Living Fortress (3.5e Monster)

* A living fortress' Strength and Constitution scores increase by 2 points for every 5 extra Hit Dice.

A giant fortress festooned with fearsome battlements and a great, taciturn face hewn in the stone of its front, it moves across the known lands with a foreboding rumble, displacing all in its wake.

A living fortress is the result of ancient and long forgotten epic magics. Although at its core it is a construct, it is the product of many commingled earth elemental spirits, which bestows it true life, and grants it the traits of an elemental. A living fortress is over 200 feet from side to side, and weighs roughly 120,000 tons.

Combat
A living fortress is outfitted with a multitude of defensible placements in a similar fashion to a real, stationary fortress. In battle, it simply lumbers in the direction that its master wills it to, with a constant, unrelenting crawl.

A living fortress cannot attack, cannot make attacks of opportunity, cannot be flanked, and cannot initiate grapples, trips or overruns.

 (Ex): Being a fortress and not an actual creature, the living fortress is treated somewhat differently in combat to an ordinary creature, as follows.


 * Direct Damage: Any damage dealt directly to the living fortress by virtue of natural or manufactured weapons of effective size Huge or smaller is halved before applying damage reduction.


 * Defensive Placements: A living fortress has battlements that can provide a standing ground for soldiers or spellcasters. A living fortress contains two siege platforms on top, each of which large enough to house a single creature or siege engine of Gargantuan size. A total of 24 balistrarias (arrow loops) cover the fortress walls, with 6 on each of the castle's flanks. Any archer or spellcaster attacking from behind a balistraria is treated as having improved cover from any creature outside of the fortress (+8 to Armor Class and Reflex saves, with effective improved evasion against any area effect originating from outside the fortress). Creatures using the slits to attack can only target creatures on the corresponding flank (i.e. in a 90 degree cone extending out from their side of the castle). Defenders standing atop the battlements have no such restrictions, but can still use the battlements to gain normal cover.
 * Called Shots: Attacks may be called on different spots of the fortress. To make a called shot on the living fortress, you must declare a 10x10 square of the fortress wall as the target of the attack. This part of the fortress is treated like a 'wall token' with 400 hit points. When damage is dealt to a wall token, deal direct damage (see above) equal to one half of that damage to the living fortress' total hit points as well. When a wall token sustains enough damage to destroy it, the corresponding portion of the fortress wall has been breached, and may be entered. Only creatures of size Huge or smaller may make called shots against a living fortress, and unlike direct damage, damage to a wall token is not halved.

 (Ex): When bullrushing a creature against an obstacle such as a wall or cliff, a living fortress crushes that creature with its titanic bulk, dealing an immediate 24d12+30 bludgeoning damage unless the creature succeeds on a DC 35 Reflex save. The save DC is Dexterity-based.

 (Su): When a creature casts a spell or spell-like ability with the Earth descriptor while inside a living fortress or on its battlements, its effective caster level is treated as four higher. Furthermore, when using a summoning spell in order to summon a creature with the Earth subtype, the spell is treated as being one level higher (for example, summon nature's ally V becomes summon nature's ally VI when intended for an earth creature). In case of a 9th level summoning spell, the summon instead conjures twice the number of creatures it normally does.

 (Ex): A living fortress can glide through stone, dirt, or almost any other sort of earth except metal as easily as a fish swims through water. Its burrowing leaves behind no tunnel or hole, nor does it create any ripple or other signs of its presence.

A living fortress always uses its earth glide, even when effectively above ground. In those cases, it remains fixed to the earth, and simply moves across the surface. A living fortress has no discernible underside, meaning that it is unable of using the overrun ability.

A living fortress always touches a source of earth, and cannot navigate a body of water (although it might be able to burrow underneath it).

 (Ex): The slow stride of a living fortress is virtually unstoppable. A living fortress cannot be tripped. When moving into a creature's square, a living fortress automatically initiates a bull rush (+48 check modifier) without provoking an attack of opportunity. There is no limit to how many creatures a living fortress can bullrush in the space of a single round, as it effectively pushes everything it encounters ahead of itself.

A living fortress gets a +20 bonus to opposed bull rush, grapple and overrun checks, as well as to saves against effects that would move or displace it.

 (Ex): A living fortress is immune to any spell or spell-like ability that allows spell resistance. In addition, certain spells and effects function differently against the creature, as noted below.


 * The move earth spell causes the living fortress to be hasted for 2 rounds.
 * Certain spells that manipulate earth and stone cause the living fortress to either lose or gain hit points. Transmute mud to rock and stone shape function like cure critical wounds, whereas transmute rock to mud functions like inflict critical wounds. A wall of stone, when cast on a damaged wall token (see called shots above) functions like heal. Even a destroyed wall token can be healed in such a fashion.