"They came a' crawlin' out o' the sea, all slimy an' wet. An' there were hunnerds o' 'em. An' they all 'ad the faces of me old fishin' mates. Even me first wife was in that grim group! All o' 'em was covered all up in coral, and they was screechin', they was. Screechin' to their Kraken god."
A common convention in Lovecraftian horror tales concerns what we, as mortals, may be unaware of, such as Old Ones who dwell at the bottom of depths unknown. This paranoia makes the eventual arrival of the piscine monsters more terrifying than it would have ever been absent the introduction of creeping fear in the beginning of the story.
I'm running a D&D game which evokes horror themes, particularly both undead-related and Lovecraftian, often to impress upon the players the grave threat to the campaign world's stability, and, even, existence.
Thus, I have become more interested in aberrations in 5e D&D. What is their place, why are they so often slighted in terms of monsters included (MToF is good for this, however), and why do aberrations not feature as prominently as many other enemies?
Is it that they are too dark, to uninteresting (not my opinion, as I am one who loves aliens and any being from the stars or the depths in fantasy), or, simply, because the idea of slaying demons is more appealing?
It is my opinion, however, that the reason aberrations are not given as much attention as other enemies by adventure authors is because of the inherent difficulty of giving a motivation to a villain so alien that its true aims cannot be comprehended except after much adventuring or long study.
My question to you, on ENWorld, is whether you think that a large adventure (the type which is honored as a season in AL and given a full campaign book) will feature aberrations prominently, as well as the cults associated with them, and, in general, your opinion on the state of aberrations in 5e D&D. What do you think?
A common convention in Lovecraftian horror tales concerns what we, as mortals, may be unaware of, such as Old Ones who dwell at the bottom of depths unknown. This paranoia makes the eventual arrival of the piscine monsters more terrifying than it would have ever been absent the introduction of creeping fear in the beginning of the story.
I'm running a D&D game which evokes horror themes, particularly both undead-related and Lovecraftian, often to impress upon the players the grave threat to the campaign world's stability, and, even, existence.
Thus, I have become more interested in aberrations in 5e D&D. What is their place, why are they so often slighted in terms of monsters included (MToF is good for this, however), and why do aberrations not feature as prominently as many other enemies?
Is it that they are too dark, to uninteresting (not my opinion, as I am one who loves aliens and any being from the stars or the depths in fantasy), or, simply, because the idea of slaying demons is more appealing?
It is my opinion, however, that the reason aberrations are not given as much attention as other enemies by adventure authors is because of the inherent difficulty of giving a motivation to a villain so alien that its true aims cannot be comprehended except after much adventuring or long study.
My question to you, on ENWorld, is whether you think that a large adventure (the type which is honored as a season in AL and given a full campaign book) will feature aberrations prominently, as well as the cults associated with them, and, in general, your opinion on the state of aberrations in 5e D&D. What do you think?
