Oneiroi — Dream Spirits of Oneirion
Winged messengers, mask-bearers and nightmare riders who cross Oneirion, the Plane of Dreams, carrying prophecy, warning, temptation and exquisitely constructed lies into the sleeping minds of mortals.
What Is an Oneiros?
An Oneiros is a stable dream-spirit possessing independent memory, personality and purpose. The plural, Oneiroi, describes the many spirits that travel the Veil of Sleep, Silver Roads, prophetic thresholds and deeper dreamlands of Oneirion.
Oneiroi are not simply dreams imagined into existence by mortal minds. Oneirion predates mortal civilisation. Mortal sleepers continually give its upper regions new faces, landscapes, stories and symbols, but the plane and its oldest inhabitants possess an existence of their own.
In a natural manifestation an Oneiros often resembles a beautiful, uncanny humanoid with broad wings coloured black, grey, pale gold, moon-white or deep violet. Yet even that appearance is merely a favoured mask. Oneiroi can shape themselves around whatever image carries the greatest emotional meaning for the dreamer.
One may therefore approach a king wearing the face of a dead father, a soldier as a fallen comrade, a child as a talking animal, or a guilty murderer as the victim whose eyes they have spent years trying to forget.
The most dangerous Oneiroi rarely appear frightening at first. They understand that the easiest dream to believe is the one that arrives already wearing a trusted face.
Oneiros Rules by Edition
These statistics represent a powerful but ordinary independent Oneiros. Named mythic beings, ancient heralds and servants empowered directly by a god or primordial dream power may possess substantially greater abilities.
Choose Horn or Ivory when the Oneiros enters the adventure. The choice represents the dream-current through which that individual most naturally works; it is not a biological subspecies.
Armor Class 17
Hit Points 136 (16d8 + 64)
Speed 30 ft., Fly 60 ft.
Saving Throws Dex +7, Wis +6, Cha +8
Skills Deception +11, Insight +9, Perception +6, Stealth +7
Damage Resistances Psychic
Condition Immunities Charmed, Frightened
Senses Darkvision 120 ft., Truesight 30 ft., Passive Perception 16
Languages any two languages, telepathy 120 ft.
Challenge 8 (3,900 XP; PB +3)
Traits
Current of Horn or Ivory. Choose Horn or Ivory when the Oneiros appears. The choice determines which form of Dream Imposition and Current Gift it possesses.
Oneiric Nature. The Oneiros doesn’t need to sleep and can’t be forced to sleep by magic. While in Oneirion it always knows the symbolic direction of the nearest stable dream-road or threshold it has previously travelled.
Borrowed Face. As a Bonus Action, the Oneiros alters its apparent form to resemble a Small or Medium Humanoid, Beast or symbolic dream figure it has previously perceived. Its game statistics don’t otherwise change.
Dream Passage. If the Oneiros spends 1 minute beside a sleeping creature, it can pass through the Veil of Sleep into that creature’s active dream. It disappears from its current location and enters the dream within Oneirion. If the dream ends while the Oneiros remains within it, the Oneiros returns to Oneirion rather than automatically reappearing beside the sleeper.
Magic Resistance. The Oneiros has Advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
Actions
Multiattack. The Oneiros makes two Dream Talon attacks.
Dream Talon. Melee Attack Roll: +7, reach 5 ft. Hit: 8 (1d8 + 4) Slashing damage plus 9 (2d8) Psychic damage.
Dream Imposition (Recharge 5–6). The Oneiros chooses up to three creatures capable of dreaming that it can perceive within 60 feet. Each target makes a DC 16 Wisdom saving throw.
Horn. On a failed save, the target takes 27 (6d8) Psychic damage and can’t take Reactions until the end of its next turn. Illusory disguises, invisibility and magically created false appearances provide no benefit against the Oneiros for the same duration. On a successful save, the target takes half damage only.
Ivory. On a failed save, the target takes 18 (4d8) Psychic damage and is Charmed by the Oneiros and Incapacitated until the end of the target’s next turn as a false reality replaces immediate perception. On a successful save, the target takes half damage and suffers no condition.
Current Gifts
Waking Recall (Horn Only; 1/Day). The Oneiros chooses up to three creatures within 30 feet. Each target can immediately end either the Charmed or Frightened condition on itself and gains 10 Temporary Hit Points.
False Awakening (Ivory Only; 1/Day). One creature capable of dreaming within 60 feet must succeed on a DC 16 Wisdom saving throw or believe it has awakened somewhere safe and familiar. The creature is Charmed by the Oneiros and Incapacitated for up to 1 minute.
The target repeats the save at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on a success. Taking damage immediately allows another saving throw with Advantage.
Bonus Actions
Dream Step. The Oneiros teleports up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space it can perceive. If either its starting space or destination lies within 5 feet of a sleeping creature, an active illusion or an object created by dream-reality, the range increases to 60 feet.
Tactics
A Horn-current Oneiros generally exposes deception, delivers a warning or forces an uncomfortable truth into the encounter before withdrawing through dream-space.
An Ivory-current Oneiros prefers manipulation to open violence. It assumes a trusted face, separates vulnerable targets through False Awakening and attacks only after its fabricated reality begins to fail.
XP 4,800
Alignment Usually N; Ivory-current Oneiroi are frequently NE
Init +7
Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +16
Defense
AC 22, touch 13, flat-footed 19 (+3 Dex, +9 natural)
hp 95 (10d10+40)
Fort +11, Ref +10, Will +10
DR 10/magic; SR 19
Defensive Abilities immune to magical sleep; +4 racial bonus on saves against mind-affecting effects
Offense
Speed 30 ft., fly 60 ft. (good)
Melee 2 claws +13 (1d6 plus dreamstrike)
Special Attacks dream imposition, dreamstrike
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 10th; concentration +15)
- At will — detect thoughts, disguise self
- 3/day — deep slumber, dimension door, suggestion
- 1/day — dream
Statistics
Str 10, Dex 17, Con 18, Int 16, Wis 17, Cha 20
Base Atk +10; CMB +10; CMD 23
Feats Ability Focus (dream imposition), Flyby Attack, Improved Initiative, Skill Focus (Bluff), Weapon Finesse
Skills Bluff +24, Diplomacy +18, Disguise +18, Fly +16, Knowledge (planes) +16, Perception +16, Sense Motive +16, Spellcraft +16, Stealth +16
Languages any two languages; telepathy 120 ft.
Special Abilities
Oneiric Subtype (Ex). A creature with the oneiric subtype is a stable native being of the Plane of Dreams. It does not need to sleep, is immune to magical sleep and can use Dream Passage.
Borrowed Face (Su). As a swift action, an Oneiros may assume the apparent form of any Small or Medium humanoid, animal or symbolic dream figure it has previously perceived. Its underlying statistics do not change.
Dream Passage (Su). By concentrating for 1 minute beside a sleeping creature, an Oneiros can disappear from its current plane and enter the creature’s active dream within Oneirion. If that dream ends, the Oneiros returns to Oneirion. This ability is not unrestricted plane shifting.
Dreamstrike (Su). An Oneiros deals an additional 2d6 points of damage with each natural attack against a creature capable of dreaming. This extra damage is mind-affecting and is not reduced by damage reduction.
Creatures immune to mind-affecting effects take no dreamstrike damage.
Dream Imposition (Su). Once every 1d4 rounds, an Oneiros may target one creature within 60 feet. The target must succeed on a DC 22 Will save. This is a mind-affecting effect. The save DC is Charisma-based and includes Ability Focus.
Horn. On a failed save, the target takes 5d6 points of nonlethal damage and is staggered for 1 round as an unavoidable truth overwhelms its assumptions. A successful save halves the damage and negates the staggered condition.
Ivory. On a failed save, the target takes 3d6 points of nonlethal damage and is dazed for 1 round while false reality replaces its immediate perception. A successful save halves the damage and negates the daze.
Waking Recall (Horn; Su; 1/day). As a standard action, the Oneiros affects up to three creatures within 30 feet. Each may immediately attempt a new saving throw against one charm, compulsion, fear or illusion effect currently affecting it, with a +4 insight bonus.
False Awakening (Ivory; Su; 1/day). One creature capable of dreaming within 60 feet must succeed on a DC 22 Will save or believe it has awakened in a familiar place.
The target is fascinated and flat-footed for up to 1 minute. It gains a new saving throw at the end of each of its turns, and the effect ends immediately if it takes damage. This is a mind-affecting phantasm.
Ecology
Environment Plane of Dreams — Oneirion
Organization solitary, pair, or procession (3–8)
Treasure standard, usually symbolic or carried
| Hit Dice | 10d8+40 (85 hp) |
|---|---|
| Initiative | +7 |
| Speed | 30 ft.; fly 60 ft. (good) |
| Armor Class | 22 (+3 Dex, +9 natural), touch 13, flat-footed 19 |
| Base Attack/Grapple | +10/+10 |
| Attack | Claw +13 melee (1d6 plus dreamstrike) |
| Full Attack | 2 claws +13 melee (1d6 plus dreamstrike) |
| Space/Reach | 5 ft./5 ft. |
| Special Attacks | Dream imposition, dreamstrike, spell-like abilities |
| Special Qualities | Borrowed face, darkvision 60 ft., DR 10/magic, dream passage, oneiric traits, SR 19 |
| Saves | Fort +11, Ref +10, Will +10 |
| Abilities | Str 10, Dex 17, Con 18, Int 16, Wis 17, Cha 20 |
| Skills | Bluff +21, Concentration +17, Diplomacy +22, Disguise +18, Hide +16, Knowledge (the planes) +16, Listen +16, Move Silently +16, Search +16, Sense Motive +16, Spellcraft +16, Spot +16 |
| Feats | Ability Focus (dream imposition), Flyby Attack, Improved Initiative, Weapon Finesse |
| Environment | Plane of Dreams — Oneirion |
| Organization | Solitary, pair, or procession (3–8) |
| Challenge Rating | 8 |
| Treasure | Standard |
| Alignment | Usually neutral; Ivory-current Oneiroi are often neutral evil |
| Advancement | 11–15 HD (Medium); 16–24 HD (Large) |
Combat
Oneiroi prefer to begin an encounter behind a familiar face or symbolic disguise. They manipulate perception and positioning before resorting to physical attacks.
Borrowed Face (Su): As a swift action, an Oneiros may assume the apparent form of a Small or Medium humanoid, animal or symbolic dream figure it has previously observed. Its statistics do not otherwise change.
Dream Passage (Su): An Oneiros that spends 1 minute beside a sleeping creature may disappear from its current plane and enter that creature’s active dream within Oneirion. When the dream ends, the Oneiros returns to Oneirion. This ability is not general-purpose planar travel.
Dreamstrike (Su): The natural attacks of an Oneiros deal an additional 2d6 points of damage against a creature capable of dreaming. This extra damage is mind-affecting and is not reduced by damage reduction.
Dream Imposition (Su): Once every 1d4 rounds, an Oneiros may target one creature within 60 feet. The target must succeed on a DC 22 Will save. The save DC is Charisma-based and includes Ability Focus.
Horn: A failed save deals 5d6 points of nonlethal damage and causes the target to be staggered for 1 round. Success halves the damage and negates the staggered condition.
Ivory: A failed save deals 3d6 points of nonlethal damage and dazes the target for 1 round. Success halves the damage and negates the daze.
Waking Recall (Horn; Su; 1/day): Up to three creatures within 30 feet may immediately make a new saving throw against one charm, compulsion, fear or illusion effect currently affecting them. Each gains a +4 insight bonus on that save.
False Awakening (Ivory; Su; 1/day): One creature capable of dreaming within 60 feet must make a DC 22 Will save or become trapped in the perception of a false but convincing awakening.
The target is fascinated and flat-footed for up to 1 minute, receiving a new save at the end of each of its turns. Damage immediately ends the effect. This is a mind-affecting phantasm.
Spell-Like Abilities
Caster level 10th.
- At will — detect thoughts, disguise self
- 3/day — deep slumber, dimension door, suggestion
- 1/day — dream
Oneiric Traits (Ex): An Oneiros does not need to sleep, is immune to magical sleep and gains a +4 racial bonus on saving throws against mind-affecting effects.
The Currents of Horn and Ivory
The Gates of Horn and Ivory are among the most persistent symbolic thresholds in Oneirion. SpiralWorlds develops the ancient distinction between true and deceptive dreams into two recurring dream-currents.
They are not nations, bloodlines or rigid factions. An Oneiros belongs to a current because of the way it shapes and transmits dreams.
Horn-Current Oneiroi
Horn carries dreams containing genuine truth. That truth may be symbolic, incomplete, frightening or difficult to interpret, but it is not deliberately false.
- Prophetic warnings
- Divine or supernatural messages
- Healing and reconciling visions
- Recovery of genuine memories
- Warnings concealed inside symbolism
- Guidance toward safe dream-roads
Horn-current Oneiroi are not automatically kind. A truth may destroy a comforting illusion, expose a betrayal or reveal a fate the dreamer would rather never know.
Ivory-Current Oneiroi
Ivory carries dreams constructed to be believed even when they are false, distorted or deliberately misleading.
- False prophecy
- Comforting but destructive lies
- False awakenings
- Possession and identity erosion
- Manufactured or corrupted memory
- Visions intended to provoke disastrous action
The most skilful Ivory spirits rarely create obviously horrific nightmares. They construct the explanation the dreamer most desperately wants to believe.
Oneiroi in Oneirion
Oneiroi range throughout Oneirion, the Veiled Dominion. They possess no single universal kingdom or capital. Their movements follow sleepers, repeated symbols, divine messages, prophetic pressure, fear and the symbolic roads linking stable dreamlands.
The Veil of Sleep
Ordinary sleepers brush against the Veil without consciously entering the deeper plane. Oneiroi use this soft border to approach mortals, carry messages and tempt lucid dreamers farther inward.
Gates of Horn and Ivory
These recurring thresholds separate dreams carrying genuine truth from dreams structured around persuasive falsehood. Oneiroi are among their most familiar travellers.
The Silver Roads
Experienced Oneiroi travel roads defined by meaning rather than mileage, crossing between stable dreamlands and the sleeping minds to which those places have become connected.
Whispering Orchard
Memories grow here like fruit. Horn spirits may recover a lost recollection; Ivory spirits can replace one with something more comforting and entirely false.
The Nightward
Predatory Oneiroi gather among nightmares alongside Sandmen, Thought Eaters and Id Manifestations.
The Palace of Night
The darkest Oneiroi gather around this ominous frontier of organised nightmare, possession and false sovereignty. It is a dangerous threshold within deep Oneirion, not the capital of the plane.
Dream, Hypnos and Morpheus
Oneiroi inhabit a cosmology far older than any single mortal mythology. The primordial power Dream belongs to the deep structure of Oneirion and precedes the later divine traditions that gave particular names to gods of sleep and dreaming.
Hypnos governs sleep: rest, drowsiness and the closing of waking consciousness. His divine office reaches Oneirion wherever sleep becomes sacred, magical, prophetic or unnaturally deep.
Morpheus is the great Hellenic shaper of convincing dream-form. He gives visions faces, voices, bodies and familiar settings through which their meaning can be experienced.
Neither Hypnos nor Morpheus created Oneirion. Individual Oneiroi may serve them, carry messages on behalf of other divine powers, bargain with mortal dreamers or act entirely according to their own purposes.
Oneiroi and Earth in 1454
Few people on Earth use the scholarly Greek name Oneiros, but almost every culture possesses names for warning dreams, nightmare spirits, deceptive visions and supernatural messengers encountered during sleep.
Courts and Diplomacy
A ruler who repeatedly dreams of a murdered predecessor, a broken crown or an invading army cannot safely dismiss the vision. Physicians, astrologers, diviners and learned natural philosophers may all be asked whether the dream is natural, magical, divine or the work of an independent dream-spirit.
The Night Before Battle
Military camps are fertile hunting grounds. A Horn-current Oneiros might reveal an ambush. An Ivory-current spirit may convince a commander that a loyal captain intends betrayal and break an army before the first weapon is drawn.
Medicine and Natural Philosophy
Learned practitioners distinguish fever, poisoning, exhaustion and ordinary nightmare from magical sleep, dream invasion or a consciousness that has crossed too deeply into Oneirion.
Plague Dreams
Places scarred by repeated outbreaks of the Red Death may develop shared dreams of bells, empty streets, sealed houses and returning corpses. Repeated imagery can become a genuine road into darker regions of Oneirion.
Waking Anchors
The Plane of Dreams uses Waking Anchors to represent the pieces of identity that help travellers distinguish themselves from the dreams trying to rewrite them.
A true name, trusted companion, scar, written oath, remembered song, heirloom or unmistakable personal memory can serve as an anchor.
Oneiroi understand these anchors extremely well. A hostile spirit does not need to destroy one physically. It may imitate the trusted companion, falsify the memory, change the words of the oath or convince the dreamer that the anchor never belonged to them in the first place.
D&D 5.5e / 2024
A traveller who remembers and trusts their Waking Anchor has Advantage on saving throws made specifically to resist dream entrapment, forced memory alteration, false awakening, nightmare possession or effects that would make them forget the route back to waking reality.
Pathfinder 1e & D&D 3.5e
A traveller maintaining a trusted Waking Anchor gains a +2 circumstance bonus on Will saves and relevant checks made specifically to resist dream entrapment, false awakening, memory alteration, nightmare possession or becoming lost within Oneirion.
These bonuses cease while the anchor is stolen, forgotten or convincingly discredited within the dream and return once its connection to waking reality is restored.
Running Oneiroi
Oneiroi work best when the characters cannot immediately tell whether the figure before them is a messenger, enemy or merely part of the dream scenery.
Introduce an Oneiros through repeated symbols, voices and faces before open combat. Make the players test what they are being told. The creature becomes memorable when identifying the lie—or accepting the truth—matters as much as defeating its stat block.
The Warning Before Battle
Every officer dreams of the same bridge collapsing beneath the army. The warning is genuine, but the bridge may represent a failing alliance rather than masonry.
The Perfect Prophecy
A prince sees his closest ally placing the royal crown upon his own head. An Ivory Oneiros has built every detail from fears the prince already possessed.
The Stolen Warning
A Thought Eater has consumed part of a prophetic dream before a Horn Oneiros can deliver it. The characters must recover the missing memory before dawn.
The False Court
An Ivory-current Oneiros has convinced a sleeping diplomat that the Palace of Night is his waking palace and that the figures questioning him are trusted councillors.
The Messenger Wearing the Dead
A genuine Horn messenger takes the appearance of a dead companion. The warning may be truthful even though the choice of face is calculated to make refusal almost impossible.
The Nightward Rider
An Oneiros crosses the Nightward upon a Nightmare. Whether the rider is carrying a warning or hunting the dreamer should remain uncertain until the pursuit is already underway.
Signs an Oneiros Is Near
- The same stranger appears in several unrelated dreams.
- A sleeper remembers a dream with impossible clarity.
- A familiar voice speaks information the real person cannot know.
- Reflections continue moving after their originals stop.
- Several doors open onto places associated with one memory.
- A false awakening contains one tiny repeated contradiction.
- The dreamer wakes knowing something but cannot remember learning it.
Mythic Context
The Greek word oneiros means a dream, while Oneiroi describes dreams personified as spirits. The surviving classical traditions do not give them one completely consistent genealogy.
Hesiod places Dreams among the children of Night. Other traditions associate them with Nyx and Erebus. Ovid’s Roman account instead describes the great dream-shapers as children of Sleep.
Homer’s Odyssey gives the famous image of two gates through which dreams pass. Dreams emerging through polished horn carry truth; those passing through ivory deceive.
SpiralWorlds develops those gates into recurring planar thresholds and Horn/Ivory tendencies among the Oneiroi without claiming that ancient Greek religion described formal factions of dream spirits.
Morpheus
In Ovid, Morpheus excels at reproducing human form, gesture, clothing, voice and manner. SpiralWorlds develops this tradition into his divine office as shaper of convincing dream-form.
Icelos / Phobetor
Ovid describes a dream-spirit who assumes the shapes of beasts, birds and serpents. The gods call him Icelos; mortals call him Phobetor.
Phantasos
Phantasos takes the forms of earth, rocks, water, trees and other inanimate things, demonstrating that a dream-spirit need not approach a sleeper in humanoid form.
Classical Sources
- Homer, Iliad II — a dream-being sent to Agamemnon in a trusted human guise.
- Homer, Odyssey XIX — the Gates of Horn and Ivory.
- Hesiod, Theogony — Dreams among the children of Night.
- Ovid, Metamorphoses XI — Morpheus, Icelos/Phobetor and Phantasos.