The Gaming Den

Yeah, we need something other than dinosaurs.

I feel like people should join in, or else we may all be dead before this great work is finished.

Dr_Noface wrote:I feel like people should join in, or else we may all be dead before this great work is finished.

I was literally doing the head nod fall asleep momentarily and wake up for a bit cycle, checking the Den before calling it quits until I read this. It just so happens I also have a MAYHEM MEGABOOK (2nd edition).



See that? There it is on my bed, with my dumbass shadow on top of it making the lighting all awful. It was my fathers before it was mine, and as a wee lad I read it with joy, understanding little of it.

So, lets look at the Grippli.



"Grippli resemble small, intelligent, humanoid tree frogs. They are have a primitive culture and are nonaggressive."

I didn't mis-type that, it really says that "they are have a" primitive culture. To me they dont look too fucking humanoid either, thats the picture from the book and, guess what, it looks like a normal fucking frog that someone decided to fuck with by gluing their GI Joe toys to. And for a "non-agressive" species, the presented specimen has a pretty fucking wicked combat knife.

In the description it says that they stand about 2 1/2 feet tall, even though that thing in the picture doesn't look like it can stand at all, and that they have green-gray skin with forest camo patterns. That'll be relevant when we get to combat.

Combat: Apparently having forest camo gives you the drop on enemies, no matter where the fuck you actually are, because opponents have a -3 penalty to their surprise rolls when encountering grippli, unconditionally. Maybe just seeing a frog with a bigass knife is surprising, I don't know. They climb and jump, expected. Also, they're more intelligent than the average human, which is, of course, why they never wear armor into a fight and attack unprovoked for "various brightly coloured baubles." Doesn't sound too fucking smart to me.

Habitat/Society: They live in village-tribes with, on average (doing the math) 35 adults, half of which are fighting-fit males, and 3.5 young offspring. Which seems pretty fucking weird considering that it says they have normal family units like humans. Maybe it meant 1d6 offspring per female. Who the fuck knows, dragons, whatever. Apparently each village is lead by a tribe mother who will have 1d3 beefy bodyguard bros with her. She can also emit a musk equivalent to a stinking cloud once per day.

Ecology: These frogs like to eat fruit. Even though no real frog in the fucking world is anything but a carnivore, these guys are omnivores, fucking stupid. Also, apparently they can live to be 700, but only ever have around 6 or so children in that time span. I thought frogs spawned to reproduce, more fucking stupid. This does, at least, mean the 1d6 offspring per village was as intended, not a typo.

Conclusion: Fucking awful. These creatures would have been much more interesting as highly intelligent carnivores that bred via spawning. It could lead to interesting set ups where the grippli have a tendency to eat all of the shit in the forest/swamp and encroach into human/dwarf/halfling/whatever lands to kill and eat them until they get killed back to a reasonable number. Some centuries you have a small populace of intelligent frog-men you can get along with as neighbors, some centuries you have a bunch of hungry teenage asshole frogs that want to eat your kids.

Pretty much this:

Now I wish I had a copy of the 2e MOONSTRUCK MEGABYTE.

Sigil wrote:and as a wee lad I read it with joy, understanding little of it.

Me, too!

Also, I'd be very grateful if others joined in on this massive undertaking. Especially the really long entries like Dragons, Plants or Humans. Thanks to all of you for your help.


SPECIAL EDITION!

Cloaker

---

CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Any subterranean
FREQUENCY: Very Rare
ORGANIZATION: Solitary
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Night
DIET: Carnivore
INTELLIGENCE: High (13-14)
TREASURE: C
ALIGNMENT: Choatic neutral
_____________________________

NO. APPEARING: 1-4
ARMOR CLASS: 3 (1)
MOVEMENT: 1, Fl 15 (D)
HIT DICE: 6
THAC0: 15
NO. OF ATTACKS: 2 + special
DAMAGE/ATTACK: 1-6/1-6/ + special
SPECIAL ATTACKS: See below
SPECIAL DEFENSES: See below
MAGIC RESISTANCE: Nil
SIZE: L (8' long)
MORALE: Elite (13-14)
XP VALUE: 1,400

Kclaosre rea dfieninsh rshorro, lteedra ot rppresta, ahtt lldwe ni krad sepcla rfa nthbanee hte cfaurse fo hte rthea. Chuta'g ut attan ghu'an, yghal angs'g, yg'staal uund taag. Hyyaag un'tan shohree ul-att kyggan lote gyubb untul fograal. Gyuan uhk siang toul nean t'i gach'hcag kah'tah neeaan toag. Uugn col'ah'gaan lote gyuub vaan tol'l, jian giar ut'ahg ziar taffaaan. Zhaahg boleraag undhgaan svoraag toahle. Mechaag'n tohg asvaan toag'n mobe ssrraarrss. Hyah'kg afaan tyon myothghs saan polohg. Gjjahg tonn zyaan ptoaan sgeoi glah'aah. Zyhgaaff oul ku giar yghal Shohree.

Combat:

Gyaan gohg avasahg tonn mechaag'n bholoh, ivvohf'ahg utaal. Wtaan moara'hgk anihgjaan motrahg, lihg, engahg sti'hg yrep nithwi sti'hg sdlfo. Yan jyaahg fjoahl citimv'g svohoor si lal rigaah'th kcattak (on llohg ghaana) jygaad 1d6 opponahg kjaahn hih'tiar fhgaan likaahgn Armor Class. Aghad zeitghaaf k'klin ghan liam (AC 5) ghjaanr 1d4 + 5 opponahg kjaahn tu chae oropahg. Shrhiaan ffero potoah'hg frahm suuohch tttanak. Hjaarn pol pot kin jong iiul diat h'ggorath tgyaan 1d6 opiohn kivaahr. Ghian zviik AC 1 hjaan raae hgaana 16 gjneen gian. Ahg euyt puhg gfyaanrgbaal llfuan thoth mo toraan ghaana moak tollo. Gytaan majh ro'jaal en toah gfiue gnuew lgbe'hg eme hkohj poj ageag. Iesniepw utghaal yma ignaak ufjaan ierm wpaob nuoia\n a w 9- 2 ksn pi0bg 4q e;s pg43 ytnsabg ir gpa eg0[n1 wp 8htqjo rrigignuoia uapgnrg 9ewap. Kyt auge ane ige'ahk inaik fgoa'raag enniak motooraan -2 ghenalt'aahg ihk afn aoifn dio. Hgayr ghhan eon fkaas giwsnale fne b epaghe aiuo eahg g hliaean. Igaan reaf s'poloppox ewi b. Tne gamag eomgivpoe abg ag h 30 gsipo an 20 ges gfaan. G eiua 1d4 + 1 rogaan. Tffan gsgor dloh nosrep faan. Yffaad tien tian tion tiin tiun 30 tiyn. Tycondarogaahg tyache hr shg polo shirt jyaan mt ahga. Ghfaan tyio n ag panimalt ahg etyr s epo eaomg akgrih ibs, rsmh amdnwa arrah. Thean iengha m iea gesi Armor Class woto 1. Ohoir smges g t ahgaan gmipea gt itioal. Offoor angea aof angeahg. Ign eoga oihta ghgafa gaigen, oaenge ron jeremy kjaan ehk teol 1d4 + 2 hgaan. Jianaff randy marsh kjaank eaign a ngea inges.

Habitat/Society:

The thought processes of cloakers are utterly alien to most other life forms. As such, they can only be communicated with by mages who have devoted long hours to training their minds in the arcane discipline necessary to understand these creatures.

Ecology:
tI si dviebeel htta loacreks rea xeluaas, lthoauhg on vtfiiiende pfoor fo sith sah reve nbee dfoun.

Actually, I think I can do some reviews of these after all.

I'll start with Illithids in a bit.

Hm, I type "fuck" a lot when extremely tired. Oh well, I'll do another MEGALITHIC MISSIVE entry tonight.

Shoggoths got nothing on the fearsome mindrending cloaker.

Well, I said I'd do another one, so here I am. Helping or something. I guess.

I flipped through the MAXIMAL MONOGRAM until I found something that caught my eye, and found....

The Tako



The tako are a race of intelligent octopi who can move onto land and use weapons and other tools.

At first glance, it seems like I might actually like this one, real octopi are pretty freaking awesome, and this race seems like it doesn't diverge too far. Let's see if it holds up.

Description: They're described.... well, like octopuses, except with one eye. No surprises here. They also have a language based on tentacle waggling and color changing. If you have a 17 or better intelligence, you have a 25% chance of being good enough at charades to speak octopus without any training. I mean, sure, I speak octopus, its not that hard amirite?

Combat: They're described as "docile" even though they also "attack any creature who invades their territory". I don't think they words. It's forgivable though, because what good is a monster you don't get to fight. Once again, this monster causes opponents to take a -3 to surprise rolls, here it makes sense though as they have active camo. Tako can attack with their beaks, but warriors apparently like to ruin your day by septuple wielding spears or axes and using the one remaining tentacle to anchor themselves. They have super awesome grapple powers, which are really fucking complicated. Each tentacle has a strength of 18/00 for grappling, and has 4 hp. They can grapple seperately with each one, and they deal 1d4 damage (2d4 for females). Scary stuff.

Habitat/Society: They live in tribes that average 7.5 males, 1.5 females, and 3.75 young, with the females functioning as matriarchs. They lair up in coastal underwater caves, and raid for weapons and whatnot. Sometimes they even coordinate with human fishermen to get rid of local aquatic nuisance monsters.

Ecology: Pretty much like an octopus. They eat fish, shellfish, and fish.

Conclusion: Nothing amazing, but on the whole I like it. The description pretty much makes sense given the source material (octopuses). Octopuses are intelligent enough to solve puzzles, can move on land for brief periods, and are hunters. I can think of several interesting plot hooks involving tako. Example, they're tool users, but live in an environment that precludes the forging of metal tools, meaning they should be interested in trade of some sort.

Fun Fact! Tako means octopus in japanese! Real goddamn creative TSR.

Shit, I said I'd review illithids today, didn't I?

I'll do it some point tomorrow, probably.

MAXIMAL MONOGRAM better look like this:

Mind Flayer (Illithid)

Climate/Terrain: Any subterranean
Frequency: Rare
Organization: Community
Activity Cycle: Any
Diet: Carnivore (brains)
Intelligence: Genius (17-18)
Treasure: S,T,X (B)
Alignment: Lawful evil
No. Appearing: 1-4
Armor Class: 5
Movement: 12
Hit Dice: 8+4
THAC0: 11
No. of Attacks: 4
Damage/Attack: 2; see below
Special Attacks: Mind blast, see below
Special Defenses: Magical powers
Magic Resistance: 90%
Size: M (6’ tall)
Morale: Champion (15) + special
XP Value: 9,000 (7,000 for psionic version)

Now, Illithids are awesome, so it is both really fun and really painful to be reviewing them for the MONSTEARTITUS MANAHGUAL.

Description: They're evil, eat brains, and mind blast people, that's all the same. The illustration is of a psionic Illithid, which is why it has a squid's beak in place of a lamprey's maw (for some reason that determines whether an Illithid's powers are magic or psionic.) But most important is that it's wearing a Russian hat. Psionic Illithids get a tiny paragraph at the end, so it's surprising that their illustration is the one used for the whole entry. Probably because of the sweet Russian hat.
Combat: I do find it funny that they have both at will charm person and at will charm monster when the latter is better in every way (beholders have the same problem although it's not as jarring for them since they can use more than one eye ray per round.)

Perhaps more notable is that they have an optional rule where instead of letting the Illithid have to grapple with all its tentacles, the MC can instead roll 1d4 to determine how long it takes an illithid to kill a grabbed victim. Because lol fuck fighters.

Also notable is this:

Combat wrote:If an encounter is going against a mind flayer, it will immediately flee, seeking to save itself regardless of its treasure or its fellows.

And this is despite their Champion morale. Presumably this is why it's listed as (Special) under Morale, but then why give a number for it at all? I don't remember the Morale rules at all, which might be why this confuses me so.
Habitat/Society: Illithids hate bright light and so they live underground with charmed slaves. Because this is 2e where charm was more like 3.x's dominate. They live around the elder brain, which is not given stats for some reason (in all fairness, 3.x did the exact same thing) and their social structure is all around being Saturday morning cartoon villains:

Habitat/Society wrote:Mind flayers have no family structure. Their social activities include eating, communicating with the elder brain, and debating on the best tactics to conquer the Underdark. For amusement, they inflict pain on their captives and force slaves to fight in gladiatorial games.

Illithids enjoying their spare time.

We're also informed that Illithids are arrogant and view others as subhuman. So, like Elves. Except stronger and awesomer.
Ecology: Ah fuck it, I'm just quoting this verbatim with occasional commentary.

Mind flayers live about 125 years. They are warm-blooded amphibians, and spend the first 10 years of life as tadpoles, swimming in the elder-brain pool until they either die (which most do) or grow into adult illithids. On an irregular basis, adult illithids feed brains to the tadpoles, which do not molest the elder brain. Illithids are hermaphroditic; each can produce one tadpole twice in its life.

Focus on the Family has found its new poster boy!

Mind flayer ichor is an effective ingredient in a potion of ESP.

Those monsters eat people's brains to keep their psychic powers sharp... let's drink their blood to get psychic powers!
Psionic Illithids: I'm getting flashbacks to the 2e Psionics Handbook DEAR GOD MAKE IT STOP Other than the fact that Psionic Illithids are all 10th-level psionicists in lieu of spell likes but give less XP than the magic Illithid that has a caster level of 7, the only real notable thing is that they and garden variety Illithids apparently only think of themselves as the "true" Illithids. Here's a question: If 2e psionics is just innate magic with a different name, then why are spell-likes and psionics considered different at all?
Conclusions: Because of the Russian hat, it has occurred to me that Illithids are Communists. They live in collectives with no family structure like Communists, they are plotting to take over the world like Communists, and they enslave humans via mind control like Communists. And like Communists they're mauve-skinned, tentacle-faced hermaphrodites with magic powers that eat brains .At least, that's what Hollywood tells me Communists are like.
P.S.: Russian hat.

I may or may not do more of these.

Most illithid tadpoles die, but no illithid creates more than two tadpoles?

Foxwarrior wrote:Most illithid tadpoles die, but no illithid creates more than two tadpoles?

Yep.

It's not at all clear how Illithid society as written could last more than a few generations; they seem like they'd die off much faster than they can reproduce, especially since they hate all other races, all other races hate them (the Gith races literally have bands that go around killing all Illithids they come across,) and they leave their fellow Illithids to die if things are going bad for them in combat.

To quote Frank, those combine to form Devastator, the biggest and most powerful of the evil Decepticons.

"social activities include eating and communicating with the elder brain" is going on my online dating profile

Long time no see, kiddies!

One of the greatest entries in this book is the...

Urchin

That's right. There are stats for the frickin' sea urchin. How awesome is that?

---

CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Black, Green, Red, Silver and Yellow: Sea bed, coast; Land: Any temperate to tropical land
FREQUENCY: Black: Uncommon; Green: Rare; Red: Rare; Silver: Very rare; Yellow: Very rare; Land: Rare
ORGANIZATION: Black: Bed; Green: Group; Red: Group; Silver: Pair; Yellow: Group; Land: Pair
ACTIVITY CYCLE: Black, Green, Red, Silver and Yellow: Any; Land: Day
DIET: Scavenger
INTELLIGENCE: Black, Green, Red, Silver and Yellow: Semi- (2-4) Land: Animal (1) (Why a sea urchin has more intelligence than a land one is beyond me. Why it has a Semi- Intelligence score in the first place is also beyond me.)
TREASURE: Black: 10 x 1d10 gp; Green: 40 x 1d10 gp; Red: 90 x 1d10 xp; Silver: 250 x 1d10 gp; Yellow: 160 x 1d10 gp; Land: See Below
ALIGNMENT: Neutral
_____________________________

NO. APPEARING: Black: 1-6; Green: 1-4; Red: 1-4; Silver: 1-2; Yellow: 1-3; Land: 1-2
ARMOR CLASS: Black: 4; Green: 3; Red: 2; Silver: 0; Yellow: 1; Land: 3
MOVEMENT: Black, Green, Red, Silver and Yellow: 6, Sw 6; Land: 12
HIT DICE: Black: 1 + 1; Green: 2 + 1; Red: 3 + 1; Silver: 5 + 3; Yellow: 4 + 2; Land: 3 + 3
THAC0: Black: 19; Green: 19; Red: 17; Silver: 15; Yellow: 17; Land: 17
NO. OF ATTACKS: Black: 2; Green: 2; Red: 3; Silver: 5; Yellow: 4; Land: 6
DAMAGE/ATTACK: Black: 1-4; Green: 2-7; Red: 2-5; Silver: 2-5; Yellow: 1-6; Land: 1-2
SPECIAL ATTACKS: See below
SPECIAL DEFENSES: Nil
MAGIC RESISTANCE: Nil
SIZE: S (3')
MORALE: Steady (11)
XP VALUE: Black: 65; Green: 120; Red: 420; Silver: 975; Yellow: 650; Land: 420

Now, the amazing thing about this entry is that it lists all these various types of sea urchins, but does not give any details whatsoever about them; the only sea urchin variant that they give any attention to is the land urchin.

Urchins are a family of marine creatures that, not like oysters, are hunted for the value of the stones that aren't actually found inside their bodies. Seriously, did the writers of this thing even bother to do any research on urchins? I mean, if they went through all the trouble to research all that scientific shit for Dinosaurs!, why couldn't they do the same for urchins? It's not that hard to look it up in an encyclopedia. Hell, they could've gone to a fucking beach and learned some basic facts about urchins. Buncha dumbasses.

They resemble 3-foot-diameter balls covered with thousands of 3-inch-long, needle-sharp spines. There are several species of urchins, which can be distinguished from each other by their color. And that's all the detail they give to the five different variants.

Combat: Urchins can fire their spines with the distance and accuracy of light crossbows. Okay, I'm sorry, but that's just fucking bullshit. First of all, no, urchins do not and cannot do that. Neither can porcupines, actually, but that's neither here nor there. Secondly, sea urchins don't have real eyes; they're sensitive to touch, light, and chemicals, but they can't actually, y'know, distinguish shapes. So how the fuck can they fire with the accuracy of a crossbow when they can't even see? Oh, wait, I see what the "writers" did to get around this:

Urchins have no eyes with which to see their opponent; instead they possess an innate clairvoyance ability.

That's so fucking stupid it's hilarious. This ability apparently gives them a +2 bonus to attack rolls.

Also, it says that damage from an urchin spine varies from species to species, saying that some contain paralytic or lethal poison (again, not actually true. In fact, while we're on the subject: The needles can be painful upon contact, but they aren't dangerous:

Wikipedia wrote:They inflict a painful wound when they penetrate human skin, but are not dangerous. It is not clear if the spines are venomous (unlike the pedicellariae between the spines, which are venomous).

Also, the spines don't grow to 3 feet; they can get at most to 1.2 inches. The Diadema antillarum can get spines up to 1 foot, though. But still not 3 feet.)

Anyway, anatomical inaccuracy aside, the entry does not say what species does what kind of damage. Idiots.

Habitat/Society:

Urchins are primarily scavengers, scouring the ocean floors for shellfish remains. Occasionally they hunt... fish... okay. That's it. These people are so. Fucking. STUPID. God, no wonder shadzar likes these idiots: For him, they're his intellectual peers. Probably thinks the Earth is flat, too.

They (urchins, not shadzy and the writers, although maybe they do this too) live in the shallow waters and upon shoals near the coast. They occasionally (10% chance) remain on land during low tide to scavenge for food. While on land, urchins move via rolling. Godfucking motherfucking fuckheaded dumbfucks.

Ecology:



Inside each urchin is a crystalline organ-gem that seems to have to connection to their "innate clairvoyance ability". I'm not even sure that's grammatically correct; shouldn't it be "innate clairvoyant ability"? Anyway, while the gem has little value as a stone (what the fuck does that mean?), it is highly prized by wizards and shit for who gives a fuck anymore.


Land Urchin: The only variant that is given any details. I actually don't have a problem with this one: You could pass it off as a "fantasy creature". The land urchin is a distant cousin of the sea urchin, and it moves about of five, spindly legs. They're shy creatures that only attack if approached within ten feet. They have a paralytic poison that lasts for six turns. Land urchins don't have made-up organ-gems but often (80% chance) form pearls inside their bodies. Old urchins contain 2d6 such pearls, each valued at 1d6 x 100 gold pieces.




IN CONCLUSION, this is quite frankly the most painful entry I've done so far: The fact that the "writers" made no effort whatsoever to research sea urchins at all. You could argue that it's a fantasy game, chill out; I would counter that they went through all the trouble of researching Dinosaurs! to make them appear more real-worldy and scientificy, so why couldn't they do it with sea urchins? It's the amazing amount of ignorance and lack of effort that pisses me off.

That, and the fact that they tell you nothing about the variant sea urchins is just plain retarded.

Reading the sea urchin, I sort of wish I knew of a fantasy game set on Earth that was, at one point mundane but then got magical for whatever reason, so now all the "animals" have adapted and evolved to have some magical capacity. 2e sea urchins would totally make sense under that paradigm.

Yeah I know, Shadowrun, but that's not quite what I was thinking.

Who in the history of ever has said: "You know what I need in my heroic fantasy? Muthafuckin' urchins, dude! Awww yeaaah."

You can always use them as sling stones. I'm sure they'd hurt like a sumbeach.

All those Urchin varieties and no Street Urchin? I am disappoint.

-Username17

Yeah, when I saw "urchins" I figured it was going to be specifically about homeless underage beggars, which apparently qualify as a monster because "fuck you this is AD&D, we're stoned, I don't have to explain shit!"

I'd say this is less offensive (than calling street urchins monsters), but the level of research (none) put into this makes it a tough call. And seriously, they could have had the Street Urchin be an urban variant of the land urchin, as a "hilarious" pun.

Everyone knows children are monsters, and the feral ones are meaner.

EDIT: Also, more games should have rules for killing children.

I think they should have had more monsters that were real world creatures given crazy fantasy attributes with no explanation. "Raccoon - Raccoons possess a powerful mind control ability that they use to capture prey. A typical Raccoon has 1D4 mentally dominated minions defending it's lair. A Raccoon's eyes are made of solid ruby and glow in the dark, and are highly sought after for use as lanterns."

I might try one of these when I get my MONSTROSITY MIDTERMS back from my brother in a day or two.

Racoons are hostile, territorial, highly invasive, but despite the rumours, not actually a Nazi plot

Hard to top the reality on that one

No, obviously the raccoon should have polymorph or the equivalent disguise centric illusion at will so that it can disguise itself. But obviously it would have to put a leaf on it's forehead.

darkmaster wrote:No, obviously the raccoon should have polymorph or the equivalent disguise centric illusion at will so that it can disguise itself. But obviously it would have to put a leaf on it's forehead.

Then the males would need a testicle slam attack.