D&D 3E/3.5 Dinosaurs in 3E.....

[Virginia Wilde]

Does anybody know where I can get good stats on dinosaurs? I'm not talking commonly known animals like Stegosaurus or Deinonychus antirrhopus ("Velociraptor"), either. I'm talking about obscure stuff like the spine-finned sauropod Amargosaurus, or the true Velociraptor mongoliensis (an egg-eater the size of a turkey), or weird stuff like Baryonyx walkeri or the misnamed Oviraptor philoceratops, or Therizinosaurus (a plant-eating relative of Tyrannosaurs about the size of a bear that had three three-foot long claws on its front limbs).

I might just end up doing them myself, but I'm really tied up with my writing work to do much about it right now, so any help would be appreciated.

 

[Evil Josef]

I don't think you'll find stats for those sorts of obscure thunder lizards. However, I've been quite in the mood of monster making and if you'll point me towards the relevant information, I could maybe whip something up for you. How's that?

 

[Virginia Wilde]

try www.dinodata.net
It's a little tough to navigate through, and the picture links sometimes foul up, but it's the best site aside from the dinonomicon, which I've been unable to find again.

 

[Evil Josef]

Cool beans. I'll see what I can't get done.

 

[BOZ]

i think dndchick might be able to help you out, too.

 

[The Great Emu]

I still think dinosaurs are one of the areas where templates could really work well. I mean dinos are classified pretty well and a set of pre-calculated templates could cut down on some of the fiddly bits. This would also allow for off the cuff appearances of bigger/smaller versions of the ones we know of.

 

[Evil Josef]

I don't think templates would be right for dinosaurs, per say, but making sets of dinosaur stats for the dinosaur infraorders, so that generally similiar (stat wise, anywho) animals like, for example, the allosaurus and the tyrannosaurus, could be derived from a single set of stats (perhaps called 'Carnosaurs' or 'Carnosauria') and easily adjusted by means of Hit Die expansion and perhaps a little natural weapon attack damage tweaking.

By the way, Virginia, a few of the dinosaurs you've mentioned have pretty vague statistics where I've checked, especially the Therizinosaurus, of which apparently only some arm and claw bits have been found.

 

[GamingFrontiersRob]

Dinosaurs in 3E

I think templates for dinosaurs work very well. In fact we printed them. Kenny Lewis, who also has credits with Mystic Eye Games, supplied us with 5 dinosaur species (sorry, I'm not sure that's the correct term): anklysaurids, carnosaurids, ceratopsid, dromaeosaurids and stegosaurids. Inside those five listings 23 dinosaurs are described with size related stats. You can find all this in Gaming Frontiers Volume 1. We intend to follow up in later volumes with listings of prehistoric animals. We are also working on a stand alone dinosaur book complete with setting and a ton more dinosaur listings. We will most likely print another set of listings in Gaming Frontiers to promote that proect once it nears completion. We have absolutely no release date planned for this so please don't ask

Robert J. Williams, President
United Playest, Inc.
www.gamingfrontiers.com

 

[GamingFrontiersRob]

My mistake

I apologize. What we printed couldn't be considered templates. It's more along the lines of what Evil Josef was looking for.

Robert J. Williams, President
United Playtest, Inc.

 

[Oracular Vision]

I have generated 31 dinosaur stat blocks, and am finishing the feats and descriptive text now. I have linked each to online dinosaur art, included some online references, and even have a rudimentary footprint chart for each general type, made from actual casts in some cases. I think it will be done this month some time...I will make it available to whoever wants it...