Dire Crustacean (Cave)

The subterranean variety of the Cave Crustacean is an elusive but deadly scavenger. Often solitary, they lurk in hidden crevices, thriving in the damp, lightless depths of the world. The Cave Crustacean’s exoskeleton takes on the same hue as surrounding stone, muck, or moss, allowing it to blend in seamlessly with its environment. When it strikes, it wields man-sized snapping pincers and mandibles that can pierce through armor, and for those that choose to flee, it can shoot a sticky filament from its body up to a melee space away. The creature is adept at climbing sheer surfaces like a scorpion, and its armored carapace resists slashing. Unlike their marine cousins, Cave Crustaceans are patient and wait to attack when their prey least suspects it. When they shed their skin, they often leave behind eerie husks in the open, to distract prey. They have limited vision and rely on vibrations in the ground to see. Notably, the blood of a Cave Crustacean has a high alcohol concentration and is therefore highly flammable. Alchemists and monster hunters alike have found many uses for their body parts: from eating their flesh as a delicacy, to using their tendons in the manufacture of tools, to creating adhesives and weaving powerful ropes that can only be cut by magic weapons from the filaments they eject.

Cave Crustaceans are Wild monsters that rarely leave their subterranean homes. They are not irascible like the Marine variety, preferring to stay hidden and avoid encounters where they might be outmatched. Being dwellers in darkness, they fear bright lights and flee from open flame. Their dimwitted singlemindedness, however, makes them immune to charm and mind magic, and to spellcasters using these schools of magic, the Cave Crustacean has no mind at all. Debut the Cave Crustacean via the sound of a distant skittering, the sight of a large rock that keeps shifting its position around the room, or a sudden death-from-above drop on spelunking PCs. Cave Crustaceans like to fight in close quarters, utilizing both horizontal and vertical space, to yank opponents into dark crevices so they can be devoured one at a time.