Slime Squisher
Posts: 365
Joined: Monday, 7th January 2013, 08:22
Rokurokubi (a multi-tile species proposal)
Rokurokubi Are humanoid monsters with supernaturally long, stretchable necks. They keep their necks coiled around their deformed bodies, ready to launch their fanged heads at their victims, and occasionally to peek around corners and drink oil from tall lamps.
Good apts: Hexes, Necro, Poison Magic, Ice Magic.
Neutral apts: Fighting, Spellcasting, Unarmed Combat, Staves (they need them to walk and counterbalance the weight of the neck), Charms, Summonings, Stealth.
Bad apts: The rest.
- Int *****
- Dex *
- Str ***
Innates:
- Deformed: Can't wear body armour.
- Slow 2.
- Fangs 3. (With vampiric bite).
- Can wear two amulets (their neck is long enough for their magical energies not to interfere).
- They can extend their neck. See below.
Gimmick: Extendable Neck.
Rokurokubi get an active ability at level three that allows them to spring out their necks (this may need an enemy target to prevent tedious scouting uses). When active, moving in any direction will cause your head to move, leaving the body behind connected by neck tiles (similar to other tentacle tiles in the game). Essentially, the head becomes your character, while the body is left behind immobile. Enemies can hit your head, body or neck, but the latter two have some damage shaving and extra magic resist. At levels 6, 9, 12 and 15, your neck stretches further increasing the amount of tiles you can reach until a maximum of 9. Staying in this state for too long will start to cause drain. There are some limitations (and advantages!) to what you can do when stretching your neck:
- Your head moves very fast (Cancels out your natural "Slow 2" and moves as if you had "Fast 3"). It also counts as flying, small, and gets an Ev bonus.
- You can attack in melee, but it will obviously only use your vampiric fangs as an attack.
- You can cast any spells, and the origin will be at the position of your head.
- You can not use launchers, pick up items, or use your limbs in any way, because hand-eye coordination is difficult at that distance.
- You can open doors, but not take stairs or portals.
- Teleporting or otherwise changing locations will cause your neck to painfully snap back.
While in "extended neck" mode, you get an active "End Extend Neck" that terminates the effect. When you do this, you lose control of the character for a few turns as your head quickly snaps back to your body. It does so at a, excuse the pun, breakneck speed (3 move delay).
Conclusions:
Rokurokubi are my take on a slow species that gets to play around with speed in a different way. You get the opportunity to move fast and ctele back (through the neck snapback) in exchange for leaving all your valuable vital organs behind, which should force you to think of the dungeon a bit differently. Even though my understanding is that tentacles are a bit fiddly in the back-end, the tile support and general infrastructure is there to let players enjoy a very out-there and different species.
Gimmick aside, I wanted to make a non-undead species with some of the effects typically associated to the undead, and in particular focused on staves.
- For this message the author Steel Neuron has received thanks: 3
- Cimanyd, dracos369, jwoodward48ss