Waterway mistress

[Drizzt1080]

This small girl has short black hair and unearthly blue eyes. She appears to be drenched from head to toe.

Waterway mistress CR 3
XP 800
CG Small fey (water)
Init +4; Senses low-light vision; Perception +12
----- Defense -----
AC 15, touch 15, flat-footed 11 (+4 Dex, +1 size)
hp 22 (5d6+5)
Fort +3, Ref +7, Will +7
Defensive Abilities misfortune (DC 17), transparency; Immune disease; Resist cold 10
Weaknesses water dependent
----- Offense -----
Speed 20 ft., swim 30 ft.
Melee Dagger +7 (1d3-1/19-20)
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 5; concentration +8)
At will—animal messenger, speak with animals
3/day—purify food and drink
1/day—obscuring mist, summon nature's ally III
----- Statistics -----
Str 8, Dex 19, Con 13, Int 16, Wis 18, Cha 17
Base Atk +2; CMB +0; CMD 14
Feats Ability Focus (misfortune), Stealthy, Weapon Finesse
Skills Diplomacy +11, Escape Artist +14, Knowledge (local) +11, Knowledge (nobility) +8, Perception +12, Sense Motive +12, Stealth +18, Swim +15, Use Magic Device +11
Languages Aquan, Common, Sylvan
SQ change shape (small water elemental, elemental body I), fountain's favor
----- Ecology -----
Environment urban or underground aquatic
Organization solitary or community (2-8)
Treasure standard (dagger, other treasure)
----- Special Abilities -----
Misfortune (Su) Anyone attacking the waterway mistress must succeed on a DC 17 Will save or suffer misfortune until the start of their next turn. Anytime the creature makes an ability check, attack roll, saving throw, or skill check, it must roll twice and take the worse result. An attack during a new round triggers a new saving throw. The save DC is Charisma-based
Transparency (Su) When underwater, a waterway mistress's body becomes transparent, effectively rendering her invisible. She can become visible or transparent at will as a free action.
Water Dependent (Su) A waterway mistress is mystically bonded to a single city's water supply and must never stray beyond its border. A waterway mistress who moves beyond her bonded city's border immediately becomes sickened. Every hour thereafter, she must make a DC 15 Fortitude save to resist becoming nauseated for an hour. If she remains outside the city for 24 hours she takes 1d6 points of Constitution damage, and another 1d6 points of Constitution damage every day that follows-eventually, this separation will kill her. A waterway mistress can forge a new bond with a new city by performing a 24-hour ritual and making a successful DC 20 Will save.
Fountain's Favor (Su) With a touch, the waterway mistress can read the faint magic of a wish made on a coin or small token before it was thrown into the water supply of her bonded city. If the wisher's intent is noble the waterway mistress grants them a small boon. She consumes the wish from the coin, and grants a single reroll on any ability check, attack roll, saving throw, or skill check made by the target while pursuing their wish. the target must decide to use this ability before the first roll is made, and the boon remains until used.

The shy waterway mistress enjoys watching the political games of civilization, and making contributions while trying to remain hidden. She travels the city's interconnected waterways looking for new secrets and lost treasure. While animals help her gather information and delivering messages to local heroes. She helps protect good communities while helping downtrodden folk fight back against cruel rulers. Several waterway mistresses might divide up a larger city. They prefer garden fountains and pools as their homes. They tend to attract song birds who act as their informants. Their homes often attract the local residents due to their fountain's favor ability.

[Lee Hammock]

Hi, I'm Lee Hammock, the lead game designer on Pathfinder Online. Before that I did lots of d20 freelance work, but I'm probably going to be leaving mechanics to the more up to date judges and concentrating on story, overall balance, and how I could see using them in a game.

The waterway mistress reads to me as something that needs more meat to it. The basic idea of a fey living in bodies of water in cities is interesting, but were not given a lot of whys or hows they do this. They just seem generically “good” with out a lot of motivation. Do they not like people messing with their fountains? I'm just not sure what I would use this for aside from a colorful occasional ally (though they do work well for that, being information focused and not much use offensively in combat). If they either had more concrete goals or were more morally ambiguous I think they would be more useful. Also it sounds like they look like kids, so attacking one gets sort of squicky.

The stats seem okay, though I think the words spent on Water Dependent would have been better spent detailing more of the background. I'm not sure that Water Dependent is something that will ever come up in games.

I'd rate this as a Should Note Vote For.

[Adam Daigle]

Congrats on making it to this round! May you have the luck and talent to push all the way through to the end!

”How I Judged These Monsters”:

When I develop a monster for the Adventure Path bestiaries, I print out the monster entry, and then go through it in a quick pass, marking up the page with notes and highlighting any problems that I need to address later when I really dig into it. Much of the time I’m circling things in the stat block or flavor text and leaving a quick note. Most often, this quick note pass is performed while I’m writing out art orders for the monsters so I can make sure that the description I give to the artist is what the final monster will be. This is where I make note of any changes I plan to make (some of which I’m sure frustrate some of my freelancers from time to time).

I’m going to judge this round in a similar manner to how I’d treat a monster I ordered from a freelancer if I asked one of my freelancers to just send me something within the same parameters that you’ve been given. My review isn’t anything personal, and since tone is difficult to communicate online sometimes, imagine my comments and critiques read in a friendly and nudging way. To heighten the experience, imagine my comments on your monster written in purple ink. :)

The blue italicized first line in my review was my gut reaction from reading the name with no context whatsoever. It was a fun guessing game I was playing while reviewing the monsters, so I included that note for everyone’s enjoyment. (Spoiler Alert: I was wrong a lot.)

And now to the monster!

I’m always nervous when I see an entry right at max word count. From the name, I can imagine any number of water creatures from folklore.

Nice! It’s a good monster. There’ve been a couple of good monsters so far. I like seeing people work in that design space.
Hit points are a bit low.
That DC 17 save for misfortune is high for a CR 3 creature.
I like the transparency ability.
Fountain’s favor is cute, but I’d maybe choose a different word than wish to avoid any confusion. (It’s a stretch, I know, but it’s always safe to be as clear as possible.)
This is a neat little urban water fey that comes with built in encounter and story ideas.
Even though it’s urban, it doesn’t have a strong tie to Golarion. This wouldn’t take much time to develop for print.

I do recommend waterway mistress for advancement.

[Liz Courts]

Hi there! I'll be one of the judges for this round, and I'll be looking at a couple of key points for your creature: flavor, GM usability, and how well it fits into the world of Golarion. For some background, I helped found the Wayfinder fanzine before I started working for Paizo, and these are all points that I took into consideration when selecting articles for the magazine. In addition, I oversee every third-party Pathfinder Roleplaying Game product that makes its way onto Paizo.com.

Flavor
I am not fond of the creature's name, as using gender-specific terms creates some dissonance once you stray away from that gender. "Mistress" doesn't leave enough room for other genders, but I recognize that this is a personal bugaboo of mine, as we've previously established in our own lore that it is entirely possible that some creatures are only a specific gender. (Nymphs and satyrs are the examples that come to mind.) However, if you *are* going to use a specific term like "mistress," then your descriptive text better explain why this creature is a particular gender. Also, calling this creature a "mistress" then describing it as a little girl is off-putting, but again, this is likely my own perceptions coloring it.

All of that aside, spirits bound to a particular element are plenty common in tales, and this one is no different. I like all of her abilities, but some motivations for this creature and how she interacts with denizens of the cities she lives in would strengthen this entry.

GM Usability
Any sort of "bad luck" roll always treads into stirring the GM/player adversarial game, which I'm not overly fond of. However, you have created a time limit on the ability (barring another attack against the waterway mistress) makes it work, and the rest of her abilities are in tune with her flavor. Using certain words in this game can present the wrong impression, and I would avoid using "wish" unless you really mean the spell of the same name. (See also: angelic, bard, constitution, demonic, devilish, enchanting, gate, etc.) The addition of the hydraulic push spell-like ability would have given her a neat additional combat mechanic.

Setting
While strongly urban, she doesn't feel particularly Golarion in flavor.

Final Thoughts
Urban water fey with luck-affecting abilities, but lacking in some background elements. I do recommend this monster for advancement.

[Kiel Howell]

I am right there with Liz...my absolute biggest complaint is the word mistress has some bad connotations to it...and then the first line of description is a little girl. Waterway also seems odd unless it is a canal city.

I like that this skirts the border of being a non-combat encounter creature but still provides focus for combat. Good treading (pun intended).

Summon Nature's Ally III on a CR3...could be deadly.

Overall, I really like this little fey creature and it makes sense that a city's fountains or even sewers would be haunted by such a creature. A weak keep for now (leaning to keep).

[Liz Courts]

theheadkase wrote:

I am right there with Liz...my absolute biggest complaint is the word mistress has some bad connotations to it...

I wouldn't say "bad," but "inappropriate" for the creature's description.

[R D Ramsey]

I agree that "mistress" on its own would be an inappropriate name in this case, but happily it's not on it's own. "Waterway Master" would raise no eyebrows, and it would be clear what was meant. This is just the reverse gendered version.

Having said that, "Waterway Master" would also be an odd name as it implies control (or attempted control) of the waterways, and this creature doesn't seem to do that.

[Drejk]

Waterway child?

[Jacob Trier]

Water Waif?
Fountain Farie?

I think you took a risk making a good-aligned monster, and to me at least, it didn't pay off. She just doesn't really grab me, I'm sorry to say.

The lack of a Golarion tie is a serious weakness for me.

I'm unlikely to vote for this monster.

[Garrett Guillotte]

It's an urban nixie variant.

[KhaosKontrol]

All we're missing is a television and we've got Sadako. ;)

Well, I suppose it seems like your creature is far less intent on murdering and possessing people.

The water dependent ability is kind of weird. That's a lot of words for a monster's ability that will most likely rarely come to relevance. Sure, it's fine for flavor, but who really cares if a monster makes its save to bond to a new watering hole? Unless one of these things is made to be incredibly plot-centric I don't see this ever coming into play.

All told, it's still an alright creature. More of a "hey, look at that" creature than a "let's kill it!" creature, but played well by a GM it could be interesting.

[MrCab]

Leaning towards keep.

The damage is a little light though, even if this does appear to be more of a story monster than something most parties will actually come into conflict with. Going after the good fey that grants wishes would be a great thing for an evil party to attempt.

[Curaigh]

Congratulations Brian,
I am trying to keep reviews simple to get through them quickly.
Creative: urban nereid, could go either way. Except for Fountain's Favor I've seen these abilities before. I do like Fountain's Favor.
Fun to GM: typical fey encounter, but I can see locals harrassing such a critter for wishes (or the large stack of coins)
Golarion Tie: err... could be stronger, all them cities must have aqua-ducts somewhere.
Good luck! :)

[Jeff Lee]

I didn't have a lot of time for item reviewing this weekend, so I'm doing monsters instead. First I'll look at how the monster's basic rundown fits the monster creation table, then general theme and abilities.

= Monster meets the target statistics for its CR
+ Monster exceeds the target stats for its CR
++ Monster greatly exceeds target stats for its CR
- Monster's stats do not meet target stats for its CR
-- Monster's stats are greatly below target stats for its CR

hp: --
AC: =
Low Atk ++
Low Dmg --
Primary Ability DC: ++
Secondary Ability DC: n/a
Good save: +
Poor save: +

Obviously not a monster that's going to be getting into a lot of fights, and it shows. Hit points are way low and AC doesn't do much to counter that. The special ability does offset it somewhat, but only by setting a very high DC for a CR 3 encounter. The lack of typical DR for a fey is surprising. Saves are slightly higher than normal. The construction balance here feels slightly wonky.

Misfortune: A good ability, though the save is high.

Fountain's Favor: Good idea, but the mechanics just don't feel right.

Water dependent: I like that you included this, as the idea of a fey spirit tied to a particular location or natural feature is stock and trade in both mythology and gaming. However, I wish you'd taken the time to rework it in your own words. As it stands, it's just a cut-and-paste of the dryad weakness with a few words changed. If you'd cut out the entirely extraneous "eventually, this separation will kill her" (Well, duh, that's what Constitution damage does...) you would have saved yourself six words to help strengthen the descriptive text.

I like the concept and idea, but it doesn't wow me. In a race with several other urban fey entries, this one is running near the back of the pack for me.

[Adam Daigle]

Jeff Lee wrote:

Water dependent: I like that you included this, as the idea of a fey spirit tied to a particular location or natural feature is stock and trade in both mythology and gaming. However, I wish you'd taken the time to rework it in your own words. As it stands, it's just a cut-and-paste of the dryad weakness with a few words changed. If you'd cut out the entirely extraneous "eventually, this separation will kill her" (Well, duh, that's what Constitution damage does...) you would have saved yourself six words to help strengthen the descriptive text.

I don't mean to disagree, but Brian did the right thing by using pretty much the exact same language.

I even included that in my monster creation advice:

Daigle Advised wrote:

If a special ability is just like another creature’s ability with only a slight change, make sure to copy that ability’s language exactly (aside from the exception). There is no reason to reinvent the wheel. Furthermore, you’ll notice that the rules elements in monster design are very formulaic. Sometimes the best guide is looking at other monsters and seeing how their abilities are written and formatted. Rules need to be consistent and use the same language, so compare your special abilities to similar existing special abilities and follow that language.

[Jeff Lee]

Fair enough. I hadn't realized you'd given that particular advice. Still, that last addition about dying seems a bit redundant.

[Avatar-1]

I like this creature, but the one thing that sticks out at me is "how does she attack?"

The special abilities sound great, but it seems to me the whole entry is designed as a pacifist. Misfortune to avoid attacks, transparency to avoid attacks, 1d3-1 dagger? There's summon nature's ally, but based on the rest of the entry, my guess is that's also intended as a distraction while she runs away!

I'd love to hear an explanation from the author, because other than that, it seems quite well thought out!

[Jeff Lee]

Well, a dryad--similar enough in design to this creature--is also short on offense. There are still plenty of ways to design an encounter around one. But yes, something to deter rather than defend would probably have benefited.

And explanations will have to wait, because they're not allowed to talk about their entries until after the round is over.

[Sean McGowan]

Poor name, I agree, but there's a lot to like here too.
I like the notion of a beneficent fey protector of a city's reservoir, aqueducts, fountains, etc. (Although it does make me wonder how they feel about the sewer system and other sources of polluted water. Might there be a corrupted version of these in cities that are just really filthy?)
Not a fan of Misfortune; I can tolerate it with pugwampi's because it's their signature shtick, but making a bigger version of it and handing it out to another creature bothers me a bit.
I do, however, really love the wish fulfillment bit with Fountain's Favor. Very neat ability that fits a fountain fairy perfectly. And I like to see new ways to answer players saying 'I wish' that doesn't involve bringing in 7th or 9th level magic. Personally, I'm fine with using wish terminology; there's already wishcrafter sorcerers doing a thematically similar thing with their class powers and it's not particularly confusing. Anyway, I do think the power here is nice, appropriate to the level, and works well as an open ended ability. The only thing is I'd suggest limiting it so a particular creature can only have one boon active at a time. (Or clarifying that, if that's the intent.)
Otherwise, nice entry. Not one of my top picks, but it definitely stands above the middle of the pack. Definite contender for a vote.

[Oceanshieldwolf]

I love this, and like the Shatterd Dryad, this is oozing with longing, dread and emotion - though this creature seems much more connected to the urban environment she lives in. The addition of animal communication and the small boon make this creature way more than XP fodder, I could easily see her as either a beneficent ally, or the dark power behind some insanely grisly plot, with a final battle in an abandoned/bricked up underwater cave/waterworks using her transparency and misfortune, combined with sacrificial animal allies. Add some levels of witch and we're in serious faery tale country.

The versatility of use makes me like this creature very much.

Not sure why she is immune to disease, and not also, say poison, but it is a small thing.

I disagree on posters decrying the name choice - this name fits perfectly for me.

Very nice submission.

[Holybushman]

Congratulations on making it through the first round.

This is a creature that, for me, invokes incredible imagery. I can also see how it's intent could be misconstrued, causing a group of urban heroes to mistakenly conclude this creature is responsible for the wrongful death of an alchemist, merchant, thieves, or anybody polluting the waterways of a city. I also really dig the wish fulfillment ability. I nice and bold creation in a world filled with hideous, dreadful things. You have my vote.

[Nicholas Herold]

I've given this round a lot of thought. I've read over all of the monsters, done some deliberation, and come to my conclusions. That said:

The concept of this monster is not terribly creative. "A dryad for aqueducts" doesn't have exact mythological precedent, but there are enough water nymphs and goddesses that it could happen. The mismatch of "mistress" and "little girl" at play with the name put me a bit off my footing initially, but I got over it--I can see what you're going for.

Similar to a dryad, these aren't exactly combat-machines. Unlike a dryad, however, they can't supplement their lack of damage with save-or-suck spells like suggestion, charm and even entangle. The misfortune is similar to, yet different than, that of a pugwampi. It only targets those who are hostile to the waterway mistress and requires a save, but that save DC is pretty darn high. Between that and the transparency, fighting one of these things seems like an exercise in frustration.

And why would you fight one of them? Unlike dryads, which are goodly but selfish and have a rather generous attitude towards kidnapping people to serve as guards and paramours, the waterway mistress seems just generally nice. Not all monsters need to be fought, of course, but these don't have any plot hooks to hang on when the standby of "boo! roll initiative!" fails.

To sum up, the waterway mistress reads very similar to a dryad. Too similar, and the major ways in which it has changed have been for the worse. I will not be voting for this entry. Best of luck!

[Steven Helt]

I'm not so bothered by the word "mistress" if the description had made a stronger connection to the soul of the urban waterwork. As written, it's underdeveloped, and it doesn't bear a Golarion connection.

To me, a creature like this is all fluff. It's not much of a fighter and essentially is an existing creature (dryad) moved over to a new setting. WHen I think Superstar, I think combat and new abilities that scare players and excite GMs. I think the mistress is a decent monster, but as an encounter to roleplay through. I am more likely to vote for something that makes my inner player salivate over the challenge.

[Joel Flank]

I loved the description of the monster, but was hoping it would be a creepy water fey, especially with some of the fun combat abilities it has. Instead, we have a monster who seems pretty much destined not to see combat in a game, and instead be a "I got a free re-roll for a copper" vending machine.

Also, the misfortune ability is the iconic ability of probably the most popular original pathfinder monster, the pugwampi, and it seems a bit forced to use that ability for another low CR monster in particular. I agree with Liz that hydraulic push would have been a better fit, and tied it's combat more towards it's watery heritage. It's also a great spell when used near a city's waterways, able to push people into canals or sewers, etc.

[frank gori]

Waterway mistress
The Good: Reminds me of Rill from Jim Butcher's fantasy series which was actually based on a dare to make pokemon cool.
The Bad: Like Liz I'm not into the use of mistress here.
The Ugly: Misfortune is way overpowered for CR3
Overall: 3.5/10- Off putting name married with the balance issue makes this something I simply cannot vote for.

[Taldren]

I just don't see a reason that anyone would want to harm one of these creatures ... evil or good.

I really would have liked to see this as a neutral creature that feeds off the wishes of others, but then bound to achieve some measure of the wish they consume. They should be able to read what they wishes are before making a decision and always choose the wish that is least likely to get it killed in the process.

In a good society they would be beneficial or at least benign. In a corrupt / evil society they could be a total nightmare as the wishes would most likely not be 'friendly'.

[Mike Welham]

I think you did a great job tying this to an urban environment with the water dependent ability, and fortune's favor has a nice "wishing well" flavor.

The waterway mistress has no obvious Golarion ties, and the creature's description features some repetitiveness and a fragment, which I think an additional editing pass would have helped clear up.

This is an interesting concept, and I wish you luck in the voting.

[Brian Lefebvre]

Thank you all for taking the time to leave feedback. I'll try to answer as many questions as possible. If you don't see a satisfactory answer let me know, and I'll try to clarify.

I really didn't start working on monster ideas until the Monday night of the top 32 reveal when I found out I had to. I tried to come up with an idea for each creature type, and then pick the best entry to flush out and submit. Going down the list of creature types in alphabetical order, the idea seed for this creature started in constructs. An animated coin fountain that attacks PCs by spitting coins at them. Move along down the line and we hit fey. After some brainstorming the coin fountain idea turned into a wishing well idea then became a fey that powers the wishing well.

The name was originally a place holder until I came up with something else. I used that because it conveyed the mysterious benefactor angle I was going for. I couldn't come up with a replacement that I liked before the submission deadline. As for the child in the description is was due to the fact that at size small it wouldn't be confused for an adult at a quick glance. Halflings are still often described as looking like children because of their small size. As for the gender thing. In most Pathfinder rulebooks all entries that could have a gender are assigned a specific gender that is consistent throughout the entire write-up. All barbarian rules are written in a female perspective, all fighter rules are written in a male perspective, etc. Since all of the fey I was using as reference material for this monster were female (dryad, nymph, nereid) it influenced which gender I assigned this monster.

Being a wishing well fey I wanted it to be able to grant boons. Since it has good luck I decided to give it bad luck as a defensive shield. It would have been great if dependant was in the universal monster rules to save on word count. Just like it would have saved a lot of word count if I thought I could just reference the misfortune and fortune witch hexes its powers are based off of. This monster is heavy defense and stealth. It tries to stay unseen in the background guiding others to do any fighting that is necessary to defend its city/neighborhood.

For offense I gave it summon monster 3, and UMD so it could use wands, or other magical items, that it might have scavenged. I don't recall seeing any entries in the Bestiary that have non-armor/non-weapon magic items in its stat block. Magic items and treasure composition being left to the GM to decide. The misfotune DC was described as being too high for its CR. One quick adjustment for that would be to replace the ability focus feat with skill focus(UMD) to give it a +14 UMD. Perhaps give it a racial modifier to UMD to raise it even higher. As a last resort, it might ask people it helped for a favor to protect it from harm.

For the defensive abilities I took away its DR and potential SR as part of its urbanization. It losing some of its connection to the natural world. I gave it disease immunity and cold resistance to help it navigate its new urban home. I was thinking of adding poison resistance, but didn't see that as a common environmental hazard.

I misread part of Adam's advice thread, and thought that the monster merely be suitable for the Golarian setting. After not finding a Venice like city in the Inner World Guide I didn't want to cut and paste Absalom into the description without knowing if there was a much better match for a home. Randomly tacking things on that don't fit the theme bugs me.

Its evolution ecology basically played out like this in my head.
When cities needed new sources of fresh water they dug wells. Underground fey found the wells, and decided to check out who was infringing on their turf. They hung back and watched and listened. Since wells would be a natural gathering places for the community the citizens became a soap-opera for the fey. Once cities began installing running water. The fey began moving around their city to learn more about what is going on with its favorite characters. The people it likes, or roots for, she helps out. Like leaving discharged fountain's favor coins to help out the poor. If the community is in trouble it helps notify people they think can help to solve the problem. If the city is big enough multiple fey could share it by neighborhoods.

Out of the list of 8 solid concepts I had. The idea that was voted as most popular with my friends was a ghost swarm. A group of people die together - house fire, building collapse, etc. None of them have the mojo to become a ghost alone, but all of their sparks unite into one entity. This idea wouldn't work for this contest because of the word count limitation. Since each type of disaster would grant slightly different abilities to the swarm.