Ti-khana Triceratops
Huge monstrosity (shapechanger), neutral evil
Armor Class 16 (natural armor)
Hit Points 147 (14d12 + 56)
Speed 50 ft.
STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
|---|
22 (+6) | 11 (+0) | 19 (+4) | 4 (–3) | 13 (+1) | 10 (+0) |
Senses passive Perception 11
Languages —
Challenge 9 (5,000 XP)
Proficiency Bonus +4
Shapechanger. The ti-khana triceratops can use its action to polymorph into a Medium snake, or back into its true form. Its statistics are the same in each form. Any equipment it is wearing or carrying isn't transformed. It reverts to its true form if it dies.
Innate Spellcasting (Triceratops Form Only). The ti-khana triceratops's innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 12). The ti-khana can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components:
Magic Resistance. The ti-khana has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
Trampling Charge: If the ti-khana triceratops moves at least 20 feet straight toward a creature and then hits it with a gore attack on the same turn, that target must succeed on a DC 18 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone. If the target is prone, the triceratops can make one stomp attack against it as a bonus action.
Actions
Bite (Snake Form Only). Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target.
Hit: 9 (1d6 + 6) piercing damage plus 10 (3d6) poison damage.
Gore (Triceratops Form Only). Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target.
Hit: 24 (4d8 + 6) piercing damage plus 10 (3d6) poison damage.
Stomp (Triceratops Form Only). Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 5 ft., one prone creature.
Hit: 22 (3d10 + 6) bludgeoning damage.
Telekinetic Bomb (Recharge 5-6). The ti-khana triceratops targets a point it can see within 300 feet of it. Each creature in a 20-foot-radius sphere centered on that point must succeed on a DC 16 Strength saving throw or takes 21 (6d6) force damage and is pushed 20 feet away from the central point and falls prone. On a success, the target takes half damage and is not pushed or knocked prone.
Description
A ti-khana triceratops is a mammoth quadruped that weighs as much as several normal-sized elephants. These reptiles are strikingly colored, the hue of its scales can range from gloss black, bone white, poisonous green, to the yellow-orange or red of a venomous wasp or snake. A few are a single colour, but most are patterned in stripes or spots. Heavily armored with crocodile-like scales, this dinosaur has an enormous head that looks like a naked skull backed by a huge bony crest over the nape of its neck and collar.
Like a regular triceratops, a ti-khana triceratops has a short horn on its nose and a pair of long horns set above its eyes. However, its brow horns are needle-sharp, longer than pikes and drip venom, resembling the fangs of a colossal viper more than the horns of a herbivore, while its nose horn is a massive crystal rather than being grown from bone and keratin. Smaller crystals hornlets jut from the creature's face and the rim of its head crest.
The crystals that stud the skull of a ti-khana triceratops allow it to produce powerful arcane blasts, turning the dinosaur into walking siege artillery. The standard type projects a bubble of psionic force that smashes away everything within a 40-foot sphere. Other variants are possible, such as crystal arrays that hurl fireballs, streams of acid, or mind-bursting psionic attacks. These crystals are implanted into the ti-khana by its yuan-ti creators and fuse with its flesh and bone, so they regrow if damaged like a natural horn.
The yuan-ti bred the ti-khana triceratops as a beast of war capable of smashing enemy formations to pieces. In battle, they either carry yuan-ti upon their backs (typically one abomination in a saddle or a howdah full of malison archers) or fight without riders. When shapechanged into a snake, a ki-khana triceratops is impossible to distinguish from a normal snake or a yuan-ti in snake form without using of truesight or similar means. As well as confusing opponents, this allows the monstrosity to infiltrate areas it could not enter in its true form.
Creatures of the Yuan-ti. Over millennia of experimentation, the yuan-ti have transformed various scaly reptilian animals into monstrosities that share some of their traits. Called ti-khana, these prized pets are carefully trained to serve their ophidian masters. All ti-khana are resistant to magic like yuan-ti and possess the innate ability to detect magic. The majority of ti-khana also have venomous fangs, the ability to transform into a poisonous snake, and some kind of supernatural or magical attack.
Ti-khana require the dark magic and alchemy of the yuan-ti to breed and develop their powers. Ti-khana can survive in the wild, but it is unlikely they can reproduce properly without the yuan-ti's arcane treatments. It is possible some types of ti-khana can mate with their unaltered relatives or lay viable eggs with their own kind. However, feral offspring can not develop ti-khana abilities without yuan-ti intervention so, at best, would grow into beasts resembling the ti-khana's mundane ancestors.
Breeding and training ti-khana is usually performed by specialist yuan-ti spellcasters, but an edifice can be enchanted to perform this task for one or more strains of ti-khana. This allows ancient yuan-ti sites to have a population of ti-khana "guarddogs" even if no yuan-ti has visited them for millennia.
VARIANT: ALTERNATIVE CERATOPSIANS
A ti-khana triceratops may have different patterns and color of crystals set in its skull and horns, and the shape and position of its head crest and horns can vary greatly. Such creatures often have other species of Ceratopsia in their ancestry or are a different genus than
Triceratops. Some ti-khana ceratopsians have blunt facial buttresses or a sharp beak instead of the lancelike horns of the triceratops variety, instead of a
Gore attack doing piercing damage, these variants have slashing damage
Bite attack or a bludgeoning damage
Slam attack with the same numerical values.
Instead of a
Telekinetic Bomb attack, an alternative ti-khana ceratopsian has one of the following:
Fireball (Recharge 5-6). A bright streak flashes from the ti-khana ceratopsian's nose horn to a point within 150 feet and explodes into flames. Each creature in a 20-foot-radius sphere centered on that point must make a DC 16 Dexterity saving throw, taking 28 (8d6) fire damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.
Mindburst (Recharge 5-6). The ti-khana ceratopsian emits psionic energy in a 60-foot cone. Each creature in that area must succeed on a DC 16 Intelligence saving throw or take 18 (4d6 + 4) psychic damage and be stunned for 1 round. On a success, the target takes half damage and is not stunned.
Thunderbolt (Recharge 3-6). Ranged Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, range 600 ft., one target.
Hit 18 (4d6 + 4) lightning damage plus 18 (4d6 + 4) sonic damage.
Vitriol Beam (Recharge 5-6). The ti-khana ceratopsian's nose horn projects rays of venomously corrosive energy in a 60-foot line that is 5 feet wide. Each creature in that line takes 5 (1d10) acid damage plus 5 (1d10) poison damage and must make a DC 16 Constitution saving throw on their turn the next round. If they fail, they take an additional 5 (1d10) acid damage plus 5 (1d10) poison damage and are poisoned for 1 hour.
(Based on a monster from the
Fiend Folio (2003).)
