Redcap

Redcap
(Creature)
Common CE Small Fey Level 5 Alignment LG NG CG LN N CN LE NE CE Adjective Redcap Images of redcaps Source: Bestiary, pg(s). 278 Type Fey CR 6 Environment Temperate forests, mountains, or underground Alignment LG NG CG LN N CN LE NE CE Images of redcaps Source: Bestiary 2, pg(s). 233

Redcaps are vicious little fey that relish the pain and suffering of other creatures. They are an embodiment of the savage, merciless side of nature. They love nothing more than cutting creatures down to size with their over-sized scythes, mushing them to paste beneath their iron-shod boots, and then soaking their caps in the bloody mess that remains.

Appearance

Redcaps look like small, wrinkled old men with over-sized hands and feet and huge bat-like ears. Female redcaps have shorter, patchier beards, slimmer bodies and less hair on their hands than males. Their faces look utterly hateful topped off with small red hats. Originally white, their headwear is completely soaked in blood, sometimes dripping onto the redcap's face. All redcaps carry over-sized scythes, normally bigger even than their entire body. They also wear distinctive iron boots covered with spikes. They love nothing more than reducing a big 'un (as they call humanoids) to their height through cunning traps or their vicious scythes, after which they stomp their victim into a bloodied pulp.

Habitat and ecology

Redcaps embody the most merciless and unpleasant aspects of nature. As such, they often do not get along well with other fey. A redcap generally shows other fey a certain minimal amount of courtesy but are not friendly to them, particularly to fey that do not fight like nymphs and dryads, as they consider them too delicate or flowery. Despite this dislike, redcaps often serve as mercenaries to other less violent fey. An exception to this dislike exists in regards to the redcaps' association with the catlike fey known as elananxes. The redcaps greatly admire the elananxes' cleverness and cruelty, and particularly enjoy watching multiple elananxes pursue a single target. Consequently, redcaps often go out of their way to ally with and befriend the cruel felines.

Redcaps prefer to dwell in hills though they can be found in other types of terrain from underground to mountains. They are also often found in abandoned buildings vacated after some great tragedy. They seem to be drawn to the sense of doom that pervades these buildings.

While redcaps are vicious hunters they are not very fond of eating flesh. They prefer to drink the blood of their victims or to suck the marrow from their bones. The main reason redcaps hunt is to keep their caps soaking in blood. Redcaps believe that if their caps are not kept constantly soaked deep red then the redcap will sicken and die. While there is little evidence of this, the redcaps believe it unquestioningly. They are so protective of their caps that some of them even sew their caps onto their scalps.

Redcaps are believed to mate only after successful murders. Female redcaps give birth to twins or triplets after 6 to 8 months. Siblings constantly fight for the respect of others and the attention of parents, and usually only one redcap per birth survive to adulthood. Parents usually encourage this fight: those that show weakness are culled. Redcaps can live up to 60 years, but are almost always killed before that.

Abilities

Redcaps battle adventurers in a forest.

While small in stature, redcaps are capable of wielding large weapons to great effect although their preferred method of attack is to stomp on opponents with heavy boots. A redcap's psychological attachment to its cap is so strong that without it they do not fight with nearly the same effectiveness as they do if wearing it.

On Golarion

Redcaps are relatively common in Golarion, a Material Plane planet with a large number of First World breaches, particularly in Avistan. They are rumoured to be attracted to the choking shade-infested caverns of Hollow Mountain, the goblin-filled forests of the Lost Coast, and several other areas in Varisia.

A small population of territorial redcaps is known to inhabit the Barrowmoor of northern Nidal. These bloodthirsty creatures attack anyone foolish enough to enter their territory. They are also said to dwell in the caverns below the fire-scarred Chitterwood in Isger, where they ally with the local goblin and hobgoblin tribes, and in the Isgeri ghost town of Finder's Gulch. A redcap named Mauxpaudi rules the Irrisen province of Feyfrost. The redcaps inhabiting the Fangwood are rumoured to be blighted, but such blighted redcaps have never been seen firsthand. They also live in Kyonin peacefully with other fey, and often terrorise the ne'er-do-wells that consider the River Kingdoms home.

On their home plane of the First World, redcaps are known to live on the slopes of the Tane known as Great Ulas. These redcaps venerate Great Ulas as a divine parent and protect it from those who seek to harvest the living mountain's blood for its potent alchemical properties.

References

Paizo published a chapter about redcaps in Fey Revisited.

For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.