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Have the jelly drop down from the ceiling into the central chamber right after the PCs enter the room. The grell should be floating somewhere nearby.
In running the monsters, try to keep them attached to or grabbing a PC for as long as possible. Keep in mind that they can still use their attacks while attached to or grabbing a character. This has the potential to be a difficult fight if handled well. I suggest the following encounter for a party of five adventurers:
- 1 Azure Jelly (see Dragon #367)
- 1 Grell
One of the goblin corpses still remaining in the caves holds treasure parcel 2 from level 4.
5 comments:
Tentamort
Tentamort Level 2
Medium Solo Lurker 625 xp
Initiative +7 Senses Blindsight 10, Perception +3
HP 152; Bloodied 76
AC 18; Fortitude 18, Reflex 14, Will 14
Resist +5 on saving throws
Speed 4
Healing Surge 1 Action Point 2
MGrab (standard; at-will)
Reach 2; +7 vs. AC; 1d8 + 3 damage, and the target is grabbed (until escape). A target trying to escape the grab takes a –4 penalty to the check.
mStinger (standard; recharge 4-6)
only against grabbed opponents, +7 vs. Fortitude; 1d6+4 and ongoing 5 Poison Damage (save ends). Secondary Attack: +5 vs.
Fortitude; the target is immobilized (save ends)
mTentacle Lash (standard; at will)
The tentamort makes two grab attacks
Tasty (immediate interrupt, when Bloodied)
The tentamort begins to feed and digest its target, immediately gaining a healing surge and regeneration 3.
Closer (minor, at will)
The tentamort shifts one towards its target
Alignment Unaligned Languages Primordial
Skills Athletics +8 Stealth +9, Perception +3
Str 17 (+4) Dex 14 (+3) Wis 14 (+3)
Con 14 (+3) Int 4 (-2) Cha 8 (+0)
Equipment None
Tentamort Tactics: The creature is rather dumb and hungry. It will focus its attacks on one target until it is slain and eaten and then try to break off its attack.
Thanks for the statblock, tadkil.
A couple suggestions - first, all heroic-tier creatures (including monsters) have a single healing surge. This doesn't need to be listed in their statblock. Most of the time, they have no way to use that healing surge (monsters can't use the Second Wind power, for instance). If you want the Tentamort to be able to use a healing surge, he needs an ability that does that. "Tasty" says that the Tentamort gains a healing surge - did you mean to say that he loses a healing surge and regains hit points equal to half his bloodied value? I suggest listing the exact number of hit points regained by using this ability (in this case it would be 38 hit points) in the ability's entry in the statblock.
Second, you may want to consider increasing the Tentamort's level to 3 or 4, since at this point in the adventure the party is somewhere between 4th and 5th level. A level 2 encounter like this is a very easy encounter (and if the party is 5th level, it's not even considered a serious challenge). According the DMG, easy encounters are those 1 or 2 levels below the PCs. Standard encounters are the PCs' level or 1 higher. Hard encounters are 2 to 4 levels higher than the PCs.
My final suggestion would be to consider making the Tentamort an elite monster (or even a regular monster). There are already a lot of elite and solo monsters on Thistletop (Gogmurt, Ripnugget, Bruthazmus, Lyrie, Orik, Nualia, Malfeshnekor) and it could really use some normal encounters featuring a higher number of combatants. In redesigning Thistletop, one of the things I wish I could have implemented was a higher number of fights featuring lots of monsters instead of just one or two.
I ran this encounter with Grells. Seemed like they were practically the same creatures.
Hey, woah, you're right. That's a great idea. I think I'll change the encounter up so that it features one grell and one jelly, just to give the encounter some variety. Thanks for the heads-up! I'm still familiarizing myself with what's in the Monster Manual.
Here's the final version I went with.
Tentamort Level 5
Medium Solo Lurker 1000 xp
Initiative +7 Senses Blindsight 10, Perception +3
HP 276; Bloodied 138
AC 23; Fortitude 22, Reflex 17, Will 21
Resist Immune to Poison
Speed 6, climb 6
Healing Surge 1 (69) Action Point 2
Saving Throws +5
MGrab (standard; at-will)
Reach 2; +10 vs. AC; 2d6 + 3 damage, and the target is grabbed (until escape). A target trying to escape the grab takes a –4 penalty to the check.
mStinger (standard; at will)
only against grabbed opponents, +8 vs. Fortitude; 1d10+4 and ongoing 5 Poison Damage (save ends). Secondary Attack: +8 vs. Fortitude; the target is immobilized (save ends)
mTentacle Lash (standard; at will)
The tentamort makes two grab attacks
AFlail (Standard, Encounter)
Close Burst 2, +8 vs. Reflex; 3d8+4and knocked prone
Tasty (immediate interrupt, when Bloodied)
The tentamort begins to feed and digest its target, immediately using a healing surge and gaining regeneration 5.
Me Closer (minor, at will)
The tentamort shifts two squares towards its target
You Closer (minor, at will)
The tentamort pulls an opponent within three squares towards it (pull 1)
Alignment Unaligned Languages Primordial
Skills Athletics +12 Stealth +10, Perception +10
Str 18 (+6) Dex 15 (+4) Wis 15 (+4)
Con 16 (+5) Int 4 (-2) Cha 8 (+0)
Equipment None
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