Monster: Giltsnake

Giltsnake
Armour Class: 1
Hit Dice: 1 hit point*
Move: 150’ (50’)
Attacks: 1 bite
Damage: 0 + poison
No. Appearing: 1-100
Save As: F1
Morale: 6
Treasure Type: Variable (special)
Alignment: Lawful
XP Value: 6

Sometimes the treasure is actually the trap – or it is when it’s been infected with giltsnakes.

Two to four inches long, tiny giltsnakes have highly ridged and articulated metallic scales – they may be pale as platinum to dark as copper – that, when the tiny snake coils up, interlock and resemble a metal coin to a fantastic degree. Disturbing a giltsnake while it is coiled will cause it to uncoil and bite instinctively.

The bite from a giltsnake’s miniscule mouth does no damage, but instead delivers a contact poison. This poison’s effects can vary by strain of snake, but the most common causes 2-12 hit points of damage unless a save vs. poison is made.

Flowery Elixirs

Magical or enchanted flora crops up throughout worlds of fantasy. Here's a few, rendered into forms that intrepid adventurers might stumble over --


Boneflower: An orchid that sprouts from the remains of long-dead corpses, a boneflower has a single blossom – pale ivory mottled with cream, and chitinous to the touch – and two pale, wrinkled leaves.

A boneflower potion is also ivory, and a little gritty, providing a +2 to all saves (or to Armour Class) vs. attacks from undead. It will negate one energy drain attack, but then the potion's effects fade immediately.


Heartsfaith: Resembling nothing so much as a strange form of goldenrod, heartsfaith bears long tassels of tiny flowers of molten gold colour on strong, tall stems.
A heartsfaith potion, golden yellow, is useful only to clerics; it provides a +1 bonus to all turning attempts for the potion's duration.


Drakesbane: This strain of lily-of-the-valley is almost indistinguishable from the ordinary variety – only a minute examination will reveal the blood-red spot inside each flower's pale white bell.
A drakesbane potion, brilliant crimson, grants a +1 to saves vs. dragon breath and a +1 to attack rolls against dragons for the duration of the potion. A drakesbane potion lasts for only four turns.


Nightsable: A variety of velvety black rose, with golden edging on its petals and greenish-black leaves, a nightsable's thorns can make the unwary sleep.
Black flecked with gold, a nightsable potion grants a +2 bonus to all saves to resist mental control or domination, such as from a Charm spell.

Magic Item: Tincture of Striking

Tincture of Striking: In actuality a thin oil, this tincture is found in ceramic vials containing 1-6 uses and is either shimmering silver, dully-shining iron or translucently iridescent in colour. One use will treat one weapon (or five missiles), allowing the next successful attack with that weapon to strike as if the weapon were magical.

A silver tincture affects Chaotic creatures, iron tincture affects Lawful creatures, and iridescent tincture affects Neutral creatures.

Monster: Anpu

Anpu
Armour Class: 4
Hit Dice: 4**
Move: 120’ (40’)
Attacks: 2 claws/1 bite
Damage: 1-4/1-4/1-6 + special
No. Appearing: 1-4 (2-16)
Save As: C4
Morale: 11
Treasure Type: D
Alignment: Chaotic
XP Value: 175

Undead creatures that prowl amongst graves, anpu superficially resemble ghouls. Unlike a ghoul, however, an anpu’s jaws are distended into a long canid-like muzzle filled with rending teeth, its hands transformed into tearing claws. The hair of an anpu becomes a ragged, filthy black mane despite its appearance in life. While some anpu rise from those of its victims it does not devour, the vast majority are the product of wretched graverobbers cursed by dying at the place of their theft – or are deliberately created to serve as the guardians of said tombs.

Like a ghoul, a successful hit from an anpu causes paralysis for 2-8 turns unless a save versus paralysis is made; unlike a ghoul, the paralysis of an anpu is not restricted by the size of the victim. More gruesomely, wounds inflicted by an anpu’s rending fangs will continue to bleed at a rate of one hit point per round until healing is applied.

Magic Item: Danah Scroll

Danah Scroll: Originally called “Danah’s spell scrolls” after their creator, and also known as wizard scrolls or “’prentice-in-a-pocket”, Danah scrolls are sheets of a strange material; as if parchment had been transmuted into a gem-like substance without losing its flexibility.

Once a week, a Danah scroll will be imprinted with a single first-level Magic-User spell (selected by the DM when the treasure is placed; every week the same spell is produced), etched into the crystalline surface. This spell may be cast by anyone, even a non-spellcaster.

Elementally, my dear adventurer --

I'm stepping away from strictly low-level things for a moment to mull over one of my favorite subjects -- the Elemental Planes.

(Don't worry, the cavalcade of odd little critters will resume anon ;) )

Since the day I started playing D&D, elemental things have fascinated me. I love the elementals, elemental effects, spells using elements, you name it; and I like my dragons with a bit of an elemental touch, when I can fit it in there somewhere. And I love the Elemental Planes, wonderful sources of the primal stuff, in both D&D and AD&D.

Now, I've been and am an avid Planescape fan. (Put down those pitchforks!) Predictably enough, I picked up the setting because of the elemental goodness it could give me -- the rest was a nifty side-benefit -- and the complex interactions of the 2e Inner Planes in all their variations make me a happy hamster indeed. Plane of Fire? Check. Plane of Ooze? We have one! Plane of Killer Death RainbowsRadiance? Drop on by, bring the kids!

But one of the most interesting bits of Planescape elemental goodness were the hints that things were not always as we currently saw them. Not only was there still the pre-PS djinn-efreet war -- something which makes little sense in a game where fire is opposed by water -- but in the PS elemental supplements they dropped in little suggestions that the Elemental Planes, just maybe, once had a different configuration. And I ate it up.

That different configuration, of course, comes from D&D.

I love the D&D Elemental Planes, stripped to their basics -- only four -- as they are. Not only do we have a different scheme of opposition (Fire opposes and is opposed by Air -- there's our djinn-efreet conflict! -- and Earth opposes and is opposed by Water), but there's also the idea of dominance, flowing in a circle:

Air -> Water -> Fire -> Earth -> Air etc etc ~

And these factor into both damage in combat and social interactions between elemental creatures. I love it.

Naturally, the D&D schema is lacking both the extended "sphere" of Para- and Quasi-Elemental Planes and it also lacks the two Energy Planes. While I can do without the extras, I think for my campaigns I'll restore the Positive and Negative Planes; I rather like them, and will probably slip them in as an unusual opposing pair of elements. (Since I'm tinkering with a six-element system already, it should work nicely ...)

Of course the trick with the Elemental Planes -- traditionally speaking -- is getting there and surviving. AD&D has the odd vortex (and, of course, Sigilian portals if you happen to be using PS) and ethereal travel, but you had best be well-protected when you arrive or expect a swift and terrible death upon arrival in the vast majority of the Inner Planes. D&D makes the travel both simpler (wormholes seem considerably more common than AD&D vortexes, with ethereal travel still an option) and less potentially fatal.

There's a good reason why I say that. While directly travelling to a D&D Elemental Plane still requires one to use magic to survive the environment (or at least to breathe, except on Air), there seems to be a convenient loophole on p. 263 of the Rules Cyclopedia:


"Creatures and things in a wormhole are magically changed into the "proper" element when they reach the elemental plane, unless protected by powerful magic."


Excellent! Fit in with the natives, enjoy yourself, have a good time. Just make sure you take a wormhole back to the Prime again, or you may wind up with some interesting problems ... A pedantic DM might rule that the trip back won't reverse the process, but bah! to that says I.

All and all, I'm quite in love with the D&D situation. My desire for the Positive and Negative Planes I think I shall fill with a lovely Dragon article from Issue 42, wherein Len Lakofka wrote up an interesting take on the Inner Planes comprising just the core four and the Positive and Negative. I have to admit, though, the drawing-point for the article isn't the pages and pages of (frankly soul-numbing) tables, but the descriptions of the planes that make up the end.

Differently-coloured and translucent soils on Earth, with pebbles that can be passed through but large rock and mineral formations cannot? A Plane of Fire where heat doesn't harm a traveller and lava flows might be sentient, even psionic? Positive and Negative Planes filled with crystals, some of which are also sentient? Solid cloud islands filled with dungeons in the Plane of Air?

Time to start filling out planar passposts, methinks!

Magic Item: Bloodflower

Jie Chue was once approached by an angry, vengeance-driven warrior, who desired to have a blade forged after his homeland was savaged by war. He desired this so that he may demonstrate to all who wronged him exactly how much pain they had caused him when his family was torn away.

Jie Chue felt that this was entirely the wrong reason for such a request, but the warrior was adamant; and so the forger set to work with a twinge of regret.

The warrior was pleased with the results, but Jie Chue was not.


Bloodflower: This normal sword has a blade of oddly milky steel, its grip wrapped in black snakeskin and its guard worked into the shape of briars and mandrake plants; the pommel-nut is a slightly-pointed dome of buttery-yellow amber, like a mandrake fruit.

A sword +1, +2 versus humanoids, Bloodflower can once a day inflict a -4 Armour Class penalty upon a successfully struck opponent, causing them to be wracked with pain for four rounds. When this ability is activated Bloodflower's blade turns crimson and seems to drip blood.

Monster: Briarbones

Briarbones
Armour Class: 7
Hit Dice: 2* (special)
Move: 90’ (30’)
Attacks: 1
Damage: 1-4 or by weapon
No. Appearing: 2-12
Save As: F3
Morale: 10
Treasure Type: Nil
Alignment: Chaotic
XP Value: 30

A briarbones appears to be a skeleton entangled with a delicate green vine adorned with sharp thorns, coiling tendrils and tiny rose-like flowers. It normally attacks with its bony hands, but may carry a weapon. Like normal skeletons a briarbones is unaffected by sleep or charm spells, but it cannot be turned.

The motive force of a briarbones is its vine. When enough damage to defeat a skeleton (one of its Hit Dice) has been defeated, a briarbones will collapse; but if left alone the vine will sink more rootlets into the pieces and ooze a sap that binds the skeleton back together to rise again within two turns with full hit points. The vine must be destroyed to prevent this “regeneration”.

Corpses found – or created – by a briarbones will be seeded with bulbs in order to produce new briarbones.

Holy Water Everywhere, and Not a Drop to Drink

Ah, the vial of holy water. That most convenient of tools in a Cleric's arsenal, the one that gets pulled out when the turning isn't taking and you just don't want to get up close and personal with the ghastly undead beasties quite yet.

There's just one question: why would an adventurer ever buy it?

Glancing through the Red Box, it quickly and painfully becomes apparent that a vial of holy water is overpriced, underutilized, or both – especially when stacked up against its mundane counterpart, a flask of oil. A quick comparison:

Holy water: range 10/30/50; 1-8 points of damage to undead; 25gp / vial. may also be used as a hand-held weapon.

Oil: range 10/30/50; 1-8 points of damage per round to any flammable creature if the oil is burning, for two rounds if the target is covered in oil; oil will burn for a turn instead if in a 3' diameter pool on the ground; 2gp / flask. may also be used as a hand-held weapon.

Something's just not right here.

An oil flask admittedly needs to be lit, but a toss of a torch against AC 10 will take care of that, and many many creatures and objects will burn quite nicely, offering at least two rounds' worth of damage for your trouble. Or you could, y'know, light your lantern with it, or make the floor slippery, or ...

Meanwhile, the holy water only affects undead, and deals damage for a single round. Yet it costs more than ten times the coat of a flask of oil. Granted holy water is a sacred substance, but still – why would an adventurer, especially a beginning adventurer, cough up 25gp when oil will do the job and then some? Removing some of the “tricks” of a flask of oil wouldn't make any sense. Nor would making the oil more expensive.

So then, back to the holy water! What can be done to make it more worthwhile? Lowering the price would arguably cheapen the roleplaying aspects of carrying the precious blessed waters of your Cleric's faith; it could be done, but what other options are there?

One possibility is to allow the holy water to damage undead for two rounds, much like burning oil (unless washed off, say by normal water). This brings it more in line with oil, without the possibility of turn-long burning holy puddles.

Perhaps a few roleplaying-related tweaks and quirks to be considered along with the extra round of damage? True, enterprising players may well try some of these anyway, but putting few “into the canon” as it were might jog their creativity along. A few possibilities:

 Blessing a corpse to prevent it from rising as one of the undead
 Used as an impromptu holy symbol (perhaps with a penalty to the turning roll)
 Poured out over an unholy idol or altar as part of a cleansing of its taint

Some DMs may even permit holy water to be used to supplement a turning check (for +1 to the roll, perhaps) or for blessing a weapon to allow it to strike a magical undead once. Situtions such as these would, however, require careful judgement on the part of the DM.

Personally, I would consider allowing the turning supplement but would be careful about the weapon enhancement.

Monster: Dark Jelly

Dark Jelly
Armour Class: 8
Hit Dice: 4**
Move: 60’ (20’)
Attacks: 1
Damage: 2-12 + special
No. Appearing: 2-8
Save As: F3
Morale: 12
Treasure Type: Nil
Alignment: Chaotic
XP Value: 175

A glistening purplish-black gelatinous mass the size of a large man’s torso, a dark jelly is a huge amoeboid that is harmed only by fire and blessed attacks such as holy water. Cold, lightning, or physical attacks will cause a dark jelly to fission into 1-5 smaller 2 Hit Dice jellies.

A dark jelly causes 2-12 points of damage to flesh when it attacks as it draws blood via a hideous form of osmosis. Its touch destroys organic materials in one round; when a dark jelly attacks, a successful hit will drain a point of Constitution in addition to its normal damage. Lost Constitution returns after a day of rest.