Belabra : Dungeons and Dragons lore

What many folk know on the Sword Coast is that the small town of Phandelver has a few deep old mines that still have a lot of Cold Iron deposits; However, I have not seen many fresh ingots on the market lately; there are plenty of things made from the material that attracts the trade of a certain kind of hunter, though, as word of the materials availability spreads far and wide across the busy trade routes and their many roadhouses. It was an unseasonally pleasant morning when I left the road and headed deeper into the heart of the continent as I was on my way to visit the Spirit Soaring Cathedral and the family of Cadderly Boneduce; I was not expecting to meet anyone who was not a bandit or hermit of some kind, so was moving at a wary pace, keeping my eyes peeled, as the humans say. Halflings have other terms, usually involving the sensitive hair on our toes, though, to be honest, my feet are not hairy at all, thanks to my mixed ancestry. The sun was just cresting over the treetops when someone with very sharp senses spotted me.

I met Lucan Thrys on his way from Calimshan, traveling off the main road as I was. Of course, we were wary of each other initially, but as soon as I offered to share a pot of tea, he relaxed his guard and called off his lurking pet.

That pet is the subject of today's video.

Lucan Thrys was journeying through the wilderness, both because he was not a member of the races and societies of Faerun and where he came from originally; the wilderness of faerun is like a stroll through a park by comparison. Lucan is a Bariur, with the upper body of a stout and muscular man and the lower half of a mighty mountain goat; he sported a pair of magnificently curved horns carved with intricate runes and decorated in gold and jewels like a king's crown. He carried two scimitars of silver steel and a recurved bow made from wood and horn taken from his home plane of Ysgard, and he was on the hunt for fey creatures, hence his need for Cold Iron. 

As we settled down next to a fire for tea, his companion spooked me again as it scuttled around from concealment in the tall grass and flax plants. Then, in a flash of tentacles and protruding eyestalks, it was suddenly a smooth, pale boulder, rounded and pebbled with a natural-looking pattern, like very weathered coastal river stone. It nestled into the ground next to Lucan, looking to all the world like a boulder that had been there for years. 

I'd seen this behavior a few times and wondered if it was anything like a sea creature that had adapted to live on the land; back at the end of the Blue Age on Toril, many creatures like that had evolved and still thrived.

I asked Lucan what his animal was, and he told me it was called a Belabra. It was not from Ysgard; it was native to Toril, as I suspected.

So this was the Belabra, I'd never seen one, but I had seen the name in some journals from Candlekeep.

As we drank tea and ate some bread, he told me all about the creature he called his one 'Nasty,' which was less a reflection of its temperament and more a reaction to what it could do in a fight. He had picked this one up a year before in the markets of Calimshan for fifteen hundred gold coins, which I thought was reasonable as it was clearly well-trained and in its prime.

Lucan was enthusiastic in regaling me with tales of the creatures hunting skills, he said it was not suprizing that not many knew of the creature, even on it's home world, as it was so elusive, an real ambush predator that seemed to get agitated whenever it was observed directly by anything other than it's prey. It seemed to know that Lucan was the one who owned it though, he said it had never been aggressive towards him and took care of its own needs, hunting small game, though it did tent to eat a lot of stray cats in Calimshan, they were too easy for it to grab, while rats required a bit more effort.

I didn't much like the sound of it having a taste for cats, but held my tongue.

We broke open some herb bread I cooked over the fire and Lucan told me he ran across some elves who thought the Belabra was some kind of sacred animal of a god of theirs named Rillifane Rallathil.

I knew that one, the Tree god, he was not just revered by the elves, I know the star elves of Aglarond in the ancient Yuirwood worship a giant treant called Relkath of the Infinite Branches, which was purported to be an aspect of Rillifane Rallathil and I know another of his names is the Great Oak, so, a powerful nature deity probably not very active outside the deep forest. If any of the other gods were similar, that would mean that Rillifane Rallathil used the Belabra to provide aid to his faithful and his clerics could probably summon them.

I learned a lot about the creature from that pleasant conversation with Lucan.

Oh we also figured out his Belabra was pregnant, but more on that in a second.

A Belabra is a medium sized creature, the hard shell is 2 feet in diameter and ranges from black or dark gray to the more rare, pale and weathered look sported by Nasty. The creature has twelve barbed tentacles that allow it to stand upright on them about five feet tall in total, and when it does that, you can clearly see the similarity to those peaceful underground creatures called the Flumph, though its like a flumpg and a grell had a baby, or perhaps the Belabra is a primitive ancestor to both species, I am not sure, they are very similar anyway, but I am not entirely certain they are related.

The shell does have a weakness, it has four gaps in the top where the Belabra keeps its retractable eye stalks, very similar to those of a snail, but with much sharper eyesight. Under the shell, between the tentacles its hide is white and it has a powerful beak like a squid that can take a hefty chunk out of anything it bites. 

In combat the Belabra will put on a burst of speed and agility, and thanks to some short membranes between the tentacles the creature can leap and glide quite unexpectedly. the belabra utilizes its shell for defense, bounding about to shield its vulnerable underside. It attacks by either ramming foes with its shell or entangling them with its barbed tentacles and attacking with its beak.

When ramming, the belabra kicks with its tentacles to launch itself into the air, traveling up to 60 yards. It can attempt to entangle a target mid-leap, imposing penalties on the victim's dexterity and providing a bonus to the belabra's subsequent attacks with its beak. Victims can try to escape the entanglement, suffering damage from the barbs in the process.

The belabra's shell grants its head a significant Armor Class bonus, while its tentacles and underside are more vulnerable. When a creature within 5 feet of the Belabra hits it with a melee attack, the Belabra sprays blood from its injured tentacle. Each humanoid creature within 10 feet of the Belabra must succeed on a DC 12 Constitution saving throw or suffer the following effects: On a failed save, the creature is poisoned for 1 minute. If the saving throw fails by 5 or more, the creature is also blinded until the poison ends. A poisoned creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effects on itself on a success. This may or may not confer immunity to the blood spray for the next 24 hours, I'm not sure on that point.

While the Belabra is prone and hidden under its shell, it gains has a +4 bonus to its Armor Class against all attacks, advantage on Constitution saving throws and it is effectively concealed, difficult to detect while motionless and hidden in this manner.

It is +4 to hit with attacks, the barbed tentacles inflict 1d8+2 damage with each strike and the difficulty class for escaping it's entangling tentacles is 12, plus, tearing free of those barbs also inflicts 4d4 damage. If a target is grappled by it, the Belabra makes bite attacks with it's beak with advantage, inflicting 1d10+2 damage with each attack. 

The Belabra has a natural armor class of 14 and around 52 hit points, a speed of 30 feet both on the ground and climbing surfaces or trees, its attributes reflect its physical strength and fortitude, including a pretty high dexterity, but it only has an intelligence of 3, so it can understand commands, but not spoken language.

Oh yes, how could we tell that Nasty was pregnant.

Although Belabra is not asexual, they only have one gender, and they all require a partner to reproduce; both get pregnant from the union, and the young start out as buds that grow on the inside of the Belabra's inner wall of the Stomach. The buds can grow in there for the next six to ten months and then get vomited out by the parent. When Lucan was describing the recent changes in behavior and that Nasty was off it's food and not moving as quickly, we managed to figure out that his Belabra was indeed pregnant and would be spitting out quite a few little offspring in the next couple of months.

If taken at a young age, a belabra can be trained to obey simple commands and act as a guard or hunter. If so trained, it identifies with its master and remains with him even in the heat of battle. Training a captured bela bra takes up to four months and requires a skilled instructor, a number of live animals (to serve as practice kills), and the frequent presence of the person who will be the creature's master. Adverse conditions can greatly extend the training period. Once their training is completed, the belabra can be employed in the same manner as an attack dog. A young belabra that has been raised for two years can be taught to capture and hold a victim without trying to kill it. 

I left Lucan and Nasty and carried on my journey to the east, though I did keep a more wary eye on the long grass and shadowed upper tree branches, now knowing yet another weird creature might be hiding there, stalking me and drooling.

We halflings are notoriously delicious after all.

My name is AJ Pickett, thanks for listening and as always, I will be back with more for you, very soon.

 

Attack of the Battle Moon (Super Atomic RPG Lets play)

Dalmosh (Dungeons and Dragons Demon Lore)

Viewer requested video time. This week, it's Dalmosh of the Infinite Maws. Perhaps a mere blip on the scale of the abyss, but something of a legend for good reason. Dalmosh is a demon kaiju, a living, breathing cataclysm.

Let's set the scene.

Calling Dalmosh from the abyssal depths requires a ritual and a feast of epic proportions. We're talking about a spread that's the stuff of legends, worth a small fortune of 10,000 gold pieces. Imagine the scene: a vast cauldron, bubbling with the most exquisite, mouth-watering delicacies from across the realms, an offering so lavish that it could salivate a god, surrounded with hundreds of platters, each a meal fit for a whole group of people, dish after dish of gorgeous and rare foods, and amidst this opulent display, the members of a ritual circle are chanting deeply for a solid hour, weaving magic to draw Dalmosh forth, not just with the promise of this grand feast but with the chanted promises of assured, massive devastation for the lord of hunger.

The summoning ritual reaches deep into the chaotic heart of the Abyss to a layer housing the Flesh Mountains, one of many living layers; the landscape is all undulating hills of meat, covered in thick skin with drifts of old dead skin flakes like dunes, patches of thick, stinking hair like alpine tussock plants and more than a few species of carnivorous fungus and oozes. The mountains of flesh are shaped into strange swirling patterns, thanks to the eons of voracious eating by Dalmosh, a 50-foot-tall, gigantic humanoid of unknown origin.

Somewhere above his largest maw are two deep-set blue eyes, but that's about as close as he has to a face; his entire body is kind of soft, he has no actual bones, and his entire bulk is kept together by muscle, thick vascular tubes and tough sinews that web their way through his insides, the rest is all digestive system, his entire body is really an immortal living gateway to a bounded sub-dimension called The Gullet, it doesn't occupy any space but is co-terminus with the inside of Dalmosh's body and spawns a new portal every time Dalmosh spawns a new mouth, which happens any time he gets slashed open by a weapon or some such.

A creature that is large seems to move slowly but covers a lot of ground; a standard movement in a round would be 50 feet (15m) or twice if he is charging at some new target of his hunger. Dalmosh is only really motivated by hunger and an equally endless desire for destruction, any creature up to large size that gets in his way will be grabbed and thrown into his maw, taking a huge amount of bludgeoning damage, followed by round after round of inexorable acid damage while trapped in the Gizzard of Dalmosh, the crushing and digesting compartment before it gets to the portal into the Gullet sub-realm, so you can still cut your way back out of Dalmosh from inside his gizzard, you have to inflict 75 points of damage in a single round with a light weapon, not an easy task. The gizzard is fairly large, and it can hold up to eight medium-sized people; most inanimate material swallowed goes straight through into the Gullet. Dalmosh has a standard, brutal, and effective combat move, he will charge 50 feet through a group of targets and inflict a full bite attack on each target adjacent to his path, which can be devastating to large groups of other creatures, making short work of masses of ranked soldiers in the blood wars, for example.

To quote directly from the 5th monster manual for 3.5 edition dungeons and dragons, 

"Though Dalmosh is dull, brutal, and indiscriminately destructive, he has managed to accumulate admirers. Trolls and ogres view Dalmosh as the ultimate expression of their vicious, avaricious natures. Some orcs do the same, but they see Dalmosh as a potential weapon, not as an object of worship.

 Those who summon Dalmosh do so to destroy their enemies. No sane creature believes that Dalmosh is capable of more than this. In fact, Dalmosh’s summoners know they risk their lives, for he of the Infinite Maws readily eats those who remain nearby after a summoning ritual.

He has no ecological niche. He simply devours everything in his path, following the movement and noise that attract him to a potential meal.  The Flesh Mountains, his home, stretch across several layers of the Abyss. His dwelling is a vast cave eaten out of those same mountains, where he lounges and takes brief moments to digest. The mountains eternally grow larger, and only Dalmosh’s endless eating keeps them in check.  Some say that Dalmosh is the living will of the Flesh Mountains, a strange entity that has existed as long as the Abyss itself.

When summoned away from the Flesh Mountains, Dalmosh will always return and reform there after two days, earlier if somehow killed by something, he just reforms in the Flesh Mountains eternally.

Creatures that Dalmosh swallows sometimes knowingly choose to enter the Gullet rather than perish in his gizzard. Those unfortunate creatures that lack the means to travel the planes become trapped. They survive by eating the remains that fall from the sky, gathering magic items, building materials, and other tools that survive the trip into the Gullet. Here and there, crude settlements have arisen, and Garnamastra is the largest of these. A rakshasa known as the Eyeless Tyrant rules this place, backed by a small cabal of assassins and spellcasters"

I recall that movie with the Cloverfield monster, and the ideo that it was covered in parasites so large, they were a lethal threat to creatures as small and puny as humans.

Dalmosh is a creature of flesh, so why not have sufficiently large chunks that get carved off him in battle, have similar qualities, but be much smaller. The Spawn of Dalmosh could still be large in size, depends on the chunk carved off and how fast it can reshape into a humanoid shape.

Dalmosh's stomping grounds, are as alive and as grotesque as the demon itself. Imagine mountains made of meat, their surfaces undulating, covered in a skin-like crust, with drifts of old dead skin flaking off like snow. Here, amidst this living landscape, thrive the demonic fungus and oozes – entities born from the very essence of the Abyss.

The carnivorous fungus here is no ordinary mold. These are aggressive, sentient growths, feeding not just on the decay left in Dalmosh's wake but on the very energy of the Abyss itself. They lure, trap, and consume anything that comes too close, digesting it slowly, adding to the grotesque beauty of the Flesh Mountains.

And then there are the oozes – slithering, sentient slimes that roam the fleshly valleys and crevices. These are not mere puddles of goo; they are predators, each with its unique method of hunting. Some dissolve their prey with acidic secretions, while others engulf and digest them over time. 

But Dalmosh always returns, and with him, the cycle continues. He devours, he destroys, and in doing so, he feeds the very land that sustains the bizarre ecosystem of the Flesh Mountains. It's a symbiotic relationship, in a twisted, abyssal sense.

My name is AJ Pickett, if you enjoy these deep dives into Dungeons and Dragons lore, please subscribe to the channel and hit the like button, thank you for listening and as always, I will be back with more for you, very soon.