Finally, a use for rasts.

[lukelightning]

You know the rast, right? That often-maligned, rarely-used, what-the-heck monster from the MM? I finally found a use for them.

My wizard is going to use lesser planar binding to call one. Then kill it with phantasmal killer or something similar, then animate it as a skeleton. Since a rast's flight is a magical effect, the rast skeleton will be able to fly. A cheap flying mount with 60' good flight!

This works on nightmares as well, but my wizard is a gnome and would rather have a Medium mount. A ravid is another option.

 

[sjmiller]

Isn't a rast the size of a large dog? Weight wise it is about the size of a Great Dane or a St. Bernard. You would need a small character to ride it.

 

[Vorput]

You know the rast, right? That often-maligned, rarely-used, what-the-heck monster from the MM? I finally found a use for them.

My wizard is going to use lesser planar binding to call one. Then kill it with phantasmal killer or something similar, then animate it as a skeleton. Since a rast's flight is a magical effect, the rast skeleton will be able to fly. A cheap flying mount with 60' good flight!

This works on nightmares as well, but my wizard is a gnome and would rather have a Medium mount. A ravid is another option.

...Brilliant...

 

[lukelightning]

Isn't a rast the size of a large dog? Weight wise it is about the size of a Great Dane or a St. Bernard. You would need a small character to ride it.

Yup, he's a gnome. If he was a medium race he'd do it to a nightmare. But the rast has the advantage of being so weird looking to begin with that people might actually not be as freaked out about is as a skeletal horse. Flying skeletal horse with flaming hooves have a long history of being ridden by harbringers of death or evil overlords.

Meanwhile, a rast skeleton doesn't look like a person or an animal, so I think it's less likely to provoke negative reactions (as in "well, he's not going around killing livestock to make that thing...")

Maybe I'll make a few of these things to use as pack animals. Great in a dungeon setting! Won't fall down pits, and medium-sized so it won't block the corridor.

 

[WizarDru]

Isn't a rast the size of a large dog?

In my group, we have a saying: "Rast: picture in MM is ACTUAL SIZE."

 

[Matafuego]

That's brillant...
Didn't know skeletons mantained their magical abilities...
And I have a fairly large clan of Gnome Necromancers IMC, thanks for the idea!!

 

[lukelightning]

That's brillant...
Didn't know skeletons mantained their magical abilities...
And I have a fairly large clan of Gnome Necromancers IMC, thanks for the idea!!

It's under the part about skeletons and movement: "Speed: Winged skeletons can’t use their wings to fly. If the base creature flew magically, so can the skeleton."

I'd thought about a zombie winged creature at first, but who wants a rotting corpse flapping around clumsily?

 

[Shemeska]

"I felt like destroying something beautiful"

You know the rast, right? That often-maligned, rarely-used, what-the-heck monster from the MM? I finally found a use for them.

My wizard is going to use lesser planar binding to call one. Then kill it with phantasmal killer or something similar, then animate it as a skeleton.

Assuming the DM doesn't have the corpse immolate, crumble to ashes, etc given where it comes from and what (quasi)element it's mostly composed of. And given that it's a being linked to and composed of the interaction of fire and negative energy already, I suppose it's an open question if trying to animate its skeleton, with negative energy might even be possible.

Or I could just enjoy being a negative nancy

 

[lukelightning]

Assuming the DM doesn't have the corpse immolate, crumble to ashes, etc given where it comes from and what (quasi)element it's mostly composed of.

True. And if the DM said this I'd say "by RAW it's ok" but I would have no problem accepting this decision, though I'd argue that my character has enough ranks in knowledge (arcana), knowledge (religion) and knowledge (the planes) to know ahead of time this woule happen so he wouldn't have wasted his time.

Now that I think about it, my idea above of making a skeletal ravid probably shouldn't work; a ravid, after all, is a positive energy creature and inherently anti-undead.

 

[Voadam]

True. And if the DM said this I'd say "by RAW it's ok" but I would have no problem accepting this decision, though I'd argue that my character has enough ranks in knowledge (arcana), knowledge (religion) and knowledge (the planes) to know ahead of time this woule happen so he wouldn't have wasted his time.

Now that I think about it, my idea above of making a skeletal ravid probably shouldn't work; a ravid, after all, is a positive energy creature and inherently anti-undead.

Worth asking your DM before hand so you don't potentially waste everyone's time during the game.