Paraelemental Beast Overview [Dark Sun]

Paraelemental beasts hail from the four planes where two elements meet and mingle, which the sages of the desert world call magma, rain, silt and sun. At home, the two halves of a beast's nature rest in balance. Anywhere else those halves grind against each other, leaving the semi-intelligent creature anything from sullen and muddled to irrational and homicidal.

Being pure elemental force, the beasts are counted as divine, yet no one worships them. Priests of the four classic elements distrust anything from the paraplanes and almost never call them. Paraelemental clerics summon them eagerly, to boost their own might or to serve their patrons, and they share those patrons' taste for quantity over quality. Such a priest gains standing just by keeping a beast nearby, and the longer it stays, the more favored he is thought to be.

In the material world a beast clothes itself in a shell of its own elements. Destroy the shell and the creature returns home.

Harming one takes a +1 or better magical weapon, a wizard or priest spell, or a psionic power from the Telekinetic or Psychoportive discipline. Spells linked in any way to its home plane do nothing to it. Defiling magic affects it only as a normal casting would, without the extra harm it deals lesser elementals.

A summoner can use the conjure elemental spell (wizard or priest version), a staff, or a summoning device, and the method chosen affects how much control is gained. Total concentration is required throughout; any distraction, mental or physical, and the beast arrives uncontrolled. Control lasts for the spell's duration plus a day per caster level, ending early if the shell is destroyed or madness wins out. An uncontrolled beast following its own will is termed free-willed.

These beasts feel no pain from the impure Prime Material Plane, unlike elemental beasts. Their torment is emotional, as their blended natures slowly come apart, and even a controlled beast must check each day. The chance that rage takes over starts at 10% and climbs 10% daily, holding at 90% from the ninth day on. When a check fails, the beast goes into a blind fury, attacks any nearby living creatures, then flees in search of a way home or terrain that feels like one.

None are native. They arrive only through summoning and cannot leave by themselves. Controlled ones usually serve a priest whose patron comes from their plane; free-willed ones are rare and stay near landscapes resembling home. Rain beasts are scarcest, since their shells cannot last under the crimson sun, while silt beasts are most common, having settled into a real niche there.