Cave Jellyfish

For no good reason, I was reading up on the lifecycle of the jellyfish.  Weird creatures, weird lifecycle.  I really like the notion of the "scyphistoma" - for some jellies, the immature polyps are stacks of jellyfish that can split off.  What a perfect creature for the dungeon.

While I've got a water level planned for level 3, I don't want to put too many traditional sea creatures in there.  Too predictable.  Instead, I'll have the cave jellies floating through the air, stinging and paralyzing and eating adventurers' faces.  The scyphistoma is what they'll likely encounter at first - and when they retreat after some nasty paralyzations, the whole thing just comes apart into a dozen jellies to chase them around.  Given the Labyrinth Lord rules, the scyphistoma is worth a massive amount of XP for something I'm putting on the second level, but I'm guessing the players never kill the thing before it breaks up into its component jellyfish.  If they do, hey, they can have the XP, they earned it.

Cave Jellyfish
No. Enc: 1d12 (1d12)
Alignment: Neutral
Movement: 3’ (1’)
  Fly: 60’ (20’)
Armor Class: 4
Hit Dice: 1
Attacks: 1
Damage: 1d3 + see below
Save: F1
Morale: 12
Hoard Class: None
XP: 13

The cave jellyfish is a glowing, translucent yellow creature that floats about in the air, supported by bladders of gas in its umbrella-shaped body.  This invertebrate attacks by lashing out with its venomous tentacles, and if a victim is hit and does save versus paralysis, he will be paralyzed for 1d8 rounds.

Despite their clumsy appearance, the cave jellyfish are capable of graceful maneuvering, and are able to move relatively quickly through the damp cavern air.

Cave Scyphistoma
No. Enc: 1 (1)
Alignment: Neutral
Movement: 0’ (0’)
Armor Class: 9
Hit Dice: 10
Attacks: 3
Damage: 1d3 + see below
Save: F0
Morale: 12
Hoard Class: None
XP: 2,400

These creatures are the larval stage of the cave jellyfish.  The scyphistoma is a glowing, translucent yellow polyp, five feet in diameter and eight feet tall.  The polyp is firmly attached to the cave or dungeon surface, and will attack anything nearby with its tentacles.  It may make up to three attacks per round, with a reach of 5’.  On a successful hit, the victim must save versus paralysis or be paralyzed for 1d8 rounds by the painful venomous sting of the tentacles.

Scyphistomas are normally quiescent, but will begin the next stage of their lifecycle if disturbed and unable to feed.  Should the creature come under attack, or victims manage to escape its grasp, it will began to split into multiple cave jellyfish, at a rate of one per round.  Each split will cause 5 points of damage to the cave scyphistoma, until it reaches zero (or below), at which nothing will be left of the parent scyphistoma but shredded flaps of bioluminescent matter.

Each cave jellyfish spawned will have 5 hit points.