The Tome of Beasts 1 by Kobold Press was recently added as partnered content to D&DBeyond. I’ve been using content from the Tome of Beast for years. Having accessible through D&D beyond is a nice change. The first Tome of Beasts focuses on a few different types of monsters, as well as adding monsters specifically themed for Kobold Press’s Midgard campaign setting. Some of my favorite creatures, though, are the ones based upon H.P. Lovecraft’s* fiction.
Lovecraftian and Lovecraft-y Monsters of the Tome of Beasts 1:
I’ll be listing out the page numbers in case you decide to go with a physical copy.
Cthulhu
You don’t get the creature itself, but you do get it’s servants on page 348. These nasties clock in at a CR 15. They have an action that can turn a creature into a cloud of gas while it slowly dies. Rough business there.
Deep Ones
On pages 72-73 you can find stat blocks for Deep Ones. They like to interbreed with coastal humanoids and corrupt their cultures. Good fun for social interactions, but pretty nasty in a fight as well
Denizens of Leng
If your players need a trip to the Plateau of Leng, you’ll populate the place with ease. You can find stat blocks for the Folk of Leng (p. 190) and the Spider of Leng (p. 341). Maybe it was your players who helped drive out those oversized arachnids?
Mi-Go
One of my favorites, the Mi-Go are human-sized, spacefaring fungus-crab-bats. You can find them and their lore on page 266.
Shoggoth
Here’s my favorite on page 326 They sing songs that incapacitate other creatures, and they hit like a truck. In the previous edition of the Tome of Beasts 1, these creatures made 1d4+1 slam attacks each turn as their muliattack. That was a lot more fun than the flat 4 they do now. They also used to have a lot more damage immunities….
Lovecraft Adjacent:
A lot of Aberrations in Dungeons and Dragons are inspired by HP Lovecraft and other works in the mythos. Although none of these bear the names of particular creatures from Lovecraft’s works, they have that flavor:
- Fate Eater, p. 168
- Idolic Deity, p. 239
- Krake Spawn, p. 249
- Mordant Snare, p. 276
- Urochar, p. 374
- Voidling, p. 390
- Xhkarsh, p. 400
Your probably gonna need some magic items to kill these things.
* I recognize the problematic nature of H.P. Lovecraft and some of his fictional works. H.P. Lovecraft’s bigoted views are abominable. I’m not going to go into detail here, as there are no shortage of sources that can do a better job than I can. Since he’s long dead, and his works are public domain, I feel comfortable enjoying the good parts.
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