Mummies: Brendan Frasier, is that you?

Before opening a sarcophagus, light a torch.

X the Mystic’s 7th Rule of Dungeon Survival

Alright! We’ve got an ominous opening quote and a terrible joke in the title! This week’s Best of the Bestiary is off to a wonderful start!

Lore: Eternal Lorekeepers and Undying Tyrants

Buried long ago in an extensive dark ritual, a mummy rises from its slumber in the ancient ruins of history. Imbued with necrotic magic by a priest of a dark deity (usually the death god), a mummy rises upon a condition set by the runes drawn upon its wrappings, such as to ward off intruders or protect a valuable artifact. Many corpses were used to make mummies, from the bodies of rulers who displeased powerful priests to common criminals or even slaves. None had a say in their fate, for how can a corpse say no to the call of another’s greater purpose?

Breaking the curse placed on a mummy is no easy feat. Rare magics are capable of it, but a more common method is to simply undo the crime against its orders that made it rise to begin with, such as by returning a sacred treasure. However, some offenses are not so easily forgiven, and nothing can sate the cursed creature’s wrath, not even revenge.

Unlike other undead, mummies are capable of speech, though they are slow to do so. Some are even used as keepers of ancient lore, made to pass knowledge down to the descendants of its creator. There are even those powerful enough who keep mummies hidden away for this specific purpose.

With a particularly powerful and dark spell, and the corpse of a particularly terrible tyrant, a mummy lord might be born. They retain their memories and personalities, allowing them to continue in their rule long after death, should their death god grant the priest-king their favor. Unlike other mummies, the mummy lord retains ownership of its heart, which it keeps in a jar. Only when that heart is destroyed can a mummy lord be truly defeated, and only by fire can the heart be stopped.

All of this together makes for some incredible storytelling potential! Perhaps the big-bad of your campaign is a powerful mummy lord who has ruled the land in tyranny for thousands of years! Or maybe the players stumble into an ancient tomb and accidentally awaken the mummy, who terrorizes a nearby town, thus forcing them to either beg its forgiveness or go and slay it. You could even use the mummy as an NPC for a bit of exposition, maybe even have it send them on a quest to fulfill some duty it needs completed. The options are incredibly versatile and all of them are fun and interesting!

Provided that you keep a lozenge on hand. The dry, raspy mummy voice is murder on the throat.

Design: A Zombie With Extra Steps

Okay guys, very funny. Now get that toilet paper off of the zombie.

The core concept of this design is exactly what you’d expect. It’s a dried out corpse wrapped in bandages. Who could have guessed? It’s almost like it’s a mummy or something!

Luckily, it does some stuff to help it stand out from something you might see in other fantasy media. Small touches, like adorning it with the jewelry it was buried in, giving it long black nails, and showing the rot of the bandages to expose the corpse beneath. It looks more zombie-like than anything, which is absolutely fitting! They’re minor additions, but they give the design some much needed personality. Plus, they’re super creepy!

Overall, this is a decent design. Yes, it’s almost exactly what you’d expect. But it is still just unique enough to call interesting. Not bad.

Stats: Rot With Me

For clarity’s sake: we’ll be discussing the regular mummy and the mummy lord in this article. I was tempted to divide it into two, but I don’t want to drag this out for too long. Not when there are weird mushroom people on the next page!

Regular mummies are fairly strong for a relatively low-level monster. Its AC is pretty pathetic (don’t laugh; it’s armor is rotting cloth) and its HP is alright. It might not sound too bad, but it has a list of invulnerabilities and immunities. You can’t damage it with poison or necrotic damage, and nonmagical melee does nothing. On top of that, it is immune to most status effects. That said, it is highly vulnerable to fire damage.

Again: rotting cloth. Give ‘im a break.

In terms of damage, the mummy has two options, and it can use both in any turn thanks to Multiattack. Rotting Fist is an incredibly dangerous attack for a low-level enemy; not only does it do pretty strong melee damage boosted with necrotic, it can also curse the victim with, and I quote, ‘mummy rot.’ While under this curse, victims can’t regain HP, and they take damage, 10(3d6), every 24 hours. Should the target’s HP reach 0 before the curse can be removed via magic, their bodies will turn to dust.

Then there’s Dreadful Glare, which paralyzes the victim if they fail the save. Which isn’t nearly as intimidating as Rotting Fist, is it?

That is the normal mummy. It’s a fairly terrifying monster that truly forces the players to be careful and creative. How do they exploit the fire weakness? How do they avoid the Rotting Fist? What in the hell do they do if they get the mummy curse? It makes for a great encounter!

And then there is the infinitely more terrifying mummy lord. In other words: the real boss fight.

The mummy lord is far more durable than its regular counterpart, with a much higher AC and nearly twice as much HP. It has all the same resistances (and the same fiery weakness), only now it has Magic Resistance, giving it advantage on all saving throws related to spells or magic effects. Not only that, it’s Rejuvenation ability allows it to regrow a destroyed body 24 hours after its defeat, provided its heart remains intact.

It also has spells! A lot of them, in fact! They are:

• Cantrips (at will): sacred flame, thaumaturgy
• 1st level (4 slots): command, guiding bolt, shield of faith
• 2nd level (3 slots): hold person, silence, spiritual weapon
• 3rd level (3 slots): animate dead, dispel magic
• 4th level (3 slots): divination, guardian of faith
• 5th level (2 slots): contagion, insect plague
• 6th level (1 slot): harm

God damn, that is one scary spell list! Give him Shield next, why don’tcha?!

On top of having all of the normal mummy’s attacks, the mummy lord has Legendary Actions! It can use up to three, and only at the end of someone else’s turn. It regains all of them at the start of its own turn. They are:

• Attack: use Rotting Fist or Dreadful Glare
• Blinding Dust: conjure a cloud of dust that can blind everyone in a 5 foot radius of the mummy lord
• Blasphemous Word (Costs 2 Actions): all non-undead creatures within 10 feet of the mummy lord must make a save or be stunned until the end of the mummy lord’s next turn
• Channel Negative Energy (Costs 2 Actions): all creatures within 60 feet of the mummy lord are unable to regain HP until the end of its next turn, regardless of cover or magic
• Whirlwind of Sand (Costs 2 Actions): the mummy lord transforms into a cloud of sand and travels up to 60 feet before transforming back; during this time, it is completely immune to damage and cannot be halted in any way

And dear lord, we’re still not done! Because then there’s the mummy lord’s lair! Fight it in there, and it has access to three dangerous Lair Actions! These are:

• Each undead creature in the lair can locate all living creatures within the lair, up until initiative count 20 of the next turn
• Each undead has advantage on saving throws until initiative count 20 of the next turn
• Any non-undead creature takes necrotic damage upon casting a spell, should they fail a saving throw; this effect lasts until initiative count 20 of the next turn

With all of this combined, the mummy lord is one of the best bosses you could possibly throw at your players! It has so many spells and effects that it could employ at basically any time during combat, making it an enemy that the players will need to constantly adapt to. They’ll need to bust out all of the stops and push their creative muscles to their limits in order to survive, let alone win!

Placement

Maybe this entry really is Brendan Frasier, because it’s awesome (I’m a big Brendan Frasier stan and I can’t let this terrible joke go)! The lore is rich and full of potential for fun sessions or full campaigns! The design, while predictable, is a cut above what you might expect. The stats for either version can make for one of the best possible boss fights in the entire game; whatever weakness the design might have, the fight more than makes up for it!

Placing this one is gonna be tough! While it is definitely top five material, I’m not sure if even it can surpass the players in the top four. Those guys are just way too good, and it’ll take a special kind of monster to usurp their current places. As good as the mummy is, and it is a spectacular monster, it just isn’t quite that good.

With all that in mind, let’s put the Mummy on the Best of the Bestiary!

1. Beholder
2. Death Tyrant
3. Mind Flayer
4. Dragon Turtle
5. Mummy/Mummy Lord <—————-
6. Green Dragons
7. Red Dragons
8. Blue Dragons
9. Black Dragons
10. White Dragons
11. Silver Dragons
12. Couatl
13. Behir
14. Aboleth
15. Sea Hag
16. Lamia
17. Bronze Dragons
18. Brass Dragons
19. Copper Dragons
20. Gold Dragons
21. Chuul
22. Kuo-Toa
23. Gibbering Mouther
24. Kraken
25. Intellect Devourer
26. Chimera
27. Death Knight
28. Fomorian
29. Bone Devil
30. Dracolich
31. Faerie Dragon
32. Lich
33. Magmin
34. Kobold
35. Kenku
36. Hobgoblins
37. Night Hag
38. Green Hag
39. Ankheg
40. Hook Horror
41. Storm Giant
42. Hill Giant
43. Empyrean
44. Efreeti
45. Grimlock
46. Minotaur
47. Dao
48. Cloud Giant
49. Manticore
50. Drow (all four of ’em)
51. Shadow Demon
52. Modrons (all five of ’em)
53. Marilith
54. Drider
55. Aarackockra
56. Azer
57. Demilich
58. Spectator
59. Hydra
60. Marid
61. Harpy
62. Werejackal
63. Half-Dragon
64. Cambion
65. Fire Giant
66. Animated Armor
67. Banshee
68. Basilisk
69. Yochlol
70. Bulette
71. Cloaker
72. Darkmantle
73. Doppelganger
74. Ghoul and Ghast
75. Ettin
76. Medusa
77. Pit Fiend
78. Erinyes
79. Chain Devil
80. Bearded Devil
81. Barbed Devil
82. Spined Devil
83. Ice Devil
84. Mimic
85. Djinni
86. Merrow
87. Nalfeshnee
88. Glabrezu
89. Chasme
90. Grell
91. Barlgura
92. Horned Devil
93. Balor
94. Shadow Dragon
95. Werebear
96. Lizardfolk
97. Vrock
98. Dretch
99. Gnolls (all three)
100. Goristro
101. Hezrou
102. Manes
103. Frost Giant
104. Weretiger
105. Werewolf
106. Duergar
107. Quasit
108. Dryad
109. Flumph
110. Goblin
111. Wereboar
112. Wererat
113. Githyanki
114. Planetar
115. Imp
116. Clay Golem
117. Flameskull
118. Displacer Beast
119. Carrion Crawler
120. Githzerai
121. Grick
122. Invisible Stalker
123. Rug of Smothering
124. Bugbear Chief
125. Bugbear
126. Flesh Golem
127. Vine Blight
128. Twig Blight
129. Needle Blight
130. Mephits (all six of ’em)
131. Bullywug
132. Hellhound
133. Ettercap
134. Gas Spore
135. Cockatrice
136. Lemure
137. Homonculus
138. Merfolk
139. Solar
140. Deva
141. Gorgon
142. Hippogriff
143. Griffon
144. Cyclops
145. Centaur
146. Ghost
147. Fire Elemental
148. Water Elemental
149. Air Elemental
150. Stone Giant
151. Deep Gnome
152. Dinosaurs (All six of them)
153. Iron Golem
154. Stone Golem
155. Earth Elemental
156. Galeb Duhr
157. Helmed Horror
158. Flying Sword
159. Crawling Claw
160. Violet Fungus
161. Shrieker
162. Gargoyle