Cross town Monstrosity (Umbra City - Maleth Noir)

Sometimes you need that high level encounter for the whole group.  Sometimes you need a threat that can destabilize the whole place (however temporarily) and sometimes you need a Big Damn Monster for the PCs to slay, all nice and public like, to get the neighborhood/city/authorities/whomever on their side (Big Damn Heroes[1]). 

Like the city being invaded by a tribe of mutants or a few of the other wider ranging encounters in Sub-ether #1, this is one of those encounters.

An all-points bulletin hits the comms traffic; city districts are being placed into lockdown preventing travel between them and the largest scramble of hex spinners anyone has ever seen just dispatched overhead…heading for the Shades.

A cancer mage was cornered at the Reccie-works and called up some abomination to cover their escape.  So, there’s a monster raging out of control at the surface street level of the Reclamation works (section Gamma). And oh yeah, there’s a cancer mage running lose in the city.  

Just another day-cycle, right?

The monster at the Reccieworks will not be stopped, certainly not by the SecFor   Whether this was the sorcerer’s plan or not in the first place, they called up some kind of ... dreggu golem,

Dreggu Golem (1): Init +2; Atk flailing slam +8 melee (1d8+3 + see below); AC 17; HD 11d8; hp 40; MV 20’; Act 2d24; SP Skin that runs and flows like wax, Toxic touch; SV Fort +8, Ref +2, Will +2; AL C.

Skin that runs and flows like wax – the at once seemingly waxy, slippery, pudding-like surface covering the creature is in fact’s it’s skin and muscles, and it is hungry with necrosis, death, and incredibly regenerating, throbbing, pulsing LIFE.  Skin to bare surface contact results in 1d6 hp damage from chemical action and the loss of several layers of skin as the golem’s body attempts to absorb and eat the skin and muscles of those it comes into contact with.  This is in addition to and cumulative with Toxic touch below.  

The creature is slippery that attempts to hold fast or grab onto the creature do so a step down on the die chain.  

Toxic touch – the touch of the screaming creature carries with it a death sentence. A successful Fort save (DC 21) must be made to avoid this fate.  On a successful slam attack or any direct skin or body surface contact with the creature, the skin at once infects, mutates, and tries to consume that which it is in contact with.  Functionally this is combined chemical attack/alteration that inflicts 2d6 hp damage, and 2d3 points of ability damage.  On a failed save this also imparts a rapid acting regenerative cancer to the victim, metastasizing in 1d6 progressions and killing the character in 1d3 months.   ON a successful save, the afflicted still takes damage but can save to recover half of the ability damage (Fortitude DC 16) a day later. Further, while the character needs to be seen at a trauma facility, they are not imparted with immediate toxic death, though there is a 2% cumulative per passing sidereal that this will become so.

Mutants and Variants gain a +4 against this effect as their systems are hardened against even supernatural cancers.  Non-organics struck by this effect still incur the physical hp damage but suffer no ability damage and no chance of cancer.

Roleplaying Hints:   KILL ME I AM IN PAIN!!!  There is nothing left to be reasoned with. It just wants to die.   Kill it.   It is constantly making noises of raging pain, but all is too distorted to make out. 

The creation of a desperate cancer mage; this could only have happened at a Reclamation Works where someone (or more likely several someones) have been … recycled.  Soul fragments those “reclaimed” while living now dead summoned and infused into the semi-organic runoff from the Reanimators (dreggu) now shaped by poisonous will into a doughy roughly person shaped raging monstrosity.  

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[1] especially if they are a bunch of DCC characters someone magicked up to deal with the problem.  While this won’t likely make them Noir’s version of the Avengers all by itself it will def. get them noticed and looked at favorably by many. 

Spiders of dreams and gears.

Plague wheels spider  Init +1; Atk bite +1 (1d6); AC 16, HD 2d10; MV 25’; Act 1d20; SP Mucous injection (see below) takes no damage from blunt weapons or poison; SV Fort +2, Ref +2, Will +0, AL C.

A large (16 inches across) jeweled spider, seeming wrought of metal and gemstones, surprisingly light as it scuttles up your body and onto your face.

The spider rides your face at night, filling your head with a lightly paralytic gooey substance (that is nearly indistinguishable from snot) that over the next d7 saps you (daily) of d2 Sta, d2 Str and d3 Pers; if caught early in many societies this will likely go unnoticed as just another bout of illness.

Anyone else will find that they die in their sleep on the relevant night.   Their consciousness however does not wander far afield.  The sixteen glass ‘slats’ mounted (eight to a side) along the ‘spider’s’ thorax are galvanic-orichalcum treated glasstel soul storage crystals.  The deceased’s consciousness and soul remain within, sleeping though dreaming of life as a predatory spider.  

D3 nights after the deceased died, unless measures have been taken with the body, it is possible the spider will suggest the remnants shift up into their next form.

At that point a mysterious and bizarre ‘clockwork infection’ sets in.  Over the next day period, the body slowly grows an assortment of gears, springs, and pulleys within the body, wrought largely of the deceased’ own tissues, until by nightfall the body is such that the spider can puppet.

Owing to its extraplanar origin (somewhere between the Clockwork Doom and the land of Nightmares likely) it takes absolutely no damage from blunt or piercing weapons. Only slashing and energy attacks will inflict normal damage upon one of these creatures.   Further the spiders are immune to poison, including gas attacks. They require neither air nor food.  

Note also, the mucousy proboscis is AC 8 when exposed and must be exposed for a round before and a round after penetrating the head of a sleeping person.  Inflicting so much as four points of damage directly to it will render it useless; double that will remove the proboscis and assembly completely.

Plague wheels spider-zombie  Init as spider; Atk +1 by weapon or +1 fists  (1d3 plus 1d4 from metal spikes that extrude on a hit); AC 12 (as deceased), HD 2d8 (never more than host organism however); MV 25’; Act 1d20; SP  immune to mind control, sleep, or mind influencing attacks and effects; SV Fort +0, Ref +0, Will +0, AL N.

Unless freed from their ‘glass’ housing, the souls will remain perpetually trapped within the spider’s corpse, even after it’s destruction.  Any magic, super-science, psychic or psionic attempt to move that soul may be successful however anyone so returned to their somewhat rotted, gear infected corpse would likely (DC 22 and higher! Will save to avoid) go mad with the constant sound of their own, constant and grinding mechanical processes while attempting to inhabit a fever heated but nonetheless rotting organic brain……...

The Cannibal Crawlers of Ilthxos IX

The Cannibal Crawlers of Ilthxos IX

These bizarre mutant degenerates are all that remains of the industrial age civilization native to the far star of Ilthxos.  But all of that changed when pacts were made with powers fell and within but a few generations, the whole of the race was fractured and warring, devolving into brutal new forms with every passing generation until the utter end…..

The otherworldly power that infested and ultimately, ruined that world, has wrecked the people’s remnants, but the eldritch nature of the thing allows them* to be summoned to far planets such as yours.

Might be a tad upset about all this.  Thank you John Crptenter's the Thing. Plz don't sue.

Cannibal Crawler (2d6 number, if applicable): Init +2; Atk club or bone knife +2  melee (1d4+2) and/or fists  (+2 melee 1d3+2)  or +1 bite (2d6+4); AC 13; HD 2d8+2; hp 11 each or hp 14 (1), 11 (x2), 9 (x2),  7 (x 7);  MV 35; Act 1d24; SP bite;

SV Fort +3 , Ref +3, Will +0; AL Chaotic (“Wild and free and beyond good and evil.”).

A bite attack will subject the attacker to their savage, pointed teeth designed for the tearing of flesh and crushing of bone; it is an awkward attack form for a formerly upright biped however thus it’s low attack rating.  DAmage is for the initial attack. The cannibal creature is then likely to keep chewing, with every intent on eating their prey alive.  They will sometimes persist in their meal past the point of sense allowing them to be killed but not to the point of saving whom they  were consuming...thus adding to their savage reputation.

This sad guy is the best "degenerate post future rawr cannibal" I could find in 15 minutes. My google fu is weak sauce today.

1 in 4 (roughly) are known to have a toxic secretion from their fingers that reacts poorly with untainted flesh (DC 13 Fort save or begin suffering from a rotting disease that will inflict 1d6 hp and STA per day until it kills them; quite likely the dead rise as Cannibal Crawlers. ) This does not affect (and is not triggered by) contact with their own kind.

Description

These formerly humanoid beings are now forever stooped, their fullness of stance vanished in the same generation as their fullness of mind.  The decline of sentience was a rough and violent time.  Those more tainted than others had the advantage and tended to survive.

Their silvery yellow skins show signs of warp and stretching; indeed, their features seem very much as though at some point their original features tried hard to physically divide in two.  They look and, in fact seem to be, in agony all of the time.  

They hunt by scent and vibration; they prefer intelligent humanoids for some tittering insane reason and can tell by the combination of upright walk and pheromones, which on some level they still recognize.  Animals and other unintelligent forms are harmless and unharmed.  They only hunt - and can digest - that which is like that which they once were.

They are, by their very nature, implacably chaotic and unable to be reasoned with.  They should be safely dispatched on their first appearance on the edges of civilization.

Their name derives both from their savage mindless manner of eating their prey alive and whole as well as the spidery crawling manner in which they rapidly  creep across the night time landscape, seeking food.

The spell by which they are called from their dead world orbiting their dimly cooling orange star is known to certain initiates of Azi Dahaka, and other destroyers of worlds.  Consider it a second level  “summon 2nd tier bad guy minion” spell if you must, it’s not something I’d thought of giving  to PCs (tho maybe I should?)

The force that did this to them in the first place is hinted at in many places but is left deliberately ambiguous to better serve a Referee’s needs.

*not so much allows as encourages.

Vlitherax (Type I demon)

Vlitherax (Type I demon)

Alien avian

The (type I) vulture demon primarily is known as the errand creature for its betters, sent forth to cross material and planar boundaries to snatch desired life forms, and sometimes summoned up as particularly vile mounts by abyssal inclined witches and wizards. .

This immense creature has two broad wings of partially feathered, semi-reptilian appearance, the craned neck and head of a vulture, two powerful hind legs that dangle behind in flight like a bee, each ending in sharp triple toed talons   The spotty and blotchy texture of the mottled skin-scale=feathers combination, as well as it’s irregularities of shape and colour often lead to this creature being mistaken for undead at even medium distances.

Vlitherax Init +2 ; Atk Beak +3 melee (2d6+2 and DC 12 Fort save v disease) and/ claw +1 melee (1d6+2 ea);

AC 14; HD 5d8 hp 32 or MV 10’ or 60’; Act 1d20; SP Demonic traits, Stinger, cross planar boundaries and Seek Target (See below)x; SV Fort +4, Ref +3, Will +1; AL Chaotic.

Special Attacks

Stinger +5 attack (DC23 Fort save or be immediately paralyzed; death via heart & respiratory failure on fumble)

 Special Abilities

Demonic Traits (infravision, darkness, crit range 20; half damage from non-magical weapons and fire)

Cross planar boundaries  (cannot do so on it’s own without being given instruction from higher power), then limited to immediate point of transit and back.  

Seek Target - fundamental to its planar crossing ‘ability’ is the ability bred into the creatures to imprint on a desired being in order to be able to seek it out.   It’s not as effective as it sounds as they are not that smart but it works enough that the shotgun approach works in most cases.

Secret Stinger's physiognomy

Deeply hidden within the thickest of it’s feathers, just inside the leg of it’s left leg is a  small semi retractable stinger, containing an extraordinarily potent paralytic that it uses to subdue its prey for capture and return flight. The stinger, which relaxes, strikes, and is immediately withdrawn is hard to see; those few who have reported a four or so foot tongue-like tendril with a blistery bone hook at the end.   THe poison is not actually poison but toxic spores which regularly build up on the stinger=tendril and clump on the bone hook itself

History -

Believed originally not to have been demonic at all but a surviving scavenger species from the Galaxy of Black Stars, brought to the abyssal realms and cultivated over successive generations.  Their former capacity to roam the interstellar void by traveling in vast flocks through hyperspace has been perverted to allow them in small numbers to be sent to the material planes and otherwise on missions of acquisition and capture.

Possessed of only a rough intelligence and a somewhat blunted cunning, they are nonetheless of doggest persistence when their prey is involved.  

Why is the Vlitherax here?

A patron demon lord or other power has dispatched the thing to fetch forth a nearby mortal of unusual power or purity - perhaps one destined to become a paladin or great holy figure?  Or one with a great potential for celestial magicks?  Can it be stopped and if not, do they try to follow?

2. This is a craftier sort - it seems as above but in fact this is a dodge on behalf of some fell power to fetch forth heroes from the mortal plane for some dark reason of it’s own.   Either they will be attacked directly or they will be in for a surprise thinking they are rescuing some princess, for example.   Where do the fell birds try to take them?     (Stuck for ideas 1 the Crimson Hell 2 Dante’s inferno 3. Land of Hades 4. The infinite pit of the abyss  5. A random hex in pandemonium 6. The courts of chaos 7.  The Eternal Wicked City  8.  The blasted wastelands of cancer  9.   The Screaming Kingdom of 7000 Skins Being Stretched At Once  10. Ultor-Fehl, the Final Shadow of Total Despair)

3. The creature is one of several bound by task or spell to a great evil sorcerer of a far away land, they have been sent east (or south or whatever) to gather the particular spell components (read: sacrifices) needed for a Ritual of Power.  Favored local npcs, pets, horses, or the like can be targets.  Or, of course, one or more characters themselves.

4.  There is a flash and the clash of arms and then a fiery column rains down from the sky a mile distant.   Investigation sees the charred semi intact corpse of the  Vlitherax , its hind claws still clutching a cast iron cage in a death grip, though the door is open, and tracks ….. Go that way.  Who or what managed to escape?  Will you go after them?

5.   The creature is one of a small flight of them (roll a d20) - a demon lord or such has determined that an ancient weapon of great power lay somewhere in the area - they are tasked with covering a search area of (5d00) miles, so they will not be grouped as such.  But this will be noticed. What are they seeking?

6.   An extraordinarily rare occurrence - one of the greater demons has tasked a named servitor demon of their court to take this being and hide a powerful item of good - a relic, the remains of a saint, or some advanced scientific knowledge, hopefully somewhere far and somewhere obscure.  Enter the PCs