#Mystara Monstrous Compendium Appendix

[oldschoolfrp]

Mystara Monstrous Compendium Appendix for AD&D 2e, 1994, Jeff Easley cover art featuring the pegataur, the blackball (an apparently living creature very similar to a sphere of annihilation), and the frost salamander

[feyariel]

Fey Reads Dragon Compendium

Part 1: The Diabolus

Trying to explain how fucked up the 3.5 version of the Diabolus is while also being ready to cover the other Dragon Compendium races is a monumental endeavor, so I'm instead just going to talk about it.

The Diabolus is a race from Mystara, the setting used for Basic D&D. Diaboli first appeared in the BECMI Immortals Rules Box Set (1986) and were later updated to AD&D in the Monstrous Compendium Mystara Appendix (1994). They'd have been lost entirely to time (as much of Mystara had been in 3e) were it not for the article in Dragon (#327, January 2005). Per the name, it looks like a stereotypical devil; the PC-worthy caveats are that it's not a true devil, but an anarcho-pacifist from a strange side dimension. It's kinda like the Tieflings in 4e and 5e, except more stereotypical-looking. Y'know, like MtG devils (or Denizens of Leng):

Squealing Devil, Magic: the Gathering. Diaboli look a lot like this.

Not much about the race has changed between editions. In BECMI, they were red, hairless, and from the Dimension of Nightmare (considered part of the Material Plane). 2nd ed made them mauve, gave them degrees of hairiness (bare, human-like, and satyr-like), and renamed their home the Demiplane of Nightmares. 3rd edition's changes (entirely in the stat block) were the biggest.

The 3.5 Diabolus Stats

Outsider (Native). This is glossed as them being adaptable to new planes, but that's a poor justification (that would be "never gains the Extraplanar subtype"). It's mainly to explain an okay typing; I'd have gone with Humanoid.

Chaotic subtype. This is an anomaly: perhaps the only instance in 3e of an Outsider race having both an alignment subtype and the Native subtype.

Medium size, 30 ft. speed, Darkvision 60 ft. Bog-standard stuff. The Darkvision replaces allusions to an unspecified Infravision when referencing the snake-like senses the race's (otherwise cosmetic) forked tongue grants.

+2 Intimidate vs. Animals and Humanoids; -2 Diplomacy, Handle Animal, Perform, and Sense Motive. Originally, they were described as seeming nightmarish to Material Planes humanoids (and the feeling was mutual); this bit codifies it in stats. It could have been a Cha penalty, but then we wouldn't have Sorcerers (see below).

Weapon Familiarity: Trident. This is weaker than straight-forward proficiency, but a bonus Martial Weapon Proficiency is already fairly weak. What's worse is that this doesn't qualify for certain prereqs.

+2 on saves vs. Spells and Spell-like Abilities. (Y'know, like dwarves.) Prior to 3e, Diaboli were immune to magic from the Material Plane, but the reverse was also true. It was one of those weird and stupid old school things that just doesn't work as a PC ability.

Natural Weapon: Tail. (Secondary, 1d4 [untyped/piercing] + Poison). The tail alone is not worth a level adjustment; had they kept their primary bite attack, though, the two would be.

Poison: Sickened 2d4 rounds (Fort DC 10 + 1/2 HD + Con), 3 + Con uses/day. This balances against touch of fatigue 3+/day, since Sickened is a weak condition, but this poison lasts longer than that cantrip. Originally, it was 1d6 rounds of paralysis and diaboli were immune to it.

Also missing are +1 Natural Armor and "cannot run, but can use a trident to cartwheel instead." Thankfully.

Languages: Diabolus and Diabolus Tail. Y'know, like Drow Sign, but with tails. Bonus Languages: Abyssal, Draconic, Common, Infernal. To play off the diabolical looks and xenophobia.

Favored Class: Sorcerer. Sorcerer tends to take over for whenever something seems Warlock-y, since Sorcerer is core.

Level Adjustment: +1. The only thing I can guess is that the Chaotic subtype allowing this weaksauce race to bypass DR is "too much".

While this stat-block is semi-faithful to its original, it gives up too much for it to be worthwhile. The Diabolus's two schticks were "Ack, I'm a demon! Except not!" (which is now a penalty) and "I can't use my magic on you, but you can't use your magic on me!" (which is now absent). None of its racial abilities complement its favored class (or really any class), its poison isn't terribly useful (too hard to hit early on, too weak later on), and it has a major penalty that should belong to an ability score. Adding insult to injury is that level adjustment, which makes the whole thing basically unplayable.

If you want bonuses to saves against magic, play a dwarf.

If you want something demonic, play a tiefling.

[vintagerpg]

The third Ravenloft Monstrous Compendium appendix was the opposite of the Mystara book for me. It is gorgeous and straightforward – Mark Nelson’s art rivals Stephen Fabian in capturing the mood of the campaign setting. Like all the Ravenloft appendices, this one largely focuses on making horrored-up versions of conventional D&D monsters. Unlike the previous two collections, though, I like these a lot. They feel more thought out somehow.

Thing is, I could never figure out how to use them. They all feel so specific in application, and the opportunity has never come up. One exception: Fleas of Madness. That’s a good story, too, but I am going to save it for when I make a zine out of that adventure…

[dailybestiary]

Nemhain

Named after an Irish war goddess, the nemhain (pronounced “NAY-wuhn,” because Irish spelling is the world’s greatest exercise in trolling) is an undead creature who is interesting on a number of levels:

1) The nemhain chose to become undead—Bestiary 5 says “as a means of protecting a person, object, place, or ideal.”  That’s automatically interesting to me—committing yourself (and your loved ones; see below) to eternal unlife to protect something is devotion/fanaticism on a grand scale.  You don't do that just to guard treasure in a 10’x10’ room…but you might for a holy (or unholy) relic, a political movement, a beloved hero, etc.  Every nemhain once made a choice, and that means every nemhain has a story…perhaps one that your PCs would be wise to ferret out.

2) The nemhain is surrounded by a cloud of bound spirits—usually the spirits of her relatives or friends.  I love this because it recalls one of my favorite undead of all time, the gray philosopher (from the Creature Catalogue and the Monstrous Compendium: Mystara Appendix), whose malevolent thoughts took shape as wispy spirits called malices.  I also love it for the pure horror of this scenario—B5 makes it clear that these souls were usually unaware that they would be drawn into the nemhain-to-be’s self-sacrifice.  It’s one thing to consign yourself to eternity; it’s quite another to bring the local PTA along with you.  And speaking of which…

3) Some nemhains start out good—but they all become evil.  No matter how pure a nemhain-to-be’s motives, the vileness of undeath and the violation inherent in harvesting the souls of her loved ones seals her fate.  So the nemhain is at best a tragic figure whose single-mindedness damned both herself and those around her.  At worst, she’s an abomination willing to sacrifice anything—and anyone—to her cause.

All in all then, every nemhain is special, every nemhain has an interesting story, and every nemhain is deadly (CR 15) at the gaming table.

The pride of elves is dangerous indeed.  When a wild elf soothsayer foretold that the Rose Chamber would be claimed by the dead, the grey elf princess Dharotea swore it should never come to pass.  She promptly closed the borders to the human mage-scholars, the halfling river traders, and especially the dwarf nations and their necromancer-kings.  Even as her self-isolated nation suffered, Dharotea, now queen, never wavered—she would protect the capital, the palace, and its glittering Rose Chamber at any cost.  Finally, to stave off her own death, she performed the Act of Reaping to become a nemhain…inadvertently slaying the rest of the royal court and fulfilling the vision the soothsayer warned of so long ago.

No one expects a bardic college to be deadly—especially not one famous for its jugglers, tumblers, and acrobats.  But the nemhain known as the First Harlequin roams the Laernuin College grounds, and those he selects to perform in his monthly pantomimes must have the ancient forms memorized exactly or be struck down mid-performance.

The worst revolutionaries are the time-traveling ones.  After thwarting a dangerous anarchist—a fiendishly charismatic bard with enough alchemy under his belt to be a literal bomb thrower—adventures discover that he has hatched plots in both the future and the past to undo their hard work. Worse yet, defeating the anarchist’s allies in one time period doesn’t always mean they’re off the game board.  While in their own time the anarchist’s chief lieutenant, Victoria Graves, is too elderly to do more than fund whisper campaigns against them, in the past she is a dashing vigilante, and in the future she is a nemhain determined to see the Scarlet Revolution come to pass.

—Pathfinder Bestiary 5 182

I’ve always wanted to learn Irish (I’m still in touch with my whatever-cousins-however-removed in Carndonagh) but I’m pretty sure I’m 20 years too late for my brain to expand as far as it needs to.  (Hell, I bought a bodhrán in Donegal when I was 17 and I still can't play it, and I’ve been drumming since fourth grade.)

If you’re looking for a fantastic fall-from-grace tale that echoes the nemhain’s, I highly recommend Garth Nix’s Clariel: The Lost Abhorsen, as well as the rest of The Old Kingdom series.

[feyariel]

Things I Didn't Know Until Today:

Nightshades are from Mystara originally. (I have yet to find their first printing, but they show up in the 2nd ed. AD&D Monstrous Compendium: Mystara Appendix, suggesting they first appeared in BECMI [possibly in a modular].)

Krenshars, by contrast, seem to be new to 3e. #foreskinmonster #why?

A large chunk of monsters from Pathfinder 1e's Bestiary 2 seem to be drawn from the 1e AD&D Fiend Folio and Monster Manual II. (I had thought it was just the FF.) If I follow this rabbit hole too far, I'll end up documenting how monsters change between editions (and having to figure out the conversion from inches to feet in D&D's measurements).