Hello All,
I'm looking for some serious help with a homebrew monster which I plan to use in my next session. I need new ideas on how to craft/ tweek this monster to both be fun and challenging but not be impossible.
Campaign Background:
I DM a Homebrew Pathfinder DnD - Final Fantasy Campaign; 6 PCs
1. Fighter/ Human - Tank DPS
2. Red Mage/ Human - Healing/ heavy ranged dmg/
3. Summoner/ Dragon Born - heavy ranged dmg/pet - tanking - (PC and pet have poor flight)
4. Engineer/ Moogle - All rounder, ranged combat/lockpicking/trapfinding/can work of mechanical and robots/ robo dog pet - tank (PC has poor flight)
5. Cat-Humanoid/White Monk - Just like monk class with healing spells
6. Rat-Humanoid/Thief - Basically a rogue with a small pool of spells - lockpicking/trapfinding
The goal:
Group has to race through a large 2 story castle under seige by undead monsters to save the king - they have only 20 minutes to reach the room where the king is.... Until they are trapped by the monster.
The Monster: A machine that can manipulate the structure of a room, essentially able to manipulate space and time (with limitations I have yet to concretely decide and where I need your help).
- It has the schematics of 100's of different types of traps in it's memory banks which it can implement into the rooms architecture.
- It can monster summon a range of different monsters into the room.
- It will let PCs, NPCs or monsters to enter the room but if they try to leave they will walk into the same room they just left.
What I have so far: (Loosely decided and am willing to change if you have an interesting spin/ idea i feel will be better)
- When the group thinks they are about to reach the room with the king; they expect it to be a specific chamber (becasue their character grew up in this castle, they all know the layout. Instead the room is nothing like what it is supposed to be. (Changed by the monster)
- The room will have 1 or more traps in it (created by the monster) which they will not be expecting (becasue the castle doesn't have traps).
- The monster is cloaked as part of the room: Possibly as a piece of furniture/ part of the walls, etc. or just reflects what ever the room looks like back to the viewer so that it appears to not be there.
- The monster may be split into 2 or 3 separate identical robots which are all linked by the same CPU. (party will have to defeat all or more than half within a specific time fram to break the loop/ trap the monster has put them in.
- Every time the party leave the room either by the way they came in or a direction they havent gone yet, they find themselves the same room which they just left (with brand new undiscovered traps and or new monsters to tackle).
- If they discover the monster and destroy it, it will regenerate becasue it is still linked to the other 1 or 2 seperate identical counterparts.
- When they leave the room of the destroyed robot, they are actually encountering 1 of the other identical robots in the next room (because the destroyed one needs time to regenerate (time limit not yet decided)
- The group somehow has to come up with a way to discover the monster is minipulating the room and has them in an endless loop of the same room.
- The group has to somehow discover there is more than one of the same monster and whichever they destroy is just regenerating.
What I need help with:
- This monster is supposed to be a puzzle, which they are desparate to solve as quickly as possible.
- I would like create this situation in such a way that they dont really have time to sit around and think but are on their toes the entire time; forcing them to keep moving from room to room because of the traps/ monsters.
- I would like there to at least 3 possible ways to solve defeating this monster so that the group has options.
- I would like there to be a real way to create a true team effor to defeating this monster; ie create a multitude of parameters to defeating the monster and the loop puzzle not by one charaters abilitites but by multiple abilities.
Questions and answers I'm struggling with:
- If there is more than one of the same identical robot linked together: What are some ways the group will discover there is more than one? How are they separated?
- My orignal though was the monster could teleport the group to any room in the castle or when they excited the room the were teleported to any room in the castle.
- I had originally planned that they would need to discover both conterparts of the monster similtaneously and destroy them within a specific time frame to get out of the loop... but then I was faced with the conundrum that they is no actual way for any party members to exit the loop and find the other counter part.
- Should the doors be locked until they defear the creature?
- Should the traps be part of the puzzle in some way and part of escaping?
- What if they break through a wall what happens with the loop?
- How will the parameters of the rooms work; ie, if half the PC's decide to stay in on room and the other half go to the other room.
- Weaknesses/ Strengths of the monster
Possibe ways they will be able to solve the problem:
- They will be able to discover the monster with a high search roll depending on what they are searching for.
- if one of the magic users uses a lighting spell it will interupt the machines CPU momentarily
- If they can take down the monster the enginner might be able to achieve a number of increasing successes to possible leard the robots cpu, how it works, that there are more than one.
- the summoner might be able to unommon her pet and then resummon her pet out of the loop to find the other identical robot
The rogue might be able to use a high stealth check to sneak out unnoticed by the monster when it's reparing itself.
Assets to help them if they get stuck:
- I have 2 NPCs playing along side them, one of them being an outsider of the group that they just met. If they are completely not getting anywhere I will help a little bit.
I realize a lot of this is really abstract and most of it isn't really concrete but any ideas you could throw my way would be a really big help. I dont want my PC's to be frustrated with this monster to the point that they just sorta give up, but I want it to be super challenging.
Thank you!
Wrong section of the forums, but good luck on your project.
