Sull

Also called floaters, sulls are saucer-shaped hunters. An adult is a light blue disk ten feet across and a foot thick at the rim, with a three-foot dome on top and a mouth jutting two feet below. It smells faintly sour and has no visible senses, yet it sees by 60-foot infravision and hears and smells out to 20 feet.

A sull rams with its hard, rubbery rim for 1d4 points of damage, then bounces off. If it can settle onto a victim from above, it bites instead for 4d4. It never crushes with its body.

During a fight, vents under the rim leak digestive gas into a stinging haze. Those who fail a save vs. poison get it in the eyes and take -4 to attack rolls; those who save, or whose eyes are magically protected, still take -1.

Gas in the dome keeps it aloft; by gulping and venting air it rises or sinks at 18 but moves sideways at only 6. Wind and turbulence can throw it off course, so it fears flyers that churn the air, like wind walkers.

Small silent groups drift in the clouds and descend to hunt only when hungry, favoring open fields and plains. A sull dives on prey at full speed at a 45-degree angle, then fights at ground level. If disturbed while eating, it carries the victim off in its jaws, lifting 40 pounds per Hit Die. It eats both plants and meat and drinks through a six-foot tube it can extend.

At age six a sull buds 2d4 young in its dome. They emerge through the mouth a foot wide with 3 HD, trailing the parent and sharing its food without fighting. By age one they are five feet across, have rims and can ram or bite; each year after, they gain a Hit Die and five feet, maturing at four with 20 feet and 6 HD.

They talk in clicks and whistles and understand common without speaking it. They learn languages quickly; a captive sull secretly grasps far more of its master's tongue than it shows and always knows its master's voice and orders.

Sulls are reclusive and wary, especially of spellcasters, who see them as vehicles rather than thinking beings. Perching birds annoy them, but they cannot drive them off. Captured sulls trained as flying platforms obey only under threat of electric shocks or magic missiles. Unable to flip over in the air and throw a rider, they hide their intelligence and wait to escape.