How deadly was this creature for other people's groups? It attacked the ship at night (can't rememeber if it was intended that way). The boat lurched with one PC doing rounds while the others were asleep. Went she looked over the side she saw all the debis and though maybe something had run into them. Being amphibious she jumped over the side to investigate while the other got up and ran to see what the problem was. She landing right on it a was imidiately grappled. She is size small and no strength bonus so once stuck she was stuck. She was able to start damaging it with her Umbral Touch mystery but with the damage it does she went down pretty quick. The spell theif went down trying to get her out and they only survived by finally letting it get on the ship so there was no 50% miss chance. How did other do?
We had 1 player jump in the water ( and quickly die)
another died during the combat. this is one of the toughest fights to date-
We had two players die during it. Both jumped in after combat started. They realized later that they would have been fine if they had just stayed onboard and hit it with ranged weapons.
It lurched up onto the deck, hitting and grappling one PC every round. The damage was plentiful but it didn't constrict or anything, so no one died. The one ungrappled PC, at the end, finally brought it down.
It didn't drop anyone or threaten to dive underwater with grappled foes, but it did certainly give them a run for their money.
Creatures can only grapple one opponent at a time no matter their size, attacks or limbs. The Fostsam Ooze is a poorly designed creature because at its first successful grapple it is reduced to only attacking the creature it is grappling.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/specialAttacks.htm#ifYoureGrappling
The same is true of any creature that has improved grab, it doesn't make the flotsam ooze a poorly designed creature. They are usually very tough because they are hard to beat in a grapple, but while they're grappling their target the rest of the party can really whale on them.
Creatures can only grapple one opponent at a time no matter their size, attacks or limbs. The Fostsam Ooze is a poorly designed creature because at its first successful grapple it is reduced to only attacking the creature it is grappling.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/specialAttacks.htm#ifYoureGrappling
I didn't think it was a normal grapple per se. It uses grapple as the mechanic for getting out of it but I thought you were just sticking to it. Since it's grapple score is unaffected by stat damage I didn't think it was actually doing any grappling. Maybe a poor call on my part. The two PCs the got stuck were both size small and with it being a huge size it didn't seem that out of sorts.
I was only talking with my rules lawyer hat on, I agree with most folks here that it should be able to grapple multiple creatures. I think a Giant Squid should be able to as well (like in the movies), unfortunately as written it can't thanks to the weirdness of the grapple rules. Thankfully that's the sort of thing a DM's for.
Yeah I was treating it more like a mimic -- it's an automatic grapple that does no damage and cannot be escaped from without magic/other assistance; it could grapple as many creatures as can fit in its occupied area, and suffers no penalties on grapple checks to maintain its threatened area (since it makes no grapple check to begin with). I have to admit, I found this creature's stat block a bit vague too.
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As far as I understood, if the creature takes a -20 to its grapple checks, it can grapple with only a single limb, thus allowing it to carry on with normal combat and even initiate a grapple with another target.
As long as the Giant Squid takes a -20 on each one of its grapple checks, it could be holding a different creature in each arm. There's your cinematographic image :).
As there were only 3 players at the table that night, Amella, Lirith and the Skald joined them in the fight. My players fled melee and climbed for a good position for firing arrows. The Skald was too close and was attacked dropped to -5 and died of blood loss.
As far as I understood, if the creature takes a -20 to its grapple checks, it can grapple with only a single limb, thus allowing it to carry on with normal combat and even initiate a grapple with another target.
Is that in the Epic book or something as it's not something I've ever come across. The problem comes from the fact that as soon as you are grappling you are limited to certain actions and the only attacks you can make are against the creature you are grappling, thus to can't initiate a second grapple.
Is that in the Epic book or something as it's not something I've ever come across. The problem comes from the fact that as soon as you are grappling you are limited to certain actions and the only attacks you can make are against the creature you are grappling, thus to can't initiate a second grapple.
It's part of the Improved Grab Extraordinary ability. But the Flotsam Ooze doesn't have Improved Grab so, technically, you're right and it can only grapple one person at a time. But I ran it that it could grapple multiple opponents because it was a huge creature with a large area and it technically wasn't "grabbing" anyone so much as they were sticking to it because it's adhesive. I agree that it's poorly written.
Improved Grab
If a creature with this special attack hits with a melee weapon (usually a claw or bite attack), it deals normal damage and attempts to start a grapple as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity. No initial touch attack is required. Unless otherwise noted, improved grab works only against opponents at least one size category smaller than the creature. The creature has the option to conduct the grapple normally, or simply use the part of its body it used in the improved grab to hold the opponent. If it chooses to do the latter, it takes a -20 penalty on grapple checks, but is not considered grappled itself; the creature does not lose its Dexterity bonus to AC, still threatens an area, and can use its remaining attacks against other opponents. A successful hold does not deal any extra damage unless the creature also has the constrict special attack. If the creature does not constrict, each successful grapple check it makes during successive rounds automatically deals the damage indicated for the attack that established the hold. Otherwise, it deals constriction damage as well (the amount is given in the creature’s descriptive text). When a creature gets a hold after an improved grab attack, it pulls the opponent into its space. This act does not provoke attacks of opportunity. It can even move (possibly carrying away the opponent), provided it can drag the opponent’s weight.
Question for the people on the board about the Ooze. The party used Detect magic to determine that there are a few items inside the ooze that might be of some use. What they want to do is cast an Unseen Servant and have him go down to try to extract the items. The question is how would the ooze react to this unseen force? Would it consider it an attack, or since it is just a shapeless force would it be allowed to extract these items.
Any thoughts are appreciated.
Question for the people on the board about the Ooze. The party used Detect magic to determine that there are a few items inside the ooze that might be of some use. What they want to do is cast an Unseen Servant and have him go down to try to extract the items. The question is how would the ooze react to this unseen force? Would it consider it an attack, or since it is just a shapeless force would it be allowed to extract these items.
Any thoughts are appreciated.
I'm not sure it would react to it at all. That being said I don't think that an Unseen Servant could possible extract the items. It's strength is just not strong enough. Although I hate to discourage out of the box thinking, maybe giving them a hint that a combination of Unseen Servant and some kind of solvent thrown just right would do it.
I'm not sure it would react to it at all. That being said I don't think that an Unseen Servant could possible extract the items. It's strength is just not strong enough. Although I hate to discourage out of the box thinking, maybe giving them a hint that a combination of Unseen Servant and some kind of solvent thrown just right would do it.
I agree I like to see out of the box thinking. It does stats that an Unseen Servant has a Strength of 2 so it can carry 20 pounds or drag up to 100 pounds. Considering there is only a ring and gantlets (sp) in there, they should not total 20 pounds to carry.
I was only talking with my rules lawyer hat on, I agree with most folks here that it should be able to grapple multiple creatures. I think a Giant Squid should be able to as well (like in the movies), unfortunately as written it can't thanks to the weirdness of the grapple rules. Thankfully that's the sort of thing a DM's for.
Actually, if a creature with Improved Grab takes -20 on its grapple check, it can maintain the grapple with only the limb that triggered the grapple, and it is not considered to be grappled itself. This means it is free to attack with its other limbs, which could, of course, trigger more Improved Grab attempts.
EDIT:
Whoops, I guess I should have read the entire thread before posting, as office_ninja beat me to it. Here's the relevant text, from the SRD:
Unless otherwise noted, improved grab works only against opponents at least one size category smaller than the creature. The creature has the option to conduct the grapple normally, or simply use the part of its body it used in the improved grab to hold the opponent. If it chooses to do the latter, it takes a -20 penalty on grapple checks, but is not considered grappled itself; the creature does not lose its Dexterity bonus to AC, still threatens an area, and can use its remaining attacks against other opponents.
I agree I like to see out of the box thinking. It does stats that an Unseen Servant has a Strength of 2 so it can carry 20 pounds or drag up to 100 pounds. Considering there is only a ring and gantlets (sp) in there, they should not total 20 pounds to carry.
I don't question whether the Unseen Servant can lift the objects, it can just fine. The concern is that the objects are stuck (unless the creature is dead) and require a grapple check to get them un-stuck. With a strength of 2 and no BAB the Unseen Servant grapples at like a -4 and if I remember correctly the ooze has a base 16 grapple to pulling free of its stickyness.
The flotsam ooze was set to make EXTREMELY short work of the darfellan. If I hadn't introduced a roleplay twist that led to a whole lot of sneaking around board at night while everyone supposedly was sleeping, so that the other PCs "accidentally" happened to be up and about and in a position to be of quick assistance... well, the thing would easily have killed that character (or, frankly, any other character I wanted to kill).
Same deal with Rowyn, though. The summoned shark is WAY more than a match for anyone dumb enough to jump in the water with no gear!