Life grew in abundance around the stately stride of the looming figure that lumbered through the trees, its wooden body creaking as it marveled at the nature around it. Animals and beasts of the wood watched it curiously, warily eyeing the rough approximations of predator and prey alike that adorned its body. The towering figure dropped to one knee and held out a surprisingly gentle hand that a particularly brave stag pushed towards, sniffing gently. The totem warden watched the fragile creature until a sharp sound drew its attention elsewhere. Straightening, the air about the totem warden shifted as its wooden hands curled into powerful fists. Intruders had come to its woods and as it exchanged its meandering for a measured march, its companions changed, growing sturdier and fiercer as they followed at its heel.
Art by Xavier 'Lozano' Ribeiro
This is a monster that was inspired by art I found and designed around just that picture. This was obviously a construct to me and I figured that it would be huge based off of its picture. I considered a few different CRs to build this creature at before finding the spell-like abilities I wanted to give it and then placing it at an appropriate CR to have access to those. Its hp and saves may be a little low, but between its DR and construct traits, it can weather most damage sufficiently. I was actually a little too worried about how it might be able to survive damage and while I gave it an acceptable to-hit bonus, its damage is a little low. Another part of my decision to go that route is its central ability, totem carvings. Each totem warden has at least four carvings and I just included the four most obvious ones to me to avoid clutter on the page. One of the reasons I like the design for this monster is that it gives GMs a chance to come up with their own totems for the creature - possibly ones more appropriate to a culture that would make these in their settings. Each totem carving gives a power or two as well as a single, spell-like ability that the totem warden can use its Wisdom to cast, thanks to shamanic magic. While this creature can certainly be encountered on its own and still prove a decent fight, I believe, I liked the idea of its overgrowth aura empowering nature around it. Looking back on it, perhaps I should have included an ability that prevents animals from attacking it unless ordered to do so but that doesn't entirely feel necessary to me. Its made of wood, so its not like most animals have much of a reason to attack it in the first place.
Pathfinder 1e:
I'll be honest, I struggled for a while with the PF2e totem warden. I really wanted to do the totem carvings the way I did them in PF1e but there wasn't enough spells to get that feel. Pathfinder 1e had an exhausting list of spells that meant I could find just about any spell to represent an animal. Ultimately, I decided to just make abilities or borrow them from the creatures that its based off of. I kept both of its AC and HP on the lower side of things for the same reason as above. Its immunities and resistances protect it from a lot so having those be smaller numbers are better. Overgrowth had minimal change from 1e to 2e aside from the fact that I had to single out the fungus creature type and that it provides the 'elite' adjustment rather than 'advanced' but that's just semantics. The Totem Carvings of course had to be a big part of it and most were actually easy to do because all but one of them are represented through actual creatures. The struggled a little bit with the stag carving - the bonus to speed was easy enough to figure out but that felt insufficient. I decided on the Twisting Horns reaction for it, giving it a sort of fun reaction to prep disarming somebody if it so desires on its turn. Its primary weapons are stills its fists, which deal low damage in part because the totem warden should be gaining a few new Strikes from at least one of its Totem Carvings or be gaining new ways to use its fists. Finally, the last ability I gave it that wasn't from a totem was its Wild Stride, allowing it to walk undeterred through the wilderness. As I finish typing this up, I do realize that I forgot to type in its regeneration in the stat block, so I will update that when I get the chance and post it. I did manage to include some extra totems in the sidebar this time around!
Totem Warden 2e:
Blue's D&D 5e Totem Warden:
I was a little wiped this week and forgot to type up encounter hooks. I'll have some done by the time I update the 2e totem warden, which will probably be tomorrow morning if you want to check back here for them. If not, thanks for at least checking out the monster - I appreciate all of you that did. Be sure to let me know what you think of it!
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Until next time, have a Monstrous Monday!
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