[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. I knew RWBY was a thing, an animated web series thing, but the size of the franchise completely passed me by. There are comic books, manga, multiple video games. And its monsters, the grimm, appear in all of them. The beowolf is an entry-level monster, capable of being slain in large numbers by our heroes in splash pages and the like, but I still wanted them to be tougher than mundane wolves. I’ve also included my (derived solely from browsing wikis) take on the grimm as a whole here, as a subtype.
And yes, RWBY purists, the canon beowolves don’t have a wind breath ability. Given the fairy tale nature of their premise, I wanted to give them some sort of reference to the Big Bad Wolf.]
Grimm The kytons and sahkils are united in their affection for fear and pain, and in their flouting of both morality and mortality. Unlike many other groupings of fiends, they sometimes collaborate, uniting their forces in order to change the cosmos for the worse. One of their most fecund creations are the grimm—foul parodies of animals that feed on negative emotional states. These form in pits of tarry liquid that congeal on the Plane of Shadow, and they can bleed over into the Material Plane where the borders between worlds are thin. On some worlds, they have all but replaced mundane animals. Both kytons and sahkils may keep grimms as guard animals, living torture equipment, and general pets.
All grimm appear as caricatures of the animal form, black with bony spurs and jagged claws. Their heads are skull-like and marked with red lines, and these glow along with their eyes when the creatures are riled. Grimms are as much of shadow as flesh, and when slain dissolve completely, leaving no physical remains. Unlike many other shadowy beings, they have no trouble with bright light, although they prefer the darkness. Grimms are immortal, and some are quite ancient. Although most grimms are barely more intelligent than the animals they resemble, as they age they gain both intelligence and power, and elder grimms can achieve human levels of intellect.
“Grimm” is a subtype of outsider with the following racial traits: Immune to emotion effects Resist acid 10 and cold 10 Negative energy affinity Intimidating Prowess as a bonus feat Animalistic (Ex) A grimm is not proficient with any manufactured weapons. Grimms understand Infernal but cannot speak
Grimm, Beowolf CR 2 NE Outsider (extraplanar) This creature is a vaguely humanoid wolf, its posture stooped and its hands more like paws. It has black fur marked by white bone spurs, and its head is a skull-like mask.
Beowolves are the most common grimms, as wolves are found as figures of fear in many cultures. They are pack hunters, traveling in large groups to sniff out and take down prey. Beowolves are nimble creatures, and often make use of terrain in order to slow down less agile enemies. Their combat strategies are relatively simple, although they can generate gusts of supernatural wind simply by exhaling. Most beowolves use this ability to knock down temporary shelters to feast on the cowering creatures inside.
A beowolf that survives for an extended period of time may grow into an alpha beowolf. Such creatures are Large in size, with 6 HD. An alpha beowolf is a CR 4 creature. Beowolves instinctively follow alpha beowolves and will fight to the death to protect one. Beowolf paws are dexterous enough to grasp rocks and clubs, and some beowolves take Catch Off-Guard or Throw Anything as feats. It would take a very patient instructor to teach a beowolf how to use more complicated weaponry.
[Monster 1000, everyone! I think! In updating my indices, I found that that’s harder to pin down than I had thought, what with templates, multiple monsters in one entry, and non-monster but game mechanics posts. But I’ll be treating this as Monster 1000 because even if it isn’t officially, it’s darn close.
I figured I would commemorate the milestone with a monster that embodies the Codex somewhat. I’ve been thinking about how to do it for a while (since around monster 900 or so). I was eventually inspired by some of the major themes of the blog. There’s a lot of dinosaurs and a lotoffiends around here. So here’s a patron for them both. The Supreme Monstrosity originally appeared in the Dinosaurs Attack! series of super-violent trading cards (seriously, be aware if you’re going to click through the source link) as the leader of an army of time-displaced, ferociously murderous prehistoric beasts.]
Infernal Duke, Saurafer CR 26 LE Outsider This orange scaled horror is a bipedal reptilian humanoid taller than a giant. Its skull is swollen and features a crown of horns and six eyes. Its arms end in muscular paws, leathery wings grow from its back, and its tail ends in an immense spiked club.
Saurafer Devil Dinosaur, the Supreme Monstrosity Concernsdinosaurs, competitions of strength, savagery DomainsEvil, Law, Scalykind, Strength SubdomainsDevil, Ferocity, Judgment,Saurian Worshipersevil druids, reptilian humanoids, gladiators Minionsfiendish and half-fiend dinosaurs, horned devils, stygionyx Unholy Symbol a fanged maw biting a globe Favored Weapon heavy flail (or natural weapons) Obediencewin a competition of strength. If you are alone, spend 1 hour writing an argument about why one individual or creature would win in a fight with another one. Gain a +4 profane bonus on Intimidate checks, and add 4 to the DC needed to successfully intimidate you. Boons1:rage1/day; 2: mass bull’s strength 1/day; 3: extended frightful aspect1/day
Saurafer, the Supreme Monstrosity, is an infernal duke who rules over violent competitions of strength. He is perhaps the physical embodiment of the doctrine of “might makes right”, and seeks forever to test his power against other creatures. His chosen species are dinosaurs, which he sees as emblems of ferocity and power. Saurafer delights in pitting creatures against each other, especially dinosaurs against creatures of other eras and worlds, in order to see who is the superior. He is a sore winner, but an even sorer loser. He despises birds, as they are a reminder that in many worlds, dinosaurs succeeded not by becoming larger and stronger, but smaller and more intelligent.
As to be expected of the patron of savage combat, Saurafer is an absolute terror on the battlefield. He toys with weaker foes, using his fear abilities to send them scattering and then picking them off one by one. Those that resist are blasted with spells and breath weapons. If all else fails, Saurafer flies into a savage rage, which rarely ends until either he or his enemies are slain. Although he delights in one-on-one battles, if he fights multiple foes at once, he evens the odds by summoning devils and dinosaurs to aid him, or even uses animal shapes to turn devils into dinosaurs and improve their melee abilities.
Saurafer stalks the blighted realm of Avernus, single-handedly destroying armies that attempt to make a foothold in Hell and testing the forces of other infernal dukes. He is an example of a malabranche promoted, as he was successful in dragging an entire planet into the clutches of Hell. He hopes to someday repeat this performance, and is looking for ways of summoning and controlling enough dinosaurs at once to invade a whole world. Although he is not terribly intelligent by the standards of the hosts of Hell, he does not tolerate condescension, and is a shrewd judge of character. He has eaten at least one malebranche who did not show him proper respect.
April Fools, everyone. This week, we’ll be covering commissions from @glarnboudin, who requested a variety of monsters from different incarnations of Scooby-Doo. Honestly, I was kicking myself that I’d never thought to do Scooby-Doo monsters before: as a young child who loved monsters but was a huge coward, Scooby-Doo was an excellent training-wheels way for me to get my creature fix.
The Creeper is perhaps one of the most iconic monsters from the original Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? series. He regularly appears in spin-offs, reboots, even a State Farm commercial. I’ve seen him referred to as a take on Frankenstein’s Monster, but I think he’s more a melange of multiple hulking brute killers from B-horror movies. The name is derived from Rondo Hatton’s character from House of HorrorsandThe Brute Man, and I feel like his look owes more to Lon Chaney Jr. in Indestructible Man than it does to Frankenstein]
Spectral Creeper This muscular humanoid is hunched over, with a dull, dead gaze and hands clenched. His skin tone is a gray-green, and he has clearly been dead for some time.
Spectral creepers are the reanimated corpses of cat burglars, pickpockets, and other non-violent thieves. Typically, a spectral creeper forms when one of these criminals dies with unfinished business—with a major heist planned, but not executed. If the creeper achieves this goal post-mortem, it continues with even bigger and bolder heists. A spectral creeper is never satisfied with the wealth they have, accumulating riches upon riches. A few creepers will even allow their treasures to be reclaimed just so they can steal them a second time.
A spectral creeper is most notable for its ability to pass through locked doors, solid walls. It can empty chests or lockboxes without opening them by reaching through their sides. They cannot do this endlessly, however. Most spectral creepers still carry thieves’ tools to help them disarm traps or open locks in case of emergencies or to assist their minions. Spectral creepers are also skilled in disguises, and may masquerade as the living in order to case a target or evade detection. Regardless of whether or not the spectral creeper was violent in life, all of them are willing to kill in pursuit of a mission. Their fists are heavy and their grip tight, but they still cannot resist rifling through the pockets of their victims even as they crush them.
Screenshot from “Don’t Fool With a Phantom”, accessed at Scoobypedia here
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. In doing research for this set, I have been watching the relevant episodes of Scooby-Doo. And this one confuses me a little. The Wax Phantom himself is pretty standard–corporate executive disguising himself as a monster to steal from his own company–but the red herring is weird. The Wax Phantom was supposedly animated by Mr. Grisby, a disgruntled wax museum owner, who seems to genuinely believe his black magic brought the thing to life. He’s also gray, dresses like the Crypt Keeper, and has a shack full of ghosts and animated skeletons. So either Grisby actually is magic and the undead are real in this version of the Scoobyverse, or he’s just so dedicated to his craft that he lives in a Spirit Halloween Store. Either seems plausible.]
Wax Phantom This looming figure appears to be a roughly shaped humanoid made out of running wax. It is faintly luminous, and its facial features are contorted into a crude grimace.
Wax phantoms are undead-like constructs created as instruments of vengeance. They appear as rough humanoid outlines the size of an ogre, incredibly strong for their size. Wax phantoms are frequently used to kidnap chosen targets—they can scale sheer walls, burst through doors or other protections, and encase victims in a cocoon of wax to take back to their lairs. A wax phantom under control of its creator follows the master’s bidding, but free-willed wax phantoms typically kill their captives in sadistic, drawn out fashions.
Constructing a Wax Phantom A wax phantom is created by building a body around an animated humanoid skeleton. The wax is sculpted into an effigy of a person or thing the creator hates, and then melts back into a monstrous form as it animated. The wax must be infused with unholy water and rare herbs worth 1,000 gp.
CL14th;Cost101,050 gp Construction Requirements FeatsCraft Construct; Spellsanimate dead, geas/quest, false life, fear;Specialcreator must be caster level 14th;Skill Check Craft (wax) DC 22; Cost51,050 gp.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. I’ve watched three episodes of The New Scooby-Doo Show as an adult for monster-based purposes now, and all of them feel less “horror mystery” than “adventure pulp”. The monsters are less drawn from horror tropes and more giant animals, the settings are far-flung locales, the clues are perfunctory (even by Scooby-Doo standards). This, unfortunately, also means we’re three for three with episodes with unfortunate racial caricatures. In the episode “Jeepers, It’s the Jaguaro”, the “head-hunters” that worship the jaguaro are particularly bad, but so is Casey Kasem trying to do a Speedy Gonzales-esque “latin” accent as a pilot.
Incidentally, I like this image of the jaguaro because it bothers to give the damn thing jaguar spots!]
Jaguaro CR 10 N Magical Beast This massive beast resembles an oversized ape, except for its black-furred head, which is like that of a saber-toothed cat.
The jaguaro is a powerful jungle predator infused with elemental earth. They are able to transform themselves into stone statues at will, waiting between lean seasons for food to return to their territories. With their affinity for stone, jaguaros often excavate caves into cliff sides as a redoubt to hide their slumbering statue forms. Such caves attract creatures seeking shelter, and thus ensure the jaguaro has an ample source of prey.
In combat, a jaguaro prefers to spring from ambush, transforming into flesh and blood and striking in the same motion. Their diamond-hard claws can chisel through wood and stone with ease. They are typically distrustful of large structures, and a jaguaro on the rampage will destroy bridges and houses. Jaguaros are peevish and determined, and may chase prey for hours before giving up.
Jaguaros are occasionally discovered by humanoids in their statue form. Some cultures venerate the creatures as god-like beings of destruction or hunting, and others instead domesticate the beasts. The jaguaro itself may view even the most fawning petitioners as a source of food unless it is soothed through the use of magic, wild empathy or lots of bribes of meat. The most ambitious of these cultures may carve their own jaguaro statues, hoping to attract a curious jaguaro investigating a possible rival or mate. A jaguaro can live for hundreds of years, and multiple generations may venerate or work with the same beast.
Although jaguros do not collect treasure, their very bones are laced with diamonds. A jaguaro’s carcass yields diamond dust worth half the standard treasure value for a creature of its Challenge Rating.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin, based on the What’s New Scooby-Doo episode “Block-Long Hong-Kong Terror” This was the first episode of What’s New Scooby-Doo I had seen; it came out right in that unsweet spot where I thought I was too old for cartoons. I was pleasantly surprised–the writers seemed to care more about the mystery than in any other Scooby-Doo series. There were five suspects, two red herrings, and at one point Daphne and Velma discuss possible motives. Also, all of the members of the Scooby Gang have personalities, which is more than can be said for some Scooby-Doo series.
The commissioner suggested that, since it’s referred to as “the bad luck dragon” in the text of the episode, I connect it to linnorms. So I went ahead and just made it a linnorm, which also fills in a CR gap in the linnorms in the Bestiaries. This did, however, add a level of difficulty to the art, because two-legged Chinese dragons are uncommon on the internet, and ones with the right color palette are even rarer.]
Chasm Linnorm CR 15 CE Dragon This immense dragon has a whiskered face and a great mane. Its scales are red and yellow-gold, and it only has two clawed legs.
Chasm linnorms are subterranean dragons that lash spitefully out at creatures they come across. They are sometimes called “bad luck dragons”, as their bite spreads a curse of misfortune, and they have an unnerving tendency to target the same individual or family for their depredations over the course of years or centuries. Although they are native to deep underground canyons, they are sometimes found in cities, dwelling in their sewers or dungeons and emerging to prey on the populace. Chasm dragons feel especially comfortable in large, well-developed cities, as tall buildings and cramped alleys remind them of their subterranean homes.
Unlike most linnorms, chasm linnorms have manes, whiskers and other hair that causes them to more closely resemble imperial dragons. Rumors abound that they are the result of crossbreeding between linnorms and underground imperial dragons, but the two species hate eat other and fight to the death when their paths cross. Like all linnorms, they are covetous, and will happily destroy entire city blocks to obtain a single bauble.
In combat, chasm linnorms act much like their cousins, using their breath weapons when able to blast multiple foes at once. Their fiery breath blows away smaller creatures, and they are fond of using this to push foes off of ledges or knock them from climbing rock walls. Unlike other linnorms, they are not poisonous, but their cursed bite is vile enough to make foes wish for poison. Anyone fortunate enough to slay a chasm linnorm is struck with its death curse, feeling as if a weight is always on their shoulders pushing them down.
A chasm linnorm is fifty feet long and weighs around 13,000 pounds.
Image from The Godzilla Power Hour Episode 12: The Sub-Zero Terror, accessed at the Non-Alien Creatures Wiki here
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin, who’s got a real Hanna-Barbera theme going. Given the watchuki’s weird technology and propensity for disguising themselves as humans in the episode, I can’t help but wonder if they were inspired by Lovecraft’s “The Whisperer in Darkness”, which posits that the explanation for the Abominable Snowman are in fact hyper-intelligent alien fungi. So I looped around, and made these the creations of the mi-go.
I ran into a bit of a frustrating hiccup, with what @prokopetz refers to as the “Sim-Dungeon” vibe of D&D 3.x and its descendant, Pathfinder RPG. The ability to do 3d6 cold damage as a ranged touch attack is not an overpowered ability for a CR 3 creature, but I wanted to make the cold beams come from an item, like they do in the source material. And the costs of a magic item with this capacity would be way outside the normal treasure for a CR 3 encounter. If this cheat bothers you, make the “watchuki wand” a supernatural ability of these creatures rather than an item.]
Watchuka CR 3 LE Monstrous Humanoid This stocky humanoid has white fur over gray skin. Its face is mostly obscured by a beard and moustache, with piercing red eyes. It is naked save for a harness, off of which hang various strange tools and devices.
The watchuki (watchuka is singular) are an offshoot of the yeti. Although their forebears are strong yet peaceful creatures, watchuki are smaller and weaker but more cruel minded. They are in fact an artificial race—created through a selective breeding program by the mi-go, who were attempting to create a servitor race to handle the grunt work of creating technological items for them while the mi-go engaged in more intellectually satisfying endeavors. Thus, even the dimmest watchuka has an inherent talent for combining magic and technology, using this primarily to forge weapons of war. Many watchuki enclaves now exist separately from their mi-go creators, and some watchuki have forgotten their alien legacy.
Perhaps due to this engineered heritage, watchuki are prone to mutation. About one in three watchuki are born with the giant simple template—these are frequently mistaken for ordinary yeti. Very rarely a Great Watchuka will be born—these creatures are of animal intelligence but are grow to incredible strength and size. A Great Watchuka is a megaprimatus with the magical beast type and the fear gaze and cold resistance of a watchuka.
Watchuka Wand Price4,000 gp; Aurafaint evocation; CL3rd;Weight1 pound This thin silvery rod is favored by watchuka as a weapon. Three times a day as a standard action, a watchuka wand can fire a ray of cold; treat this as a ranged touch attack with a range of 120 ft and no range increment. A creature struck takes 3d6 cold damage and must succeed a DC 13 Fortitude save or take 1d6 points of Dexterity damage. These items are typically made using watchuka item crafting: the construction requirements below are for non-watchuka crafters. Construction Requirements Cost2,000 gp Craft Wondrous Item, ray of enfeeblement, snowball
“The Country of the Iguanodon” by John Martin, in the public domain. Accessed at Wikimedia here
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. This is about as retro as retrosaurs get. These ghastly creatures made me think “zombies”, which took me in the direction I went with them. I can imagine this painting as an exhibition match between necromancers off in the distance, taking bets and sipping wine.]
Primord CR 9 NE Undead This immense pallid horror resembles a swollen lizard or crocodile, with piggy black eyes over a massive maw lined with teeth.
A primord is something of a showpiece among necromancers—it is a creature designed more to be a display of talent and resources than a useful entity. Primords can find employ as guardians and terror weapons by skilled necromancers, but are frequently expended to fight each other in contests of wizardly might. Primords are mindless killers, and they live to fight. Without orders, a primord will instinctively kill and devour creatures, adding their mass to its own. They battle with claws and teeth, but their most effective weapons might be the combination of their grotesque appearance and merely plowing over enemies with their mass. Primords are as comfortable in the water as they are on land, and free willed primords can often be found at sea, attacking whales and sea monsters.
Creating a Primord A primord is created using a mounted skeleton as a base—this can be the intact skeleton of a Gargantuan creature, or a composite made from the skeletons of multiple recent or fossil creatures. This skeleton is then buried in a mass grave with 20 HD of zombies, and the spells animate dead, false life andbestow curse are cast over the morass. A primord counts as having twice as many Hit Dice as it actually has for the purposes of the material component needed, and for animation and control.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. The original image was posted to Twitter, possibly as part of the #buildabetterfaketheropod movement, but appears to have been deleted. The little horns got me thinking “devil dinosaur”, and then it kept going. In the Pathfinder setting, my favorite daemonic harbinger is Deceid, the lord of invasive species and ecosystem collapses. I think he had a hand in these guys’ creation.]
Stygionyx CR 15 NE Magical Beast This massive reptile looks like a cross between a dinosaur and a crocodile, with white eyes and a pair of horns over its fanged maw. A jagged ridge grows along its back, and its long arms end with scythe-like claws.
Even the Outer Planes can suffer the effects of invasive species. Dinosaurs are not uncommon in the Abyss, particularly with the fiendish template, as various demon lords maintain primeval aspects to their layers or count reptilian humanoids as their worshippers. Among the carnivorous dinosaurs, the spinosaurus is one of the largest and most resilient, and they eventually escaped into the River Styx. Rather than being locked into a fugue state and becoming just another casualty of that mighty river, they were molded into even more fearsome semiaquatic predators. Stygionyxes now patrol all of the Lower Planes, seeking to make petitioners and fiends alike into toothsome snacks.
A stygionix is sapient, but they act much as their animal ancestors did, as ambush predators of waterways. Their claws and teeth pass through the hides of fiends with ease, and they radiate an aura that makes teleportation impossible. Once combat is joined, they will often fight until slain, still thrashing and slashing to the bitter end.
Acclimation to the River Styx has granted stygionyxes immunity to all manner of mind influencing effects and spells, making them difficult monsters to control. They can be negotiated with, but their single minded dedication towards hunting and eating leaves little room for compromise. Some fiends turn them against their enemies with promises of novel delicacies (such as celestial beings or mortals), or merely lure them into positions where their depredations can play a purpose. Fiendish warriors of many species hunt them for trophies or sport, but the hunter frequently ends up the hunted.
A stygionyx grows more than fifty feet long. The oldest specimens can live for a century.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. The artist involved designed about eighty creatures, mainly hybrids and fakeosaurs, as potential D&D threats. Check them all out here]
Dragonweed CR 5 N Large Plant This fibrous plant has a ovoid, woody body from which grow six roots, which clamber along the ground like tentacles. Above a crown of leaves is a long stalk, ending in a massive beaked head.
Dragonweeds are a pernicious and dangerous type of carnivorous plants. They are so named for their fear and elemental powers, but some dragons do encourage dragonweeds to grow outside their lairs as a security measure. Dragonweeds can conceal themselves among ordinary plant growth by retracting their stalk-like necks, and they are surprisingly stealthy for their size. A dragonweed radiates fear that overwhelms many creatures and keeps them from fleeing or fighting—this compensates for their slow speed and allows dragonweeds to close the distance to catch and eat all manner of prey.
Dragonweeds of all elemental affinities can crossbreed effortlessly, and new mutations can crop up even in pure bred strains. The only physical difference between dragonweeds of different affinities is the color lining their beak-like mouth. Acid-affiliated dragonweeds have a green mouth lining, blue indicates cold, yellow indicates electricity and a red color marks fiery dragonweeds. Stranger affinities are rumored but unsubstantiated, such as force, sonic or negative energy damage. They are of animal-like intelligence, but are fairly dim and uncurious at that. They ignore plant creatures of all kinds, and some more intelligent plant monsters keep them as pets and companions.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin, with a very interesting pedigree. This creature is a speculative evolution concept by Robert Bakker, an iconoclastic paleontologist. He developed it for an episode of the Discovery Channel documentary Paleoworldas a “missing” carnivore, a bone-crushing macropredator in the style of an entelodont. Of course, entelodonts weren’t specialist macropredators, but the facts never got in the way of a good Bakker story.]
Ursapotamus CR 11 N Magical Beast This massive quadruped stands taller than an elephant. Its jaws are long and hippo-like, except that they are filled with an array of shearing teeth. Its body is that of a long-legged bear, with flat feet ending in sharp claws.
The ursapotamus is a huge hyper-carnivore that feeds on megafauna. It is an artificial hybrid, possibly created in an attempt to emulate the ammut as a sacred animal. Even though neither bears nor hippos are solely carnivorous, ursapotamus are. They tend towards being strongly seasonal, gorging themselves during the wet season and retreating into aestivation during the driest months.
An ursapotamus is an ambush hunter, striking from cover of water, grass or both. They prefer reed beds and marshy grasslands to open rivers and lakes. Like a bear, they are capable of rearing onto their hind legs when attacking. An ursapotamus uses its massive bulk to shove grabbed opponents while simultaneously inflicting deep, bleeding punctures with its tusk-like teeth. They usually hunt large game, such as elephants, rhinos or hippos, but human sized prey will be taken.
Ursapotamuses are solitary for most of their lives, ranging over wide territories in search of prey. They mate when the opportunity occurs, but like bears can delay pregnancies until their dormancy period. A mother ursapotamus is usually awoken by her cubs being born, and feeds them with fatty, energy rich milk until they are old enough to walk on their own, whereupon they accompany her in her hunts and learn the tools of the trade.
An ursapotamus stands between ten and twelve feet high at the shoulder. They can live to fifty years of age, but such ancient individuals are rare.
Screenshot from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad accessed at Where the Long Tail Ends here
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. The dragon from 7th Voyage is referred to in Ray Harryhausen’s notes as Taro, even though the name is never spoken in the film. The name came from the tuatara, which inspired his design. This in turn inspired me to take it in the direction of an insular giant and a flightless drake, as there are plenty of giant reptiles and flightless birds on real world islands. It also inspired the adaptive defense ability. Tuataras, despite their morphological simplicity, have one of the fastest evolving genomes in the animal kingdom. Appearances can be deceptive.]
Drake, Island CR 13 LE Dragon This immense dragon has four legs and no wings, and a crest of low spines connected by skin running down the length of its back. Its tail ends in a triangular barb and its teeth include two prominent fangs. Ridged horns grow from its head.
Island drakes are massive drakes that have adapted to life on islands by becoming large and flightless. Whereas other drakes have to compete with true dragons and stay relatively small and mobile, island drakes have expanded to the role of apex predator, and rarely have to worry about true dragons. They have taken the adaptive nature of drakes to an extreme—they can become temporarily immune to energy damage, giving them an upper hand in fights if a dragon does come to attack them.
Although island drakes are just as malicious as most other drakes, they have more patient and orderly minds. This is taken advantage of by powerful sorcerers or monsters, and island drakes make better allies than a typical drake. The one exception to this are with cyclopes; island drakes hate all cyclopes with a passion and attempt to kill them on sight.
Few islands can support more than a single island drake, but the creatures can go without food for extended periods of time and survive on fruit, shellfish or other miscellaneous food items if large prey is unavailable. Island drakes may swim from island to island in search of food, treasure or mates. Island drakes lay a small clutch of large buoyant eggs into the ocean—these float like coconuts for potentially thousands of miles before coming ashore on a new island and hatching.
An island drake is about sixty feet long, standing around twenty feet high at the shoulder.
Still from “A Scary Night with a Snow Beast Fright”, accessed at Biohazard Films here
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin. There’s just something about furry theropods that made them a recurrent pop culture monster decades before a real feathered, cold dwelling big carnivorous dinosaur was discovered with Yutyrannus. The Partridge Creek Monster was a fictional report of a black, feathery ceratosaurus in the Yukon. The comic 2000 AD featured the “furry tyrannosaurs” in several issues. And then of course there’s this handsome fellow. I went back and forth on whether to make it Huge or Gargantuan, since the animation of its size is woefully inconsistent throughout the episode.]
Gelusaur This immense shaggy beast appears to be something like a carnivorous dinosaur, although its tail drags on the ground and its arms are long. Its eyes have black sclera and red irises.
Gelusaurs are magically augmented dinosaurs that are top predators in the frozen reaches of the world. Their bodies are infused with elemental cold, suggesting the influence of the elemental planes, selective breeding by arcanists, or both. They are nocturnal creatures, rarely venturing from their ice caves except during the long polar winters. Then, they gorge themselves on mundane and magical prey alike, stocking up to hibernate through the summer months. Gelusaurs are usually faithful to their lairs, only moving if no prey returns to the surrounding area when the monster is inactive.
A gelusaur is a straightforward combatant—they attempt to grab prey items in their mouth and swallow them whole. Prey that keeps its distance is blasted with their freezing, blinding breath, and gelusaurs can throw rocks to cope with flying adversaries. They hate both fire and bright light, and will flee from enemies with ample access to fire effects. They are usually solitary creatures, but good parents—a group of gelusaurs typically consists of a mother and her sub-adult children.
A gelusaur is about forty feet long and weighs eight tons.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin, who wanted a retro-rex with cinematic abilities. The original “Dynamosaurus” is a nomen invalidum, given to a chimera of Tyrannosaurus and nodosaur bones. I went with a magical beast given my predilection for retrosaurs as magically enhanced or created dinosaurs.]
Dynamosaurus CR 12 N Magical Beast This massive bipedal reptile is dominated by a huge head bristling with oversized teeth. Its arms are small in comparison, and its tail is broad and powerful. Armored scutes cover its back and body.
Augmented through magical enhancements and selective breeding, a dynamosaurus is a tyrannosaurus exaggerated and amplified. They are ultimate predatory beasts, their inherent instincts sharpened into a killing machine. Although they originated in arcane laboratories, dynamosauruses have escaped captivity and entered the wild, where they threaten to destabilize ecosystems with their lust for violence and hunger for meat.
The ground shakes as a dynamosaurus moves, and their very presence incites lesser creatures to panic. Those that are not already affected by its frightful presence are intimidated with its awful roar, and a dynamosaurus will frequently target fleeing creatures for the sheer joy of the chase. Their teeth can shear through solid bone, and the bony plates that protect their vital organs keep them from being felled by a lucky shot from prey. One of the few things that can kill a dynamosaurus is another dynamosaurus. Although they sometimes travel in groups, these are fractious alliances that can turn competitive in a blink.
A dynamosaurus is as long as a mundane tyrannosaur, averaging over forty feet long, but their musclebound frames and bony armor increase their weight.
[Commissioned by @glarnboudin, based on the Pterodactyl Ghost from the New Scooby-Doo Show episode “Hang In There, Scooby-Doo!”. I figured I’d tie them to the phantosauras a similar pseudo-dinosaur creature. In the episode, there’s no evidence that these are even supposed to be ghosts, as opposed to relict pterosaur-men, but hey, a formula’s a formula.
Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that the Pterodactyl Ghost was based on Sauron from the X-Men. Very similar physical appearances.]
Ectodactyl CR 13 NE Outsider This green-scaled creature looks like a flying reptile bent slightly into humanoid shape. Prehensile hands grow from its wings, its feet are webbed, and its yellow eyes blaze with hate.
Lesser kin to the great phantosaur, ectodactyls are creatures created by the fearful dreams of mortals and their misconceptions of prehistoric beasts. An ectodactyl combines the form of a pterosaur with that of a humanoid, and their behavior is a savage parody of “man the hunter” and other fantasies of the blood-bespattered past. Ectodactyls are cruel creatures that hunt and kill for the sake of killing. They are found in remote mountains in the Material Planes, and are not uncommon of the slopes of the dreaded Plateau of Leng. They prefer to live in caverns, decorated with trophies of their victims. Their exploits are often carved onto cave walls as a permanent record of their evil deeds, and these may be mistaken for ancient relics until the monsters reveal themselves.
With their humanoid hands, some ectodactyls wield weapons, but most prefer to fight with their claws and beak. The beak of an ectodactyl is infused with negative energy, but such energy cannot even heal the undead (perhaps out of sheer spite). Ectodactyls enjoy hunting undead monsters as much as they do the living. Just about the only creatures an ectodactyl can stand aside from their own number are phantosaurs. Where their ranges overlap, ectodactyls view a phantosaur as a massive hunting hound, steering its activities in order to cause as much damage as possible.
An ectodactyl stands about six feet tall, with a wingspan of 10 feet.
When you think of fantasy tabletop game art in the 1980s, you think of Bill Willingham, who did some of the best art in the D&D Expert and Basic Set (e.g. the baby blue and bright slim red books with Erol Otus cover art).
But did you know that Bill Willingham actually wrote some adventure modules himself?ForVillains and Vigilantes, a game that has the distinction of being the first superhero tabletop RPG, though it was vastly overshadowed by Champions a few years later. But even in the early 80s, it was still put-putting along, and it had Bill Willingham going for it: he not only wrote the module but provided great comic-style art to introduce concepts in them. I wonder why more adventure modules done by artists haven’t tried that.
Bill Willingham liked the characters in his tabletop adventure modules so much that, when he created his own creator owned comic, Elementals, he brought the baddies from this module to it.
If you ever run into any tabletop game lovers who were big into games at a certain point, it’s an all but certain guarantee they’ll have a copy of the Breeder Bombs adventure module. And if you buy out collections, you’ll find this adventure as numerous as Topspin and Twin Twist jumpstarter figures are to Transformer toys. It’s as if this module can breed. I own three copies myself, just from picking it up from collections.
Why was this adventure everywhere? Well, most of the TSR Marvel Superheroes game was about the “core marvel universe,” and at the time, that was not quite as popular as the X-Men. Or perhaps I should clarify: in the 1980s, the top selling Marvel hero was Spider Man on the spinner rack and newsstands, GI Joe, a rural favorite, was the top seller by subscription, but X-Men was the top seller to the fan audience through the new development of comic book stores. That audience of superfans had COLOSSAL overlap with people who were tabletop gamers.
And this one was catnip to the superfan: it had both Magneto AND the Sentinels, perfect to get the “core X-Men experience,” and finally resolved a nerdy, nitpicky point of order that went unsolved in X-Men comics itself: what was the deal with the Magneto robot who employed Mesmero and captured Lorna Dane in Mutant City? This mystery went unsolved by the comics themselves for literally a decade and it wasn’t even resolved in X-Men comics proper, but by an offhand little clue in Byrne’s Captain America (much like how Nefaria’s lost Ani-Men mystery of Dragonfly went unsolved in X-Men but was instead resolved in Gruenwald’s Quasar run 15+ years later).
Looking at the trailer and promotional material for this video game you would be forgiven for thinking it was some sort of ultra-violent dating reality show where competitors are eliminated through rounds of live ammunition laser/bullet tag.
Collectively the Escher gang tick off a lot of bingo boxes, and so much screen time you would think the game was supposed to be entirely about them and not the *checks notes* the six core gangs, five or six other factions, and four extra gangs invented for the sequel tabletop game “Necromunda: Underhive”.
This is probably in part because the base game only has three playable gangs, and clearly they chose Escher for the sex appeal angle, and Goliaths for the weird hypermasculinity… but they really… really lean into one of those:
How’s that working out for them…
I can’t help but think that perhaps the fashion bras, skin-tight pants are not really conveying the Escher gang as a people of amazons from a sub-society where their men are generally physically feeble and unable to defend their territory. Maybe it’s several decades overdue for a reinvention. Possibly at a conceptual level that forgoes the assumption of patriarchy being the default.
