Crafting Homebrew Horrors For Your Heroes

Create monsters that'll turn those characters into heroes.
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Some of the best moments in a game come from when a brave party of adventurers stares the worst conjurings of your imagination in the eyes and says "Not today, death!" Especially when the monster feels unique, like it's come into the world just to face down these heroes, and even manages to shock and delight the players. In this episode, we show by example how we go about achieving exactly this.
It's a simple process that's taken time, and learning lessons the hard way, to develop. We've discarded techniques like scouring through thousands of monsters trying to find that perfect fit, or spending way too much time learning the math behind rulesets in the hopes that it will unlock some kind of magic shortcut. Eventually, we realized the best, and fastest, way to make those horrifying moments pop is to create a simple monster that fits the story, rather than finding a complex one that doesn't.
In the Sanctum of Scholars, we get some inspiration for this season's main monster. We're cooking up a predatory creature that has evolutionary stages, yet seems eternal. To find ingredients, we turn to the terrors of the ocean waves. We cover the way a tiny blue dragon harvests venom, the life cycle of a glowing jellyfish, and the daring culinary adventures of a simple fish.
In Lamashtu's Breeding Pit we take our monster through the stages of horror, detailing its horrific evolutions and unique abilities. All the ideas are derived from the player characters we know it'll be fighting, as well as the many inspirations we've collected up to this point. We come away with something that we couldn't be more excited to run.
Horror Roleplaying Guide
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As always, huge thanks to our patrons for making this episode a reality.
Inigo the Brave, David P., Adam F., Alex R., Steve A., Sigma, Kuraidoscope, Skyler E., Deadman, Ninja Duckie, PseuArt, Blackthorne, First Law, Peacockdreams, DM Thunderbum, Marley R., Timewarp, Dangerous Marmalade, Zach G., NoMaam, Michelle T., Adlerious, Chris F., The Senate, Lucas D., Lyla G., The GM Tim, Nevermour, Thomas W., DM Natske, Heavyarms, Leprecan, and Will H-P.
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[@kylereblitz2856]

Balrog with guns sounds awesome to me. Like if Schwarzenegger played the balrog.

[@HookandChance]

Ok fine. We agree, secretly we would watch the hell outta that. Good call.

[@HookandChance]

Would their be stakes to the action? Who would the Balrog with guns be saving? Or is it just mayhem?

[@kylereblitz2856]

@@HookandChance the Balrog and a crack squad of goblin commandos must repel an invading force of agents from the surface. After all his little buddies bite the dust, the action culminates in an epic mountaintop showdown between our fiery, shadowclad, gun-toting badass, and the sinister, grey-bearded leader of the surface agents, played by Dolph Lundgren (speaking Russian).

[@HookandChance]

Ahhahaha love it. Though we feel the reversal of the story would be great. First the Balrog must make it through the wizards generals first. Lezard Golas, the chaos demon duo of Merris and Pipein, The Strider and the rest before the mountaintop battle. Also perfect casting already for the role of the wizard. No notes! 🤣