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Powers Check

2021-06-17T07:43:32Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:7D67:47B3:441B:930A: /* In Later Editions */

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'''Powers Checks''' (an abbreviation of '''Dark Powers Checks''') are a mechanic unique to the [[Dungeons & Dragons]] setting of [[Ravenloft]]. Intended to be a way to enforce mechanically the roleplaying/thematic background element of how the Dark Powers rewards villains by gifting them with both unnatural powers ''and'' malefic curses, the basic idea is that when a player characters commits certain sinful acts, such as murder, betrayal, using a [[Necromancer|necromantic]] spell, blasphemy, etc, the player rolls a Percentile Die. This is compared to a large table that combines various sins and sin modifiers (acts of passion tend to be more likely to draw their eyes than cold-blooded, dispassionate malice, for example); if the player rolls equal to or less than this number, then they have caught the attention of the Dark Powers and are infused with spiritual taint. The more times this happens, the greater their powers - and their curses - grow, until ultimately they become [[monster]]s or even full-fledged [[Darklord]]s.

==Act of Ultimate Darkness==
In [[Ravenloft]] canon, there are some acts so foul, so horrible, so monstrous, that no Powers Checks are required; those who commit them just automatically get the Dark Powers' attention. For PCs, this is generally an automatic failed Powers Check, but for NPCs, this could even cause them to leap from "normal person" to "[[Darklord]]" in a single fell swoop.

Precisely what counts as an Act of Ultimate Darkness is left to the DM's discretion. For example, [[Strahd von Zarovich]], in one night: turned himself into a [[vampire]] to try and preserve his youth, murdered his brother to take his brother's wife, murdered all the guests at his brother's wedding to disguise what he'd done, and tried to mind control the woman he "loved" so he could turn her into his vampire bride - which caused her to curse him and leap to her death from the parapets of [[Castle Ravenloft]].

==Terror Track==
Powers Checks are intended to build towards a specific theme; the end result should be a coherent set of powers and curses that ultimately creates a recognizable monster. The term "Terror Track" is thusly used to define a specific set of Powers Check-gated gifts & curses that build towards a specific creature end-goal - for example, one of the earliest uses of the term in the boxed set "Domains of Dread" for [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]] 2nd Edition, gives us the Terror Track of the [[Vampire]].

Unfortunately, much like the general powers and curses of a failed Powers Check in general, the effort of inventing a Terror Track is left up to the DM. The [[Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition]] provides three sample Terror Tracks; the Ringleader, the Brute, and the Coward. Fans have responded by trying to create Terror Tracks for other DMs to use, resulting in them being scattered over various [[Ravenloft]] netbooks.

In [[Quoth the Raven]] #9, Terror Tracks are provided for the [[Kuo-toa]], the [[Sahuagin]] and the [[Reaver]].

In the [[Undead Sea Scrolls]] 2002, Terror Tracks are provided for the [[Aswang]] and the [[Upir Lichy]].

The largest source of Terror Tracks, however, can be found in the article "Terrible Transformations" for [[Books of S|The Book of Shadows]], which features '''twenty''' different Terror Tracks! Uniquely, it's the only one of its kind that focuses on rules for [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]] Terror Tracks, whereas the other five mentioned above are written for [[Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition]].
* [[Skin Thief]]
* [[Banshee]]
* Boneless
* [[Chosen One]]
* [[Dream Spawn]]
* [[Ettercap]]
* [[Gargoyle]]
* [[Ghoul]]
* [[Grimlock]]
* [[Heucuva]]
* [[Lich]]
* [[Mist Horror]]
* [[Reaver]]
* [[Red Widow]]
* [[Sea Spawn]] Master
* [[Shadow]]
* [[Werejackal]]
* [[Wererat]]
* [[Zombie]] Lord

==Redemption==
Unlike in some games, [[Ravenloft]] Powers Checks are ''not'' certain doom for your player; redemption is as much a part of [[Gothic Horror]] as damnation, after all. It's not easy, and you can never reach the heights of purity again, but it is possible through roleplaying and mechanical actions to purge yourself of the dark gifts and curses, climbing back towards normalcy.

==Reception==
The intent behind Powers Checks was to act as a curtail on [[Murderhobo]]s. Did it work? Well... honestly, probably not; many players find Powers Checks either never come up, or else annoying in how they seem deliberately tailored to screw over the players - the 3.5 "Ravenloft Player's Handbook" was widely critiqued for how many extra sources of Powers Checks it added, including '''leveling up in certain classes''', and even before then there were absurdities like the Speak with Dead and Deathwatch spells (which, respectively, let you ask a few questions of the deceased and ''let you check how much HP creatures have'') causing Powers Checks.

To say nothing of [[munchkin]]s deliberately aiming for Powers Checks because the penalties were often roleplaying centric and thusly worth it for the mechanical benefits of the powers.

==In Later Editions==
Powers Checks were deeply rooted in TSR's approach to D&D, and so they didn't really sit too well with WotC. In 4th edition, the concept was dropped (if only because a dedicated Ravenloft setting never resurfaced there), with instead the player being suggested to come up with spooky background or character traits to represent brushes with the dark powers. The closest that 4e got to Powers Checks were a pair of Themes called the Haunted Blade and the Misshapen, which gave the character powers tied to a brush with dark forces.

In 5th edition, [[Van Richten's Guide]] to [[Ravenloft]] scrapped the idea of Powers Checks entirely and replaced them with '''Dark Gifts''': an entirely voluntary option that the player can pick at starting level, or earn through play, that grants them distinct boons, at the cost of largely cosmetic "spooky" drawbacks. As a result, the book contains a specific array of Dark Gifts, consisting of the following. Each grants a couple of minor powers, but comes with a drawback.

'''Echoing Soul:''' You have a connection to past incarnations, were magically swapped into your current body, or you have a deep spiritual link to another being - there's a d6 table to roll on to randomly generate the specifics. Regardless, you experience intrusive echoes of one or more entirely different lives; on the plus side, this gives you two free skill proficiencies and a bonus language. The downside is the ''Intrusive Echoes'' trait; if you trigger the downside by rolling a 1 on an attack roll, ability check or saving throw, you become overwhelmed by foreign visions and memories, which you determine by rolling on a d6 table. You might end up charmed or frightened by a random creature for 1 minute, blinded for a turn, halve your speed for a turn, be incapacitated for a turn, or even get to reroll the triggering roll because you awoke a memory of a past triumph. Fortunately, Intrusive Echoes can only happen once per short rest.

'''Gathered Whispers:''' You're a spiritwalker, somebody who can naturally perceive the spirits of the deceased or denizens of other planes, and thus have to deal with them endlessly haunting you. d6 table to explain who the haunts are. It gives you the positive traits ''Spirit Whispers'' (Message as an SLA) and ''Sudden Cacophony'' (1/day, add Proficiency Bonus to AC vs. an attack - doesn't work against deaf assailants). The negative trait is ''Voices from Beyond'', which forces you to roll on a d4 table; you might end up with Disadvantage on your next attack roll/ability check/saving throw, be deafened for 1 minute, be frightened of a random creature for a turn, or get the benefits of a free Augury spells. ''Voices from Beyond'' triggers when you roll a 1 on an attack roll, ability check or saving throw, but can only happen once per short rest, just like the ''Intrusive Echoes'' trait.

'''Living Shadow:''' Like the name says, your shadow is mysteriously animate all on its own. Ever heard of a little Disney movie called "The Princess and the Frog"? You're basically Dr. Facilier. Positive traits: ''Grasping Shadow'' (Mage Hand SLA) and ''Shadow Strike'' (give yourself +10feet of reach with a melee attack Proficiency Bonus times per day). Downside: ''Ominous Will'', which causes the next creature to make an attack roll, saving throw or ability check within 30 feet to roll a d4; they add the even number as a bonus and subtract the odd number as a penalty.

'''Mist Walker:''' You have spent so long traversing the infamous Mists of Ravenloft that you have gained an unparalled connection to them, for both good and ill. The positive traits are ''Misty Step'' (cast Misty Step 1/day, and if spellcaster, gain it as a bonus spell) and ''Mist Traveler'' (you don't need Mist Talismans to reach domains; you just need to know the domain's name). The downside is ''Poisoned Roots'': Once you finish a long rest, the terrain in a 10-mile radius becomes spiritually poisoned against you. You can only stay in such an area for weeks equal to your Constitution modifier, and if you overstay, you ''gain'' 1 level of Exhaustion each time you complete a long rest there which can't be removed until you move on. Basically, this is an adapatation of the ''Static Burn'' curse that the [[Vistani]] suffered in 2nd and 3rd edition.

'''Second Skin:''' You have a Jekyll & Hyde-esque ability to transform into a strange secondary form, which you can either specifically designate or generate through a roll on a d6 table. There's only a single benefit here; ''Transformation'', which lets you cast Alter Self (Change Appearance only) on yourself 1/day and adds Alter Self to your spells list if you're a spellcaster. But, if you use this SLA, then when you return to normal, you'll retain some visible trait of your previous form until you complete a long rest. Rather than the standard "critical fail" triggered downside, this Dark Gift's downside is ''Involuntary Change'', where exposure to a catalyst (either determined or chosen from a d6 table) forces you to pass a DC 15 Charisma save or automatically shapeshift via your Alter Self SLA. Basically, this gift is pretty much all fluff, as there's not a lot of crunch wrapped up in transforming this way.

'''Symbiotic Being:''' You're Venom. Seriously. That's it. You have a physical living creature with its own indepentent mind and personality fused to your body. There's a d6 table to generate manifestation, and they include a living tattoo, crystalline growths, and a face that's basically an homage to Vampire Hunter D (or Voldemort in the very first Harry Potter novel). You gain the traits ''Entwined Existence'' (Symbiote has its own Int, Wis and Cha scores, and gives you free proficiency in either Arcana, Deception, History, Intimidation, Insight, Investigation, Nature, Religion, Perception or Persuasion) and ''Sustained Symbiosis'' (1/day, you can sacrifice a Hit Dice to either boost a saving throw or to automatically critical succeed a Death Saving Throw). The downside is, of course, ''Symbiotic Agenda'' - your symbiote has its own goal that it wants to achieve, and if you try to pass up an opportunity to pursue that goal, you have to pass a Charisma save (DC 12 + symbiote's Cha modifier) or else it takes over you, represented as a Charm effect that lasts 1d12 hours. You can either create the symbiote's agenda, or roll on the provided d6 table.

'''Touch of Death:''' Your flesh courses with malevolent energies or supernatural venom, allowing you to bring death to whoever brushes your skin. There's a d6 table to suggest how this might have been caused and manifests. Your positive traits are ''Death Touch'' (as an action, make an unarmed strike that does +1d10 Necrotic damage, boosted by +1d10 at levels 5, 11 and 17), ''Inescapable Death'' (your attacks ignore Necrotic Resistance), and ''Withering Contact'' (if you start your turn grappling or being grappled, the other guy takes 1d10 Necrotic damage). Surprisingly, there's no explicit downside to this ability! Although a sneaky DM could rule that the ability can activate involuntarily outside of combat and cause you to accidently kill someone you touch. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PBbHVDGIco| Either way, you better get used to not being able to hug things anymore.]

'''Watchers:''' You are the object of interest to ethereal spirits, which manifest themselves in Tiny-sized bodies made of shadowstuff and constantly hang arond you, even if you try to drive them away. There's a d8 table of example forms that these watchers might take, from ravens and rats to drifting religious symbols or animated objects. For a positive trait, you get ''Borrowed Eyes'', which lets you invoke the power of the Watchers to gain Adventage on Investigation & Perception checks plus Immunity to Blindness for 1 hour 1/day. The negative trait is ''Dread Presence'': you have Disadvantage on saves against Scrying, and if your Watchers are visible, you also suffer Disadvantage on Deception, Performance and Charisma checks. You can disperse these Watchers with a minute's work and a successful DC 15 Animal Handling check, but it only lasts for 1 hour and can only be done 1/day.

[[Category: Game Mechanics]] [[Category: Ravenloft]]

Van Richten's Guide

2021-06-17T06:26:05Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:7D67:47B3:441B:930A: /* Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft */

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'''The Van Richten's Guides''' are a series of monster-related sourcebooks written for [[Dungeons & Dragons]] and connected to the setting of [[Ravenloft]].

From an in-universe perspective, the Guides are, as their title says, treatises on monster-hunting written by the esteemed Dr. [[Van Richten]], the most prolific and well-educated monster hunter in all of the [[Demiplane of Dread]]. At some point, Van Richten disappeared, after which his legacy was taken up by the [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]]. In addition to completing and publishing his own unfinished notes - the Guides to the Fiend, Vistani and Witch - they went on to create their own guides, which they published under the same name for legacy purposes and to ensure they would reach their target audience.

On the meta-level, each Guidebook examines a single creature type and expands upon it to make it both a better fit for Ravenloft's purported "Gothic Horror" goal (even if, in practice, it leans closer to [[Castlevania]] amongst most people who actually play it), providing an exhaustive examination of tactics that can be used to run that monster or fight that monster, variant "salient abilities", unique weaknesses, lore, and other aspects that flesh them out.

Van Richten wrote and published on his own the following books for the [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]] system:
* Guide to [[Vampire]]s
* Guide to [[Lich]]es
* Guide to [[Ghost]]s
* Guide to [[Therianthrope|Werebeasts]]
* Guide to [[Fiend]]s
* Guide to the [[Mummy|Ancient Dead]]
* Guide to the [[Golem|Created]]
* Guide to the [[Vistani]]

These books were later reprinted in "collected editions" by the Weathermay Twins, known as the Van Richten's Monster Hunter's Compendiums. The third and last of these volumes also included the otherwise unprinted "Van Richten's Guide to [[Witch]]es", which, as the name suggests, examines [[Witch]]es, [[Warlock]]s and [[Hag]]s.

The Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins wrote two guides completely of their own for [[Dungeons & Dragons]] 3rd edition which saw print; one for the [[Walking Dead]] and a second for the [[Shadow Fey]]. A third guidebook, dedicated to "The Mists", which focused on anomalous and eerie entities born from the reality-binding vapors that wreathe the land, in addition to covering Outlanders (humanoids from other worlds brought amongst the ignorant natives of the [[Demiplane of Dread]]) and anomalous reality-zones that one might encounter whilst enveloped by the Mists, was completely written up... but, [[White Wolf]] lost the license before they could officially print and sell it. The PDF was set free onto the internet, and is now hosted on, amongst other things, the [[Fraternity of Shadows]] website.

Looking into adapting content found in these guides to later editions? Note that not everything written by White Wolf & Sword&Sorcery for 3-3.5e was converted entirely everything from the 2nd Edition, and- more intriguingly, the powers Liches are privy to in Guide to the Lich are still, 3.5 canon, such as the salient abilities Liches gain are in Monsters of Faerun, though only a small excerpt. Please note, that these make both liches and vampires essentially epic-level threats, whom are more dangerous depending on their personal holdings and age- a vampire patriarch for example, is essentially a demigod immune to sunlight, and probably only beatable if they gained additional weaknesses over their long-term existence, they can even fully heal themselves once per day through the use of their alternate form ability, which has an additional form of their choosing- essentially their second Castlevania Dracula Form- limited to no CR or cap or anything. They can even cheat themselves into becoming this strong. If you've ever heard of the epic-questline, the Quicksilver Hourglass in 3.5, a quest where you have to stop members of the Union of Eclipses using a deific artifact to age the world to death and rule the remainder, then failure would result in vampires like this popping up all over the material plane. Bullet dodged.

==Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft==
A book titled "Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft" released on 18th May 2021, serving as the complete [[Ravenloft]] setting book for [[Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition]].

For players, this book offers mechanics for [[Dhampir]], [[Hexblood]] and [[Reborn]] "races", new "horror-themed" Trinkets, tips on altering backgrounds to a more horror motif, the new (or possibly reprinted from [[Curse of Strahd]]) Haunted One and Investigator backgrounds, the [[Occultist|College of Spirits]] subclass for [[bard]]s and the [[Undead]] patron for [[warlock]]s. A new mechanic in the form of "Dark Gifts" is also offered, replacing the [[Powers Check]]s of old.

Most of the book is dedicated to DMs, however. The second chapter is devoted to the topic of ''Creating Domains of Dread'', and provides advice on building darklords and their domains, and discusses the major genres of horror useful to a Ravenloft 5e game, which it breaks down as ''Body Horror'', ''Cosmic Horror'', ''Dark Fantasy'', ''Folk Horror'', ''Ghost Story'', ''Gothic Horror'' and ''Other''.

Chapter 3 is devoted to providing details on '''Domains of Ravenloft'''. Most of this is devoted to domains; seventeen of which are about four pages long, with most of that being [[Darklord]] related, and another dozen or so that are only a single paragraph long.

Still in chapter 3, it then provides major Ravenloft organizations (with the emphasis on the [[keepers of the Feather]] and the [[Vistani]] and prominent NPCs native to the Demiplane of Dread:
* [[Alanik Ray]] & Arthur Sedgwick (the Ravenloftian Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson)
* The Caller (obviously the [[Incubus]] known as the [[Gentleman Caller]])
* Erasmus van Richten (Dr. van Richten's previously dead [[vampire]] son, now a ghost)
* [[Ez d'Avenir]]
* [[Firan Zal'honan]]
* [[Jander Sunstar]] (heroic [[elf]] [[vampire]])
* [[Larissa Snowmane]]
* Dr. Rudolph [[van Richten]] (the iconic van Helsing expy)
* The [[Weathermay-Foxgrove Twins]]

Chapter 4 is short again, and is full of basic DM tricks, hence its title of '''Horror Adventures'''. Most of interest are new mechanics for curses, fear, stress, haunted traps, and survivors. There's also a short adventure set in the infamous House of Lament.

Finally, chapter 5 is all about the '''Monsters of Ravenloft'''. Whilst there are some new critters, most of these are actually returning beasties from old! A major detail, however, is that [[FAIL|none of the entries bother to list the creature's alignments]], so for all we know, that [[Berserker|Relentless Killer]] [[Trap|could just be a Neutral Good softie]]!
* [[Doppelganger Plant|Bodytaker Plant]] (originally called the Doppelganger Plant, an expy of the pods from Invasion of the body Snatchers)
* [[Boneless]]
* [[Brain in a Jar]]
* [[Carrion Stalker]]
* [[Carrionette]]
* [[Death's Head]]
* [[Dullahan]]
* [[Gallows Speaker]]
* [[Gremishka]]
* [[Jiangshi]]
* [[Loup-garou|Loup Garou]]
* [[Necrichor]]
* [[Nosferatu]]
* Priests of [[Osybus]]
* [[Relentless Killer]]
* [[Star Spawn]] Emissary
* [[Strigoi]]
* Swarms (Maggots, Scarabs)
* Ulmist Inquisitors
* [[Unspeakable Horror]]s
* [[Vampire|Vampiric]] [[Mind Flayer]]
* [[Wereraven]]
* [[Zombie]]s (swarm of zombie limbs, zombie clot, zombie plague spreader)

[[Category: Dungeons & Dragons]] [[Category: Ravenloft]] [[Category: Game Books]]

Carrionette

2021-06-17T06:23:48Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:7D67:47B3:441B:930A:

[[Image:Jumping carrionette.jpg|thumb|right|"I've got no strings/To hold me down..."]]
In [[D&D]]'s [[Ravenloft]] setting, a Carrionette is a doll-like golem capable of soul transference - aka ''possession'' - by stabbing a living host with a specially prepared needle. They are native to the domain of [[Demiplane of Dread|Odiare]], having been crafted by Giuseppe at the behest of Maligno, the realm's [[Darklord]]. Carrionettes are one of the few kinds of monster to be found within Odiare.

In 3rd edition, as well as appearing in the official 3.0 (Denizens of Darkness) and 3.5 (Denizens of Dread) Ravenloft [[Monster Manual]]s, Carrionettes also appeared in the article [[Creature Catalog]] IV in [[Dragon Magazine]] #339.

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Carrionette MC Ravenloft.jpg
Carrionette 2e.png
Carrionette Dragon 339.png
</gallery>

[[Category:Dungeons & Dragons]] [[Category:Dungeons & Dragons Monsters]][[Category:Monsters]][[Category:Ravenloft]]

Slaad

2021-06-16T23:03:22Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:7D67:47B3:441B:930A: /* Alternate Versions */

[[File:Slaad 4.jpg|300px|thumb|right|A red, green, blue and gray Slaad.]]

The '''Slaadi''' are a race of toad-like extraplanar beings from the world of [[Dungeons & Dragons]]. Natives of [[Limbo]], they are the counterparts to the [[Modron]]s in that they serve as the living exemplars of [[alignment|Chaotic Neutral]]. They originated in 1st edition as submissions of D&D fan and science fiction author Charles Stross perhaps by way of '' [[White Dwarf]]'' (although, contrary to common thought, ''not'' to its [[Fiend Factory]]); thence they hopped over to the eenfamous [[Fiend Folio]].

In practice, they got portrayed as [[Chaotic Stupid|"Whee! Lolrandumb! I's funny!"]]. Blame [[Planescape]]'s ''Faces of Evil'' for Xanxost.

==Slaad Types==
Slaadi are mostly remembered for coming in multiple different colors and their horrific breeding cycle. See, the basic Slaad come in Blue and Red colors. Blue Slaadi have a corruptive bite/claw attack (depending on the edition) that physically and mentally mutates a victim into a Red Slaad. And Red Slaadi can implant eggs with their claw attacks that hatch into chest-bursting tadpoles that subsequently turn into Blue Slaadi.

If the victim of either a blue slaad or a red slaad is high enough level (AD&D), an arcane spellcaster (3e), or able to cast any sort of third-level spell (5e), then the result is instead a Green Slaad, a more powerful strain with innate spellcasting abilities. These are cherished and prized by the lower Reds and Blues, who seek to nurture them; as a result, green slaadi are notably arrogant and braggadocios. They have the ability to assume a humanoid form - in AD&D, this is the form of their original host, but in 3e this became a simple Change Shape ability, which is passed on to the higher forms.

If Green Slaadi live for at least a century, they have the chance to mature into the more powerful Gray Slaadi, who are the next tier on the progression ladder. These are much better mages, and have a particular skill in crafting and using magical items.

Death Slaadi are the next highest up on the list. In AD&D, nobody knows where Death Slaadi come from; in 3rd edition, it was stated that gray slaadi who have survived for at least a century in that form sometimes undergo a ritual that transforms them into death slaadi; the ritual seems to involve infecting themselves with the essence of Evil, which is why Death Slaadi are 'sometimes' Chaotic Evil and other slaadi are Chaotic Neutral. 5e says that the ritual requires consuming the corpse of a slain death slaad, which means the number of these monsters is likely fixed. These are portrayed as the brutal overlords of the race, albeit inferior in power to the mighty Slaad Lords.

There might, in the existence of Death Slaadi, be a proto Mencius Moldbug commentary on the 'Great Wheel': that chaotic good is a sham and that chaos is, at its core, evil - or at least [[Far Realm]]. Some at TSR recognised that That Way Comes [[Skub]]. So the first Monstrous Compendium appendix for Planescape (2e, barely) retcons that Death Slaadi are all chaotic-neutral like the rest of 'em. The 3e Monster Manual kicks that right in the pants, to restore the near-evil. The Epic book doubled down with the Black Slaad, also sometimes evil. Simply adding a chaotic good counterpart to the death slaadi is an idea that nobody seems to have thought of yet.

The exact list of types has (appropriately) fluctuated over editions, but the general list is '''Red''', '''Blue''', '''Green''', '''Gray''' and '''Death''', as this was the original slaad list in [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]].

In 3rd edition, the '''Mud Slaad''', '''Black Slaad''' and '''White Slaad''' were added as direct parts of the family tree. Mud Slaads, which appeared in the 3e [[Fiend Folio]], are the least member of the member of the slaad race, inferior even to Red and blue Slaadi, and are portrayed as cowardly, cringing, insecure creatures with a sonic damage-inflicting shriek attack, that reproduce by mutating other creatures into more mud slaad. Black and White Slaadi are the ultimate non-Slaad-Lord forms of the Slaad Race, and appeared in 3e's Epic Level Handbook. Death Slaadi who survive for at least a century mature into White Slaadi (which would mean that the number of black slaadi, rather than being fixed, should be in perpetual ''decline''), who in turn become Black Slaadi if they survive another century. Aside from different levels of epic power (HP, defenses, etc), both Whites and Blacks have the exact same abilities, including the ability to infect victims with raw chaos-stuff that can rapidly break the victim down into more chaos-stuff.

[[Dragon Magazine]] #306 introduced the '''[[Gormeel]]''', which are a mutant slaad offshoot characterized by their ''Lawful'' alignment, [[Just As Planned|because embracing order is the last thing you'd expect chaos to do, so of course it does that just to fuck with you.]]

In 4th edition, most of the color-based slaad returned, along with several alternative versions and new slaadi:
* Red Slaads are divided into Blood Slaads (pretty much their old selves) and Juggernauts (15ft tall musclebound bruisers).
* Blue Slaads are divided into Talon Slaads (armed with chaos phage implanting wristblades) and Digesters (oversized brutes who seek to literally eat away at reality),
* Green Slaads are divided into Curse Slaads and Madjacks, characterized mostly by their different sets of magical abilities.
* Gray Slaads are divided into Rift Slaads (who can manipulate the planar fabric) and Havocs (more powerful versions).
* Black Slaads are divided into Void Slaads (who have all sorts of life-draining tricks) and Entropics (who can shapeshift into life-draining miniature black holes).
* White Slaads (also called Chronos Slaads) have the power to pull replicas of themselves from the time stream.
* Flux Slaads are the smallest and weakest of their ilk, often fleeing the [[Elemental Chaos]] to set themselves up as rulers of [[bullywug]] tribes.
* Slaad Spawners are mutant slaads of any of the aforementioned breeds who can produce baby slaads (not slaad larvae, miniature adult slaads) from noxious boils on their backs.
* Golden Slaads have been transformed by exposure to a surge of raw chaos, and randomly shift into and out of the form of a golden [[slime]].
* Putrid Slaads are slaad [[zombie]]s.

===Rulers===
Slaadi are ruled by the Slaad Lords, who represent unique aspects of Chaos.
* [[Ssendam, Lord of the Insane]], appears as either a giant golden slaad or an immense translucent-gold [[slime]] that resembles an amoeba with a human brain for a nucleus. It has been described as being either male or female in different sources, and with the alternate forms of a naked man wielding a black sword that stuns what it touches, a golden slaad, or a gorgeous gold-skinned [[elf]]-maid with 0 [[Wisdom]].
* [[Ygorl, Lord of Entropy]], manifests as either a giant black slaad or a shadowy, sickle-wielding, bat-winged humanoid skeleton. Also played by the epic Michael Clarke Duncan in the game "Demon Stone." Some sources say he actually experiences time backwards.
* Tales of the Outer Plane added the forgotten Slaad Lord [[Wartle]], whilst [[Dragon Magazine]] #221 added [[Chourst, Lord of Randomness]] (who is basically the most ADHD Slaad imaginable), and [[Renbuu, Lord of Colors]] (who loves to experiment with changing colors on everything), who later became official in the [[Planescape]] expansion Planes of Chaos.
* Dungeon #101 added [[Bazim-Gorag the Firebringer]], who became official in the "Champions of Ruin" [[splatbook]] for the [[Forgotten Realms]]. He has two heads, a fiery aura, and a glaive wreathed in black flame.
* Secrets of the Plane Below mentions [[Norsar the Many]], a white slaad lord with the ability to pull hundreds of different temporal duplicates of himself from the timestream.

==Alternate Versions==
They got a lot of attention in the [[World Axis]], but were really revamped; amongst other things, they changed from being chaotically random to wanting to dissolve all of reality into an endless chaos, changing them to the 4e definition of Chaotic Evil (since 4e [[skub]]tastically decided to reduce [[Alignment]] to a spectrum of Lawful Good - Good - Unaligned - Evil - Chaotic Evil). This was explained in "Secrets of the Plane Below" that slaad believe there was once an infinite multiverse of many parallel realities (think Marvel or DC), but somehow they all got smooshed together into the present cosmology. This really pisses them off, and/or has driven them mad, because they supposedly can still see into the former parallel realities and now they want to rip reality apart in order to free them.

4e slaads even got their own [[Demon Prince]]; Urae-Naas, a "female" slaad so bloated with eggs she can't walk anymore and has to drag herself along on her long arms and enormous tongue, who rules over the Phage Breeding Grounds; a bounded 10-mile demiplane made from the ever-rotting guts of her dead boyfriend, the [[Archomental|Primordial]] Ramenos, which serves as the 53rd layer of the [[Abyss]]. The plane's most distinguishing feature is the legions of humanoid slaves trapped within the rotting walls of the entrail-caverns, screaming vainly for release before she drags her bulk their way and decides to implant them with her brain-eating progeny.

That's not to say they were entirely stripped of their randomness; they got a really fun "Slaad Reaction Table" in the Secrets of the Plane Below splatbook, where trying to talk to a slaad could result in it suddenly becoming convinced the party doesn't exist, bursting into croaking laughter, attacking them in a mad frenzy, or its head exploding violently before the rest of it nonchalantly wanders off.

[[Pathfinder]] replaced them with the more snake-like [[Proteans]] of the Maelstrom, creation and destruction in one, and who created much of the rest of the multiverse in their experiments with chaos. Whether or not this was a bad thing is a question long debated by philosophers (except the Abyss, most people are pretty sure on that one and it's generally considered the Protean's oldest mistake), but Proteans are open to debate on the matter. They're also open to dissolving you into raw chaos with warp waves, some of their castes are as violent as any Slaad, but on the whole, they tend to be more philosophical and varied than their froggy cousins.

==See Also==
For more info, check out these links:
* http://thecampaign20xx.blogspot.com.au/2015/07/dungeons-dragons-guide-to-slaad.html
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaad

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Red slaad 1e.png|1e Red
Blue Slaad 1e.jpg|1e Blue
Green Slaad 1e.jpg|1e Green
Gray Slaad 1e.png|1e Gray
Death slaad 1e.png|1e Death
Red Slaad 5e.jpg|5e Red
Blue Slaad 5e.jpg|5e Blue
Green Slaad 5e.jpg|5e Green
Gray Slaad 5e.jpg|5e Gray
Death Slaad 5e.jpg|5e Death
Slaad 3e.jpg
Green Slaad 2e.gif
Slaad MM 2e.png
Blue Death Slaad 3e.jpg
Blue Slaad EC.png
Slaad Planescape.jpg
Slaad plane below.jpg
Slaad spawner.jpg
Slaad limbo.jpg
Bazimgorag.jpg
Mud Slaad.jpg|Mud Slaad
White Slaad.jpg|White Slaad
Black Slaad.jpg|Black Slaad
Golden Slaad.jpg|Golden Slaad
Gormeel.jpg|Gormeel
Slaad Gith 3e.jpg
Blue Slaad combat.jpg
Chourst.jpg|Chourst
Renbuu.jpg|Renbuu
Renbuu Planescape.jpg|Renbuu in Planescape
Ygorl 1e.jpg|1e Ygorl
Ygorl 2e.jpg|2e Ygorl
Ygorl 4e.jpg|4e Ygorl
Ssendam 1e.jpg|Ssendam
Wartle.jpg|Wartle, the most un-badass of the Slaad Lords
</gallery>

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