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Archives of Nethys

Archives of Nethys

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PFS StandardCairn Wight

Jealous guardians of tombs, barrows, and sepulchers, cairn wights usually spawn from necromantic rituals. For those mortals who cannot abide the thought of separation from their earthly possessions, the undead existence offered by transformation into a cairn wight can be tempting. Perhaps as frequently, particularly avaricious and wealthy royalty or merchants seek out victims to transform into cairn wights to guard their precious wealth for all time.
Only in the rarest instances is the greed of a mortal strong enough to spontaneously transform them into a cairn wight without a dark ritual or the intercession of a powerful divine being. On those occasions, however, the resultant wight exhibits unmatched viciousness and likely owns rare treasure indeed.
As guardians of material possessions, cairn wights are supernaturally bound to the armaments they wore during the ritual used to create them. They can spread their necromantic powers into the weapons they wield. A slash from a cairn wight's sword channels life from the victim into the wight.

Recall Knowledge - Undead (Religion): DC 21
Unspecific Lore: DC 19
Specific Lore: DC 16

Elite | Normal | Weak
Proficiency without Level

Cairn WightCreature 4

Legacy Content

Uncommon LE Medium Undead Wight 
Source Bestiary 2 pg. 292 2.0
Perception +7; darkvision
Languages Common, Necril
Skills Athletics +8, Intimidation +7, Religion +5, Stealth +8
Str +4, Dex +2, Con +4, Int +1, Wis +3, Cha +3
Items longsword, studded leather armor
AC 16; Fort +8, Ref +6, Will +7
HP 67; Immunities death effects, disease, paralyzed, poison, unconscious
Final Spite [reaction] Trigger The cairn wight is reduced to 0 Hit Points; Effect The cairn wight makes a Strike before being destroyed. It doesn't gain any temporary HP from drain life on this Strike.
Speed 25 feet
Melee [one-action] longsword +10 [+5/+0] (versatile P), Damage 1d8+7 slashing plus drain lifeMelee [one-action] claw +10 [+6/+2] (agile), Damage 1d6+7 slashing plus drain lifeCairn Wight Spawn (divine, necromancy) A living humanoid slain by a cairn wight's weapon or claw Strike rises as a spawned wight after 1d4 rounds. This spawned wight is under the command of the cairn wight that killed it. It doesn't have drain life or cairn wight spawn and is clumsy 2 for as long as it is a spawned wight. If its creator dies, the spawned wight becomes a full-fledged, autonomous cairn wight; it regains its free will, gains drain life and cairn wight spawn, and is no longer clumsy.Drain Life (divine, necromancy) When the cairn wight damages a living creature with a melee Strike, using an unarmed attack or its bound weapon, the cairn wight gains 5 temporary Hit Points and the creature must succeed at a DC 14 Fortitude save or become drained 1. Further damage dealt by the cairn wraith increases the drained condition value by 1 on a failed save, to a maximum of drained 4.Funereal Dirge [two-actions] (auditory, divine, emotion, fear, mental, necromancy) The cairn wight chants a low, haunting melody. Living creatures within 50 feet must attempt a DC 17 Will save. The cairn wight can't chant a new Funereal Dirge for 1d4 rounds.
Critical Success The creature is unaffected.
Success The creature is frightened 1.
Failure The creature is frightened 2.
Critical Failure The creature is frightened 2 and takes a –2 status penalty to saving throws against drain life.

Sidebar - Additional Lore Cairn Wight Dirges

Unlike a typical wight, cairn wights have an unusual affinity for music. The lyrics of their dirges often contain a valuable bit of knowledge or long-lost lore, possibly the greatest treasure a cairn wight guards. There are even brave souls who seek out the creatures to listen to their songs in hopes of finding profit from the dry, rasping words.

All Monsters in "Wight"

NameLevel
Cairn Wight4
Hunter Wight7
Prowler Wight9
Wight3
Wight Commander12

Wight

Source Bestiary pg. 332
Wights are undead humanoids that, much like wraiths, can drain the life from living creatures with but a touch. They arise as a result of necromantic rituals, especially violent deaths, or the sheer malevolent will of the deceased.

As many types of wights exist as types of people from which they might be created. Hulking brutes, skittering sneaks, and cunning tinkers all make for different wights with different niches to fill. Environment, too, plays a part in determining a wight's special abilities and defenses. Frost wights, for instances, can be found in the parts of the world where exposure is a common end. Regardless, wights typically haunt burial grounds, catacombs, or other places of the dead. But their hunger is targeted toward the living—those individuals who remind them of the shackles of mortality and whom they feel compelled to “free” to the state of undeath.

A single wight can wreak a lot of havoc if it is compelled to rise from its tomb. Because creatures slain by wights become wights as well, all it takes is a single wight and a handful of unlucky graveyard visitors to create a veritable horde of these undead. Thus, canny priests and adventurers know that the best solution to a wight problem is swift and total eradication. Care must be taken, though, to destroy wight spawn before attempting to destroy the parent wight, for spawn without a master gain the ability to create spawn of their own.

Durable and sustained as they are by negative energy, wights can last in harsh environments without decaying the way some lesser undead do. They might dwell in high mountain passes, sealed passageways, or submerged in bogs or lakes for decades or even centuries before the passage of an unsuspecting traveler rouses them from their rest.

Sidebar - Related Creatures Barrow Arsenals

In addition to the wight presented here, many other varieties exist. For example, the covetous cairn wight—ritually created to eternally guard its own wealth or that of its master—haunts barrows, ossuaries, and mausoleums. Hunter wights arm themselves with bows and create arrowheads from bone shards snapped off their own ribs.

Sidebar - Geb Wights And Weaponry

For the rank-and-file wight, only the scrape of blackened fingernails steals the essence of life. Many stronger wights bind to armaments, either through the ritual that raised them or a sentimental attachment to a weapon they wielded. Not only are these weapons more versatile, but deploying them can surprise foes accustomed to the limits of average wights.