected by this ability can't be affected again for 24 hours, this effectively becomes an At Will ability. It can run away and come back later as a "new" encounter. That's begging for abuse. So if its allies stop being affected, it runs away and comes back as a "new" encounter. That's cheesy.

You also failed to mention how long these bonuses lasts.

I'm not fond of it havig to sing as full round-action. Special abilities are normally only standard actions. This means he can't move and sing, which doesn't really make a lot of sense. It also makes it impossible to use in combat when it would be most likely to use this abiltiy to bolster its allies.

You also failed to mention whether its allies needed to hear the singing to be affected by it. Is it a sonic mind-affecting charm effect? How are its allies affected but not its foes? It should probably just affect their Willpower saves.

I think you should consider renaming this ability since it doesn't actually "charm" as the spell.

The bonus gained should not be an untyped bonus but should be an enhancement bonus. You should also list the skills affected since it has 5 skills that are charisma-based rather than make the DM look them up.

This is what I recommend:

Empowering Song (Su): Three times a day, as a standard action, a gancanagh can sing to gain +4 enhancement bonus to its Charisma-based skills [Bluff, Diplomacy, Disguise, Intimidate skills and Perform (sing) skills] and it gains a +4 enhancement bonus on saving throws vs. enchantment spells and spell-like abilities. This bonus last 1d4 rounds. All allies within 30 feet of the gancanagh gain a +2 enhancement bonus to their saves for the same duraction. All foes within 30 of the gancanagh take a -2 penalty to their saves unless they succeed on DC X Willpower save. A creature that successfully saves cannot be affected again by the same gancanagh's song for 24 hours. The save is Charisma-based.

This is another good reason why you should adjust the creature's charisma downward. Obviously you replace the X with the appropriate DC which should reflect the creature's 16 charisma not a charisma that is 22.

Debby

[LOTRfan]

Okay, that's a lot of changes.

Alright, so I'm going to bump the CR up while also making some of the changes. I think I'll change the Charisma to 18 (which is still more powerful than the Harpy, but I was trying to make the Charisma score slightly less than that of a Succubus. Which, in retrospect, was probably not a good idea, seeing as its CR is one more than its Hit Dice). I'll also be adding more Hit Dice, because Fey have poor hit points as it is and if it will be facing higher level characters it may need another one or two.

I'll have to change the LA later after I figure it out. I think the way that LA works is atrocious because it essentially ignores the racial HD when determining the LA and just adds it afterward to get the total ECL. Which, in my opinion, is sort of silly. But yeah, the ability to bestow a curse is powerful for a 5th level character to have, especially since Wizards/Sorcerers don't even get the opportunity to learn it until 7th. I'll try to figure our a reasonable LA after I add more Hit Dice.

I like the new Empowering Song (though I should have been more clear in that I meant that spell-like abilities and spells cast by the gancanagh are treated as being four levels higher, not that they get a +4 bonus to their own saving throws. Although now I'll probably reduce this to +2 and the allies to +1 while saving the +4 enhancement bonus on the skill checks) and I'll add that in with the new DC. But I'll have to make these changes later, as right now I have to start getting ready for work. Thank you for being honest and extremely helpful.

[inuyasha]

wow this is great, mind if i use it in a game coming up once its finished?

[LOTRfan]

I ended up using a slightly modified version of the Empowering Song ability that you suggested; instead of taking a -2 penalty to will saves, enemies instead take a -1. This is mostly because the ability now also grants the gancanagh to cast enchantment spells as if the caster level was were two levels higher for 1d4 rounds. Speaking of caster level, I never actually listed what caster level the gancanaghs have. It's caster level 4th. I'll add that in now.

I removed the racial bonus to the DC for Toxic Touch and lowered the Charisma score, but the HD increase added one to the DC, so it's now 17. CR is now 5, but it's sort of still on the weak side. Which is alright, I guess, as this guy really isn't meant to be a combatant. LA is now +2, so a 1st level gancanagh character has an ECL of 9.

Inuyasha, please feel free to use it. I'm glad you like it. Let me know how it turns out. :smallsmile:

Also, if you like this, there are a lot of other monsters/faeries from Irish myth that you might be interested in.

[Debihuman]

I'm glad you found my critique helpful, though in retrospect, I could have been a bit less severe. Thank you for being such a good sport about it. Despite all my nattering about how off parts of it were, I like it a lot. It's going in my keep pile so to speak. :-)

With more HD, it makes sense to adjust Charisma score to 18. If you are now aiming for CR 5 that makes sense. At CR 2, Charisma 18 would probably still be a bit high, which is why I was recommending Charisma 16. Good call on that.

This is why I like to compare a homebrew creature's abilities to similar creatures from the SRD or MM.

Also you don't want the PCs to have spells that can outstrip your creature's Special Abilities. That sometimes can happen with creatures that have few HD and really high CR.

Looking forward to seeing the completed and revised creature.

FYI, if no caster level is listed it is assumed to be the same as HD. Also, since it now has 6 HD, it needs a 3rd feat.

And one more thing: The DC Will save to avoid the penalty is missing from empowering song. Just a quick question: why do allies get bonuses to skills but foes get penalties to saves? It seems a little bit imbalanced.

Debby

[LOTRfan]

I'll add a feat momentarily. I'll also add the DC (I thought I included that, my mistake). Do you have any suggestions on how to make Empowering Song more balanced?