Unconverted D&D creatures

Echohawk · Jul 2, 2008

Big Mac said:
Is there any chance we can get a breakdown on the number of Jakandor creatures at some point soon?

Like so?

Big Mac · Jul 2, 2008

Echohawk said:
Like so?

Thanks Echohawk. You are a one person taskforce!

Echohawk · Jul 2, 2008

Big Mac said:
Thanks Echohawk. You are a one person taskforce!

Tracking the unconverted critters is the least I can do, since I don't contribute much (well, at all really) to the actual conversion process.

Which is mostly because my monster design abilities are really very poor :blush:

. So much so in fact that my players almost insist that I stick to published critters for the games I run. Fortunately, my adventure design skills are fine, and I have this handy index available to find suitable creatures, so it all works out well in the end

.

Big Mac · Jul 2, 2008

Echohawk said:
Tracking the unconverted critters is the least I can do, since I don't contribute much (well, at all really) to the actual conversion process.

Which is mostly because my monster design abilities are really very poor . So much so in fact that my players almost insist that I stick to published critters for the games I run.

I'm not brilliant at monster design either as some of the things (like picking a CR) are more art than science. Once monsters have been created, I think that I'm fairly good at working out the "...As Characters" bits or extrapolating a new subrace, but it all takes extra time.

But I would rather convert (or learn to convert) old monsters than create new ones. I'm a fan of the old TSR campaign settings and am hoping to see all the various fan communities finish their 3rd edition conversions. There is more to these settings than monsters, but I think that the hard work at the Creature Catalogue could give a very welcome boost to all of these fan communities.

For example Creature Catalogue work could really help Beyond the Moons get the meat of the Monsters of Wildspace PDF sorted out. I figure if I hang around here, I can help get some of that sorted.

Echohawk said:
Fortunately, my adventure design skills are fine, and I have this handy index available to find suitable creatures, so it all works out well in the end .

I'm fairly good at designing places and hopefully hanging around here will be a masterclass in monster design. Indexes (like) are great tools. Especially for people, like me, who can't remember where everthing is. :blush:

I'm making an index of SJ canon at the moment (as a wiki), but if I wasn't, I'd probably suggest making a Creature Catalogue wiki with every monster fully hyperlinked to the appropriate parts of the SRD. I'm pretty good at wikilinking, so could help out with something like that if I had more free time.

Shade · Jul 2, 2008

Echohawk,

While looking up the raghnilder in Dragon #158, I came across another troll variant that didn't come up in the unconverted giants list: the skovtrolde. You do have it in your Monster Index, though.

Echohawk · Jul 2, 2008

Shade said:
While looking up the raghnilder in Dragon #158, I came across another troll variant that didn't come up in the unconverted giants list: the skovtrolde. You do have it in your Monster Index, though.

Yeah, that one is one of the border cases that I have indexed as a "variation", rather than a full creature. In most cases, I haven't included those on the unconverted creature lists, because they really are very minor variations from the original. The skovtrolde has quite a lot of stats changes though, so I'll add that one back in.

Big Mac · Aug 2, 2008

Echohawk said:
Dark Sun: 8

I don't really want to hold up any Spelljammer conversions, but as there are only 8 of these, do you think it is worth having a Converting Dark Sun monsters thread? Or is Athas.org still activly converting these 8 monsters as part of their 3rd edition project?

Echohawk · Aug 2, 2008

Especially since three of the eight (renegade halfling, wild kank and wild mul) probably don't warrant a separate conversion. I'd be happy to drop those from the unconverted list if there is agreement that they don't really need to be there.

Big Mac · Aug 2, 2008

Echohawk said:
Especially since three of the eight (renegade halfling, wild kank and wild mul) probably don't warrant a separate conversion. I'd be happy to drop those from the unconverted list if there is agreement that they don't really need to be there.

I'm not sure on the first two (I'd have to look them up) but I looked at the Wild Mul the other day and think that it should be done as a Prestige Class or a Racial Paragon Class. From the names, I suspect the first two would also work out as PrCs or Racial Paragon Classes.