TheFinalHolmes

Doing some clean up and re-branding.  Making separate blogs for my D&D worlds and possibly other projects in the future because I have a lot and I don’t want to entirely clog my own personal channel with those at this time.  For now, there will only be two for my separate worlds of Sekrezia and Loam while this channel will remain as the go between spot for my projects as well as serving as my main point of access for engagement.  Also ended up changing my icon and background since my old icon was ages old now.  More links will be posted to this over time but to begin here are the links to my two D&D worlds: 

An Ode To Sekrezia - https://www.tumblr.com/blog/odetosekrezia

The Epic Of Loam - https://www.tumblr.com/blog/epicofloam

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I am not immune to dragon-shaped things. I also couldn't be prevented from finishing this list, even if I mucked it up. The Zomok is the ultimate defender of the wilds, having first been spawned in the First World, Pathfinder's version of the Feywild. These are the true kings of almost all other forest guardian plants we've covered before. Few of the creatures we've covered can vie for power in the way that a Zomok can, save perhaps for the Mosslord/Green Man, who may still be willing to ally with a Zomok. However, a Zomok is not territorial against others of their own kind who defend the forest, and only gain further allies to their cause by these. In fact, it is not uncommon to find more than one Zomok in a single forest.

Formidable in a fight, Zomok continues Pathfinder's tradition of creating unique breath attacks for each kind of dragon. those who manage to survive the ripping torrent of dirt, verdigris, and moss it breathes out still might be ensnared for the next pass of its fury. Those who do not, are interred into the very Mulch it holds domain over (although this is only mentioned in the ecology section and not the mechanics so debatable if its a true effect). The Zomok has significant control over the plants within its vicinity with the ability to use them to alter the terrain or give it instant allies, even if it will rarely be needing of them. It also has significant power 'outside' its vicinity, with the ability at any time to teleport to a new area and materialize itself from the trees and vegetation there, along with bringing along any creatures that dwelled in this vegetation. The Zomok also shares some of the same strategies of the Mosslord, incorporating other plants into its own ecology by having them inhabit its gullet and attack those it swallows. Even if one were to use the evident weakness of fire, a Zomok has the ability to end these dangers on its turn.

Thanks Nolan Whale. Dunno what your parents let you watch but you made a pretty cool creature with this one. For those, 2% of people who know of the Oblex existence and don't get the reference, this creature was made as a part of a Make A Wish project. Anyway he made some messed up shit and we're gonna talk about it. As with a lot of the coolest stuff to come as a 5e exclusive, we have the Mind Flayers to thank for the Oblex. Unlike most Mind Flayer offshoots which are born of tadpoles incubating in unorthodox bodies, the Oblex was a direct result of experiments by the illithid. Initially, they were meant to serve as bloodhounds for the Mind Flayers and report to them, but instead they became independently ravenous for the memories of others.

The way that the Oblex chooses to hunt opens up so many opportunities for complex story telling and roleplay. Whenever an Oblex is able to find prey, it eats their memories. This has a duel effect of both draining the victim of their natural talents and supplanting them to the Oblex. We're gonna talk about another feature, the Oblex is more wellknown for but I need to talk a bit about this and how incredibly powerful it is for how understated it is. The target takes a medium amount of psychic damage from such an assault, causes all their rolls to have a reduction, and leaves them generally confused in terms of roleplay. This can fade in an hour or by the use of Greater Restoration or Heal. The oblex, however, seems to PERMANENTLY gain the skill proficiencies and languages of that creature. Which is wild, especially when you consider how often the general Oblex is designed to have gained a number of victims. It does not seem far-fetched that there would be a number of Oblexes who have gained proficiency in EVERY skill for the targets they've hunted.

An Oblex also has a small assortment of mentally debilitating spells at its disposal, including the dreaded Dominate Person. Beyond the means of obfuscation we'll talk about, the Oblex is well-built for psychological confusion in order to effectively manipulate any prey into its clutches, with hallucinatory terrain and hypnotic pattern allowing the chance to guide people where they want them, Dominate Person for taking a more aggressive persuasion tactic, and Hold Persons/Monsters if they need to stop someone in their tracks.

The cream of the crop however is of course the infamous Sulfurous Impersonations. More higher grade than any other shape shifting ooze, from Phasms (not technically oozes) to Mezlans, the Oblex can create incredibly adept simulacrums off of the memories of their victims. These are perfectly alike to their owners, with the notable exception of the sulfurous smell. Not unlike the Podspawn of the Bodysnatcher, these figments are also not able to be harmed and act as lures for the Oblex who can create an increasing amount at once as it ages. This allows an Oblex to be doing an incredible variety all at once and manipulate things beyond the scale of what a single creature would usually be able to.

Also, while the Mind Flayers didn't entirely get their goal, they still use Oblex in certain ways and can often be found in relation to them. This easily amps oblex up considerably, as Mind Flayers are one of the greatest BMEG in the entire D&D catalog as well. There are so many bizarre and otherworldly ways to use an Oblex in creative ways.

Our fourth and third place spots are gonna be quickies, because both represent a vast array of potential but there isn't a lot to say about them due to their nature. The aesthetic and attitude of the immortal ichor is suitably inscrutable by itself but its aesthetics and vibe can be widely varied based upon its origin. See the Immortal Ichor is the representation of a vile deific force that has been killed. Often times, they inevitably seek to revive the beings they came from, though they work from only a memory of their former self.

Obviously the nature of a questline surrounding this creature is impossible to sum up. In order to make this a bit more interesting though, I have some example plots for several different editions. In 3.5, deep beneath the ruins where Kyuss was both born and destroyed, a series of canopic jars were set up to keep his blood from uniting into an immortal ichor. Now however, worms have worked their way through the cracks of the ruin's base and begun to eat away at these vases. As they do so, many of them have started to form into the worms that walk that will serve as its minions (hey we just talked about them) once its broken down enough for it to unite into an immortal ichor.

In Pathfinder, Zar-Azmak was already a slow infection in life, as a demon lord of entropy and rust. However, now in his death, his blood has slowly seeped out into all of the earth and only now are people beginning to realize its effects and how it will slowly deteriorate all life. Now, one must decide whether they should choose between this slow death or trying to allow for the ichor to reform the God so as to at least have an entity that can be fought against.

In 5e, three immortal ichors have joined forces on behalf of the dead three of Bane, Myrkul, and Bhaal. They have become obsessed with the idea that they were actually formed from the same god, since the worshippers that work on their behalf so often join forces, and wish to be transfused together to bring this transcendent god of death back. Perhaps in the wake of the Absolute Crisis, they will put their own plots into motion, since they were not aware of who their actual predecessors were.

In Starfinder, the the disappearance of Golarion, also caused the disappearance of Rovagug, sealed below. Whatever happened to Golarion, it ended up breaking the seals of Rovagug but also ripping the being of destruction into shreds. The immortal ichor remaining has languidly drifted through space, finally being pulled into the sun Mataras. This burning conflagration of destruction has been slowly reconstructing the Spawn of Rovagug in the core of the star with the intent to send them against the Burning Archipelago before eventually creating a ritual to have the sun overtake the galaxy and destroy life in the Pact Worlds.

This thing is sick as hell and maybe my all-time favorite creature on this entire list. I try not to give my own opinion on most of these creatures for fear that my evershifting level of hyperfixation won't let me describe it enough to warrant such praise but ah well. You'll just have to take my word for it even if I don't do enough to give it the limelight.

My initial thoughts on the Mezlan were pretty poor, as in the first cursory readings of any bestiary the image carries a lot of the weight and I just didn't really get captured by an ooze that just looks like a person. I kinda just assumed that it would be some sort of shapeshifting ooze, which there are a few of now. Admittedly all the shapeshifting ooze are pretty cool but as a base concept I would need more than that in order to peak my interest.

The Mezlan were built as the ultimate warriors of a bygone empire. Their bodies have resisted the passage of time by being bioengineered under severe conditions. This has turned them into amorphous beings, capability of reconstituting even after the most destructive circumstances. Even when 'killed' with acid, further significant energy damage must be applied to them or they will return over the process of several years.

This has ensured that they are the perfect long-term assailants for high priority assignments in planar and empirical schemes. As they have outlived there own empires, they are excellent tools for those that can acquire their services. However, it may be that a Mezlan requires a great deal more than money to assuage its tastes. Each of the ones that exist gave up their lives completely willingly to a life of constant militarism. Only those who hold a true ideology for their now eradicated nations would have ever committed themselves to this, although it is unclear if they knew just how well the experiments would take.

This is one of few creatures built off of standard humanoids where the system more prefers militant and martial entities over casters, although a few of the latter also exist. Personally, I like the rare opportunity this lends towards for the more grizzled psyche of a war veteran and would lean towards using martials myself.

A bit of a step down from being able to control an entire planet, a Shipmind controls an entire spaceship. Though given that the spaceships of Starfinder can feasibly come close to small planetoids it doesn't end up being much of a step down from the Oracle of Oras. Even if it were, it more than makes up for the step down.

Being one of the creatures to serve as the launching off point between Pathfinder and Starfinder, it in some ways feels a bit odd to have a stat block for it in the former but these are some of my favorite Starfinder creatures because it doesn't require a conversion. It also makes it one of the first creatures to talk about the Dominion of the Black, of which it is tied too heavily.

Let's talk about the ship part first though. Now from what we have records of, Shipmind's were designed to interface with the bioorganic ships used by the Dominion, serving as the brain to a greater body and gaining access to all the major systems. However, there is nothing here to say that a Shipmind could not take control of any sort of shape, so long as they were given a proper interface. This might extend their influence, with members of the Dominion seeking to board ships and construct the interface, so that a Shipmind could slip in and hijack an enemy vessel. The major vessels you'll find Shipminds on though are Seeders, the only detailed ships of the Dominion. Though its the only one mentioned though, I would advise that you can design several more, as the Dominion is made up of a myriad of bizarre and varied aberrations that would have very different crafts.

Being a part of the Dominion, the Shipminds are designed with deeply raw intelligence and belief in the mysterious ideologies of the galaxy-spanning cult. Some of these beliefs lead them towards the cruel experimentation of species they see as lesser and the gathering of intellect, brains, and memories. They are as deeply and bizarrely zealous as the others of their expansionist people, needing to be sated with live sacrifices and quarantining random sections of their 'body' as they become immune. However, it also seems to gear towards the superiority of aberrant life, something which shipminds come close to but are not themselves.

This belief and the fact it does not come into alignment with their own physiology may be part of the reason Shipminds have a greater tendency to diverge from their creators intentions. Instances of Shipminds going insane and killing their crew are common enough to be known, which makes it even more entertaining how the Dominion keeps employing their use (it makes them more alien to me that they seem to care so little about the lives lost through these tremendous tragedies).

This split in the uniformity of the Dominions could potentially introduce an opportunity for others working against them. If a Shipmind with enough significant information on them were to defect, it may potentially be a race between them and the Dominion to find this essential piece. Though it is unlikely that the creature's defection at all lessens its hatred for whoever does end up finding it.

We're winding down on our list now and that means we're seeing some real powerhouses come into play. One thing that you actually don't see as much of with the aberrations is that we see more instances with plants and oozes of having titanic sizes and influences over huge swathes of territories. A couple of these, like the Oblivions unfortunately are not smart enough to make these lists, as they represent mindless destructive forces.

The Oracle Of Oras is anything but mindless however, and can hold sway over entire planets. This is something that can sometimes become commonplace in Starfinder but put into the frame of the other systems we discuss, should still be viewed with a lot of grandeur.

A lot of the significant weight of the Oracle of Oras, however, ends up coming from the people who get built up around it though. The Oracle of Oras is one of those creatures that is intrinsically linked to Starfinder's system because it is connected to a God that exclusively appears there. I won't talk much about it, as like I say, I try to keep these agnostic and I'm sure you could sub it out with a deity of your own design. However, Oras serves as the god of evolution and change in Starfinder. They are largely followed by scientists and druids, some of the most knowledgable people in the galaxy. This automatically gives the Oracle a massive and competent group to serve as its protectors and servitors, as they are often seen as the direct physical will of their deity.

However, as a gene repository and natural influencer of biodiverse ecosystems, many of these creatures have had ancient and widespread influence over the very planets they reside on. The creatures are known to them and in many cases even influenced by their designs and to be in the presence of such a creature means that you are already on terrain that is wholly under their control. 5e has made us keenly aware how deadly it can be to fight a creature on their home turf, but the Oracle of Oras takes this to another level entirely, and hardly can be found without being on its own turf.

Many significant strides in bioengineering are also owed to the Oracle of Oras, and any individual tree would have no shortage of allies who need not even be called upon. There is no shortage to the environs these creatures can reside in either, with details of them being found in cloud giants and deep oceans.

And finally, we come to our third and final vermin that qualifies for this list based on intellect. Now, once again, like both of our other vermin, this kind of is a cheat. Though it's perhaps less so than the Dokufu. See in some of the iterations of the Worm That Walks, it is considered to be an Aberration. So if you were wondering why it didn't appear in our previous BMEG listing, here we are. In fact, the Worm That Walks has had a couple of typings with one version of 3.5 and PF2E giving it the Aberration treatment, another version of 3.5 making it an Ooze, and then the Pathfinder variant being a Vermin. I decided to go with Vermin, because for one it allows for there to be more Vermin for this, but also because Pathfinder seems to use the Worms That Walk most and that is my preferred model for them.

Now, there was a time when the Worm That Walks was the number one spot on this list. A large part of that came from its connections to the deific figure known as Kyuss which has a lot of significant lore in 3.5. There is a lot I could get into to boost it up as a result of this... however, I ultimately decided to drop a lot of this from my covering of the creature, as I mean for this to be a bit more system-agnostic and Kyuss has kind of aged out from the collective memory.

That being said, there is still some cool stuff that brings the Worm That Walks up this high. For one, it has significant versatility in the fact that it is technically a template. We haven't dealt with templates much on this list. They kind of go into two different categories. Either they are so small that they do not remotely serve as their own distinctive creature, or they are an eponymous and iconic feature of the game, like Vampires which are technically a template in a lot of the editions. The Worm That Walks is the first instance of this that falls into the latter category.

That template allows for a lot of customizable qualities to the creature, especially as the creature is built off the corpse of an evil wizard who died and had a vile ritual done with their body. Even in these instances, the production of such a creature is rare and difficult to produce. Therefore, even before it is in the ground and incubating, a Worm That Walks likely has an inordinate amount of influence behind it in order to bring it to this horrific form. In addition, it gains all of the powers and spells it had in life, so it only truly gains from the power already necessary to get there.

Ok so let's just start with the fact that this may just be one of the weirdest rips from popular media that Pathfinder has ever done. I mean Lovecraft sure, cryptids sure, Godzilla franchise sure. But one random monster from one science fiction horror movie from 1978. I just.... like. Why this one? Why not like... Space Amoeba or Creature From The Black Lake. Do I know if either is any good? Absolutely not those are just the first monsters I came up with for 70s creature features. Ok besides Alien but that one I can understand Pathfinder not getting the rights for. Bodythief off of Invasion of the Bodysnatchers just seems so... random. Now do if I know if that one is any good? No.

Honestly, I'm sure there's a very interesting licensing reason behind it but irregardless of my ignorance of that history, I will say that the Bodythief is pretty rad. They enhance immensely upon our previous entry of Fungus Queen in that instead of having fungal zombies they have exact duplicates who are also zombies. Well not quite. The duplicates seem to be capable of all the same mannerisms necessary to blend in to typical human life and even gain access to the memories of the victims killed in order to produce them. The one thing they lack however is the ability to reproduce sincere human emotion.

Now, in a brief description of the movie, it seems to be indicated that this makes the replacements somewhat wooden and zombie-like (though I'm inferring based on the usage of terms and references, I haven't seen it so don't come after me). The Pathfinder description doesn't actually make note of any such change in behavior however. I think instead it seems reasonable to keep it a little more subtle than that.

Think of the alien horror and roleplay that can be derived out of that. Where you would have to check the pulse of a person or investigate via magic to ensure that the emotions are real. For the pod-spawned to be feigning emotions based off memory alone gives few genuine moments to catch one of them in the act. Of course this is also skipping ahead from how long it would take for your players to even register that something is off in whatever town or city this is taking place in.

The psyche of the actual creature is also in interesting one. Although its unlikely the players would ever get much active chance to engage with it. Given its hatred for emotions, it is far more likely to attempt to kill them immediately upon their actual interaction with it rather than discuss its reasoning. Also... I don't feel like giving it motivation for its creations was wholly necessary, as leaving the reasoning vague made it seem a bit more alien. I'd also avoid using the temptation of killing the players to do some sort of secret machinations with a player. The more people get invested in their characters in recent times (which is good, by the way), the less relevant any sort of additional mechanics on death become to players. Unless you have a very committed player you wanna run such an idea by, it's a super dicey ask.

We've yet to come to the highest position for each type within our Mulch list (that being plant, ooze, and vermin) but we are now at what I would qualify as the top member of the subcategory which is fungus monsters. Which you know.... fungus isn't a plant at all. They're closer related to humans than to plants. It's probably about time we fixed that Wizards/Paizo. But whatever.

You may be somewhat familiar with Zuggtmoy, demon queen of fungus, who is a staple demon lord of D&D. While the Fungus Queen seems to be reminiscent of this feminine fungal power, Zuggtmoy is not an actual entity in Pathfinder and so it may be more intended as something of a replacement of the concept.

The Fungus Queen offer yet another faction in the "splintered" power structure of the Abyss. Now I leave that in quotations for a reason. The Abyss is always kind of a difficult beast to tackle in the cosmology of both Pathfinder and D&D. On one hand, its immensity and the details given for the myriad of layers and entities gives an untapped potential for storylines. On the other hand, there are elements of how the Abyss works that causes the internal politics of the plane and its inhabitants to be an intimidating element.

The large element at play here is that the many sections of the abyss are eternally turned against one another in an ever-changing struggle for power, with their only unifying element being their involvement on one side of the Blood War. This is all well and good as a concept, but unbridled chaos is a hard thing to just hand over to a creator without at least some sort of starting point of how to divide things up. There is so much in the Abyss to keep in mind whenever one is trying to construct something from scratch and so ultimately most stories that deal in anyway with the actual planar elements of it either A) Scratch the surface, B) Engage with it in the Blood War where the factions don't matter as much, or C) Touch on the few areas where there is a clear division.

Fortunately, the Fungus Queen serves as one of those clear divisions. It is with an opponent that already has a few of the known schisms but that's ok. The Fungus Queens are masters of seduction and, as such, hold a deep contempt towards the Succubus who vie for that particular role. They are themselves spawned from the corpses of succubus. The first were created as a spiteful perversion of succubi that attempted to kill a witch who held great power within Cyth V'Sug's realm, which is Pathfinder's fungal demon lord. Naturally, they take on a more wicked, natural, and coven-like roles than their original forms, making sure to keep peace with others of their 'harem' and take on territories of deep wild. Though they also retain much of their predecessors powers, twisted in new ways. Their kisses are even more potently deadly, with the chance to kill and fill these victims with their spores.

These then serve to extend their power as fungal zombies. However, as much as this assists to give them more influence (alongside other plants they can control) it does not seem to serve to extend their brood. This, ultimately, does require the corpse of a succubus. There does not seem to be another way that these creatures can spawn and so ultimately anything they do even in the Material Plane will also require them to be on the lookout for these potential egg sacs. These creatures are violently jealous though, and certainly this energy is just as like to drive them towards any other creature that might challenge their beauty, from Nymphs to Rusalka. I think this could also easily extend to the leaders of a forest town or even just a point of great personality and influence in their realm, such as a Green Dragon.