What is a good thematic replacement for Bugbears, either within the Yoon Suin bestiary or elsewhere (Oriental...
What is a good thematic replacement for Bugbears, either within the Yoon Suin bestiary or elsewhere (Oriental Adventures, Mad Monks, your own imagination, etc.)?
Grasshopper Men, maybe Kenku, depending on what kind of encounter you are going for. Outside the book I like Oni (Japanese demons) or even just Bugbears in Oni masks could be fun.
ReplyDeleteAlasdair Lawrence what kind of encounter you going for?
Brian Richmond :) I also said Oni.
ReplyDeleteMark Johnson I'm trying to fuse Yoon Suin with generic random dungeon generators and couldn't find an easy sub for Bugbear wandering monsters. Oni seems like the best fit tbh, separating them out from Ogre Mages
ReplyDeleteBrian Richmond all of these are excellent thank you
Figments are like goblins, and I remember there's a series of blog posts on the OSR that take the position that Goblins are manifest bad ideas. Figments are manifest opium dreams (I.e. nonsensical ideas). Therefore perhaps Oni/whatever we want to call them are manifest sinful ideas? Greed, coveting, wrath etc. It gets a bit Christian yes but it means no two Oni are the same - they have elephant trunks or one eye or protruding tusks, and they are demons of vice. They covet things cruelly - slaves, wealth, meat.
ReplyDeleteI can see a mission now with players being hired guards in an opium den, hired to keep figments from attacking their paying clients.
ReplyDeleteInsert warm up cannon fodder figments.
An "important" slug man stops in and while dreaming starts to summon Oni, who run a muck. Now someone needs to wake that patron, but the private room has its own guards, who look more likely to kick your guts out than listen to reason. Start rolling that timer, every d4 rounds, a new Oni to represent the 7 deadly sins, until either all sins are purged or that patron is woken.
I am sure someone could flesh this out more, but you get the idea.