RMA: Medusa

Monsters with petrification attacks are not new fodder for this blog, and this Greek classic has been mentioned in those conversations, but I haven't done a full write-up on her before. She is a rather interesting monster for a few reasons, so let's get to it, shall we?

First off, I'm going to mention the pedantic issue of the name and then drop the issue. I know that in mythology Medusa was the individual character's name, not a race. I'm not sure of why D&D handles the name this way - perhaps because of the other D&D Gorgon - but for whatever reason, like the Pegasus, Medusa has become synonymous with the creature type.

Secondly, you know I loves me some Harryhausen, but just to be clear, he completely made up* the whole "half snake, half woman" design for 1981's Clash of the Titans. The original creature was a woman with snake hair and a face that would make a train take a dirt road.

Medusas (Medusae?) have a reputation for being TPK material, which may be why I have not seen them used much. Granted there is one in B2's Caves of Chaos, but other than that I personally haven't run into them much. When you look at the stats, though, they have some weaknesses along with their obviously strengths.

Medusa (from Moldvay)

AC: 8
HD: 4**
Move: 90' (30')
Att: 1 snakebite + special
Damage: 1d6 + poison
No. App. 1d3 (1d4)
Save: F4
Morale: 8
Treasure: F
AL: C

NOTE: For convenience I'm going to refer to the medusa as "she/her" instead of "it", even though the Medusa isn't really human (I'm not going to even get into the idea of an all-female species!)

With her poor AC and so-so hit dice and low morale, its obvious she isn't a combat powerhouse. We'll get to her petrification ability in a moment, but first I want to talk about the snakes. Despite having a head full of them, she only gets the one 1d6 bite per round. Sure it's save or die. But it's death in one turn, which gives the afflicted character a chance to keep fighting, or get a Neutralize Poison cast on him before keeling over. Beyond that, she has no other attack.

"But wait!" You say. "Her gaze is an attack!"

Nope.

The description is quite clear. It is the act of looking at the medusa's face that petrifies its victims, not her looking at you. She can (and often does) try to find ways to trick people into looking at her face (she's Chaotic, after all), but Flesh to Stone beams don't shoot out of her peepers. Some petrifying creatures, like the Gorgon and Cockatrice, attack to "stone" their victims. Not so the medusa.

That being said, it's still a dangerous ability. Typically, she will trick a party into looking her while covered with a hood or veil or some such. Then, WHAMMO! A few bad saves and she has a new statue garden. PCs that avoid getting stoned are left either hamstringing themselves by shutting their eyes or trying to mess with a mirror. On top of all this, the medusa is getting a fat +2 to saves against any incoming spells.

It's interesting to note that by strict interpretation, even though multiple medusae can appear in an encounter, each one is only vulnerable to seeing its own face (not the others').

Given its tactics described on B39 and in The Keep, it's fair to assume a medusa has human level intelligence. This begs the question "What does it want?" I expect a lot of good RP fodder and plot hooks could be found here. Obviously if she had or knew something important to the PCs, she might ask a favor in return, as she certainly can't easily move about in normal society to get what she wants or needs.

* “Every statue I’d seen [Medusa] was just a woman with a pretty face and had snakes in her hair. Well, that wasn’t very dramatic, so I gave her a rather demonic look. We gave her a rattlesnake’s tail, so that she could be a menace from the sound effect point-of-view. It was a shock to see her come out from behind the wall crawling on her hands because that was the only way she could propel herself.” 

- Ray Harryhausen

Moldvay Musings XV: I Do Declare!

In an earlier post, I touched on situations that require "pre-declaring" actions in BX. That is to say, before initiative is rolled. This is an interesting artifact of older D&D, as I do not think it is used much in "modern" RPGs. Honestly, we've hardly used it ourselves in my group and I don't even recall using it back in the day. Maybe as my beard grays my gray matter is getting a bit tired.

There are a couple of reasons I think this idea has fallen out of favor. For one, it feels a bit more like a legacy mechanic from D&D's wargame roots than something that was consciously added to the early game; kind of like the whole idea of phases to one's actions (Melee, Ranged, etc.). Newer editions by contrast simply tell the player how much of which kinds of actions they can complete on their turn.

The second reason is that pre-declaring can feel like it is making it harder for players to react tactically in an encounter. If I already declared I was casting Bless, then does that mean I can't switch to Cure Light Wounds when I see our fighter get wounded?

These are valid concerns and they do affect the nature of game play, but before dismissing them out of hand, let's look at some of the benefits of this rule.

1. What's good for the goose. Enemy/NPC/Monster spell casters should need to declare as well. Perhaps as a DM you don't want to tell the party exactly which spell is being flung at them, but the PCs should at least be able to see that the pesky goblin shaman is starting to chant and wave his arms around. This lets the characters A) know who the enemy spell casters are, and B) plan accordingly.
2. Spell interruption as a tactic. It's true that would royally suck as a low level magic user if your only spell of the day got fizzled because some kobold scored one lousy point of damage from a sling stone. Of course, as mentioned in the first point, that means the PCs can do the same thing to the bad guys (assuming the initiative die is behaving). This can give weaker PCs the opportunity to have a greater effect on the combat, especially if they have a good DEX or other initiative bonuses (like halflings). Also, it gives the aforementioned MU that's tapped out on spells something to do: Just chuck a dagger at any enemy casters and Presto! Old School Counterspell! This also gives players a chance to do something about that incoming Fireball before they're stuck saving for half damage. 
3. Making magic more than artillery. If your spell casters are vulnerable in this way, it makes the successful use of any spell more useful. When you look at the spell lists in BX, not that many spells are really designed for use in the middle of the fight. Even with a very generous interpretation of what constitutes a "combat" spell (eg healing magic, protection spells, etc.), it only works out to approximately 50%. If a magic-user or cleric's spells aren't as "useful" in a fight, then it gives the players (and the DM) the opportunity to explore some of the other cool magical stuff these characters can do. (For ideas, might I recommend perusing the series of Random Spell Assessments on this very blog!). This also plays into what I've described as a more BX feel to magic, with a more distinctive "flavor" to magic and spell casting.

Personally, I could see going either way with this rule (ignoring or implementing). On the one hand, I know that players generally are loathe to be limited by arbitrary mechanics, but on the other, I do think that this could bring an interesting wrinkle to the game. Some house rules I might consider if I were to try it could include things like: 

• An ability check (WIS for clerics, INT for MU/Elves) to retain the failed spell. ie it fails, but you don't forget the spell for the day.
• Letting PCs or monsters shield their side's spell caster to grant them an AC/cover bonus until the spell goes off.