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Old 02-10-2021, 08:05 PM   #31
hcobb
 
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Location: Pacheco, California
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

ITL 79 "They do not favor thrown or missile weapons, though they can fly overhead and drop rocks on you if the situation warrants"

BTW my reading of ITL 133 is that dropped rocks are far more accurate than crossbow bolts.
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Old 02-10-2021, 08:50 PM   #32
JohnPaulB
 
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Location: Portland, Maine
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

Quote:
Originally Posted by Axly Suregrip View Post
Hi Phiwum,
Sounds like you are looking to have a small group of NPC fighters where most will be beginning fighters.

Some design points:

Fighting gargoyles leads to HTH so armor is good and DX not so much (since the +4 DX in HTH). Also fine daggers will help in HTH, and having the dagger ready would be good too.

Also they should try to outnumber the gargoyles so that some can attack from outside of HTH into the pile. This would mean missile weapons are out, mostly. Also means the melee weapon is best to do high damage to deal with the armor. And it also means a pole weapon user won't be getting engaged, so he can back up and charge again.

Also consider a utility person with a missile weapon in case they are flying to avoid combat.

So this is a squad of four such hunters. They would lead with the two sword men while the crossbow and halberd play back to avoid getting into HTH. Also, they would want a physicker at base camp.

Thug leader 34 pt fighter

ST 14
DX 11(9)
IQ 9

Leather(-4*)
Bastard Swd
Very Fine Dagger (+2 damage) (1+4 in HTH)
Talent: *Toughness x2 (4 cost)
Has sword and dagger in each hand. Thus will not need to chance drawing the dagger when engaged in HTH.
How about making one of the group a wizard.

Give him one (or several) of these:
Clumsiness (T)
Rope (C)
Illusion (C)
Sleep (T)
Drain Strength (S)
Control Person (T)
Staff I, II, III (S)

If the gargoyle goes HTH, they are on the ground with the friend and all attacks on them are at +4 (ITL p117). If you shoot/stab into a HTH, you have a chance of Hitting Your Friends. So if you miss the gargoyle, you roll to see if you hit your friend.
However, if he uses a Thrown Spells, it never miss their target and hit another… they take full effect or none. Failure costs 1 Fatigue. (ITL p 136)

So make them Clumsy and reduce their DX for 3 turns.
Put them to sleep.
Control Person them. With maximum IQ of 10, they might not rebuff it.
With that low IQ, they might not be able to disbelieve all those illusions the Wiz is making. How about adding some Gargoyle Illusions to the mix.

Make a Rope to tangle them up, though the friend may not appreciate being tied up to a still thrashing/crushing gargoyle.

With Staff III, you can flare your energy from the hex next to the HTH or one more away, he gets a DX+3 bonus on top of the +4 DX (all rear hexes). Damage is 1 die or 1 fatigue. Staff III says it bypasses the Natural Defense of its target, but also says magical defenses such as Stone Flesh still operate. Is the part of the Gargoyles ability to stop 3 points of damage partially magical?

And lastly, once the Gargoyle is bound up, Drain his Strength for all its worth.
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Old 02-10-2021, 08:52 PM   #33
phiwum
 
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Boston area
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

Quote:
Originally Posted by hcobb View Post
ITL 79 "They do not favor thrown or missile weapons, though they can fly overhead and drop rocks on you if the situation warrants"

BTW my reading of ITL 133 is that dropped rocks are far more accurate than crossbow bolts.
This the paragraph you're citing?

Quote:
Originally Posted by ITL 133
Some fliers will drop rocks or weapons on their foes.
Spears and axes may be dropped at -4 to hit but do +2 damage
if they connect. Grenades, molotails, and gas bombs may be
dropped at -4, but with no damage bonus. Other weapons
are unlikely to do more than accidental or nuisance damage.
Informal weapons (like boulders) do 1 die damage for each
100 lbs. weight (they’re unlikely to hit squarely, but very
likely to graze and bruise). They, too, are dropped at -4 DX.
I guess I've missed any clear mention on the use of missile weapons, but dropped weapons (which must include rocks, surely) are at -4 DX. What do you think a crossbow's adjustment would be for a flyer?

I guess I'd tend to agree that a PC gargoyle shouldn't use a missile weapon, though not favoring them is different than never using them. It would take a special argument why this particular gargoyle is fond of crossbows, aside from the fact that they're a really good weapon.

I'd forgotten that rule about gargoyles, so thanks for that.
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Old 02-10-2021, 11:10 PM   #34
Axly Suregrip
 
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: Durham, NC
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

Quote:
Originally Posted by phiwum View Post
Thanks for the suggestion, Axly. A minor error is that the Lt Crossbow only fires once per turn, not twice, since it's a crossbow and not a bow.
Thanks for the correction. Yes, that is what I meant.
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Old 02-11-2021, 01:09 AM   #35
Steve Plambeck
 
Join Date: Jun 2019
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

Well if Gargoyles are intelligent in your world, I'm guessing the counter-measures they'd come up with to oppose systemic hunting would make them more fun to play than the hunters! I can see formations of them dropping large, weighted fishing nets onto the hunters, turning caves into traps that hold the hunters until they starve to death, dive bombing with rocks, starting landslides with the hunters halfway up the mountain, dousing with barrels of oil from above followed by lit torches... The hunters might turn out to be the coyotes where the Gargoyles are the roadrunners.

I wanna play the Gargoyles!
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Old 02-12-2021, 04:56 PM   #36
Anomylous
 
Join Date: Jul 2018
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

You do need a wizard, but they don't need to be particularly high IQ.

The magic combo is: Freeze, then Rope. By the time the Freeze spell wears off, the Rope will have entangled the gargoyle to the point where it won't be able to do much. You do need to find a gargoyle with ST <20, but they start at only ST 13 so this shouldn't be too difficult.

I guess the tactic would be to find the gargoyle equivalent of an outhouse and just camp out there. As long as they came one at a time you'd be golden... the real trick would be figuring out when to cut and run before they send a fully armed hunting party out to investigate why nobody's coming back from the loo... (Do gargoyles poop sand, or what?)
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Old 02-12-2021, 05:53 PM   #37
phiwum
 
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Boston area
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

Quote:
Originally Posted by Anomylous View Post
You do need a wizard, but they don't need to be particularly high IQ.

The magic combo is: Freeze, then Rope. By the time the Freeze spell wears off, the Rope will have entangled the gargoyle to the point where it won't be able to do much. You do need to find a gargoyle with ST <20, but they start at only ST 13 so this shouldn't be too difficult.

I guess the tactic would be to find the gargoyle equivalent of an outhouse and just camp out there. As long as they came one at a time you'd be golden... the real trick would be figuring out when to cut and run before they send a fully armed hunting party out to investigate why nobody's coming back from the loo... (Do gargoyles poop sand, or what?)
I created a metal ore eating horny toad that pukes little piles of non-metallic minerals picked up from caves.

Last edited by phiwum; 02-12-2021 at 06:14 PM.
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Old 06-13-2021, 04:38 PM   #38
JustAnotherJarhead
 
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Location: Cali
Default Re: Gargoyle hunting

Gargoyles don't know they can't "really" fly... so don't tell them their wings are pretty much useless, they Believe they can fly via wings, therefore...they can!

Gargoyle defense is stony skin, so treat as metal armor for all intents, it's not magical, they are a silicon based life force, but living none the less.

a hunting party would certainly include spears, to defend against aerial charge based attacks, Gargoyles are intelligent enough to not charge a pointy thing foolishly.

2d6 weapons will make mince meat of a Gargoyle in HTH with a companion, just don't miss too many times...lol I would favor having one ST15 character in the hunting party, with 3d6 weapons for a real wake up call.
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