By Alan McCoy from Dungeons & Dragons: Fundamentals
How to build challenging encounters against a Carrion Crawler
Note: This has been prepared utilizing only the 5E Core Rules. The Carrion Crawler can be found in the Monster Manual page 37.
The carrion crawler is one of the earliest monsters to have been defined and included in the Dungeons and Dragons game.
The Carrion Crawler is a large aggressive monstrosity that resembles a cross between a giant green cutworm and a squid. They are roughly nine feet long and have heads the roughly three feet in diameter.
The Carrion Crawler is, as the name suggests, a scavenger predator that is attracted by the scent of blood or decay, it will then seek out the source and devour first the flesh and then the very bones of the rotting meal.
Carrion Crawlers are highly territorial and will aggressively attack any creature that invades their area especially if disturbed while consuming a meal.
Carrion Crawlers have been reported haunting caves, sewers, dungeons, forested marshes and cemeteries or battlefields. Rumor has it that they were originally developed to clean a battlefield of an epic war to avoid the health hazard of nearly a million dead. Of course, some escaped and have been able to reproduce.
Carrion Crawlers are more than scavengers, ecologically they serve much the same function as jackals, vultures and crows perform on the surface world: They clean away dead tissues before it has the chance to fester.
Carrion Crawlers are patient hunters, able to move along walls, ceilings and passages very quickly, using its many clawed feet for traction. These creatures are attracted by light, knowing that a light underground often means a meal. While they are not intentionally stealthy, instinct guides them to stay out of sight and to avoid direct conflict while hunting.
Carrion Crawlers are egg-layers, laying clutches of a hundred or more eggs that hatch in about ten days, they are not maternal and will promptly forget about the eggs and may even eat them if they come upon them later. Newly hatched grubs are voracious and will often consume each other in their hunger.
Carrion Crawlers produce a sticky secretion from glands located in their tentacles, this secretion is a potent paralytic, which can be gathered by those with the proper equipment and training. It is prized as the base ingredient in a common poison used by merchants and other people wishing to protect their belongings with a non-lethal and therefore legal substance.
Step 1) Let’s Review what we know about the Carrion Crawler:
A Carrion Crawler can move or climb at 30 feet per round.
Carrion Crawlers are exceptionally tough, very strong, and gifted with above average dexterity and wisdom. They have poor Charisma and are barely intelligent.
Carrion Crawlers have no language, their drives consist of hunger, territory and reproduction.
Due to their keen sense of smell, the Carrion Crawler is considered naturally proficient in the Perception skill (+3).
The Carrion Crawler has Darkvision 60 feet, and a passive perception of 13.
Step 2) Determine the probable Strategy.
While this has been partially covered above, the Carrion Crawler is always on the lookout for food and any food source that it can find. It will happily devour any food, dead or alive that it finds. They trail light sources, as instinct tells them that light means food. They also trail the scent of blood, so areas of recent combat within their territory are likely to draw at least one carrion crawler.
Not that they may trail survivors hoping to catch them off guard and weakened, and therefore easy meals.
Step 3) Determine Tactics
The instinctual drive tells a Carrion Crawler to let its poison do the work. They will usually hang from a hidden ceiling or some hidden area until they see an isolated victim. Swing down, multi-attack with the tentacles to paralyze, ready to escape if the victim does not succumb, ready to grab if they do.
If the Carrion Crawler has a paralyzed victim, it will grapple them and move them away from interference so that it can eat in peace. A paralyzed victim cannot call out or summon aid.
While eating, the carrion crawler will continue to strike the victim with its tentacles, to keep it quiet and to continually renew the poison.
Step 4) DM Tips and Observations
In 2E, the head of the Carrion Crawler had a significantly higher AC than the body, this was not carried forward to 5E, probably because 5E lacks a mechanism for specifically targeting body parts. Still, to give the entire creature the AC of the body places this creature at disadvantage. I Suggest raising the AC to 15.
Multi-Attack of one tentacle and one bite is clumsy and unrealistic, exchange this for Multi-attack of two tentacles, bite is a bonus action that can only be used on a paralyzed opponent.
This monster is unique in that it does no actual damage until and unless it paralyzes. Bites equal consumption of the meal.
The DC of the Poison is reasonable in this case, I suggest that it not only apply the PARALYZED condition, but also the POISONED condition. This will make the escape of a victim/meal less likely.
As a DM, these creatures are one of my favorite “REST” interrupters. Having been drawn by the scent of blood, the party will be plagued by these scavengers if they attempt to rest too often.