Tide Corrupted Crab

Chitin slick with bile, eyes glowing like drowned lanterns—these aren’t your ordinary tide-crawlers.

Description

Drawn by arcane resonance and the scent of living minds, these mutated crabs swarm from tidepools and wreckage when rituals are cast too close to the shore. Their shells glisten with black slime, and their movements are unsettlingly synchronized. They don’t hunger—they obey.

Creature Type

Beast (Tide-Corrupted)

Alignment

Unaligned

Challenge Rating

1/8 (Modified Giant Crab)

Environment

Coastal, tidepools, ritual sites

Group Behavior

Swarm, waves of 6–10

Stat Modifications

• +1 Hit Point (average 15 instead of 13)
• Acidic Bite: On hit, deals an additional 1d4 acid damage
• Hive Pulse: Immune to charm and frightened while within 30 feet of another Tide-Corrupted creature

Grapple Tactics

• Crabs attempt to grapple ritual participants using Athletics vs. the target’s Athletics or Acrobatics
• On success, they drag targets 15 feet per turn, disrupting ritual positioning
• Targets can use an action to escape

Fear Response (Environmental Trigger)

• If exposed to loud noise or fire within 10 feet: must succeed on a DC 12 Wisdom saving throw, bypassing normal immunity to the frightened condition
• On failure: Becomes frightened, flees 20 feet and avoids grappling for 1d4 rounds

Traits

Harvest & Use

• Chitin: Can be harvested and alchemically hardened into ritual-resistant plating
• Slime Glands: Useful for crafting minor fear-based traps or anti-vermin oils

Identification Checks

• Nature or Arcana (DC 13): Recognize these as magically mutated creatures responding to arcane resonance
• Religion (DC 15): Connection to corrupted rituals or possibly Abyssal influence

Lore & Player Hooks

• Drawn to unfinished rituals, corrupted wards, or locations tainted by Whispering Stone or slime
• NPCs (especially Fizz) may offer bounties for crab shell fragments or slime glands
• Crabs often appear in notes, diagrams, or failed ritual logs as minor but dangerous disruptions