Tiddalik

Medium monstrosity, chaotic neutral

Armor Class 15 (natural armor)
Hit Points 138 (12d8+84)
Speed 30 ft.

STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
16 (+3)	15 (+2)	17 (+3)	6 (-2)	14 (+2)	11 (+0)

Saving Throws Str +6, Con +6
Skills Stealth +5
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 12
Languages –
Challenge 5 (1,800 XP)

SPECIAL TRAITS

• Deluge. A tiddalik that begins laughing either as a result of a failed saving throw against a hideous laughter spell or a successful DC 15 Charisma (Performance) ability check unleashes stored water in a torrent. All creatures within 30 feet of the tiddalik take 9 (2d8) points of bludgeoning damage and are forced prone. A success on a DC 15 Dexterity saving throw halves the damage and negates the prone condition.
• Locate Water. A tiddalik can spend ten minutes to concentrate on the location of the nearest source of pure water measuring at least 10 gallons within a 5-mile radius. It can find water hidden behind natural barriers regardless of thickness, but it cannot discover water within manufactured objects, including worked stone. For each additional ten minutes of concentration, it can extend the radius an additional mile.
• Vulnerability to Hideous Laughter. A tiddalik has disadvantage on all saving throws made against the hideous laughter spell.

ACTIONS

• Multiattack. The tiddalik makes one bite attack and one tongue attack.
• Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 17 (4d8 + 3) piercing damage.
• Tongue. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, 10 ft. reach, one target. Hit: The creature becomes grappled by the tiddalik (escape DC 15).
• Absorb Liquid (3/Day). A creature grappled by the tiddalik’s tongue must succeed a DC 15 Constitution saving throw or gain 1 level of exhaustion. A creature that gains a level of exhaustion this way must complete a long rest before it can be affected by this ability again.

ABOUT

A tiddalik is typically shorter than a human and looks thin to the point of emaciation when it holds no water. When full of water, it bloats considerably, becoming nearly the size of a horse, and it loses all pretense of a humanoid appearance.

It typically remains rooted in place during the day to avoid sweating out the water it hoards jealously, while it travels at night to find bodies of water it can absorb into its body. Depending on how thirsty it gets, it rests peacefully in water reaching halfway up to its head, or it stands among dry, cracked ground. Purportedly, the tiddalik was an ordinary frog which morphed into a humanoid form as it grew to a disproportionate size-and acquired an equally disproportionate thirst. Theories for the tiddalik’s powerful thirst run the gamut from the original frog insulting a deity to the frog accidentally swallowing a one-way portal to the Plane of Water. Whatever the cause of the frog’s overwhelming desire for water, it unleashes the water uncontrollably when something makes it laugh.

Unquenchable Thirst. A tiddalik is a walking ecological disaster regardless of how it reacts with respect to water. When it is thirsty, it dries out the land and kills plants, animals, and humanoids dependent on life-giving water. Oddly, killing a tiddalik does not return the water, and many people have learned the hard way that destroying a tiddalik ultimately leads to their own destruction. However, making it laugh is equally fraught with danger, since gushing water accompanies its gales of laughter. This watery release causes immediate damage to everything around it and eventually floods the land upon which it stands, as the water level rises several feet in short order. The best way to deal with a tiddalik is to return it to one of the places where it consumed all the water and trick it into returning the water to its source. Unfortunately, the tiddalik usually contains more water than the basin it dried out, so floods are still inevitable.