Most freakish template creatures?

[Jürgen Hubert]

So, what are the most freakish creatures you have created that use one or more templates on top of a "normal" creature? And what impression did it make on the PCs and the players?

Mine would have to be the Very Young Half-Fiendish Silver Dragon. It seriously creeped the PCs out. It appeared to them in the form of a young human girl - but with three red eyeballs in each of its eye sockets - and had a rather disturbing conversation with the PCs.

Thanks to some earlier adventures, the PCs had a pretty good idea of what they were facing. After a while, they retreated and had a pretty heated argument about whether it would be morally justified to kill the creature despite the fact that it posed no immediate threat to the PCs or other people...

 

[Psion]

I really liked my Creature Swarm Sapphire Dragon (template from Advanced Bestiary, basically a dragon composed of a swarm of gecko-sized mini-dragons), but didn't get as much play out of it as I would have liked.

 

[Chaldfont]

I love templated creatures. They are great for experienced (jaded) D&D players who know everything about the monsters.

Here are some I have used:

Two-headed, corrupt dire bear
Gelatinous nothic
Half-troll/half-black dragon
Reptilian dire ape (summoned by a lizardfolk druid with a modified summon nature's ally spell)

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Half-troll/half-black dragon

The mind boggles how this creature came into existence. But I guess that's one of those Things Man Was Not Meant To Know...

 

[Chaldfont]

The mind boggles how this creature came into existence. But I guess that's one of those Things Man Was Not Meant To Know...

The Garghalaargh was the result of uspeakable breeding experiments by the Mother of All Serpents (a reptilian demigoddess). To say more would lead to madness.

 

[Voadam]

Vyrlakos disease vampire on a high level orc fighter.

They had been getting hints about this eye of gruumsh war leader who had been suborned by a glabrezu minion of a demon lord of disease. Then they found out he had been turned into a disease vampire and stripped of his command by one of the demon cult priestesses. When they finally got to him it went really well, and the finishing cold iron spike in his crypt was a great scene.

 

[Tonguez]

Half-troll/half-black dragon

I've got a pair of Boneless*, plague-bearing Half-black dragon, Half-fiend trolls (one Scorcerer and the other a Psychic Warrior) with the ability to merge into a gestalt set up as the gods of Madness and Disease imc who I've used on a couple of occasions (like when the PCs were investigating the outbreak of a strange sickness which caused the normally peaceful local mangani (arboreal bugbears) to go rabid).

* Boneless is my own template which basically replaces bone with flexible cartilidge increasing reflexes +4, +4 to grapple and +4 to escape artist checks

I've also got a gigantic fiendish aquatic otyugh savant (Int 26) as a major NPC (and grandfather of one of the current PCs)

I've also did a Fiendish 'Living Wave' (Water Elemental) that protects the harbour of an Island the PCs are currently approaching (my game is set in Mythic Polynesia)

In the past I've used lots of insectoid goblins (the offspring of the god of Flies - himself a fiendish insectoid goblin), a fiendish giant eel (the protector of a sacred pool who is worshiped by the local gnomes) and am going to introduce an intelligent collosal giant clam with abilities to summon storms and spit acrid water (breath weapon) at some point soon (this creature is derived from Tahitian myth, as was the living wave)

Anyway I love templates and use the feindish and insectoid templates extensively
of course I also just add abilities that I like too without any template at all...

 

[RangerWickett]

Does anyone recall Klixxit from Piratecat's storyhour? I recall it being something like a half-dragon half-fiend half-earth-elemental pseudonatural shadow-template true-ghoul kobold.

 

[Bill Muench]

I really enjoy templates, advancing creatures, and adding class levels. I think it really gives 3rd edition a lot of possibilities. I've got a couple of favorites:

The Grbleringbeshen, a group of Shadow Gibbering Mouther Rog12s (not "Rogues" in the traditional sense of actually taking class levels - the Rog levels just reflect their innate abilities)
Baelberyth, a Two-Headed Half-Fiend Advanced Remorhaz
Kord's Arm, an Incarnate Stone Golem Ftr/War Hulk
Half-Farspawn Psionic Illithid (unnamed)
The Stone Worm, Advanced 40-HD Purple Worm Revived Fossil
The Deathless Sharks, Half-Scrag Advanced 10-HD Sahuagin (add Frenzied Berserker levels for new levels of pain)
The Black Abscess, Corpse Creature Living Avasculate/Enervation (Mmmmmm, undead ooze...)

 

[afreed]

If I can shamelessly plug a commercial product...

I'm very fond of Lhorighast, a half-fiend ooze human monk 12 / blackguard 2 I created for Fantasy Personae: Sages, Spies, and Informants (which Joe Kushner just reviewed). From Lhorighast's background:

The underworld is the ultimate destination of all pollution. Corpses decay and sink into the earth; refuse is buried or washed downstream; and ancient cities are crushed beneath new towers and palaces. Somewhere beneath the surface is an ocean of filth into which darkness is inevitably drawn. Dark thoughts, too, sink into this ocean: horrid secrets, taboo desires, and malevolent plans taint a terrible whirlpool.

Out of this morass arose Lhorighast the Emissary, also called the Black Sage, the Saint of Filth, and the Aberrant Cyst. He comes to the surface to whisper his wisdom to his chosen tools: mortals willing to erode the world’s mountain in their climb to the top. He is venerated by the true denizens of the underworld and feared by those softened by interaction with the surface. He is immortal; if slain, his kingdom shall create him anew.

That’s what his followers say...

His stats are absurdly complicated, but I like him anyway. Bob Gallagher also did an awesome illustration for ol' Lhorighast.