A half-humanoid, half-skeleton, all spiky ghost. Copyright 2010 Wizards of the Coast.

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Athas is a world with plenty of horrible death in it, so of course it has plenty of ghosts.

The Lore

The ghosts we’re talking about in this entry are also called “raaigs”, so you can use that word when nomenclature is important and you want to distinguish them from wraiths, specters, or the specific D&D monster actually called a Ghost.

They are specifically the ghosts of priests and holy warriors that served the now-dead gods of Athas, and who met their demise while charged with protecting their holy sites and relics.

The typical encounter with a raaig will happen when the PCs enter the ruins of such a place. The ghost, still fulfilling its mission, will manifest and challenge the intruders to check whether they’re devout pilgrims or dastardly thieves. Since no one alive remembers the proper prayers and passwords to appease these spirits, they are likely to attack.

The Numbers

Raaigs have the full ghost package: ground and flight speeds of 6, Darkvision, phasing, insubstantial, immune to disease and poison. The book mentions they become corporeal for a moment when they attack, but this moment doesn’t last long enough to influence their stat blocks, which considers them to be insubstantial at all times.

They don’t have any weaknesses that let them become partially corporeal either, so the only way to deal full damage to a raaig is if you’re using the rules update that makes force damage fully affect all insubstantial creatures.

Raaig Tomb Spirit

Your common specimen as far as these very specific ghosts go. The Tomb Spirit is a Level 9 Soldier with 66 HP, which looks like a small number until you remember it will be taking half damage from everything.

The tomb spirit projects an aura (1) of Gripping Dread, which forbids enemies inside from shifting and deals 5 cold damage to enemies marked by the spirit who make an attack that doesn’t target it. This is a spooky version of the Paladin’s mark mechanic.

Its main attack is a chilling blade that deals cold damage. As a minor action once per round it can issue the Raaig’s Challenge, which targets Will, and pulls 2 squares and marks for a turn on a hit.

Raaig Crypt Lord

A higher-ranking guardian in life, the Crypt Lord is a Level 14 Soldier with the Leader tag and 96 HP. It’s mostly a Tomb Spirit with bigger numbers and improved abilities:

Its Chilling Blade deals more damage and marks on a hit; its Gripping Dread has a radius of 2; ts Challenge pulls 4 squares instead of 2.

The one new ability here is Ghostly Command (recharge 6+) which lets each undead ally within 5 squares of the lord shift 2 squares and make a basic attack. As this takes a standard action, it will probably be used to open the fight.

Raaig Souflame

This is the ghost of someone who was so favored by the gods in life that they retained a small spark of divine power after death. Their hold on this spark is tenuous, however, and it might leave them if they’re too damaged. In this case, they will be turned into desperate beasts full of grief and rage. This is a Level 21 Skirmisher with 138 HP and all raaig traits.

The idea here is that they lose the divine spark when bloodied, and so they effectively have two sets of abilities and movement speeds - one for when they have the spark, and one for when they don’t.

When “healthy”, the soulflame has a ground speed of 8 and a teleport speed of 3. It attacks with a Divine Blade that deals a mix of untyped and radiant damage and lets the ghost teleport 3 squares on a hit. It can get fancy with this and use it to perform a Flickering Phantom maneuver (recharge 5+): the souflame teleports 4 squares, makes a stronger than usual sword attack, then teleports another 4 squares and makes another, weaker attack. The teleports are effects, so they happen even if the attacks miss.

When bloodied, it loses the ability to teleport and gains a flight speed of 8 instead. Its main attack becomes a Deathly Blade whose added damage is necrotic instead of radiant, and which makes the target only regain half HP from healing for a turn. Its Flickering Phantom ability is replaced with Hollow Rage, an encounter power that deals heavy damage and prevents the target from regaining HP entirely (save ends).

Encounters and Final Impressions

The book says raaigs are intelligent and strong-willed enough to take command of most other undead that haunt their temples, such as skeletons, mummies, and other ghosts, so these will make up their allies in an encounter. It also reminds us that not all gods were good - protectors of evil temples might still have command of the devils or demons that also served its patron god. Souflames in particular are likely to attract surviving angels that served the same deity, as they are drawn to that faint spark.

This makes me think that a non-hostile raaig makes an excellent mentor and teached for the super-rare divine PCs of Athas. Maybe your cleric or paladin was trained by the soulflame who is the Last Priest of Pelor and who was aware enough to take the PC under their wing instead of treating them as an intruder.

And if angels and devils arrive to serve such ghosts, that’d be a big draw to someone who is researching a way into the Astral Sea, as I think that plane is not normally accessible from Athas.