Snoligoster

Basic Information

• (Dorsohastatutus caudirotula)

A fearsome carnivore dwelling in the cypress swamps of the American South, particularly in the region around Lake Okeechobee, Florida. It resembles an enormous crocodile, but with long, glossy fur. It has no legs or fins; only a single long spike on its back on which it impales its prey. It travels quickly through the swamps by the means of three bony plates on its tail which it can rotate like the propeller on a steamboat.

Its favored prey is man. When it catches a person, it flings it up and backwards so that the unfortunate victim is impaled on the dorsal spike. The creature then digs a hole with its tail to deposit the victim in, purees him with its rapidly revolving propeller and then inhales him.

Sources

Bibliography

1. Fearsome Creatures of the Lumberwoods by William T. Cox (1910)

Game and Story Use

• Your party is pursuing a group of fugitive criminals who fled into the swamps. The locals seem strangely reluctant to help. “The snoligoster’ll get ‘em,” they say. But you aren’t about to let a piece of folklore cheat you out of that bounty…
• Or, contra wise, the members of your party are the fugitives, fleeing either the authorities or some other powerful enemies. The swamp seems like a safe place to hide. At least it would if not for those stories your grandfather used to tell about runaway slaves who “got et by the snoligoster”…
• Perhaps the party is actively hunting the snoligoster - either to kill it for a bounty for the "swamp monster", or to capture it a live for a circus or zoo specializing in monsters.
• A built-in propeller is anatomically speaking pretty weird, especially if it can match a steamboat for speed. In a biopunk setting, someone would probably pay good money for a DNA sample, and better for a breeding pair.
• Imagine a boat pulled by tame snollgosters.