pretendtobeanelf-blog

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Doodle dwarven dames.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Doodly dwarfs

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 31 August 2018

Not all infernal denizens are small and misshapen like the Dretch. Take for instance the Balor, a high level demon who lifts, throws fireballs, flies, teleports, hits like a train, explodes on death and in general is just really really dangerous. Of course, high level parties can take the heat, so don't be afraid to push them a little with some ringers when it comes time to wrap up the story.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 30 August 2018

What's the difference between an Ogre and a Troll? In D+D it's that Trolls regenerate damage unless they're burned or acided up. These things take a lot of putting down, and after one encounter most players will usually make sure they have at least one reliable source of fire available at all times.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 29 August 2018

Slimes are a longstanding D+D tradition, and who better to rep blobby crew than the last of the OGs, the Gelatinous Cube. Another dungeon ecology monster, the cube exists to answer why rooms are clean of debris whenever you re-enter a dungeon. These platonic blobs of acid goo will sweep through dungeon corridors, picking up any leftover corpses and dissolving them down, leaving the dungeon sparkling clean and lemony fresh. This is one of D+Ds mascots at this point, even though most games these days aren't hardcore dungeon divers that the cube was designed for. Players still find it pretty endearingly goofy, and it's so uniquely Dungeons and Dragons that it's just not a party without one.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 28 August 2018

Otyugh's are tripedal lumpy things that live in dark underground holes, nesting in raw sewage and mostly living off of carrion, offal and feces. They're stupid, driven mostly by hunger and probably have several bodily systems devoted to farting. Surprisingly the Otyugh is one of those D+D monsters that doesn't get copied as much as other classics like the Beholder or Illithid, I can't think why.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 27 August 2018

Elementals are one in the long line of D+D stealing from the Elric novels. They're ambulatory piles of whatever classical element you want, but of course over the years this has expanded outwards to include whatever nonsense you want. Metal elementals, sulphur elementals, mercury elementals, anything goes. They're usually pretty tough, immune to criticals and with some neat movement based abilities.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 26 August 2018

Rust Monsters are another classic dungeon ecology monster designed around a random plastic alien toy that Gary Gygax got in a big bag from the dollar store. They really screw over Fighter types given that they eat your weapon and armor, use these things sparingly. Despite their abilities screwing over players I kind of like these guys, the lore paints them as being fairly domesticatable and even capable of being very affectionate to their owners, stroking them with their feathery fronds as they get fed scrap metal from a bag. They also make for some terrifying cavalry mounts, Dwarves will deploy blocks of Rust Monster cavalry with the riders equipped with stone armor and hammers.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 25 August 2018

Modrons are probably the most endearing thing to come out of Planescape, D+Ds interdimensional setting. They're wierd biomechanical entities who come from Mechanicaus, the plane of absolute law. As such, they can ironically enough seem rather illogical to outsiders. They will not interact with anyone outside recieving orders from and giving orders to their direct superiors and subordinates. Any trace of individuality or self-expression is met with the rogue unit being summarily removed from the system. Some do manage to escape though, and rogue (as in renegade, not necessarily the class) Modron adventurers are a rare but consistent sight throughout the city of Sigil.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 24 August 2018

These days thanks to D+D, Golem basically means "Magic Robot". They're usually made from a single substance and in D+D land possess an uncanny immunity to direct magical attack. You get a Clay Golem (Actual Mythological Golem), one of the classic D+D four pack along with Flesh (Frankenstein), Iron (Talos) and Stone (Not sure where they got this one, probably an early indication of the slippery slope towards Golems becoming genericized)

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 23 August 2018

Purple Worms are a big scary high level threat. Also a nice convenient answer as to why there are so many adventurers around. When your local ecology includes train sized worms that can easily wreck a decent sized town, suddenly having roving bands of mercenary assholes doing monster fights for hire doesn't look so stupid.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 22 August 2018

Liches are undead wizards, not content with an entire lifetime of magical assholery they worked out how to cheat death and now get to dick around with spells for all eternity. This is pretty much how I imagine any given lich would react to an adventurer party showing up and saying that it's time for him to die once and for all.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 21 August 2018

Ilithid and Drow are both scary enough, but every true veteran Underdark explorer knows that the real terror below is the Eye Tyrant. Beholders are another classic D+D creation, dating all the way back to Supplement 1: Greyhawk. These things are proper monsters and are pants wettingly terrifying in every edition of the game. Each of their eye stalks can shoot a magical attack, each one more magical and deadly than the last. And that's saying nothing of the dreaded central eye, which projects a cone of energy that flat out negates other magic in the area. Add to this an inbuilt extreme xenophobia, frightening level of intelligence and the fact that these things can fly at a decent clip and you have one of the most iconic and consistently scary foes that any party can face. And this is just an ordinary, off the shelf beholder, we haven't even gotten into the variants like the ones who gouge out their main eye so they can actually learn proper magic, or the vampire ones that replace their eyestalks with vampire mouth tentacles. Also the spelljammer setting had one as a bartender in a space pub, which is an image I really enjoy.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 20 August 2018

When it comes to classic, original D+D monsters they aren't always a slam dunk. In fact, most of them are kind of goofy. For every Mind Flayer or Beholder that gets burned into the fantasy genre as D+Ds stamp on it, you get a dozen things like the Roper here. This thing disguises itself as a perfectly ordinary stalagmite no different than any of the others in a cave... and then when you get close tries to grab and eat you. That's it, that's all they do, they're dumb ambush predators who you can pretty easily run away from if you don't get tangled up in their ropy tentacles. Honorable mention to Piercers, molluscs who evolved to look like stalactites, and who wait for you to get below them before letting go of the ceiling and dropping on you with their spear tipped shells. They're dumber, but also really boring to draw so you get the horrible tentacle lump.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 19 August 2018

Giants, they're big and tough and tough and big and most of them don't really have a lot going on other than that.. Giants are a very classic monster for D+D, they have a lot of unique rules like being able to catch and throw boulders, special loot rules for the bags they carry, all that good stuff. They also have a unique culture in D+D, assigning respect and worthiness to each other based on height, so the largest will be the in charge-est. Also damn perspective is a bitch to draw.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 18 August 2018

The Gith are an extradimensional race who are entirely original to D+D. They're split into two cultures, the Githyanki and the Githzerai, in a spectacular show of why fantasy writers should never name anything. Githzerai are generally cool dudes, like an entire species of zen monks who just chill out in another dimension, but Githyanki are pirate raiders and kind of all around assholes. Their big gimmicks are silver swords that can be used to cut the cords that let astral travellers head back to their bodies, every one of them having minor psionic power, and their elite fighters being fighter-wizard hybrids called Gish, a term that was adopted by players to describe any character that could switch hit in such a fashion. I like these guys, they're rad and original to D+D and play a bit into the science fantasy angle that D+D's always had in the background what with the plane hopping and so on. Shame about their naming scheme though.

[pretendtobeanelf-blog]

Originally posted to Facebook 17 August 2018

The Mimic is one of those creatures that only really makes sense in the context of a dungeon ecology, without regular passing adventurerers to feed on why would anything evolve to disguise itself as a treasure chest? There have been a few variants of these down the years, from the tiny baby mimic wizard familiar the size of a jewelry box all the way up to the mighty House Mimic, a mimic the size of a building.