Anguiliian

An anguiliian (AN-gwill-ee-anz) looks like a human crossed with an eel. Its sinuous, 6-foot body bears two fleshy limbs near the top, each ending in bony pincers that cut, crush and grip; the same limbs double as front fins. Two-thirds of its length along, two stubby legs sprout with broad, six-toed feet, and past them the body ends in a flat tail finned above and below.

The head has a blunt snout, reptilian eyes, and a round, jawless mouth packed with ring after ring of teeth. Wide spiny fins on either side look like ears. The scales are muddy brown, flecked with black and tan.

They talk in clicks, thumps and whistles, using a dialect of the sahuagin language. Chieftains usually speak the surface common tongue reasonably well, plus the tongues of a couple of other peoples from land or sea.

Anguiliians hit fast and hard, hoping to swamp their enemies. Their senses rival a sahuagin's: underwater against surface folk, they gain +2 on surprise rolls and give opponents -2. In open water they englobe their target, with a few above, others at front, rear and sides, and most rising from beneath.

Once per hour an anguiliian can sprint at a movement rate of 30 for a total of five minutes, in one burst or several, then must wait a full hour to do it again.

They bite, pinch and slam with their tails like a battering ram. A bite that hits fastens on, unless the target wears metal armor or has natural AC 0 or better. From then on the anguiliian bores into the victim for automatic bite damage each round, rakes with its feet for another 2d4, and gains +2 to hit with pincers and tail. They have tunneled into whales this way and eaten them from inside. The only ways to remove one are to kill it or succeed at a bend bars roll.

If the mouth cannot latch, it may seize with its pincers instead. When both pincers hit in the same round the victim is trapped, taking raking and pincer damage automatically each round while the creature gains +2 with tail and bite.

Electrical attacks of every kind leave them unharmed. Fire, on the other hand, deals 2 extra points per die and they save against it at -2. Bright light and fresh water are intolerable; exposure to either forces a morale check or a retreat. On rare land raids they grip stone-tipped javelins in their pincers.

Their home is the lightless deep, 1,800 to 2,400 feet down. They rise toward the surface only by night to hunt, and on moonless nights a few break the surface for quick strikes on isolated islands or passing ships.

Tribes roam the depths continuously, with females carrying their eggs as they swim. An elder chieftain of 5 Hit Dice heads a patriarchal order, and like sahuagin leaders he can be challenged, but anguiliians keep no fixed nobility and no priests. A typical encounter is a party of 5d4 adult males scouting or hunting for the main tribe. A tribe has a 40% chance of keeping 3d4 marine eels as guards.

Anguiliians will eat any flesh at all, including carrion, fallen enemies and their own dead, and they regularly take giant squid, whales and many kinds of fish. Their own meat stinks so badly that even sahuagin refuse it, though sharks, kraken and other deep horrors happily eat anguiliians whenever they catch them first.