Rat, Horrid

A spiny rat hisses at you from behind a wooden box. Its muzzle is covered in pit marks, no doubt causing from the acid drooling from its lips. Those beady red eyes stare back you from under a series of bony protrusions that continue along its body and ending at the mass of spikes at the tip of its tail. This explains the mysterious holes in the side of the grain silo... and along the bottom of the door... and in the stone floor...

Horrid Rat

CR 1

XP: 400

NE Tiny Animal

Init: +4; Senses: low-light vision, scent; Perception +3

DEFENSE:

AC: 17, Touch 14, Flat-Footed 15 (+2 Dex, +3 natural, +2 size)

HP: 6 (1d8+2)

Fort: +4; Ref: +6; Will: +3

Immune: acid

OFFENSE:

Speed: 15', climb 15', swim 15'

Melee: Bite +4 (1d3-2 plus 1d6 acid)

Space: 0 ft.; Reach: 0 ft.

STATISTICS:

Str 6, Dex 19, Con 15, Int 2, Wis 17, Chr 2

Base Atk: +0; CMB: -2; CMD: 12

Feats: Weapon Finesse

Skills: Stealth +20; Racial Modifiers: +4 to Stealth

SPECIAL ABILITIES:

Ill-Tempered (Ex): Attempts to control or train Horrid Rats are made a -4 penalty. While Horrid Rats are no more resistant to charm or compulsion effects, giving a charmed or compelled Horrid Rat a command that is not in its nature allows for a retry on the Will save, just as if the Horrid Rat was ordered to commit an obviously suicidal act. The nature of a Horrid Rat is generally vicious, turning to cowardice when overwhelmed and able to flee, and back to bloodthirsty when backed into a corner.

ECOLOGY:

Environment: Any temperate

Organization: Solitary, pair, nest (3-12) or plague (13-100)

Treasure: None

Role: None

Source: ECB, pg. 288

Examples of the common rat after being altered by vindictive druids and sent into the cities to plague urbanites, Horrid Rats are vicious and down right evil, little beasties. Capable of chewing and corroding their way into almost any kind of food storage, they have been known on more than few occasions to cause a mild panic about crops or supplies. Known to multiply just as fast as their mundane cousins, Horrid Rats have nasty tempers. The saying "like a horrid rat trapped in a cage" often refers to someone willing to sacrifice the well-being or safety of the group for his own benefit, regardless of how real or imagined that benefit might be.

Physically, Horrid Rats look like normal rats, but completely covered in bony plates that extended from their muzzle to the tips of their tails. Coloration is usually dull white, but can easily be covered in the muck and grim of the typical city sewer. Usually, the only way to tell a Horrid Rat from a normal one at a distance is the smell of stomach acid and the sounds of it faintly eating away at the floorboards.

A Horrid Rat is calculated using the normal rat and applying the Horrid Animal template.