Gelatinous cube a challenge?

[thethird]

Okay, the other day my pbp party decided to attack and overkill a poor gelatinous cube that was just merrily walking (or whatever a gelatinous cube does) around the dungeon and well...

This (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/ooze.htm) guy has a CR of 3. And the dc to avoid being paralyzed for 3d6 rounds is fortitude 20. I know that constitution is important but what party of 3 level characters can make that save? The reflex save to avoid being engulfed (which you automatically fail if you are paralyzed) is 13 (most dex based characters will probably make that one due to high ref, high dex but is still hard for others).

Luckily for the party they were level eight. And even if the cube was advanced in HD (and it was a sentry one, dungeonscape) I don't feel that it really challenged them (except for the still wrecking dcs) since it still only did one d6 of acid a round.

Even if I feel that it wasn't a hard challenge I feel satisfied with the encounter, it was the first one that we pbped and I think i might learn some things from it. It also served to advance some plot and that is always nice.

But...

Any suggestion on how to make the gelatinous cube more challenging bearable to low level parties (the level to which it is intended) and to high level parties?

[Rongar]

Yes, the Fort save can really be a bear, but you can outrun a cube big time (only has a 15' move rate) if you need to. Also, if it just tries to engulf you, you can forgo the AoO and just move out of the way with a DC 13 Reflex Save, which is a heck of a lot better than a DC 20 Fort Save once you get slammed by it's attack, or engulfed by it rolling over you and everyone else in front of it (think the blob). Unless you have an attack that can really do some damage to it, then just back off or move out of it's way (it can sense movement, etc, up to 60' away). And as far as I can tell, you can sit back and dole out damage to it from afar since it doesn't appear to have many immunities...

Hope this helps. :smallsmile:

EDIT: I guess I just answered your question about lower level parties since it is a challenge for them. High level groups usually just kill them in a round or two. If you want to use this monster to challenge higher level parties, either make it bigger/faster, give it more reach, or perhaps give it immunities to missile fire or something of that nature...

In 3.X, there's really no limit on what you can do with any type of creature.

[Amphetryon]

Many of the terrains in which you'd expect to find a Gelatinous Cube are traditionally populated by races that have a bonus to CON (Dwarves, Gnomes). A CON 20 Barbarian 3 makes the FORT Save 50% of the time in a Rage, assuming he has no other gear boosting Saves - and a Cloak of Resistance +1 is definitely affordable at this point, as are the odds that someone casts Resistance, Bear's Endurance, or something else to boost the Save. So, at this point our Barbarian makes the save more than half the time, with other strong FORT Save ever so slightly behind.

Further, the FORT Save is predicated on either a failed DC 13 REF Save - at least a 50/50 proposition for most Character concepts by this level, before magic/magic items - or the Gelatinous Cube hitting successfully with its robust +2 bonus to a Slam attack (which is essentially either a lucky critical or a Character willfully walking around naked).

I'm not really seeing the problem, unless your parties are typically composed of Races that take CON penalties AND Classes with poor FORT/REF saves.

[Hat-Trick]

Being one of Third's players, I thought I'd stop by and chat a bit.

I was the only character that fell victim to the dangers of the Gelatinous cube, having failed the higher Reflex save of 17 due to HD advancement with my piddling +3 to Reflex. However, my +10 non raging Fortitude save was still not enough to make much of a dent in the also HD advanced Fortitude save versus the paralysis. Luckily, my character has fast healing 2 and the party destroyed it promptly after.

Only one person had a higher FORT save than me at +11. Every single character in the party would be hurting to make that save. Sure you might not get hit often due to its abysmal attack bonus, but reflex saves get a bit harder to hit when you need a 14 or better on the dice.

[Killer Angel]

Yes, the Fort save can really be a bear, but you can outrun a cube big time (only has a 15' move rate) if you need to.

That's true, but "Gelatinous cubes are hard to see, even under ideal conditions, and it takes a DC 15 Spot check to notice one. Creatures who fail to notice a cube and walk into it are automatically engulfed".
So, that DC 15 could be higher, and for low level character, it's not so impossible to simply walk in it...

[ArcturusV]

Course, you could do other things with it. A classic I've used it for is Gelatinous Pit Traps. The Cube can't get away not having the ability to climb. It makes for a less immediately deadly trap. But still one that no one wants to get involved in.

Combine with an open, visible pit and something that can punt around PCs, and I start seeing players sweat it big time.

[Gwazi Magnum]

Make it so you're in a tunnel or somewhere small and closed off, and your goal at the other end. Put a gelatinous cube in your way, that's probably the most challenging because you got to get through it one way or another.

That's what my group went up against at one point and it crippled us enough one player who was secretly playing a demon chose to reveal himself and team kill after that since we were weak enough from that fight.

[Duke of Urrel]

Course, you could do other things with it. A classic I've used it for is Gelatinous Pit Traps. The Cube can't get away not having the ability to climb. It makes for a less immediately deadly trap. But still one that no one wants to get involved in.

Combine with an open, visible pit and something that can punt around PCs, and I start seeing players sweat it big time.

Your destructive imagination is a credit to the DM's guild, ArcturusV.

I see this trap as something that can be very easily leveled up to threaten even very tough guys with lots of Hit-Points. Just make the pit deep and cover its entire floor with the Cube (which it can easily do if the pit isn't very wide). If you fall into this trap, can you even try to swim or climb up out of it? Constitution shmonstitution – if you can't extricate yourself from this mess, your life will be over soon.

[CTrees]

That's true, but "Gelatinous cubes are hard to see, even under ideal conditions, and it takes a DC 15 Spot check to notice one. Creatures who fail to notice a cube and walk into it are automatically engulfed".
So, that DC 15 could be higher, and for low level character, it's not so impossible to simply walk in it...

My favorite encounter with a gelatinous cube was caused by exactly this. We were in an area with a fair amount of undead, and see a skeleton in badly worn armor floating down the hall towards us. No one notices the cube itself, and we assume the skeleton is some nasty undead. I charged it on my mount. Didn't go well, but it *was* hilarious, as I was stuck there in the cube, having plowed straight into it at charge speeds.

[Vaz]

Course, you could do other things with it. A classic I've used it for is Gelatinous Pit Traps. The Cube can't get away not having the ability to climb. It makes for a less immediately deadly trap. But still one that no one wants to get involved in.

Combine with an open, visible pit and something that can punt around PCs, and I start seeing players sweat it big time.

Cobalt Half Dragon with Rapid and Maximised Breath Weapon feats. Every 3-6 Rounds, you're breathing off a DC48 Line of Force (48 Damage), Bullrushing it all. Make it a cone for funzies.

[thethird]

Thanks for the responses guys. I've done the gelatinous cubes as traps before, but I never actually tried to use them as a get go monster.

I'll try to rewrite some of my concerns.

-At low level, a gelatinous cube can be troublesome, although as Amphetryton pointed out the saves are probably solvable (one or the other). Still two points, the cube also applies paralysis when it hits an enemy. Thus characters with good reflex can still be engulfed. And characters with high con might not be paralyzed once engulfed but they are still considered grappled by the gelatinous cube. Most characters with high con, and low dex will also have high strength and thus might be able to escape, but the longer they remain in the cube the longer they take acid damage and the longer that they might be paralyzed.

-At a high level, even if an advancement would increase the DCs and heighten its grapple bonus its damage (its acid damage) is pitiful and a character with acid resistance and/or fast healing might end living perpetually in the gelatinous cube, paralyzed for eternity. That in itself is a scary demise, but I think they would be more challenging with a higher damage.

Another idea that occurred... me acid born kobolds inside it, they would be able to breath inside the cube, they would be immune to the continual damage of the acid and they would be able to shred anything that the cube engulfs.

[Callin]

pffft Imagine if you will a Colossal G Cube with a one or two Acid Born Sharks swimming around in it...

/shudder

[Hat-Trick]

Expanding on that idea, you'd need to get the swimmers immunity to paralysis somehow. Otherwise, they don't add much to the encounter.

[ArcturusV]

Zombie Acid Sharks.

[Vaz]

Skeletal Acidborn Pirahna Swarms.

[Hat-Trick]

Skeletal piranha sound nasty, I vote that.

[ArcturusV]

Skeletal Piranha. Reminds me of Vanilla Fortress.

[thethird]

Expanding on that idea, you'd need to get the swimmers immunity to paralysis somehow. Otherwise, they don't add much to the encounter.

I wasn't really worried about that. they would be paralyzed the first turns when they enter the cube but the effect will eventually fade and then they will be able to move.

Of course the skeletal acidborn piranhas sound nice.

[Darrin]

Any suggestion on how to make the gelatinous cube more challenging bearable to low level parties (the level to which it is intended) and to high level parties?

Add monk levels. No, seriously. (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/eo/20060922a)

More Elite Opponents: Oozes (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/eo/20040521a).


Most oozes are more like semi-mobile traps than creatures. Once you notice them, they are usually easy to circumvent by just... walking around them. If you're looking for a way to make them more interesting, then the Sentry Ooze template (Dungeonscape) gives them animal intelligence, which should be enough to set up ambushes or use basic battlefield tactics.

Once the party is strong enough to obliterate an ooze in the first round or so, the best way to use oozes is as a "side dish" to a much more dangerous opponent who knows how to use the ooze as basically a "terrain feature" that does acid damage or paralysis or whatnot. A half-dragon (green) drow sorcerer, for example, could hide inside a gelatinous cube (immune to acid and paralysis) and summon more cubes to surround the party (engulfing terror, Drow of the Underdark). Actually, anyone can do that with an Amulet of Ooze Riding (28000 GP, A&EG p. 85).

Another nasty combo: Start with a couple patches of Dread Blossom Swarms. Now add a Living Cloudkill (Eberron Campaign Setting) and toss on the Sentry Ooze or Anarchic template. With an Int score, it gets feats, so give it the Thick-Skinned feat from Savage Species. This increases its DR to 12/magic, and also coincidentally makes it immune to the 2d6 swarm damage. The Dread Blossom Swarm is also immune to the Living Cloudkill. Very deadly if the party isn't equipped to deal with swarm immunities, poison, distraction, and two sources of Con damage.

[thethird]

Those are all great ideas. Thanks :smallsmile:

[kinem]

They are very nasty because you might walk into one unaware, and once you do, it's very hard to not die at low levels. I lost a PC that way. I didn't feel it was "fair" because all I did was open a door, see an empty passage, and walk through the doorway; once I did that I was as good as dead - no real chance of escape. I think a DM has to be careful with them. If there's warning and if you can avoid the trap by probing ahead with a pole, that's different.

[Vaz]

Add monk levels. No, seriously. (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/eo/20060922a)
Fist of the Forest as well? :P.

[JusticeZero]

It's a teamwork thing. It's nasty for the guy who hits it and goes "sploosh! eew!". After that, the thing makes zombies look like speed demons. Just kite it and shoot it till it falls apart.

[Rhynn]

Whoah, and here I assumed from the title you were having the opposite problem.


This (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/ooze.htm) guy has a CR of 3. And the dc to avoid being paralyzed for 3d6 rounds is fortitude 20. I know that constitution is important but what party of 3 level characters can make that save? The reflex save to avoid being engulfed (which you automatically fail if you are paralyzed) is 13 (most dex based characters will probably make that one due to high ref, high dex but is still hard for others).

Level 3 good Fort save and Con 14 is +5, that's a 30% chance to make the save.

The better question is, who the heck needs to make that save?

Gelatinous cubes have Speed 15 ft. They're not fight monsters, they're trap monsters - you fall into a pit and there's a gelatinous cube, a chute drops a gelatinous cube right on top of you, you're running away from a real monster and run into a gelatinous cube, you see a gelatinous cube with treasure inside it and want it out...

It's a trap monster because either it gets you or it doesn't, and if it doesn't, you just slowly whittle it dead.

They don't even resist damage in any way (except electricity). Any missile or reach weapon is sufficient to kill them. With a 10 ft. reach weapon, you set yourself up away from it, and as it nears, adjust your distance so it will ends its moves so there's an empty 5 ft. between you... then you hit it and move back 30 ft. It's mindless. It's going to move after you. You hit it again. Alternatively, just pelt it with missiles and keep moving away.

[bravebonebook]

Just to be mean with a "normal" cube-trap encounter: place the cube 20' down a pit trap (wedged in, if you will), character falls in and must be rescued before killed by the acid. The twist is that the character is suspended in the cube until it is destroyed then (unless someone prepared earlier) the suddenly free character plummets the additional 100 or more feet down the pit shaft since the cube no longer holds him/her.

DM: "Well you manage to finish the cube and free Jonny..."
Group: "Yay!"
DM: "...only to watch him fall deeper into the darkness of the pit until his screams go silent."
Group: "Ruh roh!"

[Callin]

OR he drops down into yet another one just under the one that was just destroyed...

[Vaz]

With Engulf, there's no line of effect for Featherfall or fly, either, without readying an action.

[Zubrowka74]

Does using slimes and oozes as missile weaponry count ? Catapult away!

[Rhynn]

Does using slimes and oozes as missile weaponry count ? Catapult away!

That is excellent. I don't doubt many a DM has pulled out hairs over this exact tactic used by players, these past 39 years. Also makes me think of another scenario where a slow ooze/slime/pudding/jelly like a gelatinous cube is dangerous - when you can't leave, for some reason. You need to protect something immobile, that the cube would destroy...

[ArcturusV]

There isn't a gamer alive, of any genre, generation, or medium who doesn't hate the Escort Mission.

[Hat-Trick]

Depends on the Escort. If it's a friendly healer/buffer or tough tanky guy, it could be bearable as long as they aren't just some weak thing that falls over at the slightest breeze while being a complete liability.

The point stands though, forcing the players to deal with stuff like that can be annoying if overused.

[TuggyNE]

There isn't a gamer alive, of any genre, generation, or medium who doesn't hate the Escort Mission.

… with the burning passion of a thousand thousand flaming suns.