C is for “Crikey, instant death no save”

On to C in the Monster Manual alphabet - might give this up before I get to D, which frankly looks like a pain in the arse!!
There are many C monsters to ignore, camels, centipedes and cattle do not get the juices flowing and neither do crayfish or crocodiles; please feel free to read all about them but remember time is a precious commodity.
On to the good stuff, in no particular order - Couatl, a psionic lawful good beast with “from 9-16 clerical abilities” whatever that means. And speaking of psionics, the cerebral parasite, purely intended to annoy those players who insist in mental abilities; take my advise and just ignore that bit of the books.
Chimera and cockatrice. Now these are proper fantasy monsters, nothing new here but as old school as Scottish dwarves who like beer and gold.
Centaur - nothing much of interest here, though for some reason only leaders have shields. (On a related centaur note a Kenzerco Hackmaster adventure, possibly Little Keep on the Borderlands, has a chap in prison whose only crime has been to bring back monster heads for reward  as requested by the local lord - you guessed it, monster heads in question were that of centaurs!!
Carrion Crawlers are another standard in the DMs locker but with 8 attacks each inflicting paralysis they are a TPK waiting to happen.
And lastly, but not leastly, the Catoblepas, a beast of ugliness and general horror. I’ll leave this here —ITS GAZE CAN CAUSE DEATH WITH NO SAVE IF EYE CONTACT IS MADE.  EVEN IF IT LOOKS AT YOU RUNNING AWAY YOU CAN STILL DIE - BLOODY HELL!!

And that’s it for C monsters, and not a Kraken among them

Small ads - end of a White Dwarf staple

Just a brief stream of consciousness post brought on by a quick skim through WD94. A very battered copy of this arrived in a job lot and something caught my eye, perhaps about thirty years too late.
I love the small ads in White Dwarf, it’s always been a place where nonsense was written and deals could be made. Announcement of the deaths of unfeasably named characters alongside ads for early TSR modules abound, some great deals here to be sure ( back to the trusty time machine!)
However what struck me about this issue was this:-

Was this the beginning of the end of WD as we new it? Probably as new fangled Space Marines and a place called Rynn’s world have a heavy presence. Tabletop gaming was certainly starting to usurp the old favourites but I guess that is progress.

However this was actually an issue full of content and well worth a read - Live and Die in Mega City One was the first instalment if a frankly excellent scenario, and worth the price of admission in its own.

One last thing - I don’t have ready access to a lot of my collection but I wonder if anyone can find my only ever time in print in a gaming mag. A young lad called Carl with the phone number Farnham Common 4105 put in an ad selling up his collection. Never worked out though because we moved house by the time the advert hit the press!!

Good memories here as always.

Until next time

Beauty, eye of - blah blah blah

So, the beholder.
Beyond doubt one of the most iconic D&D monsters as well as a total bad-ass.
Much has been said concerning the beholder  and I will be treading very well travelled paths on this but such is life.
I love this beast with a passion, the ultimate bad guy, a lonely megolomaniac with a heart of stone.
If you look at the stat block in the trusty MM many questions could be asked, particularly about the array of hit points and the variable armour class. I’m pretty sure first ed wasn’t really set up for such things but I’m sure organised players could take advantage.  That being said, if I were a beholder with all of these powers (which is a recurring dream of mine!) then I’m pretty sure I would be nigh on invincible, and rightly so. No stand up fights for this chap, even with its slow speed it was absolutely made for hit and run attacks and definitely for fleeing any battle going even slightly against it. With disintegrate and levitation you would never need to be cornered and your home base ( of which you would have several) would be full of murderous traps and such like.

For further reading there have been any amount of articles and books written; I am personally a big fan of the Forgotten Realms Xanathar concept- a crime boss hiding behind layers and layers of lackeys and sops - it should be the finale of a great campaign to finally meet a beholder - my only faint tinge is sadness comes from the fact that they have no moustaches to twirl!!

I’ll leave you with some Beholder art ( better available), from my UK MM and  from my copy of the Greyhawk OD&D book.  Lastly is a photo of a t-shirt available through The Secrey Cabal Gaming Podcast ( easy to find with some google-fu). I love the cabal and recommend their podcast if you like gaming in general. The artwork is by Steve, a talented artist and member of the Cabal crew.
Until next time
Be safe
Carl