Madame Web - Feb 15

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. Recently, we were setting down to discuss yet another Pathfinder (1^st ed.) campaign, set in Osirion, when one of our party people came distinctly disgruntled: he found a book of Greek and Norse myths, dated 1987, written for fifth and sixth graders… and it talked how the readers can use the mythical names in their own fantasy RPG games. Which games, what games, it is unsaid, but our friend did not handle this state of affairs too well, and spent all of our planning time half-ranting and raving. Sad and awkward, let me tell you. Onto ‘Madame Web’?

‘Madame Web’ – I will try not to get into the spoilers’ territory, but regardless – has several major flaws. First, its’ plot is taken, lock, stock and barrel, from the very first ‘Terminator’ film. People are not calling the movie out on it, but this is what happens. Mr. Ezekiel is the ‘Terminator’ analogue, while the female characters are something of a collective Sarah Connors instead.

Second, unlike ‘Terminator’, ‘Madame Web’ comes across as asexual, regardless of whether it was intended to, nor not. This is not new, there are plenty of films that had this sort of thing, and not just ‘CATS-2019’ – there’s ‘Over the Moon’, there’s ‘Quiz Lady’, there’s plenty of other equally forgettable films… though Disney isn’t a part of this tendency. ‘Frozen-2’ – there are Anna and Kristoff; ‘Encanto’ – there is Dolores and her own swain; ‘The Marvels’, (come on, they are also a part of Disney) – there’s Carol Danvers and her new husband (?); and so on. Romance does make a movie more memorable in the minds and memories of fans and audiences, you know! ‘Madame Web’ tries to avoid that, and so it does, and so many people just do not know why they should root for the titular character and her posse…

This brings us to the third – the feminist angle. These days, it is not enough to win an audience over and become a socio-political darling; you actually need to work to accomplish this and ‘Madame Web’… does not. Instead, it tries to tie into Peter Parker himself to push itself above the rest… whatever ‘the rest’ are. The first Tom Hardy ‘Venom’ was, in fact, original, even if it struggled with its’ script and everything else – and so, it was the movie’s originality that enabled it to work. The second ‘Venom’ film, featuring Carnage, was actually more of a reboot of the franchise, and ‘Morbius’ was… bad, but more of ‘Doolittle-2020’ rather than ‘CATS-2019’ bad, i.e. lackluster and lazy rather than a burning trash fire. On the other hand, ‘Madame Web’ is… cut out of the same cloth, in fact, as ‘Morbius’ is – lackluster and kind of directionless. In fact, some of the crew from ‘Morbius’ have, apparently, worked in this movie too – not exactly a good sign.

Again, the ‘Terminator’-like premise of ‘Madame Web’ is not bad, self-fulfilling prophecies and all. Its’ execution, however, is bad, simply bad, and the aromantic angle, (the Parkers aside), does not help it. Consequently, it just collapses, as our latest RPG attempt had, a teenage book of Greek and Norse myths notwithstanding.

…This is for now, then. See you all soon.

Io - Greek myths - Feb 11

Let us talk about Io.

Io is more than just two letters, she is one of Zeus’s/Jupiter’s many paramours. Therefore, what is special about her? Let us ponder.

How does the myth go, in general? Io was a nymph or a human princess, daughter of Inachus, himself a river god or a human king. She caught the eye and attention of Jupiter. The greatest of the Greco-Roman gods began to court her. This caught Hera’s/Juno’s attention. Trying to do something about it, Jupiter turned Io into a cow. It did not work. Juno demanded the cow for herself. For some reason – to save his own ass, maybe – Jupiter complied, and Io was put to pasture under the watchful gaze of Juno’s primary minion of that time – the hundred-eyed Argus. After a while, the king of the gods, the legend among mortals, Jupiter, realized that you know, this is not right, he got Io into this mess, so who but… Hermes/Mercury to get her out of it? The latter agreed, went to the pasture, put Argus down, and released Io. However, he did not turn her back into a human/nymph, and in addition, Juno sent a gadfly, (a biting fly), to harass Io further. After many other trials and tribulations, Io reached Egypt, where she stopped being a cow, and became a goddess instead – usually Isis or Hathor, as far as Greeks and Romans were concerned. Juno’d put Argus’ eyes onto a peacock’s tail, the end. Where to start?

It is an old myth. It is a myth about the gods. There are no mortals there. Unlike modern times, such as Mr. Riordan’s novels and other fiction, back then the gods and goddesses weren’t just characters as Odysseus or Perseus were, for example; rather, they were personifications of concepts, allegories, ideas, and so on, and so forth. Hera/Juno, for example, was a goddess of marriages and families; she stood for family unity and loyalty, which is why, despite all of her husband’s infidelities, when a mortal named Ixion tried to seduce her, she… either refused him, or gave him a minor goddess, (a cloud goddess), named Nephele, as a wife instead. Post mortem, Ixion is in the underworld, rolling around in a flaming wheel… that sounds suspiciously like a sun metaphor. Ditto for Sisyphus’ punishment – a stone that goes first uphill and then downhill sounds suspiciously like a sun metaphor.

For the Greeks and especially the Romans, the only Olympian sun god was Apollo, who himself almost ended up in Tartarus. He had a son named Asclepius, who – first – healed the sick, and then resurrected the dead. Pause. Unlike the New Testament, where the Savior got into trouble for completely different reasons, Asclepius was smitten down with a thunderbolt precisely for resurrection and defying the natural order.

Apollo did not care – Asclepius was still his son, so he grabbed his trusty solar bow and shot the Elder Cyclopes who used to forge the thunderbolts dead.

The Thunderer was not impressed either. He grabbed Apollo and would have sent him into Tartarus after Asclepius, when in rushed Leto – Apollo’s mother and Jupiter’s paramour, who did the unmentionable and saved Apollo from that final fate, reducing his punishment to some sort of an exile instead.

Why Leto’s actions were unmentionable? Because it is never said, what they actually were – all we know is that she was able to suck-up to Jupiter for the last time, to save her son’s life. (In a manner of speaking, but still). After this incident, she remained on Olympus, (probably), but purely as a part of entourage, never doing anything, while Artemis gradually moved away from Olympus, becoming a goddess of the wild places, (among other domains, but not so much the moon), and Apollo remained a very important god, but a solar god? Not so much. These days, people associate the sun with Helios as much as they would with Apollo; for Homer in his ‘Odyssey’, the sun was flat-out Helios rather than Apollo. …What Io has to do with this?

Let us try again. Zeus/Jupiter was the king of the gods, but he was also a thunder god, and his immediate siblings too were gods of nature, rather than of human aspects, (i.e. Athene and Hermes, as examples). Poseidon embodied the sea. Hades – the Underworld. Demeter (and her daughter Kore) was the earth, (the fertile ‘civilized’ part of it). Hestia, (who was the least developed of all the deities associated with Olympus), was the fire – the hearth-fire, but that is not important. So why is Hera not a ‘natural’ goddess, but of human marriages and families?

She was not. Not at first. Just as the peafowl was not her sacred animal at first either. The peafowl live in India and South-East Asia, and were introduced to the Mediterranean Europe at least from the time of Alexander the Great’s conquests, if not later. (The closest relative of the Asian peafowl is the Congo peafowl of Africa, but the ancient Greeks and Romans did not know it). Before then, the sacred animal of Hera/Juno might have been the cow instead, for one of her epithets is ‘cow-eyed’, and it was considered flattering in ancient world. Moreover, the cow is a good mother (and wife, to a point), on one hand, and can be associated with a rain cloud as well. Put otherwise, Zeus and Hera, Jupiter and Juno, could have been a couple from the start – Zeus/Jupiter being the destructive aspect, thunder and lightning, whereas Hera/Juno being the more benign, the life giving rain aspect instead. In some of the older myths, Zeus and Hera become a couple during a storm: Zeus confronts Hera disguised as a cuckoo, Hera shelters it from the storm, Zeus becomes himself and wins Hera over – or that is how the story goes.

The European cuckoo is 110% brood parasite, rather like the cowbirds of North America and the honeyguide bird of Africa. (This is one of the reasons as to why this story does not come up too often these days). That said, Zeus/Jupiter was a bad husband not because of all the children that he had sired, but also because he was a bad husband. He married Metis, the mother of Athene, and swallowed her, and so Athene emerged from him alone, (and had many issues). He had a relationship with Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis, and see above, as to how that seemed to have ended. And Hera/Juno?

Let us get onto Io. She was turned into a cow, of all things. However, if Hera/Juno was also a cow, at least some of times, (and remember, Zeus/Jupiter himself used to be a bull from time to time, and Demeter/Ceres, their sister, was associated with horses), she would hate it even more, and assume that her husband was trying to replace her. Hence, her claim to Io the cow. So, why does her husband comply?

…In the ‘Iliad’, Zeus claims to be the strongest on Olympus, able to defeat all the others in a tug-of-war over Tartarus. Hera… is not impressed; at one point, she uses her beauty and brains to distract Zeus while her allies are giving the Greek forces a hands-up over the Trojan host. While Zeus does eventually catch-up onto her, this does not stop him from proclaiming his love for her, claiming that she got his entire lovers’ list beat. Kind of both humiliating and sweet at the same time. Put otherwise, Zeus might’ve authentically fallen in love with his sister-wife by then, (and vice versa?), plus he’s aware that physically, she’s no slouch herself – in another part of the ‘Iliad’, she beats the crap out of Artemis, when the latter challenged her; by contrast, Hermes surrenders to the twins’ mother Leto without actually doing anything – back to Io?

In Io’s story, Jupiter may be trying to replace Juno with a different wife, but he is not ready to challenge her openly yet, this could be messy. Therefore, he complies, and Juno puts Io into charge of Argus, the embodiment of the starry sky.

Wait a second, isn’t her husband’s domain also the sky? Yes, and so’s hers, and while she is not trying to replace him precisely, she is trying to build-up a challenger for the sky-god’s title. Enter Hermes, slash Mercury.

…Does anyone ever notice that the latter is acting atypically for him? Hermes/Mercury is a messenger of the gods, he is the patron of thieves, politicians, bards, merchants, and many more, but he does not murder people, let alone other immortals, for fun. Here he does, using a sickle-shaped sword of all weapons. (Later on, he loans it to Perseus to slay Medusa).

…A sickle-shaped sword? A lunar crescent! Being stuck in Argus’ stellar nighttime sky-pasture, Io the full-moon-cow threatens to ruin the entire lunar calendar. Enter Mercury with a crescent moon sword, (either new or old crescent, details are tricky), to end Argus and let Io the moon free. She is still a cow, however, and stays as such until she gets to Egypt, where she becomes a goddess instead – either Isis or Hathor. Both goddesses were associated with Juno by the Romans. Clearly, Jupiter had invested a lot of power into Io being the new Juno back then, and it worked-out… in a way that no one involved expected it to.

What else is left? In Ovid’s version, Mercury puts Argus to sleep by telling him the tale of Pan and Syrinx, the nymph who refused the former by turning into a reed, i.e. dying in an atypical way. Pan used the reeds to make his first panpipes, i.e. giving Syrinx an entire new life, (or at least existence). This is what happens to Argus as well – he dies and stops being Argus, but his eyes go onto a peacock’s tail, and so, he gets reborn – isn’t mythology fun?

That said, this was also the de-facto end of the tale of Io, with only ties left to wrap-up is her son, Epaphus, who became friends with a boy named Phaeton. The latter was the son of Helios, and tried to ride his father’s solar chariot through the sky, only to be struck down by Jupiter (in order to save the world, of course). Helios was devastated, (and there were some rumors that it was he who was struck down by Jupiter instead). Being a solar god with Zeus/Jupiter around is flat-out bad, it looks like – but that is another story.

Marvel & PJ take 2 - Jan 25

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about the FH game and its’ new character instead.

First, however, here is an honorary mention of MCU’s previous Disney+ TV shows – the ‘She-Hulk’, in which the titular character became a ‘legal eagle’ version of a Mary-Sue. This is not particularly good or healthy for any character, even a Disney/MCU backed one, and so ‘She-Hulk’ is as good as cancelled, the word on the street is. Will ‘Miss Marvel’ be the next to good? This show’s titular character, Kamala Khan (KK) was redesigned in ‘The Marvels’ film, so the jury is still out. What next?

Right, the 1^st season of the PJO TV series is ending, (next week). It was ok, though it can be pointed out that unlike in the original novel, (‘The Lightning Thief’, cough), PJ and Annabeth are an interracial couple now, (with Grover being the obligatory non-human sidekick). This is not too new, admittedly – first there were Ron and Hermione in J-Ro’s ‘Cursed Child’ piece, and while it may have been something of a reason as to why that piece failed, it was not the most important one.

Second, there are Tom Holland’s PP and Zendaya’s MJ in MCU (/not in MCU?). Between this MJ, and the Black Cat from Tom Holland’s first Spider-Man film, so Disney/MCU was making inroads into this sort of scenario before the adaptation of ‘The Lightning Thief’.

(Keep in mind that Disney/MCU also was trying to making it in AoS, but it failed, and it might be part of the reason why AoS characters have vanished from MCU for good).

Otherwise, the 1^st season of PJO is a dutiful and solid faire, and it has went down with minimum fuss and commotion, with no one caring about the interracial couple at the heart of it, (myself included). What I want, (in a manner of speaking), to point out, is that the Greek satyrs weren’t really good-like; instead, they had horse-like ears and tails, while being otherwise human; the ‘great god Pan’ and his children were the half-human half-goat hybrids instead; in the Roman mythology, they were Faunus and the fauns, but we’re getting sidetracked from the FH.

Today on FH (Jan 25, 2024), we were introduced to a new Viking character – the Varangian. They are swinging a mean bardiche battle-axe, so is there anything to say?

Yes, the Varangians were the elite guards of the Byzantine Empire, (aka the second Roman Empire, though this statement is debatable). They were mercenaries, and they were good old Vikings, just under a different moniker. In the FH game, the Varangian… is an independent agent, on a collision course with their treacherous uncle, if you care about this sort of thing. Put otherwise, once again, FH pulled a ‘cool-sounding’ name out of a hat and tried to make it work. It did work, too, in a manner of speaking. Bully for them, I daresay. At least this time the moniker is appropriate for the character.

Well, this is it for now, however. See you all soon instead!

'Echo' - Jan 11

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about MCU’s ‘Echo’ series instead. Normally, we would talk about one episode after another, but since Disney/MCU have done something different this time, and released all of the episodes in one swoop, let us do the same thing and talk about the entire miniseries at once too.

For a start, ‘Echo’ was good. It was a miniseries about the journey of the titular heroine, first as a villain, and second as an (anti)-hero. We saw Echo build herself up, then tear herself down, (the ‘Hawkeye’ miniseries), and finally rebuild herself from the ground level once more. The acting was done perfectly, and the plot (as well as the character) development went down smoothly. So, what is there to criticize?

Nothing, but it can be pointed out that Disney/MCU is trying to do something similar to Echo’s (the character’s) journey in the miniseries; they’re trying to rebuild themselves, and they’re trying to incorporate Native Americans, among other minorities, to do that. First, there is Kahhori from the 2^nd season of ‘What if?’, so let us talk about that.

In the ‘What if?’ episode 2x06 we have something different from MCU’s regular fare: we get an alternate history universe, where the Spaniards clash with the Mohawks. Now, contrary to popular cliché, the Spaniards did not just colonize Latin America, (including Mexico), but they did come into what would become U.S. territory: they did so in the southwest, (and it was a part of Mexico rather than the U.S. for a while), as well as in the southeast, (i.e. Florida, which was also Spanish for a while), but the Mohawks weren’t a part of it. Historically, the Mohawk people lived in New England, (the New York State, to be precise), as well as in the Canadian province of Ontario. The Spaniards never came there, but the English and the French did. Pause.

Now, having the Native Americans fighting, well, Anglo-Americans, (or Franco-Americans), would be not just politically incorrect, but outright unacceptable by the modern American/Western mass media. Seriously, can you imagine Native Americans, powered by alien/magical/other artefacts, or not, taking down London, Paris, or Washington D.C. for that matter? Especially in the modern Western media where cultural integration and goodwill among people are the concepts of the day? No, you can’t, and not even U.S.’ political enemies cannot. (Though North Korea is somewhat dicey, admittedly). Hence, we had the Spaniards instead, and the Native Americans overwhelming its’ capital of Madrid. Hey, Alternate History rocks, baby, you want some good AH – read the late, great Eric Flint’s ‘1630s’ book series, otherwise you’re stuck with Disney and MCU!..

Now, Kahhori does appear in ‘What if?’ S2 finale, but the fact that she is Native American does not play a big role in that, so let us switch onto ‘Echo’, where her voice actress plays the role of Bonnie, who is a friend of Echo/Maya. Disney/MCU went out to make it clear that the two roles/characters are separate, and so Kahhori will not appear in MCU, at least not in the short term, so there is that. Without Kahhori and her superpowers, what is the Native Americans’ role in MCU?

Why, the same as it is for the other racial/social/other minorities – their ‘uniqueness’ is just ‘window dressing’. I.e., a character’s, well, characteristics have to play a role, preferably an important role, in the show/movie/novel, etc., because otherwise, they will be forgotten by the audience instead. Ms. Cox’s, and by extension, Maya Lopez’s prosthetic leg plays a notable part in ‘Echo’, and so it has become one of the defining traits of the titular heroine. However, it has nothing to do with her Native American origins – Maya got it in a car accident, the same one that would cost her her mom. Since Echo is an ‘artificial’ character, who was invented for a while now, she rose with the occasion, rather than fell with it. Wilson Fisk helped.

Now, Wilson Fisk first appeared in MCU’s Netflix series, especially ones connected to Daredevil and the Punisher. They were not unofficial apocrypha, unlike AoS, but they were ignored by MCU and vice versa. There were several shows about ‘the Defenders of New York’, but they were eventually all subsumed back into Disney/MCU, without a trace. ‘Echo’ attempts to fill in the niche, with the help of ‘Hawkeye’, (the show). ‘Hawkeye’ itself was a different show from ‘Echo’, but it did reintroduce Wilson Fisk/Kingpin to the MCU. However!

In the Netflix series’, Wilson Fisk was depicted… actually very much like the cartoon version from the 1990s ‘Spider-Man’ cartoon series: a baseline human, who, however, was Spider-Man’s biggest opponent through both brains and brawn. In one story arc, Wilson Fisk and his son, (yes, he had a wife and a son, it is canon), actually framed both Peter Parker and Spider-Man, cough, so Spider-Man had to team-up with Matt Murdoch and Daredevil to fix this. (Fisk’s son went to jail as a bottom line). In MCU, Fisk did not clash with Spider-Man, though Daredevil did do a cameo in the ‘No Way Home’ movie, but since Spider-Man’s own status in MCU is somewhat vague, we might as well skip and go straight to the ‘She-Hulk’.

Only not, as ‘She-Hulk’ was more of a failure than a success, and right now, it is being ignored by MCU, as is the ‘Ms. Marvel’ miniseries. Even if it was not a failure, it is still very different from ‘Echo’, and so the two shows probably will not connect anytime soon, especially since Daredevil’s role in ‘Echo’ is mostly of a cameo – for now. Since Wilson Fisk survived his latest encounter with his stepdaughter/protégé, this can change. Will Fisk change, however? MCU, in fact, is not big on redemption for villains, let alone corruption for heroes, so it is unlikely. Stranger things have happened, however, and right now Disney/MCU itself is trying to change into something different from what it was, so we will have to wait and see instead.

For now, though, this is it. See you all soon!

Marvel & PJ - Jan 7

 

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and our 2023-4 holidays celebration got carried away, in a weird way. The sudden shift in weather did not help either. Where were we?

Ah yes, the 2^nd season of ‘What if?’. This was a heterogeneous mix, and a change from the 1^st season. How? If the 1^st season was really a series of variations of the ‘Avengers’ theme, the 2^nd season was not. Rather, it was an authentic anthology of stories, most of which done in various genres, and then we come to Captain Carter (and her new friend, Ms. K), facing off the Strange Supreme. The good people won, the bad doctor lost, and it felt… like a reset of the ‘What if?’ S1, and in an unnecessary way: the S1 finale gave him a purpose and a path to redemption after all. Now, however, it all appears to have been in vain, and instead we get, or rather, are going to get in S3, ‘the Watcher’s and Captain Carter’s travel through the multiverse’. This is not a bad thing; when the show went Meta, it really succeeded, but still, the S2 finale left a strange taste in my mouth, (pun unintended).

The other show of the late 2023, PJ & the Olympians… listen: Mr. Riordan has done his characters practically to the metaphorical death… though the fact that the show (the show’s 1^st season?) is following the plot of the initial novel tightly, is a good thing, overall. Mind you, the initial novel of the franchise might be one of its’ weaker points instead; at that point in his literary career Mr. Riordan tried to imitate J-Ro; Percy, Grover and Annabeth were supposed to be the new Harry, Ron, and Hermy, but things quickly began to go in a different direction by the time of the ‘Sea of Monsters’ already; it’ll be interesting to see as to how he and team Disney will handle it. The original two films were flat-out failures after all.

Now, on some level, I want to discuss all of ‘What if?’ S2 episodes one by one, but, alas, real life intrudes. It sucks, after all, and we are getting Marvel’s™ next show – ‘Echo’ – later next week. Maybe we will discuss the ‘What If?’ episodes in that context instead.

Otherwise, for now, this is it. See you all soon!

DnD Skeletal monsters - Dec 18

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and Pathfinder lately does not fare much better…

First, however, a couple of asides. First, the ‘Quiz Lady’ movie. It is vapid. I am not the biggest fan of Awkwafina or of Sandra Oh, but this movie just wastes them and everyone else involved in it: the movie does not go anywhere, there are no real stakes in it, no anything, and it is pointedly aromantic. There is nothing wrong with aromantic films in theory, but in practice, they tend to be forgotten quite quickly, such as another Netflix film, ‘Over the Moon’, which also starred Sandra Oh… as a voice actress because it was an animated film, but again – it was child-friendly in an aromantic way, and so it became quickly forgotten.

On other hand, there is the upcoming ‘Snow White’ Disney remake, which just might be forgotten for the better: Ms. Z’s statements have done more harm than good, and the remake itself seems to be problematic. Of course, there is also a question as to why does Disney needed to remake ‘Snow White’, but the answer is obvious: its’ new movies, such as ‘Wish’ or ‘Strange World’, are just as aromantic, vapid and forgettable as ‘Quiz Lady’ or ‘Over the Moon’ are, so Disney is in the same boat as Netflix is.

This, oddly, brings us over to ‘Pathfinder’. This RPG franchise is handling its’ transference to the second edition… not very well: their paladin class got remade completely, as was their cleric, and now they are going on with their layout – no ‘bestiaries’ (monster manuals) and etc. This is their call, of course, but our crew are keeping away from this franchise now, it just is not comfortable for us any longer.

Meanwhile, their wiki has introduced the ‘article of the week’ concept… several weeks ago. It is not a bad idea, in fact, and this week’s article is the skeleton’s monster entry. Now, again, we are largely done with Pathfinder, but you can find the skeleton monster entry in the original D&D Monster Manual 3.5 edition, and this is exactly what we will be doing in this entry: giving you several skeleton variants of opponents.

First up, is a straightforward ‘monster’ with the skeleton template – the leopard, (selected by a random generator):

Advanced skeleton leopard: CR 2; Medium undead; HD 5d12; hp 72; Init +4; Spd 30 ft., climb 10 ft.; AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 11; Base Atk +4; Grp +7; Atk +7 melee (1d6+4, bite) and +1 melee (1d4+2, 2 claws); Space/Reach 5 ft./5 ft.; SA Improved grab, pounce, rake 1d3+1; SQ Damage reduction 5/bludgeoning, immunity (cold), low-light vision, scent; AL NE; SV Fort +5, Ref +7, Will +2; Str 20, Dex 17, Con 0, Int 0, Wis 10, Cha 1.

Skills and Feats: Improved Initiative.

Improved Grab (Ex): To use this ability, a leopard must hit with its bite attack. It can then attempt to start a grapple as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity. If it wins the grapple check, it establishes a hold and can rake.

Pounce (Ex): If a leopard charges a foe, it can make a full attack, including two rake attacks.

Rake (Ex): Attack bonus +6 melee, damage 1d3+1.

Skills: Leopards have a +8 racial bonus on Jump checks and a +4 racial bonus on Hide and Move Silently checks. Leopards have a +8 racial bonus on Balance and Climb checks. A leopard can always choose to take 10 on a Climb check, even if rushed or threatened. In areas of tall grass or heavy undergrowth, the Hide bonus improves to +8.

Right. Next up, is a medium-level ranger NPC, who has a bone creature (from the ‘Book of Vile Darknes’) template:

 

Maia Josia, female human ranger 10: Medium undead; HD 10d12; hp 69; Init +7; Spd 20 ft.; AC 19, touch 22, flat-footed 11; Base Atk +10; Grp +15; Atk +13 melee (1d6+6/19-20/x2, +1 short sword) and +8 melee (1d6+3/x3, shortspear) or +13 melee (1d4+6, 2 claws); Space/Reach 5 f./5 ft.; SA Combat style/improved combat style (two-weapon fighting), favored enemy +6 (animals), favored enemy +4 (humanoids), favored enemy +2 (magical beasts), spells; SQ Animal companion (none), damage reduction 5/magic, darkvision 60 ft., evasion, immunity (cold), swift tracker, undead traits, wild empathy +3, woodland stride; AL LE; SV Fort +8, Ref +11, Will +4; Str 17, Dex 21 (25), Con 0, Int 13, Wis 12, Cha 8.

Skills and Feats: Concentration +12, Craft (pottery) +9, Craft (weaponsmithing) +14, Craft (woodworking) +9, Handle Animal +12, Hide +12, Knowledge (nature) +14, Listen +1, Move Silently +20, Search +12, Spot +1, Survival +16; Combat Reflexes, Deceitful, Dodge, Endurance (B), Improved Initiative, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting (B), Self Sufficient, Track (B), Two-Weapon Fighting (B), Weapon Finesse (short sword) (B).

Spells Known (2/1; save DC 12 + spell level): 1st - alarm, calm animals; 2nd - barkskin.

Possessions: +1 studded leather, +1 short sword, masterwork shortspear, notebook, spare clothing, obsidian chunks in a bag, spell components, flint and tinder, bedroll, food and water supplies, bull's-eye lantern, other equipment, gloves of Dexterity +2, domain icon, 6200 gp.

And finally, here’s a mature adult black dragon with a skeletal dragon template, (from the 3.5 edition of ‘Draconomicon’):

Female mature adult black dragon; CR 7; Huge undead (water); HD 22d12+22, hp 150; Init +0; Spd 60 ft.; AC 25, touch 4, flat-footed 25; Base Atk +28; Grp +38; Atk +28 melee (2d8+8, bite), +23 melee (2d6+4, 2 claws), +23 melee (1d8+4, 2 wings), +23 melee (2d6+12, tail slap); Space/Reach 15 ft./10 ft. (15 ft. with bite); SA Crush, frightful presence; SQ Blindsense 60 ft., damage reduction 10/magic and 5/bludgeoning, darkvision 120 ft., immunities (acid, cold, sleep, and paralysis), low-light vision, spell resistance 23, undead traits; AL CE; SV Fort +18, Ref +13, Will +15; Str 27, Dex 10, Con 0, Int 0, Wis 10, Cha 14.

Skills and Feats: Improved Initiative.

Crush (Ex): Area 15 ft. by 15 ft.; Small or smaller opponents take 2d8+12 points of bludgeoning damage, and must succeed on a DC 26 Reflex save or be pinned.

Frightful Presence (Ex): 210-ft. radius, HD 21 or fewer, Will DC 23 negates.

 

Well, this is all for now, we are all out of appropriate skeletal monsters. We do hope that you will enjoy using them in your campaigns, however. For now, though, this is it. See you all soon, instead!

 

Dragonfly vs. wasp - Dec 11

A question was asked – who would win in a fight, a dragonfly or a wasp? Here is the short answer – it is a trick question!

As a starting point, the two insects are built quite differently. Both, of course, have the same insect body plan: an abdomen, a thorax with 4 wings and 6 legs, and a head with eyes, jaws, antennae, and whatever else insects have there. Beyond this generalization, however, a dragonfly and a wasp are built differently.

A dragonfly is built for speed. It is the cheetah of the insect world. Unlike the tall cat, however, a dragonfly has endurance as well as speed, as it spends all of its adult life flying around, looking for food and mates. Dragonflies are not territorial… unlike their damselfly cousins, which are: males of those insects have a perch/an established territory, and they keep each other out of it, but damselflies are not as good fliers as dragonflies are. Moreover, we are talking primarily about dragonflies here.

Wasps are more territorial, meanwhile. There are two main wasp types: the solitary and the social, and here we are talking about the social species, such as the paper wasp and the hornet. They are as carnivorous as any dragonfly is, but are also social, while dragonflies are not.

What is more important, though, is that while dragonflies are built for speed, as the cheetahs are, the wasps and hornets are built for strength instead, (as the lions and tigers are). Moreover, not unlike the lions, wasps are known to cooperate with each other, though along different lines than those of the vertebrate lions. To wit: while wasp nests are more numerous than the lion prides, the bonds between the lions are stronger, because, well, the lions live longer – for years, while in temperate climates wasps die at the end of fall/beginning of winter – only the wasp queens survive. (I.e. the wasp analogues of the bee queens).

…The dragonflies, it can be argued, do not fair much different: they also die in winter, and only their eggs, or larvae, survive the winter. Unlike the wasps, however, they do not have a pupa stage: when they are ready to transition from water to air, they crawl out of the water onto a tall cattail or reed, and burst from their back – literally: the skin on their backs bursts, and the adult dragonfly crawls out of its’ last larval skin. Alien xenomorphs, top that.

Getting back to our face-off, the dragonfly can fly, well, rings around a bulkier wasp, but unless it is really bigger than the wasp is, it will not tackle the wasp, and we are talking literal tackling here.

A wasp hunts with its’ sting, (in a manner of speaking): when a wasp finds its’ prey, (a spider, a caterpillar, a honeybee – it is different with different wasp species), it jumps onto its’ prey and paralyses’ it with the stinger. Then the wasp takes its’ prey to its’ nest, where it either feeds the prey to the larva, (as the social wasps do), or puts it into a storage, and lays its egg, so that the larva would eat the spider/caterpillar/etc. later, (as the solitary wasps do).

Meanwhile, dragonflies have no stingers – they just rush at their prey, seize it with their legs and eat it. The legs of dragonflies are hairy and spiky, useless for working, just fine for perching, and when the dragonflies fold them, their legs form a fine net/basket for catching insects such as mosquitoes and butterflies, but against powerful wasps – not so much. Venomous stingers aside, wasps and bees are just too heavy and strong for dragonflies, and the dragonflies do not mess with them.

Robber flies sometimes do. Despite being, well, flies, and as such, related to houseflies and mosquitoes, the robber flies live more like the dragonflies, being active hunters, especially as adults. A scientist once put a robber fly against a bumblebee. For a while, the former seemed to be gaining the upper hand, until the bumblebee unleashed its stinger and went on the counterattack. The robber fly quickly played possum and the bumblebee got away. Considering that the robber flies have a venomous bite of their own, and the dragonflies do not have it, the fight between a dragonfly and a bumblebee – or a wasp, for that matter – would have been over even quicker.

Therefore, getting back to the initial question: who would win, the dragonfly, or the wasp, the answer is the wasp. However, since a dragonfly would never tackle it, this answer is theoretical overall.