Spelljammer Converting Spelljammer creatures

Cleon · Feb 2, 2015

Skykine Original Stats

Skykine
CLIMATE/TERRAIN: The skies of Edill
FREQUENCY: Uncommon
ORGANIZATION: Herd
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Any
DIET: Carnivore
INTELLIGENCE: Animal (1)
TREASURE: None
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
NO. APPEARING: 1–12 or see below
ARMOR CLASS: 5
MOVEMENT: 3, Fl 25 C
HIT DICE: 9
THAC0: 7
NO. OF ATTACKS: 2
DAMAGE/ATTACK: 2–24/2–20
SPECIAL ATTACKS: None
SPECIAL DEFENSES: None
MAGIC RESISTANCE: Nil
SIZE: G (65′)
MORALE: Unreliable (4)
XP VALUE: 6,500

Skykine are huge creatures native to the air world of Edill. They resemble broad-bodied dragons with short, thick necks. Skykine have four legs like a dragon, but they are short and appear atrophied. Their wings, too, appear much too small and weak to support such a large creature. (In fact, their wings are used only for steering. In their body cavity is a strange organ that allows them to levitate and fly through the skies of Edill. They cannot, of course, leave the atmospheric envelope.)

At the end of a short neck, the skykine’s head is broad and flat, with a long snout like an alligator’s. The creature’s forehead is sharply sloping, indicating that it has no space for a large brain—an explanation for its low intelligence. Its eyes are large and spherical, protruding well out of its skull. This gives it 360º vision in the plane of its body, but only 180º vertically (in other words, it has a blind spot below its own body).

Skykine have rough yet supple skin, very much like that of a shark. They range in color from off-white to blue-grey—perfect colors to let them blend in with the skies of their air world home.

Combat: Skykine attack with a bite, and with a tail smash. Their bodies are thick and not overly flexible, which means they can only bite foes in front of them and tail-smash creatures behind them. The creatures are large enough that their attacks can damage a spelljamming vessel, with 10 hit points of damage equating to 1 Hull Point of damage. In addition, against any creature of size H or larger, they can charge and ram. A successful ram inflicts 10d12 hit points, or 1d12 Hull Points of damage.

Although predators, skykine never attack anything larger than half their own size unless they are attacked first. Even then, the large creatures prefer to flee, giving barking, bellowing cries of warning to others of their kind. If they are harried to the point where they believe escape is impossible, they will turn and attack.

Habitat/Society: Skykine travel in small herds, often (65%) but not always based on family groupings. If a family herd is encountered, there will be one mature male and 1d3 mature females, plus 2d4 juveniles. Mature males and females have the same statistics, and the sexes are indistinguishable except to another skykine. Juveniles range from 10% to 60% of the size of an adult; their hit points and damage inflicted have the same ratio. All juveniles, regardless of size and age, have AC 6 and THAC0 11.

In a family herd, if a female is attacked or threatened, the male will fight ferociously to defend her . . . until he is reduced to half hit points, at which time his instincts of self-preservation will take over and he will flee. If the juveniles are attacked, the male will respond in the same way; the female(s), however, will fight to the death to defend their young.

Ecology: Skykine feed on other airborne lifeforms, but nothing bigger than about 30′ in length, of course. In turn, the skykine are the favored prey of Edill’s dragon population. The dragons consider them to be harmless food animals. Of course, “harmless” means very different things to a 150′-long dragon and a human spacefarer!

The big creatures are thought to live for 20 years or so, landing on an orbiting earth body only long enough to bear their live young.

Originally appeared in SJR6 - Greyspace (1992).

Cleon · Feb 2, 2015

Cleon said:
Skykine

Okay, these look like they shouldn't take too long.

Magical Beast is the obvious choice for creature type. They may resemble dragons in appearance, but if a Dragonne does not have the possibly Dragon type, I don't see why a Skykine would.

They're similar in size and shape to a Whale, and I'm tempted to give them some stats in the same ballpark as a Whale.

A Baleen Whale has 132 hit points. If we give our Skykine Con 28 its 9 Hit Dice would produce 130 hit points, which seems about right. Str 35 and Dex 13 like a Baleen Whale also seems OK.

The original has a 2d12 bite and a 2d10 tail slap. I'm thinking we'd better change those to their closest equivalent in the standard natural weapon damage progressions, which would be a 3d8 bite and a 3d6 tail slap.

The original's Armour Class of 5 would translate to a natural armour bonus of +8. That seems too low - somewhere around NA +14 seems more appropriate (it's the NA bonus a Dragonne or Triceratops would have if they were Advanced to Gargantuan).

"Kine" means "cows", so I'm tempted to give them the mental stats of the Bison (Int 2, Wis 11, Cha 4), although we might want to slap a +2 to that Wisdom to give them the same Wis modifier as an SRD Whale.

Hmm, the above sounds pretty good. I think I'll stat it up to see what it looks like.

Cleon · Feb 2, 2015

Skykine Working Draft

Skykine
Gargantuan Magical Beast
Hit Dice: 9d10+81 (130 hp)
Initiative: +1
Speed: 10 ft., fly 60 ft. (average)
Armor Class: 21 (–4 size, +1 Dex, +14 natural), touch 7, flat-footed 20
Base Attack/Grapple: +9/+33
Attack: Bite +17 melee (3d8+12)
Full Attack: Bite +17 melee (3d8+12) and tail slap +12 melee (3d6+6)
Space/Reach: 20 ft./15 ft.
Special Attacks: Ramming
Special Qualities: All-around vision, flight, low-light vision
Saves: Fort +15, Ref +7, Will +6
Abilities: Str 35, Dex 13, Con 28, Int 2, Wis 13, Cha 4
Skills: Listen +3, Search +0, Spot +19
Feats: Alertness, Flyby Attack, Hoverᴮ, Iron Will, Snatch
Environment: Any land
Organization: Solitary, pair, family (2-5), or herd (6-12)
Challenge Rating: 7
Treasure: None
Alignment: Neutral
Advancement: 10-18 HD (Gargantuan); 19-27 HD (Colossal)
Level Adjustment: —

A bulky dragon-shaped creature the color of the sky. Its batlike wings and four spindly legs are small and spindly, looking far too weak to support its whale-sized body. The beast's large head is as broad as its body, with long crocodilian jaws. A pair of globular eyes jut from opposite sides of a skull who's sloping forehead is far too flat to house much in the way of a brain.

Skykine are whale-sized flying creatures who spend their lives in the air, save for the brief periods the female skykine need to land to give live birth to their young. They are normally encountered in families or herds led by a single adult male – although that's nigh impossible to tell, since both bull and cow skykine appear identical to other species. Skykine hide is abrasively rough while being supple and tough, much like shagreen. Its color matches the sky – from azure blue to storm grey and cloud white.

Skykine are carnivorous but cowardly. They only eat flying creatures less than half their own size; but unfortunately are dull-witted enough to occasionally mistake small aerial vehicles for food. Encounters with larger predators, or supposed "prey" who prove dangerous, prompt a skykine to flee toward its herd while barking in alarm. The fleeing skykine normally only stops and fights if it is injured or beleaguered by pursuers it is unable to escape. However, bull skykine defending their mates, or adults defending their family's young, will initiate combat, and mother skykine willingly fight to the death to defend their offspring.

A skykine is 60 to 70 feet long. Its levitation organ means it's effectively weightless, but its mass is about 50 tons.

Combat
A skykine is a timid combatant who is only willing to attack opponents of a smaller size category than itself. It will flee anything larger than this, or whenever it takes significant damage. Only a cornered skykine will fight to the death, or a skykine cow who is defending her calf. An attacking skykine normally starts by ramming an enemy or, if its opponent is much smaller than itself, by charging and making a bite attack. It then lashes out with bites and tail slaps until the skykine wins or decides to run away.

All-Around Vision (Ex): Skykines have 360º vision. Their protruding, globular eyes give them a +4 racial bonus to Spot and Search checks, and they can't be flanked.

Flight (Ex): A skykine's body contains a special organ that makes its body naturally buoyant. This buoyancy allows it to fly at a speed of 60 feet. This buoyancy also grants it a permanent feather fall effect (as the spell) with personal range.

Ramming (Ex): As a full round action, a skykine can fly at up to quadruple speed (240 feet) and ram an airborne target (such as a flying vehicle or another creature). To ram, the skykine must end its movement in the target's space. This attack deals 8d8+24 points of damage. If the target is a creature, it can attempt either an attack of opportunity or a DC 26 Reflex save for half damage. The save DC is Strength-based.

Cleon · Feb 2, 2015

Cleon said:
Skykine

That looks in the right ballpark to me.

We could reduce the Intelligence to 1, since the entry goes out of its way to mention their low intelligence, but Int 2 is also OK by me.

We've also got a few special abilities to consider:

The 360º vision from their unusual eyes suggests All-Around Vision.

All-Around Vision (Ex): Skykines have 360º vision. Their protruding, globular eyes give them a +4 racial bonus to Spot and Search checks, and they can't be flanked.

Their "levitation organ" suggests a beholder-type Flight ability:

Flight (Ex): A skykine's body contains a special organ that makes its body naturally buoyant. This buoyancy allows it to fly at a speed of 60 feet. This buoyancy also grants it a permanent feather fall effect (as the spell) with personal range.

Finally, they have a Ramming attack. Something like the following ought to do.

Ramming (Ex): As a full round action, a skykine can fly at up to quadruple speed (240 feet) and ram an airborne target (such as a flying vehicle or another creature). To ram, the skykine must end its movement in the target's space. This attack deals XX points of damage. If the target is a creature, it can attempt either an attack of opportunity or a DC 26 Reflex save for half damage. The save DC is Strength-based.

I left off the "breaching the ship" that some of our versions of Ramming use, since there's no mention of it in the original. But we could add it in if you like:

If a skykine rams a ship, in addition to the above damage it also makes a Strength check to breach its hull. The breach DC varies with the type of vessel rammed, but is normally 18 plus 1 per 10 feet of length, although an adjustment of between –5 to +10 may apply due to the sturdiness of design, materials and/or craftsmanship. A typical 50-foot merchant ship or 75-foot longship is breach DC of 25, a typical 100-foot warship is DC 30 (See Chapter 5 of the DMG for information about ships). Success normally holes the hull, causing the ship to founder in 1d10 minutes.

We also need to decide on the Ramming damage. The original's 10d12 is, frankly, ridiculous compared to the SJR6 skykine's 8d6 hit dice - if they rammed each other it'd almost certainly be fatal! Fortunately, our version has more hit points so we might as well use the original's Ramming damage as a target.

A triceratops' Powerful Charge does 4d8 plus double its Strength bonus. Our skykine is one size larger, which'd suggest 6d8+24 damage for its Ramming, but 8d8+24 gives an average damage of 60, which is closer to the original's 65 average damage. [9d8+24 would average 64.5, only half-a-point off, but 9d8 is not on the standard natural attack damage progression.]

Alternatively, if you fancy wandering further off the standard base damages, we could keep the d12s the original used and make the Ramming damage 6d12+24, which would give a 63 average. That's 2 points lower than the original.

Any preferences?

Cleon · Feb 2, 2015

Cleon said:
I left off the "breaching the ship" that some of our versions of Ramming use, since there's no mention of it in the original. But we could add it in if you like:

If a skykine rams a ship, in addition to the above damage it also makes a Strength check to breach its hull. The breach DC varies with the type of vessel rammed, but is normally 18 plus 1 per 10 feet of length, although an adjustment of between –5 to +10 may apply due to the sturdiness of design, materials and/or craftsmanship. A typical 50-foot merchant ship or 75-foot longship is breach DC of 25, a typical 100-foot warship is DC 30 (See Chapter 5 of the DMG for information about ships). Success normally holes the hull, causing the ship to founder in 1d10 minutes.

Just to be clear, I'd prefer to leave the "hull breach" bit out. My thinking is this sub-attack suggests the Ramming creature has some kind of hard pointy bit that can break through the ship's hull, which the Skykine seems too, well, "fleshy" to have.

freyar · Feb 2, 2015

I'd leave off the hull breach as well. The rest is pretty good. As for ramming damage, 8d8+24 seems like plenty, maybe even too much given the likely CR. Might want to think about that a bit more.

Cleon · Feb 3, 2015

freyar said:
I'd leave off the hull breach as well. The rest is pretty good. As for ramming damage, 8d8+24 seems like plenty, maybe even too much given the likely CR. Might want to think about that a bit more.

Well, I'd likely accept 6d8+24. That'd still be 9 points higher on average than their bite + tail combo's average damage of 42.

Still, the original ramming attack was so unusually harmful (10d12!) I think we'd better make keep the damage high.

We can always bump the Challenge Rating up if we think it necessary.

So shall I update the draft with the All-Around Vision, Flight, and Ramming?

Oh, and I'm starting to think we should give it Hover as a bonus feat - it seems a natural fit to their "levitation organ".