Fire spider

Fire spiders were a species of spider infused with elemental fire that were native to Conflagratum, the 601 layer of the Abyss.

Description
These diminutive spiders had bodies black like coal, laced with streaks of magma and legs that were wholly made of arcane fire.

Behavior
These creatures operated in hive minds and delighted in setting things aflame. When set loose in an area they would focus their attention on the most combustible of objects.

Abilities
Any combustible material that made contact with a fire spider would be set aflame, including living creatures, thus fire spiders could easily cause rapidly spreading conflagrations. Their fangs were also venomous.

As befitting their fiery nature, fire spiders were very vulnerable to cold. Some believed they were even vulnerable to water or other nonflammable liquids. And due to operating as a hive mind, swarms of them were very suspectible to mind-affecting spells and abilities.

Combat
Multiple swarms of these creatures would work in concert with one another, isolating their prey by encircling them with rings of fire.

History
In, fire spiders arrived on the Prime Material plane for the first time when a group of Maerimydran drow spellcasters based in the Twisted Tower of Ashaba summoned them to set large parts of the southern Rystall Woods on fire, separating it from its northern reaches,   an area that would later become known as the Border Forest. In later centuries, drow would continue to occasionally summon fire spiders in order to set things aflame.

In the Year of Risen Elfkin, 1375 DR, during the Zhentarim invasion of Shadowdale, a drow named Xullrae Dhuurniv summoned a swarm of these spiders on to the Prime Material plane in an effort to set the forest of Cormanthor aflame.

Habitats
Though they originated in the Conflagratum, fire spiders later spread to many other fiery regions of the Abyss. And following their summoning to the Prime Material in -2439 DR, reports suggested that they could occasionally be encountered within the Deep Wastes.

On the Prime Material plane, fire spiders rarely survived or propagated outside of areas in temperate regions that were rich with prey and combustible material, such as forests.

Trivia
These spiders could be summoned by spellcasters through use of the spell fire spiders.

Appearances

 * Adventures
 * Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land