Dungeons & Dragons Online: Monster Profile: Undead Rats

Szark

The Dungeons and Dragons Online official site has been updated with profiles of a few of the monsters in the game. This time around it's the undead rat, and the Carcass eater.

Most of us adventurers have had at least a few experiences with rats before. A few find their way into your camp at night and rattle the pans. Or you pry off a grate in the sewer and a few dozen of the filthy rodents run out in all directions. Well, as you know by now, things are often a little different in Xen'drik.

The rats can get pretty big in a typical city, but they usually stay out of view and mind their own business, cleaning up refuse in the dumps or the sewers - or chasing the odd cat. Unfortunately, adventurers not too far from Stormreach recently sighted something altogether different, something they have taken to calling an undead giant rat. As this name implies, these rodents seem to be undead and have been described as larger than large dogs and twice as heavy.

In my experience, even most dire rats don't get to that size. These creatures could hardly fit through some of our sewer entrances! Looking a bit like rat wights or zombies, they attack quickly and viciously with claws and bite and often infect their victims with vile diseases.

As frightful as these animals sound, another recent addition to the area's fauna makes them look a bit like house pets. On my trips to Shavarath, gazing out over recent battlefields, I often glimpsed reddish fur moving among the corpses of the fallen.

These carcass eaters have apparently made their way to our humble corner of Xen'drik. Maybe they were brought here by someone, or perhaps Shavarath's coterminous period is starting early this time around, and they traveled through a manifest zone on their own. I believe they are animals rather than magical beasts, so where they came from before inhabiting the plane of battle is anyone's guess. Regardless of their natural history, one should be very wary around them.

Unlike the mysterious undead giant rats, the carcass eaters are not creatures from beyond the realm of life. With their jagged teeth and ferocious appearance, they inspire true fear without needing powers of the dead. Attacking just as rapidly as the giant rats do, they never back down once the fight is joined. Usually dining on carrion, they have a special ability which they put to good use against living opponents.

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