B/X Bestiary on DriveThruRPG

The Trilemma Compendium Bestiary for Basic/Export is now live on DriveThruRPG. (This is why I was fussing over treasure types, in case that wasn't obvious!)

Many thanks to Johnstone Metzger for his hard work in doing all these conversions, and for all the backers who made this thing possible in the first place.

There are 112 creatures in total, including crawling ghosts, catalyzing alien Nuss, void gulls, cursed spider-bears, and of course dire pelicans!

Check it out on DriveThruRPG. There's a pay-the-difference bundle options, so if you've picked up the compendium PDF already, you can get the bestiary at a significant discount.

B/X Loot vs. Danger

Continuing my investigations into B/X monster treasure, I wanted to understand how dangerous it is to get xp from different types of creatures. There are some well-known outliers - Dwarves have the high-density type G (which is unique to them), kobolds guard a pile of slag, and dragons have the chart-topping hoard "H". But where are goblins, ogres, minotaurs? Read on!

As a simple proxy for how tough a lair is to raid is, I used the creature's xp value, multiplied by the average number appearing in lair. For its lair gp value, I used the average treasure value of its treasure type.

With these numbers in hand, I have a fairly simple way to scatter the monsters across a graph of 'loot' vs. 'danger'.

Scatter plot of B/X monster lair danger vs. loot 

The graph mostly speaks for itself, but there are a few interesting critters.

One, kobolds are the absolute worst. They have substantially less treasure than normal rats! Kobolds carry type P, but this add insult to injury as you now have to go through their pockets to round out the miserable haul.

Moving up the left side of the cluster takes us on a tour of the easiest pickings - giant rats, halflings, carcass crawlers, bandits, dwarfs, troglodytes.

The right hand side of the cluster holds the creatures that make you work for slim pickings. Stirges, thouls, gargoyles, bugbears, ogres, and minotaurs. The minotaur is the toughest non-dragon creature on the graph, but it only has the same treasure as giant rats. That'll teach you to go looting in a prison!

Perhaps worst of all is the basilisk. If this chart is anything to go by, a nest of basilisks will leave you stone dead and dead broke.

Dragons are interesting because they all have type H. Red dragons are substantially tougher than black or (especially) white dragons, but they all have the same hoards.

B/X Treasure Types

As I put the finishing touches on Johnstone's stats for the B/X Trilemma Bestiary, I've been asking myself, "Does this creature have too much treasure? Too little?" Follow me down this rabbit hole!

Basic D&D's treasure types are more than a little quirky. They're easy enough to reference in play, but choosing among them is tricky. Is there any rhyme or reason to them?

My starting reference is Necrotic Gnome's excellent Old School Essentials wiki, which lists all 22 treasure types from B/X. Types A through O are "hoards", types P-T are individual coin purses, and U and V are group treasure. The wiki also helpfully lists their average payout values.

Throw a coin to your.. oh nevermind

While poking away at the treasure types, I got interested in weight. Some of the treasure types are made up of large numbers of low-value coins, while others are heavy on the gems. Low-density treasure is a special challenge:  shovelling, bagging and hauling hundreds of pounds of coins is noisy, takes time, and weighs the adventurers down.

Treasure density seemed a really good way to look at treasure types. My average treasure values are slightly different from Gnome's because I put in placeholder values for magical items. Rightly or wrongly, I used these values:

• Magical item, 50ct, 300gp
• Magical item (weapons, shield, or armor), 100ct, 300gp
• Magical item (not armaments), 20ct, 300gp
• Scrolls 1ct, 100gp
• Potions 10ct, 100gp

Here's what I found (click to expand):

B/X Treasure Type Avg. Value vs. Weight

Treasure type H, 'dragon hoard' is interesting because it's almost exactly the density of gold. There are gems and magical items, but there's also great mounds of low-value coins to balance it out. If you're choosy, you can probably take quite a lot of value of an H-type hoard without carrying much weight.

Among the hoards, treasure type I stands out for high-density, portable riches: just platinum, gems, and jewellery. Strangely, I can't find any monsters that have it as treasure!

Treasure type J, "kobold slag" so heavy for its value that it's barely worth taking.

Types L, N and O are outliers among the hoards because they're just a bunch of gems, potions and scrolls, respectively.

Individual treasures, P, Q, R, S, and T are just coins of varying value; they form an orderly line up toward type L (gems).

Group treasure type V (favored by bears, great cats and lizards for some reason) is the high-density good stuff. It's almost as valuable as hoard type C, but is nearly 100x more dense.

* * *

Okay, that's useful for comparing treasure types, but what's appropriate for a given monster? How hard does B/X make you work to get treasure from monsters? In the next post, I'll be looking at how much XP worth of monsters you have to defeat (in whatever way) to get that sweet, sweet loot.

Chariot of Worms

The weird, meandering tunnels found in dwarven mines stand in stark contrast to the orderly architecture of the masters. They weren't carved by masons, nor by water, but by void worms.

A mature void worm is 50' long, with a body made of nothingness. Where it lies, no rock exists. It inches forward slowly, occasionally intersecting. Once it has passed, there is undisturbed solid rock once more.

The appearance of a void worm often goes unnoticed. They're silent, and whatever they eat, they are uninterested in surface dwellers. They're heralded by nothing more than a circular opening appearing in a wall, enlarging to the full diameter of the worm, revealing an ever-shortening tunnel.

An hour or more later, when the worm crosses whatever room or corridor it blundered into, a similar breach opens on the far side.

At the tip of each tunnel is a seam of gold, which to the untrained eye appears to be a natural part of the rock. A thick, rich vein of pure gold! But alas, mining this kills the worm. The worm's nothing-body begins to rot immediately.

Crumbling, porous rock encroaches on all sides, replacing the smooth tunnel with crunching, delicate spurs of natural rock. In a few weeks, the void has closed completely.

The brave or foolhardy might run along its body, using it as a momentary glimpse into the surrounding rock, to other caverns or true seams of value, but the risk of being trapped is ever-present.

Wise miners let the worms pass.

The Four-Lamp Chariot

According to the Ricalu, it was the Jorn that first figured out the worms' dislike of moonlight. How, nobody knows, but a lamp stuffed with lune moths will halt them completely.

Four such lanterns, arranged as the corners of a tetrahedron three paces in height and held in a frame of iron, can imprison a worm completely. A grinding (but stable) tetrahedral 'room' results, with the void worm's gold seam meandering around the rock face as it seeks escape.

By judiciously dimming one of the lamps, the worm rebels and expands in that direction. The frame is dragged with it, slowly pushing the chamber through solid rock.

By this method, many secret spaces can be reached.

The Queen's Chariot and the City of Worms

Of course, a single worm will only take you so far. According to Titardinal, the Queen of the Jorn rode in a six-lamp chariot driven by four worms (one a juvenile). With all four pushing, it was so rapid it bore her retinue through the bones of the earth at a brisk jog!

But even this pales against Jorn legend. Supposedly, the ancient masters of the deep forged twelve mighty beacons, and enclosed so many worms into an icosohedral cavern so massive it held an entire city, bathed in flickering lune-light.

So potent and numerous were its worms that the masters of the city could relocate it at will, leaping from vault to vault overnight. Iron-clad Jorn would pour out of the ground and butcher any who refused tribute.

A Word to Sorcerers

However, not even the sages of the Lycaeum were able to conclusively determine if this underworld city really existed, let alone where to find it. Their program of chariot-experimentation under Bashkanal was a failure. Surface sorcerers have no maps, and no guides of the underworld, and many esteemed lives were lost in collisions with voids, earthblood, and worse before the remaining lune lamps were returned to their posts in the great brass dome.

The Nuss

The Nuss first appeared in the extraplanar wilderness adventure, Extent of Gamandes.

Hunger for the Form

Far off, in the void between worlds is a region of chaotic, vital energy. There is no matter there, but the ether is thick with a potentiality of form and movement.  The beings that dwell there, the Nuss, clamor for material existence.  

The essence of each Nuss expresses a different, unique form. They long to inhabit mortal flesh, "erupting" it into whatever form they have waited an eternity to express.

The Nuss look with contempt upon mortals that express only one stable form during their long lives, vainly resisting change. Worst of all is the mortal habit of producing near-identical offspring - an act of supreme selfishness!

If they had the chance, they would use the material realms more wisely. They want bodies, to share if they must, so they can show the selfish the blessed joy of eruption!

While most Nuss express random, distorted and frequently crippled shapes, a few are chosen for the sacred duty of converting mortal flesh to their joyous cause: the Harbingers of Nuss.

The Harbingers of Nuss

Harbingers are 8' tall abominations with trilateral symmetry (three wings, three legs, three arms), topped with an eye-encrusted mass.  Their blade-like wings beat constantly, emitting a constant, fluttering hum.

They move and fight with equal ease in any direction, though they are somewhat ungainly on the ground. They can fly at incredible speeds, however: faster than the eye can see, tearing the sky with a deafening noise.

Their hollow-tipped spears inject the essence of a Nussan form; anyone stabbed must resist with restorative magic or heroic fortitude, or begin 'erupting': taking the shape of the Nuss whose essence was injected. From the moment of injection, complete transformation can take as little as 6 days.

Harbingers are not interested in martial glory, only bringing forth new eruptions. They will retreat from stiff resistance and wait for a chance for an ambush, but they are determined: unworthy Harbingers are recycled.

Each Harbinger carries d6 doses of Nussan essence.

B/X D&D Stats

Armor Class: as +2 Chain
Hit Dice: 9*
Move: 90' (40')
Attacks: spear / kick
Damage: 1-8 / 1-6
No. Appearing: 1-2
Save As: Elf 7
Morale: 9
Treasure Type: Nil
Alignment: Chaotic
XP: 1600

The first target injured by the spear must save vs. Poison or be infected by Nussan essence.  If the saving throw is failed, a transformation starts immediately, completing over the next 6 hours.

Roll randomly to determine the limb and what it is transformed into:

Location:
1-head, 2-left arm, 3-right arm, 4-torso, 5-left leg, 6-right leg

Transformation:
1. Warty spheres
2. Tough, rope-like umbilicals
3. Tentacled mats
4. Branching worms, with many legs or none
5. Toothy, stud-like protrusions
6. Dozens of tiny, bead-like eyes

Unless it is removed by cure disease, wish, or similar spell, another transformation will occur each following day for a total of d6+1 transformations.

Dungeon World Stats

Intelligent, Devious, Cautious, Planar

Poisoned Spear (d10), Near

HP 10; 1 Armor

Instinct: to inject transforming essence

Land and strike suddenly

Weave and change directions

Leap into the heavens with a thunderclap

Void Gulls

Deprived of their home plane long ago, these alien gulls have adapted to the void that howls between realms. When found in the material plane, they are found in small patrol or scouting groups.

They are keenly interested in sorcerers and summoners of all types, and will abduct them opportunistically, hoping to extract magical secrets from them.

They move by 'glide-hopping' - bouncing up on their one leg, and flapping for a few feet before hopping once more. In combat, they seize prey with their rubbery fingers, and deliver axe-like blows with their bony, tripartite 'beaks'.

Gull 'nests' are ruled over by a void-bringer, a gull with considerable magical ability. The presence of a nest in the material plane is a dire sign.

EDIT: Void Gulls appear in the extraplanar wilderness adventure, The Extent of Gamandes.

B/X D&D Stats

Armor Class: as +1 Leather

Hit Dice: 4+1*

Move: 120' (40')

Attacks: claw/claw/beak

Damage: 1-4/1-4/1-10

No. Appearing: 1-8 (3-24)

Save As: Fighter 3

Morale: 8

Treasure Type: C + N

Alignment: Chaotic
XP: 200

If either claw attack hits, the gull has briefly seized its target and may strike with its beak.

A nest of 13 or more gulls will be ruled over by a void-bringer, with the abilities of a 6th level Magic-User.

Dungeon World Stats

Group, Intelligent, Organized, Planar

Beak hammer blow (d8+1); 9 HP; 1 Armor

Close

• Mob a solitary victim
• Flee to fight again another day
• Drag away a hostage
• Conduct a ritual to tear open reality and let in the void

Torchbearer Stats

Might: 3

Nature: 4 / Hacking, Seizing, Gliding

Conflict Dispositions

Kill: 4

Attack +1s, Hammer Beak

Maneuver +1D, Rubbery Wings

Drive Off: 4

Feint +1s, Grabbing Claws

Defense +1D Mad Hopping

Flee: 8

Attack +1s - Rubbery Wings

Maneuver +1D Rubbery Wings

Armor: Leather

Instinct: Abduct a wizard or elf