Twisted Menagerie Manual
Dungeon Crawl Classics
Autogiest: Deep in the wastelands lie a multitude of corpses wrapped in rusting caskets of twisted chrome and faux-leather upholstery. From these mass graves of crushed hopes and unquenched road rage rises a horror that all wastelanders fear, the dread autogiest.
The fiend is a conglomerate spirit of those who have died in violent car wrecks that have joined together to punish the living. By itself, the autogiest is a shapeless, glowing red mist that drifts against the wind. It cannot be harmed by mundane means or interact with anything in this form. Once it finds a suitable vehicle to inhabit, usually one of Keeper quality or better, its reign of terror as an unholy juggernaut begins.
Keeper Large Car Autogiest: ?
Minion Vehicle: Autogeist Animate Minions power.
Blast Shade: Often mistaken for harmless “nuclear shadows” from the Great Cataclysm when holding still, these angry spirits are born from unfulfilled desires shattered by an early death at the hands of an atomic level explosion. The embittered soul reanimates the scorched shadow remnants of their body to torment those who are still alive.
Corpsenado: ?
Cryo-Lurker: The ancient practice of cryogenics left untold numbers of individuals (or their heads) encapsulated and frozen. Some were soldiers kept on ice for times of war, others were travelers whose journey ended in the lost luggage bin, and there were those sleeping until the promise of a new future to revive them. That future never came, but the incursions from the plane of Eternal Unrest have reanimated their frozen and mutated forms, fulfilling their desires by way of un-death.
Cryo-Lurker Brute: ?
Cryo-Lurker Buckethead: Unable to afford the full cryogenic treatment, the buckethead was still a very determined person in their past life. Their determination and force of will is what keeps them going, even now. A severed head carried in a receptacle (often merely a steel bucket) the buckethead is far from defenseless.
Cryo-Lurker Cryoslime: When the physical form of the cryogenically frozen cannot stand the strains of the change, it collapses into a 10’x10’ puddle of frozen, malevolent ooze.
Cryo-Lurker Frost-Burned: ?
Cyber Ghoul: After the great Search Engine War, the victorious search algorithm sent its web crawlers out to explore the last great frontier, the living brain. As the crawlers entered human minds and drained them of information, the search engine learned to keep the host bodies alive, fueling them by feeding off of other living targets – incidentally allowing the algorithm to spread.
Easily recognized by their twitching, shuddering gait and the wires that protrude from their flesh, cyber ghouls are far from common un-dead. Unlike traditional un-dead which are fueled by dark necromantic energies from vile dimensions and unholy powers, cyber ghouls are more correctly the “un-living”. While their host bodies may be technically dead, stolen thoughts and electrical impulses keep their muscles moving and their thoughts coursing through diseased minds.
Any intelligent creature may be transformed by the cyber ghouls and instances of larger ghouls of up to 10d5 HD are known to exist.
As part of their bite attack, cyber ghouls pull the memories from their victims. Each bite permanently drains 1 point of Intelligence and for every 5 points of lost Intelligence the victim also loses 1 level of experience. Victims drained to 0 Intelligence or below 0-level are infected with the World Crawler AI and transform into cyber ghouls.
Power Wight: Created using the secrets of both golemcrafting and necromancy, these creatures are always planned works fashioned in a lab and never spontaneously occur. They are grizzly masterpieces formed from the finest parts of various corpses and incorporate advanced NecroTech devices within their bodies.
Lesser Power Wight: ?
Greater Power Wight: ?
Un-Dead: As they have an innate understanding of the nature of un-dead and NecroTech, greater power wights can create 1d3 HD worth of unintelligent corporeal un-dead every week, given the proper materials and lab space.
Robo-Lich: Reputedly crafted from deceased magic users, a robo-lich is a grizzly fusion of corpse and robot. They appear to be highly cybernetically augmented, semi-skeletal cadavers cut off at the waist and grafted onto tank tread platforms they use to move about. The lower left arm is replaced with a small plasma cannon and the right with a wicked looking robotic combat claw.
Rockin' Wraith: Throughout time, there has been a select club, the membership of which all were tragically struck down in their 27th year. For hundreds of years, the organization was thought to be mere legend, but modern day Umerica has learned that this is no legend and the “27 Club”, as it is known, is real. So too is its un-dead membership.
The members of the 27 Club obey their founder; an un-dead blues musician who is rumored to have made a deal with the devil, presides over them.
Long before the apocalypse, before there was even a written history of humankind and their mythologies, there was the being now known as Rojo. A demon of great power and guile, he first appeared in the public zeitgeist during the early days of recording when several bluesmen made deals with him at the crossroads, not for fame or wealth, but for talent. Beginning with ragtime musician Louis Chauvin, Rojo (who takes his current name from the next of his supplicants, Robert Johnson, whose rockin’ wraith form was destroyed at ground zero of the apocalypse) made Faustian pacts with musicians. The deals have always been the same, instrumental mastery and a heightened gift of musical expression in return for claiming their souls at the ripe old age of 27. Rojo’s “27 Club”, filled with un-dead musicians – rockin’ wraiths – roam the Urth in order to aid him in the gathering of more souls.
Rojo's Demonic Deal power.
Wraith Rider: Animated by an unknown, rage-filled spirit from the plane of Eternal Unrest wraith riders seek vengeance on the roadways of Umerica. Humans suffering a traumatic violent death, in rare cases, may rise again as a wraith rider.
The wraith rider was killed by a road gang while trying to make a delivery.
The love of the un-dead was murdered, and the wraith rider is filled with an unquenchable rage.
Double-crossed on a mission for the Three Royals and killed for knowing too much, this rider travels the roads towards the Citadel of Scrap for vengeance.
The vengeful spirit is that of a slain parent, slain while protecting their child.
The wraith rider was a local misfit who was killed by the local community for a crime they did not commit.
Driven off the highway during a road race, the wraith rider seeks to find and slay the driver responsible.
The wraith rider was murdered, and his vehicle stolen.
The wraith rider was killed by a member of the party and now seeks revenge for his death.
Once the guardian of a cache of precious materials, the wraith rider was murdered during the theft of its charge.
The wraith rider has fulfilled its quest for vengeance but it still has a final task to complete, visiting the
grave of a dead family member in hopes of achieving final peace.
Wrath: ?
Xeno-Mummy: Aliens from beyond the grave stalk the nights of Umerica. Their corpses animated by unknown energies within their wrappings, xeno mummies are puppeteered by their funerary dressings in an effort to collect the energies required to maintain their preservation fields.
The humanoid shapes of this long dead alien species are preserved within strange mylar-ic wrappings. Covered from oblong head to pointed toe in alien glyphs and scrawls, these creatures give off a faint, blue luminescence visible at 20 feet. Whatever strange funerary rites these aliens undergo leaves their blackened, husk-like faces exposed to the air and their shark-like mouths hanging open (when not actively tearing the flesh of a victim).
Zombie: Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Anyone that dies within a corpsenado's funnel will raise as a zombie within 1d4 rounds.
Blink Zombie: Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Chrono Zombie: Anyone who dies of the aging effects of a chrono zombie will raise as one in 1d5-1 (0-4) hours.
Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Melting Zombie: Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Petrol Zombie: Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Rave Zombie: These crazed un-dead can spontaneously raise from the corpses of Technos Discos followers (usually in groups of three or more) or can be created by necromancers that have learned to raise the dead with enchanted music. It is unknown if this necromantic raising process taps into the power of the Terrible Bringer of Beats or another, more vile, source of horrifying melodic energy.
Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Silver Zombie: Animated by rogue nanites originally intended for medical purposes, these zombies tend to have a metallic tinge to their rotting flesh.
Anyone injured by a nano zombie must roll under their Luck after the encounter or they have been infected. This will have no immediate effect but when they ever reach 0 or less hit points, they will definitely die and raise as a nano zombie shortly after.
Corpsenado's Spawn Zombies power.
Zombie Monk of the Cyberhive: Zombie monks are humanoid corpses that have been cybernetically resurrected to serve the Earth Brain of the Cyberhive.
Any slain foes will be collected by a robo-lich for techno-reanimation as zombie monks.
Given 24 hours a robo-lich can convert a humanoid corpse into a fully functional zombie monk. This process installs a new personality into the remnants of the corpse’s brain so any previous knowledge or personality is erased.
Carl Aug M.D., Greater Power Wight: ?
GAWBYCAID Within Host Cyber Ghoul: ?
Greater Power Wight Nurse: ?
Lesser Power Wight Janitor: ?
Animate minions: for up to one hour per day, it can animate up to 1.5x its HD in other vehicles that will mindlessly serve their new master. Minion vehicles will have 1d14 action dice and are treated as un-dead.
Spawn zombies: During combat the corpsenado can, as an action, fling zombies out to a range of 150 feet. These zombies take no appreciable damage from being thrown and are able to attack at the end of the round that they were spawned. There is no limit to the number of zombies a corpsenado can spawn. To determine the number and type of zombies cast from the hellish whirlwind roll 1d7: 1) 2d4 zombies (as per DCC RPG); 2) 3d3 petrol zombies; 3) 2d5 rave zombies; 4) 1d4 melting zombies; 5) 2d3 blink zombies; 6) 1d3 silver zombies; or 7) 2 chrono zombies.
Demonic deal: If someone with a sincere desire to create music for the ages summons him to the crossroads, Rojo will offer them his standard deal; granting unparalleled musical gifts for their soul - as a rockin’ wraith sometime during their 27th year. He will not deviate from this contract, knowing that those who care only about the music and not fame or other mortal trappings will accept the deal. Should the deal be agreed to, an ancient white lighter will appear in the pocket of the musician (or, if unclothed, among their belongings) at their time of death. The effect of such 'musical' mastery is left to the judge.
