Can Opener
(a.k.a. Jack the Can Opener)
As your Instructor it is my duty to pass along the knowledge that I have acquired, no matter what the subject. I find the subject of the so-called Can Opener to be personally disturbing, but I shall continue to fulfill my purpose. The Can Opener specializes in killing my kind. It uses its claws...
Instructor, it's okay. I've got this. The serial killer known as Jack the Can Opener specializes in huntin' and killin' soulforged, golems, and other mechanikin. It has left an oily trail throughout the Zone and has even been sighted on the Shattered Moon. Its true identity remains unknown. Ok class, you're dismissed. We'll start again tomorrow.
The notorious serial killer known as "The Can Opener" first killed in the Cannery district of Aurumopolis. At first it targeted solitary Mechani-kin workers. It was named for its proclivity for tearing open the metal or stone bodies of their victims. The victims were found with their hex crystal or maharlitech hearts removed from them.
The Aurumopolis Police were completely disinterested in the deaths of the "Unnumbered". They only showed up to leave paperwork along with their thoughts and prayers. However, once the Can Opener expanded the slaughter to other cities around the Kirinal Concordance Zone, the Zone Authority Police began the first real investigation into the Can Opener killings. Despite their efforts, the Can Opener has not been captured and remains at large.
Encountering the Can Opener
The Can Opener stalks the back alleys of the poorer districts of cities around the Kirinal Pit. It seems to prefer non-soulforged construct sophonts such as the haphazardly made Bug Brothers, otherworldly warforged, and autognomes from beyond the stars. It will also kill the soulforged who are native to Erathia, but the vast majority of its kills are the Unnumbered.
It mostly attacks solitary victims or those in small groups. The majority of encounter survivors are flesh and blood mortals with a mechanical companion. They report the Can Opener lurching out of an alley, attacking and tearing open their forged friend.
Those who have survived an encounter with it decribe the can opener as a 9-foot tall red and green bipedal creature covered in chitin with a crab-like face. It's enormous claws tear through flesh, bone, and metal with equal ease. It tears open any mechanicals that it kills, strewing their innards everywhere as it searches for their motivating engine.
The Can Opener is an equal opportunity killer and has been known to also slaughter flesh and blood mortals. In those cases, however, it forgoes the vivisection, simply killing them by snipping off limbs or heads.
Recently a sighting of the Can Opener was reported on a skyship flying to the Shattered Moon. Those who survived the flight were the first to report on the Can Opener's mysterious, but unsubstantiated, conneciton to the Celestial Glutton known as the Tambanokano.
Players do not read below or you'll be spoiled.
The Can Opener Confessions
The Can Opener is actually a fiend summoned by a coven of at leat three members of the Cult of Tambanokano. These worshippers of the moon-eating kaiju crab hope to raise their master from it's home in the Tambanokano's Trench. They have discovered that sacrificing mechanical sophonts to its avatar, the Can Opener, strengthens the monstrous crustacean allowing it to spawn more eggs.
They want to bring those eggs to the moons where they will hatch and the Spawn will grow. They emerge as dog-sized crabs and then mature into monstrous avatars of Tambanokano, an army of Can Openers. They hope that the Spawn will thrive on the moon and, through the power of Totemic Gravity, draw their progenitor into the sky where it can finally eat the Moon.
Can Opener Plot Hooks
Cutting Through Red Tape
The Zone Authority Police hire the party to investigate a series of Can Opener kilings in an industrial part of town where they have no jursidiction. The actual authorities in that area are actively interfering. Why?
Creepy Crawlies in Cryzad's Sea
Reports reach the party of Can Opener killings on the Shattered Moon. They discover that a barrel of Tambanokano eggs have made it to Cryzad's Sea. They are hired to dive into the spherical shard to discover what has happened.
Slashed Survivor
A maimed survivor, whose mechani-kin companion was brutally killed by the Can Opener, begs the party to bring the killer to justice. They can't pay the party, but they know a lot about the Can Opener.
Mechani-kin Massacre
A particularly gruesome series of murders has been taking place in the poorer districts around the Zone. The investigation takes the party throught the dark underworld of mechani-kin and how they're treated in the Zone.
The Cult of the Can Opener
The party follows the clues and turns up an unexpected revelation. They discover a group of cultists who appear to worship the Can Opener, or the dark force behind it. Are they actually connected to the killer or are they just fan boys?
Homebrew
The Can Opener CR: 4
STR
18 +4
DEX
10 +0
CON
18 +4
INT
10 +0
WIS
14 +2
CHA
12 +1
Athletics +7, Perception +5, Survival +5
Darkvision 60 ft., Passive Perception 15
Actions
Multiattack. The Can Opener makes two opening claw attacks.
Opening Claw. Melee Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft. Hit: 10 (1d12+4) slashing damage plus 3 (1d6) necrotic damage. If the target is a creature, it suffers a lingering wound that causes 5 (2d4) necrotic damage at the start of each of its turns. Each time the Can Opener hits the wounded target with this attack, the damage dealt by the wound increases by 2 (1d4). The wound ends if the target regains hit points or if a creature uses an action to stanch the wound, which requires a successful DC 14 Wisdom (Medicine) check.
Legendary Actions
The Can Opener can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action can be used at a ime and only at the end of another creature's turn. The slasher regains spent legendary actions at the start of its turn.
Claw Slice. Melee Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft. Hit: 10 (1d12+4) slashing damage.
Vanishing Slice (Costs 3 Actions). The Can Opener makes one Opening Claw attack. After the attack hits or misses, the slasher can teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space it can see.
The Can Opener is a notorious killer that specializes in hunting sentient mechanical beings. It is actually a summoned fiend that embodies the anger and spite of the moon-eating kaiju crab known as the Tambanokano
Members of the cult can summon it through a tattoo of a fiendish crab somewhere on their body. It can be summoned for 1 minute every 1d10 hours.
When the Can Opener is killed, it leaves no corpse behind, instead fading away as if it never existed.
Siege Monster. The Can Opener has advantage on attacks against and does double damage to objects and structures.
i snickered at thoughts and prayers. good thing there's players to actually get the job done!
The Aurumopolis Police are definitely "thoughts and prayers" types of people!
Take a look at my Institutions of Learning challenge article.
Learn about the World of Wizard's Peak and check out my award winning article about the Ghost Boy of Kirinal!