Drat
- Armor Class
- 9 [10]
- Hit Dice
- ½
- Attacks
- Attack (special)
- Special
- 30-ft bad-luck aura
- Move
- 9
- HDE/XP
- 2/30
Description
The Drat, so-called because of the frequent expletives emitted in its vicinity, is so rare as to elicit skepticism with regards to its very existence. It appears to be a common rat, and can be encountered anywhere that a rat might be found. The drat would be little more than an annoyance if not for its special ability.
A drat has an aura of bad luck which covers a radius of 30 feet around it. Anyone besides the drat within the radius suffers a cumulative penalty of -1 per round on attack and saving throw rolls, while giving opponents (who are outside the radius or are immune, IE. drats) a cumulative +1 bonus on attack rolls against affected creatures. The maximum penalty (or bonus) which may accrue is -6 (or +6).
There is no way to detect this effect, other than to attempt and fail at attacks or saving throws, and the drat does not even need to be visible. For instance, a drat could be peacefully sleeping on the other side of a wall from the adventurers and its sphere of influence will still affect them. The only surefire way to detect the presence of a drat is by noticing the ever-increasing string of unlikely events beginning to happen. For instance, a very dexterous Thief will, after only a few minutes of exposure, begin to bumble about so clumsily that they will soon trip over their own feet. It is essential that the GM be completely and scrupulously fair in the use of this monster.
Source note: This creature is converted from The Basic Fantasy Field Guide of Creatures Malevolent and Benign – Omnibus Edition, 1st Edition Release 4, © 2010–2025 Chris Gonnerman, R. Kevin Smoot, James Lemon, Matt Sluis, and Contributors. The Basic Fantasy Field Guide textual material is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International; this page adapts that creature to White Box.