BACKSTORY: I am running a seven deadly sins style campaign, and I am dealing with the sin of sloth. As the party enters into a town, they find a large number of unobtrusive and adorable sloths which want nothing more than to cuddle with the strangers. As they enter the town, they find the locals all carrying their pet sloths and are either moving/speaking slowly, sleeping in random spots, etc. No work is performed, the town and it's port is falling into disrepair. The sloths are in fact baby megatherium. PROBLEM: I want to have the sloths attempt to take control of the party members in the sense of a charm or some other mind control spell; however this is not the natural nature of the beasts. I have already built a back story of a powerful ancient mage who was known to perform arcane experiments on all manner of creatures. QUESTION: In your opinion, what is the most reasonable way to have these creatures attempt to gain control of the party? As a side note, there is at least one mated pair of full grown megatherium which will be the boss in this scenerio. I have also considered that this pair(s) may be in control of the smaller sloths which try to latch on to the party members. Looking forward to responses, and thanks in advance!
I'd recommend treating it as a charm... have the players make a WIS save to resist them, and if they fail they can't resist carrying the sloth and I'd say the biggest problem would be that their max speed is reduced and they'd get disadvantage on DEX saves. I'd probably also not make the sloths ever attack the party members, but if someone is still carrying a sloth when they fight the megatherium the sloths basically Help their parents, giving the Megatherium advantage to attack anyone still carrying a sloth.
I'd recommend treating it as a charm... have the players make a WIS save to resist them, and if they fail they can't resist carrying the sloth and I'd say the biggest problem would be that their max speed is reduced and they'd get disadvantage on DEX saves. I'd probably also not make the sloths ever attack the party members, but if someone is still carrying a sloth when they fight the megatherium the sloths basically Help their parents, giving the Megatherium advantage to attack anyone still carrying a sloth.
Ooh, a constant help action is brutal. Reduced speed and disadvantaged dex saves would make the most sense for the effects, I agree. A charmed effect would also be sensible, as it would introduce a fun mechanic, but other than the reductions, the characters don't have to act contrary to how they would normally.
It would also be kind of funny if you made it so that the sloth took up one of their hands, so that they couldn't use two-handed weapons or shields, but that could easily be gotten around by treating the sloths as backpacks, so that's an unnecessary side effect. Again, just funny.
Thank you for the input, but I have decided to go into a completely different direction. I am using a creature called a TREACLE, a small shape-changing ooze (which will assume the shape of a sloth) which slowly steals blood from its victims. They assume cute forms in order to put their victims at ease.
I think this will work nicely.
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BACKSTORY: I am running a seven deadly sins style campaign, and I am dealing with the sin of sloth. As the party enters into a town, they find a large number of unobtrusive and adorable sloths which want nothing more than to cuddle with the strangers. As they enter the town, they find the locals all carrying their pet sloths and are either moving/speaking slowly, sleeping in random spots, etc. No work is performed, the town and it's port is falling into disrepair. The sloths are in fact baby megatherium. PROBLEM: I want to have the sloths attempt to take control of the party members in the sense of a charm or some other mind control spell; however this is not the natural nature of the beasts. I have already built a back story of a powerful ancient mage who was known to perform arcane experiments on all manner of creatures. QUESTION: In your opinion, what is the most reasonable way to have these creatures attempt to gain control of the party? As a side note, there is at least one mated pair of full grown megatherium which will be the boss in this scenerio. I have also considered that this pair(s) may be in control of the smaller sloths which try to latch on to the party members. Looking forward to responses, and thanks in advance!
I'd recommend treating it as a charm... have the players make a WIS save to resist them, and if they fail they can't resist carrying the sloth and I'd say the biggest problem would be that their max speed is reduced and they'd get disadvantage on DEX saves. I'd probably also not make the sloths ever attack the party members, but if someone is still carrying a sloth when they fight the megatherium the sloths basically Help their parents, giving the Megatherium advantage to attack anyone still carrying a sloth.
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Ooh, a constant help action is brutal. Reduced speed and disadvantaged dex saves would make the most sense for the effects, I agree. A charmed effect would also be sensible, as it would introduce a fun mechanic, but other than the reductions, the characters don't have to act contrary to how they would normally.
It would also be kind of funny if you made it so that the sloth took up one of their hands, so that they couldn't use two-handed weapons or shields, but that could easily be gotten around by treating the sloths as backpacks, so that's an unnecessary side effect. Again, just funny.
Thank you for the input, but I have decided to go into a completely different direction. I am using a creature called a TREACLE, a small shape-changing ooze (which will assume the shape of a sloth) which slowly steals blood from its victims. They assume cute forms in order to put their victims at ease.
I think this will work nicely.