Basic Fantasy RPG Forums

Thanks Smoot that made my day. Feeling a bit blue, luckily writing up new undead always makes me feel better! Hooray for the restless dead!

Straight from one of my favorite rpg's, Fable 2, I bring you the Hollow Men...err...I mean "Hollow Ones". I am going to be honest, this is probably my all time up to this point favorite monster. I like the idea of guardian undead for some reason.

Hollow Ones: http://images.wikia.com/fable/images/d/d4/Marsh.jpg

Hollow Ones
Armor Class: 12
Hit Dice: 1*
No. of Attacks: claw or 1 weapon
Damage: 1d4 or by weapon
Movement: 30'
No Appearing: 3d6, Wild 3d10
Save As: Fighter 1
Morale: 12
Treasure Type: None
XP: 37

At first glance hollow ones appear to be skeletons or dried out zombies, but in truth they are far more dangerous than either of those two undead. Hollow ones are the bodies of the dead animated by otherwise harmless spirits known as wisps. Wisps are the spirits of the dead that have become lost on the way to the afterlife. They gather in great swarms in places where the dead can be found in large numbers; ancient battlefields, abandoned towns, old cemeteries and barrow fields. Wisps are defensive of their resting place and at the first sign of danger they find a body to animate to drive off the intruder. An easy way to tell the difference between a hollow one and a more common skeleton or zombie is the eerie blue glow that emanates from their eyes. Hollow ones fight with whatever weapons are at hand and only resort to their claws when they can find nothing else. Oddly enough hollow ones will not abide the presence of other corporeal undead and will try to drive them away like any other intruder. In some places hollow ones are honored by locals for keeping ghouls and wights out of burial grounds.

Hollow ones are relentless in battle seeking to kill or drive off those who would intrude upon their troubled rest. They employ direct attacks and try to gang up on one target at a time. Some hollow ones rise wearing the rusted tattered armor they were buried in giving them greater protection than other hollow ones (35% chance, AC 14). Hollow ones only take half damage from weapons, and only a single point from arrows, bolts and sling stones (plus any magical bonus). They are, however, weak to fire and take double damage from any sort of fire based attack. As with all undead, they can be Turned by a Cleric as Skeletons, however they possess a resistance to this ability and have a 20% chance of simply ignoring the Turn attempt. They are immune to sleep, charm or hold magic. They are not mindless, but their thought patterns are strange and distorted making reading their minds impossible.

One out of every twelve hollow ones encountered will be a hollow one champion of 3 Hit Dice
(175 XP) with an Armor Class of 15, having a +1 bonus to damage due to strength. Hollow one champions have a 1 in 1d6 chance of possessing an ability known as wisp fire. Wisp fire is a blue-white colored flame that is freezing to the touch. Wisp fire is a ranged attack and requires a standard action to use, it deals 1d6 points of cold damage and has a range of 20/40/60.

I read almost everything (I don't read on-line games), Its my duty as a curious RPG gamer/master/creator

I read stuff, most of the time... most of the way through. I try, but it's hard when having the attention span of a newt.

What do the Hollow Ones Turn as?

Woops. Skeletons, let me add that in!

The 20% turn resistance does give them an interesting kick - even at high levels, these guys won't necessarily disappear with a flick of a holy symbol.

Make a good scare monster, that.

Like it said they are more dangerous than your standard mob undead. Their greatest strength is underestimating their capability.

Tyrian Dragons did not turn out quite like I was hoping so I might just shelf them for now.

I just pulled this from a very old warcraft source book. It seemed pretty cool so I thought I would add it to my menagerie.

Edit
And now I have decided to do something different. I have simply replaced the name of the monster with something else, the description in the original was so vague that I have created an entirely new monster with a simple find/replace and 5 minutes of editing. I laugh at this.

Night Beast
Armor Class: 13
Hit Dice: 3+3*
No. of Attacks: 2 claws / 1 bite
Damage: 1d4/1d4/1d6
Movement: 40'
No Appearing: 2d4, Wild 3d6
Save As: Fighter 3
Morale: 11
Treasure Type: None
XP: 175

Cursed beings from another dimension, night beasts only appear in the world as the result of magical mishaps. True aberrations, they are accidentally drawn through temporary rifts in the planes and deposited in this world with no apparent way of returning. Nothing is known about their home plane, or how precisely to generate the rifts through which they come. Night beasts are usually encountered in small packs near sites of recent intense magical activity. Fiercely territorial creatures, they rarely stray from the general vicinity of the place they first appeared. Fearless, they brazenly prowl near both villages and monster lairs. Although night beasts display an apparent fondness for nighttime and its darkness, they can perform equally well in the daytime. Pure killing machines, night beasts will attack any creatures they encounter, regardless of whether animal, human, undead or something more fearsome. Strangely, night beasts refuse to feed on the remains of their victims, preferring to shred and tear the corpses before immediately returning to prowling. Rumors suggest that night beasts somehow receive sustenance continually from their native dimension...as well as guidance from a distant force.

Night beasts prefer to hide in shadows before leaping upon their foes. They attack with feral tenacity, slashing with their deadly claws and biting with their sharp infectious fangs. Night beasts are nearly fearless and typically fight to the death. They carry a strange dangerous infection known simply as the Night Beast Curse. Those bitten by the night beast must make a save vs poison or contract a disease which slowly erodes the targets sanity. While infected the character takes 1d4 points of temporary Wisdom damage each day as they begin to hallucinate about being stalked from the darkness and of terrible monsters lurking in the shadows. A target reduced to a Wisdom score of 2 or less goes insane and is considered a NPC from that point forward. Cure Disease can remove the Night Beast Curse. Once a character is cured of the curse they recover 1 point of Wisdom damage per day of rest.

Here are my two latest creations the alchemical Crimson Bones and the possessing spirit known as the Odem. Any feedback on either one would be welcome.

Crimson Bones
Armor Class: 13
Hit Dice: 2*
No. of Attacks: 1 claw or 1 weapon
Damage: 1d6 or by weapon
Movement: 40'
No. Appearing: 2d6, Wild 2d10
Save As: Fighter 2
Morale: 12
Treasure Type: None
XP: 100

Crimson bones are a special type of undead created through a combination of alchemy and necromancy. Crimson bones appear to be normal skeletons in all regards except they are a bloody red in color. Like normal skeletons they are mindless and obey only the will of their creator. Crimson bones are far more deadly than any normal skeleton for they are nigh unstoppable. Each time a crimson bones is reduced to 0 hit points it is destroyed as normal, however the crimson bones rises again with half its starting hit points on the following round. The crimson bones continues to rise each time after destruction unless its bones are doused with holy water. Crimson bones only take ½ damage from edged weapons, and only a single point from arrows, bolts or sling stones (plus any magical bonus). As with all undead, they can be Turned by a Cleric as zombies. They are immune to sleep, charm and hold magic. Being mindless, no form of mind reading is of any use against them. Crimson bones never fail morale, and thus always fight until destroyed.


Odem
Armor Class: 16
Hit Dice: 4*
No. of Attacks: 1 touch
Damage: 1d6 + 1d4 Wisdom loss
Movement: Fly 60'
No. Appearing: 1
Save As: Fighter 4
Morale: 12
Treasure Type: C
XP: 280

The odem is an undead spirit that feeds on fear and terror. It constantly tries to take control of living bodies and force them to perform unspeakable acts. They are the remnants of the spirits of evil creatures that did not have the force of will to become full fledged spectres. Odems are not tied to particular areas and can move about at will. They tend to use a host until it reaches such levels of horror to be driven mad. At this point the odem abandons its host to seek out another victim. Odems are naturally invisible. Those who can see invisible creatures see an odem as a seething cloud of luminous white vapor. An odem speaks the languages it knew in life, which are not necessarily the same languages of their host.

An odem damages a creatures mind with but a touch. A creature touched by an odem takes 1d4 points of Wisdom damage. A creature reduced to 0 Wisdom by such means is driven insane and acts as if under the effects of a Confusion spell until their Wisdom is restored to at least 1. The odem can attempt to possess a creature at will. This ability is similar to the spell Magic Jar as cast by a 10th level Magic-User, except that it does not require a receptacle. If the attack succeeds, the odem disappears into the targets body. The target can resist the attack with a successful save vs spells modified by the targets Wisdom bonus. A creature that successfully saves is immune to that odems possession attack for one day. While possessing a host the odem takes complete control of the targets actions, though the host remains aware of what is happening around it. While inside a host the odem is rendered immune to a Clerics Turning ability, though the ability allows the host to make a save vs spells to expel the odem. Such a save can only be made once. Odems outside a host can be Turned as wraiths. Odems can only be struck by magical weapons and spells. Like all undead they are immune to sleep, charm, and hold spells.