Can you say "Audrey Two"?
Well I could, but I wouldn't have a clue what it means! Some cultural reference that eludes me, I'm afraid...
Tis a Little Shop Of Horrors reference, Audrey II is the name of a giant, sentient plant - that likes to eat.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091419/
Happy to help. :)
Cheers.
Well I could, but I wouldn't have a clue what it means! Some cultural reference that eludes me, I'm afraid...
Sorry to be cryptic, but yes, I was having a little fun. Audrey II is the maneating plant from Little Shop, as our friend above pointed out.
Whatever the characterization you use, I love the idea of a pet mimic.
I've had parties get befriended by a kobold, and my standard kobold characterization is Beavis from Beavis and Butthead (typically bordering on Beavis' Cornholio, depending on the life threateningness of any given situation).
You could steal that characterization, if you like. I'll try to think of some other appropriate characterizations.
Maybe something like Satchel Pooch from the Get Fuzzy comic. Particularly this strip: Get Fuzzy
My party befriended Bob the Mimic too. The wizard kept him as a pet. When he asked Bob what his favorite food was, Bob couldn't decide, but kind of liked Goblin... or Kobold... no, Gnome was pretty good. When asked what Gnome tasted like, well... it tasted sort of like chicken.
So the wizard brought Bob back to the Tipped Tankard and arranged to have him fed three chickens per day. The stableboy would just set them loose in the room and leave.
Until the inn's cats disappeared.
And then the stableboy disappeared (he must have run off).
Then the owner started complaining about the noises coming from the room when the wizard was away. Especially now that the barmaid was leaving the chickens up there.
Bob got some stern warnings, about eating the help. It would have escalated, but another side plot got Bob-- he succumbed to a raid from the Last Laugh who had been contracted to steal Skaven Umbermead's library. Bob got two of them before he died, though.
Use it as a boat, next find some singing mushrooms.
IMC, the PC's left the Mimic behind, despite the fact it showed itself to be friendly, and keen to follow them along (albeit verrry slowly).
The PC's soon locked it in a room, and liberated the slaves, returning to the surface victorious. They are now embroiled in a plot with Drakthar and his Gobs.
In the meantime, Skellerang has comissioned the Stormblades to conduct a search of the Jzadirune and Malachite Fortress, search for any missing slaves (they'll find one poor, starving and forgotten soul) and they'll also find the mimic.
The mimic will become a minor celebrity at the Tipped Tankard, boosting that tavern's popularity with the locals, while the PC's tavern - The Drunken Morkoth - will suffer from the lack of patronage.
I hope this 'slap in the face' will further engender the competitive juices that already flow freely between the Milliner's Five and the Stormblades.
This one's a bit out of left field...
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I see nothing inherently impossible about this - but what is a mimic's motivation? Reading the MM entry it seems like it just enjoys eating, and perhaps looking after things (like treasure). Does anyone have any ideas as to how to roleplay such a creature?
I don't know if this'll help any, but in my PCs' party, the party rogue was the one taking a liking to the Mimic (which I gave the ability to speak Common, because my players love roleplaying encounters,) and decided to try and hire him away from Kazmojen with better food, good booze, and more pay.
I gave the Mimic the name, "Gloomph" (the sound he makes when he eats something,) and for no good reason other than it amuses me, roleplay him as having a husky voice, a Cockney accent, and a good ol' chap, coarse but chummy, drinking-buddy personality.
Currently, he lives in the basement/dungeon of the party's borderline-destitute aristocratic character, clearing out the rats and keeping the adventuring treasure safe.
So... my advice is... have fun with it!
I think the other bit of advice I'd have is, you should probably give the Mimic homebody-ish tendencies, to keep him from tagging along on adventures and being an unfair combat advantage for the PCs at such an early level.
In my campain the Dwarven Barbarian of Kord befriended the mimic, which is the only monster he ever made friends with. The Mimic, Longjaw, foreshadowed that his older, meaner sibling had stayed on the level below. After the party gave it all their rations in exchange for the rat, they only returned once to make sure it was getting along OK and knew of the lower passage to the underdark.
Longjaw returned much later, having aquired a Ring of minor fire resistance, in the lair of the giant leader of the Flamewarders. Here it was able to provide some comic relief to a deadly chapter and fill in a few blanks the party had about the Cagewights. It was also a small reward to the Dwarven Barbarian, not every monster you let live comes back to kill you.
My group immediately recognized the creature's friendliness. I gave it a good Australian accent and it complained, "I'm starvin'!" Having just killed a dark stalker in that very room, they fed it the corpse which it gratefully consumed. It then willingly followed them at their invitation, and they later used it to guard their backs at the top of the elevator shaft into the Malachite Fortress. Meanwhile, the mimic expressed its personality somewhat: "I like to eat, but I don't like movin' around too much," was pretty much how it summed itself up.
When the party returned, I had a special surprise awaiting them. Two more dark stalkers, Jzadirune having been mostly cleared out and the jig therefore now up, had tried to escape, intending to head out the Underdark entrance. The mimic caught one of them and killed it. Having just eaten the other stalker, though, it was too full to ingest it completely. That was the in-game setup.
Meanwhile in the real world, I, the wacky DM, had visited my daughters between games. I asked them if they had any old Bratz dolls they never played with anymore and they gave me one they were sure they didn't want. I pulled her legs off, and kept the legs in a pocket for when the party came back up from the Malachite Fortress.
When they arrived, I turned aside and stuck the legs into my mouth, one on either side, so that just the calves and feet were sticking out. Then, I turned around and spoke in a voice of someone huffing and puffing because of how full he is, and also with a mouth full. "I'm stuffed!" the mimic exclaimed as the party came into view. Hilarity ensued as the mouth-full mimic described how it had caught its new meal.
Before long, the PCs "sold" the mimic to Skie, which I thought was the perfect solution. As a sentient being, what actually happened was more like Skie interviewing the mimic as a potential security specialist, and Skie paying the PCs a "finder's fee". Skie has been very happy with her low-cost & effective guard; the mimic gets all the food he wants and doesn't have to move around very much; and the PCs have a pretty friendly working relationship with the gnome at this point.
My party befriended the mimic too and fed it all sort of things (mostly dead enemies). I played it as quite child-like and always hungry. Because they move so slowly the PCs made some wheels and an axle and had the mimic shape itself like a cart while they wheeled it around. The mimic was fascinated by the world outside Jazidrune. The novelty enventually wore off and they found the mimic a nice new home. They still run into it every now and then and its probably one of their best friends!
My party employed the mimic as a guard, in exchange for a steady supply of cheese (it's favourite!) Once the character who was keeping it died, it got hungry waiting in his apartment and soon fled into the city.
Use it as a boat, next find some singing mushrooms.
Hehhe, i loved that one too.. wonder if i can still find it in my collections ;) -scary crocs
The one with the first adventure of the Germanicus sisters.. another classic iirc..
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I just played it as a hungry but garrulous minion, that was very sedentary. The Wee Jasidan took over Ghelve's Locks after the adventure, as clearly The Vanishing was a magical malady and Jzadirune was too dangerous to be left unwatched. The mimic became a pointless butler/manservant of sorts, and as he was the only one who could speak Undercommon it had little interest in the other PCs.
Given the PC is question got up to no good in the Malachite Fortress far below using the corpses to practice necromancy, encourgaed by Embril (he was Shackleborn and she needed him fully evil as a spare), he was happy to have the mimic as a first line of defence against anyone nosy enough or stupid enough to break in (Alleybashers, Last Laugh etc).
He prefers skeletons for an aesethetic point of view, as he can polish the bones, and after the flensing fed the fleshy remnants to the mimic. To be honest he may have to put it on a diet, I guess I should advance its HD. Eventually he'll probably try and make it undead.
Nice to see other groups established a relationship with it :)
Use it as a boat, next find some singing mushrooms.Hehhe, i loved that one too.. wonder if i can still find it in my collections ;) -scary crocs
The one with the first adventure of the Germanicus sisters.. another classic iirc..
Glad some one caught my reference. Makes me feel a tad less old.