Shuddering Forms in Ancient Tomb Depths (Basic Undead for King of Kings)

Given that tomorrow is Halloween (and with roughly another month having passed since my last post... sigh, I really need to get back on blogging and back on running D&D games again, but I keep on meeting roadblocks and annoying hurdles (some my own fault, some not)), I figured it'd be as good a time as any to write about one of my favorite creepy types of D&D monsters: the UNDEAD! I've already written about the undead in King of Kings in a few different places: salt mummies, parrot-fiends, false prophets, and rusalki (not to mention various types of undead dinosaurs in session reports) have rounded out the kinds of dead things now walking in the world of the Enlightened Empire. So check those out if any of them catch your eye! Here, I wanted to make some original, King of Kings-ified versions of classic D&D undead, riffing on Gus L.'s Monster Archaeology posts from years back (a huuuuuge influence on me and my thinking about D&D), namely his post on Lesser Undead in OD&D (please PLEASE check it out !!)

 

The Reanimated

Number Encountered: N/A  

Hit Dice: 1  

Attacks: 1 claw (1d6) or weapon  

Armor: Unarmored (0)  

Morale: 6*  

Puppeteered: The reanimated are controlled by some outside force or being. If that control is severed or destroyed, the reanimated instantly collapse to the ground.  

Undead: Immune to poison, disease, mind effects, etc.  

Unfeeling: Do not react to being harmed. Do not make morale checks unless forced to (such as due to a dispelling or turning).

 

The dead are a tool, one that can be used to very effective ends in the right hands. Whatever their origin, condition, or the mode of their animation, these reanimated cadavers form the backbone of the art of necromancy.

 

Types of Reanimated

Fresh

In Good Condition: +1 to hit points.

Bloated

Buoyant: Floats in water.

Fetid Gas: A successful hit causes the corpse to release stinking gases. Save vs. stench or begin to vomit.

Rotting

Disease: The claws of a rotting corpse carry disease.

Horrifying Countenance: Rotting corpses are disgusting to behold. Save vs. disgust or take a -1 penalty to all rolls while you can see the corpse.

Pickled

Edible: Although it likely tastes poor, the pickled corpse is technically edible.

Preserved: The pickled corpse has advantage on saving throws against effects that would damage or disintegrate its body.

Skeletal

Fleshless: Skeletons are immune to cold effects and take half damage from fire.

Fragile: Skeletons take double damage from bludgeons.

 

There's practically innumerable ways for a corpse to be reanimated: a necromancer animating dead muscle with chthonic magic, a ghul's chilly touch bringing the body under thrall (keep an eye out for a post on ghuls that I keep procrastinating on), a nefarious carnivorous plant wrapping its vines around the limbs like a marionette, baleful rays from purple moon-rocks throbbing in the joints, or fished out of the pickling jars of some mad sorcerer. There is no one way to counteract all types of reanimation (although turning, given the influence of Truth over all things, can be effective against all types of reanimated).

 

[This is basically just my attempt at combining all possible types of "dead body controlled by a necromancer" into one statblock with little modular bits connected. Zombies and skeletons are already this type of undead in OD&D and Basic, so this is more or less a broadening from that original mold! Also, the note that they can be forced to do morale checks is my first clumsy attempt at integrating various ways of "turning" undead that first got introduced in the post on parrot-fiends, since the Unceasingly Useful Dermestid Box provides a secular alternative to undead-turning.]

 

While reanimated corpses lack all agency, being little more than hunks of flesh puppeteered by an outside actor, there are those of the living dead which cling to independence and whose shuddering mockery of life sneers at Truth. Two such willful bodies are worth touching upon here.

 

Barrow Body

Number Encountered: 1d6

Hit Dice: 3+1

Attacks: 1 touch (energy drain)

Armor: as chain (2)

Morale: 10*

Energy Drain: The touch of a barrow body drains a full experience level upon a successful hit. The victim loses one hit die's worth of HP, corresponding to-hit bonuses, and any class abilities gained from the level they lost. A character brought to level 0 by a barrow body dies and becomes a barrow body.

Invulnerability: Barrow bodies take no damage from non-magical missiles. While melee attacks can damage the body's... body, the daeva inhabiting it does not "die" until dispelled (i.e., the barrow body can be rendered immobile by melee damage, but it will still be "alive").

Paralyze with Terror: Anyone seeing a barrow body must save or be paralyzed with terror. Paralysis is broken if the barrow body attacks, goes out of sight, or if the victim is shaken out of it via smelling salts etc.

Undead: Immune to poison, disease, mind effects, etc.

Unfeeling: Do not react to being harmed. Do not make morale checks unless forced to (such as due to a dispelling or turning).

The death of a good, honest person is a victory for deceit, and thus corpses not properly protected (by a watchful dog (their mean gaze shielding from unclean spirits) or ritual fires) are vulnerable to possession by the invisible deceitful daeva Nasrusht. Nasrusht has no body, and thus hungers after bodies, for even feeling dulled by death and decay is more than the nothingness that is its normal existence. In the western satrapies at the core of the Enlightened Empire, Nasrusht is kept at bay by ritual excarnation, placing the body atop a tower of silence and leaving it open to be picked apart by carrion birds and dogs, before the bones are safely removed and ensconced in the tomb. Such towers are a more recent appearance here in the eastern satrapies. Instead, the locals since time immemorial are more accustomed to heretical burial practices: constructing barrow mounds to bury their heroes, or ensconcing them beneath great stone kurgans, flesh still on bone when set into the earth. Thus, for centuries generations of good, honest folk have been left open to rapacious Nasrusht, leaving an uncanny barrow body in many tombs. Some temple exorcists of the True Religion have made it a mission to wander the countryside and expel the Nasrusht-cursed corpses from their crypts, despite the protestations of villagers and tribesmen disgusted that their ancestors are being defiled so insultingly.

 

Corpses of good people are ritually unclean due to Nasrusht's influence, whether reanimated as a barrow body or otherwise. The only exception to this are ancient relics of saints, begrudgingly made clean by temple functionaries disappointed at the popularity of such local cults. Thus, victims of Nasrusht's touch, which makes the skin pallid and the face languid and drains the victim of the will to live and of their connection to their very selves as they become more alike to the dead than the living, will not be ministered to by temple priests until they are ritually washed and atoned. Their accursed half-life can only be dispelled by a high-ranking mobad, and not just any high-ranking mobad but one who has specialized in the art of forgiveness for uncleanliness via star-magic. Such mobads are rare, and likely to request very particular favors in exchange for their services (it is said that one such mobad-doctor, Behzad Marzbani, occasionally makes his appearance in Humakuyun when he isn't on his dhow in the Sea of Giants).

 

[For more on Nasrusht and burial practices in historic Iran, read the page on corpses in Encyclopaedia Iranica. Also note that IRL, the type of burial practice involving exposing the body to the elements actually originated in eastern Iran, not in the west, as I have it here, but I kinda flipped it for the purposes of the game.]

 

Yes, I maybe cleaved a bit too close to the look of the ringwraiths with this drawing but they look cool so

Rove-Wraith

Number Encountered: 1d6

Hit Dice: 4+1

Attacks: 1 weapon (1d6 + energy drain)

Armor: as chain+shield (2+shield)

Morale: 11*

Energy Drain: The sword of a rove-wraith drains a full experience level upon a successful hit. The victim loses one hit die's worth of HP, corresponding to-hit bonuses, and any class abilities gained from the level they lost. A character brought to level 0 by a rove-wraith dies and becomes a barrow body.

Invulnerability: Rove-wraiths take no damage from non-magical weapons, and half damage from silver weapons.

Mount: Rove-wraiths ride upon steeds made from smoke or congealed blood.

Paralyze with Terror: Anyone seeing a rove-wraith must save or be paralyzed with terror. Paralysis is broken if the rove-wraith attacks, goes out of sight, or if the victim is shaken out of it via smelling salts etc.

Undead: Immune to poison, disease, mind effects, etc.

Unfeeling: Does not react to being harmed. Does not make morale checks unless forced to (such as due to a dispelling or turning).

While good, honest corpses are left open to nefarious Nasrusht, the corpses of especially cruel and evil-hearted men, those most motivated toward deceit and destruction in life, are made unclean by their own conduct and can maintain willfulness after death. Most often, these are the corpses of rapacious conquerors, warlords, and tyrants, although especially cruel torturers and sorcerers are present among their number as well. They are called rove-wraiths because, in their desperate restlessness as they hunger after the pleasures of life, they wander about the wildernesses and palace complexes they once ruled over, never comfortable staying in one place (rather unlike the buried bodies held by Nasrusht, or ghuls cursed forever to a single spot). They become fixated on some object of their obsession in life, or on some cruel mission they never succeeded in following through to fruition, which they seek after in their wanderings (even if the mission was as simple as not feeling they had brought enough villages to heel). They are, however, thankfully rather solitary creatures, banding together into small and short-lived alliances of evil, and thus their forces are kept from overwhelming the world of living men.

 

1d12 Rove-Wraiths of the East and their Cruel Fixations

1.  Yarga the Bloodthirsty: Barbarian tyrant of northern Numistan in ancient times, who once delighted in the lamentations of women. Now a blind and deaf mummy stiff under layers of clay with an uncanny drunken ability to dodge blows. Seeks a way to hear his favorite sound again.
2. The Decapitatrix: The cruelest of amazon queens, who decapitated the victims of her raids, and then her own tribeswomen, until she herself came under the blade. A shuddering headlessness under dripping deer hides. Desperate for her own head, now lost.
3. Dog-headed Dyan the Dreadful: The only known wraith of the dog-headed men, who are already known for their demon-haunted cruelty. He was known for injustices done unto babies and mothers. Just wants to taste succulent childflesh again, but for his burnt-out tongue.
4. The Ringseeker: Eunuch advisor to an ancient tyrant, arch-liar and arch-torturer, whose foul tongue wormed its way into his liege's worst neuroses. Ashamed of himself, he seeks after a golden ring of his tyrant's seal, which he coveted from the ruler's heir.
5. Shameful Once-Prince: Wraith of the ruling house of the Enlightened Empire, passed over for the throne due to his evilness, leading to uprising and civil war. Disfigured, scarred, and perpetually sobbing, he wanders after his insistent birthright.
6. Farahnaz the Ferocious: Warrior woman tyrant of the mountain fastnesses, now ghastly and bent over like a dessicated monkey, sword in hand. Wanders the mountains searching for the dragon (now long-dead) that she abandoned her kingdom to starvation for.
7. Skazzadraxx of Tandurstan: Ancient dino-wraith king, whose palace (now half-buried and rotten) was a circus maximus of gore, wherein the now-decrepit thunder lizard mockingly murdered human slaves for the delight of reptile masters. Seeks after rivers of blood once again.
8. The Star-Blind: Selfish sorcerer who sought to spy on all souls in the world through meditations on the north star as an aspect of many-eyed Mihr. Empty eye sockets glowing with starlight, skin bursting with a thousand betrayed secrets, he wanders just wanting to finally die but Mihr won't let him.
9. Filth-Festerer: Mother of a dozen diseases, she was a selfish chthonic sorcerer who bred daevas in her bloodstream and had sex with feces-covered false prophets. Her skin sloughs off like a loose robe as clouds of flies festoon her. She seeks the ancient evil known as the Red Death.
10. Queen Naghme: Poisoner of two dozen husbands and suitors, now given over to spiders and snakes. Her pallid skin bulges with the venomous things crawling beneath the surface, wrapped in her black rag. She seeks after the tomb of her son, in order to marry him.
11. Nameless Betrayer: Eunuch of an ancient tyranny whose betrayal was so rank that his name was expunged from all records, all monuments, and all speech. Shamefully shuddering in a ragged rug clutching a curved dagger, he seeks after his own name, surely still recorded somewhere.
12. [ ]: Sorcerer who sought to bring about the Deluge anew, putting his ear to the ground to listen to the whispers of the caged false stars below. Killed a hundred or more in rituals mocking the sun, but never sought his own immortality, instead being magically suicidal. Cursed by Truth to spit brine when he attempts to speak, he knows his name but it is anathema to be spoken. Seeks out the salt desert, so he may finally dry.

[Yes, these are just wights and wraiths... BUT my hope is that they're at the very least an interesting take on wights and wraiths, that tie them more into the setting :) Thank you for reading and have a happy Halloween!] 

Isle of the Cyclopean Monolith (A Ten Room Dungeon for King of Kings)

So I've been wanting to post more adventure locations for a while, and a format that I think is great is Tristyn's Ten Room Dungeon. She made a bunch of them earlier in her blog's existence, but recently made that post I just linked to with a general overview of the format. So here I've made a ten room dungeon for King of Kings, Tristyn style! The rooms don't really stick completely to the guidelines in the post, but yknow its close enough. I'll start posting more of these, its a really fun way to make a nice lil adventure location!

Your ship rocking in the rough waves of the Sea of Giants, you spot a little black crag poking out of the seafoam... "Land ho!" you cry, turning toward what you hope is a respite from the storms and the schools of raucous dolphins, but instead you find...

THE ISLE OF THE CYCLOPEAN MONOLITH

You're gonna take this sketchy almost purely relational dungeon map and you're gonna LIKE IT

Wandering Monsters

Roll 1d6

1-2: Pygmy Giants [Total number: 16]

3-5: Pariah Dogs [Total number: 23]

6: The Piscine Apparition [Total number: 1]

Piscine Apparition % in Lair: 50% 

Pygmy Giant % in Lair: 80% 

[I include % in Lair here to account for reaching the lair/house of the respective creature while they may not be there.] 

Platform 1: A platform made of lashed together driftwood. The smell of briny sea air, the bitter feeling of salt on your face, the sound of yipping dogs. Small wood and rope pens hold a total of 21 fat pariah dogs. Connected to the pier by a wooden walkway, and to platform 2 by a rickety wooden staircase.

Platform 2: A platform made of lashed together driftwood. Frigid wind rushing through your hair, the floor shifting beneath your feet. Five small tents serve as houses for 10 pygmy giants, as well as 2 pariah dogs that sleep up here. Not all of the pygmy giants will be here all at once. Connected to platform 1 by a rickety wooden staircase, and to platform 4 by a wooden rope bridge. Beneath the platform lives a degenerate octopus that has grown fat and lazy on the waste and effluvia of dogs and does not take kindly to being bothered. It roosts on a large clam that holds a pearl worth 325 drachmae.

The octopus

A pygmy giant

Platform 3: A platform made of lashed together driftwood. The smell of briny sea air, the bitter feeling of salt on your face, the feeling that something you wouldn’t want to see has happened here regularly. Most of the platform is taken up by a pen used for breeding dogs. Beneath the platform is the little moray eel style lair of the piscine apparition.

PISCINE APPARITION 

Number Encountered: 1 

Hit Dice: 3 

Attacks: 1 kick (1d6) 

Armor: none 

Morale: 8 

Aquatic Curse: The piscine apparition can cast a curse of water breathing. Pointing with its big toe, which puts it off balance, the target must make a save vs. spells or have their respiration transformed to water breathing. 

Mischievous: The piscine apparition is a silly little thing that delights in causing problems.  

Spirit Being: The piscine apparition is a spirit of the Sea of Giants. It is immune to damage from mundane weaponry, fire, acid, electricity, etc. The only things that can harm it are immaterial weapons, spirit wards, and magic.  

A gawping fish thing sat upon two chubby humanoid legs. It wishes to get to the antediluvian monolith but cannot pierce the wards placed around it by the pygmy giants. 

The Piscine Apparition

Platform 4: A platform made of lashed together driftwood. Frigid wind rushing through your hair, the floor shifting beneath your feet. Three small tents serve as houses for 6 pygmy giants, with a fourth serving as a smokehouse for dog flesh. Not all of the pygmy giants will be here all at once. Connected to platform 2 by a wooden rope bridge, and to platform 3 by a wooden staircase.

Cave Room 5: Smoked dog meat and dog cheese storage facility used by the pygmy giants. Connects to room 8 and cave room 6. The passage to room 8 is marked by multicolored ragged flags and occult wards.

Cave Room 6: A chamber of things gleaned from the sea. A hostage sailor is tied up against the slick cave wall. He is desperate to be freed, but is liable to steal from the party if he has the chance. There is also a box of gold teeth, small pearls, sea glass, and scrimshaw collectively worth 450 drachmae. Connects to cave room 5 and cave room 7.

Cave Room 7: Soggy cave smell and the sound of dripping water. Empty except for a cave painting of octopuses, dolphins, and the outlines of squat hands. Connects to room 8, cave room 6, and cave room 9. The passage to room 8 is marked by multicolored ragged flags and occult wards.

Room 8, the Open Air Clearing: Wide open under the cloudy sky, ringed by the cracked craggy rocks at the peak of the island, sits the ancient, antediluvian monolith carved in days long forgotten. It exudes a terrible aura that causes intense nausea and confusion the closer you get to it, the cnidarian tentacles stabbed into its surface seeming to squirm in the corner of your vision. It is covered with a thin layer of green and black slime, algal and fungal, which prickles the skin to the touch. The pygmy giants hate to approach it.

Save vs. poison or be unable to approach the antediluvian monolith without collapsing and/or vomiting. If touched with bare skin, it deals 2 points of damage per turn to all touching it. The monolith is worth immense amounts to the right buyer, upwards of 2,500 drachmae if you can find someone who can stomach its unwholesome vibrations. If yanked out of the ground, beneath the monolith are the mummified remains of an anomalocaris. Connects to cave room 5 and cave room 7.

The cyclopean monolith

Cave Room 9: An eroded cavern dripping with caustic green slime. On the ground, amidst the half melted remnants of a human corpse, is a lapis lazuli statuette of a goat shaped goddess, worth 400 drachmae. Connects to cave room 7 and cave room 10.

Cave Room 10: A small cave marked only by a single cave painting of an eye in a star. Connected to platform 3 by a rock cliff that can be navigated with rope.

The Grand Hospital of Humakuyun, d8 Unclean Spirits, and d12 Things the Nurses Want You to Do

On the shores of the northern sea, at the confluence of the roads which travel east and west, sits Humakuyun, last stop before the wilderness. While infamous for its dreaded assassins, Humakuyun-on-the-sea is also widely loved for its lively parties and its beloved hospital. The Grand Hospital of Humakuyun is a veritable pilgrimage site for doctors, alchemists, and nurses, and a regular destination for adventurers. Whether you have been subjected to a horrible folding curse, been bitten by a venomous snake, or contracted the red death, the nurses of the Grand Hospital will accept you with wide open arms (though they might not hug you, depending on how leaky your buboes are).

The Grand Hospital is the only place in the east where you can get real medical attention. You might be able to rest and recuperate in other places, sure, but only at the Grand Hospital will most maladies be addressed. The building is kept completely clear of any foul odors (seeing as, of course, plague is spread through miasma), fastidiously cleaned of any stinky filth by a veritable army of servants clad in distinct green robes. When resting and recuperating at the Grand Hospital, you receive a +1 hp per day bonus to daily healing, and have no risk of contracting disease or being possessed by an unclean spirit. Resting and recuperating in most other environments brings with it associated risks. Injury makes oneself more susceptible to intrusion by unclean spirit or plague.

Resting and recuperating in any spiritually unclean or filthy location (graveyard, sewer, pigsty, deep underground, building built atop any unclean location) prompts a save vs. ritual uncleanliness (save vs. death) or you are taken by an unclean spirit or disease. Until the disease or spirit is purged from your body, you cannot heal anymore. Being subjected to a curse also makes you susceptible to unclean spirits. Roll on the table below to determine the nature of the possession.

1d8 Unclean Spirits and Diseases

1: Spasmodic Spirit: When viewed with eyes unclouded appears as a stiff many-legged thing. Causes random uncontrollable spasms. When this spirit possesses you, roll 1d20; any time you roll the number produced, you go into uncontrollable spasms, unable to act.

2: Dysentery: Diarrhea! Slower movement and faster fatigue; dehydration requiring double the water, rest, rations. Disadvantage on saving throws against disease.

3: Heavy Shoulders Spirit: When viewed with eyes unclouded appears as a wide-eyed long-trunked ape-thing sitting upon the victim's shoulders. Move encumbrance status up one step: from unencumbered to encumbered, from encumbered to heavily encumbered, from heavily encumbered to immobile.

4: Sweating Sickness: Intense fevers and sweats. Too uncomfortable to wear armors or thick clothes. Inability to focus on anything, no attack bonuses and must roll for any spells cast.

5: Stolen Sight Spirit: When viewed with eyes unclouded appears as a dark black glistening insectile thing clinging to the victim's face. Forces the victim to see a horrible dream at all times, unable to stop it by closing their eyes and unable to see their surroundings.

6: Consumption: Difficulty breathing, coughing up blood, rapid weight loss. Steady loss of 1 point of STR and CON every week, and unable to run (automatically captured if in a chase).

7: Pitiful Wrath Spirit: When viewed with eyes unclouded appears as a small crawling mammal-thing, two humanlike faces on either end of its body. Every so often, the victim makes a reaction roll to determine their current emotional state, with low results as more negative emotions and higher results as more positive emotions.

8: The Red Death: Horrible red buboes leaking pus and blood. Physical frailty, difficulty breathing, bleeding from eyes, eventual bleeding in lungs. To be detailed in a further dedicated post.

Intense disease and curses take time to heal even at the Grand Hospital. Constant attention, priestly cleansing rituals, wafting of sweet smelling plants, exorcisms, sacrifices, application of poultices or imbibing of potions all take days, weeks, months. There is a base number of weeks that different levels of plague or curse take to heal (1 week for very basic diseases such as the sweating sickness (influenza), 3 for more involved afflictions, 6 for certain curses, 12 for the worst plagues and curses), and every week after that span of time, the patient makes a saving throw vs. death, recovering more or less fully on a success.

The nurses and doctor-savants and alchemists of the Grand Hospital are always in need of something. Since they expect to see an adventurer again in the future anyway, they often ask new arrivals to go retrieve some item, manuscript, herb, or piece of information for them.

1d12 Things the Nurses Want You to Do

1: Go to the Hinterbog in the east and retrieve the skin of a bright yellow frog; you will know it by the shape of the spots on its back, forming a six-pointed star. Do not lick them! They will make your tongue swell up.

2: Go to the Wall of the Conquering King and ask the Wallmasters how they deal with the thin air in the mountains.

3: Go into the Holy Cedar Forest and snatch up a mossling, just one... and be sure to figure out how to not catch the mosslings' ire, at least not on yourself. How you do that is up to you.

4: Go to Temple Town and retrieve the toes of mummy-saints. Don't take more than one toe from each mummy-saint! We don't want to anger our forefathers... nor the high priests of the fire temple.

5: Go to the Great Desert to the south and bring us a baby sandworm. Please keep it alive, if you bring us a dead one we won't pay you. How you keep it alive for the hundreds of miles between the city and the homes of the sandworms is for you to figure out.

6: There is a snake-vampire living in a copse of evergreens to the east. Go get cursed by him, and come back for us to examine the effects and determine a cure. Do not kill the vampire, that might ruin our findings.

7: Travel to the edge of the satrapy of Numistan, where the red-frond flowers grow. Harvest their stamens and bring them back to Humakuyun, but be sure to keep them out of the sun.

8: Consume this entire barrel of lizards all by yourself and go about your normal business for a week and then report back.

9: Visit the distant leper colony on the edge of Great Desert and remove all your clothes except for this amulet we will provide. Report back on what happens.

10: Travel to the rotting corpse of the slain giant in the territory of the client king to the northeast and harvest part of his liver. We have heard it grows back unceasingly and want to understand it.

11: Go into the Land of Darkness, cross the northern sea if you must, and return with as many individual pine needles as you can. Ideally store them in animal skins.

12: Drink nothing but this mixture of silver and water and sleep in a circle of salt for one month. Report back to us every week.

Froglings of the Enlightened Empire

 So I was in the process of writing a post with random tables and city information for one of the cities in the eastern satrapies, but I realized it referenced a people that hasn't yet been discussed at all on my blog! That's because it is an addition to the setting that I made during my posting hiatus, but I just figured it would be an important thing to post about first!

from The Mandalorian

THE TRAITOR FROGS

When the antediluvian days were waning and the men, women, and sacred ones of the First City were rising, there were some among the sea tyrants who saw their fate, even as the spell to flood the world was being woven. Chief among these were the amphibians, who knew dry land much better than their brethren. The salamanders and the frogs even included some in their number who had visited the First City and dwelt within its walls. The amphibians wanted to keep the land, for they feared that if the whole world became ocean then they would shrivel up in its brackish depths, and they would be consumed by the guilt of the death of humankind. And so, the frogs and salamanders and olms conspired to give humanity magic, to protect them from the horrible flood. It is a frog named Prometheus who is said to have given the first, now long lost, clay tablet of spells to the the thief Keyumars in those long forgotten days. In the telling of events more well known among men, Keyumars simply dove deep into the kingdoms of the sea tyrants and stole it for himself, but those who study the depths of history know better. The first spells for humankind were written in a frog-like hand.

For this, the frogs and salamanders and olms were forced out of the sea and branded as traitors. The traitor frogs fell upon the First City and its surroundings and built a new home there, and began to live among humanity. The traitor newts fled into the wilderness, willing to go along with the frogs' plan to give humans magic but not as enthusiastic about the change. The traitor olms fled into the depths beneath the earth, since they among the three amphibians did not have the physical forms to survive on land. When the sea tyrants began to take over the underground, the olms fought back and to this day that struggle continues. A giant friendly olm is a fine sight for any spelunker in need.

These mythic days are long behind them all, however, and whether there is any truth in the stories of the deeds of the great heroes of the frogs and salamen is a matter for debate. Since the froglings (as they are now called by humanity, although the name "traitor frog" has not left them) descended on the First City after the end of the Deluge, they have been a consistent feature of urban communities. Coastal areas especially, both within the Enlightened Empire and without, very prominently feature frogling communities. They are exiled from the ocean, but often skirt upon its surface on boats, their sails pushed along by the flapping of innumerable fly wings.

The traitor frogs, as the premier masters of magic on the surface world, have developed many unique forms of sorcery. Chief among these is Diptomancy, the art of communication with flies (and other small buzzing/stinging/biting things, although notably bees refuse to speak with diptomancers). This began as a form of divination, ascertaining fate through the shapes of poetically-conditioned fly swarms, but it has developed into a science and an art all its own. During the ancient days of the Warring Kings, there were many frogling principalities lorded over by batrachian sorcerer-kings and mage-mothers, and their spell tablets, secreted away in dank depths and crumbling ruins, hold some of the most powerful spells of history.

I don't intend on having froglings ride on giant frogs but aren't these just so good?

--------------------

I was going to write up a frogling race-class but I'm at a bit of an impasse with regards to what to do with these guys with regards to the players. I could keep them as NPC-exclusive (keeping the game completely human-only as it currently is (technically the amazons, brinemen, and half-jinn are humans)), or make them a race-class (which to me seems a bit weird because they have honestly just as much flexibility as humans do), or fully separate race and class (which I'm worried about how to puzzle through because of how I've boxed myself in with some of the human nations), SO instead of presenting any character information, here are some example diptomancy spells.

BATRACHIAN SPELLS OF THE FROG-KINGS

Fly's Last Meal

Level 1

Duration: Until caster ends

Range: Touch

When this spell is cast, the caster touches a fly and is able to ask this fly any question relating to what it has eaten and what was surrounding it when it ate it. The caster is able to end the interrogation at any point. This spell is often used to find out what happened at the scene of a death, assassination, or murder.

Gust of Fluttering

Level 1

Duration: 6 turns

Range: 120'

A training spell of diptomancy. Any and all flying insects in the area congregate in a point designated by the caster within the spell's range and flap their wings very rapidly. Their fast flapping creates a noticeable wind, which will cause any light objects to be caught up in it. The caster can order the cloud of flies to release a sudden and massive gust of wind in one specified direction, pushing any being or object not too heavy back up to 240'. Doing so causes the cloud of flies to immediately dissipate.

Advanced Gust of Fluttering

Level 2

Duration: 6 hours

Range: 120'

The most commonly learned diptomantic spell. Any and all flying insects in the area congregate in a point designated by the caster within the spell's range and flap their wings very rapidly. This maintains the attention of many more flies than the simpler version. Their flapping creates a noticeable wind, which will cause any light objects to be caught up in it unless it is focused in one direction. The caster can order the cloud of flies to release a continuous gust of wind in one specified direction for up to the spell's entire duration. This gust of wind is strong enough to push heavier objects and creatures.

Item: Barrel of Flies

A common object kept by frogling sailors, the barrel of flies is just what it sounds like: a wooden barrel filled with flying insects. These are usually caught and barreled at "fly-factories" that keep rotting material to grow flies in for sale. When at sea, the frogling sailor-sorcerer has no flying insects around to provide for their advanced gust of fluttering, so the barrel of flies is a must.

Noxious Discharge

Level 3

Duration: 3 turns

Range: 240'

A biting insect emerges from somewhere within the caster's robes, and seeks out the target which the caster points at. The target makes a saving throw vs. poison, failing to do so causing them to begin to incessantly spew forth a stinking corrosive acidic discharge, the very same sort that houseflies use to digest their food. They are unable to take any actions in combat other than struggling against their vomiting, and if they fail a DEX check they also begin to take 1d4 damage every other round as they stumble around and cover themselves with their corrosive vomit. The vomit is able to melt through wood and other organic material.

Mayfly

Level 6

Duration: Indefinite

Range: Sight

The caster points at a target they can see. If they have the ability to feel romantic/sexual attraction, they must make a saving throw vs. death or be overtaken by the instincts of the adult mayfly. Those who do not feel romantic/sexual feelings are immune. If they fail their saving throw, they are overtaken by intense romantic feelings and the need to have a romantic moment with someone, anyone. However, the moment they so much as move away from a kiss or finish up with a romantic dinner, they will die, having fulfilled their immediate goal. The only way to stave this is to stop them from being intimate with anybody, and the only way to end the curse is through a magical ritual.

Two Mummies for Kings of Kings

I love mummies. They are some of my favorite undead creatures, both in terms of Dungeons and Dragons and in other media like horror movies and Halloween decor (yes, Halloween decorations are a form of media/art, you can't prove me wrong). The mummy in Dungeons and Dragons is a very unique creature, which other bloggers have written about before... its "mummy rot" as a gameified translation of the curse associated with Egyptian mummies from the archaeological dig at the tomb of Tutankhamun, its place as a higher level undead enemy despite not having the dreaded "level drain" (which is another topic that plenty of other people better than I have written about plenty of times). 

I do intend on using the iconic D&D mummy in King of Kings, but in addition I have some other thoughts, inspired by both some mummies from real life and other creatures from the history of D&D (one of which you may notice below).

In particular, both of these mummies are likely to appear in a location in Elburz Satrapy known as Temple Town, a religious settlement built atop centuries upon centuries of tombs, shrines, and temples at the foot of the Holy Mountain just north of the capital of the satrapy.

A "saltman" from Iran

The Dessicated

Armor Class: 13

Hit Dice: 4+1*

Attacks: 2 x touch (1d6)

To-Hit: +4

Movement: 60' (20')

Saving Throws: D10/W11/P12/B13/S14

Morale: 12

Alignment: Lawful or Chaotic (never neutral)

XP: 350

Number Appearing: 1d4 (2d6)

Paralyze with Terror: Anyone seeing a dessicated must save vs. paralysis or be paralyzed with terror. Paralysis is broken if the dessicated attacks or goes out of sight.

Dessication: If a victim is hit by both touch attacks in a single round, they are dessicated and take an extra 1d10 damage that cannot be healed naturally. The only way to heal damage taken from dessication is to perform a particular ritual (see below). Brinemen, fish, amphibians, and water spirits take double damage from dessication.

Damage Immunity: Only harmed by fire or magic.

Rehydration: If the entire body of the dessicated is covered with water (river, lake, waterfall), it dies instantly.

Undead: Make no noise, until they attack. Immune to any effect that affects living creatures (i.e. poison). Immune to mind-affecting or mind-reading spells (i.e. charm, hold, sleep).

The dessicated are walking corpses of the deserts, mountains, and caves which have lost all moisture in their body due to the incredibly dry conditions they were placed into. Most dessicated were not mummified with any particular process, but rather were interred in a tomb with dry air or significant amounts of salt which naturally dried them out. Their faces are forever frozen in a scream, their skin a thick hard leather, their joints stiff as they clamber out of their tombs. The dessicated are a not uncommon sight in the mountainside crypts of Temple Town, and in the depths of long abandoned salt mines.

Rehydration Ritual

A magical ritual

Ritual Elements: a large body of fresh water (river or lake), the blood of a water buffalo, an amount of sugar equal to 1/6th the amount of water

Ritual Steps:

    1. Place the dessicated individual into the water, with all armor and clothing removed.

    2. Beseech the spirits of the water to enter into the body of the supplicant dessicate.

    3. Bring the water buffalo to the water, making sure all four of its feet are in the water. 

    4. Slash the buffalo's throat with a clean and sharp blade, letting the blood drip into the water.

    5. Bring the sugar to the water, making sure both of your feet are in the water.

    6. Pour the sugar into the water.

    7. Thank the spirits of the water and wait. The spirits of the water will heal the dessication within an hour.

(The above is the first of what I may build into a larger ritual magic system where characters have to gather information on the steps of a ritual and get the elements together in order to perform it. May expand on this in future).

I kinda wanted to avoid Egyptian stuff
but it was kinda hard to find one that
looked right

Ancient Ancestor

Armor Class: 16

Hit Dice: 5+3*

Attacks: 2 x weapon (1d6 or damage by weapon) OR curse.

To-Hit: +5

Movement: 60' (20')

Saving Throws: D10/W11/P12/B13/S14

Morale: 12

Alignment: Lawful or Chaotic (never neutral)

XP: 925

Number Appearing: 1d4 (1d4)

Frozen in Awe: Anyone seeing an ancient ancestor must save vs. paralysis or be frozen in awe. Paralysis is broken if the ancestor attacks or goes out of sight.

Damage Immunity: Only harmed by fire or magic. Fire damage is as normal, but magic weapons deal only half damage.

Resinous Preservation: The sticky resins used to encase the ancestor's body in ancient days make them incredibly adhesive. Any weapons or items that make contact with the ancestor stick to it. The only way to break the adhesive is with fire or boiling water. If the ancestor is pushed or otherwise forced into a wall, it must make a save vs. paralysis or stick to the wall.

Binding Embrace: If both of the weapon attacks of the ancestor hit a victim, the victim is caught in a sticky embrace by the resinous limbs of the ancestor. During that round they are unable to do anything to stop the embrace, but every round thereafter they can make a strength check (or save vs. paralysis whichever you prefer) to break free. All attacks directed to the ancestor (other than backstabs) will deal damage to the victim caught in the embrace.

Ancestral Curse: Instead of attack in a round, the ancestor may choose to point at any creature it can see and curse them. The character makes a save vs. spells, resisting the curse on a success. If they fail, the fear and anxiety make them unable to act in the next round (every round thereafter they are able to act as normal). The actual effects of the curse reveal themselves in the days, weeks, and months after the encounter with the ancestor. (Roll on the table provided or come up with a curse yourself).

Undead: Make no noise, until they attack. Immune to any effect that affects living creatures (i.e. poison). Immune to mind-affecting or mind-reading spells (i.e. charm, hold, sleep).

Ancient ancestors are the cadavers of long forgotten kings, queens, warlords, and sorcerers, preserved with pomp and circumstance in days long past. Their skin is thin and drawn tight on their bones, encased in a sticky layer of resin and a set of glittering golden armor. In death they are still able to think and speak, but often find themselves vengeful for their once great empires and domains having crumbled in their absence and their legacy either forgotten or spoken of only with spite. 

(I feel like the D&D inspiration behind this bad boy is pretty apparent... one of my favorites!)

1d12 Ancestral Curses

1. The Spiral Curse: The victim of the curse slowly contorts into a spiral, unable to move at all other than rolling like a wheel, liable to just roll uncontrollably down sloping surfaces or hills.

2. The Oozing Curse: The victim of the curse begins to sweat a thick green ooze, at first rather slowly, even growing to the point that they cannot see through the muck and have difficulty moving as the slime overtakes them.

3. The Wasting Curse: Over the course of roughly a month or two, the victim wastes away until they are little more than skin and bone. They will not die from just the curse alone, but their light weight and thinness makes them susceptible to life-ending injury.

4. The Following Curse: The victim of the curse realizes that they are being followed by a being which is invisible to all but themselves (and any who is able to see invisible creatures). If the being ever catches up with them, they will die.

5. The Earthworm Curse: Slowly and painfully, the victim of the curse transforms into an earthworm. They can feel their bones melting in their body as they lengthen out and lose limbs over the course of a few months.

6. The Shrinking Curse: Each day the victim wakes up noticeably shorter than they were the day before. After a few months, they will be absolutely minuscule, unable to function in human society.

7. The Faceless Curse: Over the course of roughly a month or two, the victim's face fades from existence. In its place there is only a featureless span of skin. They cannot eat or drink and will likely die.

8. The Cow Hate Curse: Cows, buffaloes, minotaurs, and other bovines absolutely despise the victim of the curse and will attack them on sight. As time goes on, cows will start to seek them out and try to kill them.

9. The Brainless Curse: Over the course of roughly a month or two, the victim's brain will slowly seep out of their skull. This usually occurs at night, but if their head is struck in combat they are likely to lose some more brain matter. They steadily lose ability score points as this progresses, begin to lose the ability to fire missile weapons and cast spells, and eventually will die.

10. The Shaking Curse: The victim begins to quiver and shake uncontrollably, only worsening as the weeks pass on. Eventually they will be unable to fight, and will often drop potions or other items on the ground.

11. The Skinless Curse: Over the course of roughly a month or two, the victim's skin grows translucent, then becomes nonexistent. They will feel pain near-constantly, and must be wrapped up tightly if they wish to not take damage from dust or strong winds.

12. The Folding Curse: The victim of the curse slowly discovers they are folding up like a letter, their bones creaking in their sleep until they are perfectly folded into a shape not dissimilar to a cube. Once this is complete, they will be completely unable to move.