2d4chan - User contributions [en]

Changeling

2021-06-21T18:58:54Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* 5E */

[[File:saint stephen panel 1.jpg|thumb|Has your newborn suddenly sprouted horns? You might be a victim of the ol' switcharoo.]]
A '''Changeling''' is a creature of fantasy, generally an offspring of an otherworldly species left to be raised by parents of a more mundane sort. In modern fiction it is often simply some sort of race of shape shifters, or the name/alias of a single shape shifter.

== Folklore ==
Being folklore there are many variations, but they all follow the same pattern: a fairy kidnaps a child and replaces it with something known as a changeling. What the changeling is, how it behaves, how long the parent is stuck with it, and how you get rid of it sooner than that (''if'' you should get rid of it), depends on the version. In some versions it's the fairy's offspring; in others, it's a piece of wood with glamour on it. Sometimes to get rid of it you throw it in the oven, other times you be abusive to it and the faerie switches the children again because you aren't taking good care of its child. (In practice, this had a nasty tendency of escalating to full-blown infanticide.) In Ireland it was common to dress up boys as girls up to the age of 12 or 13 because their fairies had a preference of kidnapping boys, and items like iron scissors would often be left where the child sleeps to ward off the fairy. The child that is kidnapped is sometimes also called a changeling, but the term usually refers to whatever the fairy left in the child's place. Some people believe that changelings in folklore were a way to explain people having deformities or mental abnormalities (e.g. regressive autism).

== Dungeons & Dragons ==
In [[Dungeons & Dragons]], "Changeling" is a name applied to one of four races; the Cerilian Changeling, the Shadow Fey Changeling, the Eberron Changeling, and the Faerie Changeling.

===Cerilian Changeling===
{{NeedsImages}}
The World of Cerilia, home of the [[Birthright]] setting, is more deeply based on European folklore than standard D&D settings. As such, it is home to a precusor to the [[Feywild]], which is populated by its own unique [[fey]] races; the Seelie and the Unseelie. Being based on the old faerie tale lores, these fey sometimes steal away children from human (or, more rarely, elven) families, with a specific breed of child-sized faerie trying to adopt the stolen child's place. The faerie eventually bores of the masquerade (if not discovered and forced to flee sooner) and so leaves of its own accord after six or seven years, whilst the fey-raised child is usually cast out upon reaching puberty and no longer looking as cute. "Changeling" is used to refer both the faerie and the victim in this affair.

===Shadow Fey Changeling===
[[File:Changeling shadow fey.jpg|thumb|The only problem is she drools on whatever dish she makes.]]
In the [[Demiplane of Dread]] live a race of Gothic Horror themed [[fey]]; the Arak, or [[Shadow Fey]]. As such, they have their own form of changelings. These are humans who, for whatever reason, impressed a shadow fey with their skill enough that the shadow fey chose to "preserve" them. Through a complicated ritual that involves feeding the soon-to-be-changeling some fey food to put them into a coma, before lighting a magical candle, sprinkling the victim with special mystic dust, ritually cutting away their shadow with an enchanted silver sickle, bunging the shadow into an enchanted sack, and legging it for the Shadow Rift before the candle burns out (or is extinguished). If the shadow fey succeeds at it, the victim's shadow is transformed into a changeling; an unaging, mindless drone that resembles its "donor", but with a fey trait based on its creator and a permanent vacuous expression, which lives on to exercise its specific skill, be it medicine, fighting, gardening, baking, smithing, whatever.

As you might expect, the shadow-less donor is not left in a particularly good condition; having lost a fundamental chunk of their soul, these "elf-shot" individuals become mindless zombies, shuffling through life without direction and swiftly starving to death if not cared for. The shadow fey see nothing wrong in what they do; as far as they are concerned, creating a changeling from a mortal's soul is a gift, as it preserves the most useful and valuable part of the mortal for all eternity.

Shadow Fey Changelings are also known as "Kin", referring to which of the breeds created them and which thusly defines their traits; all of the "common" breeds of Arak create them, but it's unknown if "lesser" breeds like the Waff and Gwytune either do or can.

These changelings were around in both [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]] 2nd edition and in [[Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition]], being covered in the Shadow Rift and in [[Van Richten's Guide]] to the [[Shadow Fey]] sourcebooks, respectively.

The known shadow changeling breeds are:
* '''Alvenkin:''' Inoffensive by nature, these changelings serve as farmers, gardeners, herbalists and other horticulturalists, much like the alven do.
* '''Bragkin:''' Those who are chosen to become Bragkin changelings are always involved in tasks of physical engineering; they are architects, builders, carpenters, masons... if it involves making things through a lot of heavy labor, then that's the role these changelings fill. As such, they tend to be quite strong.
* '''Firkin:''' [[Artificer]]s and technical artisans are made into changelings to serve the Fir. Clockwork, trap-crafting, anything involving mechanical devices is the domain of these changelings.
* '''Muryankin:''' One of the few changeling breeds inclined to violence, Muryankin are the muscle of the Arak, serving as expendable guardians and soldiers through their combination of fighting skill and berserk fury.
* '''Portunekin:''' A rare breed indeed, Portunekin were doctors, physicians, and other healers in their old life, which is why they were taken; to become the healers of the Arak.
* '''Powriekin:''' The other changeling breed most likely to be sent on missions of blood, Powriekin were changed for their skills in stealth, theft and murder; they work for the Arak in the wider world as [[rogue|thieves]] and [[assassin]]s.
* '''Sheekin:''' Performers and entertainers of all stripes are snatched up by the Shee, making these soul-less "living performance machines" perhaps the most common changeling breed.
* '''Sithkin:''' Pale and ghostly, to the point they are often mistaken by the unwary for the [[Undead]], Sithkin don't have as clear a purpose as the other breeds; they seem to serve the Sith as general dogsbodies, being sent to receive items of importance to their [[necromancer]] masters from places of death, such as graveyards and mortuaries.
* '''Tegkin:''' As feral as the Tegs that made them, these changelings are the hunters of the Arak, thinking only of bringing down whatever quarry they are directed to, and supplying meat and hides to the Shadow Fey as a whole.

===Eberron Changeling===
[[File:A1334d220039632d69d30cd45f7830b8.jpg|300px|thumb|right|Eberronian Changelings make for lethally gifted [[assassin]]s, making for a different sort of threat to the [[party]].]]

The changeling race that people actually remember was a race introduced in the [[3.5e|3.5 edition]] campaign setting of [[Eberron]]; this version of the changeling was portrayed as being a race of humanoids with a hint of [[doppelganger]] in their ancestry, which gives them limited shapeshifting abilities. In their debuting edition this takes the form of their signature supernatural racial feature, Minor Change Shape. In major cities they are often prostitutes, able to be ''anything'' you want (at least so long as it's between 4'3 and 6'9 and humanoid). They have a reasonably sized population and make 2-4% of the population of major cities.

They were reprinted in ''Monster Manual III'' with a nod that they exist in other settings, though unlike [[Warforged]] though they don't get any new options there. In the fan-written [[Ravenloft]] sourcebook for the domain of [[Paridon]], changelings were said to be the [[Dread Doppelganger]] equivalent of [[Caliban (Ravenloft)|calibans]].

Since they're a core race in ''Eberron'''s campaign setting they got a lot of support within Eberron supplements and even books outside them actually remembered they existed. They have two unique [[Prestige Class]]es (and a bunch of feats) in ''Races of Eberron'': Cabinet Trickster and Recaster. Cabinet Trickster makes them equal to a true doppleganger in shapeshifting and mindreading ability, but otherwise not impressive. Recaster, however is one of the few casting prestige classes that loses caster levels and is still worth it thanks to some spontaneous and free metamagic, a limited number of times per day, and the ability to pick two spells from ''any'' casting list in the game (e.g. Haste as a level 1 spell from Trapsmith). They also got three racial substitution levels consisting of some minor stuff for [[Psionics|Egoist]] and more interesting stuff for Rogue and Wizard. Changling Rogue replaces trapfinding with 10 skill points a level and some extra social abilities, making it an awesome first level dip. More unusual is the ability for Wizards that specialize in transmutation ''and'' illusion (you still get the same number of slots but lose an extra school, and transmutation has plenty of options) while attracting a familiar as morphic as they are. Outside of the two classes from ''Races of Eberron'', there's an extra pair of prestige classes that aren't exclusive to them, but they are uniquely suited for: Warshaper and Chameleon (detailed on the prestige class page).

Changelings tend to fall into three groups regarding how they use their abilities. Passers adopt a single, "true" identity and often avoid changing form. The creepiest of Passers is those who select their true form as their identity, which alienates people because it looks creepy as hell and advertises that they are of a naturally deceptive race, and tends to pop up primarily within (the small) communities of Changelings. The variant most PCs are of (since playing passer makes the race pointless), the Becomer, restricts shapeshifting to "on duty" uses. Becomers change lives regularly, often changing personality along with it. The oddest still are Seekers or "reality seekers" eschew deception and seeks to find perfection in form. Despite the very religious nature of the philosophy and the way faith works in Eberron making divine magic powered by belief alone, there is no support for Seeker as a mechanical religion.

Changelings can not possess Dragonmarks, though they can mimic the appearance of a mark. This can be evaded with the Racial Emulation feat, which allows one to qualify as an imitated race. Normally not too great a choice since it locks you into mimicking one race or losing feats, it becomes truly absurd with the Chameleon prestige class (mentioned above) and using its daily bonus feat to obtain a Dragonmark feat. As absurd fluffwise as it seems, this is actually something the Cataclysm Mage Prestige Class gets as an explicit ability, and per that ability dragons will try to kill you if they find out.

====3.5E====
::Ability Score Modifier: None
::Type: Changelings are Humanoids with the Shapechanger subtype
::Medium: As Medium creatures, changelings have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
::Changeling base land speed is 30 feet.
::+2 racial bonus on saving throws against sleep and charm effects
::+2 racial bonus on Bluff, Intimidate, and Sense Motive checks
Natural Linguist: Changelings add Speak Language to their list of class skills for any class
they adopt.
::Minor Change Shape (Su): Changelings have the supernatural ability to alter their appearance as though using a disguise self spell that affects their bodies but not their possessions. This ability is not an illusory effect but a minor physical alteration of a changeling’s facial features, skin color and texture, and size, within the limits described for the spell. A changeling can use this ability at will, and the alteration lasts until he changes shape again. A changeling reverts to his natural form when killed. A true seeing spell reveals his natural form. When using this ability to create a disguise, a changeling receives a +10 circumstance bonus on Disguise checks. Using this ability is a full-round action.
::Automatic Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: Auran, Dwarven, Elven, Giant, Gnome, Halfling, and Terran.
::Favored Class: [[Rogue]]

====4E====
In 4e, Dragon Magazine and the use of a Changeling picture for the [[Doppelganger]] implies that they exist in the [[Nentir Vale]] setting, but they debuted in the [[Eberron]] Player's Guide and are mostly associated with that setting.

::Ability scores: +2 Charisma, +2 Dexterity or +2 Intelligence
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 6 squares.
::Vision: Normal

::Languages: Common
::Skill Bonuses: +2 Bluff, +2 Insight.
::Change Shape: You have the changeling disguise power.
:::Change Shape - Racial Power. At-Will, Polymorph, Minor Action, Personal. Effect: You alter your physical form to take on the appearance of any Medium humanoid. You retain your statistics in your new form, and your clothing, armor, and possessions do not change. The new form lasts until you change form again. Any creature that attempts to see through your ruse makes an Insight check opposed by your Bluff check, and you gain a +5 bonus to your check.
::Changeling Trick: You have the changeling trick power.
:::Changeling Trick - Racial Power. Encounter, Minor Action, Melee 1. Target: One creature. Effect: You make a Bluff check opposed by the target’s passive Insight. If your check succeeds, you gain combat advantage against the target until the end of your next turn.
::Mental Defense: You have a +1 racial bonus to Will.
::Shapechanger: You have the shapechanger subtype; you can alter your appearance. As such, you are subject to effects and conditions that affect shapechangers.

====5E====
There are three versions of the Changeling statline: The original Unearthed Arcana, Eberron version (from ''Wayfinder's Guide to Eberron''), and the latest version from ''Eberron: Rising from the Last War''. While each version keeps the basics of shapechanging, the later versions added upon the basic tricks.

One odd thing about the 5e version is that, in contrast to the original changeling being said to be half-[[doppelganger]]s or something a bit more distant, 5e changelings are actually the ''original'' species. Doppelgangers on Eberron, according to 5e lore, are the result of [[Daelkyr]] tinkering with changelings, augmenting their shapeshifting and imbuing them with innate [[psionics]], but also programming them to wreak social havoc and destabilize communities even when they don't really want to.

::Ability Scores: +2 Charisma, +1 to '''any''' stat (+3 Cha is allowed)
::Size: Medium
::Speed: 30 ft
::Shapechanger: As a standard action, you can change your appearance and voice.
::Changeling Instincts: Gain proficiency in two of the following skills: Deception, Insight, Intimidation, and Persuasion
::Languages: Common + 2 others.

{{D&D4e-Races}}
{{D&D5e-Races}}
{{clear}}

===Faerie Changeling===
This obscure race was introduced in [[Dragon Magazine]] #304, and was essentially the classic fairytale version made playable: a [[fey]] humanoid that was given to mortal parents to raise, making it weaker than the rest of its kin. This changeling looked like an attractive [[human]], [[half-elf]] or even a full-blooded [[elf]], with at least one subtly odd feature hinting at its true fey origins. This "faerie changeling" was likely a reference to the Cerilian Changeling, and had the following statblock:
:: -2 Strength, +2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution, +2 Charisma
::Medium
::Base speed 30 feet
::Low-light vision
::A changeling is considered both a fey and a humanoid. It can wield fey-restricted weapons and magical items, but is also affected by both fey-bane weapons and by spells that target humanoids, such as Charm Person.
::+2 racial bonus against saving throws that specifically target humanoids, such as Charm Person.
::+2 racial bonus to Disguise checks.
::Fey Luck: A changeling with an Intelligence score of 10 or more has the spell-like abilities of Guidance 1/day, Resistance 1/day and Virtue 1/day. All SLAs are cast as if by a 1st level [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|Sorcerer]].
::[[Favored Class]]: [[Bard]]

== Pathfinder ==
[[File:Pathfinder_Changeling.jpg|200px|thumb|right|Pathfinder's rendition of Changelings]]
[[File:changeling ARG.png|200px|thumb|They sure do love dancing around cauldrons.]]
In [[Pathfinder]], Changelings are an all-female (Outside one line that says there's rare abominations entirely lacking of any genitalia) race first introduced in the Carrion Crown adventure path. These are the juvenile forms of [[Hag]]s -- read, creepy-ass evil spell-casting monster-crone old women whose hobbies include eating people, murder and torture -- and consequently inherit a lot of spooky behavior, magical powers and forms that are "beautiful, yet unsettling". Hags deliberately foster out their daughters to places where they're confident the locals will mistreat and abuse them; a changeling can only become a hag if she chooses to follow her mother's magical call and agrees to undergo the agonizingly painful ritual to be transformed into a hag. Thusly, mother hags do their best to ensure their daughters get bullied so badly they will willingly grab at the power and the chance to avenge themselves on humanity, even at the cost of being painfully turned into a hideously ugly old witch. Changelings have a natural affinity for the [[Witch]] class, as one might expect.

Changelings get +2 to Wisdom and Charisma, but -2 to Constitution. They're Medium Sized Humanoids who have Normal base speed, with a +1 Natural Armor bonus, two 1D4 damage Claw attacks, and Darkvision of 60 feet. They also get a specific bonus trait based on what kind of [[Hag]] they are related to. Initially, Changelings only had Annis Hag, Green Hag and Sea Hag powers, but they received variants for each of those in the ''Advanced Race Guide'' and new powers for Blood Hag, Winter Hag, Mute Hag and Storm Hag mothers in ''Inner Sea Races''.

* Annis Hag Changelings can have either Hulking Changeling (+1 racial bonus on melee damage rolls) or Mist Child (+5% to miss chance of attacks made against her whilst she has concealment or total concealment).
* Green Hag Changelings can have either Green Widow (+2 racial bonus on Bluff checks if the target is sexually attracted to her) or Object of Desire (+1 to caster level for Charm Person and Charm Monster).
* Sea Hag Changelings can have either Sea Lungs (can hold breath for (three times Constitution) rounds before starting to drown) or Ocean's Daughter (+1 trait bonus on Swim checks, automatically succeeds at Swim checks made to avoid nonlethal damage from swimming).
* Blood Hag Changelings receive Crawling Skin, which gives them a +2 racial bonus to Disguise checks made to imitate a specific individual.
* Mute Hag Changelings receive Dead Eyes, which gives them one eye that is a solid dead black in color but which also gives them a +2 bonus on all saves against gaze attacks and visual illusions.
* Winter Hag Changelings receive Frostlaced Flesh, which gives them a +2 racial bonus on all saving throws versus cold effects and means they leave no tracks when moving through snow.
* Storm Hag Changelings receive Into The Wind, a +1 racial bonus on ranged damage rolls.

These were supplemented in the Hag/Changeling focused splat ''Blood of the Coven'' by adding alternate ability score modifiers. Another notable change is that Night Hag Changelings now exist through magic ritual on the fetus within a witch or another hag when, originally, Night Hags only spawned Half-Fiends since they were evil Outsiders.

* Annis Born (Slag May) +2 Str, +2 Cha, –2 Con
* Ash-Born (Hearth May) +2 Wis, +2 Cha, -2 Con
** +1 racial bonus on damage rolls for spells with the fire descriptor. This bonus increases by 1 for every 4 character levels the changeling has beyond 1st.
* Blood-Born (Veil May) +2 Wis, +2 Cha, -2 Int
* Dreamthief-Born (Waker May) +2 Str, +2 Cha, -2 Wis
** +2 racial bonus on saving throws against mind-affecting effects.
* Green-Born (Callow May) +2 Wis, +2 Cha, -2 Con (the default)
* Mute-Born (Sorrow May) +2 Int, +2 Wis, -2 Con
** Mute-born aren't actually born of hags, but of witch mothers who are either cursed or really angry.
* Night-Born (Moon May) +2 Wis, +2 Cha, -2 Dex
** +2 racial bonus on saving throws against disease.
* Storm-Born (Virga May) +2 Wis, +2 Cha, -2 Con
* Winter-Born (Snow May) +2 Int, +2 Cha, -2 Con

Inner Sea Races presents two alternative racial traits for changelings; Witchborn, which lets them change out the +2 Wisdom for +2 Intelligence, and Hag Magic, which lets them choose a single 1st level or 0 level spell from the [[Witch]] list in place of their Natural Armor Bonus. The chosen spell becomes a spell-like ability (caster level equal to the changeling's character level) usable either 1/day (1st level) or 3/day (0 level).

In Pathfinder 2nd Edition, Changelings appear in the Advanced Race Guide 2e as a "secondary" race, or a versatile heritage - that is, the PF2e equivalent of Templates. This means you choose a basic race beforehand, and then apply the Changeling racial abilities. Also, no longer an always female race, because of course Paizo wasn't going to keep that kind of lore in the present age.

{{Pathfinder-Races}}

== Magic: The Gathering ==
A Static key word ability found on only on shape shifters. The ability makes the card it is on every creature type. This is a characteristic defining ability, so it applies no-matter what zone the card is in. [http://wiki.mtgsalvation.com/article/Changeling]. The history of the mechanic can be read [http://archive.wizards.com/Magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtgcom/daily/mr306 here.]

There are actually a few non-creature cards with the subtype, thanks to the briefly-used Tribal supertype. Having every creature subtype on non-creature cards is mostly only used for [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Discussion.aspx?multiverseid=122045 Haakon, Stormgald Scourge] to play them infinitely so long as you have the mana, odd tutors that give a type but don't specify "creature", and the rare tribal abilities that trigger when you cast a card with a type.

== World of Darkness ==
{{NeedsImages}}
White Wolf's [[World of Darkness]] lines have a 'Changeling' game as part of their original series, their LARP series, and the rebooted series. They are more-or-less on opposite ends of the tonal spectrum.

[[Changeling: The Dreaming]] is for faeries that are born into mortal bodies and dealing with their dual natures. Characters live in two worlds simultaneously: the mundane one we're all familiar with, overlapped by a world we might call make-believe but is very real for them, and the two worlds can affect each other. There is always a tragedy with World of Darkness games; for Changelings, as they grow up the magical world becomes less and less real to them, until eventually they "grow up" and forget their natures as faeries. All Changelings eventually succumb to mundanity, living the rest of their lives locked out of their potential for magic. The different character classes are types of faerie: sidhe, troll, pooka, silkie, etc.

[[Changeling: The Lost]] is for mortals that were kidnapped by fae, and managed to escape back to the real world but are forever scarred by the experience. Resuming their old lives is made difficult by both time-dilation effects during their imprisonment, and possibly by the simulacrum or impostor that replaced them when they were kidnapped - said replacement is usually either wholly convinced that they are the person who they were meant to replace and will probably react violently when informed otherwise, or a complete psychopath that makes the changelings not ''want'' to resume said lives). Characters are a little nonhuman themselves since they've spent time among fae, usually as toys or slaves while being subjected to positively Lovecraftian tortures, which also have a habit of mutating them into monstrosities and oddies, ranging from living ice sculptures to literally heartless hulks, and have a hard time acting "normal"; in some cases, they can end up turning into full-fledged fae themselves. Even if they do manage to adjust reasonably well, there's always the issue of their old masters trying to recapture them. Character classes are damned complex with 39 Seemings + Kiths, 12 Courts, 9 optional Entitlements, 28 Contracts, and that's just what's in the core book.

== Dresden Files RPG==
In the Dresdenverse, Changelings are those humans lucky (or more likely unlucky) enough to have a Fae for one of their parents. Their non-human traits manifest at puberty, giving them anything from super strength to really good looks. Unfortunately for them, they also get a partially Fae mind too, meaning that they have to deal with what can only be described as mental illness, ranging from dementia, to psychotic urges, to anger issues. Even more unfortunately for them, they are considered to be members of whatever Fae nation their parent belonged to, which means if they're Winterfae changelings, they're beholden to sadistic killers and emotionless sociopaths. And Summerfae changelings don't really get a good deal either, they have to answer to orwellian Knight-Templars who often place emotion and passion above reason and common sense. Even if their Fae parent genuinely loves and cares for them, chances are, they believe in using tough love to prepare them for the harshness of the world, which amounts to putting them in life threatening situations on a regular basis.They also can feed off of love as well.

Changelings can choose to be either fully human (sane, mortal, and powerless) or fully Fae (lacking some of the qualities that made them human before, but powerful and functionally immortal). Until they Choose, they remain Changelings, trapped between two worlds. One would think that the Choice to remain human would be easy, but Changelings always feel their Fae natures calling to them, promising a more fulfilling and rewarding existence; all they need to do is throw away silly things like humanity, free will, romance, and whatever doesn't involve the compulsive urge to manipulate and/or murderfuck their loved ones and the ability to tell lies they are also known at being careless when doing so and are good at being tricksters they will still harm in anyway even if necessary it means for them to do so to kill in the process like a dementor sucking there love ones own life/love right out of them in the process of it all a Changeling rises to feed off of love and conquers all.

==Warhammer 40,000==
See [[The Changeling]].

[[Category:World of Darkness]][[Category:Monsters]][[Category:Eberron]][[Category:Ravenloft]]

Daelkyr

2021-06-21T18:43:37Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* Known Daelkyr */

Daelkyr are insane totally-not-Lovecraftian Outsiders from Xoriat, the realm of madness. They invaded the Eberron something like 9000 years ago for reasons unknown to anyone (probably including themselves) and caused one of the most horrific conflicts in the history of Khorvaire. While few in number, daelkyr are powerful to an almost godlike degree, capable of reshaping reality on local level, reforging the forms and minds of creatures with a thought, barely contained by time and space so they don't really move in the way sane creatures can comprehend, looking like they teleport (they don't, they time-travel to move, don't ask how). And yet they are technically mortal and could be killed. Which is actually an advantage in Eberron cosmology, as all true immortals are unchanging and cannot learn. Daelkyr can and do learn and change, which makes them even more dangerous. No one knows what they really look like - those who've seen them described them as angelically beautiful humanoids clad in living armour, but everyone sees them as members of their own race. Some tried looking on them using True Sight to pierce through this glamour and every one of them instantly went insane.

Daelkyr are the source of almost all aberrations in Eberron. They created [[Illithid|illythids]] by mutating Gish they kidnapped from the astral plane, dolgrims, dolgaunts and dolgarr by mutating captured goblinoids, [[Choker|chokers]] by mutating captured halflings, [[neogi]] and [[derro]] by mutating captured dwarfs, and beholders, gibbering beasts and slimes from the sludge that was left in the fleshcrafting cauldrons. Some even say they also created basilisks and medusae - a theory medusae themselves object to vehemently. About the only major aberrations they didn't create are Aboleths who, as always, predate everything. Using their vast and ever growing armies of fleshcrafted horrors the daelkyr waged a war against everyone on Khorvaire, but mostly the Dhakaani empire, who were the most organized and powerful force on the continent. Dhakaani goblinoids fought the daelkyr threat for thousands of years, slowly losing ground and sanity, and it's rumored daelkyr broke the eusocial bond between goblinoids to weaken them. Still, Dhakaani managed to kill a lot of daelkyr until only six of them remained. Unfortunately those six were the trickiest ones with multiple contingencies and proved to be either unkillable or capable of resurrecting themselves. With their empire crumbling around them it looked like Dhakaani would eventually lose, until suddenly some orc druids from the ass end of nowhere started teleporting around and binding the remaining daelkyr to prison demiplanes in Khyber, saving Khorvaire and probably the entirety of Eberron.

In the current days all six daelkyr remain bound to their prison demiplanes, but are not sleeping like similarly bound Overlords and actively scheme to achieve... something. No one sure what, because the actions of daelkyr agents don't follow any sane agenda. Daelkyr are one of the two go-to patrons for insane evil cultists known collectively as "cults of dragon below". Unlike the Overlords they are still active threats as while they are incapable of leaving their prison demiplanes, their armies are free to go in and out. Several wars are currently fought against said armies, most notably below the Mror Holds, where dwarves try to reclaim their ancestral empire, below the Towering Woods, where druids try to contain the biggest portal to Dyrrn's prison, and under Xendrik where Umbragen Drow fight for their survival. Another major hot-spot is the Shadow Marches, the aforementioned ass end of nowhere from where the orc druids that saved the world came from. Those druids called Gatekeepers are still busy keeping daelkyr locked as almost half the orc tribes in the marches are worshiping the Lords of Madness and want to set them free, keeping Shadow Marches in a constant tribal war.

==Known Daelkyr==
*'''Dyrrn, the Corruptor''': the grand daddy daelkyr, the patron saint of Getting Shit Done and arguably the mightiest of its kind (or at least of those who invaded Khorvaire). All those humanoids corrupted and turned into aberrations? It's their doing. The plague of Silence that broke the Dhakaani empire? Theirs too. All three major current wars against daelkyr? All against Dyrrn's armies. Most other daelkyr see themselves as artists or scientists, but Dyrrn is the conqueror. Mind Flayers and Dol worship it as their divine creator and call it the Overmind. Yes, Illithids WORSHIP the guy. It's also credited with creating the Clone spell. Goblins are certain they killed it during the war. Which they might be right about, but considering this is the guy who invented cloning spare bodies for your soul to shunt into in case you die...
<Gallery>
Dyrrn.png
</Gallery>
*'''Belashyrra, the Lord of Eyes''': the daelkyr obsessed with secrets and visions. It created beholders and beholderkin, although there's no love lost between them and their creator with most of them fucking off and doing their own thing when Belashyrra got locked in its prison demiplane. Belashyrra is one of the most popular patrons among the cults of Dragon Below, granting them powers of vision and eye ray magic in exchange of their sanity.
<Gallery>
Belashyrra.png
</Gallery>
*'''Kyrzin, the Prince of Slime''': the guy responsible for creating all the slimes and gibbering beasts. Orc cultists of Shadow Marches mostly worship this guy and it grants their followers powers over disease and poison, both to inflict it and cure it.
*'''Orlassk, the Lord of Stone''': the guy credited with creating all the monsters that can turn flesh to stone. You probably should not mention that to any Medusa as they consider this theory heretical. Its cults are rare and are mostly Wizards of Transmutation as it grants their followers increased understanding of transmutation magic. It managed to bind their prison to a giant gargoyle and is generally content with traveling and messing with people in deep Khyber, not interested much in the world above.
*'''Valaara, the Crawling Queen''': the daelkyr responsible for creating most of the monstrous insectoids and insectoid symbionts. Not much else is known about it.
*'''Avassh, the Twister of Roots''': the daelkyr credited with creating monstrous plants. Again, not much above that.

[[Category:Eberron]][[Category:Dungeons & Dragons]]

Daelkyr

2021-06-21T18:42:34Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* Known Daelkyr */

Daelkyr are insane totally-not-Lovecraftian Outsiders from Xoriat, the realm of madness. They invaded the Eberron something like 9000 years ago for reasons unknown to anyone (probably including themselves) and caused one of the most horrific conflicts in the history of Khorvaire. While few in number, daelkyr are powerful to an almost godlike degree, capable of reshaping reality on local level, reforging the forms and minds of creatures with a thought, barely contained by time and space so they don't really move in the way sane creatures can comprehend, looking like they teleport (they don't, they time-travel to move, don't ask how). And yet they are technically mortal and could be killed. Which is actually an advantage in Eberron cosmology, as all true immortals are unchanging and cannot learn. Daelkyr can and do learn and change, which makes them even more dangerous. No one knows what they really look like - those who've seen them described them as angelically beautiful humanoids clad in living armour, but everyone sees them as members of their own race. Some tried looking on them using True Sight to pierce through this glamour and every one of them instantly went insane.

Daelkyr are the source of almost all aberrations in Eberron. They created [[Illithid|illythids]] by mutating Gish they kidnapped from the astral plane, dolgrims, dolgaunts and dolgarr by mutating captured goblinoids, [[Choker|chokers]] by mutating captured halflings, [[neogi]] and [[derro]] by mutating captured dwarfs, and beholders, gibbering beasts and slimes from the sludge that was left in the fleshcrafting cauldrons. Some even say they also created basilisks and medusae - a theory medusae themselves object to vehemently. About the only major aberrations they didn't create are Aboleths who, as always, predate everything. Using their vast and ever growing armies of fleshcrafted horrors the daelkyr waged a war against everyone on Khorvaire, but mostly the Dhakaani empire, who were the most organized and powerful force on the continent. Dhakaani goblinoids fought the daelkyr threat for thousands of years, slowly losing ground and sanity, and it's rumored daelkyr broke the eusocial bond between goblinoids to weaken them. Still, Dhakaani managed to kill a lot of daelkyr until only six of them remained. Unfortunately those six were the trickiest ones with multiple contingencies and proved to be either unkillable or capable of resurrecting themselves. With their empire crumbling around them it looked like Dhakaani would eventually lose, until suddenly some orc druids from the ass end of nowhere started teleporting around and binding the remaining daelkyr to prison demiplanes in Khyber, saving Khorvaire and probably the entirety of Eberron.

In the current days all six daelkyr remain bound to their prison demiplanes, but are not sleeping like similarly bound Overlords and actively scheme to achieve... something. No one sure what, because the actions of daelkyr agents don't follow any sane agenda. Daelkyr are one of the two go-to patrons for insane evil cultists known collectively as "cults of dragon below". Unlike the Overlords they are still active threats as while they are incapable of leaving their prison demiplanes, their armies are free to go in and out. Several wars are currently fought against said armies, most notably below the Mror Holds, where dwarves try to reclaim their ancestral empire, below the Towering Woods, where druids try to contain the biggest portal to Dyrrn's prison, and under Xendrik where Umbragen Drow fight for their survival. Another major hot-spot is the Shadow Marches, the aforementioned ass end of nowhere from where the orc druids that saved the world came from. Those druids called Gatekeepers are still busy keeping daelkyr locked as almost half the orc tribes in the marches are worshiping the Lords of Madness and want to set them free, keeping Shadow Marches in a constant tribal war.

==Known Daelkyr==
*'''Dyrrn, the Corruptor''': the grand daddy daelkyr, the patron saint of Getting Shit Done and arguably the mightiest of its kind (or at least of those who invaded Khorvaire). All those humanoids corrupted and turned into aberrations? It's their doing. The plague of Silence that broke the Dhakaani empire? Theirs too. All three major current wars against daelkyr? All against Dyrrn's armies. Most other daelkyr see themselves as artists or scientists, but Dyrrn is the conqueror. Mind Flayers and Dol worship it as their divine creator and call it "Overmind". Yes, Illithids WORSHIP the guy. It's also credited with creating the Clone spell. Goblins are certain they killed it during the war. Which they might be right about, but considering this is the guy who invented cloning spare bodies for your soul to shunt into in case you die...
<Gallery>
Dyrrn.png
</Gallery>
*'''Belashyrra, the Lord of Eyes''': the daelkyr obsessed with secrets and visions. It created beholders and beholderkin, although there's no love lost between them and their creator with most of them fucking off and doing their own thing when Belashyrra got locked in its prison demiplane. Belashyrra is one of the most popular patrons among the cults of Dragon Below, granting them powers of vision and eye ray magic in exchange of their sanity.
<Gallery>
Belashyrra.png
</Gallery>
*'''Kyrzin, the Prince of Slime''': the guy responsible for creating all the slimes and gibbering beasts. Orc cultists of Shadow Marches mostly worship this guy and it grants their followers powers over disease and poison, both to inflict it and cure it.
*'''Orlassk, the Lord of Stone''': the guy credited with creating all the monsters that can turn flesh to stone. You probably should not mention that to any Medusa as they consider this theory heretical. Its cults are rare and are mostly Wizards of Transmutation as it grants their followers increased understanding of transmutation magic. It managed to bind their prison to a giant gargoyle and is generally content with traveling and messing with people in deep Khyber, not interested much in the world above.
*'''Valaara, the Crawling Queen''': the daelkyr responsible for creating most of the monstrous insectoids and insectoid symbionts. Not much else is known about it.
*'''Avassh, the Twister of Roots''': the daelkyr credited with creating monstrous plants. Again, not much above that.

[[Category:Eberron]][[Category:Dungeons & Dragons]]

Daelkyr

2021-06-21T18:32:09Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4:

Daelkyr are insane totally-not-Lovecraftian Outsiders from Xoriat, the realm of madness. They invaded the Eberron something like 9000 years ago for reasons unknown to anyone (probably including themselves) and caused one of the most horrific conflicts in the history of Khorvaire. While few in number, daelkyr are powerful to an almost godlike degree, capable of reshaping reality on local level, reforging the forms and minds of creatures with a thought, barely contained by time and space so they don't really move in the way sane creatures can comprehend, looking like they teleport (they don't, they time-travel to move, don't ask how). And yet they are technically mortal and could be killed. Which is actually an advantage in Eberron cosmology, as all true immortals are unchanging and cannot learn. Daelkyr can and do learn and change, which makes them even more dangerous. No one knows what they really look like - those who've seen them described them as angelically beautiful humanoids clad in living armour, but everyone sees them as members of their own race. Some tried looking on them using True Sight to pierce through this glamour and every one of them instantly went insane.

Daelkyr are the source of almost all aberrations in Eberron. They created [[Illithid|illythids]] by mutating Gish they kidnapped from the astral plane, dolgrims, dolgaunts and dolgarr by mutating captured goblinoids, [[Choker|chokers]] by mutating captured halflings, [[neogi]] and [[derro]] by mutating captured dwarfs, and beholders, gibbering beasts and slimes from the sludge that was left in the fleshcrafting cauldrons. Some even say they also created basilisks and medusae - a theory medusae themselves object to vehemently. About the only major aberrations they didn't create are Aboleths who, as always, predate everything. Using their vast and ever growing armies of fleshcrafted horrors the daelkyr waged a war against everyone on Khorvaire, but mostly the Dhakaani empire, who were the most organized and powerful force on the continent. Dhakaani goblinoids fought the daelkyr threat for thousands of years, slowly losing ground and sanity, and it's rumored daelkyr broke the eusocial bond between goblinoids to weaken them. Still, Dhakaani managed to kill a lot of daelkyr until only six of them remained. Unfortunately those six were the trickiest ones with multiple contingencies and proved to be either unkillable or capable of resurrecting themselves. With their empire crumbling around them it looked like Dhakaani would eventually lose, until suddenly some orc druids from the ass end of nowhere started teleporting around and binding the remaining daelkyr to prison demiplanes in Khyber, saving Khorvaire and probably the entirety of Eberron.

In the current days all six daelkyr remain bound to their prison demiplanes, but are not sleeping like similarly bound Overlords and actively scheme to achieve... something. No one sure what, because the actions of daelkyr agents don't follow any sane agenda. Daelkyr are one of the two go-to patrons for insane evil cultists known collectively as "cults of dragon below". Unlike the Overlords they are still active threats as while they are incapable of leaving their prison demiplanes, their armies are free to go in and out. Several wars are currently fought against said armies, most notably below the Mror Holds, where dwarves try to reclaim their ancestral empire, below the Towering Woods, where druids try to contain the biggest portal to Dyrrn's prison, and under Xendrik where Umbragen Drow fight for their survival. Another major hot-spot is the Shadow Marches, the aforementioned ass end of nowhere from where the orc druids that saved the world came from. Those druids called Gatekeepers are still busy keeping daelkyr locked as almost half the orc tribes in the marches are worshiping the Lords of Madness and want to set them free, keeping Shadow Marches in a constant tribal war.

==Known Daelkyr==
*'''Dryrrn, the Corruptor''': the grand daddy daelkyr, the patron saint of Getting Shit Done and arguably the mightiest of its kind (or at least of those who invaded Khorvaire). All those humanoids corrupted and turned into aberrations? It's their doing. The plague of Silence that broke the Dhakaani empire? Theirs too. All three major current wars against daelkyr? All against Dyrrn's armies. Most other daelkyr see themselves as artists or scientists, but Dyrrn is the conqueror. Mind Flayers and Dol worship it as their divine creator and call it "Overmind". Yes, Illithids WORSHIP the guy. It's also credited with creating the Clone spell. Goblins are certain they killed it during the war. Which they might be right about, but considering this is the guy who invented cloning spare bodies for your soul to shunt into in case you die...
<Gallery>
Dyrrn.png
</Gallery>
*'''Belashyrra, the Lord of Eyes''': the daelkyr obsessed with secrets and visions. It created beholders and beholderkin, although there's no love lost between them and their creator with most of them fucking off and doing their own thing when Belashyrra got locked in its prison demiplane. Belashyrra is one of the most popular patrons among the cults of Dragon Below, granting them powers of vision and eye ray magic in exchange of their sanity.
<Gallery>
Belashyrra.png
</Gallery>
*'''Kyrzin, the Prince of Slime''': the guy responsible for creating all the slimes and gibbering beasts. Orc cultists of Shadow Marches mostly worship this guy and it grants their followers powers over disease and poison, both to inflict it and cure it.
*'''Orlassk, the Lord of Stone''': the guy credited with creating all the monsters that can turn flesh to stone. You probably should not mention that to any Medusa as they consider this theory heretical. Its cults are rare and are mostly Wizards of Transmutation as it grants their followers increased understanding of transmutation magic. It managed to bind their prison to a giant gargoyle and is generally content with traveling and messing with people in deep Khyber, not interested much in the world above.
*'''Valaara, the Crawling Queen''': the daelkyr responsible for creating most of the monstrous insectoids and insectoid symbionts. Not much else is known about it.
*'''Avassh, the Twister of Roots''': the daelkyr credited with creating monstrous plants. Again, not much above that.

[[Category:Eberron]][[Category:Dungeons & Dragons]]

Myconid

2021-06-21T09:19:56Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* Origins & Beginnings */

[[File:Basidia 5e.jpg|thumb|right|300px]]

'''Myconids''' are a race of mushroom-men native to the [[Underdark]]. Unlike most things that live down under the surface of the typical [[Dungeons & Dragons]] world, myconids don't want to kill. They don't want to enslave. They don't want to take your stuff. They just wish to be left alone to farm fungus, use hallucinogenic spores to engage in mass shared drug-dreams for fun, and rear the next generation of their people. That said, they are willing to defend themselves, and as much as they sound like a band of hippies, they can be quite dangerous. Particularly in 4th edition, they can breed really quickly, which prompts other races of the Underdark to be particularly hostile towards them.

Myconids have their own patron god; [[Psilofyr]] in the [[Great Wheel]], who was replaced by the [[Archfey]] known as the [[Carrion King]] in the [[World Axis]] (although [[Psilofyr]] also existed in that setting too).

Myconids also appear in [[Dark Souls]], where they're not so friendly but instead really deadly.

==Origins & Beginnings==
[[File:Myconid A4 cover.jpg|right|300px]]
[[File: Myconid 1e.jpg|right|200px]]
Myconids made their debut in A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords. In the foreword to the 2013 reprint collection A0-A4: Against the Slave Lords, author Lawrence Schick writes: "By far my favorite part of the module was creating the myconids and their amusing and alien society. D&D needed mushroom men, and I was proud to provide them. Erol Otus supplied the original concepts. 'What I want,' I told him, 'is the dancing mushrooms from Walt Disney's Fantasia, only sinister.' Being Erol, he knew exactly what I meant, and boy, did he deliver."

Indeed, the front cover of A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords shows some fairly threatening myconids, especially the trio in the background. Given that the fungus men are generally a peaceful race, it is perhaps an unusual way to introduce them, but it is also true that most of the violence on the cover is being done ''to'' the myconids, rather than by them. Perhaps appropriately for fungi capable of causing violent hallucinations, their debut illustration is in vivid colours.

There is a lot of information on myconids packed into In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords, not only in their monster entry at the back, but also spanning three pages of the adventure itself. When the adventurers first reach the fungus colony, the creatures they initially encounter are not the myconids themselves, but creatures animated by the myconid king. These monstrosities are a rotting, slime-covered kobold with toadstools growing from its eye sockets; two giant worker ants with drooping antennae and sluggish movements; a fire beetle with no glow and equally sluggish motions; and a human corpse whose flesh has mostly been replaced by a bulbous purple fungus.

Past these animated guardians is the fungus forest where the myconids dwell. All of the myconids' chambers are quite damp, and between the many stalactites stand giant mushrooms and toadstools which occasionally rustle and sway as if touched by an invisible wind. Some of the larger glowing fungi are ambulant, and move slowly around while making grumbling sounds. The myconid village is lit by blue phosphorescent ceiling-mold. Myconid houses are huge, hollow puffball-shaped fungi scattered between other giant mushrooms. The residents enter their homes through self-sealing oval ooze-membranes.

Myconids have bloated, spongy flesh, and vary in colour from purple to grey. Contact with myconids is dangerous, since their skin oozes a substance which does 1-4 poison damage on contact. The only body parts free of the ooze are their stubby hands, each of which has two fingers, plus two opposing thumbs. The description of the fungus farm in the adventure seems to imply that the tiniest myconids begin life attached to the ground, only becoming mobile when they reach a minimum size.

A myconid's abilities vary depending on its Hit Dice. Each myconid community has a single 6 HD king, and the rest vary from 1 to 5 HD. The smallest myconids are two feet tall, and they gain two feet for each additional HD, so that their king towers a full twelve feet tall. The damage they do when clubbing opponents also gradually increases, with 1d4 damage done per HD. There is an even spread of myconid sizes in each community, with the exception of the king, who is always uniquely the largest member of the community. A colony is broken down into a number of "circles" each with (usually) twenty members. A colony might have as many as ten circles, but the group in A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords has only three circles, for sixty myconids in total.

Myconids emit a variety of spores, gaining new types as they grow. All of them begin with the ability to release distress spores, which quickly alert all myconids within 120' of danger. At 2 HD, a myconid gains the ability to emit reproducer spores when new myconids need to be grown. A dying myconid also emits these spores automatically. Myconids cannot speak, so only when they reach 3 HD (and six feet in size) can they communicate with other creatures using their rapport spores. The target of these spores must fail a save against poison (possibly voluntarily) after which he or she can communicate telepathically with that myconid for ten minutes per HD of the myconid.

At eight feet tall, a 4 HD myconid already overshadows most adventurers, but it also has useful pacifier spores. Like the rapport spores, a myconid can only direct the pacifier spores at one target. If the target fails a save vs. poison, it becomes totally passive for as many rounds as the myconid has Hit Dice, unable to react even if attacked.

The fungus folk have a three part daily cycle. For one third of each day, the fungus folk rest (their equivalent of sleeping). For the next third, they farm crops and take care of other work. For the final third, they participate in a collective telepathically-connected hallucination which serves as entertainment, worship and social interaction combined. This activity is known as a meld, and is facilitated by both rapport and hallucinator spores. Once they are in a meld, only distress spores will cause myconids to end it prematurely, for they consider the meld to be the reason for their existence.

The hallucinator spores are produced only by the largest (5 HD, ten feet tall) myconids, and they can also be used as a weapon. Any non-myconid target failing a poison save will either cower whimpering (50%), stare into nothingness (25%), flee shrieking (15%), or attack the closest creature (10%). Myconids can release each of their spore types a number of times per day equal to their Hit Dice.

Towering over all others of his kind is the myconid king. At 6 HD and twelve feet tall, the king is a large, yet solitary figure. Unlike all of the other myconids, he does not participate in the melding process. Instead, the king plans myconid work schedules, deals with affairs external to the colony (such as visitors) and brews potions. The king tries to ensure that the other members of his colony do not have to commit violence, as doing so causes them to experience unpleasant hallucinations during their melds. The other myconids view the king's separation from the circle with horror, but if he dies, the largest remaining myconid will always dutifully accept the dreaded role.

One way the king can protect the colony is by animating guardians. Only the king produces animator spores, and these can be used to infect and animate a recently-deceased corpse. A purple fungus covers an infected body, takes over the internal systems, and animates it. The corpse rises 1-4 days after infection, and it stays active for 2-5 weeks before decaying too much to continue functioning. While it is active, the corpse can be given simple orders using rapport spores. Although it resembles a zombie, and has a similar lack of self-preservation, an animated creature is not undead, and cannot be turned. Animated creatures are slow, and always go last in a round.

The myconids in A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords are hospitable enough, and provided that visitors are not rude or demanding, they will be allowed meet with the king. The king is interested in news from the labyrinth outside the myconids' home, and willing to provide assistance to the adventurers in return for them completing a side quest involving a giant crayfish. If things do not go well during the visit, the myconids will quickly raise the alarm using their distress spores. If the party attempts to flee, the myconids will likely permit them to do so, but if displeased, the king may have them incapacitated by pacifier and hallucinator spores, stripped of all their belongings, and dumped back outside the colony.

Myconids live exclusively underground, have a deathly fear of sunlight, and never venture outside. They are a peaceful race, but do have conflicts with humanoid races over resources. Unfortunately, humanoids and fungoids tend to view each other as disgusting threats. The correct pronunciation of myconid is "MY-ko-nid", according to Dragon #93.

The adventure A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords was reprinted in the edited compilation A1-4: Scourge of the Slavelords, but without the myconid monster entry, since that had in turn been reprinted in the Monster Manual II along with a new black and white illustration. The more recent hardcover compilation A0-A4: Against the Slave Lords included the full text of the original adventure. It also contains an appendix filled with fan-submitted art from the Slave Lords series.

The AD&D hardcover Dungeoneer's Survival Guide is packed with mentions of myconids. They are identified as one of five distinct underground cultures that date back to ancient times, and along with jermlaine, the myconids are the most pervasive of the five, spreading into most of the deeper underground regions. In the section detailing the lands of Deepearth, the myconids dwell in the fungus forest area (obviously). This particular colony is focussed on irrigation, as their forests lack a natural water supply.

GDQ1-7: Queen of the Spiders has a short encounter with a myconid outpost in its "Futher Adventures in the Depths" section. These myconids farm slimes and fungi in a large, open vault also inhabited by formians. The fungus folk and the centaur-ants engage in a form of chemical warfare with each other using slimes, puddings, oozes, and molds. Given that there are 200 myconids and 130 formians resident in the area, this conflict has the potential to erupt into a large scale battle at any time.

Incidentally, those "dancing mushrooms from Fantasia" that inspired the whole thing? They got a more direct translation into the D&D [[multiverse]] as the [[Campestri]], who didn't catch on so well.

==2nd Edition==
[[File:Myconid MCV2.jpg|right|300px]]
[[File:Myconid MM 2e.png|right|300px]]
The myconids featured quite prominently in 2nd Edition, starting with two full pages in the Monstrous Compendium Volume Two. The artwork shows a myconid whose eyes have migrated from its stalk to the dome on on the top of its head. This myconid also has only three fingers on each hand, although the text still specifies two fingers plus two thumbs. We also learn here that fungus folk have wide feet with vestigial toes.

The abilities of the myconids are largely unchanged from 1st Edition, but the ranges of most of the spore effects are capped at 40 feet. The description of the animator spores also gives stats for a typical animated corpse (it has 1 HD and 2 claw attacks for 1-3/1-3 damage). We learn that myconids have a typical lifespan of 24 years, growing 1 HD (and two feet) every four years.

Myconids don't feed directly off the fungi they farm, but off the soil nutrients left by decaying fungi. They are a peaceful race and conflict between myconids is unheard of. Myconids have no desire to conquer anyone and would prefer to be left alone. They view humanoids as violent, insane species out to conquer others. They have trouble trusting any humanoids, generally expecting them to become violent at any moment. Even when approached peacefully, they tend to be suspicious of outsiders.

Communal myconid space includes mounds of moss-covered stones that double up as seats and beds. The fungus folk also share a large garden area, where they eat and drink, and where the king grows potion ingredients. Dead myconid kings are buried beneath the mounds while other dead are buried near the gardens. The only myconids usually found outside of their community are work details looking for dead creatures they can bring back for their king to animate.

At first glance, the artwork on card #368 of the 1991 AD&D Trading Cards looks like someone has coloured in the black and white picture from the Monstrous Compendium, but it is actually a completely new picture, just of exactly the same myconid. It has a pale purple skin and yellow eyes.

In the Monstrous Manual hardcover collection, the text and statistics are reprinted exactly as they first appeared in the Monstrous Compendium, but there is a new colour picture and the myconid's eyes have returned to their normal place on its stem.

The article Familiar Faces in Dragon #200 suggests a 1 HD myconid as an alternative [[familiar]] for an [[Underdark]] [[mage]], and PHBR11: The Complete Ranger's Handbook suggests that myconid could also be followers for [[ranger]]s, but notes that such a follower has low trainability.

The Night Below includes an opportunity for adventurers to free a small group of myconids from an unusual persecutor. An insane, exiled male [[drow]] suffers from the delusion that he is a minor god of fungi, and he has acquired a wand of plant charming to assist him in his quest for followers. Together with his band of gas spores, ascomoids and, strangely, [[wererat]]s, the drow is attempting to forcibly convert the confused myconids.

Shards of the Day in Dungeon #60 is an [[Underdark]] adventure where the resident myconids are being experimented on by [[illithid]]s. The mind flayers are trying to perfect dust of contrariness, and have chosen the fungus folk as test subjects. This adventure is also notable as containing what seems to be the first myconid with a name. The king is called Reyseta.

Myconids feature in The Gates of Firestorm Peak as potential allies for the adventurers. In an area known as the Twisted Caverns, the myconids live in a state of constant warfare with the local population of troll mutates. This pressure has turned these fungus folk into far more aggressive specimens than most. They have set up a variety of traps in strategic areas of the caverns, including covered pits filled with dangerous molds and key entrances crossed by webs lined with hallucinogenic powders.

Their social structure is also slightly different with the king having bodyguards (5 HD) who, like him, remain apart from the circles and assist in the defence of the colony. The king keeps clubs coated with dangerous yellow mold next to the boulder which serves as his throne. Despite their more war-like countenance, the myconids remains peaceful creatures at heart, and are willing to communicate with the adventurers. If they agree to destroy the myconids' main enemy, the king will send one of his bodyguards to assist, as well as sharing healing potions.

In the encounter with the king it is noted that myconids do not bend easily, and spend most of their lives standing.

The adventure Uzaglu of the Underdark in Dungeon #67 features an [[undead]] myconid king, named Uzaglu. The leader of a myconid colony destroyed by [[derr]]o, the king was raised by a derro [[Necromancer|necromantic]] spell and now serves the [[dwarves]]. Because he is undead, Uzaglu's spores do not simply animate corpses, but instead create dimly intelligent undead. The animation process causes them to become partially frozen by rigor mortis, so these creatures have limited flexibility and move around by hopping. This, combined with an abhorrent need to bite people, gives them the name hanuk arazuul or "hopping vampires". The touch of one of Uzaglu's minions has the same effect as [[mummy]] rot.

Uzaglu himself is bloated and his flesh is milky and decayed. He is perpetually surrounding by the equivalent of a 30' diameter stinking cloud, and can produce some unusual spores, including preserver spores which slow the rate of decay of his minions, a semi-paralytic spore and a death spore which fills the lungs causing suffocation.

During the 2nd Edition era, TSR (and later WotC) released a bewildering range of D&D starter sets. Some of these were intended as introductions to basic D&D, some as introductions to AD&D, some used their own not-quite-compatible-with-any-edition rules, and others (like Dungeons and Dragons Adventure Game: Diablo II Edition) were just strange licensing deals. Perhaps because a peaceful mushroom man is an appealing creature to include in a set potentially aimed at younger children, myconids featured in many of these sets, including the Introduction to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Game, the Complete Starter Set and the Dungeons and Dragons Adventure Game. All three of these sets reuse the artwork from the Monstrous Manual, and have simplified abilities and only a brief description.

Also produced during the 2nd Edition era was the Spellfire collectable card game. The myconid featured on card #89 of The Underdark expansion, using the Monstrous Manual art.

==3rd Edition==
[[File:Myconids 3e.jpg|right|300px]]
The myconids made their 3rd Edition debut in the article Bad Seeds in Dragon #292. There's a preface to the article soliciting feedback and noting that some of the material is intended for an upcoming product, foreshadowing the Monster Manual II later the same year.

Most of the 1st/2nd Edition lore remans the same, but these myconids have more physical variation. Their hands have a random number of digits, and occasional individuals have extra arms or legs. A myconid's eyes are perfectly concealed when closed. The location of the eyes isn't specified in the text, but the illustration places them on the edge of the cap. These myconids no longer have the poisonous skin of the previous two editions, but they do gain the standard immunities of 3rd Edition plants (poison, sleep, paralysis, stunning, and mind-influencing magic).

Mechanically, these myconids share the same 1-6 HD variation as before, with each HD still equating to four years of age and two feet of height. Each of the six myconids has its own stats block and title. The junior workers (1 HD) are adolescents of 4-8 years. Although feeble, they are the circle's first line of defence when needed. Average workers (2 HD) are 8-12 years old, and form the backbone of the community. Elder workers (3 HD) serve as supervisors and shock troops. Guards (4 HD) are 16-20 years old, and are charged with overall defence of the circle; they tend to be more aggressive. Circle leaders (5 HD) are older than 20 years, and lead and administer the circle.

As previously, each tribe has a single 6 HD king, whose spores animate guardians, and who is also able to make a number of potions for the community. The other five types of spores are also unchanged, with some rules clarifications to the pacification effect making it similar to the dazed condition. Spores can be released in a 120-foot spread or a 40-foot ray, depending on the type.

The text in the Monster Manual II is an edited version of the Dragon #292 article, with a new illustration and a new gender-neutral title for the myconid leader, who is now their "sovereign". The lore confirms that myconids are immobile until the age of four, and gives them an alternative name of "fungus ones". Such is their distrust of outsiders that they actively seek homes away from busy areas. Their extensive knowledge of fungus farming is emphasised, including optimum growing conditions, crop sizes, and how to use the different parts of each type. The organisation of circles within a tribe is said to favour distances between circles no greater than the range of the distress spores (120 feet).

The D&D v.3.5 Accessory Update booklet has some minor changes to all six sizes of myconid. These are limited to skills points and a few additional feats, but the chosen feats give the elder worker more hit points, and the guard slightly better attacks.

==4th Edition==
[[File:Myconid 4e.jpg|right|300px]]
The Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters preview book introduces the myconids of 4th Edition as immigrants from the [[Feywild]] of long ago, who are now more numerous in the [[Underdark]] than anywhere else. They are described as "fiercely secretive". Despite this preview, myconids didn't make it into the [[Monster Manual]], and had to wait until the Monster Manual 2.

Although they are still not evil creatures, the 4th Edition myconids are expansionist, constantly striving to expand their territory and numbers. This places them in frequent conflict with other residents of the dark places they dwell in. The myconids' insidious presence has spread from the [[Feywild]] to infect both the [[Underdark]] and the [[Shadowfell]]'s equivalent (the Shadowdark). These myconids have a connection to [[fomorian]]s, and are described as being "touched by the madness" of the twisted [[giant]]s. Later, in Player's Option: Heroes of the Feywild, it is noted that fomorians fight skirmishes against legions of myconids in the Feydark.

In the Monster Manual 2, the traditional six-tier hierarchy is replaced with just three types of myconids. The largest myconid retains the 3rd Edition title of "sovereign". It has commanding spores which it uses to move other myconids into place in front of it, and a spore burst attack which it then uses to poison and daze enemies in combat with its allies. It also has a slam attack which does up to 15 points of damage. The sovereign is the only myconid able to communicate with non-myconids, using a form of telepathy. Unlike in previous editions, this isn't explicitly a spore-related ability, although communication between myconids remains spore-based.

Only slightly less powerful (but much smaller) than the sovereign are the myconid guards. They have the traditional pacification spores which stop enemies from acting, as well as causing poison damage. As shown in the illustration, the guards have spiked arms which they use as their standard form of melee attack.

The third type of myconid is a rotpriest. These have abilities not previously seen in myconids, including a spray which causes the target to decompose (taking necrotic damage), a life burst which it can use to heal other myconids, and the ability to absorb damage dealt to nearby kin. The guard and sovereign have a similar, but less powerful ability to share damage with their allies. A rotpriest typically wields a staff. It has the ability to regenerate itself unless harmed by radiant damage.

[[Underdark]] expands the fungus ones' family to include the myconid gas spore and colony swarm. The gas spore resembles the gas spore from the original AD&D Monster Manual, and has a similar spore burst attack. As a minion, it also has only one hit point. The colony swarm is a collective of smaller carnivorous fungal creatures. They rise up to defend myconid colonies using their poisonous devouring spores and rotting decay attacks.

The Great Cathedral of Psilofyr is also described in Underdark. This is an ancient petrified toadstool towering 600 feet high and spanning over 400 feet in diameter. The myconids believe that the stone fungus holds the slumbering essence of their creator, [[Psilofyr]] (see below). The cathedral is ruled by a powerful myconid lord called Amasutelob. He commands armies of [[otyugh]]s, fey-grove [[choker]]s, [[Shambling Mound|shambling mounds]] and other plant creatures.

In the adventure Den of the Slavetakers in Dungeon #171, myconids are one of the factions vying for control of a meteor shard. At the climax of the adventure, the myconids raise a giant fungal tower they have "glued together with spittle and ooze" to get to the temple which houses the shard.

The idea that myconids spread implacably and continuously is emphasised again in Into the Unknown: The Dungeon Survival Handbook, one of the last 4th Edition supplements. Myconids spores are apparently capable of creating enormous fungal masses that crowd out other plants and animals. The fungus ones do not react well to [[adventurer]]s who hack their way through these fungal constructs and consider such actions as an attack on their colony. Negotiation with the myconid sovereign is recommended as an alternative to facing an angry myconid community, who are said to pour from their lair like a colony of fire ants once attacked.

It is perhaps noteworthy that the 4th Edition myconids are both the only version of the myconids with aggressive, expansionist habits and the only edition which doesn't make any mention of the myconid meld. Could it be that the myconids of other editions are such peaceful creatures only because their meditative practices stem their expansionist tendencies?

==5th Edition==
[[File:Myconids 5e.jpg|right|300px]]
It is perhaps fitting that the myconids were reintroduced to the latest version of the D&D rules once again via In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords. During the long playtest period between 4th and 5th edition, WotC reprinted some older edition material, and this included the hardcover compilation A0-A4: Against the Slave Lords. Although the reprint remained faithful to the original AD&D rules, that month's playtest packet included a new document titled D&D Next Monster Statistics for Against the Slave Lords (A0-A5). The myconid adult, juvenile and sovereign are all detailed inside.

The juvenile is the smallest myconid. It has just 7 hit points and a single slam attack which does 1d4 bludgeoning and 1d4 poison damage. A juvenile has both rapport spores to allow it to communicate telepathically with other creatures, and distress spores which can broadcast an alarm to other myconids within a 50 feet range. The medium-sized adult has 22 hit points, and does three times as much bludgeoning damage with its slam attack. The range of its distress spores doubles, and an adult can also release pacifying spores which stun a target for up to a minute.

A large creature with 33 hit points and a slam attack which does 5d4 bludgeoning damage, the myconid sovereign has the same abilities as other adults, but two additional spore attacks. It has hallucination spores which cause a creature to react randomly for up to a minute, and animating spores which can animate the corpse of a humanoid or a beast of up to large size for between two and five weeks. The playtest document includes statistics for an animated human commoner. All three types of myconid are averse to sunlight; it kills them after an hour of exposure. They also have a poisonous skin which does damage relative to the myconid's size to anyone who touches them. Plants are immune to this effect.

The Monster Manual makes a few changes to the playtest version. Myconids no longer have poisonous skin and their aversion to the sun is now called sun sickness. The juvenile is known as a "sprout" and its distress spores have a much greater range (240 feet). Its rapport spores, on the other hand, now last only one hour instead of six. Both the sprout and the adult have reduced movement speeds. The sprout's fist attack does one point less damage. An adult myconid's melee attack does 1d4 less bludgeoning damage but 1d4 more poison damage.

Both the adult and the sovereign have an improved armor class from the playtest versions. Like the adult myconid, the sovereign now does less bludgeoning damage but more poison damage. The sovereign has nearly twice as many hit points (60 hp), and has gained the multiattack ability which lets it use either hallucination spores or pacifying spores and then still hit with its fist. In the playtest rules, the hallucination and pacifying spores had a limited number of uses per day, but in the final version they are unlimited. The effect of the hallucinations is now to incapacitate the target, instead of being determined randomly.

The D&D Next version of animating spores has the creature rise almost immediately, but in 5th Edition the process take a full 24 hours to work, closer to the 1-4 days of AD&D. The animated corpse still lasts 1d4+1 weeks. The Monster Manual includes a more interesting sample spore servant (a [[quaggoth]]) but also helpfully provides a whole template for converting other creatures into servants.

The Monster Manual is quite light on myconid lore, but it is clear from the paragraph describing their spore-based reproduction that their 4th Edition expansionist tendencies are no more. Instead they carefully control the release of their reproductive spores to avoid overpopulation.

Circles of twenty or more myconid are still the basic social structure, and once again they use their rapport spores to meld into a group consciousness. As in earlier editions, they consider the meld to be the reason for their existence. If approached by travellers, myconids will gladly provide shelter and safe passage.

Given that (spoiler!) the 2015 adventure Out of the Abyss culminates in the wedding of [[Zuggtmoy]], [[Demon Prince|Demon Queen of Fungi]], it is not surprising that the fungus folk feature quite prominently in the adventure. This is their most significant presence since A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords, and there are more named myconids here than in the rest of D&D history combined.

Quite early on in the adventure, the heroes meet Stool, an inquisitive young myconid who has been taken prisoner, and who may become an important ally. A little later on, there is another potential encounter with a group of myconids who have fallen under the sway of "the Lady", and who are behaving erratically, dancing to tunes that only they can hear. One of their group is a friend of Stool's, named Rumpadump. An introverted myconid by nature, Rumpadump is the only unaffected member of the group. He is able to lead the adventurers on to Neverlight Grove, a myconid refuge where much of the adventure is set.

Unusually, two sovereigns share control over Neverlight Grove. Sovereign Phylo has unfortunately fallen under the sway of Zuggtmoy's influence, and he has established new rules governing which myconids meld with each other, allowing some of the circles to focus entirely on supporting the Demon Queen. Sovereign Basidia has not yet been infected with Zuggtmoy's spores, and will try to warn visiting adventurers away, lest the corrupted myconids sacrifice them to her. It is an integral plot point in the adventure that Basidia is later able to reach out to the heroes using rapport spores over a much greater distance than would normally be possible.

The Grove's community consists of seven circles of myconids, most of which serve a specific function. The Circle of Builders is responsible for maintaining the group's dwellings and structures. The Circle of Growers are the community's farmers. Responsible for the sporing and tending of new myconids is the Circle of Sporers (also refered to once as the Circle of Sowers), while the Circle of Explorers consists of the those restless myconids willing to act as scouts and pathfinders. The Circle of Hunters tracks dying creatures and retrieves their carcasses for reanimation. The remaining two circles -- the Inner Circle and the Circle of Masters are unique to this community and a result of Zuggtmoy's growing influence over Phylo.

One of the appendices in Out of the Abyss provides three new types of spores available to adult myconids under Zuggtmoy's influence. Caustic spores cause acid damage, Euphoria spores cause poison damage to non-myconids and leave the creature exhausted as an after effect. Infestation spores infect flesh and blood creatures with disease and madness that gets gradually worse until the victim is cured or dies, likely to be reanimated as a spore servant.

Although the myconid is mentioned as an example of the plant monster type, the creature itself doesn't form part of the Basic Rules or the Systems Reference Document for 5th Edition.

==Deities==
The myconid god [[Psilofyr]] was introduced in DMGR4: Monster Mythology. He is often depicted as a fungal world-tree, with mycelia reaching through the planes into the homes of the myconid kings. Psilofyr is a benevolent and protective deity dedicated to the myconid race and the pursuit of perfection through meditation. He keeps the myconids safe, teaches them the secrets of potion-making, and, when a king dies, guides the senior myconids in their selection of the next king. He constantly shares his thoughts with his kings. One king in twenty is selected by Psilofyr to become a priest-king.

In avatar form, Psilofyr looks like a gigantic myconid with a vast mycelium complex drifting behind him. He levitates just above the ground and changes colour, depending on mood and environment. A blue-gray colour is common. He can cast wizard and priest spells, as well as using a variety of spore-based powers. These include cause disease, cloudkill, sleep, pacification, weakness, radiance, and an effect equivalent to dust of sneezing and choking. Psilofyr's avatar takes only half damage from blunt weapons, water and cold attacks, and communicates telepathically. He only rarely sends an avatar to commune with a myconid king, if that community faces a great threat.

Planes of Law notes that Psilofyr's proxy is a short myconid named Cybin Decayer, who speakers in a whisper and tries to avoid drawing attention to itself. Psilofyr's realm of Mycelia is described in the Planescape section below.

In the Forgotten Realms, Psilofyr is an ally of the elven god Shevarash (according to Demihuman Deities). Drizzt Do'Urden's Guide to the Underdark suggests that Araumycos, a great fungus and possibly both the largest and longest-lived organism of Faerï¿½n is actually a manifestation of Psilofyr. Araumycos is also involved in Zuggtmoy's plans in the 5th Edition adventure Out of the Abyss, and the possibility that Araumycos is Psilofyr adds an extra layer of intrigue to that story.

Not all myconids are loyal to Psilofyr. [[Demonomicon of Iggwilv]]: [[Zuggtmoy]] in Dragon #337 notes that there are evil myconids among the Queen of Fungi's favourite minions. In Zuggtmoy's abyssal realm of Shedaklah, the Slime Pits, there are half-fiend fungus creatures like basidironds, phantom fungi, phycomids and myconids. Fiendish Codex I notes that there are myconids loyal to Zuggtmoy living in the realm's settlement of Xhubhullosk. These fungus ones are insane, and their caps are covered in tumours and parasitic growths.

In 4th Edition, it is unclear if Psilofyr is still alive. Underdark notes that it has been an age since any myconid has heard Psilofyr's meditative instructions, and the myconids are increasingly oblivious of their creator.

Although he is not actually a deity, Dragon #420 introduces a [[Feywild]] ruler known as the [[Carrion King]]. Little is known about this fungal lord, but he is the master of the 4th Edition myconids and one of the most powerful residents of the Feydark. Like the myconids, the Carrion King is given to madness and he desires only to see his legions spread across the world. He does not occupy a single body, but is a distributed consciousness dwelling in a single, wide-spread root system. He grows new mushroom-like bodies whenever he needs to interact with others.

As part of his schemes to ensure the spread of the myconids, the Carrion King has cultivated a new species of myconid symbionts, which can bond with humanoid plant monsters. The resulting host and symbiont combinations serve the Carrion King and act as his emissaries. The Carrion King counts both Lolth and Zuggtmoy as his enemies, as well as a number of incarnations of himself; these are giant mushrooms spawned by his consciousness that have subsequently gone rogue.

==Relatives==
Although myconids could probably claim to be distant cousins of any of D&D's variety of fungal creatures, there are two species for which the relationship is explicit. Both are smaller and sillier versions of the myconid. The first, the [[campestri]]s, feature in the comic relief adventure Old Man Katan and the Incredible, Edible, Dancing Mushroom Band in Dungeon #41.

Campestris are much smaller than myconids and have no limbs. Usually happy-go-lucky creatures not given to worries, in this adventure they have been displaced from their swamp by giant mosquitoes, and have sought out Old Man Katan to help them. Each individual campestri is only a little smarter than a domestic cat, so they have not been very successful in their efforts. They have noticed that when they sing loudly and badly, it drives away the fish, and causes Katan to stop fishing and instead light up a foul-smelling home-made cigar. This helps the campestris by keeping the dangerous giant mosquitoes away.

With only one hit dice and a single attack that does only one point of damage, the campestris are unlikely to be part of a combat encounter. Their habits of playing silly practical jokes, singing (usually badly) and dancing make them more useful as a role-playing encounter or a distraction. They have two means of defence. The first is a cloud of spores that acts as a slow spell on nearby creatures. Each campestri can release these spores once per day, and they serve mainly to distract opponents. Their second defence is a diet high in salt, which makes them unpalatable to all except bullywugs.

The campestris get a full page Monstrous Compendium-style entry at the end of the adventure. This was reprinted in the Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume One along with a new, colour picture.

Another creature related to both myconids and campestris is the friendly fungus, described in 3 Wizards Too Many in Dragon #196. They are small, mobile mushrooms no taller than a foot. They have a cap-like head and a stalk-like body, but they do not have discreet limbs and can instead grow tentacles or pseudopods as needed from their amorphous lower ends. Each fungus attaches itself to a single larger creature that is willing to look after it by feeding, scratching and stroking it. In return, they can carry small items, and fetch small items, much like some pets. They make a variety of sounds to indicate a range of emotions from contentment to disgust, and are capable of remembering and passing on a mental image. They see -- the equivalent of infravision -- through countless pores on their bodies, and typically have only 4 hit points.

==Diplomacy==
Myconid kings animate all kinds of dead creatures, including humanoids (derro, duergar, gibberlings, gnomes, goblins, hobgoblins, humans, jermlaine, kobolds, orcs), mammals (mobats), insects (fire beetles, giant ants) and monsters (trolls).

Naturally, myconids co-operate with giant fungi, including shriekers (A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords). Mold men have been known to associate with myconids, but view them as having rather limited interests (Dragon #265). Myconids view mold men, on the other hand, as rustic cousins (Monstrous Manual). They seem to have neutral relationships with derro (Dungeon #20).

Nightshades -- the elemental spirits of poisonous plants -- are said to be on good terms with "evil" myconids (FRQ3: Doom of Daggerdale, Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume One), perhaps those who are loyal to Zuggtmoy?

The reptilian humanoids known as laerti or asabis (Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume Two) are known to eat myconids, although they prefer the internal organs of humans or camels. The troll mutates on the other hand, will eat myconids with gusto (Monstrous Compendium Annual Volume Four). In turn, myconids favour ground-up troll mutates as fertilizer for their farms (The Gates of Firestorm Peak).

In the Forgotten Realms, in Fluvenilstra, the Garden City of the Lowerdark, the slyth residents employ myconids to control the various plant creatures they use to defend their city.

In the 4th Edition Monster Manual 2, myconids are said to be used as cheap labor or slaves by drow, fomorians and shadar-kai. They can be encountered together with geonids, rust monsters, green slimes, homunculi and deathjump spiders. In the adventure Stormcrow Tor, in Dungeon #169, a tiny colony of four myconids have a fungal bloodthorn as an ally. This aggressive vine strikes and grapples opponents using its impaling thorns. These same myconids are in conflict with nearby kenku. Dungeon #187 notes that myconid slaves manage vast underground fungal forests for the duergar. Underdark notes that they can be encountered with dark creepers, gravehounds and troglodytes.

According to The Ecology of the Vegepygmy in Dungeon #201, Vegepygmies and myconids sometimes form alliances. These are usually short lived, as the myconids find the vegepygmies' outlook to be less enlightened than theirs. In Undermountain: The Lost Level the vegepygmies have driven out the myconids who previously lived in the Champignon Caverns, so clearly the two species don't always get on. Volo's Guide to Monsters confirms that in 5th Edition, vegepygmies and myconids coexist well together, along with shriekers and violet fungi.

Although they are not usually known as slavers, in the Living Greyhawk adventure SHE8-01: Severance, a small group of myconids has captured a gnome whom they keep in chains. At least on Oerth, kobolds occasionally cook and eat myconids; in the Living Greyhawk adventure URDi3-01: No Holds Bard, the kobold cook and her assistants are preparing to chop up a captive myconid for a stew.

==Myconids and magic==
===Myconid potions===
In A4: In the Dungeons of the Slave Lords, the king has a collection of potions stored in bottles made from the heads of giant ants. They are extra-healing, growth, healing, invisibility, speed, and water-breathing. The myconids in Dungeon #20 have made potions of clairaudience, clairvoyance, delusion, diminution, growth, poison, speed and vitality. In The Gates of Firestorm Peak, the myconids make their potions of extra healing from the distilled essence of their hope for peace, and store them in stoppered plant pods.

The myconid entry in Monstrous Compendium Volume Two details five new, unique potions that can be brewed by a myconid king. These include a potion of fungus growth which causes a single myconid to grow rapidly, gaining a Hit Dice and size, and a potion of fungus healing which is a healing potion that only works on fungoids. The rarely brewed potion of decay infects someone with the purple fungus the king uses to animate bodies; a cure disease spell is needed to prevent the imbiber from dying. Powders of hallucination are a back-up form of the myconids' hallucinatory spores, and are sometimes combined with spider silk to form a trap. Each myconid community keeps one potion of anointment ready. This is used on the largest myconid in the event that the king dies, and triggers immediate and painful growth. It is poisonous to non-myconids.

The undead myconid king in Dungeon #67 creates potions of decay, oils of timelessness and paralytic goo, in addition to powders of hallucination and potions of enhanced fungal growth.

In 3rd edition, the list of potions brewed by the myconid sovereign is a little more vanilla: bull's strength, cure light/moderate/serious wounds, delay poison, endurance, endure elements, greater magic fang, invisibility to animals, lesser restoration, magic fang, negative energy protection, neutralize poison, protection from/resist elements, remove blindness/deafness/disease/paralysis, and resist elements.

===Myconids as components===
In Better Living Through Alchemy in Dragon #130 the typical ingredients for incense of meditation are given as 1 oz. of hallucinogenic spores from a myconid, and one holy/unholy symbol". Dragon #137 sets the going rate for collecting and selling one-pint jar's worth of myconid spores as 100 gp, but in the adventure The Dark Forest in Dungeon #22, Randal the Alchemist is prepared to pay 300 gp for "each handful" of spores they bring back. He also clarifies that the spores must be given voluntarily by the myconids, because they disintegrate if the myconids carrying them are killed.

There is obviously quite a retail mark-up, since the price of spores as an alternative spell component is given as 1,000 gp in Dragon #147. The article Variety, the Spice of Magic notes that myconid spores can be used for the illusionist's dream spell, and must be inhaled prior to sleep. It doesn't specify how much must be inhaled (just a handful or a whole pint jar's worth?), but doing so reduces the time the spell takes to function by half. There is a risk though, since 10% of the time a twisted nightmare results instead.

According to Secrets of the Magister, a remnant of myconid (fresh or dry, spores or body part) is one of the components for the 7th-level wizard spell obliviasphere. One of the spell's possible effects is to turn someone into a myconid. Monstrous Compendium Volume Two confirms that myconid spores are useful in poisons and in potions of delusion.

In the Living Greyhawk adventure PAL4-05: Possessions in the Dust, there is a vial of myconid spores, which, when inhaled, grants the ability to communicate telepathically within 30 feet. The effect lasts for one hour. Another adventure, URC3-01: Brotherhood of the Oath mentions powdered myconid jelly. This is a moderate narcotic which allows its imbiber to resist pain.

It is possible to animate creatures using an alchemical powder with similar properties to those of the myconid king's animator spores. In the the adventure Ex Libris in Dungeon #29, there are gnoll zombies created in this fashion. It isn't clear if the animating powder uses myconid spores as a component, or if it just works in the same way.

A magic location known as a garden of resplendent hues can sometimes grow where a myconid king and his entire tribe are killed (Drow of the Underdark). When this happens, the spores the dying myconids release settle on the rocks and grown into a forest of colourful but immobile mushrooms, puffballs and molds. These gardens may harbour a desire for vengeance. If a ranger or druid champion willing to avenge the tribe's destruction visits the garden, it has the power to transform him or her into a myconid-like plant creature for a period of a month.

The 4th Edition supplement Into the Unknown: The Dungeon Survival Handbook describes pacification dust which svirfneblin create using spores harvested from nearby myconids. Dragon #429 describes myconid essence as an oily substance with an earthly tang. It is harvested from the core of a dead myconid sovereign and saps strength from those who consume it. Drow use it on dangerous slaves and have been known to keep living myconids from whom they painfully extract the essence.

===Magic items to use against myconids===
The cloak of symbiotic protection from FR4: The Magister and Dragon #112 provides special protections against molds and fungi, including a +4 bonus to saves against myconid spores. This is because the cloak is made, in part, from a living substance which feeds upon spores and microscopic airborne life.

The Bazaar of the Bizarre column in Dragon #224 details the bane toadstool. This toadstool gives its wielder a number of powers including the ability to pacify fungoid creatures, a poison touch which also putrefies food, and detect poison. However, secretly, each time a character handles the toadstool, there is a chance of contracting a progressive disease. The disease initially causes only aversion to sunlight, but progresses to hair loss, the appearance of thread-like mold over the skin, and eventually complete transformation into a fungoid entity.

===Spells and rituals===
Since D&D mostly treats fungi as plants, spells like Protection from Plants, 10' Radius will work on myconids. According to the Wizard's Spell Compendium, Volume III, the spell needs to be cast at 7th-level or higher, in order to affect them.

In Out of the Abyss, the appendix notes that a myconid sovereign can create an awakened zurkhwood mushroom by performing a lengthy ritual. Zurkhwood are enormous fungi growing thirty to forty feet in height.

==External Links==
* http://www.enworld.org/forum/content.php?3744-Monster-ENCyclopedia-Myconid: An ''enormous'' compilation of myconic lore, images and references.

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Myconid A4 meld.jpg
Myconid A4 1.jpg
Myconid A4 2.jpg
Myconid A4 3.jpg
Myconid A4 4.jpg
Welcoming Committee A4.jpg
Myconid Firestorm Peak.jpg
</gallery>

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

Gremishka

2021-06-21T06:47:17Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* 5e */

{{dnd-stub}}
{{NeedsImages}}

'''Gremishkas''' are wicked, spiteful, lizard-monkey-rat-things that infest the dark corners of the [[Demiplane of Dread]]. They've been around since the inception of [[Ravenloft]] in the setting's Monstrous Appendix Compendiums for [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]] 2nd edition, then made it into [[Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition]] in both Denizens of Darkness (3.0) and Denizens of Dread (3.5), with their final appearance to date being in [[Van Richten's Guide]] for [[Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition]].

==AD&D==
In their original iteration, gremishkas are stated to be a branch of the [[gremlin]] family native to the [[Demiplane of Dread]], with the biggest difference being that gremishkas don't have wings. Standing about 2ft tall on average, a gremishka looks like a furry [[goblin]] with a protruding, muzzle-like face and cat-like eyes; their bestial aspect is so pronounced that they have been mistaken for small dogs or large cats from a distance. Despite looking like a demented monkey-thing, gremishkas are actually highly intelligent, with an average [[Intelligence]] score of 13-14 (compared to the [[human]] average of 9-10). Chaotic Evil in alignment, they mostly live as parasites and pests; they inhabit urban or underground environments, occupying caves, abandoned buildings, forgotten allies, neglected cellars, sewer systems and the like, and creep into houses at night to steal food and small trinkets that they take a liking to. Their only major interest seems to be in playing pranks and setting traps for other races, which they like to watch from the shadows, snickering as some fool ends up falling into their oft-complex machinations. Omnivorous, they eat anything they can catch, primarily feeding on rats, vermin and small pets. They have been known to form a temporary attachment to children who are their size and live near their lairs. Gremishka are hunted by just about anything that can find and catch them, including large snakes, dogs, giant spiders, kobolds, and many more — especially humans.

In combat, gremishkas rely on numbers - swarming over foes in a grappling horde to gnaw, bite, claw and rend - and on speed, which manifests mechanically as an unusually high armor class of 4 and a +4 bonus to all saves against AoE attacks. They dislike bright light, but it doesn't actually hurt them.

==3e==
In 3rd edition, gremishkas get very little changes compared to some. They are still a "dread" equivalent of the common [[gremlin]], being described as "twice as bad and twice as deadly". They're Tiny sized Magical Beasts, and now have the "Skitterish" racial weakness, which forces them to make a DC 15 Fear save if suddenly exposed to bright light. Otherwise, they're basically retreads of their AD&D counterparts, although they have new art visibly inspired by the Gremlins horror-comedy movies of the 90s.

==5e==
[[File:Gremishka.jpeg|thumb]]

Like many other returning Ravenloft beasties, the 5e gremishka comes with a brand new look and a brand new backstory, with tweaked abilities to match. In 5e, gremishkas are what you get when a rookie spellcaster botches an attempt to create life, presumably making them a kind of dread/failed [[homunculus]] - as such, they are especially prevalent in the [[Magocracy|magocratic]] realm of Hazlan. 5e Gremishkas have an appetite for magical stuff such as spellbooks, spell components, and familiars, and love to torment the mages that gave them life. Despite their strong connection to magic, the use of it in their proximity can have unpredictable results, either healing them, bouncing off of them and hitting someone else, or, worst of all, causing the gremishka to explode into scaly chunks. These chunks then regenerate into fully grown duplicates of the original gremishka, and immediately form a swarm that is almost immune to spells of 3rd level and lower!

[[Category: Monsters]] [[Category: Ravenloft]]

Slime

2021-06-21T06:38:36Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* Pre-3rd Edition */

[[File:The gelatinous green cube by shockbolt.jpg|500px|thumbnail|right|[[Halfling]] [[Rogue]] rolled a 1 to Intelligence...or should it be Wisdom? Or maybe both?]]

{{topquote|A slime draws near!|Every Dragon Quest game ever}}

The '''Slime''', also known as the '''Ooze''', the '''Gel''', the '''Jelly''', or the '''Goo''', is a humble form of monster that pops up in absolutely ''every'' frigging fantasy setting you can imagine, and even a few science-fiction settings. It is most famous in tabletop games for its many diffuse forms in [[Dungeons & Dragons]] and in videogames for [[/v/|Dragon Quest]] (in which it serves as the mascot and also has a fucking huge array of possible slime-forms), but, like we said, you can find a slime just about everywhere if you look.

Slimes are usually low to middle tier threat levels; they are mindless masses of animate sludge, and some higher-level variants may be made of elemental matter, such as water, "liquid ice", magma, molten steel, etc. They have no culture or higher purposes, they just ooze around eating anything organic they touch and growing bigger until they have to divide. Hardly likely to outwit most adventurers, but many games make them fairly resistant to certain kinds of attack, especially physical ones, so just assuming they're harmless is a good way to get dissolved. One prominent commenter described fighting a slime as "playing a terrifying game of 'guess the immunity'," referencing to the fact that unless you have your appropriate Monster Manuals memorised, you can rarely predict what will kill a slime variety outright. And guessing wrong can sometimes be worse than not trying, because using the ''wrong'' damage type can cause the slime in question to get stronger or divide into more slimes. And what they are or are not vulnerable to isn't always consistent between editions. A lot of them are also [[Gotcha Monster]]s because of their use of camouflage or near invisibility. This is often enforced by their slow speed that ensure an unsupported ooze can simply be fled from. Their lack of biological needs aside from hunger (solved by dropping scraps to them) means they are often used as part of mundane traps, like an ooze at the bottom of a pit trap.

==Slimes in Dungeons and Dragons==
===Pre-3rd Edition===
* '''Gelatinous Cube''': Perhaps the most notorious slime to come out of the tabletop game field is the gelatinous cube, a D&D monstrosity that takes the form of a huge cube-shaped mass of near-translucent gray or green jelly, perfectly sized for oozing through the typical dungeon corridor as a living, insurmountable barrier. It was originally created by Gary Gygax as a joke, being the exact size of one grid square. Like the [[Rust Monster]] and [[Owlbear]], it's one of those absurdities that everyone pokes fun at, but which has too much nostalgic fondness from the fanbase for anyone to seriously consider getting rid of it. Later, fortunately, it ''did'' come with a half-assed explanation: wizards breed them as living janitorial services to clean the garbage out of the perfectly-square corridors of their evil dungeons. As it's also mostly-transparent, save for the dissolving bits of armor floating in it like fruit in a jello dessert, walking straight into it only to be engulfed is an occupational hazard for dungeon-delvers. It has a paralyzing touch. Its weaknesses vary depending on the edition. Oh, and this thing is so (in)famous that it even showed up in a Disney film!
<gallery>
Gelatinous cube Monster card.jpg
Gelatinous cube MCV1.jpg
Gelatinous cube MM 2e.png
Gelatinous Cube 3e.jpg
Ooze 4e.jpg
Gelatinous Cube 5e.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Black Pudding''' / '''Deadly Puddings''': Has nothing to do with the food called black pudding - this one has come to take Sam Tarly. Comes in other colors besides black, depending on what environment they are found in. All of the different colors are called Deadly Puddings. Can split if hit by weapons or lightning. Black puddings can dissolve organic material and metal. White puddings look identical to ice and snow and can instantly dissolve organic matter. Dun puddings live in deserts and can instantly dissolve leather, and can also eat metal. Brown puddings live in marshes and can instantly dissolve leather and wood. Stone puddings, grey puddings, and dense puddings all live underground. Stone puddings are slow moving and attack by dropping on prey from the ceiling, but can only dissolve flesh. Grey puddings can dissolve leather, wood, and metal, including magical armor, but they also are vulnerable to certain spells. Dense puddings are smarter than other puddings and infect people they attack with a debilitating disease, but are slower, not well camouflaged because of their blue color, and can only dissolve living flesh.
<gallery>
Black pudding Greyhawk.jpg
Black Pudding 1e.png
Black pudding MCV1.jpg
Black Pudding 2e.gif
Black Pudding 5e.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Grey Ooze''': Can rapidly corrode non magical metal similarly to a Rust Monster, but cannot dissolve stone. Is immune to cold and fire. Can camouflage itself as a puddle of water. In 5th edition they can sometimes develop the ability to use psychic attacks. Grey oozes are completely different in 4th edition. They have a foul smell that give an attack penalty and their acid attack can melt your bones.
<gallery>
Gray Ooze 1e.jpg
Gray Ooze 5e.png
</gallery>

* '''Green Slime''': Green slimes are mostly immobile and are more similar to plants. Their only attack that they have is dropping on people who walk under them. Anybody who touches one will turn into one if they are not cured quickly. They are vulnerable only to fire, cold, and cure disease spells. They can eat through both metal and wood. The Green Slime returned in 4th edition but heavily changed. It is no longer immobile or able to infect people with a touch, but still prefers to surprise enemies by dropping on them. It is weak against fire and light. Green Slime returns again in 5th edition, but is now classified as a dungeon hazard instead of a monster and so doesn't have stats, though its traits are similar to how it behaved in early editions. It destroys metal and organic material on contact and can be destroyed by sunlight, anything that cures disease, or anything that does fire, cold, or radiant damage.
<gallery>
Green Slime 1e.png
</gallery>

* '''Ochre Jelly''': Similar to a black pudding but somewhat weaker. Only dissolves flesh. Can split if hit by weapons or lightning.
<gallery>
Ochre Jelly 1e.jpg
Ooze 4e.jpg
Ochre Jelly 5e.png
</gallery>

* '''Crystal Ooze''': Native to the caverns of the Plane of Earth, these crystalline slimes usually subsist on the minerals found in rocks with the oldest being fuck hueg. While they're content to just leech what they need from their surroundings, Crystal Oozes will attack any living creature for the minerals in them and they're no push-overs either. Their slam attacks deal piercing and slashing damage and can crit on rolls of 18-20. They also give off a Subsonic Hum that can stun an opponent while the Ooze slithers over and engulfs them at their leisure. If the victim fails their Fortitude save, they become petrified and a new Crystal Ooze pops out in 1d4 hours. They're immune to the cold and electricity and resist fire; however, their bodies can shatter and split from bludgeoning and sonic attacks. Crystal oozes are completely different in second edition D&D. Instead, they are a variant of grey ooze that lives underwater and corrodes organic material, but not metal. Weapons can only deal 1 point of damage to a crystal oozes.
<gallery>
Crystal ooze S4.png
</gallery>

* '''Slithering Tracker''': An intelligent slime that is nearly transparent. It paralyzes victims and slowly drains them of plasma. They are said to be created from humanoids who willingly gave up their forms to get revenge on somebody they hated.
<gallery>
Slithering tracker MCV2.jpg
Slithering Tracker 2e.jpg
Slithering Tracker 5e.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Mustard Jelly''': What happens when an idiot wizard tries to polymorph into an Ochre Jelly. It produces poisonous fumes that smell like mustard and slow down those who breathe them in. It is intelligent and can split in two at will, instead of splitting when hit with weapons. It cannot climb up walls or squeeze through tight spaces like ochre jellies can. It is immune to normal weapons, takes half damage from cold and the magic missile spell heals it, and it can eat through wood.
<gallery>
Mustard Jelly.png
</gallery>

* '''Olive Slime''': A plant like slime similar to the green slime, but even more dangerous. Like the green slime it is immobile and attacks by dropping on people that walk under it, and it produces a venom that causes numbness so the victim may not even notice the attack. It possesses the victims it infects and slowly eats them from the inside out, turning them into plant like zombies that melt into olive slime when they die, and can spread the infection. It is immune to everything except acid, fire, cold, and cure disease spells, and spells that affect plants. The zombies are the same except they are weak to magic missile instead of cure disease. If a olive slime meets a green slime then one of them will destroy the other.
<gallery>
Olive Slime.png
</gallery>

* '''Stunjelly''': Similar to a gelatinous cube. It disguises itself as a stone wall, although remains semi transparent. It has most of the same weaknesses as a gelatinous cube, except that cold affects it normally.
<gallery>
Stun Jelly 1e.webp
Stun Jelly 2e.png
</gallery>

* '''Aballin''': Also known as "living water", aballins are a type of slime that resembles a pool of stagnant water, strangely devoid of life and full of metals like coins and armor. Despite looking like water, Aballins are composed of a weak acid, which it uses to digest their victims after wrapping around their heads and drowning them (which means water breathing is pointless). Due to their semi-liquid bodies, they prefer to live in water but slither like slugs (up to a 30 degree slope). Unlike most other slimes, its roughly as smart as a wild animal and can learn to hunt its prey. Legend has it that the first was a druid polymorphed by an archwizard's curse. They are immune to fire, cold, and electricity, but are vulnerable to spells that affect water, and when they are pretending to be a pool of water they cannot be harmed by anything that wouldn't affect a pool of water. They also cannot be damaged by piercing and slashing weapons, and if you try there is a chance you will hit the person the aballin is trying to drown instead.
<gallery>
Aballin 2e.png
Aballin 3e.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Lava Ooze''': An ooze made of lava. They are immune to fire and vulnerable to cold. In third edition, it consumes metal and stone, but cannot digest gems, which become stuck its body until it is killed.

* '''Ghaunadan''': An shapechanger that serves the god [[Ghaunadaur]] whose true form resembles an ooze but also can transform into either a male human or a female [[Drow]] (So yes, this means that [[#Monstergirls|slimegirls]] are totally canon in D&D). In humanoid form they have a charming gaze and in ooze form their attacks cause paralysis. They are resistant to blunt weapons and while in ooze form can disarm enemies by trapping their weapons in its body.
<gallery>
Ghaunadan 2e.png
Ghaunadan 3e.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Flareater''': A slime that likes to drop on prey from the ceiling. They are mobile unlike green slimes. While they can eat flesh, their favorite foods are light sources. They can increase their hitpoints by consuming both magical and non-magical light sources, and split when they reach enough hitpoints. They are immune to damage from light, heat, and fire, although long term sun exposure will kill them, and they are paralyzed by cold damage.
<gallery>
Flareater.png
</gallery>

* '''Symbiotic Jelly''': An intelligent slime that lives in a cave where it charms a carnivorous monster and uses illusions to make the monster appear as something less dangerous and add fake treasure to the cave to act as bait. When the monster it has charmed feeds on meat it somehow remotely feeds the slime as well.

* '''Acid Blob''': A smaller slime that moves by bouncing around and likes to hunt in packs. They can corrode metal.

* '''Alkilith''': A [[Tanar'ri]] with the form of an ooze. They exist to spread corruption and pollution, and by infesting a door or a window they can transform it into a portal to the [[Abyss]].
<gallery>
Alkilith 2e.png
Alkilith 3e.jpg
Alkilith 5e.png
</gallery>

===3rd/3.5 Edition===

* '''Bone Ooze''': A massive ooze that feeds by sucking people's bones out. Its insides are filled with sharp bone shards and they're stupidly deadly. They came back in 4th edition, renamed to bone collector, and classified as an undead ooze.
<gallery>
Bone Ooze.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Flesh Jelly''': A blob of flesh covered in a layer of skin. It grows by absorbing living creatures. Touching one can infect you with a disease called filth fever. [[Luke|It also has an overwhelmingly foul smell]].
<gallery>
Flesh Jelly.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Reason Stealer''': An unintelligent ooze with a craving for intelligence. When it delivers a killing blow it steal the victim's mind, gaining their stats, feats, skills, and prepared arcane spells for 24 hours, after which it becomes mindless again.
<gallery>
Reason Stealer.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Teratomorph''': A reality warping slime. Although it is neutral aligned like most slimes it has a lot of chaotic abilities. Its touch can, at random, weaken your stats, polymorph you, make it stick to you, or, if you are really unlucky, instantly absorb you. It randomly opens portals to other planes in the area around it. It also warps the environment around it, making attacks and dexterity checks more difficult, and has a chance of hitting everything around it with two random spells. It has the ability to detect law. It is immune to chaotic spells, lightning, and acid. Weapons have a chance of completely missing due to the section of its body you are attacking suddenly shifting to another dimension before you hit it unless it is affect by a dimensional anchor.
<gallery>
Teratomorph.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Arcane Ooze''': Is immune to spells and can steal spells from arcane spellcasters to give themselves temporary hitpoints. Magical acid attacks heal them, and magical lightning attacks speed them up.
<gallery>
Arcane Ooze.webp
</gallery>

* '''[[Living Spells|Living Spell]]''' (Template): One of the newer additions to the family. Originating in [[Eberron]]'s Mournlands, one of many results of the Day of Mourning, but since adapted to "generic" D&D. Living spell is a template that is applied to one or more spells instead of a creature to make a creature based on that spell or spells. It is always typed as an ooze. Enemies that are slammed or engulfed by the living spell are affected as though they were hit by the spell or spells it is based on. Living spells are also very resistant to magic. In 5th edition they are classified as constructs instead of oozes.

* '''Snowflake Ooze''': A snow like ooze that live in cold climates and inflicts cold damage. It is immune to cold and vulnerable to fire, piercing attack have a chance of harmlessly passing through it, and bludgeoning attacks cause it to split.
<gallery>
Snowflake Ooze.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Summoning Ooze''': A inteligent living summoning circle created by a summoning ritual gone wrong. It has the ability to cast summon monster spells. Immune to acid and fire.
<gallery>
Summoning Ooze.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Bloodfire Ooze''': An evil ooze made out of burning hot blood. It is created through ritually mixing the blood of 100 good or neutral humanoids with a demon's ichor. Is immune to fire and resistant to acid and electricity, and vulnerable to cold. It attacks with fire, and can empower fire spells cast within 60 feet of it.
<gallery>
Bloodfire Ooze.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Corrupture''': An amphibious ooze made of acidic liquid flesh that appears in areas where nature has been defiled by magic or pollution and attacks by spraying acid.
<gallery>
Corrupture.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Conflagration Ooze''': An intelligent ooze that attacks with a poison that causes your insides to burst into flame. Is immune to fire and vulnerable to cold. Some of them also explode when they die.
<gallery>
Conflagration Ooze.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Graveyard Sludge''': A slime made of necrotic energies and powered by the souls of the dead.When powerful necromancy is used around the dead, usually at graveyards during rituals or a [[Lich]] accending (though a really strong spell will do), the slime is formed and begins to hunt down any corpses to feed on the spiritual energy. The energy is used to defend itself but Liches like to use them as a means to bolster themselves. Graveyard Sludges can also cast 5th level or lower spells if they've fed on enough spellcasters. Their abilities are somewhat different in third edition. Creatures that die within 20 feet of graveyard sludge come back as zombies with an acid attack. They can cause fear, and strengthen undead creatures. They are immune to acid, and they are both alive and dead, so they are healed both by heal and inflict spells.
<gallery>
Graveyard Sludge.webp
</gallery>

* '''Bloodbloater''': A tiny aquatic ooze that drinks blood and attacks in swarms. Looks like an oversized cell. Because they are a swarm, they are immune to weapons and single target spells.
<gallery>
Bloodbloater.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Flotsam Ooze''': An aquatic ooze with a very sticky body which collects debris.

* '''Reekmurk''': A huge black aquatic ooze that lives in the depths of the ocean or in underground lakes. They can dissolve wood and have a powerful stench. They are immune to cold, but have a vulnerability to sunlight and spells that act like sunlight.

* '''Ethereal Ooze''': An incorporeal ooze from the ethereal plane. It naturally forms into crystalline cuboid shapes instead of being just a blob.
<gallery>
Ethereal Ooze.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Bloodrot''': Not actually a true slime, but is really a form of undead made from the remains of somebody who died by being completely dissolved in acid. Infects people with a magical disease called blood fever that causes the victim to melt into a puddle when they die which the blood rot eats. They can hide inside of the bloodstream of anyone who is infected with blood fever. They can also sense the location of anybody who is infected with blood fever within several miles, so if you escape from a battle with one but are infected then more will be attracted to you. Like many true oozes, it can split apart if hit by slashing or piercing damage. It came back again in 4th edition, now classified as an undead ooze, but lost its unique mechanics.
<gallery>
Bloodrot HoH.png
</gallery>

* '''Brine Ooze''': An ooze that lives in deserts. It either hides in salt lakes or pretends to be a pool of water. It has the ability to rapidly desiccate whatever it slams into and is immune to desiccation itself. Slashing and piercing damage causes it to split.

* '''Cesspit Ooze''': An ooze found in impoverished urban areas that feeds on fear and misery. They form spontaneously from the corpses of people who decayed in sewage or refuse in places near strong sources of magic. Its acid can dissolve organic and metallic materials but not stone. Those who are damaged by its acid may be driven into an uncontrollable rage. They have an overwhelming stink that sickens those that get too close to it. When they die, they explode and splatter acid around them. Slashing and piercing damage makes it split. They are immune to acid and resistant to electricity and fire, but have a weakness against positive energy similar to undead creatures. It is also more intelligent that other kinds of oozes, and are considered to be chaotic evil instead of neutral unlike other oozes.

* '''Sentry Ooze''' (Template): An ooze that has been modified with magic to make it stronger and more intelligent so it can act a guardian for a dungeon.

* '''Welp of Zargon''': Those infected by [[Zargon]]'s slime may transform into humanoid slime creatures. They deal acid damage and can also infect people with Zargon's slime. Creatures that get too close to one may be stunned by its horrific resemblance to its former self.

* '''Venom Ooze''': A more dangerous glowing variant of the Ochre Jelly that was engineered by the [[drow]]. They are immune to cold, acid, and electricity, and have the ability to poison large bodies of water.
<gallery>
Venom Ooze.png
</gallery>

* '''Blood Amniote''': ''Another'' monster made of blood. It is classified as an undead but has all the traits of an ooze. It is a huge mass of blood with the faces of people it has killed that makes people it touches expel their blood through their skin and it splits in two when it drains enough blood. They also came back in 4th edition as an undead ooze.
<gallery>
Blood Amniote.jpg
</gallery>

===4th Edition===
* '''Slime Devil''': A devil specializing in interrogation that is also an ooze. It engulfs people and asks them questions, inflicting psychic damage if they lie.
<gallery>
Slime devil.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Abolethic [[Skum]]''': Sometimes when an [[Aboleth]] enslaves someone, the process goes wrong and turns them into an ooze. Abolethic Skums are invisible while in water and have an aura that makes enemies vulnerable to psychic attacks. It is a minion type enemy so it dies in one hit.

* '''Spirit Ooze''': An ooze formed from bits of insubstantial undead. They can hover and after hitting an enemy with their main attack become harder to damage and can shift by one square for one turn.

===5th Edition===
* '''[[Oblex]]''': Has the ability to create exact copies of anyone it has eaten except for the cord of slime attaching the copies to the oblex.

===Pathfinder===
* '''Deathtrap Ooze''': Reversing the ooze used as part of a trap gimmick, a deathtrap ooze ''is'' the trap. Able to transform into any trap with one or fewer moving part, a deathtrap ooze can pretend to be disabled and attack adventurers from the rear or attack the poor sap attempting to disable it outright, and that's assuming it's even found.
<gallery>Deathtrap ooze B3.png</gallery>

* '''Gunpowder Ooze''': An ooze, made of gunpowder. Continuing the "guess the weakness" game above, it has vulnerability to fire but explodes and splits upon taking fire damage. It also coats people it attacks in gunpowder, making ''them'' liable to blowing up. The split and auto-combustion mean that this CR14 monster can be killed by nothing but two vials of alchemist fire creating a chain reaction of the split oozes blowing each other up. This means they're more living traps than anything.
<gallery>
File:Gunpowder Ooze.png
</gallery>

* '''Hungry Flesh''': An artifical ooze made of a huge pile of flesh. Thankfully they have very high nutritional needs (their own 3000 pound weight in food daily) so they'll quickly starve without support.

* '''Sapphire Ooze''': A sapient, extraplanar, good aligned ooze that can talk?! This ooze can transform into living armor for a creature and buff things with saves against fear. Being the rare sapient ooze, they actually have a personality: [[Leeroy Jenkins|Overeager adventure seekers that often get into trouble themselves.]]
<gallery>
Sapphire Ooze.png
</gallery>

* '''Carnivorous Blob''': Have you ever wanted to run a campaign based on the 80s version of “The Blob”? Use this, and accept no substitutes!
<gallery>
Carnivorous blob B2 PF.png
</gallery>

* '''Sewer Blight''': A low level ooze made of sewage that lives in the sewers under large cities.
<gallery>
Sewer Blight.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Slime Demon (Omox)''': A demon made of sewage that delights in desecrating bodies of water.
<gallery>
Omox.jpg
</gallery>

* '''Fell Flotsam''': Undead ooze created when the spirits of dead creatures combine with the muck at the bottom of a swamp or river.
<gallery>
Fell Flotsam.jpg
</gallery>

===Slime Deities===

* [[Juiblex]]: The demon lord of slimes and oozes.

* [[Ghaunadaur]]: The god of slimes and oozes, who may or may not be the same being as Juiblex.

* [[Zargon]]: An [[Elder Evils|Elder Evil]] associated with slimes.

* [[Bwimb]]: The [[Archomental]] of ooze. Got killed by [[Orcus|Tenebrous]] and replaced by his daughter Bwimb II.

==Slimes in Dragon Quest==
The slime is the mascot of the Dragon Quest video game series. Basic slimes are blue raindrop shaped creatures with cute faces. They come in a wide number of variants. One such variant are metal slimes, which give huge rewards for defeating them but are ridiculously difficult to beat due to their defensive abilities and tendency to run away before you can do any significant damage. Due to how iconic they are, [[TVTropes]] uses Metal Slime as the trope name for rare enemies in games that are tough to beat but give huge rewards. Not all slimes in the Dragon Quest are enemies. Good slimes usually introduce themselves by saying "I'm not a bad slime!"

==That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime==
That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime is an [[Isekai]] light novel and [[anime]], about a normal Japanese man who dies and ends up in the body of a slime in a world resembling the Dragon Quest games. Slimes in this world are normaly unintelligent and weak monsters, but this slime happens to have the most broken ability in the world: the ability to copy the skills and form of whatever they eat. They befriend a powerful dragon and become the chief of a [[Goblin]] village, which they expand into a new nation. It is actually surprisingly good by isekai standards.

==[[Monstergirl]]s==
{{Monstergirls}}
Surprisingly, slimes have long been given the [[monstergirls]] treatment: Slime Girls (also known as Goo Girls) are typically not very smart, but very affectionate and horny, and their malleable gelatinous bodies have a ''lot'' of kinky shit they can do in the bedroom. In the more restrained versions a slime will engulf a guy while milking him dry, giving him a full body hug. This frequently results in cum floating around in the slime's body, often going towards a the slime's "heart", a core of a color that contrasts the body that is said to hold the slime's soul. It is often an erogenous zone [[/d/|because of course it is]]. In more extreme cases the slime will also penetrate the guy, engaging in stuff like sounding, or fucking him in the ass while he fucks her in the... well, [[Dark Eldar|everywhere is a hole for a Slime]]. There are also a few cases where [[vore]] starts to be involved, which would be a bit more true to nature for the slimes of D&D fame.

===MGE Slimes===
The Slime is one of the most profuse species in the [[Monster Girl Encyclopedia]] so far, second only to the [[Succubus]] family in terms of diverse members. The slimes of the MGE were heavily influenced by the slimes of the popular fantasy gaming series "Dragon Quest", with the Slime Queen and Slime Carrier in particular being derived from members of that series' vast array of slimes.

Your standard Slime in the MGE world is a dim-witted, happy-go-lucky aimless drifter that just squiggles around looking for a guy to sex. These stand out mostly via their blue coloration.

The Red Slime, in comparison, is smarter and more aggressive.

The green Bubble Slime has a unique chemical composition that causes her to constantly secrete bubbles of noxious-smelling gas. As a side-effect, she's no longer as sticky and cohesive as other slimes, making her grapples easier to escape. However, her substance is a powerful and addictive aphrodisiac, which eventually leaves her victim dependent upon regular ingestions of her drug-like mass. She was one of the first of the [[grimdark]] mamono.

The purple Dark Slime is an extremely powerful succubus/slime hybrid native to Demon Realms. The only slime-girl in the MGE with a core (thus far), they're also smart and predatory; they have the unique ability to corrupt human women, transforming them into new Dark Slimes, via a process that basically involves enveloping the women in their body, orgasmically digesting her alive, and then reforming her as a new slime.

Slime Queens are sometimes mistaken for normal slimes due to their being the same blue color. These slimes suffer a mutation that renders them incapable of physically dividing to reproduce like a normal slime; instead, they swell to massive proportions, and can manifest multiple slimegirl "bodies" from their central mass as they see fit, all of which are, of course, extensions of the slime's singular mind. The bigger she grows, the smarter she becomes. Kenkou Cross has asserted that there are actually Slime Queen variants for all of the standard slimes.

Sea Slimes are jellyfish-girls who live in the ocean, and so lack the shapeshifting prowess of their standard cousins.

Nureonagos are a Zipangu breed of slime whose name comes from a yokai that manifested as a soaking wet girl who comes wandering around on rainy nights. The Nureonago mamono is a slime with especially advanced mimicry abilities, allowing her to take the form of a solid human girl in clothes - but she can't deny her nature, and so always looks soaking wet.

Likewise, the Shoggoth is a slime-girl maid who specializes in shapeshifting, specifically in extruding pseudopods and shaping them into tools to help her do her various chores.

The Parasite Slime is a slime that can't take on a slime-girl form of its own, instead attacking human women and raping them until their mind breaks before using them as lures to attract human men to be their partners, turning them into the mindless fuck-puppets called "Slime Carriers". This is one of the two slimes that compete for the title of "most fucked-up mamono in the MGE".

The Humpty Egg is the ''other'' slime contender. See, in the region of the MGE world known as "Wonderland", there's a super-horny, busty and fluffy [[harpy]] species caled the Jubjub Bird. These harpies lay eggs, and if a man gets too close to an unhatched egg, there is a good chance that the unborn chick inside will become aware of his spiritual energies and react by ''bursting out of her shell as a horny [[loli]] slime-girl made of egg-guts'', essentially aborting herself to have sex faster. Consisting of a [[loli]] made up of goopy, semi-solid egg-yolk and surrounded by a malleable mass of egg-white they use to form the traditional slime pseudopods. These slimes actually lay eggs when they get pregnant, which usually hatch into new Jubjubs, but are more likely than "normal" Jubjub eggs to turn into Humpty Eggs. This species was met with considerable outcry when it was released, with even many [[loli]] fans going "seriously, dude, this is going too far!" (Was this supposed to be Rule 34 of Sanrio's Gudetama? If it is then it may be even more sick. Poor Gudetama! He doesn't deserve this.)

===Gallery===
<center>
<gallery>
File:MGE Slime.jpg|A normal slime.
File:MGE Red Slime.jpg|A red slime.
File:MGE Bubble Slime.jpg|A bubble slime.
File:MGE Dark Slime.jpg|A dark slime.
File:MGE Slime Queen.jpg|A Slime Queen.
File:MGE Shoggoth.jpg|A [[Shoggoth]].
File:MGE Nureonago.jpg|A Nurenago.
</gallery>
</center>

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

Kraken

2021-06-21T04:46:26Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* See Also */

{{stub}}

{{topquote|Release the Kraken! 
''The tolling of the iron bell!'' 
''Release the Kraken!'' 
''Rising from the depths of hell!''|Danny Sexbang, signing the death sentence of a kingdom}}

{{topquote|Let no joyful voice be heard! 
''Let no man look up at the sky with hope!'' 
''And let this day be cursed by we who ready to wake...'' 
'''''...the Kraken!'''''|Davy Jones, sic'ing his pet on a now-doomed ship}}

The '''Kraken''' is a monster from European mythology, presumably Nordic, and is described as a sea-going creature of such enormous size that when it comes to the surface to doze and bask in the sunlight, sailors have been known to mistake it for an island and walk around on its back, getting a hell of a surprise when it inevitably decides to submerge again.

In the original myths, the kraken is never really described beyond being a bloody huge thing living deep under the water. In pop culture, however, it has become synonymous with an incredibly huge squid, though it's unclear if this is because of [[Dungeons & Dragons]] doing it or the other way around. Most likely this impression came about due to the examples of 12 meter long Giant Squids (''Architeuthis dux'') that occasionally wash up on shore.

==D&D==
In D&D, the Kraken is typically presented as an enormous [[aberration]] or magical beast, in the form of a ridiculously huge squid with genius-level intelligence, powerful magical abilities, and an even bigger ego. Ironically, despite 4th edition's terrible reputation, it actually preserved the traditional Kraken, and even gave it a ''nastier'' relative that hunted the [[Astral Sea]]. It was 5th edition that broke with tradition, portraying its Kraken as a deformed fish-frog-lizard thing with tentacles reminiscent of Ray Harryhausen's creation (then again no description was given in the 5e monster manual, and older lore mentions Kraken do like to ''upgrade'' themselves), it's still an egotistical super-genius with a spate of nasty legendary actions.
<gallery>
Kraken MM 1e.jpg|1e
Kraken 1e.jpg
Giant squid MCV2.jpg|2e
Giant squid MM 2e.png
Kraken 3e.jpg|3e
Astral kraken.jpg|The Astral Kraken from 3e's Planar Handbook.
Kraken 4e.jpg|4e
Kraken 5e.jpg|5e took inspiration from Clash of the Titans
Kraken saltmarsh.jpg|For some reason, the baby Kraken in [[Ghosts of Saltmarsh]] uses the 3e design. Apparently, the one from the Monster Manual was already heavily modified.
</gallery>

===[[Birthright]]===
{{Infobox Deity
|Name = Kraken
|Symbol =
|Aliases = The Many-Limbed God
|Alignment = Chaotic Evil
|Divine Rank = Unknown
|Pantheon = Cerilian
|Portfolio = Sahuagin, sea
|Domains =
|Home Plane = [[Prime Material Plane]] (''Krakennauricht'', Aebrynis)
|Worshippers = Sahuagin
|Favoured Weapon =
}}
[[Birthright]] had the Kraken as one of the unique [[awnshegh]] that bedevil Cerillia, and, atypically for one of the animalistic ones, also a super-smart genius. It is terrifying, given its massive size in a relatively-grounded and realistic campaign setting, and no one knows what the actual fuck it is, what it's doing, or why it picked the former Great Bay, now the Krakennauricht as its territory. Maybe it was one of the mounts Azrai rode across the sea, maybe it was a creature from the elemental plane of water the evil god corrupted for some inscrutable purpose. Either way, it's the biggest monster in the world... and it has enslaved the [[Sahuagin]], having destroyed their civilization and using them as its minions. They worship the Kraken as the Many-Limbed God and offer it whatever treasures they obtain from the ships they sink and live sacrifices. Most notably, the priests of the Kraken do actually have access to [[cleric]] spells, though where and how they get the spells is unknown. For some reason, it has also forbidden the Sahuagin to make themselves known to other races, leaving the Krakennauricht, and from setting foot on land, with the exception of Krakenstaur.

{{D&D-Birthright-Deities}}

==MGE==
{{monstergirls}}
In the [[Monster Girl Encyclopedia]], the kraken is a giant squid-girl, a relative of the [[scylla]]. Taking the form of a taller-than-average and hugely busty white-skinned woman with ten squid-like tentacles, they are mostly shy and retiring - but when they go hunting for a boyfriend, they have been known to sink whole ships to snatch up the man they like, leaving the rest as prey for the swarms of aquatic mamono who flock to them when they go husband-hunting. They have the ability to spit a magical ink that consumes light, creating magical patches of darkness.

==40k==
Warhammer 40k has [[Hive Fleet Kraken]], a large fleet of [[Tyranid]] organisms noted for encircling foes at every level. There are also proper krakens found on [[Fenris]], although they are largely suspected to be of Tyranid origin.

=See Also=
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDN_nGcQg7M| Mr. Rhexx's analysis of them,] [[Fleshcrafting|which attributes their new look to a love of fleshcrafting.]]
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4itm0SRxAro| Release the Kraken by Ninja Sex Party], textbook example of why one should never summon the Kraken... He's just such a huge dork.
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEf0o01ghck| A textbook example of a typical kraken encounter.]

[[Category: Monsters]]

Kraken

2021-06-21T04:38:25Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4:

Kraken

2021-06-21T04:32:23Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4:

{{stub}}

{{topquote|Release the Kraken! 
''The tolling of the iron bell!'' 
''Release the Kraken!'' 
''Rising from the depths of hell!''|Danny Sexbang, signing the death sentence of a kingdom}}

{{topquote|Let no joyful voice be heard! 
''Let no man look up at the sky with hope!'' 
''And let this day be cursed by we who ready to wake...'' 
''...the Kraken!''|Davy Jones, sic'ing his pet on a now-doomed ship}}

The '''Kraken''' is a monster from European mythology, presumably Nordic, and is described as a sea-going creature of such enormous size that when it comes to the surface to doze and bask in the sunlight, sailors have been known to mistake it for an island and walk around on its back, getting a hell of a surprise when it inevitably decides to submerge again.

In the original myths, the kraken is never really described beyond being a bloody huge thing living deep under the water. In pop culture, however, it has become synonymous with an incredibly huge squid, though it's unclear if this is because of [[Dungeons & Dragons]] doing it or the other way around. Most likely this impression came about due to the examples of 12 meter long Giant Squids (''Architeuthis dux'') that occasionally wash up on shore.

==D&D==
In D&D, the Kraken is typically presented as an enormous [[aberration]] or magical beast, in the form of a ridiculously huge squid with genius-level intelligence, powerful magical abilities, and an even bigger ego. Ironically, despite 4th edition's terrible reputation, it actually preserved the traditional Kraken, and even gave it a ''nastier'' relative that hunted the [[Astral Sea]]. It was 5th edition that broke with tradition, portraying its Kraken as a deformed fish-frog-lizard thing with tentacles reminiscent of Ray Harryhausen's creation (then again no description was given in the 5e monster manual, and older lore mentions Kraken do like to ''upgrade'' themselves), it's still an egotistical super-genius with a spate of nasty legendary actions.
<gallery>
Kraken MM 1e.jpg|1e
Kraken 1e.jpg
Giant squid MCV2.jpg|2e
Giant squid MM 2e.png
Kraken 3e.jpg|3e
Astral kraken.jpg|The Astral Kraken from 3e's Planar Handbook.
Kraken 4e.jpg|4e
Kraken 5e.jpg|5e took inspiration from Clash of the Titans
Kraken saltmarsh.jpg|For some reason, the baby Kraken in [[Ghosts of Saltmarsh]] uses the 3e design. Apparently, the one from the Monster Manual was already heavily modified.
</gallery>

===[[Birthright]]===
{{Infobox Deity
|Name = Kraken
|Symbol =
|Aliases = The Many-Limbed God
|Alignment = Chaotic Evil
|Divine Rank = Unknown
|Pantheon = Cerilian
|Portfolio = Sahuagin, sea
|Domains =
|Home Plane = [[Prime Material Plane]] (''Krakennauricht'', Aebrynis)
|Worshippers = Sahuagin
|Favoured Weapon =
}}
[[Birthright]] had the Kraken as one of the unique [[awnshegh]] that bedevil Cerillia, and, atypically for one of the animalistic ones, also a super-smart genius. It is terrifying, given its massive size in a relatively-grounded and realistic campaign setting, and no one knows what the actual fuck it is, what it's doing, or why it picked the former Great Bay, now the Krakennauricht as its territory. Maybe it was one of the mounts Azrai rode across the sea, maybe it was a creature from the elemental plane of water the evil god corrupted for some inscrutable purpose. Either way, it's the biggest monster in the world... and it has enslaved the [[Sahuagin]], having destroyed their civilization and using them as its minions. They worship the Kraken as the Many-Limbed God and offer it whatever treasures they obtain from the ships they sink and live sacrifices. Most notably, the priests of the Kraken do actually have access to [[cleric]] spells, though where and how they get the spells is unknown. For some reason, it has also forbidden the Sahuagin to make themselves known to other races, leaving the Krakennauricht, and from setting foot on land, with the exception of Krakenstaur.

{{D&D-Birthright-Deities}}

==MGE==
{{monstergirls}}
In the [[Monster Girl Encyclopedia]], the kraken is a giant squid-girl, a relative of the [[scylla]]. Taking the form of a taller-than-average and hugely busty white-skinned woman with ten squid-like tentacles, they are mostly shy and retiring - but when they go hunting for a boyfriend, they have been known to sink whole ships to snatch up the man they like, leaving the rest as prey for the swarms of aquatic mamono who flock to them when they go husband-hunting. They have the ability to spit a magical ink that consumes light, creating magical patches of darkness.

==40k==
Warhammer 40k has [[Hive Fleet Kraken]], a large fleet of [[Tyranid]] organisms noted for encircling foes at every level. There are also proper krakens found on [[Fenris]], although they are largely suspected to be of Tyranid origin.

=See Also=
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDN_nGcQg7M| Mr. Rhexx's analysis of them,] [[Fleshcrafting|which attributes their new look to a love of fleshcrafting.]]
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4itm0SRxAro| Release the Kraken by Ninja Sex Party], textbook example of why one should never summon the Kraken... He's just such a huge dork.

[[Category: Monsters]]

Kraken

2021-06-21T04:31:17Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4:

{{stub}}

{{topquote|Release the Kraken! 
''The tolling of the iron bell!'' 
''Release the Kraken!'' 
''Rising from the depths of hell!''|Danny Sexbang, signing the death sentence of a kingdom}}

{{topquote|Let no joyful voice be heard! 
''Let no man look up at the sky with hope!'' 
''And let this day be cursed by we who ready to wake...'' 
''...the Kraken!'''|Davy Jones, sic'ing his pet on a now-doomed ship}}

The '''Kraken''' is a monster from European mythology, presumably Nordic, and is described as a sea-going creature of such enormous size that when it comes to the surface to doze and bask in the sunlight, sailors have been known to mistake it for an island and walk around on its back, getting a hell of a surprise when it inevitably decides to submerge again.

In the original myths, the kraken is never really described beyond being a bloody huge thing living deep under the water. In pop culture, however, it has become synonymous with an incredibly huge squid, though it's unclear if this is because of [[Dungeons & Dragons]] doing it or the other way around. Most likely this impression came about due to the examples of 12 meter long Giant Squids (''Architeuthis dux'') that occasionally wash up on shore.

==D&D==
In D&D, the Kraken is typically presented as an enormous [[aberration]] or magical beast, in the form of a ridiculously huge squid with genius-level intelligence, powerful magical abilities, and an even bigger ego. Ironically, despite 4th edition's terrible reputation, it actually preserved the traditional Kraken, and even gave it a ''nastier'' relative that hunted the [[Astral Sea]]. It was 5th edition that broke with tradition, portraying its Kraken as a deformed fish-frog-lizard thing with tentacles reminiscent of Ray Harryhausen's creation (then again no description was given in the 5e monster manual, and older lore mentions Kraken do like to ''upgrade'' themselves), it's still an egotistical super-genius with a spate of nasty legendary actions.
<gallery>
Kraken MM 1e.jpg|1e
Kraken 1e.jpg
Giant squid MCV2.jpg|2e
Giant squid MM 2e.png
Kraken 3e.jpg|3e
Astral kraken.jpg|The Astral Kraken from 3e's Planar Handbook.
Kraken 4e.jpg|4e
Kraken 5e.jpg|5e took inspiration from Clash of the Titans
Kraken saltmarsh.jpg|For some reason, the baby Kraken in [[Ghosts of Saltmarsh]] uses the 3e design. Apparently, the one from the Monster Manual was already heavily modified.
</gallery>

===[[Birthright]]===
{{Infobox Deity
|Name = Kraken
|Symbol =
|Aliases = The Many-Limbed God
|Alignment = Chaotic Evil
|Divine Rank = Unknown
|Pantheon = Cerilian
|Portfolio = Sahuagin, sea
|Domains =
|Home Plane = [[Prime Material Plane]] (''Krakennauricht'', Aebrynis)
|Worshippers = Sahuagin
|Favoured Weapon =
}}
[[Birthright]] had the Kraken as one of the unique [[awnshegh]] that bedevil Cerillia, and, atypically for one of the animalistic ones, also a super-smart genius. It is terrifying, given its massive size in a relatively-grounded and realistic campaign setting, and no one knows what the actual fuck it is, what it's doing, or why it picked the former Great Bay, now the Krakennauricht as its territory. Maybe it was one of the mounts Azrai rode across the sea, maybe it was a creature from the elemental plane of water the evil god corrupted for some inscrutable purpose. Either way, it's the biggest monster in the world... and it has enslaved the [[Sahuagin]], having destroyed their civilization and using them as its minions. They worship the Kraken as the Many-Limbed God and offer it whatever treasures they obtain from the ships they sink and live sacrifices. Most notably, the priests of the Kraken do actually have access to [[cleric]] spells, though where and how they get the spells is unknown. For some reason, it has also forbidden the Sahuagin to make themselves known to other races, leaving the Krakennauricht, and from setting foot on land, with the exception of Krakenstaur.

{{D&D-Birthright-Deities}}

==MGE==
{{monstergirls}}
In the [[Monster Girl Encyclopedia]], the kraken is a giant squid-girl, a relative of the [[scylla]]. Taking the form of a taller-than-average and hugely busty white-skinned woman with ten squid-like tentacles, they are mostly shy and retiring - but when they go hunting for a boyfriend, they have been known to sink whole ships to snatch up the man they like, leaving the rest as prey for the swarms of aquatic mamono who flock to them when they go husband-hunting. They have the ability to spit a magical ink that consumes light, creating magical patches of darkness.

==40k==
Warhammer 40k has [[Hive Fleet Kraken]], a large fleet of [[Tyranid]] organisms noted for encircling foes at every level. There are also proper krakens found on [[Fenris]], although they are largely suspected to be of Tyranid origin.

=See Also=
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDN_nGcQg7M| Mr. Rhexx's analysis of them,] [[Fleshcrafting|which attributes their new look to a love of fleshcrafting.]]
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4itm0SRxAro| Release the Kraken by Ninja Sex Party], textbook example of why one should never summon the Kraken... He's just such a huge dork.

[[Category: Monsters]]

Warlock

2021-06-21T04:25:21Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* 5e */

:''For Eldar Warlock, see [[Warlock (Eldar)|here]].''

'''Warlocks''' are a type of magic spellcaster in fantasy settings. Also, in settings where "witch" is a gendered term (such as Charmed or the average Halloween store), they are the male counterpart of witches (because imagining a dude in one of those Leg Avenue witch costumes would be too [[gay]]). In other settings, it simply denotes a different school of magic user. Compared to others, warlocks are usually dedicated completely to offensive magic and in a few cases, dabbling in the forbidden arts like black magic and daemonology to achieve more power, although this is not always the case.

==In Warhammer==
The term "warlock" and "[[witch]]" appear almost interchangeably in [[Warhammer]] and [[Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay]] as a generic term for any practitioner of evil magic. In "Realms of Sorcery", the magic [[splatbook]] for WFRPG 2e, the difference was finally spelled out; a "Witch" is any untrained magic user who has managed to advance to a sufficient degree of skill that they can cast one or more non-Petty Magic spells, and in fact a Witch can actually learn to cast spells from multiple of the Eight Lores due to being outside of the restrictive training of the Academies, but at the cost of being slightly more unstable when casting than a proper apprenticed [[Wizard]]. Conversely, a Warlock is any Witch who has progressed from the Eight Lores to actively using Dark Magic, Chaos Magic, or Necromancy; formally, Warlocks are broken in ''Daemonologists'' (practitioners of the Dark Lore and/or Chaos Magic) and ''[[Necromancer]]s'' (practitioners of Necromancy). Both were presented as Advanced Careeers for the Hedge Mage in that same book, with Witch as a progression for Hedge Mage and Warlock as a progression for Witch.

The [[Chaos]] sourcebook for that same edition, ironically, makes no mention of the term "warlock". The ''concept'' remains in the form of the various Cult Magus advanced careers, and a whole career path to represent the wargame's [[Chaos Sorcerer]] unit, starting as a lowly Maledictor before rising through the ranks as a Doomweaver, then a Soulflayer, then finally a Cataclyst.

==In Deadlands==
In [[Deadlands]], both the generic black-magic using badguy and the PC "huckster" class/archetype/thingy would technically fall under the warlock moniker, and black magicians are commonly called warlocks to boot. Hucksters are a special case in that they literally deal with the devil for their magic; whenever a huckster casts a spell, they astrally project into the Spirit World and offer a passing demon to play a game of skill & chance (poker being, of course, traditional); if the demon wins, it gets a chunk of the huckster's soul (which translates to a huge amount of physical pain and/or death for the huckster), and if the huckster wins, the demon has to surrender the mojo needed to make the huckster's spell a reality. Part of what makes spells differ in difficulty to cast is the some spells either need more juice to work than others or else are calling for stuff the demon wouldn't normally like to do - it's a lot easier to call them up to kill somebitch than to make them protect you, for example.

==In Dungeons & Dragons==
[[File:D%26D Warlock.jpg|400px|thumb|right|A Warlock class character.]]
Instead of gaining their power through meticulous training and study like the [[Wizard]], or natural-born talent like the [[Sorcerer]], they make contracts with very powerful entities and forces and channel that energy, like an arcane [[Cleric]].

Ironically, despite being defined by their pacts with powerful patrons, the root words of "warlock" actually translate as "oathbreaker". In the Christian tradition that the term originates from, this is because they have broken their "oath" to God by striking a deal with another entity (or, to be more old school about it, striking their name from God's Book of Life and signing it in Satan's black Book of Death). In D&D, it subtly telegraphs the inevitable plot hooks about conflict with the character's patron, and their sudden but inevitable betrayal.

===1e===
In 1st ed AD&D, characters had titles as they leveled up. An 8th level Magic-User gained the title "Warlock." Nobody cared about these titles, not even the people who used weapon speed or the AC to-hit modifiers for each weapon. There was a Dragon magazine article (issue 43) describing a 'witch' npc class, and male npcs that took this class were sometimes called "warlocks" instead.

===2e===
In 2nd ed AD&D, a character could take a class kit, which was essentially a set of alternate class features that you could take to add a different play style to a class. Such kits required you to meet certain requirements to take them though. In the [[Splatbook| The Complete Wizard's Handbook]], there was a Wizard kit called the Witch. In the description of the Witch kit, it is mentioned that most Witches are female, but male Witches are possible, being commonly referred to as Warlocks. The Witch kit states that the power the Witch gains, is taught to them by extraplanar entities, for a variety of reasons. In exchange for this magical knowledge though, Witches constantly had to struggle with the extraplanar entities to maintain their free will. Unlike traditional Wizards, a Witch needed to be more than just Intelligent, requiring decent Wisdom and Constitution scores as well. While this kit is not an official Warlock class, it was the first time the themes of the Warlock made it into a player class.

===3.5===
The 3.5 ed Warlock was introduced in ''[[Splatbook| Complete Arcane]]''. It looks like textbook [[munchkin]] bait, but is actually kinda ''meh''. Warlocks have at-will casting and no spells per day in 3.5, which made some people call hax but isn't so hot because very few DMs would ever run enough encounters in one in-game day for [[Vancian]] casters to completely run out of spells and most Warlock spells aren't that great anyways. Among the handful that do, some like to have [[Awesome|spells that are at-will and keep 3.5]]. One of the Warlock's most powerful abilities is to [[Dakka|DAKKADAKKADAKKA]] with Eldritch Blasts, without having an accuracy problem. This ability can win encounters, but the time necessary to do so balances it out, so this class is both for people who want fast combat going The Matrix on the ceiling, and for patient masterminds. Warlocks are [[Tier System|Tier 4]], able to do some things fairly well, but they simply don't get enough spells to remain versatile enough to participate in most encounters and have nothing game breaking enough to enter tier 2. Since their damage is static and they can't do much to improve it, they can have problems doling out enough damage to remain relevant, and a mere 2 skill points per level and no use for intelligence doesn't exactly help. Unlike most tier 4s, which would require major overhauls to bring to tier 3, Warlock just needs number tweaks to be brought to tier 3 with better skill points, spells known, and damage considered sufficient. Since Warlock invocations do not count as spells, Warlocks do not meet the "Able to cast Nth-level arcane spells" prerequisites for prestige classes like the [[Rainbow Servant]] and [[Mystic Theurge]]. Warlock levels do, however, count as arcane caster levels, so they meet the comparatively rare "Arcane caster level Nth" prerequisites of prestige classes like Acolyte of the Skin, Blood Magus, Enlightened Fist, Green Star Adept, and Wild Mage. Warlocks can also enter the few prestige classes explicitly intended for them (there are 3 such classes in ''Complete Arcane'' and 2 in other books).

Unusually for a non-core base class, Warlock got a decent amount of support in future splat where most non-core classes were forgotten by WotC beyond one or two future additions. [[Dragonfire Adept]] uses Warlock mechanics with a slightly different spin. Warlocks were even included in the base game of ''[[Neverwinter Nights]] 2'', though there's no reason to bother with one unless the module you're playing restricts resting (as both expansion packs do) since a wizard can regain his spells in (literally) 6 seconds in this game.

Warlock is an unusually potent [[Dip Class]] since many of the abilities they can get at level 1 are passives that last all day.

===Pathfinder===
[[Pathfinder]] didn't give the warlock a conversion due to the non OGL status of the 3rd edition version. ''Occult Adventures'', however, introduced the [[Kineticist]] class, which follows Warlock mechanically a bit more closely than [[Magus]] to [[Duskblade]], but thematically you are an element bender instead of having made vague deals with evil outsiders or fey. Unfortunately, the Kineticist is also considered one of the most difficult classes to build in Pathfinder, and the hardest to understand. The [[witch]] takes up the flavor portion of the warlock while having its own mechanics.

Then ''Ultimate Intrigue'' came along and made warlock an archetype of the Vigilante. In this context, they are more Vigilante Arcane spellcasters. While they have some Magus spellcasting, they also can sling magical bolts, and still use almost all the vigilante tricks of misdirection, masked combat, and walking straight past the guards after making a quick change of outfits. Sadly the mystic bolts thing is utterly non-supported and falls apart by mid-levels without third party materials, but you're still proficient in martial weapons and have pretty decent casting. About the only thing beyond general ranged attacks they can qualify for and make use of is the ability to change bolts to bludgeoning, piercing or slashing with the Weapon Versatility feat, but this just means they're subject to damage reduction. With third party material however, the mystic bolts become a potent weapon in their own right, albeit at the cost of your already limited talents.

===4e===
When 4th edition rolled around, Warlocks made a surprising leap into the [[Player's Handbook]], supplanting the [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|Sorcerer]] as "the other PHB [[mage]] class". Classified as Arcane Strikers, Warlocks were flavored as eerie, sinister casters who could place victims under dread curses and gain magical benefits by reaping the souls of those they had cursed. They were also somewhat stealthy, thanks to their "Shadow Walk" feature, which granted them concealment until the end of their next turn on any turn in which they moved at least 3 squares. Like all classes in core 4e, the Warlock had subclasses, and a very obvious basis: their Pact, or what 5e would rename their Patron; the specific kind of unearthly entity that the warlock had received their power from, which even dictated one of their cantrips and also determined which kind of bonus they got from reaping the souls of those they had cursed. As a result, they started with three patron types in the PHB; the Fey, the Infernal, and the Star. In a step that 5e wouldn't replicate, a paragon level (11+) Warlock could take a feat called ''Twofold Pact'', which represented them swearing allegiance to a '''second''' patron and getting access to its associated cantrip and pact boon, allowing them to choose which boon to benefit from whenever they dropped a cursed enemy.

The '''Fey Pact''' was made with an [[Archfey]] or, really, any particularly strong [[fey]]. Fey spells tend to have themes of either "glamour magic" (seductive, intoxicating enchantments") or savage nature-type magic (such as setting a pack of ravenous sprites on a foe that rend the flesh from their bones). Their mandatory cantrip is Eyebite, and their pact boon is Misty Step (teleport 3 squares when a cursed creature drops to 0 HP).

The '''Infernal Pact''' was, as you can probably guess, made with a scheming [[devil]], or maybe even one of the [[Archdevil]]s. The least subtle of the pacts, it's all about scouring foes with fire, sucking away their souls, or invoking other hostile elements from [[Baator]]. Is mandatory spell is Hellish Rebuke and its pact boon is Dark One's Blessing (gain temporary HP equal to your level when a cursed creature drops to 0 HP).

The '''Star Pact''' is an odd one, with elements of the [[Cthulhu Mythos]] - basically, in the [[World Axis]] cosmology, certain stars are sapient and they're basically giant [[aberration]]s, which can bestow powers on those willing to risk communion with them. These stars were so new that they actually got an article in [[Dragon Magazine]] ("Wish Upon A Star", #366) that went full Lovecraft, detailing some of the most common of these "dark stars" and a [[Paragon Path]], the Student of Caiphon, dedicated to one of these stars - something that would be followed up in Dragon #403's "Strange Constellations", which adapted Atropus, Father Llymic, Pandorym, Ragnorra and The Worm That Walks from 3e's [[Elder Evils]] into star-fiends that can empower warlocks. Arcane Power would present a far more benevolent motif for the Star-lock in the Master of Starry Skies PP, but overall they remain a creepy, creepy son of a bitch - and the only class in the PHB other than the [[Cleric]] that specializes in doing radiant damage! Their mandatory cantrip is Dire Radiance, and their pact boon is Fate of the Void (you gain a +1 bonus to one D20 roll of your choice made before the end of your next turn when a cursed creature drops to 0 HP - this bonus stacks, but it only remains usable for one turn).

For those curious, the "dark stars" named in that issue are Acamar, Caiphon, Delban, Gibbeth, Hadar, Ihbar, Khirad, Nihal, Ulban and Zhudun. These had actually first appeared as part of certain powers in the PHB1, alongside a never-detailed star called Thuban ("Tendrils of Thuban", a level 15 daily spell, which paralyzes and consumes a cluster of foes with tendrils of liquid summoned from the frozen emerald seas that lie under the star Thuban). The [[Monster Manual]] 3 would create a sadly under-developed monster category called the [[Star Spawn]]; celestial aberrations representing the progeny of these terrible stars, and even statting one such star - Allabar, Opener of the Way, a living planet corrupted by the [[Far Realm]] - as the most powerful of them.

When the [[Forgotten Realms]] Player's Guide rolled around for 4e, it introduced the new '''Dark Pact''', an alliance made with horrible, malevolent spirits native to the [[Underdark]] and popular with [[drow]] warlocks, resulting in spells focused on darkness, poison, madness, and spite. Several of its iconic spells possess the ability to gain upgrades if you inflict damage on your allies, although even without this "augment" they're quite beefy. Its mandatory cantrip is Spiteful Glamor, and its surprisingly complex pact boon is Darkspiral Aura (when a cursed creature drops to 0 HP, your Darkspiral Aura value gains 1 point; you can use your Darkspiral Aura as an immediate interrupt when an enemy makes a melee or ranged attack against you, inflicting 1d6/1d8/1d10 Necrotic & Psychic Damage per point in your Darkspiral Aura; if this damage is less than 12, your Aura drops to 0 points; if more than 12 damage, you can halve the damage you take and your Aura drops to 1 point - you lose all Aura points when you take a short rest).

[[Dark Sun]] did the same thing; the '''Sorcerer-King's Pact''' was its attempt to recreate the [[Templar]] of AD&D, that strange pseudo-priestly class that derived its powers from its oath of allegiance to the tyrannical mage-psions of Athas' last cities. Its mandatory cantrip is Hand of Blight, and its pact boon is Fell Scorn - this strange feature is borrowing some elements from the psionics rules system, and can trip up an unobservant reader; the Sorcerer-King pacted Warlock has a single point of "Fell Might", which can be spent when casting certain spells in order to trigger some upgraded effects, and is recharged whenever the warlock drops a cursed creature to 0 HP. This trait is controversial to say the least because, normally, pact-associated spells don't need to spend this sort of resource to get their bonus. Even though Fell Might will recharge like crazy because, hey, cursing people is what a warlock is supposed to ''do'', it still leaves a sour taste in the mouth.

Arcane Power would introduce what many wrongly believed to be the last of the Core pacts, in the form of the '''[[Vestige]] Pact'''; obviously themed after the [[Binder]] of last edition, the Vestige Pact calls upon the spirits of bizarre ghosts and ancient, forgotten entities, with a unique mechanic attached to it. Each Daily power associated with this pact, always named "Vestige of whoever", becomes a Vestige in the Warlock's arsenal. Whenever the warlock completes a rest, they can determine which Vestige is their "Active" Vestige - they can also choose to change their Active Vestige whenever they use one of those Vestige powers, causing the newly invoked Vestige to become Active. Your Active Vestige determines the effects of your pact boon and the secondary effects of your mandatory cantrip, "Eyes of the Vestige".

The reason that neither Vestige nor Sorcerer-King was the last of the Core 4e Warlock Pacts? Hidden in the Essentials era sourcebook "Heroes of the Elemental Chaos" is the '''Elemental Pact''' for core warlocks. Representing the obvious choice of a warlock drawing their power from a [[Archomental|Primordial]], this [[elementalist]] warlock has some slight overlap with the [[Wild Mage]], but not much. It gains the bonus feature "Elemental Affinity", where you have Affinity to either Acid, Cold, Fire, Fire, Lightning or Thunder - this is determined randomly each time you complete a rest, and you can change your Elemental Affinity when you invoke your second wind. When you cast an arcane attack power that deals Force, Necrotic, Poison or Psychic damage, you can make it inflict whichever damage type you have Elemental Affinity for instead. Its pact boon is Accursed Affinity; after you drop at least one cursed victim, everyone you place your Curse on for the rest of the encounter gains Vulnerability (5/tier) to whichever damage type you currently have Elemental Affinity with.

Essentials also introduced two Warlock [[Variant Class]]es (alternatively known as subclasses); "Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms" introduced the [[Hexblade]], an Arcane Striker-Defender that is basically a cross between a Warlock and a [[Swordmage]], whilst "Heroes of Shadow" introduced the [[Binder]], a restyling of the Warlock into a full-fledged Arcane Controller.

The Hexblade was initially introduced with only Fey and Infernal Pact options; it gained its own version of the Star Pact in Dragon #393, an Elemental Pact in "Heroes of the Elemental Chaos", and a Gloom Pact in "Heroes of Shadow".

The Binder, as the very last Warlock derivative to emerge prior to 4e's cancellation, only had the two Pacts; Gloom and Star, both in its native "Heroes of Shadow". It did manage to gain a Fey Pact for itself in Dragon #406.

It bears mentioning that, whilst original/"Core style" warlocks can take the spells from both the Binder and the Hexblade for themselves, the "Pacts" as used by these variant classes are not synonymous with the Core-lock's Pacts, so Gloom Pact spells have no special riders when used by non-Binders or Hexblades. This is one of the many reasons why most of 4e's fans didn't like the "simplified" versions of classes created for Essentials.

4e paired the Warlock class up with the [[Tiefling]] race, much like how Dwarves make iconic [[Fighter]]s or [[Clerics]], or Elves make good [[Wizard]]s, or [[Half-orc]]s make good [[Barbarian]]s. 5e continues this tradition.

====4e Sample Patrons====
Issue #381 of [[Dragon Magazine]] featured an article called "Performing the Pact", which provided some example Patrons for each of the five pacts available at the time.

The Dark Pact patron is ''Yorgrix, Weaver of the Poison Web'': once a demonweb spider kept as a [[familiar]] by an overconfident [[drow]] matron, Yorgrix patiently mastered the dark magic it watched its mistress perform and then, fueled by hunger and ambition, slew and devoured both her and the entire city in which she dwelled. Glutted on countless souls, Yorgrix was transformed into a dread spirit; now imprisoned in the city it massacred, it reaches out to the minds of mortals with a simple promise: power for food.

The Fey Pact patron is ''The Eochaid'', a strange [[fey]] spirit embodying the interplay between nature and arcane magic, and which manifests as a strange amalgamation of humanoid, animal and plant. Ancient as the [[Seldarine]] themselves, the Eochaid desires only to promote and strengthen magic, seeking its growth. Those willing to plant magic's seed - and to retrieve arcane artifacts for it to protect - are blessed with its wild hexes and unearthly glamors.

The Infernal Pact patron is ''The Prisoner in Iron'', an infernal warlock of such power that the [[Archdevil]]s feared him and have bound him in the deepest dungeons of Dis, hoping to hide him forever. But such is his power that he can still reach out to the mortal world, offering tutelage to the ambitious, seeking to empower a champion mighty enough to free him from his chains.

The Star Pact patron is ''Ulban, the Wanderer''; a sapient time-traveling comet from a far-flung apocalypse, the last survivor of its universe. Now it wanders space and time, empowering those who, in some inscrutable way, will play their part in prevent Ulban's future from coming to be - often battling against the other dark stars in the process.

The Vestige Pact patron is ''The Bleak Guide'', a reaper-like entity from the [[Shadowfell]] charged with maintaining the orderly transition of life to death, and more than willing to act as a go-between for [[vestige]]s and those mortals who will use their power to make is own existence easier. It can't act against the [[necromancer]]s and [[undead]] that vex it so - but its mortal agents, on the other hand...

===5e===
The 5e Warlock is a complicated marriage of 3e invocations, 4e pacts, and 5e spellcasting, with a few caveats. They gain a pitiful amount of spell slots, as well as only a handful of spells known. To the untrained player's eye, they're painfully limited compared to "real" casters, but in reality they're <strike>roid-pumping nightmares</strike> not bad. Their spell slots all automatically scale the slot level up so their spells are always guaranteed to be pumped up, and also refresh after every encounter or few (short rest). Invocations are back from 3.5, albeit scaled back a bit, providing various kinds of special abilities, from access to spells that aren't on their list as at-will, encounter or daily powers, to power-ups for the pact form, and of course power-ups for Eldritch Blast.

To complete the Warlock package, you get a pact with a supernatural being. The pact gives you a thematic extended spell list; for example, Great Old One Warlocks can cast (but not spam, sadly) Evard's Black Tentacles. Pacts provide a bevvy of unique class features like teleportation, damage resistance or telepathy. On top of magical powers, they also give you a consolation prize in the form of a pact boon, which can either be a souped-up familiar, a free enchanted weapon that you can shapeshift into whatever kind of weapon you need (and you always have proficiency with it, even if it's currently in a form you wouldn't otherwise have proficiency with), or a magical book that gives you an additional three cantrips that can each come from ''a separate class's list''. An alternative pact boon was the Star Chain, introduced in "Non Divine Faithful", which closely ties into the Seeker patron: this is a magical trinket that can be used to cast ''Augury'' and can be used to grant Advantage on an Int check once per short rest. A better alternate pact boon is the talisman, introduced in the class features UA, a magic necklace that allows whoever wears it (which can be you or anyone else, no attunement slot required) to add a d4 to an ability check roll if they aren't proficient in the pertinent skill. This was later made official with Tasha's Cauldron of everything, but was nerfed so that it can only be used a number of times per long rest equal to your proficiency modifier.

The available pacts are:

''Archfey'' - Bound to a powerful faerie lord or sylvan pseudo-deity, a warlock with this pact gains the power of Fey Presence (Charm or Frighten all creatures in a 10ft cube around you once per short rest), Misty Escape (teleport 60 feet and turn invisible once per short rest), Beguiling Defenses (you are immune to Charming and can attempt to Charm anyone foolish enough to try a Charm effect on you) and Dark Delirium (can attempt to entrap a target in an illusion to Charm or Terrify it once per short rest). This one is in the Player's Handbook.

''Fiend'' - Bound to a [[Demon Prince]], [[Archdevil]], [[yugoloth|Ultraloth]], powerful [[demodand|ghereleth]], or other sufficiently-powerful entity native to the lower planes, a warlock with this pact gains Dark One's Blessing (gain temporary HP for dropping another creature to zero HP), Dark One's Luck (can add a d10 to an ability check or saving throw after you roll it once per short rest), Fiendish Resilience (gain Resistance to a single damage type of your choice after completing a short rest, though magic and silvered weapons can pierce it) and Hurl Through Hell (teleport a target into some hellish dimension for 1 turn, causing 10d10 Psychic damage to a non-fiendish target, once per long rest). This one is in the Player's Handbook.

''Great Old One'' - Warlocks with this pact are bound to terrible abominations from outside time and space, drawing on the power of aberrant gods like [[Cthulhu]]. They gain the boons of Awakened Mind (telepathy with a 30ft range), Entropic Ward (can make yourself harder to hit and get a bonus if the target missed once per short rest), Thought Shield (mind cannot be involuntarily read, Resistance to Psychic Damage, inflict equal Psychic damage on anyone who inflicts Psychic damage on you) and Create Thrall (permanently charm a single creature with a touch, gaining telepathic communication with them from anywhere on the same plane, so good luck justifying ''this'' ability with a good-aligned character). This one is in the Player's Handbook.

''Undying'' - A Warlock with this pact has offered their soul to something that has "cheated death"; most obviously a powerful [[lich]], [[ghost]] or [[vampire]], but mortals ascended to godhood and weirder things are also valid. [[Planescape: Torment|The Nameless One]] isn't mentioned, but would be a perfectly thematic (and awesome!) patron for this pact. The "necromantic" pact, these warlocks get features related to the ability to cheat death; Among the Dead (Spare the Dying as a bonus cantrip, Advantage on saving throws against disease, Undead must pass a Wisdom save to attack you), Defy Death (gain a significant healing 1/day by passing a death saving throw or using Spare the Dying), Undying Nature (can hold your breath indefinitely, don't need food, water or sleep, immunity to magical aging, age 1 year for every 10 you live) and Indestructible Life (can freely heal yourself 1/encounter, including reattaching limbs as part of it). Comes from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.

''[[Hexblade]]'' - Basically, you want to play a character inspired by Sauron or Arthas with Morgoth or Lich King style figure; your power is with a mysterious [[Shadowfell]] entity that makes its presence felt through powerful weapons bound with shadowy magic. [[derp|Despite this, you don't have to take the Pact of the Blade.]] Having first appeared in [[Unearthed Arcana]], the official version came out in "Xanathar's Guide", at which point it seems to have absorbed some of the fluff, if not the crunch, from the [[Raven Queen]] patron featured in that same UA. This pledge makes the warlock more of a melee combatant, in the vein of the class it takes its name from; their two level 1 features are ''Hexblade's Curse'' (1/short rest, place a curse on a foe within 30ft that makes your attacks more likely to hit and heals you if they die whilst cursed) and ''Hex Warrior'' (you can enchant one-handed weapons you are proficient with to use Charisma for their attack & damage rolls; if you've the Pact of the Blade, your Pact Weapon always has this trait no matter the form it takes, also you get free proficiency with medium armor, shields and martial weapons). At level 6, they gain ''Accursed Specter'' (raise a slain humanoid as a loyal specter 1/day). Their level 10 feature, ''Armor of Hexes'', buffs up their curse by letting the warlock negate a cursed opponent's attack against them on a 4+. Finally, at level 14, they get ''Master of Hexes'', which lets them forgo the healing effect for dropping a cursed opponent to instead immediately reapply that curse to a fresh opponent. Its bonus spells are close-ranged, a mixture of protective spells (shield, blur, blink) and temporary weapon enchantments - the only exceptions are Phantasmal Killer and Cone of Cold.

''Celestial'' - This is the "good guy warlock" patron option, where you make a pact with an [[angel]] of some description. In mechanics, it's a refluffed version of the Undying Light Patron presented in an earlier Unearthed Arcana - ironically, unlike the Hexblade, this version was so well-received that WoTC saw no need to change its subclass features when they reprinted it for the Xanathar's Guide to Everything. The difference between the two versions is that it adds some healing spells to its list of bonus spells, instead of just fire/radiant damage-dealers, and rearranges what levels you get which features at. At 1st level, you gain Healing Light - the "heal with a touch" feature from the UL Patron, which it didn't get until level 14 - and Light & Sacred Flame as bonus cantrips. At level 6 it gets Radiant Soul, which is Resistance (Radiance) and bonus to radiant & fire damage, a feature the UL got at 1st level. They both get the same "bonus temporary HP on completing a rest" feature at level 10, but the Celestial renames it the Celestial Resilience trait. Finally, it gets Searing Vengeance - 1/day, when reduced to death, spring up at half maximum hitpoints and inflict radiant damage & blindness on all enemies within 30 feet - as its 14th level trait, when for the UL Patron it was a 6th level feature.
*More on that last ability: specifically, you can use it once per day, and you can opt to activate it instead of rolling a death save. So here's one way for you to exploit it: ''Celestial Warlock Drop Pod Bombing Runs''. It's kinda like the ODST drop pods from Halo, except without the actual pods. You get a bunch of other celestial warlocks, recruit a bunch of griffins or dragons or whatever, ride them over pearl harbor, then deliberately drop off your rides. After you get all your bones broken by the crash, you activate your Searing Vengence, then start shooting eldritch blasts, while topping off your health with your Healing light ability for your bonus actions. (of course the key here is that this ability can only be triggered ''when you would be otherwise forced to roll a death save'', and in 5e, if an attack that downs you has enough remaining overkill damage to equal your maximum possible HP, it will just kill your character outright, no death saves allowed. So if your ride's altitude is high enough for the fall damage to be ridiculous, then instead of looking like clever badasses, [[Modron|monodrones]] will just teleport in to put Darwin awards on your <s>corpses</s> puddles.)

''Fathomless'' - For the warlocks who want tentacle powers, but feel that Great Old One patrons are nothing but landlubbers. This patron basically gives you the ability to summon tentacles and adapts your body to life in the deep, cold ocean. Overall, an excellent choice if you want to have '''''Davy Jones''''' as your patron.

''[[Genie]]'' - Your [[Elementalist]] warlock, you have to choose specifically whether your patron is a [[dao]], [[djinn]], [[efreet]] or [[marid]]. You get some generically genie-like spells (detect evil/good, phantasmal force, create food & water, phantasmal killer, creation, wish), plus some elemental spells determined by your patron's elemental alignment. You start off with a "Genie Vessel", which is any kind of trinket that could potentially have held a genie; the traditional lamp, a bottle, an urn, a lantern, a hollow statuette, or a ring with a compartment; this holds an extradimensional lounge room in it that you can teleport into to hide, emulating the "genie in the vessel" yourself - at 10th level, you can bring up to 5 willing creatures along with you when you do. At 1st level, you can do bonus elemental damage on an attack once per turn. At 6th level, you gain elemental resistance and can fly through levitation for a few periods of time per day. Finally, at 14th level, you can gain a Limited Wish that emulates the effects of a 6th level or lower spell once every 1d4 days. Elemental damage granted by your features is determined by your patron; bludgeoning for a dao, Thunder for a djinni, Fire for an efreet, and Cold for a marid. This pact is also your best official option for another kind of elemental patron, such as an [[Archomental]] or the [[Elder Elemental Eye]]. Got added to the game in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything. If this version doesn't take your fancy, there's also the [[Scarred Lands]] and [[Midgard]] versions, which ironically aren't as different from the official version or each other as you might initially think, or mix-and-matching with the playtest version that had better mechanics for its spell list and elemental resistance.

====Semi-Official Stuff====
The Warlock has been surprisingly well-off in terms of [[Unearthed Arcana]] content, with the Ghost in the Machine, Undying Light, Seeker, [[Hexblade]] and [[Raven Queen]] patrons in Unearthed Arcana, and the [[Kraken]] and [[Lolth]] patrons created by Mearls and released either on his Stream or in Twitter. As stated, the Undying Light was reworked into the Celestial Patron, and the Hexblade made it into the game in Xanathar's Guide, and you can read up on the UA articles on its page.

But what about Mearls' creations? Well...

'''Lolth''' as a Patron is a kind of dark mirror to the normal [[Archfey]] patron, combining some obvious Lolth references with bits of the [[Queen of Air and Darkness]]. Her bonus spells are Faerie Fire and Jump (1st level spells), Darkness and Web (2nd level spells), Fear and Vampiric Touch (3rd level spells), Dimension Door and Giant Insect (4th level spells), and Cloudkill & Hold Monster (5th level spells).
* Her level 1 class feature is ''Dark Queen's Servitor''; this is basically a modified version of [[Druid|Wild Shape]] that lets you turn into a giant spider, whose bite does bonus poison damage based on your level. The big draw is that you can still cast your Bonus Spells whilst in giant spider form.
* At level 6, she grants you the ''Poisoned Beauty'' feature, which lets you attempt to inflict the Charmed and Vulnerable (Poison) conditions on a visible creature for 1 minute (or until damaged) if it fails a Charisma save. You can use this ability once per Short Rest.
* At level 10, she grants you the ''Spider Queen's Chosen'' feature, which gives you Resistance (Non-Magical Bludgeoning/Piercing/Slashing) when you're in Spider Form.
* Finally, at 14th level, she gives you the ''Kiss of the Spider Queen'' feature, which lets you spend an action to touch a creature; the victim of your touch takes 12d10 damage (your choice of Poison or Psychic), or half that if it succeeds on a Constitution save. You can only use this ability once per Long Rest, and a creature Charmed by you has Disadvantage on its save.

The '''Kraken''' Patron is pretty unique, and it makes a nicely themed pairing with a [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|Storm Sorcerer]]. Its bonus spells are a mixture of "storm [[elementalism]]" (thunderwave, create/destroy water, gust of wind, call lightning, water breathing, control water, cone of cold), two divinatory spells (augury, commune with nature) and Evard's Black Tentacles, which is an obvious fit.
* At level 1, you gain the feature ''Grasp of the Kraken'', which lets you summon writhing spectral tentacles at a point you can see within 60 feet. Creatures you target within 10ft of that point must make a Strength save against your Warlock spell save DC, or be grappled for 1 minute or until you use this ability again. A spectral tentacle has a Str (Athletics) bonus of 2 + your Proficiency bonus, and a reach of 10 feet.
* At level 6, you can the feature ''Inky Escape'', which lets you drop a Darkness (5ft radius) on a point within 5ft of you as a Reaction to taking damage once per short rest. You can see through this darkness, obviously.
* At level 10, you gain the powerful ''Scion of the Depths'' feature, which grants you the ability to breathe water, a swim speed equal to your normal speed, and Immunity (Lightning). When your immunity reduces damage from an effect to 0, as a reaction you can cause creatures of your choice that you can see within 30 ft. of you to take lightning damage equal to your Charisma modifier + your proficiency bonus.
* Finally, at level 14, you gain the feature ''Unleash the Kraken'', which lets you open a portal at a point visible within 30 feet of you. When you open the portal, kraken tentacles pour through it, and you must choose which boon you gain from the list below. Once you use this ability, you must complete a long rest before you can use it again.
** ''Transport:'' You and up to 5 creatures of your choosing that you can see are grasped by tentacles that emerge from the portal. A second portal opens at a point of your choice within 100 miles that you have visited in the past 24 hours, depositing you and your chosen allies there.
** ''Fury:'' The tentacles slam into your foes. Pick up to 5 creatures that you can see within 30 ft. of the portal. Those creatures must make Dexterity saving throws against your Warlock spell save DC. Creatures that fail their saving throws take 10d6 bludgeoning damage and are restrained for 1 minute. Creatures that succeed take half the bludgeoning damage and are not restrained. On its turn, a restrained creature can use its action to attempt a DC 15 Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check to end its restrained condition.

The Kraken Patron above eventually got bumped up to a slightly higher tier of Semi-official with the release of the September UA's '''Lurker in the Deep Patron''', which pays a lot of homage to the above. It can be seen as an upgrade to the Kraken Patron. The bonus spells are exactly the same.
* At level 1, you get the ''Grasp of the Deep'', which is basically the same thing as Grasp of the Kraken, but instead of grappling with the tentacles you get to smack someone repeatedly for 1d8 (upgrades to 2d8 at level 10) cold/lightning damage as a bonus action. It also reduces their speed by 10 feet temporarily. Also at level 1, you get ''Scion of the Deep'', which lets you telepathically communicate to anything with a swimming speed like Aquaman.
* At level 6, you get ''Fathomless Soul'', which gives you a bunch of sea-themed goodies: the ability to breathe air and water, resistance to cold damage, and a swimming speed equal to your walking speed. You also get ''Guardian Grasp'', which allows you to halve any incoming damage for you or your buddies by wrapping your tentacle around them. This will make the tentacle go away, but it's well worth it.
* At level 10, you get ''Devouring Maw'' which summons a giant gaping maw that restrains foes in an area on a failed save, deals them an automatic 3d6 cold/lightning damage, and nets you some sweet temp hp equal to your Warlock level as long as there is someone near the maw.
* As your capstone at level 14, you get ''Unleash the Depths'' which is more or less the same thing as Unleash the Kraken above. The only major difference is that the Fury half of unleash does 6d10 cold rather than 10d6 Bludgeoning, and knocks people prone.

===Class Feature Variants===
The November 2019 UA granted quite a few things to the Warlock aside from the ability to swap out a spell each long rest (A necessity with how cramped the Warlock's slots are) and some new spells.

Each of the existing pacts gain some new Invocations, with Tomelocks gaining more spell-like powers and Advantage on concentration saves, Bladelocks gaining automatic armor proficiency, and Chainlocks being able to make their pets attack as a bonus. However, the biggest update here is the new Pact - The Pact of the Talisman gives you a talisman that allows whoever wears it (which can be you or anyone else, no attunement slot required) to add a d4 to an ability check roll (and saving throw if you have the pertinent invocation) if they aren't proficient in the pertinent skill. The other eldritch invocations specific to this pact require someone other than you to be wearing the talisman, as the first one allows you and said person to teleport to each other as an action, and the other lets you counter-attack something who hurts the person wearing your talisman.

===A minor footnote on D&D 4e and 5e Warlocks===

One of the roleplaying possibilities for Warlocks that sometimes gets mentioned is that once empowered, the Warlock is under no obligation to keep obeying their Patron. The rules explicitly do not contain any references to any of the patrons being able to strip the powers from a Warlock, unlike, say, a Paladin--in other words, the implication is that once granted, a Warlock's powers are theirs to keep. (It's mildly worth mentioning that "Warlock" descends from the old English ''"wǣrloga"'', meaning "traitor or deceiver" ("wǣr", meaning "covenant, truce, or pact" and "loga", meaning "liar"), and that kind of name cuts both ways.)

This was intentional (as, among other things, it allowed for Lawful Good Infernal Warlocks without the need for some very creative roleplaying), and influenced the initial three 4e Patron choices (and a few later ones): Who would give away free power to mortals that you could not revoke? Somebody whose cause is advanced by the mere usage of that power; Devils, Archfey and The Great Old Ones all obviously qualify (as did [[Vestige]]s)--all were (in 4e's default cosmology, at least) restrained in some way from the mortal world, and higher level 4e Warlock powers, at least, frequently gave them some temporary purchase on said world when used. On top of that, from the immortal patron's point of view, letting the recalcitrant Warlock keep their power is a good PR stunt: sure, one mortal might balk, but others will start wondering where he got his powers from. Others that might be more amenable to the patron's goal...

([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiS5mkIff_8 Here's a Mike Mearls interview] that explicitly notes this possibility in 5e, as well. Then again, Mearls also implies in that interview that Clerics can turn against their Deity and still have their Divine Magic, so take that claim for what it's worth. Admittedly, Divine classes did lose their "powers are revoked if your deity is pissed" trait in 4e, so it's not unprecedented.)

DMs should also note that while the Patron cannot directly withdraw the Warlock's new powers, they are also not restricted from sending repo men to get the recalcitrant Warlock back in line if the Warlock still has debt outstanding.

===How to build a warlock that the [[Paladin]] won't try to kill===

At first glance the warlock would look like a class that would be difficult to justify having a Good alignment. This is not true; all it takes is some roleplaying creativity and lore familiarity. Here are some ideas sorted by pact:

''Archfey''
*There are just as many Good or Neutral Fey as there are Evil ones. Just take your pick.
*You actually work for a full Faerie Court. The Evil jerk you take orders from is just your immediate supervisor and/or teacher, and you sometimes report to somebody non-Evil further up the chain of command on what he has you doing, just to make sure he's not using you for his personal benefit.

''Fathomless''
*This category includes water elementals and "merfolk demigods" neither of which are necessarily evil by default. For example, your patron could be [[Ben-Hadar]], Elemental Prince of Good Water Creatures, though he's not canon to 5e yet.
*The Fiendish ideas can also work here if your patron is [[Dagon]], demon prince of all things aquatic.

''Fiend''
*You offered someone on one side of the [[Blood War]] your services against the other, on the condition that you *only* be sent to kill people connected to the enemy (This is easiest with whoever's currently [[Archdevil|Archduke]] of the first layer of [[Baator]], since they have to fumigate their lawn of demons every freaking morning and are always looking for help).
*You made the old classic "Sell the soul of my future firstborn child to the devil in exchange for power" bargain... but conveniently failed to mention that you're gay (this also works with the archfey pact if none of the good or neutral options appeal to you, since fairy tale creatures sometimes have a habit of abducting children).
*You straight-up bought the powers from Mammon, Archduke of greed, with ordinary freaking money. Because Mammon is a fiend who actually does that.
*Like the Hellknights of [[Pathfinder]], you are more concerned with order and empire-building than being evil. Stability is your primary concern. (Be warned, some Paladins will probably still kill you for this)
*You were a prostitute (the "hate this job but am fucking broke" kind), and got a visit from [[Graz'zt]] or [[Malcanthet]] one day, who opted to give you the powers instead of money as payment. You still [[/d/| don't like to talk about that day]], but in the end, it allowed you to pursue other means of employment.
*There have been ''extremely'' rare cases of fiends working to redeem themselves, such as [[Planescape: Torment|Fall-From-Grace]] and [http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/fc/20050824a Eludecia]. Your patron could be one of these rare fiends that is either working to achieve redemption, or has already been redeemed, though your DM may rule that such a being owuld grant a Celestial pact instead.
* You're a Purified and your pact is with the [[Church_of_the_Silver_Flame|Silver Flame]] itself. It's just influenced by Bel Shalor.
* Your job is to tempt Chaotic Evil people into Law, rather than to temp Lawful Good people into Evil.

''Genie''
* While [[Dao]] and [[Efreeti]] are evil, [[Djinn]] are chaotic good by default, and [[Marid]]s are chaotic neutral. Just pick the latter two.
* If you really want an Efreet or Dao patron, you could say that you freed one from imprisonment and he offered you a wish in gratitude. Your wish was for the powers.

''Ghost In the Machine''
* Just because a brain is made of metal doesn't mean that the resulting personality is automatically predisposed towards any one particular mindset, worldview, or attitude towards fleshies. Just look at the Warforged of Ebberon. Really, you could give your patron any characterization under the sun here.

''Great Old One''
*This one is actually a lot easier than you might think. Firstly, it's important to remember that Far Realm entities aren't evil-aligned, they're [incomprehensible symbol] or [different incomprehensible symbol]-aligned. Secondly, most GOO's are by-nature nearly-if-not-completely impossible for beings native to the [[Great Wheel]] to cognitively process, so if you're lazy you could just say that your patron, Covfefe the unknowable, never explained their motives to you and thrust these powers upon you without you ever having asked for them in the first place.
*Heck, the PHB itself outright says that a GOO patron doesn't even need to be '''aware''' of you, and that your powers might've just come from reading a copy of the Necronomicon!
*If you insist on having a backstory more fleshed-out than that however, then you could say that your patron finds the Great Wheel reality and its denizens just as alien and incomprehensible as we would the GOO's, and is using you to try to make sense of it as best they can; they might for example periodically take over your body and crudely try to mimic common human activities (the way an ape or toddler would) in an attempt to discern the meaning behind them.
**Or your Patron sees through your eyes, and asks you strange questions; but as long as you survive, and seek out "interesting" things, it's happy just to observe the mortal world through you. (Think "Very strange overly-inquisitive six-year old".)
*You developed a beef with devils for some reason, and were offered warlock powers by [[Zargon]], the leader of the Baatorans and the guy who ruled [[Baator]] before Asmodeus kicked him out. Also works as a fiendish patron.
*Your patron is Caiphon, a [[Awesome|giant, sapient, purple star that wanders around the night sky]], said to have an important role to play in the future of the world. (This being is listed among the "Elder Evils," [[What|but those beings, despite the name, are noted to only ''generally'' be evil]]).
**Or your patron is Ulban; a sapient comet made from the last surviving souls after a future apocalypse which has traveled back in time to recruit agents to prevent that apocalypse from coming to pass.

''Undying''
*Remember, the description for this patron is that they have "Cheated death" somehow, so they don't have to be undead; As mentioned above, entities like originally-mortal gods or The Nameless One (the PC from the videogame [[Planescape: Torment]]) would work just fine here.
* You serve [[The Undying Court]] of Eberron.
*Your patron is an ''Arch''lich, which is a type of lich who isn't evil (they've been in D&D lore for longer than the "must periodically feed mortal souls to phylactery to stay around" aspect of lichdom has, so they probably sustain themselves on bandits and murderhobos, the plane of positive energy, or maybe just sheer force of willpower and magical might).
*Another non-evil pseudo-lich is the Baelnorn, elven liches that become undead so that they can guard a particular area, clan, or object. Maybe something important was stolen from the place they're protecting, but they can't go after it themselves because that would mean abandoning their post and leaving it vulnerable to thieves or attackers.
*Most of the Fiendish ideas can also work here if your Patron is [[Orcus]], the Demon Prince of the Undead (doubly so since he was originally a mortal). Loopholes, ho!

''Hexblade''
*The [[Shadowfell]] is no more an inherently Evil plane any more than [[Feywild]] is an inherently Good one. Maybe your Patron weapon really hates Fey creatures or some such.
*There is no reason you could not refluff the hexblade to be any kind of high powered magical sentient sword and the archetype could also work if you, say, had Excalibur as your patron. or maybe it's just an axe that's always eager for you to hit stuff with it.
*Since the Shadowfell is (among other things) the "waiting room" where the recently deceased get sorted into the proper [[Outer Planes|Outer Plane]], your Patron could be something that seeks to destroy undead and send them where, in its eyes, they should've arrived long ago.

''Celestial''
*Normally this pact should present even less of a problem than the Archfey one, but it can be just as problematic as any of the others if, say, the DM is running an Explicitly Evil Campaign set in [[Ravenloft]]. So in a situation like that, you could for example say that your Patron gifted you your powers as an act of goodwill in the hopes that it might change your outlook on life.
*Or more believably, your patron could be an evil Empyrean.
*A fallen angel could also work as an evil Celestial patron, though some DMs may rule them as only being eligible as Fiend patrons.

''Any''
*Your powers come from your (likely Aberrant) [[Dragonmark]]. This one is an officially suggested option, albeit [[Eberron]] specific.
*You won your powers in a game of chance, The-Devil-Went-Down-To-Georgia style.
*Your pact is tied to your bloodline like a sorcerer, not anything ''you'' in particular did; maybe some distant ancestor of yours helped one of the archdevils get into their current position for example, so they guaranteed that all that person's firstborn descendants would be warlocks. (Surprisingly common with Fiends. In the [[Nentir_Vale]] setting, this is implied to be the case with many [[Tiefling]] Infernal Warlocks.)
*Your patron isn't asking you to do anything particularly evil; for example, the Lawful Evil Fiend wants you to fight off the Orcish Horde which is endangering his long-term plans (and killed your family), or the entity is more interested in having a reliable diplomatic courier.
*You're somehow important to your patron's long-running scheme, whether as a chosen one or in a simple "for want of a nail" kind of way. What matters is that your patron needs you to survive long enough to serve your purpose, which the warlock powers are useful for.
*You and your patron share a common enemy; particularly reasonable if the enemy wants you dead to the point that they will throw serious resources at you.
*You gave your patron something like a decade of your youth, your creative spark, your social tact, your L33t Overwatch skills, etc.
**One especially useful idea is if you sold them your memories, and as such don't have a clue who you are or why you wanted the power in the first place. This works great for when you need to write up a warlock in a hurry and only have time for the crunch.
*You genuinely did not know that the entity you bargained with was evil, as it was masquerading as a more benevolent entity.
*You were tricked or coerced into becoming a servant of your patron and they gave you warlock powers so you could be a more versatile pawn, not because you actually wanted them.
*You got your powers by theft or trickery, not because your patron actually wanted to give them to you.
*You killed the previous person your patron empowered, justified or by accident, and the patron has decided '''you''' are going to replace them, like it or not.

*You went stag on your boss, as mentioned above.
*You keep the paladin constantly charmed.

===Custom Warlock pacts and Patrons===

A lot of fans like to design their own custom warlock patrons, which doesn't necessitate homebrewing a new pact. After all, there are a lot of powerful entities in the [[Great Wheel]] that would theoretically be fully capable of granting such a pact: [[Archomental|Archomentals]], [[Modron]] hierarchs, [[Slaad]] lords, and [[Rilmani]] Arurumachs, just to name a few. The patron doesn't even need to be very powerful, since 5th Edition fluff paints the patron as more of a "tutor" than the actual source of the warlock's power. Even relatively weak entities could potentially act as a warlock's patron as long as they have access to strange, arcane secrets and a reason to trade those secrets with a mortal.

If however you ''do'' want to homebrew a new warlock subclass, then there's a free PDF on the DM's guild that's a handy guide for doing so: https://www.dmsguild.com/product/259521/CreateAPatron-A-Warlock-Patron-Creation-Guide

===Gallery===
{{NeedsImages}}

{{D&D3-Classes}}
{{D&D4-Classes}}
{{D&D5-Classes}}
{{Pathfinder-Classes}}

Wizard

2021-06-21T04:13:36Z

2603:8001:3500:CB:B15D:1F85:8B18:5EF4: /* In 5th Edition */

[[Image:Zap muthafucka.jpg|thumb|left|They're pretty much like this.]]
For the /tg/ homebrew, see [[WIZARD (system)]].

'''Wizards''' are [[magic]]-wielding people who use their knowledge of the arcane to cast spells and lay down charms and such. The wizard often requires much planning and preparation before using magic, and usually cannot perform magic trivially. Wizards are powerful and intelligent individuals, usually taking on the role of scientist in fantasy settings. They also are known for being squishy. The preferred class of [[Munchkin|people who hate to lose]] in D&D 3.5.
[[Image:No sense of right and wrong.png|thumb|right|This, too.]]

Wizards show up in pretty much every single fantasy rpg that you can think of, and are pretty much the can-all, do-all guys of pretty much all systems. You want something done? There's a spell for it. Of course, there are some games that undercut the typical wizardly power, but for the most part, wizards tend to be the power-houses of the game.

Wizards are known to [[Cybering|put on a robe and wizard's hat]] every morning, and especially before being intimate.

==In Dungeons & Dragons==
[[Dungeons & Dragons]] is perhaps the most famous user of wizards in all of /tg/ media, and the D&D wizard is the defining for many casual RPGists. D&D wizards have been around since the very first edition, where they were simply called "Magic Users", and show no sign of disappearing any time soon. However, the formula of the D&D wizard has changed slightly over the editions.

Traditionally, the D&D wizard is what [[TVTropes]] would call a "Squishy Wizard" and a "Glass Cannon"; they can drastically change the face of battles through deft applications of the right spells, but fold like a cheap napkin soaked in grease if a [[goblin]] with a dagger gets the drop on them, due to not being able to wear armor and abysmal hitpoint values. This... hasn't really changed; wizards have gotten some more hitpoints on average and more options for protective gear, but they still remain amongst the squishiest and worst-armored members of the various classes.
[[File:Attractive Wizard.jpeg|thumb|right|500px|And this, if you're into that: [http://mattrhodesart.blogspot.com/2011/09/we-are-not-taking-wizard.html Source].]]
Another thing that distinguishes the traditional D&D wizard is their style of magic. Known as [[Vancian Casting]], as it was inspired by the post-apocalyptic fantasy stories of one Jack Vance (which [[Gary Gygax]] was rather fond of), the basic formula works like this: a wizard has a number of spells they can cast each day, determined by their level. However, to cast those spells, they need to read and memorize them first by studying their spellbook. When they do cast one of these memorized spells, it wipes itself from their memory, so they constantly need to study their spellbooks in order to be able to keep contributing. This factor applied for the first three (and a half) editions of the game, after which things got... [[AEDU System|different]]. [[skub|People are quite divided about the results.]]

These two factors make low-level wizards pretty... well, pathetic. The iconic image of the 1st level wizard is some loser who can cast maybe one magic missile a day, and then has to hide behind the [[fighter]] with some darts or a crossbow until the party deigns to take an eight hour rest. However, their power level increases dramatically as they increase in levels, giving them more spell slots to use as well as access to more powerful magics. TVTropes calls ''this'' trope "[[Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards]]".

Many advocate that the best way to play a wizard is not the more anime/videogame interpretation of "walking artillery piece", but instead the "Magic Batman" approach. This basically amounts to the wizard dumping attack spells, save for a handful of "save or suck" spells like Disintegrate and Flesh to Stone, and instead focusing on utility spells that allow it to basically outgame the [[DM]]. Of course, this is a rather controversial playing style, as it tends to piss off DMs and non-wizard players alike: the former is due to ruining any attempt to run a challenging encounter, and the latter is due to the feeling of redundancy. After all, when you've got a wizard who can go invisible and open any lock with just two spells, what do you need a [[rogue]] for? When you can summon demons, elementals and giant monsters, what do you need a [[fighter]] for?

This was, in many ways, the reason why 4th and 5th edition made such broad changes to how magic worked in general. Heck, the ability for "Magic Batman" to complete nullify anything the DM throws at them is a [[meme]] at this point; [[Order of the Stick]] explicitly made its Wizard protagonist Vaarsuvius into an [[Evoker]] with Conjuration as a prohibited school so he couldn't simply effortlessly nullify any challenge thrown at him, and then still has to throw in a quirky personality and frequent disabling plot inconveniences to make it stick.

===The Schools of Magic===
Since at least the 2nd edition of [[Advanced Dungeons & Dragons]], magic in the D&Dverse has been divided into eight different schools, focusing on grouping different kinds of powers and effects into relatively recognizable and coherent themes.

Traditionally, your typical wizard is thought to be a "generalist", making use of all schools of magic equally. However, in 2nd and 3rd edition, a wizard could choose to specialize; this gave them certain bonuses (greater likelihood of learning spells of their specialty school, a bonus spell memorized each day, etc), but also caused them to forsake one or more schools of magic in order to properly pursue true mastery. This was based on an earlier mechanic from 1e, where the [[Illusionist]] was presented as an entirely separate class to the wizard. In 2e and 3.0, the school you forsook was determined by school you specialized in, whilst in 3.5, this was changed to instead requiring you to give up a school of your choice. In [[Pathfinder]] you gain special abilities based on your specialization and your opposition schools aren't entirely barred, but they require double the effort to cast. Pathfinder latter offered outright barring schools as a variant option that gave even more bonuses in exchange, largely because opposition schools were important to the lore established in their early, 3.5 based, [[Adventure Path]]s. 4e abandoned the schools altogether. 5e brought them back and removed the "lose a school" aspect entirely, in part because specialization was now mandatory.

'''Abjuration:''' This school of magic revolves around defense, as "abjure" comes from old words meaning, essentially, "to repel". Abjuration spells cover a mix of anti-magic spells, spiritual defense spells, and physical defense spells; if it shields from harm, literally or metaphorically, then it's an abjuration spell. This school covers classics like Magic Circle, Dispel Magic, Shield and Mage Armor. It also contains banishment magic, antimagic (when that isn't Universal), and some forms of nondetection. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Abjurer]]s''. Back in the old days, an Abjurer's banned school was Transmutation.

'''Conjuration:''' This school of magic revolves around summoning creatures and effects from other worlds. Teleporting is sometimes considered part of this school, and certain attack spells are likewise held up as part of the conjurer's art. Mostly, though, this is for calling critters to do you will. DMs aren't very fond of this school, and neither are martial class players, because it allows wizards to greatly amp up their power level by tricks such as summoning extraplanar beings who can then use their own magic to add even more might to the wizard's part of the table. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Conjurer]]s''. In 2nd edition, Conjurers are barred from learning spells of the Divination school.

'''Divination:''' This school of magic revolves around learning stuff. Seeing into the past, reading the future, learning when somebody's lying, reading thoughts, scrying, all that fun stuff is part of the Divination school. Although hardly the flashiest of styles, this is one of the most hated schools amongst DMs. Not only is it integral to the time-honored adventure-breaking "scry, teleport and fight" methodology, but it also makes a swift mockery of any attempt to run a mystery-themed campaign. These spells also ramp slowly, making those that specialize in them even more quadratic. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Diviner]]s'', and in 2nd edition, they were prohibited from learning Conjuration spells.

'''Enchantment:''' Despite what the word enchantment means in pretty much any other RPG in the world, This school of magic revolves around monkeying with peoples' minds, partially or entirely. As with Conjuration, DMs and non-caster players can get rather ticked off at this school. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Enchanter]]s''. An Enchanter in AD&D is unable to learn Evocation spells.

'''Evocation:''' TORGUE GOT MORE BOOM!! This school of magic revolves around offense, plain and simple. This is the oft-maligned School of Blowing Shit Up, using elemental damage in various shapes and types to blast, burn, freeze, crush, dissolve, implode, explode, slice, dice, puree and otherwise bestow a really shitty day upon anyone who has ticked you off. Although some purists turn their nose up at this school, it is perhaps the most visually impressive and "iconic" of magical styles, and so retains quite a fanbase, especially with players who don't want to render the non-wizards completely obsolete. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Evoker]]s''. Back in the day, specialist Evokers were unable to use Enchantment spells.

'''Illusion:''' This school of magic revolves around playing tricks on peoples' minds by making them see and hear things that aren't there, or not see/hear things that are. Invisibility is perhaps the most iconic spell of this school. Ironically, unlike Conjuration, Divination or Enchantment, DMs rarely have many overt complaints about this school. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Illusionist]]s'', and were in fact the creators of the Generalist/Specialist split; back in Basic, the Wizard was called the Magic-User and the Illusionist was a separate class entirely - this carried over into AD&D 1st edition as the Wizard/Illusionist split, before finally developing into the specialist system of 2e. Traditionally, Illusion is opposed to the school of Necromancy, so Illusionists can't learn necromancy spells.

'''Necromancy:''' This school of magic revolves around playing with the forces of life and death. D&D has sometimes tried to divide necromancy into three styles: White (healing magic, exorcisim), Gray (animating or speaking to the dead) and Black (instant death, inflicting pain and disease). This rarely sticks; animating the dead went from Gray Necromancy in AD&D to Black Necromancy in 3e, gaining the "(Evil)" descriptor to enforce that it can't be used by good guys, despite not really being functionally different form repurposing an old worn out shirt that someone else has discarded. Traditionally, wizardly necromancers have been rather inferior to clerical ones, mostly due to lacking the innate ability to control undead that even a low-level evil cleric has and so being forced to waste precious 6th level spell slots on Control Undead spells. This is a matter of some contention. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Necromancer]]s''. For whatever reason, it was decided in 2e tht a Necromancer couldn't learn Illusion magic.

'''Transmutation:''' Known as '''Alteration''' prior to 3e, this school of magic revolves around the ability to transform things, typically by changing one thing into something else. This covers both "traditional" alchemy-type effects like Steel to Clay or Rock to Mud and shapeshifting spells like Polymorph, Flesh to Stone and Disintegrate. Wizards specialized in this school are known as ''[[Transmuter]]s''. Their traditional banned school is Abjuration.

These eight schools have remained remarkably consistent over the years of D&D's existence. The closest they have ever come to being challenged is the sporadic and usually underdeveloped appearances of more esoteric schools: [[Elementalism]], [[Wild Magic]], [[Shadow Magic]] and [[Chronomancy]].

===In BECMI===
The very first version of the Wizard, called the Magic-User, is established here. The frailest of all classes with no ability to use armor and a measly D4 hit dice - even the [[elf]] and [[halfling]] get D6s - the magic-user depends on the party's protection, but can use powerful spells that get more powerful as they advance in levels. At 9th level, they become "Named" characters, and can choose to either create their own tower (and potentially a dungeon) to establish their own territory, attracting apprentice wizards, or they can become an employed mage for a noble, or they can keep traveling and attract [[fighter]] & [[cleric]] henchmen willing to work for them. They depend on spellbooks to memorize their spells (or to learn new spells from), and must seek out tutors as an alternative way to learn spells.

In the BECMI [[Dungeon Master's Guide]], rules are presented for making "humanoid" (monster) magic-users, representing the comparatively rare arcane spellcasters who arise amongst [[orc]]s, [[goblinoid]]s, [[fey]], etcetera. These humanoid spell-casters were originally called ''Wicca'', but for whatever reason, be it [[Satanic Panic|current events making it a bad idea to use a name that meant]] "[[witch]]" or protests from the religion that called itself by that same name, this didn't stick; [[Hollow World]] saw the Wicca be rebranded as the ''[[Wokani]]'' in its player's guide, and that name change carried over to the Rules Cyclopedia.

Despite basically using the same mechanics, the Wicca/Wokani was culturally reflavored as a [[Witch Doctor]] type; the DMG even goes so far as to describe the spellcasting process for wokani (and [[shaman]]s, their [[cleric]]al counterparts) as consisting of "dancing, waving strange items, shouting and howling". This led to their spell-list being altered to a much simpler array of spells, comprised predominantly of utilitarian spells like Detect Magic or Sleep; they don't learn any offensive spells until they become capable of casting 3rd level spells, and even then their list is small (Fireball, Lightning Bolt, Ice Storm, Wall of Fire, Wall of Ice, Cloudkill, Dissolve, Death, Flesh to Stone), but they can learn the spell [[Reincarnation]]. Their spells also cap out at 6th level, not that this matters, since most humanoids average about 2nd to 4th level maximum in the wokani class. To emphasize this thematic limitation on spells, wokani cannot learn any other kind of spell from wizard scrolls. This would eventually be split off into the [[Adept]] class in 3rd edition.

===In 1st Edition===
If there are any differences between the BECMI Wizard and the AD&D 1e Wizard, they are so subtle as to defy quick recognition. They're pretty much identical... except in two key ways. Firstly, AD&D Magic-Users can, from 11th level onwards, create their own enchanted items and spell scrolls. Secondly, founding their own territory can't be done until 12th level.

The [[Illusionist]] of this edition loses the ability to cast "standard" Magic-User spells, and is instead restricted to casting its own specific pool of spells, which Magic-Users can't learn themselves; powers like Phantasmal Killer or Prismatic Spray first appeared in this edition. Additionally, illusionists have a restriction on what kind of magic items they use, and can only create magic items and scrolls that draw upon illusion-type magic.

[[Unearthed Arcana]] introduced the idea of "Cantrips", small and weak spells that covered glorified magical tricks. In a nutshell, a wizard could "give up" a number of 1st level spells to instead gain access to these smaller spells, which had far more specific uses and were so gimmicky they frankly weren't worth it.

===In 2nd Edition===
In this edition, wizards are king, plain and simple. Although they suffer immense difficulties at getting to higher levels, if they pull it off, they can curb-stomp just about anything. This was the edition that created the now-iconic schools of magic, detailed above, and it drastically expanded the spells available and what spells a wizard could cast; whilst prohibited schools were a thing, they were a far cry from AD&D 1e's "An Illusionist cannot learn standard Magic-User spells, '''period'''" approach.

Popular "cheats" for aspiring wizards in this edition include the use of [[kits]] and [[multiclassing]] to get around certain weaknesses; for example, the right kit could make your wizard drastically more powerful (such as the Undead Master kit, which gave your [[Necromancer]] access to Enchantment spells, the ability to Command Undead like an evil [[Cleric]] of equal level, and the ability to Command Outsiders as if they were undead of equivalent hitdice), whilst the [[gish]] technique could compensate for the wizard's squishiness. A fighter/mage multiclassed character advanced more slowly, but would retain equally potent magical and martial abilities, whilst a fighter who then dual-classed to wizard would start with a much beefier pool of hit points to work with.

In addition to introducing the iconic Specialist Wizard "subclass" in the PHB, [[TSR]] realized that they had a gold mine here which could be milked further. So, various splatbooks offered up a number of different specializations, most of which haven't been remembered so well.

* [[Wild Magic|Wild Mage]]: A wizard specialised in tapping into magic's wildest, rawest form and exploiting that potentially dangerous power. First debuted in Tome of Magic, then was reprinted in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Elementalist]]: A wizard specialized in controlling one of the four [[element]]s. Appearing alongside the Wild Mage on two occasions, this one also appeared in [[Al-Qadim]], where Arabian Adventures featured two different styles; the Elemental Mage (basically a reskin/tweak of the original Elementalist), and the Sorcerer, an elementalist who drew on two elements simultaneously.
* [[Shadow Magic|Shadow Mage]]: A wizard specialized in manipulating umbral matter and drawing power from the [[Plane of Shadow]]. This guy first appeared in Player's Option: Skills and Powers, and then reappeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Dimensionalist]]: A kind of specialized [[Conjurer]] focusing on magic that manipulates the boundaries between different [[plane]]s. This guy appeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Force Mage]]: A specialist [[elementalist]] hyper-focused on manipulating raw force energy, such as that seen in the iconic [[Magic Missile]] spell. This guy appeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Mentalist]]: Sitting somewhere between an arcane emulation of [[psionics]] and a specialist [[enchanter]], Mentalists focus exclusively on spells that affect and control the minds of others. This guy appeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Alchemist]]: A wizard that specializes in creating potions and using magic to analyze and alter material - a more focused version of the [[transmuter]]. This guy first appeared in Player's Option: Skills and Powers, and then reappeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Artificer]]: A wizard specialized in creating physical tools to create, contain, channel and control magical energy. This guy appeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Geometer]]: A wizard specialized in the use of runes, symbols, diagrams and other such mediums to channel and contain magical energy. Basically a [[rune]] wizard. This guy first appeared in Player's Option: Skills and Powers, and then reappeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Song Mage]]: A wizard specialized in the way that music and song can be used to channel and manipulate magical energy; basically a [[bard]] that focuses on magic instead of trying to be a jack of all trades. This guy first appeared in Player's Option: Skills and Powers, and then reappeared in Player's Option: Spells & Magic.
* [[Sha'ir]]: A wizard who forms a unique pact with a [[genie]] [[familiar]], trading favors in exchange for magical energy drawn from this familiar. The iconic [[Al-Qadim]] wizard, this specialization debuted in Arabian Adventures.
* [[Arcanist]]: A wizard who studies the darkest arts for knowledge and power - essentially a [[diviner]]/[[necromancer]] cross. This specialization appeared in the Domains of Dread boxed set for [[Ravenloft]].
* [[Runecaster]]: An arcane spellcaster who uses [[rune]]s to invoke and channel magical energy for a specific purpose; most popular with [[giant]]s and [[dwarves]]. Appeared in the [[Giantcraft]] splatbook for the [[Forgotten Realms]].
* [[Abjurer|Metamage]]: A wizard specialized in directly manipulating the casting of spells itself - essentially an [[abjurer]] with a further focus in [[metamagic]]. Also called an Incantatrix (for females) or Incantatar (for males), this [[Forgotten Realms]] specialization appeared in the Cult of the Dragon.
* [[Dualist]]: An [[elf]]-created specialist wizard who focuses exclusively on two schools of magic that are normally considered to be opposed to each other. Appeared in Cormanthyr: Empire of Elves for the [[Forgotten Realms]].

===In 3rd Edition===
Wizards are more powerful than ever. Some says the priests usurped the wizard’s throne, but they are just [[heretics]]. While it’s true that the [[CoDzilla]] is a powerful force to be reckoned with, it is also true that wizards allow more versatility, power and the cheesiest builds. They also got a new toy to play with in the form of "metamagic" effects, that allowed them to prepare spells with special benefits, like a bigger area of effect or increased numbers, in higher level spell slots from normal.

3e wizards also gained a sibling in the form of the [[Sorcerer]], a "spontaneous caster" that shook up the Vancian Casting mechanic; although it could learn fewer spells than a wizard, it received more spells per day and had access to all of the spells it knew at any given time. The wizard's immense power and versatility generally gave it the leg up on the sorcerer, though, who also had problems stemming from [[Skip Williams|in-house developer conflicts]], such as few skills on their skill list that used their casting stat, or difficulty using "metamagic" effects to modify spells.

Cantrips returned in this edition, but now they were less gimmicky and were memorized from a pool of separate "Level 0" spell-slots, instead of costing you precious 1st level spell slots to memorize and to learn.

===Pathfinder===
[[File:Ezren 2nd edition.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Ezren, Pathfinder's iconic Wizard]]
Wizards are largely the same in [[Pathfinder]]. The big changes are, as mentioned above, opposition schools now require two spell slots to cast instead of being totally prohibited and each specialty now grants a number of class features as you level up, due to the Archetypes system. Also Cantrips are now at will, the main consequence of this being you don't need a magic item to cast detect magic on everything and can do it from first level and you can skip touching anything unknown that's lighter than 5 pounds if it doesn't require fine manipulation.

Spell wise, Pathfinder nerfed some of the Wizard's best spells. Emphasis on "some". Only a few early game staples like Grease, Glitterdust, Ray of Enfeeblement, polymorph effects have been nerfed. Most of the truly gamebreaking shit, Planar Binding, Simulacrum, Wish, or Charm/Dominate Person, is untouched. This doesn't even nerf low level Wizards too badly since only the best spells that were nerfed, many really good spells (color spray, sleep) are untouched and many spells that were only barely in second place (pyrotechnics is almost as good as Glitterdust) got untouched.

====[[Spheres of Power]]====
Due to the way Spheres handles casting, the Wizard is much less absurd than it usually is. Additionally, it maintains the Arcane Bond feature and replaces their arcane schools with the [[Incanter]]'s Sphere Specialization, whilst gaining said class's 3 per 2 level Magic Talent progression. Usefully, however, the Bonded Object option of Arcane Bond lets them gain access to Magic Talents they don't have for a minute at a time. It actually competes well with the Sorcerer rather than overtaking it like it usually does.

One of their Sphere specific archetypes, the Eclectic Researcher, allows the player to make a narcissistic genius; able to craft spells that require the Researcher to use them.

The other archetype, Cosmic Sage, lets them improve their ability to Scribe Scrolls, and gains a free implement, for the cost of using longer casting time, similar to using Spheres metamagic.

===In 4th Edition===
[[File:4e Exotic Wizards and Familiars.png|300px|thumb|right|Some wizards have some really strange [[familiar]]s.]]
The idea of wizards being "same engine, new coat of paint" can't be said for wizards of 4th edition. With an edition design goal of trying to keep classes from being dramatically stronger or weaker than each other, the "[[Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards]]" trope was dropped, which meant wizards were no longer the "do everything" class. However, despite the agony that many wizards-lovers felt at a first glance at the class, the truth is that a lot of former wizardly glory did remain behind the scenes - many "utilitarian" spells were remade into Rituals in 4th edition. Whilst this technically meant anyone with the right Feat could now cast spells like Magic Mouth or Arcane Lock, wizards got that feat for free and were able to learn more Rituals than anyone else. Plus, there were whole new Rituals that allowed people to do things like raise permanent flying islands or construct castles with a wave of their hand, stuff that was never really covered in past editions.

Most startlingly, wizards in this edition forsook not only the traditional Schools of Magic, but also the very idea of [[Vancian Casting]]. [[Wizards of the Coast]], in a short booklet they published about their class design process, explained that the idea of wizards who could cast 1 spell a day and then hid in the back of the group always sounded kind of boring to them. So, they rewrote the entire format for spell-usage, and then found this could be used to give every class some neat things to do in combat. 4e divided spells into At-Will (can be cast whenever the caster wants), Encounter (spells that can be cast once, and then you need to take a five minute breather before you can cast them again), Daily (cast once, and then you need 6 hours of rest to use again) and Utility (non-offensive spells that can be cast Encounter, Daily or even At-Will). Furthermore, "spells per day" and "spells known" were no longer interlinked; like a 3e [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|sorcerer]], so long as a wizard had the "spells per day" slot to burn, it could cast any of its spells as often as it liked.

One other thing that wizards did retain, just altered for the new powers format, was their spellbook. Unlike other classes, who only learned 1 new power whenever they scored a new Utility or Daily power, a wizard got to learn 2 powers. By studying their spellbook during a long rest, a wizard could switch around its memorized spells as it saw fit, allowing it to retain the spirit of its traditional versatility.
As stated above, 4e wizards forsook the traditional 8 schools - you could still build a thematic spellcaster, you just needed to pick the spells you wanted without worrying about mechanical drawbacks for doing so, and sourcebooks & [[Dragon Magazine]] articles provided plenty of fleshing out past the initially Evoker-heavy presentation of the PHB. But wizards in 4e still had their "subclasses" - but what defined them now was their choice of Implements, a feature called "Arcane Implement Mastery". Hearkening back to those long-marginalized trappings of wizardry, 4e wizards picked a specific kind of Implement to master, and from this they gained specialized abilities. The PHB presented Wizards with the Implements of: Orb of Imposition, Staff of Defense, and Wand of Accuracy. Arcane Power added the Orb of Deception, the Tome of Binding and the Tome of Readiness. Obviously, you need to be ''wielding'' a mastered Implement to gain its associated powers!

* Orb of Imposition: Once per encounter, you can either impose a penalty on a "save ends" ongoing spell equal to your Wisdom modifier, or you can extend the duration of a wizard at-will spell that lasts "until the end of your current turn" so that it ends at the end of your next turn. Invoking either power is a free action.
* Staff of Defense: You gain +1 AC when wielding a staff. Additionally, once per encounter, you can boost your AC against one attack (after its damage has been rolled) by an amount equal to your Constitution modifier as an immediate interrupt.
* Wand of Accuracy: Once per encounter, add your Dexterity modifier to an attack roll as a free action.
* Orb of Deception: Once per encounter, if you miss an attack with a Wizard power that has the Illusion keyword, you can instead attack another target with the same spell, this time gaining an attack roll bonus equal to your Charisma modifier. A viable target is one within 3 squares of the original target and which was not targeted by the original attack.
* Tome of Binding: Once per encounter, you can use a free action as part of using an Arcane power with the Summoning keyword to grant all creatures summoned by that power a bonus to their damage rolls equal to your Constitution modifier.
* Tome of Readiness: Choose a Wizard Encounter Attack power of your level or lower that you don't already know. This power is now "stored" and can be used in place of a memorized Wizard Encounter Attack power of the same level or higher whenever you are in battle, though it can only be used once per encounter. You can change which power you have "stored" whenever you reach a level that lets you learn a new encounter power. Basically, you have +1 extra encounter attack spell which you can only use 1/encounter, but which increases your normal encounter powers per day limit.

Essentials added multiple subclasses to the Wizard, in the form of the [[Mage]], the [[Bladesinger]], the [[Sha'ir]] and the [[Witch]]. The original wizard would be formally renamed as the "[[Arcanist]] subclass in the article "Class Compendium: The Arcanist" in [[Dragon Magazine]] #401.

Truthfully, the "4e wizards are just [[Evoker]]s!" meme is not truly accurate. Yes, they do have a lot of blasting spells; most of the wizard's traditional "non-violent problem-solving spells" wound up as Rituals for balance reasons. But, even in the first player's handbook, the wizard's spell-list is full of spells from other schools. Attack spells in the PHB include Conjuration (of the "conjure an effect" variety, not the "summon monster" variety), Enchantment and Necromancy spells, whilst the Utility spells are full of migrants from the Transmutation and Abjuration schools - which you should honestly expect because there were very few offensive Transmutation/Abjuration spells in past editions. Heck, the PHB even features Otiluke's Resilient Sphere, one of the most iconic "offensive Abjuration" spells! Further spells would then be released in other sourcebooks to further fuel your non-Evoker options; [[Dragon Magazine]] provided its share, including illusions, enchantments, non-minion necromancy, and pyromancy, but Arcane Power in particular brought back the idea of Summons, as well as plenty of new spells for illusionists and, to a lesser extent, enchanters. In fact, whilst the sample wizard builds in the PHB were the school-neutral "Control Wizard" and "War Wizard", Arcane Power provided sample builds in the form of the "Illusion Wizard" and "Summons Wizard", which should give you an idea of just how thoroughly those schools got an update in that sourcebook.

In addition to articles that provided new wizard spells indirectly - such as #372's "Secrets of the City Entombed", which provided [[Necromancer]] spells for the [[Avenger]], [[Bard]], [[Cleric]], [[Shaman]], [[Swordmage]], [[Warlock]] and Wizard, there were a number of issues of "Class Acts" articles that directly expanded the wizard's arsenal:
* #364: [[Illusionist]]s: Like the name says, a straight-up conversion of some classic illusion type spells, even with the trusty illusory wall, spectral hound and phantasmal terrain spells.
* #381: Wizards of the Feywild: [[Enchanter|Enchantment]] and [[Illusionist|Illusion]] spells, with a few added variations of the "Magic Missile" theme because, y'know, [[Elf|elven archers]]?
* #383: [[Evoker]]s: Despite its name, technically more of an [[Elementalist]], with a number of heroic tier spells based on blasting foes with elemental magics.
* #385: [[Conjurer|Summoners]]: Adds a new assortment of Summoning powers for your [[Conjurer]], with some updated mechanics from those in Arcane Power. This article reintroduces the old-school idea that if you don't directly control your summon, it goes badly for you; these summoned [[fiend]]s and [[elemental]]s (and a [[couatl]] summon, for some reason) have the ability to operate more independently than those summons in Arcane Power, but there are drawbacks (like taking damage) to just letting them do their own thing.
* #388: Pryomancers: Another [[Elementalist]]/[[Evoker]] fusion, padding out the spell-list with more fiery spells, some fire spell-buffing feats, and adding a new [[Paragon Path]], the Master of Flames, which is open to any arcane class.

===In 5th Edition===
In 5th edition, wizards changed drastically yet again. They still learned spells and filled out their spellbooks, picking spells memorized to determine what they could cast. However, not only did cantrips remain "cast at will", like in 4th edition, but the 5e wizard now functioned like a 3e sorcerer, in that it no longer forgot its spells after casting them. The spellbook was essential to switch around what spells the wizard was physically capable of casting, but it was no longer rendered unable to cast just by stealing the spellbook and having it use its magic.

Another change, perhaps more dramatic, was the idea of Arcane Traditions. All classes in 5e now take a subclass early in their career, and for wizards, this swallows up the old idea of "school specialization", to the point that the first wave of subclasses were based on the traditional specialist wizards. This resulted in (until we got the Lore Master) forsaking the idea of both the generalist wizard (in theory at least, the 5e necromancer makes a pretty good generalist) and of "forbidden schools".

Finally, the very nature of 5e casting, with its ability to cast spells in higher-level slots, and with at-will cantrips that effectively replace weapons for casters, provided the wizard with a great deal of flexibility and endurance compared to the olden days. First level Wizard spells also got some good buffs, with spells such as Shield and False Life keeping a 1st-level Wizard from being goblin-knived.

Regardless of their Tradition, all 5e wizards get the Arcane Recovery class ability to start with (once per day, you can regain a small number of spell slots with just a short rest), the usual increases to their ability scores (either +2 to one score, or +1 to two scores) at levels 4/8/12/16/19, and gain the abilities Spell Mastery (can freely pick one 1st level and one 2nd level spell and can cast these mastered spells at their lowest level without using any spell slots as if they were cantrips, takes 8 hours to replace these) at level 18 and Signature Spells (pick two level 3 spells; you always have them prepared, they don't count towards your number of spells prepared, and each can be cast at its basic level without using up a spell slot once before needing a short rest to recharge) at level 20.

All of the "classic" subclasses also get the "[Tradition] Savant" feature, which halves the time and gold it takes to copy a spell of their tradition into their spellbook. For details, see [[Abjurer]], [[Conjurer]], [[Diviner]], [[Enchanter]], [[Evoker]], [[Illusionist]], [[Necromancer]] and [[Transmuter]]. Of note is that these subclasses are in no way even in terms of power or utility, especially at 2nd level. Some, like the Abjurer and Diviner, have strong abilities with obvious use right out the gate. Others, like the Illusionist and Enchanter, get middling sidegrade powers that are nice but not worth writing home about. And some, like the Transmuter and Conjurer, have abilities that are so fundamentally broken it's worth talking to your DM before even rolling these characters up. Their basic abilities have been aggressively pre-nerfed to the point where how they were ever intended to function is lost.

With 5e's fairly slow output of non-adventure sourcebooks, the Wizard has grown quite slowly. A handful of other traditions have been released in [[Unearthed Arcana]], but so far, only five further official Traditions exist:
* Firstly, there is the '''[[Bladesinger]]''', an [[elf]]-orientated [[gish|warrior-wizard]] that was the original inspiration for 4e's [[Swordmage]] and is the wizard's answer to the [[Fighter]]'s Eldritch Knight. This was provided in the ''Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide'' and later reprinted in ''Tasha's Cauldron of Everything''.
* Secondly, there is the '''War Magic''' tradition, a unique blending of evocation and abjuration to create a more tactically inclined, "tanky" sort of wizard, a 5e adaptation of the [[Warmage]]. This was provided in ''Xanathar's Guide to Everything'' and had first appeared in Unearthed Arcana.
* Thirdly, there's the [[Dunamancy]] traditions of '''[[Chronomancy|Chronurgist]]''' and '''Graviturgist''', both of which appeared in ''[[Exandria|Explorer's Guide to Wildemount]]''.
* Finally, there is the '''Order of Scribes''', which gives you bonuses related to calligraphy, your spellbook, and spell scrolls.

Unearthed Arcana Arcane Traditions consist of:
* The '''Technomancer''', an [[Urban Fantasy]] wizard who can use technology as a medium for spells.
* The '''Theurge''', a [[Mystic Theurge|wizard-priest]] who combines arcane studies and religions studies to add divine magic to their arsenal.
* The '''Lore Master''', a generalist wizard slash arcane scholar whose studies grant them unparalleled versatility, soundly hated for their effortlessly defeating the [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|Sorcerer]] in the arts of [[metamagic]].
* The '''Inventor''' (School of Invention AT), a weird sort of [[Artificer]]-[[Wild Mage]] hybrid who manages to be more fun to play and/or less annoying than the ''[[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|actual]]'' 5e [[Wild Mage]].
* The '''Onomancer''', a 5e take on the [[truenamer]] that is yet another metamagic wizard that outclasses the sorcerer, only with a janky and weaksauce first-level power that literally every other class feature needs to go off in order to work for that authentic truenamer experience.
* The '''Archivist''', a reworked version of the Artificer subclass, because Wizards will never stop peeling support away from newborn babe classes that desperately need it to feed the squealing spoilt brat of the class that bears its name. Comically-overpowered, it ''starts'' with a better version of every core wizard class's starting ability in the form of a pen that can half all costs for scribing spells, and yet another power that lets them turn all damage they deal into irresistable force damage for free as often as they want, so long as they're taking the admittedly-hefty risk of using their spellbook as an implement. Later abilities include free ritual castings, a familiar that spells can be arced through, for a better version of the Pact of the Chain Warlock while we're at it, and a capstone that lets them resist death in favor of permanently losing the ability to ever cast 3d6 spell levels' worth of spells ever again. An incredible exercise in having almost literally every single power be poorly designed in some way, and the weakest and worst of an already-stinky lot in that particular UA.

Additionally, with the lack of an [[Eberron]] sourcebook for 5e, WoTC's first thought for tackling the '''[[Artificer]]''' was to shoehorn it in as a wizard tradition. Its specialty was basically burning spell-slots to create one-use magical potions and scrolls or temporarily buffing arms & armor. At level 14, they could finally make 1 permanent magical item per month after spending a week of solid work to do so. This version was pretty resoundingly panned as the most awful attempt at converting it that WoTC could have come up with, especially since the level 14 feature created only some of the weaker magic items on the list, which would be long obsolete by that point. When a draft Artificer base-class came out in 2017, pretty much everyone forgot that this version existed.

[[Mike Mearls]] also stated on his stream that, rather than come up with a new subsystem and individual classes for [[psionics]], he'd personally use a '''School of Psionics''' Arcane Tradition to turn a wizard into a [[psion]]. The resultant rules can be found on the 5etools website.

[[Blackstaff's Tome of Wizardry]] is a "quasi-official" splatbook from the DM's Guild that contains a massive array of new Wizard subclasses.

====Class Feature Variants====
In the November 2019 UA, a UA dedicated to providing enhancements and replacements to every single class, the Wizard hilariously got the least robust
changes of any class in the UA. All they got was the ability to swap out their cantrips for free every level, and a paltry sum of bonus spells to add to their spell lists. Perhaps this a recognition that the Wizard was a bit overtuned, but it is still very funny to compare the changes the Wizard got compared to the [[Sorcerer]], or really any other class.

==In Warhammer Fantasy==

[[File:Winds-of-magic-waifus.png|400px|right|thumb|Battle Wizards - Waifu Edition!]]
Wizards are present in almost every single army you care to name in the world of [[Warhammer Fantasy Battles]]. Although usually (not always; there are key exceptions, like Ogre Butchers, spellcasting Vampires, and Chaos Sorcerers) lacking in terms of tankiness or physical combat ability, their ability to both launch magical fireballs and/or buff the shit out of friendlies (different wizards do better at different things), and perhaps more importantly to fuck up the efforts of casters on the other side makes them incredibly valuable members of the force.

In Warhammer, magic is a kind of [[Winds of Magic|spiritual breeze]] that exhales from the [[Realm of Chaos]] and sweeps across the world, splitting into various currents that permeate and/or are attracted to (it's debatable which it is) various natural phenomena. For this reason, wizards in-universe speak of the Winds of Magic, which form distinctive styles and powers.

The two races most adept with the art of magic are the [[High Elves (Warhammer)|Asur]] and the [[Slann]], who are the only races in the setting capable of using "High Magic". This consists of the eight Winds all blended together in a harmonious whole, allowing for spells of particularly devastating effect and color and making them masters of dispelling other wizards' efforts at casting.

In [[The Empire]], originally, wizards had no training whatsoever, and "hedge wizards" were the only practitioners of their kind in the world. This was a dangerous art, based on experimentation and random chance, which made them versatile, because they could learn spells from many Winds, but also risky, because they had no idea how to avoid corrupting their spells with Dark Magic or just fumbling the spells and blowing themselves up. During the reign of Magnus the Pious, the High Elf mage [[Teclis]] created the Eight Colleges of Magic; although he reasoned that humans were "too weak-minded" and short-lived to master High Magic, they could certainly master the nuances of one Wind at a time. Although publically distrusted and hated by the Witch Hunters of Sigmar, the Battle Mages of the Empire are much-loved by the soldiers who serve alongside them, who value their ability to add much-needed firepower to imperial battles.

In [[Bretonnia]], all youths who have magical talent are abducted early on; the males disappear, whilst the females return as the mysterious Priestesses of the Lady of the Lake. It's strongly hinted that such souls have actually been abducted by the Wood Elves, though what happens to the boys is unclear.

In the [[Ogre Kingdoms]], Butchers are primitive shamans who cast sympathetic magic by devouring certain reagents; the heart of a bull [[rhinox]] to heal those around them, bones to cause the enemy's bones to break, trollguts to imbue themselves with a [[troll]]ish ability to regenerate.

The [[Skaven]] have two distinct classes of wizard, in the form of the Grey Seers (mutant skaven with the natural ability to draw upon the corrupted magic that resonates with their race), and the Warlock Engineers of [[Clan Skryre]], who use [[magitek]] devices to draw raw magic from the atmosphere and channel it into useful forms. Mostly blasts of energy.

[[Orcs & Goblins]] are believed to derive their magic from the raw battlelust of their own kind, which means that fighting orcs serve as natural batteries of magical power for their shamans to tap. As shamans have very little training in controlling magic, however, most ultimately end up exploding.

The [[Tomb Kings]] have a caste of [[lich]]e-priests who practice ancient ritualistic magic, the oldest form of necromancy in the world, tapping into the Wind of Death in ways very different to modern wizards.

The [[Vampire Counts]], meanwhile, are naturally adept at using necromancy, a form of corrupted and Chaos-tainted Death Magic.

The sorcerers and shamans of [[Chaos]] practice many different magical arts, from directly drawing upon the powers of [[daemon]]s to the more destructive branches of the Winds of Magic.

==In Warhammer 40000==
Technically, there is no magic in [[Warhammer 40,000]], but the mechanics of psionics fills much the same role. In the setting there exists an immaterial realm controlled by the forces of [[Chaos]] which can be tapped for "magic" use. Worshippers of [[Chaos]] practice Sorcery, which is a style of using rituals to draw extra psychic power beyond what they could ordinarily channel on their own from daemons who have been bartered or bound through those rituals. Races opposed to [[Chaos]] like the [[Eldar]] or the [[Imperium]] employ various psionic adepts which use their power without demonic help (and usually against the wishes of [[Chaos]]). These psykers range from being very weak to the power level of an "traditional" wizard or even mightier but must endure a permanent onslaught on their psyche, mind and very soul. Hence the more powerful a psyker is the more dangerous he lives. Through discipline and various rituals psykers can overcome some of the problems of the [[grimdark]] setting but in the end every "magic" user is under the constant threat of being possessed or torn asunder by unseen powers. The only exception to this are the [[Orks]] which technically tear themselves apart and do not regularly become possessed because GREEN IZ BEST! For more details see [[Psyker]].

==In The World Of Darkness==
The "wizard archetype" in the [[World of Darkness]] is filled by the monsters known as Mages, although what these actually are depends on the game variant you're following.

In the Old World, [[Mage: The Ascension]] portrays Mages as humans who awoke to the realization that reality is ''not'' fixed in place, but is guided by human consensus and by devoting themselves strongly to their own reality paradigm, they could escape those bonds. Or, in layman's terms: reality is more fluid than people realize, and any person crazy-fixated on a particular way of doing magic enough can eventually become crazy enough to break the rules that limit everybody else and manipulate reality as a result.

In the New World, [[Mage: The Awakening]] portrays Mages as humans who have undergone a massive spiritual awakening, breaking free of ancient shackles on the human consciousness and learning to tap into the world of higher reality behind the lies others are still bound to.

{{D&D3-Classes}}
{{D&D4-Classes}}
{{D&D5-Classes}}
{{Pathfinder-1st-Edition-Classes}}
{{Pathfinder-2nd-Edition-Classes}}
{{Pathfinder-2nd-Edition-Archetypes}}