Amphibious. The aboleth can breathe air and water.
Mucous Cloud. While underwater, the Aboleth Vanguard is surrounded by transformative mucus. A creature that touches the aboleth or that hits it with a melee attack while within 5 feet of it must make a DC 15 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, the creature is diseased for 1d4 hours. The diseased creature can breathe only underwater.
Probing Telepathy. If a creature communicates telepathically with the Aboleth Vanguard, it learns the creature's greatest desires if the Aboleth Vanguard can see the creature.
Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If the Aboleth Vanguard fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.
Frightful Presence. Each creature of the Aboleth Vanguard’s choice that is within 120 feet of the Aboleth Vanguard and aware of it must succeed on a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw or become frightened for 1 minute. A creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success. If a creature's saving throw is successful or the effect ends for it, the creature is immune to the Aboleth Vanguard's Frightful Presence for the next 24 hours.
Multiattack. The Aboleth Vanguard makes three tentacle or fling attacks, and one tail attack.
Tentacle. Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 15 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (3d6 + 6) bludgeoning damage + 8 (1d4 + 6) psychic damage, and target is grappled (escape DC 17). Until the grapple ends, the target is restrained and has disadvantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws, and the Aboleth Vanguard can't use the same tendril on another target.. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or become diseased. The disease has no effect for 1 minute and can be removed by any magic that cures disease. After 1 minute, the diseased creature's skin becomes translucent and slimy, the creature can't regain hit points unless it is underwater, and the disease can be removed only by heal or another disease-curing spell of 6th level or higher. When the creature is outside a body of water, it takes 6 (1d12) acid damage every 10 minutes unless moisture is applied to the skin before 10 minutes have passed.
Tail. Melee Weapon Attack: +10 to hit, reach 15 ft. one target. Hit: 15 (3d6 + 6) bludgeoning damage.
Fling. One Large or smaller object held or creature grappled by the Aboleth Vanguard is thrown up to 60 feet. A thrown creature must succeed on a DC 16 Dexterity saving throw or be knocked prone. If a thrown target strikes a solid surface, the target takes 3 (1d6) bludgeoning damage.
Enslave (4/Day). The aboleth targets one creature it can see within 30 feet of it. The target must succeed on a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw or be magically charmed by the aboleth until the aboleth dies or until it is on a different plane of existence from the target. The charmed target is under the aboleth's control and can't take reactions, and the aboleth and the target can communicate telepathically with each other over any distance.
Whenever the charmed target takes damage, the target can repeat the saving throw. On a success, the effect ends. No more than once every 24 hours, the target can also repeat the saving throw when it is at least 1 mile away from the aboleth.
Innate Spellcasting. The Aboleth Vanguard’s innate spellcasting ability is Intelligence based (spell save DC 19, +11 to hit with spell attacks). It can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components:
At will: minor illusion
3/day: dominate monster
1/day: modify memory (cast at 8th level)
The Aboleth Vanguard can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action option can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature's turn. The Aboleth Vanguard regains spent legendary actions at the start of its turn.
Detect. The Aboleth Vanguard makes a Wisdom (Perception) check.
Tail Swipe. The Aboleth Vanguard makes one tail attack.
Psychic Drain (Costs 2 Actions). One creature charmed by the Aboleth Vanguard takes 15 (5d6) psychic damage, and the Aboleth Vanguard regains hit points equal to the damage the creature takes.
Description
Before the coming of the gods, aboleths lurked in primordial oceans and underground lakes. They reached out with their minds and seized control of the burgeoning life-forms of the mortal realm, making those creatures their slaves. Their dominance made them like gods. Then the true gods appeared, smashing the aboleths’ empire and freeing their slaves.
Aboleths have never forgotten.
Eternal Memories: Aboleth have flawless memories. They pass on their knowledge and experience from generation to generation. Thus, the injury of their defeat by the gods remains perfectly preserved in their minds. Aboleth Vanguards do not have better memories than their kin, nor do they remember necessarily more about the earliest days, but they have had more time to hone practical uses for their knowledge, drawing connections and seeing deeper meanings in events of the past, and to grow more cunning and malicious.
Aboleths’ minds are treasure troves of ancient lore, recalling moments from prehistory with perfect clarity. They plot patiently and intricately across eons. Few creatures can conceive of the extent of an aboleth’s plan.
Heralds of Doom: Aboleth Vanguards are proud beings who relish their role as the first contact force before a cross-dimension invasion. No cruelty or force is below them. Aboleth Vanguards have learned many things on their own and are old enough that their already perfect Aboleth forms are made even more resilient and durable, ignoring extremes of pressure, cold, and the paltry weapons of lesser things.
Gods in the Lake. Aboleths dwell in watery environments, including ocean abysses, deep lakes, and the Elemental Plane of Water. In these domains and the lands that adjoin them, aboleths are like gods, demanding worship and obedience from their subjects. When they consume other creatures, aboleths add the knowledge and experiences of their prey to their eternal memories. Aboleth Vanguards were there first, however, and most often have claimed the choicest, deepest, most well-defended spots, or those with the best access to slaves or other resources. These Aboleths are most commonly found setting the stage for invasion by securing a secluded area to build a dimensional gate.
Aboleths use their telepathic powers to read the minds of creatures and know their desires. An aboleth uses this knowledge to better understand the area as well as gain a creature’s loyalty, promising to fulfill such wants in exchange for obedience. Within its lair, the aboleth can further use its powers to override senses, granting creatures, such as its followers, the illusion of promised rewards.
Enemies of the Gods. The aboleths’ fall from power is written in stark clarity on their flawless memories, for aboleths never truly die. If an aboleth’s body is destroyed, its spirit returns to the Elemental Plane of Water, where a new body coalesces for it over days or months. An Aboleth Vanguards may have scars on its body left there by the gods themselves. Perhaps the. Aboleth Vanguard keeps the scars each time they reform as a badge of pride in having spat defiance in the face of the gods in person, or perhaps injuries left by a god are permanent, even after reforming a new body. Either way, Aboleth Vanguards take pride in physical signs of their defiance of the gods who took everything from them and banished them to the dark.
Ultimately, aboleths dream of overthrowing the gods and regaining control of the world. Aboleths have had untold eons to plot and to prepare their plans for perfect execution.
Lair and Lair Actions
Aboleths lair in subterranean lakes or the rocky depths of the ocean, often surrounded by the ruins of an ancient, fallen aboleth city. An aboleth spends most of its existence underwater, surfacing occasionally to treat with visitors or deranged worshipers.
Lair Actions
When fighting inside its lair, an aboleth can invoke the ambient magic to take lair actions. On initiative count 20 (losing initiative ties), the aboleth takes a lair action to cause one of the following effects:
- The aboleth casts phantasmal force (no components required) on any number of creatures it can see within 60 feet of it. While maintaining concentration on this effect, the aboleth can’t take other lair actions. If a target succeeds on the saving throw or if the effect ends for it, the target is immune to the aboleth’s phantasmal force lair action for the next 24 hours, although such a creature can choose to be affected.
- Pools of water within 90 feet of the aboleth surge outward in a grasping tide. Any creature on the ground within 20 feet of such a pool must succeed on a DC 14 Strength saving throw or be pulled up to 20 feet into the water and knocked prone. The aboleth can’t use this lair action again until it has used a different one.
- Water in the aboleth’s lair magically becomes a conduit for the creature’s rage. The aboleth can target any number of creatures it can see in such water within 90 feet of it. A target must succeed on a DC 14 Wisdom saving throw or take 7 (2d6) psychic damage. The aboleth can’t use this lair action again until it has used a different one.
-
While in it's lair the Aboleth Vanguard can cast scrying, at will and without any components, through pools of water within 5 miles of it's lair. It can see, but not hear, through these pools with perfect clarity, allowing it to see any who approach, and use its "Probing Telepathy" ability. If a target interacts with the pool the Aboleth Vanguard is scrying through, they can see the creature staring back at them.
Regional Effects
The region containing an aboleth’s lair is warped by the creature’s presence, which creates one or more of the following effects:
- Underground surfaces within 5 miles of the aboleth’s lair are slimy and wet and are difficult terrain.
- Water sources within 5 miles of the lair are supernaturally fouled. Enemies of the Aboleth Vanguard that drink such water vomit it within minutes.
- The sky within 5 miles of an Aboleth Vanguard’s lair is in a constant state of dark, rolling clouds, harsh winds, rain that can fluctuate from a drizzle to a downpour with thunder and lightning.
- As an action, the Aboleth Vanguard can create an illusory image of itself within 2 miles of the lair. The copy can appear at any location the Aboleth Vanguard has seen before or in any location a creature charmed by the aboleth can currently see. Once created, the image lasts for as long as the Aboleth Vanguard maintains concentration, as if concentrating on a spell. Although the image is intangible, it looks, sounds, and can move like the aboleth. The Aboleth Vanguard can sense, speak, and use telepathy from the image’s position as if present at that position. If the image takes any damage, it disappears.
If the Aboleth Vanguard dies, the first three effects fade over the course of 3d10 days.
Previous Versions
| Name | Date Modified | Views | Adds | Version | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
10/12/2020 11:50:35 PM
|
15
|
0
|
1
|
Coming Soon
|
|
|
4/29/2021 3:26:19 AM
|
34
|
1
|
2
|
Coming Soon
|
|
|
4/29/2021 3:49:28 AM
|
34
|
0
|
3
|
Coming Soon
|
|
|
6/1/2021 2:46:46 PM
|
35
|
0
|
--
|
Coming Soon
|
|
|
11/29/2021 3:15:17 AM
|
49
|
4
|
--
|
Coming Soon
|
Comments