Thematic Monsters


Advice

Lantern Lodge

I’m GM for a group doing a home brew. I’ve got the dungeon layout finished but I need to fill it with some interesting monsters. The villain who they’re after is a Necromancer/Druid/mystic Theurge. 3/3/1. The players will face his animal companion (separate encounter), A skeletal champion with plant fibers for muscles, zombie dire wolf pups (powered by a fungus). I’d like 2-4 more encounters. Plants and low level undead that will be stylized to be plants controlling dead bodies. Any help would be much appreciated.

Dark Archive

Using plant-zombies seems de rigeur. Human or local goblin or orc cadavers could be one alternative, as well as local animals, like a bear or some boars. Along with the wolves, they might be sent out to patrol for local animals to kill and bring back to the lair to feed the plants / fungus gardens that sustain them all.

A plant/zombie-infested *owlbear* could instead be the biggest of the big bad threats he's managed to get under his sway.

But perhaps also he has taken over an underground warren created by a giant ant colony, that he has infested with his parasitic fungus and are now like cythnigots visually, but with the stats of a giant ant with the plant/zombie type modifications/immunities, and a special attack from the plant bits sprouting from it (like spores that cause disorientation, such as a sickened condition, but be careful not to make it too debilitating, or able to 'stack' to stunlock people, like Boggard's croaks or something, 'cause that can get frustrating when you are having a half-dozen of them attack, and having to roll all those annoying saving throws!).

Dozens of such parasitized ants could still exist, and be used to upkeep the tunnels, and patrol for intruders and fetch and carry things for the evil druid/necro. And, somewhere, deep at the heart of the tunnels, is the ant-queen... Perhaps she's also parasitized/infected. Perhaps she's *not*, and there's an entire section of the ant-warrens still inhabitated by uninfected ants, and they are fighting a losing war against the invading druid/necro and his fungus-infected ant-zombies! (The uninfected ants aren't smart enough to be allies, really, but they are the enemy of your enemy, so it's in your best interest not to kill too many of the uninfected ants, who are also fighting your enemy!)


Plant monsters which incorporate bones for cosmetic rather than mechanical effect could work. A psychepore firing bits of bone and some fungus leshies perhaps.

How low is low level, anyway?


Assassin vines, shambling mounds (an immobile one, if the APL is on the low side), and the yellow musk creeper.

Ghouls and ghasts are a little more interesting than skeletons and zombies. Could do bog mummies (and just your standard peat bog as a hazard; those things are terrifying). Maybe some "sentient spore clouds" that are incorporeal undead like shadows or wraiths.

You could have freshly dug tunnels that force characters to crawl on their stomachs, the odd animate root, hungry zombie or small monstrous spider making for a hectic and claustrophobic encounter.


Necromancer/Druid: he worships the god of composting!


oozes and molds. Fungi. Are Mycanoids a Pathfinder thing?

Lantern Lodge

So players will face this at level 3. But they’re a bunch of munchkins, and these are definitely non optimal foes.


Scott Wilhelm wrote:
Necromancer/Druid: he worships the god of composting!

Less of a joke than you think

He is a perfect fit for the villain. He has a number of interesting spells but most of these are higher level than the OP's villain can cast.


Bjørn Røyrvik wrote:
Scott Wilhelm wrote:
Necromancer/Druid: he worships the god of composting!

Less of a joke than you think

He is a perfect fit for the villain. He has a number of interesting spells but most of these are higher level than the OP's villain can cast.

Oh, yeah.

Moander appeared in a Forgotten Realms novel: Azure Bonds. There were lots of references to that book in those old AD&D computer games for the PC. My Curse of the Azure Bonds game never worked, though: it always froze the computer.

In college, our DM put us against (the priesthood of) an evil nature god name ENAG so-called because that was the abbreviation in the Schedule of Classes for Agricultural Engineering classes.

I have a Druidzilla build that calls for her to worship Dahak, Golorions Dragon God of Destruction. I chose Dahak because this Druid will take a lot of levels in Warpriest, so I want a Deity whose Favored Weapon is a Natural Attack, and I really like the Lesser Blessing of Destruction. And it turns out that when you are looking for Deities that have the Destruction Domain and Favor a Natural Attack, your choices are limited.

For roleplaying purposes, she is a priest who represents a more destructive side of nature: hurricanes, volcanoes, earthquakes, that kind of thing. Her working name is Hanna Luapele. Hana is a small town in Hawaii I read about once, and lua pele is the Hawaiian word for volcano.

Anyway, it is refreshing to see nature deities and nature priests that aren't just hairy-armpit-hippy-chicks. Not that I have anything against them: it's just nice to take a break from the stereotype.

I was thinking it would be fun to make a Prestige Class for Priests of Kali.

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