Are there any templates for "Decrepit" or "Crippled" creatures?

[Wolfsnap]

I had the idea of take a very dangerous CR 14 dragon down to about CR 9 by having it be cursed/crippled/falling-apart. It has suffered terrible wounds that have not healed, it is hideously scarred, half blind, half mad, missing lots of scales and teeth, etc - but still a formidable opponent for my level 7 party.

I was surprised to see that there are no existing templates which cover such a creature - although I suppose there's not too much call for that kind of thing. I came up with somethign on my own, but it's a little too complicated and random to really make a good template. Does anyone know of any existing rules to cover this situation in 3.5?

[Kierato]

Not that I know of, but I can probably make a simple one if you want.

[ulgulanoth]

wretched?, enraged?, hungry?

[Wolfsnap]

ulgulanoth wrote:

wretched?, enraged?, hungry?

On the right track, but all of those are +0 CR templates, and I'm looking for something that that would be a -5 CR template (or several templates that stack negative CR effects).

I've started with a Very Old White Dragon and done the following:

-5 to natural AC
-5 to BAB
-5 All Ability Scores

reduce HD to the next lowest Die (d12 HD became d10 HD)

reduce all damage dice by one step (any d6 become d4, any d8 becomes d6, etc)

reduce breath weapon damage by 5 dice (from 14 to 9)

reduce all Save DC's accordingly

Reduce DR by 5

Reduce SR by 5

Remove flight ability (ruined wings)

Reduced number of spells per day

Reduce normal movement by 1/3

The modified dragon is AC 26,with 166 hp, and a +20 bite attack that does 2d6+12 damage (along with the rest of it's normal natural attacks). It still retains it's full suite of abilities, but the save DCs are all reduced and more survivable and it's breath weapon is no longer instantly fatal to the squishier party members.

It's still plenty dangerous. I'm not entirely sure whether I should also blind it or not. :P

[Remco Sommeling]

No, simple way, since it depends too much on the creature's strengths..

reversing the advanced template might be a start though, giving a dragon a penalty of -4 to all it's scores and -2 to it's natural armor might work, though depending on circumstances you might leave it's mental abilities intact and reduce it's breath weapon by 2 dice, possibly cut it's flying speed down by half and maybe just allow short periods of awkward flight.

I think such things need a personal touch, but the advanced template in reverse seems a good base line, just replace penalties that don't seem fitting, exhausted and staggered might work for particulary crippling effects, limits on uses on special abilities, taking particulary long to ready it's breath weapon for example giving PCs a full round to seek cover.

The building rules in the bestiary can still serve you well as a general guideline, but a drop of CR by 5 is kinda extreme and hard to justify, closest thing I can think of is in council of thieves :

Spoiler:

the pitfiend duke in part 4, the infernal syndrome suffers from some pretty heavy penalties, dropping CR from 20 ish to 12

[Kierato]

Make it always staggered so that it can only make a move or standard action (or charge up to it's movement and make one attack). One thing that makes dragons powerful is it's multiple attacks. This alone would drop it's CR.

[James Jacobs]

How about this:

Decrepit Simple Template (CR –1)
Creatures with the decrepit template are weaker and slower than average.
[b]Quick Rules{/b]: Halve all speeds; –2 on all rolls and special ability DCs; –4 AC and CMD; –2 hp/HD
[b]Rebuild Rules{/b]: Halve all speeds; –4 to all ability scores; decrease natural armor by –2.

Basically just reversed everything from the Advanced Creature template and added a speed reduction.

Other alternatives:

Advance the creature to middle age, old age, or venerable age (for creatures of Int 2 or lower, do not increase Int).

Apply the effects of slow to the creature to simulate its condition.

[Wolfsnap]

Reversing the advanced template seems like a good place to start, although I don't think that qualifies as "Decrepit"; more like "Weakened" or "Sickly". I see a Decrepit template as something that you would only apply to higher CR creatures. (after all, Kobolds don't get decrepit, they just die! :P ) So I'd make the template a -3 CR template at least. Although perhaps for complex high CR creatures, there's no escaping a certain amount of necessary customization.

Decrepit Simple Template(CR -3)

Creatures with the decrepit template are in a state of extreme decline and are much less powerful than healthy members of their species.

Quick Rules: Halve all speeds; -6 on all rolls and and special ability DCs; -8 AC and CMD; -4 hp/HD
Rebuild Rules: Halve all speeds; -8 to STR, DEX, & CON; -4 to WIS and CHA; decrease Natural Armor by -6

I feel maybe I should add something about reducing all spell like abilities to 1/day as well.

[James0235]

Rite Publishing's Book of Monster Templates has a template called Accursed which changes the creature's CR to half that of the base creature.

[Stockvillain]

This is an interesting concept; it gives your party a chance to take down things that it wouldn't normally be able to touch without forking over a bunch of unbalancing gear.

Since the ability score penalties already reduce the DCs of special abilities, I'd maybe add in something like:

Sickly Constitution
"This creature is in pretty bad shape; using any special abilities [such as breath weapons, SLA's, etc] makes the creature Fatigued until its next action."

or

Failing Senses
"Cataracts cloud this creature's eyes, and it's hearing isn't what it used to be; all creatures are treated as having concealment [20% miss chance] to this creature. This concealment is effective against special senses such as tremorsense, blindsight, and blindsense."

or

Not All There
"This creature's mental faculties aren't what they once were; it takes a -4 penalty to all Will saves. Further, anytime it makes a successful Will save, there is a 25% chance that the creature acts as though Confused for 1 round. Ignore results of "acts normal" and re-roll."

Any of those Special Qualities should make the fight a little easier on the PCs. I don't honestly know what sort of CR penalty they'd give; that would be situational, I think. At least a -1 for each. Hell, I may use these as effects from magic traps or curses in the future . . .

[Mikaze]

Makes for a nice quick'n'dirty template to slap on if you want to have a scenario where low-level PCs can weaken some big bad monster through gathering the right MacGuffins or doing the right rituals. Or to apply to some otherworldly horror that isn't completely manifested on whatever plane the PCs are located.

[Kierato]

I think we've been going about this all wrong.

Crippled Very Old White Dragon
CR 10
LE Huge Dragon (Cold)
Init +0 Senses Darkvision 120ft, Blindsense 60 ft, Improved Lowlight vision
Defences
AC 25, touch 8, flat-footed 25 (+17 Natural, +0 Dex, -2 Size)
hp 137 (11d12+66)
Fort +13 Ref +7 Will +8;
Defensive Abilities DR 5/magic, SR 22
Immune Cold
Offense
Speed 60 ft, Burrow 30 ft, Fly 200 ft (poor), Swim 60 ft
Melee 1 Bite +17 (3d6+12), 2 Claws +17 (2d6+8), 2 Wings +15 (1d8+4), 1 Tail Slap +15 (2d6+4)
Ranged
Special Attacks
Breath Weapon (40 ft cone, 10d4 cold damage, Ref DC 21/half)
Statistics
Str 27, Dex 10, Con 23, Int 10, Wis 13, Cha 10
Base Atk +11; CMB +21; CMD 31
Feats Multi Attack, plus 5 others
Skills 66 Skill points
Languages Common, Draconic
SQ Weakness to Fire
Combat Gear Whatever
Assorted other white dragon abilities (for a very young white dragon)

This is a very young white dragon with the giant template (making it the appropriate size for a very old dragon. It is 1 CR higher than what you wanted, but that is easier to fix than 5+ CR.

[Wolfsnap]

Kierato wrote:

This is a very young white dragon with the giant template (making it the appropriate size for a very old dragon. It is 1 CR higher than what you wanted, but that is easier to fix than 5+ CR.

That's an excellent idea! Although, I may add in some of the older dragon's abilities at a reduced DC as well.

I still think a Decrepit Template would be useful, though - for powerful creatures that don't have the convenient age categories that Dragons have.

[Arcane_Guyver]

I've used the 'Giant' template on younger dragons before to do this, it works pretty well. Whatever you end up using, make sure that the monster's AC, saves & SR aren't too high for your PCs to handle.

[Retech]

Possible 3.X Shenanigan:

Uber Decrepit (3x), Venerable, Dragonwrought, Loredrake, Spell-hoarding, Greater Draconic Rited, Young, Advanced, Nalfeshnee-Possessed, Solar-Blessed, Hellcat-Bound, Perpetually Drunk, White Dragonspawn Abomination

Racial Ability Score (Decrepit using the advancing age option, hence Venerable)

+10,+18,+8,+17,+7,+13

Normal CR :)

And free special abilities:
Improved Grab
Pounce
Smite

And basically every resistance and immunity of devils, celestials, demons, dragons, as well as +5 free wizard casting levels

[KenderKin]

"Crippled" is actually very poor language choice that can be offensive to some people.

That might be why there is no "published" template for that!

FYI

;)

[Nemitri]

that reminds of me of the "old" robot from transformers II, it was so freaking useless it had to give its part to optimus...