Tuesday, April 20, 2010

A New Monster From My Lost City

I was working on my expansions for B4 The Lost City last year and it's grown into this several hundred page behemoth (with not one but TWO extraplanar gates - one of which is 150 page setting in and of itself) - and I haven't detailed New Cynidecia yet or any of the cavern, really. Most of what I have done so far has been re-tooling the pyramid and adding upper ruins (in the desert) and the aforementioned extraplanar areas. Now, I'm one who draws from a lot of different sources sometimes - especially when expanding someone else's adventure to begin with. So I've used some Dungeon Magazine and White Dwarf Magazine adventures, some d20 stuff, some old Judges Guild stuff, one MERP product, some ideas from a Dragonsfoot workshop page and several one page dungeon entries - that's what I can remember off the top of my head - to fill out some of these areas. But I've created a lot of the stuff, too - some whole cloth, some inspired by other products or images found online.

So, anyway, here's a creature that I created for the Necropolis Demiplane that is part of a large trap at the entrance of the Lich's lair (a trap that would not affect the PCs - it's part of the what keeps the power balance in the Demiplane...). So, here's a new critter for those who care about such things:

Guardian Columns

AC 5; MV 30’; HD 8; hp 8-64; THAC0 12; #AT 2; D 2-12/2-12; SD Edge weapons do 1 pt damage, special regeneration; SZ L; Int Non; AL N; XP 600+12/hp.

Guardian Columns appear as 4’ diameter columns of intertwined bones (human or otherwise) and, in fact, that is what they are. The necromancer who creates these aberrations gathers thousands of bones from any type of creature (the type has no effect whatsoever on the Guardian Column) and binds them together with a minor demon’s spirit form. The resulting creatures are often used as silent guardians.

The Guardian Column forms “legs” of sorts out of the bones and “walks” on these, rather slowly, though it can form “legs” anywhere.

The Guardian Column attacks with two “appendages” at a time that whip out from the body of the creature from nearly any point (giving the Columns a +2 to hit). The ends of the appendages are spiked with splintered and shattered bones, which grab the victim and tear at their flesh as they are hit and removed.

Guardian Columns take only one hp damage from edged weapons and no damage at all from arrows or spears (or other thrusting weapons), but take full damage from blunt weapons (that is, a blunt weapons does its full damage every time it hits – a mace does 6 hp damage for every hit).

A Guardian Column with a ready supply of bones (in, say, a charnel house) can continually re-form itself with the bones, thus, effectively, “regenerating” hit points every round until the bones are exhausted (splintered by blunt weapon attacks or magic attacks).

Like all undead, Guardian Columns are immune to mind affecting spells, cold attacks and lightning.


So...any good?

2 comments:

David The Archmage said...

I like it. I think the regeneration could use a little more explanation. Maybe tapping it out at double the original hit points? If it reaches 0 hp does it still regenerate?

Daen Ral Worldbuilder said...

Hmm

Okay - yeah at zero hit points the thing blows apart, never to reform.

I had intended the duration of regeneration to be DM discretion - I'm not sure how to quantify it (how many bones does it actually need?) It was more just a way to make the thing more creepy. "As you hit it, bones splinter and fly off the creature. An appendage grabs bones off the floor and...it seems stronger..." or something like that.