Monster Dossier

Grim Reaper

Grim Reaper DEAD MAN'S HAND Decks of cards are a traditional method used to tell a person's fortune, but legends hold that certain cards or combinations...

Level 21

Traits

uniquenemediumundead

Rules & statistics

Monster Profile

Perception

41

Senses

  • Name
    darkvision
  • Name
    see invisibility
  • Name
    status sight
  • Name
    true seeing

Languages

Languages
  • common
  • necril

Skills

Acrobatics
43
Athletics
38
Deception
40
Intimidation
43
Religion
39
Society
36
Stealth
43

Ability Mods

Str
8
Dex
10
Con
8
Int
5
Wis
7
Cha
8

Items

  • scythe

Defenses

Ac
47
Saving Throws
Fort
37
Ref
41
Will
38
Abilities
  • +1 status to all saves vs. magic
Hp
  • Hp
    320
    Abilities
    • negative healing
Immunities
  • poison
  • death effects
  • disease
  • paralyzed
  • unconscious
Resistances
  • Amount
    15
    Name
    all damage

Speed

Walk
50
Fly
75

Attacks

  • Range
    Melee
    Name
    keen scythe
    Attack
    40
    Traits
    • agile
    • deadly
    • magical
    • reach
    • trip
    Effects
    • death strike
    • energy drain
    Damage
    4d10+23 slashing plus death strike and energy drain
    Types
    • slashing

Spellcasting

  • Type
    Innate
    Tradition
    divine
    DC
    47
    Attack
    37
    Entry
    7
    Spells
    • Name
      plane shift
    10
    Spells
    • Name
      finger of death
      Amount
      4
    Constant
    2
    Spells
    • Name
      see invisibility
    3
    Spells
    • Name
      haste
    6
    Spells
    • Name
      true seeing

Abilities

Top
  • Entries
    • The grim reaper can choose whether or not it counts as undead for effects that affect undead differently. Even if it does not count as undead, the grim reaper still never counts as a living creature.
    Name
    Death's Grace
  • Entries
    • The grim reaper automatically knows the Hit Points, conditions, afflictions, and emotions of all creatures it can see.
    Name
    Status Sight
Mid
  • Traits
    • aura
    • divination
    • divine
    • misfortune
    Entries
    • 20 feet. Living creatures in the aura must roll twice on all d20 rolls and use the lower result.
    Name
    Aura of Misfortune
  • Entries
    • The grim reaper can choose whether or not it takes positive damage.
    Name
    Negative Healing
  • Activity
    Number
    1
    Unit
    reaction
    Traits
    • teleportation
    Trigger
    A creature within 100 feet makes a ranged attack or uses an action that has the concentrate, manipulate, or move trait.
    Entries
    • The grim reaper teleports to a square adjacent to the triggering creature and makes a melee Strike against it. If the Strike hits, the grim reaper disrupts the triggering action.
    Name
    Lurking Death
Bot
  • Traits
    • death
    Entries
    • A creature critically hit by any of the grim reaper's attacks or that critically fails against any of its spells must succeed at a 47 Fortitude save or die.
    Name
    Death Strike
  • Entries
    • When the grim reaper hits and deals damage with its scythe, it regains 20 Hit Points, and the target must succeed at a 43 Fortitude save or become doomed 1. If the target is already doomed, the doomed value increases by 1 (to a maximum of doomed 3).
    Name
    Energy Drain
  • Entries
    • A creature killed by the grim reaper can't be brought back to life by any means short of divine intervention.
    Name
    Final Death
  • Traits
    • divine
    • evocation
    Entries
    • Any scythe gains the agile trait, can't be disarmed, and becomes a +3 major striking keen scythe while the grim reaper wields it. If the grim reaper Strike||Strikes a creature with a weakness to any specific type of damage, the scythe's damage counts as that type of damage, in addition to slashing.
    Name
    Infuse Weapon

Background

Lore

Grim Reaper

DEAD MAN'S HAND

Decks of cards are a traditional method used to tell a person's fortune, but legends hold that certain cards or combinations of unfortunate draws can attract the attention of the grim reaper. Specialized fortune-telling decks, such as the Harrow, might not feature the visage of the grim reaper directly, but to the paranoid, death could lurk in any unfortunate hand of cards.

GRIM REAPER TREASURE

The grim reaper keeps no treasure, but sometimes lesser deaths hang on to strange keepsakes from those whom they have slain—especially in cases where a lesser death has set its unholy sight on an extended family or faction.

The Grim Reaper is the unflinching personification of death. Silent as the grave and as inevitable as time itself, this legendary being hunts down and finishes creatures that have evaded death for far too long. Sometimes the Grim Reaper comes without warning, while at others it comes to finish the work that other creatures could not. The Grim Reaper serves no god, fiend, or aeon. It is both despised and feared by psychopomps and celestials, but few—if any—dare to stand in its way. Like some eternal plague, it kills those who try to cure the multiverse of its presence. It stands alone and holds only its own council, and the pleading and reasoning of mortals and immortals alike fall on deaf ears once the Grim Reaper closes on its quarry. Its own reasoning is silent to mortal ears and inscrutable to the mortal mind, but no matter the reason, the result is unyielding and final.

While some legends hold that the Grim Reaper appears before everyone as they die, the truth is quite a bit more disturbing. Such vigils in fact lie within the providence of the psychopomps, a race of immortals charged with the protection and guidance of mortal souls through the afterlife. The Grim Reaper has little interest in protecting souls or guiding them. It is instead compelled by sinister agendas arising within the nighted realm of Kreifalaid, where the Horsemen of the Apocalypse rule. Indeed there are many similarities in shape and form between the Grim Reaper and Trafaledrek, the Horseman of Death, but no recorded instance exists of these two powerful entities working together. Instead, the Grim Reaper serves as something of a manifestation of Kreifalaid itself, and in this regard is believed by some to be an incarnation of the mysterious First Horseman. When the Grim Reaper comes to a world, it does so not as an angel of mercy, but as a relentless harvester of life. Those who fall to the Grim Reaper were not destined to die as much as they were selected, hunted, and murdered.

Perhaps the most frightening legends surrounding the Grim Reaper concern its nature as a singular entity, for some believe that more than one grim reaper exists in the Great Beyond. These whispers tell of a cabal of at least nine of these creatures that stalk reality, culling the living as inexplicable servants of true entropy. According to the teaching of some death cults, the final goal of the Grim Reaper is to end the entire cycle of life and death and serve as a silent lord of an empty universe.