NEW MONSTER: WITHERED HUSK

WITHERED HUSK

FREQUENCY: Rare

NO. APPEARING: 1-12

ARMOR CLASS: 7

MOVE: 12”

HIT DICE: 3+1

% IN LAIR: 80%

TREASURE TYPE: Nil

NO. OF ATTACKS: 1

DAMAGE/ ATTACK: 1-10

SPECIAL ATTACKS: Fear

SPECIAL DEFENSES: See below

MAGIC RESISTANCE: See below

SAVE: Fighter 3

INTELLIGENCE: Low

MORALE: See below

ALIGNMENT: Neutral evil

SIZE: M

PSIONIC ABILITY: Nil

LEVEL/ X.P. VALUE: IV/ 125 + 4/hp

These undead creatures resemble wrinkled, dried out zombies. Their gangrenous skin is tougher than leather and their eye sockets hold an undefinable darkness. Withered husks normally attack by striking with their arms. Their hands are fused into claw-like members, making grasping weapons or manipulating tools impossible. They do have a sense of their own condition and this serves only to make them more hateful of the living. Due to their hateful condition, the withered husk need never make a morale check, but can be commanded to retreat by its master.

Seeing a withered husk will cause fear. Creatures of 2 hit dice or levels or less will save at -4. Creatures of 3 hit dice have normal saving throws. Four hit die creatures save at +4 and creatures of 5 hit dice or more are unaffected. Individuals affected by fear flee at their fastest rate for the two to five melee rounds.

They can be turned or destroyed as if they were shadows, but can not be compelled by evil clerics the way other undead can, although evil clerics may turn or destroy them. They are immune to mind-affecting spells such as sleep, charm, and hold, and suffer no damage from normal or magical cold.

A withered husk can be created by a magic-user using an animate dead spell and a fear spell, or by a cleric casting animate dead and cause fear. In either case the body must belong to a murderer convicted in a righteous court and the body must be embalmed in a special solution for a week in order for the magic to take effect. The cost in materials is 100 gold pieces per hit point of the creature. This solution gives the husk its leathery, wrinkled appearance.

Following this process, the cleric or magic-user can force the withered husk to obey in the same fashion as a zombie, but it is far easier to set it to guard an area than to let it roam. Should the withered husk be sent on a mission where it can encounter living things without its master present there is a 10% cumulative chance per day that its hatred of life will cause it to abandon its master's orders and begin attacking those it meets indiscriminately. In such cases there is a chance equal to the master's level plus intelligence that it they can regain dominance, but they have only one attempt to be successful, and after that the husk is beyond their control forever. A cleric or magic-user can control a number of withered husks equal to their level.