I plan to have a party of seven level 3 adventurers get sent to the tower of an illusionist/inventor that has long since past but still has some defenses up. I figured I'd be able to set up some semi-challenging encounters if I threw some Oaken Bolters, Bronze Scouts, an Iron Snake, and maybe a Shield Guardian at them along the way, to fit with the inventor motif, but also figured that maybe there'd be some illusions cast to make it seem like other things in order to drive intruders away, with the constructs making sure there'd be some punch to it all if needed, especially since I also imagine there may not be as many of them there to fight. Any help in picking good creatures to use for this would be greatly appreciated.
Think a little outside the box of what a "monster" is when it comes to illusionists. Maybe there are areas of the tower that are guarded by Phantasmal Force spells. That way, when the party enters a room, all of them have to make a save or spawn a monster of their own nightmares that it is fighting them, but can't really be beat by just brute force alone.
How about using Phase Spiders? you can mix them with a bunch of illusions and use their Ethereal Jaunt ability to make it seems as if they are illusions, but in reality they are simply phasing in and out of the ethereal plane.
You can even add other oversized illusions to fool them, like a giant cat or hamster.
I think the giant silverfish is a great base for making other giant creatures that you could flavour. The extra legs thing makes most enemies instantly creepier and with enough homebrew to suit the levels, you could force some interesting combat.
How about mixing traps that come out of the walls/ceiling with monsters that resemble the wall/ceiling to amp up the paranoia level. Or add a few elemental monsters that only appear if party members fail to wash their hands or only appear IF they wash their equipment after slogging through a room full of mud. Water weirds. Xorns. Salamanders. Shocker lizards. That kind of thing to create a sense that the illusionist wanted to toy with intruders.
I had a thought of doing that, although from what I could tell, it only affects one target, meaning that while one person may be dealing with it, everyone else is just watching them swing and flail wildly at thin air, claiming they're being attacked without any idea of what's going on. While fun, I imagine even the greatest master of the school of Illusion wouldn't have that be the only thing.
How about using Phase Spiders? you can mix them with a bunch of illusions and use their Ethereal Jaunt ability to make it seems as if they are illusions, but in reality they are simply phasing in and out of the ethereal plane.
You can even add other oversized illusions to fool them, like a giant cat or hamster.
Oooh, that could be very useful, especially if in the end, I have it pop back up and appear to be friendly(at least to a specific person).
How about mixing traps that come out of the walls/ceiling with monsters that resemble the wall/ceiling to amp up the paranoia level. Or add a few elemental monsters that only appear if party members fail to wash their hands or only appear IF they wash their equipment after slogging through a room full of mud. Water weirds. Xorns. Salamanders. Shocker lizards. That kind of thing to create a sense that the illusionist wanted to toy with intruders.
I was imagining more of a "I don't want people entering my home, and if I could avoid people breaking my things, that'd be great too, but I'm also not going to just not do anything." I plan to also have a guardian of sorts left behind who is definitely not eager to fight as well, thus trying to make themselves seem as dangerous and scary as possible in order to drive people away.
I had a thought of doing that, although from what I could tell, it only affects one target, meaning that while one person may be dealing with it, everyone else is just watching them swing and flail wildly at thin air, claiming they're being attacked without any idea of what's going on. While fun, I imagine even the greatest master of the school of Illusion wouldn't have that be the only thing.
What I did for a game was something like this:
There was some ancient super-weapon buried deep in a cave structure. The weapon was an orb of sorts that was covered in needles. When anything got too close to the orb, it fired needles at the target. If the needles hit, then the orb got a data-read of the target and spawned a monstrous nightmare developed from the mind of the victim. What was actually happening was that I was using the Phantasmal Force, but making it so that all the players could see the illusion. The illusions were really more of a decoy, as the orb was the real adversary that kept shooting needles each round and spawning more illusions. The party had to figure out that the monsters were only illusions and put them aside to concentrate on the orb or they would be overwhelmed by the monsters or forced to retreat.
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
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I plan to have a party of seven level 3 adventurers get sent to the tower of an illusionist/inventor that has long since past but still has some defenses up. I figured I'd be able to set up some semi-challenging encounters if I threw some Oaken Bolters, Bronze Scouts, an Iron Snake, and maybe a Shield Guardian at them along the way, to fit with the inventor motif, but also figured that maybe there'd be some illusions cast to make it seem like other things in order to drive intruders away, with the constructs making sure there'd be some punch to it all if needed, especially since I also imagine there may not be as many of them there to fight. Any help in picking good creatures to use for this would be greatly appreciated.
Think a little outside the box of what a "monster" is when it comes to illusionists. Maybe there are areas of the tower that are guarded by Phantasmal Force spells. That way, when the party enters a room, all of them have to make a save or spawn a monster of their own nightmares that it is fighting them, but can't really be beat by just brute force alone.
How about using Phase Spiders? you can mix them with a bunch of illusions and use their Ethereal Jaunt ability to make it seems as if they are illusions, but in reality they are simply phasing in and out of the ethereal plane.
You can even add other oversized illusions to fool them, like a giant cat or hamster.
I think the giant silverfish is a great base for making other giant creatures that you could flavour. The extra legs thing makes most enemies instantly creepier and with enough homebrew to suit the levels, you could force some interesting combat.
How about mixing traps that come out of the walls/ceiling with monsters that resemble the wall/ceiling to amp up the paranoia level. Or add a few elemental monsters that only appear if party members fail to wash their hands or only appear IF they wash their equipment after slogging through a room full of mud. Water weirds. Xorns. Salamanders. Shocker lizards. That kind of thing to create a sense that the illusionist wanted to toy with intruders.
I had a thought of doing that, although from what I could tell, it only affects one target, meaning that while one person may be dealing with it, everyone else is just watching them swing and flail wildly at thin air, claiming they're being attacked without any idea of what's going on. While fun, I imagine even the greatest master of the school of Illusion wouldn't have that be the only thing.
Oooh, that could be very useful, especially if in the end, I have it pop back up and appear to be friendly(at least to a specific person).
I was imagining more of a "I don't want people entering my home, and if I could avoid people breaking my things, that'd be great too, but I'm also not going to just not do anything." I plan to also have a guardian of sorts left behind who is definitely not eager to fight as well, thus trying to make themselves seem as dangerous and scary as possible in order to drive people away.
What I did for a game was something like this:
There was some ancient super-weapon buried deep in a cave structure. The weapon was an orb of sorts that was covered in needles. When anything got too close to the orb, it fired needles at the target. If the needles hit, then the orb got a data-read of the target and spawned a monstrous nightmare developed from the mind of the victim. What was actually happening was that I was using the Phantasmal Force, but making it so that all the players could see the illusion. The illusions were really more of a decoy, as the orb was the real adversary that kept shooting needles each round and spawning more illusions. The party had to figure out that the monsters were only illusions and put them aside to concentrate on the orb or they would be overwhelmed by the monsters or forced to retreat.