Knight Terror

Well fed, a knight terror looks just as it did in life: a robust, vigorous warrior. Starving, it becomes gaunt and ashen.

It retains all its former class abilities, usually as a powerful fighter or priest, and gains charm person and cause fear 3/day, suggestion 2/day, and phantasmal killer and emotion 1/day.

Once per round, instead of any other attack, it may hurl a mental bolt at someone within 10 feet using its normal THAC0, treating the target's AC as 20 minus his Wisdom. A hit drains 1 Wisdom, recovered at 1 point per day.

Its own Wisdom starts at 10-12, rises as it feeds and drops by 1 every 12 hours. That score sets its Strength, hp per Hit Die and morale: 3-6 Starving (Str 5, 1 hp, Unsteady 7); 7-9 Hungry (Str 7, 3 hp, Average 10); 10-12 Normal (Str 17, 4 hp, Steady 12); 13-15 Fed (Str 18, 6 hp, Elite 14); 16-18 Sated (Str 18/00, 8 hp, Fanatic 18). Hungry, it is fearful and paranoid; full, it is boldness itself and grants its morale to the troops it leads.

Born from knights whose fanaticism led them astray, they keep their old place in their order, often rising through ambition, and quietly corrupt the ranks while feeding on them, turning whole chapters toward evil. They do not breed.

Outside nature like the undead, they still must feed, as vampires and ghouls do. Sages call it divine justice: too weak-willed to resist evil in life, they now live on others' will. Allies serve as food when enemies are scarce. Wisdom below 3 destroys one.