Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Behir In Name Only

Ok, first: announcement: So James Raggi had me rewrite his classic Death Frost Doom module (the one I started my own campaign off with) to create a new deluxe version with more new stuff in it (and less old stuff) with Jez Gordon ilustrations. I feel good about it "…this feels like the essence of D&D crushed into diamond. Overworld and Underworld. Pure myth. "

It is currently available as part of the Bundle of Holding charity thing, where you can get this along with the Labyrinth Lord Advanced, and +Dyson Logos 's Dyson's Delves (awesome maps) and much more--all together for like 8 bucks or whatever. Only available for a week.

If you have any questions about what the differences between the old and new Death Frost Dooms feel free to ask in the comments--I definitely think the rewrite is worth getting even if you have the old one, as there's a lot of new content you can scrape fro other dungeons.
Ok, now on to the main course, continuing to vandalize the 5e monster manual.

Behirs. Behirs are basically crappy semidragons as if D&D needed more of those dating back to AD&D Monster Manual 2. However, the new 5e illustration is very cool and salamandery, and I did was black-in the shadow to make it look nice and slimy.

I completely, if lazily, overhauled this monster:
The behir is now a familiar-type monster maybe a foot and a half long.

"Behir" is a nice, pseudo-Arabic Jack Vance-style name--so I figured chaos wizards of the Dying Earth thousands of years into the future send Behirs back in time to whisper spells into the ears of sorcerers while they sleep.

The Chaos Wizards hope to place the right spells with the right wizards at the right time in order to carefully manipulate timelines so that futures where they rule come about.

Since these effects are subtle and have a butterfly-wing-theory-like effect on the future, practically speaking it seems like the wizard's just getting random spells each night. Which, in game terms, they are.

This very speedy revision of the Behir is based on two way better ideas you should read:

1. False Patrick's Shaman class-which chases spells in dreams using a cool mechanic which you can totally port over if a PC gets hold of a Behir.

2. Arnold Punch's idea about where faeries come from.
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11 comments:

Purgatus said...

Is the new version of death frost Doom going to be available in print?

Zak Sabbath said...

Definitely--it will probably be out around December 4th, same time as Red & Pleasant Land, so everybody can save on shipping costs by buying both at once.

Purgatus said...

Sounds like a plan. Thanks Zak. I'm really enjoying your material. I've incorporated your dragon cultist material into my home hoard of the Dragon queen campaign and am just generally loving your weird mind. Keep it up man.

Zak Sabbath said...

cool--i've heard of a few people using it for that

piles said...

Vornheim, Red & Pleasant Land, and now Death Frost Doom getting revised/reprinted. It is getting better and better!

The large (and also blue?) Behir was too close to the Blue Dragon with its breath weapon attack in my opinion and I really like your take. Making dragon-like monsters small definitely helps differentiating them. You also did that with the Basilisk. I totally like that approach.

Is your Behir retaining its lightning ray attack? If so, how about changing 'whispering spells' into 'directly planting spells into brains by electrostatic forces'? Heck, you could replace the ray attack by having it dealing electrostatic (brain?) damage as an area effect, similar to electric eels.

Zak Sabbath said...

i like whispering

but, yeah, it still has lightning

Pal said...

Awesome! Where can I find DFD revised only, without having to buy a bundle?

Zak Sabbath said...

You can get it at the LOTFP website Dec 4

piles said...

That is fine of course. I was trying to theme the monster around lightning/electricity.

Anyhow, whispering has something ... what's the word ... unheimlich?

Anonymous said...

Any chance of it being reprinted as a hardcover?

Also, what kinda changes/additions did ya make?

Zak Sabbath said...

It will be reprinted as a hardcover and available around Dec 4th.

I added in a lot of details, fleshed out the underlying mythology and connections, changed things in the original that James has grown to feel are too "typical D&D" and added in clues, mechanisms and tricks and rewrote and re-organized the prose so it'd easier to run.