Monstrumologist Monologue (may NSFW)

[The Vorpal Tribble]

There are many questions unanswered about the super-natural world. How do owlbears come to be? What does a mindflayer like in a brain? How do sparkly vampires without blood get it up?

All shall be revealed. Come forth and ask, but be mindful, the truth may shock you!

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Index

[Tavar]

Well, how did owlbears come to be? Also, what about those weird lion things from the Tome of Magic?

[Inhuman Bot]

Well, how did owlbears come to be? Also, what about those weird lion things from the Tome of Magic?

Beurs, or whatver? The things with like, 6 legs?

I think those were based on a mythologicial creature.

[Zaq]

Why is a giant with three arms more "aberrant" than a giant with two heads?

How the bleeding hell is a Lhosk (MM3) considered a Monstrous Humanoid?

[Mongoose87]

Centaurs? What the heck?

[SurlySeraph]

Half-Farspawn.
Illithid Heritage.
Abberration Blood.
Are there seriously enough humanoids romantically involved with horrific creatures from the Far Realms that we need two feat chains and a template to reflect all their offspring? And if so, why on Earth do they get involved in said relationships?

[golentan]

Query 1: If you have a gold dragon, and hybridize it with a black dragon, what is the resulting creature and what is its alignment?

Query 2: Why is something animated as a skeleton unable to be resurrected in any form until the skeleton is gone?

Query 3: Given that the generation time of shadows is measured in seconds and they can take out 99% of the world's population, why is the world not shrouded in malignant evil? How can I use this for my own nefarious ends, or avoid having my nefarious ends stuffed with the stick of righteousness (provided, I assume, by a paladin).

Query 4: How many outsiders are there? Do the Modrons keep a census?

Query 5: What is the lifespan of a Pixie? Why haven't immortal characters that can level take over the world?

Query 6: What DOES happen when a fiend and a celestial have a child?

Query 7: What is the cost of a Tusked Behemoth? More generally, what is the cost of a monster for a given CR?

Query 8: How do arrowhawks fly in a gravity well? Shouldn't their 2nd wing pair prevent the primary from achieving lift, making them an aerodynamic nightmare? And in their natural habitat, shouldn't they be able to fly merely by effort of will? In fact, why do any elemental plane of air natives have wings?

[golentan]

Half-Farspawn.
Illithid Heritage.
Abberration Blood.
Are there seriously enough humanoids romantically involved with horrific creatures from the Far Realms that we need two feat chains and a template to reflect all their offspring? And if so, why on Earth do they get involved in said relationships?

Yes.

Because I love Mr. Shoggoth, that's why. Love knows no boundaries. See, he's hugging my head. Now he's arghakalsaoijweainfaksjvoiwehn.....

*blood dripped slowly onto the keyboard, and the creature's hunger was sated... for now*

[Zaq]

The Dark template, from Tome of Magic, is good for a few puzzlements.

1) A Lawful Good Shadowcaster with the feats Shadow Familiar and Celestial Familiar can have a Lantern Archon with the Dark template as a familiar. What the hell does that look like?

2) You can put a Collar of Umbral Metamorphosis on your mount, giving it the Dark template. If your mount is intelligent, or if you teach it a very specific (not RAW, but reasonable) trick, it can then Hide in Plain Sight. You, for the purposes of this question, do NOT have the Dark Template, nor any other form of HiPS. So, you can be riding around on a mount that is hiding in plain sight while you are not. What the hell does that look like?

[Gorgondantess]

Half-Farspawn.
Illithid Heritage.
Abberration Blood.
Are there seriously enough humanoids romantically involved with horrific creatures from the Far Realms that we need two feat chains and a template to reflect all their offspring? And if so, why on Earth do they get involved in said relationships?

Actually, I have a game in which at least one instance of those is rather well explained: eugenics. Breeding a human with some freakish entity results in a rather powerful being, one could assume beings such as illithids might try doing that- in fact, I believe they have in a certain supplement. So, it's a more cold, calculating thing than studly adventurer saying 'Hey, that aboleth is a total babe.'

[Dacia Brabant]

I'm not VT but I'm gonna take a stab at these anyway.

Query 1: If you have a gold dragon, and hybridize it with a black dragon, what is the resulting creature and what is its alignment?

A Black Gold, i.e. an Oil Dragon. Breathes flaming oil and natural gas, and is very definitely Evil. Green Dragons are its chief nemesis.

Query 2: Why is something animated as a skeleton unable to be resurrected in any form until the skeleton is gone?

Because it's still your skeleton, kind of hard to live without one of those.

Query 3: Given that the generation time of shadows is measured in seconds and they can take out 99% of the world's population, why is the world not shrouded in malignant evil? How can I use this for my own nefarious ends, or avoid having my nefarious ends stuffed with the stick of righteousness (provided, I assume, by a paladin).

Because shadows can't exist without the light.

Query 4: How many outsiders are there? Do the Modrons keep a census?

Yes, I believe they came up with the googolplex specifically for this purpose.

Query 5: What is the lifespan of a Pixie? Why haven't immortal characters that can level take over the world?

They're too busy getting high on pixie dust to bother with that stuff.

Query 6: What DOES happen when a fiend and a celestial have a child?

The world ends.

Query 7: What is the cost of a Warbeast (I think, from Heroes of Battle)? More generally, what is the cost of a monster for a given CR?

I don't have that book but, going by item creation rules, determine how much xp it's worth and muliply that by 5 for its gp value (not including its equipment/treasure, if any).

Query 8: How do arrowhawks fly in a gravity well? Shouldn't their 2nd wing pair prevent the primary from achieving lift, making them an aerodynamic nightmare? And in their natural habitat, shouldn't they be able to fly merely by effort of will? In fact, why do any elemental plane of air natives have wings?

I think the more important question is, how many catgirls did you just kill?


I would answer the question about Half-Farspawn, but I don't want to get banned.

[golentan]

I think the more important question is, how many catgirls did you just kill?

But... but they can choose to fall faster than they can fly in any direction. Why do they need wings? I MUST KNOW!!!

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Query 1: If you have a gold dragon, and hybridize it with a black dragon, what is the resulting creature and what is its alignment?

Half-Black Gold Dragon(or half-gold Black). It has 2 breath weapons, and is the alignment of the non-template half. Half-red Red is actually a good way of adding pluses to a Dragon without making it as deadly as advancing an age category would.

Query 5: What is the lifespan of a Pixie? Why haven't immortal characters that can level take over the world?

For the same reason Liches haven't. Immortal does not mean unkillable, and in fact may make you more of a target.

Query 6: What DOES happen when a fiend and a celestial have a child?

Half-Fiend Celestial:Evil
Half-Celestial Fiend:Good, angsty.

Edit: What is a Ling, and what did it breed with to give us thieving midgets?

[SurlySeraph]

1) A Lawful Good Shadowcaster with the feats Shadow Familiar and Celestial Familiar can have a Lantern Archon with the Dark template as a familiar. What the hell does that look like?

Like a blacklight, of course.

2) You can put a Collar of Umbral Metamorphosis on your mount, giving it the Dark template. If your mount is intelligent, or if you teach it a very specific (not RAW, but reasonable) trick, it can then Hide in Plain Sight. You, for the purposes of this question, do NOT have the Dark Template, nor any other form of HiPS. So, you can be riding around on a mount that is hiding in plain sight while you are not. What the hell does that look like?

It looks awesome.
More specifically, it looks like you're hovering in a seated position in midair.

Actually, I have a game in which at least one instance of those is rather well explained: eugenics. Breeding a human with some freakish entity results in a rather powerful being, one could assume beings such as illithids might try doing that- in fact, I believe they have in a certain supplement. So, it's a more cold, calculating thing than studly adventurer saying 'Hey, that aboleth is a total babe.'

Yes, but three different lines of experimentation? I'd think they'd say "Oh, they get tentacles and bulgy eyes. OK" after the first few dozen and have done with it.

[Ormur]

2) You can put a Collar of Umbral Metamorphosis on your mount, giving it the Dark template. If your mount is intelligent, or if you teach it a very specific (not RAW, but reasonable) trick, it can then Hide in Plain Sight. You, for the purposes of this question, do NOT have the Dark Template, nor any other form of HiPS. So, you can be riding around on a mount that is hiding in plain sight while you are not. What the hell does that look like?

If you're actually riding the mount (moving) it will get massive minuses to it's hide check. But if it succeeds I'd guess it would be creeping and looking like it was a part of the environment, a rock, bush, dumpster, whatever. Then you'd probably look like you were gliding along the ground with what I'd picture as optical distortions beneath you, something like the special effects of stealth in movies.

[Nada Rakshasa]

Query 7: What is the cost of a Warbeast (I think, from Heroes of Battle)? More generally, what is the cost of a monster for a given CR?

The cost of a Warbeast (from Monster Manual 2) is 50 gold per HD if it's 3 HD or less or 100 gp + 75 per HD for one of 4 HD or more. As for monsters based on CR... I dunno.

[golentan]

The cost of a Warbeast (from Monster Manual 2) is 50 gold per HD if it's 3 HD or less or 100 gp + 75 per HD for one of 4 HD or more. As for monsters based on CR... I dunno.

Nonono. The Warbeast from Heroes of Battle (edit: looked it up: Tusked Behemoth. Sorry. Got confused because it's listed right after skeletal warbeast...)

You know, the book where they give all the juicy steeds to salivate over and no rules whatsoever for acquiring them, and responded to questions to their help center on balancing the price as "Whatever you as a GM feel is balanced is what they should cost."

[Ormagoden]

A wizard did it.

[Telonius]

Why is a giant with three arms more "aberrant" than a giant with two heads?

Lack of symmetry. The athach's middle hand either has only one thumb (in which case it isn't symmetrical - therefore aberrant) or has two thumbs (which is really weird and not part of the usual anatomy of a hand - therefore aberrant).

Query 1: If you have a gold dragon, and hybridize it with a black dragon, what is the resulting creature and what is its alignment?

I don't know, but it automatically gains the Saints template.