The Bestiary FAQ

The Hollow Earth Expedition (HEX) roleplaying game has been in existence for about five months now officially, and there are many elements of the game system that have aspects to them that make the players, and GMs, think a little bit. This Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) page is designed to answer some of the commonly asked questions about one of the more common HEX game elements - Creatures and Beasties of the Hollow Earth and the Surface World.

Bestiary Frequently Asked Questions

I was looking over the book and noticed that no creature or person had a Defense higher than 8. Is this an intentional system limit or just a coincidence?

Jeff Combos had this to say... "Great question. There is no limit on Defense. Large creatures often have high Body ratings, but their Size rating drags their Defense down to where normal characters can hit them. The end result is a Defense rating below 10 and a whole bunch more Health points for the larger creature. As you've seen in the game, it balances pretty well. T-rexes are tough creatures, but not invulnerable.

Do you have some kind of rating system for various creatures, so I can try to constuct my own or gauge how many I should put up against the party?

Jeff Combos had this to say: "When creating all the creatures in the bestiary, I did have a system that I used. In general, most creatures started with 12 Attribute points and 10 Skill points. For each power level I bumped them up, I gave them +6 Attribute points and no addtional Skill points because they are Animals. They also received an additional Talent per power level I increased them by.

"If all of that is too much trouble (or confusing) I recommend taking a creature from the bestiary and using the same number of Attribute, Skill, and Talents points to create another creature."

Does it stand to reason for creatures and beasties, due to their Size, that the bigger you are, the worse a combatant you are?

Actually, this is not the case at all. First of all, let's deal with Size. True, as a creature gets larger it becomes more difficult for it to hit targets smaller than itself. On the other hand, the huge creature gets to use its full Attack Rating against creatures its own Size. Also, as creatures get larger, their "weapon" ratings scale up as well. For example, a Tyrannosaurus Rex gets a +4L bonus to its Attack Rating because of the size of its bite. Therefore, in an example with a Size 16 creature, it would have an Attack Rating of 22 versus a Size 0 opponent (Str 16 + Brawl 4 + Skill Aptitude 2 + "weapon rating" 16 - Size 16 = 22). It would do a whopping 9 points of damage on average to a normal human!

Also, one could make a case that a creature that large would make Area of Effect attacks and ignore the whole Size penalty entirely.

How does a Tyrannosaurus Rex maintain its full Defense against 4 combatants that are Size -2? Is it because of Size, i.e., you maintain your full Defense against a number of opponents equal to your Size?

Basically, a creature gets to maintain its full Defense against smaller creatures for each 2 points of Size difference (See Size Bonus, HEX page 126). In this case, the Tyrannousaurus Rex is 6 points larger, so it gets to use its full Defense against 4 opponents (the first one is free + 3 more). Mixing and matching different Sized opponents gets a bit complicated, but you can figure it out depening on the order of Initiative during the turn.

Special thanks to Jeff Combos, Melissa McNally, M. Sechin Tower, and the folks on the Hollow Earth Expedition (HEX) forums for their help in the compiling of this FAQ information.

Hollow Earth Expedition is a trademark and copyright of Exile Game Studio, LLC. The Hollow Earth Expedition Logo and other graphics are copyright of Exile Game Studio, LLC, and are used with their permission. The Ubiquity game mechanics are copyright of Exile Game Studio, LLC, and are mentioned and used with their permission. All distinctive Hollow Earth Expedition logos and terms are trademarks of Exile Game Studio, LLC. No attempt is being made here to supercede any of the copyrights and trademarks mentioned above. The HEX Compass graphic was created by Daniel Potter, and the permission of John M. Kahane and Daniel Potter is required for use of this Logo by any other persons.