For all of you that have seen any of the Pumpkinhead movies:
So the thought popped in my head while watching the first movie last night to create a Pumpkinhead monster for Ravenloft and I guess for general 3.5 D&D. He/it wouldn't be very hard to make, but my question for everyone is what CR would he be? Arguably, I guess, it wouldn't matter because he is practically invincible except for the couple of specific ways to get rid of him. I plan on possibly using him in my game which takes place in a custom domain I created within the Core, and there is indeed a witch that would summon him similarly to how it is done in the movies, but I just wanted to get everyone's opinions.
Now I would have him as a demon outsider that gets summoned into Ravenloft, but of course the problem then becomes he couldn't get out of Ravenloft unless he is killed or possibly when he finishes his mission Dark Powers pending. If he is a strong enough monster, as he more than likely should be, the Dark Powers may not want him in Ravenloft very long, even though he only goes after specific targets and those that get in his way. So maybe they would allow him to return to the outer planes after his mission is complete. Especially because if trapped in Ravenloft after his mission is completed, it could result in a dark day for Ravenloft indeed.
Any suggestions, comments, ideas? I'm sure this has been done before, but I want to make my own version too just to say I did.
I think it depends... are you looking for the monster to be a monster in its own right, or is it a tool of vengeance for someone else?
I looked over the wikipedia entry for the movie, and it seems like the summoning demands two corpses - one used to provide motive/vengeance and the other for, I assume, raw materials. That second corpse may also need to be pulled out of the ground of a pumpkin patch.
Overall, from the summary I read, it looked like there was an injustice done and then the monster summoned by a witch for a steep price, then unleased. I was a little unclear on the price, since the wiki summary was... sketchy. It seemed like the target of the curse might also take on Pumpkinhead-traits, as might the person who had cause to invoke the curse?
Personally, I think it works best as a tool for someone else to achieve vengeance - and in that case, I'd discount any outsider/summoned status and simply consider it a manifestation of fears. I'd toss out any of the "it's summoned and now can't leave the plane" rules.
I think something like this has been done before, with a strawman/scarecrow golem that haunts someone's farm after the family father went mad with paranoia, and allowed his defense mechanism (the scarecrow) to go wild and "protect" the farm against the family's desire to leave, stop it, escape, whatever. Still, it's not a bad idea, and there's always a twist you can toss toward it. It reminds me a bit of Burton's Sleepy Hollow, where the monster (Headless Horseman/Hessian, Pumpkinhead) was used to pursue an agenda. The witch who raises Pumpkinhead might be an interesting Darklord - allowing people to come to her, heartbroken and distraught, and granting their wishes for justice when they are bloodyminded and wrapped up in fury and grief, then turning the enchantment to catastrophe.
"Of course I can grant you revenge upon your enemies - bring me the corpse of your lost child and another corpse. We will create an instrument of vengeance, and those who wronged you will pay..." Never mind that it will corrupt/kill you as well, and you may be asked to obtain a fresh corpse from a pumpkin patch by murdering someone there - perhaps with a sickle the witch provides?
I do like the manifestation idea instead of it being a summoned monster. Yes Pumpkinhead is a tool of vengeance. Basically if something horrible is done onto you, you can call upon this witch to summon Pumpkinhead to get revenge on those who wronged you. Ultimately, those that wronged you will be killed in brutal horrible ways, but the price you pay is that your soul is damned forever and you will undoubtedly go to hell for directly causing the pain and death that Pumpkinhead unleashes. For example, in the first movie a man's boy is ran over by a group of careless kids who then leave the boy to die after hitting him. So the man goes to the with with his dead boy and the witch then has the man dig up a specific body from a forgotten graveyard. Using the dug up body, and blood from the dead boy and the man, the witch is able to call Pumpkinhead, who rises using the dug up body. Ultimately, when the man that wanted the vengeance dies so does Pumpkinhead, and the man's remains are then buried and used for the next calling of Pumpkinhead whenever that time may come.
Wrong is committed against Victim A.
Victim A seeks out the Witch for vengeance.
Victim A is told to dig up Corpse of B and bring it and a Token of the wrong committed to the Witch.
The Token is used to create Pumpkinhead (the dead son in the movie).
Pumpkinhead finishes it's work and/or dies when Victim A is killed.
Victim A becomes Corpse of A.
Victim C starts the cycle again, and is directed to retrieve Corpse of A for the Witch.
I imagine that you can get creative with how the monster manifests based on what token is used, assuming that not every call to vengeance requires someone's corpse as the cause. Or, maybe it does require a body - worse yet if your loved one that you are seeking revenge for isn't quite dead, merely wounded or horribly sick, and they are forcibly turned into fuel for the Pumpkinhead.
Either way, it looks like Pumpkinhead rises from the corpse of the last one to seek vengeance using the rite. The other stuff (the invoker (father) and the token (son)) just provide fuel and serve the cycle?
I think there's an argument for some sort of corrupted plant creature as a Darklord, but the idea of the Witch being the Darklord, to me, has a bit more appeal - especially since you can cloak her (or him) as a hermit,or a doctor, or a hedge mage, or even a therapist or elder in the village - no one may "know" about the rite until they come to the Witch in desperation - and susceptible to suggestion.
Plant-wise, you can draw it out as a corruption of the natural order, a confused or twisted druidic summoning, or similar - a predator looking for nutrient(blood)-rich bodies to feed from, or a protector operating according to some warped code (they defiled the woods! they hurt the innocent! etc).
I have watched the Pumpkinhead series, and there are a few ways you can do this.
The plot sequence of the first one was
- Child is killed.
- Father seeks witch for vengence.
- Father digs up specific corpse in pumpkin patch graveyard
- Monster is raised and savagely kills those "responsible" (child's death was an accident; the one responsible a selfish jerk, and all the others were trying to convince the jerk to do the right thing and help...tragic because they did not deserve what was coming)
- Father sees and feels every murder as if he was there (a curse - he would never have murdered the teens himself; his desire for vengence made him seek an outside source to do what he would not, but in the end, he was there for it and the murders were grisly things. The price was his soul--it was as if he did these acts)
- Father 'redeems' self when he realizes the only way to kill the monster is to die, and he makes that sacrifice
- Father's corpse is buried in the specific spot in the pumpkin patch gravesite; he will be the next Pumpkinhead when summoned, renuing the cycle.
This offers a lot of posiibilities. Personally, I think the most compelling is to have the "father" figure never redeem himself. To twist this to a Ravenloft storyline, you have the person seeking vengence, the Father (I'll call him that, though obviously, the crime could be anything). He performs the necessary acts to raise the monster (from the very ground, perhaps, as if it part of the land, if you don't want him to be an undead or summoned demon).
While he seeks vengence for a decent reason, but the punishment does not fit the crime (horrible murders and utter terror--Pumpkinhead was brutal, sadistic, and merciless; he absolutely terrorized those teens).
The Father had this creatured summoned so the he would not have dirty his hands or his conscience with the vengence, only to find that he experiences it all, and it is far worse than anything he'd have wished on the victimns.
However, the Father in Ravenloft is not willing to sacrifice himself to stop the beast, even when it keeps going. He is horrified by what it does and is disgusted by the creature. But, when the monster is hurt, he feels the pain, so he actually tries to prevent people from hunting the creature, no matter how much he would like for the creature to be gone. But Pumpkinhead cannot be killed while he is alive, and it cannot be controlled, so it keeps killing.
The crime needs to be fleshed out, but again, if you want to follow the movie, the punihsment of setting Pumpkinhead on the victums should be disprotionate to the crime.
In the movies, we never see Pumpkinhead complete his tasks. Would he have simply returned to the pumpkin patch had he killed all the teenages as the father wanted? So, if the in-game crime is vengence against a accidental death, you have to consider what will happen when of those involved are dead--this would also mean the PCs will be arriving on the scene about the same time Pumpkinhead is being raised.
On the otherhand, you can make the punishment on-going. If Pumpkinhead was summoned by a woman wanting to get vengence on another woman sleeping with her husband, maybe the monster killed the mistress, and then the husband (despite that not being what the wife wanted), and then it starts killing all women and men who have cheated on spouses or broken other oaths (a priest breaking an oath of chasity even if with a woman he loved). This could be going on for years, all the while the original wife who summoned the creature experiences each horrific death but is unwilling to do what is required to stop it.
In a custome domain, this could make for an interesting Darklord. Pumpkinhead becomes the manifestation of the Darklord whenever summoned, requiring a symbotic relationship with some other person to be active. In effect, the summoner becomes half the Darklord, cursed and tortured by the link--no one who would enjoy being a cold-blooded killer could form such a bond.
Pumpkinhead can also be developed to be a tortured soul as well. Given the cycle presented in the movie, the last summoner becomes the next Pumpkinhead, which is a form of torment: they don't want to be butchers, but are forced to kill at the whim of someone else. Though they have this monstrous form, they might equally hate what they have become and despise the summoner who brought it about but cannot act in any way other than to satisfy the odd need to kill certain people.
Pale wrote:I looked over the wikipedia entry for the movie, and it seems like the summoning demands two corpses
Technically just the one corpse, the one buried in the pumpkin patch. Plus blood from each person involved in summoning Pumpkinhead who then will be tied to the beast spiritually. Only the death of each one who gave blood will kill it. So if more than one summoner was involved it gets a lot more complicated since all of them have to die.
"Money is the root of all evil...I think I need more money."
Ah, I think I was counting the corpse of the person originally wronged/murdered - but there doesn't need to be a death to demand vengeance.
I still like the idea that the witch who raises the Pumpkinhead monster is the Darklord, with her schtick as providing the ritual to people. I think a sort of planned, deal-based evil (while not invoking fiendish pacts, necessarily - though the Pumpkinhead might -be- a fiend of sorts) has a lot of merit.
Perhaps the witch was cast out of her village for stereotypical dark deeds (evil eye, mean to kids, kicked puppies, only had that one tooth, someone wanted her property) and used this ritual for those who came around to her hut on her reputation as a mystic or alchemist, etc. Perhaps she started a feud (Hatfield v McCoy) between her persecutors, and conveniently offered each side the tool (Pumpkinhead) to escalate it?
You've got her egging on a blood-feud then, "selling guns" to both sides to keep it going, and delighting in the fact that she is the means that both sides are using to destroy the other after they had turned her out, made her miserable, stole her land?
Pale wrote:Perhaps she started a feud (Hatfield v McCoy)
Funny you should mention them. According to wiki, the Hatfield and McCoy feud is the central plot of the 4th (direct to SciFi channel) Pumpkinhead movie... (I got curious after reading this thread. Never saw any of them myself, but now I'm intrigued)
"We're realistic heroes. We're not here to save the world, just nudge the world into a better place."
Was actually thinking more of Saberhagen's books of swords - Farslayer. Hatfield and McCoy are a better-known example, I think.
Farslayer was a sword, silver-colored blade, black handle, with a small white bullseye on the hilt. Take it in both hands, spin with it, recite a verse, and let go, and it would fly off and kill your desired target. Problem was, the sword would usually end up buried in your target, when said-target was at home, near friends and other sorts who now had a nice enchanted sword ready at hand to return to sender.
A blood feud in those books sprung up around two families who "traded" the sword back and forth. I was thinking, in this Pumpkinhead context, of two families who keep sending the monster back and forth between them, while the witch enjoys their turmoil.
