Yeenoghu

Description

(from Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes - 2018):

Also known as the Beast of Butchery, Yeenoghu inspires his followers to devour any creatures they meet. In his mind, the cosmos is made up only of predators and prey. 

To sate his blood lust, Yeenoghu often rampages across the Abyss, killing everything in his path. Only those demons that join him in wreaking carnage can avoid his wrath. Yeenoghu's wanderings across the Abyss are like the meanderings of a storm. He and his cultists pass through an area like a monstrous hurricane whose course can never be predicted. 

Of all the demon lords, Yeenoghu has made the greatest mark on the Material Plane. During his rampage across the world eons ago, the race of gnolls sprang up in his wake. Every gnoll is a miniature embodiment of Yeenoghu's rage and hunger. They mimic their creator, killing any creatures that cross them and respecting only those that can withstand their fury. 

Cultists. Yeenoghu rarely acquires cultists other than gnolls, leucrottas, and the other creatures spawned by his incursions across the planes. The few humanoids that take up his worship are disaffected loners, many of them outcasts driven away from civilization. A cult of Yeenoghu operates like a pack of gnolls, regardless of what creatures make it up. Yeenoghu infuses them with a cannibalistic hunger, and they know that each victim they claim draws them closer to his presence.

The Beast of Butchery appears as a great battle-scarred gnoll, towering 14 feet tall. Yeenoghu is the Gnoll Lord, and his creations are made in his twisted image. When the demon lord hunted across the Material Plane, packs of hyenas followed in his wake. Those that ate of great Yeenoghu’s kills became gnolls, emulating their master’s ways. Few others worship the Beast of Butchery, but those who do tend to take on a gnoll-like aspect, hunched over, and filing their teeth down to points.

Yeenoghu wants nothing more than slaughter and senseless destruction. The gnolls are his instruments, and he drives them to ever-greater atrocities in his name. Yeenoghu takes pleasure in causing fear before death, and he sows sorrow and despair through destroying beloved things. He doesn’t parlay; to meet him is to do battle with him — unless he becomes bored. The Beast of Butchery has a long rivalry with Baphomet, the Horned King, and the two demon lords and their followers attack one another on sight.

The Gnoll Lord is covered in matted fur and taut, leathery hide, his face like a grinning predator’s skull. Patchwork armor made of discarded shields and breastplates is lashed onto his body with heavy chains, decorated by the flayed skins of his foes. He wields a triple-headed flail called the Butcher, which he can summon into his hand at will, although he is as likely to tear his prey apart with his bare hands before ripping out its throat with his teeth.

Yeenoghu's Lair:

Yeenoghu’s lair in the Abyss is called the Death Dells, its barren hills and ravines serving as one great hunting ground, where he pursues captured mortals in a cruel game. Yeenoghu’s lair is a place of blood and death, populated by gnolls, hyenas, and ghouls, and there are few structures or signs of civilization on his layer of the Abyss.

Lair Actions: On initiative count 20 (losing initiative ties), Yeenoghu can take a lair action to cause one of the following effects; he can’t use the same effect two rounds in a row.

• Yeenoghu causes an iron spike—5 feet tall and 1 inch in diameter—to burst from the ground at a point he can see within 100 feet of him. Any creature in the space where the spike emerges must make a DC 24 Dexterity saving throw. On a failed save, the creature takes 27 ((6d8)) piercing damage and is restrained by being impaled on the spike. A creature can use an action to remove itself (or a creature it can reach) from the spike, ending the restrained condition.

• Each gnoll or hyena that Yeenoghu can see can use its reaction to move up to its speed.

• Until the next initiative count 20, all gnolls and hyenas within the lair are enraged, causing them to have advantage on melee weapon attack rolls and causing attack rolls to have advantage against them.

Regional Effects: The region containing Yeenoghu’s lair is warped by his magic, creating one or more of the following effects:

• Within 1 mile of the lair, large iron spikes grow out of the ground and stone surfaces. Yeenoghu impales the bodies of the slain on these spikes.

• Predatory beasts within 6 miles of the lair become unusually savage, killing far more than what they need for food. Carcasses of prey are left to rot in an unnatural display of wasteful slaughter.

• If a humanoid spends at least 1 hour within 1 mile of the lair, that creature must succeed on a DC 17 Wisdom saving throw or descend into a madness determined by the Madness of Yeenoghu table. A creature that succeeds on this saving throw can’t be affected by this regional effect again for 24 hours.

If Yeenoghu dies, these effects fade over the course of (6d8) days.

Madness of Yeenoghu:

If a creature goes mad in Yeenoghu’s lair or within line of sight of the demon lord, roll on the Madness of Yeenoghu table to determine the nature of the madness, which is a character flaw that lasts until cured. See the Dungeon Master’s Guide for more on madness.

D100:     Flaw (lasts until cured):

01-20:    “I get caught up in the flow of anger, and try to stoke others around me into forming an angry mob.”

21-40:    “The flesh of other intelligent creatures is delicious!”

41-60:    “I rail against the laws and customs of civilization, attempting to return to a more primitive time.”

61-80:    “I hunger for the deaths of others, and am constantly starting fights in the hope of seeing bloodshed.”

81-00:    “I keep trophies from the bodies I have slain, turning them into adornments.”

(from 3.5e Fiendish Codex I Supplement - 2006):

This gaunt, 12-foot-tall humanoid demon is covered with mangy patches of yellow fur and has pale gray fl esh showing where the fur is absent. His face is that of a leering, amber-eyed hyena, and he wields a massive fl ail with three spiked heads.

Savage and ruthless, Yeenoghu is the patron of all gnolls and commands the servitude of ghouls through the subjugation of the demonic King of the Ghouls.

Servants, Enemies, and Goals: Yeenoghu is one of the lesser demon lords, yet he still commands a large empire on the 422nd layer of the Abyss, a region known simply as “Yeenoghu’s Realm.” He spends much of his time hunting lesser creatures or captured mortals and idly plotting assaults on the holdings of powerful demonic entities who are not themselves demon lords quite yet.

One of Yeenoghu’s greatest and earliest triumphs was the subjugation of Doresain, the King of the Ghouls. Once a vassal of Orcus, the King of the Ghouls controlled his own layer of the Abyss until Yeenoghu’s army invaded and conquered the layer and its undead ruler. The King swore fealty to Yeenoghu and continues to pay him homage to this day. Doresain still rules the White Kingdom today, but as a sworn ally of the more powerful Prince of Gnolls. Orcus’s attention has been elsewhere, and so far, he has not acted against the Prince of Gnolls for the theft of one of his subjects.  

One of Yeenoghu’s great desires is to see to the prosperity of his people, the gnolls. He envisions a Material Plane dominated by his children, where elves and humans and dwarves and halfl ings are slaves at best and food at worst. Yet he realizes that all the gnolls in the Material Plane could not achieve such a goal—as a result, he actively supports cultists of other races who turn to him for support. The enigmatic leader of the Maure family once represented his most powerful cult among humanity at the time, yet internal strife caused by rival demon lord Malcanthet saw to the ruin of this resource. Today, Yeenoghu counts the Queen of Succubi as one of his greatest enemies and periodically raids her realm. He is always turned back by her defenses, but one day he hopes to gain enough allies to see to her ruin.  

Only Yeenoghu’s eternal war with Baphomet nears the level of his hatred for Malcanthet. The source of the confl ict between the Prince of Gnolls and the Prince of Beasts is unclear, likely forgotten even by the two demon lords themselves, yet they show no signs of ceasing their eternal hostilities.  

Yeenoghu demands living sacrifi ces in remote wilderness regions on altars of crude stone. His faithful wear dark brown robes accented by mangy yellow furs. They are not allowed to clean these robes, and in time they grow horrific with clotted blood and foul odors.  

Clerics of Yeenoghu have access to the domains of Chaos, Demonic, Evil, and Fury. His symbol is his tripleheaded flail.

Strategy and Tactics: Bestial and straightforward, Yeenoghu is more likely to charge into melee growling and screaming epithets before doing anything more subtle, although his fi rst action in combat is almost always to cast bull’s strength on himself (the statistics above take this into account). If faced with large numbers of foes, he’ll summon gnolls, ghouls, and demons for support.

Triple Flail: Yeenoghu wields a unique triple-headed +3 adamantine heavy flail. Each time he scores a hit with this item, roll 1d3 to see how many of the heads hit the target. A hit with the flail deals the same amount of damage no matter how many heads strike. If more than one head hits the same target, the victim must succeed on a DC 32 Will save or be confused for 2d4 rounds. If all three hit, the target must also make a successful DC 32 Fortitude save or be paralyzed for 1d4 rounds. Only Yeenoghu can use the weapon to confuse and paralyze targets. The save DCs are Strength-based. 

Summon Ghouls (Sp) Once per day, Yeenoghu can automatically summon 1d6+6 enhanced ghouls. These ghouls have maximum hit points and a +5 profane bonus on turn resistance, Armor Class, and attack and damage rolls. This ability is the equivalent of a 7th-level spell (CL 20th). 

Summon Gnolls (Sp) Once per day, Yeenoghu can automatically summon 11d6 gnolls or 2d6 5th-level gnoll fighters. This ability is the equivalent of a 9th-level spell (CL 20th).

Summon Tanar’ri (Sp) Once per day, Yeenoghu can automatically summon 1d2+1 vrocks or 1d4 bulezaus. This ability is the equivalent of a 9th-level spell (CL 20th).