d66 Monsters and Men of BIBLICAL CARCOSA!

Rodney Matthews. Don't know what it's called.

Biblically-accurate blood-soaked sci-fantasy hex-crawl across an Old Testament/Revelation para-apocalyptic fever-dream landscape that can be crossed in six days, or swallow up two million people (plus animals) for forty years.

Bruce Pennington covers (Book of the New Sun, Clark Ashton Smith, Dune); Rodney Matthews; Dark Sun; Kingdom Death; Mork Borg. McKinney's Carcosa, obvs.

System agnostic with the heavy stink of old-fashioned D&D-ish. 

Table not weighted for probability, because it's not really a random encounter table.

Roll d6:

1. Roll d6:

1. Nephilim: 8’ tall extra-terrestrial cat-folk lion-centaurs; favoured weapons, bow and arrow. Some of them have six legs. Refer to each other with the honorific ‘Coeurl’. Can be paid in salt. 
2. Lilin (Owl Women) (6-36): bird-featured, taloned hands and feet; otherwise human. Like to perch in trees, watching, with big staring eyes. Capable of dust/mud-caked suspended animation. Variously reviled as thieving monkeys and murderous succubi. Use small/medium flying humanoid stats (but no wings) of any type (including FF Berbalang). 
3. Ur-Griffin (1): towering, startlingly colourful, wingless griffin; sounds like Godzilla. Doesn’t roll to hit, you roll to save – no real point trying to fight unless you have an army of giants.
4. Gorgonians: snake-haired Amazons riding iron-scaled, fire- and gas-breathing bulls. Ruled by a medulich-queen. Seek mortal males to produce viable mandusas/maedar (rare, precious; no snakes; stone-to-flesh touch) to propagate their species. Fearsome, honourable, compassionate, inevitably practical.
5. Land Whales (Behemoths) (1-6): breast-feeding, live-birthing dinosaurs with belly buttons. Dragon Men prize their milk, and to ride one, slung underneath while suckling, is a legendary feat.
6. Leviathans (1-2): Ichthyosaurs, placoderms, plesiosaurs, zeuglodons – the biggest sea monsters and the longest dead. Vast, filmy and luminous, barely material - unconstrained by seas that no longer exist. You can survive being swallowed, as you are slowly digested over a thousand years.

2. Roll d6:

1. The Leonine Men: anachronistic leper Knights Templar in local dress: cavalier/paladin abilities and attitudes. Favour huge two-handed swords. Special characters equivalent to Mummies and/or Were-Lions. 
2. Moon Dogs: unsettling liminal beings, fluid to the mortal eye but more-or-less dog and/or human-like. Can see invisible, detect possession and telepathy. Enemies of disease and mind-control. Do not speak to mortals.
3. Seraphics (Winged Victories): paramortal androgynes; prototype of Paladin and Vampire. Battlefield scavengers, feeding on spent lives and broken morale. Appear variously glorious, gorgeous or ghastly – the effect is glamour/telepathic feedback camouflage.
4. Man Scorpions (1-3): morphologically similar to the Nephilim, but scorpions and bigger (range from large, through giant to gargantuan). Can have arms and/or pincers in any configuration. Smaller ones wield pole arms. Remarkably pleasant voices.
5. Hooved/Horned Lions (1-6):  one or another variety of brightly-coloured, furred and/or feathered aggressive ceratopsian. If you could raise and/or tame one, it’d make an awesome mount.
6. Cubes: their surface engravings are blueprints for constructing helical orbital tethers/space elevators. Capable of communicating - and presumably compatible – with the ones on the Moon.

3. Roll d6:

1. The Dreaded Ones (Purples): Flagellants, poisoners, voluptuaries. Affectionately refer to each other as horror and terror. Why not name their great Lankhmar-by-way-of-Erelhei-Cinlu city as Sodom-and-Gomorrah?
2. Silurians (Valusians): the Serpent People – deeply offended that their blood magic fuel-source is going to out-breed them into extinction. Invented magic, so have a chance to counter yours. 
3. Diluvials (not these ones): To survive the coming Flood, they need all the resources and all the livestock. Brigands, berserkers, dervishes and pirates; possibly even a/the Barbarian Horde. 
4. Opinicus (Flying Horses): a bustling crowd of dirty, noisy, ragged pegasi. Disturbingly omnivorous; mostly scavengers. Can be subdued/tamed, using kindness, fresh meat and/or brutality. Congregate in marshes. More like donkeys and jackasses than riding or war horses.
5. Edenites: the beautiful people, jealously beloved of a/the Creator. Everything they do is automatically Lawful Good. Multi-classed Druid/Paladins. They are both Eloi and Morlock. 
6. Annakim (Hill Giants) (1-3): not as bloodthirsty, cave-dwelling, dim-witted, gargantuan or lusty as renowned/rumoured. Sensitive, shy, woodland-dwellers, with psionic camouflage but a horrible stench. Can crush your skull with one hand.

4. Roll d6:

1. Carnotaurus: scaly carnivorous aurochs. If there’s only one, it’s significantly bigger and older than normal; bad-tempered. Cow’s milk is pink and syrupy (with purple froth), salty, and prized by Dragon Men.
2. Cherubim (1-4): Four-faced guardian obelisks that burst into grinding life as pyramidal killdozers with flame-throwers. “THOU SHALL NOT PASS”. Markers of places without honour, commemorating no highly esteemed deeds etcetera. And/or Eden.
3. Manna Bees/Beetles: nanite-swarms and drone-units. Convert the aftermath of battles into sweet, flossy, nutritionally-dense material, carried away in great drifts on the wind. As long as the violence continues, none need go hungry.
4. The Unfinished: misshapen primordial humanoids. Discarded clay, sparkless dust, withered fruit; misery of abandonment turns to envy and hate for the Creator and the Creation. So prototypical they are subject to neither Death nor Time.
5. Anunnaki: extra-terrestrial Mi-Go as the vulnerable gooey centre of a Xorn/Xaren exo-suit in pseudo-Babylonian/Sumerian-style. Breeding/modding humans to mine elements they are otherwise deathly allergic to. Masquerading as glorious tutelary deities.
6. Watchers (1-3): gargantuan baobab-cactus Elder Thing/Triffids. Glistening black eye-organ gives them 360 vision, heliographic communication and ability to focus available light as long-range death/heat ray.  You besiege or mine them, rather than fight them. Prefer to stay put, but have been known to uproot and travel (singly or in herds) – slow, inexorable.

5. Roll d6:

1. Men of Blazing Metal (Shining Ones): silver or gold, respectively roughly equivalent to Elf and Dwarf. Doomed to be out-bred by mundane humanity – silver will not go quietly; gold, neutrally accepting. Junior allies and trading partners of the Anunnaki.
2. Men of Glowing Metal: bronze or iron; Living Statues as persons/people – they eat the same food, breathe the same air and range across the same moral and cultural continuum as you, but piss fire and shit gold. Cannot hide from infravision.
3. Men of Shining Blood: Prefer very particular hot, wet environments and don’t stray far without grand designs. Guardians/hoarders/inheritors of Serpent People sorcery. They also invent(ed) fireball. No skin, except when going abroad in disguise. 
4. Elohim: goat-horned mountain-guerilla/gorilla Clerics; tough, vengeful; armed with staves, knives and slings. They’re more numerous and sophisticated than the received wisdom has it.
5. Dragon Men: bare- and barrel-chested. Cultivate keloids and cicatrices. Bifurcate tongues (penises, if they have them). Shout loud enough to knock you down/root you to the spot. Venerate, hunt, tame and ride the most draconic wild beasts. 
6. Sea Monsters: all manner of toothy, tentacles, scaly, slimy things (including flamin’ SQUARKS!). Drag themselves ashore and head inland, looking for somewhere to die and something to kill. Carcasses attract verminous monster pests and smell atrocious.

6. Roll d6:

1. d666 Locusts: half a HD, otherwise as Cave Cricket/Locust. Odds/evens, Demonic or Devilish for damage resistance/vulnerabilities. If one reaches your brain, has access to your intelligence and abilities. The noise of the swarm is deafening and maddening.
2. Winged Bulls: exactly that. Wrongly ascribed wisdom and beneficence. Good eating if you survive the hunt. They also breathe fire, but can be broken, clipped, extinguished then yoked as beasts of burden (if you’ve got what it takes). Destined to be bred into the aurochs that will be wiped out in/survive the coming Deluge.
3. Biblically-Accurate Angels (1-3): wheels, wings, eyes, blazing bright; practically invulnerable, utterly implacable killers robots transmitting “BE NOT AFRAID” like a fucking Dalek on all frequencies as they oversee the Creation. So many damage dice you'd think this was T&T.
4. Sick Giants: minimum hp, heavy plate armour and shield. Very strong and well-armed (Fire, Frost, Fir-Bolg equivalents). Carry great iron-shod staves to lean and walk on. Constantly complaining, but not automatically hostile. Mercenaries.
5. Devil Swine: basically RAW.
6. EYE OF GOD! Azathothian astronomical event. Visible across all space and time. The heavens peel back. All are naked before it. Nothing will ever be the same. Forever and ever. Amen.

Commentary & What Was Left Out.

Initially inspired by a random encounter table on a blog I saw maybe five years ago and recall without specifics. Details sketchy, possibly about East or West of Eden, the Land of Nod (not that blog as far as I can tell), Old Testament as campaign setting. If anyone has any idea, I'd appreciate a link.

I'm not enough of a scholar to include bits of Mormonism and Scientology, but there's probably room for a stripe of each. 

If there is a One-True-God then there are lots of One-True-Gods, hustling for position. I'm pretty sure they eat each other.

Clerics only get basic spell access (1st and 2nd level), otherwise more like 5e Warlocks or Dark Sun Templars. Accessible and vulnerable patrons.

Competing apocalypses. All the imagery.

The pre-humans of Islam (including some unorthodox contemporary 'scientific' takes on the jinn) and Theosophy.

Carcosa-as-Jerusalem or Jerusalem-as-Tanelorn are both valid.

Chorazin, with its Black Pilgrimage and powers of the air.

The sin(s) of Sodom (and presumably Gomorrah): Ezekiel 16:49-50.

Noah as rapacious warlord from some comic I read that I can't remember the name of; Cain was the Conan/Eternal Champion-like hero. 21st Century; possibly French.

Actual Biblical characters and stories optional, including Vampire or Zombie Christ.

ICE AGE MEGAFAUNA! - Back to Basic

It looks like all (and there weren't so many, really) the prehistoric mammals got wiped off the books along with the Dinosaurs.

Apply one or more of the following tags to the statblock of familiar modern specimens, from aardvark to zebra. 

Cave: +2 HD, all damage dice raised to the next increment

Dire: +2 HD, +2 damage per attack, +2 Morale

Giant: x2 HD, x2 damage, Armour Class as Chain.

Horned*: +2 HD, gives a charge attack, knockdown on a special.

Sabre-toothed*: +2 HD, bite damage raised to 2 dice or next increment if already multiple

Woolly: +2-7 HD (d6+1), +4 damage to main attack, +2 damage to other attacks

* and/or Tusked.

HD increases stack. Dice increments stack. Plusses to damage, take the highest. 

Damage multiplier applies to dice only, not adds.

Apply HD multiplier to the base statblock or after applying any other tags, or wherever it falls in your animal's descriptive title. 

If HD rise to 8 or above, you can instead handle the prehistoric mammal as if it was an 8 HD dinosaur with 3d6 attacks. Such animals are between the size of a modern rhino and an elephant, and save at +4 vs. spells that don't inflict damage and vs. poison/venom.

If HD is approaching, reaches or exceeds 16, then you could treat the mammal as a 16 HD dinosaur with 6d6 attacks. They're as big as Dinosaurs (of course), and immune to spells that don't cause points of damage and poison/venom.

Armour Class as the original, or equal to Unarmoured or Leather. Mega-armadillos and mega-porcupines etc can have Scale to Plate protection.

Prehistoric mammals live in arctic and subarctic conditions, are immune to normal cold, and save at +1 and take -1 damage per die vs. magical cold. Because it's the Ice Age. Always. Unless it's a steamy jungle-type Lost World Beyond the Ice.

They must make a Morale Check if you use fire or firearms against them. 

Specials (19-20 vs. human sized etc) will be bear hugs, tramples or rending/auto-bite. Swallowing you whole can be a possibility, but doesn't seem as thematically strong for mammals as it does for dinos.

Walruses, weird whales, ice-breaking horned manatees and long-necked seals can sink boats and/or snatch folk from the deck. Porcupines can fling a volley of spikes like a Manticore. Spiked and clubbed tails are in the mix.

The idea of Horned Sabre-toothed Giant Woolly Vampire Cave Bats is of course ridiculous.

All herbivores are delicious and nutritious and go a long way.

Carnivores have at least one organ of such concentrated nutrition that it will kill a modern human(oid), but is a delicacy to Cave Men.

Cave Men are equal to Bugbears, and have at least 16 Strength, immunity to normal cold and bonus/resistance as other prehistoric mammals. 

The language barrier between them and modern humans cannot be overcome by either comprehend languages or speak with animals. 

If they don't think you're gods, they might think you're food, and they possess a plentiful resource unrecognised by them as useful or valuable to modern people.

Flavour according to your setting and the last thing you read/saw about prehistoric human society.

Since 2003, you're allowed to include Cave Hobbits. Either 1+1 HD and Basic Halfling abilities or use Athasian Halflings.

Neanderthals are Neanderthals, RAW or seasoned as you like.

JUDGE DEATH (2000AD) for Old School Fantasy and Horror

Psionic humanoid undead immortal outsider.
(Art: Brian Bolland)

Inter-dimensional alien super-fiend. 

Declared life to be illegal (as it is the living who exclusively commit crime). Carried out summary execution of his entire home world - billions of lives. This was centuries before he started dimension hopping. 

Doesn't care whether yours is a fantasy, historical or sci-fi setting - you're all lawbreakers (especially the elves).

Looks like a zombie or mummy dressed in a mockery of a Mega City Judge uniform. He doesn't need to wear anything, he chooses to - his office has standards to uphold.

An immortal spirit, Judge Death can partially or totally possess a living being, or reanimate a handy corpse, but only a vessel properly treated with the Dead Fluids allows him to bring his full abilities to bear.

All details preceded by an asterisk (*) are even more optional than the rest.

Hit Dice: as an undead type that you think best represents the temporary host body and/or the power and threat of Death in relation to your setting, system and table (I'm imagining Judge Dredd and Judge Anderson as min. 4th level characters).

As a zombie-type, Juju (3+12) or Lord (6) works; Lich (11) or Mummy (5+1) fit his appearance in the comics.

As a villain, he's at least Vampire/Mind Flayer tier (8+4).

*He can use d12 for hp instead of a d6/d8.

Treat an improvised/untreated corpse host as a Zombie (2 HD).

Armour Class: Unarmoured as Plate (his uniform is equal to Leather, but does not stack).

*Or as undead type for Hit Dice.

Invulnerable Monster: immune to normal weapons, bullets, crits, impales, massive damage effects.

Undead, clearly. *Immune as undead type for HD.

*Immune to charm, sleep, feeblemind, polymorph, cold, lightning, death spells (including reversed healing).

*+2 or better weapon to bypass Invulnerability, and these sever limbs on a crit/nat 20.

Half damage from all attacks.

Attacks with Filthy Claws for d4 hp each vs. metal armour (including the thick animal/monster hide equivalents of Chain and Plate); d6 otherwise.

*Save vs. disease if you've been wounded to see if you contracted Mummy's rotting disease (your preferred iteration).

He can wield weapons, use devices, grapple, throw objects etc. *and Cleaves like a Fighter of equal level vs. low-level opponents.

Grasp Heart: his signature move - phasing his hand into your chest and squeezing. 

Automatic vs. helpless victims or if he rolls 4 more than the number needed to hit (*or three consecutive hits, or a crit) - auto-kill on Death's next action if he wants to (and he really wants to).

*Save each round he holds your heart or take d4 non-lethal hp and 1 Strength damage. He knows if you're lying to him, and can read your surface thoughts if you're below 4th level.

If Death suffers damage in the interim or he chooses to, you are released.

Stench of Death: as a Troglodyte, and if you crit fail, you're sick as if poisoned by a Giant Centipede.

*Make three saves in a row or roll a crit, and you're immune to the effect for the rest of the encounter.

Mournful Charm: as a Vampire, one target per round, by gaze, gesture or communication.

*50% per appropriate time period he cannot resist the urge to pass sentence of death on a helpless target.

*Superhuman Strength: equivalent to an AD&D Vampire (18/76 Exceptional Strength), or your setting/system maximum for humans, or the bonus increment above this.

Making him fully and messily capable of grasping your heart without using his special ability.

You Cannot Kill What Does Not Live: as long as his host body has hit points remaining, it regenerates 1 hp per ten-minute turn.

*Severed extremities do not regrow but can be reattached or replaced, Frankenstein-style.

At 0 hp (or at will), taking a full round, Death abandons the host in gaseous form (as a Vampire). 

One of his catchphrases.
Art: Frazer Irving

Effectively indestructible, this form can use Stench of Death as a touch attack, exercise Mournful Charm, or attempt to possess a new host (automatic vs. helpless target; otherwise use your preferred possession sub-system).

Clerical Turning works like a Holy Symbol vs. Vampires against his gaseous form only.

A dissolve result vs. undead type by HD will drive Death from a host not yet treated with the Dead Fluids, and is no more effective than a Holy Symbol vs. Vampires against his gaseous form.

Vulnerabilities: Takes full normal damage from fire.

As an Invulnerable Monster, he's immune to normal damage, but not non-lethal/secondary effects, so can be pushed, pulled, grappled, entangled, tripped, thrown, disarmed, knocked back, knocked down, skewered and pinned to objects, dismembered, buried in cement, locked in a lead box and dropped into the Marianas Trench etc. 

Effectively helpless for 1 round when changing to gaseous form - this is your best opportunity to stop him getting away and taking a new host.

An interpretation of the comics would suggest trapping him in a Gelatinous Cube is an option.

I don’t know enough about D&D-adjacent psionics to comment specifically, but Judge Death appears to be (normally) vulnerable to psionics (for an entity of his status) - including telepathy, as a sapient being. 

Can be fooled (at least once) by feign death or similar.

Living Hosts are fragile and will deteriorate - mentally, physically and spiritually - the longer Death maintains a hold on them. They share none of Death's immunities/resistances or special abilities, unless/until treated with the Dead Fluids.

Commentary.

More classic catchphrases.
Art: Alex Ronald; Colours: Gary Caldwell.

It's been established that he was once Sidney D'Eath, son of a serial-killing dentist, whose wholesale genocidal tendencies showed long before he turned undead, but there are various other iterations.

In the primary 2000AD timeline, Death is both an apocalyptic supernatural threat and not entirely to be taken seriously. Sometimes works for me - this juxtaposition is a common tonal feature of the Judge Dredd setting. Dead Fluids flow frequently.

Judge Dredd: Lawman of the Future (1995 movie tie-in comic): Death is the undead alternative-universe Judge Dredd (apparently the original idea for the 2000AD archetype). Has a soulgem that powers his suite of special abilities. No Dead Fluids.

Judge Dredd: Final Judgement (2012 movie tie-in comic): He appears to be Sidney D'Eath from the primary (movie) universe, while also being an entity from a parallel universe of perfect entropy. No Dead Fluids, but plenty of stuff I liked.

Batman/Judge Dredd: Judgment on Gotham and Die Laughing: I have finite tolerance for the zany comedy antics of Judge Death in the mainstream 2000AD strip, so these two crossovers are a low point from my perspective. Visually interesting, though. Can't remember if any Dead Fluids.

Fall of Deadworld: Kek-W and Dave Kendall's non-stop parade of death metal album covers, telling the tale of how Death's homeworld was turned into Deadworld - and what the Dark Judges were doing before they turned their attention to the primary 2000AD universe. Absolutely saturated with Dead Fluids.

For Brits of a certain era, compare with Joey Boswell (Peter Howitt, not Graham Bickley) - another black leather-clad sex-symbol who announced himself with 'Greetings'.