Excoriants, informally known as 'Flayed', are horrifying creatures made from humanoids tortured past the point of madness. They lash out at all living things within sight, seeking only to inflict pain on others. They are occasionally created by Evil-aligned groups as shock troops for unleashing on soft targets. Excoriants are short-lived, and resistant to any healing magics. They continue existing only through slaying living creatures.
Creating an Excoriant: Magical torture, which shall not be described here, creates one of these over the course of six days and six nights. All of the target's skin is removed, and they emerge as a bloody and murderous creature, frenzied by their own agony. Statistics: Excoriant Medium-size Humanoid (Augmented) Hit Dice: 4d8 + 8 (27 hit points) Initiative: +3 Speed: 40ft. Armour Class: 12 (-1 natural armour, +3 Dex), touch 13, flat-footed 9 Base Attack/Grapple: +3/+8 Attack/Full Attack: Longsword+6 melee (1d8+4, 19-20/x2) or grasping claws +6/+6 melee (1d3+3) Fighting Space/Reach: 5ft./5ft. Special Attacks: Frenzy, Strength from pain Special Qualities: Immune to Healing and Mind-influencing effects, Short-lived Saves: Fort +4, Ref +7, Will +0 Abilities: Str 16, Dex 16, Con 16, Int 6, Wis 8, Cha 2 Skills: Climb +6, Jump +6, Listen +3, Spot +3 Feats: Dodge, Run Environment: Any Organization: Solitary or struggle (3-6) Challenge Rating: 3 Treasure: None Alignment: always Chaotic Evil Advancement: 5-12 HD (Medium) Level Adjustment: - Excoriants look like humanoids without skin, their muscled torsos glistening and bleeding. Their eyes burn with a yellow light, and their teeth gnash. Frenzy (Ex): When reduced to half hit points or less, Excoriants gain +2 to attack and damage rolls, and -2 to Armour Class. If they regain enough hit points to rise above half their hit points again, this effect fades until they are reduced again. When frenzied, an excoriant will not distinguish between allies and foes, only hesitating before attacking another Excoriant. Strength from pain (Su): An Excoriant gains succor from slaying other living beings. They regain 1d8 hit points each time they kill a living being of at least 1 HD, and regain 1 hit point each time they slay a creature or less than 1 HD. Short-Lived: Excoriants lose 1 hit point per round in which they make an attack roll. These cannot be regained through any means other than the Strength from pain ability. They can be stored in a dormant state if controlled by an Evil cleric or other person with negative energy channelling, as if they were undead creatures with equal HD. Excoriants gain a +2 racial bonus on Grapple checks. You wouldn't want to handle them either. How you can use Excoriants in your game: - A local cult has turned one of their less faithful members into an Excoriant, as a demonstration of their power, to the others. Forcing each member to participate in the ritual of creation will harden most souls, and shares the guilt and complicity. Your Player Characters might run across it, awakened as a guardian in case of trouble. In this instance, it might turn on any in its vicinity. - An Evil group might also turn a captured member into one of these horrifying monsters, luring it by means of a trail of rats into the city marketplace and unleashing it upon a crowd to terrify and slaughter their opponents. A group of PCs who have some tracking skill might be able to use this to find the cult's headquarters. - The ritual to craft such monsters was learned from Devils, who use this as a punishment and have built 'Flay-Factories' churning out hundreds of these in a week, to use as shock troops in fighting the Blood Wars. In this case, they are often equipped with weapons which can harm their enemies, like silvered or unholy weapons. Also posted on Game Masters Stash on 9 May 2019. Comments are closed.
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