#arduin

[thecreaturecodex]

Div, Apaush

Image © @chimeride

[Sponsored by @crazytrain48, based on the "sun demon" from Arduin. Why these are sun demons is somewhat obscure to me; their scales and boluses suggest they should be iron demons, right? The art does an excellent job making it more sunny, with the solar disk head, which I love. I leaned into it by giving them the name of one of the Zoroastrian daevas of drought, and some of their spell-like abilities.]

Div, Apaush CR 9 NE Outsider (extraplanar) This creature is a vaguely avian humanoid, with a beaked head ringed by a structure halfway between a sunburst and an owl’s facial disc. It has fan-like wings, metal talons on its hands and feet and a long whip-like tail. Its body and wings are covered with overlapping metal scales that screech horribly as the creature moves.

The apaush are sometimes known as “sun divs” or “sun fiends”, as they are devotees of drought. They are native to the hottest, driest parts of Abaddon. An apaush on the Material Plane makes sure to use its weather controlling abilities to keep things sunny and hot, and the droughts they provoke lead to widespread starvation and thirst. The head of an apaush resembles a solar disk and some apaush work with clerics of evil sun gods and archfiends. An apaush constantly emits a rasping, screeching noise from the metal scales on its body and wings. Like all divs, the apaush have a psychological weakness; in their case, apaush hate silence. They make noise almost compulsively in quiet places, and in the area of a silence spell are edgy and uncomfortable.

Apaush are incredibly fast fliers, and prefer to attack from the sky. They make hit and run attacks while airborne, spitting boluses of molten iron that entangle and scorch enemies, casting destructive spells, or merely tearing into foes with their claws. An apaush’s metal scales provide it with supernaturally powerful protection against ranged attacks, and the screeching of its metal body is so loud as to be painfully distracting up close.  If forced to land, they usually cast defensive spells like fire shield and wall of fire, to punish melee combatants as much as possible.

An apaush is tall for a Medium creature, being taller than seven feet tall on average. Their whip-like tails are often that length again, but too weak to be used in combat.

Apaush               CR 9 XP 6,400 NE Medium outsider (div, evil, extraplanar) Init +6; Senses darkvision 60 ft., Perception +15, see in darkness Aura screeching (30 ft., Will DC 19)

Defense AC 23, touch 12, flat-footed 21 (+2 Dex, +11 natural) hp 114 (12d10+48) Fort +10, Ref +10, Will +8 DR 10/good and melee; Immune fire, petrifaction, poison, sonic; Resist acid 10, electricity 10; SR 20 Defensive Abilities fiery body,healing petrifaction

Offense Speed 30 ft., fly 120 ft. (average) Melee 2 claws +15 (1d10+3 plus 1d6 fire), bite +15 (1d6+3 plus 1d6 fire), 2 wings +13 (1d6+1 plus 1d6 fire) Ranged molten bolus +14 touch (3d10 fire) Spell-like Abilities CL 12th, concentration +15 At will—detect good, dimension door, heat metal (DC 15) 3/day—cup of dust (DC 16), empowered searing light, stinking cloud (DC 16) 1/day—control weather (cannot cause precipitation), fire snake (DC 18), wall of fire

Statistics Str 16, Dex 15, Con 18, Int 13, Wis 10, Cha 17 Base Atk +12; CMB +16; CMD 28 Feats Empower SLA (searing light),Flyby Attack, Great Fortitude, Improved Initiative, Multiattack, Power Attack Skills Bluff +18,Fly +17, Intimidate +18, Knowledge (geography, planes) +16, Perception +15, Stealth +9; Racial Modifiers -8 Stealth Languages Abyssal, Celestial, Ignan, Infernal, telepathy 100 ft.

Ecology Environment any land and underground (Abaddon) Organization solitary or flock (2-6) Treasure incidental

Special Abilities Fiery Body (Ex) An apaush is so hot that it deals 1d6 points of fire damage to any creature touching it or striking it with a melee touch attack, natural weapon or unarmed strike. It deals an extra 1d6 points of fire damage with all of its natural weapons. Healing Petrifaction (Ex) Any attempt to petrify an apaush heals it of 1d10 points of damage, plus 1 per HD of the creature for supernatural petrifaction effects, or caster level of the effect for spells and spell-like abilities. Molten Bolus (Su) As a standard action, an apaush can vomit up a blob of molten metal. Treat this as a ranged touch attack made with a thrown weapon with a range increment of 15 feet. A creature struck is entangled for three rounds, takes 3d10 points of fire damage, then takes 2d10 points of fire damage the next round and 1d10 fire damage on the third round. The blob can be scraped off by dealing 10 points of damage to it with a slashing weapon, or cooled down with a chill metal or quench effect (but the entangling still lasts the full duration). An apaush can use this ability once every 1d4 rounds. Screeching Aura (Su) Whenever an apaush moves more than 5 feet in a round, it produces an awful noise. All creatures within 30 feet of the apaush must succeed a DC 19 Will save or take a -4 penalty to attack rolls for 1 round from distraction. This is a sonic mind-influencing effect, and the save DC is Charisma based. Wings (Su) The wings of an apaush are lined with razor sharp scales and deal slashing and bludgeoning damage on a successful hit.

#div #apaush #sun demon #pathfinder 1e #arduin #sponsored post #extraplanar outsider

[oldschoolfrp]

"Chaeronyx: A cross between a centaur and a medusa in appearance. Both males and females have the stoning ability. They are found only as mated pairs in deeply forested areas and are generally chaotic/evil." (Morno = Bradley W Schenck, The Arduin Grimoire Vol II: Welcome to Skull Tower by Dave Hargrave, Grimoire Games, 1978)

#Arduin #The Arduin Grimoire #Morno #Brad Schenck #dnd #medusa #centaur #Arduin Grimoire #Dave Hargrave #Bradley W Schenck #chaeronyx #The Arduin Grimoire Vol II #Welcome to Skull Tower #Grimoire Games #D&D #Dungeons & Dragons #flaming sword

[doomboy911]

Theme Arduin(Tri-Color Dragon)

Prompt List Creature Codex Art Challenge

Commentary

So yeah pixel art is my passion. I had a three headed dragon and a vision. While I may have lost some detail like the red wings I think I captured what's most important. I put all my heart into making those big ol eyes perfect.

Palette picked

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[chimeride]

Good job on the Vroat! Now, how about another beastie from Arduin? This one is a Sun Demon--an 8' tall humanoid seemingly made of glowing red-hot iron, and smells like it too. It has a bird-like beak and claws but a reptilian-type tail and wings, with fangs and claws seemingly everywhere. It squeals and groans like metal on metal whenever it moves, creating so much noise that it becomes impossible to concentrate due to the sonic vibrations.

Sun Demon, the 219th Known One

#yoooo im so proud of this one #crazytrain48 #those suggestions really slappp sorry im so late #suggestion #Arduin #rpg #Sun Demon #demon #bird #owl #lizard #chicken #flying lizard #876 #octem 110 #terra 4 #monster #chimera #creature design #bestiary #the Known Ones #little break before my holidays

[umberhulk]

Octorilla OSR/OSE

Large Mutant Gorilla with 8 octopus-like tentacles. No one is sure of the exact origin of the octorilla but, it is likely to be the result of magical alchemical experiments. Wizards are often trying to create the perfect guardian, they often fail, or sometimes the results of their experiments escape. This eight armed monstrosity has the body of a large gorilla with thick tentacles for…

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#arduin #monster #Octorilla #ose #OSR

[tempatpklmedanyulia]

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[1-50thofabuck]

As always, this was written on the fly without research or referencing anything else. So if I say something incorrect it's because I was forcing myself to work from memory and I don't want to look anything up as I write each part. If I research or discover something in between articles I'll add that info to the next article. This one likely contains misspellings, typos, poor wording, etc as again, I wanted to write on the fly conversationally and not sit and workshop it into a prose poem. I added a few things after I wrote the article but it will be clear what those parts are. In future articles I won't explain all this, just wanted to make it clear again as I get into the monster writeups. PLEASE comment corrections, thoughts, insights, opinions, and insults. I'm lonely!

All the World’s Monsters: Readthrough Part II: Air Squid to Archer Bush(the complete “a”s!)

Finally! The Monsters!

That’s what I’m talkin’ about. All the text for the monsters is IN CAPS, SO THE ENTIRE ENTRY READS LIKE THIS. WHEN QUOTING I WILL NOT USUALLY DO THIS BECAUSE IT WOULD GET ANNOYING, DON’T YOU THINK? So if I quote “blah blah blah” it actually reads “BLAH BLAH BLAH.”

Air Squid

Starting off with a bang. I said before this is the kind of thing I love. Flying squids rule! So, let’s dive in(fly in?). 

Each chapter begins with a drop cap, which is nice. The little detail of the fighter dropping their sword is cool. I dig it.

This is a Dave Hargrave monster, and that’s one of the names we’ll see a lot. It’s an intelligent monster, with IQ range 2d6, i.e., they have Intelligence scores of between 2-12, so, from almost animal intelligence to quite bright. Chaotic, neutral is its alignment, with the comma between the two just like that. Remember, in Holmes Basic, which this was following, PCs couldn’t even choose to be chaotic neutral - it was true neutral or nothing. I’m not sure if this applied to monsters - I’ll have to look through the Holmes list again. It may even be reflecting a single axis alignment system and noting that the creature could be either chaotic or neutral. Hmm. (I’ll know by the next article, I’m trying to more or less honestly write this on the fly!) (Note: I figure it out with one of the following monsters.) I won’t go into all this with future monsters, just a note for the first one.

Hit dice from 6-12d8+1, with size ranging from 35 to 75’ long. (I did read ahead through the A’s, and I thank Hargrave for clueing us in; you’ll find a frustrating number of monsters whose size is “shrug.”) Quite a spread, but not really illogical. It seems to be one of those things that early writers did that ended up not being the standard: giving many monsters a fairly wide HD range, where most monsters in official publications didn’t have any HD range at all. 

AC of 7 seems okay, interesting that it doesn’t scale off of HD in any way, but not incorrect necessarily. Fly 12 seems reasonable. Dexterity range 1d6+6 is okay I suppose? 

The air squid is found outdoors, in water(so presumably it swims too even though only flight speed is listed?), and of course, “air.” These don’t get as specific as other D&D writeups that would include mountains, swamps, forests, hills, and not just “in the air.” I don’t believe any monster stats had an entry or “slot” like that previously, like a part of the stat block or writeup that says “environment” or “terrain” or “found in.” I think it wouldn’t be til 2nd Edition that that became a standard part of the stat block. That info still existed by way of the wandering monster tables. For example, a monster is found on the tables for hills and mountains then obviously those are the two places in which they can be found. Also, the “interpreting the monster entries” section lists cities, mountains, and so on, so they were aware of the idea. Granted, the editors came up with the explanations for the environment types, or as they phrase it, “found in,” and apparently didn’t enforce much consistency. The air squid’s lair is “on mountain peaks.” Sure, why not?

15% chance in lair, only 1 ever encountered, and they always have a type E treasure. 

Here’s where it gets really crazy: this thing has 13 attacks, and the size/HD doesn’t matter: the tentacles cause 1d8 points of damage in “constriction,” though there are no rules for this. Presumably the monster just grabs, crushes, and releases. Would it come to ground to do this? Just hover around the ground grabbing and crushing, not grabbing, holding, and flying up high to release? Meh. Plus a d10 damage with its beak. The damage not scaling isn’t really a big deal, but the attacks seem a bit wonky. 

Why no ink spit? I’d find that a lot more interesting than a ton of attacks, personally. Being described as “sky-blue,” one would also expect a surprise bonus, at least situationally. Oh, and if you wondered how it flies? Hargrave didn’t just go with “Uh, magic, like, probably an insane wizard’s experiment or something, you know?” but instead attempted to give something of a naturalistic explanation with the squids being “helium-filled.” I can’t help but imagine popping a fully-inflated air squid with a well-placed arrow or spear. It could become like a mini game, with characters trying to pop air squids as they fly by. An attraction at the most incredible carnival ever to exist. Sure only 1 is supposed to appear but let’s be serious with our lack of seriousness. 

Not much else to say about the air squid really. It’s pretty cool. With a generation of hindsight it could use some workshopping in my opinion but these were pioneers, dangit. The next entries won’t focus on some of the topics I focused on here because now they’re been addressed. 

Airfang

The second monster in the book, and the first “..wtf?” Like, what actually is this thing? It’s apparently “tiny,” with an HD range of 8-12. What is “tiny” in this context, since official “size categories” such as tiny, small, medium, and large were not to come for a while(I don’t think it was until 2nd Edition AD&D)? Is tiny how I would interpret “tiny” if someone told me something was “tiny?” Itty-bitty? Probably not. A foot? Who knows how tiny this up to 12 HD monster with 2 attacks scoring 3d4 damage each could be? 

It’s a “metallic scaled creature” with an armor class of 2+4(?) that is “mostly mouth, tentacle, and wings.” Huh. It reminds me of some of the random little enemies in old NES games that swarmed you and you had trouble even figuring out what the heck they even were. Of course, most of those didn’t eviscerate a starting character in a round or two by dealing massive amounts of tiny damage from its tiny tentacles and tiny mouth. 

Is the 2+4 representing separate areas for the tentacles and body(because a “tiny” creature should definitely have different AC ratings by location, a mechanic that was kind of trash even on the few official monsters that used it). Or maybe they meant 2-4, which should more properly be 4-2, reflecting that the AC improves as it increases in HD? 

Once again, we’re given very specific locations that these abominations can be found, such as “outdoors.” Well that sure narrows it down, thanks. Like the air squid, it’s also found in “water” and “air.” So, basically, literally everywhere. And why in Discordia’s name is it found in water anyway? It has scales and tentacles I guess? It’s faster than the air squid, with a flight speed of 24! I forgot to mention, it also “latches on with its mouth and then bites repeatedly,” so I’m not sure if this implies that it only has to attack once with its mouth and then it auto-hits, or if this is just a descriptive visual, but either way, it’s pretty lame. 

You encounter 3d6 of these, too. 3d6 tiny, indescribable monsters that inexplicably have a mountain of HP and have the potential for enormous damage, swarming a PC. Just imagine using these and explaining how their appearance is totally silly, they’re too tiny and fast to potentially make out, one of them took an entire round of hits from the entire party and didn’t die, three of them reduced one party member to bones in a round, somehow, and potentially, some of them are automatically inflicting damage after “latching on.” If your players don’t quit on you, you’ve either built up a huge Loyalty rating with them, or they’re just very, very lacking in discrimination. Or perhaps you knew they’d enjoy a good, absurdist comedy encounter.

Its alignment is “hungry,” hahahahahahahaha! :| If this was a one-off joke, or it was a monster that was otherwise good, it’d be okay. Sadly to the first one, having peeked ahead, this isn’t the first time this “gag” is done in the “a” monsters alone. 

To the second one: this monster sucks. I have trouble believing that out of 5 billion entries, this boring, overpowered, uncreative nonsense was one of the best. 

Mystery solved; turns out, this is an airfang

Ant Man

An obvious idea that would be done a number of times - and I’m not saying that as insult, at all - this version is based on creatures from a book, “Kavin’s World,” which could also be the name of a sci-fi sitcom. 

These also have a very wide HD range, from 1-14. Not having read the books or feeling that it would be worthwhile to research it, I can’t say how widely the ant men in it varied in strength. Their AC does not vary, at a very high 2. So even the single hit die ones are as tough as plate mail. They only move 6, so, fairly slow(I’ve seen some relatively quick ants). Their intelligence skews towards good - 2d6+6, varying from low to genius and averaging at high(13). Dex is average(3d6). Seems to me an ant’s might be a bit low, comparatively, but hey.

Neutral alignment is fair. Again, I have no idea how these things are in the book. They appear a lot of places, but no place unreasonable for an ant, much less an alien ant or whatever these things are. 200d20 of these appear in a lair, which even by ant standards seems pretty high, but book yadda yadda. Wandering or in lair they have the same amount of treasure, and a 100% chance of it, at that. Seems a bit odd but whatever.

Boy do they get a lot of attacks. 2 “hands”(quotes theirs), 2 stings, and a bite, scoring up to 44 points of damage plus poison from the stings which cause 4d6 on a failed save for another potential 24 damage… yikes. Keep in mind, this describes the 1 HD version and the 14 HD one. A 1 HD monster that can potentially cause 68 HP damage in one round. The bite says “HIT -2” but I’m not sure what that means. It’s a -2 to the attack roll with the bite? Or the damage is 2d6-2? I’m guessing the former, but I’m not positive.

Ant men are big-ass ant people with four arms, two which end in stingers, because sure! and two end in “hands” that score damage as a two-handed sword. They’re also immune to “mental spells,” which I assume means charm, fear, illusory magic, probably hold, and so on. They believe that other sentient species, including those with demonstrably similar intelligence, are cattle, which is not a very true neutral position to hold. Sounds neutral evil or lawful evil at best. “True Neutral. I believe that there should be a balance in all things. Nature is balanced, law and chaos must be balanced, good and evil must be balanced. And everyone not of our race are animals to be used as slaves and food.” Not seeing it.

I don’t know what to make of this one, but it’s not the strangest one I’ve seen so far, so it’s okay.

Ant, Giant

An expected monster, a classic. Is this the first time a giant ant was statted in print? I don’t know, but IT HAS FROM 1-27 HD. But it also doesn’t give an actual size range, so I imagine this is so you can stat from chihuahua sized giant ants to “Them!” giant ants up to true kaiju giant ants. This is also the first one we’re seeing that has an AC that scales to its HD, in this case “its armor class is 3 plus one third of the number of its hit dice, fractions are rounded up giving a range of 2 to -6.” Chuck Cady did well, I like it, and obviously pleasing me is everyone’s top priority. 

Its damage also scales, +1 per HD, which gets pretty high - arguably, unreasonably so - but on the other hand, one of my biggest gripes at high levels is how bad the damage often is by high level monsters(the tarrasque doesn’t do jack in damage to any party high enough in level enough to fight it), so I’m just a hypocrite. Wait. I just realized. I thought it was +1 per HD + acid, and it’s actually +1d3 per HD in acid damage. So a 27 HD giant ant doesn’t get +27 damage, it gets +27d3 damage. In acid. 

So its bite doesn’t scale, with a 1 HD rat-dog or a 27 HD kaiju ant scoring the damage of a short sword… plus or minus a few dozen d3 in acid. It seems really weird to me that the acid scales that greatly and not the bite, but… I’m kinda okay with it?

Do ants use acid? Hmm. Well, slugs don’t, so. At least there are only 3d20 of them in their lair and not 2,000+ of them like ant men.

“Alignment: any, hungry.” C’mon, Chuck. I’m introducing good-aligned giant ants and blaming you. The giant ant appears in all the same places as the Ant Man, even though this has a different creator. Ants can be found about anywhere, though…

I would be remiss not to mention the incredible description: “The generic description of the giant ants.” (In all caps of course.) Now we’ll never know exactly what an ant looks like. “I once lay awake long into the night, wondering just what kind of creature was the noble ant.”

Ape, Desert

Back to Hargrave with another pretty decent monster. Desert apes are apes with a literal third eye with accompanying hypnotic powers. I think I’d have liked to see a full-scale psionic ape, but this is cool. Movement 10 is a bit unusual for the way this game scales movement, but I don’t have a problem with it. HD spread on this one is only 4-8, reasonable for rank and file apes up to the leader. Intelligence averages low at 2d6, with dexterity being high, equaling that of the very agile giant ant and ant man(for whatever reason). AC 4 is.. all right I guess.  

Chaotic neutral is okay, though I dislike the tendency to lean towards that alignment that seems to have existed since the beginning. I’d like to see hypnotic apes that are more lawful, allowing them to better take advantage of their incredible power, but honestly this isn’t a complaint. Despite how it may sound, very few of my comments are “complaints,” merely observations, though I may make them in a sardonic way in a lame attempt at humor. The truth is I highly respect the effort and passion that is put into these kinds of works, even if I joke otherwise. 

Found in “dungeons, open, deserts.” Can we just skip listing “dungeons?” Literally every smegging monster to ever exist is found in dungeons. Pterodactyls are found in dungeons. I’m sure treants are found in dungeons. Like, literally every monster is indexed to a specific “dungeon level” for the purpose of putting them in dungeons. There’s really no need to state “dungeons” on every single monster. Also, what is “open?” Is that the same as “outside?” Or do they mean non-forested, non-mountainous regions, like plains or something? The opening explanation for the book doesn’t list “open,” so it’s another case of monster creators doing what they want and the editors not enforcing any kind of continuity. It’s not a big deal, but I have to comment on it in a readthrough.

Two attacks, one being a rather heavy club(scoring 1d8 damage) and the other, hypnosis, which is listed as an attack with no real indication of what “hypnosis” actually entails, though it lists it as a “visual” attack, I guess because it’s using one of its eyes, so perhaps it means a gaze attack? Not sure if “gaze attack” was a term cemented into D&D/AD&D yet. Either way, is hypnosis the same as charm, or…? 

These apes cannot speak a normal language, though you might imagine they could, being of low human intelligence and having hypnosis and stuff. Alas, ape biology simply doesn’t allow for the forming of words like we use, and there’s no such thing as evolution or crazy magical effects to cause this to happen, and so we’re stuck with psionic apes only communicable with through magic such as speak with animals, and we’re told these chaotic neutral scoundrels will lie 30% of the time. 

Ape, Snake

This is one of those monsters that when you look at the name you just try to guess what it might be. An ape made of snakes? An ape with snake arms? An ape filled with snakes? This is another Hargrave monster,  with the most reasonable HD spread so far, 5-7. these small spreads are okay(not saying the larger ones can’t be, they’re just uncharacteristic of what we tend to see in official writeups). Technically they exist in AD&D for various humanoid monsters as well, they’re simply expressed differently: a stronger kobold is statted as a goblin, an even stronger one as an orc, etc. By the time you get to hobgoblins, their strongest members are statted as ogres. So their HD could have been shown as “1+1 - 4,” and it would have been a greater spread than the snake ape. 

Let’s skip to the description to see what this thing actually is. One line leaps out and suckers my face with tentacles: “Also known as an octorilla.” Dave, buddy, you could have called this an octorilla and you went with snake ape instead? Octorilla is much cooler, and gives an almost immediate idea of what it might be like. Was it so it would go into the book earlier, like why people give their businesses names beginning with “a” so they get in the front of the category in the yellow pages(back when people used yellow pages)? Tentacles aren’t snakes, Dave. “But maybe people back then wouldn’t have known!” People “back then” wouldn’t have known half the stuff we put in these games, let’s move on.

So, this thing was “spawned in the vats of chaos,” which was basically the precursor to “probably the result of a mad wizard’s experiment.” Both of these are the equivalent of Marvel Comics’ “they’re a mutant.” They are what they are and we don’t have time to come up with origins and explanations, dammit. (Not even kidding - mutants were created because Stan Lee was too lazy to continue to come up with origins for characters so he basically said “what if a mad wizard(God) did it?” I’ll wait for angry responses from Stan Lee fans “correcting” me about something I couldn’t actually care less about.)

AC actually has a range, from 6-7, or as I observed previously, should probably be listed as 7-6(I won’t comment on this in the future). Move 8 seems okay I suppose for an octorilla. Swim 6, so, it’s better running around on land than swimming. Intelligence very low, but not quite animal, averaging 5, with a high dexterity averaging 16! Why exactly? 

Alignment “chaotic,” so I suppose they are going with the single description alignments. Found in dungeons and “open,” again, among other places, specifically woods and water, which makes enough sense.  

This is another with way too many attacks. I really miss OD&D with 1 attack per character or monster regardless of how many arms it has or whatever. Two of its three attack types have scaling damage, and it’s high damage. It gets 4 attacks with its arms, which I guess is a punch or slam of some type, beginning at the same damage as a two-handed sword. The largest cause double this damage. Its beak begins at 1d8 and can also double for the largest ones. It also gets four “constrictions,” which score double its “regular damage,” so, 2d10 for the smallest and 4d1 for the largest? You know that’s overkill. 7 HD giants don’t do that kind of damage in a single attack(though they should). The description tells us that if a sucker-lined arm hits twice in a row or two arms hit in one melee turn(which was probably still 1 round in Holmes and not 10?) constriction takes place and continues until either party is dead. This is when I’m noticing it actually says “1-4 constrictions,” so maybe it only gets the arm attacks unless the previous conditions are met? It’s kind of confusing, and generally, such conditional attacks aren’t listed among the regular attacks like that, but this was an early time. It would certainly make the monster more reasonable if that’s the case. It also says that there’s only a need to make an attack roll for constriction “each turn” if someone is wearing plate mail. That tells me they do mean rounds, but what is the roll for? If they’re saying if an arm hits twice in a row or two hit in a round, the constriction is automatic, then there was already an attack roll made - two of them. Are they saying that constriction isn’t automatic if someone is wearing plate mail? I don’t get this at all.

Aside from some confusing aspects, including what this abomination actually looks like(sure, gorilla and octopus, complete with octopus beak - I still have no idea what that would look like), it’s a neat monster. I like it.

After completing Part II of this readthrough, I looked up “octorilla,” and found that such a monster was published in “the Arduin Grimoire II,” by Mr. Hargrave here. Perhaps Chaosium appealed to Hargrave to change the name because the book was lacking in “a” monsters, or he only really finally decided on “octorilla” between AtWM and tAGII, but I doubt it. Also remember that the introduction expressly stated that no “Arduin Grimoire” monsters are found here, and the second volume of tAG hadn’t been released yet, so this was probably a precursor to the later Arduin “octorilla.” You can see an OSE writeup and the original monster writeup here, complete with pictures(the modern version, not by Hargrave, skips the beak!).

Arceel

It would be understandable to think this was a made-up nonsense word by emphasizing the pronunciation incorrectly, like “ar-keel” or even “ar-seal,” but it is “arc eel,” as in electric eel. It’s man sized, and 10 HD! Sheesh! 

The AC is 2+6, the same thing its creator, Steve Henderson, did with his last entry, the nonsensical Airfang. “Its AC is high due to its rubbery skin.” Thanks for the important info, why does its Dex average high though? Also, it’s “repulsive,” lest you think it was adorable. 

It has low human intelligence, but never lairs nor has treasure(I guess it’s the lack of hands?). Chaotic in alignment, it only lives in swamps - not “outdoors” or in dungeons - and its swim rate is abysmal, maybe to allow PCs to escape when they realize this thing is an inexplicable bucket of HP that does 4d6 lightning damage. It’s described as a “lightning bolt,” but clarifies in the description that it “must touch its victim.” I’m not sure if “must touch” simply indicates that an attack roll must be made as opposed to it being an area of effect power, or if it also means that someone touching it takes damage. 

These eels are a lot cooler, put them in your game instead

I wish it flew like the air squid. Water-based monsters get so little use, comparatively, in my opinion(though this could be a flaw in execution, i.e., people need to find ways to use them more). And the HD seems pretty high, really. I know it’s a nitpick, but I don’t care for the cutesy name either. Why not just call it “giant electric eel?” That’s what it is, man. It doesn’t even have acid or cold breath given to it by a mad wizard, or that it gained in the vats of Chaos, so it’s just a big-ass electric eel. 

Archer Bush

This is one we’ll see other places, such as Mystara. I suppose it’s one of those natural or obvious ideas that multiple people come up with, as mentioned before. It’s mentioned as being taken from the book “Symbiotica,” so it’s just as possible that whoever created it for Mystara was inspired by the same book.

It has no intelligence, but usually has treasure; which makes sense as it’s described as being a “guardian” creature, planted almost invariably for such a purpose. 

No alignment is given, not even a joke one like “alignment: wood.” That’s not funny, but neither is “hungry.” Speaking of which, it’s found in “open,” as well as woods. So I guess “open” must mean literally any outdoor area at all aside from cities, which are listed as their own environment, and ruins, which are actually considered part of the “cities” category for some reason. Which means technically, nobody ever plants these in the ruins in which they lair, nor do wealthy lunatics plant them around their yard for security. I’m sure the creator didn’t intend to make their use that narrow, I’m being pedantic, or something similar to it. I don’t think it actually needs an alignment, and sometimes I think systems overstat things that don’t need them. (DC Heroes was the worst for that, statting things like coins - and by the rules, the weakest human can snap one in half.)

One of the most reasonable HD attributions so far, and it doesn’t even have a spread! The AC is pretty low for something that could logically be argued to be a bit higher. Its dexterity is 12, so it’s going to act in melee a little faster than an average person; too bad it doesn’t get melee attacks, and it isn’t high enough to give it a bonus to its ranged attack, and monsters don’t really work like that anyway. It attacks with the “probability” of “a light bow fired by an eighth level fighter of average dexterity.” I don’t put “probability” in quotes to mock it, but to highlight a specific way that certain rules were often expressed early on that you didn’t see so much later. If you read the “AD&D Dungeon Master’s Guide” - and I‘m going to write a short article in the future on why you should, regardless of what RPG you run, and what parts are universally useful and often overlooked - Gygax goes into dice probabilities, and describes the potential universality of die rolls and how one can be exchanged for another. I talked about this a bit in the previous part. Looking at chances as probabilities, converting them to percentages, can be very useful. I also point this out to question why “light bow” is mentioned. One could argue it’s to reflect the range or damage or something, but it expressly states that it factors into its hit probability somehow. 

It certainly doesn’t factor into its damage, which is insane: it fires 50-100 needles, each of which score 1 HP damage, so we’re talking 50-100 HP of damage potential per round from one bush alone and they average 21 appearing at a time. And that’s before poison, which is save or die, meaning an average of 1,575 possible save or die attacks PER ROUND. That assumes all 21 are within range, but still.

Well, we’re done the “a”s, and I could use a breather after that last one. K. Jones, I’ll be watching you. 

Next time we sail into the “b”s, with the Bagda and Fallowman, and, oh I don’t know, tentatively end with the writeups of beetles. See you then!

#rpg #d&d #rpgs #ad&d #osr #all the world's monsters #readthrough #arduin #arduin grimoire #ose #chaosium

[waywardinfinite]

An old pixel doodle of Cipher~

#original #original character #original art #pixel art #pixel #cipher arduine #cipher #digital art #artphilippines #art ph #artists on tumblr #wayward art

[greencheekconure27]

@tuulikki thought you might like this.as a fellow sad folk ballad fan.

(Six variants of the same ballad from France,Spain and Northern Italy/Piemonte.

I won't translate them entirely, but the basic plot is as follows: a king/ nobleman, usually injured, returns home from war and is met by his mother, who tells him that his queen has just given birth to a son.However the king is already dying and doesn't survive the night.Before he dies he warns his mother to keep his death secret from his wife: the mother then has to come up with various excuses to hide the funeral proceedings from her.( "Why are the churchbells ringing? " It's for my nephew who died in Andalusia" or "Why are all the manservants crying? "Our best horse drowned." or"What's that singing?" "A church procession passed by the palace" etc.etc.") until eventually the queen wants to go to mass and asks her mother in law what dress she should put on.The mother in law recommends the black one, as it supposedly looks best on her.The truth comes out either because she's either greeted as a widow by a passersby on her way to the church or because she sees the fresh grave.She begs the grave to open up and take her too, and the earth swallows her.)

#folk music #playlist #ballads #piemonte #spanish ballads #french ballads #occitan #italy #traditional music #folk songs #re giladrin #la muerte ocultada #le roi renaud #re arduin #music #folklore #folk ballads #Youtube #Spotify #SoundCloud

[electricexpo22]

Visit Electric Expo2022 Ahmedabad on 10-11-12 June 2022

Venue:- EKA Club, Near Kankaria Lake, Ahmedabad

Visitor Registration:- http://www.electricexpo.co.in

#electricexpo #electricexpo2022 #electrical #electrician #wire #cable #switch #electricwire #electricalengineering #electronics #electricianlife #technology #electricians #electricity #electric #electricalwork #electronic #arduino #electricalcontractor #electricalengineer #mechanical  #lighting #electricalhacks

#electric #electricexpo2022 #electrical #electrician #electricwire #arduino #electricwire electricalengineering electronics electricianlife technology electricians electricity electric electricalwork electronic arduin

[vintagerpg]

This week is about some D&D odds and ends. The first is a big one: Supplement II: Blackmoor. It’s the third D&D product (after the box set and Gygax’s Greyhawk) and an extremely important one. Though Arneson’s name is on it (and his world of Blackmoor was the original D&D campaign setting), there is some debate over who wrote the bulk of this book, but whoever typed the words, the constituent ideas feel very different from what we’d consider the core of D&D, and thus are likely firmly from Arneson’s Twin Cities group.

There’s a hit location system that is never again revisited. The monk and the assassin are introduced here as are a host of water-based monsters, including the classic sahuagin, morkoth and Ixitxachitl.

The main attraction, though, is the very first D&D adventure, The Temple of the Frog. Detailed over 20 pages, it is the first serious look players got at what a D&D adventure could be. It doesn’t really line up with our modern conception of the game — there is a mass combat component, for instance, and a good dose of science fiction (the proportion of science fantasy here reminds me more of Arduin than Barrier Peaks). In a truly bizarre oversight (again, reminding me of Arduin), there are no attributes provided for the frog people who live at the center of the temple.

Most interesting of all, though, is how clearly you can see the path not taken when reading through this book. There’s a whole parallel universe of RPGs in this book.

#RPG #TTRPG #Tabletop RPG #roleplaying game #D&D #Dungeons & Dragons #Dave Arneson #Blackmoor

[thecreaturecodex]

Valpyr

Image by MJ Allen, © Emperors Choice Games

[Sponsored by @crazytrain48. The valpyr is Arduin's answer to the question, "I want to use this balor miniature, but how do I do that without murdering my entire party"? Later, in the Emperors Choice era, the question was "how do I sell that balor miniature". The valpyr is clearly a balor clone, with an undead type and a lower HD. So how do I justify it existing in a setting where balors are a thing? Read on.]

Valpyr CR 11 NE Undead This creature is a demonic humanoid, with a forked tail, a pair of horns, and inky black eyes. Enormous bat-like wings grow from its back, and its body is wreathed in silvery flames. It carries a shortspear in one hand and a barbed whip in the other.

A valpyr is an undead mimic, a creature born of evil hoaxers and disguise artists. Their targets of mimicry are powerful fiends, most commonly balors. Valpyrs masquerade as balors in order to intimidate mortals and immortals alike, scaring off psychopomps and necromancers while browbeating lesser monsters into serving them. Valpyrs have to temper their bluster with caution. Even though they are powerful by the standards of mortals, they are nowhere as strong as a balor, and anything that can genuinely challenge one of the lords of the Abyss would have little difficulty destroying a valpyr.

Most valpyrs maintain savage fiefdoms of other creatures to serve them, and usually initiate combat from behind waves of loyal undead or monstrous hounds. Against weaker foes, they prefer to fight with manufactured weapons, the better to maintain the illusion that they are a balor. If they feel genuinely pressed, they instead fight with teeth and claws in order to drain the life from their enemies. Valpyrs will attempt to bluff or intimidate stronger enemies, but flee rapidly if their threats fail.

Although most valpyrs are balor mimics, some instead resemble other types of demons. This is usually due to the sins committed by the valpyr in life, but rumor has it that some valpyrs can intentionally change their form through sinister rituals. These variant valpyrs use the same base statistics, but replace fiery body and whip mastery with two appropriate abilities of the demon in question (like constrict and multiweapon mastery for a valpyr mimicking a marilith, or Huge size and an unholy nimbus for a valpyr mimicking a nalfeshnee).

Valpyr CR 11 XP 12,800 CE Large undead Init +5; Senses darkvision 60 ft., Perception +20, see invisibility

Defense AC 25, touch 14, flat-footed 20 (-1 size, +5 Dex, +11 natural) hp 147 (14d8+84) Fort +10, Ref +9, Will +14 DR 10/good; Immune fire, undead traits; SR 22 (26 vs. divination) Defensive Abilities fiery body, nondetection

Offense Speed 40 ft., fly 120 ft. (good) Melee adamantine shortspear +13/+8 (1d8+5), masterwork whip +13/+8 (1d4+2), bite +12 (1d10+2 plus 1d6 fire plus ability drain), 2 wings +12 (1d6+2 plus 1d6 fire) or 2 claws +14 (1d8+5 plus 1d6 fire plus ability drain), bite +14 (1d10+5 plus 1d6 fire plus ability drain), 2 wings +12 (1d6+2 plus 1d6 fire) Space 10 ft.; Reach 10 ft. (20 ft. with whip) Special Attacks burn quintessence

Spell-like Abilities CL 11th, concentration +17 Constant—nondetection, see invisibility At will—command undead (DC 18), detect magic, magic missile 3/day—bull’s strength, scorching ray, quickened true seeing 1/day—animate dead, fireball (DC 19), glibness, plane shift (DC 21)

Statistics Str 20, Dex 20, Con -, Int 22, Wis 17, Cha 23 Base Atk +10; CMB +16; CMD 31 Feats Flyby Attack, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Intimidating Prowess, Iron Will, Multiattack, Quicken SLA (true strike), Two-Weapon Fighting Skills Bluff +20, Disguise +27, Fly +24, Intimidate +32, Knowledge (arcana, religion) +23, Knowledge (planes) +20, Perception +20, Sense Motive +20, Spellcraft +23; Racial Modifiers +4 Disguise, +4 Intimidate Languages Abyssal, Common, Daemonic, Infernal, Necril SQ whip mastery

Ecology Environment any land or underground Organization solitary or army (1 plus 2-20 galleytrots, skeletons and zombies) Treasure standard (Large masterwork whip, Large adamantine shortspear, other treasure)

Special Abilities Ability Drain (Su) A creature struck by a valpyr’s claw attack must succeed a DC 23 Fortitude save or take 1 point of Constitution drain. A creature struck by a valpyr’s bite attack must succeed a DC 23 Fortitude save or take 2 points of Constitution drain. A valpyr gains 5 temporary hit points every time it deals ability damage. The save DC is Charisma based. Burn Quintessence (Su) Any fire damage dealt by a valpyr’s supernatural or spell-like abilities deals full damage to incorporeal creatures and ignores the energy immunities and resistances of extraplanar outsiders. Fiery Body (Su) A valpyr burns with silvery fire. It deals 1d6 points of fire damage with its natural weapons, and any creature that touches it takes 1d6 points of fire damage (no save). Whip Mastery (Ex) A valpyr treats a whip as a light weapon for the purposes of two-weapon fighting, and can inflict lethal damage on a foe regardless of the foe's armor.

#pathfinder 1e #valpyr #undead #balor #arduin #sponsored post

[oldschoolfrp]

Goblins doing goblin things in their goblin cave (Morno / Bradley W Schenck, The Arduin Grimoire Vol II: Welcome to Skull Tower by Dave Hargrave, Grimoire Games, 1978)

#Arduin #The Arduin Grimoire #Morno #goblin #goblins #Bradley W Schenck #Brad Schenck #Dave Hargrave #dnd #D&D #Dungeons & Dragons #Grimoire Games #cave #cavern #polearm #stalactites #The Arduin Grimoire Vol II #Welcome to Skull Tower

[sarkos]

In California’s atmosphere of psychedelic medievalism, Eliade’s influence was more direct. The Bay Area was home to a variety of growing movements: the Society for Creative Anachronism, growing neo-paganism, and a lot of people who were into D&D. One of them, David Hargrave, produced a variant of Dungeons and Dragons in the mid 1970s that he published in a series of books known as the Arduin Grimoire. Hargrave built the magic system for his game with the help of Isaac Bonewits, the future Archdruid of the New Reformed Druids of North America. Bonewits shared Eliade’s love of synthesis and sense of adventure—he had a bachelor’s degree in ‘magic’ from the University of Califoria, a major of his own design Bonewits certainly read Eliade, and worked to synthesize the disparate religious systems he read about into a single system. The result, was ‘neo-paganism’ a movement that Bonewits helped found. In fact, in 1978 Bonewits produced the book “Authentic Thaumaturgy” which described how to create in-game magic systems based on how real magic worked. The Arduin Grimoire, RuneQuest, and other games drew strongly on Bonewits expertise with ‘real’ magic when they designed their ‘fantasy’ versions.

(via The History of Mana: How an Austronesian Concept Became a Video Game Mechanic—The Appendix)

[artparks-sculpture]

A sculpture titled 'Together (Lifesize Abstract Loving Couple statue)' by sculptor Hans Grootswagers. In a medium of Bronze/Arduin natural stone and in an edition of 9/9.

#artist #sculpture #sculptor #art #fineart #Hans Grootswagers #Stone #Bronze #metal #limited edition

[umberhulk]

Timeline of Arduin Artifacts

Working my way through the magical artifacts in the first 4 Arduin adventures I noticed the artifacts were given an age. Was Dave was thinking about when these were created in the historical timeline of Arduin? I’d like to think so. I bet the answer is yes to some degree. I don’t think Arduin was every fleshed out to extend of Forgotten Realms. I get Dave had some ideas about the history of…

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#arduin #Hargrave #Magic #Treasure