Poisonous wolfsbane plant3/2/2023 ![]() ![]() Others, however, believed that having contact with wolfsbane on a full moon could actually cause shape-shifting. While those hunting traditions were lost, the plant retained its common name into the Middle Ages, where wolves and werewolves were a genuine fear in Europe. Frightened folks turned to growing wolfsbane for their protection, as superstitions said that werewolves could be repelled by the plant, or even tamed by it. ![]() Werewolf illustration circa 1512 by Lucas Cranach the Elder Ancient Greeks hunted wolves by poisoning their bait with this plant, which led to the common name of wolfsbane. They naturally grow in mountainous areas across the northern half of the globe and are also planted in gardens for their deep purple blooms, which continue flowering long after other perennials fade for the season. The plant belongs to a genus of highly poisonous perennials known as monkshood or aconite. One thing both Hollywood and horticulturists can agree on: wolfsbane is a potent plant. ![]() Stories also proclaimed that a sorceress who carried wolfsbane seeds wrapped in lizard skin could become invisible and witches who applied the poisonous sap to their flints and launched them at unsuspecting enemies. In the Dark Ages, wolfsbane was said to be used by witches in spells and potions and was one of several ingredients for an ointment that, when applied to a broom, could facilitate flight. In Greek myth, wolfsbane (Aconitum) originated from the toxic slobber of a three-headed dog named Cerberus, the scary canine guardian to the gates of Hell. Nevertheless, the correlation of wolfsbane with the supernatural predates Hollywood and familiar authors. As early as Dracula in 1931, wolfsbane casually replaced garlic as a repellent for vampires in film. The plant has been a familiar plot element in horror movies, television shows, and novels. In the Harry Potter series, Remus Lupin, a tormented werewolf, drinks a potion of wolfsbane carefully concocted to control his transformations. It also has a colorful history associated with werewolves, vampires, and witches. Wolfsbane exists in the real world, but it is a poisonous plant that is deadly.Wolfsbane is a beautiful-and poisonous-fall-blooming perennial.Recommendation is to make it an injury poison that works only against lycanthropes. Because of the low price, it renders the other poison obsolete (unless tweaked by the GM).The werewolf is only inhibited by flavor text where most go out their way to avoid it. Only the wererat has a fortitude below the listed threshold.Lycanthropes experience a feeling of discomfort when within 30 feet of a bundle of wolfsbane, and any lycanthrope with a Fortitude of 17 or lower cannot willingly enter a square adjacent to a bundle of wolfsbane. A bundle of wolfsbane is usually enough to keep at bay a lycanthrope that lacks serious resolve lycanthropes find its smell sickening, and though it cannot truly harm them, most go out of their way to avoid it.Īs a poison, wolfsbane has the same effect as Ground Thassil Root (Dungeon Master's Guide, page 51). Wolfsbane is dangerous to handle, because it is poisonous to humanoids in sufficient quantities. A flowering plant found both in the natural world and the Feywild, wolfsbane is a key ingredient in a number of potions and alchemical formulas associated with warding off or harming lycanthropes. ![]()
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