Question about intelligent planar creatures

[lytokk]

So, in another thread I asked for help populating creatures in an overrun library. Someone had suggested using a ravid, as they could replicate a haunted library feel, at least until the player found it. Knowing my players, they would attempt to negotiate or find a non-violent solution to this. The ravid has an INT score of 7, but no mention of a language. My knowledge of planar creatures is limited, but I know that anything with an INT 3+ is able to speak and comprehend a language.

The question is simply is communication possible with this creature and if it is, how?

[bjoern]

So, in another thread I asked for help populating creatures in an overrun library. Someone had suggested using a ravid, as they could replicate a haunted library feel, at least until the player found it. Knowing my players, they would attempt to negotiate or find a non-violent solution to this. The ravid has an INT score of 7, but no mention of a language. My knowledge of planar creatures is limited, but I know that anything with an INT 3+ is able to speak and comprehend a language.

The question is simply is communication possible with this creature and if it is, how?

Allow it to comprehend and hear what the players say. And then it communicates back via telepathy?

[Fax Celestis]

Ravids have no known language, but that doesn't mean this could be an exceptional one. It's been living in a pile of books for who knows how long: maybe it picked something up.

[Psyren]

Someone had suggested using a ravid,

That would be me :smallbiggrin:

WotC clearly intended some way to communicate with them - Manual of the Planes states that they can be "induced to serve as guides" to the PEP because they know their way around. I would probably say they can understand at least Celestial, even if they can't speak themselves. If the players can't speak it, have one of the books contain an Incantation that summons the library's curator - a stuffy yet helpful lantern archon, who can use his tongues ability to serve as intermediary between the players and the frightened creature(s).

I particularly like the idea because it presents a roleplaying opportunity. The players, having fought through a barrage of hostile and sentient books/bookshelves/etc., would probably be primed for slaughter at that point -then they find a lone scared creature or pair of creatures at the heart of the library who didn't mean any harm. Do they exact brutal revenge, or try to use the library to help the creatures find their way home to the positive energy plane? And in return, another book - either located by the archon or found in the Ravid's sleeping area - will contain whatever it is the players came to the library looking for in the first place. And the game goes on.

[lytokk]

I hadn't even thought of animating the bookcases. I had really only been thinking of animating the books. Bookcases, desks, chairs. Now I've got some serious ammunition to throw at them. Still was thinking of using a scalamagdrion as the end boss to the little one shot dungeon, prb having the ravids hiding from that guy.

Really hoping the players decide to clear out the library now.

[Psyren]

Yes, that's good - put an even worse threat in the library, a reason for the ravid(s) to be so scared that their objects attack on sight.

Perhaps the players find a chewed up corpse of one of the ravids so they can start to figure out what's going on.

[Chronos]

Anything with an Int of 3 or higher knows at least one language unless the description specifies otherwise. Usually, the default is Common, but that might not be the best choice for an extraplanar creature. Do the books say anywhere what language is most commonly used on the Positive Energy Plane? My guess would be either Celestial, Sylvan, or Auran, unless the plane has its own language separate from those.

[Extra Anchovies]

Anything with an Int of 3 or higher knows at least one language unless the description specifies otherwise. Usually, the default is Common, but that might not be the best choice for an extraplanar creature. Do the books say anywhere what language is most commonly used on the Positive Energy Plane? My guess would be either Celestial, Sylvan, or Auran, unless the plane has its own language separate from those.

Monsters tend to list languages they can speak and understand in the monster description entry, before the 'combat' subsection. The Ravid doesn't have language abilities by RAW, but if it's been in a library for a long time it could be able to understand any of the three Chronos suggested. If you need an in-game explanation, maybe one of the books in the library is a magical telepathic/talking book that teaches you how to understand a language one word at a time. Speaks a word out loud while at the same time projecting an image or feeling into your mind to match the word, sort of like a magical Rosetta Stone program.

That doesn't solve the problem of how the Ravid communicates back, but that problem is solved in its monster entry: it can animate objects. It would only have to drop its books for a few moments to arrange loose scraps of paper and pieces of rubble into letters, words, and sentences, or it could animate a pen and a book and underline/circle the words it wants to use, in the order it wants to use them.

[lytokk]

Communicating back could be as simple as throwing say, the dictionary of a language they can understand at the least threatening players face, again and again and again until they get the point, followed by a book with an illustration of whatever else is in the library with them.

[Chronos]

I don't mean that it might have learned one of those languages in the library; I mean that, by the rules, it ought to know one language anyway, just because it's an intelligent creature. The lack of language mention in its entry is inconvenient in that it means we don't know what language it knows, but it should still know one, by RAW.

As for it communicating back... Well, don't get too clever. It's not an absolute imbecile, but think of the slowest kid in a regular classroom, and that's about how smart it is. It should be able to handle nodding yes or no to player-initiated questions, but it probably won't come up with much ideas on its own for communication.

[Psyren]

This is why I suggested an archon (or similar entity with truespeech/tongues) as a go-between. We know it should have a language by RAW; thus no matter what that language is the archon can speak to it and relay its responses in turn. You could even make up a language called "Ravid" that consists entirely of trills and whistles for this and it would still work.

[Mr Adventurer]

Or they find a scroll of four Extended Tongues in the library.

ETA: Or just the one, that they cast on the Ravid...

[Spindrift]

Don't the lumi live on the PEP? they should probably have a language, if you need one from the PEP.
They're a bit crazy though, they'd probably want to burn down any library cause books are full of lies.

[lytokk]

What book are the lumi in? nm MM3