My players have been casting around for a way to keep them safe from worms. They're split between levels 9 and 10 right now, and it's amazing how challenging a few simple spawn can still be.
I recently started a thread about the use of grease as a worm preventative, but now my players have returned to more conventional tactics. Last night we saw the first use of Repel Vermin and though I should have seen it coming, I found myself at a bit of a loss. If a verminous critter makes it's will save and crosses the barrier, it suffers 2d6 points of damage. That's enough to kill any worm of course. So if some PC has a worm inside them and the cleric approaches with her Repel Vermin sphere up, then presumably the worm is instantly destroyed.
But what about the spawn? Should this act like the "Curative Transformation" weakness that they have? Should every spawn suddenly become a regular zombie? Doesn't that make this simple spell more powerful than it should be? For the rest of the AP, (almost) including Kyuss himself, all the players would need to do is have their repel vermin up and they reduce challenging fights to zombie smashing. Broodfiends? Just undead bugs now.
My thought is that the spawn (or whatever Kyuss creations) should suffer the 2d6 points of damage, but all of the worms within them should not automatically be blasted out. But once in the sphere, could the spawn place a worm on the cleric successfully?
And does this spell give a free ticket past any of the wormswarms in the Spire?
I'd appreciate any thoughts and suggestions to moderate what could otherwise be sweeping ramifications for this spell. Admittedly, it's a 5th level spell and so should be powerful, but it shouldn't be the magic bullet to solving the Age of Worms problem.
Thanks in advance.
Last night we saw the first use of Repel Vermin and though I should have seen it coming, I found myself at a bit of a loss. If a verminous critter makes it's will save and crosses the barrier, it suffers 2d6 points of damage. That's enough to kill any worm of course. So if some PC has a worm inside them and the cleric approaches with her Repel Vermin sphere up, then presumably the worm is instantly destroyed. ...
Just undead bugs now.
...
You've got your answer right there. So far as I know, the worms are Undead type, not Vermin type, and are thus unaffected by the Repel Vermin spell.
If you've already done something in game, or are feeling generous, you might have *free crawling* worms have to make a will save to enter a Repel Vermin, but not be damaged by it.
I do think Repel Vermin is one of the few "repel/hedge" spells that you can actively push it against something effectively (instead of breaking the protection from the 'pushee'). But that shouldn't have any effect on the worms or spawn.
Sadly no. The worms are classified as vermin. I don't have the thread documentation to support this claim at the moment, but it has been discussed before, and if I recall correctly James Jacobs himself weighed in on the subject, confirming the verminous nature of the worms.
Here is the thread: Go to http://paizo.com/dungeon/messageboards/ageOfWorms/archives/kyussSpawnDefeat edByCandles
And here: http://paizo.com/dungeon/messageboards/ageOfWorms/archives/mechanicsOfSpawn OfKyussWorms
To quote Demiurge 1138:
The Ecology of the Spawn of Kyuss [Dragon #336--I think] makes it very clear that Kyuss worms are in fact vermin. Antilife shell works on them, as does repel vermin.
Thanks for the links Deimodius. Those were the very threads that I was thinking of.
The spell Repel Vermin is a far cry from a 1sp citronella candle though, and I think that it should have some effect. The question is where to draw the line and how to defend your position once it's drawn.
Well, repel vermin is a 4th level spell, so it's not that low level. After all, cure disease is 3rd level, and it turns a spawn into a normal zombie. Probably only one player can cast it in your party, and at 10th level, probably a max of twice per day. If your party clumps up in the 10 ft radius from the caster, they should be vulnerable to other attacks, and at least they won't march that way, so you can get some worms on people during surprise round.
Here's how I'd handle it. The worms are vermin when they are outside of their host spawn. So a ranged touch worm will die as it's hurled through the repel vermin barrier. The vermin inside the spawn are not separate creatures, so they are protected by the spawn's undead status (but vulnerable to any attacks that can kill the host zombie, like greater turning or spells that specifically target undead. This way, repel vermin protects its subject (it's an abjuration spell, so that's what it's designed to do) but doesn't have any offensive capability. And it can't be used as a deworming treatment for the higher level Kyuss creatures--the verminous worms are still part of the undead spawn when it walks through the barrier, but once the spawn is inside the barrier, it can use a touch attack to infest you with a worm. Conversely, when a worm is inside a PC, the PC's humanoid type protects it from the spell, so you can't just walk through the barrier to de-worm yourself.
At some point, I would guess players would discover by trial and error that cure disease works. My player hasn't yet (he's forgotten the FF description, three or so years after he used spawn against me). Once they do, by 12th level or so they can afford a wand of cure disease if they really want one, and the worms lose their scariness, unless you get hit with them repeatedly in a short time (as might happen in Spire of Long Shadows or Wormcrawl Fissure).
Of course this still leaves open how repel vermin interacts with the more powerful worm-carrying creatures, and with things like the sea of worms in SoLS or the wormy walls in the Tabernacle of Kyuss. I'll have to give that some thought. Certainly, you want SoLS and IWF to make your players crap a brick or two, if only belatedly when they realize that just because they can handle a few wimpy Spawn doesn't mean they can handle swimming in worms.
I will look at the higher level challenges when I get a chance--I think repel vermin should be effective up to a point, but shouldn't be a silver bullet for the highest levels of the adventure.
Note that there are all kinds of tactics for dealing with Kyuss zombies--hide from undead (1st level cleric spell) can even help you to avoid them. And in a couple of levels, your 12th level cleric has merely to turn undead and they go poof!
SPOILERS GALORE FOLLOW . . .
Some more thoughts. Antilife shell works on vermin, so it should prove to be a barrier against the worms as well. Of course you'll collapse that barrier if you push it against an enemy, so in some ways it poses less problems than repel vermin. The key is to apply the rules to one in a way that is logically congruent with how you've applied them to the other. (I swear we all ought to be lawyers and make money!)
Some Kyuss creatures and how repel vermin and antilife shell might affect them:
Wormswarm. At 12 HD, a wormswarm is basically immune to RV--it would take a 36th level caster to repel them. Antilife shell works defensively. No problem--if you want to burn a 6th level spell (your highest spell level) to make yourself safe from wormswarms in SoLS, that's one less heal you can cast. You want to be able to cast heal in SoLS!
Overworm. As a magical beast, the overworm itself is immune to RV. You should apply the same logic to its worm-infested ability that you do to melee touch attacks by Kyuss spawn. If you rule that worms inside the overworm aren't affected by RV, RV does nothing against overworms. AS will keep the overworm at bay, but if you attack the worm with ALS up, you'll collapse the barrier and make yourself vulnerable to catching worms from it.
Kyuss knight. A Kyuss knight's bite attacks are made by the big worms in his eyesockets, but these creatures do not detach from the host. Cure disease is not mentioned as killing these worms--they are completely integral to the Kyuss knight, and I would rule therefore that the Kyuss knight is completely unaffected by RV or ALS. If you wanted to extend the rules for normal Kyuss Spawn to these creatures, you could say remove disease wipes out the bite attack and resultant intelligence drain, but that's kind of a stretch. These things have enough HD that they'll be immune to RV cast by anything less than a 48th level caster, so RV is not an issue in any case. Since the creature itself isn't living, I don't see how ALS can affect it unless you want to be really, really easy on your players.
Favored spawn of Kyuss. Apply the same logic to its "create spawn" and "foul embrace" attacks that you do to a regular spawn's. Apply the same logic to its "infested skin" ability that you do to the overworm's "worm-infested" ability. RV should protect those inside the barrier from its "wormburst" ability. ALS will do so also, as long as the barrier hasn't been collapsed. Remove disease is not specifically mentioned as transforming a favored spawn into an ordinary undead creature, so I don't see that RV should kill off the worms inside it. That being the case, a wormburst made from inside the RV barrier should have full effect.
Wormdrake. This thing's worm breath weapon is even more difficult to rule on than the Kyuss knight's bite attacks. The wormdrake itself is a dragon type, so whatever logic you use for Kyuss spawn and their worms should apply to the worms in this thing's draconis fundamentis. If it breathes on a character protected by RV or ALS, though, you've got an interesting problem. The line of worms doesn't have a specific number of hit dice (like a swarm). Are they just a large number of individual worms, and therefore incapable of getting through RV? Here's how I'd handle it--since RV does 2d6 damage to vermin moving through the barrier, reduce the breath weapon's damage by 2d6 (to 10d6), and grant a +2 circumstance bonus on the reflex save to avoid becoming infested. Before you make this reduction, have the caster roll to overcome the wormdrake's spell resistance, just as you would to a demon trying to move through a magic circle. ALS should work, but again the wormdrake has a very good chance of getting through with this attack due to spell resistance. So, in this case, the spells provide marginal protection, not foolproof protection, and the wormdrake has lots of other weapons in its arsenal. I think these rulings are about right for the effects of 4th and 6th level spells on a CR 20 creature.
Walls of the Tabernacle of Worms. If you attack the walls with a melee weapon, the wall is inside your RV barrier and you've collapsed the ALS barrier. So these spells have no effect on the "spray of worms function." If you pass through the walls using ethereal jaunt or passwall, the worms materialize inside your body, so ALS and RV have no effect on this function of the walls as well. Based on the effects' descriptions, the walls conjure or evoke worms rather than being constructed of them, so you can't push an RV barrier through a wall to damage or destroy it.
Doors of the Tabernacle of Worms. Difficult to rule on. Here's how I'd handle it: With a DC 30 caster level check, RV does 2d6 damage to the door as the subject of the spell approaches. This works only on approach and not retreat, so you have to retreat 10 feet from the door to repeat the process. I'd count it as a standard action, so that a monk can't run back and forth seven times and take the door down. Since the door has 90 hp and fast healing 20, it will take a lot more than this to break through. ALS doesn't affect the doors due to the collapsing of the barrier.
Kyuss. Kyuss is basically a creature composed entirely of worms, but I think it would be a bad call to treat him as anything other than a single creature, since you can't break him up the way you can a swarm. Create spawn ability should be affected the same way that a spawn of Kyuss's ability is affected. Kyuss has so many hit dice that RV would not keep him at bay regardless, but you probably have to make the same ruling on his ability to infest people with worms as a result of melee attacks that you make for the lowly spawn of Kyuss. In any event, I'd apply Kyuss's spell resistance to virtually negate any benefit from RV. ALS might protect against ranged worm-throwing and the ray of worms from "divine blast", but you could again apply spell resistance. You could also rule that as a god Kyuss is immune to ALS, but even if he's susceptible (as a creature with the aberration type), your cleric is going to have to roll a 19 or 20 to overcome his spell resistance each time he tries to punch through the barrier. As for Kyuss' engulf special ability, the worms aren't detaching themselves from his body and becoming "vermin," so RV won't work at all (unless you are 90th level) and ALS is 90-95% likely to be negated by his SR.
Broodfiends, Wormcallers, Worm Nagas, Eviscerator Beetles, Ulgurstastas. No worm-based attacks. They won't be affected at all by repel vermin. ALS keeps worm nagas at bay, but they are spellcasters, so tactically the spell does little for you in an encounter with a worm naga.
Now, let's say we go the whole hog and rule that all forms of Kyuss worm are 1 HD vermin and are thus affected by RV. I think this is clearly incorrect, but what would it do?
It would probably kill the worms in any wormbearing creature that crossed the barrier, turning spawn into zombies, favored spawn into ????advanced zombies????, killing wormswarms (or at least destroying those squares of the swarm that come into contact with the barrier).
Overworms, Kyuss knights, and wormdrakes would have their worm-related special attacks (temporarily? permanently?) negated, but all three have plenty of other things to make them fearsome, so RV is still only marginally useful against them.
You could rule that RV allows you to walk through the walls and doors of the tabernacle as if you were ethereal--but there are strong indications that the walls are made of stone, so at the most you could walk through the doors unharmed. This reduces the amount of other spells (knock, disintegrate, passwall, ethereal jaunt, etc.) used to penetrate the Tabernacle and heal damage from the resulting worm infestations, but doesn't necessarily make the whole dungeon a cake walk.
If you really wanted to go the whole hog, you could rule that ALS and/or RV completely negates Kyuss's engulf and damages Kyuss himself by vaporizing the individual worms of which he's composed. This might considerably reduce Kyuss's options, but he's still got a gazillion powerful spells and four whomping melee attacks per round. But any final confrontation in which the players aren't deathly afraid of THE WORMS just isn't the right ending to an AP called "Age of Worms." And since Kyuss is a god, you should at least apply his SR, and you're within your rights to say that the precedents you set with lesser creatures earlier in the campaign don't apply here.
Addendum to above post:
The Sea of Worms (SoLS). This is a weird one. There are approximately 3 dozen wormswarms in here, but effectively it's just one big wormswarm with infinite hit points, and if you kill worms they immediately reappear. So, if you dive into the lake with RV up, you kill the worms but then they reappear inside the barrier. In any event, since the swarms can take infinite damage, and aren't moving to attack you, I don't see that RV affects the Sea at all. As for ALS, again, you're moving to the worms here and not vice-versa, so it amounts to collapsing the barrier and making yourself vulnerable. In any event, there are better ways to avoid the Sea's damaging effects--like air walk.
First of all, thank you very much Peruhain for your thoughtful, lengthy, and exhaustively detailed reply. Wonderful stuff there. I like most everything that you suggested.
For the spawn, I decided to pretty much follow your advice. The spawn themselves are undead and are therefore immune to RV. However, any attempt to place a worm (whether by ranged attack or melee) upon a target within RV's sphere will automatically fail as the worm is either repelled by the barrier or takes 2d6 points of damage if inside. The same magic which unites worms and zombie into one being protects the worms from RV once they have begun to burrow into your flesh. They burrow by eating you after all, so perhaps they are no longer considered to be a separate entity. Anyway, that's how the magic will work.
I have only one point to make about your catalog of higher level creatures.
Wormswarm. At 12 HD, a wormswarm is basically immune to RV--it would take a 36th level caster to repel them.
This statement is untrue where it suggests 'immunity' to RV due to HD. If a creature's HD are less than 1/3 the RV caster's level, then they are automatically repelled. Otherwise, the need to make a will save to enter, and upon success they take 2d6 points of damage. A wormswarm will never be less than 1/3 the caster's level, but they do need to make a will save. With a +4 will save, they are far far from being 'immune' to the spell. This is fine, just a small correction to your Tome of Understanding about Repel Vermin.
I hereby nominate Peruhain of Brithondy to be the new Sage of the Paizo boards in loco parentis for the published Sage of yesteryear's Dragon magazine. All in favor, just post "Ask the Sage" questions directed at Peruhain.
I guess that's what I get for crowing on our game forum. ;)