Sins of the Saviors, Ordikon & the mithril-clad template


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber

Hello, all! I'm currently prepping pathfinder #5 and am stat-blocking Ordikon. As there was no template in the Bestiary I checked the Advanced Bestiary by Green Ronin because Paizo uses that excellent book rather often to flesh out critters with templates. There is a listing for metal-clad creatures & mithril is included in there. I'm pretty sure they were using the same template because it has the same abilities. I found a discrepancy in Ordikon, however. The Adv Bestiary says that a mithril-clad creature has a +1 CR increase in one place but it also says there is a +5 CR increase in another place. I'm not sure my gang is ready for an EL17 encounter, but I think an EL13 would probably feel pretty weak, and a letdown, for them (especially considering Ordikan's unique position and relationship to Karzoug). The listed CR in the pathfinder #5 is 14. There has got to be a misprint somewhere. I'm not looking for blame I'm looking for errata...does anybody know if Green Ronin put out an errata sheet for Advanced Bestiary? Also, did Paizo decide to compromise with a +2 CR increase or did they use their judgment? I'm fine with your guys' judgment, I just want to know how the decision was made to make sure I give my party a memorable challenge without killing them all. Thanks in advance to anyone who can answer my long-winded question....!


Either they forgot to reference the template or they re-did it.

I don't have access to the template right now, but I'd guess that they changed the CR to properly reflect his capabilities, or maybe they gave him the elite array and more equipment than normally - that usually increases an NPT's CR by one, though they usually say what they did.


Looking in the Advanced Bestiary, the CR adjustment that has the +5 value is in the spot where Level Adjustment should be. There's your errata: +1 CR, +5 Level Adjustment.


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber

Thanks for the help! I tend to reroll stats on all major NPCs so I can flavor them to taste. I think what I'll do is give him one extra level so he'll fit CR14.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

It's worth pointing out that for GMs who like to reverse engineer and tinker with stat blocks... you really SHOULD get copies of the books that we use to create the adventures.

And as a corollary, if in reverse engineering the stats, don't get too stressed out if you find an error. Sometimes, it's an error we did in the text, sometimes it's an error you made in reverse engineering, but in the end, the CR system isn't really meant to serve as a BY THE LAW set of rules. They're guidelines, and no replacement for an individual GM's knowledge of how his own group of players function, or how the current mix of characters work against specific creatures. It's of course good to try to make sure that the numbers are right, but there comes a point where worrying about making sure every tiny bonus is accounted for starts to deliver diminishing returns and you start eating into time better spent, in my opinion, preparing other parts of the game (such as handouts or soundtracks or other play-enhancing stuffs).

Contributor

Pst! Hey you! Eris!
Come a little closer... I wanna let you in on a little secret...

Spoiler:
In creating Ordikan, I didn't use a template. If you read the description of his Mithril Body down near the end of his stat block, you see that it describes the effect as being similar to an iron body spell. That's kind of an understatement, actually, but it looks good in print. It IS the effects of an iron body spell. I wanted to give him a permanent effect of that spell, but I thought that simply making him an iron man would be a little cliche and blah. So, I thought, "Hey I can make him in to a Mithril man. And I can give him a cool name to go with it too!"

So there you, go. That's the secret. No template. Just a cool idea.

When coming up with his CR I just used the game designer's best friend for determing these things: playtesting. I used a couple different groups and set the CR at what I felt was appropriate for the level of players that should be encountering my mithril mage.

So that's it. Hope that helps.


Steve Greer wrote:

Pst! Hey you! Eris!

Come a little closer... I wanna let you in on a little secret...

** spoiler omitted **

You're a sneaky, sneaky man.

Kudos!

One of the most important lessons in GMing is to realise just how much you can sometimes accomplish with virtually nothing in the way of rules tinkering.

Need a unique monster or enemy? Blatantly steal some other monster's stat block and explain how it looks differently (for added deviousity - yes, I know it's not officially a word - use the description of another monster that can work with the sort of natural attacks, modes of movement and powers, and even that doesn't have to be an exact science.). Tinker a tiny little bit with some abilities (replace some feats and to hell with the prerequisites - there's always bonus feats!), or use some spell effect or similar stuff in place of a full-fledged template.

This can work wonders! People think you spend sleepless nights coming up with great new monsters and abilities and so on, while in truth you just switched around a couple of things and played dirty. This effect is maximised and empowered (without increased spell slot needs) if your players are very literal when it comes to the rules. For some people, this sort of tinkering and winging is just not apprehensible with their mindset. Prepare to baffle!


Steve Greer wrote:

Pst! Hey you! Eris!

Come a little closer... I wanna let you in on a little secret...

** spoiler omitted **

Hmmm...he's a sneaksy little hobbit...my precioussssss...

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