Rasping Cicada
Level 1Attacks
Abilities
Requirements An enemy creature has spoken since the rasping cicada's last turn
Effect The rasping cicada learns and mimics the sound of its opponent's voice. It can't make new sentences, but it can choose to repeat select parts of the phrases it has heard. All non-cicada creatures within 30 feet, other than the owner of the stolen voice, must succeed at a DC 15 will save to disbelieve the mimicry.
Saving Throw DC 15 fortitude
Maximum Duration 6 rounds
Stage 1 1d4 poison damage plus Slowed 1 (1 round)
Stage 2 1d4 poison damage plus Slowed 2 (1 round)
Stage 3 2d4 poison damage plus slowed 2 and Stupefied 1 (1 round)
These small insects are a nuisance and danger to small villages within Brevoy, taking over entire forests and blending in with the foliage. Also known as calling beetles, due to their ability to mimic and repeat the voices of their previous victims, crying cicadas wait for passersby to lure into the trees, fascinating their victims with their cries before fluttering their wings to release toxic dust. Once a target is near death, crying cicadas will take flight from the trees and land on the body to feed.
The scale dust of crying cicadas can be turned into an effective ingested poison, but obtaining a cicada and harvesting these scales is so dangerous that most would-be poisoners simply die in the process. Even finding the insects is dangerous enough; crying cicadas' natural stealth and dark coloration make them difficult to locate among the trees of a forest, and following their cries often leads one to fall victim to the very creatures they're hunting.
The longer a colony of crying cicadas stays in a forest, the wider their collection of cries grows. Often, a young colony will be able to replicate only the sounds of small, dying creatures, but larger, more established colonies will have the ability to mimic the sounds of children and dragons.