BEHOLD AND BE NOT AFRAID: The Mistaken Divinity Of The Beholder

 

The Eye from
The Baleful Gaze of Tabaldak's Geas
my 2025 Appendix N entry

This post by Gus L. over at All Dead Generations dovetails with a thought I had about a beholder kin which I used in my Appendix N Jam entry The Baleful Gaze of Tabaldak's Geas

The Secret of Bone Hill Is The Spectator

The Spectator is one monster I really like from L1:The Secret of Bone Hill. I imagine it's one of the first published "kin" of the beholder. It can be summoned by a magic-user using monster summoning V (~14th level magic-user to cast) and 3 small eyes from a beholder.

Stats-wise, it's HD 4+4, AC 15, and guards a magic item or something of at least 15,000gp in value. It has a few notable abilities as one might expect:

• Magic resistance of 5% (1:20) to all spells cast at it
• Its central eye can reflect 1 spell cast at it back to the caster
• Its four smaller eyes can cast: cause serious wounds (2d8+3), paralyzing ray (5d4 rounds), telepathy (implant suggestion), and create food & water.

Mana From (Approximately) Heaven For The (Hijacked) Masses

Create food & water really got my gears turning because why would some extraplanar monster need that spell? Sure, we could argue that a guardian being would pack in their own meals, but meh the hobby generally has allowed demons not to have to eat unless they want to. And how does create food & water align with this creature's main mission of guarding magic items?

What if this mini eye of terror is using create food & water to lure other dungeon creatures into protecting it- a sorta dungeon mutualism. Like ants that farm aphids. This allows the eye to extend its reach and power in a given location when it can't leave the thing it is guarding. 

This is why the orcs in the dungeon have a burning eye on their shields. Not because of some dark lord; they've just found god. And god is on the 4th level.

When this effect is combined with telepathy and paralyzing ray, or as an alternative fear, this mimics the "DO NOT FEAR ME!" feel of biblical angels. And now you have a reason for a dungeon faction- a cult of the eye.

But how large could this cult get? My preferred D&D, BX, separates the spells into create food and create water, but uses the exact same text. So let's calculate how many "normal humans" this spell can support. The text says:

Volume: Food sufficient for twelve humans and twelve mounts for one day is conjured.

If a standard mount is a horse, they require 6 times as much food as a single human (according to internet searches), so 1 horse equals 6 humans. So, 12 + (12 x 6) is ~84 humans- a true lair's worth!

Example

Thank goodness for the words of Sister Mary, the only blue-eyed one among us (a favored sign she says), who began writing the angel's rules down in a book she found once it started speaking to her heart directly. Take only the food and nothing more!- it directs.

And so each day the procession begins at noon. Two open the door. Mary announces our presence. Take only the food and nothing more! We respond in kind. Then four of us shuffle forward on hands and knees to retrieve the shields laden with sweet meats, fruits from divine gardens, and crystal goblets of water more crisp than any wine.

This is how we've escaped the horrible strife between the Wolf and the Hound? It was Mary who led us to the sorcerer's tower where she worked as a child, but no one has seen the wizard since before the war. Many say the holy eye drove him out, unable to stand the gaze of the divine.

It was Mary who pushed beyond the foryer once food ran low and the sickness began. She found the inner sanctum that held the angel. Praise THE EYE! Proof the gods smile on us as long as they don't touch the flaming sword, it hovers above-- but no worries Sister Mary says the chosen one should be arriving soon...very soon...

OD&D: Opium, Dunsany & Dreamlands Part II

PURPOSE: As a sorta follow-up to my reskinning of Lair of the Lamb, I was encouraged to try reskinning OD&D monsters for various genre settings. Here are Levels 1 & 2. Below is for Level 3.

These were a little bit more difficult because four of the ten entries are essentially fighters & fighter+1 level and wizards & wizards+1 level. Also, the animals were just unexciting ones, but "giant"-- boo. But see what you think of them.

OD&D UNDERWORLD LEVEL 3

1. (undead) Wights 3 HD, AC 14, level drain, those killed rise as wights

2. (giant) Heroes 4 HD, AC 14, multi-attack (or cleave)

3. (vermin) Giant Hogs 2+2 HD, AC 13, bite, charge

4. (vermin) Giant Ants 2 HD, AC 12, bite

5. (vermin) Ochre Jelly 5 HD, AC 12, punch, split when hit

6. (humanoid) Thaumaturgists 3 HD, AC 10, dagger, spells 4/2/1

7. (humanoid) Swashbucklers 5+1 HD, AC 16, multi-attack (or cleave)

8. (humanoid) Magicians 3+1 HD, AC 10, dagger, spells 4/2/2

9. (vermin) Giant snakes 4 HD, AC 15, bite poison/constriction

10. (vermin) Giant weasels 3 HD, AC 14, war dance, bite

THE TWILIGHT REALMS: North of Sleep, South of the Setting Sun, LEVEL 3

1. MONKS OF GRIAULE✤: Once a great wizard was about to deliver a death blow to an even greater dragon, but the wizard’s certainty faltered for one heartbeat of a hummingbird result in the dragon being paralyzed but not dead. A town and cult grew on that immense dragon’s back and the serpentine will infuse into the populous. Now the cult pilgrimages to remote places, sealed in secret places, and patiently waits, heartbeat slowed to that of their immobile lord. Any intelligent being who walks within the radius of the monk begins a battle of wills– a loss mean consumption of native will and supplanting of Griaule’s.

2. THE FORGETFUL HEARTS: Black shields bearing a winged hourglass and black humors bearing lost souls. Stare too long and you see their eyes are really silver coins one places on the eyes of the dead. Popular theory is they are heroes killed on a quest of great importance and then forded the river Lethe to avoid the final resting place. However, that swim gave them life but cost them their memories of purpose but not their prowess. They often loiter at entrances to difficult areas of dungeons or ruins. Arms for hire if paid in the largest found gems. They would kill for one last wish or to find the deck of cards that controls fate itself.

3. CIRE’S SWINE: These great-dane-sized creatures have human eyes, human teeth, human malice, and an all too-familiar laugh. Run on all fours, but can easily manipulate thing with their front hand-like feet. No one knows if these are smart swine, transformed humans, or god-cursed creatures, but it is known they really hate those who weld magic. Good thing they are easily tempted by food…or fresh bodies.

4. RANCID TREASURE: In the Twilight Realms that which is unobserved can change and lost treasure is no different. Covered in the prints of many hands and many ambitions, lost treasure can spoil. Electrium and platinum coins become as beetles, gems as crustaceans, and jewelry sprouts growths or elongate like coral. The pile becomes a reef of wealth and defends itself like a hive.

5. CLAY OF THE GODS: Not all was cleaned up after the gods molded creation. Some of the clay used in creation was lost or discarded or forgotten about. That mass is formless as chaos, but shot through with hunger and only knows destruction. Cloven with a sword, the clay merely splits into two, reforming, and resuming its activities. However, clerics have been known to exert their will as devotees of gods on the clay, giving it just a tiny spark of mortality, and there are even stories of said clay becoming a fully formed being under the watchful eye of a cleric (Clerics can turn CLAY OF THE as undead of 2 HD higher than its present state; with tutelage, the CLAY can become a hireling or classed PC (cleric or fighter) but never a level higher than the HD it was turned at).

6. DISCIPLES OF SPUN FATE: These are priests of the spiders of Leng who claim to read the  fate of all in the Dreamlands. If that is true or not is hard to tell in the lands beyond sleep. Equally hard to verify is the impact of their zealots who go unobserved in the daily happenings and often evoked to explain mysterious misfortune. These individuals often are looking to influence by any means those with potential (high CHA) into serving their eight-legged masters, but often the exact end is unclear. For those who cooperate, great fortune awaits but with a gnawing uncertainty, their is an element that is undiscussed. Spells: (1) Darkness, Hold Portal, Spider Climb, Sleep (2) Invisibility, Web (3) Rope Trick

7. FURIES FROM ZAIS: A legion of half-sisters sowing sorrow for a grievance unnamed. Thier love for each other is unbreakable despite roving far from the city walls of Zais. Each is connected to the others by dreams and portents that glide through the Dreamlands as birds and moths. They are honest sell-swords and sought for their martial prowess, but they will not betray or harm each other. They are said to worship the 13 true sphinxes of the Dreamlands.

8. THE DREAMING MAGE: A singular figure draped in voluminous red & gold robes the color of a setting sun. Eyes are always closed yet this simi-translucent mage reacts as if they see all. Those who have survived encounters with this apparition claim attempting conversation seems to lead to disastrous ends. The mage appears to be distracted, distant and infers the worst from any suggestion. Yet, those same survivors report friends being lured away by the mage's needs never returning. Spells: (1) Charm Person, Magic Missle, Light, Hold Portal (2) Mirror Image, Wizard Lock, (3) Lightning Bolt, Monster Summoning I

9. WYRMS: Not quite serpent and not quite eel, these beasts are born from fabrique eggs, lost crown jewels, or the heads of dead wizards. They are long with scales of white quartz-hues, 3 or more pairs of short leopard-like legs, and typically have a venomous bite, breath a foul cloud, vomit lightning, or petrify with an opalescent weeping 3rd eye.

10. TARTARIAN HOUNDS: Old fireplaces, chimneys, cooking areas, and funeral pyres are all birth places of these creatures– a mix of ash and shadow given hound-like form; if a hound had a triple jaw, front legs as a lion, and a body that disappears into a fluttering banner of smoke. They track by heat but combust on contact with fire.

✤: Idea completely take from the very excellent book The Dragon Griaule which is a collection of short stories about the the town on back of the paralyzed dragon. The writing is beautiful and the idea is of course fantastic!

CRUEL INTENTIONS: The motivations for fae cruelty

Arthur Rackham

A small but good bit I have moved over from Twitter. This is why we should always blog our ideas first THEN put them on social media so we don't have to double post. 

Why are they “cruel" at least by human terms?

First: They can’t create life and so are loathe to destroy it. But certainly will substitute, modify, & transmogrify that life hence all the baby swaps. trades, and turning men into ravens & pigs.

Second: Fae will never let you die (see above). but they also hate the gods and adore worship. So, tricking a bunch of folks into servitude and maintaining that servitude through immortality is the next best thing. But they hate this too because they know it's not true love from humans as the gods know it.

Third: They always take you at your word no matter how sound your mind or body is/isn’t; related- “sound” to fae is roughly “intact”; you and a fox both have equal sound minds & bodies; undead don’t & they don’t make deal with the undead.