The Adrasura
Recently, in an encounter that took place near the end of a two-year campaign that I had run, I had an encounter that wanted a couple of CR 20 outsiders to serve as, essentially, bodyguards for the true big bad evil guy the party needed to kill. I thought of the balor and the pit fiend, of course, but decided that I would rather save these iconic paragons of evil for a time when they could be stars, and not just serve as meat shields. I turned instead to the other evil outsider races that the Bestiary 3 so kindly provided, and eventually settled on the CR 20 kyton and asura.
While preparing for the fight, I noticed that the CR 20 asura (called an asurendra) has the power to summon “any asura of CR 19 or lower” once per day, with 100% accuracy. I quickly went to take a look at his options…and was surprised and dismayed to discover that after the CR 20 asurendra, the next-highest-CR asura is CR 11, making this ability notably less useful than it appears. Afterwards, I resolved that I wanted to make at least one asura between CR 11 and CR 19, and, as luck would have it, I have a platform to do so roughly once per week. So, without further ado, meet the asurendra’s new best friend, the adrasura.
Asura, Adrasura
This red-skinned fiend is vaguely humanoid, though it sports four arms, has a massive face on its belly—complete with gaping, fanged mouth—and appears to have its head on backwards.
ADRASURA CR 15
XP 51,200
LE Medium outsider (asura, evil, extraplanar, lawful)
Init +9; Senses all-around vision, darkvision 60 ft., arcane sight; Perception +33
Aura elusive (75 ft.)
DEFENSE
AC 31, touch 26, flat-footed 20 (+5 deflection, +5 Dex, +6 insight, +5 natural)
hp 210 (20d10+100); regeneration 10 (good weapons, good spells)
Fort +19, Ref +13 Will +20; +2 vs. enchantment spells
Defensive Abilities infernal grace; DR 10/good; Immune curses, disease, flanking, poison; Resist acid 10, electricity 10; SR 26
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee 2 +1 heavy flails +26 (1d10+7/17-20), bite +19 (1d8+4 plus 2d6 acid)
Special Attacks steal spell
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 15th; concentration +19)
Constant—arcane sight
At Will—alter self , detect chaos, detect good, detect thoughts (DC 18), greater teleport (self plus 50 lbs. of objects only)
3/day—dispel magic, dominate person (DC 21), delayed blast fireball (DC 23), fly
1/day—haste, mass suggestion (DC 22), summon (level 7, any CR 14 or lower asura 50%)
STATISTICS
Str 18, Dex 21, Con 21, Int 13, Wis 22, Cha 20
Base Atk +20; CMB +24; CMD 50
Feats Combat Reflexes, Great Fortitude, Improved Critical (heavy flail), Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Lightning Reflexes, Power Attack, Skill Focus (Bluff, Disguise), Weapon Focus (heavy flail)
Skills Bluff +34, Disguise +34, Escape Artist +11, Knowledge (planes) +14, Knowledge (religion) +14, Perception +33, Sense Motive +29, Spellcraft +24, Stealth +28; Racial Modifiers +6 Escape Artist, +4 Perception
Languages Common, Infernal; telepathy 100 ft.
SQ receive sacrifice, war sage
ECOLOGY
Environment any (Hell)
Organization solitary
Treasure double
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Infernal Grace (Su): An adrasura gains a deflection bonus to AC equal to its Charisma modifier.
Receive Sacrifice (Ex): Adrasuras are greatly pleased when living things are slain in their name. Whenever a creature affected by a compulsion effect caused by the adrasura (such as its dominate person and mass suggestion spell-like abilities) kills a living creature, the adrasura gains a number of benefits. Its regeneration and DR increase to 15, it gains a +2 morale bonus to AC and to the saving throw DCs of its spell-like abilities, and it gains a +2 morale bonus on attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. These benefits last for 1 minute.
Spell-Like Abilities: An adrasura’s spell-like abilities are Wisdom-based.
Steal Spell (Su): Once per round, when a creature within 30 feet of the adrasura casts a spell that targets another creature within 30 feet of the adrasura, the adrasura can attempt to steal the benefits of that spell as an immediate action. In order to do so, the adrasura must succeed on a caster level check (15 + 1d20), with a DC equal to 11 + the caster level of the spell to be stolen. If the adrasura succeeds, it is treated as though it had been the target of the spell, instead of the other creature. If the adrasura is not an eligible target for the spell (such as enlarge person, which does not affect outsiders), the spell does not affect it, but the original target is also not affected. For each time the adrasura has used this ability in the last hour, it suffers a -2 penalty on caster level checks made to use this ability.
War Sage (Ex): An adrasura gains an insight bonus to AC equal to its Wisdom modifier. This insight bonus does not apply at any time the adrasura is denied its Dexterity bonus to AC. Additionally, the adrasura is considered to be proficient with all simple, martial, and exotic weapons, and suffers no penalties for wielding multiple weapons, provided it makes only a single attack with each such weapon in a given round.
Ecology
Among the more powerful of the asuras, adrasuras are incredibly proud and vain, and consider themselves to be lesser deities, worthy of worship from mortal races. Their anatomy is both familiar and bizarrely alien: their head faces backwards, giving them the disconcerting appearance of having no face when viewed from in front. Or, rather, this would be the case, if not for the massive face that dominates their chest and belly, with eight-inch-diameter eyes and a fanged mouth, which occasionally dribbles acid, which stretches from one side of their belly to the other. They also possess four arms, the second pair attached just above the waist.
Adrasuras are, as a general rule, obsessed with the practice of providing sacrifices to deities, and spend much of their time either interfering with such sacrifices, or attempting to trick, bully, or otherwise cajole mortals into providing such sacrifices to them, as well. Legend states that the first adrasuras were created when a deity demanded his followers to sacrifice their first-born sons to him, as a test of their faith, and then mistakenly allowed the test to go too far, resulting in a massive slaughter which the deity had not intended. Many believe that it is their origin that cause adrasuras to fixate on sacrifice, but other sources, including a manuscript reportedly written by an adrasura itself, purport that such sacrifices are a great source of power for many deities, and that if the process were fully understood, an adrasura might be able to achieve full divinity itself—offering a possible salvation to all asuras, or a possible way to battle the gods with their own weapons.