Rosenrot, a Villain of Sorts

[Zeta Kai]

Rosenrot

Spoiler

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Rosenrot in her natural form.

The original Spirit Dragon.

The original Rosenrot.

This ghostly creature looks like the skeleton of a huge dragon, with a glowing outline of a fully-fleshed dragon surrounding its bones. This outline is faint, but its spectral hide looks like that of a red dragon. A tiny glowing orb smolders within each empty eye socket. Faint whispers in an unknown-yet-horrid tongue can be heard close to it.

Huge Old Dragon (Incorporeal)
Hit Dice: 33d12+330 (544HP)
Initiative: +15
Speed: 5’ (1 square), Fly 160’ (32 squares, poor maneuverability)
Armor Class: 29 (-2 size, +15 Dex, +6 deflection), touch 29, flat-footed 14
Base Attack/Grapple: +33/--
Attack: Bite +46 melee (2d8+15) or Claw +46 melee (2d6+15)
Full Attack: Bite +46 melee (2d8+15), 2 Claws +46 melee (2d6+7), 2 Wings +46 melee (1d8+7), Tail Slap +46 melee (2d6+7), Crush +46 melee (2d8+7)
Space/Reach: 15’/10’ (15’ with Bite)
Special Attacks: Antimagic, Breath Weapon, Frightful Presence, Glorious Manifestation, Spell-Like Abilities, Spells
Special Qualities: Blindsense, Damage Reduction 15/magic, Dragon traits, Immunities, Incorporeal traits, Keen Senses, Skills, Spell Resistance 34
Saves: Fort +30, Ref +33, Will +28
Abilities: Str -- (+0), Dex 41 (+15), Con 31 (+10), Int 26 (+8), Wis 27 (+8), Cha 22 (+6)
Skills: Appraise +34, Bluff +35, Concentration +36, Craft (Alchemy) +34, Decipher Script +31, Diplomacy +33, Hide +48, Intimidate +37, Knowledge (Arcana) +36, Knowledge (History) +30, Knowledge (Religion) +33, Listen +34, Move Silently +41, Perform (Chant) +29, Profession (Alchemist) +38, Search +34, Sense Motive +35, Spellcraft +39, Spot +34
Feats: Blind-Fight, Dodge, Flyby Attack, Great Fortitude, Hover, Improved Flyby Attack, Improved Multiattack, Iron Will, Mobility, Multiattack, Snatch, Wingover
Environment: any
Organization: solitary (unique)
Challenge Rating: 22
Treasure: 3× standard
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

Antimagic (Ex): Three times per day, Rosenrot can emit an antimagic field centered upon herself. This field has a 40’ radius, & lasts up to 1 hour. Rosenrot can dismiss her own field as a free action, but any time remaining on the effect is wasted. Activating a field is a swift action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity. While her field is active, Rosenrot can remain incorporeal, but all restrictions on supernatural & spell-like abilities apply.

Breath Weapon (Su): Rosenrot has one type of breath weapon, a cone of sonic damage (24d6). A successful Reflex save (DC36) is required for half damage.

Frightful Presence (Ex): Rosenrot can unsettle foes with her mere presence. The ability takes effect automatically whenever she attacks, charges, or flies overhead. Creatures within a radius of 240’ are subject to the effect if they have fewer HD than her. A potentially affected creature that succeeds on a Will save (DC37) remains immune to her frightful presence for 24 hours. On a failure, creatures with 4 or less HD become panicked for 4d6 rounds & those with 5 or more HD become shaken for 4d6 rounds. Dragons ignore the frightful presence of other dragons.

Glorious Manifestation (Su): Once per day, as an immediate action, Rosenrot can unveil her full magnificence, frightening & blinding those around her. While manifesting, she loses her Incorporeal subtype, along with all related traits. Her Strength score during this time is equal to her Dexterity score. Any creature within 40’ of her while she is manifesting in this manner must make a successful Fortitude save (DC32) or be blinded for 1 hour. She can maintain this form for up to 6 minutes per day. She can dismiss her manifestation as a free action, but any time remaining on the effect is wasted.

Spell-Like Abilities

• At will: magic missile, glitterdust (DC18)
• 3/day: greater invisibility (DC20), telekinesis (DC21)

Spells: Rosenrot knows & casts arcane spells as a 16th level sorcerer of the level. Her daily spells are 6/8/8/7/7/7/7/5/3. The base DC for her spells is 16 + the spell’s level. Her spell list includes:

• 0th level: dancing lights, detect magic, ghost sound, light, mending, message, prestidigitation, read magic, resistance
• 1st level: comprehend languages, expeditious retreat, mage armor, ray of enfeeblement, true strike
• 2nd level: blindness/deafness, command undead, detect thoughts, eagle’s splendor, web
• 3rd level: explosive runes, deep slumber, protection from energy, tongues
• 4th level: bestow curse, charm monster, enervation, solid fog
• 5th level: fabricate, hold monster, permanency, persistent image
• 6th level: contingency, guards & wards, true seeing
• 7th level: banishment, greater teleport
• 8th level: polymorph any object

Blindsense (Ex): Dragons can pinpoint creatures within a distance of 60’. Opponents the dragon can’t actually see still have total concealment against the dragon.

Dragon Traits: A spirit dragon possesses the following traits:

• Darkvision out to 60’ & low-light vision.
• Immunity to magic sleep effects & paralysis effects.
• Proficient with its natural weapons only unless humanoid in form (or capable of assuming humanoid form), in which case proficient with all simple weapons & any weapons mentioned in its entry.
• Proficient with no armor.
• Dragons eat, sleep, & breathe.

Immunities (Ex): All dragons have immunity to sleep & paralysis effects. Each variety of dragon has immunity to one or two additional forms of attack no matter what its age, as given in its description.

Incorporeal Subtype
An incorporeal creature has no physical body. It can be harmed only by other incorporeal creatures, magic weapons or creatures that strike as magic weapons, & spells, spell-like abilities, or supernatural abilities. It is immune to all non-magical attack forms. Even when hit by spells or magic weapons, it has a 50% chance to ignore any damage from a corporeal source (except for positive energy, negative energy, force effects such as magic missile, or attacks made with ghost touch weapons). Although it is not a magical attack, holy water can affect incorporeal undead, but a hit with holy water has a 50% chance of not affecting an incorporeal creature.

An incorporeal creature has no natural armor bonus but has a deflection bonus equal to its Charisma bonus (always at least +1, even if the creature’s Charisma score does not normally provide a bonus).

An incorporeal creature can enter or pass through solid objects, but must remain adjacent to the object’s exterior, & so cannot pass entirely through an object whose space is larger than its own. It can sense the presence of creatures or objects within a square adjacent to its current location, but enemies have total concealment (50% miss chance) from an incorporeal creature that is inside an object. In order to see farther from the object it is in & attack normally, the incorporeal creature must emerge. An incorporeal creature inside an object has total cover, but when it attacks a creature outside the object it only has cover, so a creature outside with a readied action could strike at it as it attacks. An incorporeal creature cannot pass through a force effect.

An incorporeal creature’s attacks pass through (ignore) natural armor, armor, & shields, although deflection bonuses & force effects (such as mage armor) work normally against it. Incorporeal creatures pass through & operate in water as easily as they do in air. Incorporeal creatures cannot fall or take falling damage. Incorporeal creatures cannot make trip or grapple attacks, nor can they be tripped or grappled. In fact, they cannot take any physical action that would move or manipulate an opponent or its equipment, nor are they subject to such actions. Incorporeal creatures have no weight & do not set off traps that are triggered by weight.

An incorporeal creature moves silently & cannot be heard with Listen checks if it doesn’t wish to be. It has no Strength score, so its Dexterity modifier applies to both its melee attacks & its ranged attacks. Non-visual senses, such as scent & blindsight, are either ineffective or only partly effective with regard to incorporeal creatures. Incorporeal creatures have an innate sense of direction & can move at full speed even when they cannot see.

Keen Senses (Ex): A dragon sees four times as well as a human in shadowy illumination & twice as well in normal light. It also has darkvision out to 120’.

Skills: Hide, Intimidate, & Spot are considered class skills for spirit dragons. A spirit dragon has a +8 racial bonus on Hide checks.

Spoiler

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Manifesting in all her glory, Rosenrot is an awesome & terrifying sight.

Possessions

Unlike almost all other dragons, Rosenrot doesn't collect treasure in the form of coins. She much prefers magic items & useful equipment to pure currency or gems. Her total combined treasure has a value of 288,000gp, & consists of the following list of items:

• 996gp
• Alchemist’s Lab × 3
• Assassin’s Dagger
• Bag of Holding (type IV)
• Bottle of Wine × 9
• Bracers of Armor +5
• Cloak of Charisma (+4)
• Elemental Gem (fire)
• Elixir of Fire Breath
• Flask of Acid × 2
• Flask of Alchemist’s Fire × 5
• Hat of Disguise
• Ioun Stone (pink & green: +2 Charisma)
• Lens of Detection
• Marvelous Pigments × 7
• Mithral Full Plate of Speed
• Potion of Fly
• Potion of Nondetection
• Potion of Resist Energy (sonic) 30
• Ring of Freedom of Movement
• Rod of Wonder
• Scroll of Polymorph × 4
• Spell Component Pouch × 4
• Staff of Charming
• Staff of Healing
• Sword of Life Stealing
• Tanglefoot Bag
• Vial of Antitoxin × 3
• Winged Shield

History & Background

Hatched almost 1,800 years ago, & re-hatched over 500 years ago, the spirit dragon called Rosenrot (ROE-zen-ROTE) was once a red dragon originally known as Grylothyx. Like her clutch-sister, Syzdothyx (from the Draconomicon, pages 261-262), she desired immortality. But unlike her sister, who chose to become a consort of the dragon-god Garyx in a bid for divinity, she opted for a more arcane path, in keeping with her sorcerous leanings & avaricious nature. Her wild greed, unceasing bloodlust, & vicious hatred of all that were happier than she (IE everyone) drove her to seek eternal life, so that she could forever undo what others had built.

It took her decades to find, but Grylothyx finally discovered the means to achieve her desire. She learned of an obscure & daunting ritual, originally crafted by the metallic dragons, known as arkhanylhuxeio. This ritual, commonly called the Rite of the Sublime Spirit, promised to reform her body into a youthful form, one that would grow to be more powerful & fearsome than even her current state. Most importantly, the Sublime Spirit was said to leave her mind intact, enabling her to continue her existence unhindered by necromantic energies or divine influence. This appealed to her independent & solitary nature, & so she committed herself utterly to her goal.

As she was already a great wyrm by this point, she wasted no time in preparing for the ritual, gathering the vast wealth needed to make her wish a reality. She razed entire kingdoms to fuel her dream of being reborn, & in this time, she gained a reputation as a notorious scourge of the land, earning enmity wherever she roamed. It was in this time of infamy that she was first called Rosenrot, which means “Rose-Red” in the language of the modern Theudanoz people. She was named this because of her crimson scales & her bloody path of destruction.

Once she amassed the immeasurable fortune in silver coins needed to complete the ritual, she performed it exactly as she had been taught. One year later, she was hatched anew as a lhuxeiodraakh, a spirit dragon of legends past. The rite had worked perfectly as planned…

Except for one thing.

The gold dragon that Grylothyx had killed to obtain the details of the ritual had been unable to tell her before he died that the ritual had one known side effect. The ceremony does indeed create a new body from the remains of the old one; but in so doing, the arcane energies created & released by the procedure have a tendency to affect the resultant dragon’s mind. The dragon’s psyche is exposed to the pure, raw chaos of magical quintessence, & so many spirit dragons emerge with a significant shift in perspective. Such was the case with Grylothyx.

As she hatched for the second time in her already-long life, prepared to face an eternity free from the specter of death, Grylothyx was changed. She felt that her past actions & motivations were strange to her, even foreign, as if they were those of some other dragon. She remembered doing them, but she could no longer understand why. Her previous mindset was one of chaos & evil, but now the evil was gone, & chaos was all that was left. She was seized by madness, but it was insanity untouched by malevolence or greed.

Grylothyx immediately decided to distance herself from her past nature. She disappeared, severing all ties with her family, her few former allies, her lair, & indeed her entire way of life. She found a new home. She formed new alliances with those who shared her new worldview. She even chose a new name, Rosupoaranosridea (“Divine Spirit of the Dragon” in the Ancient’s tongue), after the ritual that made her what she is today. And for the past five centuries, she has worked to fulfill her new goals. She is taking her time, planning each step with crazed precision & twisted care. She is unhurried, for now she has all the time in the world.

Personality

The spirit dragon once known as Grylothyx is less vicious than she was in her past life, but that makes her no less dangerous. She initially seems to be playful & capricious, but hints of her mania lie just beneath a façade of whimsy. She is fond of telling stories & jokes, but they tend to leave her audience perplexed or unnerved more than entertained. She is charming & respectful to those who she fancies, but they only please her if they can help her achieve her objectives. Those goals consume her restless mind, driving her in subtle-yet-profound ways that others may not see. The most frequent hints that others see of her neuroses are her sudden shifts in her conversational topics & the frequent mutterings that she makes to herself. Occasionally, some have said that she gains a facial tick when agitated, & that her ethereal aura shifts rapidly in opacity.

She is genuinely pleased to interact with others, & will do so at length, but only with those who can be of some use to her. She also likes to do magical research, & will pour over a tome of ancient knowledge with a singular focus that blots out the rest of the world. One of her biggest pet peeves is to be called by her new nickname, Rosenrot, which she was given in memory of that horrid red dragon of legend, who was thought to have died centuries ago (it doesn’t help that Rosenrot is similar to & easier to say than her chosen name, Rosupoaranosridea). She also dislikes distractions from her chosen work, even if she invited the disruptions herself. If something threatens her plans, she instantly drops all pretense of cordiality & invokes her fearsome power, reminding all within her presence of the dreadful might that she possesses.

Goals, Motivations, & Future Plans

Rosenrot is a sorcerer in her own mind, first & foremost. Her transformation into a spirit dragon is the only act in her past life that she can identify with, & she is wholly fixated on magical study & the advancement of magic in the world. She believes that the world used to be a much more magical place, teeming with the raw energies of creation, & she seeks to return the world to that primordial state of chaotic flux.

To do this, Rosenrot is collecting every piece of arcane lore that she can get her claws on. She tries to behave herself, gathering this magical lore through less violent means than she would have in her mortal life. She converses with mages whenever she can, the more powerful the better. She pays to read the contents of the most ancient of libraries. She travels the world, scouring lost ruins & plundering forgotten tombs. Her favorite activity though, is magical experimentation. In her many arcane laboratories, she works restlessly to unravel the mysteries of pure magic, the raw potential of possibility-made-manifest & the energies that make it function. These trials sometimes end badly, destroying her labs & killing her few assistants. She tends not to care, for it’s the end-goal that matters, not how many setbacks (or how many corpses) she accrues along the way.

For this & many other reasons, Rosenrot has few close allies. Her remaining relatives believe that she died centuries ago. Her past associates think that she disappeared. She has difficulty making cordial contacts, & even more trouble in keeping them, as her madness tends to unnerve others. Although she has not gained many friends, she hasn’t lost as many enemies as she’d like, either. Those who oppose dragons of all stripes still hunt her, as do the metallic dragons who know of her usurpation of the Sublime Spirit ritual, those who oppose sorcerers & their arcane ways, those who oppose the advancement of chaos, those who oppose madness in its many forms, & those who have grown to oppose her on personal grounds. She may be mostly alone in her mad quest, but that suits her just as well; she is content with her research, & the promise of supreme chaos that it holds.

In the future, as she gains more power, Rosenrot will choose the following spells to aid her pursuit:

• 7th level: insanity (Very Old)
• 8th level: binding (Very Old), temporal stasis (Ancient)
• 9th level: dominate monster (Very Old), gate (Ancient), time stop (Ancient)

Plot Hooks

1. Rumors tell of a red dragon of legendary malice has returned to the world to destroy it.
2. A fiery-haired sorceress is petitioning the wizard’s guild to see their private library.
3. A long-lost silver mine has been re-discovered, & its contents reveal that it was looted by a red dragon.
4. A mysterious explosion has leveled a mountain, uncovering the remains of a magical laboratory.
5. A dragon-worshipping cult has started focusing on sorcery & arcane research.
6. A cleric of Garyx has pledged to discover the fate of a long-vanished dragon.
7. An adventuring party was recently routed by what appeared to be a crazed dracolich.
8. Legends of a portal to Limbo are being investigated by a strange red-skinned woman.
9. Several prominent mages have disappeared without a trace in the last few weeks.
10. The land has been swarming with red dragons lately, but they aren’t pillaging & razing so much as hunting & searching for something.

[Gorgondantess]

YEAH! RAMMSTEIN!
I was seriously listening to that song as I saw this. Great inspiration.
Cool villain too, I suppose.

[Zeta Kai]

YEAH! RAMMSTEIN!
I was seriously listening to that song as I saw this. Great inspiration.
Cool villain too, I suppose.

Yeah, this dragon was made for a dragon contest that is being held here in the homebrew forum. It's not really based on the Rammstein song very strongly; I just took the name & the overall theme of self-destruction. Like the man in the song's plot, the dragon felt compelled to commit pointless acts, & its life ended as a result.

This monster, which was designed as a higher-level antagonist for any party regardless of alignment, is a showcase for the spirit dragon monster that I made for the Vote Up a Monster #5 contest. I wanted to play by the rules of statting up dragons, & I felt the need to give the dragon a distinct personality & motivations. I hope that I succeeded.

[Juhn]

...Did you just turn a VUAM result into a full-on villain?

Not muscling in on afro's territory, I hope.

In all seriousness, though, I'll read the whole thing when it's not 3:30 in the morning,

[DracoDei]

Your Attack line reads the same as your Full Attack line ( also they can't crush or tail-sweep in the same round that they make a full attack I don't think.

[Zeta Kai]

Your Attack line reads the same as your Full Attack line ( also they can't crush or tail-sweep in the same round that they make a full attack I don't think.

Thanks for the catch, DD. This copypasta error has been fixed.

And I normally leave the villains in Afro's hands. That's his territory, & he does an admirable job with them. But for the purpose of the dragon-making contest, I decided to flesh out some ideas that I had kicking around in my head. Every once in a while, I need to homebrew something that doesn't fit within the confines of the VUACS project.

[SwordGoddess]

Awesome dragon. I've been kicking around an idea for a tabletop campaign lately, and Rosenrot would be an excellent addition to it. Would it be all right to use her?

[Zeta Kai]

Awesome dragon. I've been kicking around an idea for a tabletop campaign lately, and Rosenrot would be an excellent addition to it. Would it be all right to use her?

Thank you very much. Of course you can use her. Enjoy.

[Pronounceable]

That picture! Augh! Get it off! GET IT OFF!!!
...

Cool thing. Much as I hate dragons of all kinds, a red named Rosenrot is awesome. And I'd liked incorporeal dragon much in the first place. Except for that picture.

Overall, this has a feeling of DnD traditionality to it. I like.

[Zeta Kai]

I'm sorry that you don't like the manifestation picture, but I spoilered it just for you, C. And I'm glad that you like her other aspects. I put some work into making her come alive. Speaking of which...

I've updated her entry, so that it includes a list of her Possessions (all 288,000gp worth). It's right above her History & Background. She should be completely finalized now, so enjoy.

[SwordGoddess]

Thank you very much. Of course you can use her. Enjoy.

Great! It may take a while for things to get moving, but I'll definitely give feedback when she starts making an appearance.