Stonesingers were horrific aberrations whose haunting, booming songs were sometimes mistaken for the sound of wind blowing over hollows in desolate badlands.[1]
Description[]
Stonesinger superficially resembled a scorpion at first glance, with an obsidian-black carapace with a tail arching forward over the back. However, it walked on a dozen legs,six on each side, each tipped in a crystal hard enough to pierce stone, and had a set of six flexible claws on the front of its head. The tip of tail, instead of having a scorpion's stinger, was a lamprey-like mouth ringed with five short, hooked tendrils.[1]
On average, an adult stonesinger was 12 feet (3.7 meters) long and weighed 3,000 pounds (1,400 kilograms).[1]
Personality[]
Stonesingers were highly intelligent and had a great appreciation of music, so much so that an angry stonesinger could be calmed by an impressive performance. However, they were also evil, and were known to kidnap and imprison other intelligent creatures to use as both audience and food.[1]
Abilities[]
Stonesingers were capable of both climbing and burrowing with ease. They had a venomous bite, which could eventually cause a victim to turn into stone. Additionally, a stonesinger could make an ear-piercing shriek powerful enough to both damage and stun a creature within 60 ft (18 m) of the stonesinger.[1]
The monsters also had a few innate spell-like abilities, being able to replicate the effects of meld into stone and stone shape thrice each day, and wall of stone once per day.[1]
Combat[]
These aberrations sang even during combat, which could be unsettling but did not obviously effect either them or their foes. They used their fangs and claws as weapons along with their varied magical abilities. Stonesingers had a tendency to make grandiose moves and gestures during combat.[1]
Ecology[]
Stonesingers were, despite their stone-like carapace and abilities, native to the Material plane. Much of their biology and life cycle was unknown. They were fond of coating intelligent creatures in stone up to the neck and using them as an audience for their performances, and were recorded as occasionally raiding towns for this purpose. However, they were also known to petrify and eat their audience when the performance was over. Stonesingers specifically fed on both natural fossils and victims fossilized by their venom.[1]
Habitats[]
Stonesingers lived underground without care for the climate. In Faerûn, they were most commonly seen near the Great Rift, where they were a constant bane of the gold dwarves, but they had also been reported from as far west as Old Shanatar and as far north as Earthroot.[1]
Appendix[]
References[]
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 Andrew Finch, Gwendolyn Kestrel, Chris Perkins (August 2004). Monster Manual III. (Wizards of the Coast), p. 168. ISBN 0-7869-3430-1.