Revising the great wheel: exemplars

The problem with the exemplars in Pathfinder is that there are 1) too many of them, and 2) they generally lack signature motifs. Here I aim to fix that:

Pathfinder uses the Nine outer planes (wheel model), which I leave unchanged for this exercise. Although even then I feel it is too many.

The exemplars of the upper planes are the goodly celestials also called angels. (Angels are not a specific race anymore.)

• Heaven (LG): archons, which appear as the traditional winged humanoids of Christian art.
• Nirvana (NG): agathions, which appear as animal-headed humanoids.
• Elysium (CG): azatas, which appear as celestial fairies and toga-clad giants.

The exemplars of the middle or moderate planes lack a unifying name. (Go figure, they play second fiddle to good and evil anyhow. Stupid D&D baggage.)

• Utopia (LN): inevitables, which appear as fantasy robots.
• Purgatory (TN): aeons, which appear as amorphous clouds with limbs.
• Limbo (CN): proteans, which appear as serpentine things.

The exemplars of the lower planes are called fiends. They’re instantly recognizable.

• Hell (LE): devils, which appear as angelic humanoids with only slight horns or other surreal features to reveal their nature.
• Abaddon (NE): divs, which appear as emaciated and rotting demonic undead. (“Daemon” is too similar to “demon.” Stupid baggage.)
• Abyss (CE): demons, which appear as chimerical monsters out of the Ars Goetia.

Renaming true giants

As I mentioned before, words like athach and ettin are synonyms for "giant" that were co-opted by fantasy gaming for completely different meanings. Furthermore, the D&D rules make an arbitrary (and confusing) distinction between "giant" as a monster type and an entry in the monster manual. In earlier editions this was a distinction between "true giants" and "giant kin" (or demigiants?), but later editions simplified the terminology and made it as confusing as it is now.

Dragon types? Drakes, dragonets, lindwyrms, wyverns, lyzards, oy vey...

One of the more frustrating aspects of fantasy gaming is the obsessive compulsion to classify things. Like dragons, for instance. Dragons are classified into distinct species by their body plan, size, color, etc. I have said before that my setting has thrown that out the window in favor of depicting dragons as unique mystical entities rather than species. That said, I still take issue with the absurd terminology...

Revising the elemental fauna to be interesting

Let's face it, elementals are boring. When Paracelsus first devised the idea of elementals, he considered them to be analogous to humans and other animals except with elemental affinity and no souls. When Hans Christian Anderson wrote The Little Mermaid, he was referencing Paracelsus when he wrote that mermaids had no souls unless they married a human. This was expanded by later philosophers and fantasy writers, as The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters attests in its entry on elementals. That book states that "Purely amorphous and non-animate representations of elementals are, however, fairly rare" (206), D&D notwithstanding...

Of Beastmen and Beastfolk

World mythology and fantasy gaming is full of creatures and races that may be described as "beastmen" or "beastfolk." Broadly speaking, there are two kinds of beast people: 1) chimerical hybrids of human and animal, and 2) anthropomorphic versions of animals.

Chimerical hybrids of man and animal are commonplace in mythology and fantasy gaming. Centaurs, harpies, satyrs, minotaurs, mermaids and so forth are just a few examples. The famous examples in fantasy gaming of "beastmen" would be the Broo in RuneQuest and the Beastmen in Warhammer.

Anthropomorphic animals, or "furries" in the most reductionist term, seem to be a more recent invention with a loose precursor in the animal-headed deities of some ancient religions. There is actually a continuum of anthropomorphism, ranging from catgirls to animal-headed humans to "beastfolk."

In future posts I will explore how to world build beastmen and beastfolk in fantasy campaigns...

The diversity of kobolds

Kobolds are one of those monsters that changes noticeably in different media.