Doug's Art and Games Blog

Monster of the Week, May 12, 2020 They just keep coming. Gluttony Beast When someone lives a life using others' suffering to become wealthy, becoming gat off the work of others' labor and suffering, the cries of the oppressed are sometimes heard by the gods or the spirits of the magic realm and the oppressor is punished rather than being allowed to die. Such cursed individuals lose all of their faces but their mouths; their bodies become gelatinous masses of adipose tissue their libs become a mass of soft, slithering tentacles, and their intelligence becomes subsumed by hunger to eat riches and wealth and overcome by a desire to live in their own filth. However, the gluttony beast quickly becomes a curse to the communities in which they are reborn as well. They are ravenous, foul, and spread a miasmic and dolorous stink over the land, which poisons and sickens the land. They themselves are surprisingly quick. Though blind, their sense of smell helps them find pr

Monster of the Week, May 5, 2020 In honor of the Mexican victory over the French in the town of Puebla in 1862, I'm going to post a monster like I would any other Tuesday The Grey People The Grey People appear in large urban crowds as inconspicuous, bland people who blend into the masses, usually hooded and cloaked with emotionless faces and almost colorless features. Their blandness is almost supernatural, and the specifics of their faces are almost headache-inducing if anyone looks at them directly. As a result, they disappear into a crowd, and people forget seeing them. The Grey People fear being discovered. If anyone begins to investigate them, the Grey People first try to disappear. After that, they begin to work on eliminating the threat, escalating from threats to attempts to kill the threat directly. In the process, those investigating the Grey People find that people do not remember these beings, and deny their influence.

Monster of the Week, April 28 I'm as surprised as you are that I keep publishing these things. Hangman Tree When a person is hanged unjustly, the psychic wound of that injustice marks the world. If the person being hanged unjustly is both magically gifted and willing to call on the dark powers to avenge their suffering, those dark powers are more than willing to grant the wishes of the supplicant and gain more presence on the material plane. These dark powers take the blood and the remains of the sacrifice, their rage and hatred, and the rage and hatred of the mobs that killed them and combine them with the earth itself and their own dark nature. From the ground where the body of the unjustly killed is buried or left to rot, the earth gives birth to a twisted, leafless tree. Eventually, the tree sprouts long filaments with eyes on the end of them, a great maw cracks in the trunk, and a misty gas issues from the tree. The misty gas first summons animals, whose blood feed

Monster of the Week, April 21, 2020 Even if you wanted me to, I refuse to stop. Hopping Horror Long before the earliest speciest made their way to land, before the earliest chordates began to form into the species we know, many unknown creatures evolved in the sea and made their way to land. The Hopping Horrors are remnants of that time, living deep in the earth. Their bodies consist of a single muscular foot with corded muscles above the foot leading to a gut and maw filled with teet and vestigial, glowing eyes. Above this are frilled breathing membranes and a mass of muscular tentacles. Driven by hunger, these solitary hunters occasionally bud asexually when gorged with flesh. Otherwise, they wait in the dark to surprise miners and explorers who dig too deep and awaken the predators that  predate the lif we know on the surface world.

Monster of the Week, April 14, 2020 I guess I am continuing to put these things out on the Internet. Masked Haunter Those who read through the play The King in Yellow are known to go mad, particularly if they read beyond the first act. But madness is not the only fate of those who meddle in the forbidden text. Sometimes, the text causes the world to warp. Other times, the text serves to open a door to other worlds, particularly when the play is performed. It is said that the Masked Haunter is native to the shores of Lake Hali, and that it is not unknown to the inhabitants of Carcosa. Called by the play, the Masked Haunter is transported from the Hyades to our world, where the alien beings are able to manifest and feed upon the minds of their prey. Hidden normally behind porcelain masks that conceal their brain-like bodies and loose flesh and tentacles that move them as they hover near the ground. They negotiate the world primarily through psyching senses; they feed o

Monster of the Week, April 7, 2020 More monstrosity this week. Nightmare Forester Creatures of the Far Realm, Nightmare Foresters travel through the Ethereal Realm next to our world until they find the nightmares of mortals. That means they seek out the traumatized and abused most of all, feeding on the energy of their fear and sorrow. Becoming semi-material over their sleeping victims, Nightmare Harvesters reach out with physical and psychic tendrils to enhance the fear and sorrow of their victims and then feed on the psychic energies. Pale, pulsing, six-eyed cephalopods, Nightmare Harvesters usually appear as translucent and immaterial apparitions when seen on our plane. They defend themselves psychically, lashing out against the egos of victims or enemies, causing fear and cluding minds to power their escape from dangerous situations.

Monster of the Week, March 31, 2020 The last monster of March. The Arbiter Looking like a black-skinned human with crow-like feet, a huge crow skull for a head, and dapper clothing, the Arbiter is a demon summoned by sorcerers to make a deal with the powers of entropy to serve their masters' desires. The Arbiter's deals are focused on arcane lore. The Arbiter will teach spells and rituals, help the sorcerer lear true names, secrets, and lore. But the Arbiter's goals are furthering chaos, destruction, corruption, and death. So the secrets it unveils usually demand a price from the life of the sorcerer or those around them. Often the magic it teaches is powerful but uncontrollable. The Arbiter is quiet, calm, even obsequious. It offers only to serve and does not fight its opponents, though it loves to watch the chaos it unleashes and cackles at the results of its action. It does not fight hard to prevent its work from being undone but may use trickery, misdir