Dragon Magazine: Monster Ecologies to be released!

[Alzrius]

While I'm always glad to see a new Paizo publication, and I'm absolutely going to buy this, I'm a bit perturbed at how all of the listed ecologies are from 3.5E issues of Dragon. I know there's more ecologies to come, but the primary allure of these magazine-wide compilations for me is that stuff from older editions gets updated to 3.5E, and so far there aren't any examples of older (and sometimes better) ecologies being in this compilation.

 

[Scribble]

Gotcha.

It'd be far cooler if creatures like these spawned by doing something, you know, EVIL. Like stealing human young and corrupting them, or ritual sacrifice, or anything besides, you know, dating.

Uhhh yeah um hi, is this Relaksha mistress of the damned? It is? Oh hey... This is Morkai Evil Prince of Elemha we met at the mixer the other night... Listen, I was wondering if you wanted to maybe goto the ritual sacrifice with me, like friday night? I have great seats, right next to the blood channel...

 

[Kesh]

They never did an "Ecology of the Gnoll" did they?

 

[Greg K]

At first I thought it was going to be a reprint of the old Ed Greenwood articles, but updated for 3e. Oh well, I'll be passing this up like a did the Dragon Compendium I. Hopefully, a DC 2 will be more to my liking or Paizo publishes compendiums for both Core Beliefs and the Demonicon.

 

[JoshuaFrost]

And $20 for a magazine, well....I think I'd like a $20 purchase to hold up better than a magazine would.

It's a Special Edition of the magazine, but it's not a "magazine". The cover stock will be thicker and the interior pages will be on a heavier paper stock as well.

While I'm always glad to see a new Paizo publication, and I'm absolutely going to buy this, I'm a bit perturbed at how all of the listed ecologies are from 3.5E issues of Dragon.

You can blame me for the listing. I randomly picked the monsters from the "confirmed" list that I thought would sound the most cool to the most people. I didn't even realize I had only picked 3.5 Ecology monsters.

Once we have a complete and confirmed list (soon, I hope!) we'll be sure to post a more thorough list of the included monsters.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Hopefully, a DC 2 will be more to my liking or Paizo publishes compendiums for both Core Beliefs and the Demonicon.

WotC will never greenlight a Core Beliefs or Demonomicon compilation. At this rate, I'd be surprised if they gave the approval for an Age of Worms hard cover of DC2.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Totally kickin'! This is going on my list of buys for GenCon '07!

 

[Prince of Happiness]

They never did an "Ecology of the Gnoll" did they?

Back in the late 80s/early 90s they did. Pretty cool too, since it was told as a story by someone who was taken prisoner by the gnolls, and the actual "ecology" parts were footnotes at the end of the story.

 

[smootrk]

Back in the late 80s/early 90s they did. Pretty cool too, since it was told as a story by someone who was taken prisoner by the gnolls, and the actual "ecology" parts were footnotes at the end of the story.

... And I really enjoyed those articles. I loved the Gnoll one, and I started using Big Scary Minotaurs after the article detailing them. Those articles were 'must read' sections of the magazines, and I really hope that they are going back to the roots and updating those old ones. The new stuff is OK, but to do a compilation I would prefer the old stuff get updated before reprinting the more recent stuff.

 

[Prince of Happiness]

... And I really enjoyed those articles. I loved the Gnoll one, and I started using Big Scary Minotaurs after the article detailing them. Those articles were 'must read' sections of the magazines, and I really hope that they are going back to the roots and updating those old ones. The new stuff is OK, but to do a compilation I would prefer the old stuff get updated before reprinting the more recent stuff.

I think that's a cool format to follow as well, since it addresses the "flavor" issue quite handily, letting the writer hit the main points without the article becoming a point-blank dissertation on troll bowel movements and behir orthodontics.