How would you Stat a Terentarek? I would say Sil 2, 30+ wounds, 8-10 soak, cortosis-like scales, and maybe caustic 5 for the poison gas it gives off when it dies. I have no idea for attacks though

Depending on size I'd give it Brawn 5 or 6 (some of them can apparently get bigger than a rancor) and a Brawl skill of 4 or 5. Then we'd be talking about claws that do something like 8-10 base damage, with some qualities like Pierce, Vicious and Knockdown. And maybe an ability that gives it a bonus to attack and track Force users, that would seem to be in keeping with the lore.

18 hours ago, Dumahcow said:

How would you Stat a Terentarek? I would say Sil 2, 30+ wounds, 8-10 soak, cortosis-like scales, and maybe caustic 5 for the poison gas it gives off when it dies. I have no idea for attacks though

Start with a Rancor. Give it 3 ranks in adversary. Give it some melee & ranged defense, probably 2 each. Give it the Sense power, so that it can search out Jedi and other Force Sensitives nearby. Maybe even give it some ranks in Durable and heck, the Suppress power to limit the use of the Force against it. Give it some ranks in Stealth and treat it as a more intelligent, cunning Rancor that hunts down Force Sensitives rather than a lumbering animal that runs entirely on instinct.

8 minutes ago, GroggyGolem said:

Start with a Rancor. Give it 3 ranks in adversary. Give it some melee & ranged defense, probably 2 each. Give it the Sense power, so that it can search out Jedi and other Force Sensitives nearby. Maybe even give it some ranks in Durable and heck, the Suppress power to limit the use of the Force against it. Give it some ranks in Stealth and treat it as a more intelligent, cunning Rancor that hunts down Force Sensitives rather than a lumbering animal that runs entirely on instinct.

The ranks in stealth are the most appalling part of your suggestions.

4 minutes ago, Degenerate Mind said:

The ranks in stealth are the most appalling part of your suggestions.

Appalling or deliciously evil?

Just now, GroggyGolem said:

Appalling or deliciously evil?

One in the same. Something that big with decent skills at sneaking around is an abomination against nature that needs to be expunged from creation, preferably with a salvo of nuclear warheads. Or two.

55 minutes ago, GroggyGolem said:

Start with a Rancor. Give it 3 ranks in adversary. Give it some melee & ranged defense, probably 2 each. Give it the Sense power, so that it can search out Jedi and other Force Sensitives nearby. Maybe even give it some ranks in Durable and heck, the Suppress power to limit the use of the Force against it. Give it some ranks in Stealth and treat it as a more intelligent, cunning Rancor that hunts down Force Sensitives rather than a lumbering animal that runs entirely on instinct.

The biggest problem I see with that is that Terentateks are actually smaller and less imposing than an actual Rancor. Terentateks are definitely Sil 2, not Sil 3. And making them as big a threat as a Rancor doesn't align with how Rancors and Terentateks are portrayed in KotOR. I agree with giving it the ability to sense, Suppress, and Adversary 2-3 to make it a threat to Force sensitives. Personally, I'd mix the stats of the Acklay, Rancor, and Vornskr.

Terentatek:

Brawn 5, Agility 1, Intellect 3, Cunning 3, Willpower 3, Presence 1

Soak 12, Wound 25, Strain 15

Skills: Brawl 4, Perception 2, Survival 3, Vigilance 2

Talents: Adversary 2, Force Rating 2

Abilities: Detect Force Sensitive (May make an Average Perception check to detect all Force-sensitive characters with a Force rating within medium range; this ability functions regardless of intervening terrain or materiel), Force Hunter (Gain a boost die to all combat checks made against Force-sensitive creatures or characters with a Force rating), Suppress (Spend 1 Force pip to add automatic Failure to Force power checks made against the Terentatek within short range until the end of his next turn. Commit a Force die to sustain ongoing effects of the power on each affected target while within range. Spend 1 Force pip to add an additional Failure to hostile Force power checks. Commit one or more Force die; when an opponent targets the Terentatek with a Force power, after the opponent generates Force pips reduce the total Force pips generated by one 1 per Force die committed, to a minimum of 0.), Toxin (if a target suffers wounds from a terentatek's toxic claw attack, the target mus tmake an Average Resilience check. The target suffers 5 wound if he fails, plus one strain per Threat. Despair means the target must check against the poison again at the start of his next turn.) Silhouette 2

Equipment: Toxic claws (Brawl; Damage 8, Critical 2; Range [Engaged]; Knockdown, Pierce 2)

20 minutes ago, Degenerate Mind said:

One in the same. Something that big with decent skills at sneaking around is an abomination against nature that needs to be expunged from creation, preferably with a salvo of nuclear warheads. Or two.

To be fair, terentateks were an abomination against nature, and the Jedi were attempting to expunge them from creation. But I still agree, they shouldn't have Stealth. They're not sneaky creatures, they're just wide-spread and live in hard-to-access dark and scary places. But the creatures themselves don't sneak around. They're about as subtle as a brick to the face.

1 minute ago, Underachiever599 said:

To be fair, terentateks were an abomination against nature, and the Jedi were attempting to expunge them from creation. But I still agree, they shouldn't have Stealth. They're not sneaky creatures, they're just wide-spread and live in hard-to-access dark and scary places. But the creatures themselves don't sneak around. They're about as subtle as a brick to the face.

Those are all fair points.

D20 radio did one a while back.

19 minutes ago, Underachiever599 said:

The biggest problem I see with that is that Terentateks are actually smaller and less imposing than an actual Rancor. Terentateks are definitely Sil 2, not Sil 3. And making them as big a threat as a Rancor doesn't align with how Rancors and Terentateks are portrayed in KotOR. I agree with giving it the ability to sense, Suppress, and Adversary 2-3 to make it a threat to Force sensitives. Personally, I'd mix the stats of the Acklay, Rancor, and Vornskr.

Terentatek:

Brawn 5, Agility 1, Intellect 3, Cunning 3, Willpower 3, Presence 1

Soak 12, Wound 25, Strain 15

Skills: Brawl 4, Perception 2, Survival 3, Vigilance 2

Talents: Adversary 2, Force Rating 2

Abilities: Detect Force Sensitive (May make an Average Perception check to detect all Force-sensitive characters with a Force rating within medium range; this ability functions regardless of intervening terrain or materiel), Force Hunter (Gain a boost die to all combat checks made against Force-sensitive creatures or characters with a Force rating), Suppress (Spend 1 Force pip to add automatic Failure to Force power checks made against the Terentatek within short range until the end of his next turn. Commit a Force die to sustain ongoing effects of the power on each affected target while within range. Spend 1 Force pip to add an additional Failure to hostile Force power checks. Commit one or more Force die; when an opponent targets the Terentatek with a Force power, after the opponent generates Force pips reduce the total Force pips generated by one 1 per Force die committed, to a minimum of 0.) Silhouette 2

This is perfect. I am definitely going to adapt this as a monster on either Chronicles of the Gatekeeper or Ghosts of Dathomir

2 minutes ago, Dumahcow said:

This is perfect. I am definitely going to adapt this as a monster on either Chronicles of the Gatekeeper or Ghosts of Dathomir

Thanks! I just edited it to add a weapon and the poison aspect (borrowing the neurotoxin from the Kouhun out of Force and Destiny). I might throw it into my game as well one of these days, but at the moment I'd say my PCs aren't exactly equipped to handle it. Two of the players would have serious trouble doing any sort of damage due to the high soak.

Legends has them as incredibly hard to kill creatures that close knit high level groups go around vanquishing.

13 minutes ago, Underachiever599 said:

Thanks! I just edited it to add a weapon and the poison aspect (borrowing the neurotoxin from the Kouhun out of Force and Destiny). I might throw it into my game as well one of these days, but at the moment I'd say my PCs aren't exactly equipped to handle it. Two of the players would have serious trouble doing any sort of damage due to the high soak.

This thing's favorite food was Jedi, so it should at least be virtually impossible for a couple low-level players to kill without some serious creativity and discretionary spending.

Or starship weaponry, if you feel like cheating.

1 hour ago, Underachiever599 said:

The biggest problem I see with that is that Terentateks are actually smaller and less imposing than an actual Rancor. Terentateks are definitely Sil 2, not Sil 3. And making them as big a threat as a Rancor doesn't align with how Rancors and Terentateks are portrayed in KotOR.

They were smaller in the game, weren't they? Yet the lore is that they were mutated Rancors through the means of Sith Alchemy and we have a visual of Terentateks on page 75 of Keeping the Peace (they were larger than Sil 3 there). I used the game, the EU and the image in the book as reference and figured sil 3 was the most even ground between it all. Supposedly those things were incredibly tough to kill for Jedi and I would imagine that they were hard to track sometimes. I can understand skipping the stealth ranks but I think the size and stats of a rancor might even be too little for those things.

In the kotor games, they aren't all that challenging by the time you face them because you're high level and kind of a Force user savant (in either game, really). Either the other Jedi were all terrible at their jobs, they were lying about the strength of such creatures or the main character has godlike power (considering what you can accomplish in the games, i'd go with the last option). In that case, a terentatek shouldn't be as easy to kill as a rancor at higher XP levels.

37 minutes ago, GroggyGolem said:

They were smaller in the game, weren't they? Yet the lore is that they were mutated Rancors through the means of Sith Alchemy and we have a visual of Terentateks on page 75 of Keeping the Peace (they were larger than Sil 3 there). I used the game, the EU and the image in the book as reference and figured sil 3 was the most even ground between it all. Supposedly those things were incredibly tough to kill for Jedi and I would imagine that they were hard to track sometimes. I can understand skipping the stealth ranks but I think the size and stats of a rancor might even be too little for those things.

In the kotor games, they aren't all that challenging by the time you face them because you're high level and kind of a Force user savant (in either game, really). Either the other Jedi were all terrible at their jobs, they were lying about the strength of such creatures or the main character has godlike power (considering what you can accomplish in the games, i'd go with the last option). In that case, a terentatek shouldn't be as easy to kill as a rancor at higher XP levels.

In KotOR, we see a captive rancor early on in the game, and it's every bit as massive as the one in Return of the Jedi. When we see the terentateks, they're clearly meant to be much smaller. More reminiscent of the sub-species of wild rancors that are seen at the end of the game on Rakata Prime. Even the smaller, weaker wild rancors on Rakata are more deadly than the terentateks that you run into in KotOR.

If you read the journals you can collect from the bodies of the Jedi who hunted the terentateks, you find out that the Jedi really were just bad at their job. If I recall correctly, two of the three Jedi who had ventured forth fell in love, and there was some sort of schism between them and the third Jedi. They parted ways, and the third Jedi went on his own to confront the terentatek on Kashyyyk. A single Jedi facing off against a terentatek clearly proved to be no match. However, this is less because the terentateks are bigger and scarier than rancors, and more because they live in Dark Side nexuses and Force powers don't work well against them. After that, I don't recall the exact chain of events, but I remember one of the two lovers died, and the second one gave in to the Dark Side before going on a suicide mission while hunting the terentateks. Suffice to say, if the three Jedi hadn't messed up their job and split the party over some love interest, they probably would've done much better hunting the terentateks.

As for how one should stat a terentatek in this RPG, your very last sentence there is pretty telling. It depends on the XP level, and how much of a challenge you expect a single terentatek to be against your party. I went with the more conservative route for the terentatek stats because I don't really see one as being "the big bad," and more just a very challenging obstacle in the path of your actual goal. But if you're a really high level and the big threat is the terentatek, then I see no reason it can't be statted out to be more difficult than a rancor.

To be fair I think they should also be obstacles more than big bads but you reallllllly have to make things a challenge without bending rules severely with GM Fiat to challenge high level PCs. For sure you can scale them accordingly to the party. Considering the consensus that Jedi level PCs are 500-1000 XP and beyond, this is why I consider Terentateks should be a high level challenge.

The stats here aren't enough to deal with a party, especially not a party with lightsabers. That 12 Soak becomes 2 Soak against a lightsaber, which means even Jedi with a basic untweaked crystal will be doing 5+ damage every hit, so it won't take many attacks to carve it up. Tweaked lightsabers will turn it into pudding. It needs multiple attacks and a way to neutralize a couple PCs at a time. Perhaps a toxic cloud that can stagger opponents within Short range. And maybe even a couple of ranks of Parry...

Resurrecting a topic. This week i might only have 2 players, a wookiee and a human hired gun, neither Force Sensitive. My idea is to have wookiee go on a hunt in the forest for one as a traditional ceremony. The more success againt one, the more honor. Also might have an old clone wars MTT with battle droids accidentally come back online and attack a village.

...and I just realized it's in Collapse of the Republic

On 10/16/2017 at 1:34 PM, Degenerate Mind said:

This thing's favorite food was Jedi, so it should at least be virtually impossible for a couple low-level players to kill without some serious creativity and discretionary spending.

Or starship weaponry, if you feel like cheating.

I feel like cheating against stuff that deadly. I'm surprised that more jedi didn't

I believe someone stated one in an article over at d20radio.com.

7 hours ago, Count Cenex de Solaan said:

I believe someone stated one in an article over at d20radio.com.

Direct link to the article in question:

http://www.d20radio.com/main/holonet-uplink-beasts-of-moraband-iii-terentatek/

As is per the usual for a lot of Chris Hunt's stat blocks, it was written in mind for his group of high-XP characters, so this thing is a monster with a wound threshold that means even a party of lightsaber wielders is going to have a slog ahead of them to chew through the monster's wounds.

“Look, it’s a terentatek.”

So, looking at the Terentatek as statted out in Collapse of the Republic, I'm seeing that I wasn't too far off:

I had Brawn 5 instead of Brawn 6. I had the Agility and Intellect mixed around (although I feel that was actually a typo on my part back then, as I can't imagine why I would give it a high intellect). I was spot on with the Wound and Strain, but I was off by three on the Soak (12 instead of 15). I had Brawl 4 instead of Brawl 2, but I nailed it on Perception 2, Survival 3, and Vigilance 2. I was one rank of Adversary too high, sitting at Adversary 2 instead of 1 (I was aiming for a challenge for my current group, sitting well over 300 XP at the time, iirc). My description for Detect Force Sensitive is almost spot on with the Force Sense given to the official build, with my version only going out to Medium instead of Extreme. I also had Damage 8 on the toxic claws, same as the book. However, my version had a much more brutal poison, and lots of other abilities, while the book instead just goes for high pierce, stun 5, and vicious 4.

All in all, I'm pretty proud of my educated guess back then! Between this, a few of the capital ships, and the B2 Super Battle Droids, I've been on a roll with all my old home brews.

Now, to just figure out how I want to throw the Terentatek at my players in this campaign...