No Escape from the Shambling Mound

The shambling mound is true terror incarnate if we can avoid botching the delivery.
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The lumbering hulk of rotting plant matter known as a Shambling Mound can be so very misused. Usually, it is simply used as a large block of hit-points to chip away at, at worst, it is a TPK waiting to happen. So how do we avoid this?
We take some inspiration from real-life plants like the Sundew, the Corpse Flower, and the Venus Flytrap to make our Shambling Mound something of true natural horror. Mucus, the stink of death, and people-eating plants lying in wait all present us opportunities to really envelop our characters, literally!
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[@chaoscommentary2179]

I’m glade I took biology all 4 years of high school I understand everything going on with the plants

[@HookandChance]

Awesome! How would you flavor a Shambling Mound? Any details you'd add to it?

[@chaoscommentary2179]

Hook&Chance D&D I would probably have a made Botanist cross pollinate a shambling mound with a assassins plant and Venis fly trap. So just a giant mouth like the Parana plants from Mario with vine like tentacles covered in poisonous Thorns and if swallowed the player takes acid damage because the fly trap fills with acid to brake down the fly it captures

[@HookandChance]

@@chaoscommentary2179 this is begging for some homebrew!

[@Reddotzebra]

If you go with the last option you could also have a hidden save that triggers when the intelligence of the mound hits 10, each engulfed target gets to roll will or charisma and if anyone manages to beat a high DC they get to pilot the whole thing. Could be a fun way to avert that TPK, but now you're basically Swamp-Thing.

[@HookandChance]

LOVE this idea. We did this once in a game for a forest creature and the person that got to pilot it still talks about this as one of the best games they ever played.

[@Reddotzebra]

Desert Shambling Mound juice: It's the quenshiest!

[@HookandChance]

🌴💩🍹 Hahaha gross

[@Reddotzebra]

Well, when you ask what plant smells the worst, my immediate three associations were the corpse flower, the Rafflesia, and the Durian fruit. The Durian smells horrible but it actually tastes like sort of a... I dunno, I'd describe it as chocolate being violently devoured by vanilla.

[@HookandChance]

You sir are brave. I can say either of us have ever gotten closer than about 36 feet from a Durian to ever taste it. It truly smells heinous!

[@chaoscommentary2179]

That part about the bog walking on the flouting grass islands I have a story when I was 10 years old duck hunting I was walking on top of one of them it’s like walking on top of a water bed any way I fell throw over my head and had to climb out back throw the hole I fell throw and had to dumb the water out of the barrel of my shot gun

[@HookandChance]

That sounds slightly terrifying, a definite real life trap experience. hopefully you were able to loot a dry shotgun off of the ducks.

[@chaoscommentary2179]

@@HookandChance nope I went home after that

[@chaoscommentary2179]

I agree 100% if you dm you must try and foreshadow the monster or trap ahead of time. Like you fallow the stench of rot and methane leading you to a mass of vines in the swamp like a island and in the vines you notice skeletons tangled up in it along with there adventuring gear. You remember hearing the villagers talking about people going missing in this area of the swamp.edit I love how you mention and island 2 yeah I comment as I’m watching the video

[@HookandChance]

The more surprises we throw at the party, the more it feels like there's nothing they can really do to strategize except keep moving forward into whatever random danger we pull out of our danger bag next. Foreshadowing is so necessary for us, and those are solid details on a nasty swampy foreshadow.

[@Reddotzebra]

Tropical environments? We've got Sundews up here in the frozen north of Sweden... Well, not currently so frozen due to global warming but still. The Swedish name for this plant is Sileshår.

[@HookandChance]

Really? We would have never guessed they would grow that for north... admittedly we're no botanists over here. We've killed cactus... which as a comedian once said, "makes us less hospitable than a desert".

[@chaoscommentary2179]

Anyone else pitcher the plant from the little shop of horrors

[@HookandChance]

FEEEEEEED ME Stanley!