Dragon 337: Will the real Zuggtmoy please stand up?

Dragon 337 has a great article this month on Zuggtmoy, the Demoness of Fungi. The cover painting and description, however, gave me pause -- they describe the upper torso of a monstrous woman with a lower torso of a coiling pillar of fibrous tendrils. This is the same visual given in the Temple of Elemental Evil computer game, which I assumed the Troika game designers created for extra "cool factor".

Oddly, however, the Zuggtmoy described in the original ToEE module is a giant puffball fungus with a mushroom-like head and three elephantine feet; she has an alternate form of an old crone. The magazine article describes this mushroom-like form as that of an Aspect of Zuggtmoy and makes no mention of an alternate human-like form.

So which is it? Leaving aside that the two sources aren't necessarily contradictory (since the original module could describe an aspect while Zuggtmoy's true form is described here), is there some source between the 1985 ToEE module and this month's Dragon that introduced the current form of Zuggtmoy, or do we have a computer game to thank for the current demoness revision?

Aside: what's up with advertising the PHB at the back of this month's issues of Dungeon and Dragon? Given that both are now exclusively D&D magazines, surely there aren't that many gamers getting started by picking up a copy of the magazine that it's worthwhile to advertise the PHB therein, compared to the return on advertising the latest supplement.
 

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Alzrius

The EN World kitten
James Jacobs mentioned over in the other thread why he went with the forms he did:

James Jacobs said:
I grew up playing 1st edition, so those old-time references are near and dear to my heart. You can expect to see similar references in future Demonomicon entries... After all, it makes no sense to me to ignore or abandon the work previous game designers have put in on a monster, even if in some cases I think that some of those choices might have been poor. As an example, Zuggtmoy's description from the 1st edition Temple always seemed a bit comical and underwhelming to me; the incarnation of her from the recent video game seemed so much more interesting that I went with that one for her true from. Yet I couldn't just completely ignore the old version, so now that form represents the humiliating form she was bound into in the Temple, and remains the one she uses for her aspect.

Admittedly, he didn't mention the "old crone" form, but it seems explanation enough (IMHO).
 

Gracias. Missed that other thread somehow.

I see the logic, though I'm not sure I particularly agree with retconning using a computer game -- even when it's my favorite D&D computer game to date. That quibble aside, it's a great article!
 

MrFilthyIke

First Post
Olgar Shiverstone said:
Gracias. Missed that other thread somehow.

I see the logic, though I'm not sure I particularly agree with retconning using a computer game -- even when it's my favorite D&D computer game to date. That quibble aside, it's a great article!

Eh, Times they do change...so do fun-gals. ;)

And I love the ToEE comp game myself. :)
 




Jubilee

First Post
Olgar Shiverstone said:
Aside: what's up with advertising the PHB at the back of this month's issues of Dungeon and Dragon? Given that both are now exclusively D&D magazines, surely there aren't that many gamers getting started by picking up a copy of the magazine that it's worthwhile to advertise the PHB therein, compared to the return on advertising the latest supplement.

Might be they believe there are people who flip open to the last pages of Dragon Magazine at the book store to read the comics and they're hoping to get them into gaming?

I think it's a nice add, but they've chosen the wrong audience, I agree. Maybe if it were on the outside back of the magazine it'd have a better chance of getting seen by non-gamers.. But then, the back outside cover is prime magazine ad-realestate - I guess Microsoft has more money to spend on video game adds than WotC has to spend on D&D ads. :)

/ali
 

Jubilee said:
Might be they believe there are people who flip open to the last pages of Dragon Magazine at the book store to read the comics and they're hoping to get them into gaming?

When the magazine comes shrink-wrapped? Or is that just subscriber copies?

<break>

Thought: Wonder what Col Pladoh has to say about Zuggtmoy's form? I'd like to know if the Stay-Pufft Mushroom Girl form was his original idea, or if that was a later Mentzer add-lib -- and which form he now prefers, stalk or puffball. Where's that Q&A thread?
 


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