Lesser Air/Earth Elemental [Dark Sun]

Dust devils and hot desert winds blow constantly across the desert world, and nervous travelers often mistake them for lesser air elementals. The real thing is mostly transparent, so a person can stand beside one unaware; staring straight at it, one might catch a faint, filmy outline that seems to fade and return with the breeze.

It relies on that near-invisibility and on speed, being the quickest of the lesser elementals. It rushes past its target at its full rate of 18, clipping it with its body for damage based on its Hit Dice. Anything it strikes that has less Hit Dice than it does must pass a Dexterity check or be knocked off balance.

At great cost it can twist itself into a visible whirling vortex the same size as itself. Its damage doubles while spinning, but the time it may remain on this plane is cut in half, counted from the round the vortex appears. Against underground or earth-based creatures it fares poorly, dealing only half damage.

Built of packed sand, salt, rock or silt sea dust, this little mound is the mightiest servant within reach of a novice conjurer. It looks like a small mound with a rough humanoid outline and crude features, including hollow pits for eyes. Most unsettling of all, it never turns around; it simply slides its face to the other side of its body and goes the other way.

It favors the straightforward approach, hammering a foe into submission with one heavy punch per round, its damage tied to its Hit Dice. It moves freely through every kind of earth, but anything flying or in the water takes only half damage from it.

Between commands it sits motionless. Complicated orders, multi-step tasks and errands are lost on it, so a summoner gets the best results with short, plain instructions.