Green Hag

Don't go into the woods after dark.

Make offerings at the temples of the travel gods, hold onto your talismans, wear your shirt inside out and carry a hazel stick.

Don't got into the woods after dark.

Do not acknowledge cute little old ladies, beautiful women or lost children. Do not heed the weeping in the trees, or the laughter, or the cries for help. Do not follow the swaying of lanterns in the darkness. If your friend left the path, they are gone. That is not their voice you hear.

But most of all don't go into the woods after dark.

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Goblin

By many, goblins are considered less a race of small humanoid creatures and more a universal constant or a force of nature. Noisy, smelly, and worryingly numerous, they are a constant nuisance to any and all around them (though never catastrophically so). With nests across the multiverse, they have been likened to the common cold - in that what they lack in raw destructive power they easily make up for in hardiness and resilience to extermination (much to the chagrin of the more "cultured" civilisations who they revel in bothering).

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I think my favourite goblins are Magic: the Gathering goblins, mainly due to the extent of their ineptitude (there's a running gag where goblin cards will do... like the opposite thing they ought to do - see Goblin Diplomats) and also their propensity for infighting and (*cough*) self-sacrifice. Plus, they're one of those creature types where you can easily flood the board with them, and my inner timmy lights up at the thought of swinging for lethal with 10,000+ goblins as facilitated by someone like Krenko.

Anyway! These goblins are inspired by Blanca's old 3d designs for goblins, which are slightly puggy, but also by the miniblin enemies from Wind Waker. I guess with the knobbly bits on their heads you might mistake them for some lesser devil or other, but from a folkloric perspective I think goblins/imps/bugbears/devils are all cut from kind of the same cloth, so I don't really mind.

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Yuan-Ti Mageslayer

Yuan-ti hate hate hate hate hate anyone who isn't a yuan-ti. Especially any other creature who have the disgusting physical defect of not having scales. These Scaleless Ones are becoming increasingly troubling, what with their insistence on learning magic. This has forced that hands of yuan-ti lords, making them train elite groups of mages which expand on the race's natural spellcasting capabilities. Thus were created the mageslayers.


While the mageslayer has a couple of offensive spells (namely fireball, burning hands and acid splash), most of it's magic is geared towards espionage and quick, deadly takedowns. Yuan-ti favour sneak attacks over anything that calls attention to themselves. Take out the enemy slowly, one by one. If this is impossible, retreat. So the yuan-ti mageslayer will disguise itself, either as a disgusting Scaleless One, a pitiful but graceful small viper, or simply condescend to blend into their surroundings. Disenchant enemy weapons and block the abilities of any spellcasters. Lure them down wrong paths with invisible hands. And when the last intruder is left alive, grab him, and teleport away with your soon-to-be precious sacrifice.


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Firenewt

 

Firenewts are relatives to lizardfolk, but their environment and behaviour is different enough for them to be confused with salamanders. Unlike lizardfolk, firenewts thrive in environments of extreme heat, with some tribes even living near or in active volcanos. Oftentimes, a creature so comfortable with fire would be a native of the Plane of Fire, but firenewts are completely native to the Material Plane.

Firenewts are extremely aggressive to both other firenewts and non-humanoid races. If a warband of these creatures is spotted, it's a sure thing that they're participating in a raid, possibly to smash the eggs of another firenewt tribe. They're also a highly religious people, with the most important members of society often being clerics in service to evil fire gods.

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Yurian

Yurians are a species of man-sized intelligent crustaceans that move about precariously atop a pair of spindly insectile legs. Found mostly in coastal caves, they are a simple folk, primitive hunter-gatherers who subsist on fish-flesh.

Although the craftsmanship (craftscrabship?) of the common Yurian is meagre, they are known to hoard the seabound detritus they find - driftwood, scraps of gemstone and metal - and fashion small trinkets from them that, despite their simplicity and fragility, are quite beautiful. Yurian caves can be strikingly pretty dwellings.

Hey! So it's been a little while again... a gap mostly to do with house-moving and a pretty harsh art block kinda thing. Anyway, hope an adorable crab-man goes some ways towards an apology. How can you stay mad at those eyes!!!?

Rhek

The rhek are a race of rhino-men who help maintain order in the plane of the Peaceable Kingdoms of Arcadia. They're one of the races that make up the Harmonium, a militant sect that enforces lawful goodness through violence. Seems a bit of a contradiction, but that's what paladins do, really. The Harmonium seeks to create a dictatorship of goodness, where those who adhere to their ideals are guaranteed peaceful, prosperous lives. It's supposed to be of those philosophical questions about order and goodness at the cost of freedom. Can we truly call ourselves good if we don't have the option to be evil? At what point does governing and eforcing cross over into tyranny?

Honestly, the idea of the Harmonium (who also served as the police force in the inter-dimensional city of Sigil) is a bit more interesting that the rhek themselves. Though you can see how they would make good enforcers of the law, since they have abilities that let them detect and smite chaotic creatures. They also seem to share one trait with the krogan from the Mass Effect games: redundant organs. This translates into rhek basically continuing to fight until they are stone dead.

Bheur Hag

The bheur hag is a relative of the marzanna, another evil winter witch. At first the bheur seems the less physically imposing of the two, a little old lady leaning on a stick. Then it turns out that she's considerably more dangerous.

One illustration can't show the full scope of the bheur hag's dangerousness. For one, they can fly and are content to pelt their enemies from above with snow and ice. One of the spells she can cast whenever she pleases is Snilloc's snowball swarm (it's pretty much what you think it is). Her staff is the focus of her magical power, but she's not helpless without it, just magically weakened. If the hag decides that she must enter physical combat, she makes herself double in size. And when she defeats a victim, the bheur strips the flesh away from the bones so quickly that any unlucky observers and literally stuck blind with horror.

And I do mean literally. It's a Will save where if you fail you're either permanently blind or go insane for 2d6 days on a 75-25 chance ratio. Don't look at her when she's eating, is what I'm saying.

The bheur hag is another creature I've come across in some of my reading. In Otta Swire's Skye, the Island and its Legends she appears as the winter goddess/spirit Cailleach Bheur, partially responsible for the creation of the Cuillin Hills. She appears in some other Scottish and Irish folklore, but the Skye one's the only one I've read in a book. Like the aforementioned marzanna, she also has a little bit of a ritual attached to her. But instead of being destroyed in effigy, whoever is last to bring in the harvest has to house a Cailleach effigy for a year.

Minotaur

Minotaurs are brutish anthropobovine creatures who normally live in small tribal settlements on fertile grassland. They are nomadic and naturally violent, although they lack the technological advancement to be a real threat to any but those who wander foolishly into their territory.

Minotaurs are famously popular as guards, henchmen and general muscle for the discerning Evil Guy on a budget. They are easily found, easily dominated or merely impressed by magic, and serve as a cheap but impressive display of power capable of intimidating most people you are likely to want to intimidate. Look past the quick temper and weakness for brightly-coloured fabrics and you have yourself a reliable minion.

Muckdweller

Muckdwellers are a race of very small reptilian humanoids. Though of intelligence comparable to the average human, their comparatively stumpy and clumsy forelimbs mean that they're unable to wield weapons or indeed construct anything more than simple, crude items which will inevitably come apart. Because of this, muckdwellers live on the outskirts of larger, more complex reptilian societies, such as lizardfolk and kuo toa. They essentially become glorified waste disposers and pest controllers.

Because of a their small size (the largest ones are seldom longer than 2 feet), they are not a great physical threat to the most basic commoner. Indeed, the occasional missing small farm-beast or shiny object is the greatest harm that the ordinary muckdweller can do to a person without resorting to swarm tactics.

Not much more to say about this creature, really. It's fairly basic, essentially a very weak Tiny sized lizardfolk. But the description of them said they looked a bit like Gila monsters, which led me to discover that they have bumpy skulls. Neato.

Bluespawn Godslayer

The blasphemous children of the dark goddess Tiamat are more in number and form than man can count. The true chromatic dragons (Red, Blue, White, Green and Black) make up only a portion of their ranks - the rest are lesser monsters, dwarf hybrids of creatures horribly twisted by Tiamat's unholy power.

The godslayers are some of the most feared of these. Mutated from the stock of blue dragons into hideous bipeds, they dedicate their lives to the slaughter of Tiamat's enemies. Godslayers take a barbaric delight in the use of melee weapons, which become charged with electricity by their innate draconic energies. Typically godslayers guard the lairs of venerable blue dragons, but are sometimes encountered abroad, roaming for good metallic dragons to torture and kill.

I tried out a more stark shading on this one, because I couldn't get anything more subtle to look right. It's not something I do too much if I can because it feels like a bit of a cop-out but there are some animations I love like Redline that make it work really nicely.

I tried to really push the "mutant" angle here, which is the one element that I like about dragonspawn - mostly they feel kind of mary-sueish (it's part dragon, part spider, part rhinoceros! super strong, no weaknesses! original character, do not steal!) and also they quite often look a bit silly. So I thought, well, the influence of an evil deity like Tiamat isn't going to produce some perfect man-dragon specimen - it's going to be this weird hybrid creature, something like the pasty human-alien thing in Alien: Resurrection, albeit insanely strong and tough. So I've given the guy two heads (two and a half if you count the little half-formed head poking out in the top right) and a little vestigial wing that isn't going to be flying anyone anywhere.

Alert readers will note that bluespawn godslayers do not, in fact, have a breath weapon but I thought the fire looked cool in the composition. And yay, we're back to no backgrounds again! Lazy art is best art.

- Joe

Yuan-ti Abomination

The Yuan-ti are an ancient bloodline of sorcerers who long ago traded their humanity for hideous power, becoming in the process horrifying, serpentine monsters. Almost the epitome of self-serving evil, Yuan-ti are to be feared without exception.

As a crossbreed between reptiles and men, Yuan-ti come in varying degrees of monstrousness. The most human-like, those called Purebloods, are in actuality the weakest, diluting their magical power for a more human appearance. At the other end of the spectrum sit those called Abominations, who often resemble little more than a giant snake with a twisted human torso and two muscled arms.

This one took me quite a few goes to get right, and I'm still not 100% happy with it. I started off with something maybe a little more realistic, but it looked a little too "anthro" in a way I really don't like - when characters have almost completely human bodies with a completely animalian head abruptly placed on top. Human anatomy and animal anatomy (particularly with snakes and lizards!) are so crazily different it feels lazy to just smash them together, so I tried to make it a bit weirder than that.

Also the idea of horns that are actually snakes was cool to me so I put that in there too.

The description of Abominations in the 3.5 MM is that of a large snake with "burly, humanoid arms". SOUND FAMILIAR??!?!?!?

- Joe

Tengu, Human-Headed

Aaaaaand here's the other kind of Tengu you can fight.

Many monsters have stats given for more powerful versions (to scale with the level of your PCs) - most of them are simple HD addition but for some the book gives a distinct second form, sometimes with new abilities. For the Tengu you can either face a CR1 Bird-Headed Tengu or a CR6 Human-Headed Tengu (both variations exist in Japanese folklore). Interestingly, the human-headed variety is much smaller, relying less on strength and more on craftiness and spells.

I love Tengu in mythology (particularly the red-faced interpretation). It's a commonly recurring motif in a lot of Japanese media, not least with KOF's Mr Karate and that one episode of Great Detective Conan where they go the the hot springs, both of which informed my picture. I find the traditional face very pleasing in a sculptural way.

Tengu, Crow-Headed

Beware of strange sounds on the misty mountains.

The tengu and the kenku both have the same mythological origin: the karasu tengu, or crow-headed tengu, mountain-dwelling, anthropomorphic bird swordsmen. Kenku is another acceptable term for tengu. It's a well-known creature of Japanse folklore, alongside kitsune, kappa and tanuki. It's said that the tengu would sometimes take on human pupils and teach them their own unorthodox fighting techniques. The tengu from Oriental Adventures is closest to its roots than the kenku, the latter essentiall being avian kobolds.

Tengu are nimble fighters, relying more on speed than strength. The setting may be Japan-inspired, but just because you teach samurai that doesn't mean you have to be obsessed with honor. Tengu use a combination of ambush techniques, illusions, intimidation and the buffeting of their wings to keep their opponent off balance. Despite this, they're not opposed to a good old fashioned duel.

I love doing creatures inspire by non-Western mythology because it really gives you an excuse to look up some new things. Japanese ukiyo-e and prints are absolutely beautiful and the fairy tales and folklore is really sweet. I've been on a pretty big fairy tale and folklore binge lately. This image of the tengu is partially inspired by this one, a painting by Katsushika Hokusai.

Ormyrr

The Ormyrr are, in many ways, a noble race; they have merely been dealt something of an ignoble genetic hand. Descended from slug-like creatures living in the silt deposits of rivers, they have nonetheless risen to form societies comparable in intelligence with those of humans, although the individuals are giant - averaging around 30 feet long in adulthood.

The chief failing among the Ormyrr is their utter dearth of any magical adeptitude. Whether by chance or intent, the Ormyrr are genetically incapable of producing mages or magic-sensitive offspring. In a colourful world of wizards and magical monsters this has bestowed the Ormyrr with a jealous fascination with all things magical - they hoard enchanted items for use as currency and commonly attack the owners of any they find. Some say the ultimate goal of the Ormyrr is to finally breed a sorcerer.

In an odd counterbalance to their jealousy the Ormyrr are fastidiously law-abiding creatures. Many have escaped death at their hands by appealing to their deep-seated sense of right and wrong.

Medusa

The Medusa is a classic creature (of Greek mythology if you don't know, and if you don't know a classic creature like a medusa from mythology what are you doing liking D&D anyway). Too often I feel that these monster women, which in the myths turn people to stone though an overwhelming mystical ugliness, get portrayed in too sexy a way too often. Like, just a scaly hot chick with snakes for hair that turns you to stone because her eyes are magic or something.

In D&D, their petrification powers do come from their eyes (called petrifying gaze), so I guess you get a free pass for that. But I tried to get the more monstrous aspect of the original Medusa across because having a monster that turns you to stone through sheer ugliness just strikes me as more interesting than magic eyes. That's horror stuff right there. You can't even sneak up and kill her in her sleep because her awful melted, pockmarked, scarred, malformed, sunken, twisted, scaly, oozing face is like right there, man.

And then I up and come with something mildly unsexy but otherwise just a silhouette. I did have something a bit uglier in my sketchbook, but I started doing some silhouettes which just looked nicer. That and if I rendered Medusa's true face at the height of my capabilities I may not have an audience anymore. I do this for your own safety, folks.

The MCM Expo was quite swell, despite me messing up on printing times and being unable to bring new stock. Still, it was nice and I sold out on some of my things and got to talk to some nice people and get a handful of new followers out of the deal. Special hello to the nice girl that recognized me from the internet (always an ego boost). I hope that the rush at the MLP booth wasn't too taxing and that you're enjoying the goofy hippogriff drawing.

GUEST WEEK: Nycter by Katie Tiedrich

Don't hurt me!

The Nycter are a race of small bat-men that live in close-knit communities in forest caves. They're a peaceful, flimsy bunch, preferring talk to fight. When cornered, they unleash a paralyzing shriek that gives them enough time to escape into the darkness. Their leaders are called Protectors of the Cave, Nycters with class levels in druid.

Despite their bat-like similarity, the Desmodu and the Nycter don't get along. The Nycter fear the Desmodu since they are much bigger and stronger, the way a human looks at a giant. The Desmodu view the smaller race as cowardly and unintelligent (though the Nycter still possesses average human intelligence). The Nycter retain more of their bat-like qualities, being able to fly and having very sensitive ears (to the point that sonic attacks are extra painful for them).

This is a race of creatures that can be used as a player race, should the DM approve. It sounds like quite a neat idea for some kinda subterranean adventure. A way to avoid the whole you have to be either a drow, druegar, svirfneblin or any of the classic human-like underground races.

Image brought to use by Katie Tiedrich of Awkward Zombie and Aikonia. Internet celebrity, wowzers!

GUEST WEEK: Manscorpion by Oliver Cuthbertson

There's a patrol out on the desert, as you can tell from the dust clouds rising from behind the dune. You ready your weapons, ready for combat. Whoever is on the other side rises over the crest of the sand. It's just a group of men with bows and spears, but as they spot you they dash forward and you see their whole bodies. Skittering legs, a plated body and a curling, sting-capped tail curling greedily towards you.

Another monster for a ya'll to use in your desert campaign.

Though there are scorpion men in 3.5, this little fella's from the Monstrous Manual from AD&D 2nd edition. The artist who did this, Oliver Cuthbertson is a bit of a veteran compared to me. Which is when things were a little bit more hardcore, I think. People today complain about the save-or-die mechanic in 3.5, but the further you go back, the deadlier the game. Manscorpion even come with a number of rounds for convulsions as you slowly succumb to their venom.

Anyway, nice black and white work. Kinda remeniscent of earlier D&D artwork, yes?

GUEST WEEK: Sahuagin by Chris Cox

The Sahuagin are yet another malevolent race (D&D has a lot of those), this time from deep, deep waters. These fellas are the natural enemies of aquatic elves, and other gentle creatures of the sea. They have bonds with sharks, both by being able to speak with them and by becoming excited by the smell of blood (and going into a rage if its their own blood). Their god is Sekolah, a giant devil shark.

Fortunately for surface dwellers and those who live further up in the ocean, Sahaugin are weak-eyed (especially in sunlight) and water dependant. Unfortunately for those people, they're also mutable creatures. Some sahaugin have an extra set of arms, while others have the appearance of the sea's more benign races. They're ruthless and xenophobic, and while their own society runs relatively smoothly, they believe in the eradication of other races.

Just be careful when you go fishing.

3D models this time! Boy, they's nicely lit. Brought to you by Chris Cox, who's fairly new to the game, but very excited about it.

Abeil (animated)

THIS S IS ANIMATED YOU SHOULD FOR RIZZLES CLICK THE PICTURE



Now that that's out of the way, this is an Abeil... vassal. A vassal is probably most accurate.

The Abeil are a race of tall, industrious bee-like humanoids. Their society is divided into three castes: vassals (the workers, in all different roles of society), soldiers and a queen. The worker is obviously the weakest of these three, but still possess a muscle-atrophying poison and the ability to create a buzz with their wings that leaves enemies into a sleepy stupor. Soldiers also have an amplified eardrum-rupturing version of this.

Like many insects, Abeils like to expand their territory, partially through economic means, which may or may not be good for any other surrounding cultures.

And now for my biological lecture for anybody who cares to read far enough down to this bit. I know why they seperated abeil society into worker-soldier-queen society: it makes for easy classification into who the commoners, the ones you fight and the one you diplomatize with are gonna be. Actual bee society is also quite interesting in that it's a worker-drone-queen society, where the all-female workers do all the work and defending of the hive. The stingless, all-male drones exist purely for the purpose of mating with the queen, usually of a different hive, since the queen stores all the genetic material necessary from previous drones for her 3-5 year lifespan.

The queen is also a really interesting thing. While the term 'queen' implies control, she's a slave to the hive. She literally spends her whole life laying eggs, and if she ever stops, the workers will raise a larva to become the new queen, which will kill the old one. Beekeepers usually imprison the queen in a certain section of the hive, so we can enjoy delicious, larva-free honey.

Also a little bit disappointed that abeils don't have a racial penalty to smoke-based attacks.

Gloom

The saying goes: "If you want someone dead, you hire a killer... if you want someone dead, you hire a Gloom".

Monstrous assassins of the highest caliber, Glooms silently do the bidding of whomever happens to command them. Never armed with more than a cruel dagger, these faceless creatures demonstrate cold-blooded murder with such a clarity of form that it could be called artful. Nothing is known of a Gloom's expected payment (they certainly have no use for gold, or trinkets, or power) but once the transaction is carried out the demise of the victim is certain.

Again, the more observant of our viewers will have noticed my conspicuous abscence from these pages for the last few weeks (to which a number of contributants could be named) but rest assured, I'll be trying my hardest again. This one was obviously a little rushed, but hopefully I'll be able to make more time in the future.

Glooms are from the Epic Level Handbook, which at first seems a little weird given that they don't have much in the way of lore or other bells and whistles - they're literally just an incredibly scary CR 25 creature armed with a knife and some rudimentary (for ELH monsters) special abilites. But (as with a lot of my favourites) it's their simplicity that makes them interesting. Where do they come from? Why do they do what they do? I imagine them as this forbidden "last resort" for when royals or high-level spellcasters who absolutely, positively, have to have someone dead. Like, the kind of deal you wouldn't want to admit to.