Thunderclaw

A widespread herbaceous plant. It can be a bothersome obstacle or a varied resource.

I saw sparks down by the meadow, alert the rest of the village. Something may be coming our way.

— Greel, a village guard

Description

by Lynda Hinton

Thunderclaw is a medium-height plant. It is a plant of large green leaves when observed up close, yet fluffy white from a distance. This is due to white fuzz that tightly covers the surface of the leaves.
It reaches 1 meter tall once it is mature, and during flowering, the plant can reach heights of 1.5 meters tall, thanks to the elongated floral spikes.
The flowers are a beautiful bright, light pink and grow clustered together at the very top of the plant. They are pollinated by small insects, which flutter about the thunderclaw patches safely, as their minute body size does not trigger the thunderclaw's electricity release. The scent of the flowers is reminiscent of ozone.

A unique method of seed dispersal

Thunderclaw seeds are relatively heavy in comparison to similar-sized plants. When the seeds mature, they fall onto the leaves, triggering the electric discharge. This sends the seeds scattering in all directions, usually at pretty impressive distances. The seeds need electricity not only for dispersal but also to germinate. Thunderclaw seeds which do not receive a substantial amount of electricity, do not grow.
Once the seeds have received a shock of electricity, they can only germinate if they receive a substantial amount of water in their first weeks of life. The seedlings do not produce electricity during this time, so they are particularly vulnerable to herbivorous predators.

Harvesting

You don't harvest thunderclaw in foggy or rainy days, unless you want your skin crispy like a cooked witchetty grub. And never forget to keep the scythe's tassel touching the ground and away from you.

— An experienced thunderclaw harvester

The right tool

Scythes are the preferred tool to harvest thunderclaw with, as they put distance between the harvester and the plant.
The handle is made of wood, and a metallic tassel runs from the blade towards the ground. The tools are expensive, and most villages that practice thunderclaw harvesting only have one or two at hand.

by HiClipart

The right weather

Those humanoids who know how to harvest thunderclaw prefer to do it in dry and clear weather.
A superstition says Hei Feng visits the patches of thunderclaw and brings with him the storm. Thus, when the weather looks like it may storm, everyone stays clear of those patches, in fear of angering a god.

Uses

In Oceasile, grippli herbalists along the candle river use the thunderclaw in a variety of ways. Outside of this area, the plant is less common, and few uses are found for it.

Medicinal

A poultice is made with the smashed leaves, which is applied to ulcers and boils.
The white fuzz of the leaves is scraped and used as bedding material for people suffering nightmares and other sleep problems.
The green parts are used in a tonic against feebleness, taken during seasonal changes.

Edible

Before the flower spike opens its buds, it is a prized snack. The buds are said to provide a "popping" feeling in the mouth with a sweet and sour taste.
Burrowing animals, however, live in between the root system. They are a prized catch and worth the effort of careful excavations under a patch of thunderclaw.

Other

The ashes of the leaves are used to purify a pond in preparation for gripplis' spawning. It is believed to kill any potential harmful creatures that may have been transported with the water into the newly created pond.
Teenagers sometimes play with the seeds, tossing them into a fire for a small blast of colour and sparks.

— Don't you dare take that torch anywhere close to the plants, you bloody idiot!
— I don't have time for your nature-loving speeches today, druid. We need to get through here.
— Do you want to start a firestorm? Because that is what you will get if you light a single plant on fire...

— A step away from a tragedy...

Distribution

Temperate woodlands and forests of all three continents

Other names

Lightening nettle
Wood spark
Thunder's seconds

Name origins

Many of the names given to this species are related to the Thunderbird, a species that shares its affinity with lightening.
Specifically, the name thunderclaw comes from a tale about a thunderbird who lost a claw in a fight.
The thunderbird was fighting for its territory against a pair of rocs. One of the rocs attacked the thunderbird's talons and managed to bite off several of its claws. These sprang a bolt of electricity damage, and the roc dropped them. These fell with lightning speed into the ground, where they sank into the wet mud.
After fending off the rocs, the thunderbird went back looking for its missing claws and dug around the area. It could not find its claws, but at least, it found a patch of a delightful plant that seemed to crackle with electricity as it moved past it.
What the thunderbird did not realise, is that it was their claws that had created the plant. The gripplies down in the ground, who had witnessed the fight and the claws falling into the ground, saw them sprouting from the ground before their own eyes. Thus, they decided to name the plant thunderclaw in honour of its origins.

Related articles

I was tossing and turning. Could not sleep, you see? There was a small "tsk" sound and a bit of light around me. It happened two or three times. Yoonra told me the next day that is a signal the thunderfuzz caught a bad dream rounding about!. Bless her for collecting it earlier in the year.

— Ubolee, a grippli cured from her nightmares

Thunderclaw as environmental hazards

Thunderclaws can be a nuisance during the day, but they can be quite dangerous at night, due to their discharge of light, which quite often attracts predators. This, combined with their debilitating properties, can make it a problem for unsuspecting adventurers.

Thunderclaw (CR 3)

Living creatures in contact with the thunderclaw's leaves take 1d4 electricity damage per round. Creatures must also make a DC 14 Will save or be staggered for 2 rounds.


In circumstances of normal light (such as during the day), the bright light discharged by the thunderclaw's electricity does not present an issue for creatures without light sensitivity or light blindness. At night, however, the sudden bright light leaves a creature blinded for 1d10 rounds unless they succeed at a DC 15 Fortitude save. A creature with light sensitivity or blindness has to save regardless of the outside light conditions unless they are covering their eyes. They also have a -2 penalty on saves to resist the blindness.


The electricity release of the thunderclaws when disturbed reacts badly with fire. The flames crackle and expand with lightning speed in a 15 foot radius, burning everything in their wake. Targets within the radius blast take 2d6 fire damage and 2d6 electricity damage. A successful DC 16 Reflex save reduces the damage to half and prevents creatures from catching on fire. If the thunderclaw is close to other thunderclaws, this creates a chain reaction of lightning and flames which creates a small firestorm that can devastate the area (increase the radius of the explosions by 5 feet for every 10 plants in a cluster). The fire remains in the area for 1d10 hours and it is not extinguishable by mundane means. This can trigger forest fires.


A typical cluster is 20 feet in radius, but they may vary (1d8 x 5 feet), with one plant per 5 foot. usually A typical cluster thus contains between around 44 plants, and the radius blast, when exposed to fire, and subsequent fire is 35 feet radius (from the edge of the cluster).