I bought my son a big bag of giant bugs, so it wasn’t long before I started thinking about using them as role-playing game props. The bugs are big — really big — so that makes them all the more formidable. The fun part was figuring out what each bug was. First up: the giant brown marmorated stink bug.
Wikipedia describes Halyomorpha halys, or the brown marmorated stink bug, or simply the stink bug, as an insect in the family Pentatomidae, and it is native to China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. It’s a relative newcomer to the United States, with the first specimen being collected in September 1998. It’s an agricultural pest that eats fruits and vegetables. The damage a bug of huge size could inflict on a community is incalculable. One of these monsters could easily wipe out an entire farming community.
In appearance, the bugs are shield-shaped. They are various shades of brown on both the top and undersides, with gray, off-white, black, copper, and blueish markings. Markings unique to this species include alternating light bands on the antennae and alternating dark bands on the thin outer edge of the abdomen. The legs are brown with faint white mottling or banding. The stink glands are located on the underside of the thorax, between the first and second pair of legs, and on the dorsal surface of the abdomen.
Stink bugs don’t like the cold and go into hibernation by burrowing into somewhere warm. It’s possible stink bugs could easily burrow beneath a town due to the warm of its citizens’ activities, only to be awakened by a community bonfire. They are clumsy fliers. But their most dangerous is their stink, which smells like cilantro. If agitated at all, the stink bug lets fly from all its pores (not just its rear), which creates a choking field capable of incapacitating desperate villagers.
Giant Stink Bug (CR 3, HD 6d8+36)
N Huge Vermin
Init -2 Spd 30, Fly 10 (Clumsy)
Senses Darkvision (Ex): 60 ft.; | Listen +0, Spot +0AC 17 (FF 17, Touch 6)
hp 63 (Disabled -6/Dying -22/Injury 22)
Saves: Fort +11, Ref +0, Will +2
Immunity: Mind-Affecting Attacks (Ex)Atk +11 base melee, +0 base ranged; Grapple +21;
+11 Melee (Bite 1d8+13/crit 20/x2);
SA: Stench (Ex)
SQ: Racial Traits: Vermin, Mindless (Ex),Abilities STR 29, DEX 6, CON 22, INT –, WIS 10, CHA 9
Stench (Ex): When a stink bug is angry or frightened, it secretes a chemical that nearly every form of animal life finds offensive. All living creatures (except other stink bugs) within 60 feet of a stink bug must succeed on a DC 13 Fortitude save or be sickened for 10 rounds. The save DC is Constitution-based. Creatures that successfully save cannot be affected by the same stink bug’s stench for 24 hours. A delay poison or neutralize poison spell removes the effect from the sickened creature. Creatures with immunity to poison are unaffected, and creatures resistant to poison receive their normal bonus on their saving throws.
