False Appearance. If the spider is motionless, has its eyes and mouth closed, and has its legs wrapped around its body at the start of combat, it has advantage on its initiative roll. Moreover, if a creature hasn’t observed the spider move or act, that creature must succeed on a DC 18 Intelligence (Investigation) check to discern that the spider is anything other than an asteroid.
Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If the spider fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.
Unusual Nature. The spider doesn’t require air.
Multiattack. The spider makes two Web Strand attacks, uses Reel, and makes two Bite attacks.
Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +13 to hit, reach 10 ft., one target. Hit: 21 (3d8 + 8) piercing damage plus 10 (3d6) acid damage.
Web Strand. Ranged Weapon Attack: +13 to hit, reach 120 ft., one creature. Hit: The target is grappled (escape DC 18). The web strand can be attacked and destroyed (AC 12; 20 hit points; vulnerability to fire damage; immunity to bludgeoning, poison, and psychic damage). The spider can grapple up to six creatures at a time using its web strands.
Reel. The spider pulls each creature grappled by it up to 60 feet straight toward itself.
Snare Ship (1/Day). The spider weaves a magical web around a spelljamming ship it can see within 120 feet of itself. The web lasts for 1 minute and suppresses the magic of any spelljamming helm aboard the ship. Decks and other surfaces of the ship that aren’t enclosed become difficult terrain until the effect ends. The web is impervious to damage but is destroyed by a successful casting of dispel magic (DC 18).
Description
An asteroid spider is a menace native to Wildspace and the Astral Sea. A full-grown specimen has a body 30 feet in diameter and legs that are at least 30 feet long. When it wraps its legs tightly around its body and closes its eyes, the asteroid spider resembles nothing so much as a giant, lifeless rock in space—hence its name.
An asteroid spider has its own gravity plane and air envelope, as well as multiple spinnerets with which it can create web strands. Its living brain functions like a spelljamming helm, allowing the spider to travel through Wildspace without a ship. It often haunts asteroid belts, lurking among normal asteroids until a spelljamming ship comes close enough to be detected. The spider then snares the ship before using web strands to catch crew members and reel them toward its snapping jaws.
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Posted Apr 21, 2022"This is No Moon/Asteroid, its a Monstrosity!"
"There's no way there is a Monstrosity this big..., ok we put the power in reverse..."
*Gets snarred by the creature's web and can't escape*
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Posted Apr 21, 2022I would politely decline ever running across this thing, or.. floating past it I suppose
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Posted Apr 22, 2022Too bad you cant burn space
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Posted Apr 22, 2022ofcourse you can burn things in space... (but not that spiders web)
be careful you dont pollute your own air envelope
or cast it between spheres in the Phlogiston (thats flamable space)
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Posted Apr 22, 2022They're complaining about the fact that 5e doesn't use the Phlogiston, I think.
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Posted Apr 23, 2022wish it could use its legs to attack, but awesome creature nonetheless
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Posted Apr 23, 2022Who says she can't attack with her legs, it's D&D, and you're in your world (universe), you can do whatever you want. I would swap out one of the Web Strand attacks for a leg attack whenever necessary, and apply attack and bite-like damage without adding poison damage. It is indeed an awesome creature. :)
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Posted Apr 23, 2022i sat on it and decided it was good without it, i was thinking of the sword spider from minsc and boo
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Posted Apr 24, 2022I have been hoping for a proper Gargantuan spider, this definitely ticks that box, can't wait to run it.
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Posted Apr 26, 2022The blindsight/darkvision seems weird; blindsight is superior to darkvision, so why would it ever open its eyes?
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Posted Apr 29, 202210
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Posted May 2, 2022From my understanding of blindsight, it doesn't provide much detail other than 'there's a thing here,' whereas with darkvision it can see specific details and recognize things.
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Posted May 2, 2022Blindsight is like a bats echolocation, think daredevils vision from the movie where you get outlines of objects but no details.
So having both is very handy. Also if anyone blinds the spider or uses darkness it can just close its eyes and continue ripping your party a new one.
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Posted May 3, 2022Finally appropriate health for the challenge rating!
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Posted May 5, 2022Oh my! I love this, I am definitely enjoy these new Spelljammer creatures!
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Posted May 15, 2022Minecraft reference? (Burning mineshaft cobwebs)
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Posted May 21, 2022The original version of this monster from back in the early 90’s had flammable webs too, so it’s simply a continuation of that bit of lore. Minecraft is great though
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Posted Jun 14, 2022I'm thinking about homebrewing an encounter/one-shot based around hunting down an asteroid spider to collect their living brain in order to create a pseudo-helm for their broken spellhammer, then using something like Rary's Telepathic Bond to communicate with the living brain and direct the ship where you need it to go so that you are capable of fighting alongside your team instead of being forced to maintain concentration on the ship via sitting in the helm. (unless they changed how the spelljammers are used in 5e.)
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Posted Jun 22, 2022That could be really cool, but if your players need everything to make perfect sense they might ask how they are able to fly through space to find it if their ship is broken.
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Posted Jun 22, 2022Well obviously there's more to the campaign setting i had in mind, but i wanted to condense my topic of conversation to only discuss the Asteroid Spider itself. To put it into full context of my campaign, i am creating "Spelljammer: Cataclysm". It's based around a meteor, possibly even the K'Thoutek comet coming into a collision course with Toril, and despite the efforts of all the high-ranking spellcasters across all of Toril, the comet hits, blasting Toril apart and forcing the survivors to search the cosmos of Wildspace for a new home. The naval fleet from The Rock of Bral goes down to the chunks of Toril in a rescue attempt, where the players get picked up. Refugees clutter the streets in the lower district of the Rock of Bral while efforts get underway to build and equip Astral Skiffs with basic minor helms in order to help the survivors seek out new worlds. From here, the players could seek out the asteroid spider and harvest the bits required to create something more suitable for spacefaring adventures. Perhaps they encounter a treasure hunter who seeks out the players to aid him, claiming to know the astral sea like the back of his hand and insists on helping the players find a new home in exchange for a "favor", only to realize later that they have to fight this beast. As any DM knows, you can plan for one eventuality but the players can pull the direction in the opposite way without even intending to. The main point of my post was brainstorming based off of in-game lore to come up with homebrew concepts.