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Scarest Monster/Creature

kafka47

SOC-14 5K
Marquis
Either ported in from another source (ie Fiend Folio) or one of your own making what is the scariest monster encountered.

Right after watching, predator, I was inspired to create a bunch of Ancient Hunters who could use Ancient technology but were in no way connected with the Droyne which the players accidently awoken when exploring they were an underground cyst.

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Scariest npc my traveller merc unit ever met, was what I thought was a causal one.

A lone Aslan Male hunter armed with a large bore hunting rifle, in his territory, ie home ground.

If I have read "White Feather" before this happened, would have gotten to kill a few pcs. As it was they accurately emulated the NV unit that Hathcock, pinned down in the Nam.
 
I came up with this for a contest sponsored by an board/podcast I frequent.

R

http://midnightslair.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=775


Mind Spiders

These tiny, harmless looking (Small body with 8 legs, about the size of a small pea. Light to card grey in color.) arachnoids hide a terrifying, deadly threat. The mind spider is normal in most respects to a regular spider. It casts webs to catch small insects as prey, and is usually harmless to most humans and demihumans. The real fright comes from its reproduction. Females of the species will keep a sack of fertilized eggs in there web, and if a warm blooded animal of suitable size (large rat or larger) she will attempt to implant the eggs in the prospective host.

The Mind Spider produces a venom that acts as a local anesthetic which allows it to craw into the victim’s ear canal or nasal passages. Typically done when the host is sleeping. Upon entering it will use it’s powerful mandibles to bore a hole into the host brain cavity and deposit the egg sack and exit the host. Upon waking in the morning the host may find some dried blood from a nose bleed or ear bleed and feel a slight soreness in the area. If left undisturbed for three days the eggs will hatch, and the larval spiders will begin to feed on the host’s brain matter. The feeding will proceed painless to the host at first but after the first day the host’s mental faculties will begin to be reduced. (1 point a day or equivalent) After a week serious conditions may occur: trembling, blindness, convulsions or paralysis may all occur, along with mental afflictions like paranoia, schizophrenia, or if they are very luck a coma. After two weeks, or if the mental faculties are reduced to zero, hundreds of fully developed mind spiders will attempt escape from the brain cavity by boring their way out, killing the host if they are not already dead.

Treatment can consist of surgery, advanced medicine or magical means. If caught early enough the victim can expect a full recovery, but any losses to mental abilities are permanent, likewise any mental affection. Recovery is only possible though advanced medical or mystical means.
 
Kafka,

Almost a straight rip from one of Larry Niven's Leshy Circuit short stories: A spore/fungal infection that re-animates corpses.

The dead body must be reasonably fresh, like less than a day old, and infected. The infection begins with a sunflower-like plant that releases the spore/fungus. The corpse is re-animated it much like the galvanic reaction in frog legs. While the length of the whole movement period depends on a variety of issues like how long the corpse has been dead, condition of muscles and bones, how 'intact' the body is, etc., the period is usually only a few hours.

The purpose for the movement is two fold; move the corpse away from the original point of infection so that the new plant won't vie for resources with the old plant and, once the corpse has been moved, use it as fertilizer for the new plant to produce more spores/fungus.

During the movement period, the corpse also thrashes around quite a bit. This means limbs could scratch and jaws could bite nearby scavengers attracted to the corpse thus passing on the infection via another route.

Prevention includes avoiding the spores/fungus producing plants, burning the freshly dead, and avoiding the re-animated corpses.

Scared the bejabbers out of my players. Plenty of new underwear broken out that night!


Have fun,
Bill

P.S. In Niven's story, the spore/fungus can re-animate a corpse in a much better fashion and then direct the actions of the corpse to hunt new victims. The hero saves himself by dousing the fungal zombies with an especially powerful antibiotic!
 
Aboleths. Sure, they're D&D (and SRD) in origin, but with a few tweaks they could be made into very Lovecraftian foes.

Another idea is a twist on the Alien (and System Shock 2) theme: a parasite that lays its eggs in Human heads (or sends its tiny larva to sneak there while the Human sleeps or is under psionic sedation). Then the larva grows, feeding itself on the host's brain, and gaining partial control of it; therefore you'll get "zombies" which are actually live Humans with parts of their brain replaced with a parasite larva. Then, when the parasite grows mature, it bursts out of the "zombie's" head with a bloody explosion and starts to walk around on its own (eating the victim's remains as a birth-feast). This could ahve a complex life cycle, with different castes and/or sexes of the parasite developing into different adult forms.

A note on the latter idea: it is based, to a certain degree, on certain real-world parasitic wasps who sedate a spider or a beetle with their sting's toxin, then inject an egg into it, and then leave; the sedative wears off, and then the spider or beetle wanders on and lives for some time, until the wasp's larva hatches and chews its way out of the living host. IIRC Alien was inspired by these wasps as well.
 
The Lorcvih, an alien race of intelligent, telepathic, metal-eating, alien bacteria inspired by earthly metal eating bacteria & the comic Dynamo Joe. Existing in deep space in the Beyond sector, they exist in metallic asteroids but are very fond of rich, high alloys. Their hive intelligence allows them to learn & their telepathy allows them to transmit info to other parts of the community. Their main weakness, like many grounding dwelling bacteria is oxygen, which kills them when exposed in 2 D6 turns. They also combine to form complex body shapes. Gotten into a ship's hull they can eat it up like microscopic termites, often not tripping sensors or alarms due to their racial memory of ships over the centuries.
 
Here's another four 'creatures' for your collection:

Werewolf - With characteristics of DDEXXX where X is 'as alter-ego', you don't want one of these stalking your ship. Unlike 'Alien' or 'Predator', even an inch-by-inch search may reveal nothing but passengers and crew.
Supernatural? Jekyll & Hyde genetics gone wrong? Viral infection? The hapless players never found out!

Catapult Scorpion - a variant of the terrestrial scorpion, it can launch a barb over distances of a metre or two. The barb is loaded with a powerful nerve toxin that induces total paralysis whilst leaving the victim conscious. This keeps the food source both static and fresh for several days whilst the local nest devours it. If the victim is brought to a sickbay, the symptoms can be discovered and rectified without lasting harm, but a less reliable field diagnosis (he's dead, Jim) may lead to comrades disposing of the 'corpse' via less-than-pleasant traditions.

Related to today's 'flesh-eating bugs', Zombie Rot is the common name for a bacterium that causes the body to undergo decomposition whilst still alive. Around a thousand times faster than Leprosy in its effects, and with pain levels similar to gangrene, death occurs in around 7 to 14 days. The disease can be halted, but not reversed, by a medical facility of TL10+, but the symptoms may not be recognised for several hours or days. Generally, the victim will lose 1 point every four (or 1D6) hours from a random* statistic (all except Soc) All losses will be permanent and every time Int is rolled, roll less than CURRENT Int to avoid the victim going psycho. In the later stages, the victim is essentially a zombie and will become a NPC.
*Actually, the process is not quite random.
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Having rolled for a random characteristic, roll less than that characteristic's current value for it to be affected, otherwise roll for another characteristic. Continue until a characteristic is affected. If Int is rolled but not affected, it may still make the victim homicidally psychotic, but in this case the effects will be temporary, lasting for 1D6 hours.

Rybecker's Disease is a virulent viral population-decimator emulating Poe's Red Death and Ebola. It has a disturbing history of escaping quarantine.
 
As for monsters:

The "Grendels" from Nivens Legend of Heorod would make a nice "riddel" monster. Colonie died out, badly damaged and all settlers gone. No large predators where reported on the world, no large alien spaceship ever crashed there
 
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