How to Die, and XP for Failure

Ok, so like I said in the last post, I made some changes to the 5e 2014 rules. The major change is to the dying and resting rules, which ties in to how I award XP. You may be able to apply the basic principle in other games.

Dying: When you go to 0 HP, you gain one level of exhaustion. Then, the party gains XP equal to your level of exhaustion, times your level, times 100. This XP is shared equally among all PCs at the end of the session.

When you fail a death saving throw, you gain one level of exhaustion, and the party gains XP in the same way as above.

Exhaustion: The normal penalties for exhaustion do not apply, except you still die if you reach six levels of exhaustion.

Short rest: During a short rest, you can spend hit dice to regain hit points as normal. You always regain the maximum amount of hit points from each die, no need to roll.

Long rest: A long rest does not let you recover any hit points by itself, but you can spend hit dice just like during a short rest. You recover all hit dice and spell slots at the end of a long rest. But if you have exhaustion, there is an X in 6 chance to not recover an expended hit die or spell slot, where X is your level of exhaustion. Roll a d6 for each expended hit die and spell slot.

After determining what hit dice and spell slots you recover, remove one level of exhaustion.

Channel Divinity: A cleric or paladin with exhaustion must roll to recover expended uses of Channel Divinity during a short rest, in the same way as for hit dice and spell slots during a long rest. They always recover Channel Divinity during a long rest. (We agreed to implement this after the Life Cleric went crazy with her Channel Divinity healing.)

Base XP Reward: At the end of each session, in addition to the XP gained from dying, each character earns XP equal to the highest level among the surviving characters, times 100.

New Characters: If your character dies, your new character starts one level lower than your high score (minimum 3).

The guys who survived the dragon fight found themselves mysteriously dumped in the wilderness. They headed to town and someone had the idea "hey, maybe we should tell the queen there's a friggin dragon in her castle." So they returned to the castle and screwed around, killed some wolves and more suitors, never got around to telling the queen anything, and then an old guy with an arrow in his back showed up in town and said the elves were coming. I didn't mention this last post, but our heroes did previously break a statue of the king's grandpa that had a weird pointy-eared monster inside. Which they killed. Well what they don't know is that it was the elf lord of the land, twisted by his long imprisonment, who was sealed in there by the first human king, and with the old elf lord dead, the great fey has finally chosen a new ruler of the land's elves, and she has called upon them to take back what is theirs, and now the elf war is about to begin.

ELF WAR PARTIES

Roll d4 for Frontline and Support, and combine.

Frontline

1. 1d4 elfmaidens riding unicorns
2. 1d2 fey trolls (cannot regenerate while touching steel)
3. Vine mech piloted by an elf
4. 1d6 foxfolk mercenaries

Support

1. 1d6 stealth archer elves
2. 1d4 singing bard elves
3. 1d4 solar priest elves
4. 1d4 flying wind wizard elves 

The Old-school 5e Renaissance Has Begun

 The new edition of D&D 5e has been out for a while, and people seem to agree that it's kinda bad but it's all right. I have no interest in playing it. But it did make me think back to the olden days (mid-2010s) when I first ran 5e. It was fun! 5e was, at the time, an OSR game. We had weird player characters wandering the wilderness and delving dungeons, searching for treasure and dying horribly to my home-made monsters. Why not return to those rose-tinted days of high adventure!

My friends were thinking the same, so we've started a 5e 2014 campaign. There's a talking cat, and a servant of cosmic Law, and a kobold that can turn giant, and more, and they came to the sick king's castle that had turned into a dungeon, and they fought poison-spitting stag lizards and creepy suitors looking to marry the queen, and they met a raven man who gave them random prophecies of doom, and the queen wanted them to cure the king and also find the lost princess, and they looted the princess's bedroom and found a secret door, and they fought a dragon that kicked their ass and killed the kobold, but the player came back with a githyanki stand-user... Yes, this is just like I remember it!

Of course I had to make some changes to the rules, but that's all part of the fun. Here's what I think needs fixing in 5e 2014. Maybe I'll go into more detail on how I did it later.

• All player options are allowed
• Put ability score bonuses wherever you want 
• Start at level 3
• No feats or multiclassing
• Fix or ban the annoying spells
• Fix the druid
• Fix the ranger
• Don't fully recover after a single long rest if you got really beat up
• Add a travel system
• Decide how to reward XP
• And most importantly: Make the monsters deadlier

I know there have been people trying to make 5e into more of an "old-school" game before, but I'm not really trying to make 5e like the early editions of D&D. I'm trying to make it into the 5e I remember playing, the game from my blurry nostalgic memories. And I'm succeeding!

To be continued...? 

MM3: Dragon to Giant

<-Previous 

Dragon

Blizzard dragon, earthquake dragon, volcanic dragon (all with wyrmling, young, adult, elder, and ancient variants)

By the time of the third monster manual, 4e had already gone through chromatic and metallic dragons, so now it was time to get a bit weirder. Here we have the catastrophic dragons, which are great! Dragons as living disasters make a lot of sense, and you could easily come up with more types: thunder dragons, tsunami dragons...

The catastrophic dragons don’t have breath weapons. Instead, their catastrophe is constantly raging, with the dragon at the heart of the calamity. I think the behaviour of the dragons would vary depending on their type. A volcanic dragon would have a volcanic lair, occasionally venturing forth to ravage the land. A blizzard dragon might haunt a tundra or mountain range. An earthquake dragon would live deep beneath the earth, rising to the surface to bring destruction before descending into the depths once again.

Dread warrior

Dread protector, dread marauder, dread archer, dread guardian

These are undead soldiers who retain the martial skill they possessed in life, and are utterly loyal to their master. They are described as still being kinda stupid and unable to follow complex orders, but I think it’s more interesting if they are intelligent, at least in matters of warfare. If the dread warriors’ master is slain, they are freed and can do as they please. But what would undead creatures that only know war do with their freedom? Become mercenaries? Set out to conquer the world? Retire and un-live in peace? Each dread warrior must make a decision on how to spend their undying existence.

Drow

Drow zealot, draegloth abomination, drow shadowblade, drow archmage, drow exalted consort, drow lady of spiders

The drow described in this book are the abyssal drow, who live in the demonic Abyss at Lolth’s side. (Remember, the mortal world’s drow empire was destroyed by the chitines.) The drow make for yet another faction in the eternal war for the Abyss.

Draegloth abominations are fusions of drow, spider, and demon. Every draegloth should be unique and messed up: a drider-like creature, a spider with eight elf-legs, a humanoid with a spider head and one arm replaced by two spider legs...

Drow shadowblades are cool too. They’re assassins who can summon a shadow clone of themselves. They might team up on a target, or just send the shadow off by itself.

Elemental

Air elemental, earth elemental, fire elemental, water elemental (all with lesser, normal, and greater variants)

4e preferred elementals that combined several elements, so the regular elementals didn’t appear until this third monster manual. Multi-element elementals are more interesting for sure, but there is something to be said for the thematic resonance of “pure” elementals. I would use them sparingly, perhaps bound to magical items a la the old “brazier of fire elementals” and so on. The one who possesses the item can summon forth an elemental, but must concentrate to stay in control of it. Allows for shenanigans with stealing the item and taking control of the elemental, the elemental going wild and so on.

Forsaken

Forsaken fearwrack, forsaken infiltrator, forsaken loreseeker, forsaken slaughterer, forsaken mastermind

The forsaken are humanoids infused with the dispersed essence of slain gods. Having got a taste of divinity, they want more. They hunt angels and devils to absorb their divine essence, and scheme to kill more gods. Also, they took their own eyes out so they don’t have to look at the mortal world. Also, they’re all super-powerful, level 26 at minimum.

I kinda want to totally rewrite this. Forsaken are people who are addicted to divine essence. Long-term use makes their eyes deteriorate, as a defense mechanism against having to see the meagre truth of their mortal existence. Also, the forsaken become incredibly powerful, filled with residual god power... as long as they keep getting their fix.

I could see forsaken as a ruling class, of a society fully geared towards getting their leaders that divine essence. Devils might be the most easily accessible source. Parties of devil hunters would be sent out into the world, probably armed with some spell or item to prevent defeated devils from escaping to Hell.

Foulspawn

Foulspawn wretch, foulspawn mockery, foulspawn warpcaller

Fucked up guys from the Far Realm. Nothing really special about them, they are enemies of all that is natural, they want to kill you or drive you mad, etc. I don’t think Far Realm creatures should be out to destroy the world or whatever, they should generally be indifferent to it. Foulspawn could be less powerful entities of the Far Realm that have entered this world by accident or summoning. The physical laws of this realm are entirely different from those of their home, and so the foulspawn find themselves inhabiting new, bizarre bodies in an alien world they can barely comprehend. A horrifying experience for everyone involved.

Frog

Thornskin frog, sporeback frog, murklord frog

Frogs are neat, they can shoot their tongues out and pull enemies in. Uhh, yeah, that’s about it, the text really doesn’t tell you anything unexpected. Gotta come up with something... Okay, so sporebacks have mushrooms growing on their back. Thornskins would have thorns, then? So frogs live in direct symbiosis with plants and fungi. What about murklords? The text says they have stripes on their back that flare when enemies approach. Perhaps a colony of psychic, bioluminescent microorganisms that detect foes for the frog.

Frogs might be tamed and used by nomads as mobile gardens. A herbalist always has access to fresh ingredients of all kinds, no matter what lands they are travelling through, all thanks to their trusty frog.

Gargoyle

Ironstone gargoyle, hornstone gargoyle, obsidian gargoyle, runic gargoyle

Gargoyles are described as a type of earth elemental, spawned from rock. That makes no sense to me. Gargoyles are at their core statues: they should be crafted. The runic gargoyle is the most interesting variant here. It is described as covered in arcane runes that bond it to its master. There we go, there’s a set of runes you can use to animate and control elemental creatures. Items used to control other elementals probably carry similar runes. Non-runic gargoyles likely had their runes destroyed or worn off, letting them run wild.

Ghoul

Ghoul flesh seeker, adept of Orcus, ghast

My idea of ghouls will be forever shaped by Pickman’s Model. Humans twisted into inhumanity through cannibalism, who steal children to teach them to eat as they do. There’s nothing in this entry to counter that interpretation, so that’s all good.

Ghouls are noted to dig vast tunnel networks beneath the earth. Pulling from Lovecraft yet again, perhaps these tunnels reach between the planes? An easy way for the party to travel between worlds, if they can stomach allying with the ghouls.

Giant

Fire giant lavamaster, fire giant flamedancer, fire giant smokecaller, frost giant berserker, frost giant shield bearer, frost giant chieftain, hill giant smasher, hill giant rockthrower, hill giant avalancher

Fire, frost, and hill giants are detailed in this book. Those happen to be my favorites from among the standard giant types. Perfect!

Going by the titles given, the frost giants seem to have a Viking-esque society, with chieftains, shield bearers and berserkers. The fire giants seem more fantastical and mystical, interacting directly with lava, flame, and smoke. And the hill giants just seem brutish, neither civilized nor magical.

Perhaps the frost giants were the original giants, ruling the world in a colder age. As the climate became warmer, some giants allied themselves with fire, while others stayed loyal to frost, retreating into colder regions. And a few outcasts refused both elements, wandering the green hills by their lonesome.

MM3: Chitine to Devil

<- Previous

Chitine

Chitine grunt, chitine warrior, chitine scout, chitine marauder, chitine web crafter, choldrith

“The chitines are a failed attempt to create the perfect slave race.” That’s pretty fucking raw. They’re Drow-Frankenstein’s spider-monsters who rebelled and now have their own society, which has some similarities to drow society. They worship Lolth, and they are ruled by a caste of priestesses (choldriths).

That’s pretty good: The drow empire brought down by their own creations. The chitine now rule the fallen cities, a twisted reflection of the long-gone elves.

Cloaker

Cloaker ambusher, cloaker lord

Flat flying creatures that live underground and envelop people to eat them. It’s fine, but not that exciting.

Then the text drops the fact that cloakers gather in conclaves where they join together in a big sphere to communicate! Now we’re talking! Take them out of the underdark and put them in the air, a giant balloon made up of scores of cloakers, floating high in the sky. Individual cloakers drop off to hunt, and to carry the conclave’s demands to the towns they hover above.

Craud

Craud impaler, craud crusher, craud king

Crauds are basically giant lobsters, and I would use them as such. Big dumb shellfish, potentially dangerous, but easy to catch if you know what you’re doing. Hardworking fishermen bring them in to sell as delicacies.

Until one fateful day, when the craud king calls his subjects to war, and the shorelines are swarmed by hundreds of rampaging giant crustaceans.

Dark one

Hex knight, shadow bolter, shadow speaker

Small people who live in the Shadowfell and come to the mortal world to steal stuff. The lore speculates that they are descendants of halflings who went to the Shadowfell, but the other way around is much better: Halflings are dark ones who left the Shadowfell and lost the dark half of their selves, and that’s why they are called “halflings” now.

“Hex knight” is a cool title. “Shadow bolter”, eeeh... We are told that shadow speakers lead raiding parties into the mortal world, and they carry small clay jugs filled with Shadowfell soil. Of course! They take a piece of the Shadowfell with them, to prevent the dark ones from losing their darkness and turning into halflings.

Demon

Babau, klurichir, maw demon, greater maw demon, molydeus, nalfeshnee swine guard, nalfeshnee tyrant, quasit, ultrodemon schemer

Demons dwell in the Abyss, where eternal war rages. I imagine it much like the hell of the Doom games, all ruins and wastelands, full of demons locked in constant battle.

Babau: Demonic spies and assassins. They were born from the blood of a demon lord wounded by a devil’s sword, and they combine the qualities of demons and devils. I think these guys may be more free-thinking than both demons and devils, doing mercenary work for the various powers of the Abyss.

Klurichir: Klurichirs are spawned in the lowest depths of the Abyss, take command of demonic hordes, and start conquering. As one demon’s realm crumbles, a new one arises. A good way to keep things fresh!

Maw demon: Just a mouth on four legs that is always hungry. Simple but effective. They can be Abyssal “wildlife”, or maybe some evil guy has a big one in a pit to feed prisoners to.

Molydeus: There are seven molydeuses, who were Tharizdun’s angels tasked with protecting a shard of pure evil, and then they got corrupted. I don’t know, I don’t really care for “evil” as a tangible substance. How about: Tharizdun tried to conquer the Abyss, with the aid of his seven archangels. Tharizdun was defeated, but his angels continue the war. Now they are just another faction in the neverending conflict, albeit one that claims their goals are divinely ordinated.

Nalfeshnee: Swine-things, huh? Gotta pull from House on the Borderland here. The lore says the nalfeshnees’ demon lord father was killed by the gods, and the nalfeshnee devoured his body. I can see it, the great fortress of the demon lord on a bleak plain in the Abyss, its master long gone, swine-things waddling through its corridors. Should they find their way to the mortal realm, they will dispassionately kill and devour all they encounter.

Quasit: Tiny demons who are familiars to wizards. The text describes them as tempters, but I think that should be a devil’s job. Here’s my take: a quasit familiar lets a wizard draw magic from the Abyss to empower their spells. The “summoning ritual” for a quasit in fact creates a new demon from scratch. As the wizard channels power through the quasit, the tiny demon grows bigger and stronger...

Ultrodemon: This demon wants to get rich, for the sake of it. Number go up; capitalism incarnate. A villain that schemes not to destroy the world, but to funnel as many gold pieces as possible to their personal hoard? Sounds similar to a dragon, but I feel like a dragon would just steal or extort gold. An ultrodemon would run a business empire. They don’t really seem at home in the Abyss, the mortal world is a better place to make money. What if an ultrodemon is actually a mortal rich guy who turned into a demon to become immortal? Like with a lich type ritual, but for billionaires instead of wizards.

Derro

Derro warrior, derro thug, derro fanatic, derro harvester, derro ironguard, derro savant, warped slave

Look, are derro supposed to be evil dwarves or not? The duergar already fill that niche. But I don’t really care for duergar. And they don’t appear in this book anyway. My decision is, derro are dwarves. Moving on.

Derro are described as corrupted by the Far Realm, the cosmic horror place in the D&D cosmology. To me, the Far Realm is just outer space. I would say the derro have learned to use certain “cosmic rays” to travel between the Underdark, the surface world, and the distant stars. They now understand the insignificance of their home world in the grand scheme of the cosmos, and how the true powers among the stars could at any time end all life on the planet through their mere presence. But the derro have a plan. They will transform the world and all its lifeforms, making it compatible with the Far Realm. To this end, they kidnap people and animals using their cosmic rays. The derro expose their victims to the warping energies of the Far Realm, and take note of the effects. Subjects who survive are released, transported back to the place they were taken from. Few will believe their wild tales of being abducted and experimented on.

Devil

Corruption devil, sire of corruption, corrupted followers (lecher, glutton, monger, idler, lunatic, craven), hell knight, hellwasp colony guard, hellwasp devil, passion devil, rage devil, slime devil, swarm devil, vizier devil

While demons get the Doom hell, devils get the Dante hell (and theirs is actually called Hell).

So, the Blood War, the giant war between demons and devils, is a big thing in D&D lore, but I don’t like it. It makes the gods look lazy, like why aren’t they getting stuck in? But if they did, the whole conflict would make whatever the PCs are doing seem inconsequential. No, I don’t think gods, devils, and demons should fight each other, at least not until the seals are broken and it’s time for the final apocalypse.

Corruption devil: The essential devil, one who tempts mortals into sin and vice. The rules give them a bunch of corrupting powers, but I think forcing player characters into sin through dice rolls is cheap. Corrupt them for real! Figure out what the characters want, then offer it to them for the low low price of their eternal souls.

Corrupted follower: Mortals who took the corruption devil’s deal. I would make these the souls of the damned, trapped in Hell for eternity. Each type of corrupted follower is tied to a particular cardinal sin, but notably, there’s no Pride or Envy, and instead Cowardice is represented as a cardinal sin. Well, it would make sense for Cowardice to be a sin in D&D, what with all the gods of battle running around. In fact, let’s look at the 4e pantheon and see if we can match gods to each of the cardinal virtues and sins.

• Avandra, goddess of change. She exalts diligence, and condemns sloth.
• Erathis, goddess of civilization. She exalts temperance, and condemns gluttony.
• Ioun, goddess of reason. She exalts chastity, and condemns lust.
• Kord, god of battle. He exalts courage, and condemns cowardice.
• Pelor, god of the sun. He exalts charity, and condemns greed.
• The Raven Queen, goddess of death. She exalts patience, and condemns wrath.

These six gods would form the pantheon of the big Catholic-church equivalent religion, with the other gods having their own churches and cults.

Hell knight: Yeah, here we go. A devil knight in full armor, mounted on a burning horse. Badass. Now I said there’s no Blood War, but that doesn’t mean Hell has no army. It has legions, and the hell knights are its elite, waiting for the final battle on the day of judgment. In the meantime, they may be dispatched to deal with any intruders into Hell.

Hellwasp devil: These insectoid devils were once demons, we are told. Wait, what? How does that even work? Devils are fallen angels. So the hellwasps are fallen demons? Angels fall when they rebel against God. Demons fall when they... stop fighting each other. Yeah, that makes sense, the hellwasp are said to live in colonies after all. I think hellwasps would be outsiders in Hell, other devils looking askance at these weird bug people who just want to build their hives and stuff.

Passion devil: These devils are kinda vaguely described as seeking to inflame passions in mortals to trick them into sin. To distinguish them from corruption devils, I’ll say that while corruption devils make mortals take their sins out on the world, passion devils tempt mortals to engage in sin with the devil itself. Whether that’s by seducing mortals into lustful devil-sex, taking a terrifying guise to frighten cowards, butchering itself for delicious meat to encourage gluttony...

Rage devil: Devil soldiers who make up the brunt of Hell’s legions, and by extension, the majority of all devils. What are they raging against? The gods, of course. Rage devils might be lent out to mortal conquerors in exchange for their soul.

Slime devil: Not actually a devil, this is an amalgamation of corrupt souls. I like that. As the aeons go by, if a damned soul forgets the very sins that condemned it to Hell, it loses hold of its form, turning into a black sludge. Vast bogs of soul sludge can be found throughout Hell, and from there, slime devils emerge to drag down and dissolve any souls that come near.

Swarm devil: A devil split into a swarm of evil flies. These would make great spies and messengers for Hell’s operations in the mortal world. Singular flies can keep an eye on enemies, or carry information between devils and their allies... A terrifying communications advantage.

Vizier devil: Hell’s emissaries to the mortal world, who worm their way into the halls of power. I would say these devils masquerade as mortals, and try to influence politics in order to create conditions where many mortals can be tempted into sin by other devils. Poverty, famine, corruption, war: all can make mortals desperate enough to sell their souls for relief.

Next -> 

MM3: Ape to Cave Fisher

Okay, I'm going to read through the Monster Manual 3 for D&D 4e, and write down my ideas on how to use the various monsters for games and worldbuilding. I'm not going to stay 100% beholden to the lore as written in the book, though. I'll pick out what seems interesting, add or change stuff as necessary, and see if I can get things to fit together.

Why the third monster manual? Well, in the first monster manual, you have to put all the staple monsters that just need to be in D&D. In the second monster manual, you put all of the classic monsters that coudn't fit in the first book. But when you get to the third monster manual, you can start getting weird.

Plus, it makes for a fun exercise if you imagine that the setting only has the monsters that appear in this book, not the basic ones from the previous manuals.

Ape

Great ape, silverback ape, ape temple guardian

The first monster of the book is the ape! Who doesn’t love apes? The lore says apes “have lived in jungles since the dawn of creation”. If that’s a Biblical-type, everything-gets-created-at-once kind of creation, it’s nothing special. But if the creation myth is more of a process, then it gets more interesting. The apes were here first!

Apes being temple guardians ties in nicely with that fact. If apes lived in the world since the beginning, perhaps they made a covenant with the first gods, taking the responsibility of guarding their holy sites for all time.

Apocalypse spell

Prison of Mual-Tar, herald of colorless fire, shard of Uralinda, godslayer inferno, light of Amoth

These are various creatures formed from the leftover essence of super-powerful spells. Maybe high-level wizards can summon or control these, if they study the ancient spellcraft.

Prison of Mual-Tar: Fragments of chains used by the gods to bind a primordial. Nah, make them the actual prisons. Mual-Tar is cut into many pieces, each held in its own prison-being. If you kill the prison, the primordial piece escapes. Kill all of the prisons and Mual-Tar is back, baby...

Herald of colorless fire: An empire was turned into a sea of dust by a rain of colorless fire. (Yep, it’s straight out of Greyhawk lore.) And then colorless fire-monsters arose from the dust, and they want to destroy everything. That’s kind of boring. What if the knowledge and secrets of the lost empire remains in the heralds? And now they are colorless fire-monster sages, sought after as masters and scholars?

Shard of Uralinda: An archfey got rejected, so he blasted an eladrin city with ice and killed everyone. The souls of the dead eladrin were trapped in the shards of ice. I’m getting Snow Queen vibes from this. The shards should be able to stick in people’s hearts and freeze them, removing their capacity for love.

Godslayer inferno: The remains of a fire used to kill gods. Hey, it’s an answer to the question “How do we kill a god?” You get a godslayer inferno to do it. Or you infuse your weapon with its essence or something.

Light of Amoth: A god blew himself up to destroy a demon prince. Their essences fused into creatures made of living light that hate both gods and demons. The ultimate enlightened beings? Supreme atheists? Yeah, “Light of Amoth” should be the name of an antitheist cult that goes around annoying clerics, and the top leadership are these weird light-people who consider themselves superior to gods and demons alike.

Arcanian

Green arcanian, blue arcanian, red arcanian

When a wizard tries to cast a spell that is too high level for them, it can backfire, kill the wizard, and turn them into an undead creature animated by the energy of the spell.

A zombie with powers and motivation derived from a particular spell is interesting, there are so many possible variations. A fireball arcanian, for example, would be straightforward: it has fire powers and it wants to burn everything. But other spells might make for stranger arcanians. A hallucinatory terrain arcanian that creates illusions. A scrying arcanian that sees all... can the party figure out how to extract knowledge from a zombie?

Banderhobb

Banderhobb warder, banderhobb filch, banderhobb abductor

A huge monster comes out of the shadows under your bed. It snares you with its long tongue, and its gaping maw swallows you whole. Then it returns to the shadows, and you are never seen again. Perfect, 10/10, no notes.

What happens to the people swallowed by the banderhobbs, though? The speculation given in the book is that they are regurgitated in the Shadowfell, and toil as slaves for the banderhobbs’ ancient master until they transform into more banderhobbs. Not bad. But maybe... Instead of putting the prisoners to work, they are simply starved. Their hunger turns them into banderhobbs, and they are sent to feed in the mortal world. But anything they swallow there, they must throw up and give to their master, and their hunger is never sated.

Behemoth

Bone crown behemoth, skinwing behemoth, spirehorn behemoth

“Behemoth” is 4e’s name for dinosaurs and dinosaur adjacent reptiles. In this book we get pachycephalosaurus, pteranodon, and triceratops. They are all used as mounts and war beasts, which is great. An army with pachycephalosaurus cavalry, scouts riding pteranodons, and a triceratops carrying a small fortress on its back, is a great image.

That word though, behemoth... In the book of Job, God rhetorically asks if anyone will domesticate the great Behemoth. Well, apparently some people do! That’s some big hubris then. Only godless warriors would dare make themselves masters of the behemoths. Followers of the Light of Amoth, perhaps? (See “Apocalypse spell”, above.)

Beholder

Beholder spawn, eye of shadow, ghost beholder

Beholder spawn?! This is the orc baby dilemma on steroids. “You’ve defeated the beholder, in the next room you find twenty beholder babies. What do you do?” Kill them all before they start shooting tiny eye rays at you, is 4th edition’s answer.

The eye of shadow is a beholder that has been warped after spending time in the Shadowfell. Beholders being transformed by the environments they look upon makes a lot of sense, actually. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder - the beauty that is beheld takes up residence in the eye.

Ghost beholders seem like a contradiction in moods to me. Ghosts are subtle, mysterious, quiet, haunting. Beholders are frantic and entire unsubtle. They draw your attention immediately, ranting and shooting eye rays wildly. I think a ghost beholder would work best as a poltergeist, unseen but possessing the location it spent its life beholding, always watching. And maybe shooting eye rays out of mirrors and stuff.

Cambion

Cambion wrathborn, chained cambion, cambion infernal scions

Children of devils and mortals. Classic stuff.

Chained cambions are wrapped up in chains, forever, and walk around using animated chains as legs. But why are they in chains? The mechanics say they get stronger if they are immobilized or restrained. I guess they enjoy being chained up. The opposite of the Satanist freedom imperative... These guys must be on the side of God, binding themselves to reject their infernal parent’s rebellion.

Infernal scions on the other hand, “covet Asmodeus’s position... and plot to supplant him”. The results of Asmodeus’s dalliances with mortals come back to daddy, and start scheming against him and against each other. A Princes of Amber scenario when Asmodeus dies/disappears/starts getting out of touch.

Catoblepas

Catoblepas harbinger, catoblepas tragedian

Love catoblepas. Long-necked, sad buffalo who breathe poison and destroy all life wherever they go.

The lore says knights and fey alike go on ritualistic hunts for catoblepas. Getting Questing Beast vibes... Perhaps the blight of the catoblepas spreads far and wide, tainting an entire kingdom. Heroes quest for the elusive beast, as the land dies. A cyclical tradition? The catoblepas must be slain every winter, or spring will not come.

Cave fisher

Cave fisher spawn, cave fisher angler, cave fisher spiker, cave fisher line spiker

These guys are fun. Big bugs that go fishing underground by throwing strangler lines down a precipice and hoping something gets caught on it.

They might be a little tricky to use in a game without just turning into gotcha traps, though. But if the characters are aware of the lines hanging down from above, they can make for a neat field hazard in a fight, as combatants try to push each other into the lines.

The cave fishers should obviously have a stereotypical angler culture, laid back, boastful, somewhat sleazy. Gynes want me, dwarves fear me.

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Landlords for WFRP

Started a campaign of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (1e), set in the small town of Osburg. I figured the characters might want to rent rooms long-term instead of just staying at an inn, so I prepared a few landlords.

Characters in WFRP have different social levels depending on their career, and each landlord is suitable for a particular social level.

• A: Nobility
• B: Professionals, academics
• C: Craftsmen, tradesmen
• D: Laborers, criminals 

 

The Horn of Plenty (A)

Inn quarter, 400/- per month.

Luxury inn that offers long-term rooms. Servants and courtesans on staff can be hired by guests. Owner Grunhilda Kruger controls several inns, taverns and brothels in Osburg. 

Berthold Heinemann (B)

Castle quarter, 100/- per month. No elves, dwarves, or halflings.

Retired university professor from Altdorf. Can teach the skills Read/Write and History.

Etelka von Borgenschlag (B)

Castle quarter, 100/- per month.

Rich widow. Donates to artists and temples, has influence over the burgomeister Albrect Adelich. Wants to improve Osburg's reputation and attract sophisticated people to the town. Manipulates her tenants in this aim, if they seem useful.

 

Apprentice House (C)

Hammer quarter, 60/- per month. 40/- for apprentices of local artisans.

Big and lively house, overseen by retired blacksmith Gottolf Schmidt. Monthly 10% chance that non-apprentice tenants are run out to make room for new apprentices.

 

Pierre & Louise Grimain (C)

Bretonnian quarter, 50/- per month. 40/- for Bretonnians.

Married Bretonnian couple. 7 children who often bring friends over. Daily 10% chance that children investigate a tenant's room. 

Wilfrieda Kurst (C)

Schauplatz, 50/- per month.

Talkative middle-aged woman. Always knows the latest gossip. Spies on her tenants and spills anything juicy to her many acquaintances.

 

The Bad Badger (D)

Golden quarter, 30/- per month.

Hole-in-the-wall tavern run by Anna Pflugerbach, a woman in her thirties who is friendly with the local footpads. Rooms are above the tavern, and measure about 2 square meters / 20 square feet.

 

Gitta Fleischer & Johanna Gräber (D)

Axtstrasse, 30/- per month.

Young women, sickly looking, scabs. House built on the hillside up to the Garden of Morr (graveyard). Secret tunnel leads to the graves; Gitta and Johanna steal corpses to eat. Nightly 10% chance of graverobbing. Their feast can be heard in tenants' rooms. Every feast there is a 10% chance that Gitta and Johanna fully transform into ghouls (permanently).

 

Holger Spitkopf (D)

Hammer quarter, 30/- per month.

Grouchy, impulsive old man. Basement rooms with minimal windows. Monthly 20% chance that rent increases by 1d10/-.

 

Malina Erkendorfer (D)

Old town, 30/- per month.

Elderly woman, almost deaf. Interested in potted plants. On the top floor lives Zacharias Erichsen, who plays violin nightly, calling upon the power of Malal to protect him from Tzeentch's attacks. Nightly 20% chance that music disturbs sleep of other tenants, preventing wound and magic point recovery.

Ghibli-esque RPGs

I saw some discussion about Ghibli-esque RPGs on the NSR discord, and it made me think about what systems I would use for games inspired by the Studio Ghibli movies. Of course, the Ghibli movies are quite different from each other, so I picked out a system for each one.

And it's only the Hayao Miyazaki movies, because those are the ones I've seen.

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

There's dynamic action and big weird monsters. A girl gets shot with a machine gun and keeps going. Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition should work great!

Castle in the Sky

I think there's like three dungeon crawls in this movie? Any old-school D&D would be fine, but I'll go with Tunnels & Trolls. Pazu would rack up a lot of AP from all the stunts he has to do.

My Neighbor Totoro

So the kids are doing a bunch of esoteric stuff with the spirits and the adults don't notice anything is off, but the magic is real because the mom got that corn in the end and it did cure her illness. Sounds like Mage to me! Adults = sleepers.

Kiki's Delivery Service

Cargo delivery, patrons, random encounters, desperately trying to stay afloat in a harsh gig economy - Traveller is a perfect fit for this movie, if you replace the spaceships with broomsticks. I do want to add some Call of Cthulhu mechanics though: if you run out of SAN, you can't fly anymore.

Porco Rosso

Your life is a failure, you're out of money, the secret police is looking for you, and you're a pig for some weird reason. Yeah, you're in an Electric Bastionland game.

Princess Mononoke

There's a lot of fighting in this movie, with lots of body parts getting slashed/shot/bitten off. Also a demon infection disease. I think Rolemaster is the right system for this one.

Spirited Away

This movie is all about working a shitty job while dealing with dangerous otherworldly entities. It's Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay! Just need to write up a Bathhouse Worker career.

Howl's Moving Castle

A small team of weirdos try to save the world from devastating war. F.I.S.T., right?

Ponyo

So the whole world gets imbalanced when Ponyo leaves the sea, and that causes a series of apocalyptic events. MÖRK BORG has a good mechanic for that!

The Wind Rises

Yeah, this is just a dude who makes planes and stuff, and then his wife gets sick. For games set in contemporary times with little to no combat or supernatural stuff, I like to use GURPS. Bonus: If the Jiro player actually wants to design those planes, I'm sure GURPS has extremely detailed rules for that.

The Boy and the Heron

Now this movie is far out. The boy moves between a number of strange locales with strange people, and it's probably an allegory for something or other. I will choose Between the Skies for this one. It's very good at strange.

And that's all of them!

Until Miyazaki makes his next final movie