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## 'Crazy Cat Lady' as challenge for 1st level party

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OgreBattle
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### 'Crazy Cat Lady' as challenge for 1st level party

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Post by OgreBattle » Sun Feb 17, 2013 3:21 am

She has full command of her cats as if they were animal companions.
You encounter her in her lair (it is dark) and the cats are taking 10 on hide.
a reminder of cat stats:

> Size/Type: Tiny Animal
> Hit Dice: 1/2 d8 (2 hp)
> Initiative: +2
> Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
> Armor Class: 14 (+2 size, +2 Dex), touch 14, flat-footed 12
> Base Attack/Grapple: +0/–12
> Attack: Claw +4 melee (1d2–4)
> Full Attack: 2 claws +4 melee (1d2–4) and bite –1 melee (1d3–4)
> Space/Reach: 2-1/2 ft./0 ft.
> Special Attacks: —
> Special Qualities: Low-light vision, scent
> Saves: Fort +2, Ref +4, Will +1
> Abilities: Str 3, Dex 15, Con 10, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 7
> Skills: Balance +10, Climb +6, Hide +14 +16*, Jump +10, Listen +3, Move Silently +6 +8, Spot +3
> Feats: Stealthy, Weapon Finesse
> Environment: Temperate plains
> Organization: Domesticated or solitary
> Challenge Rating: 1/4
> Treasure: None
> Alignment: Always neutral
> Advancement: —
> Level Adjustment: —
> The statistics presented here describe a common housecat.
> COMBAT
> Cats prefer to sneak up on their prey.
> Skills: Cats have a +4 racial bonus on Climb, Hide, and Move Silently checks and a +8 racial bonus on Jump checks. Cats have a +8 racial bonus on Balance checks. They use their Dexterity modifier instead of their Strength modifier for Climb and Jump checks. *In areas of tall grass or heavy undergrowth, the Hide bonus rises to +8.

Seems like if goblins attack a town, they'd steer clear of the cat lady house.
Last edited by OgreBattle on Sun Feb 17, 2013 10:42 am, edited 3 times in total.
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John Magnum
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Post by John Magnum » Sun Feb 17, 2013 3:34 am

What's the difference between 1d2 - 4 and 1 as far as damage expressions go? Is it so even if you get +1 to damage you're still doing 1d2 - 3 which is still exactly equal to 1? I... don't really understand that. Same goes for 1d3 (???) - 4.
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OgreBattle
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Post by OgreBattle » Sun Feb 17, 2013 3:39 am

> John Magnum wrote:What's the difference between 1d2 - 4 and 1 as far as damage expressions go? Is it so even if you get +1 to damage you're still doing 1d2 - 3 which is still exactly equal to 1? I... don't really understand that. Same goes for 1d3 (???) - 4.

It's just for completeness, so when you apply half-dragon, legendary creature, and half-troll templates to the cats of cat ladies in exotic locales the numbers can scale up. If the PC's manage to defeat the cat lady, the cat mob can reappear later in the campaign with the ghost template.
Last edited by OgreBattle on Sun Feb 17, 2013 3:47 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Red_Rob
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Post by Red_Rob » Sun Feb 17, 2013 12:00 pm

And to think all the jokes about commoners and house cats could have been avoided if they'd just put in the clause "A successful attack always deals at least one damage if the target is the same size as the attacker or smaller". I mean, they even wrote out the stats for cats, it's not like noone considered how much damage a cat would do.
Normally we just ignore the stupid that results from overly literal rules during our games, but it would be fun to have a game that highlighted all the broken and wierd things that result from the rules being screwy. So, you'd have a village of commoners living in fear of their cat lady overlord who has moggies prowling the streets threatening to deal with any troublemakers that the players would have to deal with. Then they'd meet a group of monks who failed to perform everyday tasks because they aren't proficient with their own hands. The local apothecary would keep a tub of water to drown people in who were dying so their hp reset to 0. People would start fights by stripping their opponent of all his clothes using Sleight of Hand and accepting an insane DC for their opponent not to notice it.
I'm sure you could find enough crazy shit like that for at least a 5 level campaign.
Last edited by Red_Rob on Sun Feb 17, 2013 12:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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OgreBattle
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Post by OgreBattle » Sun Feb 17, 2013 1:28 pm

> Red_Rob wrote:
> Normally we just ignore the stupid that results from overly literal rules during our games, but it would be fun to have a game that highlighted all the broken and wierd things that result from the rules being screwy. So, you'd have a village of commoners living in fear of their cat lady overlord who has moggies prowling the streets threatening to deal with any troublemakers that the players would have to deal with.

"We thought of her strange and fearful... but when the orcs came and the guard fell... the cats... they came and saved us"
Also, skeleton-telegrams from that "pass object from one person from another to move any distance in the chain in 6 seconds".
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Prak
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Post by Prak » Sun Feb 17, 2013 10:02 pm

I actually kind of want to make the cat lady a low level wizard, and all her cats are templated. Imagine a tower where every opponent was a different templated cat. Maybe even cat swarms (they're Tiny after all), or a hivemind.
...excuse me while I go write up the great feline hivemind.
Cuz apparently I gotta break this down for you dense motherfuckers- I'm trans feminine nonbinary. My pronouns are they/them.

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Count Arioch the 28th
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Post by Count Arioch the 28th » Sun Feb 17, 2013 11:45 pm

> OgreBattle wrote:
> Also, skeleton-telegrams from that "pass object from one person from another to move any distance in the chain in 6 seconds".

You're thinking too small. Get big skeletons (carve them from rock and cast Stone to Flesh if you have to) and turn it into a transit system. Or be an evil necromancer and point your skeleton chain at places you want to not exist anymore, and just have them pass a metal rail down the line, low-tech necromantic railgun.
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Post by Vebyast » Mon Feb 18, 2013 3:17 am

Every single piece of wood in the entire civilization started out as ten-foot-long one-inch-by-one-inch planks because they exploit the loop between the prices of ladders and ten-foot-poles to make all their lumber. The same goes for all their metal (maybe a cycle between breastplates and full plate? I don't know.).

Every single paladin in the world falls the instant they take their first level. I'm not sure how this could be exploited, but there has to be something you could do with it.
Last edited by Vebyast on Mon Feb 18, 2013 3:24 am, edited 3 times in total.

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Post by Koumei » Mon Feb 18, 2013 4:06 am

> Vebyast wrote:Every single piece of wood in the entire civilization started out as ten-foot-long one-inch-by-one-inch planks because they exploit the loop between the prices of ladders and ten-foot-poles to make all their lumber. The same goes for all their metal (maybe a cycle between breastplates and full plate? I don't know.).

Iron Pots and Scrap Iron by the pound. The scrap costs more.

> Every single paladin in the world falls the instant they take their first level.

I forget, what intrinsically makes them fall?

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OgreBattle
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Post by OgreBattle » Mon Feb 18, 2013 4:09 am

> Count Arioch the 28th wrote:

> > OgreBattle wrote:
> > Also, skeleton-telegrams from that "pass object from one person from another to move any distance in the chain in 6 seconds".

> You're thinking too small. Get big skeletons (carve them from rock and cast Stone to Flesh if you have to) and turn it into a transit system.

So railroads are giant skeletons buried halfway into the ground, passing things. Cool.

> Or be an evil necromancer and point your skeleton chain at places you want to not exist anymore, and just have them pass a metal rail down the line, low-tech necromantic railgun.

That's applying non-existant real world physics to D&D though.

> I actually kind of want to make the cat lady a low level wizard, and all her cats are templated.

what's the lowest level way of giving cats Sneak Attack?
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Prak
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Post by Prak » Mon Feb 18, 2013 4:36 am

> OgreBattle wrote:

> > I actually kind of want to make the cat lady a low level wizard, and all her cats are templated.

> what's the lowest level way of giving cats Sneak Attack?

Fiendish. +2 LA or no change to CR, makes Int 3, the minimum for taking a class.
Alternatively, Hunter's Eye in PHBII give sneak attack (1d6/3CL), but it's personal range and Ranger 2. Conceivably, a wizard could craft items that give it, but they'd need a bunch of scrolls, or something.
Last edited by Prak on Mon Feb 18, 2013 4:43 am, edited 1 time in total.
Cuz apparently I gotta break this down for you dense motherfuckers- I'm trans feminine nonbinary. My pronouns are they/them.

> Winnah wrote:No, No. 'Prak' is actually a Thri Kreen impersonating a human and roleplaying himself as a D&D character. All hail our hidden insect overlords.

> FrankTrollman wrote:In Soviet Russia, cosmic horror is the default state.
> You should gain sanity for finding out that the problems of a region are because there are fucking monsters there.

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OgreBattle
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Post by OgreBattle » Mon Feb 18, 2013 4:58 am

> Prak_Anima wrote:

> > OgreBattle wrote:

> > > I actually kind of want to make the cat lady a low level wizard, and all her cats are templated.

> > what's the lowest level way of giving cats Sneak Attack?

> Fiendish. +2 LA or no change to CR, makes Int 3, the minimum for taking a class.

Ok, a pack of Fiendish White Raven Warblade cats sounds good.
... hmmm it seems the best use for monk levels would be on a fiendish/celestial/awakened mount no?
Last edited by OgreBattle on Mon Feb 18, 2013 5:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Vebyast » Mon Feb 18, 2013 5:19 am

> Koumei wrote:

> > Every single paladin in the world falls the instant they take their first level.

> I forget, what intrinsically makes them fall?

Nonsensical definitions of the law and chaos alignments mean that it would be impossible for a paladin to adhere to a literal interpretation of their code of conduct. Or, more whimsically, they very act of contemplating DND's alignment scheme invokes so much chaos as to violate the CoC.

> OgreBattle wrote:Ok, a pack of Fiendish White Raven Warblade cats sounds good.

That sounds almost as bad as Warblade Phase Spiders. <shudder>
Last edited by Vebyast on Mon Feb 18, 2013 5:21 am, edited 1 time in total.

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### Re: 'Crazy Cat Lady' as challenge for 1st level party

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Post by Previn » Mon Feb 18, 2013 2:17 pm

> OgreBattle wrote:Seems like if goblins attack a town, they'd steer clear of the cat lady house.

House?
Toss torches, move on.
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Post by JigokuBosatsu » Mon Feb 18, 2013 4:26 pm

> Prak_Anima wrote: Imagine a tower where every opponent was a different templated cat.

Doesn't that happen in The Voyage of Bran? Or am I getting my legends confused?

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Post by Koumei » Mon Feb 18, 2013 11:48 pm

You'd be amazed how many templates you can stack on the one animal. Even without resorting to Half-Golem (becomes Construct) -> Ungolemified or whatever it is (becomes Humanoid, no really) to unlock the crap that humanoids can turn into, like vampires and yuan-ti.
A friend managed to template a rat up to CR 60 or something, once. He was bored. I was bored enough to look through the books and help find templates. And it was "legal" (in the sense of each template being allowed to be added to the previous resulting creature, and with inherited templates coming before transformative ones). So you could totally have a cat like that, too.

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Prak
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Post by Prak » Mon Feb 18, 2013 11:55 pm

Incarnate Construct can unfortunately only be applied to "humanoid shaped" constructs. What that means is up to the gm.
Cuz apparently I gotta break this down for you dense motherfuckers- I'm trans feminine nonbinary. My pronouns are they/them.

> Winnah wrote:No, No. 'Prak' is actually a Thri Kreen impersonating a human and roleplaying himself as a D&D character. All hail our hidden insect overlords.

> FrankTrollman wrote:In Soviet Russia, cosmic horror is the default state.
> You should gain sanity for finding out that the problems of a region are because there are fucking monsters there.

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Koumei
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Post by Koumei » Tue Feb 19, 2013 12:48 am

Ah right. No wonder we didn't use it on the rat. Which looked more like a Zerg Overlord at the end.
I have seriously only ever seen Incarnate Construct used on a Warforged as a way of having a negative level adjustment. Ignoring that I'm pretty sure it does not work that way (the argument being "I know it says it can't reduce your ECL below 1, but I have X class levels, so my ECL is fine!") it ended up as a pretty gimpy character.

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Post by flare22 » Tue Feb 19, 2013 3:20 am

i think the crazy cat lady ruling the peasants idea has merit but only if the town lacks a guy who sells mounts in which case he and his riding dogs would rule the town but remember all these animals cost gold to buy raise train and care for so and most people do not have the cash to afford 150 gp riding dog. i am not sure about cats but i pretty sure there to expensive for a regular person to purchase enough of to make a swarm let alone train them for battle or manage there upkeep and anyone who can use handle animal at high enough ranks to breed raise and train a swarm of cats from scratch is to high level to be an appropriate challenge for a level on p.c.
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Post by Neurosis » Tue Feb 19, 2013 10:39 pm

How many cats?
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