Illuminated Panthers

These reclusive, swamp-dwelling cats are tawny with deep black rosettes.  On closer inspection, the rosettes are actually cities and landmarks that make up a map to a hidden city.  Which city the map leads to differs for each panther.  Some say the pelt of one of these cats is the only way to find the City of Happy Orphans or the Hermitage of the 10,000 scribes.

The Sum of your Sins

Alejandra the Shepherdess spoke with animals and could heal them with a touch and the peasants prayed to her because of it.  When she died they put her in a simple cave and sang songs and danced for the animals that had gathered from miles around.  A rumor is a lie people want to be true and a rumor sprung up that she'd been courted by a prince who sent a coffer heavy with gems as a dowry.  Some seek to profane her humble cave in quest of those gems and the animals have taken up to try and keep them out and drive them out and stop them. 

On entering the cave, a wave of rats will threaten and gnash their teeth.  If these are overcome a group of small dogs comes biting and barking.  Any rats that have been killed will be joined to the bodies of the dogs and now lively again and biting.  Then a couple boars will come to drive away the unwanted.  Any dogs slain will writhe and yap from the shoulders of the boar as if joined in birth and rats slain will be there too.  And finally a great old bull will come spinning and kicking and goring with great horns.  And any boars slain will jut from its shoulders, tusks flaring, and any dogs slain will jut from the back of the bull, all along its sides , and any rats slain will be peppered about like fruit from a briar, grasping anything it touches and trampling it and rendering it asunder and this is the sum of your sins.

Serendipity XXVII

When I go looking for images I need I often find cool things I never expected to find. These images are all in the public domain:

I wish I had a bigger, higher resolution image for the next one, because the monsters are great!:

I was recently trying to come up with magical properties for masks. This might come in handy:

These images are all from this book.

4 XP Monsters

Trying to think of monsters that treat xp as an attack vector for players.  Wights are the traditional monster for this but I was interested in giving players a warning-- like losing small bits of xp over time to freak them out, rather than screwing them over quickly to just make them afraid of wights in future encounters.

Wight Flies - Tiny, moisture seeking-- they suck away memories as they drink from eyes, wounds, or open mouths (1xp per round per fly, DM's prerogative on how many hundreds appear at any location).  They leave fragile, ivory-like structures in corpses.  If eaten, these will grant the memories of past victims (100 xp per handful).


Grey Mold - Fine, sickly grey, it can grow anywhere-- on men, dragons, liches-- and is difficult to get rid of.  Anything in its presence is filled with a hollow sense of despair (lose 10xp per round x your level).  If you are hit by something infected by it you will likely be infected too (make a save).

Pot Boy - A thin, sickly looking boy clutching a small crockery.  The pot is covered in a filthy bit of rag.  If you see it (fail a save) you will no longer gain experience until something is done.  Telling someone about it will spread the problem to them (if they make a save they don't see it).  Legend tells of whole cities in the dull thrall of a single pot boy-- learning nothing, forgetting, merely existing.

The Gentle Double - A doppelganger that asks permission.  If you say yes and allow it to take your form, you receive a portion of the memories and experiences of it's current form (500xp x your level).  It then precedes you in cities and rural areas spreading good will and promises of aid.  Also called a Vardøger.  Scholars are divided on whether it is a truly good creature-- pressuring you to do good with its promises, or a chaotic one-- making promises that it never expects to be kept.

-----------

The last is not attacking xp, but using it as a reward to give players an interesting choice.

Discretionary Monsters

I realized in my game there are three kinds of monster: placed, wandering, and discretionary*.

"Placed" are those you know are in a particular place in the dungeon.  Whether a random roll told you they were there or you decided to put them, they are certain to be in a location.

"Wandering" monsters may appear, especially when noise is made, anywhere in a dungeon and at any time, if a roll says they do.  There is a certain line-up of possible creatures which might appear, but it is never certain they will, or which of them will.  Players could clear a whole dungeon and never encounter one of these.

"Discretionary" monsters appear when I, the DM, decide they do.  There are most likely one or two I've prepared ahead of time for any dungeon.  The monster comes and goes when I decide it does.

Now, hold on, you might be thinking, how is this old school?  It may seem a bit hypocritical for someone who believes so much that "story" is what emerges from play, and all the random rolls that move play forward.  But my game is fairly low magic, where you are likely to encounter wolves, and bears, and difficult terrain.  I like my game that way.  An adventure game that is so magical that wolves in a forest would no longer be considered a threat, because there are manticores, and minotaurs, and dragons in every hex, would lose much of what is thrilling about adventure tales from the real world.

And yet, I'm not trying to simulate frontier living, I want that spookiness of fairy tales.  If all that ever show up in my dungeons are wolves and bears and I have no control over when they appear, a dungeon might become a very mundane affair.  I want players that go underground to be afraid.  And to fear more than the loss of their lives.  And so I started keeping some monsters on "reserve."  They would show up at times players felt most vulnerable.  And it really worked.  It freaks them out.

Now, to avoid my becoming some adversarial DM that kills parties by making monsters show up and attack at my whim, I make these discretionary monsters non-violent.  They don't attack, even magically.  What kind of monster you might be thinking?  Well, old ghost story standards: a lost child, who by all rights shouldn't be down in the dungeon, who says something before slinking off into darkness.  A talking animal.  A little man riding a dog.  Something odd, but not outright threatening.

You might think that players will, after a while of seeing many of these, catch on to these non-violent monsters and no longer fear them.  But it turns out that it can be difficult to tell between one of these and a wandering monster, or if the characters have just entered a room, a placed monster.  In other words, it is never quite clear to them what type of encounter they are having so as long as a dungeon has all three types it will always be in a player's best interest to be wary, if not fearful.

"Might I hold your sword for just a moment?"

So, in a nutshell, here are some things I think required for a successful discretionary monster:

• Appear when players feel vulnerable.  See here for some thinking on that.  I find when characters are climbing up or down long drops a perfect place, either the first person to climb down a rope is pulled aside and told about what they see, or the last person to descend is told something is stirring in the shadows.
• Are hard to determine if they are a threat.  Something odd or off about a normal thing is pretty much the definition of creepiness.  The "why are you down in a dungeon, child!?" is probably the perfect example.  But a cat that comes out, sits, and offers a hand to shake, or a dog that comes out and starts coughing as if to vomit could work.
• Not outright hostile.  I think a Blind Agnes is an example of a creature that, while not a pack of orcs with swords, would cross the line for me and be unfair for me to use when I choose.  It would steal the vision of a player, and while creepy that is an outright attack. And yet, these types of monsters don't have to be harmless, which leads to the next point:
• Will make the situation even more dangerous if you engage with them.  The monster seems to want to lead you somewhere else.  The Blood Dove and Greater-Crested Potionguide would both work well as discretionary monsters.  But children or peasants might ask characters to do something that would be dangerous to do: "Close your eyes," "Hand me your sword for just a moment," "Follow me, I have something to show you."  I don't think it matters that few players would be foolish enough to do these things, even having the option presented to you is creepy.
• Used sparingly.  This gives me the option to do something a computer can't do, make monsters appear based on what I can tell about player mood.  Good times to deploy are when players are getting bored, distracted, or play is starting to slow down into a slog.  These kinds of monsters allow me to put a spark back into the game.  But they work because they create tension, and if they appear around every corner there is no tension.  Once or twice a dungeon is usually plenty.
• Aimed at particular players.  This is another thing that a computer or random system would find difficult to do.  I like for new players or quiet players to see these.  Then, it gives them something they can, and even need to tell the rest of the party, it gives them a reason to interact with the other players.  I like pulling them outside the room to tell them what they see because it causes tension with the other players, the rest of the party will really want to know, now, what that player was told.  It makes the new/quiet player the center of attention for a bit.  Note, that this all only works because these discretionary monsters are non-violent.  When a wandering monster shows up it is usually quickly evident to everyone.

I'm curious if other old school DMs use monsters in this way.  I think it is a pretty easy and effective practice though.

*Yeah, it's an accurate but horrible name.  If you have an idea for a better one let me know.

Monster Themes

In this recent post I tried to find a way to flesh out and differentiate monsters that have similar mechanical undercarriages.  It didn't work that well.  Now I'm thinking the simplest approach might be to just pick a theme and apply that to the different monster behaviors.

Here are some simple themes:

Monster Themes

1. Ancient
2. Cave
3. Chaos
4. Disease
5. Faerie
6. Insect
7. Magic
8. Prehistoric
9. Reptile
10. Evil of __________

"Ancient" I see as dry, mummified, or maybe your typical skeletal creatures- things that have been hidden away in this place for ages.  "Cave" is like albino, blind cave things.  "Evil" is basically full of possibilities.  If you have a cult of worship for gluttony, the monsters can all be variations of fat, huge-mouthed things.  Fear, pain, lust, etc. will provide lots of unique monster opportunities.

Let's try a few.

What about "Faerie"?  What would vermin be in that context?  How about little faeries themselves, flitting just out of reach until there is a large enough gathering of them that they are bold enough to attack.  That's pretty predictable, how about little bluebirds that fly in and peck you, or butterflies that swarm you and start putting you to sleep with their touch.

What about "Magic"?  Magic vermin might be blink rats that teleport to your shoulder and start chewing your ear off.  Or maybe even more magic, little, floating orbs that sizzle with energy and sting when they touch.  Or maybe a snake that cycles into a rat into spider and back again.  Or maybe that would be more suited to Chaos.

In the end, this isn't giving us the specific monster-making help I would like, but it may be the best possible.   Why am I posting this now?  Because we'll need this table for the next step in making our dungeon together.

Creepy Vermin

I mentioned in this post that I could use the behavior categories also as a kind of template, so, as a base, vermin have giant rats stats by default, and then I can differentiate them from there.  I've been thinking since that post about about how to do this.

Someone might call this "fluff" but, to me, this is where much of the game lies.  If I can freak out my friends just by describing what is slithering towards them, I'm happy.  Also, just mechanically, there isn't much range of damage or hit dice you can give creatures and keep them within the same dangerousness.  I mean, start giving giant rats 2 HD and they are no longer vermin, they start functioning as some other kind of dungeon monster.  So, in the end, a lot of creatures, unless you've given them a cool special ability, will be palette swaps for previously encountered creatures.

Anyway, on to what I came up with.  I started by trying to come up with a list of adjectives that might describe what I consider creepy or verminous.  I made a chart.  Then I thought it might be simpler and more strightforward to just combine creepy critters, so I made a second chart.  I'll show you that second one first because I don't think it works as well:

You can see above that I tried a second draft of this chart.  I cut bat and leech, because mouse/pigeon in my mind is much like a bat, and worm and leech seemed too close as well.

Again, I still didn't like the results much; how much different from a centipede is a worm/centipede or a maggot/centipede for that matter.  I think the problem is that too many characteristics that ick us out are packaged into each verminous thing and we need to tease some of them out to get more possible, and novel, combinations.

I think now, that a way to fix this might be to have the creepy stuff in one column and then fuzzy-pet stuff in the other (you could get like maggot-kitten hybrids, ick) Anyway, I just wanted to share it with you so you could see my process.  So, now back to the first attempt I mentioned:

I'm thinking now another possible column would be to add a "target," because an easy avenue to body horror is to tell you the thing is crawling toward your ear or burrowing into your armpit.

Anyway, let's try a few:

8, 9 , 2
Naked skin, it glides, and has teeth, okay maybe flying cave squirrels.  Or to try and get weirder, hairless Chihuahuas that bark continuously and glide at you with little needle teeth.

8, 8, 4
Okay that's kind of gross, it looks like a hairless hamster with a long proboscis and it will hop suddenly and try to plunge it into you and suck your juices.

2, 5, 6
This is scaly like a small lizard and it moves on shaky legs like it is sick or dying but it has a stinger on its belly.

5, 5, 3
This is slimy and shaky, sound like a newborn.  So, maybe this looks like a newborn puppy that shakily approaches with eyes closed and then pounces with sharp claws.

Not too bad.  I might use some of those.  One of my players is a dog groomer and I think having new-born puppy-things following her around the dungeon trying to do her harm might freak her out.

It doesn't completely solve my problem because I have scavengers and pack creatures to worry about too, but it's a start.

Monster Tactics / Encounters

So I blogged here and here about wanting to have a simple system to help with how creatures will act when they become hostile, but I realized that I was trying to solve another problem as well.  I most often run small dungeons and trying to come up with wandering monsters is always tough for me.  Sure, you can come up with a cool showcase monster, but a dungeon needs a whole array of possible creatures to encounter.  And, come the end of the week my tired brain has always struggled with that.

With the creature behaviors as a starting point I can, hopefully, more easily flesh out the ecosystem of each new dungeon.  If the dungeon is submerged, for instance, the vermin can be little crab-things, and I'll up their AC.  If the dungeon is a sewer under a urban area, I can have down-and-out humans act with the behaviors of creatures: scavengers and vermin.  Or I can just palette swap -- these vermin are worms not rats-- or riff, these spiders act like slavers, these termites are soldiers with different castes.  Etc.

Another thing I want to address is the method I've been using to keep track of wandering encounters.   What I've done for a quite a while is, for each dungeon, make little booklets made with the cool telemonster tool Jensan made.  But I've found the little booklets fiddly in play and hard to store along with their dungeons because they aren't a flat piece of paper.  I'd like a single, letter-size piece of paper that I can fold in half.  That way, with a single-sheet map, and the encounters I can walk around DMing with two sheets of paper.

Here is a form I've been working on to help with both of these issues at the table.  I'm not done yet, but the idea is you pencil in whatever adjustments you want to make to the standard monster type (I'll probably add standard HD and dmg values), generate a few encounters worth, and then draw the hit points of these in boxes on the graph paper (a great trick I got from ZakS).

I've simplified the encounter results roll to 2 and increments of two from there, to try to help me memorize this and do things quicker at the table.  If I remember correctly this will make packs and scavengers more likely to show up than vermin, which makes some sense to me. 

The asterisk could be the cool showpiece monster.  It will also most likely be placed in a specific location, but this would mean you encounter it outside of there.  Or, heck, the asterisk can just be overtly aggressive things like zombies or rabid bears.

I mentioned in the last post that the number appearing will be important.  I thought about it a lot and I think, with my play groups of around 4-6 people that sometimes have hirelings, 2d6 for packs, 3d6 for scavengers and 4d6 for vermin should work okay.  With the understanding that packs get overtly aggressive when they are twice as many as the party, scavengers when they are triple, and vermin quadruple the party number.  I'm going for simplicity and the ability to easily recall these. 

The way I have the table set up in this draft, a result of 11 or 12 would bump you to the second table of intelligent opponents.  That would make them pretty unlikely to be encountered.  But, I can flip those tables and have some locations far less likely to have wild creatures wandering around.  Which makes sense, because the cult temple guards would probably want to deal with roving packs of predators.

I'll try it out, next dungeon I run.

Monster Tactics cont.

Continuing to come up with a system to help me run monsters.  First a few thoughts I've had since last post:

I thought of "want to touch you" as an additional kind of behavior category.  This would include rust monsters and anything that wants to lay eggs in you.  But I realized, that I have no problems knowing what those things will do when and encounter happens.  The more unique a monster the more I feel comfortable knowing what tactics it will probably use.  This is more about trying to add complexity to the kind of battles that happen very frequently in my games where giant rats just suicide attack a party if their morale doesn't fail.  (I also want to work up a framework to deal with parties of humans, which I've largely avoided up to now.)

That being said, we have to keep in mind that if the majority of the behaviors depend on outnumbering the party to attack, # appearing for monster encounters becomes much more important.  Too few rats, and vermin never attack outright which is effectively reducing the number of wandering monsters in a dungeon.  Too many rats, though, and you basically moot the whole behavior system with the rats attacking as normal.

I think one way to address this is to allow for escalating numbers.  In other words, vermin that shadow the party for, say, a whole turn will accumulate more vermin.  Shadow for another turn more vermin gather, until the party leaves the dungeon or does something about the vermin.  Then all the number based behaviors become a ticking time bomb.

Another possible approach is to use escalating behaviors.  If it seems a bit much that more and more of these monsters appear in a dungeon you could just make them more and more bold.  With a bit of adjustment, the list of animal behaviors from last post becomes almost a list of increasing boldness:

1. Defensive Attacker
2. Vermin
3. Scavenger
4. Pack hunter
5. Lone Hunter
6. Aggressive Attacker

Here, I've added a category for animals like bulls and rhino that won't bother you if you leave them alone, and when they do fight will likely fight to drive you off, not to slaughter everyone in sight.  Aggressive Attacker is just a more descriptive name for grizzlys and orca and such that will attack in an aggressive and straight forward way, taking down one target before moving to the next, combining what I called "mindless" and "high threat" last post.

So, except for the lone hunter step, this gives us a pretty smooth progression from little to more boldness and aggression.  I think my current lean is to go with escalating behaviors.  So, for example, the party encounters a pack of sickly scavenger dogs.  There are too few dogs for them to attack outright so they start shadowing the party hoping for food.  After a certain amount of time of not being fed by the party or by corpses from the party's other encounters (1 turn, 1hr?)  the dogs will have lost their fear enough to start acting like pack hunters, with the highest hp individuals darting in for attacks and dogs attacking from multiple sides.

Sentient Behaviors
One thing I realize is that maybe the "tactics" in the title is not quite right for what I want here.  I want, not only help in know how groups will fight, but what the heck they want if they parley.  With that in mind here are some categories I came up with for groups of humans and other intelligent foes:

1. Bandits
2. Slavers
3. Guerrillas
4. Warriors
5. Soldiers
6. Adventurers

Bandits want money and don't want to risk their skin if they don't have too.  Give them what they want and they will likely just leave you alone.  If they are outnumbered or outpowered, they might try subterfuge, trickery, or predicting where the party might be later and meeting them there.

By Slavers I'm thinking any group that wants prisoners, so they could be cannibals or zealots gathering religious sacrifices, or just slavers.  They will use try to use non-lethal weapons and maybe swarm opponents with grappling attacks or try to disarm foes.  But if they have to kill a few folks to break resistance they will.

Guerrillas are used to fighting an occupying force that outnumbers them.  They will shadow and reconnoiter carefully before committing to doing anything.  They will try to predict where the party will be later and set up an ambush.  They will try to use traps and missile weapons to their advantage.  They may break off the attack even if it is going well, just to be careful as well as trying to demoralize the party.

Warriors come from a society that honors and values individual bravery and feats in combat.  They aren't necessarily hostile, but once they are they will have high morale and be dangerous.  They are skilled warriors, fighting man to man and trying to quickly take out the highest threat targets in the player party.  They are less likely to take prisoners.

Soldiers are trained to fight as a group and will use group tactics like shield wall and fighting retreats.  They will have a leader that, if taken out, will cause them to suffer severe morale penalties.  They
are more likely to parley and accept surrender.

Adventurers are the least clear in my head and might just be a place holder until we think of a better category.  They are essentially like the party a mixed group individuals of varied ethnicities, gender and abilities.  Loose cannons, they may act as bandits or as warriors.

And that's what I have so far.  I'm sort of assuming fairly homogeneous groups for my own sanity's sake.  So, even if it makes sense to have a ragtag bunch of bandits where each of them have different weapons and armor types, I will try to avoid that for simplicity.  Also, I'm hoping that these guidelines will help when I add magic-users and divine-types to the mix.  Magic-users with slavers will try to use their spells too immobilize and knock out the party, guerrillas MUs will use spells to aid in stealth, reconnaissance and misdirection, etc.

Monster Tactics

I don't see my DM role as being an adversary of the players.  I see myself as a facilitator of adventures.  In other words, I have to do just enough to know that adventure is possible and keep spinning the wheels so the game continues.  I don't have to worry about story, or big bad finale monsters, or anything but helping players move around in that shared imagined world.  The problem comes when players face opponents, because then I am the brain of the adversaries.  And this is one of the last places that I feel the game is not giving me enough support when I DM, when monsters attack.

I've largely dealt with this by using random rolls to determine which target, from those closest to it, that a monster will go after.  That and morale has been enough, surprisingly, to have some really fun combats, partially, because I have stuck to mostly creatures of animal intelligence.  But I've wanted something more sophisticated for a while.

Traditionally, I think the solution is supposed to be to look up the monster in the monster manual and you find out about its behavior and ecology there.  But that means you have potentially infinite monster behaviors to memorize as DM.  That's not a good option.  I think traditionally the encounter dice are supposed to give the DM valuable info too, but because it just generates a range of numbers it isn't going to solve that memorization problem: high or low numbers will presumably lead to different corresponding actions by different creatures.

In this post by Alexis of the Tao of D&D looks at creatures by intelligence and one of the factors is how they react during encounters.  That has been bubbling in the back of my head for years now as well as an article from the Dragon that talked about intelligent monsters targeting high threat party members like magic users.

I think I have finally come up with a solution that simplifies the idea while keeping much of the flavor.  I can assign all creatures one of a small number of behaviors.  That will give me some consistent behaviors without requiring too much to remember.  I would put them into these six categories:

1. Mindless
2. Vermin
3. Scavenger
4. Pack hunters
5. Lone hunter
6. High Threat

I still need to flesh out the actual behaviors but here are some ideas:

Mindless creatures, like zombies, would function the way I've been handling monsters, they attack whatever's closest with a bit of randomness for equally close targets.

Vermin would only physically attack if they far outnumber the target or are cornered, but they will shadow the party and try and steal small trinkets and food.

Scavengers would behave similar to vermin with a lower outnumbering ratio needed.  They would also become aggressive over any carcasses the party produces fighting other creatures.

Pack hunters would try to encircle the party and, also dependent on the numbers of each group, might start probing attacks by stronger pack members to see if the whole pack should swarm in.

Lone hunters might shadow the party for a while before darting in quickly in an attempt to carry off the smallest party member.

High threats are like mother bears with cubs or elephant bulls in must, unless you show sign of submission and back away quickly, they will attack ferociously.  (hmm, that seems a little too similar to mindless).

What I like about this is that players could learn these behaviors and gain a sense of expertise about the dangers in the wilderness as their characters become veterans.  And all I have to do is decide which behavior type traditional monsters fall under.  Are stirge vermin or pack hunters?  And that gives the cool possibility of having some stirge that act as vermin, the bluish-black ones, and some as pack hunters, the reddish tinged ones.  Parties will learn to pay attention to that small difference.

Are there any other broad behavior types that are left out?  Maybe lie-in-wait type hunters, but those are more like traps that would then attack mindlessly.

(I know this still doesn't deal with sentient foes, but I have an idea that six additional categories might work for them, including guerrilla tactics and such.)

The Angel of Memory

This angel appears as nine alabaster-white discs floating just above the ground.  If touched, they give some but won't move from their position.  If a creature stands on one of the discs it will forget something and remember something.  Stepping off and getting back on, or stepping to a different disc will result in the same thing but the process is hazy and inexact, the subject losing more memories each time.
________________________________________________________________

Stepping on a disc removes a memory and replaces it with one from someone else that has stepped on the angel in the past.  These may be aeons old.  What you remember could be:

1. The place you buried your ill-gotten gains.
2. Those ruins the great wizards go to to die.
3. The place you left the imprisoned djinn.
4. How to use an uncommon weapon.
5. Your signature spell.
6. Your recipe for a toxin.
7. A shortcut that makes travel between two common points half as long.
8. The name of a forgotten god.

What you forget, hmm, I'll leave that up to you.  I was thinking class skills basically, and that they could be remembered as normal be the time the character reaches next level, or sooner if they hire a trainer.  So a fighter might forget how to use long swords for a level but know a spell they can cast from their mind once.

Stepping on the first disc is free, additional cause the subject to lose 100xp per lvl.

I imagine it would be possible that a character would lose something so important to them they might step again and again onto the angel to try and get it back.  To simplify resolving this I might say a new memory is placed in the upper left disc and is shuffled through them with each new memory added.  So, a player has nine tries to retrieve that particular memory before it is rotated into the aether.  It isn't lost for good, because other memories are rotated into the discs each time they are used, but who knows how many thousands of attempts would take to find it after it has left the discs.

The Angel of Music

The Angel of music appears as three alabaster-white cylinders hanging in mid-air, each shorter than the last.  Disturbing one of these cylinders will produce a clear, resonant tone.  Each cylinder a different tone.  After three tones have been produced all living creatures in earshot will be affected in one of three ways:

1) Reduced in age to the time their kind is first ambulant.
2) Set to the prime age for their kind.
3) Increased in age to the time their kind is still just barely ambulant.

And then the Angel teleports to a random location nearby.
_____________________________________________________________________________

To keep things simple, I would tie the effect to the first cylinder hit.  To keep things unpredictable I would determine this randomly.  In other words, the smallest cylinder doesn't necessarily turn everyone into a toddler.  But if I rolled that cylinder "B" is the youthening one, then any three tone sequence that starts with that cylinder will turn things into toddlers of their kind.

You have to hear the tones for the effect to work. 

For the second effect I would make it a complete refresh: parasites, scars, tattoos gone, lost limbs regained etc.  This could serve as the bait (they've read about it somewhere and want to get an eye back or something) that could make a cautious party mess with the Angel at all.

If this interests you see this and this.

Silhouettes LII

Nothing too exciting this time, but these things have started cluttering up my desktop so let's get some more out there.  Here are public domain silhouettes for your maps, charts, and counters:

An addax:

 A goa:

A gemsbok:

A mountain goat:

A Musk ox:

This stegosaurus has been sitting around on my computer for years, but I haven't ever found a better example so I might as well give you this slightly lumpy one:

And, finally, a gila monster:

 

I've got more of these animal silhouettes coming soon.  Mostly wilderness related and not very useful as monsters, but I like having a lot of parts to make weird mashups with.  Here's an example:

These have all been added as vector graphics to the zip file linked in my sidebar to the right.

Misc VIII

I try to gather up ideas that seem a little too thin to warrant a separate post into these miscellaneous posts.  Usually they are small house rule mechanics or campaign setting ideas.  Anyway, here are a few more:

Word Eater
They look like obese children with mouths slightly open and drooling.  They amble out of stark wastelands to follow parties and listen.  They appear mute.  If they hear a word of particular interest to them, such as a name or a word shouted with emotion, they will "eat" it.  The word then disappears from the mind of the speaker.  They cannot say it, read it, or understand it as language if it is spoken to them.  Some say the only way to get the word back is to slice open the belly of the Word Eater and extract it.  But such a butchering might release a flood of strange and ancient words.

Blight Writing
Some wise women have the ability to draw a malady from a person by "writing them out."  This involves several strange ingredients as well as bird guano and willow bark.  A set of scratchings will appear on the bark that resemble both quail tracks and cuneiform writing.  If a spell is cast to allow reading this willow scroll, the reader will catch the malady there recorded.

Extended Stat Check
To see how long the burly fighter can hold the collapsing ceiling up, the swimmer can hold their breath, or the rogue can balance on the swaying tightrope, try this: Roll a d6 each round and when the total of the results surpasses the character's appropriate stat they finally reach their limit.  I think this could be much more dramatic than a single stat check or saving roll and since a player with their character in such a situation will probably be static while the rest of the party frantically does something else, it will give them something to do each round.

Simple Charges
When you first use a wand or staff roll a d6.  A result of 1 means it just fails to work.  You can try to use it once a round until it does work.  Once it works, however, the failure range moves from just 1 up to 1-2.  This continues with each successful use.  Once the failure number is 6 the item will never work and must be recharged if that is possible. 

To recharge a single level, cast a spell of equal level on the object, then roll the number you would need to succeed if it had that level charge left.  For example, a completely dead wand would need a sixth level spell cast into it and then the caster would need to roll a 6 on the d6.  If successful, then a fifth level spell would need to be cast on it and then a 5 or 6 rolled for it to "take."  And so on until it is fully charged.

Silhouettes L

Here it is, the fiftieth batch of public domain silhouettes for your maps, charts, and counters.  Use 'em or lose 'em.

I wanted something a little special for this post, so how about some lycanthropes?  We start with a werewolf:

A werebear

A wererat

And a weretiger or rakasha

That last one's just a mashup of two other silhouettes in the pack, but I think it works.

Now a lizardman I cobbled together from a few images:

An ape from a tarzan book that could also be a yeti or shaggy goblin of some sort:

An alternate thief or perhaps an assasin:

a wolf rider:

I might edit that one later to make it look more like a goblin on a worg, but I thought I'd give you the original.

Here's a native with spear ( I think he was the son of Tarzan):

He looks a little nonchalant to me, almost like he's a surfer hitting the beach.

Here's a savage flying beast from Pellucidar which looks like it might be based on a Rhamphorynchus:

And two kinds of geckos:

A woman begging (or maybe doing jazzhands):

And the one you've all been waiting for . . . a pig:

These have all been added as vector graphics to the zip file linked in my sidebar to the right.  I also converted a few more images in that file to svg and renamed some files.

More Monster Making

I was hoping to do the room stuffing thing with my friends tonight, but I don't think I'm really prepared for it yet.  I did sit down and make this monster chart:

It's a roll-all-the-dice giving you the basic nuts and bolts of a monster.  I haven't even rolled on it yet, it might be entirely unusable.  But it was one of those things where I needed to make what I saw in my head so I could try it out.

I have used my dice drop chart a few times and haven't been that happy with the results.  I might try printing a bunch of the possibilities on business card-sized slip and draw from them like a deck.

Another idea is to prompt players with categories like "body horror" or "fairy tale."  Or maybe just with tones like "goofy" or "creepy."  I suppose those could be another roll, another draw, or, if you're being game-like anyway, rotate through them.  In other words, the first player has to come up with an explanation of their roll as something body horror related, the next fairy tale-esque, etc.  I suppose that's all assuming the stats and special abilities don't give an idea of what the monster is all about anyway.  Okay, I'm off to see about making the cards.  Have a great Friday night.

Update: 6:28: Acch, just realized the AC doesn't really make sense. I think I was mushing ascending and descending together in my head.  I think it can be an easy fix though, by switching the Size and AC columns.  That would give more size points also.

Silhouettes XLVIII

For your charts, maps, and player handouts, these are all public domain, so use them as you wish.

A wild dog, rabid dog, or wolf:

And with all the insects I posted last year I never got in a praying mantis:

A Viking warrior on horseback:

and another priest or wizard calling for a spell:

These have all been added as vector graphics to the zip file linked in my sidebar to the right.

The Bridge of Crows

A wide chasm.  Riches rumored to be on the opposite side.  Murders of crows cawing and hopping about on this side.  If you sleep near the crows they form a bridge in your dreams that you can walk across the ravine.  If you wake while walking the crows fly away leaving you to fall.

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The bridge of crows is from an actual fairy tale I haven't read.  I just saw an illustration of it as I hunted for silhouette material.  It showed up in my dreams chart.  I suppose it's more a location or feature than a monster.

I think I would make it so that one or more players would have to find a way to fall asleep near the crows, even with all the noise.  And it would take 1d6 turns for them to see the bridge and cross it.  Hopefully there is some encounter in the mean time to make things tense.  Maybe something lairs right next to the crow landing.

Crossing the bridge successfully would essentially teleport the character to the other side.
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So, I think that's about the end of my fairy tale run.  I was trying to think of some more direct threats, monsters pcs could actually fight.  But from my experience fairy tale threats are either beaten by simple rules or gobble you up whole-- not much exciting combat going on.  If you've got ideas post them in the comments.

The Russet Bear

The russet bear has reddish hair and likes the sweetest things.  It will follow you about hoping for more if you feed it berries or cream.  Whistle a song it will amble along and dance the happiest dance.  Any who see the Russet Bear dance will wish to join in (save at -2, fairy tale magic is powerful).  It has different dances for different tunes:

The twirling dance (twirling, dizziness afterward, prevents attacking etc.)
The hide and seek dance (all viewers flee while the song lasts)
The ring-around-the-rosy (all viewers come in close and link hands)
The single file dance (all viewers form a conga line and follow the bear which will follow the tune maker)
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Set a simple tune that players might know like Happy Birthday or the Do Re Mi song, or the William Tell Overture for each specific dance.  That way players will have to experiment a bit to discover the different dances.  And have actually actually whistle the tunes they are trying, heh.  The song doesn't have to be whistled in game, players could use instruments or hum.  To clarify who is affected you could say anyone whistling along is not.  So the whole party can be safe as a dance starts and savvy foes might start whistling too.

The bear will usually wander off in the night unless the party goes to great pains to keep it stocked on lots of sweet foodstuffs.

So the bear is less a monster than an awkward magic item.  I tried to keep the dances whimsical but potentially useful-- say the players are ambushed and have the bear tagging along-- start up the hid and seek dance and the ambushers will clear out giving time for escape.  It might be more about hijinks too, like taking the thing to court and making all the nobles do the conga.  Or I suppose the Russet Bear could be following a troubador npc and be used against the party.

Update: After posting I'm feeling I didn't get the tone quite right here, it's a little too twee.  With the last two posts I was trying to get the creepiness and threat that seems to underlie the apparent childishness of fairy tales.  To get more of that here, I might make the dances more frightening - the twirling dance like the tarantella will dance people to death, maybe add London Bridge which will send dancers over cliffs like waves of lemmings at each chorus of "we all fall down." Something to make players a little afraid of the bear themselves.  Hmm, maybe if you don't keep it fed with sweets it will make you dance.

The Milk Maid

A barefoot, young girl with a wooden pail of warm milk walks in a dangerous place.  Oddly unharmed, she says to the party "All worried and weary come drink from my pail.  Come drink this warm milk and feel hearty and hale."

Drinking the milk will always heal the drinker (2d6 hit points) but other effects depend on the kind of milk it is.  The milk in the pail actually comes from a local denizen, so it might be unicorn, dragon, or ogre (don't think too much about the specifics it's a fairy tale).

Refusing to drink from the pail means the next encounter will be with something that has.  (This will be obvious because of the empty pail nearby or milk dripping from its chin.)

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So, this monster isn't really ready to run out of the box.  You'll need to decide what the milk of each of the creatures on your random encounter table would do (if an ogre drinks dragon milk?  If a unicorn drinks kobold milk?).  If players decide to drink the milk, have them roll on your encounter table what kind of milk it was (it seems funnier and creepier to know you just drank rot grub milk than to just feel the effects).

Also, I think this milk maid would work best with some foreshadowing.  Have the local village peasants arguing about whether you should or shouldn't drink from her pail with examples of what happened when their second cousins did etc.  That way, even her appearance is a kind of an event.