| Climate/Terrain: | Shallow sea floor |
|---|---|
| Frequency: | Rare |
| Organization: | Solitary |
| Activity Cycle: | Day |
| Diet: | Carnivore/Scavenger |
| Intelligence: | Animal(1) |
| Treasure: | Nil |
| Alignment: | Neutral |
| No. Appearing: | 1d4 |
| Armor Class: | 8 |
| Movement: | 2 (crawiling and swimming) |
| Hit Dice: | 3 |
| THAC0: | 17 |
| No. of Attacks: | 1 |
| Damage/Attack: | 1d6 |
| Special Attacks: | None |
| Special Defenses: | Camouflage |
| Magic Resistance: | Nil |
| Size: | M (5' long) |
| Morale: | Unsteady (7) |
| XP Value: | 175 |
Opabinia has a segmented body (the tail alone comes in three sections), five eyes, and a single tentacle (of equal length to the body) with a crablike claw at the end. It obviously hunted by grabbing passing prey with this claw. As it could not move swiftly, it relied on this ambush, either taking the color of the sea floor or lying in murky water and relying on water vibrations to tell it when prey came near. AD&D characters have a +2 penalty to surprise rolls when encountering this creature. The Opabinia’s is strong enough to yank a man off his feet and hold him under until he drowns. A trapped AD&D character must roll a strength check on 1d20 to escape; a BUGHUNTERS PC must make a successful Fitness check to escape the beast’s grasp.
Dragon204 (Dragon204)