Adventure 2: Monsters:


Spider-stag lifecycle:
Spider-Stag stabs people with crystal antlers -> baby antler spiders -> adult antler spider -> juvenile stag, with antler spider mounted on its "head" and the stag growing out from it -> full Spider-stag with crystal antlers

(most larval form is the gold coins that Selath produces)



Monster 1: Spider Stag
A great white stag, with a great twisted mass of black chitin antlers (little bit beetle shell, little bit shiny fly carapace)
- does not have a face, rather just a mass of undifferentiated flesh

- strong, healthy, not hard to hit AC 15
- leaves bloody footsteps behind it
- defense: aura of dissolution: 5 pts of damage vs strength save 14; as gums bleed.  Goes out to 50 feet. sort of an inverse Awe
- attack: trample attack, dex save to avoid 5d6 as it moves through
- attack: antler stab, inject its egglings via antler-ovipositors
- will collapse into cobwebs when killed


Weakness: 
beauty, fascinated by it. 
also its chitin-antlers hold all of its sensory organs, so vulnerable there to


Motivation:
- be seen majestically posing at a distance
- leave its young in corpses
- be hunted down and then fight


SubMonster: Antler baby swarm
- spiders-things that look like a conglomeration of antlers
- difficult to hit, will try to bite as a swarm, or will skitter off into the forest to start their lifecycle anew


SubMonster: Antler Spider
- A dog sized Spider made out of antlers.  Like a creepy living statue/art-project.  Has velvet fuzz on the antlers instead of hairs, makes clacking sound as its antler-legs move against surfaces
- Attack: bite, 2d6, +5, Pack tactics for advantage
- ability: leap!
- ability: spray webbing: DC 11 to avoid, restrained
- ability: webbing illusion: webbing forms into a gnome with a knife. 1HP, +0 attack, 1D6 damage
- ability: Resistance to piercing damage (like a skeleton)
- likes to spin web trips and traps, to restrain
- likes to rip people apart in a pack, likes to drag them off for later
- has a small disk of solid gold at its heart (30GP)

SubMonster: Juvenile Stag
- An Antler spider that has started to turn into black crystal, and to grow a stag out from it. The spider's legs grow upwards, the stag body grows downwards out of its abdomen. Not yet large enough to trample
- ~50 HP,
- antler stab (3d6)
- squirt webbing, Dex 13 or be restrained





Witch - Selath, the Merchant 
 - Middle aged, hard eyed, and portly in her human form.  Her eyes are gold spheres
 - backstory: tried to commit suicide by goinginto the Forest after her business enterprise collapsed & her debts became unsolveable.  Found new life there.
 - Acts a bit like nobility, arrogants and assuming, will lie shamelessly and without reason about the Forest, her motivations, the world, etc. Behind this is cruel and wants everyone dead.  Likes fine things, perfumes, silks, flowers.
 
 
 - surrounded by clouds of pink rose petals. (many thousands of them).  Wields 2 golden swords
 - in giant spider form, black & armored chitin, and the swords become her mandibles.
 - Can have her spider form emerge from the husk of her human form, and vice versa.  Uses this tactically to escape disadvantageous positions, leaving her husk behind in one square and emerging in an adjacent square.  Able to use this ability 5 times per combat.
 
 
 - 2 actions for her.  spider, bonus action used for petals. basically 3 actions
 - attack: web shoot, restrains, over 6x6 area. DC 14 dex to avoid, DC 15 strength to escape
 - attack: golden swords: cut (2D6) . On hit, DC 13 Con save, or golden coins pour from mouth of target disabling them.  In time, if kept in the dark coins start to grow tiny antler legs & become tiny baby antler spiders.
 - defense: turns into spider from human, or into human from spider.  In either case leaves the corpse of the other behind it as an obstacle.
 - ability: minor psychic reading
  Weakness: incredibly greedy. also weak to flattery & fine things

 
 
 SubMonster: Petal swarm
 Acts as a living, organic form on the battle field.  Looks and is supple like petals, but can be as sharp as steel
 
 - attack: petals swarm out and surround and serrate.  1D6 damage, disadvantage
 - defense: forms a wall of petals to block movement & sight. 5x1 squares,
 - defense reaction: intercepts and misguides an attack on the main lady, forms a wall to block fireballs
 
 
 SubMonster: Golden Guard
 A golden humanoid, thin and featureless. Created when Selath slams one of her golden swords into the ground.
 
 AC 17, HP 50
 Attack: punch, +5, 2d6, knockback 5
 Defense: Resist Fire, Immune Psychic
 Grapple? Fuck what are the grappling rules.  
 Tries to run interference for Selath by tying up the strikers
 
 
      
(Editors note: looking back, I appear to have Incepted by the head-crabs from Half Life and their life-cycle.  I thought I was coming up with something here that was marginally cleverer than it actually was).