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tbok1992
2012-12-26, 01:11 AM
This is a thread about weird D&D creatures, whether they be fixtures of the many D&D Stupid Monsters Lists or so strange they are awesome. Celebrating 'em, overanalyzing them, creating new backstories or fluff for them, whatever you want, this is the thread for it.

To start off, I kind of wonder why nobody ever mentions that the Nerra, at least their 3e Fiend Folio iteration, are very likely based off of a creation of Jorge Luis Borges, specifically The Fish in the Mirror from The Book of Imaginary Beings. The similarities of "Beings from a mirror world who want to conquer ours" are unmistakable.

This would make it the second D&D creature originally invented by Borges, the first being the classic Peryton. And yes, I know it technically "is" a Greek creature, but given that the earliest source we currently have for it is Borges' own Book of Imaginary Beings, all his "references" were "conveniently" either lost or destroyed, and that Borges loved him his metafiction, I think we can safely say it was Borges' own creation.

Also, anybody think that they need to make a more neutral variant on the Ghanadaun from 2e as a PC race? BEcause I'd love the idea of a partially-ooze PC race. And darnit, I want my own Googirl PC! :smallbiggrin:

Totally Guy
2012-12-26, 09:21 AM
Anyone ever read Isle of the Unknown?

Jay R
2012-12-26, 01:44 PM
It's been this way in D&D since 1974, but color-coded dragons, or dragons that breathe anything but fire, still seem weird to me.

JustIgnoreMe
2012-12-26, 02:44 PM
To start off, I kind of wonder why nobody ever mentions that the Nerra, at least their 3e Fiend Folio iteration, are very likely based off of a creation of Jorge Luis Borges, specifically The Fish in the Mirror from The Book of Imaginary Beings. The similarities of "Beings from a mirror world who want to conquer ours" are unmistakable.

This would make it the second D&D creature originally invented by Borges, the first being the classic Peryton. And yes, I know it technically "is" a Greek creature, but given that the earliest source we currently have for it is Borges' own Book of Imaginary Beings, all his "references" were "conveniently" either lost or destroyed, and that Borges loved him his metafiction, I think we can safely say it was Borges' own creation.

Except according to the current Wikipedia article there's a winged stag carved on a fountain at Linlithgow Palace, built during the reign of James V of Scotland (1513-1543). No idea what they'd've named such a creature, but they certainly carved one. Borge may have made it up for his book, but whether he knew it or not someone else had made it up first.

tbok1992
2012-12-26, 09:17 PM
Except according to the current Wikipedia article there's a winged stag carved on a fountain at Linlithgow Palace, built during the reign of James V of Scotland (1513-1543). No idea what they'd've named such a creature, but they certainly carved one. Borge may have made it up for his book, but whether he knew it or not someone else had made it up first.
Ah.But I am pretty sure Borges came up with the name and backstory for the Pertyon, even if the concept of "Winged deer" had been done before.

Also, one of my favorite weird monsters has to be The Shrieking Terror:
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/mmiii_gallery/83052.jpg
Something about that design just works so well, like some lost creature from those old Ugly Stickers cards. I know the backstory says it was a crazy wizard's cross between a Hydra and a Vargoulle, but I prefer to think of it as the progenitor of the Vargoulle race, slipping through from the Far Realm to "Beautify" the Prime Material Plane by turning humanoids into creatures near its own image.

awa
2012-12-27, 02:21 PM
to be fair poison gas breathing dragons have a long history

personally Ive always felt beholders eye beams seem kinda weird. To me eye beams seems more like a super hero thing then a fantasy thing. Note its not eyes used as a weapon that bothers me its the beam part.

also that shrieking terror looks awesome

TuggyNE
2012-12-27, 08:25 PM
personally Ive always felt beholders eye beams seem kinda weird. To me eye beams seems more like a super hero thing then a fantasy thing. Note its not eyes used as a weapon that bothers me its the beam part.

Eye beam of create food and water is the most best.Yes, I know that's not a thing anymore, but I don't care :D

Yora
2012-12-28, 04:55 AM
Of all the freaky 1st Edition D&D monsters, beholders are pretty much the only ones that somehow made it to become established parts of the game. In 1st Ed. they were just weird monsters like pretty much every other one.
Standard Mimics are still around, but that's it.

Doorhandle
2012-12-28, 06:55 AM
Ah.But I am pretty sure Borges came up with the name and backstory for the Pertyon, even if the concept of "Winged deer" had been done before.

Also, one of my favorite weird monsters has to be The Shrieking Terror:
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/mmiii_gallery/83052.jpg
Something about that design just works so well, like some lost creature from those old Ugly Stickers cards. I know the backstory says it was a crazy wizard's cross between a Hydra and a Vargoulle, but I prefer to think of it as the progenitor of the Vargoulle race, slipping through from the Far Realm to "Beautify" the Prime Material Plane by turning humanoids into creatures near its own image.

Agreed. It IS a cool thing.

...now cross breed it with a beholder.

Togath
2012-12-28, 08:47 AM
I've alway been fond of flumphs, escpecially their pf incarnation, as it seems like a fun twist from normal to have a lovecraftian looking non-evil race.

KillianHawkeye
2012-12-28, 08:58 AM
This is a thread about weird D&D creatures, whether they be fixtures of the many D&D Stupid Monsters Lists or so strange they are awesome. Celebrating 'em, overanalyzing them, creating new backstories or fluff for them, whatever you want, this is the thread for it.

If you want weird creatures, look to your avatar. Wolf in Sheep's Clothing? Who the hell thought of a monster that pretends to be a tree stump with a rabbit standing on it?? Crazy.

Doorhandle
2012-12-29, 03:16 AM
Well, they're more awesome than weird, but the Tane from pathfinder would work. Excluding the things taken from Lewis Carroll (like the bandersnatch) that are pretty weird in of themselves, the other 2 tane are pretty odd: A FAST, explosive walking tree with lightning for sap (Sard), and a mutated fey bear/snake thing that looks like it walked out of a heavy metal album cover(Thrasfyr.)

The mothman is pretty cool: A creature that acts as an agent of fate, ensuring all dooms come to pass, that looks in no small manner like a kamen rider. :smallcool:

Jyoti are also frikkin' weird: Bird people form the positive plain of energy that are NEUTRAL: Freakishly xenophobic, unable to respect or worship any deites, and have an irrational hatred of the sceaduinar. The sceaduinar themselves are also odd: negative-energy natives, crystalline in nature, who hate life and unlife with with equal passion. They believe the jyoti stole their ability to create, pushing them into the unwanted role of mindless destruction.

Darthteej
2012-12-29, 01:05 PM
The gravbeast (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mm/20040627a), which eventually made it into the Monster Manual II. No idea where they got it from, but I've always wanted to have my party fight one.

On the note of the MMII, there's also my favorite monstrous humanoid EVER-yakfolk. Neutral evil anthropomorphism yaks that use mind control to enslave humans and dwarves, can violently hijack your body as if you were a magic jar, and apparently have some ancient deal with genies that lets them summon them and do what they want.

EDIT: Turns out they came from Al-Qadiem.

Ravens_cry
2012-12-29, 02:43 PM
I like the owl bear, though I reject the fluff they are a wizards experiment gone wrong, or right. Rather, I see them as being a natural creature that got named what they are because of resemblances, a common human trait.
I never thought of them as a joke when they have massive claws on arms that could knock your head clean off and a beak that could snip your head off like shears.
I mean, look at the thing!:smalleek:
http://img545.imageshack.us/img545/126/owlbear.jpg

hamishspence
2012-12-29, 02:46 PM
I like the owl bear, though I reject the fluff they are a wizards experiment gone wrong, or right. Rather, I see them as being a natural creature that got named what they are because of resemblances, a common human trait.

Yup. It wouldn't be hard to fluff them as evolved dinosaurs, or something along those lines.

Yora
2012-12-29, 02:53 PM
There are way too many monsters described as escaped experiments. Like carrion crawlers and Chuuls.

Ravens_cry
2012-12-29, 03:01 PM
Yup. It wouldn't be hard to fluff them as evolved dinosaurs, or something along those lines.
Strictly speaking, that's the default fluff of *any* bird.:smalltongue:

There are way too many monsters described as escaped experiments. Like carrion crawlers and Chuuls.
Yeah. Sometimes it fits, but generally it is a pretty lazy explanation.

North_Ranger
2012-12-29, 03:27 PM
I've alway been fond of flumphs, escpecially their pf incarnation, as it seems like a fun twist from normal to have a lovecraftian looking non-evil race.

Gotta say I agree with you about the Pathfinder incarnation of flumphs, along with the treatment they gave the wolf-in-sheep's-clothing, adherers and various other monsters. Misfit Monsters redeemed is easily one of my favourite PF books :smallsmile:

Me, I had trouble accepting the concept of 4th Edition angels... celestial agents no more, they pretty much looked like invisible flaming ghosts in heavy armor. The design just did not appeal to me... along with a whole crapload of other things in 4e, but that's a rant for another thread.

Jay R
2012-12-30, 11:57 AM
Neither the owlbear nor almost any other monster can exist without a completely new approach to the evolution (or other creation) of species. To start with, owlbears, hippogriffs, pegasi and many others make hash with the division into birds, mammals, etc.

I once created a world that was identical to ours until 1066. When the light from the supernova that reached earth that year (from the Crab Nebula), it brought the first manna, and magic was first possible. But all the legends of wizards and magical creatures existed, just as they did in our world.

The presence of magic enabled new creatures to be created, out of the imaginations of the people - which is why so many of them look like medieval monsters of heraldry, legend and myth.

The presence of magic makes the results of physical laws less certain, which makes science (which is the use of observation and experiment) less successful at discovering physical laws, so the level of technology has not gone much beyond the level of 1066.

tbok1992
2012-12-30, 12:02 PM
I like the owl bear, though I reject the fluff they are a wizards experiment gone wrong, or right. Rather, I see them as being a natural creature that got named what they are because of resemblances, a common human trait.
I never thought of them as a joke when they have massive claws on arms that could knock your head clean off and a beak that could snip your head off like shears.
I mean, look at the thing!:smalleek:
http://img545.imageshack.us/img545/126/owlbear.jpg

But the owlbear is pretty much the most iconic "An insane wizard did it" monsters. Making it not that would make it way less interesting.

Ravens_cry
2012-12-30, 12:05 PM
But the owlbear is pretty much the most iconic "An insane wizard did it" monsters. Making it not that would make it way less interesting.
Iconic? Eh, I don't know. Famous? Sure, but nothing about it says to me 'This creature could not exist any other way'. Unlike, say, the spider-horse or the duckbunny.
(http://www.headinjurytheater.com/article95.htm)

Togath
2012-12-30, 12:45 PM
Neither the owlbear nor almost any other monster can exist without a completely new approach to the evolution (or other creation) of species. To start with, owlbears, hippogriffs, pegasi and many others make hash with the division into birds, mammals, etc.

I once created a world that was identical to ours until 1066. When the light from the supernova that reached earth that year (from the Crab Nebula), it brought the first manna, and magic was first possible. But all the legends of wizards and magical creatures existed, just as they did in our world.

The presence of magic enabled new creatures to be created, out of the imaginations of the people - which is why so many of them look like medieval monsters of heraldry, legend and myth.

The presence of magic makes the results of physical laws less certain, which makes science (which is the use of observation and experiment) less successful at discovering physical laws, so the level of technology has not gone much beyond the level of 1066.

Why is the owlbear impossible?, I understand the other two, but it's a bi-pedal bird with claws, so not that different from a dinosaur(other then using it's front claws rather then rear ones):smallconfused:

Ravens_cry
2012-12-30, 12:58 PM
Why is the owlbear impossible?, I understand the other two, but it's a bi-pedal bird with claws, so not that different from a dinosaur(other then using it's front claws rather then rear ones):smallconfused:
Well, the bipedal stance is a bit different and most dinosaurs lacked strong upper limbs, but I don't see it as evolutionarily being impossible, just not a path went down on Earth.
It's not like the thousands of pound filers with (comparatively) itty bitty wings.

Yora
2012-12-30, 01:33 PM
Neither the owlbear nor almost any other monster can exist without a completely new approach to the evolution (or other creation) of species. To start with, owlbears, hippogriffs, pegasi and many others make hash with the division into birds, mammals, etc.
Evolution works just the same, you only have to branch out at a point before the division into the animals of present day Earth. Since they are fictional worlds, six or eight limbed variants of the normal four limbed one could have evolved early on and confined to a sleeping gene that reactivates in several only distantly related creatures.
And a platypus is not related to ducks, but only has evolved a skull feature that looks like one found in ducks. An owlbear could simply be a feathered dinosaur that split off around the time that reptiles and birds diverged, simply being the only species of its class that survived to the present day.

Paragon468
2012-12-30, 01:38 PM
The Roving Mauler. No more needs to be said.

awa
2012-12-30, 04:37 PM
yeah nothing about the owl bear requires a wizard did it and honestly it doesn't feel like something a wizard would make except for giggles. Its basically just a bear with some feathers it doesn't really have any abilities that imply an owl abilities.

Yora
2012-12-30, 04:44 PM
The Roving Mauler. No more needs to be said.
That one is supposed to violate any logic and any theories of evolution and biology. Isn't it actually a spirit that takes a mind boggling shape and not an actual animal?

Paragon468
2012-12-30, 04:59 PM
That one is supposed to violate any logic and any theories of evolution and biology. Isn't it actually a spirit that takes a mind boggling shape and not an actual animal?

Quite honestly, I'm not even sure. I've never used them or encountered them, I just know that their biology makes no sense at all.

THEChanger
2012-12-30, 08:01 PM
They are, apparently, Magical Beasts with the Extraplanar subtype. What this means for their nature as spirits or naturally evolved critters is not a subject I am knowledgable enough with to make the call on.

Jay R
2012-12-30, 09:42 PM
Why is the owlbear impossible?, I understand the other two, but it's a bi-pedal bird with claws, so not that different from a dinosaur(other then using it's front claws rather then rear ones):smallconfused:

Because it's a mammal/bird, like all the other examples, just like I said.

tbok1992
2012-12-30, 09:54 PM
That one is supposed to violate any logic and any theories of evolution and biology. Isn't it actually a spirit that takes a mind boggling shape and not an actual animal?

I believe it's also related to the vestige Buer, as well as looking like the version from real mythology.

Ravens_cry
2012-12-30, 11:56 PM
Because it's a mammal/bird, like all the other examples, just like I said.
What says it's a mammal? Sure, some of it kind of looks like fur, but some birds have feather so thin, take the kiwi for example, that it looks a lot like fur.
Remember, most D&D worlds are not Earth.
Things don't always have to fit our little classifications.

Togath
2012-12-31, 12:53 AM
Owlbears also lay eggs, and are fluffed as having feathers rather then fur, so definitely not a mammal.

TuggyNE
2012-12-31, 01:39 AM
Owlbears also lay eggs ... so definitely not a mammal.

*coughplatypusechidnacough*

Togath
2012-12-31, 03:21 AM
Aye, I suppose there are those two, forgot about them. The platypus also brings up another point; even the real world has some pretty odd creatures(an aquatic, egg-laying duckbilled mammal with poisonous spines on it's legs if pretty out-there sounding without the context, or just about anything from the deep sea, or the water-bear[a six legged microscopic creature capable of surviving very high radiation, extreme temperature, and complete vacuums])...I sort of to make stats for a dire water-bear now:smallsmile:

Jay R
2012-12-31, 10:31 AM
Owlbears also lay eggs, and are fluffed as having feathers rather then fur, so definitely not a mammal.


What says it's a mammal? Sure, some of it kind of looks like fur, but some birds have feather so thin, take the kiwi for example, that it looks a lot like fur.

It may have been re-fluffed in later editions to be covered with feathers alone. I wouldn't know.

But the original description, from the 1E Monster Manual, states, "Owlbears have brownish-black to yellow brown fur and feathers." That's the owlbear as originally introduced to D&D.

Besides, my comments were about owlbears, hippogriffs, and pegasi. Even if the owlbear no longer qualifies, nobody can reasonably claim that D&D does not have mammal/bird monsters


Remember, most D&D worlds are not Earth.
Things don't always have to fit our little classifications.

You appear to have come full circle. That these things don't fit our classifications is pretty much the statement I made that you disagreed with.

I wrote, and you objected to, "Neither the owlbear nor almost any other monster can exist without a completely new approach to the evolution (or other creation) of species. To start with, owlbears, hippogriffs, pegasi and many others make hash with the division into birds, mammals, etc."

So I guess that we are now in agreement that these things don't in fact fit our classifications.

Oh, and for those of you who brought up the platypus and echidna: Monotremes are a rare, unusual order, mostly extinct, and less advanced than most mammals. And even so, they caused serious re-evaluation of the rules of taxonomy.

The owlbear, pegasus, and hippogriff (not to mention chimera, manticore, and many other such beasts) aren't as primitive, and would require a completely new approach to the evolution (or other creation) of species, just as I said.

Does anybody seriously question this? Is there anybody willing to claim that a world containing beholders had the same lines of evolution that our world did?

Ravens_cry
2012-12-31, 10:45 AM
Hippogrif and pegesi *fly* on wings far, far too small to support their weight. That doesn't break the laws of evolution, that breaks the laws of physics!

Yora
2012-12-31, 10:58 AM
Assuming their bodies have the density of horses.

Ravens_cry
2012-12-31, 11:15 AM
Assuming their bodies have the density of horses.
No assumption at all. A Pegasus weighs 1,500 pounds. It says so right here (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/pegasus.htm).
A Hippogriff weighs 1,000 (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/hippogriff.htm).

Dave Halfbreed
2012-12-31, 11:37 AM
See, I get Griffins. I don't get owlbears. Okay, bears are cool, owls are cool, but I don't get that particular combo-how about storkbears? Alligatorbears? Owlbats?

Owls are cool because of their hearing and stealth. Thing is, they lose that stealth if they're bears, their predatory brutality is redundant with the bears, and bears have perfectly fine senses of hearing and smell. I guess they get a better sense of sight, but that doesn't help that much

At least you can give Griffins eagle eyes, claws and wings-cool things that improve lions while still keeping lion hearing, smell, and back paws. Owlbears don't have wings, although the art gives them talons. The beak is nice and sharp, but when it's that short, why bother? Bear jaws are better, actually, since adventurers aren't the size of cats and tend to wear something those powerful bear jaws can be used for.

Here's something-those awful Ewok movies had boar wolves. Those are actually pretty badass. And there have been similar animals in the Eocene and Oligocene epochs. Samething with beardogs (which were also like bearlions in some cases), hyenadogs, bearcats, and snakewhales.

Owlbears just bug me, I guess.

Jay R
2013-01-01, 11:12 AM
I think we have adequately covered owlbears. (I've thought more about them in the last two days than in the previous two decades.)

Anybody have any other weird monsters?

For me, it was always the mimic. They were so arbitrarily designed to annoy dungeon-crawling parties of PCs that they are much more likely than owlbears anything else to be the creation of a crazed wizard.

awa
2013-01-01, 11:19 AM
actually i always felt that mimics felt fairly natural as far as the gotha monsters were concerned remember they don't have to look like a chest.

Toy Killer
2013-01-01, 02:32 PM
I personally love mimics (at least as a DM), as they tend to run as free agents in my games. Sure I could use a combination of all sorts of contingency spells to make any number of things happen within the dungeon, but it's so much easier to say a mimic did it.

The party rolls into a 30x30, check for traps and they realize the room itself has a sand floor that 'drains' and creates a cool vortex thing, awesome fight, under the sand is a door that leads to further in the dungeon and later they encounter the body of another adventurer. Wait, how did the earlier chamber refill up with sand? How did the room 'know' that the party was there?

A mimic was watching and triggered the trap. when the party dies, he resets the sand. He gets a share of the loot, can hide in plain sight, and needs his day job too.

Vaz
2013-01-02, 08:45 AM
Penagolan by far; a decapitated human head that still somehow is attached to its inner bodily organs which attacks by atrangling people with its own intestines.

Nice.

Togath
2013-01-02, 01:01 PM
Penagolan by far; a decapitated human head that still somehow is attached to its inner bodily organs which attacks by atrangling people with its own intestines.

Nice.

Not exactly a dnd one(there are dnd stats for it, but it's also a mythological one), but, aye, it is a rather weird mythological one.

Concrete
2013-01-05, 06:48 AM
I could probably post some weird ones, but they would just be stolen from Bogleech's reviews anyways, so I'll just link there:
http://bogleech.com/dnd.html
Many of these come from earlier editions, and his articles are mostly gushing or griping over how they have changed over the years.

Yora
2013-01-05, 08:19 AM
The early monsters were a lot more experimental, but I think over time it probably became clear that most people cared a lot more for more conventional things.
Beholders and mimics are pretty much the only really weird ones that somehow made it to gain real lasting popularity.