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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nyeshet" data-source="post: 3031646" data-attributes="member: 18363">The Unknown is often frightening. So don't just alter the monsters - keep their actually identity ambiguous if possible. Instead of saying things like: "An orc wearing poorly fitted leather clothing of various dark colors - obviously taken from the corpses of his prior fallen foes - steps out from behind a boulder some fifty feet up the road." Say something like: "The road is partially overgrown from lack of use. As the last limb of the blood red orb of the setting sun sinks into the rough horizon of this unforgiving mountainous landscape, you see a shadow move next to a boulder some distance further along the path. It is a creature stepping out onto the path to block your way. At first it is difficult to tell whether the creature that emerges is even humanoid, but the mishappen figure that hulks out of the shadow of the bolder into the twilit path seems to be of humanoid form. From this distance and in this lighting it cannot be determined whether he is covered in poorly fitted hides and leathers or whether his own coarse and thick flesh hangs upon his large frame like several layers of tattered rags."The PCs will wonder if the creature is an orc or an ogre, a humanoid or an undead. If it continues to refrain from speech immediately rushes to attack them it may take a round or two for them to realize anything at all beyond what has already been told them. The poor lighting, the vague description that hints at several possibilities, and so forth all contribute.Also, why stick with silver and cold iron? Perhaps that ancient menace can only be hurt with Flint or Obsidean. Or maybe instead of silver they'll need rare(r) mithril. Or perhaps only arrowheads carved from the bones of sapient creatures the menace has mudered - and taken from their desecrated graves or dipped in the blood of their living relatives - can harm it. In some ancient Japanese stories, some insect monsters can only be harmed by a weapon if the blade has been spit upon just prior to the attack.</blockquote>

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