Opponents with more than 2 arms

[Swordmagnet]

Let's get back to the original thread, shall we?

MW, against a single opponent your multi limbed monster would simply slice and dice. Consider this: each pair of limbs is a seperate opponent. Each additional PC engages a pair of limbs. Therefore a six armed monster is considered three opponents. Against three PC's the odds are one to one. The idea that it needs special compound eyes or multiple heads is redundant; it's an other planar creature or magical construct, it dosen't need to make sense.

I think it was Jason and the Argonauts or maybe Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger that had the heroes fighting a six-armed animated statue of Kali. Rent the movie, pop some corn and smile as you replace the actor's faces with those of your players.

[MonkeyWrench]

Ok here's a rough draft so to speak of the demoness in question. Comments and suggestions are welcome.

The creature has the upper torso of a well muscled woman with three pairs of arms. The creatures lower body is that of a giant snake between 15 - 30 feet long.

ST: 5
AG: 8
TO: 6
EN: 4
HT: 4

WP:4
Wit: 6
MA: 3
Soc: 1
Per: 4

Ref: 7
Aim: 6
KD: 7
KO: 10
Move: 6

Comabt Proficiency 6-10 (cut and thrust or wrestling most likely)
CP: 13 - 17
Each set of arms is treated as a seperate opponent. They are fully capable of making their own maneuvers, but if one set evades then the other two are assumed to have evaded as well (due it's ability to sway back and forth using it's tail it gains 2 dice for evasive moves)
At any time the creautre may decide to constrict with it's lower body.

So there's my rough draft. Tell me what you think. I'm not worried if it's to powerful my mian concern is does it make sense from a rules stand point. I envision it's favorite tactic is to grapple using it's snake body and then slice away at the poor hero who got nabbed.

I'll have to add some flavor text on my next post.

[kenjib]

What CP does it use for the lower body?

[MonkeyWrench]

I'm going to use it's wrestling prof. to cover attacks made by it's lower body.

This brings me to a question. How do you switch between proficiences in a single round? Lets say that in the first exchange I use my C&T to slice and dice, but in the second exchange I want to grapple with my wrestling prof. Is there a CP cost to switch between proficiences?

[kenjib]

Can it grapple one person while attacking another with it's four arms?

[MonkeyWrench]

I'm thinking it can grapple with it's tail while continuing to use it's 6 arms for whatever. And the more I think about it the more I think that I will only have it grapple.

Imagine this...
A 30 foot long snake woman with six arms. She rises up out of a pool of stagnant water littered with the bones of her kill. She hisses at you and darts towards you faster than something so big should be able to move. She engages you in combat and as you try to defend her tail wraps around your legs and lower torso. She lifts you up in the air, clawing your face and eyes, chocking you, and stabbing you in the abdomen. Scary huh?

But to answer your question I'd say that yes it can grapple with one set of arms while attacking with the other 4. Although it should only be the lower set so as to not get in the way of the other arms.

[kenjib]

I see.  So, just to be clear, the tail also gets an independent combat pool just like each pair of arms?

[MonkeyWrench]

just to be clear, the tail also gets an independent combat pool just like each pair of arms?

Exactly. Although I would treat it as having a lower CP than any of the sets of arms.

The demon would be a terrible opponent, capable of wading through combat. The downside is that all those combat pools are attached to one body. Pain, shock, and bloodloss would affect all CPs.

[kenjib]

Cool - that kind of power sounds really appropriate and really invokes some cool imagery.  I like it.  One other thing - if you face this demoness alone, can you still try terrain rolls to avoid fighting all of her at once, or is this not possible because it's one creature, or is it possible with a penalty?

[Mike Holmes]

Yep, this is the kind of epic creature that you don't fight unless it's got a hold of your wife and kids, guards the royal crown your after, is anathma to your faith, is threatening to burn down that village of nice people you who just put you up for a month for free after you got mangled fighting the He-, um Medusa, and you're feeling lucky besides. Yep, with enough SAs one guy can still take it on.

Or you have a bow, and are far enough away. Just how fast is it anyway? ;-)

BTW, there's no reason that the arms have to correspond by pairs in terms of it's developed ability to attack. If that seems too powerful, then just go with two opponent's worth. Dropped weapons and disarms will still be less of a problem, however, as will arm wounds.

Damn, now I really want to play this. :-)

Mike

[Durgil]

The bottom line, I guess is that it is some kind of supernatural creature, so it can pretty much do what ever you like.  I would think that if it followed any kind of natural laws though it could only concentrate on so many things given it only has one set of eyes that work in unison.  I guess what I would think is more plausible is close to additive, but with deminishing returns like 10 CP for one set of arms, 14 Cp for 2 sets of arms, and 17 for 3 sets, then treat it like a double or triple attack maneuver.  You could also just treat it like a normal 2 armed creature that's 3 times faster.

Just some ideas that came to mind tonight.

[Brian Leybourne]

I agree that the different CP's for different sets of arms should have a diminishing return. But not because it's having to divide its attention between them (I maintain that it would not have evolved the arms if it had not evolved the ability to use them perfectly), but because they are close enough that each set will be getting in the way of each other set etc.

Perhaps something like the creature gets it's full CP if it only uses one set of arms, or 75% of it's CP for each set if it uses 2 sets of arms, or 50% CP for each set of arms if it uses all three...?

Brian.

[MonkeyWrench]

Perhaps something like the creature gets it's full CP if it only uses one set of arms, or 75% of it's CP for each set if it uses 2 sets of arms, or 50% CP for each set of arms if it uses all three...?

So if it's full CP is 17 then using 4 arms would make it 13 and using all six would make it 9? (rounding up)
Three combat pools at 9 each isn't bad, especially if they are all used against one opponent. I like it.
What sort of maneuvers would you think would be available other than a triple strike?

[Brian Leybourne]

It opens up whole new options such as bind, strike and strike; block open, bind and strike, and so on :-)

Brian.

[Draigh]

or what about a stop short or feint with one arm, then four thrusts, each from different angles from the other arms?  That would leave the last arm for defense, if any were needed (assuming it had 6 arms)