3.5 Night Twist- an organic WMD

[Waldmarschallin]

Good afternoon, all



Has anyone ever introduced the Night Twist from Monster Manual 3 (3.5 edition) into their game? It's a great example of flawed planning, as it seems to be a thoroughly appropriate encounter for a mid-high level party in the wilderness, but has the capacity to depopulate entire continents just by normal behavior.

Specifically it has a mind-influencing spell like ability that compels all who hear it to follow to the source or begin taking damage. there is no limit to the number of creatures it can affect with this power, and the only criteria is that they be vulnerable to mind-influences, and have intelligence of at least 5. It has a range of 5 miles per hit die of the horrid plant (default 14, or 70 miles I think). The book does not specify whether the keening sound can automatically be detected, but since most sound wouldn't naturally carry that far, I think we can assume so. It does this every night at dusk.

The will DC is low, only 15 or something, so the chances of more than one PC in a team falling victim to it is pretty low. However, if the Night Twist is placed on, say, a boat, entire coastlines will become uninhabitable. Even considering a fairly developed, educated city where the most common level is 3-5, you'd easily be looking at 1/2-3/4 of a city just walking into the water until they drown from exhaustion.

In my primary world, the Realm of Wisland (the good guys) were able to capture one of these horrible monsters after a shoggoth cult found the plans for breeding one in the study of our top science advisor and loosed it upon a remote Fey island. Since acquiring it, the Realm has transferred population out of a large block of territory (nearly 1000 square miles) on their north eastern coast, and built a fortified U-Boot pen guarded by constructs and Shambling mounds. The Twist itself is stored aboard one of their Hunley-type submarines, crewed by undead with a living crew of only two Commissars (clerics) , who have high enough will saves to be pretty safe from it. It has been unleashed exactly once- destroying an entire invasion force of 20,000 men at sea. Obviously, enough castings of Commune will yield the information of what caused such carnage, which means it's only a matter of time before rival powers get their own. No coastline would ever be safe, barring large scale magical infrastructure to protect residents.

This monster has the potential to completely reshape international politics and destroy much of civilization. Obviously, a CR 11 monster should not be able to do this, but its impact on long-running campaigns promises to be interesting, doesn't it?


Apparently this has been errata-ed, as different versions of the MM3 have the range sharply reduced

[Kami2awa]

That's a pretty cool use of it, and definitely a good evil plot for the players to foil. Creepy too.

There's quite a lot of low-CR creatures that are potential civilisation destroyers - many undead with the Create Spawn ability can in theory become an exponentially-multiplying horde of undead in short order, unless limits are placed on their spawning.

[Holya]

Hold on there now partner.. Its fifty feet per hit die.. Where are you getting miles from because I'v got my MM3 open here and it specifically calls out fifty feet per hit die on its despair song. I do believe copy and pasting this part of the stat block is alright.

Despair Song (Su): Every evening, a night twist emits a sorrowful sound that inspires melancholy and despair in all creatures with an Intelligence score of 6 or higher within a radius of 50 feet per Hit Die of the night twist. Those who fail a DC 22 Will save are affected as if by a crushing despair spell and must seek out the source of their sorrow (the night twist) to the neglect of all other tasks or needs, including eating or sleeping. If physically restrained and not allowed to seek out the night twist, a victim of this despair song loses 1d10 hit points every evening until it dies or the enchantment is removed. Relocating a victim outside the area affected by the night twist's song does not end the enchantment.

The despair song ceases to affect a subject in the round after the night twist makes a slam attack against it. To remove the effects of the night twist's despair song before it attacks, a limited wish or more powerful magic must be employed. Dispel magic or dispel evil spells cannot remove the enchantment. However, a bard of 12th level or higher using the song of freedom class feature can provide the subject a second Will save. The death of the night twist always ends the enchantment. A night twist's caster level is equal to its Hit Dice for the purpose of its despair song ability. The save DC is Charisma-based.

Now the DC on the one in the MM3 is vastly higher.. From what you posted.. So is our books different? Or did ya perhaps misread it? Because while the idea of using this thing to destroy the coast line is delightfully evil.. I don't think you're getting the range you are talking about till it is well into epic levels worth of hitdie.

[JMS]

Hold on there now partner.. Its fifty feet per hit die.. Where are you getting miles from because I'v got my MM3 open here and it specifically calls out fifty feet per hit die on its despair song. I do believe copy and pasting this part of the stat block is alright.

Despair Song (Su): Every evening, a night twist emits a sorrowful sound that inspires melancholy and despair in all creatures with an Intelligence score of 6 or higher within a radius of 50 feet per Hit Die of the night twist. Those who fail a DC 22 Will save are affected as if by a crushing despair spell and must seek out the source of their sorrow (the night twist) to the neglect of all other tasks or needs, including eating or sleeping. If physically restrained and not allowed to seek out the night twist, a victim of this despair song loses 1d10 hit points every evening until it dies or the enchantment is removed. Relocating a victim outside the area affected by the night twist's song does not end the enchantment.

The despair song ceases to affect a subject in the round after the night twist makes a slam attack against it. To remove the effects of the night twist's despair song before it attacks, a limited wish or more powerful magic must be employed. Dispel magic or dispel evil spells cannot remove the enchantment. However, a bard of 12th level or higher using the song of freedom class feature can provide the subject a second Will save. The death of the night twist always ends the enchantment. A night twist's caster level is equal to its Hit Dice for the purpose of its despair song ability. The save DC is Charisma-based.

Now the DC on the one in the MM3 is vastly higher.. From what you posted.. So is our books different? Or did ya perhaps misread it? Because while the idea of using this thing to destroy the coast line is delightfully evil.. I don't think you're getting the range you are talking about till it is well into epic levels worth of hitdie.

This was just rated in the LA thread, and I think there was errata?

[Waldmarschallin]

Yes there was errata, and at least in the updated pdfs I've seen you can actually see where the color of the page changes/where they made the edit

Hold on there now partner.. Its fifty feet per hit die.. Where are you getting miles from because I'v got my MM3 open here and it specifically calls out fifty feet per hit die on its despair song. I do believe copy and pasting this part of the stat block is alright.

Despair Song (Su): Every evening, a night twist emits a sorrowful sound that inspires melancholy and despair in all creatures with an Intelligence score of 6 or higher within a radius of 50 feet per Hit Die of the night twist. Those who fail a DC 22 Will save are affected as if by a crushing despair spell and must seek out the source of their sorrow (the night twist) to the neglect of all other tasks or needs, including eating or sleeping. If physically restrained and not allowed to seek out the night twist, a victim of this despair song loses 1d10 hit points every evening until it dies or the enchantment is removed. Relocating a victim outside the area affected by the night twist's song does not end the enchantment.

The despair song ceases to affect a subject in the round after the night twist makes a slam attack against it. To remove the effects of the night twist's despair song before it attacks, a limited wish or more powerful magic must be employed. Dispel magic or dispel evil spells cannot remove the enchantment. However, a bard of 12th level or higher using the song of freedom class feature can provide the subject a second Will save. The death of the night twist always ends the enchantment. A night twist's caster level is equal to its Hit Dice for the purpose of its despair song ability. The save DC is Charisma-based.

Now the DC on the one in the MM3 is vastly higher.. From what you posted.. So is our books different? Or did ya perhaps misread it? Because while the idea of using this thing to destroy the coast line is delightfully evil.. I don't think you're getting the range you are talking about till it is well into epic levels worth of hitdie.

[Waldmarschallin]

This was just rated in the LA thread, and I think there was errata?

ooh- do you have a link to that part of the thread?

[JMS]

ooh- do you have a link to that part of the thread?

Yeah, though the agreement was that the Night twist was worthless muck, and not really playable.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/shows...&postcount=182

[KillianHawkeye]

Can confirm that it was reduced from 5 miles to 50 feet in the MM3 official errata file.

Always check the errata, folks!