Yellow Musk CreeperCoiling around several human skeletons, this wet green plant’s sickly flowers smoke with a nasty yellow vapor.Yellow Musk Creeper CR 2Source Pathfinder RPG Bestiary pg. 285
XP 600
N Medium plant
Init +2; Senses tremorsense 30 ft.; Perception +0DefenseAC 14, touch 12, flat-footed 12 (+2 Dex, +2 natural)
hp 22 (3d8+9)
Fort +6, Ref +3, Will +1
Immune plant traitsOffenseSpeed 5 ft.
Melee tendril +5 (1d4+4)
Space 5 ft., Reach 10 ft.
Special Attacks create yellow musk zombie, pollen sprayStatisticsStr 17, Dex 15, Con 16, Int —, Wis 11, Cha 8
Base Atk +2; CMB +5; CMD 17 (can’t be tripped)EcologyEnvironment temperate or warm forests and underground
Organization patch (creeper plus 1–6 yellow musk zombies)
Treasure incidentalSpecial AbilitiesCreate Yellow Musk Zombie (Su) As a full-round action, a yellow musk creeper can bore dozens of tendrils into the brain of a helpless creature within reach, such as a creature entranced by its pollen. This attack inflicts 1d4 points of Intelligence damage per round. When a creature is reduced to 0 Intelligence, it dies, and the tendrils break off inside its brain. One hour later, the creature animates as a yellow musk zombie (see below).
Pollen Spray (Ex) As a standard action, a yellow musk creeper can spray a cloud of pollen at a single creature within 30 feet. It must make a +4 ranged touch attack to strike the target, who must then succeed on a DC 14 Will save or be entranced for 1d6 rounds. An entranced creature can take no action other than to move at its normal speed into a space within the yellow musk creeper’s reach, at which point an entranced creature remains motionless and allows the creeper to insert tendrils into its brain. The save DC is Constitution-based.DescriptionThe yellow musk creeper is a hideous plant that grows in haunted graveyards, grisly battlefields, and other places where death hangs heavy in the air and thick in the soil. The yellow musk creeper’s method of procreation is singularly frightful—it slays the living, infests them with its seeds and pollen, then animates them as zombies. These zombies serve the plant as a guardian for several days, but when new zombies are created, older ones wander off into the surrounding wild, collapsing and breaking apart within 2d6 days to give seed to a new yellow musk creeper.Yellow Musk ZombieA yellow musk zombie is a rotting creature from which wet green vines have sprouted. Treat a yellow musk zombie as a standard zombie, but with this special quality.
Plant Traits (Ex) This zombie’s animation is provided not by necromancy but by the plant that grows throughout its body. Yellow musk zombies lack undead traits, but gain plant traits. They are treated as plants, not undead, for the resolution of magical effects and attacks. Channel energy cannot harm a yellow musk zombie, for example, nor does negative energy heal a yellow musk zombie.Zombies of the Yellow MirePathfinder Campaign Setting: Horror Realms p. 33
The yellow musk zombies born in Yellow Mire may be familiar to adventurers who have encountered yellow musk creepers in the past, but the abominable flora of Golden Garden are an altogether separate horror. Below are three of the most common varieties of yellow musk zombies that arise from Golden Garden, which otherwise share statistics with typical yellow musk zombies. Deathspore Zombie (CR +1) With stark black rashes streaked across their rotting faces and skeletal bodies, these yellow musk zombies are more imposing than their typical counterparts; they gain a +4 bonus to their Strength score and have a Charisma of 14. A creature struck by a deathspore zombie’s natural attack has a chance of being afflicted with the following poison.
Deathspore Toxin: Injury; save Fort DC 14; frequency 1/ round for 6 rounds; initial effect 1 Con drain; secondary effect 1d3 Dex damage; cure 2 saves. Gold Musk Zombie (CR +2) These advanced yellow musk zombies have DR 5/cold iron as well as acid, cold, and electricity resistance 5, and they can be healed by negative energy as if they were undead. In addition, any creature slain by gold musk zombies becomes a gold musk zombie in 1d4 rounds. These new gold musk zombies are weakened for the first 24 hours of their existence, and take a –2 penalty on all d20 rolls and checks, receive –2 hit points per Hit Die, and do not create additional gold musk zombies from the creatures they kill. After 24 hours, these penalties are lifted. Pale-Puff Musk Zombie (CR +0) Weaker than their yellow musk counterparts but far more numerous, pale-puff musk zombies do not gain a bonus to Strength from becoming a zombie and have a Charisma score of 6. A large puffball of stinky yellow pollen grows out of the zombie’s head from a sturdy brown stem. The first time a pale-puff musk zombie takes any amount of damage but isn’t destroyed by the attack, the puffball breaks apart and spreads over a 5-foot-radius area, affecting any creatures in the area as a yellow musk creeper’s pollen spray ability.
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