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Seatbelt
2008-11-14, 01:07 PM
First I'd just like to say how awesome it is to DM for new players. My druid got 2nd level spells and he was talking like he was invincible, and my barbarian realized he gets an iterative attack at 6th level and thought how awesome that was. Then he discovered improved uncanny dodge and thought that was the most badass thing ever.

But anyway, my campaign. The party is trecking through the wilderness to this small city, to meet a bard contact named Eric Zahn. He's a member of the guild they belong to and he's called the party to deal with a thieves guild that's causing a lot of trouble (like.. open gang-police warfare, etc.)

But there is also this mysterious monster problem that has popped up in recent weeks. Something is summoning all kinds of monsters that are slowly growing in power and strength and disrupting more and more of the town. (So at first like fiendish dire rats and later like.. demons and devils and psudeonaturals).

Now, the ultimate reason for the monsters being here is Eric Zahn's music (thank you, Lovecraft. btw I already ran a story based off the Cats of Ulthar, and had cat people mess up the party). He has somehow unwittingly (and unknowingly) tapped into the far realms or that other place beyond time and immagination that Lovecraft is fond of, and something came through. Now I need a monster, and it can really be anything, from CR 6-9, that could reasonably be summoned or called from Somewhere Else, and that would be able to summon other random monsters. I'm only really familliar with the monster manual, so I was hoping you wonderful people would have some suggestions.

afroakuma
2008-11-14, 01:12 PM
Monster Manual II has abishai and advespas, which I actually constructed a similar adventure around. This has the added advantage of the abishai's nondetection ability putting scare factor on the secret foes from nowhere.

The 3.5 MM has osyluths, which would probably be your best bet. They're on the top of your scale (CR 9) but can summon maasses of lemures for an hour a day. Swarms of fleshy blobs skulking through the city is pretty creepy.

Dublock
2008-11-14, 01:12 PM
can I assume this is 3.5E or what? :smallwink:

Moriato
2008-11-14, 01:30 PM
Well there's the far realm, where a lot of Lovecraftian stuff lives. The Kaorti (sp?) and such, but for the life of me I cannot remember what book it's detailed in.

RTGoodman
2008-11-14, 01:35 PM
Well, for starters, anything Lovecraftian could use the Pseudonatural template from Complete Arcane if you have access to it. It's literally a template that makes monsters into Squamous, Indescribabe Horrors Man Was Not Meant To KnowTM. Just find a monster that's kinda like what you want (probably a monstrous humanoid or aberration or something) and just slap on the template, and you should be fine. If you can wait a couple of levels, I'd suggest maybe a Pseudonatural Destrechan (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/destrachan.htm). If not, a Pseudonatural Ettercap (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/ettercap.htm) could be sufficiently horrifying.

I don't know about the summoning thing, though. The only think I can think of is a monster called the Summoning Ooze from Monster Manual 3. It has an ability to basically use summon monster I at-will as a standard action, with an improvement every 2 HD. For you, I'd do something like:


Summon Unspeakable Horrors (Su): The [Creature Name] is a conduit for summoning squamous beings from beyond Man's ken. Once per round as a standard action, it can summon a creature as the summon monster I spell at CL 20, though all creatures summoned by this method have the Pseudonatural template. The summoned creatures remain for 20 rounds or until slain, or until the [Creature Name] is slain. For every two HD above the standard that the [Creature Name] has, the summon monster spell it can use increases by 1 level (for instance, summon monster II at +2 HD, summon monster III at +4 HD, etc.). Each 2 HD it gains also increases its CR by 1.

littlechicory
2008-11-14, 01:36 PM
I believe the Kaorti are Fiend Folio.

monty
2008-11-14, 01:43 PM
The Alienist gets an ability that lets them summon pseudonatural creatures. Maybe make an ability based on that.

RTGoodman
2008-11-14, 01:49 PM
The Alienist gets an ability that lets them summon pseudonatural creatures. Maybe make an ability based on that.

Yeah, but I think (AFB) that it's basically "Whenever you use a summon monster spell, the creatures you summon all must have the Pseudonatural template." I just sorta co-opted that and added it to the summoning ooze's ability for the above ability.

Seatbelt
2008-11-14, 02:07 PM
Ok, cool. I'll monkey with that. Thanks for the suggestions.

afroakuma
2008-11-14, 02:11 PM
I would reccommend either going with fiendish/demonic or pseudonatural, not a mix of both.

Kaorti are Fiend Folio, yes.

Telonius
2008-11-14, 02:14 PM
DEMONhunter statted out a Shiney Demon (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10380&highlight=Shiney+Demon) a while back. If your players are Tenacious D fans at all, they might get a kick out of it.

Darrin
2008-11-14, 03:37 PM
Now I need a monster, and it can really be anything, from CR 6-9, that could reasonably be summoned or called from Somewhere Else, and that would be able to summon other random monsters. I'm only really familliar with the monster manual, so I was hoping you wonderful people would have some suggestions.

Hmm. You need something that can cast lesser planar ally. Devourer might work, but the CR 11 is a bit high. However, it does provide a reason for random monsters showing up in waves: the Devourer needs to be fed various victims to feed off their essense, and it uses them to power its lesser planar ally summons. To make it suitably cthulhuesque, add the pseudonatural of half-farspawn template to change it into an outsider.