5E: Fifth Edition Monster Variants Inspired by Fourth Edition Sources

Cleon

Legend
"The Scarlet Death is an incorporeal undead being that inhabits locales that are frequently misty or foggy such as marshes or moors. Appearing as a roughly humanoid-shaped coalescence of fog with eyes like whitish beacons, it hunts and waylays travellers, using the weather to conceal its tracks."

Hmm…

A scarlet death is a vaporous undead that haunt marshes, moors and other locales that are naturally misty or foggy. It is so named because the normally whitish creature flushes red after draining blood. This undead resembles a small cloud with a vaguely humanoid top half with two arms that trail off like smoky tendrils and a head that's featureless apart from eyes like white lamps. The lower half is a misty mass floating over the ground. A scarlet death speaks in an eerie whisper but has no interest in communicating with the living.
 Scarlet deaths are often called other names such as blood mist or crimson death, although these names can also refer to similar creatures the scarlet death is often confused for; like the undead vampiric mist, or the crimson death mist, a far more powerful monstrosity.
Secret Murders. Scarlet deaths are stealthy and intelligent killers motivated by their thirst for blood. A scarlet death takes great care to avoid discovery and prefers to waylay solitary travelers and hide their bloodless remains. The death's lair is a ghastly place full of decomposing corpses and treasure from its victims, these dens are always well hidden and the entrances are often underwater.
I added a paragraph about alternative names to cover:

(given we are aligning it with the 3e monster...should we just call it Crimson Death...?)

I'd rather not use the same name for both 5E conversions to help distinguish them.

Since the original AD&D monster was some kind of living vapour I think it makes most sense to use Crimson Death for the high-CR monstrosity version and rename this undead version to something different, namely Scarlet Death.
 

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Cleon

Legend
ok done/removed

Updating the Scarlet Death Working Draft.

So I guess it's done.

Which misty menace do you fancy working on next?

We were talking about doing a low-CR undead based on the 4E version of the undead Vampiric Mist, tentatively called a Scarlet Mist as well as two monstrosities: a weak Blood Mist based on the AD&D living Vampiric Mist from I7 – Baltron's Beacon (1985) and a mighty Crimson Death Mist harking back to the original Monster Manual II (1983).

Of the three, the 4E inspired Scarlet Mist would be the easiest to finish.
 

Casimir Liber

Adventurer
Ok I have this right now (not pulbished yet as easier to correct first). I think a more diverse bonus action gives it more options in creative combat.

Regarding next - now on dndbeyond we have a CR 3 vampiric mist - so am inclined to do a monstrosity, probs the strong one.
 

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Cleon

Legend
Ok I have this right now (not pulbished yet as easier to correct first). I think a more diverse bonus action gives it more options in creative combat.

Just noticed a typo in the Scarlet Death Working Draft. Its tendrils do 3d6 + 5 but I mistyped a 7 instead. Will fix that in the next update.

screenshot-2024-09-29-090851-jpg.381110


Going though the above in order.

The Enworld version doesn't have "typically" in its alignment, it's just "neutral evil" like the original monster.

It doesn't have Condition Immunity frightened in Enworld.

Am fine upgrading Shifting Mists to be more like a Goblin's Nimble Escape. Will do that in the next upgrade.

Just realized the Description has a logical clash. It's got "A scarlet death speaks in an eerie whisper but has no interest in communicating with the living" while the Languages has "understands the languages of creatures it has killed with life drain but can't speak."

How about changing the paragraph to:

A scarlet death is a vaporous undead that haunts marshes, moors and other locales that are naturally misty or foggy. It is so named because the normally whitish creature flushes red after draining blood. This undead resembles a small cloud with a vaguely humanoid top half with two arms that trail off like smoky tendrils and a head that's featureless apart from eyes like white lamps. The lower half is a misty mass floating over the ground. A scarlet death's voice is an eerie whisper incomprehensible to other creatures, and even if the death could speak it has no interest in talking to the living.

Regarding next - now on dndbeyond we have a CR 3 vampiric mist - so am inclined to do a monstrosity, probs the strong one.

I'm still favouring the 4E-based Vampiric Blood Mist as the next conversion, then do one of the monstrosity mists.
 


Cleon

Legend

Let's check…

It's still got frightened in Condition Immunities. The Enworld version has Condition Immunities charmed, exhaustion, grappled, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned, prone, restrained.

Its Lifesense still has a "mist", it should start Lifesense. The scarlet death can sense the location of any creature within 60 feet of it.

Oh, and I just noticed that your revision of Shifting Mists also has a mist that should be scarlet death and I copied that over in my last working draft update. Better fix that…

…updating Scarlet Death Working Draft.

Oh, and the Description doesn't have a line gap between the penultimate Note paragraph and "(Originally appeared in Monster Manual II (2002).)" That's presumably the usual D&D Beyond issue with formatting rather than something you meant to do.

Speaking of the Description I'm now wondering about rephrasing the alternative name sentence/paragraph to make it a bit less clunky.

Is this better?

 Scarlet deaths are often called other names such as blood mist or crimson death. These names may properly belong to similar creatures the scarlet death is often confused for such as the vampiric mist, an undead, or the crimson death mist, a powerful monstrosity.​
 


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