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Fearsome Critters from Lumberjack Tales
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<blockquote data-quote="Cleon" data-source="post: 4568134" data-attributes="member: 57383"><p><strong>Fearsome Critters from Lumberjack Tales - The Slide-Rock Bolter</strong></p><p></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-size: 15px"><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Slide-Rock Bolter</span></strong></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Gargantuan Magical Beast</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Hit</span></strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"> <strong>Dice:</strong> 12d10+84 (150 hp)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Initiative:</strong> +1</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Speed:</strong> 20 ft. (6 squares), Climb 20 ft., Swim 30 ft.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Armor</strong> <strong>Class:</strong> 22 (-4 size, +1 Dex, +15 natural), touch 7, flat-footed 21</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Base</strong> <strong>Attack/Grapple:</strong> +12/+36</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Attack:</strong> Bite +20 melee (4d6+12)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Full</strong> <strong>Attack:</strong> Bite +20 melee (4d6+12) and tail slap +15 melee (2d8+6)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Space/Reach:</strong> 20 ft./ 15 ft.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Special</strong> <strong>Attacks:</strong> Gobbling avalanche, improved grab, trample 3d6+18, swallow whole</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Special</strong> <strong>Qualities:</strong> Low-light vision, imitate rock, scent, slide, tremorsense 120 ft.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Saves:</strong> Fort +15, Ref +9, Will +10</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Abilities:</strong> Str 35, Dex 13, Con 24, Int 2, Wis 14, Cha 8</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Skills:</strong> Climb +20, Disguise +2* [<em>+10 as stone shelf</em>], Hide -11* [<em>+1 in rocky terrain</em>], Listen +12, Move Silently +1, Spot +12, Swim +20</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Feats:</strong> Ability Focus (gobbling avalanche), Cleave, EnduranceB, Great Cleave, Improved Overrun, Power Attack</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Environment:</strong> Temperate mountains</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Organization:</strong> Solitary or pod (2-5)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Challenge</strong> <strong>Rating:</strong> 9</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Treasure:</strong> 10% coins, 50% goods (gems and precious metals only) and 25% items (non-organic items only) plus special (value of carcass, see below)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Alignment:</strong> Always neutral</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Advancement:</strong> 13-18 HD (Gargantuan); 19-36 HD (Colossal)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Level</strong> <strong>Adjustment:</strong> —</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><em>The beast before you strongly resembles a sperm whale, or cachalot, in both size and shape. Which is a mite unusual, considering you're up in the mountains. Its skin is stony hued and spotted with lichen, matching the surrounding rock. The thing's head is enormous even for a beast of such dimensions, with a titanic square jaw and thick blubbery lips like a scorpion-fish's, its eyes appear tiny, despite being the size of grapefruit, due to immensity of the skull they are set into. At the opposite end of the body its tail is horizontal like a whale's, except each fluke ends in enormous down-curved hooks.</em></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Slide-rock bolters are mountain predators of titanic magnitude and cetacean ancestry. They may be known by other names, such as mountain gullet, <em>le cachalot de avalanche</em> (the avalanche cachalot) or whale o' the peaks. An average specimen of this beast is some fifty feet in length and weighs approximately 90,000 pounds, with a twenty foot square head.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><span style="font-size: 12px"><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Combat</span></strong></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">These monsters prefer to hang from the edge of a valley by their tails, then use Slide to descend upon prey who passes beneath it and scoop up as many victims as it can manage with Gobbling Avalanche. The slide-rock bolter then continues its slide up another slope, either to turn around for another pass or to stop at a convenient ridge and tail-hang again in wait for its next victims. Alternatively, they use their Mimic Rock ability to pretend to be a bluff of rock and wait for prey to wander nearby then flop into their midst to trample, bite, swallow whole, and tail-slap.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">In either case, slide-rock bolters are doughty fighters who only consider retreat after taking more than half their hit points in damage, whereupon they will slide off downhill, vomiting out any swallowed victims if such continue to hurt them after a few rounds in their gizzards.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Gobbling Avalanche (Ex)</strong></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">As a full-round action, a slide-rock bolter can move up to twice its slide speed and literally run over any opponents at least one size category smaller than itself. The bolter merely has to move over the opponents in its path; provided the bolter's movement covers at least one square occupied by a target it is subject to the gobbling avalanche attack. All targets so affected take 6d6+18 points bludgeoning damage. In addition, if the slide-rock bolter moves over all the squares a target creature occupies, the target must make a DC 19 Reflex save or be swallowed whole (see Swallow Whole, below).</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Opponents struck by a gobbling avalanche can attempt attacks of opportunity, but these take a -4 penalty. If they do not make attacks of opportunity, these opponents can attempt DC 30 Reflex saves to take half damage.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">If the bolter strikes a creature or object of its own size or larger it must halt its movement, although it inflicts normal gobbling avalanche damage to the obstacle. A slide-rock bolter that ends its gobbling avalanche in an illegal space returns to the last legal position it occupied, or the closest legal position, if there’s a legal position that’s closer. </span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The save DC is Strength-based for the save to take half damage, Dexterity-based for the save to avoid being swallowed whole.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Improved Grab (Ex)</strong></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong></strong>To use this ability, a slide-rock bolter must hit with its bite attack. It can then attempt to start a grapple as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity. If it wins the grapple check, it establishes a hold and can attempt to swallow the foe as its next action. (See Swallow Whole, below)</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Mimic Stone (Ex)</strong></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">A stationary slide-rock bolter can camouflage itself as a shelf of rock. This masquerade is purely visual, the bolter still feels like smooth leather to the touch and retains its natural scent. Anyone who examines the bolter can notice the ruse through a successful Spot check opposed by the slide-rock bolter’s Disguise check, although by this time they may well be close enough to be on the receiving end of the monster's gulping avalanche.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Slide (Su)</strong></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">A slide-rock bolter can produce a magical lubricant that allows it to slip down and up slopes with marvellous speed. A bolter's cheek-glands stock sufficient enchanted skid-grease to Slide for a number of rounds equal to twice the individual's hit dice, it need not expend the grease in one continuous sequence, and can completely replenish an empty set of cheek-glands with ten minutes of rest.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The slide-rock bolter can only launch a Slide from a slope of greater than 45 degrees of at least thirty feet in height. A bolter must prepare itself before starting a slide, which requires a move action. Once properly prepared, the slide-rock bolter may wait as long as it likes before starting the Slide, but if it moves more than a five-foot step, or exits a suitable slope, it loses said preparation and need to spend another move action to re-establish it.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">While sliding the bolter receives a 30 ft. enhancement bonus to its land and climb speed, increasing its speed to 50 ft. A slide-rock bolter can make a run action to move at five times its slide speed, and can even run when climbing, but can only run downhill while sliding. A sliding bolter cannot move backwards or turn more 45 degrees in any five-foot space, nor turn more than a total of 90 degrees during each round of sliding. [<em>similar to a flying creature with average manoeuvrability</em>]</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The Slide lasts as long as the bolter makes at least a double-move every round and moves at least twenty feet vertically (up, down or in combination), or it runs out of skid-grease. The Slide stops if it fails to meet any of these conditions, or the bolter runs face-up a slope of a height equal to the altitude from which it initiated the Slide. A slide-rock bolter can avoid the previous restriction by curving sideways to avoid running headfirst into the cut-off height, then turning tail-up and sliding back downhill without interrupting its Slide.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Once the slide has ended, for whatever reason, the slide-rock bolter needs to reorient and prepare itself again before launching another Slide, requiring the expenditure of a move action by the bolter when it is positioned upon a suitable slope.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Swallow Whole (Ex)</strong></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong></strong>A slide-rock bolter can try to swallow a grabbed opponent of a smaller size category than itself by making a successful grapple check. Due to the enormous greasy gape of a slide-rock bolter's maw it can attempt to swallow an opponent two size categories smaller than itself as a swift action, and foes three or more size categories smaller than itself as free actions, although it can make no more than one swallowing attempt on any given individual per round.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Once swallowed, the opponent takes 2d8+12 points of crushing damage plus 8 points of acid damage per round from the bolter’s gizzard. The acid damage in a slide-rock bolter's gizzard is from a corrosive bile which only dissolves organic materials like flesh, stone and metal are unaffected. A swallowed creature can cut its way out by using a light slashing or piercing weapon to deal 25 points of damage to the gizzard (AC 17). Once the creature exits, muscular action closes the hole; another swallowed opponent must cut its own way out.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">A Gargantuan slide-rock bolter’s gizzard can accommodate 1 Huge, 4 Large, 16 Medium, 64 Small or 256 Tiny or smaller opponents.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Trample (Ex)</strong></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Reflex save DC 28. The save DC is Strength-based.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><span style="font-size: 12px"><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Skills</span></strong></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Slide-rock bolters have keen senses giving them a +4 racial bonus to Spot and Listen checks. A slide-rock bolter has a +8 racial bonus on Climb or Swim checks, it can always choose to take 10 on a Climb or Swim check, even when distracted or endangered.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">*Among rocky terrain a slide-rock bolter gains a +12 racial bonus to Hide checks. A slide-rock bolter gains a +8 racial bonus on Disguise checks to masquerade as a stone ridge (see Mimic Stone, above).</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><span style="font-size: 12px"><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Lore Checks</span></strong></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>DC 19</strong> - A slide-rock bolter is an enormous man-eating beast only found in steep mountains. They look like whales with stony skin and grapple-hooks for tail. These beasts will slide down into a valley, scoop a party of prospectors into its mouth without slowing, then slide up the opposite slope to another mountain-top perch.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>DC 24</strong> - Sometimes, these monsters don't wait on peaks to toboggan down on victims like an avalanche, but just lie on mountain trails with their eyes shut and pretend to be a huge slab of rock until some careless tourist wanders up to its mouth. If you search around a bolter's favourite perch you may find some indigestible valuables amongst the bones of its victims.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>DC 29</strong> - Slide rock bolter's don't always live alone, and seem to be able to talk to each other without regular folk hearing any noise. A dead slide-rock bolter's carcass is worth a lot of money, it's teeth and the amazingly slippery grease in its jaw-glands are worth their weight in gold.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><span style="font-size: 12px"><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Ecology</span></strong></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Only the steepest mountain country is inhabited by these beasts, where the slopes reach 45° or more, a grade of one pace up for every pace sideways. A slide-rock bolter's belly is serried with sled-like runners and limpet-like feet, which allow the animal to both scale perpendicular cliffs and slip across ground as easily as a sleigh. Bolters often loiter about mountain passes that herds of caribou, wild horses and the like use to reach greener pastures, such grazing animals forming the bulk of their diet.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Slide-rock bolters have transformed the sonar of their cetacean forefathers into a finely tuned ability to feel ground vibrations through their massive lower jawbones, by which means they can locate the footsteps of their prey. In addition, these animals possess excellent hearing, and vision that almost rivals an eagle's in its keenness.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Bolters are sociable animals, although they prefer to hunt as individuals rather than packs. They generally gather in family groups or small bands of the same sex. The biggest specimens, mostly colossal bulls, tend to be loners or the head of a family pod (mama, papa and full or part-grown young 'uns). Slide-rock bolters have a pretty complicated social life for animals, which they maintain by 'talking' to each other by sending vibrations through the rock, by which means they can converse with their kith and kin over great distances. Bolters instinctively shun bloody disputes with their own kind, settling disputes over territory or mating through head-to-head pushing contests instead, the winner being the bolter who overruns the other.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">These frightful carnivores prefer a most peculiar hunting strategy. They use their tail-hooks to anchor themselves head-down upon some precipitous slope, such as a mountain ridge or the edge of a deep gulch. From this vantage point they wait for some prey to pass below them, mayhap hanging motionless for days at a time before hapless victims wander by. Once prey is sighted, the slide-rock bolter waits until the right moment, slavers a marvellous skid-grease from its mouth and then hoicks up its flukes' to loose their hold upon the mountainside. Thus released, the bolter toboggans down the slope like a living avalanche, drooling a thin skid-grease from corners of its mouth, which greatly augments its velocity, gulping down any unfortunate victims in its path. A big bolter can swallow an entire party of prospectors in one scoop, mules and all, the poor victims' passage down its gullet being smoothed by the same grease that facilitates the beast's slide down the mountainside. After making a swallowing-run, a slide-rock bolter often allows its own impetus to carry it up the next slope, where it slaps down its tail to wait for another meal.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">A slide-rock bolter's skid-grease is a magical fluid enchanted by organs in the bolter's cheeks. It grant these gigantic beasts the power to easily skim across even rough ground. Said glands may hold no more than one long slide's supply of grease, but can replenish their stock from vast reserves of slide-oil within the bolter's skull. This slide-oil is not sufficiently empowered to support a bolter's sliding, but must be processed by the cheek-organs first. A healthy bolter's head stores enough slide-oil to provide hours of sliding once it is empowered by the cheek-glands, typically two pints per hit point the slide-rock bolter possesses, with each pint of oil becoming a pint of grease, which is enough for a round of sliding. Skid-grease keeps its supernatural slickness for only a few moments after a slide-rock bolter discharges it, afterwards becoming a sticky residue.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">While tobogganing across valleys is a bolter's favourite means of catching prey, they do use other stratagems, such as lying in streams during a salmon run, gulping down the fish as they swim upstream, plus any bears foolish enough to interpose. A commoner trick is masquerading as a shelf of rock, as even keen-eyed travelers can be fooled into strolling up to a slide-rock bolter who's lying motionless with its eyes tight-shut. They can do an uncanny imitation of geology.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Although not as swift in water as the whales they resemble, slide-rock bolters are skilled swimmers and may be found frolicking in mountain lakes, during which times they may show an uncharacteristically pleasant disposition. If so, this is not due to any change in conscience on the bolter's part, but because they frequently visit lakes after gorging themselves on prey, finding a dip in the water a pleasant aid to their digestion, thus their occasional lack of hostility is down to a lack of hunger. That's not to say they won't hunt aquatically, many a moose has disappeared into a bolter's huge maw while swimming across a tarn.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 12px">Treasure</span></span></strong></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></strong><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">After digesting a meal, a slide-rock bolter spits out any indigestible remnants that remain. A bolter habitually visits the same spot to do this business, and the resulting spoil-heap may contain a fair stock of indissoluble valuables left over from its victims, assuming you're strong-stomached enough to sift through the bones. Mostly these are things like coins, prospectors' gold nuggets, gems from high-altitude mines and assorted usable equipment, which may include the occasional magical item.</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The carcass of a slide-rock bolter has considerable value. The easily portable portions are equivalent to a treasure of a challenge rating equal to the bolter (4500 gold pieces for an average specimen), half this value is slide-oil, worth 10 gold pieces per pound weight (so 2250 gp and 225 lbs on average specimen), the other half is ivory teeth and skid-grease worth five times as much by weight (50 gold pieces per pound, so an average specimen's grease & teeth are worth 2250 gp and weigh 45 lbs).</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">There is still more value in the rest of the carcass - the blubber is edible and can be rendered down into oil, most of the flesh is useless, but some portions are edible, such as the tongue, in the form of plus hide and a bolter's hide and bones are also valuable. However, it requires a large expedition with specialized equipment to butcher a slide-rock bolter, which still leaves the problem of transporting tons of oil and flesh down from the mountains - the value of the rest of the carcass is equal to the easily portable pieces (4500 gp on average), but is worth but one silver piece per pound (so 45,000 pounds in total, or 22½ short tons).</span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></span></span><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"> [<em>Lumberwood Critters generally lack darkvision, unlike standard Magical Beasts</em>]</span></span></span></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Cleon, post: 4568134, member: 57383"] [b]Fearsome Critters from Lumberjack Tales - The Slide-Rock Bolter[/b] [FONT=Arial][SIZE=2][SIZE=4][B][FONT=Arial]Slide-Rock Bolter[/FONT][/B][/SIZE][FONT=Arial] [/FONT][FONT=Arial]Gargantuan Magical Beast [/FONT][B][FONT=Arial]Hit[/FONT][/B][FONT=Arial] [B]Dice:[/B] 12d10+84 (150 hp) [B]Initiative:[/B] +1 [B]Speed:[/B] 20 ft. (6 squares), Climb 20 ft., Swim 30 ft. [B]Armor[/B] [B]Class:[/B] 22 (-4 size, +1 Dex, +15 natural), touch 7, flat-footed 21 [B]Base[/B] [B]Attack/Grapple:[/B] +12/+36 [B]Attack:[/B] Bite +20 melee (4d6+12) [B]Full[/B] [B]Attack:[/B] Bite +20 melee (4d6+12) and tail slap +15 melee (2d8+6) [B]Space/Reach:[/B] 20 ft./ 15 ft. [B]Special[/B] [B]Attacks:[/B] Gobbling avalanche, improved grab, trample 3d6+18, swallow whole [B]Special[/B] [B]Qualities:[/B] Low-light vision, imitate rock, scent, slide, tremorsense 120 ft. [B]Saves:[/B] Fort +15, Ref +9, Will +10 [B]Abilities:[/B] Str 35, Dex 13, Con 24, Int 2, Wis 14, Cha 8 [B]Skills:[/B] Climb +20, Disguise +2* [[I]+10 as stone shelf[/I]], Hide -11* [[I]+1 in rocky terrain[/I]], Listen +12, Move Silently +1, Spot +12, Swim +20 [B]Feats:[/B] Ability Focus (gobbling avalanche), Cleave, EnduranceB, Great Cleave, Improved Overrun, Power Attack [B]Environment:[/B] Temperate mountains [B]Organization:[/B] Solitary or pod (2-5) [B]Challenge[/B] [B]Rating:[/B] 9 [B]Treasure:[/B] 10% coins, 50% goods (gems and precious metals only) and 25% items (non-organic items only) plus special (value of carcass, see below) [B]Alignment:[/B] Always neutral [B]Advancement:[/B] 13-18 HD (Gargantuan); 19-36 HD (Colossal) [B]Level[/B] [B]Adjustment:[/B] — [I]The beast before you strongly resembles a sperm whale, or cachalot, in both size and shape. Which is a mite unusual, considering you're up in the mountains. Its skin is stony hued and spotted with lichen, matching the surrounding rock. The thing's head is enormous even for a beast of such dimensions, with a titanic square jaw and thick blubbery lips like a scorpion-fish's, its eyes appear tiny, despite being the size of grapefruit, due to immensity of the skull they are set into. At the opposite end of the body its tail is horizontal like a whale's, except each fluke ends in enormous down-curved hooks.[/I] Slide-rock bolters are mountain predators of titanic magnitude and cetacean ancestry. They may be known by other names, such as mountain gullet, [I]le cachalot de avalanche[/I] (the avalanche cachalot) or whale o' the peaks. An average specimen of this beast is some fifty feet in length and weighs approximately 90,000 pounds, with a twenty foot square head. [/FONT][SIZE=3][B][FONT=Arial]Combat[/FONT][/B][/SIZE][FONT=Arial] These monsters prefer to hang from the edge of a valley by their tails, then use Slide to descend upon prey who passes beneath it and scoop up as many victims as it can manage with Gobbling Avalanche. The slide-rock bolter then continues its slide up another slope, either to turn around for another pass or to stop at a convenient ridge and tail-hang again in wait for its next victims. Alternatively, they use their Mimic Rock ability to pretend to be a bluff of rock and wait for prey to wander nearby then flop into their midst to trample, bite, swallow whole, and tail-slap. In either case, slide-rock bolters are doughty fighters who only consider retreat after taking more than half their hit points in damage, whereupon they will slide off downhill, vomiting out any swallowed victims if such continue to hurt them after a few rounds in their gizzards. [B]Gobbling Avalanche (Ex)[/B] As a full-round action, a slide-rock bolter can move up to twice its slide speed and literally run over any opponents at least one size category smaller than itself. The bolter merely has to move over the opponents in its path; provided the bolter's movement covers at least one square occupied by a target it is subject to the gobbling avalanche attack. All targets so affected take 6d6+18 points bludgeoning damage. In addition, if the slide-rock bolter moves over all the squares a target creature occupies, the target must make a DC 19 Reflex save or be swallowed whole (see Swallow Whole, below). Opponents struck by a gobbling avalanche can attempt attacks of opportunity, but these take a -4 penalty. If they do not make attacks of opportunity, these opponents can attempt DC 30 Reflex saves to take half damage. If the bolter strikes a creature or object of its own size or larger it must halt its movement, although it inflicts normal gobbling avalanche damage to the obstacle. A slide-rock bolter that ends its gobbling avalanche in an illegal space returns to the last legal position it occupied, or the closest legal position, if there’s a legal position that’s closer. The save DC is Strength-based for the save to take half damage, Dexterity-based for the save to avoid being swallowed whole. [B]Improved Grab (Ex) [/B]To use this ability, a slide-rock bolter must hit with its bite attack. It can then attempt to start a grapple as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity. If it wins the grapple check, it establishes a hold and can attempt to swallow the foe as its next action. (See Swallow Whole, below) [B]Mimic Stone (Ex)[/B] A stationary slide-rock bolter can camouflage itself as a shelf of rock. This masquerade is purely visual, the bolter still feels like smooth leather to the touch and retains its natural scent. Anyone who examines the bolter can notice the ruse through a successful Spot check opposed by the slide-rock bolter’s Disguise check, although by this time they may well be close enough to be on the receiving end of the monster's gulping avalanche. [B]Slide (Su)[/B] A slide-rock bolter can produce a magical lubricant that allows it to slip down and up slopes with marvellous speed. A bolter's cheek-glands stock sufficient enchanted skid-grease to Slide for a number of rounds equal to twice the individual's hit dice, it need not expend the grease in one continuous sequence, and can completely replenish an empty set of cheek-glands with ten minutes of rest. The slide-rock bolter can only launch a Slide from a slope of greater than 45 degrees of at least thirty feet in height. A bolter must prepare itself before starting a slide, which requires a move action. Once properly prepared, the slide-rock bolter may wait as long as it likes before starting the Slide, but if it moves more than a five-foot step, or exits a suitable slope, it loses said preparation and need to spend another move action to re-establish it. While sliding the bolter receives a 30 ft. enhancement bonus to its land and climb speed, increasing its speed to 50 ft. A slide-rock bolter can make a run action to move at five times its slide speed, and can even run when climbing, but can only run downhill while sliding. A sliding bolter cannot move backwards or turn more 45 degrees in any five-foot space, nor turn more than a total of 90 degrees during each round of sliding. [[I]similar to a flying creature with average manoeuvrability[/I]] The Slide lasts as long as the bolter makes at least a double-move every round and moves at least twenty feet vertically (up, down or in combination), or it runs out of skid-grease. The Slide stops if it fails to meet any of these conditions, or the bolter runs face-up a slope of a height equal to the altitude from which it initiated the Slide. A slide-rock bolter can avoid the previous restriction by curving sideways to avoid running headfirst into the cut-off height, then turning tail-up and sliding back downhill without interrupting its Slide. Once the slide has ended, for whatever reason, the slide-rock bolter needs to reorient and prepare itself again before launching another Slide, requiring the expenditure of a move action by the bolter when it is positioned upon a suitable slope. [B]Swallow Whole (Ex) [/B]A slide-rock bolter can try to swallow a grabbed opponent of a smaller size category than itself by making a successful grapple check. Due to the enormous greasy gape of a slide-rock bolter's maw it can attempt to swallow an opponent two size categories smaller than itself as a swift action, and foes three or more size categories smaller than itself as free actions, although it can make no more than one swallowing attempt on any given individual per round. Once swallowed, the opponent takes 2d8+12 points of crushing damage plus 8 points of acid damage per round from the bolter’s gizzard. The acid damage in a slide-rock bolter's gizzard is from a corrosive bile which only dissolves organic materials like flesh, stone and metal are unaffected. A swallowed creature can cut its way out by using a light slashing or piercing weapon to deal 25 points of damage to the gizzard (AC 17). Once the creature exits, muscular action closes the hole; another swallowed opponent must cut its own way out. A Gargantuan slide-rock bolter’s gizzard can accommodate 1 Huge, 4 Large, 16 Medium, 64 Small or 256 Tiny or smaller opponents. [B]Trample (Ex)[/B] Reflex save DC 28. The save DC is Strength-based. [/FONT][SIZE=3][B][FONT=Arial]Skills[/FONT][/B][/SIZE][FONT=Arial] Slide-rock bolters have keen senses giving them a +4 racial bonus to Spot and Listen checks. A slide-rock bolter has a +8 racial bonus on Climb or Swim checks, it can always choose to take 10 on a Climb or Swim check, even when distracted or endangered. *Among rocky terrain a slide-rock bolter gains a +12 racial bonus to Hide checks. A slide-rock bolter gains a +8 racial bonus on Disguise checks to masquerade as a stone ridge (see Mimic Stone, above). [/FONT][SIZE=3][B][FONT=Arial]Lore Checks[/FONT][/B][/SIZE][FONT=Arial] [B]DC 19[/B] - A slide-rock bolter is an enormous man-eating beast only found in steep mountains. They look like whales with stony skin and grapple-hooks for tail. These beasts will slide down into a valley, scoop a party of prospectors into its mouth without slowing, then slide up the opposite slope to another mountain-top perch. [B]DC 24[/B] - Sometimes, these monsters don't wait on peaks to toboggan down on victims like an avalanche, but just lie on mountain trails with their eyes shut and pretend to be a huge slab of rock until some careless tourist wanders up to its mouth. If you search around a bolter's favourite perch you may find some indigestible valuables amongst the bones of its victims. [B]DC 29[/B] - Slide rock bolter's don't always live alone, and seem to be able to talk to each other without regular folk hearing any noise. A dead slide-rock bolter's carcass is worth a lot of money, it's teeth and the amazingly slippery grease in its jaw-glands are worth their weight in gold. [/FONT][SIZE=3][B][FONT=Arial]Ecology[/FONT][/B][/SIZE][FONT=Arial] Only the steepest mountain country is inhabited by these beasts, where the slopes reach 45° or more, a grade of one pace up for every pace sideways. A slide-rock bolter's belly is serried with sled-like runners and limpet-like feet, which allow the animal to both scale perpendicular cliffs and slip across ground as easily as a sleigh. Bolters often loiter about mountain passes that herds of caribou, wild horses and the like use to reach greener pastures, such grazing animals forming the bulk of their diet. Slide-rock bolters have transformed the sonar of their cetacean forefathers into a finely tuned ability to feel ground vibrations through their massive lower jawbones, by which means they can locate the footsteps of their prey. In addition, these animals possess excellent hearing, and vision that almost rivals an eagle's in its keenness. Bolters are sociable animals, although they prefer to hunt as individuals rather than packs. They generally gather in family groups or small bands of the same sex. The biggest specimens, mostly colossal bulls, tend to be loners or the head of a family pod (mama, papa and full or part-grown young 'uns). Slide-rock bolters have a pretty complicated social life for animals, which they maintain by 'talking' to each other by sending vibrations through the rock, by which means they can converse with their kith and kin over great distances. Bolters instinctively shun bloody disputes with their own kind, settling disputes over territory or mating through head-to-head pushing contests instead, the winner being the bolter who overruns the other. These frightful carnivores prefer a most peculiar hunting strategy. They use their tail-hooks to anchor themselves head-down upon some precipitous slope, such as a mountain ridge or the edge of a deep gulch. From this vantage point they wait for some prey to pass below them, mayhap hanging motionless for days at a time before hapless victims wander by. Once prey is sighted, the slide-rock bolter waits until the right moment, slavers a marvellous skid-grease from its mouth and then hoicks up its flukes' to loose their hold upon the mountainside. Thus released, the bolter toboggans down the slope like a living avalanche, drooling a thin skid-grease from corners of its mouth, which greatly augments its velocity, gulping down any unfortunate victims in its path. A big bolter can swallow an entire party of prospectors in one scoop, mules and all, the poor victims' passage down its gullet being smoothed by the same grease that facilitates the beast's slide down the mountainside. After making a swallowing-run, a slide-rock bolter often allows its own impetus to carry it up the next slope, where it slaps down its tail to wait for another meal. A slide-rock bolter's skid-grease is a magical fluid enchanted by organs in the bolter's cheeks. It grant these gigantic beasts the power to easily skim across even rough ground. Said glands may hold no more than one long slide's supply of grease, but can replenish their stock from vast reserves of slide-oil within the bolter's skull. This slide-oil is not sufficiently empowered to support a bolter's sliding, but must be processed by the cheek-organs first. A healthy bolter's head stores enough slide-oil to provide hours of sliding once it is empowered by the cheek-glands, typically two pints per hit point the slide-rock bolter possesses, with each pint of oil becoming a pint of grease, which is enough for a round of sliding. Skid-grease keeps its supernatural slickness for only a few moments after a slide-rock bolter discharges it, afterwards becoming a sticky residue. While tobogganing across valleys is a bolter's favourite means of catching prey, they do use other stratagems, such as lying in streams during a salmon run, gulping down the fish as they swim upstream, plus any bears foolish enough to interpose. A commoner trick is masquerading as a shelf of rock, as even keen-eyed travelers can be fooled into strolling up to a slide-rock bolter who's lying motionless with its eyes tight-shut. They can do an uncanny imitation of geology. Although not as swift in water as the whales they resemble, slide-rock bolters are skilled swimmers and may be found frolicking in mountain lakes, during which times they may show an uncharacteristically pleasant disposition. If so, this is not due to any change in conscience on the bolter's part, but because they frequently visit lakes after gorging themselves on prey, finding a dip in the water a pleasant aid to their digestion, thus their occasional lack of hostility is down to a lack of hunger. That's not to say they won't hunt aquatically, many a moose has disappeared into a bolter's huge maw while swimming across a tarn. [/FONT][B][FONT=Arial][SIZE=3]Treasure[/SIZE] [/FONT][/B][FONT=Arial]After digesting a meal, a slide-rock bolter spits out any indigestible remnants that remain. A bolter habitually visits the same spot to do this business, and the resulting spoil-heap may contain a fair stock of indissoluble valuables left over from its victims, assuming you're strong-stomached enough to sift through the bones. Mostly these are things like coins, prospectors' gold nuggets, gems from high-altitude mines and assorted usable equipment, which may include the occasional magical item. The carcass of a slide-rock bolter has considerable value. The easily portable portions are equivalent to a treasure of a challenge rating equal to the bolter (4500 gold pieces for an average specimen), half this value is slide-oil, worth 10 gold pieces per pound weight (so 2250 gp and 225 lbs on average specimen), the other half is ivory teeth and skid-grease worth five times as much by weight (50 gold pieces per pound, so an average specimen's grease & teeth are worth 2250 gp and weigh 45 lbs). There is still more value in the rest of the carcass - the blubber is edible and can be rendered down into oil, most of the flesh is useless, but some portions are edible, such as the tongue, in the form of plus hide and a bolter's hide and bones are also valuable. However, it requires a large expedition with specialized equipment to butcher a slide-rock bolter, which still leaves the problem of transporting tons of oil and flesh down from the mountains - the value of the rest of the carcass is equal to the easily portable pieces (4500 gp on average), but is worth but one silver piece per pound (so 45,000 pounds in total, or 22½ short tons). [/FONT][/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Arial][SIZE=2][FONT=Arial] [[I]Lumberwood Critters generally lack darkvision, unlike standard Magical Beasts[/I]][/FONT][/SIZE][/FONT] [/QUOTE]
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