Thursday, June 10, 2010

Mythversions! Er... Reverse Monsters!

One feature of my campaign world is the replacement of most standard mythological creatures with my idea of what their opposite would be. Today, The reverse Medusa, for Swords and Wizardry Whitebox.

Pigmanlion!
AC: 8/11
HD: 6
Move: 9
XP: 800
Attacks: Lion's bite, or by weapon.
# Encountered: Solitary, plus 1d20 living statues (Move 3, hd 1, xp 50, crush prone with base for auto hit, double damage, ac 9/10)

A hunched humanoid, stooping eight feet tall. Pigmanlions combine the worst features of (wait for it...) pigs, men and lions. They have a roughly human body, save for digigrade legs ending in black hooves and a corkscrewed lion tail, while the head is that of a maned pig, with the fangs and roar of a lion. The human skin is the color of ivory, and very cold.
The gaze of a Pigmanlion has the power to bring any sculpture to awkward, rubbery life, as a stone-to-flesh spell in a 60ft. Cone. No save applies. Most statues have the statistics listed above, but many petrified adventurers are reanimated by Pigmanlions, who typically leave one limb stone to ensure loyalty and an inability to escape.
Pigmanlions have the personalities of stalkers, fawning over their "creations." They have the voices of young, uneducated cockney women, despite being clearly male.
Adventures/Treasure: In addition to pieces of fine statuary not yet animated, Pigmanlions acquire the gear of petrified adventurers (In my games, gear is not petrified, only the person), and various minerals and ores left behind when they "carve" out subterranean lairs with their stone-to-flesh power.
Possible adventures could begin with the disappearance of a citie's statues, followed by its sculptors. Random encounters with one typically see it trying to trick victims with its feminine voice, luring the hapless onto solid rock, where it can turn the floor into a pit of flesh, then close with melee weapons and bite. Despite their maneating tendencies, they are sacred to Venus (Or Ishtar, or any fertility goddess.) Killing one has a 50% of causing the slayer's first-born son to transform into a Pigmanlion.

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