Towards the Hoard of a Hundred Horrors: Aurumvoraxes

Glorious is the sumptuary beast, with golden coat and silver claws, porphyrous teeth and velvet maw. Intolerant too, gruesomely so, of those who ape its exquisiteness. Fortunately for most, such beasts will only mate with their perfect equals, and attack all others of their own kind on sight.

Munificent is the royal weasel, who bends to the whims of its prince. Of who it chooses to serve none can say - more often pauper than true prince - but the bond is beyond death. Beyond reason as well, for every whim no matter how small is enacted by the royal weasel.

Terrible is the mauler, who breaks the necks of dragons under the weight of its jaws. Terribler still when hungered, for when hunting it kills abundantly beyond the filling of its belly. Terriblest yet when its princess is harmed, for none but its princess may calm its rage.

By another name,

They are

Aurumvoraxes

HD: 7 AC: 16, plus immune to fire and poison ATK: 1d8/1d8 Claws, or Spine-Cruncher SAV: 11 MOV: As swift horse, plus 30' leap INT: As clever beast, or as its prince(ss) when given explicit commands ML: 9, 12 when its prince(ss) is unconscious by injury or dead
No. Appearing: 1

Spine-Cruncher: The aurumvorax clamps its jaws around its target's neck, or the closest equivalent. The target must save vs. death or die instantly as their neck is crushed, or their head severed entirely. If they succeed, they take 2d8 damage and dislodge the aurumvorax. Spine-Cruncher works on targets up to 14 HD.

Killer Copper Pieces: Mangraves

Brack-anchored predatory trees, the elegant arched spindles of their roots gathering scabrous silt. Their bark is alabaster, their leaves a delicate, sensual pink - but they are consummate vegetable shapeshifters, able to match their appearance to surrounding plant-life. The wary can still spot them by their accompaniment: carrion-beetles, corpse-nibbling fish, and suchlike - and of course they become obvious when their sucker-tipped roots rear up from the water.

They hunt by detecting animal heartbeats. In turn, they are hunted by the people who share their coastal environments for their rich crimson sap, which can be worked into the finest rubber and plastic, or made into gum that is chewed to promote vitality. These tree-hunters take drugs to depress their heartbeat, using pumps in their palms and heels to quicken their blood-flow and prevent themselves from passing out*. Paddling out in canoes like drunken crocodiles they may sneak up on the trees and tap their sap. It is still an enormously dangerous profession, due to the flailing of tapped trees' roots, complications from the pumps and the drugs, and the other dangers of the coast which those precautions render them vulnerable to.

The enormously wealthy sometimes keep these trees in their gardens, "taming" the things by feeding them so much blood they don't bother to attack or disguise themselves.

They are

Mangraves

HD: 6 AC: 14 ATK: 4 Sucker-Roots SAV: 10  MOV: N/A INT: Dumb animal ML: 12
No. Appearing: 1d3

Sucker-Roots: 2 of a mangrave's roots can reach 30', and the other 2 can reach 15'. A successful attack from a sucker-root represents it sticking to you - for every round thereafter you will take 1d6 damage automatically until it is severed or otherwise detached. Against anyone with a sucker-root stuck to them, a mangrave may also make a grapple action in addition to draining their blood - trip them, hold them underwater, drag them closer, etc. A sucker-root takes 6 damage to sever - only half this is taken by the mangrave itself.

Mangraves surprise on a 3-in-6 unless one is moving at half-speed. Conversely, a mangrave can never be surprised unless one has altered their heart-rate by drugs or some other means.

* When they're not on the drugs they can do this:

 

 

If you know, you know. 

Killer Copper Pieces: Enfolders

(Killer Copper Pieces = the ones that don't make the cut for the Hoard of a Hundred Horrors)
((The idea for enfolders came to me in a dream)) 

The stuff of the underworld, like radiation, can contaminate the bodies of those who eat of its creatures and breathe its fetid air. This contamination tends to concentrate in the skin, and so those who delve into the underworld tend to collect tattoos, scars, and piercings like iodine tablets - as much superstition as true abjuration.

Those unlucky ones in whom the contamination reaches a critical point will find their skins slacken and fuse to the surfaces of the underworld, taking on the properties of its stone and wood and suchlike, their shrivelled bodies beneath their stony yet disturbingly-pliable hides sustained in a miserable half-life by their root.

This transformation has a distinctive feeling, so enfolders tend to be found in two sorts of places - near entrances to the dungeon, the results of desperate, failed escapes, and near treasures worth risking a fate worse than death to acquire.

Sometimes referred to as Stuck Willies (and brickjackets and stonemoaners and etc.) - every dead and near-enough-to-dead adventurer in the world below is a Willy - regular corpses are Stiff Willies, sheet ghouls are Slick Willies, and so on and so forth.

They are

Enfolders

HD: 2 AC: 10, plus Brickjacketed ATK: Enfolding, Stonemoaning SAV: 12  MOV: As walking person - can't go beyond 30 feet of their root INT: As person after decades of solitary confinement ML: 10
No. Appearing: 1d6

Brickjacketed: Enfolders have 5 damage reduction against everything but picks, explosives, and whatever else could crack solid rock - unless the attack is targeting an opening in their skin. 

Enfolding: An enfolder will always grapple on a successful hit. Initially this grapple has a strength of 12 - this strength increases by 4 every round you remain grappled by the enfolder, as it envelopes you in its skin. After the grapple reaches 20 strength you begin suffocating.

Stonemoaning: Enfolders that spot a person will begin to moan hoarsely. Every round an enfolder is moaning there is a 2-in-6 chance of a wandering monster showing up to investigate. Enfolders cease moaning the moment they cannot see any people.

Towards the Hoard of a Hundred Horrors: Vargouilles

History is a bottomless well of blood, poisoned by grudges. From out of its depths rise the curses of hateful generations past and forgotten.

These living curses lurk among us - by day ordinary-seeming, unaware of their true nature, and by night their heads detach, warp and flitter, trailing the tubes of their entrails on gloomy missions, inflicting pain and panic. An arrow loosed eventually lands, and lies still. A curse is a weapon for no just war, for it flies night after night without ever stopping.

They are

Vargouilles

HD: 1 AC: 14 ATK: 1d6 bite, OR Kiss OR Shriek SAV: 8  MOV: Fly as bat INT: As human ML: 7
No. Appearing: 1d10

Kiss: A vargouille spreads its curse with a kiss. One kissed by a vargouille must save, or contract their curse - on the first round after contracting the curse, a thin pink line of raw flesh circles their neck. On the second round, the line weeps corrupted blood. From the third round on, if their head is not firmly secured to their neck by their hands, or bandages, or suchlike, then it flies off as a new vargouille. Vargouilles are reluctant to overpopulate - too large a population of vargouilles in a community is a beacon to the headless huntsmen. The curse of a vargouille's kiss may be lifted by the same means as any other curse.

Shriek: Those within 30 feet must save or take 1d6 non-lethal damage each round they don't spend hiding or fleeing for the next 1d6 rounds. Those who fall unconscious due to this damage have their hair turn white permanently. Those who make their save against a vargouille's scream are immune to all such screams for a day. Headless hunstmen are immune to this.

A vargouille can chew the head off a corpse to make that corpse its new host body. Both the vargouille and its new body will appear to be an ordinary human during the day, but one's appearance is not changed to match the other.

Should a vargouille pass over the Seal of Iphegor it will be flung down to earth and become unable to fly until it removes itself from the radius of the Seal - however the true form of the Seal of Iphegor has been lost for centuries, and countless counterfeits crowd grimoires.

The Headless Huntsmen

HD: 3 AC: 16 ATK: 1d8 longsword & Hanged Man's Rot grenades, or 1d6 bow & arrows, or 1d6 bident and net SAV: 9 MOV: As human, or as riding horse INT: As human ML: 10
No. Appearing: 2d4

Impatient, ruthless exterminators of the vargouilles. The horses they ride are fearless, but otherwise ordinary.

Their neck-stumps are plugged by plates of lead printed with worn runes. Their blood does not flow except at the moment of their deaths, when it is expelled in a flood. When they attempt to go about incognito, they will wear hoods or helmets supported by gourds or tubers underneath. They communicate through gesture, and are somehow able to see without eyes, hear without ears. Headless huntsmen possess no special sense to detect vargouilles, but know the signs of their presence in a community - pregnant women whose children have been gnawed from their wombs, pets left impaled on branches, feces smeared on window-sills, and suchlike.

Hanged Man's Rot: Save vs. CON when breathing it in miasmic form, or contract. A Hanged Man's Rot grenade has a 10-ft. radius. Where a serious infestation has been detected, the headless huntsmen will bring a copper cooking-wagon which can in time fill an entire hex with Hanged Man's Rot miasma.

The disease is an affliction of the cervical vertebrae and its nerves - at first only a stiffness in the extremities, then becoming apparent as a harsh, weeping rash around the neck when it advances - in the end it leaves its victims paralyzed and suffocating. Save or take 1d6 DEX damage each week, which cannot be recovered until Hanged Man's Rot is cured. A dose of cure to the sickness can be produced with 20 sp of rare herbs, the knowledge of a sage or equivalent figure, and a day's work.

A vargouille can contract Hanged Man's Rot from both miasma and victims of it they feed on, yet takes no DEX damage. Instead, their ability to control a host body is destroyed. To those afflicted with Hanged Man's Rot, a vargouille's kiss is simply fatal if their head detaches rather than accursed.

D6x6 Bonkers Boots

Click the button below to get your boots:

Special thanks to Spwack for the generator generator here: https://meanderingbanter.blogspot.com/2018/10/automatic-list-to-html-translator-v2.html

D6	These boots have the style
1	of jodhpur boots.
2	of cowboy boots.
3	of go-go boots.
4	of hessians.
5	of poulaines.
6	of jackboots.

D6	These boots are made
1	from the stitched soles of men who outran justice.
2	from a wicker-like weaving of the spines of serpents.
3	from a pair of hollowed camel-humps and the unplucked hide of an ostrich.
4	from the manes, fangs, and leather of a pair of gay man-eating lions.
5	of quicksilver miraculously woven into rippling cloth.
6	from the contiguous carapaces of remarkably boot-shaped insects.

D6	These boots are adorned
1	with colourful ribbons like ballet shoes.
2	with jingling golden bells.
3	with feathery plumes down their backs.
4	with bejewelled hobnails.
5	with in-sewn stockings embroidered with calligraphic prayers to gods of movement and travel.
6	with thin chains of tin and painted glass.

D6	These boots let their wearer
1	tread unharmed on water, lava, oozes, and all other at-least-mostly-fluids.
2	dance any dance perfectly.
3	kick with the force of a horse, and let any of their strikes against something marked by their boot-print - even something as light as a breath - hit it with the force of a horse's kick.
4	leap vertically up to any height they can see - though they provide no protection on the way down.
5	march forever without becoming exhausted, and at the moment of death set a location anywhere in the world for their boots to march their corpse to.
6	click their heels together twice to return to the position they stood ten paces back.

D6	These boots can be found
1	with their last wearer's legs still sticking out of them - bone-in - in a dungeon.
2	being modelled by an animate mannequin.
3	in the collection of a leprechaun cobbler who is trying to figure out how to curse them, as he does all his wares.
4	in the cottage of a giant, who uses them as thimbles.
5	being worn by a senile wanderer with outlandish tales of far-flung lands.
6	being worshiped by a colony of feral cats as their god.

D6	If these boots don't fit
1	you're shit outta luck.
2	they can be resized by any wizard with knowledge of transmutation.
3	they'll magically resize themselves.
4	they'll Bed of Procrustes your feet to fit them.
5	you can go on a quest on behalf of a god of footwear (or some similar domain) to have them miraculously reshaped.
6	you can remake them by hand - but take care not to break their enchantment in the process.

Towards the Hoard of a Hundred Horrors: The Popopo

A tight-lipped smile, a bird's impassive eyes. White hair, white skin, and long, lithe limbs. Her beak stretches up and out of her throat, and there comes that awful sound - half song, half laugh: "Po-po-po" - easy to rhyme.

She is a lonely and envious creature. She takes other's children and makes them hers, brooding in darkling dungeons. In the west she is Mournful Dove. In the east she is the Capon's Cuckoo. In the north she is Winter-Come-Early. In the south she is the daughter of Night and Grief.

Yet across all corners of the world her call is the same - therefore, she is

The Popopo 

HD: 5 AC: 15 ATK: 1d6 peck and 1d6/1d6 claws + Raptorial Claim SAV: 10 MOV: As sprinting human, fly as pelican INT: As smart human ML: 7, 10 in defense of stolen children
No. Appearing: 1

The Popopo is strong enough to fly while carrying a single person. 

Raptorial Claim: An individual marked by the Popopo's claws becomes vulnerable to her magic. For each claw-mark upon them, the Popopo may inflict one of the following effects. Once per night the Popopo may also claw the exterior of a home, and thereby affect everyone inside it at once - and if she does so three nights in a row, on the third night all inhabitants automatically fail the first of their saves:

-Sleep: Save or fall into a deep sleep for 12 hours - if you receive a serious jolt you can save again.

-Glamour: Save or perceive the Popopo as an ordinary, if entrancing, woman - you understand her call as your own language. You can save again if someone not under the Popopo's spell points out what she truly is to you.

-Madness: Save or roll a 1d6 - on a 1-2 do nothing, on a 3-4 flee, on a 5-6 attack the nearest living thing. Save again each round.

Imperfect Scions

HD: 2 AC: 12 or as armour ATK: 1d4/1d4 claws + Swallow Whole or as weapon SAV: 7 MOV: As human, fly as sparrow INT: As human ML: 7
No. Appearing: 1d2

Swallow Whole: Someone hit by both of an imperfect scion's claw attacks in one round must test vs. strength or be swallowed whole by it. They take 1 damage per round, and cannot escape until the thing is cut open.

Glamour: Imperfect as they may be, their glamour is more skillful than the Popopo's. It is always active, with no save possible against it, making them appear as normal people - until they swallow someone whole, or fly, or think they are alone.

To sages and cunning-folk it is known that the Popopo is never satisfied with her brood. She will give them away to those with the rite to call her, shaping them into the caller's idea of a perfect child. Such stories never end well - the children become far less subservient when they mature.

Towards the Hoard of a Hundred Horrors: Townfathers

Suppurating grub-hulks slumbering and snoring in the lightless deep - each a nation, the founder and the foundation.

They are nightmare to nightmares, and lords of men.

Communities thrive under their protection, but these in truth are larders. When the festival of awakening comes the price of protection is paid in full.

They are

Townfathers

HD: 12 AC: 12 ATK: 1d20 crush - can hit all targets within an enclosed space simultaneously SAV: 12  MOV: As very big caterpillar - can compress itself through openings a human could crawl through INT: As lazy, hungry chimpanzee ML: 6
No. Appearing: 1

The Rumbling: The infrasonic rumbling of a sleeping townfather keeps other monsters at bay. Within the hex a townfather is in you do not need to check for wandering monsters. Within a hex's distance of a townfather's resting place wandering monsters are only 1/4 as frequent as usual. In the hexes immediately beyond this range wandering monsters are only 1/2 as frequent. A sleeping townfather whose rest is disturbed must test morale to awaken.

The Dinner Bell Calls: An awakened townfather can tune the mood of its dependents, for ease of feeding or self-defense - inducing xenophobic aggression, apocalyptic terror, placid revelry, or whatever else. Not quite mind control, but close enough. Those within range of the Rumbling must save or be affected, and take a cumulative 1 point penalty to their save for every week spent exposed to the Rumbling. A sufficient shock (injury, bucket of cold water to the face, hurting someone they care about, etc.) gives another save to throw off the influence. 

A townfather exposed to sunlight takes 1d6 damage each round.

A sufficiently old and well-fed townfather becomes a living dungeon - impervious from the outside, one must delve within to slay it.

Founding Family

HD: 2 AC: As armour worn ATK: As weapon wielded, advantage on grappling SAV: 7 MOV: As human - can compress themselves through openings a human finger could fit through INT: As human ML: 6
No. Appearing: 1d4

Traitors, collaborators, bound by blood. Descendants of the first to find a townfather, first to accept its bargain. Handsome, overly-identical sorts - pins and needles in their joints and in the hidden corners of their faces hold them into human shape. A second heart in their chest pulses the milk of the townfather through their veins - pale, slow and thick as treacle. They hear it as a choir of angels, calling them ever-forward to their grand destiny (of pampering the creature and sating its appetite).

 

Within range of the Rumbling they are telepathic with each other.