DINOSAURS! - Back to Basic

The Mandela Effect has eliminated the 40+ dinosaur stat-blocks from Advanced and Basic D&D, leaving only scattered references - including that they're big stupid hungry reptiles.

Oh no! Have to make my own in a lonely-fun vacuum. 

Compatible with most old school D&D-alikes/derivatives.

(And apologies to dinosaur aficionados and experts).

Proof!

They don't need species names: Big Hungry, Old One Eye, the God-Beast,

Hit Dice.

As they are equally huge and weird (see above for proof), dinosaurs can be built on the 1e AD&D Froghemoth, meaning they get 16 HD.

Armour Class.

Things like Pterodactyls are leathery so they have AC as leather (+2); most other dinosaurs are scaly so they have AC as scale armour (+3). The dinosaurs with armour plates (you decide if Stegosaurus is one of these) have AC as plate (+6). 

Triceratops gets +1/+2 vs. missiles for having a shield round its neck - Stegosaurus might also qualify for back plates, if you've not already decided they're armour plated.

Pterodactyls can also get +1 to +3 for flying, or nothing if you think they're clumsy, ponderous fliers.

Attacks.

One big attack for 6d6, or can split the dice between up to six opponents. 

Pterodactyls always split three ways: beak and two wing buffets for 2d6 each (and see below). 

1d6 attacks are incidental bashes, blunders and buffets in the melee.

2d6 and 3d6 attacks are claws, kicks, flipper and tail swipes and so on. Includes the bites of small-headed herbivores.

4d6 and above are carnivore bites, single-target stamps, goring and tossing with horns. 

6d6 is the slavering jaws of the Tyrant Lizard King, being trod on by a Brachiosaurus, sat on by a Triceratops.

If you prefer, 4d6+ attacks don't need a hit roll, you save to evade.

Various 3d6+ attacks can cause hull damage; 4d6+ can cause structural damage.

Special Attacks.

On a successful hit of 19-20 vs. a human-sized target, the dinosaur inflicts a special.

(If smaller than human-sized, special on 14+)

The big carnivores swallow you whole; the big herbivores trample you underfoot. 

Auto-damage (save to resist for half) each round until you can escape/are rescued - you're pretty helpless while being digested/stomped. Various bits of equipment are at risk.

Marine dinosaurs knock you into the water or swallow you if you're already there; includes capsizing and holing boats.

The armoured dinosaurs with spiky tails knock you prone and you drop whatever you're holding - lose Initiative and no attacks for two rounds (one to pick up your weapon, one to get back up - in any order, or you can crawl away). 

You can also use this for rams, butts and tossing by the bone-headed and the horned dinosaurs.

Flying dinosaurs carry you off into the sky, or knock you down (like a spiky tail) with a wing buffet, or knock you off the branch/bridge/deck/ledge with same.

...unless they do an apocalyptic swoop - an AoE attack of up to 16 dice, but also suffers same number of dice damage itself. If you like, use massive damage instant death rules on it. Maybe it's also on fire because the volcano has erupted.

Special Defences.

Immune to spells that don't cause points of damage, normal fire and poison/venom.

Use your judgement - it'd be shame to spoil a cool improvisation or cunning plan for the sake of a statement. 

There's special cases to be made for all sorts of illusory tricks, setting things on fire, freezing the lake/river/swamp, casting disintegrate as the stinking jaws close round you like a cage, enlarging toads thrown into the yawning throat etcetera.

Stupid Dinosaur Behaviour.

At this stage, dinosaurs are pea-brained monsters of appetite and are easily fooled. 

Carnivores always attack and always attack the nearest largest suitable target. Includes siege engines, other dinosaurs, submarines, airships, lighthouses, mining equipment, atmosphere processors, time-machines, and trains (etc).

Herbivores generally only attack if attacked. If surprised (whether or not with hostile intent), they must pass a Morale Check or stampede - trampling you into the dirt (as special, above - and see below).

Horned herbivores can set vs. charge, but mainly do so against other dinosaurs (and similar, above).

All dinosaurs can fight on for d3 rounds at 0 to -16 hp (or if their head has been disintegrated in spectacular improvisational manner). 

Split their attacks between as many opponents as possible, and on a natural 20 (or a 1, if you prefer) they topple over (dead) on whatever they're fighting for a 6d6 AoE.

Morale for most dinosaurs is 8. On a double six, they go berserk and fight to the death, even turning on each other.

Morale Checks can also be triggered by 10+ points of magical cold/fire damage, or a similar amount of electrical damage, in a round.

Commentary.

These are the dinosaurs of Ray Harryhausen and Charles R. Knight and not as many Doug McClure films as I thought. They don't even aspire to Jurassic Park levels of accuracy, let alone have feathers.

I've noted elsewhere that my opinion is the older edition dinosaurs are high in number, low in inspiration.

I think the E/X of Basic D&D probably got it about right by having a limited range, even if they're otherwise unexceptional in their treatment. The Master set consolidation (particularly after the Latinate glut of the 1e AD&D Monster Manuals) was a sensible move, and was the spark point for this article.

ALLANSIAN BLOODBEAST: Monster Conversion - Fighting Fantasy to Old School

Iain McCaig 1984

Armour Class +4     Hit Dice 7     Move n/a     Morale n/a

Bloated and limbless, it eternally wallows in the pool of slime it was spawned in.

The Allansian Bloodbeast is an Invulnerable Monster and regenerates 3 hp/round from any source. 

It is immune to acid and normal fire. Very hot/large and magical fires (causing 10+ hp damage) cause half damage but it retreats to the bottom of its slime pool for at least 1 combat round.

Electricity causes only 1 point per die, but reduces its attacks by 50% for 1 combat round. It will 50% retreat to the bottom of its slime pool for the duration instead.

Tongue: Its 10' prehensile tongue will grab a victim of size M or smaller and drag them to be bitten or (50%) into the slime pool on the next round. To resist the drag, grapple vs. STR 18.

The tongue can be severed with 6 points of slashing damage in a single round. If this happens, the Bloodbeast retreats to the bottom of its slime pool and will not emerge until the tongue regenerates (1 on d6 on the first day, 1-2 on the second and so on).

Bite: It bites for 2d6 hits. On a 9+, you lose a limb. On a 12, it crushes your skull/bites off your head.

Only those grabbed by the tongue or attempting to attack its weak spot can be bitten.

Slime Pool: If unprotected and susceptible, you must save vs. fumes each round or be nauseated (as Troglodyte stench) and partially blinded (as if trying to avoid a gaze attack). 

On a critical fail, you are overcome and collapse helpless. The Bloodbeast will grab you with its tongue at the next opportunity and drag you into its pool.

Anyone dragged into the slime pool suffers d6 acid damage each round and is unconscious after 2 rounds.

Weak Spot - Real Eyes: The Bloodbeast has hundreds of false eyes that burst from blisters on its head. Its vulnerable real eyes are hidden amongst these.

A crit against the head will hit a real eye (or 5% chance). If the attacker knows the Bloodbeast's weak spot, they can increase their chance to 10% equivalent. If this seems too much of a challenge, apply a -4/20% penalty to hit instead (called shot equivalent).

Striking an eye causes the Bloodbeast to suffer half its HD in damage (3d6+3 or 3d8+4, and instead of weapon damage). It will retreat to the bottom of its slime pool to recover at the next opportunity.

Commentary.

I sometimes forget how awesome the Bloodbeast from Deathtrap Dungeon is/was. 

IIRC correctly, in the gamebook you can't fight it normally and must either get a lucky strike against an eye, sever its tongue or dodge past it. Or die, of course.

It's not a monster you're meant to kill. However, Fighting Fantasy as a setting tends to the lower end of magic weapon allowance so you might need to go the whole hog and make it like some iterations of the Hydra so it can't be killed with body hits alone. Or go the Call of Cthulhu route and reducing it to 0 hp merely drives it the bottom of its pit.

The cover illustration suggests it has a stinger, but this is not mentioned in the gamebook or in Out of the Pit. But it does get used in the Playstation game, in which it also gets to spit poison, use magic, is vulnerable to the Venom Sword, and has only one real eye.

No idea how the Bloodbeast is meant to have evolved or how it breeds or how it even gets about. It seems likely that it secretes its own slime, as it uses it as a pre-digester. 

Maybe that stinger is an ovipositor and implanted eggs are carried away by adventurers and wandering monsters? 

Mechanically, used some bits of the (AD&D) Froghemoth and the (Dark Sun) Fael and stuck them onto a (B/X et al) Cave Bear. I imagine the solo adventurer as being a 4th level Fighter (YOU are the Hero).

Hope I've done it justice.

AD&D Monster Manual 2 - T to V.

Link Back to R & S...

Taer.

A solid 'lost world' monster - 'crudely sculpted stone idols... they might, in fact, be some kin of mankind'.

Also work as Ogres, Trolls, Yetis and variant Bugbears.

Good.

Tarrasque.

The illustration does not give any sense of its size. 

I like its fear and reflection mechanics, but otherwise didn't then and don't now have much love for the monster itself.

A typo in my copy gives it 1-12/1-2 for its claw attacks, suggesting that one is teeny tiny.

Tasloi.

Carnivorous arboreal brachiators. A solid little monster, with relevant notes on habits and tactics as well as the wargame-y distribution of weapons etc. 

They train/ keep as pets giant spiders and giant wasps - they use the wasps as flying mounts.

Why not just call them Tropic or Jungle Goblins? Why not just call them Goblins? Use as Goblins, whatever the climate or terrain.

Good.

Termite, Giant Harvester.

The Termite, as much as the Bee, feels like an archetypal colony/ hive monster. Their sprawling/ towering nests are ripe for repurposing as dungeons.

According to the entry, they can spit a blinding fluid 'similar to kerosene' - so similar that it can be set on fire. I don't know where this comes from, because the Fontanellar gun fires glue, closer to pine resin than a petroleum derivative.

Nothing to stop you having Giant Harvester Termites being the kickstart to the Dieselpunk Revolution of your setting.

The last sentence of the entry lets us know that Termites can use broadcast telepathy in a crisis, so maybe they are capable of developing psionics (as individuals or as a colony).

Thessalhydra.

Another monster I would use in place of a Dragon, or place as the level-inappropriate central monster of a larger adventure site (see Froghemoth).

Hydra heads surround a huge mouth, and it has a tail pincer: multiple attacks, poison & acid damage, grasp and bite, spits acid, and that central mouth crunches up your items as well as your character.

Almost all the text is devoted to its killing (you or it). An unapologetic monster.

A quick internet search tells me that Thessal- has nothing to do with Thessalonians, and that there are other monsters sharing this prefix (the Thessal-gorgon, -mera and -trice).

Thri-Kreen (Mantis Warrior).

There must be some haters out there, but that's because the Thri-Kreen have always been cool.

It says they like to hunt elves, make their own signature weapons and can dodge missiles (better than 50% chance). They're not social and there's nothing about what languages they can speak or understand.

They are barely fleshed out here in MM2, but that just gives more space for the imagination.

Thunder Beast.

The Stench Kine of the Abyss.

I'd reskin as even bigger Stench Kattle and let them loose across the Lower Planes, but I'm not in charge of AD&D cosmology.

I like their fog cloud breath building up over 3 rounds, something I'd give to other big monsters - particularly those in colder conditions.

Thunderherder.

Non-aggressive sand worms that don't really do anything but knock over your tents and panic your animals.

Time Elemental.

The abilities are more interesting than the monster, though the idea of Time being an element like Air, Earth, Fire and Water is quite interesting in itself - BECMI cosmology elaborates on this.

This set of abilities would make an excellent base on which to build pseudocanis Tindalosi.

Transposer.

A faceless humanoid with horny-ridged suckers instead of hands and feet, and can assume a less threatening guise.

Inflicts a form of Nilbogism, that heals it while hurting those who cause it harm.

No notes on origins, habitat, society or ecology. Feels alien or horrific.

Tri-Frond Flower.

A plant with sleep, rot and vampire attacks. Gives me cone-hosts of the Yithians vibes from the start.

Give it a movement rate and set it free. Maybe even combine it with the Vagabond (see below).

Troll, Marine (Scrag).

See Ogre, Aquatic (Merrow).

Twilight Bloom.

Environmental hazard. 

The language of the description (purple, silvery, droop, fine, mossy, attractive perfume and sweet sap, lavender blooms, gently tilt, syrupy poison) feels like a very luxurious way to die, maybe in a Clark Ashton Smith story.

Urchin, Land.

I think I would play up to its 'spine covered covered body ...often mistaken for a bush' and have it look more like a shrub than a spiny sea-creature. A shrub with a saw-tongue, projectile spikes that paralyse, and an escape cloud of dark gas, with green/black pearls tangled in its root-like feet.

Or make it glow pink in the dark, like the urchins in Monsters University, or think of them more as lice or barnacles on something much bigger.

Ustilagor.

You may know them now as immature Intellect Devourers (as early as 2e), but once they were psionic mushrooms that could mess with your emotions, with that classic Unratable Intelligence/ Neutral (evil) Alignment combo.

Vagabond.

'A vagabond is a life force of unknown origin, possibly from a far planet, parallel universe, or undiscovered plane' - they're basically the Great Race of Yith or something from Star Trek.

The description is non-committal on on whether they create their form or if they seize possession of it. They are quite keen to join adventuring parties.

Vargouille.

Really horrible flying heads! 

They cause permanent hit point damage - something I'd only seen in Call of Cthulhu at that time, so this made them seem extra scary.

In later editions, they reproduce by your head turning into one of them and flying away - which is brilliant, and should be a viable replacement PC option.

Vegepygmy.

Russet Mould turns you into a Vegepygmy, but Vegepygmies can reproduce by budding. 

Though the entry states that 'they coexist well with other forms of plant life', it doesn't go into the implications of having multiple methods of coming into being, or how mould-born and bud-born regard each other.

Maybe there's an answer in later editions, or maybe I'll just make one up. Consider making them more fungoid and associating them closely with Myconids.

Verme.

A fish as big as, or bigger, than the Tarrasque.

It swallows on a hit if you're 12' tall or less and dissolves you in 6 rounds even if you can survive the 2-16 hits of digestive acid damage per round. Resistant to edged weapons. Inside of its mouth is sensitive to fire (so's mine; isn't yours?).

Vilstrak.

No physical description, except that it is of 'stony substance'.

It has 'the uncanny ability to physically merge with earth or stone', which is clearly intended to mean they can pass in and out of the solid substance (they live in hollows in the earth and rock), but they are only 75% undetectable while doing so - what is it that gives them away?

They are described as avaricious and keep their treasures in their hollows - which means they are able to extend their merging ability to objects they carry. It doesn't say if they can drag a living being into the rock with them.

The Vilstrak is illustrated - both with the entry and at the front of the book - and I read it as having a third eye; maybe this is the one that allows it to see out of the rock when it's in there. 

Vulchling.

Vultures with vaguely human faces, and not much more than that. Might be in the mix with Harpies and/or Vrock, but otherwise these are a single flying Hit Dice. No connection with Vultures beyond appearance (and possibly implied habits).

BUT - I find that there's so little here that I can't help wondering what they could be.

Like.

Vulture.

Giant and Ordinary ones, but not as big as the cage-carrying one from 1981's Clash of the Titans.

Driving them off with blows or the threat of blows is baked in.

Next, finishing off with W, X, Y and Z...

AD&D Monster Manual 2 - E to F.

Link back to a D post with Dragons in it...

Eagle.

Just an Eagle. 

It's got 1+3 HD, so it's tougher than a Goblin, Normal Human, Orc and Hobgoblin.

Eblis.

Eblis, but not from MM2.

The other weird humanoid/stork monster of MM2. They have Illusionist characters that dance to cast a limited number of spells.

Make 4 beak attacks per round (fast!), and have resistance to fire because they're so damp (they live in marshes/ swamps). 

Use instead of the Ogres you rolled when entering a swamp hex.

Eel, Electric (Marine).

Three sizes (6, 7 and 8 HD), up to 40' long. Their electric shock stuns as well as causing damage.

Use as intended, or as an otherwise relatively unaggressive giant cave worm/slug.

Elf.

The grugach are a bit Ewok-y. They're angry little elves that set traps including deadfalls that hit hard as fireballs and pin the victim if they survive.

Valley Elves are 'World of Greyhawk'.  They're as tall as humans, are only friends with Gnomes, and are accompanied by Cooshee (Elven Dogs), but otherwise they don't really justify their own entry.

Elfin Cat.

With their ability to enlarge (doubling their attack power) and turn into a tree branch, there are strong faerie folklore vibes coming off this. 

The description puts them in association with all the jolly woodland folk, but I'd rather make their Neutrality chilly and have them keep to their own company when they're not frightening (but probably not preying on) church-going villagers.

Executioner's Hood.

This bag-with-eyeholes monster can be up to 3' in diameter, so can fit that size of head inside them without stretching.

They're just out to kill and eat you, and the best way to get one off without harming the victim is to douse it in brandy so it falls off, drunk.

I think this would be more interesting if it was looking for a host rather than a meal - maybe it wants to get drunk - otherwise just a size and attack form variant on the Lurker Above etc.

Falcon (Small & Large).

Just as edifying as the Eagle, though with the addition that it has a 25% chance of blinding you in 1 eye with a beak hit. One of those hidden mechanical reasons to wear a full helm.

Firefriend (Giant Firefly).

A friendly glowing intelligent bug that can shoot a beam of light from its bum for 5-20 hits and is immune to electricity and fire. They can speak Common and like to hang out with friendly folk to chat and tell stories.

Make them animals and take away that bum-beam. Keep their tolerance of humans and allow them to be used as light-sources. You probably have to find and exploit them in their home dungeon, rather than buy them from a dealer and take them with you.

Could also work reskinned as Mi Go.

Fly, Giant.

Big horrible flies, probably hairy and smelly. Can bite you and jump away (you can't strike back) if they have Initiative. Hit them with a torch to burn off their wings.

Horseflies suck your blood/fluids at a frightening rate. Bluebottles are attracted to sweet things, blood and open wounds. 

Shrink the bluebottle to about the same size as the Firefriend (S 1' long) or Webbird, and run it as a swarm monster, possibly one that lays eggs in your open wounds and backpacks, infesting both with maggots.

Foo Creatures.

Intelligent giant dogs and lions that oppose Lawful Evil.

Forester's Bane (Snapper-Saw).

Environmental hazard/ location monster, which will have grown back if you return this way within 2-8 weeks.

I'm guessing that it eats the meat it kills, because its berries are described as 'large, plump, and delicious, being very nutritious and rich in protein'.

Formian (Centaur-ant).

I've mentioned previously that apart from Bees I don't have much time for hive/insect monsters.

That Formians have a minimum Strength of 22 is quite interesting, and I suppose so is that they received an upgrade to Lawful Neutral monster exemplars in later editions.

Froghemoth.

'Huge and weird'.

It gets a page and I think it's worth it. Use this instead of a Dragon or Watcher in the Water. It has a Gamma World and a Call of Cthulhu vibe to it - I like it's peri/telescopic eyes and nostrils.

This is the kind of monster I'd like to put at the centre of an adventure location, but not be integral to the quest (if there is one) - it's a threat to everything in the area and it's not going anywhere, so the weaker denizens learn to live with it and get around it. The kind of level-inappropriate monster you encourage another monster to fight, rather than take on yourself.

Onward to G...