Mythic Monsters 6: Oozes Too (PFRPG)

This supplement clocks in at 32 pages, including nine pages of covers and legal matter, leaving us with 23 pages of content. Each installment in Legendary Games’ Mythic Monster series contains 13-14 mythic monsters: one original and the others mythic versions of nonmythic creatures from previous Paizo and Legendary Games supplements. The mythic-ized old monsters’ entries consist almost entirely of crunch, with minimal fluff to describe their new abilities and no artwork. The new monster in each supplement comes with complete fluff and crunch, along with a full page, full color illustration. Additionally, each installment begins with a few mythic feats, path abilities, or new miscellaneous game mechanics related to the type of creature featured in the supplement.
Oozes were the focus of Mythic Monsters III, and with this installment oozes become the first creature type to be the theme of more than one Mythic Monsters supplement. In my completely biased opinion, they deserve it (oozes are likely my favorite creature type).
To start, we get an archmage path ability, the Oozechemist, which grants the Bottled Ooze alchemist discovery (which is also made usable to non-alchemists) with additional mythic bonuses. Archmages who also have alchemist levels and have taken Bottled Ooze normally gain the extra ability to spend mythic power to lower the extract level needed to summon oozes.
Then we get a ooze-themed summoning spell, Summon Slime. Six of them, to be precise: there is one Summon Slime spell for each spell level up to six, much like the standard Summon Monster I-IX spells. It is not clear why no seventh, eighth, or ninth level versions are presented. And, of course, since this is a mythic book, mythic versions of the Summon Slime series are presented!
Next come a dozen mythic oozes, all upgrades of older monsters. At the low end, we have the mythic giant amoeba and the mythic amoeba swarm, both CR 2/MR 1. The design space of sub-CR 3 mythic monsters is rather underdeveloped, so these are a welcome addition to the series. The mythic giant amoeba has the ability to split itself into a mythic amoeba swarm, and vice versa. In giant amoeba form, it can transfer damage it receives to a creature it is grappling, while in can latch on to creatures who leave its square.
At the high end, we have the CR 20/MR 8 mythic plasma ooze. This monstrosity can invert its magnetic pulse to repel metal away, and it can use mythic power to overcome immunity to fire or electric damage.
Finally we have the Sonic Slime, an original CR 12/MR 5 beast. The sonic slime is described as being formed from tremendous natural cataclysms, or from the primordial stuff of the world. On the crunch side, it deafens and nauseates nearby creatures just by moving due to the sound its movement creates, and inflicts random conditions with its slam attack. It becomes more powerful in enclosed spaces due to echoes. When it is not moving, it absorbs sound, becoming invisible (since it is just sound-waves) and creating a zone of silence. When it is moving, it can be seen as a blur (and has partial concealment).

Short Term Rating: If you are looking for some monsters to drop into an encounter, the 13 oozes presented here are among the best monster stat-blocks I have seen. The summoning spells can also be given to enemy casters pretty easily. For immediate use, mythic or otherwise, this gets a perfect 5/5.
Long Term Rating: After I first acquired this supplement, I had quite a bit of fun with advanced versions of the mythic amoeba. At a starting CR of 2, there is plenty of room for customization via additional hit-dice and templates, and the ability to shift between a single creature and a swarm interacts well with advancement, making for a big range of enjoyable encounters. And that’s with just that one monster. The other oozes in the book also have powers that make them useful beyond throwing them into an encounter unmodified. The archmage path ability is particularly useful for NPC alchemists. The Sonic Slime is suggestive as a plot device as well as a monster. And as I said at the beginning, I’m biased in favor of oozes. Hence, this supplement wins a long term rating of 5/5.

This installment of Legendary Games' Mythic Monsters-series is 32 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page ToC, 1 page SRD, 3 pages of introduction, 2 pages of advertisement and 1 page back cover, leaving us with 22 pages of raw content, so what do we exactly get here?

We're back with more mythic slimes - and a new array of beginning material, this time the 3rd-tier archmage ability oozechemist that nets you the bottled ooze discovery (not only when you're an alchemist) and power these oozes, turning them mythic. Nice one. We also get 6 variants of summon slime spells for level 1-6, which per se are cool...though the list at the end, with nary 20 entries, takes up half a page - feels a bit bloaty here layout-wise - half a page couple of names,, 1/3 of a column mythic spell-info for these, then the rest of the page is blank. Not a good use of page-count in my book.

Alright, so let's get into the oozes (though not literally - I don't want my audience to dissolve...get it? All right, 2 bucks into the bad pun jar...) - we kick off with the CR 2/MR 1 Giant Amoeba and amoeba swarm. The former exposes those rupturing its membrane to filth fever, while the second may actually fuse into a mythic giant amoeba as an alternate form - interesting. Now next would be the Mythic Brain Ooze at CR 9/MR 3, whose pulse may actually deal int-damage and they also get quite a nice array of SLs. Pity that pulse and aura of the base creature get no mythic, improved version though - to me, both could have made for a nice upgrade potential.

Mythic Brown Puddings clock in at CR 8/MR 3 can create AoE-suctions in water and also foul water - now if that wouldn't make for an interesting story in a desert environment... Now on the high-level scale, the mythic carnivorous crystal is beautiful - and deadly at CR 14/MR 5. Waves that transform metal into brittle crystal, ray refraction and the option to encase foes in razor sharp cages of shards make for one massive threat. Better yet - that's not all, this beast can do to your players. The cindersmoke ooze at CR 10/MR 4 is essentially a poison-gas-themed magma ooze - the new abilities are cool, but it should be noted that not all abilities refer to the new creature correctly as cindersmoke ooze - nothing serious, but still something that could have been easily remedied.

At CR 5/MR 2, the crystal ooze becomes particularly corrosive and make incite a contagious, petrifying effect working somewhat like a poison - nice imagery here. The CR 9/MR 3 Dun Pudding can duplicate the shifting sand-spell and is rather efficient at destroying items - with its burrow speed an interesting threat to settlements etc. The CR 5/MR 2 Frost Cube with its non-lethal cold-spores makes for an interesting cross between gelatinous cubes and molds. Speaking of variants - what about the sorcerous, intelligent CR 13/MR 5 sorcerous cube and its engulfing mend meld/slime command... makes for some interesting options. After all, who expects the slime to actually do something smart? Especially if the respective cube can just suspend magic items and activate them...nice action-economy wise and potentially really nasty. For lower levels, CR 3/MR 1 garden oozes can spew slippery sludge that creates difficult terrain and emit sickening gases.

Want an epic threat? What about a CR 20/MR 8 Mythic Plasma Ooze that can emit focused plasma beams, magnetic pulses for attraction and repulsion and deliver terrible death to all that stand it its path. Very cool! The final slime once again is new and unique and comes with a gorgeous 1-page artwork - the sonic clime at CR 12/MR 5...is innovative and truly worthy of legendary games - it can fly, is incorporeal and creates an aura of deafening, nauseating sonics. Much better - it can combine drag and trample via mythic power (Doppler-drag, baby!) - the latter of which can also be used to mythically shatter of sympathetic vibrate things asunder. Have I mentioned their aura that disrupts and potentially absorbs spellcasting or their truly devastating charge attacks? Once again, a thoroughly superb creature!

Conclusion:

Editing and formatting are rather good, though once again, a creature is missing the ecology-part of the statblock and I noticed a couple of instances where e.g. italicization of spells was forgotten. The pdf comes with hyperlinks, but no bookmarks, which constitutes a comfort detriment in my book. The pdf adheres to a two-column full-color standard and the two pieces of original artworks are awesome.

So here's the second ooze-book and Jason Nelson does it again and manages to create even more unique, cool abilities for oozes that set them apart, make them unique and superior, abilities that the base creatures should have had. Add to that the superb new creature and we have a good pdf on our hands. Hell, even the variants of e.g. the cubes make get unique, cool options - to the point where boring base creature mini-templates actually get their own distinct identity. That being said, the additional material isn't that strong here and when compared to the first oozes book, I couldn't help but feel that not all of the creatures herein lived up fully (!) to their slithering, death-dealing potential. All in all, this installment of Mythic Monsters is fun, offers cool critters and should be considered a good buy, but e.g. the carnivorous crystal and the new creature do showcase the full potential of the line, the pinnacle not each of these critters reach. Hence, my final verdict will clock in at a heartfelt recommendation of 4 stars, also for non-mythic-DMs who want to scavenge some abilities to make oozes more exciting in their respective games.

Endzeitgeist out.