Yes, I know, this one should have been saved for Halloween. Never mind.
Think of this one more as an adventure than an encounter, a low to mid level side quest or even the focus of a murder mystery investigation. You can play it as a straight crime adventure or as a dark, gothic horror.
This one has to be a rarity. Encounters with dybbuk in your campaign should be years apart.
Dybbuk
by Cab Davidson
| Stat | Dybbuk |
| AC: | Special |
| HD: | Special |
| Movement: | Special |
| Attacks: | By Weapon |
| Damage: | By Weapon+Paralysis+ Energy Drain |
| Number Appearing: | 1 |
| Save as: | F3 |
| Morale: | 9 (2) |
| Treasure Type: | Special |
| Alignment: | Chaotic |
| XP Value: | Variable |
The mysterious and dangerous Dybbuk is unlike any other undead. It has no physical form of its own. Its incorporeal form cannot be seen even by those able to Detect Invisble, but it can be sensed by means of Detect Evil. In this form it is essentially unable to interact with the physical world in any way. It can travel extremely fast in incorporeal form, and can fly up to 24 miles every night seeking a victim.
A Dybbuk is created when a powerful entropic entity finds among the living a candidate with the most depraved and unholy desires, but a fear or inhibition from acting upon them. Such desires are so far beyond that which most can understand that they will not be discussed here, but they amount to the worst and most inhumane acts that can be done to other sentient creatures. The candidate is offered an opportunity to act upon those desires, in return for their mortal life, and the result is an eternal curse whereby the subject is transformed into a Dybbuk, and will wander the lands seeking victims to possess and use to carry out said vile acts.
Possession is a slow process - a dybbuk in incorporeal form seeks out an unsuspecting victim and will watch, potentially for months, hoping to identify a subject most useful to them. When they are certain they have found the perfect subject they will attempt to take possession while the subject sleeps - they may attempt up to seven times to do so, on seven successive nights, and on each occasion the victim must make a saving throw vs. spells at -2. Once possession has occurred, the dybbuk will rest until the next night.
During the day the victim will be unaware of anything untoward having happened. But the next night the dybbuk will take possession of the victim, who will rise (unaware that anything is happening) in their sleep, dress, arm themselves, and act upon the dybbuks will. Every night thereafter, the dybbuk will take control.
The dybbuk is both intelligent and manipulative. While the victim will lose some sleep and perhaps have some tiredness, the dybbuk will attempt to hide its actions from the victim. Hours of murderous crime may be covered up by careful washing and allowing the victim just sufficient sleep to suspect nothing. The dybbuks studies will allow the victim to pass all but the most informed scrutiny.
Detecting dybbuk possession is difficult. ESP during the daytime will not reveal the possession. Truesight can show the dybbuks presence, or ESP while the possessing spirit is active at night. Otherwise the victim will, likely, eventually be blamed for the dybbuks actions, and most often the possession ends when the victim is caught and dealt with (by lengthy jailing or by being killed). The dybbuk will leave its victim at the point of death or imprisonment and then, typically, travel many hundreds of miles to find its next prey.
In combat, the dybbuk can use any skills or weapons possessed by its victim including weapon mastery, thief skills and magic user spells. The dybbuk possesses, in addition to the weapon skills of its victim, the ability to paralyse a victim (as a ghoul) and after taking whatever unholy pleasure it chooses, it can choose to energy drain its prey. However no clerical or druidic abilities can be used unless the dybukk has possessed a cleric of an entropic immortal (or if immortals are not used in your campaign, a chaotic cleric). Killing the victim will not kill the dybbuk.
A Dispel Evil spell will kill a possessing dybuk. They are resistant to turning - they can be turned as if a wight, but a T will only dismiss the spirit for 1d6 hours, and a D will dismiss it for 1d6 days. An exorcism conducted by a name level cleric on holy ground will permanently expel the dybbuk.
Dybbuks are, thankfully, rare.