(un)reason
Legend
Dragon Issue 307: May 2003
part 3/9
Monsters in the alley: Another article that feels like it was too late for the urban themed issue, making me wonder if Paizo is struggling to keep itself organised and read and edit everything submitted in good time. Even now they're throwing out all the fiction submissions unread, I still suspect they have fewer resources at their disposal than when they were a full part of the WotC offices. Still, even if it is a couple of months late, it is a James Jacobs one, and he rarely disappoints me when it comes to inventive monsters. Let's see if he can keep up his winning streak.
Dweomervores are little barbed-tailed dragons that eat magic, and reproduce asexually when there's a plentiful supply of it. Since they need to eat magical items, adventurers will likely wind up hunting them when some of their gear goes missing. At least it's a better excuse than the random mischief faerie dragons will inflict on you for kicks.
Splinterwaifs may or may not be the twisted remains of dryads who's trees were cut down and used to build stuff. Whether they are or not, they steal children and turn them into bushes before slowly eating them, which is a very interesting way to go that also makes it very hard to hunt them down, since there's no bodies. Better have your divination spells at the ready to figure this one out.
Trap Haunts are ghosts who were killed by traps, which means adventurers have way above average odds of becoming one. As if the tomb of horrors wasn't nasty enough, add a few of these and you'll never clear it out.
Wilora are shapeshifting birds that steal memories with their gaze and assume people's forms. The most mythological feeling of this collection, they don't seem to have much motivation beyond jumping into people's lives temporarily and getting up to mischief that the poor amnesiac has to deal with next morning. Well, it's a good alternative to dopplegangers or obliviax. If there's a substantial population of them in an area, people will be very superstitious about barring the doors and padding the walls at night.
Since none of these are really straight combatants, have good descriptions with some ecological thought in, and will all need some brains to deal with, I think this is another pretty good article from James. The important thing with new monsters is that they always need to be slightly different, otherwise why write them, and these fit that bill.
Risen dead II: It definitely seems like they're bringing out sequels to popular articles faster these days. Well, I suppose that fits with the overall tendency of faster edition changes and more instant communication with the public. If they're cutting months off finding out what worked and what didn't through forumwatching, and days off the process of transmitting and revising manuscripts via using email, then of course there's going to be some acceleration. Plus it helps if they're easy ones to write like this one. Yup, it's 4 more undead converted from regular monster types into templates. Bodaks, Ghouls, Ghasts and Sons of Kyuss get genericised for flexibility. The templates are exactly what you'd expect, but there are some amusing quirks in the examples. Bodak Hydra get to use the death gaze with all their heads, while kyuss infected ogre mages enjoy both regeneration and fast healing, which makes them an absolute nightmare to put down for good. So it looks like they've found another vein of easy to mine crunch to tap into, and hope it doesn't run dry too soon. Ho hum. What other monster types fit better as templates than existing creatures then?
part 3/9
Monsters in the alley: Another article that feels like it was too late for the urban themed issue, making me wonder if Paizo is struggling to keep itself organised and read and edit everything submitted in good time. Even now they're throwing out all the fiction submissions unread, I still suspect they have fewer resources at their disposal than when they were a full part of the WotC offices. Still, even if it is a couple of months late, it is a James Jacobs one, and he rarely disappoints me when it comes to inventive monsters. Let's see if he can keep up his winning streak.
Dweomervores are little barbed-tailed dragons that eat magic, and reproduce asexually when there's a plentiful supply of it. Since they need to eat magical items, adventurers will likely wind up hunting them when some of their gear goes missing. At least it's a better excuse than the random mischief faerie dragons will inflict on you for kicks.
Splinterwaifs may or may not be the twisted remains of dryads who's trees were cut down and used to build stuff. Whether they are or not, they steal children and turn them into bushes before slowly eating them, which is a very interesting way to go that also makes it very hard to hunt them down, since there's no bodies. Better have your divination spells at the ready to figure this one out.
Trap Haunts are ghosts who were killed by traps, which means adventurers have way above average odds of becoming one. As if the tomb of horrors wasn't nasty enough, add a few of these and you'll never clear it out.
Wilora are shapeshifting birds that steal memories with their gaze and assume people's forms. The most mythological feeling of this collection, they don't seem to have much motivation beyond jumping into people's lives temporarily and getting up to mischief that the poor amnesiac has to deal with next morning. Well, it's a good alternative to dopplegangers or obliviax. If there's a substantial population of them in an area, people will be very superstitious about barring the doors and padding the walls at night.
Since none of these are really straight combatants, have good descriptions with some ecological thought in, and will all need some brains to deal with, I think this is another pretty good article from James. The important thing with new monsters is that they always need to be slightly different, otherwise why write them, and these fit that bill.
Risen dead II: It definitely seems like they're bringing out sequels to popular articles faster these days. Well, I suppose that fits with the overall tendency of faster edition changes and more instant communication with the public. If they're cutting months off finding out what worked and what didn't through forumwatching, and days off the process of transmitting and revising manuscripts via using email, then of course there's going to be some acceleration. Plus it helps if they're easy ones to write like this one. Yup, it's 4 more undead converted from regular monster types into templates. Bodaks, Ghouls, Ghasts and Sons of Kyuss get genericised for flexibility. The templates are exactly what you'd expect, but there are some amusing quirks in the examples. Bodak Hydra get to use the death gaze with all their heads, while kyuss infected ogre mages enjoy both regeneration and fast healing, which makes them an absolute nightmare to put down for good. So it looks like they've found another vein of easy to mine crunch to tap into, and hope it doesn't run dry too soon. Ho hum. What other monster types fit better as templates than existing creatures then?