#gufna

I'm a little nervous about this creature - not because I don't like it, but because it has some rather unusual gimmicks which I tried to translate in game terms as accurately as possible. As always, feel free to point out any mistake or any improvement I can do.

Thank you very much, and enjoy!

UTHRA, GUFNA

Image (c) mimir.net

This creature is a towering, vaguely humanoid mass of vines, leaves and other vegetable matter. The shapes on the vine's stem look uncannily like human faces.

GUFNA      CR 18

XP 153'600

LG Colossal Outsider (extraplanar, good, law, uthra)

Init +1; Senses darkvision 120 ft., tremorsense 120 ft.; Perception +29

DEFENSE

AC 32, touch 6, flat-footed 32  (+7 deflection, -3 Dex, +26 natural, -8 size)

hp 294 (19d10+190); fast healing 10 

Fort +21, Ref +3, Will +18; -2 vs. poison

Damage Reduction 15 / evil and slashing; Immune electricity, forced movement, negative energy, negative levels, sonic, teleportation; Resist cold 10, fire 10

Spell Resistance 29

OFFENSE

Speed 10 ft.

Melee 2 slams +32 (3d10+19), 2 vines +26 (3d8+9 plus grab)

Space 30 ft.; Reach 30 ft.

Special Attacks constrict (vine, 3d8+9), explosive fruit

Spell-Like Abilities (CL 20th, concentration +28)

     At will - aid, dimensional anchor, dimension door, entangle (DC 19), hallow, wall of thorns, wood shape (DC 20), zone of truth (DC 20)

     5 / day - plane shift (DC 23)

     3 / day – banishment (DC 25), greater restoration, hungry earth

     1 / day - holy word (DC 25), imprisonment (DC 27), interplanetary teleport

STATISTICS

Str 48, Dex 5, Con 31, Int 20, Wis 25, Cha 26

Base Atk +20; CMB +47 (+49 bull rush, +51 grapple); CMD 54 (56 vs. bull rush, cannot be tripped)

Feats Awesome Blow, Dimensional Agility, Dimensional Assault, Dimensional Dervish, Greater Bull Rush, Improved Bull Rush, Improved Initiative, Quick Bull Rush, Power Attack, Weapon Focus (slam)

Skills Craft (woodworks) +20, Diplomacy +27, Heal +27, Intimidate +27, Knowledge (nature) +26, Knowledge (planes) +26, Perception +29, Sense Motive +28, Spellcraft +27, Stealth +1 (+17 in forest areas), Survival +24; Racial Modifiers +16 Stealth in forest areas

Languages Abyssal, Aklo, Celestial, Uthraic; telepathy 120 ft.

Special Qualities legendary resistance, living gate, massive, merciful, uncanny transposition

ECOLOGY

Environment any law-aligned and good-aligned plane

Organization solitary

Treasure incidental

SPECIAL ABILITIES

Explosive Fruit (Su): Once every 1d4 rounds as a standard action, a gufna may hurl an oversized fruit from its body, up to a distance of 200 feet. On impact, the fruit explodes, causing 8d6 fire damage and 8d6 force damage to all creatures within 20 feet of it, and causing them to become staggered and deafened for 1d6 rounds. A successful Reflex save (DC 29) halves the damage and negates both staggering and deafness. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Legendary Resistance (Ex): Once per day as an immediate action, if a gufna fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.

Living Gate (Su): Through means poorly understood by planar researchers, a gufna can turn its own body into a planar pathway to any plane of its choosing. Three times per day, by concentrating and doing nothing else for a full round, the gufna turns into a colossal tree-like vine, seemingly tall enough to link the earth and the sky together. While the gufna is in living gate form, any creature can enter the gufna’s body and be immediately transported (as with plane shift, but see below) to an Inner Plane of the gufna’s choice. The choice of the plane is made at the moment of the transformation, and may not be changed until the gufna changes back into its natural form. A gufna may allow or deny transportation according to its own will, and is automatically aware of the aligment of any creature enters it body while in living gate form (as detect chaos, detect evil, detect good and detect law). While in living gate form, a gufna may not move nor use any melee or ranged attack, though it may still make use of its spell-like abilities and its uncanny transposition ability. A gufna’s damage reduction also improves to 15 / - while in living gate form. A gufna may return to its natural form as a full-round action. Note that theoretically a gufna may even create a dimensional passageway to the World of Light, but non-uthras are automatically denied entry to it under all circumstances.

Massive (Ex): Because a gufna is so massive, uneven ground and other terrain features that form difficult terrain generally pose no significant hindrance to a gufna's movement, though areas of forest or settlements are considered difficult terrain to a gufna. A Huge or smaller creature can move through any square occupied by a gufna, or vice-versa. A gufna can make attacks of opportunity only against foes that are Huge or larger, and can be flanked only by Huge or larger foes. A gufna gains a bonus for being on higher ground only if its entire space is on higher ground than that of its target. It’s possible for a Huge or smaller creature to climb a gufna — this generally requires a successful DC 30 Climb check, and a Small or larger creature that climbs on a gufna’s body provokes an attack of opportunity from the uthra.

Merciful (Ex): A gufna may choose to inflict non-lethal damage with its natural attacks without penalty.

Uncanny Transposition (Su): As a standard action, a gufna can target any creature, object or even a continuous area effect within 100 ft. of itself and teleport it to any solid surface for up to 60 ft. If the creature is not willing to be teleported, he must succeed at a Will saving throw (DC 27) to negate this effect. The gufna may target itself with this ability. If the gufna attempts to teleport an spell effect that is controlled by another, unwilling creature, the gufna attempt to counterspell this effect, successfully teleporting the effect on a success. The save DC is Charisma-based.

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Gufnas are among the most enigmatic of the uthras, embodying not judgment or purification, but connection. They are living pathways, their immense bodies forming bridges between places, planes, and states of being. Entire ecosystems flourish upon and around them: mosses, lichen, and smaller flora thrive along their surfaces, while great leaves gather fresh water into natural basins and clusters of heavy, pulsating fruit hang like lanterns, each seeming to cradle some unseen motion within.

These vine uthras are known to cultivate entire cloud-forests, creating stable microenvironments in otherwise hostile or transient planar regions. Travelers who stumble upon such groves often find them uncannily hospitable—provided they do not threaten the gufna itself. Fresh water pools in the broad cups of its leaves, and nutrient-rich berries grow in abundance along its lesser tendrils. For followers of the uthras, these groves are sacred waystations, places of rest and quiet transformation.

Perhaps most remarkable is the gufna’s role as a conduit of travel. When other uthras—most often naktas accompanied by ananas—require passage across vast distances or between planes, gufnas facilitate their movement through means poorly understood by mortal scholars. A traveler stepping into the shadow of a gufna’s coiled mass may emerge moments later in a distant realm, as though space itself had folded to accommodate the journey. These pathways are neither portals nor gates in the traditional sense, but extensions of the gufna’s own being, linking disparate locations through its living structure.

Despite their generally passive nature, gufnas are far from defenseless. When threatened, their massive forms respond with sudden and overwhelming force. Thorn-like spines erupt from their surfaces in violent bursts, lashing vines strike with crushing strength, and their swollen fruits can detonate in explosive releases of energy and light. Most disconcerting of all is their ability to distort the space around them, displacing intruders and casting them far from the gufna’s domain in an instant. Such acts are not performed in anger, but in firm and absolute rejection.

Many theologians believe that gufnas serve a greater purpose within the mysterious design of the uthras. Their cultivation of stable environments, their provision of sustenance, and their role in transporting other uthras suggest that they may act as caretakers of the hidden realms associated with the World of Light. Some go further, proposing that gufnas do not merely inhabit these realms — but actively sustain them, anchoring fragments of a more perfect reality within the flawed fabric of the current multiverse. Yet all those who rest within a gufna's shadow often leave with the unsettling sense that they have passed through more than a forest — they have brushed against the edges of another reality.