Bone-Turner Hag Remastered
A good villain can make a fun campaign into something you talk about for years afterward, but what makes a good villain is tough to nail down. Hags, for many, are a delightfully evil option, and are nicely grounded by their more normal meanness. Your average hag isn’t just evil, but cruel in a way that’s more recognizable than your typical cultist’s delusions of godhood or whatever else. Of course, that’s just your average hag; today, the hag we’re talking about is notably… worse.
The bone-turner hag has the same homegrown villainy of a green or night hag, but with much more to make it haunt a player’s adventures over time. Collecting bones and impersonating the creatures and people they’ve collected from lets a bone-turner not just frighten but easily stalk or even infiltrate the party, watching them for when their bones, or the bones of the monsters they slay, might suddenly become useful to the hag. Even if the the party knows that the hag is watching them, it could remain very difficult to distinguish her from just… a deer, or a goat, or the local drunk, or whatever else the bone-turner has ‘collected’ that time. The possibilities are nearly endless…
If there are more monsters you can’t wait for us to remaster, let us know one our next Patreon remaster poll, which we post every week! And, if you want to know what other horrible, non-SRD monsters it might be fun to suck the bones out of, message us on our Discord, and we’ll give you the full report.
Bone-Turner Hag
Perhaps the most grotesque of all hags, the true form of a bone-turner is an amorphous sickly-green blob, not unlike an ooze to the untrained eye. However, bone-turners are much more dangerous than an ooze, as they are much more intelligent and cruel. Bone-turner hags possess unusually sharp pseudopods, which they use to stab into prey. These pseudopods ravage the nervous system of their victim; if a creature can’t escape the hag’s grasp, the probe reaches even deeper, wrenching at their victim’s internal body until the hag rips their very bones free.
Self-Obsessed Abominations. The original bone-turner hags were said to once have been an especially pathetic coven of green hags, weaker than nearly every threat around them. To become more formidable, these hags began to practice dark magic to morph their bodies and to steal the traits of their enemies. As the hags changed they became more and more dangerous, but even after they had come to dominate their neighbors, their obsession with ‘self-improvement’ only grew.
Soon, the hags turned on each other, each one determined to overcome the others and become ‘perfect’. In this struggle, the hags’ magic warped their bodies permanently, leaving those not destroyed utterly changed, with cracked minds and flesh that was corrosive and malleable. Delighted with this ‘blank slate’, the hags each set out on their own in search of more creatures to steal from.
Cunning Collectors. Bone-turner hags are obsessed with finding the perfect set of body parts and physical traits, and are constantly on the lookout for creatures with interesting new capabilities for them to steal. Using their shapeshifting, the hags can wait unnoticed as an innocuous woodland creature or mundane humanoid, or ambush prey as a strangely intelligent but otherwise normal predator. If a hag’s true nature is discovered, it abandons subtlety, shifting forms rapidly to use many creatures’ abilities in combination to slay her prey and make off with their bones.
Opportunistic Brokers. Bone-turners are as cruel as any other hag, but their primary concern is growing their collection; if a creature offers them an especially rare or appealing set of bones, they can be persuaded to be amiable, or even to grant someone a favor. Favors from a bone-turner are never cheap, but their mastery of anatomy and body modification makes them expert surgeons, when it suits them. Some creatures have even been said to bargain with a bone-turner to have pieces of their body permanently added to or changed, though such bargains rarely end well for the supplicant.
Bone-Turning and Natural Weapons
The bone-turner hag is a wily enemy, and is intended to be encountered with some dangerous monsters' bones already collected. Here are a few classics that might be useful for your next bone-turner:
A wolf, so the hag can knock her enemies prone.
A giant bat, for 60 ft. fly speed and blindsight.
A manticore, for Tail Spikes.
A giant spider, so the hag can save fresh bones for later.
Bone-Turner Hag
Medium Aberration, Typically Chaotic Evil
Armor Class 16 (natural armor)
Hit Points 144 (17d8 + 68)
Speed 30 ft., climb 30 ft. (true form only)
STR 19 (+4)
DEX 18 (+4)
CON 19 (+4)
INT 14 (+2)
WIS 15 (+2)
CHA 16 (+3)
Saving Throws Con +8, Int +6, Wis +6
Skills Athletics +8, Deception +7, Perception +6, Stealth +8
Damage Resistances bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage from nonmagical attacks
Damage Immunities acid, poison
Condition Immunities poisoned
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 16
Languages Common, Deep Speech, Sylvan
Challenge 9 (5,000 XP) Proficiency Bonus +4
Amorphous (True Form Only). The hag can move through a space as narrow as 1 inch without squeezing.
Boneless. While the hag is in its true form, it can’t be knocked prone. If the hag takes 20 or more bludgeoning damage on one turn while in the form of a creature whose bones it has stolen, the hag must succeed on a DC 20 Constitution saving throw at the end of that turn or is forced to expel the broken bones and revert to its true form.
Magic Resistance. The hag has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
Magic Weapons. The hag's weapon attacks are magical.
Spider Climb (True Form Only). The hag can climb difficult surfaces, including upside down on ceilings, without needing to make an ability check.
Actions
Multiattack. The hag makes one Probe attack and one Pseudopod attack. If the hag has stolen a creature’s bones, it can replace either or both attacks with one of that creature’s natural weapon attacks.
Probe. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 9 (2d4 + 4) piercing damage plus 9 (2d8) acid damage. If the creature is Large or smaller, it is grappled (escape DC 16) and must succeed on a DC 16 Constitution saving throw or be stunned until this grapple ends.
Pseudopod. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage plus 9 (2d8) acid damage.
Extract Bones. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one incapacitated Beast, Humanoid, or Monstrosity grappled by the hag. Hit: 55 (10d10) slashing damage. If this damage reduces the creature to 0 hit points, the hag kills the target by extracting and assimilating its bones.
Spellcasting. The hag can cast one of the following spells, requiring no material components and using Constitution as the spellcasting ability (spell save DC 16):
3/day each: meld into stone, stinking cloud
1/day each: black tentacles, stone shape
Bonus Actions
Change Shape. If it has stolen a Medium or Large creature’s bones, it can transform into that creature, using its unbroken bones as a frame to imitate its shape. Any equipment it is wearing or carrying isn't transformed.
While in another creature’s form, it gains that creature’s natural weapons, senses, and walking, swimming, and climbing speeds, but otherwise retains its own statistics. When the hag hits with any natural weapon, the weapon deals an extra 9 (2d8) acid damage.
The hag can return to its true, amorphous form at any time, and the hag reverts to its true form if it dies.
