Things I would like to see:
-Eye Tyrants. Beholders have always been my favourite creature from D&D (though my players have developed an allergic reaction to them, probably because they have always died when I've thrown one at them). No idea if it is possible to add Beholders using their other name, but I remember a supplement for 3.5 that was specifically about Eye Tyrants and wasn't published by Wizards.
-Inevitables. One cannot avoid having Inevitables, because, well, they are inevitable. Plus the concept behind them is great as adventure fodder ("So here it says you didn't die when you were supposed to... let me fix that. Don't look at me, I don't make the rules, only enforce them").
-Golems. I know bestiaries from here to Mongolia have included dozens of golems, but there is always room for one more. Sock Golem (deals electric damage when grappled by hairy characters), Used Diaper Golem (for all that is holy, don't cut it open), Vital Organ Golem (subject to critical hits *always*), et al.
-A variety of Genies and Genie-related creatures would be interesting to see.
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Does the Dance of JoyCorrect.
Not only are ju-ju zombies open content, thanks to the Tome of Horrors, the phrase "juju" is from real world African myth associated with fetishisim and witchcraft, so even if the Tome of Horrors didn't have the ju-ju zombie in it in open game format, we could probably STILL make a Juju zombie.
And I'm pretty sure we will indeed be putting the juju zombie into Bestiary 2, in any event. If only because it makes a perfect companion for the skeletal champion template as a "tougher zombie" variant.
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Actually, that would be quite cool. Weren't the Modrons kind of like this (look past the funky geometric shapes, mind you...).
Yes a bit, the modron were very lawful creature, but not frightening.
And they didn't have a hive mind.I thought of creatures more insect like, with mechanical part. Sort of hybrids between formian and Inevitable. And some creature "Ordered" by some weird power.
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Unusual clockwork creatures.
Combining clockwork creatures.
Clockwork creatures that have smaller clockwork creatures inside them.
Creatures that turn other beings into more creatures like themselves.
More Azatas and Archons. And some Agathions.
Low-level nuisance monsters.
More exotic humanoid player races.
High-level non-outsider monsters.
Creatures with multiple forms dependant on its lifecycle.
Related creatures that tie together as a symbiotic or hive group.
New oozes and slimes.
More body horror inducing parasites and monsters.
Symbiotic monsters that combine with other creatures to make new templated creatures.
At least some dark, scary, or horrifying looking good aligned creatures.
More monsters with parts that can be harvested for fun and profit.
Monsters that explode.
More "trap" monsters.
More truly alien beings like the living equation Moingos of Planescape.
MORE FEY!
Mariliths with chainsaw hands and lilends with rocket launchers.
The monsters revisited books are good enough I'd really like to see some more new monsters that can take the place of some old fan favourite properties. The staff has proven they're adept at distilling a monster down to its base elements brilliantly.
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Does the Dance of JoyCorrect.
Not only are ju-ju zombies open content, thanks to the Tome of Horrors, the phrase "juju" is from real world African myth associated with fetishisim and witchcraft, so even if the Tome of Horrors didn't have the ju-ju zombie in it in open game format, we could probably STILL make a Juju zombie.
And I'm pretty sure we will indeed be putting the juju zombie into Bestiary 2, in any event. If only because it makes a perfect companion for the skeletal champion template as a "tougher zombie" variant.
Actually, I was thinking more along these lines.
I'd really like to see some stats for the Kangaroo.
I've suddenly realised that this strange beast is missing from RPG games.
Unusual clockwork creatures.
Combining clockwork creatures.
Clockwork creatures that have smaller clockwork creatures inside them....
OK, but no Michael Bay-inspired fireballs.
Hmmm, Power Word: Kill... "Ba-weep-gra-na-weep-ninny-bong!"
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And I'm pretty sure we will indeed be putting the juju zombie into Bestiary 2, in any event. If only because it makes a perfect companion for the skeletal champion template as a "tougher zombie" variant.
So can we expect the juju zombie to be a template, like the juju zombie in Tome of Horrors and the Dread Zombie in Advanced Bestiary?
My memory of the "classic" juju zombie is pretty hazy (AD&D MM2?) but to me the coolest thing about them is their intelligence. Tome of Horrors, which tends to be pretty faithful to previous editions, gives them an Intelligence of 4, leading me to believe they weren't actually as smart as I remember them to be. Advanced Bestiary gives Dread Zombies the Intelligence of base creature -4 (minimum 0).
I'd like to enter a plea for juju zombies being of at least average intelligence. (I'd also prefer to lose the hyphen, but I'm pretty relaxed on that point.)
My memory of the "classic" juju zombie is pretty hazy (AD&D MM2?) but to me the coolest thing about them is their intelligence. Tome of Horrors, which tends to be pretty faithful to previous editions, gives them an Intelligence of 4, leading me to believe they weren't actually as smart as I remember them to be. Advanced Bestiary gives Dread Zombies the Intelligence of base creature -4 (minimum 0).
I'd like to enter a plea for juju zombies being of at least average intelligence. (I'd also prefer to lose the hyphen, but I'm pretty relaxed on that point.)
If it were more like your 'Serpent and the Rainbow' sort of zombie, I'd say a wisdom penalty to the base creature (and thus will penalty) might be more appropriate to the concept. Intelligence seems to stay intact, but they lose their will to resist the zombie master.
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First, excellent work on Bestiary I. Looking forward to Bestiary II.
Ideas for Bestiary III ...
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1) More "variants" beyond undead. I think this approach to monster design keeps things very interesting without having to create entirely new monsters.
2) Jermalaines are a favorite of mine, but I suspect Mites fill that gap now.
3) More oozes (& variants) would be great.
4) I am not a fan of more dragons for simply the sake of more dragons. Like the tarraesque, dragons fill a unique ecological niche and should remain rare & somewhat special.
5) More Chthulhu Mythos critters like the Shoggoth, especially those at lower tiers.
Ideas for other PDF products
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1) Summoner's "Field Guide" - This would be a PDF-only book that collects all of the summonable monsters stat-blocks & other "crunch". No illustrations required. This would be for players running summoners who would like to have more than the list available to them. It could be priced around between $5 & $10 dollars and I think you'd do pretty well.
2) Monster "Theme" Reference - One thing WotC got right, at least conceptually, with 3.5 (MM5) and 4E (MM1 & MM2) was the idea of monster "themes". Where they fell down IMO, was using those themes in a printed book and not a web enhancement (PDF). I think that is what previous posters mean when they give the thumbs-down to that approach in PFB II+. And, as James points out, the place to look for fully realized monster themes is in the extant modules & adventure paths. Need some killer gnolls for your campaign, there is an AP for that. (iPhone pun intended.)
So, the idea of this PDF would be an index which lists common monsters, mostly monstrous humanoids, that have class levels. An example might be ...
Gnolls
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CR8 - Desert Flame (Clc2/Src1) - PFS 50: No Rest for the Wicked, Pp. 21
CR12 - Packmaster (Rgr4/Drd4) - AP 44:Running with the Pack, Pp. 30
CR16 - Dread Fang (Rge10/Asn3) - PFM:Curse of the Riven Sky, Pp. 32
You get the idea. As a PDF only product, it could be updated quarterly, or even annually as new products are released. It could be included as a subscription "extra" but I know I would pay for something like this to aid me when writing.
That's it for the moment.
DD
Hey Doug - Not sure if you knew about d20pfsrd.com or not so I thought I'd let you know we are doing some of what you are asking.
1) Summoner's "Field Guide" - This would be a PDF-only book that collects all of the summonable monsters stat-blocks & other "crunch". No illustrations required. This would be for players running summoners who would like to have more than the list available to them. It could be priced around between $5 & $10 dollars and I think you'd do pretty well.
We have fully statted out blocks for either all (or pretty much all) summonable creatures. You can see one example here. You can see more by entering "summoned creature:" into the search field on d20pfsrd.com (or by clicking here).
2) Monster "Theme" Reference - One thing WotC got right, at least conceptually, with 3.5 (MM5) and 4E (MM1 & MM2) was the idea of monster "themes". Where they fell down IMO, was using those themes in a printed book and not a web enhancement (PDF). I think that is what previous posters mean when they give the thumbs-down to that approach in PFB II+. And, as James points out, the place to look for fully realized monster themes is in the extant modules & adventure paths. Need some killer gnolls for your campaign, there is an AP for that. (iPhone pun intended.)
These might not be exactly what you are looking for (but might be close). I started grouping similar themed monsters into "theme packs" on the site some time ago. Other matters came up and so it hasn't been touched in some time but you can kind of see what we were thinking. Right now there are two theme packs, "Land of the Lost" and "High Sea's Adventure". Obviously these would need updating but it might be along the lines of what you were thinking.
CR8 - Desert Flame (Clc2/Src1) - PFS 50: No Rest for the Wicked, Pp. 21
CR12 - Packmaster (Rgr4/Drd4) - AP 44:Running with the Pack, Pp. 30
CR16 - Dread Fang (Rge10/Asn3) - PFM:Curse of the Riven Sky, Pp. 32You get the idea. As a PDF only product, it could be updated quarterly, or even annually as new products are released. It could be included as a subscription "extra" but I know I would pay for something like this to aid me when writing.
We do have very many monsters and npc's converted from pre-pfrpg rules to pfrpg rules. You can look to see if what you are looking for has already been done here.
We have fully statted out blocks for either all (or pretty much all) summonable creatures.
And thanks for that excellent resource, jreyst. I was going through those last night to build a printable document to have at the table. I found that many of the links from the Summon Monster spell don't lead to the summonable version of the monster. Also, the summonable Horse entry seems to be just a template.
Those entries did save me quite a bit of time, though, so thanks again!
We have fully statted out blocks for either all (or pretty much all) summonable creatures.And thanks for that excellent resource, jreyst. I was going through those last night to build a printable document to have at the table. I found that many of the links from the Summon Monster spell don't lead to the summonable version of the monster. Also, the summonable Horse entry seems to be just a template.
Those entries did save me quite a bit of time, though, so thanks again!
No problem! By the way, if you come across problems or things you think might be problems, feel free to report them on the d20pfsrd.com messageboards. You can find links to them on the left side of all pages on the site.
I'll see about getting those summon monster links corrected too.
Oh also, in case you didn't notice it, all pages have a Print this Page link in the top left area of the page. That formats the page a little better for printing in case that helps you out.
Oh also, in case you didn't notice it, all pages have a Print this Page link in the top left area of the page. That formats the page a little better for printing in case that helps you out.
Thanks! Yeah, that's a nice feature, but I wanted to distill the statblocks down to fit several per page. I have all of the SM I creatures on one page (front and back). Nice and handy.
I would like to see the Nightshades: Nightcrawler, Nightwalker and Nightwing
I don't know if they are open content, but I really hope so.
Would Lemmy or Keith Richards be suitable as monsters? Sort of undead but not really.
I would like to see the Nightshades: Nightcrawler, Nightwalker and Nightwing
I don't know if they are open content, but I really hope so.
They are open content. d20pfsrd.com will have conversions up soon.
They are open content. d20pfsrd.com will have conversions up soon.I would like to see the Nightshades: Nightcrawler, Nightwalker and Nightwing
I don't know if they are open content, but I really hope so.
Thanks for the information. let's hope they show up in Bestiary II.
Thanks for the information. let's hope they show up in Bestiary II.
Since I think they were pretty popular <in that other rpg we used to play> I would suspect they will be in the Bestiary 2, but who knows? Until they are you can use the ones from d20pfsrd.com. They are not available yet as I am trying to get them checked for conversion accuracy before posting links etc. The first one mostly done is the Nightcrawler and assuming its good it should be up tonight sometime. The other two tomorrow sometime I would guess.
Creative Director
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Nightshades will be in the Bestiary II.
There'll also be a LOT of daemons in Bestiary II; these are the monsters that, in 2nd edition, got renamed to "yugoloth." The word "yugoloth" is not an open content word; WotC owns that word. But the word "daemon" is not, and furthermore, there are several daemons already in OGL sources like the Tome of Horrors and the Book of Fiends.
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Nightshades will be in the Bestiary II.
There'll also be a LOT of daemons in Bestiary II; these are the monsters that, in 2nd edition, got renamed to "yugoloth." The word "yugoloth" is not an open content word; WotC owns that word. But the word "daemon" is not, and furthermore, there are several daemons already in OGL sources like the Tome of Horrors and the Book of Fiends.
You just made my day James. Please let Todd write the fluff for daemons !
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Creative Director
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You just made my day James. Please let Todd write the fluff for daemons !Nightshades will be in the Bestiary II.
There'll also be a LOT of daemons in Bestiary II; these are the monsters that, in 2nd edition, got renamed to "yugoloth." The word "yugoloth" is not an open content word; WotC owns that word. But the word "daemon" is not, and furthermore, there are several daemons already in OGL sources like the Tome of Horrors and the Book of Fiends.
He kinda already did: See "The Great Beyond."
The flavor text in Bestiary II will be condensed, more or less, from the info there as appropriate.
Nightshades will be in the Bestiary II.
There'll also be a LOT of daemons in Bestiary II; these are the monsters that, in 2nd edition, got renamed to "yugoloth." The word "yugoloth" is not an open content word; WotC owns that word. But the word "daemon" is not, and furthermore, there are several daemons already in OGL sources like the Tome of Horrors and the Book of Fiends.
Nightshades don't get enough attention, I almost completely forgot about them, but they are fun to use as "boss" monsters for battling truly dark, evil darkness-undead type creatures (or as minions to something much more powerful). I am glad to see more Nightshades will make it into Bestiary 2.
And more daemons are fun. Seeing that these 2 will be in the book has made my day.
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What I'd love to see in monster abilities, in general, is toning down save-or-die abilities into secondary effects (for example, Sea Hag's 'Evil Eye' or Gorgon's breath) and abilities that "support" or "build on" each other (for example, how the APG witch can use 'Cackle' to as a move action prolong effects of her hexes).
No flumphs for you!
Also, I dont suppose that one day we will see more linnorms?Absolutely. Although not in Bestiary II.
I thought it was mentioned earlier by F. Wesley in this thread that there will be more linnorms? On the 1st page actually. One exception from my list was gone, I assumed it was Dragons (as in true dragons, with the age categories) but I didn't think no new dragons were in it.
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Creative Director
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I thought it was mentioned earlier by F. Wesley in this thread that there will be more linnorms? On the 1st page actually. One exception from my list was gone, I assumed it was Dragons (as in true dragons, with the age categories) but I didn't think no new dragons were in it.Also, I dont suppose that one day we will see more linnorms?Absolutely. Although not in Bestiary II.
There's SORT of gonna be more linnorms. SORT of. In an oblique, kinda hidden way. Not gonna say more yet...
Nightshades will be in the Bestiary II.
There'll also be a LOT of daemons in Bestiary II; these are the monsters that, in 2nd edition, got renamed to "yugoloth." The word "yugoloth" is not an open content word; WotC owns that word. But the word "daemon" is not, and furthermore, there are several daemons already in OGL sources like the Tome of Horrors and the Book of Fiends.
Thanks for the answer James. You just made my day :-)
I think a Construct template would be pretty awesome.
Golem dragons.
Robotic gibbering mouthers. :<
SO, what about those folklore fey?
Yes, good question, Kirth.
Like dryads and nymphs?
Yeah; the 1e MMII did a great job with things like quicklings and buckawn and korreds, which were new but weren't too far from their folklore roots. I'm just tired of the emo/I wear all black/S&M fey that seem to pop up all over -- oh, and the diminutive little flower ones (MMIV? MMV?) are pretty useless, too.
I want to see brownies and clurichaun and lupins and such!
I'd really like to see more creatures that have the whole synergy thing going.
I'm talking about, for example, what shocker lizards (Bestiary), legion devils (FCII), and scouring constructs (MMV) have - an ability that depends to some extent on how many allies they have.
The jovoc demon was a nasty little bugger too ... too bad they're not OGL, I really like 'em.
Also, personally, I'm a huge fan of templates - I'll never get enough of them. I use them all the time to create new creatures and improve the flavor of encountered creatures - it's cool to use a well known creature but give it a simple +1 template to make it something altogether different.
You know what else? I'd really like some of the stuff that's in the Pathfinder Chronicles subscription to be in the plain Pathfinder HC subscription. Like the Book of the Damned Vol. 1. Why is that in Pathfinder Chronicles? Will all the outer planes books be in Pathfinder Chronicles?
In the immortal words of one C. Brown: AAUGH! :)
There's SORT of gonna be more linnorms. SORT of. In an oblique, kinda hidden way. Not gonna say more yet...I thought it was mentioned earlier by F. Wesley in this thread that there will be more linnorms? On the 1st page actually. One exception from my list was gone, I assumed it was Dragons (as in true dragons, with the age categories) but I didn't think no new dragons were in it.Also, I dont suppose that one day we will see more linnorms?Absolutely. Although not in Bestiary II.
Now you've really piqued my interest LOL All the more reason to get that Bestiary II I guess
