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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rothe" data-source="post: 3893753" data-attributes="member: 39813">Here is my approach to this.   Evolutionary history is pretty much "normal" until very, very recently.  That is magic existed as a background force but was poorly tapped and not really understood.  It had only the most subtle of effects on evolution.  All the major intelligent species (chose what you wish) are normal in that their biology does not require magic.In this way all the biological and evolutionary history of the real world can be borrowed and modified for use in the setting.  That is the effects of magic on evolution do not need to be contemplated and extrapolated.Magic is introduced into the setting at anything approaching a D&D level only about 100,000 to 50,000 years ago.  The ability to use magic also followed an evolutionary process.  First only 1st level spells could be accessed and the "gods" contacted poorly.  As time went on, knowledge increased and more and more powerful spells became available. Now the discovery of magic (it increased use) I see as having a magical mutagenic influence on the environment.  Thus many or most monsters that rely upon magic arose from normal populations through this magical pollution/background.  Some could breed true others still arise from normal creatures.  (Hence on explanation of how monsters can still arise in settled areas).   The "magical" intelligent species especially the half-man ones such as centaurs (I can really think of no evolutionary path that makes much sense for such) arose from such mutation.  Centaurs maybe from a tribe that were great horsemen.In addition, once magic becomes available it might start being used to experiment and later creatures, another source of monsters.   This is my preferred origin for dragons.  I postulate they were first long flightless worms designed to get into dwarven strongholds and destroy them (hence the fire breath).  The dwarves changed there stronghold design from narrow entry tunnels to great vaulted entry halls to rain down missiles on these worms.  The dragon creator then added wings to dragons 2.0 to address this changed.One can also factor in how much "background" magic there was and still remains to tailor how possible it remains to make new monsters.  IMC I postulated a "comet" that struck the world bring an ore with highly concentrated magical energy.  In its raw state it is highly mutagenic (discovered after it was too late).  The potential power of this ore was discovered in the early days when magic was poorly understood.   Those who were involved in the original mining and transport of such ore became many of the intelligent fantasy species of my setting.   The premier horse clan became the centaur (one morning the humans and horse work up as centaurs, some where humans that became centaurs other s horses that became centaurs.  It is still an insult/internal division if you're ancestor was a horse or human.  It's something they don't talk about. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />)  Likewise, giants, giant eagles, etc. arose from contact with this ore. Those are some of my thoughts.</blockquote>

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