Yeth hound

Yeth hounds, or simply yeth, were intelligent outsiders that hunted during the night.

Description
The hideous yeth hounds resembled large greyhounds, standing high at the shoulder and weighing about. Their short fur was a dull, nonreflective night-black, often blending into the darkness and leaving only the cherry-red glow of their eyes and the smell of chilled smoke to indicate their presence. They possessed an oddly human-like visage, with protruding noses in place of muzzles and more flexible necks than those of canines. Their ears were short and pointed, curving upwards and away from the rest of the head in such a way that they resembled horns.

Personality
Yeth hounds were wicked hunters and fundamentally obedient creatures, following the toughest member of the pack with complete deference and consciously seeking evil masters so serve. Aside from that, they had no loyalty to each other and would not assist each other unless told otherwise. The only prize they sought from their prey were their terrified screams as they hunted them down and tore them limb from limb and any treasures found with a yeth hound were purely incidental.

Threats and intimidation were of no use against yeth hounds as they possessed only one crippling phobia Yeth hounds never went under sunlight even in the middle of a hunt and even if certain death awaited if they didn't. They made sure that there was always time to return to their dens before the strike of dawn and stayed there pacing or sleeping until night fell again. Not even the wills of their masters could persuade them to stay during the day.

Abilities
Yeth hounds had good senses, sight, and hearing but their sense of smell was especially good. They were better at tracking prey by smell than other indicators.

They could run faster than humans and were good flyers who could fly even faster, despite having no wings. They glided a bit above ground to hunt and could stop and resume flying with ease and they never grew exhausted.

Sunlight had an actual detrimental effect on them. When they were caught by sunlight, yeth hounds were forcefully transported to the Ethereal plane, to be precise to the Deep Ethereal. At night, they returned to the Border Ethereal but were in state in which they could move but not affect anything or be affected by anything. This state persisted until they reunited with their master or a pack member of theirs, something they tried to do as fast as possible.

It was difficult to hurt a yeth hound with physical attacks. Only magical and/or silver weapons could hurt a yeth hound, other weapons simply passed through the body of the yeth hound.

Their most special ability however was their voice. When a yeth hound barked or howled, those who weren't evil outsiders in a 300 ft. (91.44 m) radius were filled with an irrational fear that made them run away from the barking yeth hound. A yeth hound used this chance to pursue the fleeing target and was happy when it had such a chance. Yeth hounds were immune to the emotion of fear.

Combat
Yeth hounds fought by biting their enemy. Their bites were aligned to evil and once bitten their enemy was in danger of being tripped by them without being able to properly react to it.

Society
Yeth hounds were one of the servitors of the drow deity Vhaeraun, whose realm was Ellaniath. Yeth hounds were also known to serve Eshowdow of Chult.

When not found alone or in a pair, they organized themselves in small packs consisting of several to a dozen members.



Suitably powerful fey could create them. Once created, they were given as a gift or reward to a person of the fey's choice. The receiver was often assigned the position of pack master of the newly created yeth hound pack and could direct the pack via telepathy, which worked as long as both the master and the hounds were on the same plane. Should their pack master die, they tried to gain a new one, usually a representative of evil like a vampire, hag or necromancer.

They couldn't speak but could understand Infernal, Common, Elvish and Sylvan.

Background
The yeth hound is based on the yeth hound of the folklore of Devon, a headless black dog known for its wailing.