Yellow Musk Creeper, Dungeons and Dragons, BG3 lore

The Yellow Musk Creeper is a deadly carnivorous plant of the Forgotten Realms with important alchemical value. In Baldur's Gate 3, the petals can be turned into Musk Salts, a component of Superior Healing potions.
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[@DaussPlays]

Oh ffs, WotC really went and made them standard undead in 5E? The entire point of musk zombies is that they aren't true undead, so clerics can't rely on the standard bag of tricks to deal with them. Being a plant gives them interesting combat interactions for players.

[@AJPickett]

right? smh

[@koboldlord]

The Yellow Musk Creeper is special to me because when I got back into DMing after years away it was the first "setpiece" monster I threw at my players and none of them had ever seen one before. It's zombies were a mixture of orcs and a hill giant. Thanks for covering this special monster.

[@zmishiymishi5349]

Yellow Musk Creeper is my nickname at work

[@pensador6953]

You just know an alchemist will try to "improve" on these vegetation horrors.

[@edwardbirdsall6580]

I will look these up when next one of my characters travels to Kura-Tur again. Trying to create a "witches garden".

[@AJPickett]

a fantastic quest, one of my favorites!

[@chadlynch1551]

For the longest time I considered unusual plants in D&D to be minor monsters not really worth worrying about. But then I read many of the old stories written by Clark Ashton Smith. He had a number of stories that included strange plants, plants with magical properties, even one where a sentient and very evil plant had taken over most of a world and enslaved the people there. Those helped to change my mind.

[@AJPickett]

Clark Ashton Smith should be as famous as Lovecraft.

[@Mr_Welch]

First step of surviving D&D. Burn all plants

[@thehillz726]

" But we're in an enclosed room!" Cried the tree huggers But the flame throwing defolier simply laughed and readied fireball

[@Pyre]

"What's this at the start of an old Monster Manual? 'Assassin Vine'? Yeah no."

[@mrmackie-qp6lr]

Welchy!

[@mrmackie-qp6lr]

If you're really asking finish up your giant videos finish redo Hill and Stone or a remaster of your genie videos

[@AJPickett]

ah, the ancient vids. yes, yes, you're right@@mrmackie-qp6lr

[@zacharyweaver276]

What to learn about next? Dang that's a hard one. Maybe another spelljammer race? Maybe the Hurwaet?

[@danielsmall3403]

I like the videos that help me give lore accurate locations for monsters/encounters, I focus more on the 2nd edition of the game also.

[@opsecmedic]

Oh this is so perfect because I've been running these off and on as a big part of our now 2 year running campaign in "Fantasy Australia" lol

[@HBHaga]

This was one of my favorite curve-balls to throw at new player groups when they were leveled for it. In one Underdark campaign I was in, a Drow Matriarch used the narcotic to control fighters in an arena she had set up. She wound up as plant food, as I recall.

[@NanoMayTry]

Awesome we have this half plant, half necromancer and other creatures that blur the genres. Two of my favorite things combined.

[@AJPickett]

There is an episode of the original Star Trek ('"This Side of Paradise," from Season 1, Episode 24 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Side_of_Paradise_(Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series ) which makes a great variant on this theme. You could make the plant mobile with a single flower head and whip-like retractable stamen which delivers toxic pollen directly ('Day of the Triffids' en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_of_the_Triffids ). Loads of homebrew possibilities await.

[@jamesadamec7469]

Love your stories. Wish you would write a series on your Character.

[@AJPickett]

What would you title such a series?

[@jamesadamec7469]

@@AJPickett A worthy question. Your character has an inquisitive mind. Comes from a unique lineage. Has a unique destiny. Comes from "the" most likeable race. I will give it some thought.

[@jamesadamec7469]

Given your approach of your halfling filled with curiosity and tempered with the wisdom of dragon kind I think the lore of the Serendipitous Sage of Candle Keep would be fitting.

[@CalciumOxyde]

This is my cat Henry’s favorite encounter. Don’t know why, but it is.

[@Comicnut64]

Awesome finally catching an AJ video after a month

[@mattnerdy7236]

Hey AJ, omgosh thank you! When it comes to plant monsters the Yellow Musk Creeper is my blue ribbon monster. I'm glad you gave it, it's own video. I remember helping someone in your discord find the Yellow Musk plant video. I didn't know you could make a potion of supreme healing from the flowers 🌸 I just found out from 3e Giant Bee honey can be used to make potions of healing, 25 pints to make the supreme potion. That makes me think of that Futurama episode when Fry gets stung by the giant space bee's 😅 You asked what do we want to see next, assassin bug video. I think people will eat up that story. I was very surprised to find out what they really where 😮 Thanks AJ love what you do, please have a wonderful day!

[@RPGChaos-yw3bj]

AJ has a great talent in bringing interest into often skipped over aspects of the game. Great stuff :)

[@muhammadedwards8425]

Nice video. A welcome update from the plant ecology video from a while back. Love to see the channel going strong

[@Killercam232]

I once ran an encounter of a yellow musk creeper, but with a twist. Rather than a singular bunch, it was a variant that vined and this alone made the creature quite formidable. It was an abandoned hamlet once ravaged by a roaming band of orcs who in their eagerness to defile the land dumped the bodies of villagers into the hamlet's well. Unknown to them was the traveling herbalist which they added to the list and the contents of his pockets. So down in the depths of the well a yellow musk creeper took root and likewise took its first zombies from the rotting dead in the depths. In time they emerged from the well and took their revenge upon the orcs that destroyed their home. The orcs abandoned the place, as they couldn't seem to keep their soldiers from stumbling into the old, fouled well every now and then, thus producing new zombies to fend off. Then along came the party, who were likewise vexed by this pesky variant of the creature. Sure they could cut and burn the vines that had grown up out of the well, but down in the depths the core remained and would regrow again in a year.

[@edwardbirdsall6580]

Herbicide.

[@Battleguild]

I had my own variant of the Yellow Musk Creeper called the White Musk Creeper. Instead of killing its targets and turning them into zombies, the burrowed seedpods instead made the creature charmed to the plant and encouraged its spread. (The host gained the regenerative traits of the plant and its weaknesses.) The adult version of the White variant was a reflavored Corpse Flower (CR8). Funnily enough though, my Creeper was also situated within a town's well.

[@thefox347]

I love DND plant lore, they never get enough attention!

[@ToprHoliday]

Had some yellow musk creeper at the dispensary the other day….

[@Rogueprince3]

Would love to see a cover of the celestial eladrin sometime!

[@mrbob3000]

Now I want to run a The Last of Us style campaign based around these Yellow Musk Creepers

[@EdricLysharae]

Behold! The warcry of YMC's greatest threat: "Baaaaaah"

[@TheHornedKing]

I would like to hear about the Radiant Dragons of Mount Celestia.

[@krispalermo8133]

Ravenloft from AD&D, stop and smell the .. " Blood Roses."

[@venkelos6996]

Very much fun! So, if I had to pick, and not feel bad for choosing a slightly complicated one, I'd choose Shades. What type are they? Not undead, or Fiends, but what? How many of their innate powers from 3e would carry over into simplified 5e? Did any survive 4e? Are they weaker on power, with Mystra rescinding Epic Magic? What have they been up to, since the Fall of Thulanthar, and Myth Drannor?

[@benpressly200]

Hey AJ! I remember before you took a break from D&D after their whole fiasco, you had started doing some D&D live plays. Do you have any intention of continuing that? Either way, I love the way you narrate your videos!

[@AJPickett]

I just posted a live play of a playtest of my new RPG (Super Atomic), so, kinda sorta yes?

[@trajanfidelis1532]

Thanks for the video AJ

[@muhammadedwards8425]

My favorite plant monster. We should throw the newer version and make it suit our games. Too many young GM just take things as is. Personally, I make them have mostly Beast puppets, and the areas they are in face animal attacks. I have the zombies remains grow the plant, players tend to leave the bodies of "random bird attacks"

[@zacharyweaver276]

7:54 yeah that seems really dumb to have creatures whose effects can target only humanoids. How would this plant survive deep in the jungle if there are no humanoids around? I think this is just a lazy attempt by WOTC to keep players from being able to utilize stuff to have monsters turn against each other.

[@tatsusama3192]

This reminds me of Jumanji. . . The original with Robin Williams

[@DEMONOFLOVEANDDEATH]

Bless the Mighty GlueStick

[@helixxharpell]

AJ, can we revisit the "Belabra"? I've designed a version of that creature for Khor. 5e doesn't have it anymore. Shame on them! It's an awesome creature in Faerun.

[@AJPickett]

excellent choice!

[@dude9822]

Great video! I really liked the description of the city at the beginning, have you thought about doing videos of various cities o D&D? I vaguely recall watching at least one other one from you but for the life of me i can't remember which city

[@Texanrascal]

Love your videos boss

[@AJPickett]

I appreciate that!

[@thuglifegame7573]

Great video AJ. Ty!

[@joshuastamos2213]

Great video!

[@chriscalvin5083]

good video AJ

[@AJPickett]

Thanks Chris, sorry for the delay, was writing an RPG :)

[@bartlester591]

Wonder what they would do to a mindflare

[@AJPickett]

Mindflayers are just as vulnerable to the Yellow Musk Creeper as any other humanoid creature... a fate that scares the living piss out of them, as it should.

[@HowtoRPG]

Thanks AJ

[@stephenparlin9361]

Another great lore filled story

[@aaronnoisey3754]

What was the symbiosis between the plant and the assassin? Was he luring victims to the plant?

[@AJPickett]

I wish I could tell you, I never actually found out. Perhaps some adventurers would have more luck.

[@derekstein6193]

My hypothesis is that the assassin used the poison derived from the sap of the yellow musk creeper on some of his targets so that they would be alive but helpless when he fed them to the plant. All he then had to do was prevent any potential creeper zombies from arising and he could harvest bits off the plant for his personal use. Both the financial benefit from selling the blossoms and the utility of the extractable poison would no doubt aid him in his work. I also suspect whatever magical ritual he must have performed rendered him functionally invisible to the creeper, as well as resistant to the scent of its blossoms. Unfortunately, the only people that would know for sure would be the kobold and possibly one or more of those pitiful souls that now reside amongst the yellow musk creeper's grasping vines.

[@AJPickett]

A plausible scenario @@derekstein6193

[@Rells2coolpeoplehavebadtastes.]

Now heres the question of the ages. Why would a plant have this talent, of manipulating the bodes of the dead?

[@AJPickett]

Food and reproduction. Plus the yellow musk zombies protect the plant and can fetch fresh victims.

[@Rells2coolpeoplehavebadtastes.]

@@AJPickett Thank you! That sounds like a reasonable explanation to me, considering the fantastical worlds it inhabits.

[@davidfletcher6703]

How about a video on vampires, I mean, you've already done a video on werewolves

[@platinum981]

!!!

[@maxthepaladin2147]

Isn't that the guy who owns twitter?