As written, it seems highly overpowered. If it hits a helpless foe with its lash attack (a touch attack), the victim falls unconscoius the next round? And she's dead in the third round? What have other people done with this?
Also, if a monster approaches some creatures that are sleeping, and the night watchman alerts them, how many rounds before the party is up and at full strength?
Viconus wrote: As written, it seems highly overpowered. If it hits a helpless foe with its lash attack (a touch attack), the victim falls unconscoius the next round? And she's dead in the third round? What have other people done with this?
Also, if a monster approaches some creatures that are sleeping, and the night watchman alerts them, how many rounds before the party is up and at full strength?
Finally, can it cast unlimited sleep and cause fear spells?
Viconus wrote: As written, it seems highly overpowered. If it hits a helpless foe with its lash attack (a touch attack), the victim falls unconscoius the next round? And she's dead in the third round? What have other people done with this?
Also, if a monster approaches some creatures that are sleeping, and the night watchman alerts them, how many rounds before the party is up and at full strength?
Against a lone creature, the Sleep effect is basically a Save or Die. One player in my game was ambushed by the Lurking Strangler while scouting. He only survived because he failed his save against the Cause Fear effect twice and ran away frightened. Otherwise he was going to keep fighting it alone, without being aware of how close he was of dying.
Fighting the Lurking Strangler with two or more players is relatively simple. As long as someone uses his next action to wake up anyone that falls asleep, the Lurking Strangler doesn't have many options of dealing damage to the party. The Lurking Strangler should be floating beyond the reach of melee combat at all times, so the party might have some problems if they don't have any ranged attacks.
By the rules, assuming that waking up is a free action, getting up is a move action, and drawing a weapon is usually a move action also, the party can be ready for combat pretty quick, unless someone decides to get dressed before combat. Remember that sleeping characters may make Listen checks at a -10 penalty to wake up, so that may have some influence in the way the night watchman might alert them of some danger, if he doesn't fall before that.
Viconus wrote: Finally, can it cast unlimited sleep and cause fear spells? Yes, each once per round like a Beholder.
Viconus wrote: As written, it seems highly overpowered. If it hits a helpless foe with its lash attack (a touch attack), the victim falls unconscoius the next round? And she's dead in the third round? What have other people done with this?
Also, if a monster approaches some creatures that are sleeping, and the night watchman alerts them, how many rounds before the party is up and at full strength?
Yep, a LS can be a killer, but only in the right conditions. It's a one trick pony, almost useless against a group of opponents.
IMC, the one in the cairn sublevel (forgot which one) waited until the PCs got back into the elevator, cramming in two by two, and tried his luck when only two of them remained downstairs. Alas for it, it was a monk and a psion... Two rounds later, the LS met its messy end.
On the other hand, I ruled that a second one I placed with the Faceless One in his laboratory would have no problem to wipe out the grimlocks, simply by sniping them from outside the range of their blindsight.
IMHO, it would be bad to tone down the LS. The mad slasher + swarm combination are way more dangerous for the PCs, and the Whispering Cairn is supposed to be challenging.
I didn't check out the lash/touch attack/unconsciousness mechanic, though. I don't have this monster book around anymore.
>Fighting the Lurking Strangler with two or more players is relatively >simple. As long as someone uses his next action to wake up anyone that >falls asleep, the Lurking Strangler doesn't have many options of >dealing damage to the party.
That's assuming that the waking player succeeds on his grapple check against the strangler, right? It seems like any other player who tries to shoot the strangler or attack it could hurt the player.
Viconus wrote: That's assuming that the waking player succeeds on his grapple check against the strangler, right? It seems like any other player who tries to shoot the strangler or attack it could hurt the player. No grapple check is needed. A Lurking Strangler would be suicidal to try to suffocate someone that has backup. It probably can still use its Eye Rays while suffocating someone, but any time the numbers are against it, it would probably hide to wait for a better time for an ambush.
If you assume that the Suffocate ability works like a grapple (there is no mention of that in the ability description, since it only works on helpless foes), the Lurking Strangler has a grapple modifier of -10, so he is not that hard to pull out from someone unconscious.
Anyway, the random chance to hit someone in a grapple only applies to ranged attacks. Melee attacks don't have that problem (and the target still loses its Dex modifier to AC, so the Lurking Strangler would be a sitting duck within melee range of the party).
Sleep spell description wrote: Slapping or wounding awakens an affected creature, but normal noise does not. Awakening a creature is a standard action (an application of the aid another action).
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