Gutdragging Lurcher

-

Undead: Undead are once-living creatures animated by spiritual or supernatural forces.

They have darkvision.

Undead have immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, morale effects, patterns, and phantasms).

They have immunity to bleed, death effects, disease, paralysis, poison, sleep effects, and stunning.

Undead are not subject to nonlethal damage, ability drain, or energy drain. They are immune to damage to their physical ability scores, as well as to exhaustion and fatigue effects.

Most unintelligent undead cannot heal damage on their own, although they can be healed. Negative energy (such as an inflict spell) can heal undead creatures.

They have immunity to any effect that requires a Fortitude save (unless the effect also works on objects or is harmless).

Undead are not at risk of death from massive damage, but are immediately destroyed when reduced to 0 hit points.

They are not affected by raise dead or reincarnate spells or abilities. Resurrection and true resurrection can affect undead creatures. These spells turn undead creatures back into the living creatures they were before becoming undead.

Undead do not breathe, eat, or sleep.

The first gutdragging lurcher was no doubt an abomination dreamed up by a sick necromancer who delighted in foulness and rot. Since the creation of this disgusting undead, its taint has spread and now gluttonous humanoids with evil-polluted souls often rise as gutdragging lurchers upon death. A corpulent corpse polluted with evil stirs after death, and its entrails burst free from their fat guts to seek out fresh prey. Lurchers are particularly vile undead who feed on the entrails of the living, often choking their victims to death with their flapping wet tendrils of rotting intestine and then pulling the foe’s guts out through their mouths to add to its wriggling collection of viscera.

A lurcher’s entrails may slither down the throat of any fresh corpse it finds (dead no longer than 2 days), animating the body as a zombie under the lurcher’s control. One lurcher can control a limited number of zombies at any one time.

A gutdragging lurcher is less easily affected by clerics or paladins. It resists the effects of channel energy, including effects that rely on the use of channel energy (such as commanding undead).

Creatures with the grab special attack are good at starting and maintaining a grapple.

Gutdragging lurchers are intelligent foes and some command a sizeable force of corpse puppets. Rumor has it a minor crime lord in Absalom’s Flotsam District, who rules a large subsystem of the sewers there, is actually a lurcher named Vleer.

A grappled foe experiences unimaginable horror. The rotting, putrid intestines that wriggle about the gutdragging lurcher push themselves into the enemy’s mouth (pulping themselves through closed teeth even) and pour down the victim’s throat to choke her to death. The victim then begins to suffocate until the lurcher releases her or she perishes, choking on foulness.

Anyone who sees a gutdragging lurcher, or even its wriggling entrails, may become nauseated.

A lurcher’s entrails may attack foes at a distance. In addition, these tentacles “see” just as well as the lurcher and can spot foes around corners. They can also squeeze into small openings or under doors to attack enemies. A lurcher feeds on the viscera of the dead to increase its reach. Old and powerful lurchers often sit within nests of warrens, their disgusting entrails infesting the places and animating corpse puppets to deal with anyone foolish enough to intrude.

A lurcher’s entrails “see” just as well as the lurcher and can spot foes around corners. They can also squeeze into small openings or under doors to attack enemies. A lurcher feeds on the viscera of the dead to increase its reach. Old and powerful lurchers often sit within nests of warrens, their disgusting entrails infesting the places and animating corpse puppets to deal with anyone foolish enough to intrude.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Shearphorus, Part 5 (Neth (X) 1st, 4712 AR)

-
Image
Entrance to the Guardian Hall. The heroes killed the ogre guard. Guardian Hall.  A 30-foot by 30-foot section of the chamber directly below the chute from the entrance to the guardian hall above has a null-gravity effect. Aranthor, who was flying, had to use a move action to reorient himself when passing through this area, but then proceeded as normal. Jules and Zemurin did not reach the ground, instead hanging 15 feet above the floor. Gryxxa, who was levitating, liberated them by pulling them outside the null-gravity area. This huge chamber, roughly carved and left with unfinished walls, is one hundred feet square. Continual flame spells nearly cover the flat ceiling thirty feet above, so the place is refreshingly well-lit. An iron boss ten feet in diameter protrudes from the stone in the center of each wall. Large iron tools of various function lie haphazardly across the floor, while one workbench features a more orderly set of fine human-sized tools and a bedroll below. An iron ...
Read more

The Gauntlet of Challenge-Cry, Part 2 (Neth (X) 1st, 4712 AR)

-
The Challenge of Might.  Light in this chamber was equal to shadowy illumination when the trapdoor above was open or the gate was imbued with fire or electricity (see below); otherwise, there is no natural light. The bottom of the deep stone shaft is flat and empty, with a massive iron door, forty feet high and thirty feet wide, set in its eastern side. The door appears designed to slide upward, much like a solid portcullis. A thick, sturdily-braced horizontal iron shelf protruding from the door five feet above the floor appears to be the only leverage point from which to lift it. The iron of the door changes color several times a minute, at first glowing orange as if pulled from a forge, then glistening with green perspiration, next frosted with ice crystals, and finally dry and crackling with electricity, before again glowing orange and repeating the cycle. Large runes etched into the doors seem to ignore the state of the door, their forms remaining the color of blackened iron th...
Read more

The Gauntlet of Challenge-Cry, Part 1 (Neth (X) 1st, 4712 AR)

-
Image
The Guardian Hall.  Opening the south port set in the wall is easy but extremely dangerous: a stream of cold energy shoots across the chamber to the opposite wall, dealing damage to anything in its path each round. Concealed under the workbench in a secret compartment were two spellbooks. One spellbook is unremarkable. It is worth 990 gp. The other spellbook, however, is very unusual: its covers are bronze plates engraved to resemble interlocking golem fists, it is thicker than the typical spellbook, and it has an integral hinged bronze bookmark in the shape of a golem’s arm. This arm is actually a mechanical trap and attacked Gryxxa when she touched the book. The book is worth 11,250 gp due to its integrated trap and unusual materials. The Epitaphrum.  As the heroes ascended toward the plateau of the Epitaphrum, it became easier than it was at the base of the Throat of Shearphorus to identify the source of Astersyn’s screams, their meaning, and the voice of the Epitaphrum. Th...
Read more