Bheur Hag

(from 5th Edition Volo's Guide to Monsters - 2016):

Bheur hags live in wintry lands, favoring snow-covered mountains. They become more active during winter, using their ice and weather magic to make life miserable for nearby settlements. 

A bheur hag's skin is blue-white, like that of a person who has frozen to death. Her hair is pale white, and she is emaciated, as if she were a person who had survived winter by eating bark and leather. Her eyes are pale and surrounded by dark, bruise-colored flesh. A bheur carries a twisted gray wooden staff, which she can ride like a flying broom and augments her magical powers. 

Cold Hearts. Bheur hags are attracted to selfish actions justified by deadly cold, such as murdering a traveler for a winter coat, chopping down a dryad's grove for firewood, and so on. These actions are especially sweet to a bheur if they are unwarranted, such as a greedy merchant hoarding more food for the winter than he could possibly eat while others starve. Bheurs love to seed such ideas and thoughts in mortals. They use their ability to manipulate weather to batter villages with snow and freezing cold, hoping to instill despair that turns the villagers against each other. 

A bheur hag loves watching unprepared people suffer and die for their mistakes during the winter. She is delighted when mortals make petty, pathetic attempts to survive, such as eating boots and leather scraps when no real food is to be found. 

Awful to Behold. When a bheur hag is fully in the throes of combat and has recently slain one of her foes, she often forgoes a direct attack on her remaining enemies and instead takes a moment to feed on the corpse, dismembering it and tearing meat from bone. The sight of this savagery is enough to render witnesses temporarily insane. 

Covens. A bheur hag that is part of a coven (see the "Hag Covens" sidebar in the Monster Manual) has a challenge rating of 9 (5,000 XP).

HAG LAIR ACTIONS:

If a hag is a grandmother, she gains a set of lair actions appropriate to her nature, knowledge; and history. A coven that includes a grandmother can use her lair actions as well, but the grandmother's will prevails-if one of the coven attempts this sort of action and the grandmother disapproves, nothing happens. A powerful auntie (or her coven) might also have access to lair actions like these, but only at certain times of the year or when the influence of the Feywild is strong. The following lair actions are options for grandmothers and powerful aunties. Grandmothers usually have three to five lair actions, aunties usually only one (if they have any at all). Unless otherwise noted, any lair action that requires a creature to make a saving throw uses the save DC of the hag's most powerful ability. 

Lair Actions On initiative count 20 (losing initiative ties), the hag can take a lair action to cause one of the following effects, but can't use the same effect two rounds in a row: 

• Until initiative count 20 on the next round, the hag can pass through solid walls, doors, ceilings, and floors as if the surfaces weren't there.

• The hag targets any number of doors and windows that she can see, causing each one to either open or close as she wishes. Closed doors can be magically locked (requiring a successful DC 20 Strength check to force open) until she chooses to make them unlocked, or until she uses this lair action again to open them.

Bheur Hags:

Bheur hags live in wintry lands, favoring snow-covered mountain peaks. They are gaunt, have blue-white skin, white hair, and are known for their gray wooden staffs that give them access to extraordinary ice magic. Bheur hags love seeing mortals freeze to death and have little if any room in their hearts for kin and community. Statistics for the bheur hag appear in chapter 3 of this book.

A powerful bheur hag might have the following additional lair action: 

• The hag creates a blizzard in a 40-foot-high, 20-foot radius cylinder centered on a point she can see within 120 feet of her. The effect lasts until initiative count 20 on the next round. The blizzard lightly obscures every creature and object in the area for the duration. A creature that enters the blizzard for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there is blinded until initiative count 20 on the next round.

(from 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual - 1993):

The bheur, or blue hag, of Rashemaar legend is said to be the bringer of winter, capable of spreading deadly cold over a wide area. Rashemaar tales are uncertain whether there is only one bheur or many, but in all stories she is a powerful and malevolent creature who serves the useful purpose of helping to bring winter. She is invariably defeated add driven off each spring.

In most stories the bheur resembles a hidepus, wrinkled old crone with pale blue-white skin and snow-white hair, wrapped in a tattered gray-blue shawl. She carries a gnarled gray staff taller than she is, and her voice howls of icy winds.

Some stories tell of the bheur and orglash (ice spirits) working in concert to mislead, attack, and devour travelers. No one knows whether these tales of cooperation bepeen the blue hag and orglash are true; witnesses are unlikely to live to tell the tale.

Other legends speak of epic battles betweqn high-ranking wychlaran (the Witches of Rashemen) and thy bheur, and of the early onset of spring as a result of victory by the Witches. The Witches themselves believe that the bheur is a natural part of the land and serves a useful purpose, but they will fight the blue hag if she begins to act arbitrarily or cruelly. As the Witches say, winter is the best part of the year, but even winter pales in the month of Hammer.

Combat: The bheur fight by laying their cold palms upon victims, causing intense pain and 2d6 points of damage from pure frost. Flame-based creatures take double damage.

A bheur carries her staff of frost, which functlons in the same manner as a wand of frost save that it never needs recharging. The staff functions only for a bheur; out of her hands, it is useless. If a bheur’s staff is lost or destroyed, she must leave the Prime Material Plane for a year in order to regain a new one.

The bheur is entirely immune to all cold-bbsed attacks and suffers only half damage from fire-based att+ks, but she sustains double damage from acid and electricity. The bheur is thus reluctant to engage wizards who use such spells in combat.

Habitat/Society: Some claim that the bheur themselves bring the cold, others that the cold draws the bheur.

As the skies turn slate-gray and snow swirls down from the sky, driven on howling winds, the Rashemaar shut their doors tightly, make certain that they have laid in enough wood and food for the winter, and cower in the terrible weather. During this time the bheur is abroad, and most Rashemaar fear her greatly. Like the dreaded uthraki shapechanging spirits, hheur prefer to prey upon lone travelers, freezing them and devouring their frozen bodies. The bheur is also said to sneak into people’s homes if the doors and windows are not proper sealed, where they snatch away young children or unsuspecting residents. Such stories are probably cautionary tales against leaving windows and doors open, but they usually do the job keeping young Rashemaar in line for fear of the blue hag.

Ecology: No one has ever seen two blue hags together, leading to a widespread belief that there is only one bheur in all of Rashemen. After freezing victims, the bheur dines on the icy corpses, and it is said that anyone who sees a bheur devour its victim may be struck blind or driven mad. Characters who witness such an act must successfully save vs. death magic or be blinded (75%) or driven insane (25%). Insane characters flee (50%), attack anyone nearby, friend or foe (30%), or collapse in a catatonic heap, incapable of speech or movement (20%). The madness lasts 2d6 days unless the victim receives a cure disease or remove curse spell.