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Inadvisable D&D monsters #137: the forgettable mouse.

The forgettable mouse – which is actually something of a misnomer, as it’s more closely related to the hamster – is a rodent common throughout most human settlements. In its habits and diet it much resembles its mundane cousins; what sets it apart is that, as its name suggests, it’s incredibly forgettable. Supernaturally so, in fact: each forgettable mouse continuously radiates a magical field to a distance of ten feet that causes sapient beings to ignore its presence, unconsciously avoid touching or stepping on it, and instantly forget about it once it leaves their sight.

Unless an individual’s attention is specifically drawn to the mouse, this effect is automatic. Otherwise, the affected party may attempt a Wisdom saving throw versus DC 10, with success allowing them to perceive and remember it for one round. The save must be repeated each round that the victim remains within any forgettable mouse’s aura; on any failure, the victim retroactively forgets the mouse’s existence, rationalising any resulting memory gaps as their inclinations dictate. This effect doesn’t erase information about forgettable mice that’s fixed in any form other than memory – for example, a written description – though it does cause individuals to forget learning such information if they subsequently enter a mouse’s aura.

The aura of the forgettable mouse can be counteracted in several ways:

• Spells that pierce illusions or provide immunity to mental influence, such as true seeing or mind blank, allow the recipient to perceive and remember forgettable mice for the duration, though unless such spells are made permanent, the recipient remains vulnerable to forgetting everything they learned if exposed to a mouse’s aura once the spell wears off
• Creatures who are immune to magic or mental influence, or who have a total Wisdom save bonus of +9 or higher (thus rendering it impossible to fail a DC 10 Wisdom save)*, can perceive and remember forgettable mice normally
• A spellcaster with a forgettable mouse for a familiar gains immunity to the auras of all forgettable mice for as long as the familiar remains bonded, and additionally enjoys advantage on checks and saving throws to pierce any similar effects they might encounter from other sources
• The principle predator of the forgettable mouse, the common housecat, has developed a natural immunity to its aura; at the GM’s option, this immunity may extend to other felines – including feline player characters – as well

Note that such immunity benefits only the affected creature. They will be unable to effectively communicate their knowledge to anyone currently under the influence of a forgettable mouse’s aura, and anyone thus informed may subsequently have that knowledge erased in the usual fashion. Forgettable mice are exceptionally trainable as rodents go; those few individuals who are aware they exist frequently teach them to carry messages, steal small objects, and perform other useful or larcenous tasks.

In spite of their animal intelligence, spells and effects that discern alignment register forgettable mice as powerfully Lawful; no one knows why.

* To anticipate the obvious objection, saving throws don’t automatically fail on a natural roll of 1; you’re thinking of attack rolls.

Does anyone else love that if a mage has a forgettable mouse as her familiar, it means potentially the entire party thinks she’s just a crazy person with an imaginary friend.

Or in some cases, it looks like the mage and her friend are just fucking with everyone on an epic scale?

For bonus fun, since the effect doesn’t specify exactly how the missing memories of the mouse are papered over, you could have different party members believing different things: one “remembers” the mage conversing with empty air, another forgets the entire interaction, and a third is certain the mage has a familiar of some description, but is unable to describe it when prompted.

I love how if you just ignore the mouse like you’re supposed to, there is most likely no consequence to encountering one.

But if you actively try to fight it’s aura, eventually you will fail, you will forget that whole battle of will you were doing, and you will have memory gaps. Given how high level PCs tend to think the world revolves around them, it is pretty likely that they might “rationalize” their missing time with “something important happened here and I must know what,” leading to a wild goose chase and probably plenty of investigated ancient wizards and liches and psionics, with no answer ever being found, because no, you’re actually just missing half a day because you spent it trying to remember a mouse.

That’s certainly one way to go, though it’d depend on a great deal of player buy-in. A few other potential plot hooks involving forgettable mice:

• There’s been a rash of disappearances among prominent citizens of a major city. Attempts to locate them via magic have been strangely uncooperative, with auguries suggesting that they’re both alive and nearby, in some cases even insisting that they’re in the same room as the caster, though no trace of them is ever found at the indicated location. In truth, the “malfunctioning” divinations are working normally, and the victims have all been polymorphed into forgettable mice by some unknown party.
• A powerful thieves’ guild has hired the party to investigate an apparent magical hit on one of their most important families. The family’s members are alive and well, but are apparently suffering from varying degrees of amnesia – and in particular, none of them can remember what the family’s racket was or how they came by their ill-gotten gains. The truth is that they employed a colony of trained forgettable mice to pilfer valuables and perform acts of sabotage, using protective amulets to shield themselves from the mice’s auras. For some unknown reason, either they were deprived of their amulets, or else the amulets stopped working, causing the family to forget all of their schemes.
• A local hedge-wizard has come into possession of variant of the disintegrate spell that’s a lower level than the standard version, at the cost of only working on inanimate matter. As they’ve applied their new hammer to every visible nail, the community has begun to suffer a rash of stolen food and shiny objects with no obvious culprit. It’s not initially obvious that this has any connection with the wizard’s new spell. It’s eventually discovered that the spell was mislabeled: what it actually does is convert the targeted matter into an equal mass of forgettable mice. The very large number of forgettable mice in one place causes the initial aura of forgetfulness to be much larger than normal, preventing anyone – including the caster – from remembering the mice appearing.