Monster Monday - Slitherfang

Circuity coiled and steel glinted in the setting sun as the vast form of the slitherfang arose from the sands. Flickering blue eyes shifted to a bloody crimson as they settled upon the party of adventurers that stood before it, their age and experience in the profession leaving them only slightly surprised by the mechanical monstrosity. The rugged fighter sighed, rolling out his shoulders as the rogue twirled daggers between her fingers. As though matching their movements, the slitherfang stretched up and shook the sand from its body before settling back into its coil and flaring its hood in a daunting display.

We're featuring another creature from the Horizon franchise, once more made in conjunction with Cameron McLoud. Per his suggestion, we're building a slitherfang this time, which featured a slight miscommunication - this thing was meant to be level 17, I somehow thought Cam said level 15 in my delusion, and built it as such. It's fine as such and if you want a level 17 version of it, you can easily build it as such simply by adjusting its numbers. That might be even more appropriate for it given some of its abilities.

The slitherfang has an immense arsenal and perhaps the most daunting of them all is its Purgewater. Within the game itself, Horizon can inflict the drenched condition, which cancels out elemental damage that the player would deal. That's a little strange transferring to Pathfinder but for those familiar with the Monster Hunter franchise, it does resemble dragonblight a bit, and that is something I've designed in the past. I used a similar idea here, translating the concept into an antimagic effect though rather than the standard antimagic field, I applied a moderate DC Will save to it. This is because it passively applies Purgewater with both its standard fangs Strikes and with its Toxic Stream ability. It uses the Will save specifically as while it can cancel out the magical effects of a martial's items, spellcasters will be the most harmed by this effect and they tend to have better Will saves so this will help make them more likely to resist such effects.

As mentioned, it has Toxic Stream, which deals slightly below limited use area damage at a high DC. It does have a cooldown, but the effects of Purgewater are so potent that I lowered the damage a bit. It does use limited use area damage with its Rattle Hood ability, which again uses a high DC and has the chance of inflicting the stunned condition as its leaves foes reeling from the overwhelming sound. It has yet another area effect in the form of its Bolt Smash action, its only area effect that doesn't have a cooldown. This deals unlimited use area damage at a relatively short range and in a smaller area than many of its other abilities.

In addition to those slightly more fantastical abilities, the slitherfang does have a few more standard effects. Slither Charge is the most obvious of these mundane abilities, and shares some similarities to the likes of Trample. But I specifically wanted this to feature Strikes so that the slitherfang could potentially use the Improved Grab on its tail Strikes and gather multiple foes up thanks to its Serpentine Grasp. It can then follow that up with Greater Constrict, which is a standard monster ability and deals around low Strike damage. This only uses a moderate DC since failing Greater Constrict leaves foes unconscious and while it's surprisingly easy to wake up an unconscious character, being able to do this to multiple creatures at once is a little much. I felt fine including it since the giant anaconda can also Greater Constrict multiple creatures, though it's harder for it to afflict as many creatures.

Pathfinder 2e:

Cam McLoud's D&D 5e:

ENCOUNTER HOOKS

The nature of these machines might make them hard to incorporate into a standard Pathfinder or D&D game. However, utilizing them as remnants of an ancient civilization or the survivor of a crashed spaceship - something of which isn't entirely uncommon in the Pathfinder setting of Numeria. In either cases, they are likely simply serving as guardians of these ancient sites or ships, but you might have characters somehow bring them under its control to lay sieges, guard its own domain, or something outside its usual operation parameters.

I put together a video on the slitherfang over on the Ready to Die channel, which also features a fight to test out the slitherfang, which had some interesting interactions. If you're interested in joining the discussion on what creatures/builds 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.

Have a monstrous Monday!