Poltergeist

No ordinary eye can see a poltergeist. Those able to perceive invisible things describe a human figure whose face is wrenched into an expression of horror, dressed in rags and hung with chains and weights, each one a token of the wrongs it did to others and to itself.

Its weapon is whatever lies at hand: any object a strong human could throw. It hits as a 5 HD monster, but the missile does no damage, and even a flying knife or sword is just a frightening near miss. The real danger is fear. A struck victim saves vs. spell or flees for 2d12 rounds in a random direction away from the spirit, choosing among the available exits, with a 50% chance of dropping whatever he holds as he bolts. One successful save makes him immune to that poltergeist's fear in that place.

Attackers who cannot detect invisibility fight at -4, and only silver or magical weapons can harm it. Holy water flicked at it or a holy symbol boldly presented forces it back without injuring it. A poltergeist bound to its place of death is turned as a ghoul; a wandering one is turned or destroyed as a skeleton.

These restless dead are kin to haunts but crueler, hating the living and tormenting them with smashed furniture, thrown objects and eerie noises. Some believe they are the souls of people whose terrible crimes went unpunished in life. Many plague families, or business partnerships, where they haunt the shop or office and frighten people nearly as much as they did while alive.

Most are bound to the spot where they died and seldom stray more than 100 feet from it. Bound spirits are stronger than wanderers, lost souls that can never find their way home and never have more than 3 hit points.

Where a poltergeist is especially powerful, a phantom shift may occur, usually on the anniversary of its death. This rare, frightening illusion carries witnesses back to the days when the spirit lived, often revealing what turned it into a poltergeist. Characters can interact with the scene freely, but if they try to harm it, or it tries to harm them, the vision breaks harmlessly and they return to the present. A shift may resume later or loop endlessly, and its timing cannot be predicted.

Both frightening and pitiable, poltergeists neither eat nor gather treasure. Destroying one or laying it to rest makes it dissolve.