Chaos titans are powerful beings from other worlds or dimensions who derive pleasure and nourishment from strife and conflict. They are not gods. Thus, they cannot shape reality in the way that a true god has authority over a domain such as light, or love, or death. Nor do they exist outside the bounds or rules of the material universe. However, in most cases, practically speaking, they are immortal and invulnerable.

It is possible to destroy them, but the correct rituals to do so are difficult to obtain and may even have been truly lost. It is easier to banish or imprison them, but even such limited tasks are the work of a legendary hero. It is unknown whether chaos titans were created by mad gods, ancient sorcerers, or are birthed naturally from maelstroms of chaos.

Chaos titans can grant powers to mortal servants in the manner of divinities. They favor powers of destruction and awe. They are often the patron of rebels, and may pretend to be gods unconnected to chaos. They communicate only telepathically, at a range of several thousand feet. Thus, they often reside in caverns deep below populated areas, where they can cultivate followers, though they have also been known to hide in storm clouds, volcanoes, or powerful rivers. They enjoy causing natural disasters periodically.

The physical presence of a chaos titan may mutate creatures nearby, though this radius will vary from titan to titan and can be controlled to some degree. Chaos titans dislike any kind of stability, and are likely to betray followers if they feel like their power is being used in the service of order. They will also use their followers to undermine any other source of law. They have little sense of time of consciousness, and thus little ability to plan; they exist mostly in the moment.

When in physical form, chaos titans often appear as giant chitin-plated humanoids, 50 feet or more in height, but may take any form that pleases them of approximately the same size. Metamorphosis between forms takes one turn, and is terrifying to behold. Anyone witnessing such a transformation must succeed on a morale check or flee (this does not apply to PCs, but does apply to all retainers and NPCs).

AC as plate, HD 20, # attacks 2, damage 3d6, immune to non-magical damage, movement 24 (levitation). They may cast the following spells at will: ESP, confusion, invisibility, levitate, pyrotechnics, lightning bolt, transmute rock to mud, part water, all cure spells. They can also grant these spells to followers of the appropriate level that are within telepathy range. Individual titans may also have access to other spells; this list is merely a suggestion.

If defeated in combat without the proper destruction ritual being performed, the chaos titan will reform in 1d4 weeks, often growing in a surviving follower or nearby beast.

Image from Wikipedia

The players in my current campaign are deep in the crypts of Death Frost Doom. They have woken the dead, and spurned the friendship of one creature that might have been able to help them. I’ve heard the players talk about wading into the undead horde and attempting to cut their way to the surface, so I decided I needed to know how I would handle that in game mechanical terms. The basic idea that I settled on is to treat the entire horde as a single creature with a huge number of HP and a variable number of attacks depending on the disposition of the undead horde front lines.

Assuming Moldvay stats for zombies, the horde will have 2 HD (9 HP on average) times the number of undead in total. The undead are shoulder to shoulder, approximately 2.5 per five feet of front (round up). So if a horde was surging up a corridor 10 feet wide, the front would be 5 zombies wide. Putting down an HP total of zombies equal to the front line of undead will push back the horde five feet and create terrain difficult for PCs (movement rate is halved), though the terrain is not considered difficult for the horde. The horde will advance 15 feet per round.

The horde will surge as one toward any source of life and flesh. Due to the close nature of the horde, it will take extra damage from area attack or grenade-like weapons, as they are more likely to catch more undead within their blast radius. The horde should be considered to automatically fail any saving throw associated with such an attack, and any damage is doubled. Examples of such attacks are flaming oil, explosives, and fireballs. The confined zombie horde should only be treated like a single monster while it is confined; if it breaks out into the open for whatever reason, encounters should again be run as with individual undead.

Horde attacks:

• The horde front line gets six attacks against any adventurer foolhardy enough to engage in melee. This number of attacks increases as the horde advances around the character. For example, 10 attacks if the throng advances five feet, 16 once the character is surrounded.
• Surge and trample: if at least two front line attacks hit, the enemy is knocked prone and pulled under the horde. On the next turn the monsters will advance over the character as if the area was unoccupied, and the horde will make nine attacks against the overwhelmed target. These attacks are in addition to the standard attacks made by the horde front lines against any other targets.
• Jumper: once per round, optionally, 1d4 zombies (adjust for situational logic) from the rear ranks will clamber over the shoulders of the front lines and fling themselves at any living creature nearby. Range is 20 feet, and if the attack hits it will do double damage.
• Any PCs overcome and reduced to 0 HP by the horde will be torn apart and eaten, and thus the PC corpse will not be recoverable.

Holding a line against the horde is difficult to impossible, as the undead will just sacrifice their front line in order to overcome the defense (for example, zombies will impale themselves on set spears, probably disarming and spear wielders in the process). Make sure to deduct HP from the horde whenever individual undead detach themselves in addition to when the horde itself is damaged.

The Death Frost Doom horde (at least the part underground) is 9885.5 HD, or 44,484 HP (assuming the average of 4.5 HP per die). I was nice and rounded down.

What do you think, is this horrific enough to represent a zombie multitude?

Image from Wikipedia

Any advance movement by the horde is considered to be shifting (that is, it does not provoke opportunity attacks). Forced movement that would move the horde away from characters is ineffective (the mass of undead behind preventing any reversal), though at the referee’s discretion such forced movement may decrease the number of horde attacks during the next turn as the “fleeing” undead will act as an obstacle to other zombies. Single zombies may be pulled away from the horde as normal and should then be treated like individual creatures again until they rejoin the horde (which should be considered to happen automatically if the horde advances).

Characters enveloped by the horde are considered prone and restrained (and grant combat advantage to the horde). Zombies may also target any defense (AC, fortitude, reflex, or will) when attacking characters that have been overcome, and will generally target the most vulnerable defense. Normal attacks are +5 versus AC, and the horde defense are AC 17, fortitude 20, reflex 10, and will 15.

I consider each hit die to be worth 10-15 HP in Fourth Edition, so total horde HP is 98,855.

HD 3-18+, AC as plate, 3 attacks or breath, move 90′, fly 240′, morale 9, # 1

A dragon’s age and power are reflected by hit dice. To determine dragon hit dice randomly, roll 3d6. If the result is all sixes, roll another d6, adding the result to the previous total. Continue this procedure as long as sixes are rolled.

Hit dice also determines the damage inflicted by a dragon’s fiery breath. For example, a 12 hit die dragon will do 12 dice of damage to all in the area of effect (half damage if a save is made). Once a dragon has breathed fire, they must wait 1-3 rounds before they can breath again. Breath weapon damage dice, like standard hit dice, are always d8s. The breath weapon range is equal to the number of hit dice multiplied by 10 feet, and it spreads out like a cone (the dragon has approximate control over the cone width).

Dragons may either breath fire or make up to three physical attacks (these could be bites, claws, tail slams, or any other kind of attack that makes sense in the situation at hand). Each physical attack does one die of damage. The die used should be that closest to the total number of hit dice the dragon possesses. For example, an 8 hit die dragon does d8 damage per hit. A 9 hit die dragon would do either d8 or d10 damage per hit (decide beforehand, determine randomly, or alternate).

Dragons are huge, scaled, lizard-like, fire-breathing monsters of great cunning, greed, and intelligence. Their intelligence, however, is of an alien sort. Being almost entirely self-sufficient, they have little use for society or technology, and are unable to relate (other than superficially) with lesser beings regarding these matters. They seek only treasure, ever growing domain, and occasionally worship. Unlike most creatures, age only adds to a dragon’s power. Surviving wyrmlings become ever more dangerous.

The youngest dragons are pony-sized, and generally grow until they reach the size of an elephant in body (though their length from nose to tail and wing span will be much greater). Though there seems to be no absolute limit on dragon size, the rate of their growth does slow significantly once they have reached that size. In color, their scales are inky black, earthy brown, mouldy green, rocky gray, or bloody crimson (or some combination thereof). Dragons enjoy eating any kind of meat, particularly living meat, though they do not require it for sustenance. A dragon deprived of meat for too long, however, will become surly.

Dragon reproduction is mysterious. They are thought to hatch from eggs, but have never been found in mated pairs and will rarely cooperate. They are by nature agents of chaos, and logic suggests that they would burn themselves out over time. However, this has not happened.

A dragon can be subdued by nonlethal damage. A subdued dragon will turn on their master if they perceive weakness, but will otherwise continue to serve as long as they are fed well and rewarded with treasure (a good rule of thumb would be about half of treasure accumulated). Dragons will also generally challenge their master when they have grown into another hit die, but this will sometimes take longer than their master’s lifespan. Such dragon lords often become petty tyrants, though their rule rarely lasts long due to the inherent instability of the relationship.

Source: Ljubljana Dragon

I think that in later versions of D&D, dragons have come to be somewhat deified. I don’t like this. I think that dragons should be fearsome and terrifying, but I don’t think you should need to be a demigod to challenge one. A young dragon should be something that could be run down by a fourth level fighter with a lance (given some luck), or even found on the first level of a dungeon.

In terms of style, there is a tension between the monstrous dragon and the sleek panther-like dragon. The sleek dragon has come to dominate fantasy art. The monstrous dragon tends to look more like it came from a fairy tale, and is often (though not always) fat. For examples, see the Holmes basic set dragon, the Rankin/Bass Smaug, the animated Flight of Dragons movie, or almost any painting of St. George and the dragon. For examples of the sleek dragon, see current D&D dragons and the work of Jeff Easley. I am interested in portraying a more mythic dragon, though still influenced by Tolkien’s Smaug. None of the gimmicky multicolored D&D chromatic dragons. My dragons all breath fire.

Regarding behavior, I want to emphasize that dragons do not live by the same rules as mortal races. I picture dragons as intelligent, but alien and prone to underestimating others.

Incidentally, I didn’t stick that bit in their about dragons not needing food for sustenance with any particular goal in mind; it just felt right given their embodiment of ever-growing power and danger. This, in concert with the growth of dragons due to increasing hit dice, might however explain why dragons sometimes get stuck underground. I’m not going to look that gift horse in the mouth. Maybe they even originate in the underworld and must reach the surface before they grow too big. Or maybe, like adventurers, they go underground in search of treasure, but sometimes outgrow their entrance.

In OD&D, total hit dice varied by dragon type, but age (and hit points per die) were determined by one d6 roll (1 being very young, 6 being very old). A similar procedure is used by the original Monster Manual, though a d8 is used instead. This is interesting, but odd. It means that given a 10 hit die dragon, there only exist dragons with hit point totals in a multiple of 10. I like the identification of age with hit dice, but rather than vary the HP per hit die (is that done with any other monster?), why not vary the number of hit dice for age? This also scales the attack bonus, which makes sense to me.

Traditionally, in both OD&D and B/X, breath weapon damage is non-random. It does automatic damage equal to the dragon’s remaining HP. I changed this because I like uncertainty, I like to roll dice, and I don’t like to expose monster health meters.

The rules for dragons take up an inordinate amount of space in pretty much all the editions I have looked at. Despite that, I still feel like my draft is a bit too wordy. Three paragraphs of rules and four of flavor. Any tips or suggestions are welcome (as always).

Christian wrote up a World of Darkness zombie inspired by AMC’s The Walking Dead (see Loviator #5). This is a B/X version. The basic idea is to make zombies more terrifying by using something like the save-or-die mechanic. In D&D, zombies are often just perceived as (slow) moving bags of HP and XP. They are only scary to the degree that they can overwhelm with numbers, and overwhelming with numbers is not very practical in D&D. Anyone who has tried to run a hoard of 40 or more monsters in D&D without some sort of simplification or handwaving should know this. This zombie is scary because it is a carrier. One bite, and you could be infected. This taps into a deep fear of contagion.

Walking dead are meant more as obstacles to avoid than as combattants to take out (though of course they can be taken out). As such, consider rewarding 0 XP for defeating walking dead in combat. Perhaps all monsters with powers such as deadly poison or level drain should actually award no combat XP? This is probably not necessary for players steeped in the old ways, but might be helpful for players coming from more recent games.

The walking dead are zombies that carry an undead plague of unknown origin. If hit by one of the walking dead, save vs. poison or be bitten. Characters bitten will become one of them in 2d6 hours. If one of the walking dead is reduced to 0 HP, it becomes immobile, but is still dangerous to anyone that comes within its reach (its reach will vary based on physical integrity). A head shot is required for actual destruction. Referees are encouraged to allow creative methods for head shots during combat.

Folkloric, mythical goblins are much more interesting than the “monster ecology” goblinkind that is standard in D&D. I think there is a lot to be gained from trying to access some aspect of the “bogeyman” tradition that originally led to the goblin, rather than the “evil stormtrooper” depiction that has become more common. However, when using goblins, there are a whole set of player assumptions that you have to deal with. If you say “you see 5 goblins”, that will produce a certain quantity of unavoidable meanings in your players’ heads that you probably wish were not there. The first step, I think, is to not mark them as goblins initially, and only later allow the players to identify them. But that still begs the question, what are a more fantastic form of goblinkind that would still work in the context of the game? I don’t think it works to say that they are “really scary” and leave it at that.

Well, who started this modern fantasy trope to begin with? Let’s go back to Tolkien and see what his example actually says, rather than the examples of his imitators. From Wikipedia, on Tolkien’s goblins:

In an essay on Elven languages, written in 1954, Tolkien gives meaning of “orc” as “evil spirit or bogey” and goes on to state that the origin of the Old English word is the Latin name Orcus — god of the underworld.

The article goes on to list 7 possible origins for goblinkind:

1. Made from the earth
2. East Elves (Avari)
3. Sentient beasts
4. Fallen Maiar
5. Corrupted Men
6. A mix of corrupted Elves and Men
7. Some cross-bred with Men

As is often the case, the banal cliches that have come down to us from the followers of Tolkien are not much connected to the actual ideas behind Middle-earth. None of these examples are close to “just some other race that evolved (or was created by a rival god) and came to be opposed to the PC races”. They all focus on the idea of falling from grace, or corruption.

So let’s say that a goblin is a human that has been corrupted by arcane forces, perhaps to be the slave of some wicked magic-user, or demon. Having a savage, id-like, but still clever, servant would be more than a little useful to such a patron. In addition to creation through dark rituals, perhaps there are locations that are sources of arcane pollution which cause nearby residents to slowly become goblins.

Note that this conception does not preclude a dark lord like Sauron from actually raising a horde of goblins, but it does ensure that they are not “just another race”.

And what happens when the corruptor dies before the goblin? Does the goblin slowly revert to his past self? Or does the goblin start to regain his past mind, but remain corrupted in body?

It is also possible that this would still allow for the use of goblins as a PC race to replace halflings, though it would have to be handled carefully to preserve the desired style.