Sounds cool. I was actually thinking of an adventure based on them. I was just going to augment them a little bit. The noise would keep increasing, corpses would keep crunching. (Maybe - After about a week, farmers would find cows completely stripped to the bone.) People would begin to get really scared and try to call in help. Alternatively, the PC's could be trapped in the village/town for some reason.
Given that these are augmented, here are a few effects I was thinking of:
- Increased Noise: This noise can actually hurt your ears. Stay out in it a while and have to start making Fortitude saves (DC 10 +1 per hour) or go deaf.
- Insanity Factor: Are you insectophobic? No? Well you will be. Will saves are needed after a while to prevent insanity. Each failure will add on some "insanity points" to the PC. Eventually, minor and then major effects will take effect.
Misc.
-1 Morale penalty to attacks/checks etc.
Scent doesn't work - the cicada smell completely overwhelms everything else. In particularly bad areas, PC's will need to cover their noses or choke/gag etc.
Disasters will start occurring. These disasters will be caused by:
A. Bugs themselves - knocking over lanterns etc.
and
B. A lot of people/animals will flinch and do a funny little dance when a cicada crawls down their neck. Something like this only more so - people will be in the middle of delicate work when this happens. They could be building something, climbing something, riding on something. Whatever it is, they will flinch and jerk around when one of these buggers gets to them. This can cause some serious problems depending on the persons current activity.
I'm not sure, but I may plug my current dungeon into this and have them journey through a couple levels to find some sort of Earthstone or something that will allow them to banish the cicadas. One idea I had was for the stone to send a cloud of very diluted acid mist throughout the valley. Not enough to harm most things, but specifically able to kill the cicadas - Bug Spray!
Of course, there's all the extra flavor: "These bugs are an ancient menace in this valley. They are a perversion of nature, created by the evil ex-Druid <insert name here>. The earth priests created a powerful magic that supposedly destroyed all of them. In reality, they just fled deep below the surface, waiting for 1717 years before resurfacing. Now you must journey into the ancient halls of the earth mother and unlock the secret cure within." .... and more.
On another note, it doesn't seem like anyone here has the full brunt of these bugs. You might have to actually live for a few weeks with them before realizing their 'capabilities'. One figure quoted is about 1,000,000 bugs per square acre; that seems about right.
