Energy Pod

This fairly large, globe-shaped being is another of the oddities born where the Positive Material plane meets the quasi-plane of Mineral. It belongs mostly to the positive realm, but it lives in the borderland between the two, hoarding energy and occasionally wandering into the mineral regions. On the Prime Material plane it is very rare and almost always found guarding a magical treasure. Rumor speaks of a mirror-image creature native to the Negative Material plane.

Eight stubby tentacles sprout from the pod, each ending in a grapelike cluster of 6d4 nodules that pulse with soft, flickering light. In battle it lashes out at up to two opponents within reach, two tentacles per foe. A hit bursts 2d4 nodules, each releasing a jolt of positive energy for 1d4+2 points of damage. A tentacle stripped of all its nodules can no longer cause harm.

Only weapons of +2 or better can hit an energy pod. Because it feeds on power, it automatically soaks up any spell aimed at it, along with spell-like effects from magical devices, and turns the energy into new nodules, one per level of the spell. These appear at once on a random tentacle (roll 1d8). Acid inflicts double damage on it; it has no other special resistances or weaknesses.