Homebrew Monster Manual

After seeing today's entry on a homebrew D&D module, Chris sends us his own addenda to the Monster Manual, lavishly illustrated with youthful zest.

My Monster Manual (Thanks, Chris!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Dicrel Seijin

Seeing this makes me wish I had my earlier DnD stuff.

I am curious though as to what is on the reverse of this, or what bled through.

After reading the prior entry in conjunction with this, I am more inclined to submit my own ephemera for archive.
http://twitter.com/kaydiv Kalo Division

Chance of talking: 100%

Like it’s a status condition or something
- semiotix
  
  100% chance of talking, but only a 95% chance of being awake. That has some potential for roleplaying hilarity.
  
  DM: You stealthily enter the cavern. A two-tailed lion-dragon is curled up on a pile of golden coins. Its eyes closed, it mutters about how it hasn’t studied for this test all semester. As you approach, it demands to know why, if it is at school taking a test, it is clad only in its underwear.
http://twitter.com/JayStephens Jay Stephens

Yeah, I wish I had some of my paper stuff from the ages of 12-16. It doesn’t matter that 99% of my dungeon mastering and world building was derivative dross… the youthful exuberance, sense of fun, and 1% originality would have made it well worth keeping.
I still remember a dungeon deep inside a 3-mile-square floating island that travelled through the oceans using enormous troll-powered pedallo devices and flotation tanks grown from mutant Ixitxachitl, and the players had to defeat the mad wizard amongst the clanking gears and chains before he could complete his suicidal spell, burst the Ixitxachitl and sink the floating island into the depths.
Those were the days.
More please.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stefan_e_jones/ Stefan Jones

This is really cute.

I remember reading APAs that were full of home-brew monsters. Very imaginative stuff; I recall from editorials in The Dragon that the home-brew material really pissed off TSR.

I think I still have some spaceship floor plans, probably for the Space Opera system, from Back In The Day.
http://www.zachstronaut.com/ zachstronaut

Oh man! So awesome! =)

I did the same thing as a kid. I need to digitize that stuff! I’ve got my own monster manual entries, but I’ve also got a like 2 x 4 array of taped together construction paper with a huge map drawn on it. The place names are incredibly embarrassing!
http://twitter.com/zacharyjohnson Zachary John⚡on

I’m trying to think of a proper home for all my ridiculousness. I put a monster up on Dribbble… but I’m thinking Flickr or Tumblr so I can do high res. Is there a community out there for collecting/sharing these things?
- Dicrel Seijin
  
  The link is from the previous D&D article posted on Tuesday. What you’re looking for is the Play Generated Map and Document Archive: PlaGMaDA.org
  
  This was the archive I’m thinking of contributing to, if I can find my old papers.
Mister44

Neat stuff. I wish I could find my original paper on the Gold Skeletons.

They were dark clerics that managed to belay death through gold, with their bones slowly absorbing it. Depending on how much of it was gold, it was worth a lot when defeated. But they were so strong they could use 2 handed swords with one hand.

I dunno if i posted this – but this is the wizard’s castle for my little girl’s first D&D adventure. Level 3 houses a huge telescope.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63283251@N04/5816964798/in/photostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63283251@N04/5816398351/in/photostream/
curiousrobot

When I was 14 (or however old I was when the Monster Manual came out), I had no funds, so I copied the entire book by hand from a friend’s copy. A week later, I got the $15 or whatever it cost and bought myself a copy. I didn’t consider the weeks I spend writing the whole book out as wasted in any way.

Ahh, youthful zealotry!
- Mister44
  
  Heh – I did something similar with this encyclopedia of the middle ages. I copied by hand every weapon, armor, and mythical beast, complete with drawings, so I could adapt it to D&D.
  
  Also the time spent writing it probably meant you learned a lot about each monster – which is very useful later.
Michael M. Hughes

Here’s a link to a PDF of a homemade adventure I came up with sometime in the late 70s—The Catacombs of He Who Never Sleeps.

http://michaelmhughes.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/catacombs1.pdf
- mwschmeer
  
  Hey Michael Hughes–can I drop that file in my Dropbox and share it from my game blog?
  
  http://rendedpress.blogspot.com
Bruce Keeler

It’s a Ligon. Pretty much my favorite animal. It’s like a lion and dragon mixed…bred for its skills in talking.