Monster Encyclopaedia I: Ravagers of the Realms

Author	August Hahn, Gareth Hanrahan, Lizard
Publisher	Mongoose Publishing
Publish date	2004
OGL Section 15	me1

The material below is designated as Open Game Content

Clochelman

Medium Monstrous Humanoid (Earth)
Hit Dice: 3d8+6 (19 hp)
Initiative: –1
Speed: 20 ft. (4 squares)
Armour Class: 15 (–1 Dex, +6 natural), touch 9, flat- footed 15
Base Attack/Grapple: +3/+4
Attack: Club +4 melee (1d6+1)
Full Attack: Club +4 melee (1d6+1)
Space/Reach: 5 ft./5 ft.
Special Attacks: —
Special Qualities: Become stone, stonecunning
Saves: Fort +5, Ref +2, Will +4
Abilities: Str 13, Dex 8, Con 15, Int 13, Wis 13, Cha 8
Skills: Craft (stoneworking) +5, Hide +3*, Knowledge (architecture and engineering) +6, Listen +6
Environment: Any mountains
Organisation: Solitary, gang (3–6) or circle (10–20)
Challenge Rating: 2
Treasure: Standard
Alignment: Usually neutral
Advancement: By character class
Level Adjustment: +2

This creature is a squat grey-skinned humanoid, with a rotund belly and a stony hide. Two black eyes like glitter in its blandly smiling face.

The clochelmen are old folk of the hills and mountains, survivors from some past age of the world. The ruins of their cities and their monasteries can be found scattered across the land: weathered stones, carved with curving runes and sigils. Some of these stones were once piled into magnificent buildings, but others are sleeping clochelmen. They have the ability to transform themselves into stone for a time: an hour, a day or a hundred centuries. In the shape of little carved effigies, the clochelmen sleep out the long twilight of their race.

The few clochelmen active in this age of the world dwell in the stoniest mountains and hills, near to the ruins of their former homes. These days, they abjure shelters and live in caves or under the open sky. They have the skills of masonry and building to create fine homes, but they are too few and have forgotten too much to raise the glorious palaces and castles they once made. If they cannot have perfection then they will have nothing and so they sit in caves and listen to the rain. Some clochelmen circles live with the dwarves as honoured elders and guests, but the stonefolk are much too hasty and destructive for the clochelmen to teach. A dwarf would hew a stone in two with hammer and chisel; a clochelman might put the stone where a little droplet of water falls on it each week, then wait until the water eroded the rock into two parts. There are no folk more infuriatingly patient than the clochelmen.

Combat

The normal reaction for a clochelman in combat is to turn into a stone for a few moments and hope that the enemy has not seen him. If forced to fight, the clochelman smashes foes with his big stone club.

Become Stone (Su): A clochelman can turn into an unremarkable lump of stone as a standard action. While stone, the clochelman has hardness 10. He cannot move or perceive the outside world, but can still feel pain when he takes damage. The clochelman can only revert to normal when he takes damage or after a pre-determined period of time has passed. For example, the clochelman could turn to stone and decide to transform back to normal in ten hours. For the next ten hours, he is utterly oblivious to the outside world and can not turn back even if picked up and mortared into a wall.

Stonecunning (Ex): This ability grants a clochelman a +2 racial bonus on Search checks to notice unusual stonework, such as sliding walls, stonework traps, new construction (even when built to match the old), unsafe stone surfaces, shaky stone ceilings, and the like. Something that is not stone but that is disguised as stone also counts as unusual stonework. A clochelman who merely comes within ten feet of unusual stonework can make a Search check as if he were actively searching, and a clochelman can use the Search skill to find stonework traps as a rogue can. A clochelman can also intuit depth, sensing his approximate depth underground as naturally as a human can sense which way is up.

Skills: Clochelmen have a +8 racial bonus to Hide checks when transformed into a stone, unless the observer knows that the clochelmen can become stones.