Werepossum [Ravenloft]

In human shape a werepossum passes for a shiftless lowlife, a sneering thief or a cackling toothless elder, dressed as shabbily as poverty dictates. The animal shape is a plump but ordinary opossum. The hybrid is the shock: a thickened body on spindly, too-short limbs, ratlike fingers with tiny hooked nails, a possum's snout, ears and grin around eyes and facial bones that stay disturbingly human, a bare prehensile tail, and silver-gray fur. It speaks Common and sometimes other tongues, with no language of its own.

Werepossums dodge fights and defend themselves only when cornered. In human or hybrid shape they may wield daggers or swords; the hybrid can also bite for 1d4+1 and has thief skills: 70% to pick pockets, hide in shadows and move silently, and 90% to climb walls. The animal shape is too weak to fight but good for sneaking off.

They attack mainly when hunting the flesh of thinking creatures, choosing lone, weak targets like vagrants, petty crooks or lost children, and flee real opposition. Fleeing is not the end: a werepossum driven off always trails its attackers and plagues them with spiteful tricks, its thief skills and its magic items.

It can feign death at will and instantly, much like the wizard spell, but needs a full round to revive. It sells the act well, dropping as if a blow had killed it, then sneaking away once foes grow bored or distracted. Alert hunters may notice the corpse never turned human. Since enemies might destroy the body, it fakes death only when ordinary escape is impossible.

Only +1 or better magical weapons, or dogwood weapons, can harm it. Each point of bite damage carries a 2% chance of lycanthropy.

Solitary and aimless, werepossums drift on the edges of towns, sleeping in any quiet nook. They steal nearly everything and are inventive with other folk's refuse. Villagers see them as creepy vagrants with a terrible sense of humor, and they love arranging misfortunes for others.

They use no wizard magic but adore magic items, usually carrying a few favorite one-shot ones like potions and scrolls; a single invisibility or ventriloquism potion lets one cause staggering trouble. They can use any unrestricted item and thief-only items.

Mating is impersonal and poorly understood, and the mother alone raises the litter of 6-10 in animal shape. The young look like normal opossums until well grown, and many die young. Werepossums enjoy being outcasts, hate other lycanthropes with even more glee than they hate humans, and have almost no allies. Wererats loathe them and kill them on sight.

They can live on nearly anything, including things best left unnamed, but relish the flesh of thinking beings. Without their malice they would be mere scavengers of civilization, and their pranks tend to slide from annoying to lethal.