Spider Cactus

A spider cactus is a barrel 6 to 7 feet tall and 2 to 3 feet thick, vivid green streaked with white and bristling with purple and green needles. In a patch along a roadside it looks no different from harmless cacti until someone walks too close.

The plant stays perfectly still until prey wanders within 15 feet; it senses living creatures and anything carrying liquid. Its arsenal is 3d6 big green feeding spines plus 5-8 (d4+4) tethered sets of barbed purple darts. Each attack launches one full set of 8 purple darts at a single target, each needing its own attack roll. A hit deals 1 point of damage and demands a save vs. poison at +2 (the venom is weak) or paralysis in 2d4 rounds, with one save per needle. Because the venom works on contact, yanking a needle out at once does not stop paralysis after a failed save.

Strands that hit reel the victim toward the barrel at five feet per round; those that miss take three rounds to retract and cannot launch again for a day. A set missing any strands stays unused until all eight regrow, at three needles per week. Once the victim reaches the trunk it is skewered on the feeding needles for 2d4 damage plus its AC, ignoring shields, and ignoring Dexterity too once paralyzed; until then the victim can twist to avoid them. The plant drinks every drop of liquid and then drops the dry husk.

The tethers pull with Strength 17, so only a creature with greater Strength can fight them. Such a victim may spend a round doing nothing else: an open doors roll yanks out a needle, while a bend bars roll snaps a strand. Allies can sever a strand (AC 5, 5 points to cut), though blunt weapons are useless. Pulling a barbed needle out costs 1d4 extra damage.

Every cactus in range attacks, and they compete. A victim snared by several goes to the one with the most needles in it, but the others keep pulling until their needles tear free, each one dealing another 1d4 damage.

Patches grow beside roads, where travelers mean food. When rain falls the cacti bloom and release thousands of eight-fronded seeds the same day. Only the first seed to land takes root, quickly soaking up the moisture in the air, so a patch usually gains just one plant per storm. Young plants grow a foot a month until full size.

Few creatures threaten spider cacti, and they may be the only things that can feed on pack insects. Once the needles are disabled, most likely by fire, a plant can be tapped for up to a gallon of sweet, honeylike sap much like scale-runner eggs. A gallon serves as a gallon of water, or feeds four man-sized creatures for a day.