#flashback summer

“Acid Panther” © Anya McNaughton, accessed at her deviantArt page here

[The French name for a cait sith like creature, which is difficult to search for without getting a ton of Final Fantasy.]

Chapalu CR 4 NE Magical Beast Emerging from the shadows is a great greenish panther, a crescent moon of white fur emblazoned on its chest. Its eyes glimmer with malice.

The chapalu, also known as a cat sith or faerie panther, is an immense supernatural feline able to change its mass at will. Chapalus are nocturnal predators that stalk the thick forests and foggy moors where the boundaries between the Material Plane and the world of the fey are thinnest. Despite their bestial appearance, they are as intelligent as a man, and use this intellect to devise the best ways to injure and kill. Their favorite food is human flesh, but they are cunning enough to limit these attacks in order to avoid retaliation.

A chapalu spends most of its life as light as a feather, affording it the ability to walk on thin air, but when it catches prey in its grasp it shifts until it weighs as much as a stone. The remains of a chapalu’s victims are often found with broken bones and crushed ribcages, as the beast delights in pressing the last air from its prey’s lungs. Chapalus are haughty and proud creatures but feel an affinity with wicked fey, with whom they are willing to ally. The chapalu in this arrangement makes sure its rider knows that it is a peer, not a mere mount, and any rider who disobeys such instructions often finds itself removed from the chapalu’s back at a great height. Some common combinations of chapalu and rider, as well as the CRs for such an encounter, are found below:

chapalu and forlarren—CR 5 chapalu and satyr—CR 6 chapalu and redcap—CR 7

A chapalu grows to 8 feet long from nose to tail.

Image © Life Magazine, by Rudolf Freund. Accessed at @abookofcreatures here

[The yale is sadly obscure, partially because it shares a name with a major university. I pondered for quite some time how to make its moving horns actually mechanically meaningful before hitting on the idea that it could use the like manufactured weapons with iterative attacks.The flavor text of them as eccentric duelists followed suit.]

Yale CR 9 CG Magical Beast This antelope-like creature has a long tufted tail, small tusks growing from its lower jaw, and long curved horns. It turns to look at you with a gleam in its eye and its horns swivel into a strange approximation of a duelist’s salute.

The intelligent beasts known as yales are stalwart crusaders against evil. A yale’s most remarkable features are its two long horns, capable of swiveling and moving independently and of rotating to face any direction. A yale is a master swashbuckler using these horns, and they take the opportunity to prove their martial prowess in vigorous duels. Any creature that looks capable of defending itself is likely to be challenged by an itinerant yale. A non-evil opponent that loses a fight with a yale will be allowed the dignity of a graceful surrender, and if a yale is bested and not killed by a non-evil foe, it often responds to its opponent’s honor with friendship. Yales make for valiant (if not entirely stable) companions, capable of bringing joy and bravery into the hearts of their allies. Their headstrong natures and constant need to prove their valor often gets them into dangerous situations.

Due to this devil-may-care attitude towards mortal danger, long life spans and low fertility rates, yales are relatively uncommon in the world. Strict vegetarians, they feed on fungi, roots and tubers that they dig for with their stout tusks and cloven hooves. Due to their magical horns and intelligence, yale are suspected of being close relatives of unicorns, but the two species have little regard for each other. Yales consider unicorns to be priggish and boring; unicorns think that yales are needlessly irresponsible and violent. Unlike unicorns, yales have a great fondness for humans and will sometimes directly protect villages in great peril. Somewhat nosy, yales have even been known to play village matchmaker, encouraging young couples and giving solace to the broken-hearted.

A yale stands about three feet high at the shoulder and weighs up to 200 pounds. Their coats can be any number of colors from white to brown to black. Although most yales have curved, scimitar-like horns, a few yale bear thin straight horns instead.

“Green Knight” © Malcolm Brown, accessed at his deviantArt page here

[The original Irish gaborchend was an elemental giant with the head of a goat. My artist on the original Creature Codex PDFs convinced me to change it to purely humanoid, because she thought we should have at least one pretty fey creature. So I mixed in bits of the Green Knight from the Arthurian canon. Doing the boons and banes let me emphasize that connection.]

Gaborchend CR 15 LN Fey A great man strides forth, beautiful but fierce. He is clearly a warrior, as he is clad in gleaming armor and carries an enormous axe. His eyes gleam with raw energy.

Mighty warriors of the fey race, gaborchends are relics of a bygone age, when the fey battled with one another to decide the features of the earth and the shape of the continents. Ageless and immortal, the gaborchends have since retreated from worldly affairs, waiting the time when they are again needed. Most gaborchends are solitary creatures who wander the most remote reaches of the planet, where they can be closest to nature in its purest state. A gaborchend’s body is a font of elemental energy, and they can tap into this power to unleash devastating attacks and command the forces of nature itself.

Despite their great physical power, gaborchends tend to be patient and philosophical creatures, more inclined towards discussion than violence with most creatures that intrude upon their solitude. Only in the case of great disrespect towards the natural world, or when called upon by great fey powers, do gaborchends take up arms to fight once more. In combat, gaborchends prefer to shape the battlefield with their spell-like abilities before engaging in brutal, destructive melee. They are especially fond of sundering maneuvers, and take great delight in smashing enemy fortifications beneath their mighty blades. A gaborchend stands 12 feet tall and weighs 2 tons. Gaborchends closely resemble humans, but their hair and skin are often bright primary colors.

Gaborchend Boons and Banes (9th level, CL 20, DC 25) A gaborchend is likely to bestow its boon on someone who can keep up with it in conversation, or someone who does a great service to the natural world. Their bane is often inflicted as a game, wherein a gaborchend invites foolhardy mortals to wound him, only to return the favor in time.

Boon: You gain regeneration 1. Cold iron weapons overcome this regeneration. This boon lasts for 1 day.

Bane: One year after receiving this bane, you take damage as if you had dealt a critical hit to yourself with your primary weapon. Upon taking this damage, you must succeed a Fortitude save or die, as if you were affected by a coup de grace. This bane lasts until the damage is taken or it is dispelled.

“Brollachan” © Ben Batchelder, accessed at his deviantArt gallery here

[It annoys me that J.K. Rowling used the name “boggart” for a creature that looks like whatever you’re frightened of, because this is what that’s supposed to be. Obviously, not her greatest sin.]

Brollachan CR 9 N Fey A vaguely man-shaped mass of horrific imagery swirls before you, constantly shifting to reveal ever-more-terrifying sights. Within the hateful cloud, a dim humanoid outline can be spied.

Brollachans are strange creatures that are the embodiment of primal terror. It is said that a brollachan always appears as the thing the viewer is most afraid of, which is not strictly true. They constantly and reflexively read the minds of those around them, cloaking themselves in a ghastly shield of images drawn from the minds of those nearby. A brollachan cannot suppress this power or precisely control what is shown, but can increase its intensity temporarily to snuff out the life of those that threaten them and lash out with phantasmal projections if attacked.

Brollachans literally repel all who see them, and as such they are usually sad and lonely creatures. They view their amazing abilities as something of a curse, and almost all brollachans spend their lives alone. They are naïve and child-like in mentality, making them easy to trick or deceive, and their morality is easily swayed in the service of one who can actually bear to be in their presence. Thus, a brollachan who meets up with a paladin or kindly druids may become a force for good to be reckoned with, but one who keeps the company of wicked souls will rapidly turn wicked as well.

Brollachans are native to the loneliest woods and swamps, as they are loved by neither man nor beast. Most other fey view them with something between pity and disdain. They are primarily herbivorous, although they may supplement this diet with game killed by their lethal terrors. The appearance of the brollachan itself is rarely seen, but without its cloak of illusions it is a pale and feeble thing with small circular black eyes and slits for a nose and mouth. Brollachans stand five feet high and weigh little over a hundred pounds, although their illusory abilities usually make them seem much larger.

Brollachan Boons and Banes (7th level, CL 13, DC 24) As brollachans are unused to company, and most of the creatures they encounter flee from them, they rarely bestow either boon or bane. If they are befriended by a stout-hearted creature, they will use their boon, but goodly creatures frequently find it somewhat distasteful. Their bane makes fear even more crippling, but they rarely think to use it on a defeated enemy unless prompted to by an ally.

Boon: You gain a +2 bonus on all attack and damage rolls made against a creature suffering from a fear effect. This boon lasts for 1 week.

Bane: All fear effects effect you one level higher than they normally would. Effects that would make you shaken render you frightened, those that would make you frightened render you panicked, and those that render you panicked make you cower for the duration. This boon lasts for 1 month.

“Pantagruel 39″ © Fabrizio Riccardi, accessed at Monster Brains here

[The word “gryllus” means cricket, and was also the name of a character in a dialogue by Plutarch, one of Odysseus’ crewmen who argues that he’d rather stay a pig after being transformed by Circe. The name was applied to medieval-style grotesques by Marina Warner in her book No Go the Bogeyman, which draws some rather spurious conclusions about these creatures and their purpose. She claimed, for example, that they almost always had two faces to represent the duality of them as figures of fun/fear. The original was two-faced by default, but now I’ve added it as an option on a random table of weird features. Because everyone likes monsters with random tables, right?]

Gryllus CR 1 CN Monstrous Humanoid This stunted little creature is somehow simultaneously pitiful, comical and unnerving. Its body is a disproportionate mishmash of animal and human parts with a leering, monstrous face.

The victims of a potent curse, the grylli are embodiments of vice and folly. Not exactly evil, grylli are instead short-sighted, foolish and selfish creatures prone to fits of greed and gluttony. In some communities, lone grylli are seen as mascots to be pitied and cared for, but a mass of the little creatures is still cause for alarm. In groups, grylli wander the countryside attempting to prove to each other which among them is capable of the greatest feats of strength and cunning, neither of which are qualities grylli have in any amount. Bumbles of grylli entering a settlement are prone to mischief such as raiding henhouses, stealing clothes off of clotheslines and pinching the bottoms of farmer’s daughters.

Violence is not a gryllus’ first instinct, but if harassed or in a foul mood they attack with needle-sharp teeth. a gryllus’ whining voice is capable of giving cry to ear-piercing wails, unsettling all who hear them. The most feared ability of the gryllus is their contagious nature—one attacked by a gryllus becomes more fool-hardy, reckless and prone to indulge their worst natures. The least fortunate of these victims are rendered insensible and slowly shrink and warp into the form of a gryllus over the course of a day. Only magic capable of relieving curses is effective at transforming a gryllus into the man he once was. Grylli remember only scattered memories of their former lives, which they may relate if properly motivated (with shiny objects or rich food).

A gryllus stands about three feet tall and weighs fifty pounds. No two grylli look exactly alike—one may have three hoofed legs and a face growing out of his belly, whereas another might be little more than an oversized head on feet. All, however, freely mix humanoid and animal features. Grylli do not age and do not die except by disease or violence. Although most are free-wheeling and wild creatures, some are the servants of the spellcasters that transformed them.

Greater Grylli When an especially powerful or noble individual is the subject of a create gryllus spell (see below) or succumbs to a gryllus’ create spawn, they may transform instead into a greater gryllus. A greater gryllus retains more of its reason than its lesser brethren as well as all of its memories of its former life. As such, most tend to be brooding and bitter creatures that turn their back on the world that cursed them. A greater gryllus has a more symmetrical shape, appearing as some sort of chimeric humanoid. A greater gryllus is a gryllus with the advanced and giant simple templates and is a CR 3 creature.

“Piasa” © H. Kyoht Luterman, accessed at their deviantArt page here

[The piasa is a weird combination of folklore and fakelore, a Native American art piece of uncertain provenance given a backstory by white settlers. I agree with the hypothesis that the original piasa was something more akin to a water panther, and that the wings were painted on centuries later. Also, I find in very surprising that almost ten years into PFRPG and there’s no official piasa yet.]

Piasa Swooping from the sky is an immense hybrid beast, combining the head of a man, the antlers of an elk and the body of a hunting cat. Its body is covered in thick scales, and its four legs each end in eagle-like talons. A long thin tail lashes behind it as it spreads its huge membranous wings.

Piasas are natives of the Abyss, but they are not demons. They are instead the physical manifestation of that plane’s hatred for all that is not ravaged and destroyed. Simple-minded, piasas behave like predatory animals, although their power is such that even cleverer fiends are blown away by their might. Piasas control vast swaths of hunting grounds in the distant reaches and deepest levels of the Abyss, viewing all who enter these expanses as prey to be stalked and devoured. Their presence is antithetical to the natural world and they love killing for its own sake. Piasas command incredibly powerful spell-like abilities, but seem to hardly understand how they work. In combat, piasas open with their titanic roar, followed by charging into the midst of their opponents. Against enemies that keep their distance, they lash out with their spell-like abilities.

Due to their magnificent power, piasas are much-coveted resources by the demon princes and other masterminds of the Abyss. Demons such as vrocks and hezrou often follow in their wake like pilot fish, eager to mop up whatever victims a piasa could not be bothered to finish off.  Mariliths are often tasked with the thankless role of forcing a piasa to bend to the will of an Abyssal army, which generally entails catching the brute’s attention and pointing it in the direction of the opposing force.

Piasas are vast in size, growing almost seventy feet long, with more than half that length being their sinuous tail. The span of their muscular feathered wings stretches to fifty feet or more.

Image © Heather Frazier

[When this monster was originally written, there were only two images of a carcolh online, one of which was woefully inaccurate and the other was fetish art. Nowadays, with the growth of interest in obscure mythological creatures having somewhat expanded, there’s several good images out there. But none I like as much as this one.]

Carcolh CR 20 N Aberration What you thought was a hill moves, revealing itself to be the shell of an immense creature combining the features of a serpent and a snail. It has four beady eyes on stalks, and seven amazingly long tentacles surround its gaping maw. Rivers of thick slime pour from beneath its shell and along its body.

Carcolhs are enormous and voracious creatures combining the features of mollusks and snakes. Nearly mindless, these creatures spend most of their lives in wait for prey. Carcolhs lie still and tuck away their heads, disguising themselves as a grassy hill. From this “hill” they extend their tentacles to snatch up approaching creatures. When not hunting, carcolhs sleep in wide-mouthed caves, often carved from the rock by the acid they constantly secrete. Nothing natural survives for long near a carcolh’s den.

Solitary creatures, carcolhs are never found in each other’s company. Carcolhs reproduce asexually only once or twice in their immensely long life-spans. Carcolh eggs are laid in a gelatinous cocoon deep beneath the earth, and the young immediately attempt to consume their brothers and sisters upon hatching. Thus, only one or two of the strongest larvae survive and grow to their final immense proportions, a feat which takes centuries.

A carcolh grows to seventy feet long and its shell is 30 feet in diameter. Their shell and tentacles are covered in innumerable tiny filaments which serve as sensory organs, allowing the carcolh to feel vibrations in the ground and air. They are excellent swimmers and climbers despite their bulk, and can burrow through even the toughest rock using their acidic slime.

To catch a unicorn © deviantArt user Abend.

[It’s Flashback Summer! This page isn’t the first iteration of the Creature Codex. From 2010-2013,  I released six PDFs under the Creature Codex name, roughly one per six months, with a handful of monsters in them for sale. Reviews were good, sales were not. So since they haven’t sold any units for literally years, I’ve closed up shop and will be posting revised versions of these monsters here. Some of them will have the original art from the PDFs, some won’t.

First up, this creature was originally the “twilight unicorn”. Considering that this PDF was released literally the month My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic came out, these days “twilight + unicorn” means something a bit different.]

Dread Unicorn CR 4 LE Magical Beast This powerful equine creature seems to absorb the light around it and its eyes gleam a sinister red. A single horn about two feet long grows from the center of its forehead.

A grim reflection of the magnificent guardians of the forest, dread unicorns instead seek corruption and the spread of their cruel philosophy of suffering. Unlike their exclusive, snobbish kin, dread unicorns will consort with any and all creatures, although they prefer the company of the undead, evil outsiders and the servants of evil gods. Dread unicorns are the size of horses, although they tend to reflect sturdy, muscle-bound breeds.

Dread unicorns are omnivorous, consuming plant matter and flesh in roughly equal proportion. Due to their love of inflicting pain, however, they often kill far more than they eat, littering their forests with rotting flesh and throwing ecosystems out of equilibrium. A forest inhabited by a dread unicorn will soon become twisted and overgrown, with many of the native animals having fled or been slain. For this reason, even evil druids tend to oppose the workings of dread unicorns.

Native to all manner of forests, dread unicorns prefer to establish themselves in lands that are already tainted by a history of evil. Former battlefields, temples to dark gods and woods used as hiding places for escaped criminals and madmen are soothing to the dread unicorns. Most dread unicorns are solitary or live in a mated pair—for all their wickedness, dread unicorns mate for life and form strong bonds with their partners. Unintelligent undead are strangely attracted to the aura of negative energy exuded by a dread unicorn, and a dread unicorn might be followed by a small army of skeletons and zombies. Dread unicorns are smart enough to take advantage of this phenomenon, using their mindless minions as cannon fodder to soften up travelers before striking. Due to their great wisdom, aspiring tyrants and despots often seek dread unicorns for advice on their schemes; the prices asked by the unicorns for this service no doubt draw these aspirants further into evil’s service.