(answering @chicken-tamer‘s request for the Freestar One equivalent of/answer to the “giant ambulatory tree-person” critter archetype)
You see it first as a constellation shining in the depths of the smoke; red-white stars bobbing and guttering at the top of the hill. The filters in your helmet wheeze as they strain the faintest scraps of breathable air from an atmosphere of mostly ash, and you draw closer, the earth crunching beneath your feet.
A deer charges past you shrieking bloody murder, a mess of burning branches tangled in its horns, flame creeping down its neck, eating its eyes. Up ahead the shape on which the constellation hangs resolves, a towering shadow thick with sinuous, prickling limbs. Timbers creak and splinter as it shifts its weight. Somewhere inside it pockets of superheated air bleed through thin passages, and so it sings—a single long, thin, high note weaving in and out of the conflagratory roar.
HD 9 MV 30’ AC 17 AT thorny brands (1d12 kinetic, 2d6 fire, 60’ reach) Special steady burn, acceleration
Steady burn—every round, a Scarlet Warden inflicts 1d3 fire damage on itself. Unless significant effort is made to extinguish the surroundings, all combustible materials within a 300’ radius will catch fire (objects with hit point totals take 1d8 fire damage/round). A thick haze originating from the tree itself envelops this radius, providing light cover out to the 300’ mark and heavy cover within 120’. Subjects within the radius of effect that are insufficiently protected from the elements (a respirator and insulated suit are the bare minimum necessary) must make a Con check at disadvantage every round or take 1d6 damage from the heat and 1d6 damage from the smoke. Attempting to extinguish the Warden itself deals 2d10 damage per round, assuming a successful skill check.
Acceleration—when a Scarlet Warden reaches 1/3 (round down) of its hp, its MV quadruples.
The woods and jungles of the new Earth are not primeval. There is nothing accidental, nothing that arises anymore solely by virtue of the clumsy processes of natural selection. These green places are cultivated, though they do not resemble the orderly, well-behaved fields and parks we associate with the notion. Hands have guided their making, but they are not made to serve.
In this, the Scarlet Warden is an object lesson. There is something like precedent for it; eucalyptus trees defend their territory by shedding pound after pound of exceptionally flammable material wherever they grow, leaving all but their own kind behind when the heights of summer pass, and slash and burn agriculture is nothing new. Planned ecologies built around genetically engineered species are technologies you can trace back to the nations of the Pre-Columbian Americas.
But the Scarlet Warden takes all these principles and automates them. It is a tree that grows to burn, and when it reaches this burning age, it uproots itself and walks. The pyroclastic transformation that takes place inside turns it into a spidery titan, propelled on hydraulic roots pumping near-boiling sap. In the early stages of the burn, before it builds a really proper wall of heat, it uses its vast (albeit sluggish) bulk to clear a crude firebreak around the place it has chosen to die. This period of relative calm is short. The forest goes silent but for the sound of splintering wood and the hasty retreats of beasts with long enough memories to know what’s coming next.
It may be that you will have no choice but to go deeper, to chase the Warden. You may have to fight that fire. You may stumble through the stinging smoke, lungs screaming, eyes half-blind, your hair full of ashes, and see for a moment the tree in its final bloom. The name does it a disservice; in the final stretch before the tree is spent it burns in more colors than there are names for.
You may even walk back out alive to tell someone about it, if your throat’s not shot forever. But I hope not. I hope you never have to do any of that
"I related to the guillotine the most: I, too, was a direct descendant of gravity, born from women who belonged inside their countries the way blades belonged inside a body."
Some more work for the #liverpoolbestiaryprintproject today. These prints are based on the ostrich who only lay their eggs during the period that the pleiades stars are visible in the sky . . . #ostrich #space #galaxy #Screenprint #screenprinting #workinprogress #wip #besitary #abstract #print #illustration
I would be highly surprised if there was a monster more highly undervalued outside of Planescape than mephits. Seriously, they each get one passing line at best now. So how do you make use of them in your stories? Mephits are traditionally used to send messages between fiends, although they gather on their respective elemental planes as well. The way I really see mephits those is as a kind of underclass doing the strange and odd jobs that no one else wants. What really sets the planer metropolis apart from the smaller bergs is the sheer number of mephits they collect. You can find how they get their by looking at human habits throughout history and remembering that one of the tones that Planescape utilizes, especially in Sigil, is a jaded avant-garde. There is a constant desire to be counter-cultural and to try something new that not everyone will understand. Dan Carlin talks about how this knowledge is used by ‘hip’ crowds to build social connection as he discusses the collapse of the Roman Republic. The implicit messages of each type of mephit messenger would be one of these ways of determining ‘hipness’ in planer cities. If you have the knowledge to understand the message being sent, it may not mean everyone likes you, but at least you know you’re cool. Now all of these “in” people are sending messages to one another with mephits and if there is one thing that all mephits share in common, its that they are annoying and flighty. Once they deliver their message, they usually abandon their new masters or are forced to flee. Hence, each metropolis has a mass of vagrant, pestering elementals with an odd idea of what is and is not a good way to make a living.
Air mephits are supposed to be very good at delivering their first messages, but none after than. According to the Mimir an air mephit signifies oncoming treachery. They are also described as being fickle and untrustworthy, attaching themselves to anyone they find interesting. They are also easy to distinguish from other mephits, since they are the only mephits who do not have wings.
Most berks forget that not all Clueless come from the Prime. A real leatherhead genie from the Plane of Air thought that he try to tough is way in on The Bellringer’s courier service by bringing the hordes of air mephits who thought that he was an interesting blood with hime to Sigil and use them to deliver messages. Problem is that the second the mephits arrived in Sigil, they all flocked off in different direction to find even more interesting people than the genie, creating a minor infestation. Rumor has it that A’kin and Fell each have a small cloud constantly surrounding them now, but that the berk who got the most mephits was Autochon himself. This leaves everyone in a bind, as no one has any idea how to get rid of the yammering, annoying elementals who are now plaguing them.
The Guvners have begun seeing a new face on their interplaner research expeditions. Dalemossmagnus, or Dale as they’ve taken to calling her, is a perpetually calm air mephit who specializes in atmospheric and meteorological conditions. The thing is, Dale doesn’t actually have any specialized knowledge and is no smarter than any other mephit. Her secret is that she is actually a Cipher and is very in tune with her gaseous environment. Sometimes her insights are very insightful, while other times, they seem obvious. This has gotten her banned from visiting her favourite plane, Pandemonium, as there are only so many times a blood can listen to her calmly pronounce “The wind is screaming” before they go mad.
Airy Vistas is an air mephit who fancies himself a barbarian lord. He has attached himself to a group of lawful orcs as their shaman’s spirt guide and has helped establish them in a hanging town of airborn kelp. Both shaman and mephit dream large and hope to bring more settlements under their control through political, economic or military means.
