More flumphs than you can shake a flindbar at: Let's Read the Tome of Horrors!

[Thurbane]

I have a soft spot for the Lurker Above...it’s one of Uncle Gary’s classic “gotcha” monsters. I remember in a 1E or 2E adventure we ran (maybe from Dungeon magazine?) where you enter a room with a Lurker Above on the ceiling, and a Trapper on the floor (basically, a Mimic that impersonates floors). Oh, fun times!

[Volthawk]

I have a soft spot for the Lurker Above...it’s one of Uncle Gary’s classic “gotcha” monsters. I remember in a 1E or 2E adventure we ran (maybe from Dungeon magazine?) where you enter a room with a Lurker Above on the ceiling, and a Trapper on the floor (basically, a Mimic that impersonates floors). Oh, fun times!

Isn't that the kind of thing where the furniture was some kind of monster too? And everything else in there?

[Rappy]

The trapper is in the Tome of Horrors too, Thurbane, so your love for 'gotcha' monsters won't be unanswered for good.

[The Tygre]

Isn't that the kind of thing where the furniture was some kind of monster too? And everything else in there?

Yes. Because THERE AIN'T NO SCHOOL LIKE THE OLD SCHOOL.

[Rockphed]

I have a soft spot for the Lurker Above...it’s one of Uncle Gary’s classic “gotcha” monsters. I remember in a 1E or 2E adventure we ran (maybe from Dungeon magazine?) where you enter a room with a Lurker Above on the ceiling, and a Trapper on the floor (basically, a Mimic that impersonates floors). Oh, fun times!

Obviously one of those is the male and the other the female form of the same monster.

[Eldan]

That's why you never see two of the same kind together.

Now, they can only mate in case of a cave-in. That's why it's so rarely seen.

[Steveotep]

The preface to the 3.0 version contains a statement that I bet did not appear in the 3.5 version (the bold is theirs).

"And here is the important part:

You won't find any of the monsters in Tome of Horrors in any other official Wizards of the Coast product!

We worked directly with Wizards of the Coast to make sure that no monster in this book (well, only a handful) would be included in a later WotC product. So you can rest assured that the contents of this book will not be superceded by any later 'official' book."

[The Glyphstone]

I have a soft spot for the Lurker Above...it’s one of Uncle Gary’s classic “gotcha” monsters. I remember in a 1E or 2E adventure we ran (maybe from Dungeon magazine?) where you enter a room with a Lurker Above on the ceiling, and a Trapper on the floor (basically, a Mimic that impersonates floors). Oh, fun times!

Don't forget the...Dungeon Ooze? Can't remember its name, but it was almost the same monster except it could attach to and disguise itself as a wall.

[Thurbane]

Don't forget the...Dungeon Ooze? Can't remember its name, but it was almost the same monster except it could attach to and disguise itself as a wall.

[Rappy]

The stunjelly is in the Tome of Horrors as well, amusingly. Anyway, here's some more entries.

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Magnesium Spirit
It's a Designatedly Evil elemental creature from an unknown plane whose entire goal in the Material Realm is to get back home in a nonsensically complicated ritual involving Strength drain, body snatching, negative level drain, and making its host go poof. It's also vulnerable to holy water and can do explodey things of explosive brightness. It's also only CR 5, so...have fun with that level drain, folks.



Mandragora
Wait, what's this? A monster that could plausibly have a death knell affect that has no such thing?! Madness I say, madness! Yeah, this mandragora is a CR 1 Plant that chokes people to death. Not that interesting, to be honest.



Mantari
Toothed, flying manta rays that live in caves and absolutely crave gnome and human flesh above that of all other creatures, making them automatically Evil in spite of only having animal level intellect.

You do know I can't make this stuff up, right? I think this is a big problem with the Tome of Horrors as a whole. When it has its highs, it is really high, but when it has its lows...dang, are they low. And what's even worse is that some of these monsters could be really fun with more of an ecology and backing behind them rather than simply stating "these things are Evil and want to eat you! Go hit them with your sword".

[Eldan]

Well, looking at the 3.5 monster manual I, I often thought that about half these critters
a) never get used,
b) would really need more fluff.

I mean, some of these things in there are just weird. So, why would the Tome of Horrors be any better?

Anyway, can the Mandragora at least heal diseases?

[Rappy]

Oh, I agree. I've made it my personal goal to comb nooks and crannies of d20 bestiaries and give life to those monsters that have been left out.

Also, nope, no healing from the mandragora (unless I missed it). It's literally just a plant equivalent of an orc or hobgoblin: pure melee mook.

[Mulletmanalive]

You mentioned a much preferable version of the Draugr from Frost and Fur. Is there any chance of us [or just me] seeing that piece of OGL goodness because i can't seem to find it available for download...

[Volthawk]

The preface to the 3.0 version contains a statement that I bet did not appear in the 3.5 version (the bold is theirs).

"And here is the important part:

You won't find any of the monsters in Tome of Horrors in any other official Wizards of the Coast product!

We worked directly with Wizards of the Coast to make sure that no monster in this book (well, only a handful) would be included in a later WotC product. So you can rest assured that the contents of this book will not be superceded by any later 'official' book."

Hmm...there's a 3.0 and a 3.5 version?

Looks like I have the 3.0 one.

[BobVosh]

Aww, but why would you ever want to punch something with a face like this?

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....It looks like a giant evil ginger from south park

...My god, Cartman was right!

[Rappy]

You mentioned a much preferable version of the Draugr from Frost and Fur. Is there any chance of us [or just me] seeing that piece of OGL goodness because i can't seem to find it available for download...

Sure thing. It's Open Game Content, so I can share that. Just check your PMs.

Hmm...there's a 3.0 and a 3.5 version?

Looks like I have the 3.0 one.

The 3.5 version was only given a PDF release. Something about the logistics of reprinting that much material or some such, I forget the exact reason.

Anyway, couple entries for this morning. Sorry I've been so brief lately, but other projects are still taking precedence, as is work. Hopefully, while often brief, these entries are still entertaining, or at the very least able to spark curiousity and discussion.

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Marble Snake
A CR 2 Magical Beast whose appearance...and indeed, its purpose...is somewhat baffling. It's a pale snake with insectoid eyes and a lion-like mane of hair that can produce a whistle that entrances people.

...Yeah, your guess is as good as mine.



Medusa, Greater
Okay, now we're finally on an entry that I can give a bit more detail on than just saying "what?" repeatedly. As their name implies, greater medusas are a higher step on the medusan hierarchy, similar to flinds for gnolls, hobgoblins and bugbears for goblins, etc., etc. They have the lower body of a rattlesnake rather than standard medusa legs and have poisonous blood in addition to the standard medusa traits. They really strike me as something made in homage of the Ray Harryhausen medusa design from Clash of the Titans, which is an ace in my book, at least. All in all, while these CR 8 Monstrous Humanoids are not absolutely stunning, they do provide a step up from standard medusas (medusae?) as well as giving you an option if you want to evolve your medusa culture further.

[Volthawk]

The 3.5 version was only given a PDF release. Something about the logistics of reprinting that much material or some such, I forget the exact reason.

Managed to track down a copy. I like.

By the way, you going to do the appendixes too, right? I can't wait for Abominations...

[Octopus Jack]

Marble Snake
A CR 2 Magical Beast whose appearance...and indeed, its purpose...is somewhat baffling. It's a pale snake with insectoid eyes and a lion-like mane of hair that can produce a whistle that entrances people.

...Yeah, your guess is as good as mine.

I want one I really want one, I really really really want one. These are going straight into my campaign setting.

[Rappy]

Managed to track down a copy. I like.

By the way, you going to do the appendixes too, right? I can't wait for Abominations...

But of course! It'd be unfair to not look at the appendices when it has such wonders as the antherions/therianthropes and the abominations.

I want one I really want one, I really really really want one. These are going straight into my campaign setting.

Well, I'm glad someone besides me liked them. In spite of my incredulous comments, I feel that the marble snake could actually be rather interesting with the right fluff added onto it. It reminds me a lot of a local legend we have here about the "snake that charms".

[Thurbane]

The 3.5 version was only given a PDF release. Something about the logistics of reprinting that much material or some such, I forget the exact reason.

Good to know - I've constantly been scouring Amazon and Ebay for a hard copy of the 3.5 version...this explains why I never found one!

[Rappy]

Indeed. Here's the quote, actually:

The book was just too big to reprint without cutting content or substantially raising the price, or both. There was no way we were going to cut down on the number of monsters. If people buy a revised version of a book, I think they rightfully expect all the monsters from the original to be revised. And it just didn’t seem right to charge a higher price for a revision than for the original book. So because we refused to cut the size of the book and because we refused to raise the price of the book, there was no book. And that is where I thought the decision would end. But luckily it didn’t. That’s where DriveThruRPG.com came in…

So the only real chance of seeing a new Tome of Horrors in print would be the whispered-about Pathfinder version, but as far as I know that's either in Development Hell or has disappeared off the map. I'm no expert, though, so don't take my word for it.

Also, belatedly at Steveotep: No, the 3.5 still has that screed, but it's listed as merely the "Introduction to the Classic Edition". It's no longer made as a claim, but it's in the PDF as either legacy material or a middle finger to Wizards of the Coast's apparently broken claim.

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Midnight Peddler
A strange Outsider resembling a haggard old man pushing a rickety old cart that always carries different goods from the Material Plane on each of his visits there, which occur only on nights deeply shrouded in fog. Like a creepier version of the arcanes/mercanes, the midnight peddler's agenda is mysterious beyond his...well...peddling. He can divine any single question from someone that buys an item from him, but there's no real "deal with the devil" or anything; midnight peddlers are listed as Always Neutral, and while he does have a negative level-based drain attack, he only uses it in self defense. As such, the midnight peddler is a mysterious figure that you can mold and shape into whatever arcane and ill-understood agenda you wish.


Mihstu
A CR 6 air elemental that is designated as EEEBUL. Like a vaporous version of the belker, these tentacled spectral air beasts kill by suffocation; in this case, engulfing prey or draining its Constitution. The damp air-loving mihstu is stunned by Cold-based attacks, but exchanges that weakness for a 50% miss chance when it is struck by any projectile, including magic missile (!). Why is is a Neutral Evil creature, I don't know...it's stated that it uses its nasty powered when threatened, so... *Shrugs*


Mite
No, not a giant arachnid-type mite; this mite is a CR 1/4 goblinoid. Mites are...somewhat of a conundrum. They don't really seem to have a solidified niche; they have the Intelligence score and "RUSH IT!!" mentality of archetype orcs, the trap-making and engineering ingenuity of your bog standard kobolds, and the backstabbing and thieving nature of the stereotypical goblin. This is made even stranger by the "pesty", a variant of the mite that exchanges even more of it Intelligence score (down to troll levels) in favor of being able to move with a base speed of 40, rather than 20, feet. With some work, I imagine the mites could be interesting enemies, but as is they seem to be a sort of amalgam of concepts that weren't totally thought out.

[Thurbane]

Midnight Peddler is an awesome plot device. I think there was a similar creature in one of Fritz Lieber's Nehwon stories...except the stuff they peddled was actually junk with an illusion cast over it.

I might see if I can work a Midnight Peddler into the current EtCR game I'm running - the party are trapped in the Village of Borovia, and the local store has a very low GP limit...

[Rappy]

Midnight Peddler is an awesome plot device. I think there was a similar creature in one of Fritz Lieber's Nehwon stories...except the stuff they peddled was actually junk with an illusion cast over it.

I might see if I can work a Midnight Peddler into the current EtCR game I'm running - the party are trapped in the Village of Borovia, and the local store has a very low GP limit...

Since Midnight Peddlers can take class levels, you can mold them to your whims. Indeed, I imagine you could have the junk peddler type with a few levels of Illusionist Wizard.

Anyway, now that I no longer feel like someone is punching me in the face due to my sinus headache, I've got one short entry.

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Mongrelman
Yes, we've finally reached the entry I've been waiting for. The mongrelmen! These CR 1 Monstrous Humanoids take the concept of "it can breed with anything" to its logical extreme; a mongrelman is literally the patchwork results of way too many interspecies love-ins. They are skilled mimics and pickpockets, living on the fringes of society because...well...most of the "civilized" races hate their guts. Assumedly because they're ugly, but I personally think the whole pickpocketing thing doesn't help.

The only drawback to the mongrelmen is that some might find creating them a bit overwhelming. You have to roll 1d20 on a chart of creatures (and one whammy roll result of losing a body part) to create your menagerie....17 times. You have to roll for the right and left sides of the head separately, as well as for the jaws, the right upper arm, the right lower arm, the left upper arm, the left lower arm, the right hand, the left hand, the upper torso, the lower torso, the upper right leg, lower right leg, upper left leg, lower left leg, right foot, and left foot.

Now, just because I felt like doing it for the hell of it, I actually rolled on this chart specifically for this thread to show you the general gist of it. So, without further adieu, here is our aberrant monstrosity!

Our poor, tortured soul has a distorted face that has ogre features on the right side, goblin ones on the obviously mismatchedly-sized left side, both of these sitting atop the muzzle of a minotaur. His chest is the heavily-armored carapace of a crabman, leading down to the thickly-scaled abdomen of a lizardfolk, tail included. His left arm twistedly bulges from the carapace, a gnoll's furry arm above the elbow and a gnome's slender one below, ending in the heavy pawed hand of a flind. The right arm manages to pull an even stranger act, starting out as a wiry elf arm before grossly bulging out into the ham-handed arm of an ogre below the elbow and finally ending in the dainty fingers of a halfling. As if this wasn't enough to make our poor mongrelman cry, we still have his legs! The upper half of his right leg is a fat orc thigh that leads down to a stout dwarven lower leg that teeters on the little foot of a halfling; his other leg goes from bugbear above the knee to the digitigrade stance of a gnoll below it, and ends in the uselessly flopped over fin of a merfolk's tail.

...Yeah, I think we can safely say that this dice roll has created a sad, sad little individual.

[2xMachina]

... halfway to FATAL...

[Reynard]

Our poor, tortured soul has a distorted face that has ogre features on the right side, goblin ones on the obviously mismatchedly-sized left side, both of these sitting atop the muzzle of a minotaur. His chest is the heavily-armored carapace of a crabman, leading down to the thickly-scaled abdomen of a lizardfolk, tail included. His left arm twistedly bulges from the carapace, a gnoll's furry arm above the elbow and a gnome's slender one below, ending in the heavy pawed hand of a flind. The right arm manages to pull an even stranger act, starting out as a wiry elf arm before grossly bulging out into the ham-handed arm of an ogre below the elbow and finally ending in the dainty fingers of a halfling. As if this wasn't enough to make our poor mongrelman cry, we still have his legs! The upper half of his right leg is a fat orc thigh that leads down to a stout dwarven lower leg that teeters on the little foot of a halfling; his other leg goes from bugbear above the knee to the digitigrade stance of a gnoll below it, and ends in the uselessly flopped over fin of a merfolk's tail.

...Yeah, I think we can safely say that this dice roll has created a sad, sad little individual.

Someone must draw this.

[Eloi]

... halfway to FATAL...

No, what would be halfway to FATAL would be adding 'buttocks' to the list of things we have to roll for, making you have to roll a xd100 in order to roll for features of all of the monsters in every single core rulebook and Monster Manual presented in a complex percentile manner, of which you have to stat out the BPP (Body Part Proportion) making the fluff about Mongrelwomen slaves to the Mongrelmen for arousing (somehow) purposes, and then adding a bell-chart for impacts to your to Facial Charisma and Bodily Attractiveness.

Now thats (only!) half-way FATAL.

[Kris Strife]

Midnight Peddler
A strange Outsider resembling a haggard old man pushing a rickety old cart that always carries different goods from the Material Plane on each of his visits there, which occur only on nights deeply shrouded in fog. Like a creepier version of the arcanes/mercanes, the midnight peddler's agenda is mysterious beyond his...well...peddling. He can divine any single question from someone that buys an item from him, but there's no real "deal with the devil" or anything; midnight peddlers are listed as Always Neutral, and while he does have a negative level-based drain attack, he only uses it in self defense. As such, the midnight peddler is a mysterious figure that you can mold and shape into whatever arcane and ill-understood agenda you wish.

I could see these being like The Collector from Superman: TAS. Small, wimpy creatures under normal circumstances that turn into giant brutes when pressed, possibly triggered by draining X levels in one combat.

[Rappy]

Someone must draw this.

Not quite on the same level, but here's the 2E Monstrous Manual's illustration of a mongrelman:

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Presumably, he got more identical rolls.

[Rappy]

Been feeling up and down lately, but I'll be damned if I won't update some when I'm feeling okay.

Moon Dog
These are...dog-monkey things. That are intelligent. And can use supernatural powers to combat evil. And healing slobber.

...Yeah.



Muckdweller
Like lizardfolk, only smaller and less important. ...Okay, to be a bit more notary, the muckdwellers are CR 1/4 Magical Beasts that resemble miniature lizardfolk or bipedal lizards (depending on which description you feel is more fitting) and typically hang out with their bigger relatives. They aren't particularly strong and have brightness on the same level as an orc, but they are rather agile and perceptive, and fill the opposite role of creature such as flinds and other "bigger, badder versions of [insert lackey monster here]". A threatened muckdweller can use Water Gun fill its mouth with muddy water and blind its opponents with the resulting stream spat from its mouth.



Mudman

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((Image from Blogger Beware, just in case I needed to make that note.))

Mummy of the Deep
A mummy.

An aquatic mummy.

An aquatic mummy that kisses you before vomiting up seawater into your lungs.

...Okay, can we bring the moon dog back, please?

[Thurbane]

I like the Moon Dog...it was a monster that emerged back in the days when a good creature that would help the party was a genuine rarity. And I like dogs...