13th Sage: Death by Dire Raccoon

by Rob Heinsoo

Today’s column introduces a critter that was originally going to be part of the High Druid’s World issue of 13^th Age Monthly. But High Druid’s World is full of stats for powerful druids and druidic dragons and the dire raccoon kinda rolled out of contention. Unlike most of our monster stats, these stats have not been blessed by an editor.

For those of you who have no interest in adding a dire raccoon to your game, these stats could easily be adapted for use for some other type of tricksy woodland creature with semi-opposable thumbs.

Dire Raccoon

Death by dire raccoon? Ignominious and regrettable, but at least your remains will be thoroughly washed.

1^st level double-strength mook [beast]

Initiative: +5

Raspy teeth and claws +7 vs. AC—6 damage

[Special trigger] Suspiciously well-placed debris +7 vs. PD (1 random enemy)—7 damage

Natural even hit: Target is dazed (save ends)

Group ability: For every three dire racoons in the battle (round up), one of them can use suspiciously well-placed debris as a quick action once during the battle.

Suspiciously well-placed debris: So long as the battle is occurring in a natural setting the dire raccoons are familiar with, they can use the suspiciously well-placed debris attack, representing traps they’ve placed in the trees, pits they’ve dug in the groud, or piles of stuff that just happens to fall over at the wrong/right moment.

Run away: When a dire raccoon drops to 0 hit points, roll an easy save (6+). If the save fails, all dire raccoons spend all their actions trying to escape the fight, and get a +3 bonus to AC and PD until the end of the battle.

More suspicious debris: More traps and weird coincidental accidents occur later in the adventuring day to PCs who have angered the dire raccoons! If it feels at all appropriate, make one suspiciously  well-placed debris attack later in the day per two dire raccoons that survive a battle with the PCs. Choose moments when such attacks are either very funny or very inconvenient. If you’re a merciful GM, allow a skilled ranger or other woodsy character to put a stop to the harassment by succeeding with a difficult skill check (DC 20). If you’re not a merciful GM, make a couple such attacks even if the PCs slew all the raccoons, since there were probably more hiding in the bushes.

AC   16

PD    14                 HP 13 (mook)

MD  12

Mook: Kill one dire racoon mook for every 13 damage you deal to the mob.