"There are more things in Heav- OH GOD IT'S BACK KILL IT KILL IT" - Nightmare Parasite for GLOG

Long, long ago, I was interested in this. I then discovered GLOG, and all of that melted away. But some of it stuck around. This is a love-letter to a 3.5e rebalancing homebrew, written for an OSR DIY sub-system:

For those who do walk his path, who embrace Terror as a means of strength, they may master the primordial arts of that Titan which should not have lived. To them, “Unafraid” is a mistranslation of “Ignorant”.

These inborn instincts can be traced back to The Nightmare himself, who rots and decays in that destitute pit, letting his existence blossom out unto the great wheel, spreading his legend, watching even in death, silently pushing those of his ascendents closer to his dream of perfect life. 

~ Xefas

It's so... purple. I dig it. This hobby rules.

Micah from Nuclear Haruspex designed this challenge to create parasite-related content for GLOG. There are many others like it, but this one is mine:

Biocon
Body King
Cuckoo Folk
Eater of Tongues
Hydrargent
Klyntar
Mother of Osk
Mycorrhizan
PARASITE
Parasite Brain
Spellbug
Temporal Paradox
Umbrant

Most other contributions are about people that have parasites, or playing a parasite that infects someone. You are a parasite, a scar, a blot on reality itself. And you're hungry.

This is you now. Credit Piotr Foksowicz

NIGHTMARE PARASITE

Starting equipment: your body, a Failed Career (you just wandered away one day)

Starting skill: 1. Interrogation, 2. Modification, 3. Observation

A Protrusions, Feast of Kings
B Caress, Efficiency, +1 protrusion
C Predators Gaze, +1 protrusion
D Apex, +2 protrusions

Protrusions
Your mortal form has been modified, gain a Protrusion from the list below. Each Protrusion deals 1d4 slashing damage unless otherwise stated, and is a reach weapon. If you have moved this round, you can make an attack with one Protrusion. If you haven't moved, you can attack with all of them.

If you are attacking a single target with multiple Protrusions, roll all d20s first, then allocate them.


Protrusion types:

1. Fleshy. 1d6 bludgeoning damage, grants +1 inventory slot
2. Sticky. Automatically grapples on-hit
3. Melty. Deals acid damage. A target that has taken 4 or more acid damage loses a random item or armour piece.
4. Burny. Deals fire damage. A target that takes 1 damage must save or be ignited
5. Pointy. 1d8 piercing damage. Grants 1 rank in Lock-Picking.
6. Chompy. Struck enemy with 3 HP or less is swallowed whole. Killing an enemy with this counts as lunch.
7. Smart. Is intelligent, has an eyeball, an ear and morale like a very loyal hireling
8. Flappy. Functions as malformed a wing/fin. Can be used to glide and swim. If you have two you can fly, badly.
9. Blade. 1d6 damage, can be used to Parry weapon attacks (reduces damage by 1d6 instead of attacking)
10. Icy. Deals cold damage. A target that has taken 6 or more cold damage is frozen to the spot.
11. Parrot. Has a nozzled structure at the end, can effectively mimic voices. Doubly effective at mimicking the pained screams of dying loved ones.
12. Everywhere. Doesn’t seem to be attached, it instead emerges from the ground, the targets body, a bottle, anywhere. You can make attacks using it at sight-range.
13. Hidden. Can be retracted inside you, unaware target takes +1d6 damage. +1 fast inventory.
14. Shiny. Also functions as a glowing semi-corporeal lure, target must make a WIS check or be distracted by it, seeing that which they most desire. Doubly effective in the dark.
15. Whip. x2 range. Useful for grabbing things at a distance.
16. Venomous / Infected (pick one). Target must save against a poison/disease you have experienced in the past. If you are currently suffering from the poison/disease, they do not get a save.
17. Sting. Struck target must save or have a random limb go uselessly numb for an hour.
18. Toxic. Struck target takes +1 damage from all other sources until they wipe it off. Stacks.
19. Cruel. If the damage dealt is odd, target has halved movement for the next round. If the damage dealt is even, target deals half damage next round. Targets that are much larger than you can save to negate.
20. Puppet. You can stab this into a corpse and control it for [level]x10 minutes before it falls apart. Take an action to attack with it, it can only move 10x[level] feet from you. If you spend an hour with a completely helpless living target, you can infest them with your Puppet protrusion, controlling them as if they were a corpse. They take 1d6 damage per 10 minutes of Puppetry.

Feast of Kings
You gain no sustenance from normal food. Instead, you heal 1d6 HP each time anyone with 50ft of you fails a save versus Fear, Madness etc. This always and especially includes you. You heal to full by spending a night within 50ft of someone who is suffering from nightmares.


Caress
Instead of dealing their normal damage, you can instead deal Terror Damage with your protrusions. Instead of Defence, this attack takes a penalty equal to their Wisdom score - 10. If dropped to 0 HP by terror damage, the target (1d6):

1. Suffers a heart attack (save or die, incapacitated if they succeed)
2. Is rendered mute or blind
3. Is greatly aged
4. Is paralysed for an hour
5. Refuses to see you or admit that any of the current events are happening
6. Goes utterly insane

Efficiency

You can remove one of the following to gain a new Protrusion.

• An arm
• A leg
• Your tongue
• An eye
• Your sanity (-4 save vs. madness)
• Half of an ability score
• As negotiated

Predators Gaze

If you can see someone, and they cannot see you, they take 1 Terror damage per minute. They instinctively know that if they can find you and see you, that they'll stop taking damage.

Apex

You gain two of the following effects. By removing two things via Efficiency, you can gain an extra benefit.

• You can attack with all your Protrusions even if you have moved this round
• If you are moving at a crawl, you are invisible
• You can gallop as fast as a horse and leap your normal speed in a single round
• Can eat and regurgitate up to 5x their bodyweight, distending your jaw impossibly
• As negotiated