Favourite d20 Creatures as Traveller Aliens

[migo]

I don't know if any of you have read the D20 SpellJammer supplement from Polyhedron/Dungeon, but they had the Mind Flayers being a space faring race that were on their way to the main human planet for fresh meat.

T20 Lite also makes references to BEMs (Bug Eyed Monsters) so that's a valid creature to throw in

I find the "grounded in science" bit to be odd. There's no scientific grounds for the Vagr, just some speculation. It's about as hard science as Frankenstein was. And if any creature is reasonable it would be a highly evolved Raccoon. They already have great manual dexterity.

If it's fun, does it matter if it fits the rules? Rules are meant to be broken. It's good to have a rule-set that you don't have to change much, but if you want to have a little fun and branch out, why not?

I've also been considering buying CoC D20 along with T20. I think combining them would make for a really nice campaign. HP Lovecrafts stories are very suitable for space adventures.

 

[Despasian]

The Mind-Flayer "Ships" would be pretty freaky lookin' to come across outside Imperial space too!

The Spelljammer campaign setting had its good points, and did justice to the mind-flayers.
As I mentioned above, I think the Neogi would be kewl for traveller. My inspiration came mainly FROM the spelljammer treatment of them (which was pretty good stuff).
Also from spelljammer, the Giff would make for a decent Traveller race if done right.

Other resources:
I liked the take on some of the 'D&D' monsters in the D20 Modern book too.
Something about the kolbold in uniform, propped up against the fire-plug just works!

Also..
White Wolf has put out 3 books of 'monsters' for their D20 Swords & Sorcery line. I found quite a few ideas from there.

 

[smilinggm]

Im new here but Ive been runnig both Traveller and D&D for nearly 20 years now. Ive played and ran just all of the editions of Traveller and D&D and to Me T20 is jsut 2 great tast that go great together.

As to great Sci-fi monsters from D&D the Monsters Manual is full of great creaturs.

How about a Bug Hunt al-la Heinlein: The MM is full of Insect like creatures;
Ankheg, Aranea, Carrion Crawler, Chuul, Formian,(they are in a category all of their own), Phase Spiders make good Psionic teleporting creatures. or any giant insect for that matter. You could even take away the magical attacks from the Demon-Retriever and you have an army of bug warriors straight out of the movie Starship Troopers. Imagin the looks on you players faces when they see a couple hundred Retrievers crawling out of the ground during a simple survey mission. I would give the Formorians their own world say a low tech world whith an extreem law level.

You could easly turn the Purple Worm into Frank Herberts Sand Worms just by advancing the creature into a 45HD Colossal Sand Worm.

The MM is also full of very hungry plants. The next time your PC's are bushwacking their way thru a jungle towards that ruined city, hit them with an Assassin Vine. If they survive that then let them slowly discover that the city that the colonist built along with all of the colnist was destoyed by the various intllegent plants that are the dominate life form of the planet. Ive already mentioned the Assassin Vine but there are others: Fungus, Phanom Fungus, Shambling Mound, Tendricuulos, Treant. All would work all tho the Treant would feal to fantasy for most die-hard Travellers.

I don't consider using any of this material as being un-imaginative. There are many great creaturs that have a very Science fiction feal. The real trick is to take the creature and build a story around it. You may not even have to change its name. Now if all you are doing is giving ACR's to to trolls then that is not staying true to the Science fiction feal.

 

[wa11eye]

I've been converting mage knight into t20 now not only do you have a new creature but also a figure.

always trying to use the things i have wa11eye

 

[someoneelsehasmyname]

Most "monsters" from the D20 games could be used in T20. You would just have to look at the creature in question and "bend it" to work. A lot of the Magical or Supernatural abilitys could be passed of as some sort of Psi power or odd device that the creature uses or has implanted into themselfs. Others were wierd byprodicts of the Anchents experaments, others yet just need to be modifed. Dimensonal hoping = teleportation. The Pcs don't need to know where the creature went just that it disapeared and they may have to track it down again. Yes I know there are wholes in this system but you don't have to give the players all the details right away as long as you can come up with something that sounds like it could work. Giving the Pcs all the information on how a carature works takes all the fun out of them learning the hard way

 

[lightsenshi]

For the campaign I designed, I actually placed a world where D&D rules worked. Of course, magic only worked on that planet.

 

[TKalbfus]

For the campaign I designed, I actually placed a world where D&D rules worked. Of course, magic only worked on that planet.

How about a planet called Proton?

Proton A676637-H

This planet has a tainted atmosphere that requires a filter mask in order to breath, its main export is protonium, a stable form of mildly degenerate matter that is as powerful an energy source as antimatter under the right conditions, but without the containment issues that antimatter implies. A protonium atom when split quickly decays into pure gamma rays at 100% energy conversion, but it is fairly safe to handle when not in a reactor and is completely non-radioactive. Rumor has it that ghosts have been spotted along an invisible "curtain" that girds the planet. This curtain coincides with planetary faultlines. There has also been sighting of people who have mysteriously vanished only to reappear some time later at some distant portion of the planet. These hallucinations have been widely reported at a number of locations. Meanwhile the plutocracy at proton continues to make enourmous profits through the sales and distribution of protonite, a substance that has so far been found only on Proton.