Monster of the Week: Leogryph

DESCRIPTION Leogryphs appear with the body of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and two eagle heads. They most often make their nests in the highest peaks of the tallest mountains where they are sometimes used as protectors for special magic artifacts or articles of power. Legend holds that leogryphs were a creation of Tiamat but these dangerous beasts are ironically friendly, except in the presence of any item entrusted to them, in which case they become fiercely protective. The dangerous but friendly duality in the leogryph's nature is mirrored in its breath weapons, with one of the heads able to breathe a cone of fire, and the other head able to breathe a cone of frost (cold). Each of these cones measures 30' long and 10' wide, may be used up to 5 times per day, and does 2d6 damage (on a failed saving throw vs. breath weapon). Like normal eagles, the leogrpyh's eyesight is so keen as to make them unable to be surprised if encountered in their lair at night. Furthermore, if they make a diving attack from 100' feet or higher, they gain a +4 bonus to their "to hit" roll, and do double damage from their claws, but may not make any beak attacks. For both land-based and air-based attacks, if both of a leogryph's fore claws strike successfully, the leogryph may choose to attack with its rear claws, doing and additional 1d6+1 damage per claw attack (on successful "to hit" rolls, double damage bonuses from successful diving attacks apply), but may not make any beak attacks. Leogryphs possess a magical ability to create weather events once per day (per the magic-user spell control weather), for a duration of up to 3 turns, but under the condition that the leogryph must remain airborne over the weather event within a range of 240'.

Oe/1E STATS FREQUENCY: Rare NO. APPEARING: 1-3 ARMOR CLASS: 4 MOVE: 12"/24" HIT DICE: 8 % IN LAIR: 25% TREASURE TYPE: Ux2 NO. OF ATTACKS: 4 DAMAGE/ATTACK: 1d4/1d4/1d6/1d6 SPECIAL ATTACKS: See below SPECIAL DEFENSES: Nil MAGIC RESISTANCE: Standard INTELLIGENCE: Semi- ALIGNMENT: Neutral SIZE: L PSIONIC ABILITY: Nil Attack/Defense Modes: Nil BX STATS ARMOR CLASS: 4 HIT DICE: 8** MOVE: 120'/240' ATTACKS: 2 claws/2 bites DAMAGE: 1d4/1d4/1d6/1d6 NO. APPEARING: 1-3 SAVE AS: Fighter: 8 MORALE: 11 TREASURE TYPE: Ix2 ALIGNMENT: Neutral