How many skeletons fit in a Portable Hole?

[Mannimarco]

So I'm setting up a necromancer character, and was wondering just how many medium sized humanoid skeletons I could pack into a Portable Hole. They'd all take penalties for squeezing and all that nonsense, but just how many would I be able to cram in there?

[Elkad]

282cu ft in a portable hole.

We know that 24 cheerleaders fit in a mini-cooper, which is about 35cu ft.

Skeletons are even skinnier than cheerleaders (though not by much).

Remaining math left as exercise for reader.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDBYD-LP_AE

[Extra Anchovies]

282cu ft in a portable hole.

We know that 24 cheerleaders fit in a mini-cooper, which is about 35cu ft.

Skeletons are even skinnier than cheerleaders (though not by much).

Remaining math left as exercise for reader.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDBYD-LP_AE

Every part of your post is beautiful. I'd say 24 per 35 cu. ft. is a good estimate; any denser and the skeletons would get a little too tangled (feet stuck in ribcages, hands jammed through pelvises, etc). That means we can fit 193 skeletons into a portable hole. They might take some time to get untangled, but that's quite the strike force.

[IZ42]

This thread started funny and got glorious. Since I am not very good at math and have nothing generally useful to contribute, I'm just gonna ask how do the pointy bits of the skeletons affect storage? Oops, portable hole, nevermind. How are you going to get this many skeletons and how long will it take you?

[Susano-wo]

Oh man, I've got a necro character I started that uses a bag of holding, but that has a weight limit. Man, I might need to switch :smallbiggrin: (though I can just pull them out of the bag, I don't need to spread anything out on a surface)

[CountAile]

Here's another funny idea:

Put a skeleton, or two, in your Handy Haversack (you know, BESIDES all the stuff that you'd carry in there) and just pull them out whenever you'll need them. Maybe, even several smaller skeletons (rats, bats, whatever - they're useful - and light enough - too) in other pockets, for additional surrealistic almost-cartoony effect and joy of messing with everyone's head 8)

[Mannimarco]

This thread started funny and got glorious. Since I am not very good at math and have nothing generally useful to contribute, I'm just gonna ask how do the pointy bits of the skeletons affect storage? Oops, portable hole, nevermind. How are you going to get this many skeletons and how long will it take you?

Well my character has a month of crafting time before we start playing that campaign again, and instead of crafting items, I'm crafting a small army. Or perhaps larger than I anticipated. Apparently, I can have a large sized zombie dinosaur squeeze into the hole, and still have enough room to be awesome. The way a friend played a similar necromancer character, they were kind of all standing, but packed in like sardines, and used a move action to get out of the hole, to climb up. Being skeletons, two move actions is amazing. They just pour out in waves.

Now I just need to continue to research what my cap is on hit dice of undead. I'm just a little confused since the Deathbound domain says you get 3x HD per level instead of 2X for controlling undead created with spells, but things like the spell Animate Dead simply tells you outright a 4 HD per per level, and doesn't say double.

[herrhauptmann]

Isnt there a portablw hole variant that functions as a pit trap 50 ft deep? Why not use that?

[Extra Anchovies]

Isnt there a portablw hole variant that functions as a pit trap 50 ft deep? Why not use that?

Enveloping Pit, yes. Do this.

[Kelb_Panthera]

If you want them to be able to deploy very quickly, I'd say about a dozen or so. Each one curled into the fetal position siting right next to one another should allow you to fit 4 or maybe 5 in the 6ft diameter circle and at about 3-ish feet tall in that position you could get 3 to 4 layers if you put something in between them to act as a platform. So between a dozen and 20 or so.

Cramming them all in there as was suggested above would get rather a lot more into the thing but it would take several minutes, at least, to deploy them all.

[Extra Anchovies]

If you want them to be able to deploy very quickly, I'd say about a dozen or so. Each one curled into the fetal position siting right next to one another should allow you to fit 4 or maybe 5 in the 6ft diameter circle and at about 3-ish feet tall in that position you could get 3 to 4 layers if you put something in between them to act as a platform. So between a dozen and 20 or so.

This entire thread, but especially your talk of multiple layers, is reminding me more than a little of these things (http://youtu.be/5qZJ85MdS-g?t=3m4s).

[Zubrowka74]

Well my character has a month of crafting time before we start playing that campaign again, and instead of crafting items, I'm crafting a small army. Or perhaps larger than I anticipated. Apparently, I can have a large sized zombie dinosaur squeeze into the hole, and still have enough room to be awesome. The way a friend played a similar necromancer character, they were kind of all standing, but packed in like sardines, and used a move action to get out of the hole, to climb up. Being skeletons, two move actions is amazing. They just pour out in waves.

Cooler yet: use the dino as troop transport for the skeletons. Just cram them in the ribcage.

[SiuiS]

Every part of your post is beautiful. I'd say 24 per 35 cu. ft. is a good estimate; any denser and the skeletons would get a little too tangled (feet stuck in ribcages, hands jammed through pelvises, etc). That means we can fit 193 skeletons into a portable hole. They might take some time to get untangled, but that's quite the strike force.


If you want them to be able to deploy very quickly, I'd say about a dozen or so. Each one curled into the fetal position siting right next to one another should allow you to fit 4 or maybe 5 in the 6ft diameter circle and at about 3-ish feet tall in that position you could get 3 to 4 layers if you put something in between them to act as a platform. So between a dozen and 20 or so.

Cramming them all in there as was suggested above would get rather a lot more into the thing but it would take several minutes, at least, to deploy them all.

Nothing says skeletons must maintain their upright form. They can collapse into a pile of bones no problem. The question becomes, what can you do with a pile of bones? Arrange them artistically in a densely packed logistical design. Deployment will indeed take forever, but the number is obscene.

[Aotrs Commander]

Funnily enough, I actually HAVE had a Pale Master who had a portable hole SPECIFICALLY for this purpose...

I don't think I ever got that many skeletons we had to worry about it too much, but one thing me and the DM did agree on was that one limiting factor was getting them in and out. More than a handful, and in became a bit of a Krypton Factor exercise in fitting them in. I.e. - not something that is really doable in combat.

It's sort of like playign twister, only one person on the outside is shouting all the commands in an increasingly desparate tone of voice... "Bob1 Seven, put your arm to the left! No, more left! Less left1 Bob Five,, move your leg! No, the OTHER LEG! Aaaargh!"



Invagrion can also highly recommend making robes for your troll skeleton out of random taupalins and what not, and passing it off a a "Robe Golem."

Hint: this works better if your charisma is higher than 8, you actually have Bluff, and the party are not face-palming in disbelief behind you.



1All animated skeletons are called some permutation of Bob. They... just are.

[unseenmage]

Check out my signature for a link to back when I asked a similar question about Constructs.

Even includes squeezing. :smallsmile:

[herrhauptmann]

Nothing says skeletons must maintain their upright form. They can collapse into a pile of bones no problem. The question becomes, what can you do with a pile of bones? Arrange them artistically in a densely packed logistical design. Deployment will indeed take forever, but the number is obscene.

Like a Bone Cathedral?
http://www.cvltnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/bone_chapel29.jpeg

[Extra Anchovies]

Like a Bone Cathedral?
http://www.cvltnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/bone_chapel29.jpeg

Oooh, oooh, oooh! Or this one! It's the Sedlec Ossuary near Prague, one of the places I really want to visit someday. So many skulls :3

[Zubrowka74]

I've seen the Paris Catacombes (http://www.catacombes.paris.fr/en/homepage-catacombs-official-website), they're gnarly, but I think Sedlec definitively wins the cake here. I wish I could go someday!

[SiuiS]

Like a Bone Cathedral?
http://www.cvltnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/bone_chapel29.jpeg

Yeah. Just less baby skulls and more everything else needed to have a skeleton proper.





Or become the halfling reaver, and have more baby skulls. Halfling skeletons are about as good as regular skeletons and you can fit more of them into the bag...

Bonus points if you manually position each and every skeleton into a fancy house and then command them t reassume this position when making camp for the night. They'll eventually become your traveling terror tent!

[Extra Anchovies]

Or become the halfling reaver, and have more baby skulls. Halfling skeletons are about as good as regular skeletons and you can fit more of them into the bag...

Bonus points if you manually position each and every skeleton into a fancy house and then command them t reassume this position when making camp for the night. They'll eventually become your traveling terror tent!

Mordenkainen's Mortuary Mansion

[Lanson]

I would much rather have a single enormous minon than a ton of weaklings. You can even use the disguise skill, or disguise other spell to make them look like something... else... something alive. Though, what you'd disguise two fire giant skeletons as that STILL doesn't make the locals run away screaming alludes me.

[SiuiS]

Character levels are magnitudes. By the time your millions of skeletons are allowable, they don't matter at your level. They're a plot device.

D&D is a system however, that doesn't scale well. So there's an actual requirement for the necromancer to expend valuable party resources to do something everyone else can do with a hundred gold and diplomacy; put down a peasant uprising. Fighter pays mercenaries to do it, necromancer either has the dragon skeleton do it or sacrifices even having a dragon skeleton so he can have the lower magnitude army of skeletons do it. So you may as well play how you want and just reserve a few tricks like halfling skeletons and a scepter of the spell engine that dumps both legion's magic weapon and energy admixtured deafening clang onto the bows of your skellies for a rain of magical sonic and acid damage or something.

[Extra Anchovies]

I would much rather have a single enormous minon than a ton of weaklings. You can even use the disguise skill, or disguise other spell to make them look like something... else... something alive. Though, what you'd disguise two fire giant skeletons as that STILL doesn't make the locals run away screaming alludes me.

A very large one of these:
http://www.51allout.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/horse.jpg

[fluke1993]

I actually had a necromancer that created a wagon of his pet disassembled hydra skeleton to hide it in a town.

[SwordChucks]

For maximum storage you could make matryoshka dolls by storing smaller and smaller skeletons in the rib cages. For example a large size skeleton with however many medium skeletons you can fit in the rib cage, and each of the medium skeletons storing as many small skeletons as possible and so on.

Then you can have them ready actions to deploy in sequence.

[Lanson]

A very large one of these:
http://www.51allout.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/horse.jpg

Hilarious, yet simultaneously terrifying.
I like it!

[Mannimarco]

I'm replying on my phone, so excuse my inability to quote...

I like the idea of having a horde of little guys for damage soaking. That is one less attack of opportunity made against one of my friends, and that is one more potential d6 or so of damage on the enemy.

As for using the dino as troop transport, he's only large size, and a zombie. Which might be changed soon, because I have a new question to ask...

Would a zombie still be able to pounce? I know it keeps the ability, but pounce is described as a full attack after a charge action. A zombie can still charge, but a full round attack is outside of what it can do with its one action only setup.

[Extra Anchovies]

I'm replying on my phone, so excuse my inability to quote...

I like the idea of having a horde of little guys for damage soaking. That is one less attack of opportunity made against one of my friends, and that is one more potential d6 or so of damage on the enemy.

As for using the dino as troop transport, he's only large size, and a zombie. Which might be changed soon, because I have a new question to ask...

Would a zombie still be able to pounce? I know it keeps the ability, but pounce is described as a full attack after a charge action. A zombie can still charge, but a full round attack is outside of what it can do with its one action only setup.

They can still partial charge. Not sure if it triggers pounce, though.

[Susano-wo]

I'm just waiting till level 12 when I get create undead and can make skeletal champions, so I'm not just limited by monster HD on my skellies. Then they shall be awesome :smallbiggrin:

[SiuiS]

I'm replying on my phone, so excuse my inability to quote...

I like the idea of having a horde of little guys for damage soaking. That is one less attack of opportunity made against one of my friends, and that is one more potential d6 or so of damage on the enemy.

As for using the dino as troop transport, he's only large size, and a zombie. Which might be changed soon, because I have a new question to ask...

Would a zombie still be able to pounce? I know it keeps the ability, but pounce is described as a full attack after a charge action. A zombie can still charge, but a full round attack is outside of what it can do with its one action only setup.

Specific trumps general. The zombie should be able to begin a full round action (charge) and end it's full round action next turn, which happens to come with a free full attack.

[Mannimarco]

Specific trumps general. The zombie should be able to begin a full round action (charge) and end it's full round action next turn, which happens to come with a free full attack.

That's a pretty interesting way to do it. Make it act like a full round casting action spell. Didn't think of it that way. Part of me was hoping that it would be able to get it's pounce round per round. In a surprise round where charactes are limited to one action, they can perform a pounce. Typical rule for playing a lion in tall grass. But I wasn't sure if zombies would be able to because a full attack is described as a full round action, and zombies can't do those.

[Sudokori]

You wouldn't necessarily need to have only entire skeletons in the portable hole. Just 1-4 full skeletons and a hundred or so undead skulls. Have the four full skeletons deploy and every round throw animated skulls at the enemy for ranged bite attacks. You know, from the skull biting and stuff. I'm new so give me a break.

[SiuiS]

A full attack can be made as a full round action, but is not a full round action. Any more than an attack action, being a standard action, can only ever be made once per round.

Pounce gives you a full attack, not a full round of attacking. It doesn't dilate time it allows multiple attacks as part of the already-full-round charge (which the zombie gets every two rounds). Just like drawing your sword is a move action and walking is a move action but drawing your sword while walking is still just one move action if you qualify (BaB+1 or higher), a charge is a full round action and full attacking is a full round action but charging and full attacking is still just one full round action if you qualify (pounce or similar).

[Extra Anchovies]

A full attack can be made as a full round action, but is not a full round action. Any more than an attack action, being a standard action, can only ever be made once per round.

Pounce gives you a full attack, not a full round of attacking. It doesn't dilate time it allows multiple attacks as part of the already-full-round charge (which the zombie gets every two rounds). Just like drawing your sword is a move action and walking is a move action but drawing your sword while walking is still just one move action if you qualify (BaB+1 or higher), a charge is a full round action and full attacking is a full round action but charging and full attacking is still just one full round action if you qualify (pounce or similar).

Does pounce trigger on a partial charge, though?

[Mannimarco]

Does pounce trigger on a partial charge, though?

It would. A partial charge is the same as a charge, but you can only move your speed, not double, and it is only ever available in instances where you are not granted two actions, like surprise round, or slow, or zombie.

Pounce is triggered on a charge. Any kind of charge.

[P.F.]

It would. A partial charge is the same as a charge, but you can only move your speed, not double, and it is only ever available in instances where you are not granted two actions, like surprise round, or slow, or zombie.

Pounce is triggered on a charge. Any kind of charge.

Do skeletal ocelots retain their pounce ability?

[SiuiS]

Does pounce trigger on a partial charge, though?

Yes. It's handled by the rules as a normal charge that happens to occur across the turn barrier, is all.


Do skeletal ocelots retain their pounce ability?

I don't have ocelot stats, but 2.5 skeletons do not retain any special qualities of the base creature, really. There's an animal skeleton template that may, but I think you're stuck with somehow using zombie stuff to get them (zombies may also lose special abilities though).

E: I think. I keep forgetting pathfinder changed small base variables.

[unseenmage]

Not sure how relevant but the last necromancer I built bought Warbeast (MM2) animals and vermin to be made into undead.

I even worked up a set of charts that randomize the available templates for animals and vermin that don't change their type.


Later I added charts to randomly select the animals and vermin themselves to simulate a random marketplace of bizarre beasts.
Strangest creatures selected were a Half-Machine Bison and a Zombie Giant Octopus.

Zombie Octopus replaces rope in my necromancer equipment lists from now on. :smallamused:



The link to these charts can be found in my sig.

[Mannimarco]

Do skeletal ocelots retain their pounce ability?

I don't recall. I know that skeletons keep racial weapon proficiencies. Elven skeleton archers ftw. Zombies lose all feats, and all extraordinary abilities that do not improve their melee or ranged combat capabilities, pounce being an (Ex). I think skeletons may be the same way.

[Svata]

Skeletons retain any (Ex) special qualities that improve melee or ranged attacks.