Flailer

A flailer looks like a giant tortoise with six legs instead of four, usually tucked out of sight beneath its broad, hard shell. Typical adults reach four feet long. The shell matches the color and texture of the surrounding rock so well that a resting flailer passes for a boulder.

It waits for prey to wander near. Its camouflage imposes a -3 penalty on opponents' surprise rolls, and it prefers to let a victim pass so it can strike from behind at +2 to hit. It attacks in sequence: two front legs for 1d4 each, a bite for 1d8, then two middle legs for 1d6 each. The shell is AC 1 and the belly only AC 4, but reaching the underside takes a called shot unless the creature has been flipped over.

Instead of its physical attacks, a flailer may use its psionics, one power at a time in the normal way. As with many psionic beings of the desert world, its defense modes are always active, even while it fights physically, as long as it has the PSPs to fuel them. Clairsentience: aura sight, plus combat mind, danger sense and all-round vision. Psychometabolism: shadow form, plus body equilibrium, chameleon power and double pain. Telepathy: sciences of probe, psionic blast and tower of iron will, with devotions of contact, ego whip, mind thrust, inflict pain, mind blank, mental barrier and thought shield.

Flailers live alone among the rocky hills bordering the city-state heartlands, and to seasoned travelers they are a constant reminder of how hostile that world is. Between hunts they rest in small caves and crevices. They eat nearly any animal, from rodents up to humans and demihumans, and often drag a kill back to the lair to eat in peace.

Litters of four to six stay with their sire for up to a year, then go off alone and remain solitary until they near death. Only then do they seek a mate and breed. The male dies naturally soon after his year with the young, and the female is eaten by her offspring right after giving birth.

The shell's odd shape and texture make it useless for armor, but desert weaponsmiths craft it into dirks, daggers, arrowheads and small buckler-sized shields.