Paws scrabbled against stone and snow as the sleek creature raced up the spire, its breath frosting in the night air. Its sleek form was covered in cobalt scales and plates and the briefest layer of ice that cracked and crumbled with its agile movement. As it reached the apex of the peak, yellowed eyes fixed upon the party below and it bared its fangs. Its body vaguely resembled that of a wolf though lacking in any fur, but as the heroes watched, it suddenly rose onto its hindlegs, flexing the scythe-like claws upon its forelimbs. Its body shape seemed to change as it arched its back before unleashing a terrible howl. As it did, icy armor suddenly coated its form, extending its claws into frosty blades. As the echo of its cry died upon the wind, it turned its glare back towards the party and pounced from its perch.
The lunagaron is an icy creature from Monster Hunter Sunbreak and one of the Three Lords, inspired by the werewolf. It shows this inspiration with its ability to change from its usual four-legged stance as a fanged beast into a two-legged stance, where it becomes less agile but gains more powerful strikes. Its basic design, representing this former stance, is built as a skirmisher. Its central ability is Change Posture, which reduces its Speed and high Armor Class to instead raise its damage – its claws go up to high and its jaws, which only have a moderate attack bonus, go up to extreme. The lunagaron can further alter its combat style with its Ice Carapace. Initially, this ability only offered 40 temporary Hit Points, but it barely even had a round of its armor before it was shattered in the test. I wanted to increase this amount, and so I reduced its base HP to add another 20 HP to this ability, which also enhances its claws.
Most ice monsters have some sort of frosty beam that they fire from their mouth, but lunagarons expel a chilling mist with Misty Breath. I decided to play into the actual mist effect of this by having it linger and cause creatures within to become concealed. Occasionally, the lunagaron will perform an acrobatic looking leap as it unleashes this mist, which I wanted to actually represent with the Snowfall Leap. This does require a skill check to determine the distance and likely reduces the size of the area, so putting this as a two-action ability felt fine. Its lateral power rather than vertical, which is a major component of Pathfinder 2e.
Finally, I wanted to design some abilities that further differentiate the lunagaron’s bipedal and quadrupedal stances. In that effort, I built two abilities that are gated by its stance. For its quadrupedal stance, I sought to play into its mobility and skirmisher build style and gave it Pounce, which is a pretty standard monster ability. Including this ability also influenced my decision to give the lungaron the Stealth skill. It still isn’t a major part of its kit, so I didn’t do much else with it. To befit its more brutish nature while bipedal, it has Rend the Earth, which is mechanically inspired by the barbarian’s Swipe feat. The flavor reason to include it comes from a move where the lunagaron claws the ground and seems to rip up the ground. Obviously a claw attack made the most sense for this, but I wanted the jaws to remain valuable as an attack to use, so while they retain Improved Knockdown, creatures hit by this ability get a save to avoid being knocked down.
With the return to a Monster Hunter creature, I took the opportunity to build an item for it! Inspired by its ability to change, I wanted its item to impart a similar effect. The armor of the winter moon, named after the lunagaron great sword in MH, allows its wearer to become a sort of mini-lunagaron by granting some protection, enhancing their speed, and forming icy claws when activated. It grants immunity to cold damage balanced by a weakness to fire, bringing the wearer closer in line with a lunagaron. Pathfinder 2e seems cautious about handing out temporary HP and I followed that, granting it only a minor amount of temp HP but I moved the duration to a time limit and allowed it to be dismissed.
Pathfinder 2e:
Given the range of its abilities, the 1e version of the lunagaron felt closer to a magical beast. The cold subtype doesn’t necessarily indicate a deeper connection to the element that it does in 2e, so I included that subtype which automatically gives it immunity to cold damage and a vulnerability to fire damage. For it attacks, I erred on the lower side of damage since it can still change posture to increase its damage substantially. However, I did have to consider that it wouldn’t have the usual four-legged bonus to its CMD against trip that many creatures have and factored that into these changes. I’m not quite sure I hit the mark with the 1e change posture, but it can’t use tear the earth without being in it, which is a fairly powerful ability in this edition. Though 1e pounce, which is limited to its four-legged stance, is no slouch either, allowing the lunagaron to get off a full attack along with a charge. Hopefully, both of these abilities will be alluring enough to encourage GMs to have the lunagaron switch between them within the fight.
To simulate its scything claws, I focused on Cleave for the lunagaron though as I type this up, I wonder if I shouldn’t have included the likes of Dodge and Mobility. I included Combat Reflexes to take advantage of its ability to knock a multitude of characters prone with tear the earth. Power Attack is necessary for Cleave, but I could see dropping Surprise Follow-Through and possibly Iron Will to instead take Dodge and Mobility.
Pathfinder 1e:
Blue's D&D 5e:
ENCOUNTER HOOKS
Frigid Fury: Stories claim of a terrifying werewolf that haunts that steppes that wields not the power of a regular wolf, but a winter wolf. Over the years, many hunters have attempted to slay this legend but many have only met their demise. It has grown to the point where the local visit hosts festivals to hunt this figure and the heroes, who are either passing through or taking a break after their last adventure, are present for it. However, they soon realize that this supposed winter werewolf is actually a lunagaron, meaning all the silver brought by the various hunters is of little use. An ancient resident of the mountain, the lunagaron prefers hit and run tactics, dashing in to savage foes before retreating again, possibly leading the heroes on chases. If it escapes, the heroes may only be able to find it by the screams of the other hunters on the mountain.
Fangs in the Blizzard: In the midst of a blizzard while they are trekking through a snowy mountain, the heroes find themselves beset by a lunagaron or a pack of them, depending on their level. This lunagaron is familiar with hunting in the blizzard and uses it to its full advantage against the adventurers. Matters are further complicated by possible dangers in the snowy night such as hidden peaks, avalanches, and other environmental hazards that the lunagaron is fully capable of taking advantage.
If you're interested in joining the discussion on what creatures I'm working on or just discussing your own homebrew works, check out our Discord! If you want to get some teasers or help us get to our yet unlisted milestones for extra content, check out the Twitter.
I've been keeping at making vids for the Ready to Die YouTube channel. Keep letting me know what you guys think of those videos, which now includes the lunagaron's vid and its Monster Mash. Feel free to check it out or share it with others, and then let me know what you think. Still learning how to best make these.
Have a monstrous Monday!
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