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Sharks
These ancient predators are among the most feared beasts in all the seas. Sharks are fearsome hunters who inspire awe and terror in humanoids crossing their aquatic domains. While their deadly reputation is well earned, most sharks are content to hunt smaller sea creatures rather than larger land dwellers. Most dangerous situations arise from severely provoked sharks or those large enough to prey on larger animals such as sea mammals, other sharks, and occasionally ocean-going humanoids.
Ancient Apex Predators.
It is said that as long as there have been seas teeming with fish, there have been sharks to prey on them. Throughout the ages, these perfectly designed predators have never needed to adapt or evolve. Sharks are more cunning than most realize, learning and adapting to their environment while remembering encounters with specific events and individuals. If a particular trick or tactic is used on a shark once, it is likely to avoid or counter it during a second encounter.
However, regardless of the encounter, nearly all sharks rely on devastating bites to dismember and slaughter prey. Sharks will sometimes take an experimental bite to determine if a subject is a potential meal. Once a shark commits to eating its new victim, it will quickly go into a frenzy, shredding the unfortunate soul into bloody bite-sized pieces.
Heightened Senses. A key component to the shark's success is its array of highly enhanced senses. Among the most well-known is its extreme sense of smell, specifically enhanced to enable the shark to detect blood from a quarter-mile away. Sharks lock in on wounded prey this way, and as they draw closer, they can use their electroreception to ensure even the most well-hidden creatures cannot evade them. This electroreception allows sharks to detect electrostatic fields in their environment, which they use to perceive the electricity generated by the animals around them.
Sea Minions. Sharks usually hold special religious significance to cultures living in or near the sea. These cultures often feature a patron shark god who rules the ocean and uses sharks to enact divine judgment. The sahuagin are the most strongly tied to sharks, holding the shark god Sekolah as their primary diety. Their bond with sharks is so strong that they can telepathically communicate with and command any shark they encounter, and the two species are natural allies.
Bull Sharks
These notorious sharks have earned their name through their stocky shape, broad flat face, and unpredictably aggressive behavior. Bull sharks reach over 10 feet long and weigh over 200 pounds. They dwell near coasts and have the unusual ability to travel from saltwater into freshwater, allowing them to roam up rivers and through brackish swamps. This habitat range often puts bull sharks near humanoid settlements, which, combined with their fierce temper, makes them one of the shark species most likely to attack people.
It is a small blessing that bull sharks are generally solitary hunters. However, their freshwater adaptability makes them a favored ally of sahuagin raiding parties looking to travel inland via river. Anyone who attempts to pursue the sahuagin raiders into the water will quickly find themselves surrounded by an ambush party of unruly bull sharks.
Great White Sharks
These monstrous sea creatures are the most massive of all modern sharks and can reach 20 feet in length and weigh up to 5,000 pounds. To make matters worse, they are accustomed to hunting larger mammals and often have no qualms attacking humanoids, making them responsible for more coastal attacks than any other shark species. These attacks usually involve the shark moving in for a single bite before pulling back. It is unknown whether the sharks disengage as part of a strategy to let their victim bleed out and drown or because they simply find most humanoids unpalatable after the first "taste test." Regardless, this bite often proves too devastating for the frail humanoid to survive, and without immediate aid, the victim usually dies quickly afterward.
Should a great white shark commit to an attack, the results are devastating. They are unrelenting hunters, dismembering and devouring anything they view as a meal. Great whites are more than capable of dispatching medium-sized creatures, sometimes even hunting small whales. Even retreating to land doesn't guarantee safety from the great white's predations. Great white sharks are known to breach the ocean's surface to identify potential prey near the water's edge. They can then wait for their target to venture back into the water or even lunge out at their victim, biting and forcibly dragging it back into the bloody depths to be ripped apart and devoured.
Reef Sharks
As their name suggests, these sharks are found roaming tropical reefs. They are smaller than the more dangerous sharks, reaching 6 feet in length and rarely weighing more than 50 pounds. Though their smaller size makes them less deadly to humanoids, reef sharks are still known to attack humanoids who approach them and often become more aggressive in the presence of food. Spear fishers and careless divers can suddenly find themselves under attack by reef sharks who often swim together in schools. Though they are not territorial, they are very protective of their personal space and will perform threat displays to drive potential threats who stray too near. Sauhagin living in or around reefs often use reef sharks as patrol animals to ward off intruders.
Thresher Sharks
These sharks are easily recognized by their distinctively large tails, which they use to whip and stun their prey. The sonic pressure at the end of the tail whip allows threshers to disable multiple small fish at once. Hunting this way enables threshers to isolate fish from schools that would typically be difficult to prey upon. Sometimes, the thresher will slice prey in half with their powerful tail attacks.
Though threshers can grow to over 15 feet and weigh over 350 pounds, they rarely threaten humanoids. Humanoids are much larger than their typical prey, and threshers usually only attack them if they feel threatened. However, threshers influenced by sahuagin or other supernatural forces may begin regarding all humanoids as threats. In these situations, threshers can quickly inflict devastating damage with their bite and tail attacks.
Tiger Sharks
These sharks earn their namesake from their striped patterns and deadly hunting prowess. The tiger shark's coloration and slow movements make it difficult to spot in the water, and once it has moved within range of its prey, it will launch a vicious surprise attack with a sudden burst of speed.
Tiger sharks can reach over 10 feet, weigh up to 1,400 pounds, and are notorious for regarding almost anything and everything as a potential meal. Tiger sharks eat fish, jellyfish, cephalopods, crustaceans, sea birds, sea snakes, seals, sea turtles, dolphins, whales, other sharks, land animals, and even garbage. Their quest to bite into everything imaginable, combined with their coastal hunting territory, makes the tiger shark one of the most likely sharks to attack humanoids, second only to the great white.
Sharks in Your Adventures
The following table provides you with some ways you can incorporate different types of sharks into your adventures.
Art Credit
- Pouncing Shoreshark - Dan Scott, Wizards of the Coast.
- Shabraz, the Skyshark - Paul Scott Canavan, Wizards of the Coast.
- Hammerhead Shark - Stephen Daniele, Wizards of the Coast.
- Half-Shark, Half- - Brynn Metheney, Wizards of the Coast.
- Thresher Shark - Joseph Snouwaert
- Shark Token - Caio Monteiro, Wizards of the Coast.
