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D&D MONSTERS, PART III
![[Shrieker]](/img/dndmonster-shrieker.jpg) |
Allow me to quote from the Monster Manual:
"No. of attacks: 0; Damage/Attack: Nil; Treasure type: Nil." What's the
point, then? It shrieks. It makes a whole bunch of noise when anything
approaches. It doesn't make your eardrums bleed, it doesn't shatter
your potion vials, it doesn't render you deaf or impotent. It just
attracts wandering monsters. Wandering monsters lead shallow lives.
Giant yelling fungus is pretty much the high point of their social
scene. You'd figure 90% of the time the shrieker is just reacting
to some other wandering monster, but wandering monsters
feel it's worth it to check out on the off chance that they might
be hacked to death.
D
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![[Rot Grub]](/img/dndmonster-rotgrub.jpg) |
These have about the best picture in the Monster
Manual. It depicts a horrified adventurer with a Village People
mustache gazing at his arm as a small stampede of worms tunnel moistly
therein. Remember "Slimey"? From Sesame Street? Oscar's
pet worm? They look like that. Your options, if you find yourself
engrubbed, are to apply flame to the entry point, to have a cure
disease spell cast upon you, or to die in 1-3 turns. That's
it. Your vorpal cudgels and spheres of annihilation are of no use
to you here, Frodomir! If you don't have flame or cure disease,
you're worm food. Moreso, I mean.
B
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![[Bulette]](/img/dndmonster-bulette.jpg) |
These are big sharky-turtle things that burrow in
the ground. According to the MM, "they love halfling and will hungrily
dig them from their burrows." I knew Fellowship of the Ring
was missing something! "Greetings, Gandalf. I'll bumble about the
place while you make cryptic pronouncements instead of telling me
what the hell's going on and OH GOD IT'S GOT ME THE PAIN IS
INCREDIBLE OH GOD OH GOD HAND ME A MUFFIN WILL YOU?"
B
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![[Mind Flayer]](/img/dndmonster-mindflayer.jpg) |
Among the many variations on brain-eating
found in D&D, the mind flayer is about the coolest. First off, it
doesn't look like a platypus or star-nosed mole. Seriously, those are options.
Secondly, the brain eating is not purely metaphorical. This thing
doesn't just feed on your thoughts or emotions, it pulls your
damned brain out of your head with those face tentacles
and swallows it like neuron sashimi. Frankly I think you could make
more money by videotaping this process and selling it over the Web
than by raiding ogre dens for random coinage.
B+
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![[Roper]](/img/dndmonster-roper.jpg) |
Okay, let's consider the inevitable Three's
Company joke as having been made and get on with it, shall we?
Great. This creature has the ability to capture adventurers with sticky
tentacles, drawing them to its toothy maw and mistaking them for homosexuals
so they can share an apartment with Chrissy and Janet. Whoops! Sorry about
that. At least it's over with. The roper can disguise itself as a
stalagmite or stone mound so as to avoid having sex with its extremely
randy middle-aged wife. Damn! Sorry. Okay, seriously. This creature
was replaced by Don Knotts in season three and oh screw it.
C
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