Converting prehistoric creatures

[Leopold]

Make it flavor text and move on. No sense to let this one small quirk slow us down.

 

[demiurge1138]

So, a creature with a gaze attack such as a medusa that attempts to petrify the beast will fail if the gazing at it head on, because the arsinoithere won't meet its eyes. It will have to cock its head, as ISR indicates, to see the creature, if it wants to. Behaviorally, should it do so, in order to get a clearer view? It takes eye contact with only one eye for a gaze attack to succeed, right?

Yes. But then again, there's no facing in default D&D. A bonus to gaze attack saves because you have a blind spot doesn't take into account if the gazing opponent is approaching from another angle. We've got a much bigger blind spot than Arsiniotherium, after all (the entire 180 degree expanse behind us).

 

[InsanePsychoRabbit]

If we're not going to give it resistance, than we should make a reference in the flavor text. Otherwise, let's wrap it up.

 

[freyar]

Let's just say that it has its blind spot in front, rather than to the rear. Does that work?

 

[Cleon]

Let's just say that it has its blind spot in front, rather than to the rear. Does that work?

I don't see what the big deal about this is, plenty of herbivores have poor foreward vision but it's no great handicap. If a horse or rhinoceros wants a good view ahead of itself, it just turns its head to the side.

 

[InsanePsychoRabbit]

I'm sorry, I made a big deal of it. Let's just put something in the flavor text and call it done.

 

[xidoraven]

Macrauchenia

Hello (and btw - hello again, PsychoRabbit - I hope you're the same human as on Wizards forums)

On the Wizards forum for dinos and prehistoric beasts, it was mentioned that this group was working on doing a write-up for Macrauchenia (I hope I spelled that right, since I don't have my list here with me).

Is this creature already done, or is it still in the to-do's?

I love Arsinoitherium. I bet it got laid a lot. I mean, look at those horns...! I am also a fan of Sivatherium and Andrewsarchus, for the record. Okay, I admit it: I am a primitive creature nerd. Rather than referring to dinos and prehistoric animals as such, I am calling them "Primitives" or Prims (not to be confused with Second Life prims). My next endeavor is to benchmark the qualities of the Serpent Kingdoms Saurials to make a set of forms of dino/prim Guardinals, the 'Dinopriminals'. Any suggestions on that front? This could include stats, races of creatures to base from, etc.
-will

 

[freyar]

Go back few pages in this thread, and you'll find the discussion of Macrauchenia. The completed version is [post=4807039]here[/url]. Andrewsarchus has been done for a while here.

Just a shameless plug: there are many prehistoric critters in the Creature Catalog!

 

[xidoraven]

Thanks! Yes, we have noted the creatures of the CC on the Wizards thread. I believe our index has them all up to the point where it was updated.

Macrauchenia was a big help. You guys (and gals) rock! Keep up the wonderful work!
-will

 

[Shade]

Moving on, then. Here's another rhino-like critter...

Elasmotherium
Elasmotherium was a large, shaggy Pleistocene rhinoceros with a huge horn on its forehead instead of on its nose. Treat this mammal as the one-horned rhinoceros described in the Monster Manual, doing +2 hp damage with its 6” horn.

Originally appeared in Dragon Magazine #137 (1988).

Elasmotherium - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia