Why we need new monsters

[Rune]

I once scared the crap out of my players (and their PCs) in a 3.0 game with a single zombie (that never even landed a blow), because they just could not kill it!

Every time they knocked it down it would pick itself up, reinsert its arm back into its socket, or whatnot, and shamble toward them again. They finally just stuffed it in a hole and got the hell out of there.

 

[saskganesh]

I think there's too many monsters! I only need a handful a level. Rather than gimmicky stat blocks and new special powers, think of scenario/encounter setup and staging.

As long as the encounters and adventures are dangerous enough, and there is sufficient drama in their delivery, I think most players will be more than satisfied. Novelty is quite ok, but no one needs to meet the "new implausilble monster of the week."

and props to the guy who can make a flumph scary.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

The most I've scared my players in the last decade was with a straight 3E werewolf--that didn't show himself directly but was howling in the distance. The party found remains a few times. Basically, I conspired to make his rep such that the party was afraid to challenge him, even after they paid a small fortune to silver all their weapons. Nothing like babbling NPCs with bad perception scores to oversell a threat.

They stayed scared of that werewolf for five or six sessions, gaining two levels in the process. And they were running from him when he caught them between a rock and a hard place. Rather anticlimatic when the two archers in the group killed him in a quick barrage of silver arrows, but I hadn't actually set out to spook them that badly ...

 

[Dausuul]

and props to the guy who can make a flumph scary.

As you turn the corner, you're hit by a burning, metallic smell. The corridor up ahead of you is very dark, but by the light of your torches you can just make out a pale shape drifting slowly in your direction. The thing looks like some kind of horrible levitating jellyfish, with a fleshy dome and coiling tentacles reaching out to brush the walls. In between the tentacles are a dozen spines dripping with yellowish slime, which smokes and sizzles when it hits the floor. Two pale, glowing eyes on stalks rotate to stare at you.

 

[Aeolius]

Ok raise your hand if you ever used all the monsters in the 1e MM.

Some campaigns exclude the use of the full monster list; aquatic games for example. Granted, I set my current game underwater in part because I enjoy making things up.

and props to the guy who can make a flumph scary.

Flumphs are LG. They aren't supposed to be scary.

I retooled the flumphs as uphlum, relative to the aboleth and mind flayer. The uphlum reanimates and possesses the slain bodies of criminals, forcing them to perform penance for their actions.

 

[Jimlock]

As we've all said, it's not the number that counts. Still if you like the sport of "creating new monsters".

Just google animals and insects...

This is what came up after I googled "insects" images.

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[jasper]

I was once in a group that FLED for a Black Heliumn Filled Balloon. Now I was not there the first time they met the Balloon. But the one who ran away the first, the fastest and the mosts. Lost an magic item and pc the night before....
how can a Black Heliumn Filled Balloon cause a party to flee.
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Wait for it.
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1E Friday night it was Sphere Of Annination (sp) which slow came out of a hole in the wall. To cause the party a misforture.
Saturday night it was just a balloon.

 

[Walking Paradox]

There were hundreds of vampire movies before Coppola's masterpiece came out, still everybody bowed before the 1992 Dracula.

Just a note: this is not the Dracula to which I was referring.

 

[Kaodi]

You see a figure lurch toward you from the shadows under the bridge. As it draws closer, you see it is an emaciated looking woman with pale skin and hair. There is something compelling about her, an air of nobility that clings to her pitiful frame, but the look in her eyes is one of wild insanity. She lurches towards you again, and cries, " Devils! Receive the judgement of the gods! " Her eyes begin to glow with a fierce white light. Insanity, and power.

...Aasimar.

 

[Barastrondo]

Some of the most memorable monsters I've ever seen or used have been those that actually thought about the question "What does it want?" Monsters that are basically just animalistic "it wants to eat the PCs" kind of have a disadvantage here -- they can be used well, particularly with Hobo's advice, but contemplate the effectiveness of a monster that wants something not immediately obvious to players.

This obviously favors sentient monsters more, but there's something to be said for having even animalistic monsters behave in inobvious ways. The classic bit of gryphons wanting to eat your horses, not you, is one aspect. What about the troll that wants a husband? The manticore that plays butcherbird, building a larder of impaled corpses around its lair? The ghoul family that wants to "adopt" a new baby? And of course, when you're dealing with social, intelligent monsters like vampires, there are all kinds of motivations you can play with other than "find pretty victim, drain, repeat."

Yeah, it's definitely a thing that players can get a little over-familiarized with monsters. However, I think that's only one part because they get used to the monster; the other part is getting used to how it behaves. In some ways I think a familiar monster that has a new, fresh context is preferable to a brand new monster: it gives players enough recognition factor to immediately register an emotional reaction other than bewilderment, but still has that exciting tinge of the unexpected.