Oma

Source: Alien Archive

CR: 16 XP: 76,800

N Colossal magical (beast)

Init.: +8 Senses: darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision Perception: +28

Defense

HP: 285

EAC: 30 KAC: 31

Fort: +16 Ref: +16 Will: +19

Offense

Speed: fly 60 ft. (Su, clumsy)

Melee: tail slap +27 (6d8+19 B) or bite +27 (6d6+19 P plus swallow whole)

Ranged: electrical discharge +29 (6d4+16 E; critical overload [DC 24])

Offensive Abilities: swallow whole (5d4+16 E, EAC 30, KAC 27, 71 HP)

Spells Known: (CL 16th)

Statistics

Str: +3 Dex: +3 Con: +7 Wis: +10 Int: +0 Cha: +5

Skills: Acrobatics +33 (+25 when flying), Piloting +33, Sense Motive +28

Languages: starsong (can’t speak any language)

Ecology

Environment: any vacuum or gas giant

Organization: solitary, pair, or pod (3–5)

Special Abilities

<p><b>Cavatina (Su)</b> Once per day as a move action, an oma can sing a telepathic song that either encourages its friends or dispirits its foes. The oma can grant a +2 morale bonus to ability checks, attack rolls, and skill checks to all allies within 60 feet. Alternatively, the oma can cause all enemies within 60 feet who fail DC 24 Will saving throws to take a –2 penalty to ability checks, attack rolls, and skill checks. This bonus or penalty lasts for 8 rounds.<br/><br/> <b>Electrical Discharge (Ex)</b> An oma can strike foes with a blast of electrical energy that has a range increment of 120 feet. When an oma scores a critical hit with its electric discharge, the target must succeed at a DC 24 Reflex save or technological items held by the target are unusable and do not provide any benefit to their wielder for 1 minute.</p>

Description

Oma are vast creatures, often called “space whales,” that travel endlessly through the inky void. They magically project electromagnetic fields that shield them from the effects of the vacuum as well as from the particulate rings and dense atmospheres of the gas giants in which they usually feed, extracting energy and nutrients with their energy baleen. Oma are most often seen traveling alone, though there are regions of the Pact Worlds system where pods of oma are known to migrate together on a particular, if mysterious, schedule. Rarely, massive numbers of oma gather in the rings of a planet and put on an incredible show, their energy fields intermingling and reacting with local gases to light up swaths of space in a multicolored spectacle. A typical oma is 150 feet long and weighs 250 tons.

The most commonly known—and least understood—feature of oma is their starsong: a haunting telepathic melody that can be perceived thousands of miles away, even across the void of space. While most describe starsong as slow, mournful, and crooning, none ever agree on the finer details of a particular oma song, which suggests that each listener hears something different. Attempts to decipher concrete meaning from these tonal poems have so far eluded even the most brilliant magic and linguistics experts, as the oma speak in riddles that even they don’t always appear to understand. Scholars and cryptolinguists among the glowing (and completely unrelated) poet-whales of Triaxus’s arctic seas claim that the patterns represent a surprisingly complete oral history of the universe, albeit a highly stylized and nonchronological version. Whatever the content of the songs, even the saltiest of spacefarers can become tearily nostalgic when they recall their first experience hearing the haunting sound in the silence between worlds.

Most reported interactions with oma have affirmed their docile nature, and many experienced spacefarers believe that the titanic creatures have a benevolent streak and that sighting one is a sign of good luck and favorable trade ahead. More than one crew of a disabled starship has reported being found by a passing oma, which then herded the ship back to civilized space. Once its temporary charges are safe again among their kind, the oma bids farewell with slow somersaults and cryptic starsong. However, those few that have attempted to hunt oma for sport have found them more than capable of defending themselves; the massive beasts can unleash a targeted burst of energy that disables most modern starship power cores. This has not gone unnoticed by various governments, who make periodic (and so far unsuccessful) attempts to reverse engineer and weaponize this ability. Oma are also capable of swallowing small starships (such as fighters and interceptors) whole; some do it accidentally as they feed, but most only when provoked.