Scaladar [Automaton]

A scaladar is a sleek metal construct shaped like a giant scorpion, built as a guardian by the archmage Corvane. It moves smoothly on level ground and can clumsily climb trees and rock piles. Cold, deliberate and nearly mindless, some are rumored to be turned loose with orders to kill every living thing they meet, and plenty of them act exactly that way.

A scaladar grabs with two enormous pincers and stabs with its tail at the same time, so it can fight three foes at once. A closing pincer deals 1d12 damage and repeats it every round until the victim gets loose. A trapped victim gets one bend bars/lift gates attempt per combat to escape that claw; if it fails, it stays caught until the scaladar drops it to seize someone else. The tail stings trapped victims automatically with no attack roll. The scaladar may also swing a held victim as a club: on a successful attack roll it deals 1d4 to the target struck, and the victim being swung takes 1d6.

The sting deals 2d4 physical damage plus a 1d12 electrical jolt. It can generate that jolt only once per turn, but electrical attacks, lightning and magic thrown at it can supercharge the tail.

Every electrical attack and magic missile aimed at a scaladar is absorbed. Electricity is stored as energy, one point for each point of damage the attack would have dealt, and released through the sting in d12 discharges; it can only discharge once it has banked at least 12 points. Magic missiles instead repair it, but only in the round they strike; after that the energy fades away.

Fire and heat, edged weapons and piercing weapons all do half damage. Spells of cold or acid have no effect, nor do maze, crystalbrittle or disintegrate. Mental influence always fails, so charm, control and illusion spells are useless. Nobody but its creator, or a controller that creator has authorized, can command one by any means short of a full wish.

It cannot swim or float, but it works underwater without trouble for a while, and there each sting discharges like a fireball with a 30-foot radius that does not harm the scaladar. Water rusts it, though: within 1d20 days it slows to half its movement rate, and after another 1d20 days it cannot move at all.

Scaladar have no social life; they appear alone or in groups, wherever their controller sends them. Each senses others of its kind within 100 feet, as well as its creator or controller. When one is attacked, every scaladar in range knows at once and may help if its orders permit. A controller can likewise give orders aloud or mentally to every scaladar within 100 feet, though mental commands require a ring of Corvane.

Some wizards have tried to devise spells for seizing control of wild scaladar, and others have reportedly tried to build their own; anyone who succeeded is keeping quiet. Corvane is suspected of building scaladar specifically to hunt down inferior copies made by rivals.

Scaladar need no food and hunt only on command. Most guard their master's stronghold under orders with a set range and purpose, such as clearing every creature taller than 1 foot from the land around a tower. They obey without question and kill without hesitation, enemies of all that lives.

Most are also ordered to grab and swallow whole any magic item they detect, except those their controller is using, steadily removing enchanted objects from use around them. Their orders usually have a primary and secondary goal, and gathering magic is often the primary one, even when force is needed.

Building them takes a demanding blend of mechanics and magic that only Corvane is known to practice. Some sages think similar constructs served the proud magical empires of ages past and may still lie in sealed tombs and forgotten vaults. Others who know the void between worlds argue they are enlarged cousins of the dreaded clockwork swarms of the void, pointing to the copper model of one that sits in Corvane's laboratory.

Corvane, once apprentice to a mad archmage, made these rings to command his creations. A ring allows mental contact and command over any scaladar within 100 feet, and it also protects its wearer: any scaladar that touches the wearer shuts down for 1d12 turns, whatever its orders. The only exception is a scaladar under the control of Corvane's master ring, which overrides any scaladar's orders and gives new ones from 500 feet away, locking out other commands and canceling a lesser ring's shutdown effect. Corvane has destroyed rivals and despised former apprentices by turning their own scaladar against them.

Corvane built one scaladar, the only one known, with a mind of its own. Called Klikkar, it looks like any other but has Intelligence 16, 50% magic resistance, a will of its own (neutral evil), and a magical voice box that speaks Common and drow. It fights like its kin, crushing a victim in its grip and swinging it into other foes for 1d4 to them and 1d6 to the held victim. It absorbs electricity and magic missiles normally and shares all the standard scaladar immunities and resistances. Only Corvane's master ring can control its mind.

Klikkar's deeper programming drives it to control, and it can command other scaladar directly. It knows that it and its kind must obey the master ring, though it suspects enough magic could get around that. Ambitious, grandiose and utterly ruthless, it has no compassion or curiosity and wants only to grow its power and satisfy its urge to control. Its cold logic sees through weak arguments and empty threats. Unlike ordinary scaladar it does not kill by reflex; it weighs each opponent for what it might gain.

Aware that it can neither swim nor float and that long exposure to water would rust it, Klikkar never leaves dry ground. It needs no food or fuel. Corvane knows of its ambitions and finds them amusing, as a kind of experiment, confident that the master ring guarantees obedience. So he watches, entertained, while Klikkar tirelessly hunts for magic that would let it defy him.