[Homebrew] Less may be more

[Hjorimir]

Taking a stab at homebrewing a setting? Less may be more. Consider limiting the types of monsters that you feature and try to give them more depth. Consider Tolkien’s Nazgul (wraiths) or Martin’s White Walkers (wights). Simple monsters with layered context.

In my own campaign setting, I don't have liches...I have the Voringians. Once the kings and queens that made up the Kaathic Primacy during a bygone age, they sacrificed their own people for the promise of immortality. But they were deceived and didn't know that the immortality would also cost them their humanity. Thus, the legend was born.

What kind of elements have you layered upon an otherwise typical monster type to give them depth? Please share!

 

[rgoodbb]

I had a thought of running a campaign where the party were all highly trained Martials. However, each time a PC dropped to 0 HP they wouldn’t become unconscious, they would die, only to be reincarnated soon after as a different race and class but with the same personality as before.

This sort of immortality would of course have cost them something in an earlier time. Are they slowly turning undead? Are they cursed? Etc. What did they give up?

Monsters/enemies could then become arch enemies/recurring villains for a lot longer, especially if one or two of them shared the same reincarnation feature. I was thinking that that could slowly add a lot of depth, back history, and layers to both sides. (With a generous sprinkling of side quests of course)

My only issue is that it may move slightly away from the generic game of D&D in my mind. That of course is only an issue if players think it is.

Just musings of a start of an idea.

 

[SkidAce]

I had a thought of running a campaign where the party were all highly trained Martials. However, each time a PC dropped to 0 HP they wouldn’t become unconscious, they would die, only to be reincarnated soon after as a different race and class but with the same personality as before.

This sort of immortality would of course have cost them something in an earlier time. Are they slowly turning undead? Are they cursed? Etc. What did they give up?

Monsters/enemies could then become arch enemies/recurring villains for a lot longer, especially if one or two of them shared the same reincarnation feature. I was thinking that that could slowly add a lot of depth, back history, and layers to both sides. (With a generous sprinkling of side quests of course)

My only issue is that it may move slightly away from the generic game of D&D in my mind. That of course is only an issue if players think it is.

Just musings of a start of an idea.

Take a look at the flavor for the video game Kohan.

FANTASTIC game in its time, and has some of the same concepts you mention as its lore and backstory.

Mine it for flavor. I have.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohan:_Immortal_Sovereigns

 

[dave2008]

I have thought about creating a post-apocalypse fantasy setting were magic is mostly absent (after some great disaster so people know there was magic, but it is mostly gone). The PCs would be initially limited to martial classes. There are certain pockets were magic still exists, but they are few and far between.

 

[Imaculata]

I have adapted a very cool monster for my pirate campaign, but I'm afraid that maybe some of my players read these boards, so I must keep it to myself or it won't be a surprise (and horrible shock) to them. Lets just say that I try to use aquatic creatures whenever possible, or change existing monsters into an aquatic variant.

 

[Oofta]

I have a few cultural differences for monsters based on where the campaign is set. For example in one semi-arid region the monstrous humanoids are dominated by hobgoblins that ride axe beaks (and other critters at higher levels), have slave camps to operate their mines, etc. The only other monstrous humanoids in the region are gnolls who wander in feral packs and were created by the nightmares/dreams of a comatose god. There's nary an orc in sight. They're still reasonably close to standard versions though, with enough flavor to make them unique to my campaign.

On the other hand, werewolves are all followers of Fenris (aka Fenrir) of norse mythology. Fenris is a giant wolf and child of Loki destined to one day break free during Ragnarok. So the werewolves want to free Fenris; there are also a fair number of "special" werewolves with levels of barbarian or cleric. Others are blessed with great power and transform into ogre or giant versions. It's a great blessing to receive lycanthropy and people that survive are considered blessed and "encouraged" to join the cult. Those that don't are all hunted down and killed by the followers of Fenris.

I'm sure there are other examples. But depending on region, the number of unique monster types are actually fairly limited and have their own place in the local culture.

 

[Draegn]

When I made my monster list I used these three lists

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legendary_creatures_by_type

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mythic_humanoids

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hybrid_creatures_in_folklore

I took out the player races such as troll, faerie, hobgoblin, and then started with the European listings and expanded as needed.