D&D General D&D monsters and the myths they come from...

[ValamirCleaver]

My favorite is "Bag of cheap plastic monster toys, let's make stats for them."

Owlbears, Rust Monsters and Bulettes, Oh My!

 

[ValamirCleaver]

Thaaat one's a bit of a stretch. It basically amounts to "they're both giant stag beetles."

???

 

[Voadam]

While we never came out with a full bestiary on Japanese monsters,

I was disappointed by this. I like the setting and would have enjoyed a full on bestiary.

 

[gamerprinter]

I was disappointed by this. I like the setting and would have enjoyed a full on bestiary.

We had it as a Kickstarter goal for a Bestiary when we ran the Gamemaster's Guide/Player Guide for Kaidan KS, but we never funded a third book.

 

[Voadam]

Thaaat one's a bit of a stretch. It basically amounts to "they're both giant stag beetles."

That one has been fairly well documented. The umber hulk is like the rust monster, Gygax documented he saw them in a toy shop bag of knock off ultraman monsters, bought them, and made game stats for them.

 

[DMZ2112]

???
View attachment 272907

It's all good, man, I just don't see it. They're all clearly inspired by stag beetles, but while the upper right image is clearly an update of the lower left image, by any metric, the only reason I see similarities between the two of them and the lower right image are because I've been playing D&D for 35 years.

Antlar doesn't look anything like the other three.

That one has been fairly well documented. The umber hulk is like the rust monster, Gygax documented he saw them in a toy shop bag of knock off ultraman monsters, bought them, and made game stats for them.

Ah, it was from the famous bag of plastic knockoff toys? Okay, I can see that game of whisper down the lane working out.

My apologies, Valamir.

 

[ValamirCleaver]

My apologies, Valamir.

There was even a thread on this very forum 2½ years ago specifically in reference to the umber hulk.

The Plastic Ancestry of the Umber Hulk​

 

[DMZ2112]

There was even a thread on this very forum 2½ years ago specifically in reference to the umber hulk.

The Plastic Ancestry of the Umber Hulk​

Um.

That article is all about how uncertain everyone is about it. Did it get revised at some point?

I'm with DiTerlizzi (as I usually am) -- that pachisaur looks even less like the umber hulk than Antlar does.

You have unconvinced me!

 

[Shiroiken]

I was disappointed by this. I like the setting and would have enjoyed a full on bestiary.

While it had some issues, the monster manual for Rokguan back in 3E was pretty good.