Tempest (Creature)

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The tempest is a living storm. It appears as a dark storm cloud of comparatively small size. Human or bestial features can often be seen in the roiling vapors of the tempest. Silver veins extend across the creature and carry the electrical impulses that give the storms life.
Tempests have no language that humans may learn. They can communicate with air and water elementals and with genie-kind, through subtle wind buffets, and spatterings of precipitation. A few, perhaps 10%, have learned to speak a few words of Common. Their voices are very soft and sibilant, with a hint of malice behind the words.
==Combat==
Tempests are very territorial and consider any violation of their airspace to be a direct challenge. They feed on moisture from animals and often hunt in and around their territories. They have a number of innate abilities that they can use to make life miserable for other creatures. Unless otherwise specified, all special abilities are used as if the tempest is a 9th-level wizard. A tempest may make two special attacks each round, one using its wind powers and one using its electrical powers.
Once per round, a tempest can use wind wall or gust of wind, or may attack with a strong wind buffet for 2-16 points of damage. Alternately, it may create or maintain a whirlwind. Such a whirlwind appears as a cone and may be as wide as 10 feet in diameter at the bottom, and as wide as 30 feet in diameter at the top. The whirlwind may be up to 50 feet high.
The tempest takes one full round to create the whirlwind. It automatically sweeps away and kills all creatures less than 2 Hit Dice in the area of its cone, and causes 2d6 points of damage to all creatures that it fails to kill outright.
Tempests may also use their powers over the air to batter down plying creatures, causing falling damage to those opponents who fail their saving throw vs. paralyzation.
A tempest can also cast a lightning bolt once per round. Only one victim may be targeted at a time. The lightning bolt causes one die of damage per Hit Die of the tempest. For example, a lightning bolt from a tempest with 12 Hit Dice causes 12d6 points
of damage. A victim of a lightning attack may make a saving throw vs. spells. If it is successful, the victim takes only half damage. The tempest's lightning bolt is like the 3rd-level wizard spell in other respects, having a length of 80 feet, setting fire to combustibles, melting metals, and shattering barriers. An exceptionally hungry or perturbed tempest sometimes uses its lightning to destroy an entire building to reach the creatures inside.
Tempests may also use a chilling wind to affect opponents, causing damage as a chill touch spell at the rate of 1-4 points of damage and the loss of one point of Strength. This attack must be made in place of either a wind or an electrical attack.
A tempest may also produce up to 20 gallons of rain per round if it is concentrating. While the precipitation is usually evenly distributed throughout its area, it may concentrate the fall to fill a hole, wash out a bridge, or otherwise harm its victims.
Tempests are immune to all wind, gas, and water attacks, and they take only half damage from electrical or cold-based attacks. They are immune to all weapons with less than a +2 magical enchantment.
==Habitat/Society==
There is much speculation about the origin of these beings, who are related to elementals and to genie-kind. Tempests are composed of all four basic elements which are fire, earth, air, and water; fire in the form of lightning, their silver "circulatory system," winds, and rain. They may be summoned accidentally when a spell-caster tries to call an elemental, especially one of air or water. At the DM's option, when a summoning is interfered with, the caster may be given a 10%-50% chance to summon a tempest. These beings may also be attracted by a weather summoning spell, with a 1% (non-cumulative) chance of appearing per spell.
Some sages believe that these creatures are immature jann, or jann which have been injured in some way and cannot retain human form. Whatever their origin, they do apparently breed and reproduce as storms. Though male and female do not truly describe the different types of tempest, there are two genders of living storm. When living storms of different genders meet, they have a brief, tempestuous affair, causing a great conflagration which may last more than a week. Hurricanes or tornadoes are produced irregularly from the mass, to wreak havoc upon the surrounding area.
When the storm finally breaks, the two tempests leave the area, and the residue they leave behind forms 1-4 infant tempests. These infant storms, sometimes referred to as tantrums, often travel together until they reach maturity a year after their birth. The young storms have 6 Hit Dice, and can use only the gust of wind power, besides producing rain.
Most tempests quite naturally seem to have a very stormy disposition. Their hunger for animal life goes beyond their need for the moisture contained in animal bodies. Some sages speculate that their physical form and background, possibly some event in their history, causes them to hate animal life. It is quite possible that the electrical impulses that give animals their life causes pain to the tempests.
Tempests may be related to skriaxits, the living sandstorms of the eastern Realms (see FR10, Old Empires). No tempest has ever been known to encounter a skriaxit, and their relationship and possible interactions are completely unknown.
==Ecology==
Tempests feed on the moistures found in animal bodies. Though unable to cause harm to living creatures by draining their moisture, they hover close to the ground after a battle to suck the water from dead opponents. They may also be found scavenging after great battles between humans. By removing water from a corpse, they render it inviable for return to life via a raise dead spell, though resurrection and other magic will still work.
When a tempest is killed, a silver residue rains down from their" form. If carefully gathered, this residue provides a mass of silver equivalent to 3-18 silver pieces. Though valuable as a precious metal, the silver may also be used as a component in making wands of lightning or as components in weather-related spells. Bits of the silver are also useful for making other weather or elemental related magical items.
Genie-kind and elementals are enemies if tempests and they often attack one another, though some genies, especially djinn and marids, keep tempests as pets, training them to guard or attack.
Tempests can be quite devastating to a local ecology if annoyed, and can cause great damage with wind, rain, and other attack forms. Living storms are never found inside buildings or underground.
==Arctic Tempest==
There is a variety of tempest that is only found in arctic and colder temperate zones. While they are similar to tempests in all other respects, their special powers differ. They cannot use the whirlwind or lightning bolt powers of the standard living storm. Instead they may either cause snow to fall or castf ice storm spells. The arctic tempest usually uses the hail form of the ice storm spell, but may use the sleet form as well. If it causes snow to fall, it may use that ability to cause 9d4+9 points of cold damage to anyone beneath it. Victims may make a saving throw vs. spells. If it is successful, the damage is reduced to half.
Like the standard tempest, the arctic variety may make only two special attacks per round, one using a wind power, such as gust of wind or whirlwind, and one using a cold-based power, such as ice storm or cause snow. It may also substitute an electrical attack for either of its normal attack forms, causing damage, as a shocking grasp spell for 1d8 + 9 points of damage.
Category:Creatures
Category:Forgotten Realms Appendix II Creatures