Endless Blue - Week 37.5 - The Kraken: Ancient Wyrms from Below the Waves

Zoology

The Kraken:  Ancient Wyrms from Below the Wave

Nothing strikes utter terror into the hearts of the Known World as the mere mention of the world kraken.  Centuries of their ruthless occupation have made their name a terrifying sound, perhaps more feared than even the Vastness.  But the history of their brutality go back further than the existence of the Fluid Nation, as the depraved leviathans are far more ancient than any piscean could imagine.

The entire race numbered less than one hundred known specimens, solitary hermits that were fiercely territorial and shunned others of their own kind.  They staked out their indulgent kingdoms in and around the Maw, and from their underground caverns brought a reign of horror to the placid seas.  They competed with each other, playing out their power struggles in an attempt to gain prominence over others of their kind, forever enacting and re-enacting the same efforts of dominance.  Yet despite their isolationist instincts, under the direction of one particularly cruel kraken they put aside their petty jealousies and hubris to  band together for the first time in written history.  That wicked alliance led to the thousand years of Kraken domination over the piscean way of life.

Kraken are a long lived race, only reaching adulthood at an age when most pisceans become venerable.  Their young are born from perfectly round eggs, each with a diamter of ten or twelve inches.  The shell is thick and semi-translucent, with the gestating yolk visible through a frosty haze.  The floating embryo inside is curled into a w-shape that parallels the pupil of a grown Kraken, making the egg resemble a rendered eye.

Category	Age (Years)
Larva	0-5
Very young	6-15
Young	16-30
Juvenile	31-50
Young Adult	51-100
Adult	101-200
Mature adult	201-400
Old	401-600
Very old	601-1,000
Ancient	1,001-2,000
Squid	2,001-3,000
Great Squid	3,000 or more

Despite the length of time it takes for maturity, the Kraken are intelligent at birth.  They have not learned to talk, but have enough wits about them distinguish danger or potential prey immediately and take appropriate measures.

Kraken

Magical Beast (Aquatic)
Hit Dice: By age category
Initiative: By age category
Speed: By age category
Armor Class: By age category
Base Attack/Grapple: By age category
Attack: By age category
Full Attack: By age category
Space/Reach: By age category
Special Attacks: Improved grab, constrict.
Special Qualities: Camouflage, darkvision, frightful presence, ink cloud, low-light vision, spell-like abilities, tracescent, ultravision
Saves: By age category
Abilities: By age category
Skills: Concentration +21, Disguise +17, Hide +10, Intimidate +16, Knowledge (oceanography) +17, Listen +30, Search +28, Sense Motive +17, Spot +30, Survival +10 (+15 following tracescent), Use Magic Device +16
Feats: Alertness, Blind Fight, Improved Critical (barbed tentacle), Improved Initiative
Environment: Temperate underwater caverns
Organization: Solitary (1)
Challenge Rating: Larva 3; very young 4; young 5; juvenile 7; young adult 9; adult 11; mature adult 14; old 16; very old 18; ancient 19; squid 20; great squid 22
Treasure: Triple standard
Alignment: Always neutral evil.
Advancement: By age category.
Level Adjustment: —

These colossal squid are approximately 40 feet long, with a thickly muscled yet streamlined body, and a mass of coursucating tentacles around its hugely beaked mouth.  Its bulbous eyes stares out menacingly through its strangely shaped pupils.  Six of its eight limbs stretch out to lengths of 30 feet, with the last pair of tentacles reaching twice that distance.  Covered in barbs, these function as the monstrosity's hands.

Kraken speak the now dead tongue of Aquelan and their native Krakonian.

Combat
Kraken are wily predators, and will employ complex tactics to amuse themselves as much as to out-think their opponent.  They will employ their camouflage skills to their greatest effect, picking off stragglers until the main school is weakened enough for a full assault.  Initiating combat, they will normally use all their barbed tentacles to deal damage and their subsidiary other tentacles to grapple, but once into the fray they will take any opportunity that presents itself.  Opponents can attempt to sunder the Kraken's tentacles as if they were weapons.  The primary barbed tentacles have 20 hit points each, and the secondary off-hand tentacles have 10.  The Kraken can use any one of its free tentacles to make a retributive attack of opportunity in response to the sunder attempt.  Severing a tentacle deals damage to the Kraken equal to half of the limb's full normal hit points (10 or 5 hit points, respectively).  Should a Kraken lose both its barbed tentacles and at least three of its other limbs, it will retreat.  It takes 1d10+10 days to regrow severed limbs.

Size	Space/Reach	1 Bite	1 Barbed Tentacle	1 Tentacle
Tiny	2 1/2 ft. long/1 ft. (5 ft. with barbed tentacles, 2 1/2 ft. with other tentacles)	1d2	1	-
Small	5 ft. long/2.5 ft. (10 ft. with barbed tentacles, 5 ft. with other tentacles)	1d3	1d2	1
Medium	10 ft. long/5 ft. (20 ft. with barbed tentacles, 10 ft. with other tentacles)	1d4	1d4	1d2
Large	15 ft. long/10 ft. (30 ft. with barbed tentacles, 15 ft. with other tentacles)	2d4	1d6	1d4
Huge	20 ft. long/10 ft. (40 ft. with barbed tentacles, 20 ft. with other tentacles)	3d4	1d8	1d6
Gargantuan	30 ft. long/15 ft. (50 ft. with barbed tentacles, 25 ft. with other tentacles)	4d4	2d6	1d8
Colossal	40 ft. long/15 ft. (60 ft. with barbed tentacles, 30 ft. with other tentacles)	5d4	2d8	2d6

Improved Grab (Ex): If the kraken successfully hits with a tentacle attack, it can then attempt to start a grapple without invoking an attack of opportunity.  It establishes a hold and can constrict if it wins the grapple check.

Constrict (Ex): A Kraken automatically deals damage with a successful grapple check.  The damage is 2d8 + Str modifier for the barbed tentacles or 1d6 + 1/2 Str modifier for normal tentacles.

Jet (Ex): In the rare occurrences that a Kraken decides to flee, it can jet backwards at a speed of 200 feet (50 cubes).  This can be done once per round as a full-round action that does not invoke an attack of opportunity, and movement must be in a straight line.

Camouflage (Ex): Pigments saturating the Kraken's toughened skin are malleable, and with a successful Disguise check a Kraken can blend in with its surroundings.  This gives the Kraken the Hide In Plain Sight feat and adds a +10 racial bonus to Hide checks.  The Kraken must maintain his concentration while using his camouflage ability to maintain this effect for more than a round, however failing the Concentration check does not result in the Kraken breaking its camouflage, just losing the racial bonus (it failed to adjust its coloration to take into account an observer’s movement, etc.).

Ink Cloud (Ex): The Kraken can eject a cloud of inky pigment in an 80 foot spread once per round as a free action.  Providing total concealment, creatures caught in the cloud are considered to be in darkness.  The cloud is dissipated in 1d2 rounds.  This ability can may be unusable should the Kraken use the cloud's second form (see below)

Alternately to the cloud effect, once every 1d4 rounds the Kraken can spit a concentrated spout of the jet-black ichor.  This chemically irritating and toxic excretion inflames the gills of those caught in the area of effect and causes suffocation.  Its poison is absorbed into the bloodstream, and as the creature's panicking send its blood coursing through its veins, it carries the toxicity further and faster throughout the body.  A cure poison spell can counteract the poison effect, and the clogged gills can be cleared with a purify food and water.  There is no cloud effect in this form, and the Kraken cannot use the cloud form again until the spout effect has recharged.

Kraken Size	Ink Spout Cone (Length)
Tiny	5 ft.
Small	10 ft.
Medium	20 ft.
Large	40 ft.
Huge	80 ft.
Gargantuan	160 ft.
Colossal	280 ft.

Spell-like Abilities: Kraken may cast the following 1/day as a 9th level caster -- control currents, dominate animal, resist energy, and vortex.  Save DCs for these spells are Charisma based.

Kraken by Age

Age	Size	Hit Dice (hp)	Str	Dex	Con	Int	Wis	Cha	Base Attack/ Grapple	Attack	Fort Save	Ref Save	Will Save	Ink Cloud (DC)	Frightful Presence DC
Larva	T	5d12+5 (37)	15	10	13	14	15	14	+5/+11	+6	+5	+4	+6	2d6 (13)	—
Very young	S	8d12+16 (68)	19	10	15	16	17	16	+8/+16	+11	+7	+5	+9	4d6 (16)	—
Young	M	11d12+22 (93)	23	10	15	16	17	16	+11/+21	+16	+9	+7	+10	6d6 (17)	—
Juvenile	L	14d12+42 (133)	27	10	17	18	19	18	+14/+30	+20	+12	+9	+13	8d6 (20)	—
Young adult	L	17d12+68 (178)	29	10	19	18	19	18	+17/+34	+24	+14	+10	+14	10d6 (23)	22
Adult	H	20d12+80 (210)	31	10	19	20	21	20	+20/+38	+28	+16	+12	+17	12d6 (24)	25
Mature adult	H	23d12+115 (264)	31	10	21	20	21	20	+23/+45	+29	+18	+13	+18	14d6 (27)	26
Old	G	26d12+156 (325)	33	10	23	24	21	24	+26/+49	+33	+21	+15	+20	16d6 (30)	29
Very old	G	29d12+203 (391)	35	10	25	26	23	26	+29/+53	+37	+23	+16	+22	18d6 (32)	31
Ancient	C	32d12+256 (464)	37	10	27	28	25	28	+32/+63	+37	+26	+18	+25	20d6 (34)	34
Squid	C	35d12+315 (542)	39	10	29	30	27	30	+35/+65	+41	+28	+19	+27	22d6 (37)	36
Great squid	C	38d12+380 (627)	41	10	31	32	33	32	+38/+69	+45	+31	+21	+32	24d6 (39)	39

Special Abilities by Age

Age	Speed	Initiative	AC	Special Abilities	Caster Level	SR
Larva	swim 200 ft. (perfect)	+0	16 (+2 size, +4 natural), touch 11, flat-footed 16	Camouflage	—	—
Very young	swim 200 ft. (good)	+0	18 (+1 size, +7 natural), touch 10, flat-footed 18		—	—
Young	swim 200 ft. (good)	+0	21 (+11 natural), touch 10, flat-footed 21	Jet	—	—
Juvenile	swim 200 ft. (average)	+0	23 (–1 size, +14 natural), touch 9, flat-footed 23		3rd	—
Young adult	swim 200 ft. (average)	+0	26 (–1 size, +17 natural), touch 9, flat-footed 26	Damage reduction 5/magic	5th	20
Adult	swim 200 ft. (average)	+0	28 (–2 size, +20 natural), touch 8, flat-footed 28		7th	22
Mature adult	swim 200 ft. (poor)	+0	31 (–2 size, +23 natural), touch 8, flat-footed 31	Damage reduction 10/magic	9th	23
Old	swim 250 ft. (poor)	+0	34 (–3 size, +27 natural), touch 8, flat-footed 34		11th	25
Very old	swim 250 ft. (poor)	+0	37 (–3 size, +30 natural), touch 8, flat-footed 37	Damage reduction 15/magic	13th	26
Ancient	swim 250 ft. (clumsy)	+0	38 (–4 size, +32 natural), touch 6, flat-footed 38		15th	28
Squid	swim 250 ft. (clumsy)	+0	41 (–4 size, +35 natural), touch 6, flat-footed 41	Damage reduction 20/magic	17th	29
Great squid	swim 250 ft. (clumsy)	+0	44 (–4 size, +38 natural), touch 6, flat-footed 44		19th	31

The remnants of the Kraken Empire, abandoned by their otherworldly gods, degenerated rapidly over the years into what is now called the Ceph.  Believed extinct, one Kraken still lives yet.  Trapped in the Undertow when it was still very young, it lurks hidden in the labyrinthine tunnels of the Bubble Below, avoiding all life and slowly losing touch with reality as the years accumulated and became centuries.  It guards its hoard zealously, as if its very existence depends on it remaining safe.

"Dreams do not tell children the Kraken exist; children already know that Kraken exist
Dreams tell children the Kraken can be killed.  Those dreams are our salvation."
-- famous words spoken  by the Cetacean commander at the fall of the Kraken Empire.

Endless Blue - Week 36.1 - The Undertow: Under the Rock Under the Sea

Geography

Under the Rock Under the Sea

Everyone has secrets, be they tiny embarrassments of everyday living, to the soul corrupting shame that ruins everything around you.  They are kept by individuals, families, and organizations, but none more so than governments.  Whether such practiced deceit it is for the lauded benefit of their constituents or the puerile reward of their own self interest, every government has things to hide.  In the Known World, secrets abound like lamprey, sucking sustenance from the secluded nooks and crannies where they hide.  One such secret is the Undertow.

Those given to flights of fanciful delusion tend to find depth of conspiracy in even the smallest inconsistency, and the Prime Meridian is a prime example.  Cartography and navigation were demonstrably the creations of the early Chelon thinkers. and while most every aspect of their ingenious system is poetry except for the glaring inconsistency of the Prime Meridian.  For all the sensible reasoning for latitude and longitude, degrees and poles, there seems to be no eminent logic behind the choice of where to position the first line of longitude, 0 degrees.

The official reason espoused by the governing Chelon is that it marks the deepest spot in Elqua's oceans, a point in the Cetecean Ocean's floor submerged by a brine lake.  For the longest time, that assertion was taken as gospel by the less than educated masses.  But as time passed, education became more accessible to the lower class and as a result more of once was mystery about the waterworld has become fascinating but mundane fact.  Individuals began to question the assessment of the Chelon scholars that appointed the Prime Meridian's status, and then flatly challenged it -- most notably by their own people.  In an effort fueled by patriotism, an expedition of Chelon measured a remote area of their homesea called The Abyss and while unable to dive to its lowest depths, incontrovertibly prove that it was significantly deeper that the cetacean plain.

The expedition brought acclaim and fame to the explorers, and raised some controversy that the primary method of navigation was flawed and needed to be corrected.  In response, the Chelon have offered excuse after excuse as to this discrepancy, from the weak challenge that the expedition did not take into account the depth of the brine lake to the blatant ridiculous claim that sea level over the Chelon Seas is higher than elsewhere.  Detractors began to vocally deride the government for its falsehood, and even go so far as to charge that it has led a conspiratorial campaign at discrediting as many participants of the expedition as possible.  Why is there such a narrow-minded, focused refusal by the Chelon government to ignore the Abyss?

The real truth is that the Chelon government has no idea.  It is simply continuing the tradition that was started so very long ago in the Golden Epoch.  At its very heart, it was decreed that the Abyss was to be marginalized.  Why has never been stated, and those in the government that have dared to speak the question have found their political careers stillborn overnight.

There is a reason, and it is all because of a simple bubble.  But not a bubble in water, like the innocuous but embarrassing side effect that comes from respiration underwater.  No, this is a bubble in stone, the very foundation bedrock that comprises the tectonic plate of Elqua's geologic crust.  Located beneath Abyss in the Chelon Sea lurks a massive sink hole, a spot of crumbled rock opening into a vast airy cavern that could very well threaten the stability of the sea bed above it.

The Abyss is a desolate portion of the Chelon Sea, its depth hostile to the native pisceans and its isolation of no strategic import.  As such, it is rare for anyone to pass by the area, let alone investigate deeply enough to find the faint but definitely perceptible vortex of swirling currents cycling around each other as the waters drain into the cavern below.  This is the Undertow, and to speak its name is tantamount to treason.

But what the Chelon government does not know is that through that gyre is not just the emptiness of a cavern, but the ancient beginning of a whole second world beneath the waves, one beneath the rock.  And its genesis began back in the Golden Epoch from which the Chelonite policy was first drawn.

It was a time of war and suffering, with the Cetacean Barbarians invading the highseas that would one day become the Mer currents.  The hordes began a swath of attacks to the southwest of the Mer homesea and curved northward, in effect creating a hook into Mer territory as the spearhead encroached on the Chelon Sea.  The tactic isolated one of the Mer ethnicities early in its development and began carving it from the greater whole.  Retreating from an overpowering enemy they could not defeat, they retreated into Chelon territory.  To save themselves for ensured destruction, the Mer tribe fled blindly, with the ravening horde of Cetaceans right behind them.  Just as the predatory barbarians caught up to the fleeing Mer, the gyer of the Undertow caught the two forces unaware and mercilessly dragged them down into the depths -- a massive sinkhole that would be dubbed "The Bubble Below".

The Bubble Below is a massive cavern system under the silt sea bed that underlies the Known World, so massive in fact it's farthest borders reach under practically all the Fluid Nations.  The initial plunge from the entrance of the Undertow to the midnight waters below is a nearly 1000 foot drop straight down with nothing but stagnant air all around.  The suddenness of the gyre's pull and the lengthy drop before hitting the surface of the sinkhole's waters killed hundreds on both sides when they slammed into the seaweed encrusted surface of the falls' run off.  It is another 500 feet below the level of the Bubble's sea level before the averaged sea bed is encountered.

Stunned by the impact, drained from the flight/chase, the pisceans were ripe pickings for the native denizens of the sinkhole.  The first few years of their entrapment  in the bowels of the earth were savage and desperate, with both races suffering unimaginable casualties.  In the face of the overtly hostile environment, the two combatants put aside their established roles and worked out an accord of mutual beneficence so both could survive together where neither could alone.

Once the new alliance was forged, the Mer/Cetacean survivors became settlers, slowly learning the ways of the everdark and taming it to serve them.  The explored the myriad tendrils of cave systems and underground rivers and were surprised by their expansiveness.  The traced back their tragic path as much as they could until they saw the falls that spilled into the empty bubble, the echoing roar of plunging water so deafening that listening to it unprotected can even destroy the melon of a Cetacean.  But even if the falls had been silent, the half-mile distance straight up to the mouth of the Undertow was an unreachable goal as if they could reach up and catch the moons.  The Falls aerate the saltwater that pours down from the Undertow, and as it flows outward throughout the subterranean ocean it pushes the staler water through tiny rock fissures back into Elqua's surface oceans.  Entry through the Undertow is a one-way trip: there exists no magic to fly, and nothing can swim against the current falling down from the opening (not to mention swimming against the pull of gravity).  With any hopes of returning to the surface seas unattainable, the survivors turned their attentions to colonizing the darkness around them.

As time passed, other races suffered the same cruel plight of the Mer-Cetaceans.  In small numbers, the migrating families of Kouton and Locanth have been claimed by the Undertow, entire squads of Chelon and Lumulus combatants in the Shellback Wars were caught and dragged under, even a few Sahaguin have been lost to the sucking pull of the Bubble Below, eventually trapping enough of each race to barely sustain the gene pools.  Only the Ceph and the Yaun-Teel are unaccounted for in the Undertow, most likely due to the fact their races did not evolve until relatively recently in evolutionary standards.

Evolution has not left the trapped pisceans untouched, however.  Without the light of the sun to shine, coloration of the races has faded away, and now the races have all become albino, their soft rubbery skin a pink-tinged pallor and their scales a translucent milky white.  Like ghostly apparitions, each race is now a banshee-like shadow of their former vibrancy.  But perhaps the most unsettling was the speed in which evolution threw aside the development of eyes, fusing the eyelids over the useless sockets, sealing over the small orbs so they could begin metamorphosing into the most sensitive melons in the case of the other races, but into hyper-acute melons in the cetaceans capable of passive echolocation (using the reverberating drone of the Undertow's falls as a sound source, which carry throughout the Bubble Below as a faint but noticeable rumbles).  These new Cetaceans, calling themselves the Beluga, gave up their violent, expansionist ways and took up the mantle of protector of the "helpless", those that cannot see without making sound.

And protection they needed.  Just like the Vastness above the surface of Elquas waters, the empty but deafening air of the Bubble Below became dangerous.  An undead sargasso began to grow, a festering blanket of twisted vines and limbs, blighted seaweed and flesh, writhing and groping at any spark of life it can reach in a vainglorious need to consume light.  The Beluga formed a paladin-hood dedicated to the destruction of the vile aberrations that sometimes break free of the floating morass that now covers all of the seas below.  The Lumulus have also changed greatly over the generations, having through sheer necessity shed their xenophobia like they shed their glassy exoskeletons.

Here the pisceans have led relatively fulfilling lives, forming communities and families that in many ways have escaped the butchery and treachery that the brethren the left behind had to endure.  It has not been without its difficulties, with roaming undead, their own threat from the Indigo, and possibly the blubbery, bloated lone Kraken that still exists in the world to contend with.  There are also the wonders to discover in the pitch black.