Illustration by Jon Hodgson

The Unluckiest Owlbear

Monday, February 22, 2009

I'm not sure when it happened, but at some point along the way, the owlbear kind of ended up being the official Kingmaker mascot. Sure, the PCs will be facing evil fey, lizard and frog men, undead monstrosities, bandits, trolls, giants, dragons, and worse during this Adventure Path, but they'll also be facing a lot of owlbears. Some of which are really rather memorable.

Anyway, once we realized how owlbear-riffic this Adventure Path was going to be, we decided to open each one of Kingmaker's forewords with illustrations of the life and death (mostly death) of the River Kingdoms' unluckiest owlbear. There he is in the illustration above, wandering through the primeval woodlands of the Stolen Lands without a care in the world. I'm not going to name him, because that would just make the next five months of what happens to the poor guy depressing.

For now, though, he's at home in his element, with no idea of the pain and humiliation to come. What has cruel, cruel fate got in store for this poor, innocent owlbear? Tune in to this blog next month to find out!

James Jacobs
Creative Director