Ripper Swarm

Senses: Senses biomass by scent and vibration within 30 feet

Living Carpet. The swarm occupies a 10-foot zone rather than a space. Any creature that starts its turn in the zone takes 1d4 slashing damage from a thousand small mouths.

Mindless Tide. The swarm does not make Morale checks and is immune to fear and Suppression. Area effects and fire deal double damage to it, and a single-target weapon attack deals it at most 5 damage per hit.

Consume the Fallen. A downed creature or corpse in the swarm's zone is being eaten. After three rounds in the zone, a downed creature cannot be stabilized and a corpse yields nothing recoverable.

Engulf. One Prone or slowed creature in the swarm's zone makes an Agility Save DC 11 or is swarmed: it takes 1d6 + 1 slashing damage and has Disadvantage on attacks until it spends an action to break free.

Flow Through. The swarm moves up to its Movement through cracks, grates, and underbrush, ignoring barricades and doors that would stop anything man-sized.

Morale: Does not make Morale checks under synapse. Without synapse it disperses to feed on whatever is nearest and stops distinguishing directions.

Tactics: Spread across the ground the party wants to use — the objective room, the retreat lane, the casualty. Ignoring the swarm costs blood every round; killing it costs the area weapons the party wanted for the warriors.

Loot / Evidence / Hooks: Intact digestive sacs fetch a price from magos biologis studying hive-fleet consumption chemistry.

A ripper swarm is the hive fleet's digestion made ambulatory: a carpet of fanged organisms that exists to consume biomass, including whatever the party is standing on, in, or made of. It is not an attack; it is a process.

Use this enemy as area denial, a consumption timer on the wounded and the dead, and ambient horror in hive-touched terrain.

Threat Profile: Swarm-pattern unit, low individual threat, engulfing attrition damage, immune to Morale under synapse, clears only to area weapons and flame.

Living Carpet. Occupies zones rather than spaces; creatures in its zone take automatic gnawing damage each round they remain.

Consume the Fallen. Downed creatures and corpses in its zone are being eaten; recovery of either becomes a timed problem.

Mindless Tide. Immune to fear, Morale, and Suppression; only synapse loss or fire changes its behavior.

Engulf. Flows over a prone or slowed target; the target saves or is swarmed, taking damage and Disadvantage until it breaks free.

Flow Through. Moves through cracks, grates, and underbrush, ignoring barricades that stop anything man-sized.

Morale: No Morale under synapse; without synapse it disperses to feed on whatever is nearest and stops distinguishing directions.

Tactics: Spread rippers across the ground the party wants to use — the objective room, the retreat lane, the casualty. They are slow and stupid; the pressure is that ignoring them costs blood every round and killing them costs area weapons the party wanted for the warriors. Wounded characters should hear the carpet coming.

Full Stat Block Priority: Low