Faolyn
(she/her)
Tom Moldvay’s back for his fifth and final collection of undead, and here he focuses on spectres (he is kind enough to tell us this is the British spelling of specter), ghosts, and liches. For the ghost, he brings us the casurua (an Irish name which means red-hammer), which, like the previous tymher-haid, is a ghost made of the souls of multiple people.
The casurua was inspired by a 14th-century Irish tale of clan chief Roe Kerrigan--or rather, his wife, Marra, who was an ambitious and violent woman. She led numerous missions wherein she and her army would sneak into villages, fortresses, and castles and take them over, killing everyone who resisted. Her pillaging made her wealthy, and she also had three sons, but it wasn't enough. With five thousand soldiers behind her and two of her sons, Ailor and Brodon, next to her, she went to Castle Kelso, near Kilreekil, which was the home of her mortal enemy, the O'Downy clan, led by Ordlin O'Downey. But traveling with an army of 5,000, a thousand of which are on horseback, is not a stealthy way of approaching your enemy. And camping at a location that really only has one way in or out isn't that great an idea, as Marra and her army found herself beseiged by not only the O'Downeys, but many of their allied clans as well. The battle, the Battle of Bealaclugga Bog, lasted all day, and at the end of it, Marra and her sons were slain. But before she died, Marra Kerrigan spoke four words: Avenge Me, Never Cease.
Years passed and Marra's third son, Dulin, became ruler of their keep, and he spend his time scheming. Many years later, Ordlin O'Downey, who was traveling with a large retinue, was forced to take refuge in Kerrigan Keep during a flood. The wars between their clans were long over and there was peace, so Ordlin expected nothing untoward would happen--especially not that Dulin would spring a trap and slay them all. Dulin threw all the bodies in an unfinished tower room, then hastily built a floor over the bodies, then sealed the room.
The hauntings started centuries later. People who entered the keep, both proper heirs and others, would run screaming from it and throw themselves over the cliff into the Lough of Liscannor. In 1730, another man discovered documents that referenced the "graveyard room," and hired workmen to remove the floor and investigate. One workman descended into the darkness, there was the sound as if "a hundred stones were hurled against the wall," and when the man emerged, it was only to die from terrible blunt-force trauama injuries, with the marks of bloody hands all over his body--and the floor had been rebuilt. This happened again in the 1800s, save the man who had gone down to investigate lived for ten days before succumbing to his injuries, and reported seeing glowing eyes and skeletal hands, and again in 1924.
I can’t find anything about this particular legend other than the source that Moldvay cites, and my searches for the casurua itself mostly lead to this article. Ah well.
The casurua is… what’s the opposite of a glass cannon? A tank that shoots blanks, maybe? They have twenty-two Hit Dice (for comparison, great wyrm red dragons had 23 HD), AC 0, 75% magic resistance, are normally invisible, and basically can’t be killed unless you completely dismantle or unearth their gravesite and get a high-level cleric to bless the area—but only have four attacks that do 3d6 damage each. And that can be less, since they throw objects that are in the area instead of generating material themselves, which may mean they have to throw things that do less damage. At the level in which you even an AD&D character is fighting a 22 HD monster, I’m pretty sure 3d6 damage, even four times in a round, isn’t going to be a huge problem.
Let’s see if I can fix that.
Casurua
Too Evil To Die, Dragon Magazine 210
Creature by Tom Moldvay; art by Jim Holloway
When many people are massacred at once and their bodies hidden away in a mass grave, a casurua may rise. They invisibly haunt the location of their deaths, appearing only when that location is invaded. The casurua is less a creature and more a phenomena, an entity of fury and outrage that, being bound to its grave, focuses its wrath on anyone who comes near. The intruder’s intent doesn’t matter—someone seeking to lay them to rest is as hated as someone who hopes to rob the grave or is simply curious.
Casurua are, for the most part, invisible, although they can choose to manifest. When they do, they are a collection of balefully glowing eyes and skeletal hands, and with them comes a foul graveyard stench.
Mindless Rage. Casurua are tortured souls who know nothing but anger. It’s impossible to reason with them; any intelligence the individuals once had was all but extinguished when they were forcibly joined together as a single undead entity. They have no memories of their previous life, not even what or who killed them. Likewise, it’s impossible to control or direct a casurua; the sheer number of minds that make it up, no matter how dulled they are, are too focused on their singular purpose. The only thing the casurua wants is for its pain to go away.
Long Silences. If the place where a casurua’s bodies are buried is left alone for a long time, the casurua will go dormant. Even if that place is later occupied, it may take a long time for the entity to “awaken” again.
Climate/Terrain: any terrain; dungeon, ruin
Legends and Lore
With an Arcana or Religion check, the characters can learn the following:
DC 15. A casurua is a singular entity made of dozens or hundreds of souls that were murdered at once. Filled with rage from their death, they attack anyone who comes near.
DC 20. Almost mindless, a casurua can’t be put to rest except by unearthing its mass grave and reburying it elsewhere in consecrated ground.
Casurua Encounters
CR 11-16 1 casurua
Treasure: 800 gp, silver ewer (250 gp), 7 corals (100 gp each), small silver idol (250 gp), three masterwork longswords and shields with matching details; dragontooth necklace (250 gp); set of gold buttons on a rotting jacket (250 gp), potions of greater healing and heroism, ring of protection, wand of magic missile
Signs
1-2. The sound of moans and gibbering and stone being scraped or thrown against stone.
3. The sound of knocking and footsteps, moving towards a specific area.
4. A graveyard stench.
5. People who sleep nearby have dreams of mass slaughter.
6. Lights go out and shadows become darker
Casurua
Legendary huge undead; Challenge 13 (10,000 XP)
AC 16 (natural armor)
HP 182 (28d12; bloodied 91)
Speed 0 ft., fly 20 ft.
STR 10 (+0) DEX 21 (+5) CON 10 (+0)
INT 4 (-3) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 23 (+6)
Proficiency +4; Maneuver DC 17
Saving Throws Str +4, Dex +9
Damage Resistances acid, fire, lightning, thunder; damage from nonmagical weapons
Damage Immunities cold, necrotic, poison
Condition Immunities charmed, fatigue, frightened, grappled, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned, prone, restrained
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13
Languages understands the languages it knew in life but can’t speak
Bound. The casurua can’t move more than 100 feet from its bodies.
Detect Life. The casurua magically senses the general direction of living creatures up to 1 mile away.
Incorporeal. The casurua can move through creatures and objects. It takes 5 (1d10) force damage if it ends its turn inside an object.
Invisible. The casurua is invisible unless it uses a bonus action to manifest.
Magic Resistance. The casurua has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
Legendary Resistance (3/day). When the casurua fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead. When it does so, creatures have advantage on their saving throw against the next Throw attack it makes before the end of its next turn.
Turn Immunity. The casurua automatically succeeds saving throws against any affect that would turn undead.
Undead Nature. The casurua doesn’t require air, sustenance, or sleep.
Unquiet Spirit. If defeated in combat, the casurua returns in 1d4 months. It can be put to rest permanently only by dismantling or unearthing the mass grave that holds its bodies and putting the bodies to rest in a hallowed location.
Actions
Multiattack. The casurua makes two attacks with its Claws or with Poltergeist Throw.
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 16 (2d10+5) damage + 5 (1d10) psychic damage.
Poltergeist Throw. Ranged Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, range 60 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (3d6+5) bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (whichever is most appropriate).
Hurl Objects (Recharge 4-6). The casurua throws rocks or other unattended objects that are within 10 feet of it in a 60-foot line that is 10 feet wide. Each creature in that area must make a DC 17 Dexterity saving, taking 36 (8d8) bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (whichever is most appropriate) on a failed saving throw, or half as much damage on a successful one.
Horrifying Visage. Each non-undead creature within 60 feet that can see the casurua must make a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw. On a failure, it is frightened for 1 minute. While frightened by Horrifying Visage, a creature must take the Dash action and move away from the casurua by the safest route on each of its turns, unless there is nowhere to move. If the creature ends its turn in a location where it doesn’t have line of sight to the casurua, it may make a Wisdom saving throw. On a successful save, it is no longer frightened.
Reactions
Eyes of Doom. When the casurua takes damage from an attack or spell, it uses Horrifying Visage.
Legendary Actions
The casurua can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature’s turn. It regains spent legendary actins at the start of its turn.
Brick Up. The casurua creates a shield out of stones, branches, or other ground material. Until the start of its next turn, it has total cover and advantage on Dexterity saving throws.
Claw. The casurua uses its Claw attack.
Poltergeist Throw. The casurua uses its Poltergeist Throw
Combat
Casurua use minimal tactics and are incapable of retreating very far, since they can’t leave the spot to which they are bound. If bloodied, it turns invisible and returns to its gravesite.
The casurua was inspired by a 14th-century Irish tale of clan chief Roe Kerrigan--or rather, his wife, Marra, who was an ambitious and violent woman. She led numerous missions wherein she and her army would sneak into villages, fortresses, and castles and take them over, killing everyone who resisted. Her pillaging made her wealthy, and she also had three sons, but it wasn't enough. With five thousand soldiers behind her and two of her sons, Ailor and Brodon, next to her, she went to Castle Kelso, near Kilreekil, which was the home of her mortal enemy, the O'Downy clan, led by Ordlin O'Downey. But traveling with an army of 5,000, a thousand of which are on horseback, is not a stealthy way of approaching your enemy. And camping at a location that really only has one way in or out isn't that great an idea, as Marra and her army found herself beseiged by not only the O'Downeys, but many of their allied clans as well. The battle, the Battle of Bealaclugga Bog, lasted all day, and at the end of it, Marra and her sons were slain. But before she died, Marra Kerrigan spoke four words: Avenge Me, Never Cease.
Years passed and Marra's third son, Dulin, became ruler of their keep, and he spend his time scheming. Many years later, Ordlin O'Downey, who was traveling with a large retinue, was forced to take refuge in Kerrigan Keep during a flood. The wars between their clans were long over and there was peace, so Ordlin expected nothing untoward would happen--especially not that Dulin would spring a trap and slay them all. Dulin threw all the bodies in an unfinished tower room, then hastily built a floor over the bodies, then sealed the room.
The hauntings started centuries later. People who entered the keep, both proper heirs and others, would run screaming from it and throw themselves over the cliff into the Lough of Liscannor. In 1730, another man discovered documents that referenced the "graveyard room," and hired workmen to remove the floor and investigate. One workman descended into the darkness, there was the sound as if "a hundred stones were hurled against the wall," and when the man emerged, it was only to die from terrible blunt-force trauama injuries, with the marks of bloody hands all over his body--and the floor had been rebuilt. This happened again in the 1800s, save the man who had gone down to investigate lived for ten days before succumbing to his injuries, and reported seeing glowing eyes and skeletal hands, and again in 1924.
I can’t find anything about this particular legend other than the source that Moldvay cites, and my searches for the casurua itself mostly lead to this article. Ah well.
The casurua is… what’s the opposite of a glass cannon? A tank that shoots blanks, maybe? They have twenty-two Hit Dice (for comparison, great wyrm red dragons had 23 HD), AC 0, 75% magic resistance, are normally invisible, and basically can’t be killed unless you completely dismantle or unearth their gravesite and get a high-level cleric to bless the area—but only have four attacks that do 3d6 damage each. And that can be less, since they throw objects that are in the area instead of generating material themselves, which may mean they have to throw things that do less damage. At the level in which you even an AD&D character is fighting a 22 HD monster, I’m pretty sure 3d6 damage, even four times in a round, isn’t going to be a huge problem.
Let’s see if I can fix that.
Casurua
Too Evil To Die, Dragon Magazine 210
Creature by Tom Moldvay; art by Jim Holloway
When many people are massacred at once and their bodies hidden away in a mass grave, a casurua may rise. They invisibly haunt the location of their deaths, appearing only when that location is invaded. The casurua is less a creature and more a phenomena, an entity of fury and outrage that, being bound to its grave, focuses its wrath on anyone who comes near. The intruder’s intent doesn’t matter—someone seeking to lay them to rest is as hated as someone who hopes to rob the grave or is simply curious.
Casurua are, for the most part, invisible, although they can choose to manifest. When they do, they are a collection of balefully glowing eyes and skeletal hands, and with them comes a foul graveyard stench.
Mindless Rage. Casurua are tortured souls who know nothing but anger. It’s impossible to reason with them; any intelligence the individuals once had was all but extinguished when they were forcibly joined together as a single undead entity. They have no memories of their previous life, not even what or who killed them. Likewise, it’s impossible to control or direct a casurua; the sheer number of minds that make it up, no matter how dulled they are, are too focused on their singular purpose. The only thing the casurua wants is for its pain to go away.
Long Silences. If the place where a casurua’s bodies are buried is left alone for a long time, the casurua will go dormant. Even if that place is later occupied, it may take a long time for the entity to “awaken” again.
Climate/Terrain: any terrain; dungeon, ruin
Legends and Lore
With an Arcana or Religion check, the characters can learn the following:
DC 15. A casurua is a singular entity made of dozens or hundreds of souls that were murdered at once. Filled with rage from their death, they attack anyone who comes near.
DC 20. Almost mindless, a casurua can’t be put to rest except by unearthing its mass grave and reburying it elsewhere in consecrated ground.
Casurua Encounters
CR 11-16 1 casurua
Treasure: 800 gp, silver ewer (250 gp), 7 corals (100 gp each), small silver idol (250 gp), three masterwork longswords and shields with matching details; dragontooth necklace (250 gp); set of gold buttons on a rotting jacket (250 gp), potions of greater healing and heroism, ring of protection, wand of magic missile
Signs
1-2. The sound of moans and gibbering and stone being scraped or thrown against stone.
3. The sound of knocking and footsteps, moving towards a specific area.
4. A graveyard stench.
5. People who sleep nearby have dreams of mass slaughter.
6. Lights go out and shadows become darker
Casurua
Legendary huge undead; Challenge 13 (10,000 XP)
AC 16 (natural armor)
HP 182 (28d12; bloodied 91)
Speed 0 ft., fly 20 ft.
STR 10 (+0) DEX 21 (+5) CON 10 (+0)
INT 4 (-3) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 23 (+6)
Proficiency +4; Maneuver DC 17
Saving Throws Str +4, Dex +9
Damage Resistances acid, fire, lightning, thunder; damage from nonmagical weapons
Damage Immunities cold, necrotic, poison
Condition Immunities charmed, fatigue, frightened, grappled, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned, prone, restrained
Senses darkvision 120 ft., passive Perception 13
Languages understands the languages it knew in life but can’t speak
Bound. The casurua can’t move more than 100 feet from its bodies.
Detect Life. The casurua magically senses the general direction of living creatures up to 1 mile away.
Incorporeal. The casurua can move through creatures and objects. It takes 5 (1d10) force damage if it ends its turn inside an object.
Invisible. The casurua is invisible unless it uses a bonus action to manifest.
Magic Resistance. The casurua has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
Legendary Resistance (3/day). When the casurua fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead. When it does so, creatures have advantage on their saving throw against the next Throw attack it makes before the end of its next turn.
Turn Immunity. The casurua automatically succeeds saving throws against any affect that would turn undead.
Undead Nature. The casurua doesn’t require air, sustenance, or sleep.
Unquiet Spirit. If defeated in combat, the casurua returns in 1d4 months. It can be put to rest permanently only by dismantling or unearthing the mass grave that holds its bodies and putting the bodies to rest in a hallowed location.
Actions
Multiattack. The casurua makes two attacks with its Claws or with Poltergeist Throw.
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 16 (2d10+5) damage + 5 (1d10) psychic damage.
Poltergeist Throw. Ranged Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, range 60 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (3d6+5) bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (whichever is most appropriate).
Hurl Objects (Recharge 4-6). The casurua throws rocks or other unattended objects that are within 10 feet of it in a 60-foot line that is 10 feet wide. Each creature in that area must make a DC 17 Dexterity saving, taking 36 (8d8) bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage (whichever is most appropriate) on a failed saving throw, or half as much damage on a successful one.
Horrifying Visage. Each non-undead creature within 60 feet that can see the casurua must make a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw. On a failure, it is frightened for 1 minute. While frightened by Horrifying Visage, a creature must take the Dash action and move away from the casurua by the safest route on each of its turns, unless there is nowhere to move. If the creature ends its turn in a location where it doesn’t have line of sight to the casurua, it may make a Wisdom saving throw. On a successful save, it is no longer frightened.
Reactions
Eyes of Doom. When the casurua takes damage from an attack or spell, it uses Horrifying Visage.
Legendary Actions
The casurua can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature’s turn. It regains spent legendary actins at the start of its turn.
Brick Up. The casurua creates a shield out of stones, branches, or other ground material. Until the start of its next turn, it has total cover and advantage on Dexterity saving throws.
Claw. The casurua uses its Claw attack.
Poltergeist Throw. The casurua uses its Poltergeist Throw
Combat
Casurua use minimal tactics and are incapable of retreating very far, since they can’t leave the spot to which they are bound. If bloodied, it turns invisible and returns to its gravesite.
