Oooh, bad news.

For reasons beyond my control, Crawl! fanzine number 4 won't be available this week. I failed my check on this one. I hoped to have it on sale, and subscriptions shipped by today. That's not going to happen. I'll be out of town for the rest of week. I'm going to my annual camping trip to The Thing In The Desert...

To hold you off until I get back next week, here's a teaser for #4:

Hargn The River Dragon

The   shimmering   river   near   Thorum   is   named   after   its   equally shimmering  inhabitant,  the  dragon  Hargn.  Hargn  tends  to  keep  tohimself. He would rather enjoy the fish of the river than be bothered by land loving mortals. When in water, Hargn is virtually invisible and is  never  seen.  If encountered  out  of the  water,  he  appears  as  long tailed fishlike creature with scales of a silvery green pearlescent sheen. He walks on four legs, with each ending in large emerald like claws.

This dragon typically keeps to himself. He considers humanoids as any other  fauna,  they're  either  food  or  play  things.  There  is  a  1  in  20 chance that Hargn will be hungry and a 1 in 10 chance that Hargn will want to play. And by play, he likes to grab his play thing and bat it into the air with his tail. This tail slap can send a man sized creature flying 10 feet for every 5 points of damage taken. If attacked, Hargn will be highly aggressive and will fight to the death. Otherwise he will ignore the interlopers and disappear into his river.

Hargn, the river dragon: Init +8; Atk +11, 2 claws (dmg 1d8), bite (dmg 1d12), tail slap (dmg 1d20); AC 23; HD 8d12; hp 48; MV 50’ or swim 100'; Atk 4d20; SP Breath weapon, Spells, Amphibious, Fast Reflexes, Water passage, Wall of mist; SV Fort +8, Ref +12, Will +8; AL C.

Breath, Sleep Gas: Twice per day, Hargn can breath a cloud of sleep gas with a radius of 1d4 x 10' up to 60' away. All caught in the cloud must make a DC 18 Fort save or fall asleep for 1d6 hours.

Spell, Cause Fear: Spell Check d20+4; 11 or less, failure and lost. 12 or more, target flees for 1d3 rounds. (Fumble, caster flees for 1d4 rounds. Critical, target flees for 1d3 turns.) Will save vs Spell Check.

Spell, Magic Shield: Spell Check d20+4; 11 or less, failure and loss. 12 or more, caster gains +4 AC for 2d6 rounds. (Fumble, caster is blown back 10’ and knocked prone, taking 1d4 damage. Critical, caster gains +4 AC for 1d4 turns, automatically blocks Magic Missiles & mundane attacks.)

Spell,  Magic Net:  Spell Check d20+4; 11 or less, failure and lost.  12  or 13, failure, 14 or more,  a  shimmering net  fills  a  10  cu.  ft.  area  for 1d6 hours. Movement within the area is halved if using magic weapons, or strength check (DC 18)  to  break through the netting.  (Fumble,  caster becomes  wound  up  in  a  net,  strength  check  (DC  15)  to  break  free. Critical, up to 20 cu. ft. area.)

Water  Passage:  At  any time,  Hargn  can  move  into  or  pass  through water without leaving a wake or splash. Effectively becoming invisible in water.

Wall of Mist: Once an hour, Hargn can summon a wall of mist.  The wall is up to 100’ x 20’ x 100’. Within the mist, targets suffer -4 to all attacks and move at half speed.