Savage Bloodshadows: Blood of Tarrian Wilderness Creatures
“It isn’t chasing you. It’s already inside your footprints.”
Ooze Snakes appear to be serpents composed entirely of living swamp muck. Their bodies constantly dissolve and reform, revealing flashes of bone, teeth, and strange glowing organs before sinking back beneath gelatinous slime. An adult may stretch twenty feet long but flatten itself into a puddle only inches thick.
Rather than striking like ordinary snakes, an Ooze Snake flows across the ground with disturbing speed, climbing walls, slipping beneath doors, or emerging from seemingly solid mud.
Its digestive slime begins dissolving prey before swallowing it, leaving only polished bones and equipment behind.
Habitat:
- Mud pits
- Rotten mangrove roots
- Underground hot springs
- Flooded ruins
Behavior: Ambush predator. It senses vibration through liquid and mud rather than sight.
Rumor: If the swamp water suddenly becomes perfectly still, an Ooze Snake may be watching from beneath the surface.
Ooze Snake
Large Monstrous Serpent (Wild Card)
The Ooze Snake is one of the most feared predators of the Boiling Swamps. Neither entirely animal nor ooze, its body is a constantly shifting mass of mud, slime, and acidic protoplasm. It flows through water, mud, and cracks in stone with terrifying ease, often lying in wait beneath seemingly solid ground until prey passes overhead.
Attributes: Agility: d8, Smarts: d4 (A), Spirit: d6, Strength: d10, Vigor: d10
Skills: Athletics d10, Fighting d8, Intimidation d8, Notice d8, Stealth d10
Pace 8, Parry 6, Toughness 10 (2)
Special Abilities
Amorphous: The Ooze Snake can flatten itself to only a few inches thick, squeezing through cracks, drains, beneath doors, or through loose stone. It ignores penalties for moving through Difficult Ground consisting of mud, muck, water, or debris.
Aquatic: No Pace penalty in water or swamp terrain.
Camouflage: +2 Stealth while submerged in mud, water, muck, or thick vegetation.
Corrosive Flesh: Anyone striking the Ooze Snake with an unarmed attack or natural weapon suffers 2d4 acid damage. Metal weapons that roll a Critical Failure while striking the snake become corroded, suffering -1 damage until repaired.
Engulf: Instead of a normal bite attack, the Ooze Snake may attempt to engulf a target of Size +1 or smaller.
- Fighting roll opposed by Athletics.
- Success: Victim is Entangled.
- Raise: Victim is Bound and immediately suffers 2d6 acid damage, ignoring Armor unless completely enclosed.
A Bound victim takes 2d6 acid damage at the start of each of the snake’s turns.
Acidic Digestion: Victims Incapacitated while engulfed continue taking acid damage. Mundane equipment not made of stone or magical materials begins dissolving after 1d6 rounds.
Mud Glide: The Ooze Snake may disappear beneath mud, swamp water, or loose earth as a free action. While submerged:
- Cannot be targeted by ranged attacks unless its location is precisely known.
- Gains Heavy Cover against melee attacks.
- May emerge anywhere within 6″ that is connected by mud or water.
Tremorsense: The Ooze Snake ignores Concealment caused by darkness, fog, or vegetation when detecting creatures touching the ground or water within 12″.
Hardy: If Shaken twice, the Ooze Snake does not suffer a Wound.
Size +2: Approximately 20 feet long.
Attacks: Bite (Fighting, Damage: Str+d8, AP 2) If the target is Shaken by the Bite, the Ooze Snake may immediately attempt an Engulf as a free action once per turn.
Acid Spit (Optional Alpha Variant): Range: 6/12/24 Damage: 2d6 Acid Victims must make a Vigor roll or become Distracted until the end of their next turn as the acid burns their eyes and skin.
Weakness (Desiccation): The Ooze Snake must spend at least one hour every day in mud or water. If deprived of moisture:
- Suffers one level of Fatigue every four hours.
- Cannot use Mud Glide once Exhausted.
Weakness (Fire): Fire attacks gain +4 damage against the Ooze Snake.
Tactics: Ooze Snakes are patient ambush predators. They bury themselves beneath swamp trails, beneath rotten docks, or inside flooded ruins, remaining perfectly still until prey is directly overhead. They strike with a powerful bite, immediately attempting to engulf isolated victims before retreating beneath the muck. They rarely fight to the death; if wounded, they dissolve into the swamp and attack again hours later from another direction.
Boiling Swamp Variant: Corrupted Ooze Snake (Veteran): Ancient specimens exposed to decades of magical corruption gain
- Size +3
- Toughness 12 (3)
- Regeneration: Natural healing every round unless damaged by fire or holy magic.
- Toxic Miasma: Medium Burst Template around the snake. Living creatures entering or starting their turn within the area must make a Vigor roll or become Fatigued from poisonous vapors.
- Improved Acid: Engulf damage increases to 2d8, and acid ignores 4 points of Armor.
This makes the Ooze Snake a dangerous Seasoned encounter in its standard form and a formidable Veteran/Heroic apex predator in its corrupted form, especially in the cramped waterways and flooded ruins of the Boiling Swamps where it can fully exploit its ambush tactics.