To forget that, I would have had to have been aware of it in the first place! I'll get there (Golarion's got me hooked), but not before Round 3 starts. I might finish the book by Tuesday. :P
You're totally allowed to shout comments through the window. You just don't get coffee and muffins. ;)
So hey! How 'bout that rotling, eh? I must admit I'm ashamed to have left so many questions open, when they all have answers. (At least a couple of which were provided by words I cut because they seemed redundant. D'oh!) But those answers will have to wait until voting closes! So right now, how about vote like you know 'em already! Eh? Eh?
Rotling
cut for space
This is the twenty-third monster that I am looking at. I do not read the comments below the entry before posting my opinion. An apology if this is duplicative of someone else’s entry, in part or whole.
A walking cyst, stretched around a collection of bone and organs. Rib-bone claws. (Fresh from the bone bowl at the barbie?) Tusks. It make a sound like menacing, wait, dripping water. The punish the world for irreverence toward death. This line really left me puzzled. The further explanation helped, but it sounds a little generic? Now wait, the third paragraph is good. “It exists only to spread agony.” I like that. Makes sense. I kind of wish you had led with that? Interesting that it never spawns by killing, suggesting an alternative means of reproduction.
Powers:
*stench = violent gagging (mm-kay)
*infections gangrene (mm-kay)
*curse wounds that will not heal (seen it, but it still might be effective)
*hears with its entire body and echolocation (hm)
*supernatural awareness of nearby critters and their conditions (ties in with the description – what can it do with that?)
*when dying, it’s a Grudge Monster (mmkay)
Summary: A gory monster that I’m not quite sure Edmund Gorey would have actually wanted to render faithfully in black and white. This monster seems a bit confused in the writing. Honestly, without the reference to it being a walking cyst, I think it would work a lot better for me. I thought I was reading three different descriptions of it between the three paragraphs of introduction. It might have been better to pick one of those? I found myself wanting to know more about the supernatural awareness it has and what it can do with it to menace the PCs. There are good ideas here that I think warranted some reflection upon their cohesion and some expansion.
Director of Brand Strategy
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I really like this one, from its clearly thought-out tactics, to creepy description, to unique ecology. I too am confused as to what type of creature it is, and think it could be better explained, especially in how it relates to fey. I look forward to seeing your work in later rounds. May the force be with you.
Does it grab me visually: A walking exploding cyst, of course I like it. The mercy killing thing grabs me. I can see them running around battlegrounds and plague filled cities, putting people out of their misery. Creepy and cool.
Would I use it in game: I’d love to put these into a plague adventure. It would be fun to build up stories about them from NPCs, especially with the mercy killing aspect.
Would my players enjoy an encounter with it: They would be completely confused by it. It attacks, infects and runs away. It doesn’t attack when they’re hurt. Then it goes out of its way to kill someone on the brink of death. I don’t think they would know what to do with it.
Lief, congratulations on earning Charles' vote.
+1
Sorry I haven't yet posted all those answers I promised! Non-RPG duties are eating my time. They'll show up sometime in the next few hours. :)
The train of thought which led to the rotling began with mold. Mold is a natural process. Natural processes made me think of fey. Stewards of mold? Fey are often associated with various sorts of mushrooms already, seems a little too obvious. Rotting vegetation isn't very exciting anyway. Rotting meat? Oh... rotting meat...
A couple of days later, my own wanderings took me to the roadside and I caught a whiff of that same smell, and a moment later I found the source. I never came closer than ten feet, because it was even worse firsthand: the rotting carcass of a roadkill deer. Clearly it had been torn open by vultures; it was on its back, the chest cavity mostly empty. I didn't stare for long, but it's something I'll never forget. Black, slimy rib bones were the only recognizable feature on the inside, at least from a distance. And the smell... no words can describe it.
That experience was the primary inspiration for the rotling's obvious physical characteristics. There was a lot of "eww, gross" this year and I played into that (should have anticipated it, really) but this wasn't gross for effect. It was gross because that's where it came from. A comment was made regarding rot grubs: I added maggots at one point, and immediately thought of the corrupted creatures from Princess Mononoke. Too close, and You, the Voting Public weren't going to get this background when you read it; no maggots.
In fact, depending on the tradition, it may well have been the stewards who enacted the clauses in natural law which set free a particular monstrosity if mortals aren't doing the right thing. (And in their wisdom, put an expiration date on the little bastard.) Potential scenario: twenty thousand years ago a steward-fey, graceful and humanoid and smelling of pine, made a pact with the first rough human civilizations when they started to think of corpses as the people they once were, not just meat: "Okay, you can keep those bodies, but for each one you have to pay respects to the cycle you're taking them from." The reason for burial rites is long forgotten, but if they're shirked the bogeyman still shows up to enforce it.
Because it isn't. :) But seriously, I hope that's answered by the novella above, and I hope I've answered the same question as leveled against the Spitfire Revenant. These are two of a kind. It's alive, supernaturally so, and has no connection whatsoever to negative energy.
I was astonished when Sean K. "ooze-vermin hybrid" Reynolds asked this question! To be fair, maybe someone else came up with the torble; there's only one byline on The Bastards of Erebus and it belongs to the person who wrote the adventure, even if others contributed some of the extra stuff. Then again, torbles weren't just a bestiary toss-in: they featured in the sewer. And they were what made me think, "yeah, it's OK to do this."
D6 hit die and 1/2 BAB. Fey are mechanically inappropriate for a melee critter. By its anatomy it qualifies as an aberration, and that's far more appropriate to its role. I also have to disagree vehemently with Meepo on this one: I could never see fey voluntarily working with undead, and certainly not creating them. Many aberrations still function according to natural law, even if they would never have evolved that way. No undead ever does. (That doesn't prevent fey from becoming undead, but that's another issue entirely.) Being an aberration also ties in an English-language sense to the "something's very wrong" origin of the creature.
Its purpose is singular: "let those stupid mortals know that more of me is a bad idea." To fulfill this purpose, it will show mortals what it feels like to have their processes disrupted, to have death and life juxtaposed inappropriately. It does this with rot and decay, and with a touch of fey magic to make it stick. But those who are already suffering, are already suffering. They have a sense of the wrongness already. They need not be punished further, because of course they too are part of the natural world and disrupting them too badly is just as much a problem. It kills those on the cusp of death for two reasons. First, their suffering no longer serves a purpose: they're obviously not going to cause any problems, and if they're no longer awake and groaning, others aren't even suffering by proxy. Second, the nearby mortals obviously didn't keep THIS rotling from emerging, why trust them to prevent another? If you want it done right, do it yourself: killed by rotling means one less potential rotling.
Because it's not undead. It did not rise from a dead creature. It rose from a bloated carcass -- the formerly-living creature, its memories, the reason it may have died, are all unrelated and irrelevant. It is indiscriminate because angry fey deal in object lessons, not individual punishment. All you damn mortals look alike! In my mind this extends to the unintelligent, by the way. The rotling has no way of telling animal from humanoid. That's okay: the most likely way a rotling might occur in a wild place is if some plague has killed off the scavengers, in which case one rotling can prevent many with its compulsive coup de grace. In border areas, where humans and animals are mixed, humans will almost certainly notice the fey-scarred animals and be fearful of the cause: mission accomplished. Sometimes you've gotta break a few eggs. And if something really goes wrong, they only last a month: a mere blink of nature's eternal eye.
Yes it is, and I noticed that, and I thought about it for a minute and realized that it should be. This beast was not named by adventurers or scholars, and naturally it can't name itself. No, the rotling was labeled by those who encounter it most frequently, and are the most fearful of it: dirty, stupid peasants. Peasants may be very creative in their imagined monsters, but that's mostly from the ergot. Their vocabularies are limited, and they aren't going to spend a long time thinking up a cool name to scream immediately before ", RUN!"
Yes, I meant literally cursed, as in a 5th-level cleric can fix it. Rotlings encounter players because the village needs saving: a niche somewhere close to lycanthropes, but with a different set of potential hooks to Something Bigger. That's why I don't think the hit and run tactics should be a big cause of frustration; the players will be the ones doing the hunting (with the possible exception of their first encounter). But the blacksmith's apprentice and the town constable have weeping wounds, the villagers are terrified, and once the players clean everything up they will be celebrated as heroes before they start thinking about where this thing came from in the first place.
So yeah, 300 words was a tough challenge. Did I miss anything? :)
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 8
aka Benchak the Nightstalker
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The train of thought which led to the rotling began with mold. Mold is a natural process. Natural processes made me think of fey. Stewards of mold? Fey are often associated with various sorts of mushrooms already, seems a little too obvious. Rotting vegetation isn't very exciting anyway. Rotting meat? Oh... rotting meat...
** spoiler omitted **...
I just want to say, having read where you got your ideas from and how you thought them through, I'm really glad I voted for you.
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I just want to say, having read where you got your ideas from and how you thought them through, I'm really glad I voted for you.And I'm kind of regretting that I didn't (it was a close thing, if I'd had a 5th vote it would have been yours). Here's hoping you didn't need it!
Ha! You should have listened to me when I tried to sway your 4th vote. :P
That shows a great deal of thought went into the creature. Applause for that! I agree by the way with your taxonomy of the two types of fey. Those are perfectly appropriate. (Have you read any Charles de Lint?)
I just want to say, having read where you got your ideas from and how you thought them through, I'm really glad I voted for you.
That means a lot to me, coming from one of the guys I fully expect to see in top 4. Thanks. :)
Have you read any Charles de Lint?
I haven't! The name is vaguely familiar, but I had to look him up to have any inkling of what he's done. Some similar concepts in the background?
He writes what I think of as fusion fantasy - taking the modern world and bringing old legends to life in it. I think some of his stuff may have been called urban fantasy. Anyway, your writing reminds me of his in that respect - fresh takes on old ideas.
I appreciate your explanation. :)
As for the "fey-spawned aberration" bit, I just didn't know what that meant. Obviously I know what an "ooze-vermin hybrid" is, I wrote that one. ;)
Congratulations Lief! It's awesome to have you in the Top 16!
FWIW Charles, I'll also echo that you took a turn for the good after the mischief. I continue to look forward to your comments on R3's submissions. :)
Lief:
First of all, congratulations on making it to the Top 16. I thought I would wait until after the voting for Round Two ended before offering any commentary or advice. And I'm going to come at it a little differently, in that I'm not going to focus primarily on your design this round. Rather, I'm going to have a go at examining your entire portfolio to this point to sort of assess what you've done well, where you could shore up a few things in your overall design and writing, and then give you some more pointed advice on stuff you could showcase in future rounds to maybe improve your chances of going all the way to the end. So, with that in mind, here goes:
I really enjoyed your seven thousand blossoms entry from Round One. I think it consistently made most everyone's Top 5 favorites, as well. So, with that in mind, expectations were set pretty high for you this round, and I'm not sure the Rotling delivered. For those interested in the gross factor, you certainly came out with something to whet their appetite. I didn't care as much for the Rotling name. It's okay, but just hovers in the "meh" category, because it's really not evocative enough to paint much of a mental picture for what the creature's about. Yes, it has to do with rot...but who would have imagined it would be a fey-spawned aberration? Your name choice for seven thousand blossoms on the other hand, immediately conjures up imagery about it that dovetails perfectly with the descriptive text that follows. I would like to see your designs continue more in that vein, if possible.
So far, I think your biggest strongsuit is your idea generation. You keep bringing some really great conceptual stuff...and that demonstrates you've got mojo. But, you haven't quite taken the big swing at something yet and knocked it out of the park. The seven thousand blossoms came really close, and visually, I think it's one of the wondrous items that might very well endure in everyone's minds going forward. That said, the Rotling probably won't. So, I'd encourage you to find the monster that inspires you the most for Round Three and then bring the really cool ideas on how you're going to portray its powers and special abilities...don't neglect the stat-block details, of course...but then really focus on finding the right mojo for its description, even enhancing or adding to it beyond the first glimpse everyone got in Round Two. If you can design something that pulls all those elements together and tie it off into a really polished presentation, I think you could bounce back into the upper echelon of competitors.
Best of luck,
--Neil
I have to go with folklore on this one, and in folklore, there is very little difference between fey and incorporeal undead. Some cultures don't even use different words for "nature spirits" and "spirits of the dead." They all belong to the same category of beings. There are plenty of affliction-causing, life-draining, burial-mound-residing fey, as well as many domestic-chore-performing, crop-tending, nature-protecting ghosts.
Good points here, and in fact I agree with them; but while I love bringing folk lore alive in PFRPG, it's still PFRPG... there's a lot of systemic baggage here inherited from decades of D&D, and "setting-neutral" means you default to the Core Rules, not historical accuracy. That's the basis of my earlier comment. This milieu says undead are unnatural and powered by negative energy.
I would be delighted to see a world setting lift shadows, ghosts and spectres from the undead category and plop them down as fey, but from the perspective of this round's rules, I think that would be world-specific. In the default world, where they're not fey, I don't think fey will interact with them, and calling them by the same name would just be due to confusion on the part of the rabble.
Congratulations! Though you did not get my final vote, this was a consisten entry.
Visual: 10 Charisma
Creativity: 10 Intelligence
Would I use it: 10 Dex
Overall: 10 Strength
Now jump out wows for me, but now glaring holes for either. I do not care for undead and gross for gross sake does not work for me. Hopefully you can make the gross for creepy's sake. A solid work that just failed to grab me, though I am glad it got others.
Congratulations and good luck in the future rounds!
Congratulations! Though you did not get my final vote, this was a consisten entry.
Visual: 10 Charisma
Creativity: 10 Intelligence
Would I use it: 10 Dex
Overall: 10 Strength
Now jump out wows for me, but now glaring holes for either. I do not care for undead and gross for gross sake does not work for me. Hopefully you can make the gross for creepy's sake. A solid work that just failed to grab me, though I am glad it got others.Congratulations and good luck in the future rounds!
It wasnt undead.
It wasnt undead.
You are correct.