Works for me!
Let's finish these up.
Since they're typically summoned, how about Environment: Any?
Always NE works for me, but I'm not opposed to CE, either.
The proposed advancement is ok, but I wouldn't mind leaving it at - since this thing is more or less unique.
I was unconvinced by the Advancement as well. It's certainly easier to change the Advancement from "Gargantuan 16-32 HD (Gargantuan); 33-60 HD (Colossal)" to "—".
Updating the
Khalk'ru Working Draft.
CR of 16 maybe? I think it's not quite as powerful as a marilith, but it's close.
Hurr… that's a tricky one. Khalk'ru is a one-trick pony but it's an awfully nasty trick.
I don't think it's Challenge Rating 16 nasty though - 1d4 negative levels per hit would require 6 strikes for an aspect to annihilate a level-equivalent foe and are easily removed by a standard 4th-level
restoration spell.
A planetar is CR 16 and they're way nastier (although admittedly they're under-CR'd). Nightwalkers and Horned Devils are CR 16 and have similar defenses but a lot more versatile abilities and higher damage output.
I'd go for CR 15.
The proposed advancement is ok, but I wouldn't mind leaving it at - since this thing is more or less unique. What would an advanced one mean really?
Originally I was toying with the idea of having some special scheme that altered the number of tentacles involved and ended up with the HD near to that of the full manifestation of Khalk'ru.
Something like for each additional 3 or 4 HD of advancement the aspect of Khalk'ru can squeeze one more tentacle into the material world. The placeholder was based on 4 HD per tentacle (so two tentacles at 19-22 HD, three at 23-26 HD, four at 27-30 HD and so on) and allowing an aspect to have all twelve of Khalk'ru tentacles (at 59 HD). Although 3 HD per tentacle with a max HD of 50 seems a more attractive progression now.
Upon reflection, that's awfully fiddly and I'm not thinking 50 or 60 HD might be too many for Khalk'ru in all his glory. That's way more than even a Demon Prince or the like. Heck, it's more than any of the Greater Titan conversions we made.
Also, there'd be quite a jump in power with each tentacle it gains which means the standard CR advancement wouldn't work either. It would make more sense to do it like a Hydra and have separate "Aspect of Khalk'ru, N-tentacled" in progression.
That seems more trouble than it's worth, so shall we move on to the full McCoy once we'd settled on the aspect's Challenge Rating?