A Soulmonger From The River Styx - Astradaemon - Monster of the Week

so looks like you blew it you're in the river sticks a dead adventurer your soul venturing on to whatever its rightful resting place is and i guess at this point you've pretty much made it there are no more dungeons left to loot no more battles left to fight only rest unless you were a human being in which case eternal damnation in whichever of the nine hells is most ironic given your particular sins but that's neither here nor there the point is souls that float through the river sticks onto their afterlife are supposed to be safe the currents of the river styx are a certain death to any mortal that would dare wade into them and most immortals are smart enough to know not to go near them there's a reason that demons and devils and angels and whatever don't go fishing in the river there's nothing good in there just a bunch of souls and depending on which version of d d you're playing the occasional giant death worm or two but as with pretty much any rule there are of course exceptions today's creature is one that defies all logic not only does it willingly go into the river stakes it does so to survive and those souls drifting onto their afterlife might not be as safe as they realize hello and welcome to monster of the week the show where we dig up old creatures from past editions of d and other tabletop games and bring them to light for use in your current 5th edition dnd campaign my name is josiah also known as dungeon dad and today we are talking about a very special little fiend from pathfinder the astra daemon is truly unique in its position within the cosmology as well as what service it provides like most fiends it is tremendously abhorrent to just look at it has the semi-translucent skin that covers its entire body long gangly spindly arms a long neck that ends in this kind of double jaw that looks kind of like an angler fish and just a random amount of tentacles seemingly sprouting from its back at any given location also it has a tail double the length of its body so that's cool too i guess the point is it's a bad time it's pretty ugly let's look at home now that likeness it has to the anglerfish or other terrors from deep within the ocean is no mere coincidence because this thing of course does thrive in a body of water not so much the ocean and more so the ever flowing river of souls the river styx is where the astra daemon makes its home and where it's able to really do what it does best which is somehow survive in a place that is so infused with the very essence of death and not only survive but thrive because this creature sustains itself by consuming the souls of the recently deceased why go to the material plane and go through all the must and fuss of fighting battles and claiming souls when you can just go straight to the source take a dip in the river have a feast and call it a day but where things start to get really interesting with these creatures is what they do with the very valuable and precious souls that they find however i'm getting a bit ahead of myself so we're going to talk about that a little bit later when we go over some plot hooks and ways to actually use this monster in your game but first off we need to talk about combat and understand just exactly what it is we're going to be putting our players up against and of course as always there is a stat block for this monster converted into 5th edition by yours truly which you can find in the description below now let's dive in and talk about some so when talking about any creatures something that's important to understand really early on is how they move around and what their mobility options are now these guys are really fast they have a movement speed of 40 a fly speed of 60 and a swim speed of 90 feet so no matter where you are it's really unlikely that you're going to be faster than them if you're in the water you can completely forget about it unless you're a solar i guess why do they have a fly speed of 150 feet solars are so just anyways yeah these guys are fast they have a challenge rating of 12 so this is gonna be a pretty tough encounter for any party really but you're going to want to hang on to this until the mid-tier of play so as beings that consume souls for a living literally they have a few abilities that tie into that soul consumption and detection which can make them pretty scary the first of which is a trait called death watch that basically allows them to look at any living creature or being or whatever and discern how wounded or how close to death that creature is this basically means that it knows how many hit points each opponent has and it is almost always going to go for the one that has the least amount of hit points because it is trying to kill them something else that's kind of neat about this too is it has a very niche and unique ability that allows it to see through illusory magic that would give false information about the well-being of an individual meaning that if someone is using feign death or some other type of illusion magic to make someone appear like they're very hurt when they're not or appear like they're totally well when they're indeed quite hurt or like feign deaths specifically appear that they are completely dead when they are indeed alive they are able to see through that instantly and be like nope that person's soul is attached to their body in such and such a way and they're actually fine i don't know how that's gonna come up or if it ever will probably won't but it's pretty interesting i just love the idea of one of these devils serving in the court of like some type of higher devil and there's some shenanigans going on with the party that are trying to use feign death for one reason or another and this guy's just like yeah i know that dude's totally still alive and then that party just gets that look on their face where they know they done up you know the one but continuing on with their slew of soul-based death eating abilities they also have a displacement ability which works pretty much exactly the same way as the displacer beast does they kind of project an illusory version of themselves sort of adjacent or around where they are so you have disadvantage and attack rules against them unless they're grappled or incapacitated or something because you're never quite sure exactly which space they're actually in in which space the illusion of themselves is being pushed into which is kind of neat and their last trait is also a pretty niche but interesting ability called soul siphon and what this does is it enables them to essentially draw in energy from souls and spirits that are within 10 feet of them so what does that mean well it means that if someone dies while they're nearby this thing it is able to absorb some of that soul's energy and they regain 1d8 temporary hit points which is pretty nice it also has the very niche effect on incorporeal undead like ghosts or wraiths or anyone traveling outside of their own body such as someone using the astral projection spell because that essentially is a spirit manifest in its purest form so if one of those types of creatures is around them they're also going to take 1d8 necrotic damage every turn as this creature kind of like leeches off of their soul again something that is super niche and really neat probably won't come up but if it does it's pretty cool now let's get down to what this creature can actually do as far as attacks go its two main abilities are pretty simple as you would expect just by looking at this very sharp and pointy looking art it has a powerful bite attack and a couple powerful claw attacks nothing really to write home about here they're pretty par for the course these are just it's physical attacks however its bite does also grapple the target if it hits which is worth noting because this brings us on to its third super special ability which is an action called the devour soul this is an action that is so powerful and so rough if it procs that it's something i debated changing how i wanted it to work for 5th edition but to be completely honest there are so few if any effects like this left in the game i decided to leave it as it was if you think this effect is too brutal then probably don't use this monster or you could maybe adjust it so it just does a bunch of damage instead of what it actually does so what does it actually do what could be so awful that i was nervous about converting it into 5th edition well when it uses this devour soul action it can only use it on a creature that it has grappled and that creature has to make a dc-16 constitution save if they fail they die straight up the astra demon just rips the creature's soul out of its body has a nice little meal calls it a day that character is deceased there are almost no effects in 5th edition that are save or die that is very much a thing of the past and i think that's probably for the best but i don't know just this creature it seems so that's its thing you know so i can understand if some people don't want to run this the way that it originally was made because it definitely comes from a much more brutal age and tabletop where killing a character because they failed a single saving throw wasn't that big of a deal but i do want to make an argument for why i think this is totally legitimate and that this creature should have this ability for starters it requires a saving throw meaning it's not an automatic death that character has a chance to make their save of course and not only that but the type of characters that are going to be in melee combat with this thing and most likely going to be getting bitten and then having to make this save are your fighters and your paladins your barbarians typically and classically those are characters that have good constitution saving those so they're going to be the most likely to be able to pass that save versus say your bard or your sorcerer also it requires the creature to be grappled so on its previous turn it has to hit someone with a bite attack and then on its next turn it can attempt to do this so that's two checks that have to be made it has to make a successful attack rule and the player has to fail their constitution saving throw also in between those two turns the player who's grappled has a chance to make a strength check to ungrapple themselves or any of the other party members can help do it as well so that means you have three chances to have this not do anything and because devour soul is an action it's not like it can just bite claw claw and then devour soul and if it doesn't work it doesn't work if it uses that ability and the character passes their saving throw that's its entire turn so while yes it is exceedingly brutal and just unlike most things in this game i think that's what makes it interesting and i think that it's fair enough or if you get into a position that you have been killed by this it's either because the dice were so so against you or you just didn't really realize what you were going up against and as a dm it's definitely our job to telegraph that when it bites down onto someone and has them grappled and you know it's going to try to use its devour soul action next turn describe to that character how they can feel their energy being siphoned away before it even really happens because it will telegraph you need to get out of this thing's mouth or you're finna die that said it's possible they just fail all their checks and they do die by no fault of their own and hey that's the game and if that happens it is what it is that's what this creature is designed to do but it should never feel like you sprung it on them they said oh i would have tried to get away if i felt like i was in more danger because usually being grappled doesn't matter anyways that's my two cents on to why all dms should try to murder their pcs as much as they possibly can let's move on to some plot hooks because that is where this creature truly truly shines so first and foremost the astra demons are indeed devils not demons which is important in the dnd cosmology because it means they have rules they have masters they have laws all that awesome litigation crap that devils are so in love with i just want to know what is the point of being one of the most powerful entities in the multiverse if you're basically just a cosmic death lawyer i don't know like asmodius what's up dude what's going on with that i i'm worried about you honestly like it's not normal anyways aster demons of course fall into that devil hierarchy they have their own kind of spot within the giant pyramid scheme that is being a devil in dungeons and dragons which means that they are often beholden to some type of master or more powerful devil so pretty much here's their deal they go into the river stakes they eat souls they do all that crap that's fine if they find a particularly radiant soul maybe they're able to get their claws around the soul of a paladin of palor someone very righteous who has not gone on to be judged yet because they are still in the river of souls that's a big theme here is that the river sticks you go through there on your way to where you're supposed to be going meaning that these souls are pre-judgment so if it's able to get its hands on the soul of someone who was a great hero that is possibly going on to one of the celestial planes or somewhere good it can take that soul take it back to its master and basically offer it up and be like hey man here's the soul of this dope paladin he was an awesome dude did nothing wrong and now he's getting over by me just because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time here you go and then what that devil does with that sold could be really interesting they might just say ah this is a high quality soul i'm gonna use this for trade value on the soul market which is the thing i assume exists i don't actually assume that i know that because i read way too much dnd but my personal life aside it might also do something truly horrific with that soul maybe it's able to use it to craft a new devil that is some type of amalgamation and just abomination to what that soul was in its life for example the wrongly claimed soul of a paladin morphed into some type of devil could have some weird radiant abilities but also be a devil it's like the classic devil with angel wing situation what's going on there where do you get those angel wings from i don't know probably has something to do with a lesson about moral ambiguity and that character's backstory but it let's kill him and take his loot the point is devils are evil and they are creative and who knows what they could get up to with some powerful soul magic that they're not really supposed to have access to because that soul was wrongfully taken and this could lead to retribution maybe there's some solars or some whatever other angels are out there that are like we need to go and kill this devil because he's taking souls from the river styx and turning them into other devils and it's bad that's bad he can't do that let's kill him and who knows this is where your party could come in at literally any step along this journey maybe they're beholden to this devil for one reason or another through a crappy deal that the warlock made so they have to help defend him against these celestials that are coming to cut him down or maybe they have to reclaim a soul of an important npc that was taken by one of these demons either through the river styx or maybe that demon just came to the material plane and was like yoink that's mine now and then went back to its devilish master so the party could be like oh crap we have to go get that guy's soul back so then they go and kind of get entangled in this whole mess or maybe the party conversely is working for the celestials they're like hey you guys are here we want your help come help us take down this devil and we'll give you ex reward or maybe you should just do it because you're a good person and he's killing people like that sucks that's a bad thing comes help us stop them from doing it and i mean at its most basic level if you don't want to get wrapped up in some type of grand soul thieving plot then you could just make good random encounters along the banks of the river styx or in that general area or i mean hey if you really want to use one of these monsters and your party is going nowhere near the river sticks maybe he's summoned by some type of wizard as a familiar or a servant the way wizards are ought to do perhaps a powerful spellcaster thinks that they're better than everyone else and even though you're not supposed to summon astra demons because they're really hard to control they think i can probably do it they summon an astra demon and then are promptly murdered by said damon and then the party this thing is just on a material plane now so the party has to deal with it it could even just be a random encounter that they come across but that's your explanation for how it got here and why it's not in the river sticks floating around in any case that's pretty much all i've got to say about these guys i think they're really interesting they have some really unique abilities they fit into a very unique part of the world and even if you use them outside of the river sticks or any plots surrounding that they can still be really fun to run in combat and they're just scary they're just scary they're terrifying both to look at and to be killed by as i mentioned before the stat block for this creature is of course in the description below in the form of a google document and of course if you are one of my lovely patrons you can get the whole monster manual 5th edition style stat block with the splash art and the whole description and some plot hook ideas and stuff all put together in a neat little package which is of course on my patreon page which you can find in the description below there as well i'm super looking forward to hear what you guys have to say about this monster if you have ever used one of these in the past maybe in a pathfinder game or if you plan on using this in the future in one of your dnd games i cannot wait to hear how angry your party gets with you when one of them inevitably has their soul completely destroyed by this thing which actually reminds me of one last thing i want to talk about before we end this video getting your soul eaten by something is almost always a complete death sentence in dungeons and dragons like if you die you die but you can be resurrected if your soul gets destroyed well tough luck your audi but it does specify with this ability that it devouring the person's soul it doesn't do it like a clean it's like a chomping disgusting visceral feast of the person's soul meaning a bunch of its fragments get left behind and the creatures statlock originally does specify that enough of the soul is left behind for that creature to be resurrected i think that's great i think that's cool it's like throwing the players a bone because like oh you just got killed by this horrible thing but hey it's not all bad you can still be resurrected however because part of their soul has been eaten i would absolutely use that as a role play opportunity like describe this player what it's like like part of them is gone and it's not just like losing a limb which i'm sure would leave you with a sense of loss if you were used to having that for a long time part of your soul is gone so while physically you may look the same perhaps there's some horrible effect or curse that is put on that person because part of their soul is just destroyed in much the same way i've always described as coming back from the dead to be a pretty intense experience coming back from the dead with like the vast majority of your soul missing is probably a lot worse so how you want to handle that as a dm totally up to you if you don't feel like penalizing a player or doing anything with that you can just ignore it and have the person come back and hey you're back great welcome to the team everything's still terrible but if you want to use that not even for mechanical disadvantages or anything but for some interesting lore tidbits like who knows what happened to that player's soul maybe there's a way they can get it back or restore themselves or something it could be really interesting is all i'm saying now that truly is all i have to say about this monster so thank you so much for watching i truly do appreciate it and if you have any monsters that you love from older editions of d d or from other tabletop games that you would just like to see covered on this channel let me know leave a comment get at me on twitter get at me on discord that's where a lot of these monster suggestions come from and i will add them to the list and who knows you could see your suggestion up next week speaking of which i would want to give a quick shout out to over heaven on discord for this week's recommendation [Music] you

Channel: Dungeon Dad

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Id: y7VYmTBu4nk

Length: 21min 36sec (1296 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 24 2020