King Occulas of the Yellow Eye
Context
King Occulas was a Big Bad in the 1970s swords-and-barbarians comic series, Claw the Unconquered. For (much) more context you can first check our Fifteen Worlds cosmology article, and the Claw the Unconquered character profile.
He’s a fairly generic heroic fantasy bad guy, but that’s useful. And he was assisted by many weird monsters, which is even better.
Background
- Real Name: King Occulas the First.
- Marital Status: Unrevealed.
- Known Relatives: Father (name unrevealed, deceased).
- Group Affiliation: None.
- Base Of Operations: Castle Darkmorn in Ichar – the throne-city of Pytharia.
- Height: 5’10” Weight: 160 lbs.
- Eyes: One brown eye, one mutated yellow eye. Hair: Black
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Powers and Abilities
King Occulas is reasonably intelligent and determined. But his main assets are being overbearing and yelling at people because he knows that he’s the King. As such, he commands considerable political, military and mystic powers through the servants of the throne.
Occulas’s guards had the abilities of ordinary soldiers (and many just had militia-level abilities), adjusting for technology level. Even in small groups they never presented much of a threat against Claw. His monsters, presented in the game stats of this profile, were markedly stronger.
History
Prince Occulas was born the heir, or one of the heirs, of the throne of the heroic fantasy kingdom of Pytharia. The extraordinarily ambitious prince entered a covenant with the gods of chaos – which is probably when he acquired his mutated yellow eye.
Since Pytharia is apparently the largest and most powerful kingdom in the Known World, the shadow gods declared Occulas to be their champion in the struggle to have the Known World go chaos-side. Occulas expected even greater power in return, seeing his destiny as ruling over all the Fifteen Worlds.
Prince Occulas terrorised the court wizard Miftung. The cowardly Miftung had foreseen Occulas on the throne, and likely guessed that he was the secret champion of Chaos. Thus, Mifung knew that Occulas was his future master and ready to kill anybody to fulfil his ambitions.
Foretold
Occulas had Miftung foretell threats to his future reign. The omen that came was about a man with a webbed, dragon-like hand.
From there, Occulas warned the benign but naive king that such a man was to kill him. Though the king was puzzled as to why somebody he didn’t know would kill him, he tasked Occulas with finding such a man and have him brought to Ichar to answer of any regicidal plot.
Occulas used terror, intimidation and torture to learn of such a man. Once he was given the name of Kregar of Kanon Wood, he sent one of his minions to kill him rather than bring him to court. Zedon, the main killer working for Occulas, eliminated Kregard and his wife.
However, he did not see that the couple had a baby, who’d grow up to become Claw the Unconquered.
Meanwhile, Prince Occulas forced Miftung to brew a special poison. The heir used it to assassinate the king, and took over the throne. He immediately went for policies of terror, oppression and abuse intended to drag the world toward becoming a void realm.
The world trembles before his deadly blade !
After — presumably — two decades of this fare, the gods of law sent their champion to Pytharia. But the spell was jammed by the gods of chaos so the champion would arrive disarmed and amnesiac. They also sent dreams to Occulas about being stalked by a man with a demon hand.
Alarmed, King Occulas had Miftung perform more divinations. this is how he learned of the existence of Claw. The guard was alerted, and rewards announced throughout Pytharia.
The amnesiac Claw wandered right in Ichar and immediately got into trouble. Occulas sent Zedon to kill Claw since the guard couldn’t. Zedon having grown in ambition Occulas made this a suicide mission so as to kill two birds with one stone. Zedon did die, but Claw narrowly escaped and left Ichar.
The barbarian travelling fast and light, he was out of reach for King Occulas. But the royal had Miftung conjure a succession of monsters in Claw’s vicinity. Claw survived all such assaults, and Occulas had Miftung summon an uncontrollable and nigh-unstoppable chaos giant, N’Hglthss.
That’s right, N’Hglthss
Claw was dragged into a quest to find a weapon to stop N’Hglthss before he’d blindly ravage the whole world. He and his friend Ghilkyn put an end to the horrible menace the king had unleashed on his own kingdom.
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During the quest to destroy N’Hglthss, Claw learned that he was the champion of Law. He also learned of Occulas’s role in the death of the parents he never knew. He rode to Ichar again for vengeance and ploughed through the guard to reach the castle.
Occulas had Miftung levitate the castle away to flee, but Claw managed to jump aboard.
Royal battle
Occulas forced Miftung to cast a spell of transmutation, turning the king into a superhumanly powerful creature that could kill even Claw the Unconquered.
However, during the battle the old wizard’s concentration was broken. Knowing that he was about to die, Miftung betrayed Occulas and teleported Claw to safety before he passed away.
The diviner’s death broke all of his spells – including the one keeping the large castle aloft. King Occulas of the Yellow Eye died in the catastrophic crash.
A Shadow-God later came to visit the crash site, and decided to procure a better champion next time.
Description
See illustrations.
Personality
Power-mad, power-hungry, angry bully and tyrant who openly revels in his ruthless ability to use, kill and abuse anybody who can help with his ambitions.
Game Stats — DC Heroes RPG
Tell me more about the game stats
This section also describes Occulas’ allies and and monsters.
King Occulas of the Yellow Eye
| Dex: 03 | Str: 02 | Bod: 03 | Motivation: Power |
| Int: 03 | Wil: 03 | Min: 04 | Occupation: Tyrant |
| Inf: 06 | Aur: 05 | Spi: 04 | Resources {or Wealth}: 007 |
| Init: 012 | HP: 020 |
Skills:
Animal handling (Horses): 03, Charisma: 06, Weaponry (Melee): 04
Advantages:
Alter-ego (Spell of transformation), Credentials (Kingdom of Pytharia, High), Gift of Gab, Rank (General of the Pytharian military).
Connections:
Shadow-Gods (Low at best).
Drawbacks:
Creepy Appearance (Yellow eye), Minor Rage.
Equipment:
Minor melee weapon [BODY 04, Enhance (EV): 02 (cap is 05), Descriptor: Slashing and/or piercing].
Design Notes
Occulas and the rest all have low screen time. Therefore, many stats are tentative.
Miftung
Miftung is by far the greatest asset at Occulas’s disposal. Miftung is old and cowardly but he’s a powerful wizard (Occultist: 07) and a competent alchemist. He’s not even a NPC, really. Just a plot element Occulas yells at to have some magic done.
Part of Miftung’s cowardice was that he was loyal to the throne of Pytharia, even when occupied by a destructive tyrant. He could not bring himself to reject the current occupant. But that seemed to be an excuse to accept being bullied by Occulas.
Here are the things Miftun does to advance the plot :
- Scrying. This is used to see omens (mainly that Occulas’s reign would be threatened by a man with a hand webbed like a dragon’s paw) and to get a sense of a certain person’s general location and activities. Miftung usually scried using a crystal ball or an enchanted mirror, mirror on the wall.
- Summoning monsters from the planes of chaos. Miftung can open apertures into the void for monsters to step through and attack. The various monsters are detailed below because heh, monsters ! The largest and most terrible monster was N’Hglthss, who has his own writeups.org entry because, heh, monsters !
One bit of dialogue implies that Miftung could only conjure N’Hglthss after Occulas did something. Perhaps arranging with his chaos paymasters to have some information or other means allowing Miftung to open such a large aperture. - Brewing poisons, as was done once to dispatch Occulas’s father.
- Casting the spell of transmutation, detailed below.
- One of the most spectacular feats Miftung accomplished was to levitate the entire, large Castle Darkmorn, plus a sizeable chunk of soil and rock under it. However, as with most other magicians in Claws’s adventures, his death meant the immediate end of all of his active spells and enchantments.
Rock that body
The last resort measure used by Occulas against Claw was to coerce Miftung into casting the Spell of Transmutation. As it took place, the immobile Miftung was sheathed in yellow light, while the focused totality of his mystical might (to coin a phrase) was channelled into temporarily turning Occulas into a demonic-looking superhuman.
Though the transformed Occulas could probably have crushed even Claw, part of the spell was to channel Miftung’s lifeforce to armour the tyrant. When the overconfident King was stabbed by Claw, the wizened thaumaturgist was thus the one who felt the pain. His concentration was broken so badly as to leave him dying, breaking all of his enchantments.
Approximate stats for Occulas in his transformed state are:
| Dex: 10 | Str: 08 | Bod: 06 | Motivation: Power |
| Int: 03 | Wil: 03 | Min: 04 | Occupation: Tyrant |
| Inf: 07 | Aur: 06 | Spi: 05 | Resources {or Wealth}: 008 |
| Init: 022 | HP: 020 |
Skills:
Weaponry (Melee)*: 10
Advantages:
Lightning Reflexes, Schtick (Paired axe and torch), Misc; All post-LDD RAPs are sustained by the person casting the spell of transmutation, not the transformed person.
Connections:
Shadow-Gods (Low at best).
Drawbacks:
Strange Appearance, Serious Rage.
Equipment:
- Battle Axe [BODY 08, Enhance (EV): 02 (cap is 10), Descriptor: Slashing, Recommended STR 07]. When attacking a shield, a battle axe receives a +1 to its final roll total. When attacking a person without body armour or a shield, the roll receives a -1 to its final roll.
- Large metallic torch [BODY 07, Enhance (EV): 01 (cap is 09), Descriptor: Blunt, Rec. STR 06, Flame being: 03].
Kann the All-Consuming
Kann was once revered as a god. He had at least one temple with a fetching statue of itself in Ichar. Reportedly, worshippers abandoned their cult because they grew afraid of Kann, and the temple went abandoned.
Kann looked much like one Jarmal, the God of Death, so presumably there is a race of such creatures, achieving various levels of divinity.
Kann didn’t seem too different from your average tough monster with a weak spot. So in the hierarchy of Things That Man Was Not Meant To Know (never mind gods), he probably wasn’t very high up. The tentative stats below reflect that.
Kann could be conjured to come to Pytharia using a unique gem. It’s a sort of enormous ruby, larger than a man’s head, over which a specific incantation must be said. Anybody can utter the spell, but whoever is touching the gem has their soul consumed to power the gate to the void realm in which Kann resides. If no soul can be consumed, the gate cannot be opened.
Kann was conjured at the cost of the soul of Zedon, the king’s assassin. He was tricked into using the gem by his master since he was becoming too ambitious. It tried to feed on Claw and some heroic-fantasy-wench-in-a-bikini, but Claw hurled a spear into its eyes, Kann dissolved into goo and vapour, and underage boys ogled the wench.
| Dex: 04 | Str: 09 | Bod: 06 | Motivation: Nihilist |
| Int: 01 | Wil: 03 | Min: 09 | Occupation: TMWNMTK |
| Inf: 08 | Aur: 08 | Spi: 12 | Resources {or Wealth}: N.A. |
| Init: 013 | HP: 000 |
Powers:
Claws (Beak): 12, Extra Limb (x6): 08, Flash: 09, Growth: 06, Skin armour: 04
Bonuse and Limitations:
- Flash is an overwhelming feeling of unnatural horror. Shade doesn’t protect against it but protections against fear do.
- Flash has an Explosive Radius, is its own AV, and targets MIN/MIN.
- Flash is dispelled on the Phase after the target is shaken, grabbed, hurt, doused in water, etc..
- Claws (Beak) can only be used on something Kann has brought to its mouth.
- Growth is Always On and Already Factored In.
Skills:
Accuracy (Extra limb): 08
Advantages:
Iron Nerves.
Connections:
Shadow-Gods (Low at best).
Drawbacks:
- Strange Appearance.
- Misc.: Kann greatly prefers devouring its food alive. Once he grabs a person (Wrestling attack), he will not crush them but take about 2 Phases to bring them intact to its beak to use Claws and feed.
- Attack Vulnerability (Kann’s eye, situated within its beak, is not protected by Skin Armour. A Trick Shot against it will encounter a RV of but 02, and with its Growth Kann’s OV against physical attacks is but 01, though the Trick Shot penalties bring it back to the 5/6 Column.
Note that the aperture is small, and hitting the eye needs to be done with a spear, javelin, gun, bow, etc. – swinging a large melee weapon wouldn’t work).
Eight-limbed cyclops
A mutated, monocular manlike giant with a pale yellow skin, whose four limbs all split in two at the median joint. It was sent to ambush Claw and Prince Ghilkyn at a mountain pass called Varcanum Pass. Claw tricked it into being hit by lightning, and that’s all she wrote.
| Dex: 04 | Str: 08 | Bod: 05 | Motivation: Nihilist |
| Int: 02 | Wil: 01 | Min: 03 | Occupation: Hunter-gatherer |
| Inf: 02 | Aur: 01 | Spi: 03 | Resources {or Wealth}: 001 |
| Init: 008 | HP: 010 |
Powers:
Growth: 04, Skin armour: 03
Bonuses and Limitations:
Growth is Always On and Already Factored In (including the Thief score).
Skills:
Accuracy (Sweep Attack with a large object): 05, Acrobatics (Climbing): 05, Thief (Stealth): 02
Advantages:
None demonstrated.
Drawbacks:
Strange Appearance, Serious Rage.
Equipment:
The giant will sometimes equip itself with a tree trunk to perform a Sweep Attack with. But he will usually throw the trunk aside after one such attack.
Muck monsters and seaweed monsters
Miftung could animate masses of rotting, water-soaked vegetable matter to kill Occulas’s foes.
This once manifested as a mass of seaweed floating on the surface of a lake an animating to grab and shred boats crossing it. And twice in the form of a roughly humanoid muck monster, vaguely similar to the Swamp Thing.
These monsters are redoubtable, being essentially invulnerable to conventional weapons. The main way to stop them is to expose them to flame and heat so the muck will dry and harden. Below a certain threshold of water in their bodies, muck monsters just crumble into inert mud.
Claw thus warded killer seaweed using lamp oil spread on the surface and set ablaze, defeated one much monster with a heat ray from a solar collector (long story), and defeated another by dropping a large, heavy, burning tapestry on it.
A strong man with a sharp sword can, with luck, sever a limb off a muck monster. But that amounts to naught, as such damage will regenerate within a Phase. In game terms, no RAP was actually scored.
A muck monster has the following stats:
| Dex: 04 | Str: 06 | Bod: 03 | Motivation: Shambling |
| Int: 01 | Wil: //// | Min: //// | Occupation: Weapon |
| Inf: //// | Aur: //// | Spi: //// | Resources {or Wealth}: N.A. |
| Init: 005 | HP: 000 |
Powers:
Fluid form: 02, Skin armour: 05, Water freedom*: 05
Bonuses and Limitations:
Skin armour also works against energy attacks without a heat component (+1).
Skills:
None demonstrated.
Advantages:
None demonstrated.
Drawbacks:
Fatal Vulnerability to being in a hot, dry environment for too long.
Source of Character: Claw the Unconquered v1 (DC Universe).
Helper(s): Darci.
Writeup completed on the 27th of April, 2011.