Wizshade

A wizshade, sometimes called a spellshade, first shows as a whipping serpent of force in the air. It slows and spreads into a spinning, many-colored vortex roughly 8 feet across, and from it a humanlike figure in flowing robes rises, ignoring which way is down. Male shades tend to be bald and long-bearded; female ones wear tall pointed hats and long hair. Hat and robes trail into the vortex and share one bright hue with the figure's pupilless, flame-like eyes. The shade can step out and walk on air, but it rarely does, since leaving the vortex makes capture easier.

Weapons slide through a shade's misty body. It cannot strike physically and takes no harm from ordinary attacks. Magical weapons inflict normal damage, with all weapon and Strength bonuses, as it counts as an enchanted creature, but special weapon properties such as vorpal edges or life drain do nothing to it.

A wizshade is magic given shape. It casts only wizard spells, never on itself, each as an instant effect needing just the final gestures. Each round, roll 1d10 for the spell level (a 10 lets the DM choose), then d100 for the spell; if the roll exceeds the spells listed for that level in the standard player's rules, the DM picks one of that level from any source. The shade casts whatever comes up, however silly. Spells that drain a target to boost the caster do benefit it. It saves as a 10th-level wizard or by its old saves, whichever are better, if its former level and class are known.

Spells and magical attacks that succeed against a wizshade inflict no damage. Instead, they lock out a spell level of the same rank for the rest of that fight: a successful cloudkill, for example, stops it casting 5th-level spells. If a locked level is rolled later, it casts nothing that round. Each lost level forces a morale check, and failing sends it back into its vortex and away. When its magic resistance defeats an attack, the shade instead absorbs the energy and loses nothing; roll 1d10, and if the result matches a level it lost earlier, that level returns.

The vortex stays put while the shade is outside it, though the shade may sink back in and leave at will. Destroying the shade collapses the vortex, and any spells that deal the vortex over 70 damage send it, and its shade, away from the Prime Material.

Both shade and vortex are formed of mists like those of the flame-sea, and a hair-thin tunnel links each vortex to the flame-sea beyond its world's crystal shell. A bold traveler who enters the vortex can follow that tunnel out. Shades speak the common tongue or other well-used languages such as elvish or dwarvish when they feel like it, though what they say often makes no sense.

All wizshades share the same powers but rank themselves by hue, which shows their age, rising like a rainbow from violet to red. They are capricious, chaotic beings who love teasing others and staging dazzling magical shows, and they take special glee in pestering mighty wizards, other spellcasters and psionicists. They keep no allies and no enemies. Tales of priestly spellshades surface now and then, never confirmed.

A wizshade owns nothing physical; even its clothes are part of it. It heals by drinking in the flame-sea. Rumor says the greatest shades are reborn in new bodies on other planes, or regain their original flesh and return to their home world without having aged a day.