A Template for Great Old Ones

[akira1]

I am working on an epic level (over 20 levels/HD) template to represent the Great Old Ones in a mixed Cthulu/Conan game I am running. I am using all the rules normal to Conan 1st addition. This template will represent the basic abilities that are common to all great old ones.

The Great Old Ones Traits: A Great Old One Possesses the following traits (unless otherwise noted in the creatures description):
-Immunities: A Great Old One is immune to all physical damage except damage dealt by weapons that are Legacy Weapons. They are also immune to any spell or effect that would attempt to alter their physical form, poison, energy drain, and control or subvert their mind.
-Spell Resistance (Su): The Great Old Ones possess Spell Resistance equal to 11 + their hit dice.
-Terror from Beyond (Ex): The Great Old Ones inspire an ancient and primordial terror in those who view them. Anytime a creature encounters a Great Old One, he must make a will save equal to 10 + ½ HD+ Charisma Modifier. A character that fails its save must flee in terror from the Great Old One for 1 minute per HD of the Great Old One. He also gains a new and permanent insanity and suffers 2d6 wisdom damage. If the character succeeds on his roll, he is shaken and he suffers a penalty to all rolls equal to the Charisma modifier of the Great Old One.
Telepathy: All Great old ones have telepathy out to 100 feet and may communicate with any creature within that range in this manner regardless of whether the Great Old One speaks or even understands the beings language.

Please give me any necessary feedback about things that are missing and may need to be included. As a side note, I do not have an encyclopedic knowledge of the Cthulu mythos.

 

[Stygian Devout]

Are the players actually going to have face them that you need specific stats? That should be an interesting encounter :twisted:

Recommend you check out the stats for various uber-nasties from Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu main book. Or at least the Monstrosity from Hell in the Hyborian Bestiary.

 

[akira1]

Most definitely they will have to face one of them as the final boss for the entire story arc (the characters themselves should have a total of 30 levels worth of classes). I have some epic rules I have worked out for Conan and I want to try them out and well, you just do not get more epic than these guys.

I do not have the money to buy the books you mentioned, but I do thank you for mentioning them (maybe i can convince one of my players that it is something they need so I can borrow it :wink: )

I am looking for basic characteristics that are common to all great old ones, have I missed anything?

 

[Trodax]

First of all, welcome to the boards akira1! Secondly, I totally agree with you that Conan and Cthulhu make a great blend. For more Cthulhu goodness, check out this massive thread in which Raven Blackwell came up with a bunch of stats for creatures and such.

Another book recommendation for you would be the Call of Cthulhu d20 RPG. It seems to be right up your alley, as it has d20 stats for all the Great Old Ones as well as a bunch of other stuff which can fit nicely into a Conan game (I bought the book specifically for use in Conan). Unfortunately, it might be a bit hard to get hold of these days, and you already said that you didn't want to buy any more books.

The abilities that all Great Old Ones and other gods share according to this book include (these are not all of them):

Immunity to massive damage, poison, disease, electricity, cold, acid, stunning, sleep, paralysis, death effects and disintegration.
Immunity to any effects that alters its form (polymorphing, petrification).
Immunity to energy drain, ability drain and ability damage
Immunity to all mind effects.
A bonus on all checks (between +5 and +20 depending on the type of god).
Spell resistance (there is no specific formula; the number varies between specific Great Old Ones).
Never fails an attack roll or save on a natural 1.
Senses that extend up to five miles.
Divine Aura (every round mortals within 50 ft can be forced to make a Will save (DC 20+Cha modifier) - if they fail they are dazed, frightened or take a -4 moral penalty (while the gods allies instead gain a +4 bonus) - the god can choose which type of aura he wants to invoke).
A bunch of spell-like abilities.
Teleportation.

And here are the stats for Mr Cthulhu himself (well, some of his stats anyway; I'm too lazy to type up all his feats and skills):

CTHULHU
Colossal Great Old One
HD: 42d12+378 (882 hp)
Initiative: +5
Speed: 140 ft., swim 140 ft., fly 360 ft. (poor)
Reach: 25 ft.
AC: 47
Attacks: 6 tentacles +56 (4d6+16), 2 claws +50 (2d8+8 ), stamp +50 (4d6+8 )
Special attacks: Improved grab (when Cthulhu hits with one of his tentacles, he can attempt to grapple the victim), horrid constriction (Cthulhu can do some extremely nasty stuff to victims he is grappling), spells (he basically knows all the spells in the book)
Special qualities: Damage reduction 40/+4, healing 50 hp/round, spell resistance 37
Saves: Fort +39, Ref +31, Will +37
Abilities: Str 42, Dex 12, Con 29, Int 33, Wis 27, Cha 29

Of course, I would never turn a beast with stats like this loose on PC's; after one round of combat you'd probably have the entire party either dead by massive damage or grappled with no chance of ever getting loose. His immunity to massive damage, 882 hp and healing of 50 hp/round would also make him pretty damn hard to kill by conventional means.

Here are some specific comments on your ideas:

-Immunities: A Great Old One is immune to all physical damage except damage dealt by weapons that are Legacy Weapons. They are also immune to any spell or effect that would attempt to alter their physical form, poison, energy drain, and control or subvert their mind.

One thing you have to pay particular attention to in Conan is whether or not this beast should be immune to massive damage. I would probably make him immune, or jack up his Fort save so the PC's have be extremely lucky to kill him by massive damage (or you might have a fight that's over in the first round).

-Spell Resistance (Su): The Great Old Ones possess Spell Resistance equal to 11 + their hit dice.

There are some high level spells in Conan that are basically save or die. I would go through the spells (at least the ones that your PC's have access to) and decide on a spell-by-spell basis if you want them to be able to affect the Great Old One.

-Terror from Beyond (Ex): The Great Old Ones inspire an ancient and primordial terror in those who view them. Anytime a creature encounters a Great Old One, he must make a will save equal to 10 + ½ HD+ Charisma Modifier. A character that fails its save must flee in terror from the Great Old One for 1 minute per HD of the Great Old One. He also gains a new and permanent insanity and suffers 2d6 wisdom damage. If the character succeeds on his roll, he is shaken and he suffers a penalty to all rolls equal to the Charisma modifier of the Great Old One.

This actually sounds too harsh to me. Well, that depends on how high the monsters Cha modifier is of course, but if he has a +9 modifier like Cthulhu above, then all the PC's would be at a -9 penalty which is pretty brutal (if you do want them to stand any chance, I mean :wink: ). At least I would give the players the option of spending a Fate point to negate the effects of terror (that is a rule that was included in Conan 2nd edition, actually).

 

[Trodax]

Actually, one thing I didn't mention is that I'm not sure the Conan rules are all that great for running a high-level fight like this. Have you considered alternatives? For example, I think a great end-fight to a campaign like this could have the scholar PC frantically trying to complete a banishing ritual, while the warrior PC's are fending of hordes of the Great Old Ones priests and cultists. You know, instead of having them actually fight the monster hand-to-hand.

 

[rabindranath72]

I would not bother with statting the Great Old Ones at all. They are gods, or nearly so, so any human-type adversary is bound to end: 1) dead, 2) dead and mad.
Also an hyborian-type epic game would not be like a D&D-like game, so characters are even more vulnerable.
OTOH, the GOO's servants are fair game, IMO. You might be best served giving a look at the d20 Call of Cthulhu game, which has stats for independent and servitor races which might work as adversaries (in the sense of: face in combat) for high level characters. The stats of the GOO in the d20 CoC game are meant for high level D&D characters, and even these, have been reported in various playtests to have failed (as it should be).

Cheers,
Antonio

 

[Style]

I appreciate what you're trying to do, but I tend to agree with these two:

Actually, one thing I didn't mention is that I'm not sure the Conan rules are all that great for running a high-level fight like this. Have you considered alternatives? For example, I think a great end-fight to a campaign like this could have the scholar PC frantically trying to complete a banishing ritual, while the warrior PC's are fending of hordes of the Great Old Ones priests and cultists. You know, instead of having them actually fight the monster hand-to-hand.

I would not bother with statting the Great Old Ones at all. They are gods, or nearly so, so any human-type adversary is bound to end: 1) dead, 2) dead and mad.
Also an hyborian-type epic game would not be like a D&D-like game, so characters are even more vulnerable.
OTOH, the GOO's servants are fair game, IMO. You might be best served giving a look at the d20 Call of Cthulhu game, which has stats for independent and servitor races which might work as adversaries (in the sense of: face in combat) for high level characters. The stats of the GOO in the d20 CoC game are meant for high level D&D characters, and even these, have been reported in various playtests to have failed (as it should be).

Cheers,
Antonio

I'm actually hoping to run a quick Conan adventure based on the tale Call of Cthuhlu. If the PCs aren't smart enough to run for their lives when old squiggly rears his head, they're going to die horribly.