Where is the Protean from 3rd ed !

The protean was one of my favorites. Apparently it didn't make the cut.

Ah yes, everybody's favourite flesh eating man-sized amoeba with shape shifting abilities. It's The Blob and Attack of the Body Snatchers all rolled into one.

Well, I can try a conversion but I've only got the rules from 2nd ed. The biggest problem is that its got a host of unique rules that are quite poorly explained. "Use the protean's Quickness Rating to determine how quickly it reassembles" (PAoE, p.83) - wtf?! I'd rather stick to established rules. Additionally, the stats are variable depending on the protean's mass, but on such a small scale that this seems hardly worth it. We lose nothing when the GM handles the mass just arbitrarily, so let's forget about that.
So, how's that?

Protean
B__A__R__S__C__I__L__W__EDG__ESS__M__Init__IP
2__3__1__1__1__4__1__3___3____4____4___5___1
Movement: 10/15

Skills: Infiltration 3, Unarmed Combat 4, Perception 2
Powers: Immunity to normal weapons, Allergy (fire, alkalis, hydrophobic and dehydrating agents), Regeneration*, Engulf (Acid damage)**, Imitation***

*The protean can only be killed by damage from one of its allergies or direct combat spells. If the damage track is filled by any other means it is only stunned and can continue to make regeneration tests every round.

**When a victim tries to break free the protean receives +4 dice to the opposed test due to its sticky slime.

***Treat as a non-magical Physical Mask spell with a number of successes equal to 1/2 the critter's magic. A protean can only try to imitate the last vicitm it devoured.

Doesn't Immunity to normal weapons only double the critters armour? Then what is it's armour?

Immunity to normal weapons gives hardened armor equal to twice the creatures magic. So this creature would have 8 points.

Interesting.

What happens to this creature when someone with Astral Hazing gets engulfed or gets within [Essence] meters?

Magic goes down to zero, Immunity dissapears, Acid attack has F0?

Only thing left is not getting stuck in this (now) mobile piece of Jell-o.

Are you saying that I can't kill this thing with magic? I find THAT a bit much. If I fry it with lightning or hammer it with Manabolts, I assume it is dead.

And you're assumption is wrong. Isn't that bad when you turn around to deal with something else and it wakes back up and engulfs you from behind? Now if you had a fire spell of some kind, you could kill it. You could also grab something of its weakness and sprinkle it over the corpse (D&D Troll style) to kill it.

The funny part though is that hydrophobic and dehydrating agents are painfully common. Like, the blob could never survive because it would roll over so many of them that it would kill itself. The human body itself contains plenty of hydrophobic things, so the blob would kill itself trying to eat a human. Suggest removing the hydrophobic part (because it won't do anything to the blob) and specifying that the desiccants have to be high grade and/or large amounts.

Oh just sprinkle some salt on the bastard and call it a day. Watch him bubble up and shrivel like a snail.

Well, salt is neither a descant nor hydrophobic, so according to the weaknesses, salt wouldn't do anything, though it certainly seems like it should.

I suppose it's important when referring to salt that it's sodium chloride. Although I saw Alkalis listed as a weakness, so an alkaline salt WOULD work.

Or just go for some agent orange (it's white, damnit!)

Salt acts dehydrating, though. As a GM, I'd allow it. Paranormal Animals of Europe also mentions that dumping the critter in a pit of quicklime would kill it. As a rule of thumb I'd say that you need about 1 kilo of any agent to kill it. In the age of the underbarrel flamethrower the protean has lost some of its edge anyway.

Omitting magic is an oversight on my part, though. The original text only mentions immunity to impact and projectile weapons, so magic fries the fragger just fine. Sorry, I'll fix it.

Alkalis are also a type of base, as in acid/base. That's the kind I was thinking of. Also, even if it does mean Alkali metals, Na isn't the same as Na⁺ when in solution with Cl^-, so salt likely wouldn't work.

Inject alkaline chemicals !

I don't know much about chemistry. However, as X-Kalibur pointed out, salt works messy wonders against snails. Let's forget about weaknesses for a moment - is there any reason why contact with salt wouldn't work the same way with proteans?

Maybe, being magical creatures, they can take it?

One of the most memorable moments of our 1st/2nd edition marathon gaming sessions. My veteran players [badasses] have completed a deep dark black op in the english country side and find themselves on foot. Crossing a farmers field late into the night. Encountering one lone cow seemingly left out to pasture. The Elven Samurai lets out a giggle as he starts jogging towards the cow for some good ole fashion "cow tippin". The laughter subsides as the team realizes there prime samurai is screaming in horrible pain. Lights are ignited and focused on the "cow". Revealing its misshapen features and ghastly abilities as it appears to be dissolving their Elf. A running gun fight ensues for the first and only time exhausting every single round/charge/reload they were carrying. There blind run into the night leads them to some abandon standing stones that appear to keep the beast at bay. They spend a sleepless night atop the standing stones, the beast finally wandering off in the morning. They waited several extra hours before climbing down just in case. I loved the Protean!

Well, it could have some magic property that keeps it from trying to equilibrate with salt on it, or it might not have an osmotic membrane, or it might have a protective layer like most creatures.

I mean if it can shapeshift into a person, I'd imagine it can have a protective layer to stop salt causing it to shrivel up.

P.S. Distilled water is more fun than salt.

Whenever you meet a protean and have a mage with you.

1: MANA STATIC!
Engulf your fighting area with mana static at at least -4 Force and their magic defenses, regenerate and shapeshifting powers are moot as their magic rating is null and void.

2: Shoot until dead.

3: Shoot a little more.

4: Burn the remains.

When I was in graduate school my advisor made a comment to me about how often I used the term "protean" as an adjective to describe variable disease presentations. He said "You sure like that word, don't you?" Little did he know it was just an homage to one of my favorite SR critters...

That would work, of course - but wouldn't that cancel the allergies to alkalis etc., too? I'm still thinking from the angle that salt sucks up moisture, so it might count as a dehydrating agent IMHO. Does anybody know how non-awakened amoebas react to salt?

Salt does not suck up moisture.

As for non-awakened amoebas, as single cell organisms, I'm reasonably sure they'll shrivel up and die as the water osmoses out of them.

Thank you for the explanation I think that's good enough for making the protean vulnerable to salt in my campaign. I'm beginning to suspect that the original author knew as much as me about this stuff.

Throw rice or silica, or drywall compound on it. Heh can you see shadowrunners carting around a 10lb bag of rice on a run?

Would dirt be considered something that sucks up moisture?

Hehe, rice. True, it is used as a desiccant. As for dirt, it doesn't really suck up moisture so much as just mix with it (which is why you get mud). Like I said, this is why I suggested specifying that it has to be a strong desiccant. Rice works, great for keeping your salt from clumping up from moisture in the air, but it isn't the sort of thing you see in a laboratory.