Remember 1982’s The Beastmaster? That film along with several others heralded the sword-and-sorcery, Conan-xploitation movie craze of the 1980s. With its swords, sorcery, “barbarian” loincloths, and the equivalent of the Dungeons & Dragons’ spell Speak With Animals – only treated as a major power instead of a magical novelty – The Beastmaster was a gamer go-to during the first decade of D&D. Despite its recognition among gamers at that time, there’s never been an official TTRPG. Considering The Beastmaster’s place alongside Conan the Barbarian, Deathstalker, and Hawk the Slayer during the era of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, why isn’t there an official The Beastmaster Roleplaying Game or sourcebook for your gaming table?
If you partook in the slew of Conan-xploitation, fantasy movies from that decade, you knew of The Beastmaster. The film had a modest box office, yet it became a gamer staple, which begs the question, why was this movie famous? In the 1980s, two American television channels were known by mocking monikers: HBO’s letters were joked to stand for "Hey, Beastmaster's On" while TBS signified "The Beastmaster Station". In other words, The Beastmaster played on those channels so often you’d think that the broadcasters got paid every time they ran the movie instead of the reverse. The constant re-runs provided the film with a cult following.
Along with Conan the Barbarian and Roger Corman’s entries, The Beastmaster formed the foundation of the 1980s modest-budget, sword-and-sorcery subgenre. The Beastmaster had two sequels: 1991’s Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time and 1996’s NBC TV-movie, Beastmaster III: The Eye of Braxus, plus a 3-season TV series and Richard A. Knaak (Dragonlance: The Legend of Huma and Dragonlance: Kaz the Minotaur) and Sylvio Tabet’s (Producer of The Beastmaster and Director of Beastmaster 2) 2009 sequel novel titled Beastmaster Myth. In 2020, director Don Coscarelli and screenwriter Paul Pepperman reclaimed the copyright to their original The Beastmaster screenplay. All of that is to say, there’s plenty of The Beastmaster to touch on, yet no tabletop RPG. Considering its decade of notoriety coinciding with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons First Edition, why aren’t fans playing characters that talk to animals and wear loincloths for armor… er, more like The Beastmaster-specific versions of those character types?
Want a few reviews from gamers? Then check out Alex Wolfe’s series on The Beastmaster:
"INSERT GAME already has all of the rules that you’d need to play INSERT FRANCHISE" was a common discussion during the Kickstarter campaign for the Altered Carbon RPG. Before and after the Altered Carbon Kickstarter, some gamers argued that Eclipse Phase could cover everything Altered Carbon’s mythology required. The same proscription was cited when debating the need for The Terminator RPG. In theory, the simulation could be detailed using most cyberpunk or superhero RPGs. Despite the debate, these projects found backers through crowdfunding and turned a profit. How? Because a unified, focused game has inherent advantages over hacking an existing system. By focusing on each property’s core elements, The Terminator RPG and Altered Carbon RPG eliminated narrative outliers, rule discrepancies, and GM homebrewing that would result from bending a generalized ruleset to work with an existing property. In addition, the art in the rulebooks fit the feel of the world, which is a huge plus.
That said, regarding The Beastmaster, there’s an argument for an existing system over a unique system. Why? Because D&D debuted in 1974 and The Beastmaster in 1982. D&D took time to roll out from its base near the Great Lakes to touch players across the world. There’s some alignment with players discovering the game and the movie at nearly the same time making the film a contemporary example of sword-and-sorcery for early D&D enthusiasts. That connection implies that many sessions of D&D in the mid- to late-80s had a player that wanted to take the role of a beastmaster. While there wasn’t official TSR support for a beastmaster, elements of that class existed in the rules and spirit of D&D. Therefore, the DM could homebrew some options and – BAM! – the player’s character was commanding ferret thieves. This worked until the player wanted one attack for their beastmaster, one for their panther, one for their eagle, and two for the pair of ferrets each round. That unbalanced and slowed the encounter, and led to attempts to reign in the OP elements of the homebrew, which resulted in DM and player frustration at the number of dead ferrets per session.
Alternately, there’s the Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition (2014) Ranger subclass called “Beast Master.” In the context of this article that sounds like a stand-in, but the subclass comes with a built-in flaw: the wider world of D&D. If you’re playing a game based on The Beastmaster, that’s the focus, the adventures of this Ranger-like Barbarian. In D&D, the focus is the range of gaming options: wizards, clerics, dragonborn, and all of the other bigger, badder classes and subclasses that take the spotlight off of the setting and premise of The Beastmaster. That is to say, your 5e version of The Beastmaster is unlikely to feel like the source material.
For the best The Beastmaster experience, creating or modifying an existing system offers detailed, mythology-specific mechanics that will play better at the table. For the sake of game balance and narrative purity, putting beastmasters into their own world is ideal.
Egg Embry participates in the OneBookShelf Affiliate Program, Noble Knight Games’ Affiliate Program, Kobold Press Affiliate Program, and is an Amazon Associate. These programs provide advertising fees by linking to DriveThruRPG, Noble Knight Games, Kobold Press, and Amazon.
What is the Beastmster?
Directed by Don Coscarelli of Phantasm fame and starring Marc Singer, Tanya Roberts, John Amos, and Rip Torn, the story of The Beastmaster involves Dar, a warrior who can communicate with animals, seeking revenge for his murdered tribe. The quest for vengeance leads Dar (Marc Singer), and his animal companions to meet Kiri (Tanya Roberts) and Seth (John Amos) as he hunts the evil wizard Maax (Rip Torn). Loosely based on Alice "Andre" Norton’s 1959 novel, The Beast Master, the movies take very little from that novel, mostly the ability to communicate with animals. For a B-movie, the director and cast were more notable than many of their contemporaries in the sword-and-sorcery craze of the 1980s.If you partook in the slew of Conan-xploitation, fantasy movies from that decade, you knew of The Beastmaster. The film had a modest box office, yet it became a gamer staple, which begs the question, why was this movie famous? In the 1980s, two American television channels were known by mocking monikers: HBO’s letters were joked to stand for "Hey, Beastmaster's On" while TBS signified "The Beastmaster Station". In other words, The Beastmaster played on those channels so often you’d think that the broadcasters got paid every time they ran the movie instead of the reverse. The constant re-runs provided the film with a cult following.
Along with Conan the Barbarian and Roger Corman’s entries, The Beastmaster formed the foundation of the 1980s modest-budget, sword-and-sorcery subgenre. The Beastmaster had two sequels: 1991’s Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time and 1996’s NBC TV-movie, Beastmaster III: The Eye of Braxus, plus a 3-season TV series and Richard A. Knaak (Dragonlance: The Legend of Huma and Dragonlance: Kaz the Minotaur) and Sylvio Tabet’s (Producer of The Beastmaster and Director of Beastmaster 2) 2009 sequel novel titled Beastmaster Myth. In 2020, director Don Coscarelli and screenwriter Paul Pepperman reclaimed the copyright to their original The Beastmaster screenplay. All of that is to say, there’s plenty of The Beastmaster to touch on, yet no tabletop RPG. Considering its decade of notoriety coinciding with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons First Edition, why aren’t fans playing characters that talk to animals and wear loincloths for armor… er, more like The Beastmaster-specific versions of those character types?
More About the Beastmaster
For those that haven’t seen The Beastmaster, Vinegar Syndrome, distributor of Don Coscarelli’s most recent edition of the original film, gives this synopsis:Want a few reviews from gamers? Then check out Alex Wolfe’s series on The Beastmaster:
- “Dungeons & D-Listers: The Beastmaster (1982)” from Psycho Drive-In
- “Dungeons & D-Listers: The Beastmaster II (1991)” from Psycho Drive-In
- “Dungeons & D-Listers: Beastmaster III (1996)” from Psycho Drive-In
"I'll Do It Myself!"
There isn’t an official adaptation, but does The Beastmaster need its own game? Couldn’t another system cover the requirements?"INSERT GAME already has all of the rules that you’d need to play INSERT FRANCHISE" was a common discussion during the Kickstarter campaign for the Altered Carbon RPG. Before and after the Altered Carbon Kickstarter, some gamers argued that Eclipse Phase could cover everything Altered Carbon’s mythology required. The same proscription was cited when debating the need for The Terminator RPG. In theory, the simulation could be detailed using most cyberpunk or superhero RPGs. Despite the debate, these projects found backers through crowdfunding and turned a profit. How? Because a unified, focused game has inherent advantages over hacking an existing system. By focusing on each property’s core elements, The Terminator RPG and Altered Carbon RPG eliminated narrative outliers, rule discrepancies, and GM homebrewing that would result from bending a generalized ruleset to work with an existing property. In addition, the art in the rulebooks fit the feel of the world, which is a huge plus.
That said, regarding The Beastmaster, there’s an argument for an existing system over a unique system. Why? Because D&D debuted in 1974 and The Beastmaster in 1982. D&D took time to roll out from its base near the Great Lakes to touch players across the world. There’s some alignment with players discovering the game and the movie at nearly the same time making the film a contemporary example of sword-and-sorcery for early D&D enthusiasts. That connection implies that many sessions of D&D in the mid- to late-80s had a player that wanted to take the role of a beastmaster. While there wasn’t official TSR support for a beastmaster, elements of that class existed in the rules and spirit of D&D. Therefore, the DM could homebrew some options and – BAM! – the player’s character was commanding ferret thieves. This worked until the player wanted one attack for their beastmaster, one for their panther, one for their eagle, and two for the pair of ferrets each round. That unbalanced and slowed the encounter, and led to attempts to reign in the OP elements of the homebrew, which resulted in DM and player frustration at the number of dead ferrets per session.
Alternately, there’s the Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition (2014) Ranger subclass called “Beast Master.” In the context of this article that sounds like a stand-in, but the subclass comes with a built-in flaw: the wider world of D&D. If you’re playing a game based on The Beastmaster, that’s the focus, the adventures of this Ranger-like Barbarian. In D&D, the focus is the range of gaming options: wizards, clerics, dragonborn, and all of the other bigger, badder classes and subclasses that take the spotlight off of the setting and premise of The Beastmaster. That is to say, your 5e version of The Beastmaster is unlikely to feel like the source material.
For the best The Beastmaster experience, creating or modifying an existing system offers detailed, mythology-specific mechanics that will play better at the table. For the sake of game balance and narrative purity, putting beastmasters into their own world is ideal.
To Be Continued...
We'll continue our discussion in the next article (published next week), including what TTRPG to use, if such a hypothetical game could make money, and which publisher might be the first to get the license.Egg Embry participates in the OneBookShelf Affiliate Program, Noble Knight Games’ Affiliate Program, Kobold Press Affiliate Program, and is an Amazon Associate. These programs provide advertising fees by linking to DriveThruRPG, Noble Knight Games, Kobold Press, and Amazon.
