Australia of Horrors

[Randel]

Okay, after browsing through TVTropes, I came across the Shiny New Australia and then this page that got me thinking:

What would a DnD adventure into an Australia themed setting look like? After all, it seems that Australia is already full of incredibly poisonous and vicious animals, hostile environments, and rather infertile soil unsuited for major farming... what would a magical version of Australia look like?

Also, kangaroos are already known for jumping around and punching people in the face. Platypuses look like mix and match creatures with highly toxic barbs on their feet. Dingos are basically wolves whos ancient ancestors since the dawn of time have never really had a chance to be domesticated... and still have to survive in a world filled with toxic plants and animals that punch them in the face.

Add all the lightning storms, the Box Jellyfish (not to be confused with the Gelatinous Cube... because Box Jellyfish basically kill you if you touch them), and giant crocodiles, and you get a pretty dangerous place even without actual monsters or dungeons in it.

So yeah, what would DnD Australia look like?

[Dusk Eclipse]

I think that Xen'drix's (sp?) can be considered as D&D's (well eberron) Autralia

[Vitruviansquid]

1. Take the names of some iconic Australian animals.

2. Add were- to the beginning of some of them and -men to the end of some of them:

Weredingo
Wereplatypus
Wallabymen
Koalamen

3. Take some of those animals, even the same ones, and add Dire in front of them.

Dire Dingo
Dire Kangaroo
Dire Koala
Dire Box Jellyfish

Almost there...

4. Take some other Australian animals and pair them up.

Dingaroo
Box Koala
Platydingo

[horseboy]

LoL Dingaroo! Now that's an awesome sounding animal.
Oh, and just to mess with people make them primates with small hammers that smack their El Camino.

Yeah, there's a reason that Torg used Australia for the Survival Horror genre.

[The Tygre]

Yeah, not to spoil the fun, but there were such things as Dire Kangaroos. They ate meat. I should probably emphasize that. They were Carnivorous, so they occasionally ripped out some smaller animals throats with their teeth. Food for thought.

That said, you might want to start looking into Aboriginal myth and culture before you do anything else. I would think the natives have a lot to say about Australia.

EDIT: And get familiarized with Australia's prehistory. Australia has a lot of mega-fauna's heavy hitters, like the Kronosaurus and the Megalania. Plenty of other dire animals and dinosaurs right there. And ask Bhu about cryptids from Australia, too. And no, I don't just mean the Yowie and the Drop-Bear; everyone knows about them, they're easy. To me, a fantastic real-world setting needs to be educational as much as it is entertaining.

[sambo.]

DnD Australia? very, very stupidly high DC poisons from a crapwadload of snakes, scorpions and spiders. (Brown Snake DC: 35+. 3d6 con damage primary then secondary save vs death? frequency: common. RedBack Spider DC: 25, 3d6 dex damage primary, 6d6 dex damage secondary. frequency: common? Funnelweb Spider, DC: 30+, 2d6 Strength +2d6 Con damage primary, vs Death secondary save, frequency: common?)

beware an aquatic campaign, you'll be battling seasnakes, all manner of sharks and not forgetting, crocs!

Oh, and just to mess with people make them primates with small hammers that smack their El Camino.

you mean smack their MONARO! (or SandMan panny).....

[Yukitsu]

Remember, no matter how dumb, dangerous, and ridiculously poisonous the wildlife is, the locals only really hate those damn toads.

[mikeejimbo]

Ah yes, cane toads. Possibly the least dangerous of any Australian animal.

[toysailor]

We need drop bears.

[SurlySeraph]

/tg/, 4chan's Traditional Games board, recently had a good discussion about this very topic. Here. Do note that it's 4chan, so worksafeness is not guaranteed.

[sambo.]

Ah yes, cane toads. Possibly the least dangerous of any Australian animal.

Cane Toads are NOT Australian.

they are, however, second only to those verminous, pestilential Rabbits in their ability to stuff up their new-found home.

the filthy things are Brazilian and represent the CSIRO's greatest ever stuff-up (inventing WiFi was their greatest ever success).

Remember, no matter how dumb, dangerous, and ridiculously poisonous the wildlife is, the locals only really hate those damn toads.

DEATH TO ALL TOADS! (and feral cats, rabbits, foxes, goats, pigs and camels!)

i find an eight-wood driver to be a most excellent Toad-Golf stick.

We need drop bears.

Vampiric, Dire Drop Bears FTW!

easily avoided by smearing Vegemite on ones face!

[Serpentine]

What would a DnD adventure into an Australia themed setting look like? After all, it seems that Australia is already full of incredibly poisonous and vicious animals, hostile environments, and rather infertile soil unsuited for major farming... what would a magical version of Australia look like?

Also, kangaroos are already known for jumping around and punching people in the face. Platypuses look like mix and match creatures with highly toxic barbs on their feet. Dingos are basically wolves whos ancient ancestors since the dawn of time have never really had a chance to be domesticated... and still have to survive in a world filled with toxic plants and animals that punch them in the face.

Add all the lightning storms, the Box Jellyfish (not to be confused with the Gelatinous Cube... because Box Jellyfish basically kill you if you touch them), and giant crocodiles, and you get a pretty dangerous place even without actual monsters or dungeons in it.

So yeah, what would DnD Australia look like?

1. Agriculture is Australia's primary industry. While, yes, the soil is unusually fertile (we're actually missing a nutrient or two that is needed by plants in such miniscule quantities that it was thought that it wasn't possible for soils to be deficient in them), we work around that, and there are many places that are extremely productive. Hell, my original hometown is on a wheatbelt right between two deserts (search for "Kaniva", and look for "Big Desert" and "Little Desert") and Australia's wines are world-class.
2. Dingoes came from Africa/Asiaish. From what I recall, whatever they're descended from, it's not wolves. Furthermore, they were more or less domesticated. That's how they got here in the first place: they came with the aboriginals.
Nitpicking aside... Lets see, some thoughts.
Don't forget that not all of Australia is desert (although that would certainly be a feature). There's also big plains, hostile craggy mountains (though not as large as other places), great mangrove swamps, unexplored rainforests (or jungles, if you will), and other impressive locales. The south coast of Victoria, for example, is very dramatic. Lots of sheer cliffs shielding tiny hidden beaches, lashed by wind and rain coming direct from Antarctica, abutting an ocean dotted with shipwrecking outcrops of rock.
Another important feature is our flammability (incidentally, recently South Australia had a catastrophic fire warning - the highest alert there's ever been). My former DM was working on an Aussiesque area where one part was... What was it? Something like eucalypt-like trees that released flammable gasses, that was populated by shocker lizards. I can't remember how, but the two species lived in a mutualistic relationship. I think the trees needed fire to reproduce, the shocker lizards started the fires, and... got something back. Dammit, wish I could remember Anyway, yeah, fire is a very big point. The aboriginals used fire to catch food (possibly sent some species extinct that way), and in doing so they changed the landscape of Australia, increasing the amount of coverage by eucalypts and other trees adapted to fire. Several species even need fire in order to breed - the fire cracks the heavy drought-resistant seed pods open.
Not all the cool stuff about Australia is dangerous. We have, for example, water-storing frogs, non-stinging blue bees, magnetic termites, more marsupials and parrots than any continent on Earth, small mammals that sex themselves to death, feral* Tasmanian devils, adorable little bilbies, trees that shed bark and branches on a regular basis...
Don't think it'd be too hard to turn platypuses into something horrifying. Maybe mundane platies are puggles - the babies?
By the way, I find stonefish much scarier than box jellyfish. Don't forget blue-ringed octopuses, too.
I think, as I alluded to above, the sheer number and variety of parrots we have here is worth noting, too. Gallahs (bright pink and grey cheeky buggers) are everywhere, and black cockatoos are meant to herald rain. Then there's rosellas, budgies, lorrikeets, sulfur-crested and other white cockatoos...

another edit: Most of our dirt is red, and most of our beaches are white and squeaky.

*in the colloquial sense.

Weredingo

Already exists. Forgotten what they're called now (Dog man? Doesn't sound right...), but they were pretty hardcore. He slept under the sand until a certain bird called. Then he would arise, and devour anyone he found until someone injured him enough to send him howling back to the sand, to wait for the bird again.
Wereplatypus: Adowabew.
Wallabymen: Well, there's already "old man kangaroo", and according to aboriginal myth all animals were originally men, or vice-versa, or the boundaries were blurred.
Koalamen: Awwwww.

3. Take some of those animals, even the same ones, and add Dire in front of them.

Dire Dingo: Sure, I guess. Though I think you'd basically have a wolf or jackal.
Dire Kangaroo: As mentioned, already existed. Carnivorous giant kangaroo 7+ feet tall.
Dire Koala: Also existed, although they were only a bit bigger than modern koalas.
Dire Box Jellyfish: ...really?

Plenty of other stuff. For example:

Real
A goanna the size of... I dunno, a small dinosaur, or the biggest salt-water crocodile you've ever seen. When lying on the ground, its back would come up to your knees or so.
Giant wombat. A wombat (/koala) the size of a bear. Think it's already statted out somewhere.
Moas. Giant New Zealand bird far bigger and stockier than an ostrich. I think Australia had something similar.
Giant eagle. Also New Zealand, big enough that it fed on moas.
Giant platypuses, giant echidnas. Like the giant koala, just bigger versions of modern ones. Although ancient platypuses still had teeth.
Sharks, obviously. And crocodiles.
Bullants. Up to an inch long (normally about (equal to or greater than) 2cm), tough, brave, don't back down. Will stare you down like an alleyway thug.

Not Real (or is it?!)
Bunyip. Either a terrible water monster, or a type of inland seal, depending on the story.
Yowie. Australia's Bigfoot.
Wowie. Giant lizard - based on the giant goanna, perhaps?
A horrible stinking birdman type creature with huge black wings and a face set between the shoulders. Ate children who wandered away from camp.
Mindie Snake. Giant desert snake that hunted down sinners. Acidic venom.
Rainbow serpent. Creator-being with powers of transformation and over weather and landscape. If I were to give it an alignment, I'd probably go with Chaotic Neutral or True Neutral, but it's arguable. No venom.
Various spirits and semi-deities.
Tillydik(sp?). Giant frog that drank all the rivers.
There's many more than this, but can't remember right now.

Tribes of people who can transform into individual or tribal totems would fit well. Looking into the magic and belief systems could be interesting, too. Even just blurring the difference between animals and humans would add a lot to an "Australian" atmosphere.

I approve of this idea

edit: The trope "Land Down Under" reminds me: Mining is a big deal here, though not as prominently as other industries, perhaps. A type of dwarf would be interesting. The town Coober Pedy is known for having underground ex-opal mine (sometimes not ex) homes. Opals, gold, coal and uranium are the mined goods that come readily to mind.

edit mk 2: Also, dunno whether it'd be usable, but anytime you hear an "exotic birdcall" in a movie, it's normally a kookaburra. It was used, for example, in The Wizard of Oz, King Soloman's Mines, a Tarzan movie, and, I think, Romancing the Stone.

[sambo.]

imho: the Rainbow Serpent would be a Deity. a very, very powerful deity at that.

[Yukitsu]

Isn't there a god of Couatls statted out around somewhere? Seems they might fit in this case.

[Katana_Geldar]

Don't forget coneshells and spur-winged lapwings, I feel as if I should take a sword with me to bat them away on my way to work.

There could be also some interesting carnivorse combined with sugar gliders. Serpentine, remember the song?

[SparkMandriller]

Anyway, yeah, fire is a very big point.

Hey everyone, read this.

[Bayar]

I think that Xen'drix's (sp?) can be considered as D&D's (well eberron) Autralia

Xen'drik is a jungle, and is inhabited by cannibalistic drow.

If you want Eberron Australia, use Argonessan. Dragons that talk with an awesome accent FTW !

[The Tygre]

Ah, Serpentine. What would we do without you?

[Serpentine]

I think we have a "black" every day of the week. Gonna investigate this claim...
Tygre: Your own research?

Black Monday: Only sandstorms, doesn't count.
No Australian Black Tuesdays.
No Australian Black Wednesdays (wow, this is a dud so far)
Here we go, Black Thursday. Killed 12 people and a whooooole lotta livestock.
Black Friday. 71 people killed.
Black Saturday's already been covered.
Black Sunday has two bushfires and one lot of waves causing drowings.

So 4/7 Australian days are black because of bushfires, and one because we're dry as... something appropriately rude.

[Myrmex]

Australian animals aren't that aggressive, at least towards humans. If you want stupidly dangerous megafuana, Africa is the place to be.

I guess the introduced animals can be dangerous, but all the endemic stuff is mildly retarded.

[Roc Ness]

This made me laugh. I did not know how scary and/or useless people thought my country was.

[Serpentine]

They can be. Snakes in particular, and crocodiles will eat you if you give them a chance. Most others are humans' faults: kangaroos, emus and dingoes that are given food sometimes eventually get mental. I got cornered on a table by kangaroos once, and a friend of the family's got attacked when he was little. Also magpies (and sometimes other birds) can draw blood - there was a series of violent swoopings in Bellingen recently.

[Katana_Geldar]

There's also Black Christmas

[Saintheart]

Ah yes, cane toads. Possibly the least dangerous of any Australian animal.

And that's taking into account the frigging toads are VENOMOUS. That's why they've taken over half the tropical areas of Australia, because anything that eats them DIES FROM THE VENOM IN THEIR POISON SACS.

Staying on the topic of introduced species, though, there are semi-legendary accounts of giant pigs. There's even a seventies B-grade horror movie called Razorback which talks about it. Yep, that's right, we've got Dire Boars roaming around out there in the Outback, too. Hell, I've seen comparisons of domestic housecats compared with the feral cats that get loose in the wild -- the damn things are twice the size of their domestic counterparts. Dire Cats, anybody?

And lastly, there's a current rumour in the southern states of Australia that some moron let a couple of panthers out into the wild and that they're breeding out there, too.

[Serpentine]

Another reminder! Stinging fricking trees. Big, green, soft-looking leaves, just begging to be used as part of a make-shift bush dunny. Killed a horse before. One of my lecturers said he fell down a hill covered in them. I think he had to go to hospital. Unlike some organisms we've been talking about that most of us will never see close enough to be at risk - when's the last time any of you saw a serious "beware: crocodiles" sign near you? - stinging trees are not at all rare. Travelling from Armidale to Coffs Harbour, you'll see them right by the side of the road for half the trip.

Also a tree I know as "itchy-bombs". They have hard nuts containing a seed surrounded by a cushion of tiny little hairs. When these hairs touch skin, they sting like blazes and are practically invisible. My mother once had to treat a boy who had rolled in a leaf pile at the swimming pool* and gotten covered in them from head to toe. She ended up covering him in plaster and hoping the hairs would stick to it.

Finally, my father got stung by a catfish he caught in Queensland. It hurt like hell, so he called the hospital who said to get in right away. He decided that it wasn't so bad and was probably getting better... then half an hour later crawled into the emergency room in agony.


*What an itchy-bomb tree was (is) doing at a swimming pool, I don't know.

edit: Fun fact about cane toads: They're driving the evolution of snakes. Several species of snake close to the introduction point of the toads are developing smaller mouths and larger bodies (less poison taken in, more mass to deal with it) than their counterparts further away. Also other predators, such as various birds, have learned to flip them over and eat them from the bellies to avoid the poison glands on their backs. Also dogs lick them to get high.

[Yukitsu]

And that's taking into account the frigging toads are VENOMOUS. That's why they've taken over half the tropical areas of Australia, because anything that eats them DIES FROM THE VENOM IN THEIR POISON SACS.

Staying on the topic of introduced species, though, there are semi-legendary accounts of giant pigs. There's even a seventies B-grade horror movie called Razorback which talks about it. Yep, that's right, we've got Dire Boars roaming around out there in the Outback, too. Hell, I've seen comparisons of domestic housecats compared with the feral cats that get loose in the wild -- the damn things are twice the size of their domestic counterparts. Dire Cats, anybody?

And lastly, there's a current rumour in the southern states of Australia that some moron let a couple of panthers out into the wild and that they're breeding out there, too.

The more I don't live in this country, the more I love listening about it. If I lived there, I probably wouldn't even step outside without a flamethrower.

Edit: As an aside to the above, people lick them to get high too.

[sambo.]

No Australian Black Wednesdays (wow, this is a dud so far)

Ash Wednesday, February 16, 1983

And that's taking into account the frigging toads are VENOMOUS. That's why they've taken over half the tropical areas of Australia, because anything that eats them DIES FROM THE VENOM IN THEIR POISON SACS.

i have lost several dogs this way.

Staying on the topic of introduced species, though, there are semi-legendary accounts of giant pigs. There's even a seventies B-grade horror movie called Razorback which talks about it. Yep, that's right, we've got Dire Boars roaming around out there in the Outback, too. Hell, I've seen comparisons of domestic housecats compared with the feral cats that get loose in the wild -- the damn things are twice the size of their domestic counterparts. Dire Cats, anybody?

a couple of my mates and their dogs brought down a 257kg, dressed weight boar a couple of years ago.

i have personally shot a cat roughly the size of a staffy/rotty that was stalking a brown snake.

If I lived there, I probably wouldn't even step outside without a flamethrower.

during bushfire season?

you would probably get shot, on sight. and i seriously doubt the judiciary would offer your family much justice.

hell, you would probably get shot by the cops if they spotted you.

Edit: As an aside to the above, people WITH NO SELF RESPECT lick them to get high too.

fixed that one for you.

[horseboy]

Staying on the topic of introduced species, though, there are semi-legendary accounts of giant pigs. There's even a seventies B-grade horror movie called Razorback which talks about it. Yep, that's right, we've got Dire Boars roaming around out there in the Outback, too.

You know, I've seen that one. It wasn't that bad for an "UP All Night" movie. Oh, and "Night of the Lepus." Behold the Dire Bunny!

[Serpentine]

Ash Wednesday, February 16, 1983

DAMMIT! I knew there was more! Bah, I'll just link this.

during bushfire season?

you would probably get shot, on sight. and i seriously doubt the judiciary would offer your family much justice.

hell, you would probably get shot by the cops if they spotted you.

Didn't think of that. Very excellent point.
If you deliberately start a fire during fire season - especially after the last one - you'd better hope the police find you first.

[SilverSheriff]

let us not forget those Huge Wild-Cats that stalk about in Western New South Wales, I think they were Panthers but I can't be sure, anyway; they've been out killing Live-stock for ages and the Government just keeps shutting it down as a Myth even with Video evidence.

I saw it on 60 Minutes about a year ago...

Edit: Dammit... Drop-Bear'd...